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To Dream of Darkness

A story by DoggyStyle57

Chapter 15, Written December 2011

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Chapter 15 - Friends in low places

Darla went back to her room in the inn, and considered what the wench, Meridith, had said. She let herself into the room, and greeted Ashley in an almost mechanical way, not bothering to recount the day's rejections to her elemental servant. She was deep in thought, and wasn't really ready to talk to the elemental about her confused mental state. She needed to sort these new concepts out herself, first.

Darla needed a source of money, but what could she do?

None of the city's mages seemed willing to hire her. To work as a mage for hire in this area, she had found that the city officials would require her to have a permit and a shop, or to be apprenticed to a mage that had those things. That meant it took money to get started - far more money than she had left. Here, magic wasn't a profession she could do from a room in the inn, no matter how skillful she was.

Her ability to talk to animals couldn't be used as her father had, to treat sick animals with herbs and magic, and make them well. Even if she used no magic, it would be suspected that she did. And honestly, she simply had no ability as a healer. Even her ability to crudely bandage a wound had been hopelessly inadequate, when a wolf from her pack had been injured, or when she herself was injured. With the exception of that one dark combat spell that could take a wound or illness from her own body and inflict it on someone else, no matter what other spells she used or what potions she had tried to create, her attempts at healing had always failed. It was the one type of magic or herb lore that she simply could not do, and she had no idea why, unless her own dark past was somehow poisioning that effort.

Her father's other saleable skill that benefited from talking to animals, the breeding and training of animals for sale, required land for a farm or kennels, and animals for breeding stock, and she had neither land nor money to get land or animals.

She wasn't even particularly skilled at typical 'women's work', like cooking or cleaning house or sewing clothes. She had never had a reason to learn such skills.

Other than being able to read, write, and translate languages, she had no other skills that she knew anyone would pay for. And she had no idea who might pay for those skills, in a society where most people did seem able to read and write.

Before this evening, Darla had never heard of the concept of girls selling their sexual favors. Her parents had never had any reason to talk to her about such things, as she had still been too young while they were still alive, and they had been quite isolated on their farm. Later, when she had been in inns and taverns disguised as a traveling merchant or as some villager, she hadn't paid any real attention to the interactions between the girls that worked in those places and their customers, beyond what it took to get their attention and order food or drink for herself. She had been too focused on gaining information about specific enemies, or planting rumors, to care about them at all. What they did with each other was of no concern to her, unless it helped her in gaining her revenge.

But tonight, she had received a pretty clear impression from the wolf wench's surface thoughts about precisely what Meridith meant by 'warming someone's bed', and about what sort of sexual acts the wolf girl would happily do for a few coppers, a silver coin, or two coins. Those thoughts confused her. It clearly had to do with mating, yet so very much of what she saw in the wolf girl's thoughts could never have made puppies. That the girl was willing to have sex with another girl also confused Darla.

To Darla's mind, mating was merely something you did when you wanted to breed puppies. A dog or wolf girl would go into heat, and an appropriate male of the same species would mate with them, and after the girl's belly swelled for a while, she would give birth to a new generation. Darla vaguely understood that her parents had mated to produce her, as well, even though they were not the same species. But aside from wanting a child, she knew of no other reason to mate. Those other confusing images of sexual acts in the wolf girl's mind were completely outside her experience.

She had personally experienced mating for the first time when she went into her second heat, last winter, at the age of thirteen. In her feral wolf form, the pack saw her as a young adult, roughly two years old in appearance and maturity, and quite ready to be bred. She had mated while in that feral wolf form with a feral wolf from the pack that had sheltered her. The male wolf had wanted to make puppies with her, and her body had strange urges caused by being in heat, that she somehow knew could be eased if she mated. She did not want puppies, but knew that because of her bargain with Asha, the fire elemental, that she couldn't bear any. So she let the wolf have his fun, to see what it was like. It had been pleasurable, in a somewhat abstract way to her mind. But to her, it was nothing more special than enjoying a particularly good meal. And once her heat ended, she felt no particular reason to be distracted by mating. Her revenge for her parents' death was far more important than any passing pleasures.

So what was left for her to do? Was being a 'whore' a viable option? What did that really mean?

Meridith said she was able to earn 'a pretty pile of coins' by selling her sexual favors each night in the inn. The wolf girl seemed to like the work, and saw nothing wrong with being a whore. No one at the inn seemed to treat her badly. In fact, she and Molly seemed to have a lot of friends among the regular customers of the inn.

Darla turned to the elemental, which she could see at the moment only as green eyes in the coal fire, and asked, "What do you know about whores, Ashley?"

The elemental stepped from the fire, and after stretching for a moment in ways no mortal body could, she became a black furred vixen again, and asked, "Wherever did that question come from Mistress?"

"I was talking with one of the wenches downstairs in the common room. That wolf girl, Meridith. She calls herself a whore, and says she can earn money easily by 'warming the beds' of guests, which I take to mean mating with them. Do people really pay good money for mating with a stranger?"

"Yes, Mistress. Whores can earn a lot of money, if they aren't choosy about whom they accept money from, or what species the customers are, or what they must do to please their customers. It's said among most mortal species that whoring is the oldest known profession, though I do believe that raising food to eat and making weapons to hunt with both came first," Ashley replied.

"Meridith said she does it with males when she is not in heat, and with females when she is in heat, because she doesn't want pups. You once said you could mate without being in heat as well, is that correct?" Darla asked.

