The Tainted Wood Read online

  Unexplored: The Tainted Wood

  Alara Branwen

  Copyright © 2018

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this publication may be copied, reproduced in any format, by any means, electronic or otherwise, without prior consent from the copyright owner and publisher of this book.

  This is a work of fiction. All characters, names, places and events are the product of the author's imagination or used fictitiously.

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  ONE

  Clint’s muscles were on fire as he toppled to the brown-carpeted floor. His thighs screamed and his abs felt like they were trying to twist and squeeze out of his body. He drug himself toward the bathroom, making sure to dodge a couple of suspicious looking dark stains along the way. Every part of his body throbbed at once as he crossed the doorway and pulled himself into a leaning position against the doorjamb.

  He heaved a sigh and looked at the bleary, auburn-eyed young man reflected back at him in the mirror. His brown hair was twisted in some places, matted in others, as though his scalp suffered a series of miniature tornadoes followed by a torrent of acid rain. With great effort, he launched himself onto the faux black marble countertop; the cool surface sent a soothing shiver into his aching muscles.

  Clint splashed his face with cold water from the sink. The liquid did little to alleviate the burning in his cheeks. He smirked at the nude, wet faced young man struggling to keep his footing against the bathroom sink. Sex was supposed to be fun, right?

  Well, it was fun, the first three times anyway. A fourth and fifth pass made Clint’s body ache badly, and his sixth and seventh times turned his muscles into a roiling mass of anguish. He probably would’ve been fine if he stopped there. But he couldn’t. It had been several years since he’d partaken of the forbidden fruit, and there was a sexual void in his life the size of the Grand Canyon. Sexual deprivation made him react to sex like a starving wolf offered meat. He gorged himself on the opportunity and overdid it to the point where his body hated him.

  Clint heard feet make contact on the linoleum floor behind him. He focused on the sultry grey-eyed gaze of the woman behind him, her long face curtained by dark brown hair. Her slender fingers travelled down his abdomen. The forefinger slid around his belly button while the middle two rubbed the area of his waist just a few inches above his crotch.

  Even though his body was spent, he couldn’t help reacting to her touch. His member stiffened. Clint let out a feral grunt and turned his attention to the sultry woman behind him.

  “Haven’t you had enough already?” Clint asked, his forearms shaking as he fought to hold himself up.

  The woman’s fingers stopped their teasing, and she wrapped both arms around him for support. She teased one of his nipples and pressed her firm breasts against his back. “Of course not. I don’t think I could ever get enough.”

  His partner’s heavy whisper exacerbated a new round of excitement. “Damn it, Mary, stop it. We’ve done it, what, eight times?”

  “Um, nine,” Mary corrected.

  “Right, well, however many it was, we have to stop. I’m exhausted.”

  “That’s not what he’s saying,” Mary reached down and grasped Clint’s member. He squeezed his eyes shut and moaned as the young woman planted a tender kiss on his shoulder blade.

  “Yeah, well he’s not the one who has to do most of the work.” Clint rubbed his arms. “Anyway, aren’t you tired at all?”

  Mary grinned. “Not really. Then again, you’ve been doing most of the work. I can take over if you like.”

  Mary squeezed Clint’s member and rubbed a thumb over the head. He groaned and clasped his hands together. “Tempting, but I’d better not. My body is already starting to hate me for putting it through so much. Besides, doesn’t the convention start soon?”

  Mary looked around the bathroom door to the digital clock on the bedside table of their hotel room. “Oh, it started a couple of hours ago.”

  Clint rushed over to look at the clock. He clenched his teeth as another wave of pain washed through him. The clock read 7:00 PM on the nose. “Oh shit, it has. Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I tried to, but you were busy kissing me and taking my clothes off, so I don’t think you were really in the mood to listen.”

  “I don’t think either of us was, to be honest.” Clint heaved a sigh and then smirked. “I didn’t expect us to do something like this so soon.”

  Mary cocked an eyebrow. “Seriously? Our hotel room has only one bed. You didn’t think that would lead to any kind of crazy nighttime shenanigans while we were here?”

  “To be honest, I didn’t know. Everything is changing so quickly. I wasn’t sure what to expect. Hell, just yesterday, we were only friends, and I was being overworked and underpaid at a shitty job. Now I’m unemployed, and we’re um - what are we exactly?”

  Mary rolled her eyes. “I know things are pretty confusing for you right now, but at this stage I think it’s safe for you to call me your girlfriend. I think we were a little more than friends before. We dated - well kinda dated. We went out to the movies a few times, and you came over to my place; not to mention your character is always plowing mine in Unexplored, so that all counts.”

  Clint smiled. “I guess it does. Sorry, I’m just worrying too much again. It’s a bad habit.”

  “It is. But it’s a good sort of worry, so you get a pass. Anyway, you didn’t answer my initial question.” Mary ran her fingertips along the sensitive underside of Clint’s member.

  Clint shuddered and whispered. “Damn it. I really shouldn’t. I’m sore, and we’re missing the convention downstairs.”

  Mary stroked his member again and ran her thumb along the sensitive crown, just beneath the rim. “You really shouldn’t, but you want to, don’t you?”

