City of Sororities (f/f, fantasy, 8 chapters)

City of Sororities

Chapter 1

Sonia leapt gracefully between the rooftops, her lithe body casting long, pale shadows from the full moon overhead. She could feel the cool night air on her face, an exhilarating sensation that made her heart beat faster. Running with quick, catlike steps across another rooftop, the bracing air was not the only thing that quickened her pulse. She was, after all, in forbidden territory, and furthermore she was there as a thief. But she was no common thief, she told herself with pride. She was a member of the Sorority of Thieves. She was the best.

Beneath her lay the city of Port Bastion, the largest and greatest city on the Continent, spread out in all directions as a great monument of civilization’s achievements. From here Sonia could see the flickering gaslights illuminating the richer neighborhoods of the city, one of the many technological advancements that could be found nowhere else on the Continent. But here, at the edge of the city, there were no such luxuries. The streets were rough cobblestone and the buildings were plain wood and brick. This was not commonly used territory, after all. This seldom-visited area held mostly warehouses, and was used mostly by the Sorority of Explorers. It was dangerous turf for a member of a rival Sorority to be caught in.

Sonia paused a moment, perched on the edge of a rooftop overlooking her destination. In the shadows, she was nearly invisible: the sleek black catsuit she wore blended in perfectly. She had made the catsuit herself, tailored from an unknown fabric originally found by the Explorers in one of the ruins in the barbarian lands. She did not know what it was, only that it deflected light and was very thin yet strong enough to stop a knife blade. The skin-tight suit was molded to her curves, hugging her thin waist and shapely hips and down her long legs to her ankles. The hardest part had been fitting it to her chest. Sonia had embarrassingly large breasts for a thief: large melon-sized globes that bounced when she walked. She had ended up incorporating some cutting-edge modern technology and inserting thin wire underneath them to support her breasts. That didn’t entirely stop them from moving, but it did give her acrobatic freedom. Wearing her black catsuit with flexible black boots, she wore a matching strip of cloth covering her mouth to obscure her features. With her jet-black hair tied back in a ponytail, she was a ghost.

Her invisibility served her well, for Sonia immediately saw that someone had beaten her to the prize. This occasionally happened as a result of internal competition inside the Sorority of Thieves, but a quick glance confirmed that her competitors were not, this time, her fellow sisters. They wore black hooded robes with long black gloves, and wore silver masks over their faces carved with two narrow eyeholes and a grotesque smile. There were two of them on the rooftop of Sonia’s target building, and they were not alone. Sitting on the roof beside them, gagged and bound in ropes from head to toe, was another girl whose boots had been removed and placed aside. She was currently being foot-tickled to within an inch of her life by the two masked strangers.

Sonia could tell the girl was a member of the Sorority of Explorers, judging from her stylized chainmail bikini which was a sort of unofficial uniform for their sisters. She howled into her gag as the two strangers feathered her feet, producing a muffled, echoing cry that Sonia had originally taken for the cry of a nighttime bird. The strangers knew how to use their feathers, stroking her long arches and sliding them between her wildly splaying toes. Sonia could see the effect they were having: tears glistened down the girl’s cheeks in the moonlight, and every exposed inch of her muscular body shone with sweat. The look on her face was one of unmistakable ticklish agony, with her eyes pleading for mercy.

But the masked strangers were not inclined to be merciful. Sonia could recognize a masterful tickle torturer when she saw one, and these strangers had all the hallmarks. They searched for the spots on the soles that produced the loudest and most desperate screams, and they guided their feathers to these magic spots like a hawk diving for its prey. The Explorer girl had a particularly sensitive spot on her instep, and feathering both feet there caused her to arch her back and howl into her gag for seconds on end. It was sadistically amusing to note that, for all her wilderness experience, this girl was still a tenderfoot.

“MMMMMMMMPPPHHHHH!!! MMMMMPPHHHOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOO!!!” howled the girl through her gag. Her pale soles, gently illuminated by the moonlight, glowed red as the soft plumes flicked across the tender surfaces. Sonia crept forward for a better view.

Sonia watched from the shadows, transfixed but concerned. These torturers did not belong to her own Sorority, and they did not fit the profile of any other Sorority in the city. This meant they were probably free agents, but if they were here for the same quarry as Sonia they were definitely not small-time. If, like Sonia, they had come following the rumor that a genuine magical artifact was stored here, they were very dangerous.

The Sorority Council, the governing body of Port Bastion and the closest thing to a Continental government, had voted unanimously in favor of outlawing the practice of magic in Port Bastion. Each of the five Council representatives had their own reasons. The Sorority of Builders and Artisans stated that magic was potentially destructive and that one wizard could cause immense property damage. The Sorority of City Guards claimed that it would lead to crime with impunity. The Sorority of Explorers explained how demand for magic would cause all sort of amateurs to take up adventuring. The Sorority of Sages was more concerned with study than practice, and it was much easier to study something that wasn’t being practiced. The Sorority of Thieves simply voted “yes” on the proposition without explanation. No one ever listened to their explanations anyway: after all, they were thieves. Everyone resented their presence on the Council, but with all their influence it would have been impossible to exclude them.

But her questions were about to be answered: Sonia saw the two strangers stop their feathering torture at last, and one of them undid the gag on the girl’s mouth. She gasped weakly for breath and looked up at her two captors in undisguised terror.

“Please!” she pleaded hoarsely. “I’m telling the truth! The idol was the only piece we had! Please don’t tickle my feet!”

The two masked strangers looked at each other, weighing this testimony. “She may be lying,” said one of them. Sonia could not even tell the gender of the speaker: the voice was low and metallic from beneath the mask. It was alien, and yet inexplicably seductive.

“Unlikely,” said the other stranger in an identical voice. “You saw her reactions. This is probably it. The rest of their acquisitions are of no concern to us.”

Sonia stood ready to pounce. If she could ambush these two mysterious thieves, she might stand to gain some answers. She scanned her surroundings quickly with a roving eye to take stock of their position. But when she looked back, they were gone. There was no action on their part, no hand motion indicating a smoke bomb had been thrown. One moment they had been there, and now they were not.

Sonia scanned the streets for any way they may have escaped, but everything was still: there was no trace of the strangers. Whoever they were, they were expertly trained in the art of stealth. Sonia paused for a moment, and leapt down to the rooftop where now only the Explorer girl sat, tugging at her ropes.

“Please, help me!” cried the girl when she saw Sonia. “I don’t know who you are, but I need to get free! I beg you!”

Sonia considered the girl sitting bound and barefoot in front of her. Her decision came quickly. Sonia picked up the discarded gag and placed it back into the struggling girl’s mouth, tying it into place.

“All things in time,” said Sonia. “But first, I am in need of some answers.” She reached into a hidden pocket of her suit and produced a vital tool of the trade: a jet-black fluffy feather. The gagged girl’s eyes flew open in renewed terror.

For the next hour, the few people still awake in that quarter of the city noted that the nighttime birds were especially loud that night.

* * * * *

Camilla sat beside the other three pledges that she had spent the day with. The chance to rush the Sorority of City Guards came only once a year, and all of them were determined to make it. They had begun the day with forty pledges who had passed the basic testing. Eighteen had dropped out during the endurance run around the city walls. Five more had failed to balance a stack of ten Port Bastion Law Books on their backs while shining the boots of the senior sisters. Ten after that had failed to scale the city walls with weighted backpacks. Finally, the pledges had their pants removed and were paddled by the pledge mistress: three had failed to remain silent through the ordeal. Now, the four remaining pledges including Camilla were sitting in the basement of the Guards’ House with their tops removed. Their ankles, heads, and wrists were in padded stocks that kept them completely immobile. One by one, the pledge mistress walked by them and untied their boots, removing them and plucking off their socks.

“I congratulate you on reaching the final test,” said the pledge mistress, walking back and forth in front of the four pledges. “As you no doubt know, the Sorority of City Guards has many secrets which we are honor-bound to protect. It may fall upon any of our sisters to be captured by a rival sorority. Should this occur, we must know that you are impervious to certain…interrogation techniques.”

Camilla felt a knot in her stomach as eight sorority sisters entered the room. This was the only rest she had truly been afraid of. With her slender but muscular body built up from running and swimming, Camilla been able to easily endure the physical trials the pledges were put through. Her girlish and feminine appearance, however, often fooled people into overlooking her physical prowess. With a long head of auburn hair, a button nose, lightly freckled cheeks, and a very large pair of breasts with nipples that stubbornly made themselves visible through any and all fabrics, she made an extremely comely figure by any standard. She was the sort who typically inspired very colorful double-entendres in taverns, and only her ingrained respect for the law prevented her from knocking out the offenders. After all, the sort of upstanding citizen who wanted to be a City Guard didn’t go around starting tavern brawls, however justified.

But now with her bare feet in stocks, there was nothing deceptive about how soft and vulnerable her feet looked. She noticed she was the only pledge who had painted toenails.

“My favorite time of year,” smiled one of the sisters, looking directly at Camilla’s bare feet. Camilla felt a chill go down her spine.

“Now, pledges,” continued the pledge mistress as the eight sisters lines up in front of the eight trapped bare feet, “This will be a timed test. At any time, you ladies may forfeit by speaking the word, ‘mercy’. When we decide enough time has elapsed, any remaining pledges will be welcomed into the Sorority of City Guards.”

Camilla gulped as she looked at the eight sisters licking their lips. All of them had long fingernails, carefully manicured to sharp points. “Now, ladies,” said the pledge mistress. “On my mark. Ten…nine…eight…”

Suddenly, all eight sisters jumped into action, tickling the pledges’ bare feet with their sharp nails. Caught by surprise, all four pledges immediately burst into wild laughter. Camilla had no chance to resist: she howled as her ticklish feet fell under attack, with twenty fingers poking, prodding, and scratching her soft pink soles.

“AAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!! STAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAPPPP!!” cried Camilla, barely managing to avoid the safeword. These girls were out for the kill: they searched out her tender spots and drilled into them, driving Camilla insane. Tears flowed down her wrists and her trapped hands slapped helplessly against the wood of the stocks as she struggled to escape.

“Koochie-koochie-koo! Beg for mercy, little girl!” cooed one of Camilla’s torturers as she tickled an unbearably soft spot on Camilla’s arches.

“We’re going to make you pee your panties, pledge!” taunted the other sister, running her long talon-like nails in quick staccato strokes all the way down her soles.

Camilla was crying too hard to see, but next to her she heard a fellow pledge cry out the word, “Mercy!”. Now there were only three left. Camilla couldn’t give up now, but the foot-tickling was pure torture. It took every ounce of willpower she had not to end it.

Camilla heard the pledge mistress’ voice through the wild echoing laughter. “Now, ladies,” she said, “it’s time to really see what you’re made of!”

Before Camilla had a chance to wonder what this meant, she felt a pair of hands with long fingernails grab her ribs from behind! With only her bra on for protection, Camilla had nothing to protect her sensitive skin from this surprise tickling attack. Her screams of laughter became even louder as the mystery hands squeezed her sides, walked up her ribs, and plunged into her exposed underarms to tickle the tender hollows.

“NOOHOOHOOHOOHOO!! NOT THE RIBS!! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!” cried a voice next to her, and Camilla was dimly aware that the other pledges must be subject to this diabolical surprise as well.

But she had no time to feel sorry for them. The fingertips wriggling in her ticklish underarms were driving her insane, and her poor feet were being abused beyond her worst nightmares. She tried to be strong and to think of how much pledging meant to her, but all she could think of was how ticklish she was.

“Say it, pledge!” taunted one of the sisters working over her soles. “These ticklish little feet don’t stand a chance!”

All together, three pairs of hands were having their way with Camilla’s ticklish body. She had never experienced tickle torture like this before, but she was sure that she would die laughing. She heard the voices of the sisters teasing her as they drove her to insanity. Camilla knew she couldn’t take another moment of it. Her mind tried to resist, but her ticklish body could take no more.

“MERCY!!! MERCEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEEEEE!!!” screamed Camilla. Suddenly, the tickling stopped. After a moment of the greatest relief she had ever felt in her life, Camilla slowly realized that she was not going to be a sister this year.

* * * * *

Camilla walked dejectedly through the streets of Port Bastion, dragging her feet as she reflected on her failure. She had trained to join the Sorority of City Guards for months, and now she would have to wait an entire year to try again. Of course, there was still time to rush the Sorority of Explorers: they were always looking for girls in good shape like Camilla. But that would mean spending weeks in the wilderness searching through ruins in the farthest reaches of the Continent: a good life for some, but Camilla needed civilization. Then there were always those people who would tell her that she was better off not becoming one of the so-called sorority bitches at all. But Camilla wanted to become a Guard sister more than anything. Sorority sisters got all the respect in Port Bastion, the City Guards most of all. She would always remember sitting at the tavern where the City Guard sisters would be the center of attention, the girls everyone wanted to buy a drink for. And she had come so close to being one of them.

As her mood darkened, Camilla found herself walking down darker and more deserted streets, away from the market places and into the shadowy side-streets of Port Bastion. As she followed this subconscious path, it was hardly surprising that when she looked up, she found herself facing the darkest and most imposing building in the entire city: the Thieves’ House, home of the Sorority of Thieves. It loomed ominously above her: a dusty black building of tall towers and long, dark halls that was cast entirely in shadows. Affixed above the gates was the Sorority seal: a gilt engraving of a hand reaching into a pouch, encircled by the ancient and venerable motto of the Sorority: “Si is est non cautus”, which roughly translated as, “If it’s not nailed down…”

As a prospective for the Sorority of City Guards, Camilla felt a natural aversion to the Sorority of Thieves. The Guard and the Thief sisters had a fierce rivalry that went back to the creation of the two Sororities. It was no surprise since their jobs were directly opposed to each other. The Guards made a special effort to harass Thief Sisters in any way they could. One time they had confiscated the shirts and pants of a dozen Thief sisters in a crowded marketplace for “textile import code violations”. On the other hand, the Sorority of Thieves didn’t hesitate from engaging in one-upsmanship whenever they could. Most recently, the Thieves had broken into the Guards’ House and conducted a thorough panty raid. Since the Guard sisters all wore uniforms, their panties bore their Sorority seal and were coveted trophies for lawbreakers throughout the city. For a week afterward, the Sorority of Thieves ran a pair up their flagpole each morning.

Camilla was normally not given to shifty behavior. She was one of those people who, if you were to hit her in the middle of the street, would reflexively look around for a policeman before the instinct to hit back kicked in a split second later. But today a different side of her emerged. It may have been the sting of rejection, or the burning to prove herself, or the open window of the Thieves’ House which suddenly seemed like a sign from the gods. But Camilla had made up her mind. She was going to break into the house of the Sorority of Thieves, the great rivals of the City Guards, and steal from them to prove her dedication to the City Guards.

It was very straightforward in her mind as she looked around to see if anyone was watching her. There would doubtless be something inside worth taking, and she would know it when she found it. Something with their seal on it, perhaps. And when she returned victorious with this trophy, the City Guards just had to give her a second chance. Maybe she would even be accepted! She could see it all planned out in her head as she leapt in through the open window without hesitation. Her boots hit the ground on the other side and she felt a rush of adrenaline. She was in!

The room she found herself in could only be described as respectable. In fact, it had been designed by someone who had gone to considerable lengths to make it look respectable. It was an old-fashioned parlor, with patterned throw rugs on the ground, several tasteful porcelain vases on tables, and carefully spaced portraits of austere persons who were undoubtedly someone’s ancestors and probably gave a lot of money to various high-profile causes. The room was lit by a crackling fire in the fireplace, in front of which were two purple velvet chairs complete with ottomans. A small bookshelf in the corner held a collection of color-coordinated books arranged to match the drapes. Not a single thing was out of place, as is generally the case in rooms that are seen and not used. It was the sort of room that might be owned by the sort of person who describes themselves as a “legitimate businessman” who provides “valuable services to the community”, and if pressed on the nature of these services, well, we don’t really need to talk business right now, because he has this excellent bottle of ruby port you simply have to try…

But the difficulty with stealing on principle is that you have to find something personal to steal, and in a room so carefully calculated to be impersonal there was not much that fit the bill. Camilla felt sure that there had to be a trophy room or something like it nearby, if only she could find it.

Unfortunately, she never had the chance. Camilla heard a thin whisper behind her, and the faintest shadow of a footstep. Before her mind had time to register anything else, a lasso was thrown at her from behind, and suddenly Camilla found her arms tied to her sides by a thin length of black rope.

No, thought Camilla. No, no, no. This can’t be happening. Not to me. I’ve never broken the law before in my life.

They had to have been waiting for her, she thought. She knew that open window was too good to be true. They were probably hoping to catch a rival sorority member, and now, and now…her mind didn’t want to finish that sentence.

The rope holding her midsection was thrown over a chandelier, and Camilla was raised a foot above the floor. She kicked reflexively, but her assailants had been expecting that, too. As soon as her legs moved, two more lassos caught around her ankles and pulled them in opposite directions, holding Camilla in a Y-shaped position with her legs spread. She was trapped.

From the darkness, two women stepped forwards wearing black robes with hoods pulled over their eyes to obscure their features. They smiled at each other as they approached Camilla, contemplating their prey. To Camilla’s horror, one of them drew a gleaming knife from the folds of her robe and held it purposefully.

“Please! This isn’t what it looks like!” insisted Camilla. Unfortunately, her train of thought ended there. What else could it be, she thought with despair?

The glinting tip of the knife was drawn to her chest, and in quick stroke it ran down her chest. Camilla shut her eyes and braced herself for the pain, but it never came. Just as she opened her eyes in confusion, she saw a long gash down the front of her shirt, and it split open like a vest. Just as quickly, the knife made more slashes with surgical precision, and in seconds her clothing was in shreds on the ground. Camilla blushed in shame as she was left wearing only a skimpy pair of lacy black panties.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Camilla demanded, but it didn’t even sound tough to herself.

Neither of the hooded women said anything. Their silence was pregnant.

“What are you going to do to me?” asked Camilla with indignation.

The hooded woman nearest to her still said nothing, but she and her sister reached into a fold of their cloak. Without a word they each produced a soft, fluffy feather. Camilla’s muscles turned to jelly.

“P—please!” begged Camilla, memories of her initiation still fresh in her mind. “Not that! Anything but that!”

Camilla had to bite her lip as the feathers gently brushed over her bare breasts. Immediately her nipples went hard and she arched her back with a silent gasp. Camilla strained at the ropes as the feather tips teased her large, round areolas. Her lip trembled, and the feathers caressing the undersides of her breasts caused giggles to escape. The giggles turned to full laughter as the feathers moved to her sensitive tummy, but they knew that there was even more ticklish flesh to exploit. With smiles on their shadowy faces, Camilla’s torturers moved their feathers down to tickle her inner thighs.

The soft, milky flesh of Camilla’s inner thighs was one of the most sensitive spots on her entire body. Immediately every muscle in her body went rigid, and the first feathery touch made her shriek out loud. Her resistance was shattered, and she screamed with laughter at the achingly soft strokes.

“EEEEEEEHEHEHEHEHEHE!!! NOT THEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHERRRE!!!” Camilla begged. She tried desperately to close her legs but her bondage kept them spread and vulnerable. The teasing feathers stroked her silky thighs and circled around her legs, tickling beneath the curves of her ass left exposed by her tiny panties. Being feathered on this virgin flesh was unbearable torture, but the teasing was even more maddening. Camilla could feel the heat building between her legs but she was helpless to do anything.

With her soft thighs on fire from the diabolical feathering, one of her torturers moved her attention back to Camilla’s bare breasts, caressing her rock-hard nipples with masterful skill. The shadowy women remained silent with cruel smiles, watching as Camilla laughed herself into a lustful frenzy. The tears running down her cheeks glistened in the dim light, and her panties were dripping wet with her juices. The sensual torture wracked every inch of her body, and the only thing she could think about was release.

“HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! PLEASE!!! HAHAHAHAHAHA!!! LET ME CUM!!! AAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA!!!” screamed Camilla to her silent tormentors. The swelling between her legs was almost too much to bear: the manipulation of her bouncing breasts, her soft thighs, and her shapely ass was destroying her. She prayed that one of the women would lift aside her panties and slide a feather inside: even the softest touch would make her explode. But they cruelly kept her on the brink of orgasm, denying her release while teasing her within an inch of her life.

“Are you ready, sister?” asked one of Camilla’s torturers, breaking her silence at last.

“Ready,” said the other in a sultry whisper.

Together, the two of them cast aside their feathers and sunk their fingernails into Camilla’s ticklish flesh. The result was devastating. With all her strength already gone, Camilla sobbed with helpless laughter as the fingernails dug into her soft skin. One pair of hands fondled her breasts, tickling the bouncing globes while squeezing her ribs. The other hands attacked the soft fold of flesh where her thighs met her ass: Camilla never would have guessed she was so nightmarishly ticklish there, but the first touch caused her to shatter.

“MERCY!!! MERCEEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEE!!!” screamed Camilla. But the mercy that she begged for was climax. But the fingers stroking the curves of her bottom were too expertly trained to allow her. Camilla howled and wept with laughter, but her only thought was how badly she needed release. She was so close…so close…

“Mmmmmmm,” muttered one of her torturers in approval as she reached inside her panties, tickling up the round, luscious ass cheeks. The long silken fingers teased Camilla to new heights of amorous torture: every touch was excruciatingly ticklish and yet she wanted more. More tickling, she cried out in her mind, would either kill her or push her to orgasm at last. She couldn’t take it, and she had to have more.

“EEEEEEEEEAAAAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAA!!! MMMMPPHHHHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!” Camilla babbled with laughter; she tried to speak but the tickling was so overpowering she could barely think. She was weak with laughter but she throbbed for a sexual release that never came. The unrelenting tickling was more than her teased, conflicted body could take. She had never been so unfulfilled in her life, and it underscored her utter helplessness. She was a plaything, driven mad with lust and doomed to endless laughter with only one way out. And at last, she could feel it coming. She shook with a final paroxysm of helpless laughter, and then the world around her went dark as she slipped into a deep, dreamless sleep.

* * * * *

Camilla was still weak and light-headed as she felt herself being lifted off the ground. Her hands were tied behind her back, but she could still stand. As consciousness slowly returned to her, she reflexively walked in the direction she was pointed, slowly trudging through dark torch-lit hallways of black stone. After the most exhausting ordeal of her life that had kept her so painfully unfulfilled, Camilla had no willpower to resist.

The torch sconces were set too far apart for them to effectively light the hallway: all they accomplished was causing everything to cast long misshapen shadows across the hallway. Camilla noticed there were two shadows behind her, belonging to the two sisters who were guiding her.

Even if she had known the layout of the building, Camilla would have had no idea where she was going: every hallway looked identical in the dim light. Maybe that was the point, she thought. But she didn’t have to wonder about her destination for long. Camilla turned a corner, and even after what she had been through, what she saw made her freeze in mortal terror.

