sillylittleabyss

[sillylittleabyss]

Where There's a Weald, There's a Way: Epilogue

Sunlight dappled an overgrown forest path, casting patterns of shadow through the branches of the trees. The songs of competing birds and the rustling of small woodland creatures in the underbrush was broken by the trundling of a carriage that bounced and jostled on the uneven, rough trail.

"Faithful Felix had the reins, of course, sweating away over the beasts of burden while his mistress lounged decadently without a care in the world-" "For the last time, stop narrating everything that happens", Cyrene's voice drifted forward the carriage from behind him. "This is a routine trip, not an epic adventure. And I'm reading, not lounging."

Felix grinned to himself, guiding the horses around a particularly nasty-looking rock sticking straight through the middle of the path. He could almost hear his mistress rolling her eyes in the carriage.

"No offense meant, Cy. Just passing the time. Since you forbade me from playing I Discern, after all." "That stupid game is beneath you, Felix. You only play it to annoy me, anyway." Felix shook his head. "You're just saying that because I always win."

She scoffed, but didn't bother dignifying that with a response. For a few moments, they rode in silence - though the creaking of the wheels and the distant sounds of the forest made plenty of ambient noise. After a short spell, though, Cyrene spoke up again. There was a slight note of mischief in her tone.

"You do seem to be in rare form today, Felix. You wouldn't be feeling nervous, would you?"

Felix twitched, almost imperceptibly. If Cyrene hadn't laid down her book to watch his reaction, she wouldn't have noticed at all.

"Most would be apprehensive driving a carriage into the dreaded Weald", he began. "Terrified, even! But not the stalwart Felix, who despite- um..."

Felix ran out of steam as he felt his mistress sidle up behind him, her soft breasts pressing into his back as she leaned out of the carriage and rested her chin on his head.

"Weren't you saying something?", Cyrene asked innocently as she drew him in close and let her hand wander down his chest, tracing the seam of his tunic where it crossed over his nipple. He shuddered at the touch, and she laughed in his ear.

"Feeling too pent-up to muster a response?" "I... think you know quite well", breathed Felix. The reins had slipped through his fingers in spite of himself, and the horses gratefully seized the opportunity to bring the carriage to a stop and nibble on some grass. Cyrene smiled, her lips brushing his ear as she whispered to him. "I'm confident you can do better than two short weeks, my dear sweet apprentice."

As she spoke, her fingers found the top of his tunic and caressed a thin band of leather that just barely poked out from beneath it. They toyed with the small leather collar that now encircled Felix's neck, slipping beneath the fabric to brush the small stone idol that hung from the front. The moment she touched it, he flushed in her hands and moaned softly, squirming in her grasp and wriggling into her.

"I'm- still not sure- about this whole collar business", Felix said. His breath came in short little gasps, but he was making a valiant effort to keep his head. "You can kind of- see it! Through my tunic." "It suits you beautifully", murmured Cyrene, rising up to casually use the top of Felix's head as a resting place for her heavy breasts. She stroked his hot, flushed face possessively with one hand as the other continued to cup the little statue. "A convenient halter for my favourite little pet."

Felix didn't make any attempt to resist as her hands took hold of his shoulders and drew him back, pulling him down until he was lying flat on the floor of the carriage. Cyrene kneeled over him now, her face hidden from view by the looming swell of her chest, but he knew exactly what the smug smile touching her lips looked like.

She didn't bother telling him what to do; she didn't have to. She simply hiked up the hem of her robe, giving him a moment to revel in the sight of her pillowy soft thighs and glistening wet pussy hovering over his face, then sank onto him with a thump. His tongue delved eagerly and automatically between her plump lips, savouring the taste of his mistress as she began to ride his face. Cyrene toyed nonchalantly with him as she bounced and ground into him, batting playfully at the dripping tent that twitched alarming under his tunic. Occasionally, she would wrap her fist around his cock, pumping it through the fabric for a few seconds with a wicked smile as he squirmed and groaned beneath her.

Her fingers slipped beneath the collar and tightened, forcing his face deep into her pussy and squeezing her thighs tightly around his head. Felix struggled and bucked as she smothered him mercilessly between her thighs, drowning him in her scent and wetness. Just as his struggles became desperate and jerky, she released him to gasp and pant beneath her for a moment before dropping onto his face once again.

"Mmm, it makes a convenient handle for impertinent little apprentices, too..."

Felix didn't respond; he was a little preoccupied trying to balance his need to lap obediently at her pussy with the need to keep breathing. Cyrene giggled and bounced, guiding his hands up to close around her jiggling breasts. With Felix pinned firmly beneath her ass, she reached for the forgotten reins and stirred the horses into motion once again.

"Work diligently, my dear apprentice! If I'm not satified by the time we reach the inn, I'm extending your sentence to a month."

---

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[sillylittleabyss]

Where There's a Weald, There's a Way: Chapter 5

When consciousness returned to him, it came with an overwhelming sense of relief. Felix felt as though an incredible tension had been released from his body, as though he was a taut bowstring that had finally been released. Oddly, when he tried to remember exactly what had been keeping him so tightly wound, he couldn't quite put his finger on it. It didn't matter; whatever it was, it was gone.

When Felix cracked open his eyes, he realised he was back in his quarters, in bed. That made sense... it was morning, wasn't it? Once again, when he reached for his memories of the night before, he found them just out of reach. It was puzzling. As was the fact that he was shirtless, but still wearing yesterday's breeches under the covers.

He was just easing himself up into a seated position when there was a soft knock at the door.

"Come in", he called. He was relieved when he saw it was Cyrene who entered; in his befuddled state, he wasn't sure he felt like entertaining visitors. Cyrene was different, though.

She gently shut the door behind her and smiled at him, crossing the room to take a seat at his bedside. "How are you feeling?", she asked. "Fine", Felix said a little hesitantly. "Pretty good, actually. Did something... happen to me?"

Cyrene didn't respond immediately, chewing on her lip meditatively. When she finally did speak, she phrased her words delicately as though carefully selecting each one. "Something has, yes. I believe you were under the influence of a Weald artifact, Felix." She held up a finger at his startled reaction. "Note my usage of the word 'were'! I'm hopeful that any anomalous influence has been... released, at this point."

Was it his imagination, or did she redden slightly as she spoke?

"You're telling me I finally completed my first Discernment, and I did it by accident", said Felix with a rueful grin. "Did you at least figure out which artifact did it? I feel like I should remember, but I'm all..."

He shook his head, trying to clear the cobwebs away. "...all jumbled up", he finished.

Cyrene laid a hand on his chest. It was a surprisingly familiar gesture coming from her - almost possessive - but Felix found he didn't mind too much. Something about her warm hand against his bare skin felt almost...right.

"Don't tax yourself", she said. "It may not feel like it, but you've been under a great deal of strain. You should try to relax." She was pushing him gently but insistently back down into the pillows. Felix sunk back, the gentle pressure of Cyrene's hand seeming to melt away any protest he might have made. "And of course, if you notice any lingering symptoms, let me know immediately."

Felix nodded, letting her settle him in. He couldn't help but shake the feeling that there was something he was forgetting, something important. The last few days were lost in a puzzling, hazy fog - but a vague sense of loss hung over them, frustratingly out of reach.

It wasn't until she was already gone that Felix realised he hadn't even asked Cyrene what symptoms he should be looking out for.

---

That afternoon, Felix was wandering somewhat aimlessly on the grounds of Viridite Castle. He'd begun with a brisk circuit of the outer ward to clear his mind and fill his lungs with some fresh air, but now he couldn't help but notice that his perambulations had been steadily bringing him closer and closer to the edge of the Weald.

Despite all the stories about it and its general aura of foreboding menace, everyone knew that the Weald was perfectly safe as long as you don't cross the treeline. Still, the realisation gave him a bit of a chill, considering everything that had happened over the past few days.

Except, what had happened, exactly? It was still hazy. Felix stared into the gloom that always suffused those trees, even in broad daylight and from a stone's throw away. There was something insistent nudging at the edge of his mind - tantalisingly close, but never quite close enough to grasp.

You remember.

Felix froze. He wasn't sure if the voice in his head was his own, welling up from somewhere deep and buried inside him, or if it was from... somewhere else.

You remember being exactly where you belong.

This time, the words came with an unbidden image: Cyrene poised above him, still wearing her scholar's robe, her face partly obscured from view by the swell of her chest. What was visible of her expression held triumph and tenderness in equal measure, and her fingers curled into his hair as they forced him forward, guiding his face where it needed to go. He saw himself reflected in her eyes: kneeling, subservient and adoring.

You remember her lips wrapped around your cock, your hips bucking, coming mindlessly and desperately for her.

Felix shuddered, his hand finding its way down to palm at the growing erection tenting his breeches absent-mindedly before he remembered where he was. What was that?

"Is someone there?", Felix called out, his eyes scanning the treeline. He felt foolish as soon as the words passed his lips.

The Weald didn't respond, except with the sighing of wind through branches. He was alone. Nonetheless, he stumbled away from the treeline in fear. Was that a memory? Did it really happen? Or was it a fabrication, some aftereffect of the artifact that had touched his mind?

Felix turned his back to the forest and hurried away. Whatever it was, it definitely felt like a lingering symptom, like Cyrene had warned him about. And hadn't she told him to let her know immediately if he noticed anything strange?

---

Felix had some difficulty finding his mistress. She wasn't in the Office of Discernment, nor was she in the library or even the great hall. Eventually, having exhausted all other options, Felix found himself somewhere he'd never dared venture before: hovering nervously at the door to her chambers.

As a royal scholar held highly in King's esteem, Mistress Cyrene was afforded a whole suite of rooms to herself. Felix knew that, of course, and knew where they were - the castle was a big place, but he'd long since memorised most of its corridors and even a few of the secret passages. He'd never been invited or sent here, though; the business of a lowly apprentice rarely extended to this part of the castle.

He knocked hesitantly, unsure if his mistress was even in. He wasn't sure what he would say if she was - if those memories were not false, then telling her about them was risky at best. But then, how could they possibly be true?

"Just a moment, if you please." Cyrene's voice came slightly muffled through the door. He heard the sound of a book clicking shut and the soft rustling of cloth as she stood.

When Cyrene opened the door, the sight of her was enough to make Felix redden. She had clearly just bathed, and was only wearing a light gown of soft white cotton. It clung to her curves and did little to keep the prominent bumps of her nipples from showing through the fabric. Her long, blonde hair hung damp and heavy over one shoulder, and a few beads of water still clung to her skin - along with the faint smell of roses, which drifted out when she opened the door.

She pursed her lips at him, folding her arms beneath her breasts with an unreadable expression. "Ah, Felix", she said. "Just the man I wanted to see. Do come in."

Cyrene swept into the room without waiting for his response, and Felix followed her in uncertainly. As he looked around at the simple luxuries that oufitted her bedchamber, he had the distinct impression that he was wandering into uncharted territory. Light curtains of lilac gauze drifted gently in the wind, the floor was carpeted with thick wool, and a small heap of books occupied part of a large, comfortable-looking bed. It made his quarters look downright modest by comparison!

She gestured for him to sit, shunting a few weighty volumes out of the way to make space for them both on her bed. He did so, but it didn't make matters any easier for Felix to have her join him. She watched him expectantly from right beside him, patting her damp hair with a towel, and the words froze in his throat. Eventually, Cyrene cocked her head and gave him an amused smile.

"My dear apprentice", she said. "You are practically vibrating. Please, proceed before you burst." A hint of mischief touched her smile, and she added, "Unless you only knocked on my door to use the latrine?"

Felix felt his face flush, could tell how obvious his nervousness probably was to her. Waiting wasn't going to make this any easier: best to just come out and say it.

"No, it's not that. It's just that I think I remembered something. Or... maybe I saw something? I'm not sure if it was a memory or not, but..." Cyrene paused and let the towel fall from her hair. He had her full attention now, and quaked slightly beneath it. Felix took a deep breath. "It was... about you, Mistress Cyrene. I saw you. In the Office of Discernments."

Felix was worried she would press him for details, make him say outright exactly what he saw her doing. He didn't know if he had the nerve to describe the details, as vivid as they were in his head. He was surprised to find that she did no such thing. Cyrene simply regarded him thoughtfully, tapping her lip with the tip of her thumb.

"I need to know", said Felix, a little more forcefully. "Was it just some Weald trickery? Or did- did that really happen?"

Cyrene looked right at him, her green eyes locking onto his and sending a bolt of electricity down his spine. Felix felt totally fixed in place as she spoke.

