A Change of Heart

The city was called Sigil. Like its namesake, it was an icon of power, a symbol that meant many things. It was the center of the Great Wheel, the great ring-shaped hub of the Outlands. It was the greatest city of the planes, its impossible geometry home to myriad races from every reality.

It was a city of doors. Portals were everywhere, magical gates that led to the furthest reaches of the planes. An empty doorframe could house an invisible route to the twin paradises of Bytopia, and if one spoke the right word in it’s presence, a wishing well would lead one to the elemental plane of water. The doors around the multiverse could take the shape of a shimmering sheet of colored light or a mundane wash pot, creatures of every description could emerge from one at any moment. It was not uncommon for the denizens of Sigil to see mighty angels walking in the company of brutish orcs, bizarre tieflings, capering slaadi, minuscule Halflings, cruel baatezu and a million other races.

Behind one door in this place so filled with them, was an alehouse. With it’s dirty wooden floors covered with a stained grey rug and walls decorated with woodcuts, plaques and animal trophies it had the look of every alehouse from around the planes. Patrons quaffed cheap ale, and the chatter of a half dozen languages muffled the clink of glasses, the creaking of chairs, and the clatter of coin. Every table had a handful of patrons swapping stories or glares over a drink, all under the watchful, beady eye of a goblin barman and the pair of ogres he employed.

All the tables save for one. A booth in the back corner, beneath a stuffed troll head  whose eyes still tracked the patrons of the shop. Occasionally, a mephit would fly over to the animated trophy and offer it a drink or a cheap snack. No one else would dare approach the booth and its occupant, and even the animated trophy would steal nervous glances towards her.

Three of Tezrian’s six hands lingered by her weapons. She had enough sheaths and scabbards around her waist that they resembled an uneven skirt, masking the place where her humanoid half transformed into that of a snake. Beneath the frock of metal and leather were seven feet of black, red, and yellow scales, the thick and powerful tail taking up the entirety of the booth. Draped around the tip were bands of expensive jewelry, matching the skimpy necklaces and arm bands she wore on her upper half. Tan skin covered a muscular physique, with extra abdominal and pectoral muscles to support her six arms. Short back hair crowned a sneering face with bright yellow eyes. The marilith was a warlike demon, one of the race of chaotic, evil fiends that inhabited the lowest of the lower planes. Incarnations of disorder, violence, hatred and cruelty, the marilith was one of the worst of their kind. An abyssal general, commander of foul legions that swept over the innocent and warred against the virtuous, she led the creatures of sin in their entropic war against law. Her forces had committed innumerable atrocities, whether by her order or their own impulses. The rest of the patrons were aware of Tezrian’s status as a greater demon, and gave her a wide berth.

Two more of her hands clutched empty glasses. Mortal liquors had no affect on her, it took more powerful stuff to get a tanar’ri buzzed. Her head rested against her final hand’s knuckles, cynically observing the rest of the alehouse’s occupants. Tanar’ri were creatures of passion, their powerful emotions all but impossible to resist. Hatred was one of those. The desire to inflict pain and suffering on the other patrons raged within her, and her hands squeezed her glasses until her knuckles were white. She hated traveling here, to this place of neutrality. It went against her nature to deny her instincts, to hold back from drawing a half dozen blades and painting the drab alehouse red with blood. But it was the unwritten rule here, to deny one‘s nature and cooperate. She wanted to break the rule, just for the sake of violating it, but she knew there was slim chance of her survival if she did. If The Lady didn’t come for her, The Harmonium, The Mercykillers or any number of other factions would converge on her, each one of them with members as powerful as her.

Tapping her finger against her cheek, she fell back on lesser forms of violence. There were a pair of briaurs two tables away, the goatlike centaurs jabbering over a plate of bread and two frothy mugs. Tezrian looked into their minds, reading their inane thoughts. They were beneath her, concerned with worthless mortal things, and she fingered the handle of a jagged warpick, imagining how it would tear into their guts. The hoofed, liminal creatures’ minds were tender and sensitive; they were a pair of artists, having never left the relative safety of Sigil. Sneering, Tezrian thought up images of her home, the infinite layers of the abyss. Grisly battlefields, torture chambers, scenes of slavery, madness and debauchery. With her telepathic powers, Tezrian bombarded the briaur’s mind, watching him clench his horned brow as terrifying, foreign thoughts assaulted him. The demon grinned, sending memories of her slaughters in the blood war. A particularly grisly image of an osyluth being ripped limb from limb caused him to sob, and he tore at his curly hair, seeking to drive the awful thoughts from his head.

