Page 9 of Dark Company

“I still don’t understand.”

She leans over and pats my hand, an understanding smile creasing her face. “You will. Come. I must prepare you for your big day.”

Standing, she reaches over and grabs a gnarled cane before shuffling in front of me and heading back towards the entrance. As we get nearer, she pauses in front of one of the few statues I don’t recognize and kisses his hand. Since she doesn’t instruct me to do the same, I ignore the polished stone and slip inside the curtained off area behind her.

Light slams back into me, nearly stealing my breath with the sweltering heat, but once my eyes adjust, something far more sinister causes my breathing to falter. In front of us, nearly blotting out the light, is an enormous statue. It’s the size of a large Alpha but raised up on a dais to make him that much taller. Standing at the base, my shoulder barely brushes against his feet. Stepping back, I’m able to take in the entire view of him, and a startled gasp chokes my throat.

Between his sculpted thighs is another shorter dais where his divine shaft juts up high into the air. The tip and length are red, stained with what looks like blood. Towards the base is a bulbous ring that stands out in an angry, puffy series of veins and tissues. From the few divine shafts I’ve seen, none of them have had this. What is its purpose?

Instead of saying anything, she hobbles over to a small spring and motions for the bucket. “Fill this with sacred water and bring it to the statue. You will find rags at the base. While you clean the holy phallus, I will tell you about the goddess Ilaria and the god Xiarius.”

I grab the bucket and dip it in the water, taking as long as I can before having to approach that which I’m not allowed to look at, much less touch. But sooner than I prefer, it’s full. As I drag it over to the statue, I see the rags she mentioned and drop them into the water with a satisfying plop.

Unable to procrastinate anymore, I climb the steps that lead up to the long legs. Unable to look at the holy phallus between his thighs, I instead concentrate on the rippling abdomen. But that’s not any better. I long to reach out and trace those muscles that look so lifelike, as if poised on the cusp of movement. Strong, perfectly sculpted legs reach down to the base of the first dais, rooting the statue in place.

Looking up, I stare at the intense eyes before dropping my gaze to the full lips. The face looks like the god we passed on the way in here, but instead of a soft, serene look as in the hall, his face is ferocious, feral. An odd heat flushes my body as I stare up at him, and for a moment, it’s as if this god made of stone can see right into my heart…. No. Not my heart. Somewhere much lower.

The juncture between my thighs, where the divine anatomy lies, starts to throb, as if my heart plummeted down there and started beating. Terror thrashes around in my chest like a living thing as our eyes stay locked for what feels like an eternity. I look over at the Clan Mother, but she merely smiles as she motions for me to clean.

I have no choice but to look up at the stone phallus. It’s thick and veiny, nothing at all like the shaft that was between Brennen’s thighs. In fact, in comparison, his is thin, reedy, like a twig compared to a branch. Reaching into the bucket, I grab a rag and glance back up at Xiarius’s face.

He hasn’t moved, and yet, I still feel his eyes boring into me. With the rag in my hand, I grip the bucket of the handle and climb up the few steps to the smaller dais. There are worn grooves on either side of the holy phallus that I wasn’t able to see from where I had been standing. From the length and width, it looks similar to the marks my legs and knees make while kneeling in the sand to clean the clothes.

Setting the bucket to the far edge of the smaller dais, I toss the rag back into the water and reach out and run my fingers along the left, smooth rut. My mind drifts to what it would look like if I actually knelt here. Glancing over at the Clan Mother, I note her smile of encouragement and take a deep breath. I pull up my skirt as I maneuver around the holy phallus and stand in between the enormous shaft and the stone chest.

Unable to keep my balance, I reach out to steady myself, only to find that his chest and abs are warm, almost like he is human. A gasp tears from my throat as my gaze flies up to his face. With the way it’s angled down, if I stepped up on the tip of my toes, I could probably wrap my fingers around the back of his neck and pull myself up into a kiss.

But I refrain, unable to believe how far gone my mind is. I’m here to clean the statue, not to kiss it. Bracing against his stomach, I lean back and slide to my knees. His thick phallus grinds up against the crack of my ass as I make my way down to a full kneel.

