The Magic Fart

Chapter 7—Oubliette

Prior woke early next morning, invigorated. He had taken a thorough shower and cleaned up, but forgotten to remove the Spire from his groin. “Did you facilitate my rest?” he inquired.

YES, it gouted. YOU FACE A CHALLENGE BEYOND YOUR MEANS. IT WILL BE EASIER TO SAVE YOUR SORRY ANUS IF YOU ARE IN GOOD HEALTH.

“I appreciate the vote of confidence.”

YOU WILL NEED TO WEAR ME IN YOUR COLON, SO THAT YOUR FARTS SEEM GENUINE.

That did not appeal phenomenally. “Let’s wait until the time.”

YOU MUST TAKE THE STATUE PATH.

“But that’s three thousand miles away!”

WHAT IS YOUR POINT?

Prior sighed. He made the arrangements and shut down his house. He was fortunate in being able to catch a flight for the following day. He was afraid the Spire would want to seduce every woman they encountered along the way, but it, oddly, seemed as eager to get there as he was, and behaved.

In due course Prior arrived at the home/office of Oubliette Emdee, who had set him up with the socket and assorted prosthetic penises. It wasn’t her fault that he had had little use for them the past year, because of lack of a girlfriend.

It was late when he arrived, even allowing for the time change, but there was a light on at her house. He knocked on the door, hoping she would not be annoyed by the intrusion.

She recognized him instantly. “Prior Gross! So good to see you. How’s the plumbing?” She was as luscious and businesslike as ever, wearing a kneelength skirt and her halter formed from her own long tresses. That was a trick her sister Tantamount had had too. It was marvelous the way her fine breasts bobbed with the motions of her head.

“Uh, yes,” he said, feeling awkward.

I WANT HER.

Oh, no! The Spire had come to life.

“What’s the matter, Prior?” she asked, concerned. “Is there a malfunction? Let me see.” She led him into the house and sat him on her patient’s table.

“Not exactly,” he said.

NOW.

Meanwhile she was opening his fly. The Spire sprang out, its full length standing tall.

“You have the Spire!” Oubliette exclaimed, delighted. “Oh, I must sample him!”

“But I’m here on business,” Prior protested. “I need to walk the path.”

“You can catch me up on everything while we share the Spire,” she said. She touched the tip with a finger, and was rewarded with a trace gout. “Set yourself on slow small pulses,” she said to it, and kissed the tip. “I’ll be with you in a moment.” She led Prior to a couch, pulled his pants off, drew her skirt down and off, and joined him on the cushions, expertly fitting her contours to his.

The Spire entered her immediately, sliding slowly into her deep vagina. It was a foot long, and broad at the base, so was more than any normal woman could handle.

“Slowly dear, slowly,” she said to it. “I’ll accommodate.” And she did.

The Spire penetrated a careful nine inches, then commenced slow pulsing as her interior gradually adapted to its expansive pressure. She intended to take it all in, but would have to stretch somewhat. Prior suspected there was some softening element in the gout substance that enabled her to take it in without discomfort.

The Spire pulsed, like the beating of a heart, sending out tiny gouts, and each pulse delivered a surge of bliss to Prior and surely to Oubliette too; he felt her channel matching the cadence.

“Oh, you darling creature,” she breathed, still speaking to the Spire. “I have longed for you all my life, and now at last I feel your glory in my center. You are every woman’s fondest dream, you most marvelous of members.”

The Spire was pleased with the flattery; Prior felt its pleasure as his own. Oubliette wasn’t just praising it; she was serious.

“Now tell me all, from the start,” she said to Prior, kissing him. He knew the kiss was really for the Spire, but it was nevertheless wonderful. She was man’s dream of a woman, and it was great to have her so affectionate and obliging, despite his knowledge that it was really his member she loved rather than him personally. The cosmic dildo. “Give it to me. Take your time.” That was addressed to both man and phallic instrument. She surely knew that the Spire could communicate directly to her via its gouts, but was doing Prior the courtesy of letting him tell it. She was nice in a way her sister Tantamount hadn’t been. She also wanted to extend her session with the magic phallus, knowing that he would soon be moving on.

So while the Spire pulsed and the woman’s deep well responded, Prior talked. “The succubus who started it all a year ago has been visiting me every few weeks. I call her Suzie. She’s been sort of a girlfriend, because she knows I’ll deliver a load and not tell her supervisor that I wasn’t asleep. She’s not supposed to come to conscious men, maybe because then news of what her kind is doing would spread and people would be on guard. But we have an understanding. She gives me a really good time, and I give her a load or two, and we both pretend it never happened.”

“Or two?” Oubliette inquired, internally stroking the organ within her while distending elastically to take more of it in. She had very special anatomy.

“She’s learned to use a condom, so she can take my emission without having to change to incubus form and deliver it to a sleeping woman. That way she can stay the night, drawing a second or even a third from me in the course of a few hours, and I get the feel of a loving woman. Sure, I know it’s pretense, but that’s her role, to be my lover in exchange for the extra loads. It’s not that she’s nice, because she isn’t, but that I recover faster and deliver more if I have the illusion it’s a loving relationship. She’s getting good at it; sometimes I do think she cares.”

“A demoness? I think not. They have no souls, no conscience, no love. They do what they have to, to get what they need.”

“They don’t need love?”

“All the sexual demons need is semen. But they are good actors.”

“Well, I guess it’s an act I need. I really crave a woman to love, who loves me back. She makes a decent substitute. She assumes different appearances, pretending to be women or girls who find me irresistible. I go for that. It’s an association of convenience.”

“Poor man,” she said sympathetically. “But with the assortment of members I gave you, you should be able to impress women.”

“I want a woman who wants me for myself, not my fancy penis. A woman like you.” He paused. “I mean, not you yourself, but—”

“One who matches my appearance, intelligence, and personality, but who isn’t all tied up in her profession. Who would have time for you.”

“That’s it. I know it’s a foolish dream.”

She sighed, and the motion extended into her vagina, generating another wave of feeling around the Spire. “Prior, you’re a decent man, and you have considerable courage, as your adventure on Mt. Icecream demonstrated. You’d make any woman a good if dull husband. If I were looking for a regular man, I’d consider you. But I’m not, and it wouldn’t be fair to you to pretend otherwise.”

“I understand. But decent men don’t get the girls. It’s the big, strong, handsome, rich men who have girl appeal.”

“Yes, of course. It’s our nature to desire that sort of thing, just as it is the nature of men to desire women like me and my sister.”

“Tantamount,” he agreed.

“I could have gone for her, if she hadn’t ripped off my penis.”

Oubliette smiled. “But you repaid her for that, didn’t you! She had to vacate her practice and relocate.”

“So I gathered. There were trucks loading smegma at her house.”

She smiled again, the expression seeming to reflect internally as her flesh caressed the member pressing into her. “I must confess it was a fitting revenge. She wanted your smegma, and you gave her more than she could handle. That did alienate her.”

“I guess so. Maybe I overdid it.”

“Put it this way, Prior: if you were the last man on Earth, and she the last woman, she would chain you to a wall, rip off your penis, stuff dirt in your socket, and do a sexy striptease just out of your reach. Then she would consider how best to humiliate you.”

He nodded, experiencing a twinge of guilt. He had behaved badly. “Can’t say I blame her.”

“She swore me to secrecy about her situation, especially with respect to you.”

He had figured as much. “So when Suzie said my ideal woman was in trouble, I just had to try to rescue her. It could be my only chance.”

“Who is this ideal woman?”

“I don’t know. Just that she’s the Maiden in the Tower, in a weird land called Fartingale. I have a week to rescue her, if I’m going to. So I’m on my way.”

Her body tensed, and not because she had taken the Spire in another inch. “Any clue to her identity?”

“None. I don’t think Suzie knew either. But she wouldn’t lie to me. My ideal woman, whoever she is, has been abducted and is captive, and I can rescue her if I act in time.”

“I have heard of Fartingale. It’s one of the worlds the Statue Path accesses. An uncouth place.”

“The Spire told me. Farts are a way of life there.”

“She would absolutely hate it. She must be rescued.”

“You know the maiden?” he asked, surprised.

“I know her type. Every week they kidnap some innocent shapely woman and set her up for a year’s sex slavery to the man who wins her. They don’t mind if she’s horrified; in fact they like to see a maiden react. It adds to the pleasure of the man who abuses her. Certainly you must rescue her and take her away from there.”

Now he had doubts. “But you know, if she really is beautiful, she might prefer one of those other men to me.”

“Not if you touch her with the Spire.”

“But I want her to want me for myself!”

“Prior, Prior,” she said gently as her avenue stroked the Spire with its special peristalsis. The godly spike was almost completely into her now; she had expanded enough to accommodate its full length and girth. She had truly amazing anatomy. “These things take time. Do you suppose you would have me like this at this moment if it weren’t for the Divine Dildo? Capture her sexuality with the Spire, then maintain the association until she gets to know the rest of you. You will have to use the prime weapon, or you will inevitably lose her.”

He wasn’t sure how she could be so sure, but he trusted her judgment. “Use the Spire,” he agreed. It was surely excellent advice.

“And practice your approach. The way you treated my sister is a fine example of how not to treat a woman whose favor you desire. Take that as a guide. Don’t be yourself. After you tame her with the Cosmic Horn of Delight, focus on how nice you can be to her in other respects, and how decent you can be generally. That will give you at least a fighting chance to hold her when you no longer have the Spire.”

Her estimate of his potential to charm a woman was not reassuring, but he knew she was being realistic. “Work on my decency,” he agreed.

“Now let’s see what we can accomplish here,” she said. “Let’s make some real love.” She put her arms around him, drawing him tightly in to her so that her breasts flattened against him, and kissed him ardently as her vulva closed around and over his shaft. This was a piece of heaven; she was everything any man could ever desire. He responded, kissing her back, pressing his groin into hers, pretending she was really his woman.

But the real action was inside. She had entirely surrounded the Spire, and was squeezing it urgently. She was going into her orgasm, trying to take the divine phallus with her. Prior felt it all; it was like riding a storm that was centered on his embedded member. His own climax was coming; he couldn’t have helped it if he had wanted to.

And between them, they got to the Spire. It was billions of years old, made to service the wives and mistresses of the Eldest God of the Galaxy; it could spout any substance in unlimited quantity. But it was of demonic origin; it lacked true feelings of its own. Until this moment.

Oubliette went into the full throes of her orgasm, drawing Prior along. She clutched him closely, kissing him fiercely, convulsing around his member. And the Spire responded. It built into its own involuntary orgasm, which was of course what the woman had been trying for. She wanted more than the keen pleasure of its touch and ejaculate; she wanted its own joy of union. She was getting it. The Spire came. It erupted in an unbearably intense pulse of rapture, jetting with abandon. It exploded with the semblance of a supernova, flinging its passion outward. It was the éclat of the birth of the universe, with infinite energy and matter radiating out from an infinitely small center. The pinpoint swelled to a glob, the glob to sphere the size of a planet, the planet to a star, and the star to a nebula. This was the primeval pinwheel, the domain of the Eldest God of the Galaxy. Thereafter the galaxy expanded to a universe, but the terminology remained. The universe stretched out, cooling, until it was mostly vacuum, a relatively dull place. Out in the hinterland they hardly even knew of the greatness of EGG or of his divine copulatory pipe. But its power remained, for those few able to harness it.

Prior came out of his instant eon of orgasmic rapture to discover him self still embracing Oubliette, the Spire still nestled inside her, dribbling its last spasm of protoplasm. The two of them were floating in a viscous sea. The Spire’s orgasm had pumped out enough juice to overflow her deep vagina and leak out into the room, which was now two thirds full.

“Spire!” Oubliette said in mock reproof as she tread thick water. “You overestimated my capacity.”

APOLOGY, the Spire gouted.

She laughed. “I made you come, didn’t I! Who was the last woman to accomplish that?”

EGG’S FAVORITE CONCUBINE, SEVERAL BILLION YEARS AGO. WHAT A CREATURE SHE WAS! A LOT LIKE YOU.

“I am surely her direct descendant,” Oubliette agreed, not trying to conceal her satisfaction. “But you have ruined my carpet. Now clean it up this instant.”

THAT’S WHAT THE CONCUBINE SAID. I SHALL HAVE TO WITHDRAW FROM YOUR DELIGHTFUL CHAMBER.

“Parting is such sweet sorrow,” she agreed. “I would really like to keep you within me forever, you utterly divine implement, but to do that I’d have to retire and marry Prior, and the carpet would stink. I’m not ready for that.”

“Let it stink,” Prior muttered. But Oubliette was already releasing the Spire; he felt it easing along her channel, inch by inch, as the two of them continued to float connected.

“Farewell, dear,” Oubliette said as the tip of the Spire finally slid out of her belly. Her labia closed on it in a parting nether kiss.

FAREWELL, DIVINE MORTAL.

The Spire, also, hated to separate; it had not encountered a woman her equal in billions of years.

“How can you clean this up?” Prior asked it, stifling his unreasonable jealousy. “I thought you gouted only outward.”

TRUE. I SHALL HAVE TO GOUT A CLEANER. POINT ME AWAY FROM THAT PERFECT WOMAN.

The Spire was out, but Prior was still embracing Oubliette, feeling her wonderful breasts against his chest within their mutual bath of thick fluid. “I have to let you go,” he said reluctantly.

“Of course, Prior,” she agreed. She kissed him again, and it seemed to make his head float better. She truly could have been his ideal woman, had she had the inclination. But he had always known she was well beyond him in every respect that counted. Which increased the mystery of the succubus’ message: how could there be a woman anywhere near as good for him as this one, who would have any real interest in him? It seemed impossible.

Then they parted and floated separately. Prior turned around and aimed the cosmic dildo toward the center of the filled room. “Ready,” he said, uncertain what was coming.

A weird bolus fired out of the member, churning the fluid in its vicinity. Prior couldn’t see it through the opacity of the substance, but the surface dipped and formed a whirlpool leading into it. The level of the fluid descended. Soon they were able to stand, as the tide ebbed down past their chests to their waists. He couldn’t help gazing at Oubliette’s perfectly shaped breasts as they emerged from the bath; her hair halter had come undone in the throes of the rapture. They hardly needed such support, upstanding despite their mass. She saw him looking, and smiled understandingly.

The level dropped below their crotches, uncovering the Spire. It was flaccid, an unusual state for it; it truly had climaxed and was quiescent, apart from the bolus it had emitted. That continued to draw in fluid, making a sucking sound as air also went into it. “What is that thing?” Prior asked.

A SMALL BLACK HOLE, it gouted.

“A black hole!” Prior exclaimed. “That’s dangerous.”

“Do not be alarmed,” Oubliette said. “The Spire knows what he’s doing.”

