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[b][u][center]Heavy is the Crown

Chapter 2

for Damiekinz

by Draconicon[/center][/u][/b]

Trapped in the grip of the dark magic tendrils, Dino could barely manage a pathetic wriggle in response. He gritted his teeth, the reindeer prince glaring at his opponent, but it was as ineffectual as anything else he had attempted thus far in the council chamber.

[i]Dark magic...Jach was practicing dark magic all this time...[/i]

All magic was supposed to be overseen by the Church of Espos. The theocracy behind the throne was the source of all magical knowledge, all technique, or was supposed to be. Light magic, dark magic, all kinds of magic were taught by the priests, but he'd never heard that they had taught Jach. Either the dragon's lessons had been secret beyond even the purview of the royal family...or he had learned them somewhere else, and had never shown his hand before now.

In some small way, it flattered him; for all that he and his friends were caught, they had forced the dragon to show the power he'd kept hidden for many a year. It was the smallest of victories, but with how everything had gone wrong, he needed to take whatever triumphs he could get.

He twisted in the bindings, shaking his head.

"You cannot...you will not get away with this!" Dino said.

"Will I not?" Jach shook his head, turning to the assembled nobles and councilors. "My friends, it is clear that Prince Dino has lost himself. Whether to madness or ambition, I know not, but the prince has abandoned all rational claim to the throne. To seek to murder me for a confession I could not truthfully give, he has made it clear that he has turned his back on all that we hold sacred, and everything that is good in life. I say that he shall be punished for this.

"Guards, come. Take the prince and his friends to the dungeon, and send a runner to the church. Tell them that we shall need a priest to apply the Heretic's Brand."

Dino and his friends froze, their breath chilled in their lungs. Asmund started shouting a second later, and Kantu was scarcely quieter in his hissing pleas. Braford looked his way, but Dino could not bring the words to his lips.

The Heretic's Brand. It was a punishment that only the church could give, but once applied, it was absolute. There was no removing it, and the magical effects of the brand would remain for the rest of his life. He would -

No. No, this couldn't be happening. This wasn't possible. He was the Prince of Espos, the man that was supposed to bring peace, prosperity, safety back to the land that Jach was corrupting further and further by the day. He couldn't lose. This wasn't supposed to happen.

"You would dare condemn the royal bloodline to the Brand?" Dino managed to wheeze out, straining against the tendrils holding his arms over his head. "You would condemn the blood of King Dorro to such degradation?"

"You were more than willing to condemn me to an early grave," the gray-scaled dragon said, shaking his head. "I fail to see that there is virtue in keeping you alive."

Dino swung his head toward the crowd of nobles and guardsmen. They had yet to say anything, shocked to silence by the use of the dragon's dark magic, and they looked even more stunned with the dragon's suggestion of the Brand. It was not a punishment lightly invoked; to be labeled a Heretic with the Brand meant that one was outcast from all society, from all family, and that they were considered the lowest of the low. Even criminals were seen as higher than heretics, and it cut them off from any and all inheritance, titles, and lands. There was nothing, [i]nothing[/i] for the Heretics when they were marked like that.

He looked around, gazing at the wolves, the reindeers, the other species that were gathered. There had to be someone, anyone, that cared enough for the old King that they would speak up for him. There had to be someone that still wished to see the bloodline on the throne.

[i]Please...please...[/i]

The crowd was silent for another minute, then a second, then a third. It wasn't until five minutes had passed that one of them - a pale-furred fox - stepped out of the crowd. Jach cocked his head to the side, and the fox stopped at the far side of the map table.

"You have something to say, good lord?" the dragon asked.

"I...I say praise to the King-Regent," the fox said. "May his courage in suppressing his enemies guide him in his rulership of Espos."

"I thank you, good lord," Jach said, chuckling.

"You what?!"

Dino thrashed about, but the tendrils pulled ever tighter. His friends roared at his behalf, and Braford nearly managed to pull an arm free before another tendril pulled it back again. The reindeer prince screamed at the nobles.

"You turn you back on the oaths that you gave my father?! You pledged to him, to his house, to his family line! And now, you turn your back and support this upstart?! Where is your honor, your dignity, your - mmmph!"