Arousal pours into my body until it nearly suffocates me. Pinned between the implacable stone body and the holy shaft, I find my hips moving up and down in slight movements. Wetness gathers in between my thighs, as my pulse throbs there, and I groan. At first, I worry the bucket tipped over and that’s what’s causing all this liquid, but when I turn around, it’s standing upright.

My body trembles as I slide my fingers in between my splayed thighs, needing to find the source of all this wetness, but to my dismay, it seems to come from me. Horror floods my system, dampening the burgeoning feelings of arousal that started to latch onto my insides, turning them into a hot, twisted, cramping need.

Standing, I look down, desperate to see if perhaps there is water left over from the last time the statue was cleaned, but no such luck. The stone is bone dry. The only evidence of anything is the embarrassing wet spot where my skirt rode up in between my legs. I need to separate myself from this situation. Nothing about this is good.

That I’ve let myself go so far as to wet myself is unthinkable. Shaking my head, I once more maneuver around the holy phallus and kneel next to the bucket and start on my task. Grabbing the rag, I thrust my hands into the water, needing the cool liquid to dampen my inflamed nerves. I reach out and squeeze water over the top, watching in fascination as the water runs down and fills a trough surrounding the base.

Again, I dunk the rag and pour water over the holy phallus until the surface is clean from as much blood as possible. Reaching out, I drag the rag over the smooth stone, gasping at the heat that rises from it. Though hard and unyielding, it’s warm like skin, just like the abs and chest, but just a bit hotter.

“Before you let your head get away from you, we built the statue of Xiarius on a hot spring and fashioned a tube that allows the warm water to be funneled through, heating the holy shaft and body. Now, keep cleaning. I want every bit of blood off before I’m through.”

I was right. Deep inside, I was hoping it wasn’t actually blood, but she confirmed it. Bringing the rag back up, I scrub at the surface, pausing to slide my fingers across the forbidden. Since it’s a statue and not an actual man, this should be allowed. Right?

“Long ago, before the world was as it is now, the gods decided they wanted company. Though many of them got along well enough, several fought amongst themselves. The goddess Ilaria wanted to create a race of beings that could draw the attention of the quarrelsome gods, directing their natures towards a more nurturing turn of mind.”

The woman’s voice fills the space, like spice swirling in the air, thick, heavy, and full of perfume. If I close my eyes, I can almost smell a scent that’s a shadow of a memory or hear the whisper of a song as it dances on the breeze. Though Annora often sang to me as a child, this is different. It’s an older voice, a mix between the Clan Mother and an unknown woman.

“It is well known that Ilaria is the goddess of omegas and women, but before that, she was simply the goddess of the water. She created the rain that made things grow. It is she who began this new race, but she couldn’t do it alone. Rain can only do so much, but without a seed to be watered, all that exists is a wet lump of dirt.”

At her apt description, a soft giggle slips past my lips. Instead of angering the Clan Mother, as I was worried I would, she simply smiles up at me, an indulgent tilt of her lips that makes my heart pound furiously in my chest. It’s so familiar that I can almost touch it, almost push past the fog of forgetfulness and touch it. I’ve seen that smile before.

“Xiarius was the god of the harvest, of new beginnings. It was by his hand that things grew. Ilaria knew she needed him to make this work. They’ve always had a symbiotic relationship. He would plant the seed, and she would water it until it grew.”

Though I had never heard this story before, her words make sense. Did we always have this god, and he was just never talked about? Perhaps the Agro betas knew of him, worshiping him with the fruits of their labor.

“That night, he took his holy shaft and parted the lips of her divine anatomy and lay with her, causing her to cry out in great ecstasy. Once he reached his own culmination, a curious thing happened. From the base of his holy phallus grew a knot. It stretched the goddess Ilaria wide, forcing her to hold him deep inside her womb until the new life could take hold.”

At her words, my fingers rest upon the knot at the base, and my heart starts to thud much lower again. There is something so decadent, so taboo about touching the sacred knot, that I can’t keep my fingers off of it.