Part Eleven
Pursuit!
“That’s your plan?” Indigo asked quite unimpressed.
“Unless you have something better in mind, that’s what we are going to do,” Amber said irritably. “So let’s get to it, because unlike Esmeralda here who doesn’t need air, we do. As small as we are, we won’t last long unless we figure out how to open this terrible glass box.”
Amber went to a part of Esmeralda’s costume adorned with flashy little jewels and decorations and tugged hard on one of the jewels.
“You can help, you know?” Amber hinted as she puffed and tugged on the jewel.
“Okay, okay,” Indigo said sighing and pulling hard on Amber’s waist trying not to tickle. He thought about giving her a quick tickle to cheer her up. But judging from her mood, it just might make things worse.
The jewel popped open and a bright pink pill appeared.
“An extra tickle berry pill,” Indigo said picking up the pill that measured almost half his height. “We’re going to make her swallow this?”
“Don’t be silly,” Amber said. “Swallowing the tickle pill would not make her ticklish enough to wake up or free herself from the coffin.”
“Then, what are we going to do with it then?” Indigo asked glowing his characteristic bluish color.
“The pill is magic,” Amber explained impatiently. “Magic that makes you more ticklish. If we concentrate the magic on a single ticklish spot, we can make Esmeralda exponentially ticklish and we can force her to wake from the Ten Century Slumber.”
“What makes you so sure it will work?” Indigo asked skeptically.
“Do you have a better plan?” Amber asked as her eyes narrowed and her glow turned a dark yellow color bordering on brown.
Indigo paused just for a moment.
“Ok, what tickle spot is it going to be?” he asked.
* * * * * * *
“I’m going to pound some sense into you first,” Loanna said stepping forward with fists clenched. “And then I’ll tickle you both to kingdom come!”
Whodsa yobe, whodsa naertsir! Orion shouted waving his hands in the air in a series of elaborate and graceful movements.
The shadows cast by the light shimmered and came to life engulfing Loanna in a web of black shadowy tentacles that tried their best to hold the giantess still. Loanna huffed and puffed and resisted the shadows that attacked her. She was mere inches from reaching the spell caster and smashing him into a bloody pulp. One last effort and she’d pound her first into his smug face.
Whodsa yobe, whodsa kliect! Orion shouted.
Loanna’s assault was instantly cut short. The shadows that grasped firmly now moved quickly and lightly tickling her all over her body. Her arms clamped to her sides and her legs closed together but the tickling flowed tight against her skin and ran even under her clothes. She was pulled off her feet and into the air and she began to laugh helplessly her deep and rich laughter.
Orion seemed to struggle to hold the shadowy spells in place with the powerful struggling of the Giantess. He drew near her and pulled off her huge soft leather boots revealing feet more than two and a half feet long.
If he could not magically restrain and tickle such a powerful creature, he’d leave the retraining to the shadows and do the tickling himself.
He enjoyed tickling Giantess feet. There were statistically more ticklish on their feet than the average creature of the Realms. He had tickled his share of creatures and considered himself to be a definite authority on the subject.
Loanna shrieked and screamed as Orion examined her bare feet and tickled away all over. He settled down to tickling the heels where she was most ticklish and where even with her strong jerking movements she could not move them away.
“Stop! Stop tickling my feet you spell caster fiend!” she shouted between her fits of maniacal laughter.
“What are you doing?” Haydeen asked angrily. “You’ll wake up the entire Academy with her laughter!”
”Unlikely!” Orion said as he tickled away. “The students sleep on Slumber Beds. A Tickle Beast wouldn’t wake them up. Only guardians such as this one and perhaps Madame Jordanna herself would bother to appear.”
“You’re taking too long!” she exclaimed impatiently and pushed the spell caster out of the way. “Let me do this!”
She drew a thick bristled brush from her bandolier and a handful of varied long and stiff feathers. She spoke her magic quickly and set the tools of her trade in place on different parts of her feet. The brush went on the heels and the feather’s soft and hard ends were strategically placed and the arch and toes of both feet. They tickled away strongly and surely, and the intensity of Loanna’s mad laughter grew exponentially.
She pulled another feather from her bandolier and placed it behind one of Loanna’s knees speaking her magic and setting it into motion. The giantess screeched in terror as the feather met with an exceptionally vulnerable spot.
“All Giants are ticklish behind the knees,” she declared brushing off her sleeves to clear away dust she still had on her clothes from the wormhole journey and admiring her work.
She was indeed not the combative type as the Elfling King had so bluntly observed, but Orion smiled realizing that no matter how many people he had tickled, Chief Interrogator Haydeen was the REAL authority on tickling different races among the Realms. He was suddenly extra glad he had brought her along with him.
As the Giantess succumbed to the tickling assault the sound of heavy beating wings was heard from the darkened sky.
“Stop this! This very instant!” a voice shouted from the black sky from the direction of the beating wings.
“Danea! Still the Keeper of the Academy, I see!” Orion shouted recognizing the voice and the beating wings of a Demon Mistress. “It’s been a while!”
Whodsa yobe, whodsa kliect! He shouted directing his hands in her direction. The Shadows that had held Loanna captive while he and Haydeen had tickled her into submission receded and the now normal sized body of the Giantess fell heavily to the ground. The shadows turned and attacked the demon keeper.