Tezrian reveled in the pain her thoughts were causing him, the desperation she was drawing from his companion. The hundreds of times she had eviscerated a larva or mane scorched their way into his mind, the shivering briaur’s hoofs rattling on the floor. Tezrian continued her battery as she scanned the rest of the tavern. She could kill every single one of them, right now. The fiendish tactician decided she would summon a dozen or two rutterkin first, using the lesser fiends to block routes of escape and occupy her prey. Observing the thoughts of the burly half-orc by the door, she learned he was a member of the Harmonium, the awfully lawful peacekeeping force that policed this city. She would start with him, striking him with her tail and constricting him, preventing him form escaping and mounting a defense. Only then would she draw her magic blades and begin slaughtering them in droves, making an awful torrent of gore that her kind so loved. The cloaked figure at the bar had magic on him, her own magical powers easily detecting that. Tezrian fondled the grip of a jagged-edged sword, then a wicked knife, before settling on a thin punch-dagger she kept by her hip. This would be perfect for him, she thought, for when she got within his guard and around whatever spells he could evoke. There was a spot right between his shoulders where the demoness would insert the blade, slipping it between the vertebrae of his spine and killing him instantly.

She thought of a strategy and a tactic for every single one of the bar’s occupants, a plan to murder them in the most thrillingly grisly way possible. The ogres she could ignore, their crude clubs could do no harm to her, so she would sever their legs at the knee and watch them bleed. The goblin would be pulled apart by magical telekinesis, if her rutterkin didn’t end him first. All of them she telepathically sent images of their death, waves of grisly intent and deathly emotion invading their minds.

She had her plan perfected, and was struggling to resist enacting it, the word to call the lesser tanari’ri on the end of her tongue, when the door opened. A wiry, green skinned figure stood in the doorway, his lanky frame almost skeletal. A tall curved silver helmet topped a flat face with no nose, and small dark spots covered his viridian hide. The githyanki wore little; a single pauldron and baroque metal lioncloth his only garment save for a scrappy metal harness and an assortment of jewelry. The newcomer carried a long, silvery sword strapped to his back, and his eyes flitted from table to table, before settling on Tezrian’s.

The door shut behind him, and the grisly assault on the patron’s mind’s ceased as the githyanki approached her booth. Four of her hands folded on the table, brushing her empty glasses aside. One lingered on the handle of her sword, the final brushing back her hair.

“I hope I havent kept you waiting,” he said as he took a seat. Conversation reassumed in the tavern, the tortured images ceasing their assault on the drinker’s minds. “You know how time feels in the astral. Hard to keep track of things.”

“I’d have executed you for desertion were you one of my soldiers,” said Tezrian, her calm, even tone at odds with the telepathically projected feelings of dread. “But I found my own amusement.”

Tezrian’s tail slid off the seat and onto the floor, the tip coiling around the githyanki’s foot. “Pity you showed up when you did, I was just about to start the bloodshed.”

“But these aren’t Baatezu. You cant just kill them for sport, they’ve done nothing to you.”

“Sympathy? From you Samak? Where’s that bloodlust and skill with arms you showed when we met on the fields of the Blood War? Where‘s the warrior who cut down a dozen dwarves without thinking? Who tore a deva in two before it could utter a word of protest?”

The githyanki shifted in his chair, looking at the other people in the bar. His conversation with Tezrian was half in muttered Abyssal and half in telepathic messages, none could overhear them, but still he felt guilty for talking like this in front of them. He was skilled in many things, but he hated crowds. He felt awkward when around too many people, unsure of what he should do. He preferred to keep a hand on his sword and a spell on his tongue, living by his skill with magic and arms and by his instincts. That was what Tezrian had seen in him in the first place.

“How many times have I explained this? Just because I can doesn’t mean I should. They’ve done nothing to me. They haven’t wronged me. If they wrong me I won’t hesitate to act, even if that means violence, but not before. And don’t think about charming them into fighting me again, I have more than enough dispels ready.”

“You sound like a githzerai,” hissed Tezrian, tapping four sets of nails against the table, “like a lawful.” She spat that last word, her whole body twisting in disgust.

Samak avoided her gaze and took off his helmet, scratching his mohawk of dry, auburn hair. The insult stung, but she was right. He had changed since they met in the blood war. It was hard to remember how long ago that was, time did not pass in his home plane, but he estimated it as at least thirty years ago. He was not gish then, just a mercenary hired to fight alongside the tanar’ri who happened to know how to throw a magic missile or two. He had managed to distinguish himself in combat, enough to attract the attention of his commander, Tezrian the Liar, dreaded marilith warlord.

“Things change Tezrian, people change. You can appreciate change, can’t you?”

“Of course,” she muttered in response, “consistency is the bugbear of existence. Stagnation, conformity, compliance, those are lawful things. Baatezu things.”

“Exactly. I’m not like you Tezrian, I’m a mortal. I can change my nature. Who I am isn’t defined by what I am.”

The marilith nodded and tapped her fingers against the table. The tip of her tail curled and twisted, and she leaned over the table, her necklaces jingling as they shifted. Her exposed breasts were within arms reach, those orbs that still tantalized the gish even after all these years. His resolve faltered for a moment, and he let his gaze linger on her beautiful features, desire and lust coloring his mind.

