The writhing serpent swam through the air like a yellow ribbon of light, casting off bolts of lightning that illuminated the tunnel with blinding flashes. My heart sank as it reached a fork with a right angle. I willed it left but had barely formed the thought when it flicked right and disappeared around a corner, plunging us into darkness. 

Lungs burning, I sucked in a ragged breath to shout as Kalum came alongside me. 

"It's heading for the surface." 

Kalum didn't bother to respond as he surged past me. A moment later I heard his hammer strike the stone wall of the passage. As the bell tone of its strike faded, it began glowing with a steady white light that let me glimpse Kalum's silhouette just before he disappeared around the corner in pursuit of the lightning wyrm. Knowing I couldn't keep pace, I slowed to a stop and stood gasping for breath. By the time I had the wind in my lungs to call light into existence, Kalum's pounding footsteps were a fading echo.  

I wanted desperately to collapse to the floor of the passage and lay there until my heart stopped pounding, but I leaned into a new run as my casting took effect and the tunnel grew bright around me. Kalum hadn't stopped because he knew as well as I did that if the lightning wyrm reached the surface, not only would we lose any hope of catching it, we'd have to explain to the guild and the elders of Ahnt how we allowed a wyrm of clutch laying age to cast itself into the wind and drift to points unknown. 

Sprinting as quickly as I could along the uneven floor of the passage, I came to another fork in the ancient network of tunnels. Pausing to listen, I heard Kalum shouting, the sound of his hammer striking stone, then another shout of rage.

A few moments later I found Kalum standing at the end of a tunnel looking up at the ceiling.

I followed his gaze just in time to watch the yellow glow of the lightning wyrm disappearing up into a narrow crack. A moment later we heard a scream.

Without turning to look at me, Kalum held a hand out in my direction, gesturing me to a stop. 

"Heavy impact casting," he said.

Wincing in anticipation but grateful for the chance to catch my breath, I stepped behind Kalum. I covered my ears as he brought his hammer up in an underhanded swing, shouting an activation word.

The tunnel thundered with the force of Kalum's blow and a circular section of the ceiling exploded upward, revealing a brightly lit space. A room, I realized. The tunnels had led directly beneath a residence.   

Kalum tossed his hammer up through the hole, then gripped the edge to pull himself up. I followed. Blinking in the glare from a skylight, it took me a moment to understand what I was seeing in the room around me. 

We stood in a large bed chamber that still looked richly appointed despite the dust and debris scattered around our makeshift entrance. A naked young man crouched in the corner holding his hands over his head. Despite the ringing in my ears, I could hear him whimpering. In the middle of the room stood a bed occupied by another naked form. A young woman, I realized. Above her undulated the lightning wyrm.

"Jol," Kalum barked.

I launched into the casting that would set an electric current dancing between my palms, drawing the hungry wyrm away from the bed and into range of Kalum's hammer. I was only halfway through the casting when the creature dove with shocking speed and latched its jaws onto the young woman's shoulder. 

The man cowering in the corner wailed as the serpent's yellow-blue scales flared brighter.

I stared, marveling that the woman neither moved nor cried out, until my sense of urgency returned a moment later.

"Kalum, get it off her!"

Kalum stepped forward, a grim expression on his face. Holding his hammer in his right hand, he slipped his left into the rubber gauntlet hanging from his belt. As he moved, I noticed the woman's skin had begun to fade from an alabaster white to a slate gray. My stomach lurched. 

"Kalum--now!" 

Reaching the side of the bed, Kalum hesitated, but when the wyrm seemed not to notice him he steeled himself and extended his gauntleted hand to seize the wyrm around the neck. 

It began writhing immediately and released its hold on the woman. Kalum hurled it to the floor behind him and swung his hammer after it. Before the creature could right itself, Kalum's hammer found its midsection and the creature exploded. The detonation sent lightning and blue shards of light in all directions, knocking both of us onto our backs. 

When we climbed to our feet, I stumbled after Kalum to the bed where the young woman lay unmoving. Seeing the gray color of her skin I feared the worst, but when I reached the bed, the only healing casting I knew died on my tongue. It wasn't a young woman, but a figure carved from stone with a smooth, nearly featureless face.

I looked from the thing in the bed to Kalum, then to the young man cowering in the corner.  

"Is this a golem?" 