The Shadows moved to restrain the Keeper of the Academy, but she had only to touch the shadows with a light green glow that emitted from her hands and they melted away as easily as cobwebs when brushed away by a busy hand. They did not stop her at all as she made her descent.
“Demon entropy makes me immune to your magic, Orion,” Danea declared as she tackled the black robed spell caster to the ground. “You should know better.”
“Just a distraction,” Orion said as he received her hard attack head on. She was terribly strong and very skilled, but even though Orion was known first and foremost as a spell caster, his fighting skills were quite exceptional.
“To control you I need ever fiber of my concentration,” he said as they wrestled each other on the ground.
“You are skilled in the demon arts,” Danea said admiringly as he held her from behind in a powerful full body lock. He used his legs to immobilize hers and controlled her arms and head in a powerful headlock. The position did not allow for a sleeper hold as he had hoped or any tickling maneuver which could also give him an edge.
“I taught you too well,” Danea admitted grudgingly trying to break free but realizing she was trapped albeit temporarily. “But your strength will fail and when it does I will free myself with a distinct advantage. How could you not see this coming?”
“He did,” Haydeen said drawing near. “That is why I am here.”
Danea turned deathly white realizing that she was trapped.
“I’m not ticklish,” she hissed as Haydeen removed the Demon Keeper’s boot to reveal a very beautiful pale white foot.
Haydeen’s eyes narrowed and a smile crept into the corner of her mouth. It was a red flag waved in front of a raging bull.
“She is,” Orion insisted impatiently as he struggled to hold the Demon Keeper in the lock, “but we are not here to tickle her out of her wits. At least not yet.”
“We can do this two ways, Keeper,” the Elfling interrogator said. “You can tell me truthfully what I want to know of your own free will or you will tell me truthfully against your will. Either way I know if you are truthful. Either way I will get the information I desire.”
Danea realized she was trapped but she would do her best to keep any information away from these two.
“So let us begin,” Haydeen said placing her hands on the tools of her trade on the bandolier.
She made the same offer every time she interrogated someone and despite her long career and extensive list of interrogated prisoners, she never had someone simply answer her questions without a struggle.
This would be no different.
“Where is the Tenderfoot Esmeralda?” she asked.
* * * * * *
Indigo and Amber slipped off Esmeralda’s right slipper with considerable effort. The foot towered over them and was probably more than three times their height. It was a pretty foot with a soft sole, a pronounced arch and nice shapely toes.
The air was beginning to get thin inside Esmeralda’s glass coffin and if they were not swift it would be their coffin as well.
“How do you know the right foot is more ticklish than the left foot?” Amber asked wiping some sweat from her forehead after the arduous job of removing the slipper.
“Because while Esmeralda slept at the Academy I crept up to the foot of the bed and tickled her bare feet,” Indigo said nonchalantly as he took some string from Esmeralda’s costume and began to cut it into pieces with his pixie dagger and tie the pieces with some complicated knots. “It took a while to figure it out but she is definitely more ticklish on the right foot.”
“You tickled Esmeralda while she slept on the sleep inducing beds of the Academy?” Amber cried incredulously.
“Yeah,” Indigo said concentrating on the knots he was carefully making. “I tickled you and Loanna too. You are more ticklish on the left; in between the toes. Loanna has the most ticklish heels I’ve seen around.”
“You tickled me!?!? In my sleep!?!?!” Amber exclaimed with her hands on her hips. “Without my consent?”
“What do I look like? A Manling from a world where tickling must be consensual? Since when does a Tickler of the Academy ask for consent?” Indigo said shrugging. “Besides you were all none the wiser and I never got so much as a giggle for my efforts. Just some nice twitching and pulling away. That sleep bed really dampens ticklishness. Much like the Ten Century Slumber.”
“Don’t change the subject! How often did you tickle me without me knowing?” Amber asked still fuming.
“A couple times,” Indigo said recalling the event. “You see I got caught by Danea who commended me for my daring, but scolded me for being discovered. She sure tickled me senseless that night. She said I’d get worse if I got caught again. I wish you had not told them about my ticklish ears. She went right after them.”
“Serves you right,” Amber said smugly crossing her arms.
“Well, it was all worth it,” Indigo said finally completing his work and giving the knots a final tug. “Voilá!”
“What are you going to do with that?” Amber said pointing at the strange mass of string and knots Indigo had tied together.
“It’s a foot harness,” he replied matter-of-factly. “My Uncle Cornflower developed it. It’s for holding a pixie firmly against a foot while tickling to avoid getting kicked away by violent thrashing. It makes tickling big people’s feet ten times more effective.”
“Wasn’t Cornflower the pixie who got stepped on by an Animus Spell Caster?” Amber observed sharply.
“Details…” Indigo said waving a hand as if to discard the tragic occurrence. “I’ve added my own safety release mechanism to the harness. I’ll be fine.”
“Well, if you get us out of this one without getting squashed, I just might be inclined to let you take another crack at my pretty toes,” she said wiggling them in her silken slipper in his direction.
“It’s a deal,” he said with a smile as he slung two loops over Esmeralda’s big toe and pinky toe. The rest of the ends went around the ankle and over the top of the foot. After pulling and tugging on the string and making a few extra knots that would make his Uncle Cornflower proud, he finally rested firmly restrained against Esmeralda’s arch.
“Are you ready?” Amber asked floating near with the pink tickle pill that had been punctured on one end with a pixie dagger.