"It happened." She let the words hang in the air for a moment, filling the room with their weight. "I had hoped to spare you the embarassment, Felix. But it seems the relic does have its limits." Through the shock he was feeling at her blasé admission, Felix struggled to find words. "You... you did that to me? And you made me forget?" Cyrene nodded brusquely. "Don't think I did so lightly. In the end, it was an act of mercy." "Mercy! How could that possibly be mercy?" "Exposure to Weald artifacts is an occupational hazard of our profession", she said firmly. "You were simply unlucky. But you were exposed, and you were spiralling. If I hadn't intervened, your condition would only have worsened."

The heat in his face now had nothing to do with embarassment, though it did have something to do with the memory of exactly what her "intervention" had entailed.

"Then you should have told me!", he said. "You should have let me decide!" "I was trying to spare you", she repeated. "Spare you the embarassment of knowing you had been placed completely in my power. Of knowing that without my help, you'd end up pumping your sanity away fruitlessly, driving yourself mad trying to find release."

Cyrene's words shut Felix up for a moment. Partly because he sensed she actually believed what she was saying, but partly because there was something in him - on some level - that stirred when she said that. That liked it. And as much as he'd have liked to ascribe it entirely to the artifact, he couldn't help but feel like it was something he'd carried with him long before he entered Mistress Cyrene's service.

"Say the word, Felix, and I'll lock the relic away and never lay eyes on it again", Cyrene continued. "But I'll be condemning you in the process. Can you live from now to the end of your days in perpetual frustration, without ever finding release?" "You- this isn't about that!" said Felix. "You just wanted to use me as- as your plaything." "Perhaps it was a perk", she said with the ghost of a smile and a tilt of her head. "And you were amusing. But if all I wanted was to use you, I could make you forget right now."

A chill ran down Felix's spine. Of course - she made him forget once, and she could do it again. She could make him do whatever she wanted, and there was nothing he could do to stop her. Even if he could, he wasn't sure he'd want to.

That last point was tested immediately. While he was reeling from the realisation of the situation he was in, Cyrene reached over and fished out a leather cord from her nightstand. Felix could see the little idol dangling from the end of it, the cord wrapped around it in loops to turn it into a makeshift necklace.

"I'm tired of debating this with you, Felix", Cyrene began. He knew this was his only chance; he should reach out and snatch it from her hands before she could use it. Yet he didn't move a muscle. "I think it's time we get to the bottom of this once and for all."

Time seemed to move in slow motion as Cyrene closed her fist around the idol. A warmth and fuzziness descended over Felix almost immediately - in an instant, he felt like he was five cups deep into his wine. Heat flooded his body as an overpowering sleepiness suffused him, threatening to carry him down into oblivion...

He was snapped awake by Cyrene's fingers clicking in his face. "None of that", she said. "I need you awake and alert. Focus and pay attention to me, Felix."

It must have been the power of the relic. The moment she said it - no, the moment she commanded it, Felix felt the drowsiness lift away. An immense sluggishness still hung over his limbs and Cyrene seemed to command the entirety of his attention, but he was suddenly more awake than he had been all day.

"The more I use this relic", she said, "the better I'm coming to understand it."

As Cyrene spoke, her fingers settled on Felix's knee and began to trace their way slowly up the side of his thigh. With her other hand, she slipped the necklace over her head, allowing the idol to slip down into her gown and nestle between the soft, warm curve of her breasts.

"It's a tool of control, but not transformation. It can't change who you are; it can only bring out what is already within." Her hand glided across his thigh to gently stroke a finger down his rapidly swelling manhood. "Though not without some fun side effects, of course."

Felix looked down at Cyrene's long, delicate fingers grazing over the front of his breeches, and lifted his eyes to meet hers yearningly as he grew in her hand. Her teasing little smile deepened into a smug grin as she held his gaze.

"Now, my dear apprentice", she said, still staring deeply into his eyes. "It's time to tell me exactly what it is that you really, truly desire."

Felix was fully awake. His mind was unclouded and unfogged by the relic, and he was in full possession of his faculties. But he could feel the magic working at his tongue - loosening it, making it impossible to hold back the answer to her question. He tried to hold against it, but only lasted a moment before-

"I want to belong to you", he gasped out. "I... I want to serve you and be claimed by you and dedicate myself to your service!"

He clapped a hand over his mouth, eyes widening in horror at what he'd just confessed. At the dawning realisation that it was the truth.

Cyrene's smile was positively wicked, her fingers already deftly unlacing his breeches. "I know", she said as she slipped his cock free and teased a moan from his lips with a few careless pumps of his shaft.

"I am an indulgent mistress. I spoil my apprentices. And now I'm going to give you exactly what you want, Felix."

She pushed him down hard, making him fall back onto the bed. Rising to her feet, she shed her gown in one careless motion and discarded it.

"And I know what that is far better than you do, my dear apprentice."

Cyrene loomed over him for a moment, sliding her hands down her own body and letting him behold her in all her glory. His eyes followed them as they glided down the smooth skin of her heavy, soft breasts and grazed over pebbled, dark areolas. Her fingers flicked over her stiff, puffy nipples and slipped down to cup the underside of her breasts.

The idol on its leather thong bobbed and then vanished entirely as she lifted and squeezed it between them, and a fresh wave of desperate heat coursed through Felix's body a moment later. It made his cock bounce in the air as it twitched with arousal, and he huffed in surprise at the force of it.

Her hands continued their journey, idly slipping down and sinking into the soft, round curves of her tummy. Felix could only watch spellbound as one hand dipped down to dance teasingly over the soft curls that crowned her pussy, and the other caressed a soft hip and thick thigh.

Unable to sit and watch any longer, Felix tried to pull himself up from the bed and meet her. Cyrene only smiled and stepped forward, pushing him back down as she sunk down over him and trapped his twitching, leaking cock in the expanse of her cleavage. He groaned out loud as she squeezed him between her breasts, still slightly damp from the bath.

"Don't try to talk, honey", Cyrene said as he tried to gasp out a plea. "Your poor little brain might melt down into slag." The idol on its cord bounced and jerked erratically as she engulfed his cock between her tits, squeezing and sliding them over his length as they rapidly became slick with his precum. "Your only task right now is to get good and riled up for me."

With one last teasing squeeze around him, Cyrene released Felix's aching cock to fall free and throb against her as she climbed over him. His poor member only had a brief respite, though - a moment later she sunk down, straddling him and pinning it between his thigh and the soft, wet lips of her pussy. Grinding his manhood into her with a satisfied smile, she leaned forward and let her hands slip under Felix's tunic to explore the taut lines of his stomach and chest.

"Please", said Felix, thrusting his hips up and rubbing himself needily against the velvet slickness of her entrance. He could barely hear himself over the blood pounding in his ears. "Please Cyrene, I need it!" "You need it?" Cyrene asked coyly as her fingers found his nipple and tweaked it, drawing another gasp from him. "Oh, Felix. What makes you think I'm going to let you come?"

She lifted her hips almost menacingly as she spoke, reaching back to guide his throbbing head to her lips and rub it slowly and teasingly between them. Cyrene laughed at Felix as he tried desperately and futilely to thrust into her, always pulling just far enough away to frustrate his efforts. His cock brushed maddeningly against the lips of her pussy, but never found its way in.

When he groaned in wordless anguish, she finally relented. Cyrene sank her hips onto his cock in one smooth motion and buried him to the hilt, her lips parting in a deep moan. Felix's eyes widened in shock, and he choked back a noise of his own as he felt his entire shaft plunge into her tight, wet core.

"Mm." Cyrene gave Felix a rich smile as she settled into her seat, crossing her arms beneath her bare breasts and taking a moment to gaze down at him imperiously. "Good boy. Now, where was I?"

With agonising slowness, Cyrene rolled her hips and wiggled her plump ass into his lap, relishing every plaintive moan and whimper she wrung from her apprentice. "You came just yesterday, remember?" She grinned mockingly down at him. "Although... I think I could excuse you for forgetting."

"No", she said as Felix clutched desperately at her ass. His fingers pressed into her soft cheeks as he tried to encourage her to rise up and fuck him, but he may as well have been trying to move the castle. "There's no fun at all in letting you come again so soon."

Slowly and deliberately, Cyrene eased herself forward to lean over him. She planted her hands on on either side of his face, and her heavy breasts hung down to tickle his chest through the tunic as she stared deeply into Felix's eyes from scant inches away.

He could feel her hot breath on his face as she spoke. Her voice was quiet, almost a whisper. "What do you say to that, Felix?" Felix felt like a prey animal caught in the gaze of a predator. "I don't- ah!", he shuddered and tripped over his tongue as Cyrene gave a teasing little bounce on his cock, making her breasts sway above him. "Please... please use me as you wish!"

That was the right answer. Without warning, Cyrene sank down onto his cock and muffled his cry of alarm with a ferocious kiss. His heart hammered in his chest as her lips crushed into his possessively, and he felt the weight of her body pressing him down into the bed. Pinning him helplessly beneath her soft breasts and thick thighs, claiming him completely and effortlessly.

She kissed him so hard he saw stars, then traced the outline of his lip with the tip of her tongue as she pulled away. Her eyes blazed with intensity, but her smile was warm and gentle. "Good boy", she said. She raised her hips and began to ride his cock slowly, her tits bouncing in his face with each deliberate descent. Finally allowed to move, Felix gripped her soft, wide hips tightly and pulled them into him harder with each thrust.

"Good boy!" cried Cyrene. She bounced faster and harder into his lap, pushing him down into the bed every time she impaled herself on his needy cock. Felix was overwhelmed: every time his mistress's slick, tight pussy slid down to engulf his manhood, the sensation was unendurable. He thrust into her desperately with abandon, every thought driven from his mind but a frantic desire to give Cyrene what she wanted.

"I'll ride you", she panted between thrusts. "and tease you, until you're a horny- hah, dripping mess for me. That's how- I like you best-"

Cyrene's tempo was becoming irregular now, speeding up and losing rhythm as her breath came ragged and sweat dripped down her skin. His nose was flooded with the scent of her, and Felix quaked helplessly beneath Cyrene as she came on his cock. Her back arched as she jolted back, clenching him tightly between her thighs as she rocked and trembled above him.

He felt her relax around him as she slowly came down from the peak of orgasm. His cock throbbed inside her, still hard as ever and quivering with need in its velvet prison. Cyrene gazed down from on high with a beatific smile on her face, her eyes half-lidded and dreamy. She heaved a big sigh and giggled, steadying herself with a hand on his chest, and started to bounce once again.

It was going to be a long afternoon.

---

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[sillylittleabyss]

Where There's a Weald, There's a Way: Chapter 4

What a fool I've been.

Cyrene shoved the idol into the drawer and slammed it shut, twisting the key with a click. In the cold light of day, she felt terrible about what she had done. She had let things get too far out of hand last night; let a Weald artifact get the better of her. If the Royal Discerner of Viridite-on-the-Weald wasn't wise enough to know better than that, then who was?

The worst part of it all was how tempted she was, even now, to take the relic right back out of the drawer and use it again. To take hold of its power for her own ends, turning her sweet apprentice into a horny, dripping mess dedicated only to serving her... and of course, being rewarded in turn.

Cyrene growled in frustration. She couldn't rationalise it any longer: Felix had placed his trust in her, and she had used that trust selfishly for her own satisfaction. No, the idol had to stay locked safely away for his own good, and for hers. No good could come of using it again.

Trying to quiet the disappointment she couldn't help but feel at the prospect of ending her little adventure once and for all, Cyrene heaved a great sigh. If she'd known she would be succumbing to a crisis of conscience, she would have at least gone in for a second taste.

---

Felix was in trouble. And, as usual, it was swinging between his legs.

He had hoped, if nothing else, that dedicating his focus to scholarly pursuits would do something to distract him from how exhaustingly horny he was recently. Even that idea was scuppered, though: when he'd turned up at the office in the morning, Mistress Cyrene had informed him that they were taking a day off. Something about pacing themselves and limiting their exposure to unknown artifacts.

He never got days off. How the hell was he supposed to occupy his mind now? He was even desperate enough to consider the King's huntsman for a second, but knew already that his pride wouldn't accept the smug expression on the man's face if Felix came crawling back. I'd probably end up trying to hit him instead, and then I'd be the one getting knocked out.

Felix didn't dare return to the privacy of his quarters; he knew how that would end, and knew how fruitless it would be. He was beginning to realise that something was happening to him, something not entirely normal. It felt... Weald-y. He was at a loss over what he could do about it, though. He imagined marching up to Cyrene and announcing that his dick didn't work and it was the Weald's fault.

Nope, that was right out. He imagined her amused smile, pouting with exaggerated sympathy for her poor, horny apprentice who just couldn't keep it in his pants. The image made his face burn even as, confusingly, he stiffened in his breeches at the thought. He'd never hear the end of it, that was for sure.

