by Eric Vall
“Well, if the house were being sold like it normally would, I believe it would sell around for forty-thousand crown aspars,” I breathed. “But since it’s going to auction, we’ll never be sure… we will just have to outbid them, at any cost.”
“I’ll be in charge of bidding against them,” Daisy nodded. “Since I’m your Mistress and a Browning, it would be only natural that I would be the one against them.”
“What if one of them bids more than the combined amount of the work that all three of them would pay?” A.B. asked. “What are we going to do then?”
“That seems highly unlikely,” Daisy disputed. “Since they say they just want Charles to work for them and are turning it into a dumb game.”
“We have one option open to us if that happens,” I explained. “They offered to double or triple their prices as long as I only work for one of them but… how are they to know if I work for all three of them? We could pit them against each other easily, hell, this bidding war is nothing more than a pissing race between the three of them.”
“Or, as you said, Charles,” A.B. started. “We pit them against each other while Daisy racks up the price to an unbelievable amount. From what you said about them wanting what the Duchess has, they’ll see your Mistress at the same level as Edony. Daisy has you, and they want what she has, we’ll use their jealousy to our advantage.”
“Maybe not raise the price so high,” I chuckled. “But yes, we could use their jealousy to our advantage. You two should’ve seen these women, I couldn’t tell if they were friends or enemies from the way they acted around each other, but… I think that’s how all women in Edenhart are.”
“So, the plan is to have Daisy bid against the other aristocrats,” Valerie breathed. “Beat all three of them, win back the manor, and then Charles works for all three of them. But what about the money? Don’t we have to hand over the money right after the auction ends? How are we going to get around that?”
“Well, not exactly,” I grinned. “I haven’t been to a lot of auctions in my lifetime, maybe three or four where I wanted a piece of equipment and couldn’t buy it for full price. There’s a payment policy here in Edenhart that they uphold during auctions, you can pay upfront or within thirty days of purchase, as long as you pay it in full. If you don’t, it gets handed over to the next highest bidder, but it won’t this time since we have all three of the aristocrats lined up.”
“It sounds like a good plan, Charles,” A.B. sighed. “And there’s no killing involved, I think we’re doing pretty good this time.”
“Unless…” Valerie sang.
“We’re not killing anyone,” I chuckled. “At least, not in this instance. Adelia, Lilliana, and Josephine are going to stay very much alive.”
“Oh, phooey,” the feline-woman grumbled.
“It might open up a few doors if one of them went missing…” Daisy trailed off.
“For the last time,” I guffawed. “We’re not killing anyone unless we have a reason to, and at this time, none of the three aristocrats have given us a reason to kill them.”
“You’re right, Charles,” the bear-girl agreed. “But if any of them gives me a reason, then I will act swiftly as I did with the guards.”
“Thank you, but no, thank you,” I grinned. “If we need to plan another one, we have to have a definite reason.”
“Oh, Charles,” the ash-blonde woman purred. “Who do you think will be the biggest threat during the auction? Out of the three women, who do you think will give you a literal run for your money?”
“Well, I’m sure that Josephine will drop out early,” I stated. “She already told us she’s running out of money because her mine has been broken down for so long, so she’ll be the first to go. That leaves Adelia and Lilliana, and out of the two of them, I think that Adelia is our biggest threat. That woman oozes old Edenhart money, I know she’s not as wealthy as the Duchess or Delphine, but she’s got money flowing from her veins just like the rest of them.”
“You don’t think Lilliana is a threat?” Daisy asked.
“You saw the way she was dressed,” I uttered. “Her dress and bonnet were plain, her glasses made from copper, and she wasn’t wearing any jewelry. You have to understand these women, their outward appearances are everything to them. They purchase the most expensive dresses, and the gaudiest jewelry, so everyone knows they’re rich.”
“But if you’re looking at it from that perspective,” Daisy countered. “Shouldn’t Josephine have been dressed that way, too? She’s the one with the least money out of the three, and she wore the most expensive-looking outfit.”
