Labyrinth of Fire (Fantasy)

Length: Novel or Novella

Tropes: Captive, Anti-hero, Dark Magic

Labyrinth of Fire by Vivian Murdoch

☆ Corin  ☆

I was betrayed, kidnapped, transformed into a hideous beast and sold into slavery.  I was a prince and next in line to the throne. I was sold and set to guarding the treasure of a distant king.  Then she came.  A sorceress, beautiful and deadly as a knife white-hot from the forge.

When I saw her a bout of pure lust erupted in me.  She spoke to me then.  Promised me that if I stood aside and let her take one small object from the hoard I guarded then she would free me and help rid me of my curse.  It seemed like the gods had finally answered my prayers.

I fought my restraints and the spells that made me a slave to my owner’s orders long enough for her to slip in and steal what she wanted.  A deep red jewel set in an arm band.  When she placed it on herself it began to glow.  She gestured, my chains fell away and I felt the binding spells lift.

Then she made another motion and thin gold chains whipped from the armband to me and I was suddenly powerless to resist her.  I begged her to keep her promise to free me, but she laughed and asked why she would rid herself of such a useful servant.  She magically brought me to an island and put me at the heart of a gigantic maze.

I was to guard the pit of fire that was the source of her power.  Months passed, she would visit and restrain me with her chains, stripping me and using me for her own pleasure before going to restore her power.  I made myself remember every torment, every pain, every pleasure.

She made a mistake chaining me near the wellspring of her spells.  I began to be able to sense the magic it was becoming a part of me.  Soon I realized I would be able to render her enslaving sorceries useless.

Finally, the night came.  She had used me for her pleasure and left me harder than steel and unsatisfied.  As she turned to go into her sanctum of power I struck.  Breaking through all of her enchantments at once. Shattering the chains that held me and slamming her into the ground.  I drew on her own power source and used it to bind her to me as I finally took my pleasure from her.

The more she screamed in pain and pleasure, the stronger I grew. But  in my haste I made the binding too deep.  I started being able to feel her through the bond I had forced.  I reveled as much in her pain as in forcing her to feel pleasure.  When my rage and lust had been slaked enough for me to think, I raised the ax that was my only weapon to chop her to pieces.

Then she stopped me. Not by begging and pleading, but by welcoming the death I threatened.  She told me that I had bound her too deeply to me.  If I killed her it would be the same as killing me, and if I died she would die as well.  I could sense through the bond that she was utterly convinced of the truth of her words.

I grabbed her by the throat.  This was not what I had intended, but I was going to make her life what she had made mine – a torture of pleasure and pain.  I would be king of this labyrinthine island and make her my unwilling queen. I thought she was my salvation, I would be her damnation.

☆ Uvina  ☆

He was the most perfect tool I had ever seen.  A hugely muscled, hulking monstrosity, deadliness dripping from his horns to his hooves.  I could feel a blaze of greed and lust at the sight of him.  I had to have him for my own.  First, I deceived him.  He was so strong, to be able to fight off the enchantments holding him, they weren’t as good as mine but still.

The look of betrayal when I replaced their chains with my own was delicious.   I placed my bull in my own maze. He would be the ultimate guardian of the source of my power.  I took him that same night, chaining him down and using my knives to torture and tease him till he was so aroused that I could tell it hurt.  Then I took my pleasure, I finally allowed him one release but the next month I denied him.

I was a fool.  I was so besotted with my new conquest and toy that I didn’t notice that he was becoming entwined with the very source of magic I used.  I had grown addicted to the pleasure of my bull man and too sure of my own power.  When he broke the bonds holding him that night and attacked me, I was too surprised to act.

When I tried to fight back it was too late.  The magic moved through him now, and he could deny it to me without even thinking about it.  Then he began his revenge, forcing me with pain and pleasure, beating me then devouring me.  Filling me and finally branding me with my own knife heated in my own fire.  When he finally raised the ax, I was relieved and made my last mistake. I gloated that he would doom himself if he killed me.

I could tell that the bond he had forced had gone too deep if one of us died so would the other. I didn’t expect him to believe me. No man had ever listened to me without me forcing them before.  But he did.  So he had me trapped with him.  I was never to be rid of the torture and pleasure he brought me.

I was the queen of his labyrinth.  Slave to the desires of this man monster and the lusts and depravity he brought forth from me.