“But what you are is nothing to be ashamed of,” she purred, one hand reaching behind his head and rubbing the back of his green neck. “You are mighty, lesser warriors quake as you approach. You are independent, individual, strong enough to rely on nobody but yourself. You are creative, adaptable, beautifully chaotic in your own subtle ways.” Tezrian licked her lips, her long tongue lingering to taste the air and emotions she created inside Samak. Despite his stoic exterior, she could feel the tumultuous, conflicting feelings within him, and it gave her great satisfaction to know she could bring those emotions to the surface. Doubt, pride, curiosity, confusion, and no small amount of lust colored his soul, her words turning the gish into a beautiful painting of mortal conflict. Maybe this is what she liked most about him, she thought, how he served as a canvas for her manipulations. And how willing he was to be painted by her serpentine tongue.

“And your flaws? Do not think I see you as any less for them,” she continued, her tail reaching up to his knee. She found a hidden dagger behind his shin guards, and by it’s texture she guessed it was made of silver, the metal that was anathema to the lawful devils she opposed. She knew there would be a cold-iron one on the other leg.

“Weaknesses are unforgivable only if you let them own you, let them control you. What of the mighty Orcus? He was fat and corpulent, lazy and complacent, and he suffered for it, but now he is one of the greatest lords of the abyss.”

“I forgot how accepting you were of me.” Samak gently moved her palm from his neck, back down to her folded hands on the table. “I was made gish some time ago, just like you said I would. Your confidence in me helped me do it. You always wanted me to succeed. A representative of The Queen even gave me my silver sword.  It was like you said back in Acheron, the war would change me. Make me greater than me peers. If I survived.”

The marilith nodded, her tail tightening around Samak’s leg. The githyanki stiffened, his hand falling to his knee. Cautiously, he petted the demon’s tail, causing the fiendish warlord to smile.

“You could change too,” he said, keeping his thoughts guarded so the marilith didn’t pick them out of his head. What he was going to insinuate would put him in serious danger. “You’re stronger than I am, stronger than any githyanki.”

“Go on,” she hissed, her multiple limbs shifting and contorting. Two stretched behind her head, and the ones folded on the table crossed across her chest.

“Strong enough not to be beholden to your nature. Just like me, you don’t have to be defined by what you are.”

“What do you mean Samak?” She said, her tail constricting tightly around him. “Speak plainly.”

“You are a demon. A fiend. Your nature is one of cruelty, malice, and hatred. You were about to slaughter these people when I walked in. You don’t need to be like that. You can change, beyond the boundaries of the demonic. Even a creature like you, especially one like you, can be strong enough to defy their nature.”

“And what upper-planar pissant has been filling your ears with that drivel?” She hissed. There was as series of thuds, and the table shook, the tips of three swords sticking up from underneath. Samak remained stoic, eyeing the blades with casual interest. They were unenchanted blades, not the magical weapons Tezrian favored. If she had wanted to do him harm she would have used something more dangerous than simple metal.

After a particularly grisly battle she had invited Samak and three other mercenaries to her command tent, uncertainty and fear for what the marilith planned overcoming all of them. It was the first time he had seen her unarmed, though he knew never to let his guard down in the presence of demons. Her serpentine tail was strong enough to crush his bones, and he had evoked an armor spell just in case. That tail had wrapped around him, but in a slow, inviting manner as one set of hands examined each of his peers. They had laid together, all four of them, wild, demonic sex more strenuous and dangerous than the battle before lasting until the dawn. He was the only one who had been invited back.

“I didn’t come here to fight you Tezrian. I came here because you mean something to me, and I want to find out what. You can be something more than a warrior in an pointless, unending conflict. Your immortal life could be spent in a million better ways, if only you‘ll try and change.”

“You’re no glabrezu,” replied the Marilith, rolling her eyes, “not even an incubus. Magic and swordplay may be your forte, but don’t try poetry. Wordplay, im afraid, is beyond your skill.”

The demon rose on her tail to her height of seven feet, the animated troll head struggling to get out of her way. She slithered out of the booth, her skirt of weapons swaying with her movements. She approached the cloaked figure at the bar, folding two sets of arms over her chest.

“See him?” She said in plain Common. “He’s a githzerai. He’s an adulterer, he’s been philandering with a tiefling hussy from the lower ward.”

Samak swallowed. The demon could read thoughts, and those under the influence often had very open minds. The cloaked githzerai stumbled from his stool, backing away in fear of the demon. This wasn’t going to go well.

“He hates your guts, Samak,” she hissed, sending images of the githzerai beating him into his mind. “From the moment you walked in he wished those ogres would beat you and throw you into the gutter for the Dustmen to collect. His kind hate yours, every one of them. It is in their nature to hate you, and they make no effort to change that.”

She jerked towards him, making him flinch. Laughing at his fear, she slithered past him towards the barman.

“And what was that you thought when we were talking?” She sneered at the goblin ”That Sigil would be better without his kind? That the githyanki were worthless pirates through and through? That The Lady would throw them out of Sigil any day now? And that on that day you’d celebrate with free drinks for every githzerai in the city? Am I right?”

The goblin nodded meekly, shrinking behind the bar as she leaned over it.

“Have they wronged you now? Is that enough reason for you to draw your blade Samak?”