With another whimper, the young man scrambled to his feet and fled the room. Through the open door we could hear him shrieking for his mother to call the guard. 

With a groan Kalum set his back against the wall at the foot of the bed and let himself slide to the floor.

"Settle in," he said. 

I sighed and fished in my chest pocket for our guild permits before sinking down next to Kalum. By the time a squad of city guards rushed into the room to level spears at us I'd already rehearsed my speech. While I explained why we had excavated up into a home from a system of ancient sewers, Kalum tipped his head back and closed his eyes.

Our detention proved surprisingly brief and uneventful, helped in no small part by the remains of the lightning wyrm embedded both in the furniture and Kalum's gear. Even the complaints about property damage from the young man and his family were fleeting, quelled by a representative of the Elders' council who appeared and promised reparations. He knew as well as we did that the destruction of a single room in a single house was a price worth paying to ensure the eradication of a lightning wyrm colony.

When we left, using the front door rather than making out own egress, I felt dead on my feet. Thinking of nothing but how long it would take to return to our lodgings and douse myself in cold water, I was a good ways down the sun-drenched street before I realized Kalum wasn't with me. I turned and saw him speaking to one of the guards at the entrance to the house. He grinned at something the guard said, then turned to follow me, leaving the smirking guard behind. 

"And what was that?" I asked when Kalum joined me.

"Our bounty is complete," Kalum said. "Time to celebrate." 

I fell in behind Kalum, not sure I trusted the eager smile that split his face.

"Kalum, I'm exhausted." 

He gripped my shoulder and hauled me along with him as he began walking. 

"Just a quick detour," he said. 

"Where?" I asked.

"Were you not curious why that cowardly screamer had a stone woman in his bed?" 

I had been, but I'd found no opportunity to ask tactfully why a young, very shrill man had a golem in his bedroom.

"Well, it isn't always stone," Kalum said, smirking at me meaningfully. "And when it hasn't been sucked dry by a lightning snake, it can walk and talk..." 

"Yes," I said wearily. "I've seen golems before."

"...walk and talk," Kalum said, his smile widening again, "spread its legs, then moan and scream your name." 

I wrenched my shoulder free.

"Don't be stupid." 

"No," Kalum said. "I have it on excellent authority that they're remarkably lifelike. Soft and warm and wet. And we can get our own. Have some fun before we spend two weeks back in that fucking desert." 

Despite my exhaustion, I felt a wave of desire wash over me. 

"Impossible," I said. "You're letting yourself be the butt of a joke." 

"You got a good look at it," Kalum said, leading me around a corner into a decidedly less manicured portion of the city.

I had, and I'd observed shockingly realistic feminine features I couldn't otherwise explain.

"And how much are they? Golems require incredibly sophisticated enchantments. Getting access to one won't be cheap." 

"Oh, I'm sure the man we're going to visit will make the usual kinds of arrangements--by the hour, by the day," Kalum said, waving his hand dismissively. "You know how these things work." 

I didn't and, it turned out, neither did Kalum. When we arrived at the establishment recommended by Kalum's smirking soldier, a large, windowless building at the end of a ramshackle alley, the proprietor recoiled when Kalum described his desired transaction. Then he sneered. 

"We do not," the man said, "...rent." 

Standing in a cavernous room surrounded by a crowd of lifeless but very lifelike figures contorted in various approximations of joy and titillation, I tried to look as disinterested in Kalum's conversation as possible. 

"Then what do you do?" Kalum said. His boyish enthusiasm had evaporated, leaving behind a tired, irritated mask. 

"We provide companionship." 

"Delightful," Kalum said, opening his arms to gesture broadly at the two of us. "That's exactly what we're looking for." 

"Long term," the proprietor said slowly, "companionship." 

I saw Kalum's expression as he came to the same conclusion I had a moment before: these golems were not intended to satisfy fleeting pleasures. They were not disposable. They were intended to satisfy the sexual ongoing needs of frustrated bachelors and bachelorettes. Indefinitely.

Kalum turned and scanned the crowd of motionless figures. Spotting a curvaceous figure with red lips and blond curls piled high on her head, he pointed. 

"How much is that one?" 

Lifting his chin, the proprietor told him.

"In silver?" Kalum said, unable to conceal his incredulity. 

"In platinum," the proprietor said.