"Yes Mistress," Ashley replied with a smile. "The females of most intelligent species can choose to mate at any time, for pleasure, rather than for breeding offspring. They don't need to be fertile for it to be fun. Only the feral animals seek to mate only to breed, and even they will, on occasion, do it for pleasure, when the female is not in heat. Humans are so fertile that they are effectively in heat once each moon, and they have devised many ways to allow sex without conceiving children. Whores are often very skilled at using innovative methods for producing pleasure, without risking themselves getting pregnant."

"Have you... ever been a whore?" Darla asked.

"Yes, Mistress. I did, once, when my master needed money badly. He had me take an attractive female form and work as a whore for many nights, giving him all the money I was paid. As tasks to serve a master go, it was not very bad, really. Some of it was even quite pleasant for me. Are you considering becoming a whore, to gain money? Or asking me to do so?"

"I... don't know. Meridith makes it sound like something you just do for a lark. But I also got an impression that she had some concern that I would think less of her for what she did," Darla said.

"Some people think that whoring is a very low profession, yes. The church has a particularly low opinion of prostitution, as they think sex should only be for conception, or at the very most, as a bond between couples married by the church. And there are some hazards to the profession. Some customers get violent, or at least too rough. Some get pleasure from causing pain. Some are diseased. But most are harmless, seeking only their own gratification. But it seems quite unlikely that any customer could harm either of us. Neither you nor I can get pregnant from any person in this realm that is likely to mate with us. The diseases that are a risk for whores cannot affect me, and you can cast them off from yourself with that transferral spell I taught you. And neither of us is the least bit likely to get emotionally involved if we do it," Ashley observed. "If that is your wish, we may certainly proceed in that manner. I can not object to it, and honestly, I wouldn't mind either way."

"I...How can I know what to do? This is entirely outside my experience!" Darla said with some frustration.

"So make it part of your experience, indirectly. You know several whores who work in this inn. Your oneromancy can allow you to read their surface thoughts, and the surface thoughts of their customers. Reach out to them, as they pair off at night, and see what is in their minds, and what they do," the elemental advised. "If you feel you can do what they do, as a means to gain coin, or that you want me to do that for you, we can proceed. If you dislike it after seeing it in their minds, then no harm is done, and you can seek another way. Perhaps instead, you could seek out victims that do not deserve the wealth they have, and take their wealth from them?"

"I'm trying to make a fresh start, and I would rather not give anyone a reason to oppose me here. I will do as you say, and seek the dreams and thoughts of those who seek profit in the night's pleasures," Darla said.

===

For the next several days, Darla stayed up late into the night, reaching out with her mind, and vicariously experiencing the 'night work' that Meridith, Molly and the other whores in the inn practiced. Each day, she slept as much as she could, to remain awake as she studied them.

It was quite... educational. The minds of the whores and their customers were like an open book to her. Most had no defense against her intrusions, and were so wrapped up in their pleasures that they did not even notice her influence.

She learned many techniques for giving pleasure, to males or to females. She found that when not employed by paying customers, Meridith and Molly shared a bed, and pleasured each other, and seemed to enjoy it greatly. And much to her surprise, she found that if she was in contact with someone's mind while they were having sex, she could indirectly experience the same pleasures they were experiencing, and that she could affect their level of pleasure, much as she could affect the intensity of a dream or nightmare.

She also found that males in particular will often tell a whore secrets they would never divulge otherwise, or that they will at least consider telling them such secrets, and in thinking of them they would bring those thoughts and memories to the surface of their minds, where Darla could read them, and alter them.

Expanding her search to other individuals in the inn, she found she could not read the mind of the innkeeper at all. The talisman that he wore around his neck shielded his mind from her. She also could not read M'Lady Portia's mind, on the one occasion that the canine mage came within range of her questing thoughts. For both the inkeeper and M'Lady Portia, Darla could tell they were there, and who they were, but nothing at all more.

===

On the first night that she was in heat, on what she counted as her fourteenth birthday, Darla asked Meridith to serve her, in her room, and paid the wolf girl for one hour. The wolf wench was very enthusiastic, and the time that they spent together was very pleasurable for both of them. The actual sexual contact took the connection between Darla and Meridith to an entirely new level, each able to experience and play off the pleasures of the other. Before they were done, the sands in Meridith's hourglass had long run out. Neither the vixen nor wolf noticed until they were sated, and Meridith did not ask any additional fee for the extra time. Meridith commented as she left, "If I did not know better, I'd swear you've done that for many years! You're a right handful, M'Lady, an' I'll gladly serve ye any time ye wish!"

On the second night of her heat, Darla changed her appearance to a black furred adult vixen, about age twenty instead of fourteen, and calling herself 'Heather', she convinced Master Duncan to accept Ashley and herself as part-time 'night girls'. Meridith, Molly and the other wenches welcomed their 'new sisters', and exchanged advice with them on how best to please certain customers. Each night, 'Heather' and Ashley would 'arrive' just after the evening meal, and work until there were no more customers waiting, often until dawn. 'Heather' sated her body's needs in this way for two weeks, while earning coins and learning secrets from the minds of her patrons. She only refused to serve Humans, and otherwise mated with equal enthusiasm with dogs, foxes, wolves, and even with one bear. She became quite popular, because of her ability to sense what the client wanted and when, and give it to him, while using her abilities to amplify his pleasure. Ashley could offer an almost endless stamina, seemed immune to rough treatment, and for a fairly high price would offer to entertain any one guest until they could no longer perform.

Darla's small money chest rapidly refilled with copper and silver coins, and even an occasional gold coin, given by grateful customers whose experience had been pleasurable beyond all expectations.

But on the last night of her heat, 'Heather' entertained a customer that changed her plans entirely.