“Yes. Put it right here,” Indigo said drawing a line with his fingertip just under her arch.
Amber squeezed the pill and a pink glowing gel oozed out and onto the area Indigo had pointed out. It glowed more intensely with contact with Esmeralda’s bare flesh and then faded until the glow and the gel had completely disappeared.
“Okay,” Indigo said. “You should hover back into a corner. This could get messy and if there’s going top be a squashed pixie, I much prefer it be me rather than you.”
“How sweet,” Amber said giving him a swift peck on the cheek and then hovering to an upper corner of the glass coffin.
“Uncle Cornflower, wherever you are,” Indigo said under his breath as he gripped the harness in final preparation, “this tickling is for you.”
He raked his fingers just under Esmeralda’s arch. For a pixie tickling on a larger creature, anything less than hard scratching can be virtually unperceivable. Since Esmeralda’s ticklish spots on her soles were better exploited with hard rather than soft tickling, he really had to do his best to dig his fingers into the soft flesh of her soles.
At first there was no reaction at all. Indigo continued to probe and try to elicit some sort of reaction. Suddenly, his efforts paid off and the foot began to twitch. The twitching became more violent and the thrashing went from side to side. Indigo was held in place with his harness and continued to tickle nonstop.
“A giggle!” Amber shouted from the corner. “I think I hear a giggle!”
Indigo could hear nothing at first, but suddenly Esmeralda began kicking and he heard laughter come from the Tenderfoot. Her toes pounded against the glass lid and Indigo was jarred with each kick. The harness held him in place and he continued to tickle. It seemed that the more he tickled, the more sensitive she was becoming.
”It’s working!” Amber shouted. “But she’s still not awake.”
“I’m doing as best as I can!” Indigo shouted as he was pounded again and again against the lid of the glass coffin.
“She’s almost out of the spell,” Amber said. “I’m going to tickle her in her worst spot!”
“No! Don’t do it!” Indigo shouted. “It’s not safe!”
They had decided not to tickle her on her worst spot which was on a special spot on her ribs. They had decided better to tickle the feet instead of the rib area. There was too much risk of getting crushed by and arm or an elbow instinctively pulling against the body.
Amber paid no heed and she darted through the air aiming for what they all knew was Esmeralda’s Achilles’ heel.
Esmeralda began to laugh even more intensely suddenly and Indigo realized that Amber’s tickling had made a difference. On the other hand, Esmeralda’s intense laughing was finishing their air supply. Indigo continued to tickle but he was light headed and tried from the tickling and the bumping of the foot on the lid.
Esmeralda’s laugh was very strong and she was rolling in the coffin from side to side. Indigo heard a scream among the loud laughter and knew it was Amber.
He shouted and tickled harder since it was really the only thing he could do.
Tears streamed down his cheeks until the lack of air and the bumping and the tickling were simply too much for his little pixie body.
The world went black.
* * * * * *
The Truthsaying had gone quickly and easily even though Danea possessed a will stronger than any prisoner she had ever encountered.
It mattered little. She was entranced and she told them all they needed to know. Orion cut away pieces of her heavy black leather armor with a knife revealing her pale and beautiful underarms. He gagged her with a handkerchief and cast his shadow spell which held the pieces of leather firmly against her wrists and ankles effectively binding her to the grassy ground spread eagle.
Without direct contact with the magic the Demon entropy was useless.
“The things you can learn about with a simple Truthsaying,” Orion said smiling at his handiwork realizing that during all the time he had spent with Danea she had never revealed a way to get around demon entropy until now.
Haydeen released Danea from the trance and her eyes shot open and stared sharply at the spell caster and his interrogator companion.
”If looks could kill…” Haydeen said referring to the cold stare as she collected her tools.
“We’d be dead,” Orion said petting Danea softly on her leather clad belly.
“Aren’t you concerned Madame Jordanna will attack us?” Haydeen asked looking warily towards the Academy Hall.
“She’s a spider, Haydeen,” Orion said referring to their conversation ages ago. “She’s spun her web. If she wanted to stop us she would.”
“You know a secret way into Xavis’s Palace?” Haydeen asked.
Orion shook his head. “I was thinking more of using the front gate,” he said smiling.
Haydeen knew better by now to ask what he meant. He was a spider also.
“Danea, you know there is nothing I’d like more than to tickle you senseless,” Orion said leaning over the Demon Keeper and tickling her underarms. She reacted immediately and laughed heavily into the gag. “For old time’s sake,” he added. “But time is short and we must be going if we are to catch the Tenderfoot and the Tickle Scourge.”
Haydeen understood what Orion meant and cast her spell upon a couple feathers that went after Danea’s bare underarms and another pair that went after her feet.
“I didn’t get a chance to study her ticklish spots,” Haydeen mentioned as she completed the spell and Danea’s muffled screams and laughter increased. “A person with her willpower will last a long while. Maybe even she’ll hold out entirely.”
“That’s okay,” he said kissing Danea on the forehead and stepping away. “I bear her no ill will and as mad as she is she will forgive me in the end.”
“Why is that?” Haydeen asked as they walked away towards the wormhole.
”She was once my Tickle Mate,” Orion answered thoughtfully.
* * * * *
Esmeralda was gasping for air.
She did not know why. She only knew she was being tickled and she had to get away from it somehow and get out of the box she was trapped it.