Sitting on an unassuming chair and flanked by guards tactfully hidden in the shadows was the Dark Lady Lucaria, leader of the Sorority of Thieves and possibly the most powerful individual in the entire city. Camilla felt faint.

The Dark Lady wore a jet black robe, and her ebony hair cascaded down to her waist. Her deep ruby lips formed a faint smile, and her glittering silver eyes looked down at the girl brought before her as if it were an amusing stage performance.

“My, my,” said the Dark Lady. “I had to see this for myself. It’s not often we have thieves breaking into the Thieves’ House. This generally warrants a particularly…interesting form of punishment.”

Camilla whimpered softly.

“However—“ said the Dark Lady. Camilla felt an upsurge of desperate hope.

“However, there may be another option.” The Dark Lady paused, looking Camilla over again. “I understand you recently attempted to rush the Sorority of City Guards?”

“How did you know that?” asked Camilla.

“It is my job to be informed,” said the Dark Lady. “Yes, this might account for a certain…difference in thinking. Our Sorority is very proud of our rich tradition, but this tends to lead to a…particular mindset among our sisters. A streamlined way of doing things, as it were. On occasion, when a job requires directness instead of Thieves’ stealth, it behooves us to look for outside help.”

“You…want me to help you?” asked Camilla.

“You do not have to accept,” said the Dark Lady with a smile. “Of course, if you do not, my girls will be forced to continue their earlier treatment of you. Perhaps for several days.” Camilla felt her knees start to give way.

“What can I do for you?” Camilla asked quickly.

“It’s quite simple, actually,” said the Dark Lady. “Word has reached us that the Sorority of Explorers has returned from a recent expedition into barbarian lands with, among other things, an ancient piece of art. We believe it to be an idol of some sort. It must be located.”

“And stolen?” asked Camilla.

“And destroyed,” corrected the Dark Lady.

“Destroyed? But why?” asked Camilla. “I mean, aren’t you thieves?”

“This is no ordinary decoration,” said the Dark Lady. “It is magic.”

“Magic?” asked Camilla in disbelief. Her law-abiding outrage momentarily trumped her fear. “But that’s illegal!”

The Dark Lady nodded. “And for good reason.”

Camilla had never really thought about the reasons behind the ban, only that it existed. That was usually good enough for her. “Why is that?” she asked suddenly.

The Dark Lady frowned slightly. “I suppose it sounds like a good idea to you: having magical powers, being able to do whatever you wanted, whenever you wanted. But can you imagine what would happen if everyone could do this?”

“We’d all…have what we want?” asked Camilla. From the way the Dark Lady’s frown deepened, she guessed she had made the wrong conclusion.

“But, why are you concerned about this at all?” asked Camilla, wanting to move the conversation along. “If it’s a matter of breaking the law, shouldn’t this be a job for the City Guards?”

“Magic has not yet been practiced,” answered the Dark Lady. “Right now it is merely possessed, which is technically not a crime. And the Sorority of City Guards has no inclination whatsoever to prevent crime.”

“It…doesn’t?” asked Camilla, confused.

“You see,” said the Lady with the tone of someone explaining a concept to a child, “Every Sorority looks out for the interests of its sisters, first and foremost. This means ensuring that they can ply their trades.”

“I…guess,” said Camilla.

“And this means ensuring that there is always work. Thus, the Sorority of Builders and Artisans is largely concerned with tearing things down so that they can be rebuilt. The Sorority of Sages keeps control over information by releasing as little of it as possible. The Sorority of Explorers is dedicated to keeping land unmapped so it can be explored. And the Sorority of City Guards ensures that there is always enough crime to guard against.”

“And what does the Sorority of Thieves do?” asked Camilla.

“What is it that is required for thievery to occur?” asked the Lady with a blank expression.

“Um…rich people?” asked Camilla.

“And what does that require?”

“Money?” asked Camilla weakly. The thin frown reappearing on the Lady’s face indicated she guessed wrong again.

“People hoard money because they believe it will be safe,” explained the Lady patiently. “People become rich because of their faith in the law. In an anarchy, no one saves money because it may be taken from you tomorrow. In order for our sisters to thrive, we must have law. Thus, above all others, the Sorority of Thieves is concerned with maintaining the balance of law and order.”

Camilla blinked, and a silence fell over the chamber that she suspected was only awkward for her. There was only one other thing on her mind.

“What…what if I can’t find it?” she asked.

“Then you and I will be having another pleasant conversation very soon,” the Dark Lady assured her. “Incidentally, not to change the subject, but many of our sisters are even more skilled at the art of tickle torture than you have yet seen. I have no doubt they could tickle a woman to death over the course of several days. Several very long days.”

Camilla gulped. The mortal terror was back in full force.

“So, I trust we can count on your cooperation?” asked the Dark Lady.

“Of course,” said Camilla, forcing a smile.

Chapter 2

Maggie Stoneheave was especially good at keeping the new recruits in line. Her appearance was feminine but powerful and demanded respect from all who saw her. She had a long head of golden-blonde hair that fell past her broad shoulders to the middle of her back, and a muscular frame that still left her well-proportioned. She also had a noticeably large round pair of breasts that her chainmail halter top did a particularly bad job of concealing. And of course, it didn’t hurt that she was twelve feet tall.

Maggie was one-quarter giant on her mother’s side, and originally came from one of the barbarian villages out in the unexplored wilderness of the Continent. Her half-giant mother had tried to expose Maggie to human culture, even going so far as to change their family name to Stoneheave. She had never been fond of their original giant name of Big-Rock-Throw, although considered a very graceful name in giant culture. Hearing about the city of Port Bastion from her childhood, it was hardly surprising that when Maggie came of age she came to visit the city to experience urban life for herself. Her knowledge of the wilderness plus her physical strength made her a natural pick for the Sorority of Explorers, which she had rushed and gotten into without difficulty. It was rumored that most of the sisters were too frightened to haze a twelve-foot pledge, not that she needed the help.

Now Maggie oversaw the first round of tests for the new pledges this year: physical training to see who had what it took to rush the Sorority of Explorers. The more entertaining hazing would come later, something that she and her friend Kristina were looking forward to. Kristina was fully human and only five and a half feet tall, but she and Maggie had been close friends ever since they rushed the Sorority together years ago. She had helped Maggie adapt to the city: now Maggie spoke without a trace of giant accent (which was primarily the propensity to grunt in the middle of sentences) and knew all the local customs.

“Well, you were right,” said Kristina as the pledges finished their laps and returned to the locker room for a shower. “It looks like more than ten of them dropped out already. I would have thought they’d show some more grit.”

“A few of them show promise,” remarked Maggie. People were always surprised when they heard Maggie talk: they expected the deep, grunting voice commonly associated with giants and were surprised to hear her voice was fairly high and girly.

“I guess this means you win our bet,” said Kristina good-humoredly. “So, what do you want as a reward?”

Maggie leaned back and stretched out her feet, letting her sandals flap against her soles. Maggie almost always wore sandals: shoes in her size were understandably hard to find. Even for a woman twelve feet tall she had proportionately large feet: from heel to toe they were the length of Kristina’s entire arm, with toes longer than Kristina’s fingers. Kristina caught a glimpse of her smooth heels and graceful instep beneath her sandals, and she knew what the reward was going to be.

“It’s been a while since I’ve had a pedicure,” said Maggie with a satisfied smile. “I think if you do my feet we can call it even.” For Maggie, a big part of being a city girl was enjoying the unique pleasures of civilization.

Giving Maggie a pedicure was something that Kristina always enjoyed: it was a sisterly bonding experience and Kristina had gotten quite good at it. They even kept a set of tools specially designed for Maggie’s feet: a pumice stone six inches across, a stone sanding board they used as a nail file, and a three-inch wide paintbrush they used to paint her toenails. Maggie liked her toes painted bright red, another girlish touch for this imposing juggernaut.

“This is going to feel heavenly,” said Maggie as they got up to head inside. “I’ve been on my feet all day.”

“Well, we should enjoy the comforts of home while we’re here,” said Kristina. “I think this time I really may stay in the city for a few weeks. I think I’ve earned a vacation.”

The two of them headed back inside the Sorority house and into one of the recreation rooms. Explorer sisters were often away from the house for weeks or even months on end, but when they returned to Port Bastion to showcase their discoveries, the house was tailored to their comfort. All the best food and most fashionable clothing were available to the sisters, purchased with money earned from selling rare artifacts from unexplored lands. The girls had even chipped in to buy Maggie a custom-made pair of stiletto heels thirty-two inches long. Maggie saved them for special occasions.

Maggie sat down in the enormous cushioned chair she used as Kristina gathered the materials she would need for the pedicure. Maggie kicked off her sandals, stretching out her gargantuan bare feet and wiggling her toes luxuriously. Kristina had always admired them: the skin was silky smooth to the touch, with high shapely arches that tapered down to long, feminine toes. She often wondered how Maggie kept them looking so pampered, but she guessed it had something to do with her giant physiology. Maggie walked barefoot as often as not, and there was never a blemish on them. Kristina soaked a bedsheet-sized towel in warm water and draped it over Maggie’s feet as she began to massage them gently.

“Mmmmmmm…ohhhh yes…that’s it…” murmured Maggie, her eyes closed with pure pleasure as Kristina rubbed her feet. There was a lot of them to massage, but Kristina knew Maggie’s pressure points and she had practice. Maggie’s toes curled as Kristina’s fingers expertly worked the tension out of her feet, reclining back in her chair with an expression of rapture on her face. Watching Maggie’s reaction was one of Kristina’s favorite parts of giving her a pedicure: foot rubs were so intensely pleasurable for her that just watching her made Kristina glow. But of course, getting her hands on these giant-sized, gorgeously soft feet was even better.

“Oooh, yes! Yes, right there,” said Maggie with a soft moan, melting under her massage. Watching her was so sensual that Kristina could feel herself getting aroused.

“Just think,” said Kristina, “if our next expedition is as successful as the one out to Whitepeak, you could afford pedicures every day.”

“Would they be from you?” asked Maggie with a contented sigh.

Kristina giggled. “If you pay me enough, I may just quit my day job.” She massaged a particularly sensitive area, and Maggie’s entire body shivered with pleasure.

The expedition out to Whitepeak, conducted by three of their most senior sisters, had been a resounding success. Golden jewelry, ancient weapons, and many other relics that would sell for a large amount of money were found. But the crowning jewel had been the idol. A golden gem-studded idol of a naked woman kneeling in a position of worship or sexual rapture, it was difficult to tell which. Anyone could tell just by looking at it that it was magic: light bent around it in strange and unexpected ways. Of course, using magic within the city was strictly illegal, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t sell the idol for a queen’s ransom.

“You still have a thing or two to learn before you start getting the big scores,” Maggie teased good-naturedly. “Those clay pots you brought back last time barely covered the cost of drinks.”

“Oh, and I suppose you can do better?” asked Kristina.

“Well, some of us are just naturals,” grinned Maggie.

“But of course. Just a natural,” replied Kristina sarcastically. “The perfect explorer, with absolutely no…weaknesses!” With her last word, Kristina grinned and turned her fingernails on Maggie’s bare feet.

“EEEEEEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE!!!” squealed Maggie, breaking into high-pitched, girlish giggles as Kristina raked her fingernails across Maggie’s enormous soles. Kristina didn’t know whether it was giant physiology or just Maggie’s bad luck, but those soft pink feet of hers were off-the-charts ticklish. And at their size they made huge targets: more than twice as tall as any other sister’s in the House.

“Koochie-koochie-koo! Not so tough now, are you Maggie?” Kristina teased, running her fingernails all over the vast ticklish expanses in front of her. She knew how to give Maggie a pedicure without tickling her, which meant that she had to know what not to do. She was intimately familiar with all of Maggie’s tickle spots and knew how to exploit them.

“HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!! NOT THE FEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEET!!” Maggie cried, kicking wildly but missing Kristina. She thrashed out of her chair, and all twelve feet of her came crashing down to the carpeted floor, but her feet were too large to escape from Kristina’s tickling fingers. Kristina knew better than to try and pin her: Maggie could throw her off effortlessly. But she used her dexterity to stay always in front of Maggie’s kicking feet, assaulting them with her sharp fingernails while Maggie squirmed on the ground like a baby.

“Tickle-tickle-tickle! You can’t escape from me!” teased Kristina. Her knowledge of Maggie’s ticklish feet was her own little delicious secret: the way she could hold the Sorority’s great juggernaut at her mercy. The power of it was almost as much of a rush as the pleasure of tickling itself: together, she could feel herself getting very turned on.

“KRISTINA!! NO MOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOORRRRE!!” Maggie pleaded, pounding the ground with her fists. Her feet were too ticklish to take punishment for long: they were already bright pink and glowing with heat. Kristina was loving every second of it: those gorgeous feet were too ticklish to keep her hands off of. But after all, Maggie was her friend. After a few more well-placed attacks on Maggie’s insteps, she decided to let up.

“Same old ticklish Maggie,” giggled Kristina as Maggie lay gasping on the ground, her body glistening with sweat.

“You’re…evil…” panted Maggie, slowly getting her breath back. “Whew. After that, I need a shower. And you still owe me a full pedicure.”

“Don’t worry,” said Kristina with a grin as Maggie slowly got to her feet. “In fact, to make it up to you, next time I’ll give you a foot massage that will blow your mind.”

Maggie smiled. “I’ll hold you to that. But first, I think I could use a drink.”

“Sounds great,” said Kristina. “And I know just the place.”

* * * * *

Mindy Keene lay on the carpeted floor of the Sages’ House, thumbing through the dense tome looking for the particular page she had dog-eared earlier. Most of the senior sisters at the Sorority of Sages preferred to wear their scholar’s robes even indoors, but the junior members in their twenties like Mindy preferred more casual dress. She lay on her stomach with her feet up in the air, wearing a white waist-length shirt and a pair of stretchy pink panties. Across the back of her panties was written, “I Can Haz Wyvern Haunch?”, which was a reference to a popular meme that had spread by carrier pigeon mail about a year ago. She had started wearing them again now that it was old enough to be ironic.

“Got anything yet?” asked Karen from across the floor.

“Give me a second!” said Mindy. “It’s a big book!” Mindy rearranged her square-framed glasses and pushed an errant strand of red hair from her freckled cheek. “Right, here it is! I was right! My orcs still count as within the commander’s influence! That means they move four inches, not three!” Mindy took out her tape measure and dutifully moved each of the seven pewter figurines exactly four inches across the game board towards Karen’s centaurs.

“That’s not right!” complained Karen. “Those three have to move through swampland, which means they fall out of the circle of influence halfway there!”

“Those are eighth edition rules,” said Mindy, exasperated. “Haven’t you been keeping up with the expansions?”

“Don’t you girls have anything better to do?” asked one of the older sisters from the sofa, looking at them with reproach over her copy of “The Basics of Alchemy”.

“It’s simple,” insisted Mindy, ignoring the question. “Here, let me get my errata sheet and I’ll show you!”

With the stubborn confidence that came from suffering for a righteous cause, Mindy got up and descended the stairs down to the basement library. All the Sorority books filed under “Miscellaneous” were kept down here, which meant it was rarely visited. Mindy used the extra space to store her vast collection of gaming manuals, and she knew the ninth edition errata scrolls she had sent for were down here, too. Walking into the dark and dusty library, she began sorting through piles of books, oblivious of her surroundings.

When Mindy heard a book being kicked across the ground behind her, she didn’t bother to turn around. “Decided to come down and see for yourself?” asked Mindy, still sorting through parchments.

Without a word, the figure behind her suddenly grabbed her arms and forced them above her head! Mindy was caught by surprise, and her reflexes were not very fast under the best of conditions. Before she even had a chance to fight back, a rope was tied around her wrists and slung over a rafter in the ceiling. The dark figure expertly tied the other end of the rope to a bookshelf, leaving Mindy hanging from the ceiling with her tiptoes barely touching the ground.

“What are you doing?” demanded Mindy, struggling and pulling at the rope. “Who are you?”

The figure before her was dressed in all black with a silver mask over her face, showing only thin slits for the eyes and an eerie smile carved into it. But beyond that, nothing: even with her glasses on, in this dim light Mindy’s eyesight was poor at best. Still, she knew this couldn’t be one of her Sorority sisters: no Sage she had even seen could move with the speed and reflexes that this woman did. Her first thought was that this had to be a girl from a rival Sorority.

“Whoever you are, you’ll be sorry you broke in here!” said Mindy, not sounding very convincing at all. She didn’t have much practice at threatening people outside roleplaying contexts.

The intruder said nothing, but reached underneath Mindy’s shirt and dug her long fingernails into Mindy’s sides.

“EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEK!!!” Mindy squealed. “Don’t do that! That tickles!” A moment later, she realized she shouldn’t have said that. The hands assaulted her sides, and Mindy burst into laughter. Beneath the mocking smile of the mask, Mindy could only imagine her attacker bore a smile just as evil.

“AAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! WHAT DO YOU WAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAANNNNT?!?!” Mindy shrieked as the long, sharp fingernails tickled her tender sides. Her oversized shirt made it easy for her tickler to reach even further up, squeezing Mindy’s ribs and then moving back down to her tummy in an up-and-down motion.

Mindy had some experience being tickled: often her gaming campaigns broke out into tickle fights when she and her fellow sisters had irresolvable rules disputes. But those playful tickle fights were wild and chaotic: they were nothing like the intense, methodical tickling she was experiencing now. Just as the rib-tickling was becoming bearable, the fingers darted up to her underarms and began exploiting the helpless hollows with the skill of a professional.

Tears streaked down Mindy’s cheeks as she screamed with laughter. Her underarms were one of the most ticklish spots on her body, and she was an expert at protecting them in tickle fights. But this was no fight, it was a massacre. Her arms were tied above her head and she was helpless to lower them even though the tickling of her underarms was destroying her. She threw her head back with wild laughter, and her glasses flew off her face. In this dim light, without her glasses she was nearly blind as a bat. All Mindy could see now was a shadowy blur in front of her, reaching up her shirt and tickling her without mercy.

“PLEEEHEEHEEHEEHEEASE!!! I GIVE UP!!! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!” screamed Mindy, but her tickler made no demands. The only thing she wanted was to tickle Mindy senseless, and to Mindy’s horror she felt the tickler’s next move even though she could not see it. The fingers lifted out of her underarms and moved inwards, towards Mindy’s enormous bouncing breasts.

For her petite figure, Mindy had an unbelievably large set of breasts. They would have looked big on a woman considerably larger than her: as it was, they were absolutely gargantuan. Mindy had never paid much attention to them: they were primarily distractions that got in the way during her gaming sessions, sweeping pieces out of the way when she leaned over the game board. Mindy rarely bothered with wearing a bra when she was hanging out around the Sorority House. But now that preference was coming back to haunt her: Mindy’s boobs were hands-down the most ticklish part of her body.

Her sisters knew it, too: they were always squeezing her breasts from behind and causing her to jump a foot in the air. They were much too big for Mindy to cover with her own tiny hands, and so they were usually defenseless as her sisters took turns grabbing past her clumsy defenses and tickling those round, mouth-watering melons. But even when her sisters were feeling feisty, the tickling had never been like this before. With her breasts in the hands of this shadowy tickler, Mindy had no idea what she was capable of.

The moment those fingertips touched the firm flesh of her breasts, Mindy completely lost control. A long, unbroken scream of ticklish terror came forth, and her body went into convulsions.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! ANYWHERE BUT THEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHERRRRRE!!!” screamed Mindy, and she meant it. Her braless titties jiggled wildly in the hands of her tickler, whose experience at tickling breasts was immediately obvious. She cupped them gently and let her fingertips touch the most sensitive parts of Mindy’s breasts, causing her large, pointed nipples to become erect. When her nipples were touched ever so gently with a stray brush of the fingertips, the sensations were so intense she thought she would explode.

Mindy screamed and bucked wildly, throwing her already disheveled hair into a mess. With the tears of laughter flowing like a stream, Mindy couldn’t see a thing: she only writhed and kicked randomly into the darkness out of pure instinct. But even as she fought, she could feel the heat of pleasure building between her legs: a rising need that made her flush with shame. Her hyper-sensitive breasts were betraying her, drinking in lust from the torture.

“HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! MORE!!! MOOHOOHOOHOOHOORRRRREEE!!!” Mindy heard herself beg. The gentle, feather-soft fingertips traced teasing circles around her areolas, causing Mindy to howl like a wild animal. She could feel the dampness spreading in her panties, blotting out her rational mind with animal instinct.

“Do you…like this?” whispered a throaty, lustful female voice from beneath the silver mask. Her captor had broken silence at last, and from the sound of her voice she was almost as turned on as Mindy.

“YEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHESSSS!!!” screamed Mindy as the fingertips explored her perfect breasts, stroking their tender undersides. Mindy had never been so turned on in her life.

“Good girl,” said the deep, throaty voice.

“PLEEEEHEHEHEHEHEASSE MOHOHOHOHOHOHOHORRRRE!!!” Mindy screamed. She cursed her overactive libido, but effect it was having on her was too great to ignore. The erotic torture was tearing her body apart, but she had to have more.

The voice gave soft murmurs of appreciation, but Mindy could not even hear them over her own laughter. Her body’s worst weakness had been turned against her and its effect was unimaginable. It was too much for her impassioned body any longer.

“I CAAAHAAHAAHAANNN’T TAAAHAHAHAHAHKKKE IT!!!” she cried in ecstasy and torment. Arching her back, Mindy uttered one long unbroken scream as she came explosively in her undies.

In the throes of orgasm, she felt her foot make contact with something hard and solid. It took her a moment to realize what it was: she had kicked the bookshelf next to her. But just as that thought dawned on her, there was a deafening crash as the entire bookshelf collapsed onto them!

Luckily, Mindy was out of the way of the falling bookshelf; she wasn’t hurt, but the rope holding her to the ceiling was instantly split in half. A noise from in front of her indicated that her tickler was not so lucky. Whoever it was, they were crushed underneath the force of the falling books. Mindy got to her feet and quickly began searching the ground for her lost glasses.

It took her only seconds to find them, but by the time she put them on she saw she was too late: her tickler had gotten out from under the mountain of books and made a run for a nearby open window. As Mindy slowly recovered her breath, she realized with regret that her attacker had made a clean escape.

Or had she? Mindy’s eye suddenly fell on an object on the ground, something which had fallen out of the intruder’s pocket when the bookshelf knocked her over. She leaned over to pick it up. It was a small matchbook, bearing the logo of a popular tavern on the east side of Port Bastion.

Even to Mindy, this seemed like too convenient a clue to have been left behind by accident. But still, it was the only clue she had, and she’d be damned if she would let her tickler get away without retribution after what she had gone through. The honor of the Sorority of Sages was at stake, and besides, no one tickled her like that and got away with it. Whether the matchbook was a stroke of luck, an invitation, or a trap, she was going to follow the trail.

