Middleday, 13th of High Sun
I was prepared for this day. My old journal, the one my father bound with his own two paws before the plague finally came back to claim what it had failed to claim years ago, ran out of pages. For days, I found myself scribbling notes in the margins, my entries becoming shorter and shorter. It was, I admit, a bit undignified of me to carry on with the poor thing.
It is now done. It is done, just as its maker is done, and it may join him in rest. I shall write no more of this.
It is here, on these clean and new pages, that I must now introduce myself. My name is Orson. For the past six years, I have had the great distinction of being in the service of the honorable Duke Maiselle, lord of the duchy of Chuleigh and its surrounding countryside. Ours has always been a family in service to the clan of Maiselle, though our labors never earned us the honor of a family name. Nor has it earned us the honor of a proper estate, or even a home in a town more worthy than the so-far nameless village that has sprung up at the foot of the manor house. It certainly did not earn us any special protections from the plague
I said I would write no more of that.
As I described in my last journal, my master's newest obsesession is in gaining the favor of his peers. He has tried numerous ways of doing so, and nearly all of them have ended in failure. He tried to take up swordsmanship to impress Lord Greatbrook, but quickly complained of fatigue and blisters in his paws. He has attempted to endear himself to the newly built abbey downhill with his affectations of piety, but the Abbot is a man of sharp scrutiny; it took him no time at all to hear of my master's insufferable libido and wandering eye.
Ever since the maid Laia was forced to leave, his eye has been wandering in my dire
As of late, he appears to have dropped all pretenses and is now seeking to buy the favor of his fellow lords. He has instructed me to prepare the manor and all surrounding environs for a large feast. It is, to be frank, an impossible task. The duchy of Chuleigh is rich in very little, a pawful of farms that manage to keep themselves and my lord fed and very little else. To hear the Duke speak of it, however, we in his estate are expected to hold a party of the kind that the King himself would consider lavish.
Fortunately for us all, the Duke is a very malleable agreeable lord. I have, through no shortage of art on my part, managed to convince him to forestall such plans until the end of the season. A feast to herald the start of the harvest, the dawn of Twilit Grace, as is the tradition of such things. Perhaps, Goddess willing, that will give us time for him to realize the folly of his ways. Or to get bored and move on to other pursuits, as is his wont.
I look back at my writings so far and realize that I have not truly learned to be frugal with my words. The blank page taunts me with its expansiveness. I shall endeavor to be more economical in future entries.
Goddess Day, 15th of High Sun
As expected, the Duke appears to have taken up a new obsession. He now spends whatever coin he has not promised to the King on trying to build a library. He has comissioned one of the large rooms of his manor be converted for that purpose. Several lads from the village have been called in to furnish it with cases.
I find myself wondering if the Duke did not invite them in order for other reasons, however. The look he gave to one of the larger stallions when his back was turned was one that would be churlish and indulgent if it were directed at one's wi
The gardener has intimated a concern at a new variety of ivy that has sprouted from the edge of the Choking Wood. I do not share that concern, and told him as much. In fact, I noted that it seemed quite a fetching sight, the affinity it seemed to have for climbing the fences around the outside of our property.
Martinsday, 22nd of High Sun
The first of my master's books have arrived. As I suspected, his selections are based more on possible prestige than on anything else. I have my doubts that he can even read half of these books, written still in untranslated Old Imperial. Still, they should fill a shelf nicely, and especial care was taken to ensure that their titles, at least, are fully legible.
There was one book in the delivery that commanded my attention in particular. At first, it seemed beneath notice, until I noticed it was the only one that was completely unmarked. Neither its spine nor its face were engraved. Instead, the cover was a single unbroken piece of green velvet, the softest and most well-constructed example of its kind I have ever held. Inside, the text was of a strange construction. Neither Old Imperial or standard liturgical letters, it was instead a flowing script of a kind I had never encountered before. I half imagined the letters were alive, on the page
I will not write superstition in these pages.