“True, but I know of Josephine’s family,” I nodded. “She may be poor right now, but if her mine worked the way it should, she’d be almost on the same level as the deceased Delphine.”
“How can that be?” Valerie asked. “Shouldn’t she have some sort of amount laid away for times like these?”
“No, you’re thinking like me, a man with limited means,” I smiled. “But most of their money comes from the labor of the men working for them either as serfs or for menial wages.”
“But do they run out if they’re constantly bringing it in?” Daisy mused.
“Aristocrats don’t know moderation,” I told them. “They’ve also never wanted for anything. They’ve lived their whole lives with a roof over their heads, and warm food in their bellies. Their money is expendable, and they’re always spending it frivolously. So, take someone like Josephine, her money isn’t guaranteed like Edony’s, she has to use her mines for profit, and now that one has broken down, she’s running out of money. It’s almost funny to say, but this is probably the first time in her life that she’s felt panic… she’s running out of money, and fast, if she doesn’t get her elevator fixed. You saw how desperate she was at lunch, Daisy, she needs it done or soon, she’ll have nothing left.”
“It’s almost disgusting how much money they have,” the bear-girl pondered. “They take and take without any regard to anyone around them, especially those who do the work for them, but I do have to admit, I liked Josephine a bit more than the other two women. She didn’t seem as power-hungry and vile as Adelia and Lilliana, and as she said, she can’t partake in the mock wars.”
“M-Mock wars?” Valerie echoed, turned, and stared at me with wide, horrified eyes. “What is that?”
“Oh…” I breathed. “I didn’t mention that part, did I? The reason that Adelia and Lilliana want the mustard gas and gunpowder are for mock wars. They referred to it as a ‘celebration’ for the queen’s birthday. Each aristocrat from different towns brings forward their servants and consorts, gives them weapons, and forces them to battle each other. The last army standing is declared the winner, and… that’s that, nothing more than the destruction of innocent lives for the greedy upper crust. But why should we be surprised? The more I learn about their lives and the things they do in secret, I can’t question it. I’ve seen the horrors that happen by their hands… hearing about them barely affects me anymore.”
“We have to do something,” Valerie cried, hopped up from the table, and rushed forward. “Can’t we do something about it? You… you can’t make those things for them, they’re going to kill innocent men with them.”
“What other choice do I have, Val?” I asked. “I have no other choice, either I give in, and Edony takes the manor away, or I scramble to find other means of surviving. This isn’t just about me anymore, you and Daisy are here now… I need to protect you.”
“I just wish there was some other way we could do this,” the feline-woman whispered. “Another way that wouldn’t cause more pain and death to the men of Edenhart.”
“We may not be able to do anything now,” I offered. “But we will someday, I promise you that.”
“It all starts with the Duchess,” Daisy stated. “Or the other high-powered women. We take them down, and the whole city of Edenhart will crumble. You’ve said it before, Charles, Edony will make for an extremely powerful monster-gir
l, once we have her in our midst, we could rip the town to shreds with our bare hands.”
“I agree,” I uttered. “But it’s not the right time, we can’t snatch her off the street now, especially with everything else going on around us, but I assure you, we will have her.”
“Just like in your dream!” the feline-woman simpered. “And she’ll be the most beautiful sister that we’ve ever had! Oh, Charles, I’m so excited! I only wish we could do it right now, I’d die to see what she’d look like in her new form.”
“I know, I am, too,” I grinned, reached out, stroked the soft hair on top of her head, and then leaned back against the wall. “But we have to wait. We have so many obstacles in our path right now… once all of this is finished, then we will start planning on how we’ll take down the Duchess.”
“What do we do now?” Valerie asked.
“We prepare!” I boomed.