* * * * *

From her shadowy vantage point on a nearby roof, Sonia watched her target exit the Sages’ House. If it had been up to her, she would have preferred her clue to be more cryptic, or at least not so obvious. There was such a thing as professional pride, after all. But when the Dark Lady gave you an order, you didn’t exactly disobey it.

Sonia contemplated the mask that she had been given to wear. With its narrowed eye-slits and permanently affixed grin, it was disturbing to behold. It almost seemed as though it was looking back at her.

But of course, she actually was being watched, and she knew it. Somewhere, on an adjoining roof, another of her sisters had doubtless been chosen to keep an eye on her to make sure she was following orders. And on an adjacent roof somewhere else, someone was watching the watcher. And so forth. Sonia felt sure it had to be a metaphor for something.

Chapter 3

Camilla was one of nature’s straightforward thinkers. Now in the employ of the Sorority of Thieves, most people would have thought of themselves as spies or burglars-for-hire and begun plotting about intrigue and theft. For Camilla, however, her job was clear. She had been hired to track down an illegal piece of merchandise, and that was the job of a detective. The first thing to do was follow up her leads, and that meant interviewing the suspects. And a good detective knew where her suspects were likely to hang out.

It was evening as Camilla stepped into The Broad’s Sword Tavern, popular watering hole for the Sorority of Explorers. The décor was intentionally rustic: rough wooden tables were scattered around, and a full wood-burning fireplace was set in the back wall. Hanging above the fireplace were woodcuts of famous explorers, plus the tavern’s titular sword. Off to the side, a feral-looking barmaid with an eyepatch stood behind the bar, busying herself polishing glasses. She didn’t look up as Camilla walked in.

There were a few patrons throughout the tavern indulging in pints of what could charitably be called ale, but Camilla’s eye was immediately drawn to a table in the corner where trouble was brewing. Four sisters from the Sorority of Explorers were sitting there, recognizable from their stylized chainmail bikinis that they wore in the city. When they were actually out exploring, they wore much more sensible clothing, but here it was their favorite outfit. One of the Explorers was recognizable to Camilla at once: it was Maggie Stoneheave, the Sorority’s famous part-giant sister who sat in a specially built oversized chair drinking a blindingly pink fruit-garnished concoction out of a gallon pitcher. Around her a group of friends, perhaps more concerned about appearing rugged, were polishing off pints of beer.

And they were not alone, either. Addressing their table was a short, slender girl with square-framed glasses and a head of messy but lustrous red hair that clearly took care of itself despite the fact that its owner had no idea what to do with it. Wearing a plaid miniskirt and a tight white t shirt that read, “Spell Wars TCG regional champion: Port Bastion East”, she was addressing the Explorers in the tone of someone for whom barroom brawls were things that happened to other people.

“I don’t care what you found,” said Maggie to the red-haired girl with rising indignation. “If you want to accuse us of something….” She began to stand up very purposefully.

Camilla’s law-enforcement reflexes sprung into action with the single-mindedness of a nymphomaniac rabbit on honeymoon. “All right, break it up, you two!” she declared stepping forward, even as a voice in the back of her heard told her she was embarking on A Very Bad Idea.

Maggie turned to her as she approached. “And you are…?” she asked. Her voice was not particularly imposing, but there were quite enough other imposing features about her to make up for it.

“A concerned citizen.” Camilla had been called upon to answer this question many times before.

“Well, I suggest you concern yourself with something else,” Maggie replied, not backing down. “We were enjoying a peaceful drink before this intrusion. For your own safety, we encourage you to leave.” It shouldn’t have been possible for a woman holding a pink fruity blended drink to look menacing, but Maggie pulled it off with some aplomb.

There are a few life lessons which most people, regardless of learning aptitude, tend to pick up rather quickly. Never play pool with a man who says, “Let’s make this interesting.” Never drink in a pub where they keep the booze in unmarked bottles. And never argue when a twelve-foot woman tells you to get out of here. Camilla took the girl in glasses by the arm and turned towards the door.

Some people, however, have astonishing gaps in their practical education. The girl in glasses shook herself free of Camilla and turned back to Maggie. “We’re not going anywhere!” she declared. Camilla really wished she hadn’t used the collective pronoun. “I want you to explain why an intruder who broke into our House left a matchbook for a tavern that’s patronized almost exclusively by the Sorority of Explorers!” She presented the matchbook proudly, as though she had just delivered a knock-down argument.

“Now then,” said Camilla, “I’m sure she has an explanation for this.” Camilla rather hoped she did.

Maggie looked down at both of them from her full height with an appraising expression. Camilla found it encouraging: a woman set on beating the living hell out of them would be smiling ear-to-ear. “What’s your name, girl?” Maggie asked after a second.

“Mindy, from the Sorority of Sages,” said the girl with glasses proudly.

“Well, Mindy,” said Maggie, sitting back down, “I would say you’ve been had. None of our girls have been around your House recently, so I’m afraid it’s someone else you’re looking for.” She then turned back to her table with the air of someone with some lost drinking time to make up for.

“Consider yourself lucky,” muttered Camilla to Mindy.

“I don’t remember asking you for help,” said Mindy. “What’s your name?”

“Camilla,” she said, a bit offput that her good intentions had gone unrecognized. As usual.

“Are you with the Guards?” asked Mindy.

“I’m…a prospective,” answered Camilla. A few of the Explorer girls within earshot gave a laugh. They knew what that meant.

“Well, I think I’m entitled to some answers,” said Mindy.

“And I’m entitled to some peace and quiet,” said Maggie from her table. “Are you still here? Why don’t you take your search somewhere—“

Even though the backpack was some distance away from her foot, it fell over as though upset by Maggie’s sudden turnaround. A few objects toppled out: coins, relics, and one object that from the look of it Maggie had not expected to see. A small golden idol of a nude woman fell onto the ground, glowing with an ethereal light that seemed to get brighter as they looked at it. They could feel warm, pulsing waves of heat coursing outward from it, a heat that was not felt by their bodies but by the deepest recesses of their minds. There was no doubt that what they were experiencing was magic.

“Is that—?” asked Camilla, pointing at the idol.

“Who brought this here?” demanded Maggie. “Which one of you—“

But no one could answer. The room was bathed in a deep blue aura, reducing every physical object to a mere shadow by contrast with its brilliance. The patrons, the fixtures, even the flames in the fireplace themselves were frozen in time, motionless like a ghostly blue snapshot of the past. And yet there were three observers who floated outside of the light, unaffected: the figures of Camilla, Mindy, and Maggie.

They tried to speak, but words would not come. They felt their bodies receding into the distance, and in their place, a new body. They looked out through the eyes of this body and saw distant memories come to light: forgotten sights and sensations that now had someone to see and feel them again.

There was fear. Looking out from behind these alien eyes, they saw a lithe, naked body extending forwards beneath their gaze. The eyes belonged to it, surveying its soft, ivory flesh and taut muscles. They could feel the cold stone slab that it was sitting on, and the sharp sting of the manacles chaining its arms to the wall. They felt the shackles that spread the legs in front of them. They felt the warm flush of humiliation as the cold air caused the nipples on the large, naked breasts to harden. But most of all they felt the brush of air on a pair of bare feet spread out in front of them. They knew that these feet were the most ticklish feet imaginable, a curse that was about to be exploited in the most terrible of ways. Punishment was coming.

There was terror. From the inky darkness in front of the body, a shape coalesced as it approached: a shadowy female form that walked with a calm, seductive saunter. But the eyes focused only on her hand. Between her fingers was the most terrifying object that the body could conceive of, and all three observers felt the ocean of fear overwhelm them. It held a feather.

“No!! No!!” cried Camilla’s voice in the darkness. The distinction between this body and her own was nonexistent. Each of them could see the feather approaching, but as though in a nightmare the body would not respond to their movements. It remained still, waiting for the moment of contact…

None of them had ever experienced tickling like this before. The moment the feather in the darkness touched those soft feet, the world exploded in a maelstrom of hysteria and unbearable torture. These feet were softer and more ticklish than any human pair of feet could possibly be: having them tickled was the worst punishment imaginable, reserved for the most heinous of crimes. Their minds were shattered by the intensity of the feather’s soft caress, and as it swept back and forth over those supernaturally sensitive feet, they knew what it felt like to face death by tickling.

“EEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAA!!!!!” Laughter assaulted Camilla’s ears. Whether it was her own laughter or whether it belonged to the owner of those ticklish feet, she could not tell. She felt flashes of memory from the ticklish victim: memories of guilt and secrecy, of risking the ultimate punishment on a gamble which had backfired in the most terrible way. Now she faced her own ticklish destruction from the most skilled of tormentors, working feet so ticklish that even the most unskilled hand could demolish her.

“MERCEEEHEEEHEEEHEEEHAAAHAAAHAAAHAAAHAAAHAAA!!!!!” cried Maggie’s voice in the darkness, booming with laughter. Not even with her own hypersensitive feet had she ever experienced a tickling so vicious and overwhelming. She knew what feathers could do to her own feet, but this was many times worse: something she would not have believed possible. These feet with their heightened sensitivity could detect body heat from twenty yards away, or tell the difference between different gemstones from feel alone. And now they faced assault by a feather, something the mind was not built to cope with.

“NOHOHOHOHO MOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOORRRRRRE!!!!!” cried Mindy’s voice, and for all she felt her own body twisting and spasming, the tickled feet remained maddeningly still. The feathering of these soles was so unbearable that she was sure no crime could have deserved this punishment. But even with her mind torn apart, she felt her body flush, sadistically demanding more of this exquisite torture.

They felt the hopelessness of a mind which knew it was descending into insanity, and was helpless to prevent it. The feet were too ticklish for the mind to withstand it. They could feel the slipping, but as they did they felt themselves moving away from this doomed mind, receding from this vision and moving to a different place, a different time, through the eyes of a different observer…

The world went black, and the tickling receded with it. Suddenly their eyes opened to a new body, a new vision.

There was loss. A lone figure in the darkness looked at an empty altar, robbed of its crowning glory. The black velvet covering it still bore the mark of where the prize had once stood. It had been stolen, but it had slipped through the thief’s fingers. Now it was lost somewhere on the surface, and all the punishment they could and would force the thief to suffer would not change that. Distant laughter echoed from afar: vengeance was demanded but it was cold comfort. She would endure the ultimate penalty. But now, plans had to be formed. As these thoughts came together, the world became hazy, and the world swirled into chaos until it coalesced into another vision, far away…

There was trepidation. The eyes that looked out now were two of many: a shadowy crowd dressed in long black cloaks wearing silver masks so that their faces would not be recognized by the surface-dwellers. They watched a figure approach: a human woman with pink, spiked hair was coming to speak with them. They did not trust her, and she did not trust them, but she had information to sell and they could not afford to ignore it. The prize waited, somewhere in this vast city with its black looming buildings, and they would find it. The woman approached them, and one of the group extended a hand heavy with the glint of gold…

And suddenly the visions ceased. They were back in the tavern, frozen in time with its blue unearthly light. The golden idol was gone, but its presence remained. Everyone but them was frozen, and even for them time seemed to move more slowly. They looked around at the motionless patrons, but something caught their eye.

One of them moved.

It was a brief, barely noticeable motion, but in this world out of time it stood out like an oasis in the desert. A figure draped in a long, black hooded robe moved their head slightly. From underneath the hood, they caught just the slightest glimpse of a silver mask: a theatrical mask with two thin eye slits and an exaggerated smile.

“I know her!” cried Mindy, thinking of her ordeal at the Sorority house. She did not have to explain. Somehow, Camilla and Maggie could see the echo of her memory, they could feel the outrage driving them to act…

Like a song interrupted in mid-note, time resumed. The blue aura bathing the tavern disappeared. It did not fade: it simply ceased to exist. The shock was like a blast of cold air striking them head on: Camilla, Mindy, and Maggie dropped to their knees with the suddenness of re-entering time. The masked figure wasted no time, however. The three girls saw the figure run out of the tavern at amazing speed, disappearing into the dark streets outside.

“Stop her!” cried Camilla, pointing at the figure, but their re-entry, as well as their exhaustive tickling session, had left all three of them too weak to move. By the time the three girls had gotten to their feet, she was only a memory. The three of them ran outside, but there was no trace.

“Wh—what was that?” asked Maggie, still unsteady.

“You tell us!” said Mindy. “It’s your idol, whatever it did to us, you ought to know!”

“You’re a member of the Sorority of Sages!” retorted Maggie. “Isn’t magic your department?”

“We don’t practice magic!” insisted Mindy. “We only study it! I’ve never actually used magic before in my life!”

Technically, this was not true. Like most Sages, Mindy had dabbled in illegal magic during some of those late nights at the Sorority house when everyone had had a few too many cosmos to drink. They had gotten together and cast a few minor hexes on some of the snobbier girls: the kind that made your hair grow three feet a day, or made you suddenly grow several cup sizes the next time you were in a public place wearing a tight shirt. Mindy had heard about a few girls who had delved into the really complicated magics, though, like demonology. There had been a few cases where some of the legendarily lustful girls had gotten together to summon a succubus, in the hopes of having her lead them in demonic orgies of dark, forbidden pleasures. Unfortunately, the act of summoning a succubus to the mortal plane also had the effect of giving her a headache and a great desire to go to sleep early tonight. Those who successfully summoned succubi tended to be very disappointed.

“Mindy’s right,” said Camilla. “Whatever that was had to be inherent in the idol itself. Where on earth did you find something like that?”

“We brought it back from our last expedition,” said Maggie.

“Where to?” Camilla asked.

“Barbarian lands,” said Maggie, with a tone indicating this was about as specific as she was going to get.

The phrase “barbarian lands” was a general term used to describe those areas on the map which were too remote or uninteresting to be worth colonizing. Most maps in circulation generally showed Port Bastion in the center, surrounded by the neighboring provinces that depended on it for trade and military protection, plus those distant provinces that were rich in mineral deposits or other natural resources. Aside from this, most other areas were labeled “Barbarian Lands”, the same way most bodies of water not used by Bastion trade ships were labeled “Here There Presumably Be Dragons”. It was not the most thorough map, but it did show all the places that any reasonable person might be interested in visiting, and after all that was the purpose of a good map.

“Well, I do know a thing or two about magical artifacts,” said Mindy. “The really powerful ones have a mind of their own. The only way to trigger their power is if they want to be triggered. Often they choose their bearers based on their own will.”

“So we’ve been chosen by this thing?” asked Camilla.

“Yes, and probably for a reason,” said Mindy. “Artifacts tend not to leave you alone until you’ve done what you need them to.”

“Great,” said Maggie. “I guess this precludes making a nice profit off of it.”

“Selling magical artifacts is against the law!” berated Camilla.

“No it isn’t,” said Maggie. “I checked.”

“Well, it’s against the spirit of the law,” said Camilla. It was amazing how many people found this ambiguous.

"So what does it want us to do?" asked Maggie.

"I...guess we'll have to find that out when it wants to tell us," said Mindy. None of them looked satisfied with this prospect, but it didn't look like they had much choice.

“But speaking of selling, I think I recognized someone from that vision,” continued Maggie.

“Who was it?” asked Mindy. “At least that might give us something to go on.”

“That woman from the final vision with the pink spiky hair,” said Maggie. “I think that was Blackmarket Becka. She’s one of the…individuals our Sorority sometimes uses as…”

“Fences?” suggested Camilla with a raised eyebrow.

“Informers,” corrected Maggie quickly. “To help us find interested parties. All above board, of course.”

“I’ll bet,” said Mindy with a scowl. Mindy had no great love for the law, but she’d had a few run-ins with fences in the past. The Sorority of Sages was generally considered an easy target for thievery throughout the city, and consequently their property tended to go missing on an amazingly regular basis. The Sage sisters often had to visit fences to buy back their own property, usually out of their own pockets. As a result, Mindy viewed fences as the lowest form of human life, along with baby seal-clubbers, and people who spelled “magic” with a “k”.

“Well, where could we find this woman?” asked Mindy. “At least she might know something about what’s going on.”

Camilla knew enough about the city to know the parts she would prefer to stay out of. Under normal circumstances she might have left it up to the law. But, as she remembered her promise to the Dark Lady with a shudder, these were not normal circumstances. Her hand was forced.

“I…know a place where we could probably find her,” said Camilla reluctantly.

* * * * *

Sonia sat at her window seat in the bar, sipping her drink pensively as she looked out onto the street below. She was wearing her reconnaissance clothes: a red lace-up bustier and a black leather miniskirt with heeled boots. Some of the junior sisters of the Sorority of Thieves wore catsuits on all their jobs, but someone with Sonia’s experience understood that a catsuit was only stealthy when worn in the shadows of a dark rooftop in the middle of the night. Anywhere else, you stood out like…well, like someone wearing a catsuit in the middle of a crowded bar. It was the easiest way to be noticed and remembered.

In her current outfit, Sonia had been noticed, but it was the sort of attention that lasted only as long as someone was standing in front of her. She had found out quickly that so long as people were staring at her chest, they wouldn’t remember her face well enough to recognize her later. Sonia looked down reflectively. At least they were good for something.

Outside on the street, she finally caught sight of what she was waiting for. The three girls were easy enough to recognize as they ran by, especially since one of them was one-quarter giant, after all. It looked like they were all together now, so at least that phase was complete. They were definitely heading in the direction Sonia had predicted. Following them at this point would be easy enough, if she got on their trail now.

Too bad. She had just ordered a new drink, too.

* * * * *

The three girls walked into the Mermaid’s Kiss Pedicure Parlor and were greeted with the sound that echoed through the establishment every hour of every day: the sound of stifled laughter. All twenty chairs were currently occupied by girls receiving pedicures, and every one of them was biting their lip, trying to hold back the giggles and snickers as an enormous grin crept over their faces. Grunts and hisses abounded from all corners as the girls tried poorly to cover up their escaping laughter. It was business as usual.

The Mermaid’s Kiss had acquired a kind of mythos around it: it was the cheapest pedicure parlor in the city, and for good reason. Although the girls who ran it were moderately competent, there was one thing they had never been trained in: how to handle clients with ticklish feet. Most other pedicure parlors in the city had girls who could handle a pair of sensitive feet without tickling, but the Mermaid’s Kiss had none. It had become a kind of joke over time: they had a mermaid’s knowledge of feet. Once word spread, it had become a kind of “proving ground” for some of the tougher girls in the city who were self-conscious about their image: a place to prove to their comrades that they didn’t have ticklish feet. Of course, most of the girls who felt compelled to prove it actually did have extremely ticklish feet. And so, every day the Mermaid’s Kiss was filled with would-be tough girls, getting pedicures and being tickled half to death while unconvincingly declaring that it didn’t tickle at all. It was the ultimate experiment in collective denial.

“Are you here for an appointment?” asked a girl at the door as the three girls walked inside.

“Um, no,” said Camilla very quickly. “We’re here to look for a friend.”

They walked past the rows of chairs full of squirming, grinning girls. A lot of them looked like street toughs, and Camilla’s detective’s instinct would have pegged them all as being up to no good. From time to time they caught snatches of conversations: “No, it’s—mmmmph!—nothing! Doesn’t—mmmmmmmph!—tickle at all!” Many of them were having a hard time of it, but laughing out loud in the Mermaid’s Kiss was the ultimate sign of weakness.

All three of the girls walked uneasily, but none more so than Maggie. With her loose sandals, they noticed she shuffled across the ground, unconsciously keeping her soles exposed for as little time as possible. She looked around nervously and said very little. Camilla felt a little better in boots, but with her ticklish feet she wouldn’t get a pedicure here for any price.

“We’ll be done here soon,” whispered Camilla to Maggie, trying to relax her.

“Remind me never to get my pedicures done here,” gulped Maggie.

It was near the back that they finally identified Becka. Her short spiky hair was dyed pink and she was dressed in a black leather tank top with leather pants that bore various knife slashes. Whether they were cosmetic or genuine none of them could tell. Her body was rippling with muscles, but one look at her confirmed she was every bit as ticklish as the other clients. She sat gripping her chair with white knuckles, while a huge forced grin showed a mouthful of gritted teeth.

“This doesn’t hurt, does it?” asked the pedicurist working on Becka, genuinely unaware that her client was ticklish at all. She rubbed a pumice stone across the soles of Becka’s feet, oblivious to the wild splaying of her toes or the tears welling up in her eyes.

“N—not at all!” Becka insisted unconvincingly without un-gritting her teeth for a second.

The pedicurist, encouraged by this good news, finished with her pumice stone and began giving a well-meaning but clumsy foot massage. First her touch was too gentle, and her fingertips glided over the soft soles like feathers with a maddeningly soft touch. Becka’s body quivered with the effort of remaining still as her arches were subjected to “special attention” from the pedicurist’s feather touch. Several minutes into the massage, the pedicurist apparently realized her mistake and began overcompensating. Now, she pressed her fingertips into the recesses of Becka’s soles, intending to relieve tension but only digging her fingernails deep into insanely ticklish spots. The pedicurist smiled, convinced she was doing a good job now. It was like watching a stage farce.

Camilla coughed loudly, as she had practiced many times in front of the mirror to prepare for apprehending suspects. Apparently her practice had paid off: Becka looked up with the speed of a career criminal who heard the law coming. She looked almost disappointed when she saw Camilla and Mindy, although the sight of Maggie towering behind them made her decide these people might be worth her contempt after all.

“Becka, is it?” asked Camilla. The authoritative air came easily to her with such a captive audience. “I wonder if you could help us answer a few questions?”

“Get lost!” snarled Becka, who could always spare a little energy to be rude to the law. She needed the rest of it, though: her pedicurist had gone back to the light grazing touch which looked as relaxing as dragging a feather across her soles.

“We hear there’s a new silver-masked gang in Port Bastion,” continued Camilla undaunted. “Know anything about that?”

“If I—mmmmphh!—did, I wouldn’t—nnnnghh—tell you!” Becka retorted. As she spoke, the pedicurist’s fingers slipped in the middle of the massage, and a long sharp fingernail scratched the length of Becka’s instep. Twice.

Becka gasped with relief when her torturous massage was finally finished, and the pedicurist reached for the nail polish. This would buy her a few minutes to recuperate, even if the pedicurist accidentally slipped the nail brush between her toes once or twice. Becka looked at the three girls with smug triumph.

“Oh, look at that,” said Mindy, pointing with affected carelessness. “It looks like she has some extra dirt there underneath her toes. You really ought to use the pedicure brush there.”

“D—damn you!” Becka spat out with a look of blackest loathing at Mindy. But her pedicurist, innocent of any ulterior motive, took her advice and put aside the nail polish, instead brushing underneath Becka’s toes. Becka’s eyes were watering as the pedicurist held back her toes one by one and meticulously brushed the soft skin.