My lord surprisingly did not recall ever asking for this particular volume. I almost heard him order to have it thrown out. After he began to flip through it, however, he apparently seemed to take an interest in its bizarre script, and he has elected to keep it.
I should perhaps be happy that he
Laborsend, 24th of High Sun
Gardener has been warned about the condition of the lawn. It seems his concern about the vines was well-placed. The things are starting to become invasive.
My lord has started to become more withdrawn. He spends his day with his head in that unmarked book, and his evenings going for long walks alone in the Choking Wood. Were it not for the fact that he spends his nights still engaged in whatever catches his fancy, I would have thought I was in the service of a completely different mouse.
More books have arrived today. The cook has complained that the shipment of food from the city is lighter than usual. I pray these two things are not related.
Firstday, 30th of High Sun
The new library has received drapes for the windows. Nobody I've spoken to had comissioned their creation, and my lord pointedly refused to answer when asked. They are massive things, seemingly all created from one giant piece of loomwork. How much these must have cost is a question that concerns me greatly.
Last night Duke Maiselle walked in on my bath and demanded that he join me. This was inevitable, I think. His tastes have lately turned towards men and he cannot seem to help himself around his own inferiors. That he has focused on me means that Laia's replacement and the laborers from town are safe from his predilections.
In the privacy of this book, I think I might confess a certain attraction to my lord. He is a creature that has never known labor, whose body seems to resist all attempts to grow muscle or lose the softness that hangs around his belly and thighs. I had plenty of opportunity to see him, plenty of time to run my paws over his smooth and tawny fur as he instructed me to wash his back. There is substance to him. If I bent him over far, so that I could not see his short crop of headfur, I might be able to trick myself into thinking I was looking at the backside of a plump, fertile maid.
It is a shame that the divide between master and servant is so wide. How fetching is the mental image of the Duke with his face in
I shall not entertain those thoughts. Those thoughts are almost treasonous. They have been coming more often, lately. The confessors at the church have told me that they have no power, that the measure of my virtue is in my actions and not my thoughts.
Damn. The knot is loose. I shall sleep fitfully tonight.
Middleday, 37th of High Sun
The gardener Yorri was horse-whipped today for his failure to keep the ivy from overtaking the lawn. Nothing else of note happened.
Goddess Day, 40th of High Sun
I hate that man.
The Duke invited me into his chambers, where his first and only command was for me to kneel between his legs. It was there, with his short and fat little mouse cock dragging across my muzzle, that he told me his intention to still hold a feast on the eve of Twilit Grace. I can still see the acidic glare in his beady little green eyes, as he stared down at me.
"You thought," he said, "that I would forget about it. You thought I would move on to some other project and think no more of it."
As foolish as it was to talk back to my lord, I opened my mouth to protest. The damn mouse took it as an excuse to grip my headfur and guide his cock inside.
"Silence!" he commanded. "Your duty was to serve me, not to dither and delay." I had never tasted a man before the Duke. I had, up until this night, always been the one who fed myself to others. Maiselle had little patience for my inexperience, and in no time he was pushing me down until my nose was against his stomach. He growled down at me, in between breathy groans. "Well, no more. I have found another who will provide me with everything I desire."
I felt a sharp fear at that notion, at the idea that I would be thrown on my rear and that my family's days of service would end with me. The Duke clearly saw that, and the pleasure he took from it nearly caused him to spill his vintage then and there. "Not to worry," he said. "I still expect you to serve. The stresses of running my demense are ever-mounting, and I shall require you by my side in order to... relieve them." Then, he pushed me down on his cock one last time and released. Goddess, the sounds he made. The words he said.
"Stay where you are. This is where you belong, now. Serve your Lord. Serve your Lord."
Words cannot describe my hatred. I hate that man. I hate that man. I hate that man I hate that man I hate that man I hate that
Goddess save me! Goddess save HIM! He should have the temerity to intrude upon my bath, as he did two weeks ago. He should have the temerity! I would break him! Treason be damned, I would bend him over and rut his soft ass until it shattered under my thrusts like glass! He would know the pride and strength of a wolf and he would WEEP! He would bawl and shriek like the craven little dustball that he is. Or maybe he would not. Maybe he would beg for my knot like
(A section of the page has been overtaken by frantic, violent scribbles. Nothing coherent can be read.)
