Steel and Promise

by Alexa Black

  Teran shrugged, claws sparkling. “I didn’t give a damn. My parents wanted an heir. I couldn’t have cared less. I mocked those who visited. Or ignored them. Or stared until they quailed and ran away.”

  Her mouth curled as if she tasted something sour. “But there was one person even I couldn’t scare off.”

  “Lord Keriel.” Cailyn thought of hands on her dress and his hot greedy breath. What’s your secret, Derys?

  “Yes. My lord Ben.” Teran spat the words. “But I didn’t care. Not then. I loved those stolen moments.” She smirked. “To think, I did it all right under the lords of Nivrai’s noses.”

  Cailyn stared, dumbstruck. “The lords of Nivrai? They were your parents.”

  “I was never fond of them. I was never fond of anyone until I met Mariel. They owned the house where I lived. That was all. I snuck out more and more often to see him. It delighted me to see my marks on his flesh, to watch him try to muffle his cries of pleasure.”

  “But Lord Keriel found you.”

  “Yes.”

  “How?”

  “He’d already come to my parents, offering me the favor of carrying a High Councilman’s heir. Finally, someone willing to breed with their silent, sullen daughter.”

  “But you didn’t want him.”

  “Of course not.” Teran’s hand flexed as if to strike. Cailyn shuddered.

  “One interminable afternoon, my parents insisted I dine with him. He tried to woo me with expensive food, promises of wealth, professions of desire.” She snickered and slipped a hand over Cailyn’s.

  Cailyn flinched but let her do it.

  “I thought he was talking with my parents, making plans for their alliance.”

  “He wasn’t?”

  The grip around Cailyn’s hand tightened. Cailyn forced herself to be still.

  “He followed me. Watched me go in to Mariel. I heard him slip away after we finished. I thought little of the sound. I thought only of Mariel.” She shook her head. “I should have paid attention.”

  “He told on you,” Cailyn said, her voice flat.

  Teran’s grip was painful now. “He told my father. He threatened to tell everyone else. Unless I agreed to bear his child.”

  “So you did it.” Cailyn pulled her hand out from under Teran’s. Once free, she flexed it, trying to work out the soreness.

  “No.”

  “But you’ve told me—you had Dion—”

  “Not because Ben Keriel threatened to spread rumors. True or not.”

  “Then why?”

  Teran’s expression hardened. “You don’t know my lord Keriel, do you?”

  “I—” Cailyn snapped her mouth shut.

  “He made a deal with me. That’s what he does.”

  “My lady?”

  “He made my parents promise that if I agreed to bear his child, they would let Mariel move into Nivrai proper. And become my personal servant.”

  You belong to Teran Nivrai now. She just hasn’t told you yet.

  Mariel was her slave, Derys.

  Cailyn’s mouth fell open. “Lord Keriel—”

  How could she ask it?

  “He did that for you?” she tried.

  Teran’s mouth puckered. “Lord Keriel did that for access to me. He knew I wouldn’t refuse.”

  “And you agreed to it? Knowing…what he wanted?” Cailyn couldn’t bring herself to say it.

  “My parents would have banished Mariel. Or killed him. This way, he was mine.”

  Cailyn cringed, thinking of Teran alone in Nivrai, seeing no one. My desire is what it is. It moves slowly through my blood, little one. It’s slow to stir and slow to vanish. If she had lost her lover to violence and politics, would it ever have stirred again?

  “So you agreed.”

  “Yes. With a stipulation of my own.”

  “That you wouldn’t raise Dion.”

  Cailyn winced. What it would be like to have a mother—or father—who had never held her as a child?

  “Yes. And that he leave me alone after Dion was born.” Teran drummed newsteel-tipped fingertips on the table. “A rule he has trouble obeying.”

  She turned away. “Mariel didn’t understand that I didn’t want the child, not really. He had big hands. He would run them over my belly, laughing as he felt the kicks. It made me feel ill to have something of Ben Keriel’s growing inside me, but it made Mariel laugh to feel it.”

  Cailyn remembered her shock at the thought of Teran pregnant. At the thought of pregnancy at all. Female courtesans kept their own cycles suppressed.