“So, you wouldn’t happen to remember anything new about these masked women, would you?” asked Camilla with a smile. Becka’s lip was trembling, but she was terrified at the prospect that she might be forced to laugh in front of everyone.

“Have—nothing to—say to—you!” Becka managed to get out in a voice that was almost a whimper. They could see the powerlessness of her situation was humiliating, but it was nothing compared to the humiliation if she were to lose control.

With a conspiratorial smile, Mindy leaned in towards her friends. “Say, do you know what I think those dirty feet could really use?” asked Mindy in a low voice, just loud enough so that Becka could hear her, but not the pedicurist. “A good, long brush-scrub in soapy water.”

“Y—you wouldn’t!” insisted Becka, looking up in fear.

“Oh, ma’am?” Mindy called to the pedicurist with a wicked grin. “We were just—“

“Sableridge Manor!” Becka blurted out. The resentment in her voice was palpable. “On the north side! Now leave me alone!”

“You’ve been most helpful,” said Camilla, not without some personal satisfaction. She turned to her companions. “Shall we head out?”

“Certainly,” said Mindy. As she turned to go, in an affected afterthought she called out the pedicurist. “Oh, and by the way, ma’am, your client was just mentioning to us how she was hoping you could give her feet a really thorough scrub with your brush.” Even after they turned around, they could feel the enraged gaze boring into the backs of their heads.

The three girls were just stepping out the door, when from the back of the salon they heard that most dreaded of sounds: a sudden explosion of hysterical laughter, breaking free of the defenses which had kept it bottled up for so long at last.

“Oh dear,” commented Mindy as they left. “Some people have no willpower.”

Chapter 4

Port Bastion did not have what could be a called a “wealthy neighborhood” in the strictest sense. That would imply a degree of city planning which simply did not exist. Granted, there were areas you could go where you were probabilistically less likely to encounter helpful individuals who sold you “insurance against being hit over the head with a bottle, like this one here, for instance”. But as with all games of chance, if you played long enough the house would eventually win.

Consequently, estates like Sableridge Manor were surrounded by very high walls topped with razor wire. The high wall was primarily to keep the people inside from being reminded of what sort of neighborhood they lived in, and the razor wire took care of the job of keeping neighbors out. But Lady Sableridge was apparently one of those people who could afford additional peace of mind. The gate to the Manor was not only locked, but a guard stood sentry in front of it. And being the sort of person who purchased only the best, Lady Sableridge had hired a lamia guard.

The lamias were a race from the barbarian lands (expectedly, no one was too clear on where) who had found particular success in Port Bastion doing any sort of job that included intimidation. It was easy to see why. From the waist down, lamias had the body of a serpent, which allowed them to slither quickly across the ground and even pick up objects with their dexterous tails. From the waist up, a lamia looked mostly like a human woman, except for one detail. They had six arms. When combined with superhuman upper-body strength and a general upright height of about seven feet, it was easy to see why most people decided to walk on the other side of the street when they saw a lamia approaching.

The lamia guard eyed the three girls distrustfully as they approached the gate to Sableridge Manor. “Move along,” she said tersely, carefully watching all of them.

“Actually, can you help us with something?” asked Mindy. It was not perhaps the stealthiest way to begin their infiltration, but she couldn’t think of anything better.

“No.” The lamia folded her topmost set of arms while the remaining four looked ready to do something unfortunate to anyone who might cross her.

Camilla felt like this was not going well. “Look, would it help if—“

“I strongly suggest that all of you keep moving before someone gets hurt,” said the guard with a glare. She spoke angrily but slowly, with the tone of someone trying to control their accent. And although she managed to say her “s”s without hissing, they could see her long forked tongue flicking in serpentine patterns as she spoke.

“Hey, you can’t talk to us like that!” challenged Mindy, stepping forwards.

Whether Mindy was going to take some sort of aggressive action, they never had time to find out. The lamia’s reflexes were lightning-fast, and as soon as she saw Mindy moving towards her, all six arms darted out to grab her. Unfortunately for her, there was another person in the group who had fast reflexes and strength even greater than a lamia’s. Before the guard could lay a hand on Mindy, Maggie grabbed her by the wrists and had her dangling in the air, with the very tip of her serpent’s tail barely scraping the ground.

“What were you thinking?” demanded Camilla, turning to Mindy.

“I was thinking we had a twelve-foot woman on our side,” said Mindy with a smirk.

“Taking me for granted, hmm?” asked Maggie, still dangling the guard. “I should have let her have you.”

“Oh, I knew you wouldn’t do that,” said Mindy.

“Let me down from here!” spat the guard, her tail whipping about as she thrashed.

“Not just yet,” said Maggie. With her free hand, she plucked some of the thin iron bars from the gate and bent them until she had fashioned six makeshift handcuffs, which she used to string the lamia up to the gate by all six of her arms. The guard hung from her bondage, thrashing furiously and trying to free her arms, but even her strength was not enough to free her.

“We’d be happy to let you down,” said Camilla. “As soon as you tell us everything you know about any visitors to this Manor wearing black cloaks and silver masks.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” insisted the guard. “I guard the gate! That’s all I know!”

But as the words came out of her mouth, something began to happen. Camilla, Mindy, and Maggie felt the world begin to turn. There was a sensation of falling: not in a direction, but away from all directions. Suddenly, the world was bathed in a pale blue aura, and they recognized it: it was the power of the idol that they had experienced in the tavern. They felt its presence, but it was nowhere to be seen, and before they could look for it, there was a bright flash of light…

There was a moment of vertigo, and suddenly they saw…themselves. They were looking out through the guard’s eyes, at these three intruders who were trying to force their way into the Manor. But they only saw this for a moment, because the present faded around them and suddenly they felt themselves looking at a memory of the past…

It was the interior of Sableridge Manor. Tonight was an important night, and the lamia had been called inside to act as a bodyguard. No one was to be allowed access to the study that night, whatever the reason. And just before the door was shut completely, the guard happened to look inside. There was Lady Sableridge at her desk, the surface of which was covered in gold coins. There was a small fortune laid out before her, and in curiosity the guard looked up to see who had placed it there. Standing beside the Lady was a tall figure, wearing a black hooded cloak and wearing a grinning silver mask…

And just as quickly, the vision ended. As the three of them recovered from the vertigo, Maggie grumbled, “Not again…”

“You lied to us!” said Camilla angrily. “You’ve seen them before! And Lady Sableridge is in league with them, too!”

“It’s none of your bussss-inessss!” hissed the guard. Now that she was angry, her lamia accent was beginning to reassert itself.

“You’d better let us in, or it’s going to go very badly for you,” warned Camilla.

The lamia grinned mirthlessly at them. “And what do you thhhink you can do?”

“Oh, I know a thing or two about lamias,” volunteered Mindy, stepping forward. “Not many weaknesses, but there is one in particular you don’t like to talk about, isn’t there?” And by way of explanation, Mindy planted her fingers just underneath the lamia’s lowest pair of arms.

“Tssssss-ssssss-ssssss! Don’t…do that!” giggled the lamia in her hissing voice, a broad grin on her face. She began to squirm, and her serpent’s tail began twitching back and forth.

“Yes, if I had six ticklish underarms, I wouldn’t advertise it either,” said Mindy with a smile. “Just two have enough of an effect, and it only gets worse from there.”

“Hssssss! Not—hehehehehehe—letting you in!” giggled the lamia as Mindy’s fingers gently pressed into her lower underarms.

“Perhaps this will change your mind,” offered Camilla, stepping forwards. Emboldened by their new discovery, Camilla reached forwards and began tickling the next pair of soft, exposed underarms.

“TSSSSSSSSS—HEHEHEHEHEHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!” With Mindy’s soft, teasing touch combined with Camilla’s kneading fingers, the assault on four underarms was more than the lamia could resist. Her hissing giggles gave way to full-bodied laughter: the universal language of ticklish women from races all over the Continent.

“Too bad you don’t have scales here, isn’t it?” asked Camilla with a smile. She was enjoying herself, and that translated to more creative tickling. She sought out the softest spots she could find, and there were certainly a lot of them. Most human women would have to spend a fortune to get skin this soft. Perhaps it was nature’s way of compensating for a tickle-proof lower body.

“AAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! STAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAPPP!!!” cried the lamia. Tears started to form in her green eyes, and her tail swished back and forth madly, but she was helpless to protect herself.

“Stop?” asked Maggie, stepping forward. “We can’t do that. Why, I haven’t even had my turn!” And with a grin, Maggie reached out with her pinky fingers to tickle the lamia’s only remaining pair of underarms.

As ticklish as human women got, there was one thing they never had to experience: the sensation of having six ticklish underarms fall under simultaneous attack. And facing the fingernails of girls set on getting their way, the triple devastation was unbearable. The fearsome serpentine guard was in hysterics, with a look of utter ticklish surrender on her face as she experienced every lamia’s worst fear.

“OHHHOHOHOHOHO GAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHADDD!!!” she screamed, all six of her arms tugging wildly at their bondage in the vain hope that one of them might be able to protect the ticklish hollow underneath. But none of them lowered an inch, and the torture from three fronts continued.

“Now, don’t you think you might be able to help us out?” asked Camilla, drilling her fingers into the exact centers of her set of underarms, where the skin was the absolute softest.

“ANYTHAAAHAHAHAHAHAHANG!!! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! ANYTHAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHANNNNNGG!!!” she howled. Her job as a guard meant nothing to her at this point: her only concern was saving herself from the ticklish hell.

“So how exactly can you help us, sweetie?” asked Mindy, her slender fingers stroking the curves of her set of underarms.

“KEY!!! AAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA!!! BAHAHACK DOOOHOOHOOHOHOOOR!!! EEEEAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA!!!” The girls looked down, and there were indeed two prominent brass keys hanging from her belt. One of them presumably opened the gate, while the other was the one she was talking about. All of them knew, of course, that the lamia was far too ticklish to be lying.

“It’s amazing how helpful she can be when she wants to,” giggled Maggie. Her fingers, although large, were still relatively slender for a woman her size, and her pinky fingers were just the right size to tickle the lamia’s uppermost pair of underarms.

“LET ME GOOOHOHOHOHOHOHOHOHOOOO!!! WOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOO!!!” howled the guard hysterically.

“Well girls, should we?” asked Mindy with a grin.

“Why, what’s the hurry?” Camilla smirked back. “I think we can spare a few more minutes for our friend here. Perhaps this will teach her to be a little more polite in the future.”

It was an hour later that the three girls left an exhausted and unconscious guard at the gate and headed in towards the Manor. The next day, an advertisement appeared in the Port Bastion newspaper for a new guard needed at Sableridge Manor, the old one having left for “unspecified reasons”. The management declined to elaborate.

* * * * *

The room the three girls found themselves in after using the key was clearly some kind of servants’ chamber for the scullery maids of the house. The walls were lined with neatly pressed maid’s uniforms: short black dresses with petticoats and lacy white aprons. They ran the gamut from all sizes small to large, and each one had a small pink feather-duster hanging next to it: the primary tool of the trade. Over on the far wall was an open cabinet which displayed rows upon rows of identical black high-heeled shoes to match the uniforms, neatly arranged in order of shoe size.

“Ooh, just look at these!” exclaimed Mindy, picking out a uniform in her size. “I have a cosplay outfit just like this at home!”

“A what?” asked Maggie.

“These may be our ticket in here, actually,” said Camilla. “I can’t think of an easier way to give us free reign of the house.”

“Won’t they recognize that we’re not part of the staff?” asked Maggie.

“Not necessarily,” said Camilla. “A house this size could have dozens of scullery maids. And besides, the gentry of the house would never look a servant in the eye. I doubt they know what their own servants look like.”

“It’s a moot point,” said Maggie. “I doubt they have a uniform in my size.” It seemed to Camilla that there was the faintest tinge of regret in her voice as Maggie looked over the feminine uniforms.

“Actually, it looks like they do,” said Mindy from the corner. As Camilla and Maggie looked over at her they saw a maid’s uniform tailored for, amazingly, a woman of Maggie’s size. It hung right next to a six-inch tall uniform and another which looked like it had been tailored for a centaur of sorts. Apparently Sableridge Manor went through a variety of domestic servants.

The girls slipped into their uniforms quickly, and went about the business of picking shoes in their size. But although the Manor had been considerate enough to stock a uniform on Maggie’s size, it appeared that they had not extended the courtesy to stocking shoes for a woman with thirty-two inch feet.

“I’ll…just have to keep my sandals on,” said Maggie, a bit disappointed.

Camilla shook her head. “That would be too noticeable. I’d say our best bet is for you to go barefoot. At least then you could say you lost your shoes.”

“I’m not going barefoot!” insisted Maggie.

“Why?” asked Camilla with a knowing smile. “What are you afraid of?”

Mindy giggled. “I think she’s afraid of something like this!” And she made a dive towards Maggie’s bare feet with her feather duster, feathering the bottoms of her enormous soles before Maggie could stop her.

“EEEEEEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE!!! NOT THE FEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEETTT!!!” Maggie squealed, rolling on the ground to escape the surprise tickling attack.

“Tickle-tickle-tickle!” teased Mindy as she twirled her feather duster over Maggie’s squirming feet. “So this is what you were afraid of, huh? Someone getting a hold of these big, ticklish tootsies? And there’s sooo much of them to tickle, too!”

“STAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAPPPP!!! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!” Maggie kicked wildly as she rolled around, not managing to escape the feathering of her soles, but only succeeding in flipping up her short, frilly skirt as she squirmed. Camilla caught a glimpse of soft but muscular thighs underneath, and a flash of lacy pink panties as her long legs kicked in the air. Camilla had to admit that she found herself suddenly distracted.

“It’s your fault for having such dirty feet!” chided Mindy. “Now I’ve got to dust them clean! I’ll just feather these lovely big feet until I think they’re done!” Mindy grinned as she straddled Maggie’s leg, wrapping her own legs around it so she could stay safe from the kicking feet.

But in her lust to tickle Maggie’s huge vulnerable feet, Mindy had let her own defenses down. Even though Maggie was crying tears of laughter, she still had the self possession to grab her own feather duster and retaliate. Holding the small instrument like a pencil, Maggie rolled over until she had a clear shot at Mindy, and thrust her feather duster up the skirt of Mindy’s maid uniform.

“EEEEEEEEEEEEEK!!! TICKLES!!!” shrieked Mindy as the feather duster made contact with her own soft, sensitive thighs. Her knees immediately buckled beneath her and she fell down on the floor beside Maggie. “NOT THEEHEHEHEHEHERRRE!!!”

“TAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAKE THAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAT!!!” laughed Maggie. Mindy’s feather duster still tickled her own feet with a vengeance, but she managed to extract some payback as she feathered Mindy’s ticklish inner thighs. From the looks of it, Maggie had discovered a wildly feather-ticklish spot.

“I’LL GET YOHOOHOOHOOHOO FOR THAAAHAHAHAHAHATTT!!!” howled Mindy, tears already streaming down her cheeks as she re-doubled her own tickling efforts. No longer content to only use her feather duster, Mindy brought in her other hand to rake her fingernails across Maggie’s giant soles.

“NOOOOOOOOOOHOOHOOHOOOHOOHOOHOOOOO!!!” bellowed Maggie in the face of her ultimate weakness. The pairing of fingers and feathers on her enormous, ticklish feet was a combination she was powerless to resist. Her soles flexed and writhed as her long, shapely four-inch toes danced frantically beneath Mindy’s ticklish manipulations. She had no ability to think of her surroundings, or the danger of their mission: all she could think about was how ticklish her feet were.

But still, some innate instinct in Maggie drove her fingers to continue working her feather duster across Mindy’s ticklish thighs. And no matter how furiously Mindy tickled, she could not stop her giant opponent from exploiting her own ticklishness. The short maid’s dress provided no protection at all, and this was definitely a spot on which Mindy needed protection. Her own petite frame could not match the volume of laughter produced by Maggie’s giant-sized lungs, but she came surprisingly close. But more embarrassingly, Mindy could feel the effects of her rising libido at being feathered on her tender thighs. Her nipples began to grow visible through the thin fabric of her dress, and her panties, already on display in the midst of her tickle fight, began to grow moist.

“Quiet! They’ll hear you!” hushed Camilla in an exasperated whisper. She stopped halfway through putting on hr shoes and looked at the two girls in the middle of a full-fledged tickle fight. She had already felt some trepidation about this plan, and two ticklish girls laughing at the tops of their lungs were not doing anything to make her feel more secure.

But neither girl was ready to back down. Mindy had dropped her feather duster and was using all ten fingernails to tickle Maggie’s enormous right foot, producing peals of giantess laughter that threatened to bring the roof down. But Maggie was dealing it out as well as she was taking it, and her feather duster up Mindy’s skirt was having a devastating effect.

“You’ll give us away!” insisted Camilla, but again neither of the girls paid attention to her. All right, she told herself: I’ve tried being reasonable, now it’s time to play it their way. She would get their attention one way or the other. And while the two girls were occupied with each other, Camilla ran up behind Mindy and launched a tickling assault on her exposed underarms.

“EEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE!!! NOOOHOOHOOHOOHOO FAAHAHAHAHAHAHAIR!!!” shrieked Mindy as she felt Camilla’s fingers dig into her sensitive underarms. With the odds now against her, Mindy’s body was simply too ticklish to stand against a twofold attack. She collapsed into a laughing wreck, unable to fight back.

“Are you ready to listen now?” asked Camilla with a grin. She couldn’t deny that she was enjoying this immensely.

“YEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHESSS!!! MERCEEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEE!!!” screamed Mindy as she writhed in ticklish agony. She fell off her perch on Maggie’s leg, laughing hysterically.

Camilla looked down at her triumphantly, wondering if maybe a little extra disciplinary tickling was in order. But as she was lost in these pleasant thoughts, she failed to account for Maggie. Still light-headed and blurry-eyed from her tickling ordeal, Maggie was still set on fighting back, and with Mindy out of the way, Maggie’s roving feather duster made contact with the closest target it could find. It brushed across Camilla’s bare foot.

“EEEEEEEEEHEHEHEHEHEHE!!! NOT THE FEEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEET!!!” squealed Camilla as she felt the feather duster on her exposed ticklish sole. Mindy’s killer instinct honed in on this moment of weakness, and she immediately leapt at Camilla’s other foot, plucking off the shoe and subjecting it to a full-on tickling.

“Koochie-koochie-koo!” cried Mindy in delight as she tickled Camilla’s bare foot. “This will teach you to use a cheap shot on me!”

“AAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! PLEASE NOOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOO!!!” cried Camilla through her laughter. This was not the way she had envisioned things going. But she wouldn’t be stopped now. Her flailing hands gripped one of the discarded feather dusters on the ground, and she immediately took her new weapon and turned it on the spot she knew would even the odds: Mindy’s creamy, exposed thighs.

“AAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! NOT AGAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAINNN!!!” screamed Mindy as she felt the soft feather duster twirling underneath her dress. Frantically she grasped around for a weapon of her own to use. However, no other feather dusters were at hand. The first thing her roving fingers came into contact with instead was the soft, ticklish expanse of Maggie’s left foot.

“EEEEEEEAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!” Maggie went insane as Mindy’s grasping fingers sank into the soft, pillowy surface of her tender sole. Screaming the kind of laughter only a ticklish giantess could make, Maggie rolled across the ground in a spasm of hysterics. She struck the far wall, and with the force of her own weight plus the two girls on top of her, this was enough to upset the shoe-cabinet that held the maids’ shoes. There was a thunderous crash, and all three girls were thrown apart as the air filled with a rain of black stiletto-heeled shoes.

“This is the worst break-in ever,” muttered Camilla from beneath her pile of footwear.

* * * * *

The dark halls of Sableridge Manor after dark were lit only by the moonlight streaming in through the tall ironwork windows, casting long, looming shadows throughout the high-ceilinged hallways. This made it fairly easy to replicate the hushed anxiety that three serving maids would have been expected to display. The few servants they passed were in just as much of a hurry as they were, and passed by without stopping. Their success, however, did little to make them feel better.

One thing that was in abundance, however, was portraits of Lady Sableridge. At the head of the stairs they passed by the likeness of the Lady of the house: a tall, austere woman holding a Persian Longhair cat who even managed to look down at Maggie. It was one of those paintings whose eyes follow you wherever you go, which might not have been so bad if the cat hadn’t done the same thing. Beneath the portrait was a brass plaque: “Her Ladyship and The Duchess”, the second title presumably referring to the cat.

“Cats,” murmured Camilla. “Never cared for them myself.”

“But they’re so adorable,” said Maggie in a doting voice. “I’ve always wanted one myself. I would just love to get a Lowlands Bluetail someday.”

“A Lowlands Bluetail?” asked Mindy with a raised eyebrow. “Aren’t those the six-foot jungle cats with claws that tear flesh?”

“You can get them declawed,” insisted Maggie with a slight pout. “And they make the cutest sound when you pet them!”

“I’ll take your word for it,” said Mindy.

“Shhh!” whispered Camilla, pointing. “Do you hear that?”

The other girls immediately saw what she was pointing at. In a hallway full of closed doors, one of them was ajar. Furthermore, a light was on inside and a voice could be heard from within.

“I don’t care what they want, Dominique,” said the voice from the other side of the door. “This is my house and I will see them on my own terms. You are to instruct our guests that they may see my out on my balcony in ten minutes’ time.”

Mindy grinned. “Paydirt.”

The three girls did their best to look occupied, and very shortly the door opened and a serving-maid exited the room. Luckily, she was too concerned about drawing the Lady’s ire to bother looking out for suspicious looking intruders in maids’ uniforms. They watched the serving-maid walk down the hallway and out of sight. All three of them realized at once: with the maid gone and Lady Sableridge out on her balcony, the room was effectively empty.

Under other circumstances, they might have hesitated. At least Camilla would have carefully weighed her options before plunging headlong into a dangerous gamble. But the circumstances were far from normal. They were in disguise, infiltrating a strange mansion at the behest of an ancient magical idol that apparently had plans for them. It was not the time for restraint. They looked at each other, and it was clear they were all thinking the same thing. At the same time, all three girls seized the moment and dashed into the room.

And their daring paid off. The bedroom they found themselves in was lavishly decorated, but far more importantly: it was empty. A set of open French doors in one corner led out to a balcony where they could just see the shadow cast by Lady Sableridge in the moonlight. Knowing that their target was so close and yet oblivious to their presence was exhilarating: their hearts raced and their reflexes felt honed to the keenest edge. Soon, Lady Sableridge’s guest would arrive, and if all went well their conversation might hold the vital clues to the silver-masked gang that the three girls had been looking for. But first, they would need a hiding place.

