I didn’t find Xy, or not directly. She could probably sense me, or her woodnd friends would let her know of an invader. Gren seemed to think she was okay, and she had known when Gren had ehe forest with some trolls after her. She probably knew about me and my zombies.

  I still didn’t know what I was going to do with them, I just khat I wanted 17 more experience points, and that the two bodies they were carrying ted as enemies, and I would get 20 for re-animating them.

  When I was about halfway back to the mausoleum, my favorite squirrel hopped up beside me. I fished out the trail mix and gave Nutty some nuts. He clearly wanted me to follow him, even though I retty sure he wasn’t showihe best path home. But I shrugged. If Xy needed me, I was on my way.

  When we finally found her, I’m afraid I fot all about my little rodent friend. Xy looked bedraggled. She hadn’t bothered to cover herself with even minimal leaves, and her green skin was scratched and blistered. She looked like she was about to fall over, but she kept moving, pulling dead branches away from a sm spot. Live pnts would probably have moved for her, but she had to move the dead ones herself.

  “Xy,” I said. “Stop.”

  “Abby,” she said, pausing to look at me only for a moment before tinuing. “I have to make sure there isn’t another bze.”

  “I’ve brought free bor,” I told her. “Time for you just to direct the work. Zombies, obey Xy.”

  Xy smiled thinly, and then told them what to pick up, but they didn’t move. I repeated the order, and the zombies started lifting branches. It was a bit slow, repeating the ands, but it got the work done. Only by giving Xy a chocote bar did I vince her to sit down on a burnt-out log a, while I helped with the work, moving faster and needing less mia than the undead.

  “It was horrible,” Xy said. “Ghastly.” Her eyes had a haunted look that chilled me.

  “He’s dead now.”

  “You killed him?”

  “Gren did. I, um, distracted him.”

  Xy smiled. “Good. I’m gd he’s dead. I wish they were all dead. Except Gren, of course.”

  I uood her feelings, and now was not the time t her around. “Gavabar’s ba charge, and I think the trolls are having an y. They know they aren’t to bother you or your forest, and I’m pretty sure they’ll want more of my booze.”

  “You shouldn’t have to bribe them to do what they already agreed to,” Xy retorted. “And they should be punished. Not a spankiher.”

  What they had agreed to had left their homes in rather poor dition, without enough lumber to fix them. The new stru had probably been a result of Baradzem’s logging campaign. I let that go for now, too. “It’s not worth it, Xy.”

  “What’s not worth it? Are you saying my forest isn’t worth it?”

  I shook my head. “I’m saying that the price of hate isn’t worth it. Let it go. I think we’ve protected this spot okay. Is this the st pce where the embers still smolder?”

  She nodded. “Yes.” She frowned. “I’m afraid I’m in no shape for lovemaking.”

  I nodded. “No. Let’s go bay tomb. I have some things in my world that help.”

  Hey! You promised!

  “I don’t — I don’t want to go to your world. I o be in my forest now.”

  “I’ll get them and bring them back,” I told her.

  She nodded, weakly. We walked together, and she had the vines part for her, but even that seemed to take more out of her. It was better than having them rub against her blistered skin.

  The zombies followed. I told them to stop a distance from the crypt, and to set the bodies down. Then we tinued. She sat on the walls of the guardhouse, carefully, and stared into space. It was a sign of how out of it she was that she didn’t ask lots of questions about what happened, or even about the zombies and the bodies they were carrying.

  “I’ll be right back,” I told her.

  I took my clothes off in the crypt, set the bag down, and then climbed the dder back through the gate.

  I didn’t ge bato Abel. I was all the way out, standing right at the edge of the puzzle, and I hadn’t ged back.

  The weird thing was, I’d wished for this in a way. I was just running up and ing right down, and it was unnerving to ge bodies every time. But I was also panig, because if I didn’t turn bato Abel, a whole lot of things would go to hell. I couldn’t prove I owhe house, for ohing, as Abby. It wasn’t like it usible that I’d transitioned and lost four inches of height. Abby didn’t really look anything like Abel.

  Ugh, this is where you go? It’s a dump!