The inevitable happened as one of the tendrils forced itself past his lips and pinned his tongue in place. It expanded, the magical substance that formed its shape getting larger and more prominent, making it impossible for him to move his mouth around it.

"Let him be taken to the dungeons," Jach said. "One way or another, I shall protect this kingdom."

"Hail Jach!" one of the other nobles shouted. "Protector of Espos!"

"Hail Jach!"

"Hail Jach!"

The shouting continued, getting louder and louder as more of the nobles took up the chant. By the time the guards arrived, carrying shackles and more, all of them had taken up the call. The echoing cries of his enemy's name chased Dino and his friends from the council chamber and down to the dungeon.

They had lost.

#

For a dungeon, the cell was relatively comfortable. Dino supposed Jach couldn't send them to the bottom of the palace jail, considering their status. Regardless of their crimes, for now, all four of them were people of standing. Braford was a royal bodyguard, someone that had a great many friends in the palace barracks, and Kantu was another noble, though relatively low in rank. Despite being banished, Asmund was a warrior of standing in his country, and putting him somewhere too offensive risked a war that the kingdom didn't want.

And Dino was a prince. Putting a prince somewhere too lowly was just asking for trouble, despite his 'crimes.'

He sat in the corner of the cell, his ankles chained to the wall. It had just enough slack for him to move around the small room, going from the bed to the bars and back again. A small chair sat in the other corner, somewhere for him to sit that wasn't the bed, and there were small books on the shelf nearest the bed. Not much, but better than the empty stone walls that some prisoners were given. It was a token effort toward his comfort.

[i]He beat us. Completely.[/i]

The thought had come and gone a number of times since the guards had locked him in the cell. He couldn't stop thinking about it, wondering where they'd gone wrong and what they could do to make things better. They faced the Heretic's Brand, after all, and that was not something that could be taken back once it had been applied.

[i]Nobody spoke up for us...nobody believed us...[/i]

Dino still couldn't believe that. He'd planned this out from start to finish, knowing that there would be some of the council on Jach's side - there always was, in the histories and stories - but he'd been sure that there would be at least a few of the councilors that remembered his father fondly enough to stand on his side. There should have been at least a few that were willing to turn on Jach...

But there had been none. Nobody. Not one.

[i]What happened?[/i]

There was no way for him to discover that now. Whether the dragon had been playing politics and buying up the affections of his councilors or whether he'd been using his magic to twist minds, it didn't matter. The council and the nobility were set against him now, and too great a majority supported Jach. Whatever he did, he had to do it on his own, and he had to do it fast.

[i]But what can I do?[/i]

That was the question. He couldn't just submit to Jach; that would have been a betrayal of his father, and he could not stand the idea of being ruled by the dragon. There was something too wrong about that, too horrible to contemplate. The kingdom of Espos had been in the hands of his father's bloodline for generations, and letting it go to someone else was just unacceptable.

But what other options did he have?

A shiver ran down his spine as he remembered the punishment looming on the morrow. The Heretic's Brand was a mark that was put on those that had crossed the bounds of law and could no longer be trusted. Those judged Heretics by the church were bent over, branded across their rumps, and they were put out for public use. Not merely for sex, but for the belief that the forced pleasures of the branded would wash away the sins of those that used them.

Dino closed his eyes, rubbing his forehead as he was dragged along by his own imagination. The Heretic's Brand was seen most days in the church squares, where those that had been branded in the past were put out for public use. Those that carried the Brand were the only ones that had their assholes available for use; no other Bearer or Granter could be touched that way without being considered sullied, or for those that used them to be sullied in turn.

[i]Mmmph...and they make us...like it...[/i]

Dino knew the rules. Espos treated anal like the dirty thing that it was, where those that could not control themselves, those that were already sullied and wrong, took pleasure in the wrong hole. Bearers, like himself, were meant to take pleasure from their pussy, while Granters - those that had dicks - were supposed to only take pleasure from the mouth or the pussy of their partners. Putting it in [i]there[/i] was unacceptable.

Unless, of course, one was marked with the Brand.

He pressed his hand against his forehead all the tighter as he imagined what it would be like to carry the Brand and feel that hunger that the Heretics were said to carry. He'd never particularly wanted it back there, but the idea that he might be forced to, to be made more sullied as a result, sent a shiver down his spine. He was a prince, someone that was supposed to be better than that, but -

Click.