She pulled at the heavy glass lid that was above her and with some effort she managed to slide it down a few inches. She placed her hand into the opening and pulled it down enough so she could pull herself up and out of the box.
A blast of cool air refreshed her and she breathed deeply. She felt as if she had been buried alive. The tickling had ceased and she was glad. She looked around and her memory came back to her. She was put in the glass coffin to be stored until Lord Xavis chose new members for his harem. It was a totally unexpected turn of events.
She saw Patrisa in a coffin next to her and to her left and right there were perhaps hundreds of glass containers with potential tickle slaves deep asleep with the Ten Century Slumber.
The question now was, how did she awaken form that magical slumber?
The answer was literally at her feet.
She pushed the glass lid down further and examined her bare right foot that had a tangled mass of string tied to it. She could see on the sole of her foot was tied her pixie friend Indigo who glowed a very faint blue color.
She undid the knot and while she did she saw an empty tickleberry capsule at the foot of the coffin. She started to deduce what might have happened and why she felt such intense tickling as she awoke.
“Indigo! Wake up, Indigo!” Esmeralda whispered urgently holding the pixie in the palm of her hand.
Indigo groaned. “What happened?” he asked groggily.
“I think you tickled me awake,” Esmeralda said.
“It worked!” Indigo jumped to his feet glowing a much more vibrant shade of blue.
“I told Amber that Uncle Cornflower’s foot tickling harness would work. Oh my! Amber! Where is she?” he asked looking frantically into the coffin for his fellow pixie.
Esmeralda carefully stood up in the coffin and from the folds of her slave girl costume the small inert body of Amber slid to the base of the coffin.
“No!” Indigo shouted as he flew down to her motionless body. He took her limp form into his arms and held her firmly in his arms. “Silly pixie girl! I told you that if anyone was going to get squashed it was supposed to be me.”
Esmeralda felt a tear down her cheek as she saw the pixie hold his companion tightly in his arms. The two were inseparable at the Academy and it appeared they went back a long way together.
All was silent save Indigo’s faint sobbing until a faint moaning and whispering came from the yellow colored pixie.
“Let… me… breathe…”
Indigo pulled back to see his pixie companion reviving.
”You almost squashed me yourself with your silly bear hug,” Amber said in mock anger giving Indigo a light shove. She was relieved he had released her of his iron embrace and glad that they were out of that stifling coffin. Her yellow-orange glow returned.
“Thanks, you two,” Esmeralda said gratefully and she climbed out of the coffin and onto the floor. ”Now, what de we do about the Tickle Scourge?” she asked looking at her sleeping mentor.
“If you open the glass coffin I believe the spell will be broken,” Amber said making a calculated magic regarding guess where she was usually right. “But don’t let her know that we are here with you,” she added. “She will not approve of us have hitched a ride along with you.”
The two pixies whispered some words of magic and they became transparent and almost invisible.
She wondered for a moment why the pixies were so secretive, but on the other hand she was glad they had tagged along.
She opened the Tickle Scourge’s glass coffin and the sleep spell was broken and she slowly began to awaken.
Esmeralda pulled free Silk from around her neck and the spider came to lift clicking and focusing its mechanical eyes on its mistress. Esmeralda prepared to cast a spell while Patrisa fully awoke.
They were inside the Palace and there was no more use for the skimpy costume that made her feel so uncomfortable. She asked Silk for her spell caster robes and as the mechanical spider tickled its way up and down her body she realized that of all the clothes she had worn throughout her life the dark green robes of a spell caster were those that made her feel most comfortable.
It was as if she had always been meant to be a spell caster.
She giggled softly at the thought as Silk weaved his way up and down her body creating the garments that she knew were just right.
* * * * *
Madame Jordanna walked slowly by Loanna shaking her head softly at the weakened Giantess too weak to even sit up. The Giantess was strong and powerful, but she required still much training. She had been at the Academy as long as Esmeralda, but her skills were still only a fraction of the Tenderfoot’s.
She saw Danea pinned to the ground as tickling feathers attacked her tickle spots. The Keeper laughed into her gag and tried her best to resist the sensations.
Danea had been defeated by her own pride and cockiness. She could have requested reinforcements or avoided direct contact with the dangerous spell caster. Her skills were exceptional, but in an effort to prove herself better than her former tickle mate, she had stooped to his level and, as always, Orion capitalized upon it.
Neshi ryou gliht no em! she said spreading her arms out wide. Night went to day in the Academy in a single moment and the shadows Orion had cast were dispelled instantly.
Danea sat up immediately tossing away the tickling feathers and removing her gag.
“I beg forgiveness,” she said kneeling upon one knee. “I have no excuse, Madame Jordanna.”
“It was foreseen,” Jordanna said as she helped Danea to her feet. “Had you defeated Orion, he would not have been skilled enough for my plan to work.”
“I have revealed everything to him,” she said blushing. “He knows all our plans!”
“He knows what I have allowed you to know,” the Elfling woman said mysteriously. “It was all foreseen.”
Danea’s head hung in shame and she remembered words that Orion spoke frequently.
A spider doesn’t explain the web to the flies.
Danea felt she was just a fly trapped in this elaborate web.
When Madame Jordanna returned to the Academy Hall Danea sat alone on the grassy knoll.
For the first time in decades, she wept.
To be continued….
NEXT: The Rendezvous
I don't get many comments here on the TMF. Any comments? Suggestions?
