When life-long friends Hanson and Graber learn there may be a great wizard on the far side of the woods behind their village, they decide to seek him out. The source of the information may be suspect, but the lure proves too strong. In hopes of learning magic to rise above their current status as Hanson the Pigs and Graber the Firewood, they set out on this quest.<br><br>When they meet wizard Holzy, they’re both intrigued and intimidated. He makes them labor and suffer, but eventually begins to teach them the practice he calls “the feat of the wand,” which turns out to impart much energy and knowledge as well as unsuspected pleasures to both men.<br><br>A submerged attraction between them comes to the fore as Holzy awakens urges and desires they hardly even dreamed existed. But he keeps them entranced and bound to him. When Holzy makes a mistake, can Hanson and Graber apply their new powers to gain freedom from his spell and be acknowledged as his equals? Will they go home in triumph or be consigned to the salt mines?

Hansen and Graber

Despite the forced labor—or perhaps because of it—Hanson did notice he’d grown stronger, gradually able to do more and more without being overcome with weariness. Watching Graber, he thought his partner experienced the same thing. Perhaps there was some strange method to this madness. Some nights Holzy still demanded they cook the evening meal, although most of the time he conjured it; sometimes tasty fare and sometimes vile, yet apparently nourishing.


One evening after they ate, Hanson did not plead a need to hasten off to bed. Instead, he continued to sit at the table and looked steadily at Holzy. He could almost see the wheels turning in the wizard’s devious brain and had to wonder what he was thinking.


“Mayhap it’s time for a second lesson in the feat of the wand. First a bath, though. The two of you reek of sweat and barnyard. Don’t you ever bathe?”


Chapter 11