Clank.

The reindeer lifted his head from his hand, looking up at the source of the noise. Standing on the other side of the cell door was Jach.

"Hello, Prince Dino," the dragon said, cocking his head to the side and adjusting his fancy cloak again. "I see that you've taken to your cell quite well."

"Your guards were...rough," the reindeer said, pulling his legs a little tighter together to hide his modesty; they had taken all but his loincloth. "What do you want?"

"I came to see how you were doing. I figured that it would be best to see whether you were holding up or cracking apart before the Branding tomorrow."

"You came to gloat."

"Perhaps." The dragon shook his head. "I must say, I was beginning to wonder if I would be able to hold the throne with the constant pressure to let you take it one day. Oh, the council accepted the whole thing about you needing to earn it, that you needed experience, but there were only so many bribes that I would be able to give. Sooner or later, they'd demand that they get the chance to judge you directly, and that could have been a complicating factor."

"You stole my throne."

"Well, I was in the process of stealing it. But today, you handed it to me. I could not have asked for a better way to discredit you. 'Wild Prince Attempts to Murder Regent.' The criers will be shouting that from the rooftops come morning, and I doubt that there will be a witness for your Branding that doesn't know what you've done."

The reindeer prince's heart sunk. Hearing it said like that finally brought the reality of his actions crashing down on him.

He hadn't come to the capital as a hero, but rather, as an upstart himself. He hadn't brought proof, but had assumed that the villain would crumble like the stories always said they did. The histories, too, had said that the bad ones were always quick to fall when confronted by a righteous man, but had never gone in detail into how that had happened in the first place. Maybe he should have dug deeper. Maybe he should have looked for more information for his plans.

"You will not get away with this," he whispered under his breath.

"Will I not?" Jach shook his head. "I thought that your father raised you better than this, Dino. I knew King Dorro was one of the better monarchs that this land has had over the years, but I assumed that you would be at least half as good as him. It seems that you are not even a tenth of what he was."

"Do not talk about my father..."

"I will say what I will to someone that cannot even conceive of how he lost."

"You did something. I don't know what, but you did something. I could not have won with how you stacked the deck."

"I did nothing that you did not make possible," the dragon said, leaning on the bars. "I will be honest, Dino. I have nothing against you. This is not the personal attack that you think it is."

"Not - not personal?!" The reindeer stood up, shaking a fist at the former advisor. "You stole my kingdom from me!"

"No. I stole a kingdom. If it had been you, or some other prince, I would have done the same thing. All I wanted was a land of my own, and this was the perfect opportunity to take it." Jach shook his head. "That said, the fact that you and your friends made it so easy has been a bonus. Have you looked at what you bring to the throne?"

"Peace. Stability!"

"The opposite, young man. You have a warrior that wants to be a chief, which would lead to war in order to get what he wants. You have a noble that's trying to avoid his obligations, destabilizing the entire region. You have a guardsman that wants to be your partner, which would throw the leadership of the home guard into disarray," the dragon said, tapping out the people on his fingers. "And lastly, you, the prince that would be so easily led by the nose that all of our neighbors would be trying to manipulate you, and probably succeeding."

"You don't know that!"

"I do. For all you despise me, I know politics. And I know that my pleasures will be far less damaging to the kingdom than your 'idealism.'"

The dragon turned. Dino took a step forward, only to freeze as the former advisor fixed him with an intense stare.

"I would advise you not to fight it tomorrow. The Heretic's Brand is an...intense experience. I wouldn't want the former prince to lose his mind in wanton desire."

And with that, the dragon left, and he was on his own once more. The reindeer shuddered, his hands shaking at his sides until he slumped to the ground again.

[i]What am I going to do?[/i]

#

There was nothing that he could do. The next day, he and his three friends were led to the church square. The four great spires of the capital's cathedral shot toward the heavens, spearing through clouds as they passed overhead. The populace of the capital had come out to see the events of the Branding, and he shivered as he and his friends stared out at the crowd.

"What is the plan, prince?" Braford whispered out of the corner of his mouth.

"I...I don't know," he confessed.

The black-furred bull twisted, looking down at him, but the reindeer had no words. He lowered his head, his face burning in abject shame as he thought of what he had done to his friends. They had followed him in his ambition, and they were going to pay the price just as much as he was.

