An adventuring party moves to invade a sorcerer's tower, but the sorcerer is prepared to make a bunch of monkeys out of them.
Inspired by a wonderful picture drawn by Mervvin.
And the obligatory audio book. I had a lot of fun recording this one even with so many characters!

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The large man gasped as much air as he could. His breastplate felt heavy around his torso. Golems laid around him in pieces. He lifted his mighty maul and pointed it at the sorcerer standing on a high platform in the sorcerer’s own library. “Don’t worry, ladies, I will take care of this sorcerer myself!”

The evil sorcerer’s tower was quite the difficult slog. Though, that was largely because Garholt refused help from the rest of the party. Now he stood at the top of the tower, surrounded by books and magical tools.

“Garholt!” one of the three women called out – a priestess with pink hair dressed in a white robe that fell just below her knees. The healer of the bunch clasped her hands together, eyes wide, tears in her eyes. “Please! Let us assist you!”

The other two women didn’t share Grace’s desperation. One, a half-elf with long green, skillfully braided hair dressed in the traditional leaf weave of her forest home, hid her cringing face with the smile she was so used to displaying. “Yeah! Let us help! I’ve got a bow! I can actually reach him!” Lilah shouted. “You’d have to like, jump up there and–really I can just shoot an arrow!”

The final woman, a very short half-dragon in a red, black, and gold dress resembling a princess’s, though it barely hung below her knees, didn’t hide her contempt. She glared a hole in the back of Garholt’s head. “Goooo Garholt,” she faux-cheered. By her own estimations, she was far stronger than Garholt. He might have an oversized maul and some armor, but Diagora was half-dragon! The princess should just spit fire, burn the sorcerer, and end this charade.

“Yes… yes! I do this with your support, with your dedication! Please ladies, stand back! This is no matter for the delicate!” the large man said. He hefted his maul and ran right toward the platform at the back of the room.

The sorcerer let out a mad cackle as he reached for a staff. He pointed it at Garholt and mocked the paladin, “You buffoon! You may have destroyed my golems, but I’ll show you what sort of beast lies beneath your armor!” With a wicked cackle, he focused his magic power through his staff, shooting a wide beam that enveloped the paladin.

“Your magic won’t break through my wall of fai–urghn!” Garholt tried to resist, but the sorcerer’s magic was too strong. His skin itched, and the itch grew more and more powerful. “What have you done to me? A simple itching spell? Hah! I’m far too… ah… This really–” He dropped his maul and scrambled to yank off his armor.

The sorcerer let out a mad cackle. “Fool!” He stepped to the edge of the platform to admire his work. “You three, watch your knight in shining armor lose control of himself and know you’re next!”

Diagora groaned. “Lilah, please use one of your druid-root-arrow things.”

“Oh yeah!” Lilah knocked an arrow, but before she could let it fly, Garholt interrupted her.

“Don’t my lady!” He managed to stop scratching himself and raised an arm to signal for Lilah to stop. “No simple spell will bring me low! I can’t bear the thought of you having blood on your hands! Please just let me… let me…!”

The three women watched in awe as fur grew from the paladin’s arm and ran all the way down the back of his hands. “What have you done to me…?” Garholt asked. Fur ran across his entire body, leaving only his face and palms without hair. He lost balance and stumbled forward, falling onto his face. He hurriedly shook his boots off and tried to stand just to fall over again.

“A simple primal regression spell. I’m taking you all the way back, further than any ancestor you can think of, back further than a caveman! You’ll be nothing but a small stupid ape, incapable of speech and lost in a primitive mind! There won’t be an ounce of a knight in shining armor left of you! But you’ll make an excellent test subject for my spells.”

“No…!” Garholt gasped. His bones started to transform, his palms becoming less dextrous while the soles of his feet turned into something closer to hands! His fur grew thicker as his body shrank before it finally turned into a short but thick coat. He let out grunts as his jaw popped and his skull slowly reshaped. With his brain unable to keep human intelligence, he was left grunting in confusion as he stood up, though his knuckles dragged on the ground giving him a barely bipedal stance. He looked around, confused by what he was seeing, unable to comprehend any of it.

“Garholt…” the priestess trailed off. “I–I can fix this!” she shouted. She ran forward toward Garholt, hand extended as it swelled with light. She wasn’t confident she could uncurse Garholt without preparation, but she had to try! No one deserved that!

“A shame such a beauty as yourself will be joining him!” the sorcerer laughed. He pointed his staff at Grace and shot another wave of distorted light.

Grace’s eyes widened. She realized her stupidity too late. Now she was going to end up like Garholt, and neither Diagora nor Lilah could break the curse. She’d just doomed him and herself! But at the last second, before the magical beam reached her, Diagora shoved her aside, instead taking the spell in Grace’s place.