I drew a palm across my lips, trying to hide my grin as Kalum's face lost all expression. 

The proprietor surveyed us with smug satisfaction as Kalum glared back at him. 

"Jol," Kalum said finally, "how much gold did you bring to the city?" 

I shrugged and told him how much I had tucked away in the locked trunk underneath my bed at the inn.

"Plenty," I said, "if you want to make a down payment on a leg." 

"I can triple that," Kalum said, ignoring me. "What would that get us?" 

The proprietor considered for a moment. His left eyebrow rose slightly. 

"One of my--" 

"Two," Kalum said.

"One," the proprietor said firmly, "of my most basic figures."

Kalum chewed on that.

I rolled my eyes at the preciousness of the term "figures." 

"Done," Kalum said.

The proprietor shook his head, not in denial, but resignation. 

"Very well. Delivery upon payment."

"Payment upon delivery," Kalum said. 

I opened my mouth to protest the entire transacting just as the proprietor grew indignant, but Kalum extended his hand in my direction without breaking eye contact with his adversary. 

"Papers," he said.

Frowning, I handed him our guild permits. 

Kalum shook them out and held them before the proprietor, brandishing the guild seal at the top of the documents like a glyph of power. 

"Our patrons," Kalum said. "Should our word of honor not suffice." 

The proprietor stared at the permit for a moment, nonplussed. Then he pushed the papers away with the back of his hand. 

"Delivery upon payment." 

I watched Kalum swallow a growl, then thrust the permit back into my hands. 

"Fine," he said. "Payment within the hour and immediate delivery." 

"Of course," said the proprietor. 

Dragging both hands down my face, I left to wait in the street, trying to decide whether I'd charge Kalum interest on the gold he'd just appropriated. Well, yes, I decided, of course I would. The real question was at what rate. I was still calculating when Kalum stepped into the street wearing his boyish grin. 

"Our guest will arrive in two hours. Plenty of time to scrub away the sand and swallow a bite. Now," he said, squeezing the back of my neck with a strong, callused hand and steering me down the street, "how shall we take her? One at a time or both at once?"

The pulse of heat that began in my chest, combined with the warm weight of his hand on my neck, hit me with almost vertiginous force. All thoughts of usury flew from my mind. The beautiful, horny barbarian had no idea the gift he had just offered. 

"Uh, both," I said, "at once." 

"Ha," Kalum said, squeezing my neck. "I knew you were half fucking goat." 

Over the next two hours, my dick never quite softened. Not while we bathed, while we ate, or even after we'd both dressed again to be decent when we accepted our delivery, because Kalum never stopped describing the things he wanted to do when we finally had a warm body between us.

When the anticipated crate finally arrived, escorted by the courteous but unmistakably disapproving proprietor of the inn, I could no longer resist my base impulses and followed Kalum's lead, stripping off as soon as the door had closed. I stepped back and waited while Kalum used a knife to lever open the wooden crate. I waited a bit longer when Kalum grew very still looking down at the crouching figure revealed in the crate before him.  

Finally, I stepped around him to look down at the thing. The grin conspicuously missing from Kalum's face sprang onto mine. I took the crumpled paper from Kalum's limp fingers, the list of activation words, and spoke a command.

The cheapest of the vendor's "figures" appeared to be a slim, androgynous, but undeniably male model. As it stood, its soft, pale member swung between its legs, hanging from a short patch of dark hair.

I swallowed my smile but couldn't keep it from my voice. "Still interested in sharing?" 

Kalum glanced at me as his dick, still mostly hard, twitched. 

"We'll see. Make it go lay on the bed. Face down." 

The thin, bald figure walked to my bed and lay prone. Kalum followed. After a moment's thought, he tossed a pillow over its head. 

"You almost can't tell," he said. His dick began to thicken again as he reached out to stroke the figure's round, pert ass. He grunted. "Come feel how warm." 

I walked to the bed, my own member pointing the way, and ran my palm along the figure's skin from thigh to back. It was warm and smooth, with what felt like muscle rather than stone beneath. 

Kalum laughed and nodded at my throbbing member. 

"You can take the other end or wait your turn, but I'm getting in there," he said, spreading the figure's ass and grazing his middle finger against the tight hole that was revealed.

The figure twitched and raised its ass slightly to meet Kalum's finger. 