Even without the impending branding, it was humiliating to stand before the crowd like this. Their hands were bound behind their backs, and none of them wore anything more than a loincloth. Their ankles were shackled together, keeping them from running off without dragging the others after them, and they stood on a stage that was just high enough that the people in the front row would have been able to look up and under his loincloth. Dino could almost feel the gaze of some of the elk and reindeer there on his pussy, and he had to force himself not to close his legs in utter humiliation and embarrassment.

Finally, the crowd split to make way for the royal procession. Dino looked up and glared at the dragon at the head of it, the lushly-appointed regent walking side by side with a gray-robed priest of the church. The priest himself carried something at his side, an urn that must have held the paint that was part of the Brand.

His breath caught in his throat as he realized that this was really going to happen. The church had already ruled against him and his friends. There would be no chance to argue that they deserved a better fate. They were going to be marked.

[i]Oh gods...oh gods...[/i]

As fear ran rampant through his veins, the royal procession reached the stage. Jach and his soldiers took the center, with some of the palace guards pulling at the chains binding Dino, Braford, Asmund, and Kantu. They were dragged back several paces, giving the dragon room to speak to the crowd, and the rest of the procession began to drag stockades onto the stage, setting them up behind the four 'criminals.'

"Today is the day of judgment," Jach called out. "Today is the day that we must remind the world what it means to give in to ambition, and heretical desires."

"Is it heresy to want to live our way?!" Kantu shouted, the harpy eagle's cry shrill rather than passionate.

"It is, when you threatened murder of the regent," Jach said, looking over his shoulder for a moment to shake his head before turning back to the crowd. "Today, they will be suitably punished and reminded of the consequences of overweening ambition. The Heretic's Brand has been prepared, and today, the public shall be the ones to show them where they belong."

Even Asmund couldn't respond to that. They'd known that the Brand was coming, but to hear that the public would have them on their first day...

"Put them in the stockades."

The dragon's order was followed with alacrity, and even though they struggled, it was a weak thing compared to the firm strength of the guards. There was no holding them back, no getting free. They had waited too long; it was too late.

Dino could not process everything as he was put into the stockades, his head and hands put into the binding holds and the wood slammed down over his head and shoulders. There was no getting out, and he bit back a whimper as the lock clicked into place. It was bad enough to be helpless like this, his ass facing toward the crowd, but he knew what was coming next. Hands rubbed along his hips, found the back flap of his loincloth, and -

Flick.

Flop.

"Ooooooooh..."

The crowd's sound of mass fascination made him bite his tongue to keep from whimpering, and the chill puff of air along his sex and his rump alike made him drip more than he wanted to admit. The few times that he had been 'exposed' in public before had been in brief rendezvous with Braford in an alley or something like that, where there had been a risk of someone coming up on them and finding out what they were doing, but no more than that. The risk had been part of the thrill, but his royal sex had never been seen by someone else before. Not like this, not in a crowd where there were hundreds of citizens of the kingdom that could see what he looked like...down there...

The rest of the loincloths were flipped up one by one, exposing Braford, Asmund, and Kantu. All four of them were Bearers; none of them had the cocks and balls of the Granters, and all of them were shivering. Asmund growled, but Dino knew that was only the bear's way to try and hide his humiliation. Kantu shrieked, trying to command others to look away, but his attempt to display authority only came across as horror and embarrassment, humiliation, and futility.

Braford was silent, the bull looking his way. Dino looked back, and they stretched out their hands in a vain attempt to hold. They touched fingertips instead, and the reindeer took what comfort he could from that little bit of contact.

"Bring forth the Brand," Jach said. "Start with the bird and work your way to the prince."

It was yet more punishment, he realized. The dragon was forcing him to hear what his fate would be, and worse, see it writ across the faces of his followers. Every friend that fell to the power of the Brand would be one more mark against him, a reminder of what he had dragged them into. They could have been free, following a life of their own and chasing their ambitions if they weren't bound to him. It was his foolishness that had dragged them into this plot, and his desires that had made them fall into this situation with him. They could have blamed him for everything that had gone wrong, and they would have been completely right to do so.

