To Redeem His People

Invoking The Blood Runes

Dronnadh watched as Brynnan performed his morning ritual of sucking off the old Warrior, Geraint, inside their tent.

“He does this every morning?” the Diviner asked.

“He thanks me, and I look after him—I am tasked to be his Keeper.” Geraint inhaled deeply as Brynnan slid his tongue down the old Warrior’s heavy shaft, then back up and around the broad helmet-shaped head.

“But if Geraint is Brynnan’s Keeper, does that mean the Bard is his slave?” Dronnadh turned to Nijal. “You said nothing about that.”

Nijal, who was putting on leg wrappings over his breeches, paused to answer, “The Warlord of Torrent Mountain, Samir, is Brynnan’s heart’s-love and natural master, and Brynnan is Lord Samir’s sexual bondsman. Geraint, Samir’s right-hand man, is appointed to guard and care for our Bard and must be thanked daily.”

“And I thank the Mother-of-All that I don’t have to do that for my master, Aldith, every morning. It’s bad enough being the plaything of the Men of the Boar,” said Dronnadh, with a look of distaste.

He continued watching as Brynnan now sucked deeply, taking in Geraint’s girthy member. The old Warrior stroked Brynnan’s head with tenderness.

“That’s it, lad, make me cum . . .” he breathed. Then Geraint suddenly gripped the Bard’s hair and thrust against him. “Aah . . . Swallow it!”

After doing so, Brynnan released the cock with apparent reluctance. Kissing it reverently, he said,  “I thank you, old Warrior. I am indeed fortunate to have you at my back.”

“And front,” grinned Geraint. Then he raised the Bard’s face to his and kissed him open-mouthed.

Dronnadh said, “You sucked him well, Brynnan. You have skill.”

“He is my teacher. Before my Master, Samir, I had never been with another man sexually. My Lord bid Geraint instruct me, and he does so constantly.”

“Does he now? Perhaps we can compare our techniques when we have the opportunity. I thank you for this night we spent together but now, I had better go and see the men outside, who will want their morning auguries read. I hope for moving clouds or flights of birds—they are easiest.”

“Yes, I, too, wonder what this day will bring,” mused Nijal. “And you, my brother, must look to tonight and the making of Bertholf’s blood-runes.”

*    *    *

The Men of the Boar and the companions travelled far that day. They kept to the foot of the mountain chain, heading South towards another pass that would bring them down again to the coastlands, well past Redmark, and into the milder lands of the Narib Redoubt.

Riding his grey mare, Rhiannon, with the dog, Ghost, at his side, Brynnan sought out Geraint.

“Geraint, old Warrior, I need your advice.”

“Well, say it, lad.”

“My soul is troubled. I belong to my Lord Samir, and under his command, my ass is ruled by you. But in our travels, circumstances have allowed many strangers to use me. And now we come to dealing with the Watchers. I don’t know what will be required of me this night, but I think there is a purpose for meeting with the Rune-Master, and Dronnadh also will assist. What if the magic requires either of them taking me anally?”

“Much as I hate to say it, m’lad, I think we must bow to necessity. M’Lord Samir tasked you first with gathering information about the invaders and thwarting them if we can. That purpose is the overriding one. As long as it’s in service to that, I have to give my permission to you. Thank the Angels that Nijal’s blood, and King Arawn’s, is in you to give you protection.”

“Thank you, my Keeper. Let it not be a more frequent act that I give my ass to strangers.”

“Just keep me and Nijal informed, lad.”

In the afternoon, Bertholf rode alongside the Bard, bringing Dronnadh with him, untethered by the chain that Aldith Battle-Master usually kept on him. They spoke of preparations for the evening and affirmed their purpose.

“I will work the Rune Magic, and you, Diviner, keep spirit watch for us. And we must set a guard outside. There can be no interference during our ritual!” said Bertholf.

“My dog, Ghost, will keep guard. No one gets past him,” said Brynnan.

“Rune-work draws spirits. Can he guard against those as well as men?”

“Ghost has paws in both worlds,” replied the Bard.

Bertholf looked to see if the words were in jest, but Brynnan’s expression was thoughtful.