It has passed. The choler has passed. I look back at what I've done to this last page and my shame is immesurable. I must be stronger. Goddess save me, I must be stronger. It is not my honor that I would tarnish by carrying on in this fashion. It is my family's. I am not the first of my line to have to deal with a tyrant, and until the day when my descendants claim their own family crest and rule over land of their own I shall not be the last. For their sake, and for the sake of my ancestors, I must persist. I must serve.
Martinsday, 42nd of High Sun
Today the replacement my lord had spoken of arrived at the manor house. She was a stranger to me, having clearly not come from the village. If her accent was any indication, she was not even of the kingdom. I could not begin to ask where she came from, though there was something primally familiar about her lilting voice and the forested hues of her country garb. Wherever the Duke had managed to find the short grey little bobcat maid who was to take up residence in my chambers, he would not say.
Her name is apparently Dierdre, and her introduction to me was such a cordial thing that I find I have very little ire for her. I do not think she knows she is replacing me, or else she is quite adept at keeping that information close to her chest. Either way, I think I might be able to find a friend in her.
I should probably warn her about our employer. It is only a matter of time, after all.
Laborsend, 49th of High Sun
I do not know how she has managed to do it, but the budget appears to be stronger than it ever has been. I have not read the ledgers, of course (that is no longer my job), but somehow my lord is filling his library at a faster rate than he ever has, and he still appears to have enough left over to feed himself and his staff handsomely.
The cook seems happy, of course. The old badger had long since given up on being able to experiment with new foods. The look on his face when I brought in crates of fruits and vegetables was not unlike the look my sister was wont to give when Father gave her a present.
Of particular note was a sack full of fruits, of a kind that neither I nor he had ever seen before. Perfectly round, with a thin and edible skin, whose color was a green and purple ombre. Having bitten into one, the cook described a texture not unlike an apple, but a taste that he was hard-pressed to put into words. I would have tried one, myself, but other duties pressed me onwards. One thing I found unusual was the sack itself, which was constructed of a fabric of excessive fineness. I confess to having worn shirts of rougher and less sound quality than what was used to package these fruits.
Of books there were many. My master once again seemed to select mostly for prestige. Large volumes of ancient history and theological treatises, a manual of fencing. Once more I found books in unmarked fabric covers. These, when flipped through, were actually in the common script. One contained a collection of poetry so ribald as to border on obscenity. I confess to having thumbed through it for longer than an honest man ought
Duke Maiselle has called me to his chambers only once more, since the 40th. The details I will not write of, for it was much the same as the last time and I find myself forcing down a choler of the same kind when I am forced to think on it.
I did in fact warn Dierdre of my master's temperament. She seemed touched at my concern, but her response was direct: "The Duke will not lay a paw upon me." That was all she said on the matter, and the confidence with which she said it leaves no doubt in my mind that she truy believes it.
Goddess Day, 50th of High Sun
This morning we found the Yorri's quarters empty. He has left no note or explanation to anyone as to why he left. I can only assume that the difficulties of keeping up with the grounds has proven too difficult for him, especially with the new invasive plant, and has elected to spend his later years with his family.
Middleday, 53rd of High Sun
Duke Maiselle's requests for me have grown more indulgent. Last night he requested I strip naked and lie on my belly on his bed. He stood behind me, bringing himself off with his paw. I should have preferred him attempting to sleep with me. Being treated as some object of erotic fascination fills me with a sense of dread. I believe he wants to claim me. He says as much, anyway. Perhaps he fears what I'll do to him if he tries
Goddess Day, 60th of High Sun
A new gardener has arrived, a thin little slip of a weasel who seems, honestly, a bit too well-pampered for such a labor-intensive job. I suspect the only reason she was hired was because she comes from whatever place Dierdre does, because her accent is identical. She will have her work cut out for her, certainly. The ivy now threatens three of the four fences, and has begun to spread out towards the village itself.