Felix spent most of his day off wandering idly around, getting underfoot, and generally making a nuisance of himself. By the end of the day, the castle's kitchens had a standing bounty on his head and he was pretty sure he'd made an enemy for life of the royal chef. Eventually, looking to lay low for a little while, he ended up on the castle ramparts.

As he opened the heavy oaken door, Felix was startled to see that he was not alone up here. In fact, he'd stumbled across none other than Mistress Cyrene staring wistfully out at the setting sun. The wind that always howled over the castle's walls lifted her blonde hair into a messy halo over her head, and outlined the curves of her body beneath her velvet robes in ways that Felix really did not need to see right now.

"Sorry, Mistress. Didn't realise you were... I'll go", he hurriedly tried to excuse himself, turning back for the door he'd just come through. "No, it's all right, Felix", said Cyrene. She gave him an encouraging smile. "Why don't you stay a while?"

Praying for his dick to behave itself for a change and not embarass him, Felix dutifully took his place at his mentor's side. He thought she seemed a little... melancholy. It was a stark contrast from her bubbly mood the day before.

He thought to ask if something was the matter. When he glanced up at Cyrene, though, she was looking thoughtfully out over the landscape and running her thumb over her lips. The way she did when she was mulling something over. Felix totally lost his own train of thought, watching her thumb gently compress the soft surface of her lips - they looked so full and plump. He wondered what it would feel like to kiss them. What they would feel like if they...

Her green eyes flitted to him and he quickly averted his eyes from her face, shamefacedly fixing his attention firmly on the sunset. She laid a hand gently on his shoulder, surprising him, and he glanced over to see her watching him, the ghost of a smile now touching those soft lips. He suddenly felt very close to his mistress; the weight of her attention was like a physical presence enfolding him.

As if her touch gave him the permission he was waiting for, the words suddenly tumbled from his mouth. "Mistress... Mistress Cyrene, there's something I need to tell you about!"

To his surprise, she almost looked like she'd been expecting it. "Of course, my dear apprentice. Let's remove to somewhere a little more private, shall we?"

---

The Office of Discernments was lit softly by flickering candlelight. Cyrene was busy attending to the candlebras that dotted the office, lighting them to dispel the evening gloom. Her robes rustled slightly in the hush that suffused the room as she touched the glowing taper in her hand to each candle in turn.

Finally, she brought her lips together and blew out the taper, then drifted over to her desk. Felix was sitting there in her chair, looking troubled and conflicted. No doubt trying to figure out how to come out and say what he needed to. If only he knew that she was already well aware of his troubles!

Cyrene's personal desk wasn't really designed for two people to sit at, so she arranged herself on the desk in front of him - placing her thick, velvet-clad thighs roughly at his eye level. He looked up at her with trepidation, and she gazed down at him patiently.

"So", she said delicately. "I believe you had something to share." "It's..." he hesitated. She'd never known Felix to have trouble coming up with a quick riposte, but now he seemed lost for words. "A curse. I think I'm Weald-cursed! There's a... strange feeling." "And what do you feel?", asked Cyrene. She did wonder if she should be pushing him like this, but she couldn't deny being curious about how this ordeal had felt from his perspective.

Felix's mouth opened and closed, struck dumb once again. Even in the dim light, she could see his cheeks redden. "Well...", he said. "I mean, in the night... and when I need to, I find myself, um. I can't easily... well, I c-can't finish!" Cyrene just quirked an eyebrow at him, momentarily taken aback. Wait, not at all? That hadn't figured into her theories.

He must have taken her silence for amusement or disgust, because he only grew more agitated. "I know what you're thinking!", he said defensively. He had leaped up out of his chair and was talking very quickly now. "That this is a matter for an apothecary. But it all started with that Weald relic! And it's driving me crazy. I can't finish, I can't think straight, I-I can't stop staring... I need..."

Felix was pacing now, looking red-faced and stricken. He looked as though he was about to pass out on the spot from anxiety, and he was talking more and more quickly as he desperately tried to explain himself to her. He was practically hyperventilating. It was more than Cyrene's heart could take, to see her apprentice in such anguish and to know it was her doing.

I need to take responsibility, she thought. I need to lift this burden from his shoulders. Even though she'd promised herself that very morning that she was done with the relic, she couldn't bear to see him sputtering and choking like this, clearly suffering. Not when the means to soothe him was literally in the palm of her hand.

She slipped the idol from the drawer. In his agitated state, Felix didn't notice at all.

He stopped in his tracks with his back turned to her, though, as the idol's effect set in. His chest still rose and fell heavily, but the frantic rambling cut short. Standing up from the desk, Cyrene crossed the room and wrapped her arms around him from behind before she could change her mind.

"It's alright", Cyrene said, feeling the warmth of his back against her body as she held him tightly. "My dear apprentice. I understand."

Felix didn't say a word, but he made a plaintive noise and turned into her embrace. She gathered him up into her arms, pressing his face to her bosom and letting him nestle there for a moment. He gave a great shuddering breath into her chest, and she could almost feel the anxiety and tension draining from his body.

Cyrene kept him there for a moment, enjoying the warmth and closeness of her apprentice as she held him in her arms. He snuggled in closer to her of his own accord, and she could feel the hardness of his covered manhood as it brushed insistently against her thigh. Despite her mixed feelings about using the idol again, Cyrene couldn't help but smile to herself as he crowded in close and rubbed himself against her needily.

"Felix", she said softly in his ear. "Tell me how I can help you. Tell me what you need." His voice was breathy, and came as though from far away. "I need... Cyrene." Not quite the answer she was expecting. Gently, she said, "No, Felix. You don't need me. It's just the influence of the relic. What you need is to come, don't you?"

Felix clutched her with sudden and surprising force, pulling himself closer into her embrace. His hands wandered down her back and slid down to cup the cheeks of her round ass through her robe.

"Mistress Cyrene", he insisted dreamily. His hands kneaded into the soft flesh of her ass through the velvet, sending a flush of heat to her core as he fondled and squeezed her roughly.

Her apprentice's hands pawing at her butt impertinently was what caused Cyrene's resolve (and her patience) to finally fail her. Very well; if he was so desperate for her, then he would have her. But he would have her on her terms, not parting her cheeks lewdly like some randy sailor down at the pier.

One hand still clutching the warm idol on her hand, she put the other one on top of his head. "Good boy, Felix", she said. "Down."

Last night, when she had told him to sleep, he had obeyed her command. He did the same now, sinking to his knees beneath her hand and looking up at her with shining eyes. The soft, uneven candlelight cast an orange hue over Felix's face, outlining his longing expression fuzzily against the darkness around them.

The sight just sent a renewed throb of desire into her. Cyrene hiked up her robe and leaned back, the cold stone of the castle wall pressing into her bare ass as she rested against it. Felix's eyes widened, following the hem as it travelled up to reveal Cyrene's soft, thick thighs one inch at a time. She pulled it all the way up over her round hips, and his eyes settled on the thick, slightly damp curls between her legs and the soft, puffy lips hidden beneath them.

She felt the cool evening air tickle her legs, felt the intensity of her apprentice's gaze fixed upon her as she became the center of his world. This was much more like it. Cyrene smiled down at Felix and lifted a leg to hook languidly over the back of his neck. Drawing him into her, she pulled his face between her thighs and softly but firmly pressed him into her hot, wet pussy.

Felix moaned into her as her scent filled his nose and her wetness smeared on his cheek. Cupping his head with a hand, she guided him gently into place and bit back a moan of her own as she felt his tongue delve eagerly in to part her lips and lap gently between them.

"Touch yourself, Felix", she breathed a little shakily. Her heart was fluttering in her chest as his hot breath stroked her mound and his deft tongue began to flick obediently over her clit. "Don't hold back. And... mm, don't stop!"

He gave a little murmur of assent from between her legs, totally devoted to his task. One hand fumbled clumsily at his breeches, the other still clutching at her thigh and sliding around to caress her ass once again. He moaned again as his fingers sunk into her soft yielding flesh, eliciting a breathless little chuckle out of Cyrene.

"You're a little obsessed, aren't you, my dear, ah, apprentice?" she said, running her fingers through Felix's short, sandy hair. "Well, since you like it so much..."

She slid her hand down to his shoulder and pushed him all the way down the ground. His mouth came free of her pussy with a confused protest as she forced him gently down to lie on the cold stone floor. His fingers were still working in vain at the laces of his breeches as he looked up at her from below; the task of unlacing them seemed to be wholly beyond his ability at the moment.

Cyrene stood above her apprentice for a moment, revelling in the absolute power she felt over him in that instant. Only for a moment, though. Unceremoniously, she lifted her robe and dropped her ass down to cover Felix's nose and eyes, positioning her pussy over his mouth so he could resume his vital work.

He gave a muffled cry of alarm as she settled her considerable weight on his face, but it didn't stop his tongue from snaking out to lap at her pussy once again - uncertainly at first, then with growing confidence. Cyrene smiled with satisfaction, grinding her clit into him and forcing his mouth deep between her lips.

She bounced gently on his face a few times, then took pity on his poor, lost hands and reached out to unlace his breeches for him. His cock sprung angrily forth the moment she freed it from its confines, already rock-hard and dripping with precum. As he moaned and writhed into her pussy from beneath her, Cyrene slowly began to glide her fingers up and down his shaft.

It was kind of amazing, actually. His cock grew bigger, redder and livelier the more attention she gave it. When she rubbed her thumb gently over the head, it throbbed ever more dangerously and leaked clear fluid over her hand. But no matter how she teased and tormented it, no matter how he whimpered and moaned into her ass, Felix never seemed quite able to cross the edge. She wondered just how long she could keep him going, if she was sadistic enough to subject him to her scholarly curiosity.

For now, though, she was content to pump and caress him, bringing him further and further along as she rode his face mercilessly. The only sounds in the office were Cyrene's moans, Felix's muffled groaning and the wet sound of her pussy descending again and again on his mouth. She could feel herself getting closer and closer to her own edge, the impending orgasm swelling and rippling in her core as Felix licked and sucked at her.

"Felix- yes! Just like that", she gasped as the flat of his tongue rasped over her clit. "Don't you dare stop!"

She rode him harder, upping the tempo as the pressure built up inside of her. When it came, her orgasm was a bolt of lightning that ripped through her and made her whole body quake. She squeezed Felix's head between her thighs as waves of bliss rolled through her, her breath getting lost in her throat with a strangled choke as she came uncontrollably on Felix's face.

An eternity later, Felix's somewhat panicked and muffled cries drifted through her blissful haze. She remembered to release him from his warm, wet prison, lifting her ass above his face to allow him a shuddering breath. She held herself up just above him, letting him fill his lungs with her aroma as she trailed her fingers up his thigh and over his big, tight balls with a satisfied smile.

"Please-", Felix gasped as she slowly curled her hand around the base of his cock. "Cyrene, please!" "You've done so very well, my dear apprentice", Cyrene murmured down to him. "Now, it's time to come for your mistress."

And as she sunk her plump, soft lips down over his throbbing cock, he did.

---

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Where There's a Weald, There's a Way: Chapter 3

"Welcome back, Felix. Glad you've decided to join us."

Felix flushed at the teasing tone in his mentor's voice. He was late back from lunch, he knew. When the bell had struck to mark the hour, he had still been in his quarters pumping away in horny frustration. And he never had managed to finish, he thought sourly. His balls still ached a little, which wasn't doing much to improve his mood.

"Apologies, Mistress Cyrene. I was... preoccupied.", he said, closing the door to the Office of Discernments behind him. "Lost track of time." "Well, you are with us now, so I suppose we shall forgive you. Only try not to make a habit of it."

Felix scanned the room for Cyrene and found her packing another crate. She had taken advantage of their lunch hour to exchange her usual robes for more practical clothing: leather boots, a long skirt of pale green linen divided at the hip, and a dark brown doublet over a white blouse. It was rare to see his mistress out of her robes of office, and Felix's eyes lingered for a moment on the way the tight doublet molded to her ample curves.

"Are we... going somewhere?", he asked, trying to find something to focus on something other than the low neckline of Cyrene's blouse or the deep swell of soft cleavage it showed off. Bloody ashes, I'm all over the place.

"Discernment, my dear apprentice!" responded Cyrene brightly. "We're finally getting into the thick of it with some field work. Out of an abundance of caution, the King has requested we don't perform such experiments within the castle's walls, so we must emerge from our lair for a bit." "Wait, outside the castle?" Felix paled a little. "You don't mean...?" She chuckled at his stricken expression. "No, Felix, fear not! We won't be braving the Weald today." As she spoke, she was already fixing the lid on the crate she'd been packing. "We will simply remove ourselves to a suitably isolated part of the castle grounds." She marched over to him, huffing a bit at the heavy crate in her arms. "You may have the honour of lugging the artifacts down our many stairs, apprentice."

