“Unusual?” I asked.
“Long and white. Not gray…bleached, or something.” He saw me blanch. “What?”
I was back in the sex club, being stopped by the stranger.
“I’ve seen him,” I blurted. “He was there that night – the night we met you and Telessa at the sex club.”
“He was there?!” Sarik said, aghast. “What happened?”
I looked at Jagor. “It was just before we left. When I was on my own, on my way back to you. He stopped me on the way back from the bathroom. Asked if you were.…” I flushed. “Lending me.”
I saw Jagor’s hands clench into fists. “He knew you were mine?”
I nodded. “He didn’t recognize me as your aide, or he would have said something. But he knew you.”
Sarik had his head in his hands. “We were in the same building….”
“Do you think he was planning something – something against me?” Jagor asked.
“Did anyone know you were going, that night?” said Sarik.
Jagor thought. “No,” he said eventually. “Not even Hendel. Just Lucy, me and a few guards.”
“Then it may have been simple, blind luck. I’ll have a quiet talk with Hendel. This is one of those times I wish there were cameras in the club.” He chewed his lip. “In the meantime, I think the King should avoid public engagements and take extra precautions. They’ll try again.”
Jagor nodded. “I’ll do my best to convince him.”
“But we can’t ignore this guy being at the club the same night you were: maybe it’s not about your father, maybe it’s about all the royals. In which case, you’re a target too.” He turned to me. “You too, Exkella.”
We all sat there staring at each other. There’s nothing so frightening in the world as knowing something awful is coming and being utterly powerless to stop it.
Sarik tried to lighten the mood, talking about old times with Jagor. The two of them went back to their youth, when they’d attended the same prestigious college. As they started to get into tales of drunken misadventures, I beckoned Telessa to follow me.
We went upstairs and sat on the deck. The sun was down, now, but the air still held enough warmth to make it pleasant. We sipped our wine and listened to the sound of the waves slapping the hull.
“How long have you been with Sarik?” I asked. It wasn’t the most original opener, but it was all I could come up with.
“You mean…how long has he owned me, Exkella?” She blinked at me with wide, innocent eyes.
It was almost a shock to hear her speak after so long: the entire time we’d spent together in the sex club and so far this evening, she’d been silent. Her accent was strong northern-Asterian, to go with her high cheekbones and clear blue eyes. I nodded, blushing; the way she said owned so casually was still a jolt to me.
“Almost six years,” she told me.
“And you’re…I mean, Sarik doesn’t own any other slaves?”
“You’re asking…am I his wife?” She shook her head, but not unkindly. “Marriage collars are always jeweled. Slave collars – like yours and mine - are never jeweled, however elaborate they are.”
Good to know. I looked at her collar: a wide, polished band of silver with Sarik’s name engraved across the front. I wondered if it was heavy. “Do you get tired of it?” I asked.
She caught my eye and smiled, and I realized my question could be taken two ways. She glanced at the stairs leading below deck, towards Sarik. “No, Exkella. I never get tired of it.”
She was in love with him, I realized. “Does he….” I started. “I mean, are you….” She waited, moving her head slowly with my words as if listening to a child. “What are your plans?” I finished weakly.
“You’re wondering if it’s normal for a slave to be in love with her owner? Is this forbidden love, like a rich Roman and his slave?”
I nodded. That was pretty much exactly what had been going through my head. She laughed – but again, it didn’t feel like she was mocking me. She was just enjoying the simple pleasure of helping a foreigner understand. “Yes, it’s normal. The Romans bought their slaves – the slave didn’t have a choice. If any of them fell in love, it was by chance, or faked by the slave for better treatment. In Asteria we choose our owners and give ourselves to them – we’re in love from the start.”
I was new to all this, but I could still spot the hole in her story. “But that’s not what happened to you,” I said slowly. “If it had been, you’d be Sarik’s wife.”
He smile faded. “Yes.” She drank some wine, looking away for a few seconds.