  Clint sighed. “God damn it, yes I do.”

  Clint ignored the pain in his muscles and wrapped an arm around Mary’s waist. Their lips crashed together, and they tumbled toward the bed for another round of riotous sex.

  ****

  Mary smiled up at Clint as she secured his right arm over her shoulder and helped him hobble toward the bank of elevators at the end of the hall. She waved her hand in front of the silvery door, and a holoscreen popped up with a 3D map of the hotel. She scrolled through the different floors until she found the first and pointed to one of the rooms on its wireframe floor plan.

  The doors slid open. The pair entered the lit cubicle before the doors closed, and the elevator sped toward the destination Mary had selected.

  The inertia of the elevator’s movement ignited several fires in Clint’s muscles. “Ugh, you’re insatiable.”

  Mary blew a raspberry. “I’m insatiable? It wasn’t me who wanted to do it that last time.”

  “But it was you who coaxed me into those first three.”

  “True, but you didn’t have to say yes, you know. It’s not like I held a gun to your head.”

  “No, you did something worse. You teased me. I can’t resist when you do that.”

  “You mean like this?” Mary brushed a hand over the crotch of his blue jeans and Clint’s member jumped beneath the fabric.

  “Damn it Mary, don’t do that.”

  Mary smirked. “Why, afraid we’ll get caught?”

  “No, I know we will. Because if you keep doing that shit, I’ll tear off your clothes and start fucking you in this elevator.”

  Mary giggled and straightened her red blouse. “Now that might be fun.”

  “Though it would be a bit awkward when someone saw us. It�
��d be like ‘sorry sir, my girlfriend and I are screwing, but we’re almost done. Just send us up a few floors, and we should be finished by then.”

  They were laughing as the elevator stopped. The silver doors opened and an extremely thin man in black jeans and a black T-shirt with the picture of a castle surrounded by a red haze stepped in to the elevator. His spiky hair was dyed black with a few hints of azure blue. The glasses he wore made his eyes appear much larger than they actually were. A pendant in the shape of a silver longsword hung from a chain on his neck.

  He smiled at Clint and Mary, and the two shared some small talk. He said his name was Thomas, and like them, he was there for the convention. He came in the hopes of meeting some of his friends from his guild. Mary asked what guild he was a part of, but he wouldn’t tell her. They were apparently “really bad guys,” and Thomas joked that they might beat him up if they knew.

  Even though they promised his safety, Thomas didn’t want to reveal his affiliation in the game or his character name. This didn’t surprise Clint very much. Unexplored was a world where you could do anything. People sometimes engaged in risqué or nefarious activities in game that they wouldn’t want tied back to them. They didn’t want to suffer any real-world consequences for their actions, so that’s why so many were very private about their online identities. Of course, others were very open about who they were.

  The elevator opened, and the trio was greeted by a multitude of people milling around the ground floor of the hotel. Many of them were dressed in cosplay with badges that identified their in game character names. People throughout the floor stopped and greeted others they recognized. There were several people dressed provocatively, and they received attention from other people whether they knew them or not.

  On their way to the front desk, Clint and Mary noticed a stunning dark-skinned woman wearing a black tank top and short, black leather shorts. She wore cat ears over her black hair and had a huge, pearly smile. A large number of adoring players surrounded her. She seemed familiar to Clint. However, before he could place her, a chunky woman wearing a flowery dress roughly pressed through the crowd of people. She grabbed the cosplaying cat girl and, despite her pleas, dragged her away from the disappointed crowd.

  When they made it to the front desk, the man behind the desk, whose nametag read “Paul,” asked them if they wanted a badge with their character names. They both said yes, and Paul handed them two badges reading “Cleave” and “Tarka.”

  Clint and Mary walked around the floor with some of the other players, looking for people they knew. There were a few that seemed familiar to Clint, but he couldn’t place them because they wore nothing that gave away who their character was. No one seemed to recognize him, but quite a few seemed to know who Tarka was.

  Several young men whispered as Clint and Mary passed them. Some of the young men gave Clint a thumbs up behind Mary’s back.

  “Seems like you’re really well known in game,” Clint said.

  Mary threw a sideways glance at one of the young men looking her way. He flushed and turned away, giggling and whispering to his gaggle of friends like a teenage girl who just saw her favorite celebrity up close. “Well, I used to be. I told you I had to do all sorts of things to survive in game before I met you and we found the Fey Wilder. I was with a lot of people, so I’m not surprised a few recognize my name.”

  “I am. Unexplored is a big world with a ton of players. Even if you were with ten thousand people, I wouldn’t think anyone at a small gathering like this would know who you were. Come to think of it, I’ve seen a few people here that I recognize.”

  “Me too. Maybe we’re just hoping to meet our friends in game and are seeing them in the faces of random strangers. Like you said, there are zillions of people who play Unexplored. The odds of us running into someone we know are astronomically high.”

  Clint and Mary mingled with a few of the players around the floor. Several of the young men who seemed to recognize “Tarka” came up to her. A spark of electricity would pass between them as they laughed and shared small bits of usually awkward conversation. He felt a small twinge of jealousy coupled with a huge boost to his ego.

