Fay Bargains

All characters are over 18.

*****

It was a swanky joint. Had that classy, old world elegance that was long out of style. I tell ya, you walk through those tall wooden doors, it's like stepping outa today and into a whole different era. Yeah, they don't make joints like this anymore. Don't help that I promised voters I'd shut 'em all down.

I let the doorman take my coat. Snazzy fella, dressed up in his fancy tux. Ain't that something. Better dressed than me, and I was the client.

Yeah, I might've lied when I said I'd close them down. But hey, what did the voters expect from a politician?

You could hear the cabaret all down the hall. A real band. Place like this don't believe in recordings. First thing you'd see are the girls. They were the point, after all. A few dancers, some call girls waiting on the wings. Even mid afternoon I wasn't the only client here. Saw a circuit judge pull one of the dancers onto his lap. Desk editor for the local paper wandered off into the back rooms with a girl on each arm. Didn't say nothing to them. Never do, unless you're here for business. Places like this didn't exist, and sure as hell no respectable gentleman ever set foot in one.

Least, that's what we told the press.

"Can we get you something, sir," the waitress said almost as soon as I sat down. "The lady will be with you in just a short while."

Waitress was a nice little number. Slim, willowy brunette, with legs like you wouldn't believe. That tiny little dress they were wearing didn't do much to hide em, either. Not too big up top, but her dress was cut low and tight enough that you kept looking to see if they'd pop out. They never did. Not unless you were paying extra.

"Scotch on the rocks," I said. Drink was cheap in a place like this. Fuzzed a man's head. Made him careless, agree to things he shouldn't. You needed a clear head in this joint, but I needed calm nerves more. Besides, all it cost is money. I had plenty of that.

Waitress came with the drink, and she wasn't alone. Soft, freckled arms wrapped around me from behind, as I felt a pair of lips press against my neck. Long fingernails dug lines down my neck, circling the collar of my dress shirt. Slender fingers slipped down to unfasten the top two buttons.

Ginger. Now there was a fine looking woman. She'd caught my eye almost five years ago. Backup dancer back then, I'd seen her in one of the late night shows. One part entertainment, three parts advertisement. The girls are for sale, you know, all of them are.

At first glance I was awestruck. Her long legs, the cute freckles dotting the creame of her otherwise unmarked skin. Even in the back of the crowd there was a certain self possessed grace that drew me to her. The Lady caught me looking. From that moment on, Ginger was always close by whenever I showed up wanting something important. Tonight wasn't any different.

"You know," she whispered in my ear, "the Lady might be a while, I'll bet we can find some way to pass the time, don't you?"

I'd wanted her desperately since the first moment I saw her. My answer was the same it had been every night she asked.

"Not today, Ginger." She pouted as she slid into my lap, but we both knew the game. Money wasn't the issue. Didn't get to where I was without picking up some change under the table. But a place like this, a faerie bar, it was wasn't money they were charging.

Deals, favors, obligations. Lifetime of city politics and you think you've got a handle on them. All that's nothing next to dealing with a faerie. Gal that ran this joint made even the most well oiled political machine look like a baby's playbox. Had something or another on just about everyone important. Businessmen, union bosses, press, politicians. It was funny, the cost never seemed so high when you started. A word here, a favor there, but it added up real fast. I looked over at the musicians. They were pretty good. Low key, but talented in that subtle sort of way you only noticed when you paid attention. Bet they could have done well for themselves if things had gone a little different. Wonder how many pleasant nights as customers in the backroom it took to bring them out here as the Lady's permanent indentured house band.

Me, I'd been smarter than most. Put a lot of time, lot of effort learning about the fay. Learned the rules, made my trades for power and influence, not fleeting pleasure. Real careful like.

Rule number one, the fay can't lie, but they can sure as hell deceive. You aren't paying attention, you're gonna get real surprised when the bill comes due.

I'd done better than most. Managed to pay down my debt, and there weren't too many who could boast that. Took me most of a lifetime, but it brought this punk of a street kid a damned long way.

Still wasn't sure it was worth it. Especially when I looked at the people who hadn't been careful.

I'd asked Ginger about it once. On some lazy night when I'd had too much to drink. It was an old story. Young, dumb kid got to school and realized cash was tight. Took a few jobs on the side, thought she'd stumbled into some glamorous dream out of an old timey film. But glamor don't come cheap, and one thing led to another.