“When I was twenty, I was in love with a man called Waslev. A good man, very clever – very good with computers. You would call him a geek, in America. I studied medicine; I planned to become a doctor. We were married when we were twenty-one.”
Telessa was staring off at the horizon now, her voice growing smaller. I edged closer.
“Waslev was always ambitious. Our economy was booming, but everything was about the palladium: there weren’t many opportunities in IT. So he started doing some things that weren’t quite legal: setting up websites that money could be filtered through. Money laundering.” She turned to me. “No-one got hurt!” she said defensively, and I nodded. “But as he got better and better at it, he fell in with some very bad people: the sort of people Sarik tracks now for the SSV. They wanted more and more money cleaned, and they wanted it stolen, as well. Eventually, something went wrong.”
Telessa stared off into the distance again. She wasn’t crying and that made it worse, somehow: that the memories brought such pain that they could numb her completely. She spoke as if she was reciting from a book, as if the words couldn’t hurt her if she remained impartial. “He lost a consignment of money. Millions. And so they killed him, and in part payment they took all his assets.”
It took a few seconds for the implications of assets to register in my stunned brain.
“I was going to have to work for them,” said Telessa. “Of course, they didn’t need a trainee surgeon. So they said they’d put me to work in a club. As a dancer…or worse.”
I slipped an arm around her shoulders and pulled her close.
“Before they could find a use for me, though, SSV raided one of their businesses and confiscated everything – including me. Since they were going to prison, everything they owned – their cars, their houses – would be sold. I would be sold to the slave market and the profits would go to SSV. It was certainly a lot better than being owned by the gang…but I still had no idea where I was going to end up.”
Telessa sipped her wine. “Sarik was climbing the ranks, even back then, but he was still fairly junior. He should have been looking for a nice, twenty year-old woman to marry, but instead he met me.” She was biting her lip, remembering. “I still remember the first time he saw me. He was meant to drive me to the slave market to negotiate my sale. Instead he marched upstairs and persuaded his boss to keep me on temporarily – filing, data entry, stuff like that. He talked to me every day, for months. He used to bring me things – chocolate, books, things he’d seen I thought I’d like. He thought he was wooing me, that I was falling for him. I wasn’t. I’d already fallen, almost as soon as I met him.”
She was smiling now, despite herself, but then shook her head. “But it couldn’t last forever: SSV knew they had a valuable asset on their hands. I was worth a lot of money as a slave; I was educated, pretty…good in bed….” My jaw dropped at the last, but she was completely serious – that Asterian openness about sex, again. “So eventually they told him they’d have to sell me.” She took a deep breath. “And so Sarik told me he loved me, and asked how I’d feel about him buying me.”
She turned to me. “Understand, back then Sarik wasn’t even in the same financial ballpark as the men who buy slaves. He could have just married someone for free. Buying your only slave is pretty much unheard of. He had to sell his house and his car and take out a brutal loan, but he did it. We moved into
a one-room apartment until he was promoted. These days it’s starting to get a little easier, but he’s still mortgaged up to the hilt.” She smiled at me. “Any questions?”
I sat there and stared for a while. “Don’t you—I mean, didn’t you feel a little bit under pressure to go with Sarik – given your choices?”
She shook her head. “No. I’d fallen for him long before I had to make the decision. What I felt was guilt: allowing him to near-bankrupt himself so that we could be together. But he loved me enough to do it…and I loved him enough to let him.”
“Will you marry him?”
She considered. “I hope so. When we have the money. But marriage means something different, here. It’s a commitment and a transfer of ownership: for us, that’s already happened.”
We sat there in silence for a few minutes while we finished our wine.
“Exkella, I don’t know if this will help you, but….” She trailed off as if she’d changed her mind.
“What?”
“I met Calara many times, when she and the Prince were betrothed.”
Oh great. More lessons in how to be more like Calara. “And?”