Pursuit!
“That’s your plan?” Indigo asked quite unimpressed.
“Unless you have something better in mind, that’s what we are going to do,” Amber said irritably. “So let’s get to it, because unlike Esmeralda here who doesn’t need air, we do. As small as we are, we won’t last long unless we figure out how to open this terrible glass box.”
Amber went to a part of Esmeralda’s costume adorned with flashy little jewels and decorations and tugged hard on one of the jewels.
“You can help, you know?” Amber hinted as she puffed and tugged on the jewel.
“Okay, okay,” Indigo said sighing and pulling hard on Amber’s waist trying not to tickle. He thought about giving her a quick tickle to cheer her up. But judging from her mood, it just might make things worse.
The jewel popped open and a bright pink pill appeared.
“An extra tickle berry pill,” Indigo said picking up the pill that measured almost half his height. “We’re going to make her swallow this?”
“Don’t be silly,” Amber said. “Swallowing the tickle pill would not make her ticklish enough to wake up or free herself from the coffin.”
“Then, what are we going to do with it then?” Indigo asked glowing his characteristic bluish color.
“The pill is magic,” Amber explained impatiently. “Magic that makes you more ticklish. If we concentrate the magic on a single ticklish spot, we can make Esmeralda exponentially ticklish and we can force her to wake from the Ten Century Slumber.”
“What makes you so sure it will work?” Indigo asked skeptically.
“Do you have a better plan?” Amber asked as her eyes narrowed and her glow turned a dark yellow color bordering on brown.
Indigo paused just for a moment.
“Ok, what tickle spot is it going to be?” he asked.
* * * * * * *
“I’m going to pound some sense into you first,” Loanna said stepping forward with fists clenched. “And then I’ll tickle you both to kingdom come!”
Whodsa yobe, whodsa naertsir! Orion shouted waving his hands in the air in a series of elaborate and graceful movements.
The shadows cast by the light shimmered and came to life engulfing Loanna in a web of black shadowy tentacles that tried their best to hold the giantess still. Loanna huffed and puffed and resisted the shadows that attacked her. She was mere inches from reaching the spell caster and smashing him into a bloody pulp. One last effort and she’d pound her first into his smug face.
Whodsa yobe, whodsa kliect! Orion shouted.
Loanna’s assault was instantly cut short. The shadows that grasped firmly now moved quickly and lightly tickling her all over her body. Her arms clamped to her sides and her legs closed together but the tickling flowed tight against her skin and ran even under her clothes. She was pulled off her feet and into the air and she began to laugh helplessly her deep and rich laughter.
Orion seemed to struggle to hold the shadowy spells in place with the powerful struggling of the Giantess. He drew near her and pulled off her huge soft leather boots revealing feet more than two and a half feet long.
If he could not magically restrain and tickle such a powerful creature, he’d leave the retraining to the shadows and do the tickling himself.
He enjoyed tickling Giantess feet. There were statistically more ticklish on their feet than the average creature of the Realms. He had tickled his share of creatures and considered himself to be a definite authority on the subject.
Loanna shrieked and screamed as Orion examined her bare feet and tickled away all over. He settled down to tickling the heels where she was most ticklish and where even with her strong jerking movements she could not move them away.
“Stop! Stop tickling my feet you spell caster fiend!” she shouted between her fits of maniacal laughter.
“What are you doing?” Haydeen asked angrily. “You’ll wake up the entire Academy with her laughter!”
”Unlikely!” Orion said as he tickled away. “The students sleep on Slumber Beds. A Tickle Beast wouldn’t wake them up. Only guardians such as this one and perhaps Madame Jordanna herself would bother to appear.”
“You’re taking too long!” she exclaimed impatiently and pushed the spell caster out of the way. “Let me do this!”
She drew a thick bristled brush from her bandolier and a handful of varied long and stiff feathers. She spoke her magic quickly and set the tools of her trade in place on different parts of her feet. The brush went on the heels and the feather’s soft and hard ends were strategically placed and the arch and toes of both feet. They tickled away strongly and surely, and the intensity of Loanna’s mad laughter grew exponentially.
She pulled another feather from her bandolier and placed it behind one of Loanna’s knees speaking her magic and setting it into motion. The giantess screeched in terror as the feather met with an exceptionally vulnerable spot.
“All Giants are ticklish behind the knees,” she declared brushing off her sleeves to clear away dust she still had on her clothes from the wormhole journey and admiring her work.
She was indeed not the combative type as the Elfling King had so bluntly observed, but Orion smiled realizing that no matter how many people he had tickled, Chief Interrogator Haydeen was the REAL authority on tickling different races among the Realms. He was suddenly extra glad he had brought her along with him.
As the Giantess succumbed to the tickling assault the sound of heavy beating wings was heard from the darkened sky.
“Stop this! This very instant!” a voice shouted from the black sky from the direction of the beating wings.
“Danea! Still the Keeper of the Academy, I see!” Orion shouted recognizing the voice and the beating wings of a Demon Mistress. “It’s been a while!”
Whodsa yobe, whodsa kliect! He shouted directing his hands in her direction. The Shadows that had held Loanna captive while he and Haydeen had tickled her into submission receded and the now normal sized body of the Giantess fell heavily to the ground. The shadows turned and attacked the demon keeper.