The next two days flew by so fast that I barely noticed them passing, I spent my time making improvements to my machine while Valerie and Daisy rummaged through the boxes in the attic. They set off in search of a dress suitable for the day of the auction, and when they came downstairs with wide grins, I assumed they had found the right one. Valerie told me that Daisy needed to look the part, as aristocratic as the other three women, and when she stepped down the stairs on the day of the auction, I had to pause to catch my breath.
Both of my monster-girls were gorgeous, but seeing Daisy like this made my heart pound in my chest. When I looked at her, it was like the first time I ever saw an aristocrat as a young boy.
I’d stood on the streets with my schoolmarm and the other boys from my finishing school and watched as a parade of carriages passed by. I’d yet to learn the full extent of the hatred the women of this world held against my sex, and it made me incomprehensibly naïve.
I hadn’t paid much attention to most of the carriages, they mostly held old crones with wrinkled faces heavy with makeup, but the one that caught my attention was the very last. A tall, thin woman sat in the open carriage, smiled to the women lining the street, and waved with delicate, slim hands. Her hair was long, snowy-white, and flowed out behind her like a waterfall. Her skin was creamy-white, her eyes burned a deep violet, and when she smiled, I felt something within my heart warm up like a crackling fireplace. It was a feeling I’d never felt before, and as I got older, and reflected on it more, I realized that maybe it was the same feeling I would’ve known if I’d had a true, loving mother.
“Are you alright, Charles?” Daisy asked. “Your eyes looked distant for a moment, what were you thinking?”
“You look so beautiful,” I breathed. “It reminded me of the first time I ever saw an aristocrat.”
“Oh?” the gorgeous brunette gasped. “How old were you?”
“I would say I was about nine or ten,” I explained. “Most boys are taken away from their ‘birth givers’ the moment they’re born and placed in something like orphanages. We were taught by schoolmarms, but I wouldn’t really call it a true education.”
“You didn’t see one out on the street before that?” the bear-girl asked.
“No, us ‘brutes’ weren’t allowed out into society until we were at least seventeen or eighteen,” I told her. “We weren’t ‘of use’ to the aristocrats until we reached that age.”
“Can you tell me about seeing her?” Daisy probed. “What was it like?”
“They brought all of us young boys out onto the street,” I remembered. “The aristocrats were having a parade, they do that every once in a while. Most of the women were just old crones, except for two of them… There was a woman and her daughter, they were the most beautiful women I’d ever seen.”
“Tell me,” Daisy urged. “I want to hear it, in your own words.”
“The woman in the carriage was stunning,” I reminished. “It was the young girl who sat beside her that held my eye for longer than a span of a few seconds. She was around my age, and the resemblance between the older woman and her was striking. It was clear they were either closely related or mother and daughter. The younger girl’s hair was the same color, except shorter, and she didn’t smile at the crowd, instead scowled at each person she passed. Her eyes were what struck me the most, they were a brilliant violet color, like the color of wild lavender on the slopes of the hills just outside of town.”
“Lavender?” the bear-girl echoed.
“Yes,” I nodded. “The young girl looked so unhappy as she rode through town in the massive procession, and for a split second, I felt as if we were akin to each other. Yes, we lived entirely different lives; she was pampered and waited upon hand and foot, and I was nothing more than a dirty brute in the gutter, but the expression she made looked so… sad and dejected. Just for a moment, the tiniest of seconds, this young girl and I were mirrors of each other.”
“Sadness?” Daisy breathed. “She’s an aristocrat, how could she feel such an emotion?”
“I… I have no idea,” I exhaled. “I just felt it when I looked at her. Her eyes met mine, stayed there for a moment as if she were pondering something, and then quickly moved away. My little heart hammered in my chest like the beating wings of a hummingbird, and I hopped from to foot to foot to catch another glimpse of her as she rolled away.”
“And that was the first aristocrat you ever saw?” the bear-girl asked.
“Yes,” I uttered. “The girl felt so familiar, and as I got older, it didn’t take much for me to realize that the young girl and woman in the carriage were probably Edony, and her mother, the Duchess at the time.”