Invited to Duke's chambers. Muzzle used.
Martinsday, 62nd of High Sun
I'm beginning to grow concerned about the cook. He now seems to almost exclusively eat those green and purple apples, and of the rest of his meals he picks at sparingly. I have asked him what is wrong, and he tells me that other food "does not taste as good, anymore."
Middleday, 63rd of High Sun
Invited to Duke's chambers. Muzzle used.
Goddess Day, 65th of High Sun
Invited to Duke's chambers. Ordered to present for him.
Firstday, 66th of High Sun
My master has ordered me to take down the magic painting from his room. He says that something about the images presented to him when he looks upon it no longer agrees with him. I have stored it behind my dresser, obscured with paper so that none of the other servants might accidentally activate it and see a vision of the future. I do not care for it, myself. Why should I seek predictions of the future when I already know how my family's destiny will play out?
Martinsday, 67th of High Sun
I write this in the early morning hours. I was pulled from my slumber by Marta, the shrew maid who had been called in to replace Laia. She was beside herself, telling me to come quickly because "Berwick has gone mad. He's wandering out into the Choking Wood alone."
Rushing out into the courtyard, we found the cook, Berwick, shuffling on his footpaws in nothing but his nightgown. He had cleared the fence and was walking around it, taking a game trail that led deeper into the Wood.
"Berwick!" I called to him. "What are you doing?"
His answers were incoherent. I could barely hear his words, but what I caught were things like "the colors are wrong" and "I'm going where the music is." I tried to plead with him, to tell him to stop and talk to me, but he did not even truly seem to acknowledge me, as if his words were directed at the forest than at myself and Marta. I had no choice; telling Marta to stay behind, I ran off in pursuit.
How a man of his age could move so fast, I have no earthly idea. By the time I had managed to sprint to the gate, he was disappearing into the trees. By the time I had gotten to the trees, he was nowhere to be found. In vain I followed the trails, hoping to catch up with him, but in the pitch black of the forest it quickly became impossible to place where he went. At some point I could hear Berwick, singing in some bizarre key like a man completely possessed. I thought I could track him by sound, but somehow his voice seemed to be coming from everywhere at once.
At one point I thought I heard piping, somebody playing accompaniment on a flute. That did not last very long, however, and before I knew it I was alone in the dark and all was silent. By then I had wandered so deep that it was a matter of some time before I could even find the way back towards the manor.
There I found Marta and we tried to think about what to do next. Obviously, we would have to tell somebody, and perhaps organize a search in the morning. In the meantime, we pushed into Berwick's chambers. Perhaps he had left some clue as to what was going on with him, something that might have explained his sudden change in mental fortitude.
We found his room empty, stripped of all of his possessions. Nothing remained but the bed and the dresser.
Middleday, 68th of High Sun
Marta is leaving.
After presenting our plight to Duke Maiselle, he appeared to be completely uncaring. He seemed to be more concerned with how Berwick's sudden disappearance would reflect on him as a lord than he was about his cook's safety. Marta, sweet girl that she was, would not accept that. She immediately ran out, declaring that if she could not ask the village for help, she would find him herself. I'm ashamed to say, it was not until she had said that, so clearly and decisively, that I elected to go with her.
We found nothing. Or, at least, we did not find Berwick. In a clearing about twenty minutes out from the house we found the old badger's nightgown, caught in a bush. It was still intact; there was no sign the fool had been attacked in it. Of the man himself, however, we found no trace. The only other thing of substance we saw in that clearing was a large ring of stones, clearly lain by someone, though for what purpose we could not even begin to fathom.
I was forced to state the plainly obvious to Marta: these woods were filled with any number of dangerous things, and we could not stay. If we persisted, the only thing we were liable to find was poor Berwick's corpse, and with fouler luck we would only join him. Persuading her was all but impossible; I almost had to drag her back to the manor when she insisted we keep looking.