  After an hour of trying to find someone they recognize without any luck, Clint and Mary stopped at a holoboard that displayed the times and areas of the events they had going on at the con. While Mary was looking at the events, Clint turned his attention to a man looking over their shoulder at the holoboard.

  He was a mountain of a man with dark brown hair. In one hand, he held a huge hammer, and in the other, shield made authentically with high-grade plastic. The shield’s design looked very familiar. He stared at it for a second, then at the hammer in the man’s left hand.

  Clint’s eyes travelled up to the man’s badge. It read “Ned,” but when he looked into the massive man’s chubby, dark whiskered face, another name came to mind.

  “Krug?” Clint said. He didn’t mean to say anything, but the question slipped out.

  The large man looked down at the name on Clint’s badge and grinned.

  “Holy shit, Cleave!”

  The large man reached down and grabbed Clint in a bear hug. Clint grinned and returned it, as best as his sore muscles would let him.

  Mary turned around and looked up at the massive man. Her face screwed up in recognition. “Krug!”

  Ned smiled and nodded, and Mary leapt up to throw her arms around his neck. The three embraced for a long moment. They would’ve continued hugging, but several people were trying to get access to the activity holoboard.

  The three friends walked away from the holoboard to a place where they could talk.

  TWO

  The group found a small table in a corner of a little coffee shop on the first floor of the hotel. They all got coffees and huddled around the small table while unintelligible convention chatter floated around them. They took turns looking at each other, then back at the white plastic lids on their coffee cups. Each one looked like they wanted to say something, but awkwardness or nervousness stole the words off their tongues.

  They sat that way for several minutes before Clint grew tired of the awkward silence clawing at his brains. He opened his mouth and said the first thing that came to mind.

  “You know, I didn’t expect you to be such a big guy. Sorry, I know that’s horrible to say, but I don’t know what else to say right now,” Clint said.

  Mary’s jaw dropped and her eyes widened. “Clint,” Mary whispered harshly. The large man stared down at Clint for a moment. His extremely dark brown eyes narrowed on the smaller man and the edges of his thin lips curved downward.

  Clint squirmed in his chair a bit. He thought taking the Tarka approach to things and just doing something to get the ball rolling would work out here, but apparently, he should’ve taken the more cautious Cleave approach. His stomach went cold as he saw the large man bring up his plastic hammer. In an instant, Ned lifted the hammer over his head and brought it down, stopping just in time to lightly tap it against his forehead.

  Ned’s large face erupted into a huge grin and he laughed. The tension instantly dissipated, and his friends joined in. When the mirth was over, Ned took a big sip of his coffee. “Dude, I’m so glad you said something. It was getting so awkward. I didn’t know what I was gonna say.”

  “I didn’t know what to say either. I mean, I know you, at least the in game you. We’ve talked a million times before. It just seems so different in real life,” Mary said.

  “I don’t know why that stopped you, Tarka. I’ve never seen you turn down the opportunity to talk,” Clint said.

  “Oh, up yours, Cleave. At least I have the balls to talk to people,” Mary said.

  “Whoa Tarka, you have balls? When did you get those? I don’t remember seeing those a few days ago,” Ned said.

  “I borrowed them from Cleave. Someone has to have some balls around here,” Mary said.

  “I am quite endowed with balls, thank you very much,” Clint said. “I defeated Pa
dwin not once, but twice in our last adventure.”

  “If you count beating him in a slap fight a win, then yeah, I guess that counts,” Mary said.

  “I was just glad I got my hands on him. Gave Larkin’s little tin can wearing butt boy a few bruises to pay him back for freaking killing me.

  “Who knew that the spineless asshole actually had the guts to defy his leader and try to take a little power for himself,” Mary said.

  “Yeah, that surprised me too. He seems like the type to only act under direct order, at least that’s what I gather from the stories Tatarna has told me,” Clint said.

  “Guess he wanted to prove that he could do more than be the Crimson Kingdom’s puppet,” Ned replied.

  “Well, he failed,” Mary said.

  The three laughed and got to know each other over their coffees. Ned used to be in the military. Like Clint, he was good with numbers and organization, so the military placed him in the finance corps.

  “Had four years of great service and had perfect conduct evals,” Ned took a sip of his coffee and grimaced. “I was taking college classes, so I could go into officer’s training. Got my degree and was ready to apply when I learned the military was doing cuts. I got separated, and I’ve been spending my time away from the game trying to find work in the finance field. Not easy in a shit economy.”

  “Yeah, no kidding, I’m hoping things clear up by the time I get my degree, whatever that will be in,” Mary said.

  “I was so happy to get out of my shitty job that I forgot how bad the economy was. Thanks for pulling me out of the clouds and bringing me back to reality,” Clint said with a playful grimace.

  “Always happy to be a buzzkill friend.” Ned grinned.

  The trio laughed again and continued their conversation. As they talked the scene in Clint’s mind changed. They weren’t three nerds sitting in a coffee shop talking about their favorite game, they were Cleave, Tarka, and Krug, protectors of the Wilderwood and the surrounding areas, the bold adventurers who defied the Crimson Kingdom and their wicked leader Larkin.