The half-dragon growled and turned to face the sorcerer. “Do you think I’ll turn into some prehistoric ape?” Smoke plumed from her nose. The scales on her face spread across it. She grunted as her face slowly pushed out into more of a snout. “You idiot!” she shouted even as red scales flourished across her body. “Playing with this sort of magic–how dare you!”

“Maybe if we stop him, the magic will end!” Lilah finally let her knocked arrow fly, though it bounced helplessly off a barrier that surrounded the mage.

“Pathetic!” the sorcerer sneered at Lilah. Perhaps she should be next! She was certainly physically stronger than the priestess, but would the spell even affect someone with elven blood? He’d find a way to dispose of her and take the priestess as another test subject.

“Don’t look at her! Finish what you started human scum,” Diagora spat, her temper flaring. She was losing control, moment by moment she could feel something powerful welling up inside her. Instincts, greed, lust, emotions stronger than any human could comprehend!

The sorcerer turned his attention back to the struggling Diagora. “Oh I know exactly what I’ve done. A half-dragon like you will become a ferocious beast, and when you’re transformed, I’ll make you into my guard dog!” he cackled.

Diagora grunted. Her hands slowly turned into claws, her tail lengthened behind her, her feet grew, destroying the boots she wore and revealing sharp claws where her toes once were. She clutched her head as her horns lengthened. “Dammit…!” she groaned.

“Diagora!” the pink haired priestess called out, running to her friend and clearly not learning her lesson. The sorcerer didn’t dare use his staff again – if he hit Diagora again, she would certainly become a full dragon, and that would be too much for even him to control. “Here, I can help!” Grace’s hand once again filled with light. She placed her hand on Diagora’s back and channeled what healing magic she could into the increasingly draconic princess!

“Get back!” Diagora yelled. The petite young woman slowly grew, getting larger and larger before everyone’s eyes. Her dress strained, ripping as she grew. Where an under five foot woman previously stood, a draconic beast over eight foot tall rose! The tattered remains of her dress squeezed her now much larger form. Still clutching her head, she let out one more roar making everyone in the room flinch and the primitive Garholt run under a desk in fear.

“Perfect! Now become my guard do–” the sorcerer didn’t get to finish gloating. In the time he spoke the words, a horrible realization set in. One look into Diagora’s eyes was all it took for him to realize he was nothing compared to this beast – this dragoness.

Diagora bounded up the platform and ripped away the sorcerer’s pathetic barrier with a swipe of her claws. She hunched over, staring into the sorcerer’s eyes. She roared once more. Out of fear, the sorcerer fainted right where he stood.

The now savage princess planted a foot on the unconscious sorcerer’s chest. She roared once more to celebrate her victory.

“Princess Diagora?” Lilah squeaked. “Are you okay? Are you still in there? I know dragons are really super smart, so…?”
Diagora turned her head and looked over Grace and Lilah. Indeed, dragons were smart, but Diagora was more instinct than anything else anymore, and she was a dragon in the presence of two beautiful women. She stuck her tongue out as if to taste the air. She could taste Grace and Lilah’s scent.

“Oh… oh no,” Grace turned and started running for the door. “Lilah! We have to get away! We have to–”

Once again Diagora lept, landing right behind Grace and, with one fluid motion, scooped her up under her arm. She glanced over at Lilah and bared her teeth. Plumes of smoke wafted from her nose holes.

“Put me down!” Grace kicked and flailed, but all she got was a tighter squeeze from Diagora to make her stop. “Lilah! Get away while you still can!” Grace cried.

Lilah stumbled backward, but in the face of such a beast, she lost her nerve. The way Diagora looked at her with that lust filled expression – there was no escape no matter what she did. She was a prey animal caught in the gaze of an apex predator. “She’s still Diagora, but her instincts have taken over! Think about how possessive she already is with women and run! You have to find help, or we’ll be stuck as her belongings!” Grace tried to warn Lilah, but there was no point. Diagora crossed the room on her long legs and snatched the paralyzed half-elf up under her other arm before letting out another triumphant roar.

She looked at the door to the stairwell – now too small for her – and instead shot a blast of fire, casually destroying a wall without care. She didn’t bother to look back at the sorcerer who had changed her or the annoying former paladin who hid away as a cowardly beast.

Luckily for them, they weren’t worth her time compared to the prizes under her arms.

She jumped from the tower, landing softly enough to not hurt her delicate treasures. With confidence, she strode across the land.

“...can’t believe I froze up.” Lilah whined. She struggled against Diagora’s grip, but even the athletic half-elf couldn’t so much as budge the powerful dragoness’s arm. Diagora barely acknowledged the struggle, only briefly squeezing Lilah to get her to stop being a nuisance.

“At least it looks like we’re heading in the direction of Desthoria. Likely to her hoard,” Grace sighed. “This is going to be so hard to explain to her father, but at least the mages there might be able to undo it. It can’t take forever, right?” Grace squeaked.

The two women sighed and said in unison “We can hope.”