I just heard the front door slam. Marta is gone. Honestly, it is for the best. If I were smart I would jo
I will not countenance that. I have a duty to perform. My place is here.
In both of their absences their jobs fall to me. I have already acquainted myself with the kitchen, and will be making my master's meals in future. Berwick had left everything the way he always did. Well, except for the bag of green-purple fruits, which had been left half-open on one of the counters.
My first action as temporary cook was to empty that bag in the forest. I do not know why, but simply having them around me fills me with unease.
Firstday, 71st of High Sun
A new maid has been hired, yet another fay little creature with a lilting voice. She seems capable, the young fox, but I'm beginning to wonder if there is not some clan that Dierdre is pulling these people from. It would certainly explain how she is able to source them so efficiently.
Speaking of, Dierdre approached me this afternoon. I had taken to preparing the midday meal when I noticed that another bag had appeared on the counter, same as the last one. I did not need to open it to know it contained more of those fruits. It was as I was preparing to take the thing and toss it, as I had the last ones, that she had appeared in the doorway.
"Could I ask the truth from you?" she asked me. I told her that she could. "What do you think of your master?"
"My loyalty to my lord is absolute," I replied. "Are you asking because you believe that is in doubt?"
She shook her head. "I am asking because I want to hear the truth from you."
"That is the truth," I insisted.
Again, she shook her head. "You wish to kill him, don't you?"
I was, I confess, floored by such a bluntly asked question. Obviously, the first words out of my mouth were a refutation. However, after a moment, I must have imagined I saw something in the glint of her eyes. She had, up until this point, been forthright and honest with me, and so I asked her "Is the Duke listening, right now?"
She shook her head.
"Has he instructed you to question me like this?"
She shook her head.
Perhaps it was unwise of me, but something in her tone was so candid and sincere. I felt the aura of conspiracy about us, as if we were two of the servitor class speaking freely and openly of him who we both served. In the face of that, I felt almost compelled to confess my inner feelings
"I do not wish to kill the Duke," I said. Then, I began to describe, in detail perhaps unsuited for the ears of a young woman, just what it was I DID wish to do to the Duke. I told her I longed to break his dominance over me, to press his face into the dirt and tear the finery from his body. I wanted to rut him like a bull drake to his hen in heat and force him to experience even a fraction of the humiliation he had so far put me through, with his weeks of insatiable lust.
Dierdre listened to me quietly, without comment or judgment. Her expression was as unmoving as a granite statue. Only when my choler had suitably subsided did she step forward, take my paw in hers, and look me square in the eye. She spoke these words, calmly and without emotion:
"And would you, dear Orson, be content with inflicting just a fraction of the humiliation? Would you accept being able to inflict half of it? Or all of it? Or ten, twenty, a hundred, a thousand-fold the humiliation as he has inflicted on you? This I can promise you."
"How?" I asked. "It is forbidden to raise a fist to my lord. To even speak of it is treason."
"I do not ask you to raise your paw," she replied. "I ask you to lower it against the base of your lord's neck, as he begs and pants at you for more."
I say again that Dierdre had, thus far, never spoken an untrue word. She had always been a serious and capable servant and house-minder. In the face of that, I truly believed for a moment that she had a plan. "What would you have me do?" I asked her.
"Nothing that you have not already been doing." Goddess save me, the glint in her eyes as she spoke. I half imagined they glowed. "Remain bound in dutiful service, as you have done. See to it that your master's plans of feasting and merriment go off to the best of your ability, and speak nothing of your growing concerns?"
"My concerns?"
She nodded to the bag of fruits on the counter.
It was at this point that certain thoughts began to surface in my mind. "What are YOUR designs on the Duke? Are you here to kill him?"
She shook her head, and this time a ghost of a smile played on her lips. "I am here to throw a party, dear Orson. As your master requested."