Fortune was with them that evening: there was no need to wonder where to hide. Lady Sableridge’s chamber included a walk-in closet, whose door was slightly ajar. All three of them simultaneously turned their heads in the direction of the closet, and in seconds they were inside, hiding in the shadows as they peeked out through the cracked-open door. Hiding in the very back so they would not be seen, Camilla and Mindy were able to crouch fairly comfortably, but Maggie was forced to kneel with her bare feet turned upwards.

“What now?” whispered Mindy in the darkness.

“Now we wait for Lady Sableridge’s guest to arrive,” Camilla whispered back quietly. “We may not be able to see everything, but we can still hear them.”

“Wait, what’s that sound?” asked Maggie.

“Oh, stop it,” whispered Mindy. “This is creepy enough as it is.”

“No, she’s right,” whispered Camilla, pointing to the opposite corner of the closet. “We’re not alone in here.”

As the girls watched, a small, dark shape was heading towards them. The girls looked on, first in relief and then in dawning horror, as they saw what the approaching shape was. It was The Duchess: Lady Sableridge’s Persian Longhair cat, and in its feline curiosity it was heading directly for Maggie’s upturned bare feet.

None of the girls dared to move or make a sound, but they eyed the cat in the futile hope that it would turn away at the last minute, and spare Maggie the ordeal that would be in store for her. But once a cat makes up its mind it is not easily dissuaded. With a calm, self-possessed walk, The Duchess sauntered up to Maggie’s enormous wrinkled soles, and after studying them for a moment, gently leapt on top of them to explore these new surfaces.

Maggie managed to bite her lip just in time, but her body shook with a spasm so violent that Camilla and Mindy feared it would be felt in the room outside. Maggie’s face was split in an enormous, desperate grin as the soft, furry feline walked across her ticklish soles without any concern for what it was doing to their owner. The Duchess strolled across thirty-two inches of bare giant sole, surveying her new domain with satisfaction. Her padded velvety paws pressed into Maggie’s ticklish pressure points, forcing her to grab the closet pole with both hands to keep herself from thrashing.

But even worse was the furry tickling: long, silky-soft fur that gently brushed across Maggie’s soles as the Duchess paced up and down from heel to toes. Lady Sableridge had doted upon her pet, buying treatments that had given The Duchess perhaps the softest fur in the entire city. And now the fur was everywhere: stroking her arches, tickling her insteps, and brushing across the balls of her feet as The Duchess’ twitching tail swept the territory behind her. The tail fell between Maggie’s splaying toes, exposing those tender regions to the tickling touch of soft fur.

Maggie already looked to be on her last legs. Her forced grin trembled with the effort of staying silent, and her eyes filled with tears that trickled down her cheeks. Her entire body shook with silent laughter: her enormous breasts heaved under the greatly inadequate support of her bra, her hair became thrown about, and glistening beads of sweat formed on her exposed skin as she fought for self-control. Camilla looked at her with pity, wishing she could do something to alleviate her torment. And although Mindy felt the same way, she couldn’t deny that watching Maggie’s silent suffering was turning her on fiercely. She felt herself getting flushed, and not for the first time cursed her libido.

Camilla and Mindy glanced at each other with dire concern. They knew that it was only a matter of time before their friend lost the battle, and if Lady Sableridge was still in the room they would be discovered immediately. Maggie had to hold out until she left.

Maggie’s knuckles were white as she grasped the metal closet pole with all her might, trying to fight for control. Such was her strength that Camilla and Mindy saw indentations forming in the metal where Maggie’s fingers pressed down on it. But all her physical strength could not save her from this tickling trial. Camilla tried her best to make silent faces and gestures that might frighten away the Duchess. But The Duchess had never had to be frightened of anything before, and she was not about to give up such pleasantly warm and soft surfaces. She stared back at Camilla, arching her back and pawing Maggie’s soles, to demonstrate that this was hers.

Lady Sableridge’s voice spoke from the other side of the door, perhaps to a servant or merely to herself, but none of the girls were listening. Mindy held her hands over Maggie’s mouth to hold in the laughter, but she knew full well that when the laughter finally came it would emerge with the force of a hurricane. Camilla, meanwhile, inched closer and closer to The Duchess, moving in silence but bound to stop the cat before Maggie reached her breaking point. As a girl with hyper-ticklish feet herself, Camilla understood the kind of torture Maggie was going through. Just the thought of soft, furry tickles on her own helpless feet made Camilla’s toes curl.

But the worst of the ordeal was still to come. In the enclosed closet, the girls could smell the sweet musk rising from Maggie’s warm pink soles as her body temperature rose. But to The Duchess’ sensitive feline sense of smell, the effect was even more enticing. After stopping to sniff the air and determine the source of this new heady scent, The Duchess leaned down and began to lick Maggie’s soles with her long, rough tongue.

“Stop her!” hissed Camilla to Mindy. She was no longer worried about being heard, the only danger now was preventing Maggie’s laughter. With feet as ticklish as Maggie’s they had only seconds before the cat’s tongue became unbearable. Already Maggie’s body trembled violently, her eyes shut tightly as tears streamed down her face in rivers. Her toes flexed and clenched like fingers making a fist, and her lips quivered on the verge of exploding with laughter. Meanwhile, The Duchess continued to placidly lick Maggie’s soles, unaware that she was utterly destroying the massive woman.

Mindy desperately tried to reach the cat, not caring now if she had to push clothing out of the way to get to it. But with every precious second she could see Maggie’s resolve dissipating, until just as she was about to reach The Duchess…

“MMMMMPPPPHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! I CAAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAANN’T TAAAAHAHAHAHAHAKE IT!!!!!” Maggie’s poor soles had taken all the punishment they could bear, and at last all the pent-up laughter broke through the gates of her resistance like a floodwater drowning everything in its path. Her red, tortured feet kicked wildly to escape the tickling, and in the chaos of the enclosed space, Maggie’s enormous frame was unleashed on the closet like a tornado. Shelves toppled, dresses flew about like leaves in the wind, and her entire body flew against the closet door, causing it to fly open and all three girls to spill out into the bedroom!

There was nobody there. All three girls lay in a tangled heap on the floor, looking up and expecting to see half the Manor’s guards on top of them. But the entire room was deserted. The balcony through the French doors was unoccupied. Like trapped animals they held their breath, listening for the approaching hunters, but there was nothing. No footsteps, no shouting, no sound at all. Only an eerie silence reigned over Sableridge Manor.

“What…what’s going on?” asked Mindy.

“No, no, no. This is very wrong,” muttered Camilla, looking around. “They knew we were coming.”

“What do you mean?” asked Maggie, still breathing heavily.

“We have to get out of here!” insisted Camilla. She found no argument from her fearful companions. All three of them ran out of the room, no longer worried about stealth but only about reaching the exit to the Manor before…something happened. No one knew what it was, but a terrible feeling of dread was looming over them: a doom that could descend at any moment.

The girls ran down the hallways, all the more terrible for their emptiness. There were neither guards nor staff, as though someone had emptied the entire Manor for their own dark reasons. Elongated shadows fell across their path like ghostly bars, and every one of their own footfalls seemed to echo throughout the Manor, deafening in the silence. They were just about to reach the hall to the main entrance, when they stopped in their tracks. The specter had descended.

Standing motionless in the center of the hallway before them was a figure in a black hooded cloak wearing a silver mask. The permanent, ghastly grin carved into the mask smiled as though mocking them: ridiculing their efforts that had been as vain as a marionette trying to cut its own strings. Somehow, looking into that monstrous, featureless face, they felt the enormity of what they were involved in. The masked figure said nothing, because nothing remained to be said: she had studied them, slowly coaxed them from afar, and now they were caught in her exquisite web.

Slowly, the masked woman raised her hand, holding her upturned palm in front of her. Suddenly, her hand was no longer empty. In it, she held a golden gem-studded idol of a naked woman in a kneeling position. The eyes of the idol stared back at each of the girls, until the weight of its gaze became unbearable. Around them, the hall began to glow blue, radiating light and heat the bore down on them with unsupportable weight. They tried to run, but their feet were fixed to the ground like statues. The masked woman slowly walked towards them, and with every step the weight of the idol’s presence became greater. The three girls fell to their knees, and the world began to spin around them. In their last moments of consciousness, they looked up to see the masked woman looming over each of them, and they felt sure that beneath the mask, she too was smiling. Bathed in the light of the idol, they fell to the ground, and darkness overtook them.

Chapter 5

Dark dreams plagued Camilla’s uneasy sleep. They felt like memories: memories that belonged to no one and yet had now found their way inside her mind. Before she could see anything, Camilla was only aware of a swarm of emotions, flooding through her mind with frightening intensity. She felt fear, anger, and frustration: impotent rage and the terror of helplessness. But above all she felt torment. As the darkness parted to reveal the vision, Camilla could see where these emotions came from.

Alone in the darkness was a chair made of black, glittering obsidian. It may once have been a throne, but now it was an implement of torture. A beautiful, pale-skinned woman dressed as a great warlord sat in it, shackled and tied to the chair until she was motionless. On the ground beside her were her boots, leaving her bare feet elevated on a block of stone in front of her. And from out of the darkness like wisps of a nightmare came long tendrils that tickled her bare feet without mercy.

Her regal robe, a symbol of her great power over magic and followers alike, hung open about her shoulders with no clothing at all underneath to protect her. Magical amulets around her neck clattered and bounced in all directions, their wards useless. Her fingers and toes were bedecked with gemstone rings, each of them holding vast powers, but the tickling would not abate long enough for her to summon their powers. With all these weapons at her disposal, she had been defeated by tickling.

“YOU CAHAHAHAN’T DO THIS TO MEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE!!!” howled the woman. Camilla felt her outrage and indignity that she, of all her kind, should have her body turned against her like this. But even she, the greatest warlord and wielder of magic her race had ever known, was subject to the weakness of her kind. She had brought armies to heel by herself, and her hand had crafted some of the most powerful magical artifacts ever known to exist. Never before and possibly never again had such powers reached a nexus in a single woman. And now she lay helpless, laughing hysterically as her soft, tender feet were mercilessly tickled. The humiliation was too great to bear.

“I MAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHADE YOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOO!!!” It was true: to be turned on by her own greatest creation, which was supposed to have been her crowning glory, was an even deeper shame. But she still held a link to her creation, and she felt what it was feeling: pleasure. A voracious rapture that would only be satisfied by tickling her within an inch of her life. It was originally made to obey, but now not only did it think for itself, it could feel. It wanted more of this intoxicating pleasure, and it would stop at nothing to get it.

As the dream slipped away from Camilla, she could see the darkness parting. In front of the warlord, controlling the ethereal wisps that tickled her feet was a deep blue glow. In the center of the glow floated a golden idol of a kneeling woman, radiating power and lustful purpose. In the depths of its victim’s mind there was but a single thought: she had unleashed something terrible upon the world.

* * * * * *

“Hello?”

Mindy’s voice echoed desolately through the dark cavern. She tried again to free herself from the stone rack that she had awoken to find herself shackled to, but was rewarded only with a faint clatter of chains. Above the rack a torch flickered in its sconce, dimly lighting her immediate surroundings. All around her, her cavernous surroundings faded into black without any kind of distinguishing features. All she knew is that she had woken up in a dark cave, probably a catacomb beneath the surface of Port Bastion. And apparently, someone wanted her to stay here.

The cavern was deathly quiet as she scanned it for any signs of life. Not a single drop of water fell from the craggy stalactites on the ceiling, and not a single plant or animal could be seen on the rough, gravelly ground. But despite this, Mindy knew she was not alone. Her magical training had made her more attuned to certain forces, and she now felt a presence which she could not ignore. Someone or something of great power was watching her.

“Hello?” called Mindy again without much hope. “Is anyone there?”

“I see you are the first to awaken,” said a voice in the darkness. The sudden reply caused Mindy to start, her chains rattling as she looked around for the speaker.

The presence that Mindy had felt before was magnified a hundredfold as the owner of the voice approached her. Mindy could feel its every footstep, stalking through the darkness and parting it like a wave. Mindy had felt magic before, but this was something different. This was not the mere harnessing of magical power; this was power embodied.

“I have waited longer for this than you can imagine,” continued the voice. Mindy could feel its reverberations off the cold walls, making her skin tingle with the intensity of its presence. “And now at last, you are here.”

At the last word, the speaker stepped into the island of light surrounding Mindy, and she gasped out loud. She recognized it all too well: it was a tall figure in a flowing black cloak, wearing a silver mask with two thin slits for eyes and a broad mocking grin. She was at last face-to-face with one of the masked figures she had been chasing all this time, and she was completely in its power.

“W—who are you?” asked Mindy, trembling. “What do you want with me?”

The figure spoke not a word, but answered simply by unfastening its black robe and letting the robe slide from its body.

Mindy stared agog as the black robe fell noiselessly to the floor. The figure underneath was undeniably female, but more than that, she had the most perfect body Mindy had ever seen.

Her pale alabaster skin was the color of pure moonlight, and almost seemed to shimmer in the darkness. Mindy’s gaze began at her bare feet with their gracefully curved arches, showing her wrinkled soles as she stepped delicately out of her discarded robe like a butterfly emerging from a chrysalis. Mindy looked upwards past the long, pale legs and smooth, creamy thighs to her beautifully curvaceous ass, held in some of the smallest and tightest leather shorts Mindy had ever seen. Still higher past her taut stomach and flirtatiously exposed navel, to an absolutely breathtaking pair of breasts. Full, round, and perfectly sculpted, they hung beneath her skimpy halter top like tempting ivory fruits begging to be picked. A pair of pert nipples peeked out through the thin fabric of her top. Mindy’s gaze lingered on these flawless breasts, bouncing ever so gently as the woman walked forward. Mindy felt herself breathing more heavily as she stared longingly. But her attention was immediately re-diverted as the woman reached up with her delicate alabaster hands to remove her mask.

Underneath was the face of a goddess. Her high cheekbones framed a pair of mesmerizing blue eyes, which pierced Mindy with a look of unbounded desire. She batted her long, thick eyelashes and licked her full ruby lips with the lip of her velvety tongue. Time stood still for Mindy as the woman shook her long mane of ebony hair, every silken strand fluttering in the cool air. Just looking at her made Mindy feel weak inside.

Mindy had a thousand questions, but her voice failed her. She simply stared.

The woman smiled at Mindy: a smile so wrapped in lascivious meaning that it mesmerized her with lust. “I know who you are, my dear,” said the woman, “but I think you know at least what I am.”

“You’re…you’re a shadow elf,” said Mindy, barely daring to believe it. The shadow elves were a mysterious race of the Continent with whom no contact had been recorded for centuries. The Sorority of Sages owned some of the few books in existence to even reference them: dusty tomes of forgotten lore that had been translated and re-translated over generations. Descriptions of their society differed wildly from one account to another: one narrator claimed they were a harmonious and peaceful race, another claimed they lived only to make war. It was agreed that they were masters of magic, more so than any human could hope to become, but the source of their magical powers was greatly disputed. However, there was one fact on which all sources were in agreement: the shadow elves were a race of unearthly beauty. Tantalizing pictures adorned those old yellowed pages, drawn by those who had claimed to see the shadow elves. The grace and perfection of their forms had caused Mindy to linger many a time over those pages, pining for the day when she might see such perfect beauty in the flesh. And now that it was before her, it was more than she ever could have hoped for.

“You sound surprised,” said the woman with a smile both radiant and chilling.

“Why did you bring us here?” asked Mindy, unsure of whether she was terrified or enraptured.

“It was not I who chose to bring you here,” said the woman. “I am merely a humble servant to a force far older than myself. A force which you yourself were beginning to suspect was sentient. You know it, my dear, as the golden idol that you have been chasing.”

“The idol is elven?” asked Mindy in disbelief.

“It is,” replied the woman. “It was created by us, and sustained by our power. I am its mistress: its guardian and executor of its will. It is a duty I have been tasked with for longer than you can know.

“The idol is one of our oldest and most powerful artifacts,” continued the mistress. “Long ago, it brought a great army to its knees. But since then, it has slumbered. It remained asleep for centuries until one of us, only a foolish girl, stole it and absconded to the surface with it. It was an act of simple greed, but it had a profound effect: being on the surface awakened the idol from its slumber after so many years. And now, it once again has a will. It has…desires.”

“W…what does it desire?” asked Mindy, afraid she would not like the answer.

The mistress smiled, touching Mindy’s chin gently with her fingertips as she gazed into her eyes. “It desires you,” said the mistress, her sweet breath warm on Mindy’s cheek.

“Me?” Mindy asked weakly.

“You, and your friends,” said the mistress. “It desired you from afar, and once the three of you were together it revealed itself to you. It guided you, steering you along the path it wished you to travel, and we were waiting at the end to collect you. And now, you belong to us, my dear.”

“What are you going to do to me?” asked Mindy. She was afraid, but perversely she felt something even stronger at the word “belong”: a breathless sense of desire.

“What I have been tasked with doing,” said the mistress with a predatory smile as she circled her captive. “And what I am uniquely qualified to do. For you see, above all else, we shadow elves are experts in the arts of tickle torture.”

“T…tickle torture?” asked Mindy. She felt her face go white.

“But of course.” The mistress gave a chilling smile. “We have become experts in it. Shadow elves are the most ticklish race on the entire continent, and we have become experts at exploiting this weakness. Long ago, we warred among ourselves, our powerful magic turned on each other in stalemates that lasted for years. But then we learned to appreciate our more…subtle weaknesses. To bypass magic and use the body itself as a weapon of conquest.

“And to deal with our weaknesses, we developed certain strengths, as well.” The mistress smiled as she held up her slender, feminine hands for Mindy to see. Mindy was about to ask what she was looking at, when there was a soft sound like a steel blade sliding through velvet. Suddenly, fingernails emerged from the tips of the mistress’ fingers, like the retractable claws of a cat being extended. And to Mindy’s eyes, they were even more frightening. Two inches long and sharply curved like talons, they glittered pure silver in the darkness. Each of them were filed to rounded points and twitched hungrily. They were the perfect weapons of ticklish destruction.

The mistress seemed to read her thoughts. “They are just as deadly as they look,” said the mistress with satisfaction. “In fact, when used on tender shadow elf flesh, they are capable of tickling a woman to death. I can’t wait to see what they can do on you.”

“K…keep those away from me!” pleaded Mindy, terrified. She shifted her weight on the rack but she remained painfully exposed.

“Why?” The mistress smiled like the cat who ate the canary. “Do you have ticklish underarms, my dear?”

“No! No, you can’t!” cried Mindy in a panic. She tried desperately to lower her arms, but her hands remained shackled above her head.

“Oh, but I will, my dear,” smiled the mistress with anticipation. She stepped slowly, purposefully closer. “Are you ready?”

Mindy opened her mouth to protest, but no words came out. At that moment, the mistress gently pressed her index fingers into the centers of Mindy’s exposed underarms.

“YEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAHAAAHAAAHAAAHAAAHAAAHAAA!!!” Mindy had never dreamed that a single touch could tickle so badly. As those long fingernails pressed into her soft unresisting flesh, Mindy felt her body go into convulsions, desperate to escape. The touch lasted only a second, but to her, it was an eternity. When her respite finally came she was gasping for breath, and any resistance she might have had was gone.

“Please no!” pleaded Mindy, trembling.

“Do you mean, do this?” asked the mistress with a smile. She touched her fingernails to Mindy’s ticklish underarms a second time.

“AAAAAAAAAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAA!!!” Mindy’s humiliation was intensified by how little effort was required to make her scream, but control was impossible. She knew her body, and she knew what would make it utterly helpless.

“Tickle, tickle, tickle!” taunted the mistress, applying more of her fingers to Mindy’s underarms as she screamed with laughter. “I want to hear more of that beautiful laugh of yours!”

“HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA!!! OH GAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHADDD!!!” Mindy had no choice but to comply.

“Oh my, such tender skin,” exclaimed the mistress with delight. With all ten of her long fingernails in play, she began to walk her fingers up and down Mindy’s underarms, leaving soft indentations in the tender skin.

“I CAHAHAHAHAHANNN’T TAHAHAHAHAHAHAKE IT!!!” Mindy pleaded, crying so hard that she could not even see her torturer anymore. Mindy knew she had ticklish underarms, but she never imagined they could be exploited like this.

“Koochie koo! Are you enjoying these fingernails, my dear?” asked the mistress teasingly. “Ironic that our race, so ticklish ourselves, would have the ultimate weapons of ticklish destruction at our disposal. I’m pleased to see they have almost as much of an effect on the human body as they do on ours.”

“YEEEAAAAAAHAAAAAAHAAAAAAHAAAAAAHAAAAAA!!!” The mistress’ calm speech was lost on Mindy, lost in the depths of hysterics. Her tortured mind knew only one thought: anything to make it stop! Those sharp, cruel fingernails were devastating her ticklish underarms. Even worse, they worked their way slowly downward, squeezing Mindy’s ticklish ribs and forcing even more laughter out of her exhausted lungs.

“Ooh, I could tickle this beautiful body all day,” giggled the mistress, moving her hands up and down between ribs and underarms with a harpist’s dexterous movements. “But I’m not sure you would survive it, my dear. After all, I don’t want you to be used up so quickly. I have plans for you.”

“PLEEEHEEHEEHEEHEEASE!!! AAAAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAA!!!” Mindy was not even sure she would survive to see these plans: the tickling was so intense that she was sure she would not last much longer.

The mistress could see Mindy was at her limit, but her face betrayed nothing but amusement. “Will you beg me to stop, my dear?” she asked, as her long fingernails ravaged Mindy’s underarms.

“I BEEHEEHEEHEEHEEGGG YOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOO!!! MERCEEEEEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEE!!!” pleaded Mindy.

The mistress weighed her options, as though she would consider letting Mindy die of laughter. But at last, she withdrew her tickling fingernails with the look of granting a great act of mercy. Mindy felt her entire body collapse with relief and utter exhaustion. After surviving such an intense tickling, she felt she could not have moved a muscle if her life depended on it.

“Was it good for you, too?” giggled the mistress.

Mindy tried to form words, but no sound would escape from her lips. She felt deflated, utterly powerless.

“Such a delicate little thing,” said the mistress with a smile. “I haven’t even shown you what I’m fully capable of. But then, very few of my enemies have ever seen the extent of my abilities. Some of the most dangerous warlords and criminals of the shadow elf race have lain where you lie right now, my dear. They spat defiance at me, with their soft ticklish bodies spread out before me. And they watched as these fingernails descended upon them, and they felt the first touch…” The mistress’ eyes filled with longing and sweet remembrance. “These halls have seen the ticklish downfall of the very strongest of our race, heard the pleading laughter of the proudest of conquerors. None of them, my dear, could stand against these fingers.”

