When the warlock entered she saw that her suspicions were spot on: he looked hellishly tired, red-eyed, distraught, frantic with a totally untypical anxiety. He rubbed his hands together, twitched neurotically and paced up and down as he stammered out his news.

‘Matthias has found her…I mean, I never thought….quite impossible…never expected this….one great joy of my life….found, found by that all-seeing genius of a bird!’

‘Her? Who? Where?’ asked the red-head.

‘The Lapland Witch…she’s not just a figment…real, really real, alive and in this territory…at last… to meet again….’

‘Well, you should be delighted. Old girl-friend turns up, probably looking for you, I bet, and with your spy system and skills it should be a piece of piss to find her, get it on and live happily ever after in a Pictish sepulcher. Not my choice of honeymoon hotel, but you do have strange tastes.’

‘But it’s where she is, Draca! Matthias was on a far-ranging sweep to the south of here, on the verges of the Debatable Lands and the Deserted Territories…’

‘Near Karramaneh’s queendom?’

‘Exactly. In her queendom in fact. She’s there….in the palace….a prisoner….and…’

‘You know what that means, dear old wizard….she could be dead meat by now if that cow’s got her in her clutches. I don’t want to sound cruel to you, but you’ve got to face this one, honey.’

‘Matthias is watching over her. I am in telepathic contact with him. My lady is in solitary confinement, awaiting the decisions of a capricious and deranged sadist as to her fate. My fears are that she is destined to serve as a pleasure babe, as the vicious bitch calls them, in her harem. I had to tell you, to let you know that I have all I need in this pack, I have my staff and my hat and some books. Always travel with a book…sound advice,’ he digressed, looking more and more distracted. ‘Among mine are two grimoires of great power…and the Odes of Horace…and…’

‘I’m coming with you, sweetie. I owe you my life. I want to face Karramanneh…she’s the only slut out there who’s anywhere near my equal. This’ll be a challenge and a pleasure.’

‘I forbid it…as your physician I simply cannot countenance your moving from here for at least another month. I…..oh, no! I’m through to Matthias…they’re moving her now…I can’t wait….goodbye, my dear, wish me well.’

The door slammed behind the magus and she heard him run down the wooden stairs and out. His boat would take him swiftly with the current south and west through the birch woods and the ravines, past lochs and mountains dense with scented heather, through a wild but beautiful terrain till he reached the cold breakers of the sea and, by that barren coast, the promontory on which was built the hell that was Karramanneh’s palace. Draca tried to get up but her wounded leg buckled under her at once. She was appalled to find herself weeping as she subsided into the frothing green waters, beating the sides of the tub in her frustration and racked with guilt that she could not serve the man who had saved her from a hideous death. And to what kind of horror was he rushing himself?

The palace of Queen Karramanneh had been a luxury health club before the Apocalypse. All that remained was the central block of glittering amber-tinted glass and sleek slabs of marbled stone. Inside it was still a temple of luxury but very far from healthy: all the splendid materials that could be sought out from neighbouring lands were gathered to adorn the lust-crazed fantasy of Karramanneh. Walls of peach-pink marble, floors of blond polished oak, carpets of silk, hangings of satin, sunken baths of pistachio-green marble filled with water from a mineral spring, windows of soft rose-pink glass. Here Karramanneh and her court took their depraved pleasure, here the naked beauty of captive haremchicks was displayed for their pleasure. Some of the pleasure-babes were free to move around under the watch of the guards in their gauzy pale blue harem pants and low-cut scarlet satin bras, armed with scimitars and short, curved bows. Also watching were the more vicious haremwhores in their purple silk thongs, their nipples decorated with dangling purple satin tassels, and their weapon a deadly hook-bladed knife.