Before he could respond, the marilith slid over towards him, looming over him and shoving her chest in his face. Samak frowned. Her body gave off no heat. Normally the demon’s upper torso was as warm as any mammalian creature, but now it was as though it wasn’t even there. The gith’s brow furrowed, and he raised a hand to touch her shoulder. The hand passed right through her tanned skin.

“The only thing keeping them from rounding on you right now is me,” she hissed, “and I’m not even here.”

The marilith laughed, and she faded from view, leaving Samak frustrated and bewildered. A projected image! It had taken him this long to realize the demon he was talking to was naught but an illusion, likely manipulating objects with telekinesis. He gritted his teeth as the cloaked githzerai rounded on him, rolling up his sleeves and snarling at him. Samak despised his distant kinsmen, but his lawful cousins could throw a mean punch, he respected them for that.

The goblin jabbered something in its own language, and the ogres turned to their employer. Samak reasoned he had twelve, fifteen seconds before the slow brutes reached him. They were uncoordinated and clumsy, and they would need to shove aside patrons and tables to reach him. The gish focused his attention at the githzerai, who trod towards him with his fists clenched.

The cloaked drunk threw an overhand blow at Samak, putting all of his weight into the strike. Samak bit his tongue and stepped inside the githzerai’s reach, shoving his shoulder into the green man’s core when he was off balance. Samak’s armored shoulder plate impacted dully into the githzerai, sprawling him. Samak had to resist the urge to draw his sword and cut the githzerai down. It was a temptation greater than anything Tezrian could offer, the chance to end one of his race’s great foes, but the consequences here would be too great. Aside from bringing the Harmonium down on him, it would prove Tezrian right, that he couldn’t deny his nature.

He reached into his pouch and drew out a handful of sand, reciting guttural arcane words. The gish crouched low and seized an empty bottle with his free hand, then threw the magically charged sand towards the prone githzerai. A plume of green smoke traveled the space between his hand and the drunk’s head, and the sleep spell took hold, magical unconsciousness claiming him. The ogres had moved quicker than he anticipated, and he cursed at them in Vlaakith’s name. Their long arms swung clubs his way, one impacting against his back and knocking him onto the unconscious githzerai.

The goblin barked, and Samak saw the repulsive creature peeking over the counter, aiming a crossbow his way. He rolled out of the way of an ogre’s kick, regaining his footing near a shrieking human girl. As he rose he hurled the bottle at the flailing ogres, casting a spell of searing light upon it. The light refracted off the bottle, blinding the brutes, who held up their meaty hands to block the searing light.

Samak bolted towards the exit, shoving aside the other drinkers, but was blocked by the half-orc Harmonium guard, who spread his arms wide and growled at him.

“Conspiritating to c’mmit murder, ‘specialy with a demon,” gurgled the burly guard, “ought to have you locked inna madhouse, just in’case.”

A crossbow bolt thudded into the floor between Samak’s feet, and the goblin ducked back behind the counter to ready another one. Samak had to act quick, before a lucky shot got him in the back, or before the ogres overcame their bedazzlement and clubbed him down. The slurring half-orc feinted high, fooling the gish, and delivered a powerful, stocky knee to his unarmored chest. Samak stumbled backwards, the air forced from his chest by the orc’s blow. He was stronger, packing more physical power into each limb than Samak had in his whole body. Unlike his cousins the githzerai, he was not an exceptional boxer, preferring to fight with a weapon in hand. The half-orc advanced on him, closing the distance while holding his arms up to guard his face. A pair of jabs struck his gut, the scrappy armor worn by the gith offering no protection from his powerful punches.

Samak stumbled backwards, winded and sporting an ugly black and blue mark, but otherwise unharmed. The orc was inside his reach, to close to risk casting a spell, lest he expose himself and catch a haymaker to the jaw. He could draw his blade, use it to parry and repulse the orc, but drawing the heavy sword would expose him just as much. Instead, he focused his thoughts on the bolt embedded in the ground, willing it to move. His kind were gifted with telekinesis, and could manipulate objects with their mind.

The bolt flew upwards, the nock striking the half-orc in his groin. A flash of pain wracked the orc, and he shut his eyes, only for the briefest moment. That moment was all Samak needed, and he reached behind his back, drawing his silver sword. The blade was a powerful artifact, magically tempered silver enchanted with numerous charms. It was capable of cutting one’s soul from their bodies, and cut deeper and more accurately then a mundane blade. However, Samak instead continued the motion of his draw, ramming the pommel of his antique sword into the half-orc’s sternum. He felt something inside his foe snap, and he lost his footing, staggering from the blow. His nostrils flaring, Samak swung the argent weapon horizontally, slamming the flat of the blade against the orc’s neck.

The attack bowled him over, sending the brawler reeling into the bar. Just as the goblin barked another order at his recovering bouncers, Samak shoved his way out the door, casting a spell to hold the portal shut, trapping his pursuers within.