In some ways, she was hardly a person anymore. People didn't have owners. Ginger did.

"Doesn't that bother you?" I'd asked her.

"Why should it? Out there I was lost and alone. So many decisions, worries. Now I just do what I'm told and I'm never alone. Never have to worry about anything again."

Crazy thing was, she meant it. I could see it in her doe eyed smile that she truly, utterly believed she was better off as the Lady's sworn servant. "How could that be?" I'd asked her, and she answered with a single word: Love.

To hear her describe it, servitude was like floating in a constant sea of love. Submerged in it, surrounded. Devotion to the Lady her sole guiding beacon. The Lady's clients were a chance to spread that love. To bring them closer to the Lady.

Yeah, closer to bondage. I wonder what that innocent girl from the university would say if she could see herself now. Any sense in her, she'd run the other way. Me, I sure as hell wasn't going to reopen that tab for some piece of tail, no matter how nice.

No, I had a much better reason.

"The Lady will see you now, Mr Mayor," said Marigold, today's hostess. She bowed as she spoke, setting her heaving bosom into motion. Nice. First Ginger, now her. The Lady was sure knew how to play it subtle.

If the lounge was ornate extravagance, the back room was all cozy elegance. Small, intimate, their walls hung with lavender velvet and lit by inset candles that cast everything in a soft glow. The lady herself was draped over a wide single armed couch. Dressed only in a diaphanous white gown that did little to hide her flesh and much to enhance it. As always, she was stunning, astonishingly beautiful in a way that would leave the bard himself speechless.

The fay often are.

Her hair was sky blue, natural in a way that dye could never reproduce. It draped down her body, long past her waist had she been standing. As it was, the longest strands slipped over the curve of her hip. Her ears were pointed, ever so slightly, but enough you'd know they weren't human. There was a crystal glow in her eyes, and reflected firelight had nothing to do with it.

I tell people Ginger's my favorite, and I mean it too, but that's just talking about the human women. Whatever your tastes, whatever your preferences, there was only one gal here that could truly be called the loveliest.

The appeal of the unattainable, the otherworldly. Where Ginger'd been open and accommodating, the Lady was like a mountain. Aloof and unforgiving, but her every peak and valley cried out to be explored. To even attempt its heights came at a cost, enough to make a mortal wonder what you'd lose if you could actually succeed.

"Colin!" she smiled, lifting a hand to wave me over. I tried not to watch how the gesture moved her all but naked breast. "Please, sit"

Sparsely furnished, there was only the couch to sit on. I set myself on the far end, though part of me begged to move closer. Even from the end, I was still too close to keep a clear head. The couch was deeper than I'd realized, wider. Enough to hold two, and then some. Faerie magic? They had a way of warping your perceptions. Especially here, in the heart of her domain.

Hmmph. I wasn't a young man, to be taken in by such naked distractions.

The insides of my pants stiffened in disagreement.

"So, Colin. All is well, I hope?" her smile coy, guarded. How much did she know? Safest to assume she knew everything, but often safer to pretend she didn't.

"I'm dying," I said bluntly.

"Well of course you are, silly mortal," she said with a titter, "You've been dying since before we met."

I thought back to that day. When an ignorant delinquent snuck into a locked up old building. It had a reputation, even then, and none of my friends would follow. I'd just wanted proof to lord over them. Instead I found her.

How old and mature she'd seemed to my teenage self. In all those years, she hadn't changed one bit, and to aged eyes she appeared young enough to make me feel guilty for looking. She looked like those undergrad interns we'd get at city hall, for goodness sakes. Good 'ol Slick Willy'd shown us all why you didn't mess around with those. At least not if you had any sense in your head.

Of course, it was my teenage instincts that had been right. She was old, real old. Wouldn't surprise me to learn she was older than the city she'd made her home.

"A lot sooner now," I croaked out the words, the weight of my years pressing especially heavy next to her ageless beauty. "Cancer. Maybe six months the doctors, the doctors say."

"ooo, so soon? And we'd just barely met. But you aren't ready to go, are you?" she leaned forward. "Let me guess, you're here to bargain. To snatch back those last few years."