*    *    *

Bertholf’s men had pitched his tent some distance from the others, out of sight in the trees beside an icy stream. The Rune-Master built a fire outside and erected a tripod and cauldron. The dog, Ghost, lay with his head on his paws some distance away, his eyes glowing red like the coals in the fire. 

Dronnadh, Brynnan and Bertholf bathed themselves with some of the heated water, then stood unclothed but for their cloaks, despite the cold. They did not eat food but drank from a horn of blessed mead, into which each man contributed three drops of blood. Bertholf had inscribed the horn with runes for wisdom and protection. He poured a trickle of mead into the fire, which hissed and spat.

Dronnadh closely watched the roil of steam. “It spreads and rises, then curls at the last. There is no barrier to thwart us in our work tonight, but we must not walk too boldly, lest we are trapped.”

Bertholf stood tall in the firelight: naked, but for his wolf-cowl and his long white hair that blew loose in the night wind. His body was lean and grey-furred like the wolf of his name. Staves of magical patterns tattooed his scarred torso. His cock hung semi-erect in its nest of curls. His arms slightly spread, hands open, he watched the flames.

“Before there was time, formless dwelt 

the firmament

No stars, no element, 

no cool water, no stellar dust. 

There was a sea . . . 

a sea of dreams, but no dreamer dwelt.

But now this night

We shake the heavens with our dreams

We seek and seeking, find

Transform and shape . . .”

Bertholf finished the invocation and fell silent. Then Dronnadh said, “Let us beware in our seeking,” he cautioned. “Wisdom is found along many paths, some of which are very dark. For whom is wisdom sought? For what purpose? Many who seek knowledge for its own sake drink the mead of destruction, not life.”

Brynnan answered, but his gaze was directed at the Rune-Master.

“He, many fingered, draws the staves

In darkness; mead of poetry raves

Mad words, such uttered wisdom is

Expression of a mind that lives.”

Bertholf glanced keenly at the Bard. “And so you pay your forfeit, Skald. But there is truth in your teasing, even so.” 

Then he approached a long, flat boulder, the height of a man’s thighs. Implements were laid upon it: the blood-mead horn, a slim, sharp obsidian knife, a horn cup, a raven feather and charred sticks from the fire.

 “You, Diviner, will serve as my rune-board this night. Approach me.”

He drew a glyph upon Dronnadh’s left wrist with a charred stick before piercing the radial artery just below the thumb. Blood spurted out, and Bertholf captured it in the horn cup, allowing it to fill halfway. The Rune-Master pressed a linen cloth over the puncture wound. “Hold that,” he instructed the Diviner. After a few minutes, he checked the injury, which no longer bled. Again Bertholf took the charred stick and began to draw figures composed of complex and branching lines until Dronnadh’s body was covered in the marks. Finally, he put the stave patterns on the Diviner’s cheeks while chanting the names of the markings. Then he took the horn cup of blood and the raven feather, painting over the black markings with Dronnadh’s own blood.

“That part is done,” he said. “Now, Skald Brynnan, is your part. You must lie on the stone and let me paint over your three runes. I have rendered the Diviner invisible to the spirits. He will not be detected. With you, it is the opposite. Once they know the blood-runes on your body, they will come for you. If you intend to travel with them, let Dronnadh be your guide. I will bring you back.”

Before Brynnan lay down, he crossed to the great dog, Ghost, and crouched beside him. “Ysbryd, my friend and father’s beast, you must guard us. You cannot follow my spirit to where it will mesh with the Watcher’s mind. Do not attack anyone but use your bark alone.”

In response, Ysbryd/Ghost licked Brynnan’s face, and Brynnan felt a surge of affection for the beast, this tangible link with his father, King Arawn of Annwn.

Brynnan lay on the stone, focusing his thoughts. He would have to trust the Rune-Master this far, at least. He prayed that Bertholf’s own tattooed staves would protect him from the Watcher’s awareness. He glanced one last time at Dronnadh, who stood nearby, looking in the firelight like some fantastical demon with his body marked in black strokes and the blood trickling down. Now it was Brynnan’s turn.