Felix gave his mistress a long-suffering look as she dumped the box into his arms. "I would have got less exercise as an apprentice for the harbourmaster", he grumbled. "Ah, but then you would be deprived of my charming company", Cyrene said with a wink. "Come, let's make use of the daylight while we have it."

---

A short while later, they'd found their spot. The sun was shining brightly above them, the sky blue and cloudless. The Weald was there, of course, ever-present as a thin green smudge in the distance. But on pleasant spring days such as these, it was easy to forget they lived on the edge of a haunted forest.

Cyrene soon began setting up the equipment she'd had him haul down from the Office of Discernments. And would be hauling back up again, no doubt. She seemed to be in an unusually good mood; was it his imagination, or was she more... bouncy than usual? Felix couldn't tell whether she was, or whether it was simply his pent-up frustration from earlier that made every swish of her skirt and wobble of her chest seem that much more distracting.

Meanwhile, Cyrene had finished her preparations. On a broad square of linen that looked suspiciously like a picnic blanket now sat one of the little miniature amphorae, looking very bland and unassuming there on the ground. Gathering up her skirts, she plopped down to the ground with a sigh and patted the grass beside her, motioning for Felix to join her.

"Remind me, Felix", said Cyrene, flipping open her field journal as he awkwardly dropped down beside her. "What is the first step in any Discernment process?" "Observation", he said automatically. "You have to monitor the thing being Discerned for anomalous properties. But... how does that apply here? I mean, it's a jar."

She gave him a knowing smile and wiggled a little closer to him so he could share the journal. Felix was uncomfortably aware of his mentor's knee brushing against his, and felt a warmth spread through his body that had nothing to do with the sunny weather.

"This is the difference between reading about Discernment and doing it, my dear apprentice", she said. She was slipping into her lecture voice, and Felix prepared himself to be enlightened. "Scholarly work is not always exciting work. Some Weald relics appear stable and mundane at first glance, only manifesting their unusual properties when carefully observed over a long period." He frowned. "But we don't know that all of these artifacts are magi- uh, we don't know they're all anomalous, right? I mean, the Wilders gave our people all kinds of random stuff." "And that is why our first task... is to watch the jar! Aren't you excited?"

Felix looked at the amphora, sitting drably and innocently on its square of fabric. "Oh yes, Mistress Cyrene. Thrilled." "Oh, don't pout", she laughed. "There are worse ways to spend an afternoon that sitting on the grass in the sunshine."

"Besides", said Cyrene. "I'm sure we'll find some way to pass the time."

---

Unbeknownst to her apprentice, Cyrene was conducting two experiments at once. She had selected the amphorae to start with because, having seen various items brought back from the Weald in the past, she was almost certain that they were just ordinary pieces of clay. They should still be observed to make sure, of course, but she didn't have high hopes for them being true relics of the Weald.

Her other, more interesting experiment was sitting beside her. She had spent the past hour grappling with what she was doing, what she had already done. Weald artifacts were not toys, of course - she knew that better than anyone. On the other hand, this was an unprecedented opportunity to study a totally new type of artifact. And letting Felix in on it would almost certainly make it harder to judge the effects.

Plus, it was really fun. Part of her regretted that she hadn't gone further earlier, when she'd had him spellbound and twitching in front of her. She had hesitated at the time, but now she just wondered what it would have felt like to take hold of Felix's stiff cock in her fingers. What his face would have looked like when he felt her fingers brushing over him. She smiled a little to herself as he sat beside her and tried his best to appear interested in the amphora.

It's just an experiment, she thought as she slipped one hand into the pocket of her doublet. Felix was already gazing aimlessly out over the fields, totally unsuspecting of what was in store for him. This time, she didn't seize hold of the idol as firmly as she had before. She just touched it - running a single finger delicately over the curves and shape of its feminine figure. Then she studied Felix for a reaction.

She was not disappointed. First of all, his breath hitched (cutely, she thought). Seemingly unconsciously, his leg pressed a little more firmly into hers, the velvet of his robe brushing up against her knee. Cyrene didn't pull away from him; she certainly wasn't complaining.

"See anything of interest, Felix?" she asked softly. She leaned a little closer and gave the idol a little stroke as she said it, and was pleased to see his eyes drop right down to her chest for a moment when he turned back to her. Remembering himself, he reddened slightly and lifted his gaze. "No... nothing, Mistress Cy. Cyrene", he corrected himself, looking a little flustered. "I haven't seen anything out of the ordinary since we sat down."

Interesting. Her apprentice was breathless and ruffled, plainly struggling to keep his composure. But he didn't seem foggy or confused, like he had previously. Clearly the light touch she'd used on the figurine didn't have quite the same stupefying effect on his mind. Instead of being vague and slipping into that dreamlike state he'd been in last time, he just seemed... bothered.

Cyrene didn't mind bothered. She placed a reassuring hand on Felix's knee, enjoying his startled reaction to her touch. "Don't lose hope, my dear apprentice", she said, giving his knee an affectionate squeeze. "We may see something interesting yet."

Felix gave her a shaky smile, and she noticed that he was hunched forward slightly. She smiled back, letting her hand rest where it was. She felt a sudden surge of possessiveness over him, a desire to hold onto him and protect him from the world. He was her apprentice, and she wasn't going to let anyone else trouble him.

She didn't feel the need to brush the idol again. The pair of them just sat there, watching the amphora amidst a charged silence that was somehow both companionable and tense at the same time. Felix stayed by her side, seeming to be unsure whether he wanted to pull away or come even closer.

The amphora never did do anything anomalous, but Cyrene considered her other experiment to be a resounding success.

---

That night, Felix tried and failed once again to get himself off. His mind buzzing with lust and the lingering smell of Mistress Cyrene's perfume, he had struggled fruitlessly to come again and again until he eventually drifted off into a sweaty, horny doze that was no less tormented than the rest of his evening had been.

There he was, tangled in his sheets and tossing restlessly, when the door to his quarters quietly opened. Cyrene slipped in and closed the door behind her; she was clad only in her nightgown, an airy light thing of chiffon. If Felix had been awake, he would no doubt have been driven to distraction by the way it clung to her round hips and soft thighs, doing little to conceal the prominent curve of her considerable bust.

She had padded silently through the castle's dark and draughty halls to Felix's room, unable to sleep and unwilling to wait any longer to satisfy her curiosity. She held the idol in one hand, clutching it tightly to ensure he would remain foggy and undisturbed.

I will satisfy my curiosity, she thought as she carefully made her way over to his bedside. And then I will be able to complete this experiment in a more scholarly fashion.

The thoughts were hollow even in her own head. That wasn't why she was here, and she knew it. She paused above Felix, looking down tenderly into his sleeping face. His brow was creased and shiny with sweat, and he gave a small whimper as she watched. The horny little sound alone was enough to send a thrill down her spine and warm her to the core.

Her eyes devoured his restless body as he slept, and Cyrene wondered what he was dreaming about. Whether it was her making him whimper. The idol felt like an ember from the fireplace in her hand; it had grown so warm that it was almost hot to the touch.

With hesitant fingers, she reached out for the bedsheet and gently tugged it away from Felix's body. The dramatic tent covering his groin slid away, and Cyrene gave a gasp as his exposed cock came into plain view.

It looked... ready for her. Rock-hard and standing straight up. The cool night air made the head twitch and bob, but his stiffness showed no signs of diminishing any time soon. His balls looked big, tight and uncomfortably full. Even as Cyrene watched, his cock throbbed and a thick bead of clear liquid welled up from the tip.

"Don't wake up now, Felix", she murmured, almost to herself. To her surprise, he nodded in his sleep as if he could hear her. That was... an interesting detail. But she had bigger things on her mind right now.

I can't believe I'm doing this, she thought as she climbed onto the bed and crouched between his legs. It looked even bigger up close; she watched mesmerised as the bead of precum quivering on the slit swelled and began to drip slowly down his shaft like a drop of honey.

Cyrene licked her lips. Her heart was hammering in her chest as she slowly brought her face closer and closer, inhaling the heady scent of his musk and sweat. Her hot breath tickled Felix's cock, and it throbbed with renewed excitement as a second dribble welled up and joined the first. She opened her mouth in awe as she watched it go.

Suddenly, Felix mumbled grouchily in his sleep and arched his hips forward insistently. His cock took Cyrene quite by surprise as the head popped right between her open lips and squished into her tongue. Without even thinking, she closed her mouth around it. The head was hot and salty when it rubbed against her tongue, and she tasted a fresh trickle pulse from it as his thick shaft throbbed in her mouth.

Looking up into the sweaty, needy face of her apprentice, Cyrene knew that she shouldn't be doing this. But it just seemed impossible to pull away. She slowly sucked him into her mouth, letting her tongue delicately slide over the underside of his shaft as she took him in, inch by inch.

That made the sleeping Felix give a full-on groan and buck his hips urgently, forcing his member deep into her mouth. A loud groan, she realised. Panicking a little, she pulled away - and the expression of anguish on his sleeping face as she released him from her mouth was heartbreaking. A thin line of precum still connected her lips to the head of his cock, and for a second she hovered there, seriously considering going back for a second taste.

No. This was too risky; she couldn't afford to be heard, to be found here with him like this. Her head swirling with mingled guilt and arousal, Cyrene left Felix to thrash against his sheets and fled into the night.

---

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Where There's a Weald, There's a Way: Chapter 2

Felix was having trouble concentrating on the Illuminated Biographies of the First Discerners. No matter how assiduously he hammered his eyes into the rows of narrow, crabbed script in front of him, they just kept sliding off the page. Drifting over to Mistress Cyrene, who was paying him little heed at the moment.

She was bent over the little drawers that covered one wall of the Office of Discernments, diligently sorting their newly acquired artifacts into them. With her back turned to him, his eyes were drawn to the way her round, shapely butt strained the material of her robe when she bent down to retrieve new items. Or the way her hands rested lightly on her wide, soft hips as she scanned the labels on each drawer in front of her.

Felix had never thought of his mistress this way in the past. After all, she was Mistress Cyrene, the Royal Discerner and the most esteemed scholar in Viridite. She was also old enough to be his mother.

But after last night's dreams, strange and scarcely-remembered, he just couldn't seem to keep his eyes from settling on the neckline of her robe, which was just low enough to reveal an inch or two of deep cleavage when she turned to retrieve another artifact from the crate at her feet.

He shook his head, forcing his gaze back down to the tome in front of him and trying to clear the pesky thoughts from it. It had been a weird dream. And the book was powerfully boring. And his mistress was undeniably more pleasant to look at than the meandering recollections of some dead historian. His thoughts were just a bit muddled, that was all. Nothing to introspect too deeply on.

And so Mabel the Keen-Eyed was born in the fifth year of the Sparrow, only a year before the Interregnum which would throw Viridite into chaos. As astute scholars will note, the conditions of the Royal Council during this period were largely marked by infighting and corruption, a state of affairs which was only attenuated by...

Felix yawned.

---

The second time she caught Felix staring, Cyrene wrote it off as simple boredom. He had been disappointed when she'd informed him that they wouldn't be testing the new artifacts right away, and even moreso when she'd assigned him the dreaded Biographies to study instead.

She knew from experience, though, that performing Discernments on Weald relics should be done one at a time, in isolation. Letting the artifacts mingle freely with each other was a recipe for unintended interactions. Everything needed to be properly stored and catalogued before they could begin; it wasn't exciting work, but it was scholarly work.

Absent-mindedly, her hand slipped into the pouch at her belt and toyed idly with the little idol still nestled there. By all rights, it should be stored and catalogued too. But Cyrene felt like the statuette was a special case - it was so clearly active, and had reacted so strongly to Felix the day before. It warranted a closer examination. And, she had to admit, she felt better having it on her person than in a drawer. It wasn't entirely logical, but there was something comforting about the way the rough, worn stone felt under her fingers...

She glanced over to find Felix watching her for a third time, and finally decided that enough was enough.

"Are your studies failing to adequately engage your attention, my dear apprentice?"

Cyrene was expecting him to look a little shame-faced, or to shoot back with some impertinent quip that no doubt sounded very witty in his own head. Both outcomes were equally likely when she chastised him, usually. She was not expecting him not to respond at all.

She was definitely not expecting to hear his breatch catch in his throat, or to look at his face and find it flushed and a little red, his eyes unfocused. With an expression of concern, Cyrene crossed the room to stand over her apprentice and look down at him. She put a hand on his shoulder, and was startled when he shivered under her touch.