“I hope so.” Prior retreated to the side of the room. He knew that a black hole had so much gravity that nothing escaped it, not even light, and indeed this one was a blob of darkness. Its event horizon was only about three inches across, but it was gulping in fluid at a phenomenal rate. It had been more like one inch before; it was growing as it fed.

Before long all the liquid was gone. The black hole started to consume the floor.

“My carpet!” Oubliette protested.

“Do something,” Prior told the Spire. “Before it comes after us.”

AIM ME AT IT.

Prior lifted the limp member and pointed it at the black hole. Another bolus emerged, this one a blindingly bright pinpoint of light. It flew toward the black hole and circled it, caught in its gravity well. It spiraled in, ever more rapidly, until it disappeared into the event horizon. Then the black hole abruptly faded out.

“What was that?” Prior asked, amazed.

A WHITE HOLE. THEY MERGED OUT INTO NOTHING.

“I never heard of a white hole!”

YOUR CULTURE IS SCIENTIFICALLY BACKWARD, FORTUNATELY.

“I’ll have to replace the carpet,” Oubliette said crossly.

Prior had a bright idea. “Spire—”

AGREED. AIM ME.

Prior held it up, pointing it at the center of the room. It convulsed, and from it shot a mass of substance. The mass flattened as it extended, becoming colorful. It reached the far side of the room, then broadened as it sank to the floor, showing a furry surface. It was a new carpet!

The material kept spewing out, until finally it settled across the entire chamber. It wasn’t just a rug; it was an enormously elaborate Persian carpet featuring an intricately woven picture of an ancient sultan making out with six luscious bare concubines simultaneously. That was quite a trick; his penis, tongue, both index fingers and both big toes were embedded in their open vaginas. Complicating the picture was a handsomely garbed woman just coming on the scene, surely his wife, who would demand equal service. What did he have left for her?

“That’s the famous King’s Dilemma carpet!” Oubliette exclaimed. “It was stolen a thousand years ago. It was reputed to be magic.”

SORRY ABOUT THAT, the Spire gouted. IT WAS WHAT WAS AVAILABLE. YES, IT IS A FLYING CARPET.

Prior repeated its message to her.

“I’ll take it!” Oubliette said. “Oh, thank you, thank you!” She dropped to her knees and kissed the Spire. It quivered, recovering some erotic ambition. Perceiving that, she put her mouth around it and drew it in, farther and farther, while Prior stood in place, feeling rather left out. She kept working it in until almost the whole of it was down her throat. Only the thick base remained outside, too broad for her delicate mouth to compass. But she kept sucking and swallowing, silently urging it to perform.

The Spire was flattered; Prior felt its feeling. Oubliette truly understood it and liked it for its history as well as its capacity to deliver sexual pleasure. It gouted. Prior felt a surge of bliss jet from it and forge into her stomach. She had indeed evoked its potency again. Joy surged into her innards, so much better than the finest food or drink, transporting Prior as well in passing. She was getting a meal of divine seminal fluid, filling her stomach much as the meter maid had gotten her colon filled. It would surely last her a long time, giving pleasure as it progressed along her alimentary system in the course of the next few days.

The last gout faded. She drew her head back slowly, once again letting the long shaft slide out, adoring it on the way. Again, as the tip appeared, she kissed it. “Thank you, Spire,” she murmured. “For everything.”

It gouted again, sending a thin stream between her lips. WHEN I AM DONE WITH PRIOR, PERHAPS I COULD RETURN TO BE IN YOUR LABORATORY.

“Oh, yes, yes, Spire!” she said dreamily, licking the goo from her lips. “Welcome anytime. My business is artificial penises; you are the ultimate in that respect.”

OF COURSE.

It seemed they had made a date. Prior still felt somewhat isolated. “Maybe we should clean up.”

Her fair visage clarified. She became aware of him. “Of course, Prior. This way.” She led him to her bathroom, where they had a steamy shower together and washed each other off. She paid him a lot of attention and hugged him several times, stroking her soapy breasts across him. He knew she was trying to make him feel better, and it was effective.

She also cautioned him again about dealing with the anonymous Maiden in the Tower. “She surely resents being abducted and put on exhibition like that. She may be angry at the man who wins her. That’s understandable. Don’t give her a chance to reject you; touch her with the Spire. She will then want sex, of course, and you will oblige her. But remember she is your ideal woman; you want to win her favor, not merely use her. Treat her as you would the woman you love, so as to win her love. Only then will she truly be yours.”

“Uh, sure,” he agreed, uncertain why she was orienting so firmly on this aspect. Why should she care whether he won his ideal woman? To make sure he didn’t decide he wanted Oubliette herself? But she knew he knew she was hopelessly out of his reach.

“You seem doubtful of my motive,” she said. “Perhaps this will clarify it: you are the one who carries the Spire. If you don’t bring him back to me, I won’t have him.”

That did make sense. “I won’t need it, once I have my ideal woman.”

“Exactly. I want you to win her.” She gave him a last luxurious embrace and kiss, then stepped out of the shower. She had to find him new clothes, because his were sopping. Fortunately she had a fair supply, perhaps from male clients. “Maybe you should be anonymous, too,” she said. “You have grown a mustache, which changes your face; that’s good. Maybe some gray tint to your sideburns will make you look older.”

“Why should I be anonymous?”

“Because it could be a trap. Maybe someone there knows you have the Spire, and wants to take him from you. You must not give them that chance.”

That did make sense. He let her tint his hair, and cut it so that it changed the apparent shape of his face. By this time it was late.

“I shouldn’t ask, I know it,” she said. “But the Spire is just so—so—”

He opened his new trousers and drew it out. She embraced him standing, feeding the Spire up under her skirt and into her pantyless cleft. It remained not fully erect, having been softened by her considerable prior attentions, but it stiffened as it encountered her flesh, and in a moment sent a nice gout up into her. She thrilled once more to its offering. Then she kissed Prior again and showed him to his room for the night.

Tomorrow he would set out on the statue path. That was bound to be its own challenge.

Chapter 8—Farting off

Veil had seen more than she cared to of the ways of Fartingale, but realized that she had to learn more. The better she understood the contestants, the better equipped she would be to deal with them. So she would have to watch more of them coming up.

She got Chance squared away, then watched that day’s contests. This time there were female challengers. The first one advanced on the male demon awaiting her. Both were naked, according to the competition rules. She was full breasted, actually more than full; her breasts sagged somewhat, borne down by their own masses, but were surely quite appealing to the male eye. She embraced him, pressing those big breasts against his chest. “You’re such a virile hunk of a man,” she said, farting enthusiastically. “I want to have a piece of you.”

The demon’s penis twitched as he let an answering fart; she had pushed a male button. But it did not become erect.

“Lie down here,” she said, taking him by the hand. He obeyed, lying on his back. She kneeled beside him, her long black hair falling to cover him like a blanket, and stroked her hands across his chest and belly. “Oh, yes,” she said. “You have a great big cock. I want to get it in my cunt.”

Veil did not like the gutter terminology, but evidently it didn’t bother the demon. His member swelled to half mast. Many men did like to hear women talk dirty.

“And handsome too,” she continued, stroking his face. She kissed him on the mouth, lingeringly, her hair forming a tent across his face. The penis grew another notch. Yes, he was indeed programmed to respond to certain key stimuli.

The woman stroked his belly again, this time descending to his member. She lifted it in her fingers, admiring it, then put her mouth to it. She licked its tip, circled the glans with her tongue, and took it into her mouth. She sucked competently on it, and it swelled farther. “Your virility has got me all worked up,” she said. “Fuck me, before I die of deprivation.” She lay on the bed beside him, lifting and spreading her legs invitingly.

The demon obliged. He got on her and inserted his penis an inch. “Oh, what a great pecker!” she said. “It just makes my pussy so hot. I’ve never had a better one in me. Give me some more, you manly man.”

These were the correct words. The demon drove in another inch. Veil was impressed, not with the woman’s too-obvious ploys, but with the precision of the control of the demon. He was doing exactly what the manual required for a given stimulus, not more, not less. He was now in about halfway, his member half visible.

“Oh, you’re teasing me with that monster,” the woman said. “Don’t make me suffer longer! Shove your big lusty cock all the way into my hot wet cunt!”

The demon obliged. The woman moaned in simulated passion and wrapped her legs around him. “Fuck me harder!” she begged. “Pull it out, shove it in! Fuck me into my biggest orgasm. Jet your cum right into my eager crack!”

Again the demon obliged, thrusting repeatedly while she expressed continuing delight at his prowess. Veil nodded; the average man would do that, enjoying the experience even if he knew she was faking. The average man hardly cared whether the woman got any satisfaction out of the interaction, just as long as she was comely and willing. Or even if she wasn’t willing. The mere availability of a vagina sufficed to put him into action.

The demon climaxed, pulling his penis out at the last moment so the spectators could see it jet. The woman had made him come within the time limit, and had qualified.

Except that there was another woman on the scene. She had long fair hair. That seemed to be a thing with the women of this culture: hair that was at least a yard long, worn loose. Veil realized that her own four foot long hair might have been an element in her desirability as a potential sex slave. Except that her captor had arranged to conceal it. That was an oddity; couldn’t he have masked only her face?

Now the new woman approached the demon. “Normal sex is so boring,” she said, farting sweetly. “I’ll show you some kinky fun.”

The demon merely looked at her. If she failed to make him climax on time, he would surely have some kinky fun with her. After seeing what the demoness had done to the losing male, Veil didn’t care to guess what the demon would do to a helpless woman. So she found herself hoping that the woman would win through, despite her misgiving over the presence of any women in this contest. What would a woman want with another woman for a sex slave? She had to be an aggressive lesbian that other lesbians couldn’t tolerate. Veil did not want to be the plaything of a brute man, but she was more averse to being the plaything of a twisted woman.

“Try some of this,” the woman said, taking the demon’s two hands. She planted them on her breasts, beneath her flowing tresses. “Squeeze them.” He did. His penis thickened a notch; men did like to handle breasts. “And this,” she said, taking his right hand and putting it to her mouth. She sucked on his thumb. His penis grew a bit more.

Now that was interesting, Veil thought. The thumb was an analogy of the penis; figuratively this was penis into vagina. The fact that it made him respond indicated that the demons were programmed for figurative as well as literal.

“And this,” the woman said as she lay on the bed and lifted her legs. She brought his hand in to her genital region and slid his damp thumb into her vagina. “How’s that feel, big man?” she asked as she worked it back and forth. She hardly needed to inquire; his penis had risen to half mast. The analogy was now only half analogy, as her vagina was the real thing. But where was she leading?

“Now let’s get serious,” the woman said. “Lie there.” Obligingly, he lay on his back on the bed. She put her right thumb in her own mouth and worked it around. Then she put it to his anus, stroking it with saliva. “Loosen up that pucker, big man.” He did, letting a fart swish out. She pushed her thumb into his rectum.

Well, this was different, Veil thought. But some men did like to be penetrated by women, in a kind of turnabout. Indeed, the demon’s member stiffened the rest of the way. He was programmed for kinky sex too. But though his penis was now fully erect, she couldn’t get it into her without removing her thumb.

She didn’t try. Instead she bestrode him, facing away from his head, and brought his hand around and forced his thumb up her own anus. “Push it in there, deep as you can,” she told him. He pushed, and it penetrated its full short length. Now they had exchanged asses, as it were.

Finally she put her head down and sucked on his phallus, framing it with her hair. At the same time her thumb was pumping in and out of his rectum, and his was doing the same with hers. She hollowed her cheeks, applying strong vacuum.

The triple stimulation was effective. In a moment the demon climaxed. His groin jumped as he thrust deeper into her mouth. His orgasm was manifest.

As his member spurted, she spat it out, so that it jetted on his own belly. She had made him come; this was the proof. But she left her thumb in his rectum, and kept his in hers for a moment longer, evidently enjoying the feel of both. Yes, she was into kinky sex. But she had defeated the demon.

Veil thought about that. The woman had never had the demon’s penis in her vagina. She had put his thumb in her mouth, then in her vagina, and then into her rectum, and her thumb into his rectum. But she had finished him off with her mouth. This could mean that she didn’t like having a man’s member in her key orifice. Yet the way she had indulged in other interactions suggested that she was turned on by penetration. She might be seeking a woman to penetrate, in her peculiar fashion.

Veil had no intention of subjecting herself to that. Far easier to deal with a man, who generally lost interest after he jetted.

Now it was time for the two women to settle with each other. They would not be having sex, according to the rules, but a farting off, as the announcer explained. The winner would be the candidate for the day. Veil watched with a certain fascinated aversion.

They entered a spherical wire cage that rested on a wider floor. The door was latched. The two women faced each other, having room enough to stand but not to get more than an arm’s length away from each other. They grappled. There was no scratching or hair pulling; this was not a fight but a competition. The first woman, who had seduced the demon in normal fashion, was of slighter build despite her larger breasts, and seemed to be at a disadvantage. Indeed, Kinky soon wrestled Normal to the floor, holding her upper body down by the weight of her body.

But neither was holding down the point. This was a farting contest, and Veil was more than curious to see how it proceeded. She knew there had to be some other move.

There was. Kinky, having pinned her opponent, wrestled around to get her posterior into place for an effective discharge. But Normal slid out from under, clasped her from behind, and rode her as she struggled to her feet.

After a moment, Normal dropped off and the two women faced each other again. “What happened there?” Veil asked.

“The prospective fart hold was broken,” the announcer replied. “They wound up in a neutral position, from which neither could prevail. There’s a fifteen minute time limit; if neither wins within that time, both lose. So there’s no point in maintaining a bad position; they break and start over.”

That made sense. Now came the second grappling. This time Normal made a sudden leap, caught the top of the cage, and swing her legs across to clamp on Kinky’s head. That would put her anus directly into position. But Kinky countered by ducking down, and Normal missed the hold.

Kinky whirled and grabbed her from behind as she dropped down, swinging her around and lowering her to the floor. This time she had a better hold, and got her knees on Normal’s arms so that her own arms could fend off Normal’s attempt to bring her feet up for another head clamp. She slid forward, getting her bottom over Normal’s face. Her anus dropped down close. It fluttered.

And Normal jerked her head up and plastered her mouth against that opening hole. She blew. Hard. Air pumped into the rectum, inflating it, diluting the fart gas.

“Nice ploy!” the announcer said enthusiastically. “Perfect timing.”

Veil had to agree. But to put one’s mouth tightly against another person’s anus—that was dedication of a sort she herself would muster only with the greatest difficulty.

Kinky held her position, and in a moment Normal’s lungs gave out and she had to let her head drop back to the floor. Now Kinky blew out her voluminously augmented fart, bathing Normal’s face, and jumped off. The referee began the count. One. Two. Three. Four. Five.

Normal rolled to her feet and stood unsteadily. She had been stunned by the diluted gas, but not sufficiently to knock her out for the full count. Kinky did not go after her immediately, because she had expended her gas and needed time to regenerate. That gave Normal time to recover fully.