Bertholf raised his arms and invoked both his Gods and the forces of Chaos before taking up the raven feather and the horn cup. He dipped the feather in the blood and slowly painted over each brand on Brynnan’s chest.

Eternity.

Wind.

Night.

As each one was traced, Brynnan felt his spirit begin to slip away. Eternity: the spirals of life, death and rebirth invoking transubstantiation of being, an evolving change. Wind: representing soul-travelling or journey. Night: the state of unknowing through which all must pass before the rebirth into a new awareness.

Brynnan awoke into a field of stars in every direction. He could see all around him. The starship rapidly enlarged before him, shooting into view from a great distance. Again, he felt it was bigger than cities, more massive than a mountain range. He could discern a surface upon it—a vast field of interlocking hexagons with the occasional circular tower protruding and clusters of pyramidal structures at intervals. It was so long that the ends receded into a vanishing point. He could not imagine what it contained.

He sensed minds projecting like beams of light—the Watchers. So far, they were unaware of him, but that would not last. He shifted himself and passed into the ship at its nearest point. He nearly lost control of his spirit projection for brief moments: it was hard to imagine what he was seeing. An entire landscape with mountains and forest, but there was no sky. Instead, the vista curved so that the view was similar regardless of the direction he focused on. Terraced mountains loomed down at him, their bases rooted to the heavens. He fled into another part of the structure.

There was nothing natural, just a series of towers like endless pillars with arrays on their circular forms. Occasionally, tiny machines floated along their sides, but Brynnan knew that they were, in reality, huge. He withdrew to the one area familiar to him: the Hall of the Watchers, as he thought of it.

It seemed that there were countless machines, each holding a Watcher. He discerned that the nearest ones were naked. Bands with trailing lines fastened to various parts of their bodies. He felt the presence of his own Watcher.

‘Shadow! I did not summon you, but I sensed your presence.’

‘My Watcher, I come. I surrender to you. Give me your thoughts.’

Disintegration, dissociation poured into Brynnan’s mind. He let the floodgates open, and the darkness came. Then he swiftly became aware again, but he was in the two-minded state.

‘We are Shadow,’ he projected the thought.

‘We are Shadow,’ acknowledged the Watcher.

Then Brynnan did a strange thing. He summoned up a mental image of the Stone of Seren and the incredible sexual arousal he had experienced there. He felt it again, as did the Watcher joined to his mind. Looking at the body in the embrace of the machine, he saw the man’s erection.

‘What is happening to us?’ the Watcher thought desperately.

Somewhere, somehow, Brynnan/Shadow knew he was being fucked. Waves of sexual excitement flooded him. He knew that the Watcher would be forced to cum if he stayed. He mentally urged the Watcher to ejaculate. But just as he sensed the man’s impending orgasm, he was seized and abruptly found himself in his own body once more, feeling dizzy and disoriented.

Dronnadh was seated on the side of the stone on which he lay, holding him in his arms, and Bertholf was fucking him in the ass.

Brynnan looked up, quite helpless, into the fierce blue eyes of the Rune-Master. The man gazed back in a predatory wolf’s stare as he gripped Brynnan’s hips and pumped his cock into him, hard. As Brynnan felt himself approaching the point of no return, he cried out, “We are Shadow, we cum . . . we are cumming!”

Simultaneously, three things happened: he ejaculated even as he felt the Watcher ejaculate, and their mind-to-mind connection snapped. Bertholf pulled his cock out and, gripping it in his fist, pumped his semen upon the Bard’s body. The third thing that happened was that the dog, Ghost, barked.

It was audible only as a deep explosive sound that was felt rather than heard. It shook the earth. Branches snapped in the trees; a small avalanche of rocks poured into the edge of the clearing, and they heard the screams of terrified horses.

Brynnan, thrown to the ground from the stone, shut his eyes tightly as everything subsided around them. There was no more earth movement, but they still heard the shouts of men as they tried to round up the panicked beasts.

He was aware of arms holding him and picking him up. It was Bertholf, with Dronnadh standing beside him, looking concerned.

“You will have to explain to me what just happened, but not at this moment. Let me conclude the working and burn the blood in the fire. Diviner, you take Brynnan to my tent.”