Immediately things began to click into place. The mysterious book with its foreign symbols; the fruit from no known kingdom; my lord's long walks into the woods where a strange circle of stones could be found. There is sorcery afoot in this house!
"What ARE you?" I asked her.
This, she would not answer. Instead, she relinquished my paw and stepped back. "I shall offer you a boon," she said. "You have my word that until the first day of Twilit Grace, in your mortal calendars, Duke Maiselle will never again force himself upon you. Keep to your duties and maintain your discretion, and this protection shall hold. After that?" She smiled, a horrid fangy thing. "Well, one can hope that your master will have learned a degree of humility from what he is about to experience."
"And what is he about to experience?"
Again, she would not answer. She turned to leave. "A replacement cook will be arriving tomorrow. Do keep those fruits where they are. It would be rather inconvenient to have to fetch another lot of them." She flashed me another toothy grin before she left. "And take care not to eat those raw. I fear their taste can be more than a little bit enchanting."
As I sit here, in this room, and read back what I have just written, the way forward seems abundantly clear. My duty to my master requires I wa info put a stop to
My master wants to throw a party. Duty demands that I give him what he so clearly wants. Duty demands that I stay, especially since so many of the old house-staff is gone. Duty demands that I stay.
Duty demands that I stay.
Martinsday, 72nd of High Sun
As promised, the new cook has arrived. Yet another creature that walks in the body of a fur (equine, this time) and talks in that strange musical lilt. He has not given me his name (none but Dierdre have, and at this stage I am afraid to ask them). However, he pulled me aside, on first meeting, to give me his solemn promise that the meals he would prepare for me were "safe for mortals."
I do not truly know what this means. I presume it has something to do with the warning regarding the fruit.
This evening I heard the sounds of rather shameless passion coming from my lord's bedroom. The voice on the other end of that passion was clearly female; the fox maid, perhaps, or Dierdre herself. Normally I would have attributed it to a change in my lord's tastes, him getting bored with me and moving on to some other amusement. Were it not for Dierdre's promise I might have believed that.
Goddess Day, 80th of High Sun
The bookshelves are completed. Originally they were simple things, the kind that the young men in the village could slap together with the time and planks they had available. Somebody came in overnight, last night, and in truth I do not know what they did to them. Some kind of polish? Sorcery? They look like the kind of thing that would sit along the walls of the stately libraries of the University in the capital.
My master did not notice the change. I have been stocking the shelves daily, but he has barely deigned to look at his crown jewel since he set me on the task. But for the book that called Dierdre and her clan to our house, I do not think he has so much as opened any of what he had delivered.
Middleday, 83rd of High Sun
I heard my master in my old room, availing himself of Dierdre. It seems that I was right in assuming she would be claiming the Duke's attentions. It is not to my credit that I stayed at the door, that I listened in on them in the middle of the one's predations on the other. However, what I heard from that room heated my blood, in more ways than one, and I felt compelled to linger a while.
Dierdre seemed a different beast from what I had so far heard from her. Perhaps it was an act, one more in her myriad deceptions as she furthered whatever plans I had been recruited into. Perhaps she genuinely DID pant for my lord's modest cock with all the abandon of a maiden on her wedding night.
I could not hear my master as clearly as Dierdre. I know he spoke, but I did not know what he said. I could guess. Oh, how I could guess. I had heard that sneering tone before. I know from bitter experience what sort of horrid things Maiselle says in that tone. "Serve your lord. Serve your lord." It is a wonder I did not kick the door down, then and there.
Am I being decieved? Does the same bobcat who cries for more as the Duke slavers in her ear truly have a plan for the mouse's destruction? Could there truly be vengeance at the end of this agonizing stint of forced servitude? Or am I being led along, destined to suffer a similar fate to Berwick, whatever that was?
Seventeen days. I shall know in seventeen days.
Firstday, 86th of High Sun
Musicians have come to stay at the manor house in preparation for the party. Unsurprisingly, they have the same voice as all the rest of Dierdre's clan.