The Shadows moved to restrain the Keeper of the Academy, but she had only to touch the shadows with a light green glow that emitted from her hands and they melted away as easily as cobwebs when brushed away by a busy hand. They did not stop her at all as she made her descent.
“Demon entropy makes me immune to your magic, Orion,” Danea declared as she tackled the black robed spell caster to the ground. “You should know better.”
“Just a distraction,” Orion said as he received her hard attack head on. She was terribly strong and very skilled, but even though Orion was known first and foremost as a spell caster, his fighting skills were quite exceptional.
“To control you I need ever fiber of my concentration,” he said as they wrestled each other on the ground.
“You are skilled in the demon arts,” Danea said admiringly as he held her from behind in a powerful full body lock. He used his legs to immobilize hers and controlled her arms and head in a powerful headlock. The position did not allow for a sleeper hold as he had hoped or any tickling maneuver which could also give him an edge.
“I taught you too well,” Danea admitted grudgingly trying to break free but realizing she was trapped albeit temporarily. “But your strength will fail and when it does I will free myself with a distinct advantage. How could you not see this coming?”
“He did,” Haydeen said drawing near. “That is why I am here.”
Danea turned deathly white realizing that she was trapped.
“I’m not ticklish,” she hissed as Haydeen removed the Demon Keeper’s boot to reveal a very beautiful pale white foot.
Haydeen’s eyes narrowed and a smile crept into the corner of her mouth. It was a red flag waved in front of a raging bull.
“She is,” Orion insisted impatiently as he struggled to hold the Demon Keeper in the lock, “but we are not here to tickle her out of her wits. At least not yet.”
“We can do this two ways, Keeper,” the Elfling interrogator said. “You can tell me truthfully what I want to know of your own free will or you will tell me truthfully against your will. Either way I know if you are truthful. Either way I will get the information I desire.”
Danea realized she was trapped but she would do her best to keep any information away from these two.
“So let us begin,” Haydeen said placing her hands on the tools of her trade on the bandolier.
She made the same offer every time she interrogated someone and despite her long career and extensive list of interrogated prisoners, she never had someone simply answer her questions without a struggle.
This would be no different.
“Where is the Tenderfoot Esmeralda?” she asked.
* * * * * *
Indigo and Amber slipped off Esmeralda’s right slipper with considerable effort. The foot towered over them and was probably more than three times their height. It was a pretty foot with a soft sole, a pronounced arch and nice shapely toes.
The air was beginning to get thin inside Esmeralda’s glass coffin and if they were not swift it would be their coffin as well.
“How do you know the right foot is more ticklish than the left foot?” Amber asked wiping some sweat from her forehead after the arduous job of removing the slipper.
“Because while Esmeralda slept at the Academy I crept up to the foot of the bed and tickled her bare feet,” Indigo said nonchalantly as he took some string from Esmeralda’s costume and began to cut it into pieces with his pixie dagger and tie the pieces with some complicated knots. “It took a while to figure it out but she is definitely more ticklish on the right foot.”
“You tickled Esmeralda while she slept on the sleep inducing beds of the Academy?” Amber cried incredulously.
“Yeah,” Indigo said concentrating on the knots he was carefully making. “I tickled you and Loanna too. You are more ticklish on the left; in between the toes. Loanna has the most ticklish heels I’ve seen around.”
“You tickled me!?!? In my sleep!?!?!” Amber exclaimed with her hands on her hips. “Without my consent?”
“What do I look like? A Manling from a world where tickling must be consensual? Since when does a Tickler of the Academy ask for consent?” Indigo said shrugging. “Besides you were all none the wiser and I never got so much as a giggle for my efforts. Just some nice twitching and pulling away. That sleep bed really dampens ticklishness. Much like the Ten Century Slumber.”
“Don’t change the subject! How often did you tickle me without me knowing?” Amber asked still fuming.
“A couple times,” Indigo said recalling the event. “You see I got caught by Danea who commended me for my daring, but scolded me for being discovered. She sure tickled me senseless that night. She said I’d get worse if I got caught again. I wish you had not told them about my ticklish ears. She went right after them.”
“Serves you right,” Amber said smugly crossing her arms.
“Well, it was all worth it,” Indigo said finally completing his work and giving the knots a final tug. “Voilá!”
“What are you going to do with that?” Amber said pointing at the strange mass of string and knots Indigo had tied together.
“It’s a foot harness,” he replied matter-of-factly. “My Uncle Cornflower developed it. It’s for holding a pixie firmly against a foot while tickling to avoid getting kicked away by violent thrashing. It makes tickling big people’s feet ten times more effective.”
“Wasn’t Cornflower the pixie who got stepped on by an Animus Spell Caster?” Amber observed sharply.
“Details…” Indigo said waving a hand as if to discard the tragic occurrence. “I’ve added my own safety release mechanism to the harness. I’ll be fine.”
“Well, if you get us out of this one without getting squashed, I just might be inclined to let you take another crack at my pretty toes,” she said wiggling them in her silken slipper in his direction.
“It’s a deal,” he said with a smile as he slung two loops over Esmeralda’s big toe and pinky toe. The rest of the ends went around the ankle and over the top of the foot. After pulling and tugging on the string and making a few extra knots that would make his Uncle Cornflower proud, he finally rested firmly restrained against Esmeralda’s arch.
“Are you ready?” Amber asked floating near with the pink tickle pill that had been punctured on one end with a pixie dagger.