“Why didn’t she hold her opponent down?” Veil asked.

“The requirement is that the fart alone must knock the other out,” the announcer explained. “The count doesn’t start until there is no body contact. That’s why there are no fists or hard throws; they might contribute to the knockout, disqualifying it. This is a fart off, nothing else.”

“But there is a time limit,” Veil said. “Yes, so they will go at it again soon. But now one has depleted her gas, while the other maintains hers. The advantage has shifted.”

So it seemed. Normal stalked Kinky, looking for a takedown and hold. Then Kinky moved rapidly, catching her by arm and leg and pushing her to the floor. She dropped on Normal’s belly so hard that the air whooshed out of her mouth.

“Trying to squeeze out her fart,” the announcer explained. “It didn’t work; she kept her sphincter tight.”

Another interesting ploy. There was obviously some sophistication in these contests.

Kinky continued to hold Normal down, as she extended one arm and put her hand on the woman’s crotch. She tried to get her finger into Normal’s anus, to force it open so that it released its gas, but Normal locked her legs tightly together, preventing the other from achieving the necessary leverage. Meanwhile her own hands were moving around somewhat ineffectively.

Kinky gave it up and started to get up—and found herself entangled. Normal had knotted the end of her hair to Kinky’s hair, and their two heads were linked together. Now Normal lifted one leg, passed her foot the other side of the hair connection, and brought it down again. Kinky’s head was yanked down toward Normal’s belly. Normal put her two hands onto the head and pushed it down into her crotch—just as she let fly with her fart. Kinky was caught. She tried to hold her breath, but Normal tickled her ribs and she had to inhale to scream. She got a lungful and passed out. Normal quickly untied the hair and got to her feet. The referee counted off ten seconds. She had won the fart off. Veil concluded that she didn’t want to be this woman’s plaything either.

Chapter 9—Trail

Prior set out along the Eeg trail in the morning. Oubliette had outfitted him with a knapsack and supplies, taking a solicitous interest in his welfare. He wondered why. She was a nice person, true, and she wanted to safeguard the Spire, but he knew she had little interest in him apart from that. There was something else. She had gotten an excellent sexual workout from the Spire, but even that did not quite account for her friendly attention. What else was she after? He trusted her; she would not do anything contrary to his welfare. But there was something.

WHAT A WOMAN, the Spire gouted.

“But what is on her mind?”

I REGRET I AM NOT A MIND READER. I CAN PICK UP YOUR THOUGHTS BECAUSE YOU ARE ATTACHED TO ME, BUT I COULD NOT PENETRATE HER UNVOICED THOUGHTS. JUST ASPECTS OF HER MOOD. I AGREE THERE IS SOMETHING. NOT BAD, NO ILL WILL, JUST CURIOUS. THERE IS SOMETHING SHE WANTS ALMOST AS MUCH AS POSSESSION OF ME, THAT PERHAPS YOU CAN FACILITATE. THAT IS THE LIMIT OF MY UNDERSTANDING.

“Well, I hope I can facilitate it, and make her happy.” They came to the first statue. This was a lovely nude woman, her arms spread invitingly, her lips puckered for a kiss. He had seen that expression before; it meant she was expecting him. “You know how to relate to the statues?” he asked the Spire.

OF COURSE. THEY ARE THE BASTARD OFFSPRING OF THE DEMONS OF THE FORMER CHERRY TREE, RENDERED INTO IMMOBILITY AND PLACED IN ASSORTED PARKS.

“Yes, of course. I mean, according to Oubliette I need their help in finding the way to Fartingale. That means—”

CERTAINLY. THAT MEANS ANIMATING THEM, WHICH CAN BE DONE ONLY SEXUALLY. LEAVE IT TO ME. I WILL ANIMATE THEM AS NEVER BEFORE.

“Good enough.” Prior unlimbered the cosmic dildo and let it project from the front of his trousers. He stepped into the lady statue. He kissed her stone cold lips, and they warmed slightly. Then the Spire found the place and slid into her hard cleft, which instantly softened. It penetrated her melting vagina and gouted, once. Suddenly she was fully warm and animate.

“Oh, you marvelous man!” she exclaimed, kissing him fervently. “You have made a woman of me.”

“It’s the Spire,” he said, knowing that the magic phallus had indeed done a job beyond the ability of any mortal man. When he had made out with her before, it had been a rather slow, difficult process, and she had spoken only one word before returning to stone.

“I know that, silly. I meant that you brought him to me. No one ever did that before. However can I reward you?” She hugged him closely, pressing her statuesque breasts against him.

“Just tell me the way to Fartingale.”

She made a stony moue. “Stay here with me, and I’ll give you much better sex than those smelly sluts.”

“I have to go there to rescue my ideal woman.”

“I could be your ideal woman, if you just keep My Lord Spire close.” She guided one of his hands down to stroke her firm bare bottom. She wanted to argue?

“I’m sure you could, but I fear my destiny is there.”

She pouted. “Oh, very well. I have put the path right. Go your way. But when you return—”

“You get another gout.”

“Exactly.” She kissed him again, ardently. It was almost possible to believe that she could indeed be suitable for him. Motivation was so important in a woman.

Then he drew the Spire out, and she reverted rapidly to stone. But there was a hint of rapture on her face; some of the Spire’s gout remained in her crevice.

The trail did not seem to have changed, but Prior took it on faith. The next statue was a man, as he remembered, but he thought might be a different one. The other had wanted anal intercourse, which was not Prior’s taste when it was his own anus in question.

I WILL DO IT, the Spire gouted.

Prior unlimbered the phallus of the Eldest God and approached the statue. He put the tip of the Spire to the statue’s rear crevice. It found the place and nudged in, issuing a gout. The statue came to life.

“I recognize that gout!” he said. “The Spire!”

“We’re going to Fartingale.”

“On your way,” the man agreed. The Spire withdrew, and the man became stone. His smile remained fixed as he reverted; his stone cold colon retained the hot gout. The next statue was a female goat. Prior was sure it had been a sheep before, so the path really was changing. He stood behind the doe and inserted the Spire. In a moment the gout brought her to life.

“The Spire is the best buck fuck in the universe,” she remarked, her interior squeezing it.

Prior was startled. He hadn’t expected her to speak fully human. But of course she was really a demoness. “We’re going to—”

“Yes, of course. It is there for you.” They moved on, encountering increasingly different statues; there was now no question that the path was changing. The original trail had led to the Eggers; this one led, he hoped, to Fartingale. And the Spire, with its eternal potency and conducive effect, was indeed making progress much easier.

Then they came to the mermaid. She was a stone statue with her tail immersed in a stone pool. How were they to get at her business end?

KISS HER.

He did, and her face softened and warmed. Then the Spire made a dropsized gout onto the water—and it clarified, becoming transparent in a widening circle. Soon the mermaid was floating in real water. She remained stone, however.

Prior doffed his trousers and climbed into the pool. He found the place under water just below the beginning of her scaled tail and infiltrated the tip of the Spire into it. It forged slowly into the softening channel there until it reached minimum operative depth, then gouted.

The mermaid’s tail flexed, and the member was suddenly forging twice as far into her. Her arms closed around Prior. Her lovely full breasts heaved. “More,” she murmured.

The Spire gouted again. The mermaid kissed Prior. “Oh, it’s been so long,” she said. “Hardly anyone uses this trail these days. And you—you’ve got the Spire, you lucky man.”

“We’re going to Fartingale.”

“Where?”

“It’s a magic land where farts are common.”

“How uncouth.” She used her comb to straighten out his hair. “Whyever would a wonderful man like you want to go to a dreary place like that?”

Prior realized she was stalling, to make the Spire stay longer. But her breasts were very sleek and soft, her hands caressing his face and neck, and her hidden groin was stroking the embedded member. It was easy to allow this dialogue to continue. “I have to rescue my ideal woman.”

She frowned. “Don’t you realize that’s a miscue? What can she offer you that I can’t?”

“Legs?”

“Oh, who cares about legs! Nothing matches a great piece of tail.” She squeezed the Spire again, evocatively.

“Well, I’m really not a great swimmer.”

“I could help you there. Suck on my breasts.”

“Excuse me?”

She caught his head in her hands and bore it down to her left breast, just above the water line, setting his mouth against the nipple. “Breathe.”

He tried it, dubiously. Highly oxygenated air come into his mouth and lungs. He drew on it harder, and the breath of life flowed into him. This was wonderful!

She cradled his head with her arms. “All this can be yours, you nice mortal man. You can sleep in my loving embrace at the bottom of the sea, safe and warm and in perpetual erotic delight. What more could you ask?”

It was rather tempting. But he knew that the moment the Spire with drew, she would become stone again. It simply wasn’t feasible.

“I know what you’re thinking,” she said. “That I have a heart of stone. But if you can get your friend the Spire to give me larger gouts where I can keep them for a while, such as in my other aperture, I can last a day or so between refuelings, and be everything to you.”

Is that true? he asked the Spire.

YES, it gouted, providing the mermaid with another thrill. BUT YOU WOULD STILL BE LIMITED TO THE SEA.

“But you’d be with me!” she protested.

He removed his mouth from her rich nipple. “And I couldn’t breathe underwater unless nursing from you.”

To his surprise, she nodded. “It wouldn’t work, unless you transformed into a merman. Of course that would happen if you nursed long enough.”

Her fresh air would transform him to half a fish? “Uh, thanks all the same, no.”

She didn’t fuss; she had expected his demurral. “But it’s been great. If you should ever change your mind, I’ll be here.” She caught his head and kissed him again.

At that point the Spire withdrew, and her lips hardened.

NO DEMON CAN GIVE YOU TRUE HAPPINESS, it gouted.

It was surely true. But Prior felt almost guilty about leaving the expressive mermaid.

They moved on, interacting with assorted statues. Then they came to a centaur filly. She was a problem, because her human fore section was well removed from her equine hind section. He wasn’t sure a gout in the rear would bring her to life all the way to the front. How could he talk with her?

IT IS FEASIBLE, the Spire assured him. IT WILL REQUIRE A FAIR INFUSION, BUT YOU WILL BE ABLE TO ANIMATE HER FACE.

“If you say so,” Prior agreed doubtfully. He approached the centaur’s posterior.

It was too high for him to reach. He had to scout for some separate stones to pile behind the statue. He stood on them, and was able to get there. He fed the Spire under her tail and into her huge vaginal orifice.

A small gout softened the stone, allowing further entry. A second gout animated the interior, and finally the Spire penetrated to its full length. Prior stood there, his crotch up against the statue.

Now the Spire started gouting in earnest. It sent surges in, filling the chamber. There seemed to be plenty of room for more. The furry flank softened and warmed. Color came to the hide, coursing from the tail on up toward the front.

The centaur bent. The frozen human section was carried around to the left. With each gout it moved farther, until the torso formed a huge U. The stone forelegs, breasts, and face came around to face Prior. But the eyes remained blank.

Oh. He leaned to the side and into her and managed to reach her face with his mouth. His groin remained attached to hers, so the position was awkward, but feasible. He kissed her lips at a slightly skew angle.

They warmed. “Thank you, Prior,” she said. “It is kind of you to animate me, however briefly.”

“You know my name!” he exclaimed.

She laughed, her huge breasts bouncing. “The Spire told me, with his gouts. They can be very communicative. The news reached my brain before you freshened my face.”

That seemed to make sense, in this context. “Then you know that we— ”

“Yes, of course, and I have already fixed the path. Your next statue will be there. I do appreciate this visit.”

“Uh, sure, welcome.” He was at a lost for useful words.

She smiled and kissed him again. “You are so pleasantly naïve. Now if you will excuse me, I must return to form before the Spire withdraws, so I will be a presentable statue.”

“That’s fine,” he said lamely. These statues had a lot more personality than he had anticipated, this time around.

She got straight, the Spire sent one more gout and withdrew. She smiled, then slowly congealed.

At last they came to a huge statue of a naked man sitting on a toilet, leaning forward in deep concentration. His right elbow rested on his right knee, his hand supporting his forehead. It was clear that he had some truly weighty matter on his noble mind.

THAT’S THE STINKER, the spire gouted. HE GUARDS THE ACCESS TO FARTINGALE. YOU MUST PUT ME IN YOUR RECTUM NOW.

Somehow this did not appeal to Prior. He didn’t mind using the Spire to fill other rectums, but he preferred to keep his own clear. “I’ll just walk past without activating him.”

YOU’LL BE SORRY. But the Spire did not try to stop him. Prior started to circle the statue. There was a sound like a cosmic section of cloth ripping, and a truly appalling stench wafted out from the toilet. Prior caught one whiff, gagged, and fell to the ground, retching.

After a while the potent gas dissipated, and he was able to recover enough to climb back on his feet. “I got the message.” He dropped his pants, unscrewed the Spire, screwed a six inch circumcised member on, then gingerly poked the tip of the Spire into his anus.

NOT THAT WAY, IDIOT, it gouted, jetting a jot of goo on the resistive pucker. I MUST POINT OUTWARD.

Oh. Of course. He reversed the implement. But now he had another problem: its substantial base was far too wide to pass the sphincter. But then the Spire shrank to much smaller size, and he was able to slide it in. Once there, he felt it expanding again, shaping itself to his rectum so that it was firmly anchored, with the tip just shy of the anus. It was oddly comfortable.

NOW I WILL SALUTE THE STINKER. Prior bent over so that his posterior faced the statue. The Spire emitted a whistling peal of gas that formed a small cloud and drifted up to puff into the statue’s face.

The effect was immediate. The face came to life. “The Spire!” the Stinker said. “What an honor.”

NOW TALK TO HIM.

Prior pulled up his pants, turned around, and spoke. “Uh, hello. I’m Prior Gross. I need to go to Fartingale to rescue my ideal woman.”

“And the Spire farts for you,” the Stinker said. “Of course you may pass.” He eyed Prior. “But waste no time in getting appropriate clothing. The natives don’t much like strangers unless they come bearing gold, sex slaves, or superlative farts.”

“Thank you. I will do my best.” The statue solidified. Prior walked by it. This time it let him pass. He had made it to Fartingale.

Chapter 10—Interviews

It was the fourth day of her confinement, and Veil was not optimistic about her fate. She was unable to tell whether the fourth qualifying candidate, a man of middle age, was intellectual, as the contest did not test that quality.

But perhaps she could find out. She would interview the first four qualifiers, and discover whether any of them were remotely acceptable. She hoped for one she would be able to tolerate, as a fall-back choice in case the three qualifiers to come turned out to be even worse.

She tackled them in turn. The first was a rather brutish looking man with a huge gut capable of generating formidable gas, as she had seen in the playback video. She did not ask his name; she thought of him as Gut. He was admitted to the residential intestine with the understanding that the interview was under the control of the Maiden, and any untoward move could disqualify him.