  Still, she could understand how Mariel felt. A child grew inside the woman he loved, safe and warm within her body. Unlike one of the courtesans, Teran could have the experience of growing a life inside her without retiring—or disappearing.

  And yet Teran had never considered herself lucky. She hardly knew Dion even now.

  Teran’s hand reached out to cup Cailyn’s again, gently now. “He wanted me. Delighted in serving me. But if I had never found him, his life would have been very different from the life I demanded of him.” She looked down. “I never asked him if he had regrets.”

  “My lady—”

  “I don’t think he had any. But I think he hoped that when Dion was born, he would get to play father. I never gave him that chance.”

  Cailyn didn’t answer. She waited, silent.

  “I had Dion. I gave him to his father. I had Mariel to myself again, without—” Teran shook her head with a violent motion. The grip around Cailyn’s hand tightened again.

  “Then I watched Mariel die. He—his body, all muscles and strength—”

  Cailyn shook her head. “I’m sorry, my lady.”

  “He was so small when he finally died. Smaller than me.”

  Teran’s head lowered. Cailyn followed her gaze, looking down at Teran’s hand on hers.

  “I couldn’t believe that,” Teran said. “I couldn’t believe that he’d become so small.”

  Her grip relaxed. She held up her hand and watched her claws catch the light. A thin smile turned up the corners of her mouth.

  “Now he is gone. And I have this.”

  Cailyn looked at her, worried. But her smile widened and her eyes brightened.

  “You do.” Cailyn allowed herself a small laugh. “I’m sure they make quite a memento.”

  Teran retracted them and extended them again with a laugh of her own. “They are a part of my body. A part of me. So is he.”

  They’d been his idea. So Teran had said. He’d wanted his lady’s hands to be her weapons.

  Or better weapons than they already were, Cailyn thought with a wry smile.

  Had the claws frightened him at first? Had he wondered where his life was taking him? Or did his desire rise immediately as he first watched metal spring free from his lady’s hands, eager for the rending of his flesh?

  Had he reacted, from the beginning, as Cailyn did now?

  She swallowed hard. Teran had called her an experiment. Had he been one as well, to a young, bored noble who snuck out to ease her boredom?

  Or had he been hers from the very beginning, as Teran had said?

  The ice-gray eyes watched Cailyn intently.

  “I’m sorry, my lady,” she said again.

  Chapter Thirty-six

  Cailyn twisted around to get a better look at herself in the full-length mirror. Religious application of Teran’s expensive salve for several days, coupled with an even more costly regeneration treatment at Teran’s expense, had made her marks fade. Now she bore a few scrapes, the yellow remains of healing bruises.

  Teran had reminded her of the rumors. “Nothing I do will be violent enough to satisfy them,” she’d said. Her smile had showed teeth. “They expect me to be a demon. They’d be disappointed if you didn’t show up half-dead.” She’d stretched, the claws glinting. “I want you as flawless as possible. I want to surprise them.”

  Cailyn looked over her nearly pristine body. She pressed her fingers into her
skin. She’d gotten used to pressure making her nerves blossom with pain. Now she felt oddly numb. She shrugged and slipped into the bodysuit Teran had chosen for her.

  It was the same black bodysuit Teran had bid her wear when she first arrived. The one that revealed so little.

  She hadn’t liked it then. Didn’t like it better now. She slipped a pair of plain black shoes onto her feet. At least their heels were high, and at least she’d put her hair up. And at least she had her lipstick. As usual, it was a blood-dark shade of red, not the brighter red Cailyn would have preferred.

  She patted her hair once to be sure it was all in order. She didn’t want to linger. Teran had gone off by herself. Probably off to the gymnasium to practice her forms. Or attack targets until she tired herself out.

  Trying not to think too hard about Teran’s tight, muscular frame, Cailyn snatched up a bag with her essentials and hurried out the door.

  Despite her nervousness, she slowed her pace as she headed to the elevators. Racing wouldn’t do anything to calm her nerves. Besides, even if she couldn’t calm down, it was a bad idea to let everyone know it. She took deep breaths, envisioning the courtesans’ goddess: serene, closed eyes, flowing hair, voluptuous nakedness.