Indignant rage simmered within him as he slid into a side street, sheathing his blade and adjusting his helmet. Was this the marilith’s plan from the onset? To lure him here just to force him into a bar fight? She probably hoped he would kill his attackers, and it was easily within his power to do so. The sleep spell could have been a scorching ray, the burst of light a fireball. He could have shorn the orc’s head clean off, and telekinetically sent the bolt right into the goblin’s heart. He wanted to strike Tezrian, to berate her for endangering him and all those within the alehouse. He should have expected it from Tezrian the Liar, the fiend wearing her nature on her arm.
It was easy to hate her, so easy to condemn her to the lower planes she was spawned from. Samak kicked a pile of rubbish he trudged by, imaging it the marilith’s tail. It was so easy to hate her, but he couldn’t muster the emotion within him. There were few others in the planes he felt as comfortable around, who he could expose his inner feelings to. Relationships had always been difficult for Samak, even among his own kind. The githyanki were bloodthirsty and irate, and Samak feared what opening up to his kin would mean. Somehow it was easier with Tezrian, knowing that even if he tried to stay inside himself she would draw him out, whether by guile, magic or by force. It gave him an excuse to open up, to express the frustration and confusion he felt. To the fiend’s credit, she listened, and hadn’t used their moments of privacy against him. At least, not much. But damn how she toyed with him!

“Wasn’t that exhilarating” Rang Tezrian’s voice in is mind. The gish looked around himself, even calling upon magical true sight, but could not see her. “Feeling the rush of combat, the thrill of warfare?” She must still be speaking through telepathy, he thought.

“You could have gotten me killed,” he thought back, gritting his teeth and furrowing his green brow. Normally the fiend accepted him for who he was, adored him despite his flaws. What had changed?

“Oh relax Samak, I was only having some fun, I knew you could handle things. Besides, if anything happened to you I could always step in and lend a hand or three. You cant seriously believe I would put you in any real danger and not be there to enjoy it?”

“No, you’d be unable to resist joining in. You’d kill everyone there, even the people who meant you no harm.”

“Yes, yes I would Samak, I would enjoy it, and you should too. Don’t tell me you’ve lost your passion for crossing swords? I could feel the exhilaration in your mind when you drew your blade, don’t try and hide it from me.”

“It’s like I said before. Feeling urges is different from following through on them. I thought you’d appreciate me showing the strength to be stronger than them. Just because I like to swing my sword doesn’t mean I should do it all the time.”

“So what use is your blade then? Do you polish it alone, thinking of bodies you’d like to plunge it into, denying yourself the real thing?”

He could hear the marilith snicker in his mind, images of what she referred to invading his brain.

“Come Samak, your soul quivers in anticipation when you draw your blade, why do you hold back? You can tell me this, I’ll listen. Come to me, you can sheathe that blade of yours, no tricks this time.”

“Do you expect me to believe someone who’s epithet is ‘The Liar’?”

“No, but I still hope you’ll take up the offer. I’m in the hive ward, I’ll guide you there.”

The hive ward was the slum of the ring-city, home to the poor, the rogues, the unwanted dregs of Sigil. The demon’s telepathic directions led him on a roundabout path through the ghetto, past bordellos and shacks and collector carts carrying piles of corpses. The mazelike, meandering gloomy under-streets, filled with muffled screams and muddy hands kept Samak on his guard, one hand on his blade’s handle, the other ready to conjure a haste spell. Fortunately, the only trouble he had was from panhandling azers and addled gensai, who rambled and rattled at him as he passed. She led him to the shadow of The Mortuary, the home of the morbid, necrophiliac Dustmen. Letting the demon guide him, he approached the threshold of a dilapidated shack not far from the grim location. The deathly place probably reminded her of home.

“You may enter,” the demon said in his mind. Samak shrugged his shoulders and slipped through the flimsy wooden portal. He didn’t trust Tezrian, but he wanted to. Wanted her company. There was no one else he could turn to, the backstabbing, manipulative warlord the best company he could ask for. Maybe she was right, maybe he couldn’t deny some intrinsic part of himself, some part of him that craved bloodshed and conflict. Maybe that was why he felt so comfortable with Tezrian, so at home with her.

The shack was dim, the air musty and full of dust, and it took the githyanki a moment to adjust to the light. It was empty save for a few empty barrels piled to one side, numerous strange stains coloring the woodwork. Empty, save for the demon.

There she was, again, leaning on her coils and examining a broad-bladed scimitar, her tanned skin catching the faint light in the most alluring of ways. Her dark tail blended into the shadows, making her seem a floating, six armed torso, a warlike, womanly apparition that Samak couldn’t draw his eyes from. Samak approached the marilith, this time casting a cursory spell to see if she was in fact corporeal. Satisfied that she was real, he put his hands on his hips, and stared accusingly at the demon.

“You never change, do you? I thought I meant more to you. I thought I wasn’t some toy to throw around.”

Tezrian set the blade aside and rolled her half-dozen shoulders. The demon slithered from the corner, encircling Samak in her multicolored coils. Her cold lower body wrapped around his legs, powerful muscles moving and squeezing as she slithered.

