When he moved over to the line of breeders, Lilith stiffened and stared forward intensely, not wanting him to pick her. She was afraid of his deliberate, slow, purposeful manner. Something was unnerving about it compared to the brash, loud, and violent manner of the Jabbers. Perhaps the Jabbers weren't objectively any better than this man, but they were at the very least more familiar than this man.
While staring forward intensely, she eventually did see Draci pass by her, and she relaxed after a few moments, when he moved on farther down the line. Now relaxed, she glanced around, and she saw his goblet on the table near her! He had actually put it down!
Lilith couldn't believe her luck, but she didn't wait to wake up from this dream. She carefully took a cursory glance around. The Jabbers didn't seem to be too focused on her section of the slaves in the lineup. Their focus seemed to be wherever the prince was at the time, and because he was a bit farther down the line, she could carefully slip out of place for a moment.
Though she knew if she was caught there would be serious repercussions, at this point she felt truly desperate to get some liquid in her. So, she took the goblet in her hands and quickly chugged down enough of the contents to sate her for the moment, then put it down and was about to turn and hurry back to her place.
As she turned, however, she bumped into none other than the prince. He was tall and imposing, and just seeing those intense purple eyes look down upon her made her shiver in fear.
"Insolent little wench!" Lord Slorn shouted in a terrible grating voice, and doubtless he would have continued berating her, except the prince put up his hand to silence him.
"Do not screech in my presence. I came here to see your stock, not to be serenaded by a banshee," the prince said coolly, turning to glare at Lord Slorn. He quickly bit his tongue, but Lilith could see how angry he was. She felt as if she had been issued the death sentence already, as that was certainly coming.
"I…I'm sorry. I was so thirsty," Lilith said quietly.
"Go stand with the others," Draci said, but Lilith wasn't sure if she was saved or if he would just have his own punishment for her back at his castle. Perhaps he was a sadist who liked to torture people? It wouldn't have surprised her, especially considering he was royalty.
Still, Lilith could only choose between this stranger who might spare her or certain death. Granted, she knew the Jabbers would give her a quick and painless death, but she couldn't deny herself the chance to be saved. So, even if she was walking towards a terrible, torturous end, that sliver of hope encouraged her to take the chance.
Once she was in the line, Slorn exploded, yelling loudly at her. "Get back in your place, you insolent child! You…you!"
"I ordered her there, Slorn," the prince said shortly. Though Lilith could plainly tell that Slorn was containing an explosion within him, the toadish alien said nothing more, and neither did Lilith.
The rest of the assembly went on without a hitch, and Lilith followed the group that was led by the prince to his ship, after he paid for the twenty-some slaves he had picked from the group he'd perused.
Strangely enough--or at least Lilith thought it strange--there were no guards that followed the slaves or prodded them onwards. Instead, the prince seemed to just have faith that all of the slaves would follow without faltering.
Though Lilith thought it odd, she followed the prince without a second thought. Everyone in the procession knew that if they failed to stay with the prince, they would be executed on the farm. Perhaps the prince's confidence that they would follow wasn't so odd after all.
Once on the carrier ship, she milled in with the rest of the crowd, and all the older women who had been picked, who were at least over nineteen, knew the drill. Slorn prepared his slaves with meticulous attention to detail--something he was famous for. Therefore, all the older girls directed the younger ones to follow them into the human transport area, which was easy enough to find by following the signs.
Lilith was prepared to follow the older girls, considering they actually knew what they were doing, but she stopped herself when she felt a sense of unease come over her. She couldn't account for the cause exactly, but she could feel the hairs on the back of her neck stand straight up, and her skin began to break out in gooseflesh. She froze momentarily before she looked up to see that the prince was staring straight at her.
For a moment, Lilith was completely at a loss, unable to make any coherent thought stick in her mind. As he started to walk towards her, however, she felt instantly afraid. She was worried he wanted to punish her for stealing, yet her feet wouldn't heed her mind and run away.
