Chapter 15

The Surprise – Part 2

With the atmosphere changing drastically over the last few seconds, it took a while to realise she was no longer pinned to the floor with a knife at her throat. But once her mind cleared and she noticed this, she rose back to a sitting position and just stayed there as she tried to figure out what to do next.

She wondered how she would deal with this now. On the one hand, she had just been attacked, again, by this girl. She could have killed her very easily with that knife, and she would have been powerless to stop her. By all means, she should just cut the girl loose, as who knows when next she may try to attack her again.

But on the other, Olivia understood. This girl went from enjoying her life with her family, to finding out she was going to be made a sex slave, to then being exiled and having to survive in the forest on her own. This would make anyone jumpy and paranoid. Olivia’s actions when hiding her erection definitely didn’t help the situation either.

So how was she going to deal with this girl?

She looked over at Lyrkia who was still in her position, hunched over and staring at the floor. What she was thinking about, Olivia wasn’t sure, but she found out pretty soon.

“I thought you were a girl. Why do you have…that?”

‘Really, that’s the first thing you say. I know the girl is quite blunt with things, but an apology would be a good place to start.’

“Before I answer, I think you should apologise first.”

.....

‘After saying that, I’m getting deja’vu’

Lyrika looked up at Olivia making a face as if she had been slighted in some way. “Wha… But I thought... Why… *sigh* I am sorry.” But while she tried to come up with some sort of rebuke, even she eventually realised there wasn’t much to say other than sorry.

“Thank you. I am a girl, by the way, I just have some extra equipment.”

‘I can’t believe this is the second time I have had to explain this to a beautiful girl. All because I saw her naked…back. I wonder if seeing Ameril like that would have done the same for my…extra equipment.’

As she thought about this, images of what Ameril would look like naked came to the forefront of her mind. As you can imagine they were very pleasant even if it was mostly all guesswork.

‘Stop that.’ She quickly scolded herself like she did recalling Lyrika’s body. ‘Why do I keep on thinking about these sorts of things.’ The scolding had to be done as she shouldn’t be thinking about this while trying to have this conversation with Lyirka.

But she did wonder if there was some deeper reason behind all of these very pleasant thoughts. Could it be the biological urge that Goblins and Orcs had started to come through? Or was she just sexually starved? It might even be both.

“I see.” Was the only reply that came from Lyrika.

Silence reigned in the camp again as they both contemplated the situation, but Olivia quickly spoke up needing to know for sure why Lyirka did what she did.

“Why did you attack me?”

The question caused Lyrika to close her eyes and sigh, where just from that Olivia knew that she was right about why she did it. She went on to talk about how she thought Olivia was planning to attack her with whatever she had concealed under the tent fabric, how it could have been a slave collar or something else.

“I just don’t… trust you yet.”

Olivia liked how she added yet on the end, but given what she was and how they met, while Olivia could only sigh at the response, it made sense.

But it doesn’t have to stay that way.

“Ok then. I guess we’ll just need to fix that.”

A quizzical look from Lyrika was the only response she received.

“So, I think I am going to have the bath. It looks like the fear of having my throat slit took away the problem I was having”

‘If it hadn’t, I think it would have been more concerned.’ She couldn’t help but think to herself.

“When I get back, I think we should talk about what we do next. That is unless if you decide to leave.”

Lyrika looked up and Olivia as she stood to make her way to the river, paying careful attention to what she was saying.

“While you don’t trust me right now, which I can understand, all I can say is that I am not like other monsters. I will not hurt you as long as you do not hurt me.”

‘Not that I stood by that mentality since the incident, but what can you do.’ She realised.

“So, you can either leave or stay. I shall leave the choice up to you.”

While Olivia would have preferred the company, this wasn’t going to work if Lyrika felt that trust between the two of them would never come. If that was the case, then it would be better that they part ways now and forget about each other.

If she felt that they could work on things, then Olivia hoped she would decide to stay.

…

As Olivia entered the river, completely naked like when she first woke in this world, she felt truly relaxed in the water. It was nothing like taking a bath on Earth, given that the water flowed against her and there was no way to turn up the heat, but it was the most relaxed she had been since she arrived here. Walking over to the side of the river, she laid herself down, fully submerging herself in the river, minus her head, and let the rushing water flow over her body.

She had no soap, but she honestly felt like there was no need for it, the water having done the job it needed to. She also took her time in the river, soaking her hair in its depths, and pulling out all the knots that she could.

A good deal of time later, she arose from the water and used some of the cleaner tent fabric she managed to find as a towel to dry herself off. It wasn’t the best material to use for a towel, but beggars can’t be choosers.

Dry and with her clothes back on, she made her way back to the camp. As she entered through the leaves of the drooping tree she found Lyrkia still at the camp, hunched over the cooking pot making the first meal of the day, using some hardtack and jerky for Olivia’s bag.

Seeing this Olivia realised she should be annoyed that the girl had gone through her bag, but all she felt was happy given that she had decided to stay.

‘If it happens again, then we can talk about it. For now, I’m not really bothered.’

“So, what now,” Olivia said as she sat back down at the camp.

Lyrika finished up the meal she had made and passed a bowl over to Olivia, stretching her hand out as far as possible, where Olivia had to do the same, given that Lyrika was still keeping her distance.