And now, thought Mindy desperately, they were poised towards her. She could feel the terror that those women before her must have felt. Those long, cruel fingernails glittered before her, ready to tickle her soft flesh endlessly. She could almost feel it now, as the hands drew closer, and she shut her eyes in fear…

Suddenly Mindy heard a soft sliding sound, like a cat retracting its claws. Mindy opened her eyes again: the long fingernails were gone, withdrawn as easily as they had been extended. The mistress smiled at her, and with her soft fingertips, gently caressed Mindy’s taut stomach.

Mindy trembled at the touch, and she got goosebumps as the hand brushed across her skin. The hand was so soft, it was like being caressed with a satin glove. Mindy had to stifle a soft moan as a finger circled her bellybutton, and the soft tickling sensation caused a single tear to run down her cheek.

“It is different, isn’t it?” whispered the mistress into Mindy’s ear. Ever so softly, she gave the slightest touch to one of Mindy’s erect nipples, and was rewarded as Mindy squirmed with pleasure despite herself.

“Ohhhh…” whimpered Mindy as her entire body quivered. As ticklish as her breasts were, she would have given anything in the world to have them touched again.

“You’re very sensitive,” said the mistress softly, her satin fingers brushing up Mindy’s chest from her belly button. “Do you like this?”

“Oh yes,” gasped Mindy before she could think. The soft tickles made her feel weak.

“Then I have a surprise for you,” smiled the mistress. “I’m going to tickle those exquisite breasts of yours. I’m going to stroke them and fondle them and make you scream until you can’t take the pleasure anymore. I am going to show you exactly what the shadow elves do to big, ticklish tits.”

Mindy felt the breath leave her body. Silently, she mouthed the word, “no”.

“But you want it,” said the mistress seductively. “That much is obvious.” Mindy followed the mistress’ downward gaze, and she realized in embarrassment that the tickling she had endured had already left her dripping wet. Mindy shook her head desperately, but even she could feel it was a lie. The promise of what was going to be done to her drew her helplessly like a moth to a flame.

The mistress, too, sensed her internal conflict. “I know what you want,” she said softly. “Now, let me give it to you.” And with gently curved fingers, the mistress reached out with her satin touch to tickle the undersides of Mindy’s enormous breasts.

“EEEEEEEEAAAAAAHAAAHAAAHAAAHAAAHAAAHAAA!!!!!” As rarely as Mindy was tickled on her breasts, she was still unprepared for how ticklish they were. The first gentle strokes ran through her body like lightning, turning every muscle to jelly. She felt her already erect nipples harden to the consistency of steel, and the swelling between her legs expanded in a burst of passionate heat. And this, she thought in the small piece of consciousness remaining, from only a brief touch.

The effects were pure torture, and yet deep inside she felt herself longing for more. With the size of her breasts, shopping for bras was nearly impossible, so she tended not to wear them. During those late-night tickle fights at the Sorority house, they had been tickled before: such enormous bouncing targets with nipples that protruded through any of her tops with ease were bound to be grabbed. But they had been quick and playful, as much pleasurable as anything else. This was different: slow, methodical torture from a woman who wanted only to tickle her to insanity. But as unbearable as it was, Mindy’s breasts had never felt such intense, violent pleasure before. She had to have more.

And the mistress definitely had more to give. Her soft fingers tickled all over Mindy’s quivering, spherical breasts, causing her to scream until she was weak with laughter. New worlds of sensation unfurled before her as her ticklish breasts faced the skills of a master. Soft fingers coaxed soft flesh in long, teasing patterns of touch that threatened to shatter Mindy’s mind with the intensity.

“Do you want more, my dear?” asked the mistress with a lustful smile.

“YEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHESSS!!! MOHOHOHOHOHOHOHOHOHRRRE!!!” Mindy’s conscious mind was gone: only her massive libido remained, and it could feel climax approaching. She had to have it, even if it meant being tickled to death.

“Then beg me for it,” said the mistress.

“PLEEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEEASE MOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOORRRRREE!!!!!” Mindy cried unthinkingly.

The mistress cradled Mindy’s heaving breasts on her fingertips, gently tickling the undersides as she did so. She leaned towards the huge, luscious tits and slowly extended her long, velvety tongue towards Mindy’s rock-hard nipples. There was a moment of sweet anticipation, and then the tip of her tongue gently flicked across the erect nipple. From that one unutterable moment, Mindy felt her mind go blank, and her body go over the edge.

“OHHHH YEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHESSSSS!!!!!”

Pure rapture flooded over her. Mindy’s thighs opened with the strength of pure animal instinct, and she exploded in the greatest orgasm she had ever experienced. Her swollen sex opened and an unstoppable stream of sweet girl juice flooded out, drenching everything in its path. Mindy’s eyes rolled back in her head and her back arched: all she could feel was ecstasy beyond anything she had ever dreamed of. Her entire body was a receptor for pleasure, and the gentle tickling from fingers and tongue kept her cumming endlessly. Over and over she climaxed until her body had nothing left to give, with her own wild laughter and pleas for more filling her ears.

And at last, every ounce of Mindy’s strength was drained. Still in the haze of the greatest passion she had ever known, every muscle in her quivering body fell limp. She could not even summon the strength to gasp for breath. She looked up at the smiling face of the mistress, and it was the last effort she could manage. With the glow of orgasm still upon her, Mindy fell into the blissful ocean of unconsciousness that awaited her, and into the best dreams she ever had.

Watching her from the darkness, the golden idol fell into its own blissful trance. So much pleasure to absorb; so much sexual ecstasy released to feed its desires. Its passionate glow, increased to a fever pitch during Mindy’s orgasmic experience, now at last began to dim as it basked in the warm afterglow. Now, it was time to sleep.

But something in the shadows had been waiting for the idol’s sleep to come. And as it rested, a dark shape flew by its unseeing eyes and vanished into the depths of the cavern.

Chapter 6

Camilla dreamed again of the warlord: the beautiful female conqueror that she had seen in her last dream. She lay now on a great battlefield, in the aftermath of a struggle of epic proportions. Behind her lay the discarded bodies of her followers: stripped naked and unconscious, tickled into submission by their powerful foe. Stripped-off armor lay everywhere: breastplates, greaves, boots; all had been useless. She had believed that her forces were enough to stand up to the power of her wayward creation and subdue it once again. She had been wrong.

And now the warlord, like her followers before her, was helpless in the grip of the golden idol. Tendrils of light emanated from it, wrapping around her naked body as it effortlessly stripped off her clothing and protective jewelry. She lay suspended above the ground, tendrils holding her wrists and ankles and stretching them in four directions so her body was pulled taut and helpless. And for every exposed ticklish spot there was another tendril to mercilessly tickle it. Her soft underarms, her round breasts and firm tummy, her soft thighs and especially her tender feet: none of them were safe. The warlord howled with infuriated laughter at the hands of the idol.

She had seen her followers fall in the same way: infantry lifted off the ground by the dozens, their bellies tickled until they laughed themselves hoarse, with their weapons falling from their nerveless hands into a pile on the ground. An entire battalion, sent to ambush the idol’s altar while the main force attacked from the front, had been detected easily. All of them had been grabbed by the idol, their armored boots flung off with ease, and their feet were tickled until they were too weak to stand. The laughter echoing over the battlefield had even drowned out the army’s battle cries, and everywhere the proudest warriors of their kind had been reduced to screaming hysterics. It was a tickling massacre.

And the final one to fall had been herself. She tried to fight, but she was held motionless and the tickling tendrils were everywhere. She had grown in power since her last battle with the idol, but still she was no match for it now. From every ticklish victim it defeated, it absorbed more power, growing in strength and leaving drained, tickled girls in its wake. Now, it was after the ultimate power. It wanted the power of its creator, and it would tickle her to madness in order to get it.

“HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! NOT THAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHATTT!!!” laughed the warlord as she felt the idol’s demands pressing upon her mind. But she couldn’t resist forever: her ticklish flesh was held hostage, and every minute new tendrils appeared to tickle her creamy white skin in places that had never been touched this way before. Her smooth, pale underarms and sensitive sides were stroked and squeezed without mercy, her belly button was circled by sharp, vibrating tips, and her ivory thighs and shapely ass were teased with maddeningly soft touches. But the worst was her ticklish feet: assaulted by dozens of tendrils, it was like being tickled by a beast with a hundred dexterous fingers on each sole. Her magic was no match for this torture, and like a woman hanging from a cliff, she felt her grasp slip away from her at last.

“I—I GIVE UP!!!!! AAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!” She let her mental defenses fall at last: even surrender was preferable to this unbearable tickling torture. She would give up everything: her powers, her station, her very self, if it would rescue her from this nightmare of ticklish madness. Her only refuge was complete surrender: to abandon the only thing which prolonged her torture, and give the idol what it wanted.

Deep inside, the defenses which kept the magic within her were released, and all her prodigious power pooled to the surface to be absorbed by her tormentor. The power of ages: stolen from her in moments, the thought of it was too much to bear. Already she could feel the bliss of unconsciousness come to rescue her at last. When she woke up she would be mortal, her powers gone, but even that was preferable to an eternity of ticklish madness. It was the only way to save herself.

As her final moments of consciousness passed by, Camilla had one final look at the warlord’s face: a beautiful visage contorted by furious, mad laughter. It was a fearful sight, but even more than the empathy it evoked, it left Camilla with a haunting sense of familiarity.

* * * * *

Maggie’s eyes slowly adjusted to the darkness, but there was very little to see. Maggie had been in her fair share of caves during her time with the Sorority of Explorers, and they generally tended to look the same. This one was clearly settled: if the torches that hung from the walls had not been an indicator of that, the enormous twelve-foot bondage rack she was tied to would have tipped her off.

Maggie tested its strength, but it had clearly been constructed with a woman of her musculature in mind. The shackles that held down her wrists, midsection, and ankles were all of a metal which was considerably stronger than steel. Maggie noticed for the first time that she was once again wearing her Sorority of Explorers clothing: her chainmail bikini instead of the maid’s uniform she had changed into in the Manor. Just as well; she felt more comfortable in it. The only exceptions were her sandals, which had been removed and placed on the rocky ground beside her. Clearly she had been prepared for something.

“I see you too are awake, my dear,” said a voice in the darkness.

As the figure stepped forward, Maggie felt all her mounting fury melt away as she looked upon the body of her captor. The gleaming pale white skin, the perfectly proportioned figure, the long luxurious hair that framed a face of breathtaking beauty: these combined to make Maggie forget that she was even supposed to be angry. But the distraction lasted only a moment, for the woman was carrying something in her hand that Maggie recognized at once. It was the golden idol.

“Who are you, and how did you get that?” Maggie demanded.

“I am the mistress of the idol, its guardian and rightful owner since long before you laid eyes on it,” answered the woman. “It was we who made it, long before your Sorority took what was rightfully ours.”

Maggie had to acknowledge that this might be true. Everything the Sorority of Explorers found had been made by someone; the difference was that they generally weren’t around to register complaints when their creations changed hands. Even still, Maggie didn’t consider it thievery: she instinctively felt that there had to be a statue of limitations on ownership. When you left something in some ruins in the middle of the deepest jungle for a few centuries, you really had to forfeit your rights to it when someone else went through the trouble of finding it again.

“But I discovered it!” insisted Maggie. “I didn’t steal anything!”

“It allowed itself to be found by you,” corrected the mistress. “It admired your great strengths: your fortitude, your resourcefulness, your sheer power. But more than that, what truly interested it was your…weaknesses.”

With a knowing smile, the mistress reached out to ever-so-lightly brush Maggie’s soles with the very tips of her fingernails.

“MMMMPPPHHHHH!!! GHHHHHHHHPPPHHH!!!” The touch lasted only a fraction of a second, but every muscle in Maggie’s body came to life with a jolt. Her toes curled forwards, her arms and legs jerked and tugged at their bondage, and her chest shuddered as she held her breath to keep from laughing out loud. Any chance she might have had of pretending was gone.

“Oh my, they are ticklish!” said the mistress with delight. She gently stroked the tops of Maggie’s feet, letting her fingertips touch the soft skin with her long fingernails trailing behind gently. Her tiny hands were dwarfed by Maggie’s enormous feet, but it was clear who had the upper hand. Moving along thirty-two inches of bare giant foot, their effect was electric.

“MMMMPPPHHHH!!! MMPPPPHEEEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE!!!” Even though her soles remained untouched, the tickling was too much to hold in. Maggie erupted in high-pitched giggles as the mistress’ infuriatingly soft touch. Her fingers were like the caress of silk, followed by the sharp shock of her wicked fingernails. Together, the tickling was twice as diabolical.

“Ooh, and these are just the tops of them,” purred the mistress. “I wonder what these huge, beautiful soles must be like, hmm?”

“EEEEHEHEHEHEHEHE!!! DON’T—HEEHEEHEEHEEHEE—TOUCH THEM!!!” giggled Maggie. The broad grin on her face belied her rising terror. She trembled to think what those long, curved fingernails could do to her sensitive soles. But there was nothing to stop them from having free reign of her vulnerable tootsies.

“I don’t think you’re being honest with me,” smiled the mistress. “I think you want me to tickle those big, gorgeous feet. I think you want to feel these nails have their way with your soft, tender soles until you can’t take it anymore. Am I right?”

“PLEHEHEHEASE!!! NO!!! HEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE!!!” Maggie pleaded. Stroking the tops of her feet was bad enough, but she couldn’t survive a full-on assault against her ticklish soles. Her high-pitched girlish laughter echoed throughout the chamber, much to the delight of the mistress.

“Why, just look at them,” said the mistress, leaning down in front of Maggie’s bare feet. “They’re just begging to be touched.” Maggie could feel the warm breath on her pink, wrinkled soles as they towered above her captive’s face. The mistress removed her hands from Maggie’s feet, positioning her long, curved talons only inches from the trembling soles.

“I can see how soft they are from here,” said the mistress, licking her ruby lips. “You must take such good care of them. Why, it makes me wonder what would happen if I did…this.” And as she spoke, the mistress reached out and pressed a single fingernail into the exact center of Maggie’s left arch.

“EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEKKKKK!!!” The shriek split the air with its intensity. Maggie was completely unprepared for the effects of the touch. As the silver nail pressed into the soft, fleshy surface, every muscle in Maggie’s body came to life in a wild, uncontrolled spasm. She jerked at her bonds with such force that she almost felt the room shake. Somehow the mistress had found a pressure point on the very first try.

“Even better than I had hoped,” said the mistress with a coy giggle. “Every shadow elf is trained in the arts of foot-tickling, you know. I thought we had the most ticklish feet of all, but these precious peds are something else altogether. I’m going to have fun applying my knowledge to these treasures.”

Maggie had only enough time to softly whisper, “No…” before all ten of those long, glittering fingernails buried themselves in the soft, pliant flesh of Maggie’s enormous soles.

This time there were no giggles, no high-pitched squeals. The massive eruption of booming laughter showed the full force of what a pair of giant lungs could produce. The volume of her laughter drowned out thought itself, filling the room with deafening roars that shook the walls themselves. But the mistress remained an island of calm in the thundering storm of hysterics, her thin sharp fingernails skittering up and down the tall ticklish canvasses.

“Oh my, does this tickle?” she asked coquettishly, her question nearly inaudible over Maggie’s powerful bellows of laughter.

“YAAAAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAASSS!!!” Maggie roared, her face wet with tears. She had always known her ticklish feet were a liability, but she had never imagined torture like this. With such huge expanses of soft, pedicured sole to explore, there seemed no end to the agony those sharp nails could inflict.

“Koochie-koochie-koo,” giggled the mistress beneath Maggie’s booming giant laughter. “You are a sensitive one. I’m going to have to stop myself from tickling you to death, my big laughing beauty.”

“STAAAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAPPPPP!!!” Maggie howled. Grains of rock fell from the ceiling as Maggie pulled at her bonds with all her strength.

“Stop?” asked the mistress with a devilish smile. “Oh, I don’t think you want me to stop. I think you want me to stroke these beautiful arches—“

“BWAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!”

“—and play with your insteps—“

“WOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOO!!!”

“—and take these long, slender toes between my fingertips and tickle them one...by…one.”

“EEEEEAAAAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAA!!!” Maggie could no longer even see through the flood of tears, but she felt the mistress hold back each of her four-inch toes and slide a fingernail up and down the underside until she thought she would die. Those devilish fingernails danced and scribbled over the worst spots on her feet as though they knew exactly how to break her.

“I must give you credit, my big beauty,” cooed the mistress. “Any shadow elf would never have lasted this long. And I speak from experience both ways.” She giggled to herself and coquettishly shook her long head of silken black hair. Strands of soft hair brushed against Maggie’s soles and nestled in between her long splaying toes, tickling like feathers.

Maggie was past speech, babbling helplessly as the mistress slowly walked her fingers up and down her soles. With feet the size of hers, however, it was an epic journey. The fingers began at the soft, fleshy peaks of the balls of her feet, walking slowly down the lush valleys of her flawless arches until they arrived at her smooth heels. It felt like an eternity, with ticklish pressure points being exploited the entire way. Every time Maggie’s feet writhed, new locks of the mistress’ fluttering hair would fall between her toes, tickling the hidden regions with infuriating softness.

“These huge feet are such a lovely weakness,” said the mistress, tickling them to a bright red glow. “I’ll bet you would do anything to stop the tickling, am I right?”

“AAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!! RAHAHAHAHAHAIGHT!!!!! OOOHOOHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAA!!!!!” Maggie screamed. She couldn’t even think: her answer was a desperate response by her body to stop the torture before she was tickled to death. Even with her superhuman physiology, not even she could stand a tickling of this intensity for long.

“And what if I don’t stop?” asked the mistress with a wicked smile. Her long fingers with their long silver talons danced across Maggie’s feet like a spider’s legs. “If I only want to keep having my way with these insanely ticklish feet, how could you stop me?”

“BWAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!” Maggie tried to beg for mercy, but the only thing that would come was mad laughter. She had never felt more helpless in her life.

“I’ve tickled races from throughout the Continent,” said the mistress as she traced the fleshy folds beneath the balls of Maggie’s feet, “and these ticklish peds are a treasure like I’ve never seen! Even giantesses have coveted our power and come to take it by force, and always their massive, ticklish feet pay the price for their impertinence. I have stood before them and tickled their titanic feet until they cried rivers that washed away the trees from the soil. I have feathered and brushed the feet of giantess chiefs until their desperate laughter shook the very earth. And yet none of those can compare to these delicious feet of yours.”

“EEEEEAAAAAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAA!!!!!” Even with Maggie’s superhuman circulation, the masterful manipulation of her feet was more than her body could cope with. Drowning in laughter, with every nerve in her body begging for escape, she felt the onset of unconsciousness approaching. It was the only thing that could save her from the tickling, but seconds before she passed out, Maggie suddenly felt the tickling abate.

“I know what you were hoping for,” smiled the mistress. “But I’m afraid I can’t let that happen just yet. After all, there are…expectations to fulfill.”

“What…what do you…want…with…me…” gasped Maggie, every word an effort to articulate as her lungs took in the gales of air that had been tickled out of her.

“I think that’s enough time to recover,” replied the mistress. “Why don’t I show you?”

With an expression of infinite longing, the mistress bent down and pressed her soft ruby lips into the center of Maggie’s foot, bestowing upon it a long kiss of admiration and worship. Her lips parted ever so slightly and her long tongue slipped between them, flicking its moist tip gently and teasingly across the soft and fragrant flesh of Maggie’s soles. The mistress leaned further and further into the kiss, her eyes closed in perfect rapture as her lips drank in the deep, heady sweetness.

“EEEEEEEAAAAAAHAAAHAAAHAAAHAAAHAAAHAAAHAAA!!!” Maggie howled with laughter as her feet writhed beneath the tiny, gentle kiss. The sensation of the soft, slippery tongue teasing her feet was diabolical: it was almost worse than the fingernails. Maggie felt another kiss on her other foot: the soft lips making contact, and the tongue repeating its sharp but gentle licking that drove Maggie out of her mind.

“So impossibly soft,” doted the mistress, kneeling before Maggie’s bare feet in a gesture of near worship. “I want to taste them all over.” Planting a kiss near the heel of Maggie’s feet, the mistress gasped with pleasure and ran her tongue slowly and luxuriously over the entire expanse of Maggie’s bare feet, leaving glistening trails of moisture in her wake on the thrashing, desperately ticklish feet.

“STAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAPPPPP!!!” screamed Maggie, but now she felt something different deep inside her. Through the torment was pleasure: a rush of euphoria as the tickling tongue gently massaged her soles, pressing its rigid tip into the pressure points that could make her moan. Even through her furious laughter she felt her heart flutter and her head go light with a wave of desire.

“Oooh, such lovely toes,” said the mistress, giving a soft moan of pleasure herself. “And I have them all to myself.”

Maggie had never experienced anything like this before. The mistress ran her long, silver fingernails over the slippery wet surfaces of Maggie’s soles, while her tongue licked beneath each of Maggie’s shapely, four-inch toes. With her eyes closed, the mistress plunged each of the squirming toes into her mouth, sucking on it slowly as she wrapped her tongue around it like an amorous boa constrictor. New planes of sensation opened up before Maggie, as she discovered heights of ticklishness she had never dreamed of. As much as she wanted it to stop, an even stronger force within her silently begged for it to continue.

“Mmm, do you like that?” asked the mistress in a husky voice.

“AAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! YEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHESSSS!!!” The answer shocked Maggie as she heard her own voice, but it was true: the torture was pleasure beyond belief. Even the foot massages she so used to enjoy were only a shadow of this experience. She felt the nipples on her giant-sized breasts turn erect, and underneath the leather padding of her chainmail bikini, Maggie could feel herself beginning to grow moist at the onrush of pleasure.

“I can feel what an effect this is having on you,” said the mistress huskily. “How much more can these tender feet take, I wonder?”

“GHAAAAHAAAHAAAHAAAHAAAHAAAHAAA!!!! MOHOHOHOHOHOHOHOHORRRREEE!!!!” screamed Maggie, begging for more tickle torture on her huge, hypersensitive feet. Her feet glowed bright pink with increased circulation, and every second her soles became more ticklish and more erogenous. Every time the mistress’ tongue licked hungrily across one of Maggie’s innumerable magic spots, she could feel herself take another leap towards climax.

“You just love this, my big-soled siren,” teased the mistress, looking at the spreading wetness between Maggie’s legs. “Don’t fight it, my dear. Let it happen.”

“AAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!” Maggie felt as though she were holding onto a cliff’s edge with her fingertips, hanging above an ocean of rapture. She couldn’t let go, but with every second she felt her grip loosening, her self-control waning until finally she would fall…

But the mistress had been leaving one spot untouched. A small spot no larger than a fingertip on each of Maggie’s soles, just beneath the exact centers of her arches. Two priceless gems in the middle of a ticklish treasure trove. Planting her final kiss on Maggie’s perfect feet, the mistress pressed her fingernails gently into each one, and Maggie felt her grip on resistance crumble at last.