“Yes. Put it right here,” Indigo said drawing a line with his fingertip just under her arch.
Amber squeezed the pill and a pink glowing gel oozed out and onto the area Indigo had pointed out. It glowed more intensely with contact with Esmeralda’s bare flesh and then faded until the glow and the gel had completely disappeared.
“Okay,” Indigo said. “You should hover back into a corner. This could get messy and if there’s going top be a squashed pixie, I much prefer it be me rather than you.”
“How sweet,” Amber said giving him a swift peck on the cheek and then hovering to an upper corner of the glass coffin.
“Uncle Cornflower, wherever you are,” Indigo said under his breath as he gripped the harness in final preparation, “this tickling is for you.”
He raked his fingers just under Esmeralda’s arch. For a pixie tickling on a larger creature, anything less than hard scratching can be virtually unperceivable. Since Esmeralda’s ticklish spots on her soles were better exploited with hard rather than soft tickling, he really had to do his best to dig his fingers into the soft flesh of her soles.
At first there was no reaction at all. Indigo continued to probe and try to elicit some sort of reaction. Suddenly, his efforts paid off and the foot began to twitch. The twitching became more violent and the thrashing went from side to side. Indigo was held in place with his harness and continued to tickle nonstop.
“A giggle!” Amber shouted from the corner. “I think I hear a giggle!”
Indigo could hear nothing at first, but suddenly Esmeralda began kicking and he heard laughter come from the Tenderfoot. Her toes pounded against the glass lid and Indigo was jarred with each kick. The harness held him in place and he continued to tickle. It seemed that the more he tickled, the more sensitive she was becoming.
”It’s working!” Amber shouted. “But she’s still not awake.”
“I’m doing as best as I can!” Indigo shouted as he was pounded again and again against the lid of the glass coffin.
“She’s almost out of the spell,” Amber said. “I’m going to tickle her in her worst spot!”
“No! Don’t do it!” Indigo shouted. “It’s not safe!”
They had decided not to tickle her on her worst spot which was on a special spot on her ribs. They had decided better to tickle the feet instead of the rib area. There was too much risk of getting crushed by and arm or an elbow instinctively pulling against the body.
Amber paid no heed and she darted through the air aiming for what they all knew was Esmeralda’s Achilles’ heel.
Esmeralda began to laugh even more intensely suddenly and Indigo realized that Amber’s tickling had made a difference. On the other hand, Esmeralda’s intense laughing was finishing their air supply. Indigo continued to tickle but he was light headed and tried from the tickling and the bumping of the foot on the lid.
Esmeralda’s laugh was very strong and she was rolling in the coffin from side to side. Indigo heard a scream among the loud laughter and knew it was Amber.
He shouted and tickled harder since it was really the only thing he could do.
Tears streamed down his cheeks until the lack of air and the bumping and the tickling were simply too much for his little pixie body.
The world went black.
* * * * * *
The Truthsaying had gone quickly and easily even though Danea possessed a will stronger than any prisoner she had ever encountered.
It mattered little. She was entranced and she told them all they needed to know. Orion cut away pieces of her heavy black leather armor with a knife revealing her pale and beautiful underarms. He gagged her with a handkerchief and cast his shadow spell which held the pieces of leather firmly against her wrists and ankles effectively binding her to the grassy ground spread eagle.
Without direct contact with the magic the Demon entropy was useless.
“The things you can learn about with a simple Truthsaying,” Orion said smiling at his handiwork realizing that during all the time he had spent with Danea she had never revealed a way to get around demon entropy until now.
Haydeen released Danea from the trance and her eyes shot open and stared sharply at the spell caster and his interrogator companion.
”If looks could kill…” Haydeen said referring to the cold stare as she collected her tools.
“We’d be dead,” Orion said petting Danea softly on her leather clad belly.
“Aren’t you concerned Madame Jordanna will attack us?” Haydeen asked looking warily towards the Academy Hall.
“She’s a spider, Haydeen,” Orion said referring to their conversation ages ago. “She’s spun her web. If she wanted to stop us she would.”
“You know a secret way into Xavis’s Palace?” Haydeen asked.
Orion shook his head. “I was thinking more of using the front gate,” he said smiling.
Haydeen knew better by now to ask what he meant. He was a spider also.
“Danea, you know there is nothing I’d like more than to tickle you senseless,” Orion said leaning over the Demon Keeper and tickling her underarms. She reacted immediately and laughed heavily into the gag. “For old time’s sake,” he added. “But time is short and we must be going if we are to catch the Tenderfoot and the Tickle Scourge.”
Haydeen understood what Orion meant and cast her spell upon a couple feathers that went after Danea’s bare underarms and another pair that went after her feet.
“I didn’t get a chance to study her ticklish spots,” Haydeen mentioned as she completed the spell and Danea’s muffled screams and laughter increased. “A person with her willpower will last a long while. Maybe even she’ll hold out entirely.”
“That’s okay,” he said kissing Danea on the forehead and stepping away. “I bear her no ill will and as mad as she is she will forgive me in the end.”
“Why is that?” Haydeen asked as they walked away towards the wormhole.
”She was once my Tickle Mate,” Orion answered thoughtfully.
* * * * *
Esmeralda was gasping for air.
She did not know why. She only knew she was being tickled and she had to get away from it somehow and get out of the box she was trapped it.