“You used to accept me for who I was. You didn’t want me to be something I’m not. You didn’t want me to massacre nobodies in the street.” Samak was unfazed as the demon circled him, keeping his eyes fixed on her sharp-featured visage. Was it raw physical attraction that kept him coming back to her? Did he overlook all her demonic traits solely because of those six dexterous hands, those firm breasts, that sly, knowing face? It had to be more than that, but as the demon entwined her scaly lower half around him it was difficult to think of anything but her appealing form.

“Hypocrite!” She hissed, rounding on him, seizing the back of his head and his elbows in her powerful grip. “I reach out to my lover after decades, and what does he do? He wants ME to change! To deny my demonhood, to be PEACEFUL! I dared not see what image you had of me in your head, I feared it would drive me to hurt you! You have the gall, the audacity to accuse me when I ask if you’ve lost your edge when your first thoughts are if you can un-demon me?”

Samak struggled against the demon, the length of her body tightening around his lower body. Her tail was strong enough to crush his bones, even if he cast a defensive spell, and he knew he had to choose his words carefully. His thoughts too needed guarding, one stray idea could make the demon crush him in her powerful grip. Samak was fortunate she did not squeeze him as hard as she could, only tight enough to cause some pain and discomfort, but he did not know how long her restraint would last.

“Did you want to make me your wife? Your concubine? A complacent, boring slave that you could twist to your own desires?” She screamed into his face, tearing off his helmet and yanking his hair. Her hands ran over him, tearing armor from his body. One hand tore the straps of his shoulder plate, then threw the pauldron aside. Another rent his harness, destroying the already piecemeal armor and leaving nothing but scraps. Her nails raked his body, leaving red marks as she took her rage out on him. Samak breathed heavily, both from the tightness around him and the adrenaline rush, but also from the heat, the closeness of the fiend. He had been wrapped in her coils before, felt those hands explore his wiry frame. They could be as gentle as they were violent, and he had come to associate the two. Tezrian’s enraged clawing was not unlike what passed for foreplay with the marilith. He couldn’t help but feel aroused, even as she raged against him, his manhood stiffening in his patchwork trousers, and he knew that the demon could feel the bulge against her tightening snake torso.

“How dare you insinuate that I should change? How dare you think that you could turn me, a tanar’ri general, from my nature?”

“Tezrian,” he said, “I didn’t think you would be so upset. There are other fiends who have done it. Who’ve turned from evil. I thought you could do it too.”

Her serpentine tail tightened, forcing the breath from the gish’s lungs. His arms were held immobile as she seized his head in four hands, forcing him to look her in the eye. Her scales felt rough against his skin, the tightness strangely comfortable and arousing despite the pain of the crushing embrace. He was like being squeezed from every angle, like a full-body hug, but far more forceful, more dangerous. Pained shivers went down his spine as Tezrian’s nails dug into his scalp,

“Who? Where? Tell me who these deserters are so that I may drag them back to the abyss and execute them myself!” The demon was in a warlike rage, her face contorted into an inhuman snarl. Samak feared she might crush him as he felt he lower body tighten even further. This was the hatred, the demonic frenzy she reserved for her enemies, for the baatezu, and Samak knew that if he didn’t act quickly his demonic lover would destroy him.

The gish called upon his arcane powers, straining to cast a spell without the use of his hands. Less martial mages would rarely attempt such a feat, but the astral warrior often needed the use of both his hands for things other than spell casting. Samak had learned to use his magic even when he wielded weapons in both hands, or when he grappled with a foe. It was an essential skill on the battlefield, even if it strained him far more to cast solely with his mind. Casting without the somatic components of the spell was frustratingly difficult, like tying a complex knot with one hand. His mind had to work twice as hard to compensate for the lack of sigils being drawn in the air, his mouth needing to utter twice as many difficult, guttural syllables to compensate for the absent runic gestures.

It burned off much of his energy, the expenditure suddenly emptying, his body shivering from the effort. The warrior-mage’s body was suddenly exhausted, feeling like he had lost days worth of sleep in a fraction of a second. He roared, and a wave of force shot from his core, blasting the marilith off of him and displacing the dust in the air around the gish. The demon impacted against the side of the shack with a loud bang, rattling the unsteady structure and causing dust to fall from the roof. Everything was silent for a moment, dust settling from the spell and the demon’s repulsion, letting Samak catch his breath before he spoke.

“This is why I wanted you to change.” His voice was heavy with the effort casting the spell required. Tezrian was a powerful demon, and casting an evocation that could affect her was no easy task. The serpent lay in a tangle of arms and coils against the wall, her skirt of sheaths askew.

“I can’t have a conversation with you without fearing for my life. And I want to have conversations with you. I want to be able to talk to you. I want to be with you Tezrian.”

The demon arose, shaking dust and splinters from her body. Her jewelry had been knocked askew by the spell, and her hair was in a mess. She slithered towards the gith again, this time slower, her lips pursed and her eyes half lidded.

“You can’t have it both ways lover,” she said, deep and husky, swaying her serpentine hips to and fro as she advanced on Samak. “I’m a dangerous girl. If you want me, and I can see how much you want me without having to probe your mind, you’re going to have to tolerate my little flaws. I love your strength Samak, and I accept all those awful little flaws you have. If you want me so badly, you’ll need to give me the same courtesy, take the good with all that bad.”