“I would like to stay, if that is fine with you. So far you have been nothing but kind to me, and I have… well. It may take some time, but I think I may be able to trust you eventually.”

“That is fine by me. Now, what do you plan to do about your problem with the chief.” Olivia asked, knowing that after the story Lyrika had told, she would be helping her and so needed to know her plan.

“I’m not sure. I have been running non-stop since I was exiled and have not had a chance to think. I do not know how I can fix things. If I return after my exile ends, I will end up with that horrible man. I cannot return before my exile as the guards at the gate will refuse me entry. The only thing I have left is to not return and try to live alone in the forest. But if I do this, then he shall just take another girl in my place, which would not sit right with me if I allowed that to happen.”

She sighed as she went through all the possibilities of what may befall her, all of which were bleak.

“Then there are the girls he already has. Knowing what he has been doing to them, it cannot be allowed to continue. But I do not know how I can help them. He practically has a whole army with him.”

As Olivia listened to Lyrika, she couldn’t agree more that the girls needed to be helped. No one should have to live like that.

But while she agreed with that, she also had to agree that doing so, seemed like an impossibility, the man having all the power that he did.

As she thought about this, something hit her.

…

Thankfully, only metaphorically.

“Why is he gathering the tribes together. I know you said he spoke of bringing the tribes together and improving their community, but I would think a man that abuses the wives he gained from these alliances, doesn’t have community relations on his mind.”

“But, what other reasons are there.”

Olivia contemplated that for a while and spoke up with a few possibilities.

“Well, it could be that he plans to go to war with someone. Bringing all of the tribes together at the end of the day, givens him a massive army that he can use. While the chiefs of the tribes may not want to start a war, all he would have to do is fake some provocation from whoever he wants to attack then the rest of the alliance would feel compelled to fight back.”

A look of shock grew in Lyrika’s eyes as she came to understand what Olivia was talking about, knowing that if this was the case, many lives could be lost in the future.

“There is also the possibility that he just wants the power. He may not be thinking about wars and the like, but with all of these alliances he is making, his true goal could be to become a leader for all of the tribes. All the marriages put him in the centre, and he may have other plans once he has all of the alliances sorted.”

While not as bad as him going to war, letting a man like that have all of the power over all of the beast-kin, would only lead to problems. There is also the possibility that while war isn’t on his mind right now, once he has the power he wants, it may end up being where things lead.

“He could be using all of this for some type of criminal activity. What it could be I don’t know. Other than that, he could have done all this just to get wives from each of the tribes.”

The more they thought about this, Olivia suggested though that the idea of him wanting to do all of this to get a large collection of wives was likely a secondary benefit, rather than the primary focus. There were many reasons why this man was doing what he was doing, but until they had more information it was only guesswork.

“So, what do I do. How do I stop him?”

“I think you mean, how do we stop him.”

“Are you saying you will help me?” Lyrika replied with a surprised look on her face.

“Of course. I would have to be some kind of monster to just sit back and do nothing after all you have told me.”

Olivia chuckled to herself at that, but got nothing from Lyrika.

“I-I. Thank you. I appreciate the help.” It was clear to see that Lyrika really wanted to hug Olivia, but the other half of her brain was keeping her back.

They both then thought long and hard about how they could deal with this situation. Thankfully they had a lot of time to deal with it, given the length of Lyrika’s exile, but it would be good to have a game plan as soon as they could and it may take a while to set it in motion.

After a good deal of time contemplating this, things started to come together in Olivia’s head.

“As just two people, there isn’t much we can do, especially since he practically has an army. That means we need to level the playing field, which means we either need to increase our numbers, or reduce his, or both even.”

“He had a lot of men with him when he first came, but I think a lot of them came from the other tribes.”

‘So, he picked up other beast-kin to add to his army from the tribes he formed alliances with. Then with each tribe he visits it grows and grows, adding to his intimidation factor as well. So how do we deal with that…Ah.’

“We need to get the other tribes to go back on the alliance. Doing that means the men he took should be against him, increasing our numbers and dropping his. The problem comes from how to get the other tribes to do that, given that the other chiefs have been all for what he has said.”

‘How would we get them to change sides. Money is normally a good motivator, but it’s not like we have any of that to use. We could try and persuade them, but why would they go against him. We need something that would cause the chiefs to want to have nothing to do with him.’

“We need proof. We need proof of what he plans to do, whatever that is, and on what he has done to the girls. If we can get that, we can bring it to each of the chiefs and that should make them see clearly. Once they break off the alliance, he will be left with his smaller group, and it will be possible to stop him.”

“That makes sense,” Lyrika replied. “But how do we do that.”

“We…err. I’m not sure. If I get close in order to find out, I’ll probably be killed. If you go, he might just take you then and there. Is there anyone you know that could help? People that you trust but can also get close to him.”

“I still have many friends from my tribe. They might be able to help, but I don’t want to put them in danger.”

“If you explain everything to them, they can decide whether they want to do it or not. I can’t think of any other way to deal with him. Besides, they might already have some information.”

‘If we come up with something else down the road then it shouldn’t be hard to change plans, but for now, knowing what the enemy has planned is vital.’

.....

So, with their plan of action decided, for the time being anyway, all they needed to do was get back to the tribe and talk to Lyrika’s friends.