Sandalwood burned in golden braziers, perfuming the air already scented with the oil of slicked bodies; the sound of insistently throbbing rhythm-sections pulsed in the brain and stirred the loins. The members of the queen’s court sprawled on multi-coloured silk cushions, smoking bhang from brass hubble-bubbles and selecting the pleasure-babes of their choice. Karramanneh had ordered an orgy for this hot and sultry afternoon, intended, so gossip said, to introduce a new captive to the ranks of the pleasure-babes. The queen’s chief minister, a plump blonde in gold halter-top and a crocus-yellow satin sarong, was toying idly with one of the unchained haremchicks, a dusky Asian with a cascade of black shiny hair. Her lithe body jingled as she moved to push her wet snatch onto the groping fingers of Maila, all her chains that dangled and jangled from her manifold piercings, glinted in the lamplight. Like all the pleasure-babes, she was a mass of delicate filigree gold chain: from each pierced ear, both brown nipples, her cute little navel, her even cuter clit, wrist, throat, ankle…so slender and golden and glitzy were the web of chains that hung from and criss-crossed her brown satin-sleek skin. Maila’s hot, thick tongue was plunging in and out of her mouth as they kissed wildly and her finger was rubbing the stud that pierced her clitoris till the spasms of orgasm rocked her skinny brown body. AS she lay back, exposing her lovely body on the rich carpet, the blonde hitched her sarong up to her hips and bared he naked shaven cunny. She knelt over the haremchick’s panting wet lips and rotated her plump hips in her own desire for delight. Her full tits flopped free from her halter-top as she untied it and she pressed down harder, harder, longing to have the insolent little slut’s tongue all the way up her puss. The chick was moaning louder and louder, Maila was squeezing her generous white thighs over the brown babe’s face, her moist twat was thrusting hard over lips and pert little nose….the moans stopped; a shiver of utter bliss ran from the blonde’s clit up through her heaving belly to issue in a yelp of ecstasy from blood-red painted lips. Her climax had coincided with the suffocation of a totally expendable little tramp…and, anyway, wasn’t there someone new coming to replace her?

Hanging from gold-plated chains on the wall opposite Maila’s little moment of delight was a Tong captive, her long black pigtail dangling between her sweet and firm little boobs, her ivory-yellow body bare save for a tuft of jet-black silky pubic hair. Her pink nipples were pierced and linked by a golden chain, her slender wrists and ankles were decoratd with several thin chains that jingled gently as she swung from her manacles. Between her long slim legs hung a clitpendulum that was being tugged by the teeth of Kalinka, the queen’s secretary. She was a brunette who wore a long red satin sheathe dress slit to the hip and cut to the navel, displaying her leggy loveliness and full breasts. She pulled harder at the chain that was attached to the Tong’s pierced clitoris and smiled to see how wet that little coral slit was becoming in the process. More pain was needed, she thought and she gave it one hard tug, delighting in the yelp of agony from the slant-eyed lovely. She stood up and began the same process with her teeth on the chain linking those pretty, erect nipples, her hand now fisting the pleasure-babe’s ass. The Tong was writhing in a mix of pain and pleasure, her body arching, her legs flailing, her head rolling, as, eyes tight shut, she panted out, ‘Please, oh, please…oh, no, no…’ Kalinka was rubbing her mound through the thin silk of her dress against one of those convulsing thighs, feeling her own pleasure mounting uncontrollably. She urgently grabbed the long black plait and seductively twined it round the pale throat of the wriggling little bitch, tightening it with each throb of the music and her own throbbing orgasm until those almond eyes were staring and bulging and a red tongue thrust from gaping lips. The little tart gave a last choking wheeze and was still. Kalinka kissed each cooling nipple and then drank the sweat from that deep little navel as she sniffed the scent of sex and death that enveloped the pretty little body.

A gong clashed and all eyes turned to the marble staircase at the end of the hall; bodies were still, lips parted from kisses, fingers and tongues slipped from mouths and twats. Queen Karramaneh was about to enter and introduce her new captive to the short but ecstatic life of a pleasure-babe.