She circled him again, this time softly, tenderly wrapping him in her coils. The tip of her dark tail slid around his ankle, winding around his leg until her crotch was pressed against his. Samak’s burgeoning sex was dangerously close to the hilt of a wavy-bladed dagger, but still he could feel the heat of her body against his. Two arms wrapped around his lower back, two his shoulders, the remaining limbs cupping his chin and stroking his cheek.

“You can try that, cant you lover? We can respect each other’s natures, however much we may want to sculpt and change each other to fit our desires.”

“I can try. For you Tezrian, I can try.”

With that, the githyanki’s tired, bony arms shot up and wrapped around his serpentine lover, pulling her into a passionate embrace. His thin, nearly lipless mouth met hers in a sloppy kiss, furiously mashing his mouth against the marilith. The demon’s long tongue shot into his mouth, clashing against his like a cavalry charge. They jousted, wet muscles wrapping around each other and exploring the little crevices of each other’s mouths.

He frantically pulled and her belt, causing the array of weapons to fall from her hips and clatter around her feet. Three arms tore at his own clothes, ripping the front off of his trousers and exposing his light green manhood.

“Finally you draw your weapon,” she cooed, seizing it in two of her left hands, one cradling his sack, the other furiously rubbing his shaft. The githyanki stiffened, the marilith’s strong, dexterous hands expertly massaging his sex. He gripped her scaly rear as she played with him, resting his mohawked head against her shoulder and breathing against the demon’s neck. Her hands alternated between gentle tugs and violent squeezes, rubbing the tip between three of her fingers and rolling his testicles between four more. She handled his spear with the skill she would any other weapon, making it as hard as steel and ready to be stabbed into her. Samak was so overwhelmed by the pleasures of her hands he forgot about the proximity of her sex, and grunted in pleasant surprise when she guided his stiff member into her folds. Right at the point where her human half merged with her snake half was a special patch of scales, not unlike the others surrounding them save their slightly elongated shape. When the demon wished, they could retract, bearing her sex to the world.

It was always strange entering her, no matter how many times he did so. She was not like a githyanki woman, more like how he imagined a human female would be. Strong, wet walls gripped his member, rubbing it, expanding and contracting around the fleshy rod. Her lips clung to him, her wetness coating his sex in lubrication and allowing her to buck her hips, to take more and more of him into her demonic folds.

 He felt a shudder surge through the entirety of her body, emanating from her crotch and traveling down her elongated spine, causing the tight coils of her tail to squirm and her nubile upper half to twitch. The demon rocked back and forth, squeezing him tight with her sex, her tail and her numerous arms that encircled Samak.

“You’re the best,” Samak groaned into her neck, “nothing feels better than being surrounded by you.” One hand groped her bosom, shoving aside her heavy jewelry and grabbing a handful of breast flesh. The githyanki squeezed it hard, knowing there was no way he could hurt his demonic lover, crushing her nipple beneath his thumb than releasing it, watching it rise back to attention before repeating the process. “I know you can’t love me. I know love is something you’ll never understand. But please try, try to understand when I say I love you.”

Tezrian pushed him over, the twisted pair falling to the dusty, splintered floor with a thud. She loomed over him, gripping his shoulders and hips, two more hands seizing his and keeping them pressed to her breasts.

“Do you really want an answer from The Liar?” The arousal was audible in her voice, the slight quiver in pitch when she descended on his cock, hair hanging over her face and jewelry clanging. The throatiness, the neediness of her voice compelled Samak to thrust upwards in time with her descents, to squeeze harder on her firm breasts when he withdrew.

She uttered animalistic gasps and tightened her tail, squeezing harder and harder as she moved faster and faster up and down Samak’s penis. He gave a pained gasp, realizing another frenzy was overcoming his lover. It was hard to breathe, his heart pounding in his head as she constricted him. Already his vision was blurring as the demon let her instincts take hold. It was too much; the raw, bestial sex, the feeling of her breasts between his fingers, the loss of breathing, the strange eroticism of asphyxiation. He came violently, his body writhing and hips thrusting powerfully upwards as he shot his seed into Tezrian. The demon’s cheeks blushed and her eyes shut, inclining her head upwards and letting her mouth hang open in a rare moment of tender passion. Samak knew his lover would not be satisfied just yet, but seeing her enjoying his ejaculation filled him with pride. How many other creatures in the planes, mortal or outsider, could claim to satisfy a tanar’ri? How many could claim with certainty that they could please a greater fiend?

They had untangled themselves, Tezrian lying on her belly with the tip of her tail curled back towards her. Samak stood over her, rubbing his member and reciting the words of a simple cantrip. When the spell completed, accompanied by a pinkish sparkle that hung in the air, his cock became erect again, full of renewed virility. Tezrian licked her lips and bit one of her little fingers in anticipation, her other arms, running sensuously over her body.