I have written invitations to all the lords within two-days ride of here, as well as a special message to be rendered to the King himself. I had my doubts that the latter would ever be answered, and it seems that Dierdre had those same doubts. She handed me a replacement letter, one which she insists will be better received. I do not know how, and I refuse to read it to find out, lest I accidentally unleash some magic spell or other.
I shall know in fourteen days.
Goddess Day, 90th of High Sun
The Abbot came today. His visit was unannounced, but not unwelcome. At least, it was welcome until I overheard his audience with the Duke and learned he was asking for help with the disappearance of several people in town. Disturbing news at the best of times, but considering who I was now surrounded by it was beyond troubling.
The Duke, naturally, handled this in exactly the way I would naturally expect a man of his caliber to do so. He prevaricated, made a series of hollow promises to send word to nearby towns, to call up a token levy to help with the search. The Abbot seemed pleased with that, credulous old fool that he is, but I could hear in Maiselle's voice that he was going to swiftly forget about this conversation as soon as the squirrel was out of his fur.
Curiously, I also overheard a passing conversation between the Abbot and Dierdre. She sounded completely different, the lilt in her voice gone, and in its place was an accent that would have sounded entirely at home on the streets of the capital. She smiled, and she curtsied, and she accepted the Abbot's benediction with all the grace of somebody who did not cleave to the Goddess. Only once she was gone did she resume talking as she always had, seemingly relieved that she no longer had to debase her tongue in such a fashion.
I shall know in ten days.
Goddess Day, 95th of High Sun
I shall know in five days.
I shall know in four days.
I shall know in three days.
I shall know in two days.
Firstday, 1st of Twilit Grace
Words do not describe the events of the previous night. I confess I do not truly understand what happened. All I can say is that clear and obvious sorcery has been performed.
The party was, for my master, an utter failure. The King fled the manor house under guard, his teenage son in tow. His bodyguard, Striker, drew steel on Maiselle, and had Dierdre's magicks not driven him also from the premises I might have found my revenge taken from me. As for the Duke himself
No, Orson. Not yet. Savor the Duke's fate a moment, before putting it down into words.
Overnight, the property has been completely overtaken by vines. One could HEAR them growing, all through the night, an omnipresent crackle as they worked past the fence, carpeted the lawns and finally climbed up to claim the building itself. The only thing that was not covered by morning were the windows, which the curious things grew around. I was forced to cut a path out of the front entrance.
There was panic in the village. Apparently the bobcat's magic could be seen and felt from all the way down the hill. The vines were also probably a crisis for them to deal with, but on that I am unsure. None dare approach the manor house now, and so nobody has deigned to tell me.
Dierdre is gone, as is the rest of her kind. She had descended upon the ballroom with such a raw, primal fury I was amazed that everyone was able to leave with their bodies intact. Once she laid her curse upon my master, she did not stay. The moment she left my sight, she was gone. Now I am alone. It is only me here, and my master. My master.
Oh, my master. A wretched man is he, cursed for his hubris and reduced to a pitiful state.
The details are far from my understanding, but it seems that clothing flees from him. Whenever he leaves my sight, he comes back to me naked as the day he was born. No longer do his fine velvets sit in his wardrobe. Instead, they find themselves in the drawers of my own personal dresser. He suspected treachery, of course, but then he found out that they could only be found there when I was with him. When first he found himself divested after learning where his clothing goes to, he rushed to my room and tore through the drawers, only to find the thing bare of even my personal effects.
The effect is immediate. Once, when walking through the hallways as Maiselle paced and nattered away in agitation, I decided to look out the window for the briefest of moments. I looked back to find the curves of his soft ass, his paws between his legs and his bared teeth as he accused me of "doing that on purpose." Oh, if only he knew.
Better yet, because his clothing only appears in my room when I am also present, it seems as though I must also watch him change. Maiselle has not taken to this gracefully. He complains that he can feel my eyes upon him as surely as if I was running my paws along his fur. Not that such a thought sits too poorly with him, considering his arousal seems to grow with every time I look upon him.