It wouldn't do any good, even if they did heed. He would just chase me down, Lilith reasoned to herself. Her thoughts didn't get much further than that, however. Draci was upon her now.
"I would like to have a word with you, Miss Lilith," Draci said, his voice taking on a strange tone, which Lilith couldn't quite account for. She didn't know what to make of it exactly. His words were spoken in a near whisper, with more affectation that usual. She couldn't help but worry that something unsavory was waiting for her in whatever private quarters Draci wished to speak to her in. "Miss Lilith?" Draci asked, a bit more forceful this time.
"Yes, sir," Lilith said, responding better to the harsher tone, as that was something that she understood a bit more easily.
"Come," he ordered, and led her to a room with a small table, a food dispensary, and a hot drink maker. He motioned for her to sit, and while she did, he pressed a few buttons on the hot drink maker and gave Lilith a cocoa-like drink, and he himself had something that was as black as his sable clothes.
Lilith didn't know what to do with the drink, so she just looked at Draci with her big, curious green eyes. She was like a well-trained dog; she wouldn't have her treat without permission.
"Drink up, Miss Lilith," Draci said, and took a drink of his coffee. His purple eyes followed her movements carefully as he watched her take a sip of the drink, and he relaxed when he saw the smile spread across her lips. "I hope you will not continue to be so afraid of me."
"Sorry, sir," Lilith responded automatically, putting the cup down. She wasn't really sorry, but she supposed that was the correct response to have. when Draci looked at her and narrowed those intense eyes of his,, she realized that it wasn't the right answer.
"That isn't a very reassuring answer for the question I posed to you. Now, I know you aren't stupid. That much I can tell. So, listen to what I say: I hope you won't continue to be so afraid of me," Draci repeated, his tone laced with a tinge of annoyance.
Lilith took the time to listen, instead of responding on instinct like she did last time, but she was a bit at a loss for an appropriate response. Even still, she felt like she had to give an answer.
"You're right, it wasn't a reassuring answer. But it's the only answer I know for your statement," Lilith replied, being a bit more honest, and slightly more candid this time around.
"And why is it the only answer that you can give?" Draci asked, taking a sip of his drink.
"Well, if someone held your life in their hands, and could destroy it at any moment, how easily would you find yourself not being afraid of them at all?" Lilith replied.
Draci didn't say anything to that for a moment, and Lilith was worried she might have gone a bit too far. After a few minutes passed with Draci gracefully sipping his drink and pondering the issue, he spoke again.
"I suppose you may have a point there. But nevertheless, you will annoy me if you're afraid of me," Draci replied.
"Annoy you?" Lilith replied, surprised to hear Draci's rather childish response to her perfectly valid reasoning.
"That is what I said," Draci replied. "And I mean it. If you continue to be afraid of me, you'll only annoy me. That would give me more of a reason to send you back to Slorn, thereby greatly disadvantaging yourself."
"That only makes me more afraid!" Lilith said, not biting her tongue quite in time to prevent the little outburst.
Draci
laughed at that. "There! That's what I want. Someone with a little guts."
"Guts?" Lilith asked. Perhaps she was asking too many questions, but the Jabbers never asked her to have guts before. All she was required to do was demurely follow the orders that she was given.
"That's it," Draci replied. "Now, drink up. I know how thirsty you get," he encouraged.
Lilith looked at him, trying to understand what he meant by that. "Are you talking about how I stole your wine?" she asked.
"Yes. That was quite the performance. You humans must get thirsty rather desperately if you would step out of line and risk your life for a sip of wine," Draci replied.
"I had been working in the fields for hours, and the temperature was just terrible. Then I had to run from the fields to the castle, get dressed, and all without any water at all. I thought I was going to die," Lilith responded, feeling a bit indignant about Draci's comment. Anyone would have been bold in her situation.
"So, the Jabbers don't give their servants water, I take it?" Draci asked, interested in this development.
"They did. I just drank too much earlier in the day, when it was hotter," Lilith replied. "But Jabbers don't give us enough water. They lost two girls last year to heat stroke, and one this year. Humans sweat, so we need more water," Lilith explained.