“After you mentioned the violet eyes,” the brunette nodded. “I figured that it was the Duchess.”
“I already knew that Edony and I were close in age,” I stated. “But I wasn’t sure by how much. She probably didn’t remember me, or that day, to be honest, it was perhaps all a blur in her memory, but… I did. It was the first time that I’d seen a real, stunningly beautiful aristocrat and felt something similar to a crush. All those emotions were quickly squashed as I learned the horrible reality I was living in, I would never see that girl again, and I could never feel those emotions for her, it was forbidden.”
“Of course, you felt that way,” the stunning brunette agreed. “She was the first pretty girl you’d encountered, and you hadn’t come to learn the state of society yet.”
I turned, smiled down at the brunette, and then offered her my hand. She took it, twirled a little, and then pressed herself into my chest. When I looked at Daisy in her elegant dress, with her freshly painted face and styled hair, I felt the same way I did that day, but this was different, I was allowed to love the brunette. Daisy and Valerie could be taken from me at any second if we were found out, but they loved me without reservation, so freely and openly that it was almost painful for me. I was a disgusting creature in the eyes of society, and yet these two beautiful women found something within me that was good, pure, and worth saving.
“How do I look?” the brunette asked. “Valerie said this was the prettiest dress in the attic, but I’m unsure, it’s quite bulky and hard to move in. What if I need to attack someone? I can’t tear out a guard’s heart easily in this? How will I have the dexterity to pierce through his chest cavity and push through his ribcage?”
I wasn’t thinking about the dexterity with her in the tight-fitting dress or the trajectory of her arm punching through a man’s chest. My head was filled only with how beautiful she looked. Daisy wore a crème-colored, floor-length gown that dragged across the hardwood floorboards, sheer fabric hung loosely from her arms and cinched at the crease of her elbow. The top was low, sewn with delicate lace, and hung lower than her shoulder, exposing her pale, freckled flesh. Lace and intricate embroidery also covered the cinched bodice of the dress, and her waist was so tiny, I swore if I wrapped my hands around it, the fingertips of each hand would touch in a full circle.
“You look so beautiful,” I breathed. “Almost like a bride, you’re only missing the veil and bouquet.”<
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“A bride?” Daisy tilted her head. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard that word before. Maybe I have in my Delphine memories, but I don’t know the meaning of it… What is it, Charles?”
“Oh?” I grunted. “A bride? It’s when a man and woman join in marriage. It’s not practiced anymore since women are in power. I don’t think a marriage has been performed in over… six hundred years.”
“So, you’re saying at one time, men and women lived as equals?” the brunette asked.
“At one point in ancient times, yes,” I confirmed. “But this quickly changed over time as women developed powers and the practice… and our pasts have been forgotten to time.”
“What is a marriage, Charles?” Daisy probed.
“Well, marriage once was a formal union,” I told her. “A social and legal contract between two individuals that united their lives legally, economically, and emotionally. Two people that were in love would marry, find a home, and then start a family together. Now, it’s nothing like that…”
“Charles…” the bear-girl whispered, turned away, and stared out of one of the windows. “Do you… do you think we could get married?”
“I-I… yes,” I laughed. “We could, it wouldn’t be technically legal because no female judge would sign off on it but… we could do it here in secret if we wanted. Is… is that something you want, Daisy?”
“Yes,” the brunette breathed. “I would like that very much. You would marry Valerie, too, of course, but yes, I’d like to be your ‘bride.’”
“Then you will be,” I smiled, rested my right hand on her shoulder, and then offered her my left. “Maybe not today, we have other things to attend to… everyone should be arriving soon. You remember what to do, correct?”
“Of course, Charles,” the bear-girl breathed. “I’ve been practicing in the mirror before bed every night.”
“Practicing?” I chuckled. “Practicing what?”
“My aristocrat personality,” the beautiful woman explained. “I hate using it, and I feel as if I’ll fall out of character if I don’t practice what to say. If I want to be believed, I need to get the character down perfectly.”