  She opened her eyes to find someone staring back at her.

  Lord Nalar. The one who’d called her “Teran’s whore.”

  This was all she needed. She pressed her lips together, determined not to react.

  “Cailyn Derys.” His lip curled.

  “My lord,” she answered, her voice clear and musical despite her annoyance. “I hope you’ll pardon me. I have somewhere to be.”

  “Not so fast.” He stroked his moustache. “I want to ask you something.”

  “Ask me something, my lord?”

  “You think you’re too good for half the nobility. How can you crawl to Teran Nivrai?”

  “Teran Nivrai asked, the same as anyone else.” Cailyn’s grip on her bag tightened. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to get going.”

  He moved to block her. “You had me fooled then, Derys. I didn’t think you worked for anyone.”

  “My lord, I have the right to accept or deny any proposal. For any reason.”

  He laughed, a short, mirthless bark. “Teran’s whore. Prancing around the dark channels. I should have known.”

  He stepped closer, his face inches from hers. She clutched her purse, ready to hit him with it.

  She hoped she wouldn’t have to. The last thing she wanted right now was an altercation she’d have to explain. Guild law protected the courtesans, yes. But that didn’t make hitting nobles look good.

  “You should know no one will hire you after this,” he spat. “You bow and scrape in front of Teran Nivrai and flaunt it. You use your father’s name for fame off the dark channels, and then expect us not to notice when you have Nivrai’s collar around your throat?” He mimed wrapping around a neck and squeezing.

  “Stay on the dark channels. If they even want you there.” His spittle sprayed her face. “Keep. Away. From. Us.”

  His lip twitched. Cailyn dropped into a defensive stance and glared at him.

  He snarled, turned on his heel, and fled down the corridor.

  Cailyn stared after him. Do you think I’m turning into Teran, or do you think she’s coming to save me?

  It didn’t matter, not really. She mouthed a prayer of thanks to the courtesans’ goddess. Her grip on the purse relaxed.

  Before her stood another set of doors and a tall, well-muscled doorman with a small computer tablet in one hand. He looked at it, looked Cailyn over, then pressed a button. The heavy doors behind him slid open.

  Cries and moans filled Cailyn’s ears. From all directions came the sounds of hands, leather, and other things striking flesh.

  Cailyn looked around. Near her, she could see a large section of sofas, tables, and padded chairs, upholstered with soft, supple material. Beyond that, she saw a small tray of food and drinks.

  Equipment filled the rest of the room. She saw at least two of every cross and bench she’d seen in Teran’s or Darien’s flagellaries. And plenty more she hadn’t. Almost all of the equipment was occupied by writhing and twisting bodies.

  She gaped at the crowd. She’d always heard that the dark channels served people who’d tired of other forms of pleasure. She’d imagined most people weren’t bored enough for them. Teran was different, but Teran was Teran.

  Then again, even Lord Darien didn’t seem like the sort who’d lost interest in other things.

  She closed her eyes, listened to the sounds around her. She’d thought she would hear screams, winces, protests. Instead, the noise that filled the room sounded more like sex than pain.

  Impacts rang from everywhere, and yelps or barks of pain followed them. But Cailyn heard just as many gasps and pants and quiet currents of pleading.

  She opened her eyes and let out a breath. Maybe this wasn’t so different after all.

  She scanned the room for people she knew. In a far corner she found Lord Darien. He slid clips onto the plump, round breasts of a woman bound to one of the crosses. He grinned and ground his knee against her vulva.

  Cailyn flushed and turned away. She hadn’t come here to stare at Darien.

  Valik stood nearby, bound to a ladderlike frame. A tall pale man with salt-and-pepper hair flogged him. Cailyn recognized him from the High Council.

  Valik’s member jutted upward. He groaned as the mop of thick leather crashed into his back. He grimaced as it hit, but his face relaxed a moment later, the lines of pain smoothing. His back arched to meet the whip and he cried out all the louder.

  The heat in Cailyn’s flesh kindled to a jealous fire. Her hand slid over her own nipple before she recovered herself and dropped her arm to her side.