She pulled at the heavy glass lid that was above her and with some effort she managed to slide it down a few inches. She placed her hand into the opening and pulled it down enough so she could pull herself up and out of the box.
A blast of cool air refreshed her and she breathed deeply. She felt as if she had been buried alive. The tickling had ceased and she was glad. She looked around and her memory came back to her. She was put in the glass coffin to be stored until Lord Xavis chose new members for his harem. It was a totally unexpected turn of events.
She saw Patrisa in a coffin next to her and to her left and right there were perhaps hundreds of glass containers with potential tickle slaves deep asleep with the Ten Century Slumber.
The question now was, how did she awaken form that magical slumber?
The answer was literally at her feet.
She pushed the glass lid down further and examined her bare right foot that had a tangled mass of string tied to it. She could see on the sole of her foot was tied her pixie friend Indigo who glowed a very faint blue color.
She undid the knot and while she did she saw an empty tickleberry capsule at the foot of the coffin. She started to deduce what might have happened and why she felt such intense tickling as she awoke.
“Indigo! Wake up, Indigo!” Esmeralda whispered urgently holding the pixie in the palm of her hand.
Indigo groaned. “What happened?” he asked groggily.
“I think you tickled me awake,” Esmeralda said.
“It worked!” Indigo jumped to his feet glowing a much more vibrant shade of blue.
“I told Amber that Uncle Cornflower’s foot tickling harness would work. Oh my! Amber! Where is she?” he asked looking frantically into the coffin for his fellow pixie.
Esmeralda carefully stood up in the coffin and from the folds of her slave girl costume the small inert body of Amber slid to the base of the coffin.
“No!” Indigo shouted as he flew down to her motionless body. He took her limp form into his arms and held her firmly in his arms. “Silly pixie girl! I told you that if anyone was going to get squashed it was supposed to be me.”
Esmeralda felt a tear down her cheek as she saw the pixie hold his companion tightly in his arms. The two were inseparable at the Academy and it appeared they went back a long way together.
All was silent save Indigo’s faint sobbing until a faint moaning and whispering came from the yellow colored pixie.
“Let… me… breathe…”
Indigo pulled back to see his pixie companion reviving.
”You almost squashed me yourself with your silly bear hug,” Amber said in mock anger giving Indigo a light shove. She was relieved he had released her of his iron embrace and glad that they were out of that stifling coffin. Her yellow-orange glow returned.
“Thanks, you two,” Esmeralda said gratefully and she climbed out of the coffin and onto the floor. ”Now, what de we do about the Tickle Scourge?” she asked looking at her sleeping mentor.
“If you open the glass coffin I believe the spell will be broken,” Amber said making a calculated magic regarding guess where she was usually right. “But don’t let her know that we are here with you,” she added. “She will not approve of us have hitched a ride along with you.”
The two pixies whispered some words of magic and they became transparent and almost invisible.
She wondered for a moment why the pixies were so secretive, but on the other hand she was glad they had tagged along.
She opened the Tickle Scourge’s glass coffin and the sleep spell was broken and she slowly began to awaken.
Esmeralda pulled free Silk from around her neck and the spider came to lift clicking and focusing its mechanical eyes on its mistress. Esmeralda prepared to cast a spell while Patrisa fully awoke.
They were inside the Palace and there was no more use for the skimpy costume that made her feel so uncomfortable. She asked Silk for her spell caster robes and as the mechanical spider tickled its way up and down her body she realized that of all the clothes she had worn throughout her life the dark green robes of a spell caster were those that made her feel most comfortable.
It was as if she had always been meant to be a spell caster.
She giggled softly at the thought as Silk weaved his way up and down her body creating the garments that she knew were just right.
* * * * *
Madame Jordanna walked slowly by Loanna shaking her head softly at the weakened Giantess too weak to even sit up. The Giantess was strong and powerful, but she required still much training. She had been at the Academy as long as Esmeralda, but her skills were still only a fraction of the Tenderfoot’s.
She saw Danea pinned to the ground as tickling feathers attacked her tickle spots. The Keeper laughed into her gag and tried her best to resist the sensations.
Danea had been defeated by her own pride and cockiness. She could have requested reinforcements or avoided direct contact with the dangerous spell caster. Her skills were exceptional, but in an effort to prove herself better than her former tickle mate, she had stooped to his level and, as always, Orion capitalized upon it.
Neshi ryou gliht no em! she said spreading her arms out wide. Night went to day in the Academy in a single moment and the shadows Orion had cast were dispelled instantly.
Danea sat up immediately tossing away the tickling feathers and removing her gag.
“I beg forgiveness,” she said kneeling upon one knee. “I have no excuse, Madame Jordanna.”
“It was foreseen,” Jordanna said as she helped Danea to her feet. “Had you defeated Orion, he would not have been skilled enough for my plan to work.”
“I have revealed everything to him,” she said blushing. “He knows all our plans!”
“He knows what I have allowed you to know,” the Elfling woman said mysteriously. “It was all foreseen.”
Danea’s head hung in shame and she remembered words that Orion spoke frequently.
A spider doesn’t explain the web to the flies.
Danea felt she was just a fly trapped in this elaborate web.
When Madame Jordanna returned to the Academy Hall Danea sat alone on the grassy knoll.
For the first time in decades, she wept.
To be continued….
NEXT: The Rendezvous
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