He closed his eyes as the bull priest approached them from behind. He knew what would come next; the image of the Brand was uncommon, but every citizen of Espos was taught what it looked like so that they would know it when they saw it. It was shaped like a stylized sun, centered right over the anus and spreading out in spiraling spikes and shimmering with the power of the holy energy that made the mark stick. It wasn't technically branded into someone, as it didn't use hot metal, but it was still a mark that was as indelible as a brand, spread across fur and flesh so that it could never completely disappear.

It was Kantu's little whimpers that caught his ears. The rest of the crowd's noise faded away for him as he listened, his cheeks burning as he heard Kantu gasp and then whimper. Little pleas began to fill the air.

"No, no, please, don't do this. I'm not - I am a nobleman. I can pay - I can be better. Don't mark me, don't brand me, don't take it - ah...ah...Nnngh, no, please..."

The whimpers were already getting more and more impassioned, sounding less like someone begging and more like someone that had been teased, someone that was being seduced by someone that knew all too well what they were doing. Dino tilted his head to the side, not wanting to hear his friend's fall, but it was too late.

"No, no - Nnngh...ah...my...my ass...not, not my ass...nnngh..."

Dino could see it all too clearly in his mind's eye: the gray-feathered harpy eagle, bent over, the dark brand spreading across his feathers as the priest painted it on him with holy magic. The cheeks would look quite different with the brand glowing against them, getting more and more obvious with each touch. The reindeer imagined his friend's tail feathers going up, the pleasure from the Brand forcing him to think of the other hole in ways that no good man ever would.

"Mmmph...ah...ah...nnnnngh...gah..."

The prince twisted his head to the side, trying to pull his ears down far enough to miss the moans, but they were too loud now, too strong. The Brand had taken hold, and there was no going back.

Asmund was louder when the priest moved to him. Dino was half-sure that the bear's roars would deafen him, and some part of him prayed that his hearing would be stricken from him, ripped away so that he didn't have to hear the changes being wrought on his friends. It didn't happen, and the anger of the bear faded to humiliation, and from humiliation to rampant, huffing grunts as he was changed by the Brand.

Braford looked his way again, and Dino met his eyes. Much as he wished to, he couldn't look away from the bull as the Brand was applied. He forced himself to stare, to look into his lover's eyes and see the changes as they came. The pleasure, the heat, the wantonness: it was all there, and it burned through the devotion that he had stared into for so many years. All their love, all the loyalty that Braford had for him, was slowly burned up in the heat that the Brand brought with it, and there was nothing that Dino could do to slow it down, let alone stop it.

He held his lover's fingers for as long as he could, whispering what little comforts came to him, but there was nothing that could be done. All he could do was be there as his lover was taken, brought low by the Brand. There was nothing of the great guard left behind in those eyes; there was only the wanton need that he had seen in endless Heretics before.

And then, it was his turn.

Dino had been silent for so long, but as the priest touched his ass, he couldn't stop himself. He tried to pull forward, attempted to break the lock, but the stockades were too strong. He tried to drag himself free, to wiggle his ass out of the reach of the priest, but there was no escape.

"No, no, please..."

The priest didn't care about his protests, and the finger and the paint it bore continued to trace the sunbursts outward from his asshole. His cheeks burned hotter as his hole started to clench, the magic of the Brand already settling in.

"Nnngh...no, I'm...I'm a prince, not...not this..."

His begging fell on deaf ears as each new stroke brought with it a new sense of need. Dino had endured many a heat, as any Bearer must, but that had always been focused on his pussy and he'd always had control of that. The urges had been there, but never so strong, never so overwhelming.

This...this was already almost overwhelming and the Brand wasn't even complete yet. His breath came in short gasps and huffs, his eyes almost bugging out of their sockets as his bound hands strained less to escape and more to reach back toward his ass. His hole clenched again and again, trying to feel something inside of it, and his insides felt empty. A new hunger came upon him, and his tail went up without him thinking about it.

[i]No, no. Not like this...not like this...[/i]

Though his pussy was getting wetter and wetter, all his thoughts were on his ass, his rim, his pucker. There was no need to be bred, but every need to be filled back there, to feel someone sliding in, to feel his cheeks clapping around the big dick that was fucking him open, or should have been. He moaned, his head sagging down as his hips raised up, the tingling heat of the Brand across his cheeks growing stronger and stronger.