  Oh great, and I brought him along, too. I took a step toward the stairs, and my body shifted. I breathed a sigh of relief and focused bay mission. Acts happened when doing home repair, and I kept a very well-stocked first aid kit. I grabbed it and ran back dowairs. Why had I ged in a different pce than st time?

  I had a thought, and I didn’t know if it was the right way to think about it. The thought was that magic was seeping through the gate, slowly spreading. It had been a week or so, and it hadn’t made a lot ress. Just ara foot or so around the puzzle. It might take months for it to fill the basement, if that was how it worked, and even loo fill the house. I didn’t know how to measure the rate ress precisely.

  It roblem for aime.

  I found Xy still staring into space, and I washed her skin carefully, and then spread anti-burn oi over her blisters as gently as I could.

  “Thank you, Abby,” she said. “Your touch stings, but when it leaves me I feel better. I put that badly, didn’t I?”

  “You put it fine,” I said.

  I covered her with bandages, until a third of her ink. “These will help protect you,” I told her. “Until your burns heal.”

  She nodded. “Why are they pink?”

  “Um, to blend into skin.” I held one against my arm, to show her.

  She ughed. “They don’t work as well on me,” she said.

  “Hey, it’s a fashion statement.”

  “I like the fashion statement you’re making,” she said, leering.

  I hadn’t put on any clothes. It seemed like a waste of time, when Xy looked like that. “Yes, well. When you’re up to it, you show me how much you like it.”

  She smiled a little at that. “It could be a while,” she said. “You should make love to Gren, instead. If you have, you know, needs. Is she okay?”

  “She’s a little scratched, but not like you. She’s probably at the y, now.”

  “Yes, that. Tell me how it all went. And why are you okay?”

  So I told her, including the bit where I used Life Drain to heal myself.

  “Gren’s arrival was timely,” Xy said. “I got worried about you and told her to go to you.”

  I smiled. “Thank you. She saved my ba.”

  “Ba?”

  “Um, it’s a manner of speaking. She saved my life. Arrived in the nick of time. Couldn’t have do without her.”

  “I want revenge,” Xy said.

  “Not helping you with that,” I told her. “But I’ll help you get better, and I’ll help you with whatever work o be done in the forest.”

  She frow me. “I also want to fuck,” she said.

  “You’re in no shape for that.”

  She sighed. “I know. It would hurt. Doesn’t mean I don’t want it.” She shrugged. “I’m gd you’re here, Abby. Thank you for everything you did. Even — the peace.”

  I smiled. “I’m gd you’re here too, Xy. I think I —”

  Hey, I think you have enough mana to raise another zombie!

  Enash, always having an eye for the tender moment. Although maybe I should be grateful. “I think” is not the way to start a sentehat ends in “I love you.” I kissed Xy lightly on the lips, careful of the burns, and our boobs brushed against each other. In spite of her being covered with bandages, my cock twitched at that.

  She noticed. “I think I could use my mouth on you,” she said. “Are yretting not going to the y?”

  I shook my head. “I’ll be fine,” I said. “A little arousal is hardly an emergency.”

  She nodded and got to her feet. “I’m going to lie down in the leaves,” she said. “Where we made love that oime. It’s my favorite spot, now. Would you like to e with, just to sleep?”

  I couldn’t turn that down. Besides, I was tired. “Let me just get a few things,” I said.

  I’d bring a toothbrush dowime. Tonight, I’d skip it. But I did want my little bag, and a ge of clothes in case I got cold, started biting, or whatever.

  “ I have more chocote?” Xy asked. “Not as a bargain or a trade, but just because you like me?”

  I gave her the st chocote bar in the bag. She munched on it, but her eyes closed, and she fell asleep still holding it in her hand. She looked adorable in the moonlight.

  I usually slept on my stomach. I’m told it’s not the best for your back, but it was how I’d always slept. Of course, I’d never had boobs in the way before.

  I rolled over, and tried on my back, but that didn’t quite work either. Xy’s breathing was like a quiet whistle; not quite a snore, but distrag. It took me a while, but I finally mao fall asleep on my side.

  I woke up at the first sign of dawn, which wasn’t unusual for me. I also woke up with an ag hard-on, which wasn’t unusual either. I didn’t remember what I’d been dreaming about, but it must have been a good one. Xy was still whistling aeacefully, and I wasn’t going to disturb her.