  The nobleman’s arm dropped. The tails of the whip hung down over his hand. His other hand wound tight in Valik’s hair. He pulled Valik’s head back, leaned down, and kissed him full on the mouth. Cailyn heard Valik moan.

  “Like what you see?”

  Cailyn blinked and turned around. A woman stood in front of her. Bright red hair, as curly as Cailyn’s own but less controlled, cascaded past her shoulders and down her back. She wore a deep purple corset that left her breasts bare and cinched her waist. Cailyn whistled softly. She’d never tried it, but she’d seen enough in the academy to know how much dedication such training took.

  Was it painful? Her gaze lingered on the pinched waist, moved up to the bare pink breasts. Colored rings glinted in the woman’s nipples.

  Cailyn realized she must be staring. “My lady,” she said and lowered her head.

  “Lady Nivrai isn’t with you, then?”

  “No. She told me I could come alone if I chose.” Cailyn breathed deep, relaxing. “So I did.”

  “We’re glad to have you here.” She reached out a hand and shook Cailyn’s.

  “My name is Elana Teth. I always hoped I’d see you on the dark channels. Your reputation precedes you, as your father’s preceded him.”

  “Thank you.” Cailyn shook the offered hand and smiled.

  “Here, let me show you around. Explain to you what everything is.” Her grip on Cailyn’s hand tightened, promising.

  “I’ve seen most of it already.” Cailyn squeezed the hand encircling hers. “But I would be glad to come with you.”

  Lady Teth smiled and led Cailyn past couples and groups of every description. Cailyn felt of her depth. What should she ask for? She wished Lord Darien had found her instead.

  “My lady,” she finally said and pointed, “look at them, there.”

  She would have asked what they were doing, except that it was obvious. A woman, her skin shining with oil, reclined on a table while the man held a lit candle, dripping wax onto her nude body. The woman moaned and twisted her body to meet the falling wax.

  Cailyn had seen candles before. She served the nobility, and plenty of nobles had a taste for antiques. They lent charm to old-style rooms, made the
m glow with soft, seductive light. If you felt like bothering to find them and buy them.

  Now it seemed they had a practical use.

  “You’ve never done that?” Elana asked. Cailyn shook her head.

  Elana peered at her, clearly curious. “Most new people try that.”

  She laughed. Her finger reached out to caress Cailyn’s collar. Cailyn froze.

  “But maybe that’s why you haven’t,” Elana said. “Maybe it doesn’t hurt enough for Teran Nivrai.” She screwed her face into a scowl and held out her hands in mock threat.

  It was a terrible impression of Teran. Cailyn laughed anyway. “Maybe not.”

  “Cailyn Derys,” Elana said, her voice still mock serious. “You’re missing out. But there is another table over there.”

  Cailyn let Elana lead her. She began to pull off the black bodysuit clinging to her skin, but Elana reached to finish it for her. Cailyn relaxed under her hands.

  Elana peeled the cloth off with care, like peeling a rare fruit. Eager to taste it, not wanting to damage it.

  Cailyn’s face burned as she climbed onto the table and lay down. Lady Teth took down the bottle of oil and opened it. She tilted it slowly and let the oil fall onto Cailyn’s skin.

  She spread the thick oil over Cailyn’s chest, her breasts, her stomach, even her hands and arms and legs. And, of course, along her vulva, with the same light touches. Cailyn whimpered and shifted to better meet her hands.

  Elana slid her fingers over the soft flesh again, her laugh full of promise. Then she pulled her hand away.

  She reached for a blue candle. Its flame illuminated her face, casting a warm glow around her for a moment. Then she tilted it down.

  The bright river of wax fell. The warm burn made Cailyn gasp. It wasn’t pain, not exactly. Intense warmth that woke her nerves and set them singing. She writhed and moaned as the wax dripped over her nipples.

  Lines of heat crossed her body, over and over. Her chest, her stomach, her thighs, all ignited by Elana, her nipple rings glinting in the warm light of the candles.

  Elana set down the first candle and picked up another, this one a bold red, then a bright, vibrant green, then others. Cailyn looked down at herself and saw the bold colors spattered on her flesh: red, green, blue, purple, yellow.