Brynnan looked around before Dronnadh flung a supporting arm around his shoulder to lead him inside. He saw the fire still burning brightly, undisturbed, the tent still standing and Ghost, lying apparently calmly in his place, but the dog’s eyes still glowed red.

*    *    *

Later, inside Bertholf’s tent, the three men discussed matters. Now bathed and dressed, they sat with horns of a restorative drink.

“ . . .And so the Watchers come into the minds of the victims they choose, people in positions of power and influence, and seek to instill in them an attitude of agreement. The Invaders want to rule us because they are wiser; they have great knowledge to bestow on us, and they want to change our way of life in all respects,” Brynnan finished explaining to the Rune-Master.

Bertholf shook his head, “I have seldom heard of a greater evil. A man’s free mind is his greatest treasure. Even if he were physically enslaved, a man still has his thoughts. And there would be no honest battle, man to man, but all to be controlled from afar. How do we combat it?”

Brynnan had his own thoughts on man-to-man combat, but he replied, “I think the Invaders may not engage in the sexual act as we know it. The sexual emotions I conjured in my mind totally disrupted the Watcher’s thought process. One can feel when they are probing at one’s mind, and inducing such a state of arousal may break the connection.” Brynnan bowed his head on his knees and sighed. “I can’t imagine myself having to fuck my way through thousands of minds to free us. There must be a better way.”

“There will be a way. Through you, I sensed the patterns of these minds. I was there with you, although you did not sense me due to Bertholf’s rune-work,” said Dronnadh.

The Rune-Master looked thoughtful. “For myself and my own men, I think I see a method. I can give each of us a tattoo with our most powerful rune of warding, and I will warn them of what they must do. And if I sense them, I will also bring myself to orgasm.” Bertholf smiled. “Just wait until I tell Arne.”

Dronnadh, however, spoke, and there was frustration in his tone. “I must be more free to work with the patterns I divine, but my keeper, Ardith, is a harsh master: always pulling me about on that chain, but I dread being disobedient lest the men kill me.”

“I know what I can do,” mused Bertholf. “Aldith has always wanted the staves of battle and victory tattooed on himself, but so far, I have refused as he had nothing that I wanted. Now there is. How would you feel about a change in masters, Dronnadh? I would not chain you if you agreed to work with me of your own will. You would be useless to me without consent. What say you?”

“I will agree to that, Rune-Master. It fits with the patterns.”

“Good. You will spend the rest of this night with me, and in the morning, I will see Aldith. For you, Diviner, there will be an added benefit. As my rune-slave, you will no longer be subjected to the men’s passions as their plaything. You will fuck or be fucked only at my discretion.”

“For that, many thanks, Master Bertholf,” replied Dronnadh.

“And now, matters are concluded for tonight. Go in peace, Brynnan. I will say nothing of your hundr’s abilities to anyone. The men will not know the disturbance was caused by the dog. They will think it was a rockfall from the cliff above us.”

Brynnan bowed in acknowledgement, then he stood and, wrapping his cloak around himself, left the tent.

*    *    *

When Brynnan crawled, naked, beside Geraint in their own tent, he found the old Warrior awake. Geraint embraced the Bard, and suddenly, Brynnan found himself weeping in Geraint’s arms. He was silent, but his shoulders shook with the force of his emotions and his tears wet the old Warrior’s shoulder. “It all seems too much,” he murmured.

Geraint took the Bard in a closer embrace, the length of their bodies pressed together with their cocks rubbing one on the other. This gentle arousal, different from that experienced earlier, soothed Brynnan’s soul. He felt his pre-cum slick their joined members and the heat of flesh-on-flesh, and Geraint’s big, mushroom-headed cock hardened as it rubbed against him.

“Hush, my lad, it’s alright. Nijal and I are with you.”

Then Nijal pressed himself against Brynnan’s back, and the Bard felt a stiff prick pushing between his thighs, pressing against his perineum and balls.

“You will not be alone in this fight. I know you feel overwhelmed, but my brother Alsar will unite with us. Be comforted.

And Brynnan was.

*    *    *