“May the farts be with you,” he said jovially, letting a moderately loud one out.

“And with you,” she agreed politely. She doubted she would ever be entirely easy with this social convention, but it was necessary to honor the local forms. She forced herself, and managed to emit a ladylike break of wind.

“You’re a great looking dame,” he remarked. “Good boobs, good buns, great ass.”

“Thank you.” He was truly meaning to compliment her. “I’ll fart with you anytime.”

It was time to get to business. “As you know,” she said delicately, “I am the anonymous Maiden in the Tower. I must choose one of seven to be my sex master for the coming year. I wish to know more about you, to determine whether we might be compatible.”

“Compatible, shmatible,” he said derisively, blowing out another solid fart. “I got a cock, you got a cunt, we both got assholes. What’s to compat? My pecker’ll fit, even if your pussy is small; I just have to jam it in hard enough.”

This did not seem promising. But she was determined to conceal her private reactions. “True, and I’m sure the fit will be adequate to satisfy you. But there are other things in a relationship than sex and intestinal gas.”

His jaw dropped. “There are?”

“I believe so. What do you propose to do after you have satisfied your lust on my limp body?”

“What’ll I do? What kind of fucking question is that? I’ll sleep, of course, then fuck you again.”

“Would you wish me to reciprocate?”

“Huh?”

“To have enjoyment of the act too.”

He was baffled. “Why would I want that?”

“It is thought that a man’s pleasure is greater if the woman shares it.”

He pondered. “Yeah, maybe worth trying, once, just for the feel. You could sit on my cock and jack yourself off, and your clenching would make me come. Might be fun.”

“It might indeed,” she agreed, and terminated the interview.

The second man was halfway handsome and certainly manly. He understood the meaning of the word ‘compatibility’ but felt there would be no problem. “I don’t need or want your interest,” he said. “Merely your acquiescence. You obviously have the body. I would have no trouble getting off with you. But mainly it’s your prospective appeal to other men that I want. I could make some handsome money farming you out, especially considering your notoriety as a Tower Maiden.”

She was appalled. “You wish to prostitute me?”

“Yes. I figure you could take on maybe a dozen men in a day, each of them paying well. Of course you would have to satisfy them, or I would revoke the deal.”

“But what of the risk of venereal disease?”

“What of it? If you got it, I would not let you tell the clients, though I would have to stop patronizing you myself. It’s a calculated risk; chances are I would have had enough of you by then anyway.” He farted indifferently.

Somehow she was not any more eager to go with this man than the first. “Thank you for clarifying that. May the farce be with you.” She couldn’t bring herself to say it properly. Fortunately she got away with it; he heard what he expected to hear. Perhaps her accompanying flatulence masked the word.

The third candidate was the woman Normal. “No, actually I’m not lesbian,” she said, after they had exchanged greeting farts. “I have an apt husband.”

Veil was surprised, but not yet relieved. “Then why do you want a sex slave?”

“It’s like this: he’s manly and gentle, the perfect lover, and he takes good care of me. But just straight sex doesn’t turn me on. He likes a turned-on woman, so I’m not very good for him. But he has excellent qualities, and I want to keep him. When I caught him seducing one of the maids I had a revelation.”

“That he was unfaithful,” Veil agreed.

“That, too. But it didn’t really bother me, because I knew I wasn’t giving him what he needed. That servant girl was only sixteen, and not really well endowed, and frankly rather homely of feature, but she put a lot of enthusiasm into it. It was obvious that she really liked sex. She just couldn’t get enough of his penis. In fact he just lay there, and she played with it, sucked it, and finally impaled her hole on it just before he spurted. She wrapped her legs around him and kept kissing him, even after he had spent. And do you know what?”

“It must have given you some excellent ideas for your own performance.”

“Yes, but not in the way you might think. I was horribly turned on, watching it. So much so that I sent the maid to her room and addressed him myself. He was amazed, and it took about fifteen minutes to work him up, because he had expended his semen. But I was so avid that he recovered, and then we had a great mutual climax. The time it took was just enough for me to achieve my own orgasm, and he loved having it with me.”

Veil nodded. “Normally it’s the man who gets turned on by watching his wife have sex with another man, but it can work either way. That seems to have solved your problem.”

“Yes and no,” Normal said candidly. “I had to fire the maid, because I can’t have my husband sexing around promiscuously; he might decide to leave me for a more turned-on woman. Yet I also need him to do it in my presence with another woman, for the stimulation it provides me, and for the time it enables me to have him. He is unable to do it in a minute when he has just spent, enabling me to address him in leisurely manner. So I need a woman with no ambitions of that nature, who is aesthetic, and under my control. Thus my interest in you.”

Now this was an interesting prospect. “Would you wish me to have sex with any other man?”

“Heavens no! You must be only for my husband, and only when I am present. You would be required to rebuff him if he wished to have sex any other time. The rest of the time you could do whatever you wished, being fully cared for, provided you kept yourself clean, comely, and mannered. No servant duties. For the year. Thereafter if I wished to maintain the arrangement, I would have to pay you a standard mistress wage.”

This seemed to be a prospect. But Veil was not keen on playing such a role if she could avoid it. “Thank you,” she said, concluding the interview.

The fourth candidate was a man of about her own age, muscular, healthy, and well spoken. “Compatibility hardly matters,” he said after their social farts cleared. “I will provide you with your own suite and servants. Your baby will be well attended. I do not wish to socialize with you. I need you only for sex.”

“With you alone?” she inquired cautiously.

He considered. “Well, I suppose if you wished to have a boyfriend on the side, that would be satisfactory, provided he did not intrude on my time.”

“I mean, you would not expect me to prostitute myself to make money for you.”

“Horrors, no! I have no need of money. I am wealthy. I merely will need you to be sexually available to me at all times, day and night.”

“This is my understanding of sex slavery.”

“Perhaps. Here is the constraint: I am highly sexed. I have worn out two wives, because they could not keep up. I dislike using prostitutes; they can be uncouth or unclean. I need a constant woman.”

“Just how often were you thinking of?”

“Normally, four times a day and once at night. It is difficult for me to go more than six hours without sex, and shorter periods are preferable. Thus it would be morning, noon, afternoon, evening, and midnight. Sometimes more often, as anything can set me off. My second wife departed after I required sex of her three times within a ten minute span while we were watching an erotic play. That’s why you would need to be steadily on hand. There may be only a minute’s notice; you must be ready at all times.”

“But when not with you, I could do what I want, provided I remain close enough to join you immediately?”

“Correct. If you wish entertainment, I can’t allow you to depart the house unless it is in my company—and there will no foolishness about refusing sex in a coach or a concert booth or even standing in an open field if that is where the call comes. The entertainment will be brought to you, and perhaps I will share it with you if it interests me. You will not be denied anything. Neither will you be bound; if you have genuine need to travel, such as to attend an ill relative, you will merely so acquaint me, and I will accompany you there. I mean you no discomfort. I merely must know that your sexual favor is never denied me.”

Veil happened to know something about sexual precocity. There were indeed highly sexed men, but normally their urges abated somewhat when reliably and competently accommodated. Frequent repetitions occurred when the sexual episodes were less than satisfactory. She could make them satisfactory. This might be as good a way to spend the year as any. She saw that the man’s pantaloons were bulging; the mere discussion of sex had stimulated him, as was the case with many men. That gave her a notion.

“I am minded to give you a try,” she said. “Without as yet making any commitment, as three candidates remain to be selected. Do you wish sex at this moment?”

“I do.” As if there could be any other response.

“Then join me now on the bed.” She had learned from the announcer that this too was permitted; it was considered an optional part of the interviewing process. She stepped out of her farthingale, baring her nether region, blew out accumulated gas, and lay supine on the bed.

He joined her immediately, his penis springing erect from his panta loons. She was relieved to see that it was an ordinary member, not oversized or misshapen. He got down on her and guided it to her vulva, then plunged it into her vagina. She felt his emission on the first thrust.

Then he withdrew and stood again, putting his spent member away. “Much appreciation,” he said.

It had been so fast she had hardly gotten her bearings. It had been like a hypodermic injection, in, discharge, and out. She quickly mopped herself and donned the skirt again, returning to perch on the farthingale stool.

“This is your normal mode?”

“Yes. I do not waste time.”

“Let me know when your desire rises again.”

“Thank you. I will. It is kind of you to accommodate me.”

He issued a gratified fart. She wanted to discover whether he slowed, after relieving himself, and whether he truly recovered swiftly. She needed to know whether his four or five times a day would ease off to once or twice, once the edge was off. She questioned him on details of his household.

Then, barely five minutes along, he expressed his renewed interest. “By all means,” she agreed, removing the skirt again. This time she did not take the couch, but stood waiting for him, to see how he would handle it. He had after all mentioned doing it standing in a field.

He didn’t hesitate. He bent his knees, produced his erect penis, and wedged it up into her moist cleft. He penetrated her with a single trust, jetting as he did. And withdrew immediately.

She mopped herself again; there had indeed been an emission. This time she left her skirt off, and sat on the couch, crossing her bare legs.

He looked. “If you would be so kind—”

That was only about one minute. Was he bluffing?

“By all means.” She stood. He was into her again, and jetting, and withdrawing. Intrigued, she continued to question him, while quietly assuming provocative poses. They were effective. They had sex three more times in fifteen minutes. The last one was slower: it required two thrusts, and the emission was only a token. But it had definitely occurred.

“I must say, you are very understanding,” he said. “You are a most attractive and accommodating woman. I would like very much to have you with me for the year.”

“How did you make it past the demoness? I watched the video, and you did not seem to spurt prematurely then.”

“That’s the key: she is a demoness. Not a real woman. Such an emulation does not turn me on, whatever her appearance. No more than a statue or a man turns me on. I was able to get an erection by laboring diligently to pretend she was real, but I could not climax. The rest was merely a matter of going through the motions. The point, after all, is that she climax, not the man.”

That was a subtlety she hadn’t properly picked up on before. “Do you ever actually make love?” she asked. “By that I mean, taking time for a single incident of sexual expression, not with a demoness, but with a real woman. Kissing, stroking, embracing.”

“No. That is impossible for me. I climax too soon. If I do not get inside the woman, I spend into the air, which is frustrating and embarrassing.”

She could appreciate that. It meant that sex with this man was indeed only that, and only for him; the woman got nothing from it because it was too fast for her to respond. Did she want that for a year, even if everything else was nice? Only, she concluded, if she had no better alternative.

“I think I know enough,” she said. “Let’s do it once more, so that you can make it home without frustration, and end this interview.”

“Gladly.” He jammed into her, jetted, and departed. There would be three more candidates. She hoped at least one was better, but knew there was no guarantee.

Chapter 11—Fartingale

Prior reached the village of Nude-on-Toilet shortly before dusk. This featured a statue vaguely similar to that of The Stinker, but smaller, with a nude young woman sitting on a toilet. She was pretty, with well formed breasts, a small waist, and very nice slightly-spread thighs. From the toilet bowl came a melody fashioned from delicate farts of different pitches. There was an odor of sweet violets.

The statue was at the community center, which of course surrounded the public privy. Folk were gathering for the evening socializing. The men wore colorful pantaloons, the women farthingales. Many of the latter were bare breasted.

THAT MEANS THEY’RE AVAILABLE FOR CASH OR BARTER, the Spire gouted quietly in his bowel. YOU WANT TO FART FOR FOOD AND FLAT, NOT FUCKS.

“Ah, right,” Prior agreed, half reluctantly. Some of the revealed upper sections were fetching, and the nether sections too, when the women happened to pass between him and a light so that the bell-shaped skirts became translucent, verging on transparent.

A lovely woman approached him, her full breasts playing peek-a-boo behind her veil of hair. She issued an inviting fart.

NO GOOD, the Spire gouted. SHE’LL ROLL YOU.

Prior turned away, letting out the Spire’s negative fart, and the woman retreated.

A second beauty oriented on him, wafting a fart that smelled of roses. Her breasts were painted silver with bright red nipples.

NO GOOD.

Prior wasn’t sure how the Spire knew, but had to trust its judgment. He faced away, blowing aversion.

I CAN SMELL THEM, the Spire explained. I ANALYZE THEIR FARTS AND ASCERTAIN THEIR PERSONALITIES.

There was more to farting than Prior had realized. A third one came, hesitantly.

HER.

Prior did not turn away. “May the farts be with you, stranger,” she said politely, letting out a small ladylike fart.

“And with you,” he replied, doing the same in a more masculine tone. He found this social custom quaint.

“You look in need,” she remarked. Her breasts were full and bouncy, making up for an ordinary face and hair that was less than lustrous, though it did reach to her bottom. “You must be here for the fair tomorrow. I am Smellie.”

There was a fair? He wasn’t here for entertainment. He needed to locate the maiden in the Tower as soon as possible.

“I’m Micro.” That was the name he had decided to use here, as part of his anonymity. It referred to his small natural penis, though he wasn’t wearing it now. “I just need food and lodging for the night.”

She considered. “I have food and a bed. You have gold?”

“No,” he replied, embarrassed.

“Then what do you have to offer, Micro?”

A MAGIC FART.

“A magic fart,” Prior echoed, not certain what it meant.

“Magic in what manner?”

“It will put you into delight for the night,” he said, prompted by the Spire.

“I’ll risk it. But if it doesn’t, you’ll have to scrub the floor.”

He followed her to her house, which was nearby. Inside, she shut the door and faced him.

“Demonstrate.”

The Spire let out a squeaker. It spread into the air of the room, with a faint musty odor. This wasn’t promising. But the woman smiled. “A joy fart! You’ve got a joy fart!”

YOU ARE IMMUNE TO ITS EFFECT, the Spire explained. PARTLY BECAUSE OF YOUR SMEGMA (WHICH YOUR REMAINING GENITAL FLESH STILL PRODUCES DESPITE THE FACT YOU ARE NOT NOW WEARING YOUR NATURAL PENIS), MOSTLY BECAUSE I AM IMMUNE TO MY OWN EMISSIONS, LEST THERE BE PARADOX, AND THAT CARRIES ACROSS TO YOU. PRETEND YOU’RE FEELING GOOD.

Prior smiled. “As I said, magic.”

“Well, you’ll certainly do. I haven’t smelled a joy fart in years. In fact we don’t see a lot of magic here in the hindland.” She bustled about, rousting up a meal for them. “You just sit down and keep that hot air coming while I set up.”

He sat the indicated chair, and the Spire continued a moderate emission. Smellie hummed a tune as she worked. It was halfway familiar, but he couldn’t quite place it. “What is that melody?”

“My theme song.” She sang the words of the refrain: “And ’twas from Aunt Dinah’s farting party I was seeing Smellie home.”

Now he placed it. The variant he knew referred to a quilting party and Nellie.