"Felix", she said, trying to catch his eye. "Are you well?" His expression, when he finally looked up at her, was vague and confused. "I'm...", he began. "I'm feeling a little..."

He just trailed off. Cyrene was starting to become seriously worried. Had something happened? Some side effect from one of the artifacts, perhaps from when he had touched the idol?

She realised that she was still absentmindedly clutching it in her other hand. Quite tightly, actually - she was squeezing it anxiously, finding the way its carved lines pressed into her palm strangely soothing. Nonplussed, she dropped it back into her belt pouch and returned her attention to Felix.

Almost as soon as she released it, he blinked. He looked around as if coming out of a trance, and gave Cyrene an uncertain smile.

"Oh, uh... hello, Mistress Cyrene. I dozed off, didn't I?" he looked sheepish and gestured at the book in front of him by way of explanation. "The King should distribute these old histories to apothecaries as a cure for sleeplessness."

Realisation slowly dawned on Cyrene as she looked into the bleary face of her apprentice, along with a little bit of excitement. She had never heard of a Weald artifact that could be "attuned" to a specific person in this way. If she was right, this could be a brand-new avenue of research!

"That's quite alright, Felix", she said, careful to keep her voice level. "Why don't you take a break from studying and come help me with relic storage, then? I could do with another pair of hands over here."

He nodded dumbly; Cyrene didn't think she'd ever seen Felix grow this quiet before. Her hand still holding his shoulder somewhat protectively, she guided him up from his seat and steered him over to her little workspace. He came without complaint, and she noted with interest that he still seemed a little foggy. The effects must need a little time to fully clear, even after the idol was deactivated.

Felix cleared his throat, clearly waking up enough to realise that his quiet demeanour was out of place. "So, uh... what did you need me to do, boss?" "Just hold the ladder while I store these artifacts in the upper drawers", Cyrene said. She scooped up another armful of knick-knacks and pottery. "Should be easy enough even for a mere apprentice."

His grumbling as he slid the ladder over reassured her somewhat; this was more like the Felix she knew. She felt a little bad for what she was planning to do next, but she needed to be sure that what she'd seen hadn't been a fluke. And after all, she thought to herself, it is the duty of my apprentice to assist with Discernments.

Cyrene climbed the ladder, humming to herself and depositing various catalogued items into this drawer or that one according to their labels. She glanced down the ladder at Felix and saw with satisfaction that his eyes were downcast, making sure not to take advantage of her vulnerability and stare up at her while she worked above him. Such a thoughtful boy, sometimes.

When the last item was safely stored, Cyrene slipped her hand into the pouch and grasped the idol once again. She felt its smooth curves press into her warm palm, the solidity and roughness of the stone reassuring to the touch as the artifact began to warm up in her hand.

She looked down at Felix to check his progress, and gave a start when she saw him. He was no longer making any effort to avert his eyes. In fact, he was staring quite brazenly up at her. And that wasn't the only thing that gave her pause. She'd noticed his state of red-faced breathlessness before, but there was another symptom visible now that had been concealed by his writing-desk earlier. And it was very visible indeed, Cyrene noted. Quite a large and prominent... symptom was now showing through the front of his robe.

Experiment complete; artifact Discerned. Its exact properties were unclear, but some kind of attunement and relationship had clearly been established between Felix and the idol. The sensible thing to do now would be to break the spell and avoid risking any further exposure. And yet...

His eyes were glued to her. After a year of stealing glances at her handsome young apprentice and being ignored in turn, it gave her a thrill to be watched by him so openly. Especially considering the condition he was currently in.

Cyrene reached down and hiked up the hem of her robe, just a little. Just enough to expose a few inches of her pale, soft thighs to him. His eyes followed the movement, his chest rising irregularly as she pulled the garment up inch by inch. She slid her hand up over her soft, round tummy and cupped one of her heavy, velvet-clad breasts, lifting it slightly up.

Felix's member visibly twitched at the sight, lifting his robe for a moment, and he gave a little noise that Cyrene could only describe as a soft moan from below her. Now it was her turn to flush. She felt her skin growing hot and blood buzzing in her ears as she was struck by the realisation that she was doing this to him. He was making that cute little noise for her.

She climbed back down and joined Felix on the floor, making sure to keep the warm little figurine gripped tightly in her hand. He didn't say anything as she approached, but she noticed how heavy his breathing was, and the way it sped up as she got closer. Seized by impulsiveness for a moment, she reached out a hand towards his manhood, hovering above but not quite touching it. Not quite willing to take that last step.

This is going to get out hand, Cyrene realised. I think we've done quite enough "testing" for the moment.

With a slightly ragged sigh, she took a step back from Felix. Turning away to spare him any embarassment, she let go of the idol and picked up the empty crate at her feet. By the time he drifted out of his hazy trance, she was already standing on her tiptoes to stow the box on top of a cupboard.

"Thank you for your help, my dear apprentice", she called over her shoulder. "We'll reconvene after lunch and pick a relic to begin Discerning."

---

Felix hurried through the halls of the Castle Viridite as fast as he could without drawing attention to himself, feeling very strange indeed. He had excused himself quickly after Mistress Cyrene dismissed him, but he didn't have any intention of getting something to eat. Instead, he made a beeline straight for his quarters.

He counted his blessings that his mentor had not noticed the erection he'd sprouted while helping her out with artifact storage. He could only imagine the humiliating lecture he would have been subjected to if she had! Luckily, he'd managed to slip out of there and leave her none the wiser, though he was still confused about what had brought it on so suddenly.

There was that dream, he thought. And I'm feeling pent-up, aren't I?

After all, it had been a little while since he had last lain with man or woman. Most of the courtiers and ladies of King Emlynn's court wouldn't give him the time of day - he was a scholar, a mere apprentice, and a low-born one at that! He'd had a brief fling with the King's huntsman for a while, but that had fizzled out when the man had started expecting him to drop everything and suck his cock whenever he felt like it. As if Felix was his personal courtesan! He was still a little sore about that.

Yes. He was pent-up and frustrated and he'd gone too long without taking care of himself. So much so that even his slave-driver of a mistress was starting to drive him crazy! It was as simple as that. And happily, being a royal scholar's apprentice gave him the privacy of his own quarters in which to resolve that little problem.

He closed and locked the door to his room behind him and shrugged off his robe. It didn't take much encouragement to bring himself back up to attention as Felix flopped down on his bed and started to stroke. He did find himself having to push away a few awkward thoughts about the woman he'd seen most recently, though.

His imagination was really working hard today. Unbidden, his mind kept conjuring images of Mistress Cyrene's big, pillowy thighs poking out from the hem of her robe. Or of her breasts squishing together and forming a deep crease in the fabric as she bent down and lifted a box of artifacts from the ground. How had he never noticed before how enormous they were?

A sprinkle of these images supplemented with his usual fantasies quickly brought him to the edge. Felix pumped his hand urgently up and down his shaft, now slick with precum. He sped up as he felt the orgasm slowly rising within him, upping the tempo as he teetered up to the precipice...

And stayed there. Twenty seconds later, he was still pumping - albeit a little slower, and with a puzzled look on his face. He was so close! He could feel release just out of reach, ready to explode and flood him with bliss. Any moment now! And yet...

He couldn't finish. Why couldn't he come?

---

Read more of my writing on AO3!

[sillylittleabyss]

Where There's a Weald, There's a Way: Chapter 1

In the kingdom of Viridite, poised on the edge of a vast and strange forest filled with menace and magic, it is the duty of the Office of Discernment to study and understand the mysteries brought out of the Weald by adventurers and explorers. Cyrene is the Royal Discerner, and her inexperienced apprentice Felix is the only assistant she has in her scholarly craft.

Most of the time, it's a boring job. When an expedition brings a genuine relic of great power into Cyrene's hands, though, she learns just how difficult it can be to resist the temptations of the Weald. Especially when they offer the one thing she craves the most.

---

Felix grunted and strained as he teetered unsteadily across the Office of Discernments with the world's heaviest box in his hands. Not for the first time, he cursed the hot, heavy velvet robes that a royal scholar's apprentice is expected to wear instead of more practical attire.

"Put it down there with the others, Felix." said Mistress Cyrene without looking up from the manifest in front of her. His mentor waved vaguely at a table that was currently supporting several more of the world's heaviest boxes. "Have mercy, glorious leader", he groaned as he set the crate down with a resounding thud that made her glance up in alarm. "What's the point of being a scholar if you have to do manual labour?"

Cyrene looked at her apprentice over the silvery rim of her spectacles, appreciating the view. Having someone to do heavy lifting and tedious labour was one of the main perks of taking on an apprentice. And she had to admit, looking at Felix puffing away and sweating over the boxes, that she didn't mind having the young man around to break up the monotony of dusty old books and moldering relics.

Felix hadn't yet had time to become doughy and soft from sitting at a desk poring over old tomes and scribbling on parchment. Unlike me, she thought, ruefully considering the way her robes of office displayed the outline of her considerable belly when she sat down. Her lithe, sandy-haired little apprentice still had the physicality and inexhaustible energy of youth, and she had long since resolved to enjoy the spectacle while it lasted.

"Young man, these artifacts were retrieved from the Great Weald at significant expense by the King's ambassadors", Cyrene began. "If any of them are damaged by your fumbling, you can explain it to his councillors on your own."

Despite her harsh tone, though, she couldn't help gracing her apprentice with the ghost of a smile. After enduring his piteous look for a moment longer, she finally sighed. "Very well", she said. "That's probably enough boxes for now. The rest can remain in storage until we've had a chance to properly catalogue these."

Felix grinned at her, grateful for the reprieve. "Finally, the good part!" His supposed exhaustion apparently forgotten instantly, he started to root through one of their many disorganised shelves of tools and knick-knacks. Pushing aside sheafs of prepared vellum and bottles of ink, he finally emerged triumphantly with a small crowbar in his hands. "Time to see what we're working with, eh?"

"Carefully," Cyrene warned, ignoring his overly-familiar tone. Her chair gave a creak as she stood up, smoothing out the creases in her robe, and joined Felix in front of the table. "By all accounts, the village that traded us these items were friendly, by Weald standards. But even so, an abundance of caution is always wise when dealing with Discernments."

Under her direction, Felix set about the task of prising up the lids of each crate. One box after another revealed its contents: a seemingly random assortment of knick-knacks and trinkets in a bed of hay, consisting of everything from simple objects of fired clay to elaborate pieces of worked bronze studded with flecks of bright crystal.

For a few moments after Felix had wrestled the last box open, the two of them stood silently and regarded the items arrayed in front of them. Cyrene studied them thoughtfully, already turning over the various methods for testing their unusual properties in her head. She kneaded her plump lower lip with a thumb as she began to mentally formulate a plan of investigation.

Felix, on the other hand, was looking into the boxes with a mixture of awe and confusion. He glanced up at her with questioning eyes. "Are these really magical artifacts, Mistress?" As usual when he felt out of his depth, he'd fallen back into the habit of using her formal title. "They look so... ordinary." "They're not magical", she corrected. "They are simply mysterious. Understanding exactly how the so-called 'magic' of the Weald works is what makes us Discerners in the first place, Felix." "I know that!", he said a little testily. "I just expected something a little more... fey, I guess."

The urge to ruffle her apprentice's hair was difficult to resist, sometimes. He was always so quick to lose his head! Cyrene settled for giving him a playful bump with her hip as she came up beside him and began to carefully lift objects from the first layer of hay, setting them down on the table delicately.

"When we understand these relics fully, my dear apprentice", she said, "they'll be no more magical than a watermill or a plough."

---

Certainly as boring as a watermill or a plough, thought Felix as he picked up yet another toy amphora. After over an hour of laboriously documenting every detail of the items in the boxes, any eldritch mystique the artifacts may have originally held was quickly ebbing away. At this point, he wasn't convinced the Wilders hadn't just given the ambassadors a bunch of their old rubbish to make them go away.

"Clay amphora, miniature, 6 inches in length", he said wearily. "Utterly unremarkable craftsmanship, tedious in every way; something I might have made to entertain my little brother when I was about 8. No apparent mystical properties, other than holding a very small amount of wine."

His mentor didn't comment; she just smiled in that way she had, the long vane of her quill twitching and bouncing as she bowed her head to scratch out another entry in the logbook. Felix supposed that being able to endure unspeakable mental torment was one of the essential skills of being a great scholar like Mistress Cyrene.

The scratching of her quill stopped, and Felix looked up, hopeful for the prospect of some conversation or diversion from this tedium. But Cyrene only gave him an indulgent smile, tucking back a long strand of blonde hair that had fallen over her face while she wrote. "Next artifact, please, Felix."