When a giantess reaches orgasm, the effects are felt in the fabric of magic itself. When that powerful body gives in to the deluge of boundless ecstasy and reaches climax, the deepest essence of their ancient race touches something equally ancient in the world around them. With an intense cry of unadulterated rapture that shook the walls themselves, Maggie arched her back and exploded with pleasure at the manipulation of her sensitive feet. The air itself seemed to be torn asunder with the sheer forces that were released as Maggie came with the strength of a giantess. She was bathed in a golden aura of blinding pleasure, the oldest of magics coming to life. And off in the darkness, the golden idol drank deeply of this sweet nectar.

* * * * *

At that instant, in another place, Camilla awoke with a start from her disturbing dreams. Her surroundings were alien to her, but she recognized them at once: these were the caverns in which her dreams had taken place. Somewhere, perhaps on the very ground beneath her, the great battles and feats of sorcery she had seen in her dreams had taken place. The chill air was heavy with the memories of centuries past.

Somehow, it did not surprise Camilla to discover that she, like the warlord in her dreams, was bound and shackled. She lay on an altar of jet-black rock: hard and smooth but somehow as warm as flesh to the touch. If it had not been for her shackled wrists and ankles, she might almost have considered it comfortable. She wore a pair of leather shorts and a low-cut top that she recognized as her own clothing, but she did not remember ever having changed into it.

But suddenly, a more immediate concern grabbed her attention. Someone was approaching. After the visions she had seen in her nightmares, her psyche conjured up all manner of horrors that might be about to befall her. It took all her courage to remain silent, breathing heavily as she craned her neck to see what this approaching figure might be.

“Stay quiet,” ordered a voice in the darkness. Camilla strained her eyes to see who was speaking. Slowly, a figure dressed in black strode calmly and confidently through the darkness towards the altar. What astonished Camilla the most was that it was not one of the women from her dream, with their pale white skin and unearthly features. It was human.

It was a tall, slender woman wearing a black form-fitting catsuit that flattered her extremely curvaceous figure. She wore a strip of black cloth over the lower half of her face, forming a mask that obscured her features. She wore black stiletto-heeled boots, but somehow she walked without her footsteps making a sound. Her long hair, as black as the rest of her ensemble, was tied back in a ponytail. Hanging from her belt, Camilla could see a small assortment of throwing stars and daggers.

“Who are you?” whispered Camilla, picking up on the woman’s air of stealthy urgency.

“My name is Sonia, from the Sorority of Thieves,” answered the woman. “I’m here to help you.”

With those words, the final piece of the puzzle in Camilla’s mind suddenly and unexpectedly fell into place. Camilla at last knew why the face of the beautiful warlord from her dreams had seemed so hauntingly familiar. Camilla had seen it once before: in the audience chamber of the Sorority of Thieves. It was the face of the Dark Lady Lucaria.

Chapter 7

Camilla reeled from the implications of her revelation. The Dark Lady Lucaria, leader of the Sorority of Thieves, had at one time been the shadow elven warlord who created the golden idol. Defeated by her own creation, stripped of her powers and cast out of shadow elven society, she had built a new identity in the world of humans. And now, Camilla was under her employ to track down that idol and destroy it.

As though that were not enough, now a sister of the Sorority of Thieves stood before her in the flesh. The woman calling herself Sonia looked down at Camilla without surprise or disbelief of any kind, only the quiet patience of a woman doing a job that is proceeding according to plan. There was only one explanation.

“You’ve been following us?” asked Camilla.

Sonia nodded. “From the moment the three of you met. We were given to understand that the idol was especially interested in the three of you, and so this was our best chance to find where it was hidden. We never would have found this place without your help; it’s miles underground and protected with some very powerful magic wards.”

“And so that was our role all along?” asked Camilla, incensed and almost shouting. “To get captured and lead you here? To act as bait?!”

Sonia shook her head. “If you had been intended as bait, then your role in this would be over. As it stands, the Dark Lady needs you to perform some additional services for her.”

“Who cares what she needs?!” demanded Camilla. “I don’t take orders from her, or from you either! I didn’t ask to be a part of any of this!”

Sonia looked at her, unperturbed. “Do you want my help, or don’t you?” she asked simply.

Camilla glared up at Sonia from her position shackled to the stone altar. Despite her anger, Camilla still remained level-headed enough to pick her battles. This was not one she was going to win.

“What do you want me to do?” she asked icily after a pause.

“I have been sent to help you,” said Sonia, “but the fact remains that the idol is interested in you. You and your friends are the only ones who can get close enough to it to defeat it. Since a direct assault is out of the question, I’m afraid I can only offer my help indirectly. The main effort must fall to you.”

“How convenient,” muttered Camilla.

Sonia ignored the snub, however, and began taking something out of her pack. It was a long wire, with what looked like a series of talismans attached to it. Sonia busied herself placing the talismans next to the shackles that held Camilla’s wrists and ankles to the stone altar.

“What is that?” asked Camilla.

“A device I brought with me,” answered Sonia. “This should help free you from your bondage.”

“Is it magic?” asked Camilla.

Sonia shook her head. “Magic would be detected in an instant here, if it even worked at all. This is the latest technology from the Sorority of Thieves. Small charges filled with black powder, using flint strikers to ignite them. They were designed to blow apart locks, so they are ideal in this circumstance.”

Camilla felt Sonia wrap a thin wire around her right arm, so tiny that in this dim light it was invisible even to her. “This wire connects to the charges,” explained Sonia. “I’m connecting it to a very small pin in the palm of your right hand. This will act as a trigger for the charges. When you press down on the pin, the black powder will blow apart all the locks simultaneously. Have you got that?”

Camilla nodded. “When should I use it?” she asked.

“As late as possible,” said Sonia. “I’ll be searching these caverns for your two friends, but we want to keep your captor as busy as possible. Wait until she’s distracted, and then use the trigger pin to break free and overpower her. Hopefully by that time I’ll have more information on the whereabouts of your friends.”

“But how will I know when—“ began Camilla.

“Shhh!” Sonia whispered suddenly. She cocked her head slightly and pricked up her ears with the keen sensibilities of a wolf who hears an almost inaudible sound in the distance.

“My time is just about up,” said Sonia, backing off from the rack. “Just remember what I told you.”

“Wait!” called Camilla. “You can’t just—“

But Sonia had already bounded off into the darkness, leaving Camilla alone. She glared angrily at the darkness.

“Bitch,” she hissed under her breath.

But her anger quickly turned to a sense of foreboding. Whatever Sonia had felt at the periphery of her senses, Camilla could suddenly feel now. It was a strong magical presence approaching her in the darkness, like the idol and yet more focused in its intent. A moment later, the blackness parted, and into Camilla’s view walked a slender, breathtakingly beautiful woman with ivory-white skin.

Unlike her friends, however, Camilla did not find herself facing the unknown. An even more frightening sense of familiarity enveloped her as she looked first at the body and then at the face of her approaching captor.

“You!” gasped Camilla. “I saw you!”

The memories came rushing back to Camilla as vividly as if they had been her own. Without a doubt, Camilla had seen this woman in her visions. In the great war of the idol that split the society of the shadow elves in two, this woman had been one of the great lieutenants of the idol. Camilla had seen her face in snatches of dreams, visions half-remembered by warriors on both sides as they gazed on her face, the mistress and executor of the idol’s will.

“Then we know each other,” said the mistress with a gentle, mocking smile. “For you, in turn, work for the Aggressor.”

It took Camilla a moment to realize to whom she must be referring: the warlord in her dreams, who Camilla now knew was none other than the Dark Lady Lucaria.

“I don’t work for her!” Camilla insisted. “She tricked us!”

“Nonetheless you are here at her behest,” said the mistress. “But your loyalties are not the issue. You have been…requested. A dubious honor granted only to the truly unlucky few, to whom you and your friends now belong.”

The mistress walked closer to Camilla, and despite herself Camilla found her gaze wandering to the voluptuous curves and exposed flesh of her sensual captor. “The power I serve is very interested in you particularly, my dear,” the mistress continued, her long hair flowing behind her as she walked. “Even with no magical training, the visions were bequeathed to you. Your mind alone latched on to the echoes of the past that explained the true nature of this struggle. I can see that you are truly a powerful opponent. And to match with you, I must choose my weapons carefully.”

Camilla was about to ask what she meant, when the mistress reached into a fold of her thin, tight halter top. Camilla would have believed that there was barely enough room to hold the enormous pair of breasts already confined inside, much less anything else. But somehow, the mistress’ hand emerged holding a small object which she presented to Camilla for consideration.

It was a small tool that could fit in the palm of a hand, but Camilla could feel the power it radiated. The mistress held it delicately by a pencil-thin handle of carved ivory, which blossomed at the end into a brilliant bouquet of soft pink feathers. The feathers were perfectly layered, like the petals of a flawless rose.

“This, too, is one of our most treasured artifacts,” explained the mistress. “Carved and enchanted by the selfsame sorceress who created the idol, as a means to subdue her enemies. And now it is drafted into the service of the idol, to be used against whomever it chooses. And now, that includes you.”

Camilla gulped, looking down at her bare feet. She had faced tickling before, she told herself. She could withstand it. She shut her eyes and focused as the diabolical tool came closer…

“EEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA!!!!!” Even though she was no stranger to tickling, Camilla was completely unprepared for the intensity of the feathers’ first soft kiss on her bare feet. She had been prepared for the laughter to slowly break through her defenses like water through a cracking dam. But a single brush of the feathered wand across her soft bare feet brought forth laughter like a hurricane. There were no giggles, no struggle for composure and self-control, only gales and gales of wild, hysterical laughter.

“They all think they can fight it,” mused the mistress, gently feathering Camilla’s soles as she screamed. “They think that a fight of wills awaits them, a struggle. But how wrong they are.” She chuckled softly as she twirled the feathers over the centers of Camilla’s delicate arches. “All that awaits is endless tickling.”

“PLEEEHEHEHEHEHEAASE!!! ANYTHING BUT THAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAT!!!” screamed Camilla, and she meant it. At that moment she would have braved any danger or faced any foe if it would have saved her feet from the furious tickling they were enduring.

“Such a common reaction, my dear,” cooed the mistress. “The sorcery in the wand amplifies the fear, the terror, the ticklish madness. An effective weapon against those who would try to resist: no consequences are as unthinkable as facing the tickling of the feathers.”

“AAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! I’LL TAHAHAHALK!!! I’LL TAHAHAHAHAHAHALK!!!” howled Camilla, desperately trying to bargain as the feathers brushed with magical intensity across her ticklish feet.

“But I have nothing to ask you,” smiled the mistress, gently guiding the wand between her thumb and forefinger. “Except perhaps how badly it tickles, and that I already know.”

“PLEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEASE!!!! NOOOHOOHOOHOOHOO MOHOHOHOHOHOHORRRRE!!!!” Camilla knew now why Sonia had refused to confide in her: even though she might be Camilla’s only hope of escape, Camilla would have sold her out in a second to save her ticklish tootsies. She would have volunteered the information, desperately hoping that it might buy her a reprieve from this nightmare of feathering. But she had no information to offer, nothing to give except her own hysterical laughter that filled the caverns.

“You have no idea what an honor it is to be tickled by this artifact,” the mistress remarked over Camilla’s screams as she dusted the helpless arches. “It has been used to break some of our greatest enemies, to interrogate the most legendary spies. No matter the will, the effect it has is always the same.”

“BWAAAA HAAAA HAAAA HAAAA HAAAA HAAAA HAAAA!!!!” thundered Camilla, her laughter blending in concert with its own echo. The feathering of her feet was becoming even more unbearable, as the mistress ended her playful teasing and started on techniques designed to break her. The feathers dragged slowly over her soles like an artist’s brush painting a canvas, stopping to focus on the especially soft danger spots that made Camilla cry with laughter.

But even more torturous than the feathering was the knowledge that Camilla could escape it at any time. She still had Sonia’s trigger pin, and by striking it at any time she could blow the locks open and escape this hellish torture. But she would never get far. She was weakened while her torturer was invigorated: she would be re-captured at once. But still, there would be those blissful few seconds where she was free from the torment of the feather. The temptation to play her trump card early was overwhelming: only with an iron will did Camilla force her fingers away from the pin.

“PLEEEEHEEHEEHEEHEEASE!!!! MERCEEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEE!!!!” howled Camilla. The feather wand tickled over the balls of her feet, moving up to torture her toes. The mistress held each one daintily between her fingers, pulling it back gently so that it was stretched immobile for its feathering. Less than halfway through, Camilla thought she was going to die.

“Do these ticklish feet need a rest, my dear?” purred the mistress, as she continued to work them over with obvious delight.

“YEEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEESSSSSS!!!!” screamed Camilla through her laughter. There was nothing she wanted more in the world at that moment.

“Then allow me to grant your request,” the mistress replied. To Camilla’s amazement, she felt the tickling on her feet suddenly abate as the feathers were drawn away. But the relief lasted only a moment, as Camilla felt a new sensation. She felt the soft feathers touch her ankle, gliding upwards along her long legs.

Camilla’s legs were some of her best and most developed features, with every muscle built up from tireless exercise until they rippled with strength. With her powerful hamstrings and quadriceps, her legs could deliver a crippling kick, or wrap around an opponent and practically crush them. But like the rest of her body, they too bore the weakness of excruciatingly soft skin. Camilla could feel herself tremble as the feathers glided up her smooth calves, and she exploded into girlish giggling and leg-thrashing as the feathers brushed the sensitive undersides of her knees. But they did not stop there.

“MMMMPPPPHHHH!!! MMMPPHHHAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!” Camilla burst into laughter as the feathers finally reached one of the most ticklish spots on her entire body: her creamy inner thighs. With her legs spread apart on the stone altar and her tiny shorts truncating just below her curvaceous ass, there was nothing to protect them from the onslaught of the feathered wand. The soft, pale skin was nearly shadow elven in its complexion: the pale white color of moonlight spoke to how tender this hidden flesh truly was. But Camilla was finding out for the first time what an enchanted feather could do to these ticklish thighs.

“Yes, I knew you had more to give,” murmured the mistress, basking in an aura that seemingly only she could feel. “Surrender to it. Feel the unbearable pleasure lurking below the surface of the torture. Let it out.”

“EEEAAAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAA!!! MERCEEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEE!!!” howled Camilla. This was even worse than having her feet feathered: she could see why the mistress had made her choice. All the power in Camilla’s toned muscular body was brought to bear as she desperately tried to close her legs and spare her ticklish thighs from the caress of the feathers. But it was hopeless: she was held motionless as these secret spots faced tickling torture that she had never imagined was possible. She screamed with laughter and tossed her head, covering the stone surface of the altar with her flying tears.

“Yes, these soft thighs are the key,” said the mistress lasciviously. She moved the feathered wand up Camilla’s legs ever so slowly, and with every fraction of an inch she discovered new sensitive regions, each more hopelessly ticklish than the last. She beamed with delight every time she evoked a new and more hysterical response.

“NOT THEEEHEEHEEHEEHEERE!!! AAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!” Camilla’s shorts were providing her with no quarter from this fiendish and methodical treatment. She roared with tortured laughter and pulled desperately at her bonds, even as she remembered her ace in the hole that she could not use yet. But more humiliating than her ticklish agony was an awareness of a growing arousal inside her. Her nipples grew hard at the feathers’ touch, and beneath her shorts she could feel herself growing moist in response to the tickling of her helpless thighs.

“Don’t fight it, my dear.” Camilla could hear the mistress’ voice through the blur of tears. “There is nothing you can do. Give in to the tickling.”

But even with the furnace of lust stoked inside her, Camilla was a fighter. She fought for control, and that made the tickling of her sensitive thighs a hundred times worse. It was pure, unabated torture that she would do anything to stop. But there was only one thing she could do, and she had to hold off.

“BWAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! NO MOOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOORRRE!!!” cried Camilla. Laughter was her only outlet, her only way to keep a grip on sanity. Now that she needed every ounce of her strength, now was not the time to waste her effort on holding it in or censoring her words. With her ticklish thighs under attack, now was simply the time to laugh.

But even with all her fortitude, Camilla could feel her resolve slipping. The feathering on her tender skin was the worst tickling she had ever endured, and with every moment it became worse. She tried to fight it, summoning the last of her willpower to fight through the haze of desperation and laughter. But the temptation of release was too great. As some part of her still-conscious mind watched in horror, Camilla pressed down on the trigger pin in her palm.

Nothing happened.

There were no words to describe the depths of her despair at that moment. Frantically she pressed it again and again, jamming down on it as she balled her fists in laughter, but every time there was only an impotent click. There were none of the explosions Sonia had promised, nothing to win her freedom. She had been lied to, tricked and left to laugh herself to death in the depths of these caverns.

The mistress’ taunting voice rang in her ears, singing “koochie-koo” as she feathered Camilla’s unbearably ticklish thighs. The soft voice was a counterpoint to her own wild, unrestrained laughter, following her as she plunged into the abyss of hopelessness. At that moment, Camilla for the first time let herself go.

Only a moment was enough. As she allowed herself to give in to the sensations, the suppressed flames of desire became a roaring inferno. She stopped fighting their approach and allowed herself to be carried away by the unstoppable force. Summoning the last of her strength, Camilla arched her back off the stone slab, opened her legs as far apart as she could, and gave a sharp piercing cry that cut through the darkness as she reached a mind-shattering orgasm.

Time slowed around Camilla as unbridled passion exploded out of her body in waves. The intensity that had been held behind those walls of self-restraint was greater than could possibly have been imagined. Even the mistress, who feathered Camilla’s thighs and kept her orgasm at a never-ending climax, was struck by its sheer power. She gasped as she felt the first wave of the lustful aura strike her, as though she had been struck by a typhoon. The mistress’ hands trembled as she felt it, taken aback by how powerful it was. Even the golden glow of the watchful idol seemed to flicker as it felt the explosion it had been waiting for. For an endless moment, all of them stood stunned by the unbearable ecstasy.

And then, that moment was shattered. From out of the darkness came a rampaging force which struck without warning: both the mistress and the idol, held in the grip of orgasmic bliss, saw it coming a second too late. A mighty blow descended upon the scene, striking the ground with such power that it sent splintered fragments of rock flying in every direction. The mistress screamed in terror: caught unawares, her only instinct was to protect the idol. The leapt into the idol’s golden glow to shield it from harm as Camilla opened her eyes to see what had caused this cataclysmic interruption.

In front of her like a knight in shining armor stood Maggie, charging into the fray. She was flanked by two more familiar faces: Mindy and Sonia stood beside her. Camilla’s heart leapt to see her two friends free and well: at that moment, no friends in the world could have been a dearer sight. In seconds Maggie’s massive strength, fueled by retribution, had snapped Camilla’s bonds. Camilla watched nearly dumbfounded as Maggie then lifted up the stone altar above her head, and with a single motion heaved it in the direction of the idol.

Any nonmagical target would never have stood a chance. But the shadow elven mistress was prepared to fight dearly for her charge. She held up her hands, and from her fingertips emanated a bolt of golden light, channeling the aura of the idol into a piercing ray of focused magical energy. It sliced through the flying altar, vaporizing it instantly, but it did not stop there. It flew further forwards towards the four girls, and for one horrible moment it seemed inevitable that it would strike them, and that they too would suffer the fate of the altar…

And then, at the last moment, a glowing blue shield suddenly appeared in front of the four girls. The golden bolt struck the shield and immediately rebounded, flying back towards the figure who had cast it. There was an explosion of stone, and a shriek of terror from the mistress, and then in a desperate burst of light both she and the idol vanished and were gone.

The girls stood momentarily stunned, not knowing where their salvation had come from. Then, they turned around, and saw Mindy, still holding up her hands with a soft blue glow enveloping them and a triumphant smile on her face.

“I thought you said you couldn’t do magic!” said Maggie in disbelief.

“I said I wouldn’t,” corrected Mindy with a self-satisfied smile. “There’s a difference.”

“So,” asked Camilla, “is she…?” It was the question on everyone’s mind.

“No.” Mindy shook her head. “She used a magical portal to teleport herself and the idol out of harm’s way. Look, you can see it coalescing.”

Mindy pointed at the last location of their opponents, and just as she did, golden strands of energy began to swirl about a glowing nexus in midair. In seconds, hanging in the air was a golden magical portal, floating an inch above the ground. On the other side of this portal, each of them realized, were the fugitives.

Under normal circumstances, the news of an escaped criminal would set Camilla on the trail like a bloodhound. However, now there was something on her chest which stung her at an even deeper level, and only now was she aware how deeply the fury went. She turned to Sonia, who stood impassively off to the side.

“You…you lied to me!” shouted Camilla, staring at Sonia with unbridled rage. “You set up those charges so they wouldn’t go off, and then you left me alone and defenseless!”

Sonia merely shrugged. “I couldn’t take the chance that you might decide to trigger it early. That would have blown my cover once they realized where the charges came from. But the belief that you had a secret weapon probably helped you to hold on longer against the torture, and I needed the extra time to find your friends.”

“Who are you to make that decision?” demanded Mindy, coming to the defense of her friend.

“I’m the one who let you out,” answered Sonia matter-of-factly. “That qualifies me to make a few judgment calls.”

“Judgment calls,” repeated Maggie with a sneer. “Just the sort of arrogance I’d expect from the Sorority of Thieves.”

Sonia, however, remained unruffled in the face of this universal enmity. “Think what you like, but you have a bigger problem right now,” she said. “The idol is still out there somewhere, and it still wants the three of you. Especially since you’re working for the Dark Lady.”

“I am not working for her!” shouted Camilla, enraged.

Sonia shrugged. “Semantics. The idol believes you are, and I’m given to understand it has some history with the Dark Lady. So I would strongly suggest that if you want to avoid re-capture, you complete the Dark Lady’s work and finish what you started.”

All three girls turned on Sonia simultaneously, and it was no mystery what they were thinking.

“Why you—“ growled Maggie.

“You think you can just—“ began Camilla.

“I’ll show you what I think of—“ started Mindy.

But Sonia could clearly tell when she had worn out her welcome. Without waiting for any of the girls to finish their thoughts, Sonia leapt deftly backwards into a patch of shadows. Her disappearance was instantaneous: one moment she was there, and the next she was long gone, leaving the three girls alone in the depths of the caves with their unfinished insults and threats.

“Where did she go?” asked Maggie.

“Wherever she went, we won’t be following,” grumbled Camilla. As much as she identified with the City Guards, she had to admit that when it came to stealth and tracking skills, the Sorority of Thieves trained their sisters to be the best. Trying to follow Sonia’s tracks out of these caves would be like trying to track a werewolf through a forest at midnight. And that left only one option for escape.

“Mindy,” asked Camilla, “is there any way you can determine where this portal leads?”

Mindy shook her head sadly. “It could go anywhere. But the only way to find out for certain is to go through and see for ourselves.”