They had a meal of beans and cabbage juice. It was what she had. His gut roiled up, but of course all the food in this land did that. Just so long as he could pass his natural gas without blowing the Spire out. It seemed okay; the Spire continued a low volume emission of joy farts, and that kept Smellie smiling. Her life remained bleak, but she was on a sustained high.

They talked, and he learned that the village had a monthly fair for enter tainment, contests, and business. It was designed to attract tourists, so that the village could profit.

“I’m just passing through. I need to find the Maiden in the Tower.”

“Oh, for that you need to go to the Maid-in-Tower Village. They have a new Maiden every week.”

“Every week? What happens to her?”

“Each day there’s competition, with one candidate qualifying. On the seventh day she must choose which one will be her master for a year.”

“Her master?”

“She’s his sex slave. They generally have good-looking anonymous Maidens who have been abducted for the purpose.”

“Abducted!” he exclaimed as if surprised.

“You mean this is involuntary?”

“Of course. That makes them more appealing. But it’s a recognized device; they have no choice but to carry through.”

“I should think there would be outrage by their families and friends.”

“Sure. That’s why they aren’t taken from the local village unless they volunteer, as some do. They are fetched in from far away.”

Prior saw how it could have happened to someone from his realm, if that was the case. Was she really his ideal woman, or was that just propaganda spread about to many men to garner more interest? He would simply have to rescue her and hope for the best.

“Where is the Tower Village?”

“That’s three days trek from here, unless you have a fast steed or magic.”

Three days! That gave him barely enough time, as he had only a week to rescue the Maiden.

“I don’t have a steed or that kind of magic. Is there any shortcut?”

“Sure. Win a ride on the Fart Blimp. It can take you there in one day.”

THIS IS FEASIBLE, the Spire gouted.

“Thanks, I’ll do that.”

When they had eaten, they repaired to the public privy, entering it together and taking adjacent holes. Smellie let out quite a load, by the sound of it, clearing her body for the night. Prior eased his gas and turds out around the Spire, discovering that there was no difficulty; the magic implement knew how to stay in place.

People glanced at them, paying no special attention. Crapping together in the public privy was a signal that they were a couple, at least for the night.

FOLK WHO SHIT TOGETHER, FIT TOGETHER, the Spire opined, evidently quoting a local maxim.

Prior glanced at the statue of the nude.

“She’s beautiful. Was she modeled from a real person?”

“Yes, of course. Every year we have a contest for comely young women posing bare on the toilet, and the loveliest wins the title of Mistress of the Village and the statue is sculpted to conform to her image. It’s a great honor, and more.”

“More? In what sense is she mistress?”

“Every sense. She becomes the leading citizen, making key decisions for the village, with a stipend so that she does not have to work at any other trade. She also has her choice of men, single or married, a different one each night if she wishes, for that year’s fucking. The men are normally glad to do it; it’s not considered a breach of their marital state, but a civic duty, and their wives are honored. She also entertains traveling men who pass this way; it brings a number who might otherwise select a different route, and the village gets their business. When her year as Mistress expires, she may choose any one of the men she has fucked to marry. Oh, I would have loved to be the Mistress, as any girl would, but of course that was a laughable dream.”

Prior avoided the need to agree.

“I’m a traveler. She didn’t choose me.”

“She’s ill and wants to retire. Soon there’ll be another contest to select her replacement.”

“Ill?”

Smellie smiled. “Euphemism for knocked up. It happens. She can’t marry her lover until she steps down.”

“Now I understand. Don’t girls have ways to avoid pregnancy?”

“There are spells. But sometimes they forget.”

They settled together on her bed. He saw that it was bumpy, with a ragged blanket. It was what she had. She did not complain, but it was clear she had reason to prostitute herself to traveling men; she needed to survive.

“How would you like me?” she asked, with a petite fart of invitation. “I can do it any way you want.”

“Actually, all I need is food and board, and you have provided that. You don’t have to have sex with me.”

“Oh no! You’re gay!”

“No, just trying to be reasonable. All I paid for was food and bed—and I fear you have little in either respect.”

“Oh, please, don’t leave now! I know it’s not great, but it’s all I have. I can make it up by giving you great sex, so you’ll have no complaint.”

She thought he was seeking a pretext to go elsewhere. Rather than argue, he clasped her. She met him eagerly, and they proceeded to the best natural sex he’d had in some time, because he wasn’t using the Spire for it. Nothing fancy, just a simple stroking of her nice breasts, kissing her face, easing his member into her receptive cleft, thrusting, and ejaculating. All perfectly ordinary, but nice.

Then he realized that she had not joined him in the climax. He had come to depend on the Spire to thrill the women it touched, but he wasn’t using that now. “I’m sorry; I was forgetting your share. That was selfish of me.”

“Oh, I should have faked it,” she said, chagrined. “It was so nice having unkinky sex for once, I forgot.”

“You’re not frustrated?”

She laughed. “I never come. It would distract me from properly catering to the needs of my guests. If you want to do it again, I’ll make sure to give a better performance.”

“No need. You were good as you were.”

“It’s nice of you to say that. You’re a nice man.”

As he sank into sleep, against her obliging body, he addressed the Spire:

She’s a good person, doing what she has to. I want to help her.

YOU ARE BECOMING SOFT HEADED. SHE’S A WHORE.

Maybe so. But also a decent human being. What can I do for her?

ENTER SOME CONTESTS TOMORROW AT THE FAIR. WIN HER SOME STAPLES.

I will.

Then, satisfied, he slept. In the morning he saw that his clothing was undisturbed; she had not sought to steal anything. She served him gruel: all she had.

“I have paid you with joy farts,” he said carefully. “Now I am minded to hire you to show me around the fair tomorrow. I will pay you in goods you need, that I can win in contests.”

She looked at him.

“Why?”

“I appreciate being treated decently. You didn’t try to rob me or cheat me, and you gave me more than I paid for. I will stay another night with you, and try to leave you satisfied that I was here.”

She shrugged. “All right.”

He knew she was trying to figure the catch.

The fair was impressive. There were impromptu singing groups doing feeling renditions of “Fart of my Fart” and “Beer Farts and Gutsy People.” There were acappella farting groups. There were sexy bare-bottomed dances.

“Everything’s here,” Smellie said.

“Depending on your taste.”

“Blankets.”

She guided him to a stall where many excellent blankets were available.

“What blanket would you take for yourself, price no object?” he asked.

She laughed, think it a joke. “That one.”

Prior addressed the proprietor. “May the farts be with you,” he said, emitting a small fart. The Spire had prepared him for this. “I wish to purchase that blanket. I offer a jug of Joy Fart.”

“You have magic?” the man asked, squinting.

“He sure does,” Smellie said.

“I boarded him last night, and he kept me happy the whole time.”

“Give me a sniff.”

“One sniff,” Prior agreed, turning around and bending over.

The man put his nose down near his pantaloons. The Spire emitted a tiny fart.

“That’s Joy!” the man agreed immediately. “But that’s my best blanket. Three jugs.”

“Two,” Prior said, knowing that bargaining was expected.

“Two. But they have to sniff good.”

Prior put his anus to a two-spouted jug. His fart went into one spout, forcing air out the other. When the Joy started coming through, the man clapped caps on both spouts.

“How much time do you need to recharge?”

“I’ve got a good load of gas. I can do it now.”

He filled the second jug. The man gave him the blanket. Prior gave it to Smellie.

“Take it home, then return to me here. We have more shopping to do.”

Amazed, she accepted, hurrying home with the blanket.

“You got it for her?” the man asked, surprised.

“She’s a good woman.”

“Sure, but her face is plain.”

“So is mine.”

Soon Smellie returned.

“Now food,” Prior said.

“But you’ve already paid me far more than I deserve.”

“I’m paying you for your guidance. It’s a day’s work.”

Still dubious, she took him to a stall where there were many kinds of beans. Prior bought several packages with more joy farts, and helped her carry them home.

“I don’t get it,” she said. He told her as much more of the truth as he thought was wise.

“I’m here on a personal mission. I have special magic for this occasion. Once it’s done, I won’t have it any more. So I might as well use it to help a nice woman. It’s free, for me.”

“You can get a slew of beautiful women, for what you’re giving me.”

“Can I trust any of them without watching them?”

She was silent a moment. “No. But how did you know you could trust me?”

“It’s a magic sense I have. You proved out, and I appreciate it.”

She shook her head. “I’ve never been rewarded for being trustworthy before.”

“And maybe never again. But this time you are.”

She considered. “May I kiss you?”

“We kissed often enough last night.”

“I mean in public, so others see.”

Ah. “Sure.”

She did so, and there was a stir. Others had been paying more attention than he had realized. Probably news of his magic farts had gotten around.

“But you know I’m moving on to rescue the Maiden in the Tower,” he reminded her. “I’m not staying here.”

“Yes, of course. Who would want to stay with me?”

“I didn’t mean it like that.”

“I know. But it’s true. I’m strictly a waystation woman. That’s why I appreciate being treated like a person. It doesn’t happen often.”

“You’re a nice person. You could make some man a good wife.”

“So can any number of women with prettier faces.”

Can we help her? he asked the Spire.

YOU’RE AN IDIOT.

Answer the damn question.

YES. I COULD GENERATE A MAGIC FART THAT WOULD MELT HER FACE AND SET GUIDELINES FOR A BETTER ONE. SHE’D HAVE TO PROTECT IT FOR SEVERAL DAYS, BUT THEREAFTER SHE’D BE BEAUTIFUL.

Prior nodded. He’d make the offer when it seemed appropriate. “Now let’s tour the fair,” he said.

She hesitated. “Everything’s centered around the privy. You can find whatever you want without my help.”

“I thought I was buying your service as a tour guide. Are you reneging?”

“No! It’s just that—well, I’m a—you know. Everyone knows it. To have me with you, treating me like a date, that could fart off your reputation in a hurry. You’ve been so good to me, I don’t want to do you ill in return.”

She was definitely not cut out to be a mean whore. “What do I care? Tomorrow I’ll be gone.”

“You should care.” But she dropped the subject. They toured the fair. They stopped to eat fartburgers, drink fartfrappes, and nibble on pot cheese. All these generated generous quantities of gas, which they blew out with abandon. Prior saw a poster saying THE FAMILY THAT FARTS TOGETHER, STARTS TOGETHER. They were honoring its windy spirit.

There were shows galore. One was a little play featuring a man with a tremendous penis. “I’ll marry any woman who can handle this,” he proclaimed. One woman tried, bending over so he could penetrate her from behind, but barely half the member got into her before it balked. Another tried, and a bit more than half got in.

The third woman was more confident. “Sit down and lean back,” she said. He did so, and she stood over him, then lowered herself onto his member so that her own weight bore her down. Inch by inch she took it in, until at the end she reached down, grabbed his thighs, and hauled herself onto the last two inches. “There!” she said victoriously.

“No fair,” someone called. “She’s using leverage. Make her let go.”

Reluctantly the woman did—and she flew up off the phallic pole, propelled by the recoil.

“That’s all right,” the man said. “It was the force of my ejaculation that did it, she’s such a good fuck.”

There was applause for the act. Obviously no ejaculation could have thrown her whole body up like that; she had jumped. But it was a nice punchline.

“Actually I once had a harder fuck,” the woman said, going into the next stage of the act. “My boyfriend didn’t have the biggest cock, but he was really enthusiastic. He fucked me so hard that when he was done, he had to pull out his cock, both balls, and half of his asshole.”

Laughter. Two more people came on stage.

“You never fucked me that hard,” the new woman to her man.

“Well, I would have, but my farts would have blown you up like a balloon.” More laughter, as they had topped the prior joke by suggesting that not only could the man have thrust so hard as to get his entire rectum into her, he would then have farted and inflated her. Realistic anatomy be damned.

“Then there’s the time I had constipation,” the woman on stage continued. “For two months I couldn’t pass anything, not even a fart. So finally the doctor gave me a pill. Not just any pill; it was the hydrogen bomb of laxatives, with a count down of exactly twenty four hours.” She looked at her watch. “Come to think of it, that was yesterday. You’d better fuck me within the next two minutes and get out of here, because you don’t want to be at ground zero when it detonates.”

“I don’t believe it,” the man said. “I’ll fuck you any time I want.” He unlimbered his large member in leisurely fashion.

“One minute,” she said, her eye still on the watch. “Maybe you’d better postpone it, because I can’t be responsible for what happens at zero time.”

“Forget it,” he said, pushing his penis slowly into her as she bent over to accommodate him. Their positions were carefully structured to provide the audience a clear view of the genital contact. Prior realized that the jokes were merely the pretext for the sexual display. It was working; he was turned on.

“Thirty seconds. And don’t pump, because any little vibration could set it off prematurely.”

“You can’t scare me,” he said, and made a huge forceful thrust. There was a bright flash, a crack of noise, and a thick cloud of smoke. By the time it dissipated all that remained on the stage was a head-high pile of fecal matter.

More applause. That had been a fine act. They must have used the smoke to clamber through a trap door, and shoved out the pile. It had also been one fine fuck while it lasted.

Prior and Smellie moved on. There was a seduction contest, where the men stood on one side of a glass wall, their limp penises poking through suitably placed holes. Each woman did a strip-tease dance. The winner would be the one who managed to make a penis spurt without touching it. The audience was mostly women; it occurred to Prior that they might be studying technique.

Several women were able to make the members stiffen admirably, but none jetted. Finally a truly sexy creature came on the scene and performed a dance of such passion that Prior himself was stimulated painfully. “Um,” he murmured.

“Got it,” Smellie said. She hoisted up her farthingale, stepped into him, turned, and got his stiff member into her cleft just in time for it to spurt. Then she pulled herself off, dropped her skirt, and stood as if nothing had happened. No one had noticed; they were watching the dancer, who finally did make a penis spurt without touching. She had won.

Now the women of the audience forged in, advancing on the remaining stiff penises. Each of them turned and backed onto one, efficiently absorbing its triggered jet.

“It’s a tradition,” Smellie explained. “The spectators get to tap the leftovers.”

Next was the stench trench, where the most feculent guts let fly. The aroma was truly awful, but there were those who were breathing it in like misty elixir.

“Stink addicts,” Smellie murmured. “Last one left standing wins.”

They moved on to the main event: the champion fart-off. This was the one Prior meant to enter. “Now you know, joy farting won’t do it here,” Smellie warned him. “These aren’t feel farts, they’re cloud farts, so they can be seen and judged. There will be some pretty tough contenders.”

“I can handle it,” he said confidently. “I have more than one kind of magic fart.”

“You’re really a wonder. May I—” He embraced her and kissed her on the mouth. She looked about ready to swoon with delight. In this culture, a fast fuck in public was nothing, but she felt obliged to ask permission for a kiss?

Two fat men got up on the stage. They turned together, bent over to present their plump rears to the audience, and blew out a fanfare of several tuba-like notes. This was the signal for the start of the event. People gathered around to watch.