His shoulders slumped as he turned back to the box, but he was relieved to see there was only one item left within. "Small stone figurine, about 5 inches", he said, reaching into the box to draw it out. "Details crude but feminine and, uh... matronly. Looks like- agh! It's HOT!"

Cyrene was up in a flash as Felix staggered back, letting the little figurine fall from his fingers and clatter to the table. She swept over, taking him by the shoulders and looking into his eyes as he winced and popped his burning finger into his mouth.

"Are you OK?", she asked. Her face was full of concern, but also a hint of wariness. They both knew the stories of the effects that Weald 'curses' could have on those affected by them. "Felix, I need you to answer me if you are able."

"I'm fine. I'm fine!", he said a little sheepishly, giving the discarded statuette a wary glance. "It didn't even hurt that much, just... it surprised me, that's all."

Cyrene nodded, keeping one hand protectively on his shoulder as she turned and regarded the figurine. She hesitated for a moment, steeling herself, and picked it up. Felix flinched as her fingers touched it, but she just looked puzzled and turned it over in her hand. Running her fingers along the crude, exaggerated curves of the idol's hips and breasts.

"It burned you immediately, you said?" "Yeah", said Felix. For some reason he was feeling just a little bit... unfocused. Cyrene's hand on his shoulder felt warm all of a sudden - not unpleasantly so, but enough to be distracting. "It was, like... red hot. Do you not feel it?" "I feel nothing", she said with a frown. "but it's possible that whatever potential it was charged with was expended when you picked it up."

She must have picked up on the panicked expression that crossed Felix's face, because Cyrene chuckled. "Don't worry, my dear apprentice", she said. "If it was charged with some kind of scholar-killing curse, we'd know by now. Still, though, I think we'd better keep it somewhere safe until we can test it properly."

Giving his shoulder a last reassuring squeeze, she crossed the office and dropped the artifact into one of the drawers of her big oaken desk. Her face still thoughtful, she locked it and tucked the key securely into a pouch at her belt. When she looked up, she saw Felix hovering uncertainly, still looking a little pensive. Her face softened.

"You'll be wanting to go roam the castle halls with those ruffians you call friends, I'm sure.", Cyrene said lightly, giving him a knowing smile that seemed to dispel his anxiety somewhat. "I think we've had quite enough excitement for one day. You are dismissed, Felix."

---

Late that night, Cyrene's feet found their way back to the Office of Discernments as they so often did when she couldn't get work out of her mind. She left her books and journals where they were, though, and went to her desk instead. A moment later, she stood gazing out the window over the castle grounds, turning the figurine over in her hand slowly.

The dark treeline of the Weald was just barely visible in the distance, transformed into a looming crescent of shadow by the light of the full moon. Her green eyes scanned it as though she could somehow intimidate it into giving its secrets up to her, but the ancient forest just crouched there and dripped ancient menace, menacingly. As usual.

Cyrene looked down at the unassuming little figure in her hand, tracing her finger gently along the lines of its round belly and protruding, sagging breasts. All crudely rendered in rough stone - something made idly with a knife or a knapping-flint, perhaps, a small trinket to carry with you on a hunt. Or maybe a little amulet to some fertility spirit or other. She'd seen a dozen relics just like it.

It had warmed up a little as she'd handled it, though. Not red-hot, as Felix had described, but she did think it felt warmer than it should with the cool night breeze wafting in from the window. Almost as though it was sucking in the warmth of her palms, holding it in and radiating it out. Maybe all this fuss is over a bloody Weald hand-warmer, she thought with a wry grin.

In a different part of the castle, a restlessly-sleeping Felix was tangled up in his bedclothes. He murmured in his sleep and wriggled edgily, caught in the throes of strange dreams that made his breath catch and beads of sweat stand out on his forehead. When Cyrene's finger slid over the statuette's graven curves, Felix gave a little groan and arched his back. Silhouetted by moonlight, his stiff member stood straight up and made a tent from the rough fabric of his sleeping-tunic.

Eventually, Cyrene decided it was time to give up and go to her chambers. Whatever secrets the Weald may hold, standing here and staring gloomily into the forest all night wasn't going to give her anything but a headache in the morning. As she strode out of the office, lost in thought, she walked right past the open drawer and absent-mindedly slipped the little figurine into a pouch.

---

Read more of my writing on AO3!

[sillylittleabyss]

imo the best way to interpret those “real people don’t do x” writing advice posts is “most people don’t do x, so if a character does x, it should be a distinguishing trait.” human behavior is infinitely varied; for any x, there are real people who do x. we can’t make absolute statements. we can, however, make probabilistic ones.

for example, most people don’t address each other by name in the middle of a casual conversation. if all your characters do that, your dialogue will sound stilted and unnatural. but if just one character does that, then it tells us something about that character.

[sillylittleabyss]

The Tiny Zone: Between Two Worlds

A few wisps of trailing white fog clung to Riley's legs as she emerged from the roiling clouds, putting the latest trial that the two of them had overcome together firmly behind them.

Riley cradled Ethan close to her hip, shielding him protectively from the strange world that they'd been thrust into against their will. They were both in this together, she knew, but it was different for him. He was so small and fragile, so helpless without her protection. He needed her. And after a couple near misses where she thought she'd lost him, the feeling of his tiny warm body against hers was a reassuring one.

"Three down," she said softly. She'd seen how Ethan winced when she spoke too loudly, and she didn't want to make him feel uncomfortable. "We've got this."

Ethan wrapped his hands around her pinky reassuringly, and Riley's heart gave a little flutter as she walked them through the latest in an endless series of doors. It was such a small gesture - literally - but it made all the difference in this cold, sterile place of plastic and machinery. Together, she and Ethan could overcome whatever weird tests and trials their sadistic captors threw at them. Riley was sure of it. Hell, she was starting to enjoy the challenge.

Ethan gave a low whistle as they stepped into the next room. "Well", murmured Ethan, so softly she had to strain her ears to hear his little voice. "That's different."

The space was a simple one, another plain featureless chamber like all the others they'd been in. This one was occupied by three objects and absolutely nothing else. The first of them was a panel - inset flush with the white plastic of the wall, it was a plain black rectangle that reminded Riley of a flatscreen TV. And, on either side of the panel, two complicated-looking machines that both seemed to primarily consist of a ring-shaped assembly, with lots of cables and wires that trailed off and disappeared into the walls.

One was pretty big, big enough that Riley could have stood inside of it quite comfortably. The other was small enough that she didn't even notice it right away, but - Riley thought with an increasingly unwelcome sense of realisation - it was just about the right size for someone like Ethan. One for her, one for him.

Before either of them could think of something to say, the black screen suddenly flickered into life. Symbols began to appear, fading onto the screen one after another - bizarre, unfamiliar glyphs that hovered there for a moment before transforming into English letters, as if they were being translated in real time for Ethan and Riley's benefit.

THANK YOU FOR YOUR PARTICIPATION

RETURN TO YOUR POINTS OF ORIGIN

NO ONE WILL EVER BELIEVE YOU

"No one will ever- are these guys for real with this Scooby Doo shit?" scoffed Riley.

"Wait... does that mean..." Ethan trailed off, leaving the rest of his thought unspoken. It might have been, Does that mean we did it? *Or maybe, *Does that mean it's over?

Riley noticed a low hum running through the room, so quiet it might have been there from the beginning. It was getting louder and higher-pitched with each passing moment, though, reverberating unpleasantly in the air. As it rose in pitch and volume, it was soon accompanied by a shuddering that shook the floor under her feet. The combination made Riley feel a little sick to her stomach.

"Wow, that is not a fun noise!" said Ethan, covering his ears as the shrill tone got louder and louder. "If this is how they plan to finish us off, their technique leaves a lot to be desired!"

Suddenly there was a brief whine like an old-fashioned camera bulb firing, and a blinding white light flooded the room. Ethan cried out in discomfort, and Riley grimaced and raised her free hand to cover her eyes. When the light receded, the two machines had changed. They were active.

A shimmering curtain of color hung in each of the metal rings, flickering and distorting occasionally as though it was suffering from interference. Despite that, though, Riley immediately recognised the scene visible through the bigger of the two rings: it was an image of her own bedroom, the bed she'd been sleeping in when she was whisked away. The image showing through the smaller ring was harder to make out from her perspective, but she would lay odds that if she put Ethan down in front of it he'd see something very similar.

Ethan seemed to have figured it out, too. "I guess that settles it, then." he said. His voice was subdued - was it a mournful note she detected, or was that just wishful thinking? They'd really only known each for about an hour, after all. It was pretty silly to expect him to miss her, wasn't it?

"Yeah." Riley replied, trying to inject a chipper note into her voice. "Home sweet home!"

"I'll be honest... I wasn't sure they were going to let us go."

"I mean, it's true what the screen said." Riley shook her head. "Even if we went back to... back to our worlds and told everyone, who would ever believe a story like this?"

"Yeah," Ethan said with a sad little smile. "A story like ours... it's pretty unbelievable."

Riley leaned down carefully, intending to put Ethan down on the ground. Something made her pause, though, and she brought her other hand up to support him instead, cupping him in her fingers. She brought Ethan up to her face, looking down at him sitting in her hands like a little doll. He smiled uncertainly, and she tried to commit every detail of his face to memory. She had the horrible feeling she was never going to see Ethan again.

"Hey," she said quietly. "Before I let you go. I just wanted you to know... I won't forget you. Thank you for trusting me. I wish... I wish we could have met, in the real world."

She kissed him on the cheek - or tried to, at least. Since her mouth was almost as big as his entire body, it was kind of awkward, and he tensed up when she pressed him to her lips. But it was the thought that counted, right?

"Riley..." Ethan said. He looked up at her with shining eyes as she gently set him down on his feet. "I won't forget you, either."

There was something else to say, but Riley didn't know what it was. For a long moment, the two of them stood there, regarding each other in silence. In the end, it was Riley who broke the spell.

She took a step back, then another. She couldn't bear to prolong this moment any longer.

"Good luck, Ethan. With everything!"

---

There was a hiss and a crackle and an ozone smell in the air, and then Riley was gone. Ethan actually saw her appear on the other side of the portal, fading into existence like a bad effect from some corny old sci-fi show. She whirled around immediately and stared right at him, but he could tell she wasn't really seeing him. He watched her face fall through the distorted surface of the portal, watched as she wandered over to her bed and sat down.

His portal was there too, whirring softly and waiting for him to pass through. He could see his bedroom through it - shamefully messy as always. He'd been meaning to take those cups down to the kitchen for days. Through that little ring was his life: his home, his family, his job, his friends. A world perfectly sized for him, where he wouldn't be in constant danger from everything around him. His world.

A world without Riley.

Ethan looked down at the floor solemnly, his fists slowly closing and opening. When he looked up at his lifeline back to safety and normality, his expression was blank.

Ethan turned away and ran to the other ring, as fast as his little legs would carry him. He plunged through the shimmering veil of Riley's portal without a moment's hesitation, and his tiny body vanished from sight with an equally tiny pop. The portals remained open for a moment longer, then the whirring stopped and the veils of color faded away. A minute later, the ambient light that suffused the white plastic of the complex winked out, plunging the chamber into darkness.

"Riley! Riley, I'm here!"

"Ethan!?"

---

Somewhere mysterious and remote, in a control room of white plastic covered in lights and dials, two aliens gravely regarded their instruments. One was very tall. The other was so tiny that they had their own little control station, complete with a chair that looked like it could have come from a dollhouse.

The big alien looked at the little alien. The little alien looked at the big alien. Each of them smiled a mysterious little smile at the other.

You might be wondering why they were smiling. You might be wondering what the purpose of all this was. But some questions are destined to be left unanswered... in the Tiny Zone.

---

Read more of my writing on AO3!

[sillylittleabyss]

The Tiny Zone: The Final Trial

Riley reached into her cleavage and rummaged around until her hands closed around Ethan's tiny body. She fished him out, red-faced and a little crumpled, and raised him to eye level.

"Wow," she said as he rolled over on the palm of her hand and heaved a great sigh of relief. "You're pretty sweaty. Are you okay?"

"Better now," panted Ethan, relishing the cool fresh air outside of Riley's top. "It wasn't... that bad."

"It worked, anyway!" Riley said with a grin. "Look, we're... well, I still have no idea where we are, but we're somewhere new, anyway!"

"Somewhere new" looked very much like every other plain white chamber they'd been in so far. This time, it was a large, oddly shaped room whose walls were bent into all kinds of strange angles and odd corners. Another open doorway was visible on the other side, but the room itself was totally empty.