"Of course I am," I snapped before caution reasserted itself. "I mean, yes, my lady."

"Hmm... such a gift you seek, and worth so much. I wonder, what should I ask in return."

She made a great show at being pensive, though I suspected she had known before I set foot in the room. She held all the cards, and we both knew it. Yeah, it might take her time and effort to get a friend in the mayor's office half as useful as I'd been, but she had all the time in the world. An annoyance to her, terminal to me.

"You might swear yourself to me," she said, "such a cost to you might balance the scales."

She paused, a playful smile crossing her face. The ultimate deal, a total surrender of will. Her spellbound thrall for the rest of my days. No cancer, sure, but could that even be called living?

"But then," she continued, "what use would you be to me, once you surrendered your domain?"

The rules of the faerie again. "No faerie may ensnare a ruler." It felt arbitrary half the time. She had her pawns so wrapped up in obligation and debt that they could hardly refuse her, but in theory they were still free beings. That's what counted so far as the magic was concerned. Tricky business, what did or didn't count as a ruler, but apparently mayors made the cut. That made me all the more useful to her. A use that'd be gone if I surrendered my will.

"No," she said, "I have a better idea. You shall give me a child"

"A child?" I stammered, trying to keep my eyes from wandering back down to her body.

"Oh, yes," she smiled, somehow managing to be both inviting and predatory at the same moment. "A son, to be specific."

This was no small thing she was asking. Humans and fay could breed, yes, but to produce anything from the coupling required agreement from both. In some ways, the halfbreeds were even more powerful than their faerie parents. They lacked the ageless permanence, true, but they were in tune with the human world in a way the faerie could never be. More than that, they drew power from the station of their parents. True fay were few, often solitary. Even the greatest faerie courts would hold fewer subjects than the number of people I "ruled" as mayor. Might not be so good as bagging a president, but it would still be a major coup for her. More than that, the children of rulers inherited a certain power over their parents' domain. Not rule, true, but things would come easier to them, opportunities more ready, power closer at hand. It would be decades before a halfbreed child came of age, and until then his power would be hers. In many respects, I would be all but handing my city to her.

What good would it be to me if I was dead?

I nodded my head, watching as her dainty foot slid up her calf, lifting the diaphanous material of her dress. To save my life, yes. And if the act of consummating our bargain held some appeal, what was the harm in that?

"The deal is this," she said. "I restore you to health, and in exchange you shall couple with me and produce a son. Is that agreed?"

She placed special emphasis on the word couple. My jaw dropped, and I ached for her touch. Would that be so bad, to take what I had wanted? This was what I had come here for, after all, and she was giving me everything I desired. In exchange, she asked for so little. It should have been suspicious, coming from her. Too appealing, too beneficial, even if it would deliver great advantage to her. But oh, I wanted her so bad.

"I accept."

Barely more than a whisper.

Smiling in triumph, she snapped her fingers. Attendants scurried into the room. Female hands quickly stripping away my clothing. I thought I saw Ginger, but the Lady had captivated all my attention. Her dress billowed to the floor, the vaporous material wafting in the air as it slipped down her body.

Her already stunning beauty exploded into radiant desire that left me breathless. The power of faerie on a willing mind is frightening, and mine had never been so willing. The very essence of femininity stood before me, against which all others are but shoddy imitations.

She stepped close, and I took her in my arms. Kissing with such fire and passion I felt it might consume me. I needed this woman. To possess her, hold her, plant my seed in her and make her mine. She broke the kiss, diamond eyes twinkling in the candlelight.

"On your knees, mortal. Come, prepare the way for your passing."

Not the first time a lover asked for this. I'd even done it once or twice, but only grudgingly. Never been the sort. Didn't think it was dignified. Now, however, I'd never wanted anything so badly. I all but dove between her thighs, lapping at the glorious nectar within. Surely this was the ambrosia lauded by the poets of old.

"Yes! Just like that, mortal. Harder, deeper."

Her tiny hands twined themselves through my hair, pressing me closer. My face was slick with the taste of Her, but still I licked. My tongue circled over the sensitive nub of her opening. Licking, sucking, drawing gasp after gasp of pleasure from my inhuman lover.

"Enough," she moaned, "It is time. Fill me, mortal. Plant your seed within."