“You shouldn’t keep a lady waiting,” she cooed, crooking one finger invitingly towards the githyanki. Samak needed no further prompting, descending on the marilith and sliding his weapon into her tight, wet sheath. He began his assault with renewed vigor, grabbing the demon’s hips and slamming against them. She groaned, writhing in fiendish pleasure, simultaneously rubbing her clitoris, squeezing Samak’s rear, holding the back of her head and massaging her breasts with her numerous appendages. She could not feel the attraction the mortal called love, her passions limited to the darker, more destructive spectrum of emotions. However, as she watched the wiry green mage attack her sex, stabbing deep into her soaking vagina, she felt a sort of lusty possessiveness. A desire to protect the mortal, to make him happy so he would do so in turn. It was a similar feeling to the way she saw her most skilled lieutenants. They were useful, and she respected their strength and skill. Existence would be worse for her without them. Maybe she would toss him aside when he ceased to please her, or maybe she would keep him like a trophy. Demons always had plans for the future, but true to their nature, were prone to changing them. All she knew now was that she wanted the gasping gish to keep besieging her walls, to let him assault her heat and make war against her lusts.

“I need more,” she said between gasps, “Samak I need more.” Her tail thrashed, the end of it leaning against his side. The gish tore his eyes from the writhing demoness’ upper half to see another patch of scales on her lower half move to reveal another wet, fleshy hole. Like the snakes her lower body resembled, she possessed a cloaca, a second sex near the end of her scaly posterior. Curiously shaped, it glistened with moisture, inviting the warrior to touch it, to bring the demonic general greater pleasure. “Please Samak,” she whined, uncharacteristically meek. She rubbed the open sex against him, causing her whole lower half to shiver.

Wordlessly, he inserted a pair of fingers into the gaping hole, feeling the strange tightness of her lower sex. This he was more familiar with, the reptilian organ more like what female gith sported. Curving his fingers upwards and causing the tail to twist in response, her fingered her in time with his thrusts, the demon’s muscular lower half squeezing his fingers just as hard as her again squeezed his rod. Samak focused, pulling his rod out to the tip for a moment while he collected his thoughts. Again he channeled the telekinetic force his race was gifted with, enhancing his fingers’ actions with ghostly pressure.

The demon’s back and tail arched in pleasure, the fiend speaking in abyssal tongues. Her cloaca felt just as full, just as stimulated as her sex, the telekinesis reaching all her sensitive spots. Samak renewed his volley of thrusts, both his prick and his fingers eroding her defenses, driving her frenzied lusts higher and higher. The sinewy warrior reached behind her neck and pulled the demon in for a kiss, his tongue dueling clumsily with hers.

There it was, she thought, finally she could feel it. Her telepathy went wild, sending feelings of raw lust and images of profanely sexual acts into the minds of everything within a hundred yards. The very tip of her tail wrapped around Samak’s neck, as the marilith’s own demonic orgasm arose. Roaring like an animal, she seized the gith’s sinewy, bony back, her nails digging into his skin as she screwed her eyes shut. Pleasure overcame her like a conquering army, her orgasm a victorious flag raised above the conquest of her body. Both the fiend’s dripping sexes squeezed tight on the invaders, her whole body arcing and writhing with ecstasy. The sensation was enough to bring Samak to his second orgasm, and he pulled out and sprayed his seed carelessly over Tezrian’s enhanced abdomen.

When the frenzy of cumming finally left Tezrian, her powerful muscles finally relaxing, she released the exhausted githyanki from her six-fold grip. He had needed far more magic than she knew, imbuing himself with the strength of the bear and the stamina of the bull before remounting the reptilian woman. The planar pair lay in each other’s arms, one wiry and green, the other strong and tan. Both slick with sweat and other fluids, they fought for air in the musty, dusty shack.

Samak was the first to escape the afterglow, breaking the ceasefire of silence with a salvo of words.

“I can try Tezrian. By Vlaakith ill do my best to accept your nature. Ill do it all for you Tezrian, if only you give me the same courtesy.”

The marilith played with her necklaces as she thought of a response, trying vainly to untangle the jewelry. Another hand petted Samak’s head, teasing the brown, strawlike strands of his mohawk between her dextrous fingers. Her head rested against three more, her fifteen knuckles supporting her sharp chin.

“For you lover? I wont ask you to change for me, as long as that awful emotion that controls your heart does not. You may be strong enough to deny parts of your nature, but that is one that I ask you do not.”

Tezrian's arms ran over her lover, caressing his sinewy body. Eventually her wandering hands went over his shoulders and up his arms, until her hand met his. Their fingers interlocked, Samak's bony palms sweaty from exertion. Tezrian's grip was strong, assured, the grip of a warrior who was always ready to handle a weapon, even after a night of carnal passion. They held each other, the demon's four extra arms embracing her bony lover's body and hugging him tight. Samak noticed he could not feel a heartbeat, or even any breathing, from the demon, just a powerful, fiery heat that emanated from within her. Her firm bosom was squished flat against his chest, and her head curled against his neck, the demon maximizing contact with the gish.

Samak sighed, at home in the fiend's arms. “So I do mean something to you then?” He said as she nuzzled him, her flexible tongue tasting the sweat on his body.

“Of course lover, of course. Nothing could change that.”