Ethan looked around the room suspiciously. "Well, this one looks pretty straightforward at-"

He was interrupted by a loud CLUNK! as something in the walls shifted. Apertures suddenly slid open at regular intervals along the walls, and clouds of billowing grey fog began to pour from them in great quantities. Within moments, the chamber was completely occluded by an opaque roiling haze - it was like someone had turned on a dozen fog machines at once. Over the hissing and rushing of the gas projectors, other sounds echoed through the chamber - loud, mechanical clicks and whirs that reminded Ethan of heavy machinery.

"You just had to go and jinx it, huh?" Riley chuckled, shaking her head.

Ethan looked up at Riley, who was peering intently into the swirling clouds that now filled the room. Maybe he was still feeling a little fragile from the forced intimacy of their shared elevator ride, but he couldn't tear his eyes away from her in that moment. He was fascinated by her big brown eyes, the smattering of freckles that dusted her face, even the way she chewed on her lip thoughtfully while the fog billowed around her.

She glanced down at him. "You good, little guy?"

"Yeah," he said, smiling for maybe the first time since he'd woken up in this bizarre place. "I'm good. We got through the other tests, we can get through this one."

Riley grinned back. "I'm glad I didn't leave you up there," she said. "Let's promise to stick together and get out of here, okay?"

Ethan nodded. Riley squared her shoulders, cupping her hand a little to keep him safe, and strode into the fog.

They only made it a few feet in before Ethan felt the impact. Riley's hand tightened protectively as she stumbled into something with a cry of surprise, and then she gave a sudden convulsive jerk and his world turned upside down.

"Agh! Oh shit, Ethan!"

Something happened to her fingers - they twitched and went all stiff - and he bounced right out of her grasp. For a moment he hovered in the air, totally weightless and surrounded by billowing fog. Then he was plunging blindly towards the ground.

This is it. This is how I die.

Ethan flung his arms out desperately, searching for something - anything - to break his fall. By sheer dumb luck, his hand found something that felt like rope, and he grabbed at it for dear life. Seizing it tightly with both hands, he slid and skidded down its length. The palms of his hands started to sting and burn as he shed momentum.

He clutched the rope with all his strength as it swung him around, almost letting go in fear when a huge shape suddenly loomed up before him and filled his vision. Bracing himself for broken bones as he slammed into it at speed, he was pleasantly surprised when they never came. The cliff in front of him was soft and fuzzy and pliant, and his body bounced harmlessly off of it.

Relief flooded through him as he realised that the "rope" he was holding onto was actually the drawstring of Riley's pyjama bottoms. He was dangling against the inside of her thigh, shaken but unhurt.

"Ethan? Is that you?" Riley's fingers appeared suddenly from the fog, curling around him without waiting for an answer. There were tears in her eyes when she brought him up to her face. "Oh Ethan, I thought I killed you!"

Riley pressed his whole body to her face, snuggling him against her cheek. Ethan froze up for a moment, still feeling a little overwhelmed by the near-death experience he'd just had. But as she held him close and stifled a sob, he let himself relax into her embrace.

"It's okay," he said. It was kind of nice, being close enough to Riley's ears that he didn't need to shout to be heard. "I'm alright."

"I'm so sorry!" Riley said, snuffling a little. "I hit something- I don't know what it was, it wasn't there before. But it gave me a shock or something, it made my whole body freeze up."

"I guess that's the trial this time," Ethan said. "Really, I'm fine. There's not a scratch on me!" He gave her a brave little smile to reinforce the point, and she nodded tearfully.

"I promise I won't let that happen again! I won't carry you any more, it's too dangerous- I'll find somewhere safe to put you!"

That... was more tempting than Ethan was willing to admit. But there was something he was beginning to realise, something that had been turning over in the back of his mind while he was plummeting to his death. So far, every test had required the two of them to cooperate with each other somehow...

"Hold on," Ethan said. "I think... put me down for a second, please. I think I have an idea."

She gave him a doubtful look, obviously not loving the idea of letting him go a second time, but relented and placed him gently on the ground. Sure enough, the fog which filled the room stopped short a few inches above the ground. He could see all the metallic posts and bars that had sprung out of the ground to block the way forward. Even if Riley was totally blind in here, he could see perfectly.

"Hey, Riley," he said. "Remember when you told me to trust you?"

"I remember." Her voice sounded so much more intimidating, echoing down like thunder from the heavens. When he was riding around in her hand, it was easy to forget just how big and scary she was.

"Well, now I need you to trust me, okay?" He reached out and plucked at the hem of her pyjama bottoms. "Just follow my lead and I'll show you where to walk."

Riley hesitated. "But... what if I step on you?" Her confidence had taken a hit when she dropped him, Ethan could hear it in her voice.

"We'll just have to take it slow and careful. We're going to stick together and get out of here, remember?"

There was a long pause.

"...I trust you." Riley's voice wobbled a little as she spoke.

"Thank you. Okay, so there's more of those things all over the place. The next one is just up ahead and to your right, so come over this way."

The next few minutes were slow going. Riley had to reduce her pace to a shuffle to accommodate Ethan's tiny stride, but despite that, his plan was totally working! Slowly but surely, Ethan guided Riley carefully around one electrified obstacle after another. Even at their snail's pace, the distant doorway on the other end of the room was getting closer and closer as they navigated the maze together.

"This one is kind of complicated. It's kind of like a bar that covers the whole room, so you have to duck- and there's another pole right next to you..."

"Oh, so I go this way?" Riley bent down low and began to shuffle in a new direction.

"No, it's to your right. No, your other right! No, you- watch out!" Ethan cried.

"Oh! Woah...!"

Riley twisted around and teetered uncertainly on one foot as she got tangled in her own limbs trying to follow Ethan's conflicting instructions. She waved her arms frantically in the air to maintain her balance, but her efforts only prolonged the inevitable. After a moment of perilous hovering, she overbalanced completely, falling onto her butt with a startled yelp.

"Ouch! That floor is way harder than it looks." Riley peered around, searching for Ethan through the fog. "Hey, you okay?"

"Uh, Ethan?"

The last thing Ethan had seen before his vision went black was Riley's titanic bumblebee-covered butt descending from the mist like a falling meteor. He remembered freezing up, his legs turning to stone with the absolute certainty that he wouldn't be able to get out of the way in time. He must have passed out for a moment under the sheer weight of the impact, though, because when he came to he was pinned and surrounded by an enveloping, suffocating darkness.

Ethan tried to call out, but his cries were muffled by the dense fuzz of Riley's pyjama pants, thick as a quilt. He tried to struggle and squirm, but he might as well have been trying to wriggle out from beneath an 18-wheeler.

The only reason he was alive, he thought, was because he'd been shunted in between her... well, in between her titanic cheeks. The time for being coy about these things had probably ended right about the time he'd gotten himself wedged in Riley's ass, Ethan reflected. He breathed shallow little breaths, turning his head to get some breathing room from the oppressive weight bearing down on him, and just hoped that Riley would find him before he began to suffocate.

It took altogether too long before she finally felt him struggling and scooted back with a gasp of realisation. Light and air flooded back into the world as she extricated him from his cotton prison, and Ethan flopped weakly into the safe gap between her legs. For a moment, all he could do was wheeze and blink away the stars dancing around his vision.

"I knew this was a bad idea!" Riley growled as soon as it was clear he hadn't broken his back. "You're too small to be running around on your own."

"It's fine," Ethan gave a weak little smile. "I'm not hurt... I mean, your butt is actually pretty soft."

Riley paused for a moment at that, frowning down at him as if she wasn't sure what to say. Then she brought her legs together without warning, pinning Ethan's body between her thighs. He cried out in alarm as she instantly and effortlessly trapped him, only his head poking out from her pyjama bottoms, but he didn't even try to wriggle his way out. He knew from very recent experience just how futile that would be.

"I'm serious." Riley leaned over him and tilted his chin up with a single finger, turning his face up to meet hers. "If you put yourself in harm's way again, I'll- I'll put you somewhere where you definitely can't get into any trouble, and you'll just have to deal with it!"

"And where would that be, exactly?" The slightly nervous tone in Ethan's voice made Riley's stern expression crack, and she smiled a little as she squeezed him just a little tighter. If he didn't know any better, he'd say she was starting to enjoy the total power she had over him.

"If you keep messing around," Riley said with a mischievous grin, "you'll find out real soon!"

"Maybe... I wouldn't mind that so much."

Short circuit, direct from brain to mouth. He reddened when he realised what he'd just said, and he blushed even harder when Riley gave a theatrical gasp. "Wait- I didn't mean-"

Riley giggled as he stumbled over his words. "A lot of guys wouldn't, I can tell you that much." she said with a wink. Feeling very flustered and unable to meet her gaze, Ethan laughed shyly as she gathered him up and climbed to her feet, returning him to his customary perch in the palm of her hand. Instead of raising him up in front of her like she had before, though, she cupped him close against her side. "Now behave yourself, tiny man."

Ethan rested his back against Riley's tummy, feeling the warmth of her skin through the fabric of her pyjamas, and allowed himself a happy little smile. He had the strangest feeling that everything was going to turn out just fine.

---

Read more of my writing on AO3!

[sillylittleabyss]

The Tiny Zone: The Second Trial

"Those signs... look pretty clear..." said Ethan.

"Yep." said Riley. "Sure do."

An unlikely duo thrown together by circumstance, the two of them regarded the little cubicle in front of them pensively. Riley stood with a hand on one hip and a thoughtful expression on her face; Ethan sat in the upturned palm of her other hand, which she was holding up to give him a better view.

It was clearly some kind of elevator, even though it was made from the same uniform white plastic as everything else. A small circular button on one wall blinked softly with a green light, illuminating a "down" arrow printed on the surface of the plastic. But there were also the two signs posted prominently on the inside of the elevator.

One of the signs was just a big number 1 in a black square. The other was a red circle with a line struck through it, enclosing a stylised representation of a big person and a little person within.

"So... only one of us can use the elevator?" said Ethan. "Not both at the same time?"

"Maybe... maybe one of us can send it back for the other one?" Riley suggested hopefully.

"But I can't, uh," Ethan murmured shyly. "I won't be able to reach the button without your help."

"Oh. Right."

"And I don't see an 'up' button, either."

"Ah, forget it," said Riley. "Let's just try it."

Holding her breath, Riley stepped into the elevator with Ethan in her hand. Immediately, the light on the button turned red and gave a hostile buzz. She gave the button a few experimental jabs, but the elevator didn't budge.

"I guess..." Riley said slowly. "I could go down alone, and try and find another way down for you?"

Ethan contemplated the idea of Riley setting him down on the ground, the door hissing shut behind her as she disappeared into the elevator without him. Leaving him alone in this vast, hostile, sterile chamber, completely isolated and incapable of fending for himself. He shuddered at the thought.

"Don't leave me here." he pleaded, standing up to look into Riley's big brown eyes. He swayed a little on her palm, struggling to keep his balance. "Please."

Riley chewed her lip and looked conflicted for a second, but in the end she shook her head. "Don't worry," she said in a soothing tone. "I'm not going anywhere."

"Anyway, I don't get it," she continued, jabbing at the button a few more times. "You weigh, like, nothing. So how does it even know you're in here with me?"

Ethan shrugged. For all he knew, they'd been abducted by aliens - who knew what kind of crazy technology their captors had at their disposal? But something did catch his eye as he glanced around the elevator for inspiration. "Riley, look there!" he cried. "In the corner!"

Riley peered around, confused, then she gasped when she saw it. A tiny black dot set into one of the walls, so small you'd miss it if you didn't know it was there. Yet it caught the weird ambient light that suffused this place from certain angles, throwing back the reflective glint of a camera lens.

"Ugh, they're watching us." Riley said with a shiver, stepping back out of the elevator. It chimed pleasantly, and the light turned green again. "Creepy."

"If it's just cameras, though, that means they're relying on vision." Ethan mused. "Maybe I can just hide...?"

"Hm." Riley stepped back into the cubby and ran her hands along the wall. "It's not just the one, though. There's quite a few of these little cameras, all over the place. I don't know if there's anywhere you can stand where they wouldn't see you, Ethan."

Ethan sighed quietly and stared around the elevator. An idea was beginning to form in his mind, but he had been hoping he wouldn't have to actually suggest it. "I don't suppose..." he cleared his throat awkwardly. "I don't suppose you have any pockets, do you?"

Riley looked down at him and blinked. A little smile crossed her face, and she said, "Oh, I see where you're going! But, uh... no, these are just my pyjamas. They are pocketless. Sorry. Although..."

Ethan looked up hopefully. "What is it?" he asked.

Riley blushed and glanced away from him. "Well, um, there is somewhere I could put you... where you'd be hidden. Just temporarily!"

Feeling as though he was missing something, he looked her up and down. "But, if you don't have any pockets, where would I go?"