  I pulled the gothy bck dress out of the bag, and put it on. Walking around naked was ohing, but walking around with a nine inch cock stig out seemed obse. By that time I wanted coffee as much as I wanted sex, although not enough to gh the gate and the transformation just yet. I needed a toothbrush down here, and a coffee maker. Sex wasn’t going to be in short supply, I had a feeling. Not given that I was about to be a sed level Seductress. And Xy, when she was healthy, seemed to be eager enough. Gren, too. Iween ies.

  I checked with myself. Was I jealous of the trolls? I wasn’t, really. What I did with Gren was betweewo of us, or maybe the two of us and Xy, and very different from an y of many on many.

  If you’re not going to rail her, at least make some undead!

  I wondered if Xy would like coffee. Only one way to find out, I suppose. Now that was worth transf for. I took the dress back off, a up the dder to get the coffee mae. Rather than making it up there, I brought everything, including two mugs, back to the crypt and plugged the mae into the extension cord. I left the door open, because it made me feel closer to Xy, but I put the dress ba while I made coffee. While I waited, I put the dress ba and checked out the cameras, making sure I could see okay.

  I got to watch Xy walking dowh toward me, naked but covered in bandages. Still sexy, despite the bands of pink.

  “Hello sweetheart, how’d you sleep?”

  “Like the dead,” she said. “What are you doing? What’s making that funny noise?”

  “It’s perg,” I told her. “I’m making coffee.”

  “What’s coffee?”

  “It’s um, a little bit like chocote, but not sweet? It helps wake me up in the m.”

  “You’re already awake,” she pointed out.

  “Well, more awake. It’s ready. Let’s see what you think.” I poured out two cups. “You might want to let it cool down first.”

  She touched the mug gingerly. “Yeah. I don’t need burns where you kiss me.”

  “Yep.” I drank some of mine, and smacked my lips. “Mmm, good.”

  She sniffed. “Not sure about how it smells,” she said.

  I nodded. “It should be cool enough, now, if you sip it.”

  She took a sip, and promptly spat it all over me. “Yuck! That’s awful! That’s not like chocote at all! Chocote is sweet and nid lovely and this is horrible and bitter and, and, and how do you drink that stuff?”

  I wiped my shoulders and my pretty bck dress as well as I could. “Well, uh, I guess it’s an acquired taste.”

  Xy just shuddered.

  I started to apologize, but I didn’t think I had anything to apologize for, so I didn’t. She broke the silence first. “I do feel better, Abby. Thank you for taking care of me st night.”

  “You’re very wele,” I said.

  “We are going to have to have lots of sex to help heal the forest,” she told me.

  “Have to?” I asked.

  “Get to? You have to admit it’s a good excuse.”

  I grinned. “I don’t need an excuse, other than that yeous and I’m a horny futa girl.”

  She grinned. “Tell me that again.”

  “I’m a horny futa girl.”

  “No, the other part.”

  “Yeous. Surely Gren tells you that, too.”

  “When Gren says things you always wonder if she just says them because they start with the same sound as something else she wants to say. Like she means ‘not totally unattractive green girl’ but she says ‘geous’ because it starts with a g.”

  I chuckled. “I’m saying it because you’re beautiful and sexy,” I told her.

  She nodded. “And you keep saying it,” she said.

  This is disgusting. we go level already?

  It was tempting to pile it on more, both because Xy would love it and because Enash would hate it. But I was curious too. “Do you need mrunt zombie help, ing up the mess, Xy?”

  Xy nodded. “I think there are areas where we could have them pick up almost everything. So as not to have to tell them to do everything step by step.”

  “Good. Well, let’s put your eo work for you, shall we?”

  “Yes. The forest is more important than listening to you telling me how lovely I am. You didn’t say lovely though. I am lovely, aren’t I?”

  “Absolutely,” I told her, taking my cup of coffee with me. We walked back to where the zombies were. They didn’t smell aer for being a day old, aher did the unanimated bodies, but the smell of coffee helped.

  I used the wand.

  You have bee a sed level Neancer/Seductress. You need 1997 experience points to reach third level.