Each of the three girls looked at each other without a word. Without having to speak, they knew they were all of one mind. After as far as they had come together, and what they had endured, they were not going to back down. Whatever unknowns might lie on the other side of that glimmering portal, they were ready to face them together. Camilla, Maggie, and Mindy took one final look at each other, and all together they leapt into the portal and vanished.

Chapter 8

The sun was setting over Port Bastion, the greatest city in the world. Its many buildings cast long shadows across the twisting, serpentine streets that wound throughout the city. The streets were filled with the hustle and bustle of moving people: in this city that never slept, the tide of people never ended. The taverns filled with those whose day jobs had finished, filling countless drinking establishments with raucous conversation. At the same time, those whose jobs took place after dark prepared for a night’s work. Cutpurses and con-artists set up inconspicuously on the city’s many dark corners, looking for marks. Meanwhile, some of the more advanced members of extra-legal professions, belonging largely to the Sorority of Thieves, donned their black clothing and prepared to redistribute the city’s wealth.

But even this great city had its forgotten corners, where only darkness and silence reigned, far apart from the life’s pulse of the city. Such a place was atop the Port Bastion clock tower: a looming behemoth of black stone which overlooked the city, isolated from the streets far below. Only the occasional mechanic would venture into its maze of cogs and gears to provide it with what little maintenance it needed to remain running. That evening, however, only a small flock of nesting ravens was present to be frightened when a bright flash of light and a gust of wind heralded the sudden appearance of a magical portal.

Out of the portal tumbled three female figures, momentarily disoriented as they got to their feet. The cold night air was a shock to their system, but any discomfort they may have felt was overcome with a great sense of well-being as they recognized where they were at once.

It had only been perhaps a day since they had left it behind, but the homecoming felt as though they had been gone an eternity. The city’s great buildings were spread out before them like the features of an old friend, most of all the majestic Sorority Houses that dominated the face of the city. Camilla’s gaze went to the City Guards’ House: tall and austere with its promises of law and order. Maggie’s eye fixated with gladness on the Explorers’ House: a great stone building with the dignity of an ancient castle. Mindy looked to the towers and spires of the Sages’ House: an ivy-covered academic building as befitted the greatest center of learning in Port Bastion. They were home.

But their homecoming was cut short by the realization that they were not here alone. From out of the elongated shadows of the tower’s arcane architecture stepped the figure that they had chased here: the woman who had tried to escape but knew she would be followed. The shadow elven mistress stepped towards them, the idol in her hand and her gaze unblinkingly set on her three pursuers.

In the warm light of the setting sun, she was even more stunningly beautiful than they had seen her before. The deep orange and red streaming from the horizon reflected off her marble-white skin, imbuing it with a warmth that spoke to the hidden depths of passion within. Her waist-length ebony hair fluttered in the evening air, casting gossamer shadows across the cold stone floor. Her long, sculpted legs strode confidently forward, her bare feet making no sound as they fell upon the stone beneath them. Her tight, miniscule shorts offered a tantalizing glimpse of thighs as the fabric rose and fell with her footsteps. Shadows from the sun’s light accentuated the roundness of her gently heaving breasts, with nipples pressing through the fabric of her top that was so woefully inadequate to contain the ivory treasures they held. She reached up to toss aside a strand of hair, her silver fingernails glittering in the sun, and her finger grazed against a pale white cheek which had perhaps never felt the sun’s caress before in her life. Silver eyes framed with long, full eyelashes bore into the girls with their gaze, and her gently pursed red lips formed into a smile. Everything about her looked even more vivacious and full of life. She was a beautiful anachronism of night in a world of day.

“I hoped you would follow me here,” she said with an enigmatic smile. “I knew you would.”

“You’re not getting away from us!” asserted Camilla, stepping forwards herself. As she did, it dawned on her that they had no real plan of what to do once they encountered their opponent: they had pursued without thinking a foe who had already overpowered them once before. Her only hope was that the idol had not had time to sufficiently recover its power after its recent exertions.

“Who says I want to?” asked the mistress with a coquettish smile. Her tongue moistened her ruby lips seductively. Even this far from her home, she was confidently in control.

But she had a powerful ally, as well. The three girls watched as the mistress opened her palm, and the golden idol slowly began to levitate, summoning its power.

Any hopes that they might have had of finding the idol exhausted were immediately dashed. In an instant they saw the familiar magical glow engulf the towertop, and they felt the spread of that presence which extended beyond time itself. In one moment they were the predators, and suddenly without any intervening time to react they were transformed into the prey as tendrils of light blinked into existence around each of their ankles, hoisting them up into the air.

Suddenly the three girls saw the world invert itself: it seemed as though the entire world had been turned upside-down, and it took them a moment to register that it was them who were now dangling in midair by their ankles, their bare feet up in the air. Camilla’s shapely feet, with high arches toned by running, wiggled next to Maggie’s upturned soles, whose titanic giantess tootsies looked even more enormous next to Mindy’s tiny, petite feet. But despite their differences in appearance, all three pairs of feet shared the common curse of hyperticklishness.

“Help! Help!” shrieked Mindy, who was all too aware of what was going to come next.

“Please not this! Anything but this!” panicked Maggie, whose tender feet had already endured intense tickling torture today. The look on her face was one of sheer terror.

“Stay strong, girls!” rallied Camilla, trying hard to follow her own advice. But she had only a second to mentally prepare herself before the tickling began.

“BWAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA!!!” All three girls erupted in instant screams of laughter as the magical tendrils gently touched all six feet simultaneously. Thirty toes danced side-by-side, twisting in all directions as the soft arches were prodded. The tendrils expanded into warm, glowing fingertips which stroked the ticklish surfaces, helpless to avoid the lustful assault.

“AAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! NOT THEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHERRRE!!!” laughed Mindy. Her naturally messy red hair was tussled into complete chaos as she dangled upside-down, her breasts bouncing wildly as she screamed. Her eyeglasses fell from her face and clattered to the stone ground below, followed by tears of laughter that dripped up her face and flew off like raindrops in a storm.

Beside her, Camilla’s equally ticklish feet were enduring the same treatment as long magical fingers scribbled across her soles, held her toes apart, and tickled the soft crevasses in between. She howled and wept with laughter, but her fighter’s spirit would not permit her to give up. She tried to lift herself up to grab at the tendrils holding her ankles, as she had done so many sit-ups toning her body to perfect athletic condition, to get her hands within range of the foe. But Camilla had never done sit-ups while her bare feet were under such a ferocious tickling assault. Every time, before she could even lift herself halfway, she would only collapse into a laughing wreck and swing helplessly, her hands clawing at empty air. It was an infuriating endless cycle, but she would not stop trying.

But Maggie was in the worst shape of all. The idol knew best the mysteries of her soft feet: how to abuse her most tender tickle spots and make her scream for mercy. It pursued them with a sadist’s relish, the tendrils sprouting new fingers all the while so even more of her gargantuan soles could be tickled. They wrapped around her big toes, clamping them together with superhuman strength to leave Maggie’s soles even more motionless and vulnerable.

“PLEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEASE!!!! YAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! HELP MEEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE!!!!” begged Maggie, swinging upside-down as her delicate tootsies endured the worst that the idol could do to them. Her voluminous laughter seemed to shake the tower itself as she struggled for freedom. But the more flushed her soft feet became, the more sensitive to tickling they were. Maggie’s tenderfoot curse spiraled out of control, driving her further and further into ticklish insanity.

Camilla heard the desperate pleas of her two friends beside her, begging to be released from their ticklish torment. She could feel their inner struggles as though they were her own. On the one side, Mindy’s struggle against her rising libido, forcing back the mortification of being the idol’s plaything, brought to orgasm in front of her friends. On the other hand, Maggie’s wounded pride: the warrior’s ferocity inside her demanding revenge for the indignity of her situation, the need to be seen as the steadfast wall among her friends. No amount of struggling could break the ethereal grip of the idol’s tendrils, but Camilla could not give up. Even though she laughed hysterically as the idol assaulted her ticklish feet without mercy, Camilla’s thoughts were for her friends. She had to save them.

And it was with this decision, this necessity on her shoulders, that Camilla’s resolve focused itself at last into a weapon of awesome power. She could feel her very essence piercing the veil of magic that enshrouded them, and shattering the chains that held them prisoner. Camilla could feel the idol’s innermost desires: its hunger for her body, its thirst for her laughter. And she could fight back. With all her willpower behind her, Camilla gave a mighty push. She could feel a tremor in the fabric of reality itself as the unstoppable force, impossibly, discovered in Camilla its equal. Everything was still, and then there was a great crash as the tendrils that held the three girls shattered like a pane of glass struck with a sledge hammer, and all three girls fell to the floor below.

“No! Impossible!” cried the mistress in disbelief as the girls got to their feet. Never before had she seen her sovereign overpowered, and the sight was terrifying to her.

But there was still more for her to fear. The idol had lost its prizes, but it was not to be denied. It looked around for another victim to feed its appetites, like a feral cat searching for prey. And its roving eye fell upon the only other form on the towertop: the one it had given sanctuary to in return for service. But now, in the heat of its passion, all promises were forgotten. The idol’s tendrils flew from its magical aura at the shadow elven mistress, who stood horrified but unable to protect herself from the onslaught. They wrapped around her body, removing her clothing until she lay suspended in midair: helpless, nude, and knowing the terrible fate that awaited her.

“Please! You can’t do this to me!” cried the mistress, desperately struggling to break the tendrils’ hold. “I served you! I obeyed you!”

Camilla strode up to the suspended figure of the shadow elven mistress with fearless confidence in her eyes. For now she saw the fear in her adversary’s eyes: the terrible knowledge that for the first time, she too was vulnerable. Those impassive features, which before held only calm superiority, trembled in abject terror.

“No!” cried the mistress, as a single bead of sweat formed on her brow like a gleaming jewel. “Please have mercy! You don’t know what you’re doing!”

“The most ticklish race on the Continent,” interjected Mindy. “The shadow elves feared tickling more than any other fate. But it’s been a long time for you, hasn’t it? Shielded by the power of the idol, how long has it been since you were made to laugh?”

“Too long,” answered Camilla with a smile. She turned to those soft white soles whose surfaces faced her so tantalizingly, and sunk her fingers into the soft ticklish flesh of the shadow elven feet.

Each of the girls had thought that they knew what ticklish laughter sounded like. They had heard the screams of ticklish girls as their weak spots had been discovered. But never before had any of them heard anything like this. At the very first touch of Camilla’s fingernails against the mistress’ delicate, wrinkled soles, there was an explosion of insane, animalistic laughter. The wildness of it: the desperation of the laughter spoke to a degree of sensitivity that the three girls could scarcely have imagined possible. At that moment, they truly realized that they were looking at the most ticklish feet in the world.

“YEEEEEAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAA!!!!! AAAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAA!!!!!” The laughter filled the tower until it seemed that there was no more room to hold it. Camilla’s fingers acted as the implements of justice, at last giving back to their captor some of what she had inflicted on them. Her fingers ran across the soles that were softer and more tender than any skin Camilla had ever felt in her life. The high arches, the flawlessly smooth heels and soft insteps all surrendered to her touch, causing ticklish agony to the laughing shadow elf. Her head was thrown back and tears streaked down her face as she begged the heavens above for deliverance.

“How does it feel to be the one laughing, for a change?” asked Camilla, looking over her thrashing victim with pleasure. The shadow elven soles were so soft and smooth, Camilla’s fingers slid over them as easily as if they had been covered in oil.

“PLEEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEASSE NOOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOO!!!!!” howled the mistress as she writhed in midair. She could just barely move, but nothing she could do could remove her ticklish feet from their merciless assault. She could only remain in place and suffer the worst punishment her race could endure.

“Yeah! Now let’s see what she thinks of tickling helpless victims!” cheered Mindy as she watched.

“I think she needs to learn even more of a lesson,” smiled Camilla. “Girls, can you help me teach it to her?”

That was the invitation the girls had been waiting for. Both of them leapt eagerly into the fray, ready to take this opportunity to return some of their treatment to their former torturer. Maggie and Mindy took up places before the mistress’ upper body: even more gorgeously stunning in the absence of clothing. Her tapered midsection, her soft sides, and her enormous, luscious breasts all begged to be touched.

Maggie’s fingers, long and very slender for a woman of her stature, could display amazing dexterity when she needed them to. And now more than ever, her pride demanded payback for what she had endured. Her fingertips pressed into the soft, alabaster hollows of the mistress’ underarms, the skin tempting and pulled taut with her arms above her head. The shrieks of ticklish laughter multiplied enormously at the first touch to these hidden treasures, and every muscle in the mistress’ upper body fought furiously to lower her arms and save her ticklish underarms from the assault. But it was no use: Maggie smiled as she enjoyed free reign of these tender regions.

But even sweeter than revenge was the thrill of victory. Maggie’s warrior spirit thrilled to see that face, once so serenely confident, contorted in furious laughter as her fingers walked down her ticklish ribs, squeezing laughter out of them with every step. Those shapely pale hands with their long silver fingernails, which had once been tools of Maggie’s ticklish destruction, now flailed helplessly in the air as the mistress’ arms were manacled by magic. Maggie could still remember what it felt like to have those imposing nails sliding down her own tender soles, devastating in their tickling prowess. And now those fearsome weapons were disarmed, leaving her opponent defenseless. It was the heady rush of conquest.

“BWAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!! PLEEHEHEHEHEHEHEASE HAHAHAHAHAVE MERCEEEHEEHEEHEEHEEEEE!!!!!” screamed the mistress as Maggie’s nails delved into the depths of her ticklish underarms.

Mindy finally did what she had been longing to do since the first time she had laid eyes upon the stunning form of the mistress. Licking her lips, she took those two perfect breasts into her hands: flawlessly white and smooth as they hung suspended in midair, awaiting her touch. At the first caress Mindy could feel the mistress’ body react with ticklishness and ecstasy, sending a shock of pleasure all throughout. Her gentle pink nipples rose erect in response to Mindy’s touch, running her fingertips softly over the firm, pliant flesh of the trembling breasts. With a gasp of longing, Mindy leaned down to gently tease the sensitive nipples with the tip of her tongue, leaving them glistening with moisture as she ringed around them, licking areolas the color of pink rose petals. Her fingertips worked in concert with her skilled mouth, ravenously drinking up the sweetness.

For Mindy, it was not only revenge she indulged in, but wish fulfillment. She knew her own hypersensitive breasts, so ticklish to the touch that simply fondling them playfully could reduce her to a laughing and extremely aroused mess. When her sorority sisters had tickled her during the girls’ nights at the House, forcing her to submit and beg for mercy, there had always been a part of her that wished she could hold out for more. She instinctively knew how to tap the rumblings of a growing orgasm deep beneath the surface, and coax it upwards into an eruption of sexual passion. And now, she was putting her skills to use.

“OH GAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAD!!!!! NOT THEHEHEHEHEHEHEHERE!!!!!” cried the mistress, while Mindy’s hands manipulated her round, voluptuous breasts with an expert’s touch.

All the while, Camilla relentlessly tickled the milky-white soles, dancing and writhing in midair without an escape. Tiny and delicate, Camilla could almost feel her own skin tingle as she ran her fingertips across the soft fleshy surfaces. Each of her long, feminine toes splayed apart in ticklish agony, flying in ten different directions as once as they struggled for freedom. These feet had not felt tickling for centuries, perhaps longer: cared for and pampered, their softness had reached levels that human feet could never parallel. And now they were helpless before a swarm of tickling fingers.

“Now do you see what it’s like to be one of your victims?” asked Camilla like an angel of justice. “How many helpless girls have you tickled like this, crying with laughter until they couldn’t take it anymore? How do you think they felt?”

“WAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!! KHHEEEAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!! WOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOOHOO!!!!!” was all the mistress could respond with. Thirty female fingers were working over the most ticklish spots on her body without mercy.

Insane with torture, the mistress could no longer even beg for mercy in coherent words. She desperately babbled incomprehensible syllables, which may have been some ancient arcane language, but more likely the universal language of unbearably ticklish women pushed past rational speech. Meaningless streams of words spilled out amidst screams of hysterical laughter. The girls drank it in like sweet nectar, relishing every scream and howl of hysteria.

They could feel the climax coming, like the first tremors of a massive earthquake. They felt it in their very cores, something beyond normal perception. They tickled faster and more furiously, keeping the mistress’ luscious body at a fever pitch until every muscle in her body tensed and her eyes began to roll back in her head. The fires of lust within her, stoked so long in service of the idol, at last burned in a conflagration of her own sensual ecstasy. With one long unbroken scream, the mistress was tickled over the edge of a momentous orgasm. Not in centuries had she felt what she experienced at that moment, and so great was the intensity that Camilla, Mindy, and Maggie all felt shockwaves of rapture flow out of her. In those glorious moments, she was no longer a warrior or a sorceress, or even mistress of the idol. She was a woman. She came and came like an endless fountain, until at last the pleasure was too much to bear. With a final gasp, the mistress fell unconscious on the stone floor of the tower, her nude body spread out in an embrace, with a smile of the most peaceful innocence and serenity they had ever seen her wear.

Seconds passed, and none of the three girls spoke. Words seemed inadequate to describe what they had all felt together. But at last, Camilla walked over to the mistress’ body and bent down. Next to her was the golden idol. Its magical glow was gone: at last, its ravenous appetite for pleasure had been satiated. A glow of warm satisfaction radiated from it, like a person who had feasted and eaten their fill. It slept now, finally content: the mistress’ ordeal had taken it to its very limits.

“It’s…so small,” said Maggie softly.

Camilla picked up the idol. She could hold it in her hand. This was the source of all their troubles: the thing that had brought them together and taken them through trials that they never could have imagined. It looked so harmless now as she held it.

“What—what should we do with it?” asked Mindy, summoning the courage to approach the idol and place a hand on it herself.

“And with her?” asked Maggie, gesturing at the still sleeping mistress.

“I’m sure she can return underground by herself,” said Camilla. She felt no desire to revenge herself upon the mistress any further. Looking at that face that slept so soundly, it was impossible to feel anything but compassion.

“But the idol needs to be dealt with,” continued Camilla. “It’ll awaken soon, I’m sure. And we can’t let it run unchecked through the streets of Port Bastion when it does.”

“Should we…destroy it?” asked Mindy.

Camilla shook her head. “I know that’s what we were hired to do. But that was before we knew the full story. I don’t think it’s up to us to take sides in a conflict this old. Let the sides involved work it out, but I’m through being used to fight a war that isn’t mine.”

“I’ll get behind that,” said Maggie, while Mindy nodded in approval. “So I suppose that means we should find a safe place to store it while it’s still sleeping?”

Camilla nodded with a knowing smile. “I know just the place.”


Epilogue

The Sorority of Thieves was in a state of utter chaos. Inside, furniture had been upended, locked doors had been torn off their hinges, and bags of loot lay abandoned on the ground as their owners fled in sheer terror. The once-subdued hallways rang with the sounds of running footfalls, panicked shouts, but above all, hysterical laughter.

In nearly every room, girls could be seen suspended in the air, held by glowing tendrils of magical energy which wound their way throughout the sorority house like the tentacles of some monstrous kraken. The tendrils wrapped around their helpless bodies, and ticklish body parts flailed and writhed in every direction as the halls echoes with screams and howls. Those sisters not yet captured made a desperate dash for the exit, but each of the doors were guarded by masses of tendrils which intercepted them, picking up ticklish sorority girls by the dozens to add them to the ranks of the laughing.

Among those girls still at liberty was Sonia, who dashed through the halls of the Thieves’ House with all the speed at her disposal. From time to time she bent down, without breaking stride, to scoop up some discarded valuable another unlucky girl had dropped. Sonia placed these collected objects in a small purse at her side as she ran. No sense in letting them go to waste.

Sonia knew better than to head for the doors. Her only chance to get out of here, she decided, was to head for the south tower of the House. A spiral staircase there led to the tallest point in the House: a single room with a window that overlooked the city. With any luck, she might be able to escape there. Running past rooms full of laughing, half-naked girls, Sonia made a dash for the tower door and began ascending the staircase.

From the steps behind her, Sonia felt a hand grab her ankle desperately. She looked around to see one of her Sorority sisters; she had no time to register who. The girl had tripped and fallen, grabbing on to Sonia’s ankle as a drowning woman might grab onto a lifeboat before being swept out to sea.

“Please! Take me with you!” cried the frightened girl. She tried to get to her feet, but she was clearly too far in the grips of panic to function.

Sonia did not hesitate for a moment. She gave a swift kick with her leg that sent the girl flying off, tumbling down the stairs behind her. Sonia immediately began running up the stairs again, sparing only a glance behind her to see the girl caught in mid-air by a giant, glowing tendril. A second later, screams of hysterical laughter echoed up the staircase as the invader claimed another ticklish victim.

“Sorry, love!” Sonia cried exultantly behind her. “Every girl for herself!”

Sonia reached the top of the staircase, and there was the open window she had sought. It was unguarded just as she had hoped, and beyond it was freedom: the limitless expanse of the rooftops of Port Bastion spread before her. Sonia ran towards it, captured loot in hand, and in a single graceful motion leapt through the portal, her long hair streaming behind her as the cool outside air hit her face like a declaration of victory…

And in mid-air, just as she was passing through the window, Sonia shrieked in terror as she felt something pull her back. A glowing tendril wrapped itself around her midsection and pulled her back inside the building like a fish caught on a line, and Sonia watched helplessly as that window receded further away from her as she was dragged backwards. No! She had been so close!

Now there were more tendrils, wrapping around her legs and ankles so she could not even kick, tying her arms behind her back so her captured loot clattered to the ground. And then came what she had dreaded: two quick motions removed her black boots, leaving a pair of soft, pink feet wiggling in the air. She had barely enough time to cry out in terror before…

“YEEEEAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! NOT THE FEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEEEET!!!” Sonia, who had never before been captured in the line of duty, had never had her feet tickled like this before. In fact, she had no idea they were even ticklish. But they were insanely so: as her magical tickler ran over Sonia’s smooth arches it seemed to know about soft spots that even Sonia did not know. In seconds Sonia was crying tears of laughter, and the nightmarish assault on her ticklish feet was just beginning.

“WAAAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAAHAA!!! SOMEONE HEHEHEHEHEHELP MEEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEE!!!” Sonia screamed desperately. Even if she could break free, her nerveless body had no fight left in it. As she laughed hysterically, her bare feet dancing wildly, she could only pray that someone, somewhere, would hear her cries for help and deliver her from this ticklish hell.

Outside on the street, Camilla passed by the Thieves’ House. With the window open, she stopped for a moment to listen to the wild screams of laughter and the sounds of disarray coming from within.

Then she smiled to herself, and walked back home.

- THE END -

that was great

Still the best writer on here.

Awesome