"Fascinating," Draci replied.
"People dying is fascinating?" Lilith asked, a bit appalled by that response, though she tried to keep her tone civil, so she didn't make her master upset at her right from the onset. Biting her tongue was hard now that she had forced herself to let loose a bit as she talked to Draci.
"Perhaps I chose the wrong time to interject, but I meant that the incompetence of the Jabbers to keep their slaves’ basic needs met is fascinating, since they have a reputation for raising the best human slaves in this quadrant of the galaxy. Maybe standards aren't too high," Draci mused and drank some more from his mug.
The nonchalance with which Draci talked about death was somewhat disturbing, but Lilith didn't say anything against it. She just drank her hot chocolate in silence.
"You bear a resemblance to my mother, Lilith," Draci said, seemingly out of nowhere.
"I see," Lilith replied quietly, avoiding Draci's purple eyes by looking into her cocoa.
"When I saw you drinking from my goblet, I knew in that moment that Slorn would have had you hung up from a pole in the middle of his compound to set an example for the others. I didn't want that to happen to you," Draci said.
Lilith was at a loss for words there. She could honestly say that she'd never been paid such a kindness before. Yet the very fact that she hadn't been paid a kindness of that magnitude before made her uneasy. What was Draci's motivation for saving her? There was no way it was simply because she resembled his mother.
"Perhaps I've inundated you with a bit more conversation that you're comfortable with. Why don't you go sit with her fellows, and we shall talk again once we reach Roza," Draci offered.
Lilith nodded at that, finished off her drink, then stood. Before leaving, she bowed and then hurried off to the human transport section.
Chapter Two
Upon their arrival on Roza, everyone was escorted by some guards that were of Draci's race, though none of them were quite so tall or striking as the prince was. The guards escorted her, along with her fellow slaves, into the castle. By the time they arrived, Draci had already sent his guards with orders as to who would be roomed where, as mandated by what job he expected them to perform for him.
The castle itself was a sight to behold. The material, though Lilith hadn't seen the likes of it anywhere before, was some type of rock. Its surface was almost glassy, and it sparkled in the rays of the sun, yet it was as black as night. There were the occasional deep purple gemstones adorning the surface, and it simply looked magnificent.
Everyone gave their names to the guards upon entering the castle, and groups were organized, then led down one of the corridors of the magnificent castle, which was adorned with beautiful paintings, intricate woven patterns, armor, gems, and anything else that was wonderful to behold.
Lilith was at the back of the procession of people, so she had plenty of leisure time to enjoy the scenery. However, when she got to the front of the line, two orange-eyed and pale men looked down at her, waiting for her to give her name.
"I'm Lilith," she replied, a bit uneasy at how they were both staring expectantly at her. They had done pretty much the same to everyone else, however, so she didn't let herself get too concerned.
"Follow me," one of the guards said, and led her though endless winding halls and staircases until he finally dropped her off in a rather grandiose room. She almost suspected that this was Draci's room, and wondered if she had been taken on such a perilous route for the express purpose of confusing her, making it impossible for her to run away.
The first reason she assumed this must be Draci's room was the elegance of the place. A large bed, big enough to host about five or six people comfortably, without them needing to touch each other, was the centerpiece of the room. A large canopy made from what looked like a silken material topped off the extravagant sleeping quarter.
Aside from the bed, there was a magnificent chandelier, a fascinating vanity with bejeweled brush, and lovely carpets made of felled and skinned beasts from some exotic planet. The room was so magnificently furnished that Lilith knew it was for the royalty of the home, even if he wasn't in sight.
"Does everything in your room suit you, Mistress Lilith?" the guard asked.
So many things about that sentence confused Lilith. She almost didn't know where to start asking questions in order to get all the answers that she needed. "I'm sorry," she began. "Could you explain what you meant by that?" she asked, just wanting him to explain why he addressed her like that, and why he said that this was her room, and asked her if it suited her. She was a slave! These weren't the types of quarters given to a slave.