An announcer appeared. “As you know, this event attracts competition from fart and wide. I’m sure most of you are familiar with the rules, but just in case any aren’t, here’s a reprise: Each farter will fart alone, into the central cavity, where his fart must form a visible cloud. Our panel of judges will measure this cloud for duration, determining when it has faded too far to qualify. The longest duration will win—”

He paused for effect. “A day’s ride on the Fart Blimp tomorrow!”

There was applause as he waved toward the anchored brown blimp floating at the village’s edge. That of course was the prize Prior needed to win.

“Now the call for contestants. Please step up to the stage and give me your names so I can announce them.”

“Wish me luck,” Prior murmured as he started forward.

“Oh, I do, Micro, I do,” Smellie said, and seemed to mean it.

He liked that. Three men and a woman were lining up as Prior came to join them. They all had huge bellies for the generation of champion farts. They glanced at Prior briefly and dismissively; his gut simply wasn’t big enough to host a serious contender.

“Our first contestant,” the announcer said, “is the WindBreaker, from the windswept plains to the north. He holds three awards for fartsmanship. Here is his opening effort.”

The first man faced away from the arena, so that Prior got a good look at his ugly face. He bent grandly over, and emitted a long slow peal of a fart that pulled itself together into a globular brown cloud about a foot in diameter. It roiled and turned as if some demon were inside trying to get out. It floated slowly upward, fissioning off curls of smoke, gradually shrinking. Finally it imploded, leaving only a fading wisp of vapor.

“Time!” a judge exclaimed.

“Seventy three seconds.”

There was applause. It had been a good effort.

“Now we have the ButtGuster from the gassy fumaroles to the south,” the announcer said. “He has competed in more cloud fartings than any other man, including last year’s Super Bowel, and is just hitting his second wind.”

The second man approached the arena and turned about. His face looked like a fart that hadn’t yet finished coming out. He bent over, concentrated, and blasted out a huge yellow cloud with tan specks. It sailed upward, expanding, until finally it thinned to the point it lost cohesion and got torn apart by the breeze.

“Time! Eighty one seconds.”

There was louder applause. This was indeed a excellent emission. The big-name farters were coming through with a fine show.

“And our entry of the fragrant gender is Whoopee, runner-up in our contest last month,” the announcer said. “We have real hope that she’ll be our first local female champion.”

The woman approached the arena, lifted off her farthingale, and stood with a broad bare bottom. She pirouetted, squatted, and let fly a modest pink cloud that rotated like a football. It hovered, valiantly retaining its shape, until it flattened, buckled, and gave up the ghost.

“Time. Eighty two seconds.”

There was considerable applause. Whoopee’s effort had taken the lead, however narrowly.

“Now Blowtorch, a convert from the firefart division. Last month’s time was sixty nine seconds, enough to place. He says he’s improved his wind since then.”

The fourth competitor stepped up, almost as ugly as the other men. His gut could be heard rumbling from a fair distance. He pushed out a swisher of a reddish cloud that did indeed vaguely resemble the flame of a blowtorch. It coruscated into the air, shimmering with power. But it burned out too swiftly, and was only seventy seconds, not in the running this time.

“And finally we have a new face, as it were,” the announcer said. “Micro, for his first competitive effort.”

The audience was silent. The people were waiting to see this thin-bellied amateur make a fool of himself. Prior hoped they were in for a remarkable disappointment. It was up to the Spire.

He approached the arena, turned, and bent over, orienting the Spire.

Do your stuff.

The Spire issued a rushing jet of black gas. It formed into a spherical mass that sparkled like a dark star. It floated in place, neither shrinking nor expanding. A murmur spread through the audience as it hung on past a minute. This was no amateur effort! Slowly, reluctantly, it thinned, until at last it sank to the ground and dissipated into a trace of goo.

“Time,” the judge said. “Ninety seconds.”

“The winner,” the announcer said, amazed.

“Micro.”

Prior relaxed in relief. The Spire had come through.

I COULD HAVE MADE IT TWO MINUTES, BUT DIDN’T WANT TO BE OBVIOUS. A NEW RECORD WOULD HAVE BEEN SUSPICIOUS.

Thank you, Prior thought as he walked away from the arena. People were closing in on him, eager to learn more of him, now that he had made his sudden fame as a worthy farter. The other contestants looked on, scowling. They didn’t like being bested by a rank amateur. Smellie hugged him and kissed him impulsively.

“You were great!”

“Just get me out of here. I don’t want to answer questions.”

She took possessive charge.

“Micro is tired from his great performance. He needs to rest now. I’m sure you understand.”

She took Prior’s hand and hauled him away.

When they were safely in her house she kissed him again.

“Oh, Micro, that was absolutely wonderful! You showed them all.”

“You helped,” he said.

“I was glad to. Oh, this village has never seen a fart like that! Hardly anyone can do a black one, and they mostly poop out in a few seconds. What a spectacle!”

She served him a nice meal made from her new supplies. The time seemed right to broach his special idea.

“Smellie, if you had a pretty face, you could land a good man, right?”

“Oh sure. Men care about faces almost as much about bottoms, once their edge is off. But what’s the use debating that? I’m a realist.”

“I may have a way to give you that face. But it would not be an easy process.”

“What are you talking about?”

“As I said before, I have a magic fart. It can be turned to several different things. I could make a fart that would melt your face and allow it to heal in a prettier image. But you would need to keep it swathed for several days, and there might be pain. Thereafter your face would be as nice as your nature.”

She sat down, awed. “You can really do this?”

“I believe so. But it could be risky. Magic can be dangerous in the hands of amateurs, and I’m an amateur.”

“Let me think about it.”

As they settled down to sleep, after making their evening excursion to the public privy, she hesitated, then spoke. “You’ve been so good to me, I really shouldn’t ask anything more.”

“Ask.”

“Last night we clasped, and you were concerned because I didn’t climax with you. Tonight I can put on a show that—”

“No. I don’t want fakery.”

“That’s what I thought you’d say. So my idea is, maybe I should try it for real, this one time. Let you simulate—as if we’re—that much would be an act, of course but—”

“In love?”

She blushed.

“In pretense. So I can fool myself into letting it happen. Forgetting myself. I know it’s a lot to ask.”

“I’ve never had a woman to love me. That’s why I’m going after the Maiden in the Tower. She’s supposed to be my ideal woman, and my hope is that she’ll truly come to feel it. It’s the biggest thing I’ve missed in my life.”

“Yes, and I wouldn’t even think of interfering with that. Tomorrow you’ll go to her, and I hope you succeed. But tonight, in pretense—” She broke off. “Maybe it’s a stupid idea.”

“I like it. We can say the words and do the acts, knowing it’s only for tonight. Completing our association.”

“Oh, thank you,” she breathed. When night came, they joined each other in the bed, in darkness.

“I—I don’t know what to say,” Prior said, feeling awkward. “I’ve never—”

“Just hold me, beloved.” Relieved that she knew how to proceed, he put his arms around her. She was all warm woman. He kissed her, and she was all melting love. It was so nice that he just kept holding and kissing her for a while, then stroked her hair.

“You’re beautiful.”

“I have dreamed of this moment.” She was better at this than he was, but he was learning.

“I never had the wit to dream of love, just sex.”

“And I want it with you, dear.”

It was stupid, but that word “dear” sent a wash of pleasure through him.

“Oh, this is great!” He hardly cared whether they had sex; it was just so nice loving her. “Darling,” he added belatedly.

She kissed him more ardently. She caught one of his hands and brought it to her breast. He had stroked breasts before, but this time it had more meaning. He put his face down and kissed it. She shifted just enough to slide the nipple to his mouth, and he kissed that too, feeling it swell. She held his head to her bosom, breathing harder, and each breath pressed it firmer and softer against his face.

“I’m getting warm,” she murmured. “But not there yet. Can you enter me without ejaculating right away?”

As it happened, he had jetted that afternoon, and his response was a bit slower than usual. He got in position and entered her carefully, and it was all right. He did not thrust, but just held position, kissing her mouth again.

“Oh, my love, my love,” she said. “I love you so much.”

“I love you,” he echoed, feeling it. Her vagina softened around him, and tightened. He repeated the words, and got a similar response. She was sexually turned on by words of love. Soon she came to the climax, and clasped him tightly, kissing him constantly, while her vagina convulsed.

It was too much. He had to thrust, and thrust again, his orgasm over whelming. She clung to him, meeting him with her closure, taking all that he had to give. He felt himself spurting, felt her accepting it, in a phenomenal mutual climax.

Yet it was not the end. He kept kissing her. “I love you, I love you!” His penis was diminishing, but not his passion. He couldn’t let go of the feeling.

“Yes, yes,” she breathed, meeting him kiss for kiss. But finally they relaxed.

“Yes, that’s what I never had,” he said.

“I neither.” Then, after a pause: “In the morning, before you go—I’ll take that fart.”

They relaxed into sleep, embraced. It was wonderful.

Chapter 12—Curse

Veil watched the next qualifier. He tackled the demoness orally, turning her on with kisses of the face and breasts, then licking her vulva expertly until she climaxed. He was good enough so that it made Veil react; she could live with that kind of sex. But there was bound to be a catch.

There was.

“I am impotent,” he informed her when she interviewed him.

“But then what would you want with me?”

“That is why I want you. I have a strong desire for sex, and my doctor says I have the physical capacity for it. But I can’t get an erection in the presence of a woman. It’s psychological, perhaps the result of some early episode I can’t remember. I believe that if I once have real sexual experience with a woman, the barrier will be gone, and I will then be able to do it with other women.”

“I’m not sure how I can give you that experience. It would more likely be an exercise in frustration for you.”

“Not necessarily so. You will be committed; you will neither laugh at me nor avoid me. Your interest is in having sexual experience with me. That should make a difference.”

“My interest is in getting out of here and going home with my child.”

“And your surest means of achieving that end is to make me potent. You will address me, use your female wiles to arouse me, and finally bring me to copulation with you. You will have no other purpose. I believe that there should be some progress in the course of a year.”

“May I see your penis?”

“Welcome.”

He doffed his pantaloons and stood with his nether portion exposed. His penis and testicles looked completely normal. She squatted and took hold of the member, peeling back the foreskin and inspecting the glans. Nothing wrong there. She massaged it with her fingers. It was ordinary through out, but did not react.

“May I make an oral approach?”

“You may.”

She touched the tip of the glans with her tongue, then licked it. There was no increase of its size or hardness. She licked the stem just behind the glans, the highly sensitive equivalent of a woman’s clitoris. Still no reaction. She put her mouth over it and sucked gently. Nothing. She took the whole limp penis into her mouth, not difficult at all in this small state, caressing it with tongue and lips.

“You are wasting your time,” Impotent said. “Other women have tried.”

So it seemed. “Would you care to try it on me?”

For the average man got just about as much sexual titillation from licking a woman’s vulva as he did from having a woman swallow penis.

“If you wish.” She doffed her farthingale and lay on the couch, spreading her legs. He got down and addressed her cleft.

“Take me to orgasm,” she said. But she reached down to put one hand on his penis, verifying its condition.

He was just as competent on her as he had been on the demoness. Soon he had her building to pleasure, and then to full climax, which she did not try to diminish or conceal. Her bare legs clamped his head as she writhed with the force of it. But his member never budged. This was a tough case.

“Have you tried a variety of women?”

“Every variety.”

“Including very young ones?”

“I am not turned on by children. My desire is for comely grown women. I merely can not get an erection in the presence of one.”

“What of violence?”

“Sado-masochism does not turn me on; it disgusts me.”

“What of sexual demonstrations? Does watching others have sex turn you on?”

“No.”

She was constrained to believe him.

“What of romantic stories?”

“Those, yes.” Progress at last.

“Do you get an erection when watching a romantic play or hearing a story?”

“Yes. But it fades in the ready presence of a woman. I can relieve myself only by masturbating.”

But she was minded to test it, for this seemed to be a man she would be able to relate to comfortably.

“May we experiment?”

“If you can find a way to make me potent, welcome.”

“Then let us lie together, and I will tell you a story.”

They lay down on her bed, side by side, naked, on their backs. She took hold of his penis so she could verify its state of arousal without looking or calling attention to it. She knew that he would forget the contact after a while, if she kept her hand quite still.

“There was once a young woman called Desiree,” she said.

“She was not particularly attractive, so was not socially popular. She wanted more than anything to have the kind of sex appeal she saw other girls practicing.”

“I would like to encounter a girl with enduring sex appeal for me.”

Veil knew it. “Desiree was walking home from her dull job when she was caught by a sudden shower. Half a torrent fell in a few minutes, and she was drenched. Water cascaded into the gutters of the street. Then she spied a little man caught in the flow, about to be washed into a deep culvert. She reached down and caught him by the collar, hauling him out of danger.”

As she spoke, she found herself getting into the story, and let it flow on its own.

‘Thank you, plain woman,’ the little man said.

‘I regret I can not suitably reward you for saving my life.’

‘That’s all right,’ she said.

He evidently felt guilty.

‘I’m an elf. We come in two varieties. A wish elf could have granted you one wish. But I’m a curse elf.’

‘A curse elf!’ she exclaimed. ‘I never heard of that.’

‘We’re not popular, so we keep a low profile. Now, unfortunately, I am required to curse you.’

She was curious. ‘What kind of curses do you do?’

‘Oh, there’s an infinite variety. Do you have a preference?’

Desiree laughed. ‘Curse me with sex appeal.’

The elf hesitated. ‘Are you sure?’

‘You mean you really can?’

‘Indubitably. But you’d be better off with a minor curse, like a hangnail.’

‘I’ll take the sex appeal.’

‘As you wish, so to speak.’

He lifted his two little hands, spread his fingers, and made a strange gesture. She felt a weird tingle. She blinked—and the curse elf was gone.

Had he really cursed her with sex appeal? She doubted it. But she was curious to find out.

The rain abated, and she walked on toward home. A man was walking the other way on the sidewalk. He saw her, and paused, staring. She tried to skirt around him, but he put out an arm to intercept her.

‘How much?’ he asked.

‘How much what?’ she replied, confused.

‘To have sex with you. Now.’

She thought he was joking.

‘I’m soaking wet, and I’m not even pretty.’

He brought out his wallet and showed a twenty dollar bill. When she just stared, he produced another, then a third.

‘That’s all I have,’ he said.

Bemused, she decided to call his bluff.

‘Okay.’ She took the money from his hand.

He immediately backed her up against a telephone pole, opened his fly, and hoisted up her skirt. Before she realized that he was serious, he had her panties to the side and his hot stiff penis was pushing into her surprised vulva. It jammed up somewhat painfully. ‘Hey!’

He didn’t stop. She tried to back off, but her back was against the pole and her wiggling only settled her vagina more firmly down on his intruding member. She was fairly skewered.