"Well then," Kalum said. "Seems eager enough. What are we waiting for?" 

I watched from the other side of the bed as Kalum leaned over to spit on the figure's hole and press his finger inside. Kalum grunted again as the ass rose up to meet him, swallowing his finger to the second knuckle. A moment later Kalum was on the bed behind the figure, knocking its legs apart with his knees and aiming the head of his thick member at the waiting hole. After spitting again, he thrust his hips forward and drove inside. He planted his fists in each side of the figure's chest to prop himself up.   

"Fuck," he said, rocking his hips forward and driving the figure down into the bed with his own weight. "This thing is going to be worth every coin." 

My own member throbbed as I watched Kalum drive in and out of the ass that began rising up to meet him. The sounds of his hips colliding with that lean ass began to fill the room with a steady clap. 

"This is incredible," Kalum said between grunts as he pounded the hole beneath him with greater and greater force. 

"Looks like we could hammer away at it all night," I said, sliding a loose hand up and down my shaft.

"Oh, we will," Kalum said, looking over at me with an open-mouthed smile. "Might not leave this room for days. We're going to fill this thing up." 

I made an appreciative noise in my throat that drew another laugh from Kalum. He delivered a few more resounding strokes then pulled out and climbed off the bed, his red dick waving wildly. 

"Your turn," he said. "See if you can get a moan out of this thing." 

As I climbed onto the bed and slid into the warm, wet hole, I had to think of something other than the fact that it was Kalum's spit allowing me to glide in and out of that enveloping warmth with such ease. I wanted to last long enough to appreciate the show Kalum was bound to provide. 

We took turns slamming in and out of that warm, pliant body. It felt as if we might have gone on forever, but finally Kalum lay down on top of the figure and began pounding with a feverish, animal-like urgency. 

"Fuck," he said, his voice a growl. "Fuck." 

I watched his ass flex and shake as he thrust into the body beneath him with mindless need. When he buried his face in the bed over the figure's shoulder and gave a muffled shout, it was all I could do to keep from stroking to climax with him and coating his back with my own seed.

But that wasn't how I wanted to finish.

Kalum lay atop the figure as the aftershocks of his climax made his hips twitch and thrust reflexively. I clenched my fists at my side and each time he twitched I imagined the burning wetness that had erupted from him like a geyser to collect deep in the figure's hole. 

"Kalum," I said, trying to keep the desperate urgency from my voice. "You can nap on your own bed." 

I heard him chuckle, then a moment later he peeled himself away from the figure's back and pulled out. His member was slowly softening and the sight of it, and the gift it had left behind in that hole, made me groan. 

"Ok, goat," Kalum said, wearing a satisfied, heavy-lidded expression. "Your turn." 

I climbed onto the bed before both of Kalum's feet were on the floor. I slid in slowly, savoring both the pressure that invited me in and the fresh lubrication Kalum had left behind to bathe my member.

The figure's hole had only swallowed half my length when I felt my orgasm building. I pounded at the figure's ass with short urgent strokes until I exploded, pumping myself into that wet heat to mix with Kalum.

I was still enjoying the echoes of my climax when Kalum slapped my ass.

"And that makes two," he stood. 

I collapsed onto my elbows over the figure, still buried deep inside. 

"How many do you think we can give it before they start leaking out?" He walked to the other end of the bed and pulled the pillow away from the figure's head. "And I'm curious about this mouth." 

I smiled and let my forehead rest on the figure's back. 

"Only one way to find out," I said. 

We spent three days using that figure hard. We each took it twice that first evening, and Kalum took again in the middle of the night, waking me as he mounted the figure that still lay next to me on my bed. I hadn't bothered to move it before I had surrendered to physical and sexual exhaustion and as I lay there looking up at Kalum, as he worked himself into a sweat, I was glad I hadn't. It was a sight I would never forget, watching him grunt and pant as he chased a third orgasm. When he finally climaxed he grunted and twitched, then collapsed and fell asleep almost immediately. He lay on his side, wedged between me and the figure, for the remainder of that night. The next morning he woke before me to inform me with a chuckle that my member had risen already and was digging into his back.

By the end of those three days, when we were finally sated, Kalum was loath to abandon the figure. Instead, we left it in a warehouse, intending to send for it when we had the funds to pay for space in a caravan.