"Does the room please you, madam?" the guard repeated.
"The room is nice, but why did you call it mine?" Lilith replied.
The guard was a bit dumbfounded for a moment. "I'm sorry, madam. This is your room. I wouldn't have brought you to it if it wasn't yours," he explained patiently.
"You mean that this is Master Draci's room," Lilith said. Surely that was what the guard meant. However, did this confusion arise from the fact that perhaps Draci wanted her to share a room with him? That was a less than comforting proposition.
"The whole castle is Master Draci's, in a technical sense, m'lady. But insofar as anything belongs to any resident of this castle, this room is yours. Master Draci sleeps elsewhere," the man replied patiently.
Lilith just stared at him a bit dumbstruck, then looked around the room again to make sure she wasn't just imagining what she saw here. No, the opulence of the room far exceeded what even the most generous and gentle of masters would make a slave's quarters out of.
"Sir, I'm sorry. I can't be meant for this room," Lilith said, getting a bit exhausted with how slowly this guard seemed to catch on. The situation was so clearly not right! How did he not see it?
"One moment," the guard said, and stepped out of the room. Lilith remained where she was left, not daring to sit down at the vanity, or on the bed, or the divan. She was afraid that she would get dirt on something and be punished, so she remained still for a little over fifteen minutes before the door opened, and the guard reentered. He was not alone, however. Draci followed him into the room.
"The lady is not happy with her quarters," the guard explained to Draci, whose face seemed to be growing darker and more troubled.
"Why have you taken umbrage at your home, Miss Lilith? Is it not so nice as what you enjoyed back under Lord Slorn?" Draci asked, his pitch a bit high. He was not the happiest that Lilith had ever seen him, that was for certain.
"D…Draci," Lilith began, shrinking back from him, a bit worried now. Did he really give her this room? Was it no mistake? And had she made herself
seem so ungracious as to scorn it? "I thought--I mean, this can't be my room."
"What do you mean? Does it not meet your expectations?" Draci demanded. "Were you so spoiled by Slorn that my rooms do not suit you?"
"That's not it," Lilith replied, shrinking away from Draci more. "I simply never expected such an extravagant room to myself. Or am I waiting on roommates?" Lilith asked in a timid squeak.
Draci had to process this information, but when he did so, he at least was able to calm down a bit. "Oh, so you're saying that my hospitality was so far above your expectations that you thought you received it by mistake?" he asked with a chuckle. "Well, Miss Lilith, I assure you that you were not met with a mistake."
Lilith sighed in relief when Draci's temper subsided. She was starting to worry that she was in serious trouble, but now she felt a good deal safer. "I'm sorry for making you think I am ungrateful. Really, this is just so much more than I ever had expected. How do you afford to give this to your slaves?" Lilith asked.
"Well, now that we've got that settled," Draci said, pretending as though he didn't hear a word of what Lilith said after she apologized, he just pulled out his watch to check the time. "Yes, well, I've got to go. Princely duties and whatnot," Draci said.
"Wait!" Lilith said, stopping him before he could run off. Or trying to, at least.
"Hm?" Draci hummed, giving Lilith a stare that seemed to imply "this better be good."
"What am I supposed to do? What are my duties?" Lilith asked.
"This is your first day. Simply wash yourself and stay in your room. You will be given work when you are needed," Draci said, pointing off to the en-suite bathroom so Lilith saw she wouldn't have to leave the quarters to wash. Then, before she could protest, Draci left. Following his master, the guard quickly vacated as well, closing the door behind him as he went.
Just like that, Lilith was left alone in the huge room. Her first order of business was to wash, as instructed. The tub was a huge one, and there were many types of soaps and bath oils--the usage of which she got a bit confused about. Still, when she left the bathtub, she smelled like she had been frolicking through a meadow of the sweetest flowers.
AFRICAN AMERICAN URBAN FICTION: BWWM ROMANCE: Billionaire Baby Daddy (Billionaire Secret Baby Pregnancy Romance) (Multicultural & Interracial Romance Short Stories) Page 100