The man panted and thrust, and in a moment she felt the hot jet of his semen. It was way too late to protest; the deed was already in progress. He thrust several more times, spewing out what was in him, and subsided. Then he withdrew, pulled in his penis, and hurried away, looking somewhat shamefaced.

Desiree was left holding the money. It wasn’t even rape; she had been paid. Stunned, she fumbled out a tissue, wiped her cleft, and put herself back together.

She took a moment to ponder, and realized that maybe the elf had not been joshing her. He just might really have given her the curse of sex appeal.

The episode had not been fun, but she did have sixty dollars she could certainly use. Still, it could be a fluke. The man she had encountered might have been so desperate for a woman that he simply took the first one he encountered. How could she be sure?

There was a pair of rather cute boys living a few houses down the street from her. She would have liked to have something to do with them, but they had never noticed her. They were decent types. She would ask them.

She walked to their house, went to the door, and knocked.

‘Hi, Al,’ she said when the door opened. ‘I’m Desiree, down the street. I wonder if—’

‘You’re soaking wet,’ Al said. ‘You’ll catch your death of cold. Come in.’

He called back over his shoulder: ‘Hey Bo, it’s Desiree.’

‘Well, there’s really no need. I just want to know whether—’

Then Bo was there too. The two boys bustled her into their warm apartment and solicitously stripped away her sodden clothing. While Al dried her with a soft towel Bo fixed her a mug of hot chocolate. In moments she was sitting nude at their table, drinking it. It was wonderful.

‘This may seem inopportune,’ Al said. ‘But there’s something about you. Would it be too much to ask if—’

This was the test. What did she have to lose?

‘Welcome, both of you.’ Suddenly she was on the bed with them, and Al was kissing her mouth and fondling her breasts while Bo was squeezing her buttocks and tonguing her cleft. Then Al’s rigid penis was in her mouth while Bo’s was plunging her vagina. They tried to be gentle, but were overcome by passion. They jetted almost simultaneously.

Desiree swallowed the coursing fluid, and rocked with the force of the eruptions. Her question had been answered: she had potent sex appeal.

The boys were embarrassed as they subsided.

‘We’ve never been like this before,’ Al said. ‘I don’t know what got into us.’

‘I do,’ Desiree said, satisfied. Innate caution caused her to avoid the truth. ‘You just never saw me nude before.’

‘We thought you were, well, plain,’ Bo said.

‘No offense. This was amaz ing.’

‘Just my luck to get caught in the rain. I’d better go home now.’

‘Of course,’ Al said. ‘But now that we know the real you, we’d like to—’

‘How about formal dates with each of you, on alternate nights?’ They agreed. Soon she was on her way home, in borrowed dry clothing, carrying her wet things. She was well pleased with her supposed curse. Now she had two nice boyfriends.

But as she settled down to sleep in the evening, it occurred to her that it could be awkward at her job, where there were four men for every woman. Could she turn off the sex appeal? Would baggy clothing mask it? Or would she be stuck trying to fend off married men, including her boss?

Well, she would worry about that in the morning. She drew he sheet over her and dropped off to sleep.

She woke in alarm. There was a man in bed with her! Or something. He was trying to rape her.

She turned on the light. She stared. The sheet was squeezing her breasts, and part of it had somehow gotten wadded around her hairbrush, and the wrapped handle was pushing into her cleft. She realized with horror that she had so much sex appeal that the very things of her bedroom wanted to have sex with her. It was indeed a curse; how could she sleep if she couldn’t trust even the sheets to leave her alone?

Veil paused in her narration. The man’s penis had swelled in her hand with each recounted sexual episode, and was now fully hard. She sat up and mounted him, setting his member at her cleft.

The man looked at her, remembering where he was. And his penis shrank. Sex became impossible.

“Damn!” he said, blowing out a foul stench.

“I’m afraid I can’t help you. You were potent only when you forgot you were with a woman.”

“True. But you got farther than any other woman has. You could tell me other stories, and perhaps in time it would become possible.”

“Perhaps,” she agreed. But she was afraid it was a lost cause.

The next man was a callow youth with a dirty neck. How clean would he be where it didn’t show?

“I got two friends,” he said, farting politely. “We do everything together. We swore never to let a woman break us up. So we figure to do it together. One for the mouth, one for the cunt, one for the asshole, blasting off together if we can. Between times you can scrub the floor, cook the mush, wash the sheets—you know, what women do. You understand?”

“Perfectly,” she said. She had described two young men having simulta neous sex with one woman; this trio planned to go it one better, stretching all her orifices at once with their unclean instruments. She’d be better off with the impotent man.

One day remained, with one more man to qualify. She hoped he turned out to be a better prospect.

Chapter 13—Tower

Prior woke with one hand on Smellie’s breast. He wasn’t sure whether it was accident, or he had been feeling her in his sleep, or she had placed it there. It didn’t matter; it was nice. He rolled over, kissed the breast, and then her mouth.

“It’s been great,” he said.

“The greatest,” she agreed. “You’ve done so much for me.”

“But do you want the last thing?”

“Yes. I have decided.”

“You will be blind for a few hours, and you’ll have to keep your face bandaged for days.”

“I’m ready. Do it now.”

She put two breathing straws in her nostrils and lay with her eyes closed. He straddled her on hands and knees, his rear aimed at her head. The Spire issued an almost liquid fart that settled across her face and around the straws. That was all; Prior, prompted by the Spire, moved away.

Her face was melting. It looked like a wad of taffy with two straws poking out. It was awful.

LEAVE HER, the Spire gouted. SHE WILL BE UNCONSCIOUS FOR SEVERAL HOURS, THEN HER FEATURES WILL FIRM ENOUGH SO SHE CAN REMOVE THE STRAWS. ALL WILL BE WELL; SHE KNOWS WHAT TO DO. IN TIME SHE WILL BE BEAUTIFUL.

Prior hoped so. He dressed, ate, and quietly departed. At least this abated any sticky farewell scene.

He made his way to the fart balloon. It was being filled by several men with so much intestinal gas the hiss of it was continuous.

A woman arrived. There was a provocative flirt to her hips as she walked; that, more than her pretty face, identified her. She was the winner of the seduction contest, who had made a penis spurt without touching it.

“Ah, the fart champion,” she said, recognizing him. “We are to be travel mates. May the farts be with you.” She let out a ladylike fart.

“We are?” he asked, surprised, as the Spire loosed a courteous response fart. “Travel mates?”

“I have kin in Maid-in-Tower Village, so I’m taking advantage of the transport there. I’m sure you won’t mind.”

Prior wasn’t eager for such a distraction. “I, uh—”

“I promise to entertain you on high,” she said, taking a little dance-like step that compelled his attention. “I am Seducia, mistress of masters.” She farted again, with more authority, and removed her jacket so as to bare her breasts.

Nevertheless, he was determined to resist her blandishments, because he wanted to be at full potency for the Tower contest on the following day. It was bad enough to have to tangle with demons, without doing so depleted.

“I am Micro, master of not much,” he responded, and the Spire issued a social fart that smelled of honeysuckle.

Soon the balloon was full of gas. They boarded and it was cut loose. It floated into the sky.

“But how does it steer?” Prior asked, alarmed, for there was no visible mechanism.

“The wind takes it, silly,” Seducia said, laughing. “The trip is timed for the correct direction.” She farted humorously.

“Live and learn,” Prior said, and the Spire let fly with a two note tweedle fart.

“Oh, you are good,” Seducia said admiringly. “As we saw yesterday. You came from nowhere, but you farted in masterly fashion.”

She glanced sidelong at him. “Shall we proceed?”

“Uh—”

She shook her midsection, causing her short skirt to flounce up, flashing her bare bottom as her breasts bounced jigglesomely. “I don’t really know a man until I have had him in me,” she said. “But it’s more sporting if I make him spurt untouched.”

“I saw, yesterday,” Prior agreed, not wanting to admit that she had already roused his erection.

“But you have to bare your member,” she said. “For fair play. I don’t like working blind.”

“I’d really rather see the sights,” Prior said desperately, looking out from the basket to the landscape drifting by below.

“I’m trying to show them to you,” she said reprovingly, with another evocative flip of her bottom. “Are you gay?”

“No. I just—have a challenge coming up.”

“You’re competing for the Maiden in the Tower!” she exclaimed.

“Uh, yes.”

“Why? With your superior farts, you can win any woman you want. Me, even, for today. Why risk your health fighting the guardian demons? A fellow can get his ass reamed for keeps that way.”

“I—I just need to do it,” he said lamely.

“Now you have intrigued my feminine curiosity. First I’ll make you spurt untouched, then I’ll weasel out your secret. It’s a double challenge. But we’ll have to establish the rules of the game. Both naked, of course.”

“I don’t want a game,” Prior protested. “I just want to get where I’m going.”

“You’re not from Fartingale, are you,” she said.

“I’m from another country,” he agreed. “I followed the statues to get here.”

She nodded. “So you surely have motivation. I understand those statues can be demanding.”

“Yes.” He saw a cluster of houses surrounded by fields. Maybe he could change the subject. “What’s that village?”

“Take off your clothes and I’ll tell you.” He kept his eyes off her.

“You’re really determined, aren’t you.”

“Yes. It’s a challenge.”

And she would keep after him until she got her way. He doffed his clothes and stood with his moderately rigid erection.

“This is the village of Shit-for-Brains,” she said.

“You’re kidding!”

“By no means. All the villages of Fartingale have descriptive names. Didn’t you notice Nude-on-Toilet, with its coed privy seats?”

“Uh, yes. I guess I didn’t think about it.”

“You seemed to adapt pretty well to the local scene, quick-sticking Smellie when I did my act. How come you picked her to shit beside?”

She had seen that?

“She’s honest.”

That set her back for a moment.

“Good point. You’re smarter than I thought. Most men can’t see far past a girl’s face and figure. Smellie deserves better than she’s had.”

“She’ll have better in future.”

“That’s nice. But now you’re with me.”

“I didn’t choose to be. I’m just trying to travel.”

“And I’m your travel mate.”

She glanced again at the village.

“Shit-for-Brains specializes in quality manure that grows plants that are said to clarify the mind. There’s not a huge market for that, compared to farting stimulants, but it does well enough.”

“That explains the pile of turds in the center.”

“Yes, that’s their statue. It has a carefully cultivated odor.”

Just then a whiff of it came.

“What a stench!”

“The stenchiest,” she agreed. “The villagers believe it makes them smart.”

Suddenly Prior felt an urgent need to defecate.

“Is there a—a potty on board?”

Seducia laughed. “Of course not. Just do it over the side. The smell is conducive, by no coincidence. It is considered good luck if you can score directly on the statue.”

“You’re fooling.”

“Hardly. Hold me while I drop one.”

She got up on the rail, and he held her arms while she poked her bare bottom out and squeezed out a ladylike turd. Her position was such that he had the best possible view of her dangling breasts and flexed thighs, which were not far above his standing penis.

“Now I’ll hold you,” she said. He didn’t argue; he was about to let loose regardless. He got his balance, buttressed by her lock on his shoulders, and spewed out a string of loose turds, powered by considerable gas. They sailed gracefully down toward the ground, but missed the statue; the craft had already passed it. There was no urine; his hard erection prevented that.

“Uh, thanks,” he said as he finished.

“Welcome. Folk who poop together, whoop together. We have now shared shit.”

She blew out a short fart as punctuation as she drew her remarkable breasts away from his face.

And that, in this culture, was romantic. He was coming to appreciate it. After all, how realistic was it to think that women had neither gas nor feces? This culture celebrated every part and function, without illusion or hypocrisy.

The balloon moved on across field, river, and forest.

“That’s the Rootin Tootin River,” Seducia said. “One sip of that bubbly water and you’re ready to inflate a dirigible. And the Feculent Forest, of which it has been justly said you haven’t truly known feces until you’ve trodden there.”

The river was brownish, and the forest from this height looked like mold on manure.

Beyond the forest was another village, featuring a giant yellow fountain.

“And that is?”

“Look at me and I’ll tell you.”

She was playing her game. He looked at her, and she did her dance while she talked. Any faint notion his penis might have had about subsiding was banished.

“That is Piss-on-It, where they hold regular pissing contests.”

“I thought those could be done anywhere.”

“They can, and are, just like the farting parties. But for championship pissing, Piss-on-It is the place. They have divisions for distance, volume, color, and I’m not sure what else, and prizes galore. There’s a story that once a thatch hut caught on fire, and there was no water near to put it out, but their champion pisser unlimbered his hose and pissed so powerfully that he put it out alone.”

“Didn’t it stink up the premises?”

“The whole village stinks of piss, so they never noticed.”

The balloon drifted on by another village. This one had a huge statue of a woman lying with bare legs spread wide. There seemed to be activity in the vicinity of her crotch.

“And that is—?”

“Look at me.”

He looked. She intensified her dance, moving close to him but never quite touching. Such was her allure that his penis got overstressed and jetted its load into the air.

Seducia smiled, flush with victory, as she caught the flying fluid in her cupped hands and spread it on her thighs like lotion.

“That is Fuck-It, where they raise and train the fucking demons for export.”

“Copulating demons?” he asked nervously as his penis dribbled the last of its content and descended, untouched. He had encountered some of those demons in his day.

“They are very popular. Plain women buy the males and use them as indefatigable lovers. Men buy the females and share them with their friends. They are programmed for a set number of fucks before they have to be returned for refurbishing. Maid-in-Tower uses them as challenges for the contestants; didn’t you know?”

The Spire had mentioned it, but it had slipped his mind.

“I’ll have to seduce a demoness to get into the tower.”

“Correction: you’ll have to make her climax. If you do it wrong, she’ll run her tongue up your ass and pump your prostate until it’s prostrate. So you don’t want to have your orgasm first; she’ll make you sorry. I’m really doing you a favor by harvesting your jism now.”

That was one way of putting it.

“Uh, thanks.”

“Their main office is in the statue’s cunt,” she continued, looking down at the village. “You can see the people going in and out. Every evening they haul up a huge hard-on shaped battering ram and give the goddess a good fucking. It is thought that bad luck will fall on the village if they don’t satisfy her. You can hear the whomping for miles around.”

That thought made Prior’s flaccid penis twitch. Seducia saw it, and nodded. She wasn’t just talking; she had an agenda.

They floated over a fourth village.

“That’s Sorry Ass, where people go to address digestive complaints, such as inadequate gas in the gut.”

“Wouldn’t want that,” Prior agreed, and the Spire emitted a melodious fart.

“Next stop will be Maid-in-Tower,” Seducia said. “Now you can tell me your story, and I won’t touch you as long as it interests me. But when it falters or ends, you’re mine. See if you can hold me off until we arrive.”

So Prior started talking, telling the story of the news of his ideal woman being abducted and in need of rescue. He omitted the details of his penis socket and the Spire. Unfortunately that abridged his narrative, and he ran out of it before the balloon reached Maid-in-Tower.