“That whole time…. He never looked at her the way he looks at you.”
Chapter Eighteen
We walked with them to their car to see them off. Sarik pulled me aside. “Lucy,” he said seriously, “you’ve walked into something here that none of us really understand. I wish I knew more, so I could keep you safe. The best advice I can give you is: when you know something’s wrong, run. Don’t hesitate. You may only get one chance.”
He hugged me, and I stood there numb as we watched their car depart. As if the fear wasn’t bad enough, I had to consider the possibility that it was my own country doing this. Sato from the State Department had been very excited about finally making contact with Asteria. How far would they go to secure the palladium for themselves?
Or was I just being paranoid?
Jagor led me back below deck, his arm around my waist like a security blanket. “We’re as safe as we can be,” he told me gently. “We have the guards and the military team. Now forget about all this: why don’t you put on that outfit you brought with you?”
I turned and kissed him. “That’s the best idea you’ve had all day!” His hand crept around and squeezed my ass and I yelped and scurried off into the bedroom. I could still feel the fear, but it was sliding back into the background. This was exactly what we needed to take our minds off things.
In the bedroom, I opened the bag that Doracella had pushed at me: Jagor’s outfit.
The first thing I saw was vivid, flame-red silk. I lifted out the corset Doracella had shown me – the same one Ismelda had mentioned. Long black laces trailed from the back, and black lace trimmed the top and bottom. I could feel the metal in it, hard and unyielding. Wearing it was going to be…an experience. I held it up against me. It would finish under my bust.
I dug deeper in the bag. There was a pair of heels in the same flame red, ridiculously tall: they must have been five inches. There was a pair of sheer black stockings: hold-ups, this time. I felt around for the rest.
Nothing. No bra, no panties and nothing to wear over the top.
At least I had a good idea of how we’d be spending the rest of the evening.
I slipped off my clothes and put the heels and stockings on first – I’d learned my lesson after last time. Then I tackled the corset. I’d had some practice back in Monaco, but I still wished I had another pair of hands.
That’s what Doracella’s for, crept into my mind. God, was that what it would be like, when we got back to the palace? Doracella lacing me into some ridiculous get-up Jagor had chosen, helping me with hair and make-up before sending me half-naked to his bed? I felt myself flush, shocked…but not as shocked as I would have been a few weeks ago.
I started lacing, and the feeling of being clasped tight snapped me back to reality. I started to breathe more shallowly, watching myself in the mirror as my silhouette changed. My hips and ass seemed to flare more, but the real change was to my breasts: as my waist narrowed it was like they’d grown a cup size. It was an illusion, but a good one.
I stopped when it became too tight, paused and then pulled a little tighter, because I knew I’d get used to it. Now unable to bend properly and taking short little breaths, I looked at myself in the full-length mirror.
The heels lent my legs extra length and the smooth stockings made them seem even longer. With the narrowed waist and flared hips and bust, my new shape was all about sex…and submission. Between the heels I could barely walk in and the corset I could barely breathe in, I was close to powerless. And this was before Jagor started whatever bondage games he had planned. Not to mention the collar: I’d got used to the way it felt, but I’d forgotten the way it looked, the way it gleamed and shone, catching the eye, telling the world I was owned.
I turned, seeing my naked ass, glimpses of my nude sex in the shadows between my thighs. I could feel the heat of anticipation building inside, working its way down to my groin.
I stepped back and almost knocked something off the bed. The brown leather case – the mysterious sarith kit.
It wouldn’t hurt to take a peek.
I had to fiddle with the spring-loaded locks for a while before I discovered you had to turn them in opposite directions. They clacked loudly back against the leather and I glanced at the door – but there was no sign Jagor had heard.
I slowly lifted the lid and stared at the contents: silver pots and some sort of tubing.
Nestled in the centre was a pint jar of blood.