[i]Try...try and hold...[/i]

But there was no holding out against this. His body would break in, one way or another. The only question was whether his mind would break down with his body, and -

[i]I would advise you not to fight it tomorrow.[/i]

Jach had even said it. Dino whimpered, a little tear in his eye as he realized that it was the one piece of advice that he couldn't afford to ignore. Already, his attempts to resist the building heat and need were cracking him, sending little fractures through his sense of self. The magic was too powerful; he could either get out of the way, or he could be broken down by it.

There was only one choice.

The last of the radial sunbursts was drawn, and the Brand was complete. Dino arched his back as the need slammed into him like a flood, huffing raggedly as his tail flagged high and off to the side. His asshole winked like a mare's cunt, and he lost his ability to speak as he tried to think of a way to attract someone to him.

And yet, for all the wanton need in him, his mind remained his own. His cheeks burned in raging humiliation, knowing that what he was doing was beneath what a prince should do, but he couldn't stop himself. There was no stopping himself.

"Come. Let us partake of the pleasures before us."

Jach again, and - oh gods, it was the regent that had him by the hips now. He felt the thick dick of the dragon rubbing between his cheeks, and his body responded by grinding back. As his cheeks clenched around his enemy's cock, the rest of the nobility and the higher-ranking guards took their places behind the rest of his friends. Whimpers, moans, and more filled the air as they surrendered to their new instincts and lovers, and he could only imagine what was going through their heads.

"I won't get away with it, will I?" Jach whispered.

"Nnngh..."

"Of course I will get away with it. Just like I will get away with you." The dragon's tip teased his hole, leaving the reindeer squirming. "They will even see me as taking mercy on you, when I claim you as my own. The king taking pity on the former prince. They will love me for that. And you...will love me for my cock."

Dino felt nothing but bliss as the first inch of the dragon's shaft slid between his cheeks and into his hole. His breath caught in his throat and his eyes rolled back as the sheer pleasure of being filled hit him like a religious experience. Conscious thought - humiliation, embarrassment, hatred for the dragon - was washed under the sheer pleasure of being filled. They were still there, still present, but they were no longer the most prominent feelings in his heart and head.

In, in, in, until he felt the dragon's balls gently kiss his pussy. His other friends were moaning too, gasping and shivering and panting for more, but they were background noise. He could barely hear them as the dragon started pulling out again, the pleasure rippling through him and pushing him closer and closer to an orgasm that he had no idea could come to him so easily.

[i]No, not...not in front of...[/i]

His meager mental protests slipped away, his mouth hanging open as that cock slipped in again. He rode the pleasure with it, his moans escaping him and his tongue lolling out of the side of his muzzle as he was publicly used.

In.

Out.

In.

Out.

Each time his enemy filled him, he felt connected to something like a god. Each time it slid out, his emptiness begged for it to return, the curse of the mark hitting him harder than he thought possible. Emptiness, urgency, need. The humiliation of being so dependent on dick only fed into the stretching, heated feeling that each thrust brought with it.

In.

Out.

In.

Out.

Faster. Harder. All the way to the hilt, every time, his pussy dripping like mad and his asshole feeling as if it was rippling around the dragon's shaft. He wheezed, he whimpered, he tried to push back -

"NNNGH!"

Asmund roared and growled as he came somewhere down the line, and the bear's orgasm seemed to set them all off, somehow. Kantu and Braford followed, shrieking and lowing respectively, and then, Dino did the same.

"Mmmph..."

He moaned, cumming and squirting over the dragon's balls. He could feel the sheer heat of them against his pussy, felt the dribbling moisture that leaked out of him and onto them. It was...it was hot...hot and slippery and wonderful and -

"Mmmph!"

And the dragon wasn't done. Jach leaned closer, chest against his back, and gripped him by the scruff of the neck.

"Oh, don't think that you're done with one, little Heretic...I'm going to give the crowd a show before taking you in..."

[b][u][center]The End[/center][/u][/b]

Summary: Dino is told that he and his friends will be given the Heretic's Brand, and the humiliation that comes with it.

Tags: M/M, M/Intersex, Man with a Pussy, Reindeer, Dragon, Various Species, Anal, Curse Mark, Orgasm, Cum, Squirting, Humiliation, Bad Guy Wins, Bondage, Exhibitionism,