“Give it to me,” Seducia said, clasping him and closing her thighs around his swelling penis. She pressed her breasts against him and kissed him as her buttocks massaged his member. Meanwhile the Spire let out a silent fart, almost unnoticed.

Prior’s will to resist evaporated. He re-angled his rod and thrust up into her slick tube. On the second thrust he spouted, and he felt her climaxing with him, her whole body convulsing with her passion. It was like wrestling a panther, except that she was not attacking him but stimulating him to further emissions. Their tensing bodies squeezed out their reserves of gas, and they farted almost in unison, thrust by thrust.

Soon they collapsed together, panting.

“Oooh, you made me come too, you amazing lover,” she gasped.

“That hasn’t happened in eons.”

Prior wondered, as he had not been trying to stimulate her. He had simply responded to his sudden need. She didn’t normally climax in sex? Evidently the challenge was all.

Was that you, Spire?

OF COURSE, the Spire gouted. I ISSUED A PHEROMONE FART THAT TURNED HER ON.

“You’re some man, Micro,” Seducia said. “If you don’t get your Tower maiden, I’ll still be around for a few days.”

“I’ll keep it in mind,” Prior said. Then it was time to get dressed, for the next village was approaching and the balloon was descending. It had been aimed and filled remarkably accurately; the windmakers clearly knew what they were doing.

The balloon drifted to the ground beside the tower, which was a huge translucent statue of a nude woman whose intestines could be seen within her belly. There was a person in there: the Maiden. He wondered who she was. Well, with luck he would find out tomorrow.

“If you’d like a roommate for the night...” Seducia said, with one of her special hip flirts.

He was tempted, but knew he needed to recover what sexual energy he could overnight. “I’ll never be in condition to rescue the Maiden if I stay with you,” he said.

“Naturally not,” she agreed. “Well, your chances are only one in seven even if you win your day. I’ll be watching.” She turned and walked away, her rear view as intriguing as her front view, as she clearly knew.

He found lodging for the night, ate, and settled down to sleep. But there was something he had to settle with the Spire. “Where do I want you tomorrow?” he asked.

I CAN SEDUCE THE DEMONESS WITH ONE TOUCH, it responded. BUT IF YOU HAVE A FART-OFF, I WON’T BE ABLE TO HELP YOU. FARTING FROM YOUR PENIS WOULD DISQUALIFY YOU. BETTER TO KEEP ME IN YOUR COLON.

That made sense. “Fart me into a good sleep,” he said, not depending on nature; he was too keyed up. He heard the faint hiss of gas, then was out. He knew that in the morning he would wake refreshed and potent; the Spire had marvelous powers of restoration. But he also knew that that did not guarantee him any victory.

Chapter 14—Choice

Veil watched the final contestants with a certain unease. One, Micro, was not a large or flashy man, and she didn’t give him much of a chance. The other was a big brute of a man she detested at first sight.

Both seduced the demoness. Brute swung her about and thrust into her repeatedly without climaxing himself, until she yielded. Only then did he suffer his own orgasm. Might, it seemed, made right. Micro was far more sensitive, stroking the demoness and kissing her as if he really cared, working her up. It was of course an act, but Veil much preferred it. The rituals of sex might be scripted, but the urge itself was genuine, and what started as a script could readily become real.

Then the two men faced each other in the farting off. Brute soon wrestled Micro to the floor and positioned his big bare bottom over his face. Micro seemed lost. He was holding his breath, but eventually he would have to breathe.

Then a visible fart squeezed out of his rectum. It formed a small cloud and floated slowly up behind Brute, following his body contours. It expanded as it went, until when it reached head height it was large enough to enclose the man’s head.

“It’s a magic fart!” the announcer exclaimed, amazed. “Micro won a magic farting contest in Nude-on-Toilet; he has a remarkable power. But can this prevail before he has to breathe?”

Brute, unaware of the mist closing in around him, did breathe—and fell over unconscious. Micro got to his feet, the winner. Veil was hard put to it not to applaud.

But the victorious underdog could still be a shit. She needed to know, so she could choose between the contestants. “Send Micro up for an interview,” she told the TV.

Micro was just turning, about to return to his lodging, when her summons preempted him. She saw his look of surprise. “But I’m not dressed,” he protested.

It didn’t matter. He was borne upward into the tower, up one leg, past the crotch, and to the station at the anus. The sphincter dilated and he stood looking into her apartment. He was mussed and sweaty, looking as if he wanted to be elsewhere. That was fine with her; she could surely get a better measure of him while he was emotionally off-balanced.

“Do come in,” she said, forcing a bit of a fart. “May the farce be with you.”

“And with you,” he agreed, stepping awkwardly in, emitting a meek an swering fart. “I—I’m called Micro. I—”

“I saw,” she said. “You powered your way to victory with a magic fart. It was a remarkable achievement.”

“I do want to meet you,” he said. “But I wanted to clean up and change first. This—I’m not ready.”

“This is merely an interview,” she said, taking his hand and leading him to the couch. It felt good to be in control, even to this limited extent. “As you surely know, I am Veil, the Maiden in the Tower. I am required to choose one of the seven daily victors to be my sex slave master for the coming year. I want my choice to be informed.”

“Uh, sure, of course. But I wanted to make a better impression.” She smiled, though of course it didn’t show through her shroud. She sat on her high stool opposite him and leaned forward so as to give her bare breasts better definition. She wanted to dazzle him if she could, again with the object of getting honest responses. “Why are you here, Micro?”

His eyes fixed on her breasts, as she had intended. “To rescue you, of course.”

She laughed. “Rescue me? I assumed you wanted a sex slave.”

“No. I mean, I’m sure that would be nice, but that’s not why I came. I—I don’t believe in slavery.”

This was certainly different. “You don’t even know me. Why should you want to rescue me?”

“I—it’s awkward to explain.” Especially if he was lying.

“Make the effort.”

“Well, for one thing, where I come from, women aren’t slaves.”

“Where do you come from?”

“I don’t know whether you’d understand. It’s—it’s beyond Fartingale.”

“Try me.”

“It’s called America. It—”

“America!”

“It’s like this, only with less, uh, farts. Not much magic at all.”

“I know. I’m from America.”

He stared at her veil. “You’re from home!”

“I was abducted and brought here, with my son.”

“Son?”

“You didn’t know?”

Chance was stirring, so she went to the crib, picked him up, and started nursing him. If this turned Micro off, that was something she needed to know.

“My son Chance is three months old. So obviously I’m not a maiden in the archaic sense. I can’t think why the beasts who run this ongoing lottery selected me to be their prize of the week. Maybe they didn’t realize I wasn’t alone, and then it was too late to find another. Is that a problem for you?”

“I, uh, I’m just surprised. I assumed—”

“That the Maiden in the Tower was a true maiden,” she finished for him.

“Normally I’m sure she is. If you’re looking for a virgin, I’m not the one.”

“I—I guess it doesn’t matter.”

“I can and will fulfill my obligation to be your sex slave, if you are the one I choose. Chance is well behaved, and sleeps more than he wakes. Any delays will be of short duration.”

“No, I mean I guess you’re the one, with or without a baby. It just takes some adjusting.”

“The one for what?”

“Well, I was told my—my ideal woman was captive, and I had only a week to rescue her. So I got on it immediately.”

This was curious.

“Who told you that?”

“It doesn’t matter. I believed it.”

He was being evasive.

“Who?”

“A—a succubus. A magical creature who—”

“I am familiar with the term. You had relations with a female demon, before you came to Fartingale?”

“Uh, yeah,” he said, staring at his feet.

“Obviously you do not have a regular woman in your life.”

“Yes, I don’t.”

“So you thought you’d like to have a sex slave for a year.”

“No! I mean, sure, I’d like that, but that’s not—”

“Not why you came here,” she finished. “I believe we have already covered that territory. So the succubus told you where there was better sex to be had, and you decided on a rescue mission.”

“I guess it does sound sort of stupid. Maybe it’s a cruel hoax I fell for. I just thought—if it really was my ideal woman, how could I not try to save her, somehow?”

He seemed sincere. She softened.

“At least you had to investigate the situation.”

“Yeah.” His eyes remained fixed on the floor.

“So am I your ideal woman?”

“Well, I don’t know. In appearance, sure.”

“You can’t even see my face.”

He blushed. “Apart from that, I mean. And I don’t know your personality. So probably I shouldn’t have come here.”

He seemed to be an ordinary, fallible man, with some exceptions. He was from her homeland, which counted for a lot. But that raised a serious question.

“How is it you have the ability of magical farting?”

“I—can’t explain that.”

“You’re being evasive.”

“Yes. I’m sorry.”

Curiouser and curiouser.

“You mean you could explain it, but you won’t.”

“Yes.”

“How do you expect to win my favor if you aren’t candid with me?”

“I guess I hadn’t thought that far ahead. I’m not the brightest bulb on the chandelier.”

She smiled again, though the expression was wasted.

“Somehow you got hold of a magical ability and used it to get you here. Now you want to take me home with you.”

“Yes, if you want to come.” He shrugged. “I know there’s not much chance.”

“We could be totally incompatible.”

“Yes, I suppose the succubus would really laugh if she got me hooked to the wrong woman. But I guess it’s a gamble I’m ready to make.”

“Because I have a good figure?”

“That, too.”

Yet he was from her homeland. If she went with him, she could go home immediately. That truly tempted her.

“Tell me about yourself. What do you do for a living?”

“I’m a file clerk.”

“You expect to maintain a family on that level of pay?”

His eyes had strayed upward. Now they fell to the floor again.

“I guess not.”

“You know there’s no market for magic farts where you live.”

“No more farting,” he agreed.

“Were I to choose you, we might be better off remaining here in Fartingale, where you seem to have some renown as a farter.”

“I don’t want to stay here.”

“But back in America, I would have to support you.”

He flushed.

“I guess I see the joke. Maybe you’re my ideal woman, but I’m not your ideal man. I guess I’ve made a real fool of myself.”

He had, yet there was something endearing about it. There were worse things than being with a man she could manage. As a sex slave, she would have to support whatever man she selected, at least for a year. In that sense, Micro was no worse than the others.

Veil suddenly remembered that she had forgotten to follow up on her riddle challenge. None of the other contestants had mentioned it, and this one might not even know of it. Perhaps now it would help her make her decision.

“Where can you walk south a mile, east a mile, north a mile, and be back where you started?”

Micro smiled. “I’ve heard that one. The north pole.”

“Agreed.” Now she sprang the second riddle.

“Where else?”

“That one really stumped me when I heard it. I talked it over with my friends, and we finally figured it out: draw a one mile circle around the south pole, then start from a mile north of that. That will do it. Or draw a half mile circle, and walk twice around it, and back.” He glanced at her hood. “Is this supposed to be a test? Because if it is, I flunked it. I know the answer only because my friends figured it out, and I remember.”

So much for selection. Yet his candor appealed.

“Tell me a story that will make me laugh.”

If a demoness could be won over by a man who made her laugh, maybe it would be true for a captive Maiden.

“You like storytelling?”

“Sometimes.”

He pondered a moment, then obliged.

“There was this famous, arrogant bachelor celebrity. A friend came to him and said ‘Hey, Hal, I’ve set up the perfect date for you.’”

Veil listened as Chance nursed, letting her mind get into the story so it seemed she was seeing it first hand. She pictured herself as the date, mentally substituting her own name for the one in the story.

Hal was interested. ‘Who is she?’

‘She’s called Veil. She’s really a great girl.’

Hal was suspicious, because his so-called friends were always trying to fix him up with stray women whose faces and figures were not their fortunes. For some reason they thought that the best women for him were intellectual types.

‘So how did this great date get set up?’

‘Well, that doesn’t really matter. You’ll like her, believe me.’

‘It matters. What brings her here?’

His friend fidgeted, then grudgingly came out with it.

‘She entered this contest, and she did really well, but she didn’t actually win. So she got the consolation prize: a date with you.’

‘Consolation prize!’ Hal exclaimed, outraged. ‘Me?’

‘It’s not how it sounds. When she learned who you are, she was all for it. Eager, even. She—’

‘Forget it!’

‘But she’s such a great girl! She’ll be so disappointed if she can’t be with you. You’ll like her, I swear!’

‘Absolutely not. Get out of here.’

His friend sighed. He walked to a cloaked woman standing nearby.

‘I’m sorry, honey. He won’t go for it. No date.’

‘Darn!’ Veil said. She threw off her cloak and stalked away, naked. Hal stared after her, noting her hourglass figure and glorious tresses.

‘Just what was this contest?’

‘It was for the world’s most perfectly developed body,’ his friend said.

‘But she didn’t win. The judge’s niece won. So Veil was runner-up.’

‘I changed my mind,’ Hal said. ‘I’ll date her.’

But it was too late. The rejected woman was gone. Hal had lost his perfect date.

“Served him right,” Veil said, laughing. Then she paused, considering. “It’s really not that funny, but I did laugh. You must understand me on some level.”

“Well, woman like stories about arrogant men who lose out,” Micro said.

“We do indeed. Maybe you’ll do.”

“Because I told a story?” he asked incredulously.

Chance had finished nursing and gone back to sleep. She set him carefully back in the crib. It was time to fathom the rest of this man, so she could make her decision.

“Kiss me.”

“Uh—” She stood, leaned down toward him as he sat on the couch, and kissed him solidly on the mouth. He was clearly startled, but his lips firmed up; he did know how to kiss.

“How much sex would you require of me, for that year?”

“None! I mean, not if you didn’t want to.” She removed her farthingale skirt and sat on his lap, surprising him again.

She could feel his penis stiffening against her bottom.

“None?”

“It’s supposed to be mutual. Sure I want you, but if you don’t want me, then it’s no good.”

“How quaint.” She turned into him so that her breasts touched him, and kissed him again.

“But I am required to desire you, in effect.”

He was breathing hard. “You sure do turn me on. But I think you’re playing with me. Maybe you should let me go and choose the man you want.”

“Maybe I should,” she agreed.

“Why are you holding back?”

“Because I don’t trust this.”

Of course he knew she was playing with him.

“How do you mean?”

“Why should someone abduct you and your baby, put you here for men to compete for, and send word to me about my ideal woman? It smells like a trap.”

Her jaw dropped. She got off him and climbed back into her farthingale.

“It certainly does. You’re not the dullest bulb on that chandelier, either.”

“Middle range,” he agreed with a wan smile. “So maybe we should avoid the trap by not getting together, much as I hate letting you go.”

“No, I prefer to spring the trap and find out what this is all about.” She faced the TV. “I hereby choose this man to be my slavemaster for the year.”

“I’m not sure this is smart,” Micro said.

“You have chosen,” the TV announcer said. “Now for your honeymoon in Eden.” Veil was about to say something else, but there was a hiss of gas, and everything changed.