That was all I needed to hear. Standing between her parted legs, my rigid tool soon found its way home inside her. I drove into her again and again, lifting up her slender body as I plunged my way deep within. My hands roamed the surface, savoring the touch of all that I had craved moments ago. Her smooth skin, the soft perky breasts that had so tantalized me.

I could feel it coming. A tight, coiled mass at my center poised to detonate at any moment. I drove in deep, pressing myself down upon her, my mouth covering hers.

Then I exploded, releasing myself deep within her fertile womb. It was like nothing I had ever felt before, that moment of climax. I spasmed, drawing her towards me as I felt myself pour into her. The intensity was overwhelming, as though my entire soul was flowing away with the seed.

I shuddered as she rolled atop me, a vision of loveliness looking down from where she straddled my body. I reached for her, desperately massaging her lovely breasts. A climax like that, I should have been spent. Instead, I was desperate for her touch as ever. Unsated, unfulfilled, I knew to the core of my being that we were not yet finished.

She took my hands in hers, shivers of desire washing through me at her touch. It took little force for her to slide them down. Past her lovely bosom, down her tight flat stomach and past her waist, until they reached the enormous, bulging cock jutting from her groin.

What? My mind was cloudy, fogged over with lust that made every thought a chore. Something didn't seem right about that, but I couldn't quite remember what.

Don't care. Too horny.

"Go on," she breathed sensually. Motioning with an encouraging smile.

My fingers wrapped around it, marveling at how massive the monster was. So warm and alive. It's thick, purple head spasmed as my fingers brushed it, large veins bulging.

"That's right," she said as I began to slowly stroke its length. "Just like that. You know what to do."

I didn't, but my lust addled body sure did. Almost on autopilot as I guided the monster down between my legs. There was pressure, pushing its way inward. A tight fullness curing an emptiness I had never recognized until that moment.

Then it was gone, and I cried out at the sudden absence.

Back again, quicker than the first, then out. In again, and out. Building up speed and force. My head snapped back, hands clutching the cushion as I braced myself. My mind had no frame of reference to understand these feelings coursing through me, but I knew I wanted it. This was what I had been missing, what I had anticipated so desperately without being able to name. Even now, I didn't understand what was happening to me.

I just knew that I loved it.

When I regained awareness, I was still in her embrace. Clarity returned, and I was ashamed by my loss of control. Our animal coupling was little more than a blur in my memory. Had she really -

I looked down between her legs, seeing only the smooth, bare crotch I had enjoyed filling. Of course that was what I saw. Why in the world would it be anything else?

What a strange dream.

"So, lover. Was that everything you hoped for?" she teased as she saw me wake.

I, I had no idea what to reply. It had been unbelievable. So overwhelming and exhilarating, but dangerous too. I felt awake, more alive than I had in years. Thousands of aches and pains were simply not there anymore. Our bargain! She had cured me!

Jumping from the bed, I leaped in the air, marveling at how spry I felt.

"It was amazing," someone said. Certainly not me, even though I'd felt my lips move and the air pass through my throat as I made to say those exact words. But of course I hadn't said them. There was no way that I could possibly produce such an airy, high pitched sound. Then I noticed something wrong with my body. Two somethings, in fact. On my chest.

I stiffened, not wanting to look down but unable to resist. It was impossible, but there they were.

"Wha-" that high pitched voice spoke again, giving words to my disbelief.

"What's the matter?" the Lady said, "having second thoughts? You haven't even seen the results yet."

Her hand waved, and a mirror appeared in front of me. Except, it couldn't be a real mirror. Sure, it showed the room we were in, the disheveled and strewn cushions of the couch I had just made love on, and the pale skin of the Lady's naked back, but there was no Me to be seen. Instead, I saw a naked, dumbfounded teenage girl.

She looked lovely, her body smooth and bare, exhibiting all the curves of a classical beauty. Glistening olive skin shone with the sheen of exertion, her bare breasts shifting and moving slightly with every ragged breath. Red-gold hair fell in curls all the way down past her shoulders, tumbling down the front of her to frame her oh so lovely breasts. Her face was exquisite, a small pouty mouth opened in an adorable O of shock right below her wide, innocent eyes. Young, like I hadn't been in years. Fresh out of high school, maybe. A year or two older at most. It had been a long, long time since I'd seen that side of twenty.