I do not think I could ask for a greater boon. I am alone with my master, now. He cannot dismiss me, needs me looking upon him at all times. I get to watch as, several times a a day, he squirms and blushes and tries in vain to hide himself from my gaze. Best of all, nobody is coming to save him. He only has me. And I truly intend to make him suffer.
Laborsend, 4th of Twilit Grace
By now my master knows two things above all. The first is that when I turn my eyes away and leave him standing naked in his dining room, it is entirely on purpose. The second is that he only remains dressed at my discretion. I have not hesitated at all to take advantage of the latter fact.
Now Maiselle spreads himself out on the bed for MY entertainment. I cannot overstate the joy I feel in seeing this man, once so haughty and arrogant, now burying his face in my pillow and trying to ignore the fact that having me looming over him, cock in hand, sends his to twitching. The first time I painted his fur with my seed, he painted my sheets with his. His efforts to mask the whorish noises he made has only inflamed my desires.
The mouse still clings to the idea that he can be saved, that with the right favors called in he might be able to earn the King's mercy and Striker might come to break this curse upon him. He has also threatened that, once this spell is broken, I will face the headsman for what I've done to him. I know better, of course. The King knows what foul magicks Maiselle has trafficked in, knows that he and his young son were in danger that night. There is no salvation. If anyone is bound for the headsman
The both of us are damned. I know this. I knew what was coming, or could at least guess that it was something unspeakable. I do not delude myself into thinking that there is any mercy to be found for me.
Still, if I am bound to lose my head, no matter how the dice fall, I should at least claim what trophies I can. I go now to Maiselle's chambers. Before I die, I will know the pleasure of draining myself inside his flabby ass.
Martinsday, 7th of Twilit Grace
The soldiers have not come. Why have the soldiers not come?
These past few days, I have taken every possible revenge I could imagine. I have lain with Maiselle in every way a man might lie with another man. No longer does the effete fool threaten me with destruction, demand I remember my place. No longer. Now it is HE who remembers his place, between my legs and braced against my cock.
Last night I was certain that I had done it all. I have barely eaten, barely slept. I have claimed Maiselle in every room of the house, almost. In the dining hall where his curse first took shape, in the now empty ballroom where the windows made it seem like we rutted in the open sky, multiple times in his own bed where countless innocent servants were taken with a fraction of the fury I took him. Through it all, he wails and cries like a hen drake in heat, now slavering for more as the fey-sickness works its way through his body. As I collapsed upon my bed, a thought occurred to me that my vengeance was spent. I have done what I promised. All that remained was to sit and wait for the ruin to come.
The ruin has not come. The soldiers, the priests, the villagers, they all stay away from this house. And now, with the benefit of a full ten hours of sleep, I find my willingness to lie down blunted.
My vengeance is not over. It is never over. Maiselle ruined my family's only chance at glory, dragged both of our names into the mud. A lifetime he spent, treating men and women as playthings. Good people are gone, claimed by the Fair Folk, and we wretched two are also taken by them. My vengeance will never be over. Never. A thousand generations hence, my ancestors will hunt his for the slights done against me.
Damn the soldiers! Damn the headsman! I will not sit here, eating whatever scraps we can salvage from the party, waiting for ruin to come.
I quit this place now. The Duke will come with me. He will not resist when I tell him, though I drag him into the sunlight without any covering. Where we go, I have not the faintest idea. We shall have to live by our wits and our bodies a while, for we have precious few friends among the nobility. Perhaps, if Maiselle's new personality holds, he might be able to earn us a bit of coin. I should like to see the mighty Duke of Chuleigh reduced to a common whore.
I leave now. You shall remain behind, journal. You were never a replacement for the book my father bound. I have no further need to organize my days or my thoughts. My days will be spent leading a naked dormouse through the countryside, and my thoughts will be on when next I can drain myself within or upon him.
This has been the journal of Orson, a wolf who has forever been denied the honor of a family name. Farewell.