"Um..." Riley reached up and tugged at the collar of her bumblebee-covered pyjama top, pulling it away from her chest.

"Oh." Now it was Ethan's turn to redden, and he felt the heat flooding his face. "Is that... okay?"

"It's okay with me if it's okay with you." said Riley in a small voice. Well, relatively small. "Desperate times and all that."

He knew full well that she could force the issue very easily if she wanted, so Ethan was grateful that she didn't lift her hand until he composed himself and gave her a quick, uncertain nod. Once again, the world blurred around him as she lifted him up, pulling her top down just enough to slip him under.

"I'll keep you safe, so just trust me, alright?"

When Riley's hand began to tilt and he felt himself slipping down, Ethan's heart began to pound. He looked down at the drop which awaited him; patterned vanes of cotton stretched from Riley's finger like the sails of some kind of bumblebee-themed ship. Underneath, her cleavage was a deep valley that plunged into darkness. It looked like a soft landing, at least. 

Riley's chest was bigger than a house, at least as far as Ethan was concerned, and he eyed the treacherous-looking cleft between her breasts with trepidation. With a palpable effort of will, Ethan made himself release his grip on her fingers and slide unsteadily from her hand.

"Oof!" He plunged for only a second before meeting the slightly damp surface of Riley's breast, but the impact was still enough to knock the air from his lungs. A deep smell, not entirely unpleasant, filled his nostrils when he tried to get this breath back.

Ethan reached out his hand in search of a strap to grab hold of, but his hands just scrabbled over the soft, yielding flesh surrounding him. "Uh, Riley?" A slightly panicked note entered his voice as he began to slip worryingly down the top of her breast. "You're not wearing a bra, are you?"

"Geez!" her voice thundered from above him. He could feel it rumbling in her chest when she spoke, sending a tremulous quiver through his surroundings. "I was sleeping, you know!" She released the collar of her top and it pinged over him, encasing him in the hot dark confines of her chest. "You're just going to have to kind of... hold on, Ethan."

Riley cocked her head at the muffled response that sounded from beneath her clothes, then shrugged - a movement which resulted in a fresh chorus of muted complaints. "Just bear with it for a minute, okay?" she said as she walked into the elevator and eyed the button anxiously.

It continued placidly blinking green, and Riley allowed herself a triumphant grin as she leaned forward to press the button. The elevator door closed with a hiss, sealing the perfect white cube behind her, and a low rumbling was the only sign that they'd started moving.

She couldn't help but smile a little at the wriggling and squirming she could feel working its way lower and lower down her chest, and she pulled up her collar again to check in on Ethan.

"You okay in there?" she asked, and giggled when she saw the little man's predicament.

Ethan had somehow managed to slide right between her breasts in the short time he'd been down there, and now his torso was wedged tightly in her cleavage. His arms were sticking awkwardly above his head, and it seemed to be taking all of his concentration to keep himself from slipping even further. His sandy hair was a little damp from the closeness and heat of her chest, not to mention from being rubbed and jostled between her slightly sweaty cleavage, and he was starting to look a little bit bedraggled down there.

What Riley couldn't see, and Ethan was eternally grateful for this, was the effect that his predicament was having on him. It was a little embarrassing in its own way that she couldn't even feel it, but he was glad not to have to explain to Riley why being smothered under the weight of her monstrous boobs made his boxers feel uncomfortably tight.

"I'm okay," he panted, reaching out one of his hapless arms to give her a thumbs up. "I'm... holding on!"

Riley bit her lip to hold back another giggle, shaking her head at the strange situation they'd ended up in, then glanced up when the rumbling ceased and the elevator gave a second chime. The doors hissed open, and she looked back down at him.

"Two down," she said. "Let's get you out of there before you suffocate... or drown, hah!"

Was it just him, or did Riley sound almost disappointed that it was over?

---

Read more of my writing on AO3!

[sillylittleabyss]

[sillylittleabyss]

The Tiny Zone: The First Trial

One night, on two worlds separated by the vastness of time and space, a man and a woman went to sleep in their beds and woke up somewhere else entirely. Neither of them would ever understand why they were chosen or how they got there, but the strangest things can happen... in the Tiny Zone.

Ethan tossed and grumbled in his sleep. He was having the weirdest dream, a dream of falling and flying and spinning all at once through a kaleidoscope of dizzying colours. His brow creasing, he reached for his blanket - but his hands closed over the empty air. In fact, he realised as he started to blearily regain consciousness, the cold hard surface underneath him didn't feel like his bed at all.

Suddenly aware that something was very wrong, Ethan's eyes shot open. With an intense sense of vertigo, he sat up and took in his new surroundings: he was still wearing the boxers he'd gone to sleep in, but his bedroom had been replaced in the night with a cold, alien chamber of cavernous proportions. Bare walls of sterile plastic stretched in every direction as far as the eye could see, a featureless white cube with a ceiling as tall as a skyscraper.

And he wasn't alone. Ethan's breath caught when he saw her: curled up in the corner, snoozing peacefully with her eyes shut tightly, was the biggest woman - scratch that, the biggest living thing period - that he'd ever seen. She was easily 30 feet tall. Hell, could she be 40? It didn't really matter, because either way he was approximately mouse-sized in comparison.

How is this even possible? Ethan thought frantically to himself. I must still be dreaming!

Ethan gasped as the monster in the corner began to move. Her eyes creaked open and she gave a huge sleepy yawn, stretching out those vast arms and rubbing at the mess of auburn hair that tumbled like vines around her face. He saw that she was wearing soft fuzzy garments covered in little bumblebees, and part of him wanted to laugh at the absurdity of his situation. Was he really about to be killed by a giant wearing bumblebee pyjamas?

The giantess suddenly gave a start, and Ethan froze as she started to look around the room nervously, her eyes open wide. When she finally spoke, her voice was like a wave of sound rumbling over him.

"H-hello?" Despite her terrifying size, her expression just looked lost and a little scared. "Where am I? Is anyone there?"

There was nowhere to hide in the little room, and it only took a moment before her eyes settled on Ethan. A look of profound confusion crossed her face, like she couldn't believe what she was seeing. Acutely aware of how measly his little voice sounded coming in the wake of her booming tones, Ethan spoke up.

"Please don't hurt me!" he called out as loud as he could across the vastness of the room. "I don't know how I got here either."

"You're so small!" said the enormous woman. "Why are you so small?"

"I..." That was a good question. Why was he so small? "I'm not small, you're the one who's big! You're enormous!"

"Hey, it's definitely not me! I'm a completely normal size, and I've been watching my weight lately too!"

The gargantuan woman scrambled to her feet as she spoke, and Ethan blanched as she rose to her full height. He'd known she was big, but seeing her tower above him like that... his head barely cleared the tops of her socks! As the giantess took a step towards him, sending shuddering vibrations through the plastic floor, Ethan cowered in fear.

"Woah... hey, little dude." She stopped. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you. I'm just... I have no idea what's going on!"

Cautiously, he lifted his hands from his head. "I don't... I don't know either," he said. "I just woke up and I was here."

She sighed, fiddling with her hair anxiously. "Okay. Well, I'm Riley. If we're going to be stuck here together, we should be on the same team, right?"

Ethan looked at her dubiously. The same team? She was like, a billion times his size! What could he possibly have to offer someone like her? But then again...

"I'm Ethan," he said. Being on Riley's team sounded a lot better than being her enemy, that was for sure. "Thanks for... not squishing me or something."

"Why on Earth would I do that?" Riley said with a quizzical chuckle. She started walking around the room, taking slow careful steps and keeping far from Ethan's corner. "Anyway, we must be here for some reason. There must be... oh. Do you see that?"

He followed her finger with his eyes. Yeah, there was something. The angle made it hard to see from the ground for someone as small as him, but it was...

"It's like, a box. Or a little tunnel or something, in the wall." said Riley, peering into it. "I think I can see something down there!"

She stuck her fingers into the hole, but frustration soon showed on her face. "Dammit," she said. "It's just... too fiddly. Twists and turns all over the place, I can't get my hand in."

Riley suddenly looked thoughtful, and she toyed idly with the buttons of her pyjamas as she turned to give Ethan an appraising look.

"Oh no," he said. "No way. That thing is like twenty stories up."

"Ethan," she said gently, starting to advance on him. "We're going to have to work together if want out of this place. Don't worry, I'll be holding onto you the whole time!"

"That's exactly what I'm worried about!" Ethan cried as she got nearer, taking a step back as she reached out with those huge scary fingers.

"Just... trust me! C'mere!"

Riley dropped to her knees and snatched at him. He tried to scramble between the legs of her pyjama pants, but her hand shot out just a little bit too fast to evade. Ethan paled as she snagged him and pulled him into the air, shuddering in terror as he felt her powerful fingers close tightly around his bare torso.

"Right!" said Riley, straightening and lifting him up to her face with a rush of momentum that made Ethan's head spin. "Now we can actually talk face to face. Wow, you are so small! It's kinda cute, actually!"

Ethan's heart hammered in his chest as Riley's huge brown eyes and lips loomed up in front of him. He opened his mouth to speak, but only a panicked gasp came out as he imagined all the various ways she could end his life right now. Squeezing him, dropping him, slipping him between those big soft lips...

"Okay, okay, calm down, dude!" Riley said. "I just wanted to look at you. This would have been way easier if you hadn't freaked out like that."

The wind rushed past his ears again as she swung him around, placing him gently in the entrance to the little plastic tunnel in the wall.

"See? Told you I'm not gonna hurt you. We're both in this thing together, little guy."

Ethan looked down from his new vantage point and immediately regretted it. Retreating into the safety of his little mousehole, he gave her an indignant look. "Please don't do that again." he said.

Riley made a face, but spread her hands in a placating gesture. "So," she said. "Can you see anything in there?"

"Yeah... there's like, a little switch. I think I can get to it..."

Climbing a little deeper in, Ethan found a small red lever - the first Ethan-sized thing he'd seen in this place, he thought - and he pulled on it until it swung down with a click. Almost immediately, a hissing sound started up from the far side of the room. What was previously a flat, featureless wall of white plastic suddenly sprouted a seam, which became a door that hissed open.

Riley beamed and clapped. "You did it, Ethan!" She peered through the newly revealed door, then bounced over to the bolthole and held out her hand, palm out flat, for him to climb onto. "As long as we work together, I bet we'll get out of here in no time!"

Ethan regarded the big, slightly sweaty palm of Riley's hand nervously, glancing up at her open, smiling face. The idea of willingly stepping into her grasp again sent a shiver down his spine - but she really did seem genuine about this whole "working together" thing. And she hadn't hurt him yet, had she?

"OK," he said, stepping out onto her hand. "Let's do this."

---

Read more of my writing on AO3!

[sillylittleabyss]

Oh gosh, looks like you lost to the succubus.

Again.

How does this keep happening? How can this busty demon gal keep beating you with her big, soft, bouncy hypnotits? Her pretty eyes? Her crooning voice telling you to surrender? Give in?

Submit…

And dangit, she’s not even a war demon, so now you have to endure the hours upon hours of pleasure.

Of mind-melting ecstasy as she drinks your soul.

Milks your essence from your helpless body.

Only for you to finally die and resurrect outside the dungeon.

Ha…

Oh well.

But just you wait! You’ll surely beat her next time…

[sillylittleabyss]

I started writing a story based on the first prompt! You can read it on AO3.

Size brainrot prompts

Some story ideas i’ve had forever that ive never had the time to develop. If you want them TAKE THEM pleaseeeeeeee!!! And show them to me!! I need these fics with my whole heart T o T -Respectively giant and tiny captives wake up in a blank, alien room, no memory of how they got there, made by their captors to play a game of cooperation for their freedom (jail break? Enemies to friends/lovers? Alien world? Gov Experiment? Who knows!) -summoned to another world(medieval, magic) but everything’s tiny, and the genius wizard who brought you here summoned you by accident. He tries to return you home but cant figure it out so you’re stuck oops (wanted by the military? Learning magic? Domestic cottage core w/ wizard?) -galactic explorer crash lands on earth, but they are tiny and earth was quarantined due to “abnormally aggressive tendencies and unreasonable habitants. Also they’re fuckin BIG”. Found by abnormally angsty and unreasonable (but not malicious) 20-something who learns to be chill. (Galactic federation un-quarantines earth?) -giant of the forest is a local village legend, and the youth of the village do “bravery tests” at night, leaving one of their friends in the woods for the night. Said local legend is actually an anxious mess who stays hidden from the kids each time, protecting them from the shadows while they stupidly walk through bear territory and the like (accidentally seen sometimes, always misinterpreted as aggressive and the kids run back with a scary story)