I stood frozen while my brain played catch-up. Suddenly a lot of things were slotting into place. I’d read more than a few paranormal romances on my e-reader. A mysterious, seductive prince with eyes you’d almost call hypnotic? Who lives in an ancient palace in a small, Eastern-European country? Who’d taken his innocent bride somewhere we wouldn’t be disturbed for some ancient sarith ceremony that his terrifying mother approved of?
That’s why she looks so young!
I didn’t have any idea where I was going: I just threw open the door and ran out…straight into the big, firm wall of Jagor’s chest. “What are you doing?” he asked, astonished.
Between the fear and the corset, I couldn’t speak. He walked into the bedroom, pushing me gently ahead of him, and saw the open sarith case. “Why were you looking at that?”
“You—” I panted. “You’re a—a….”
He frowned. “A what?”
“A…vampire,” I almost whispered.
He stared at me intently. And then he nodded.
“I’d hoped to keep it from you for a little longer, but…” He picked up the jar of blood and unscrewed the top. “Tonight, you will drink the blood of our family. Then I will feast on yours.” He stuck his finger into the jar and tasted it with evident pleasure. Then he dipped his finger again and held it out towards me. “Taste, and know that you will soon become one of the endless of Asteria!”
“No!” I backed up, but I was against the wall. “No!”
“Taste!” he boomed, and pushed his finger into my mouth. I spluttered, eyes screwed shut in horror as the thick liquid was rubbed over my tongue, tasting….
…sweet?
…sort of cherry-ish?
My eyes opened.
“It’s black cherry syrup,” he told me, and kissed the top of my head. “You idiot.”
I looked at the case. I couldn’t speak, yet.
“Sarith is an ancient Asterian drink,” he told me. “I was going to make it for you. It’s traditional.”
I still couldn’t speak. Relief and utter humiliation were competing to push any coherent speech out of my brain.
“A vampire?” he asked. “Really?”
And suddenly I was laughing, great rolling giggles that left my sides aching. He was laughing too – every time he looked at me or the sarith kit it started him off again. I punched him on the arm. “‘The endless
of Asteria’? You bastard!”
“You really thought I was going to—to drink your blood?” he managed.
“I thought the Queen—stayed young—by drinking the blood—of virgins.” I was holding my stomach now. “Stop. Stop making me laugh!”
“It’s pilates. It’s too hard to find virgins these days.”
I kissed him to shut him up, so that I could recover. That led to some more kissing, and some rolling and cuddling, and even warm, non-sexy cuddling takes on a whole different feeling when you’re sans panties. He gently pushed me away.
“First the sarith,” he told me.
***
Sarith and the process for making it is difficult to describe: but I’ll do my best. For a man who still couldn’t make coffee, Jagor was surprisingly adept, but then he’d been doing it since he was a teenager. And unlike making coffee – where you’re doing things by feel and eye – this was a preset, very specific routine, every little step followed precisely; even when and how many times to stir.
Imagine a chemistry set, but with a lot more silver and engraving. Various flasks were connected together with rubber tubes and a tiny wood burner was used to boil the water. The whole thing took almost an hour, which was part of the attraction. This was at least as important in Asterian culture as the tea ceremony in China.
Water was boiled and dripped through a cylindrical cloth bag containing tightly packed coffee grounds, then mixed with a thick dollop of black cherry syrup. A fair amount of vodka – some expensive Polish brand I’d never heard of – was added. Everything was constructed from curves and cylinders until the very last step. Then a perfect sci-fi cube of shining, almost black material was dropped into the liquid: very rich, dark chocolate.
The resulting brew is the ultimate in aphrodisiacs. It has alcohol to lower your inhibitions, phenyl-ethylamine from the chocolate to turn you on, caffeine to keep you up all night and sugar to power you through your sweaty, intense couplings. It tastes absolutely wonderful, and I now consider it one of Asteria’s great contributions to the world (though it’s impossible to find outside the country).
Asteria - In Love with the Prince Page 22