Princess (22 page)

‘What of guards, eunuchs, the other girls? Do we take sperm?'

‘Take a sip, but do not bite into your necklace unless the need arises. It would make you too headstrong for this task.'

Iriel nodded, trying not to show her fear as glanced up at the palace. Taking the jar from Cruisack's bag, she took a swallow of the troll sperm, wincing at the foul taste as she passed it to Aeisla. As they crossed the darkness of one last alleyway she quickly took a lick of her leather necklace, and felt her courage rise as they moved into the shadows of the kitchen yard.

They began to climb, to one low roof, a ledge and a second roof, from which a colonnaded passage looked out. Slipping between the pillars, they entered a narrow passage which quickly turned into the heart of the building. It was pitch black and set with doors, forcing them to feel their way slowly along, but when it turned again they found themselves in a broad hall lit dull silver by the moon striking in down a light well. Rows of tables and benches showed as flat grey surfaces in black shadow.

‘A feasting hall?' Iriel suggested in a whisper.

‘Where the servants eat, I would suppose,' Aeisla replied, ‘but perhaps above us.'

She moved to the light well, peering up, then sniffing. Iriel caught the tang of perfume immediately as her eyes settled on another colonnade two stories up. Above was the roof, edged by pillars, with plants hanging down into the light well. Aeisla nodded and pulled herself out of the window. Iriel followed, stretching up to one ledge, the next and hauling herself between two pillars and into a warm, perfumed darkness, from which a voice spoke as light flooded over them from every side.

‘Welcome, as expected, although I confess not by the light well window, nor two of you.'

Aeisla was already throwing herself forward, her axe striking out to hurl one guard aside as she snatched a thrown net from the air. Female screams rang out, then a male cry of pain as Iriel drove her fist into the face of the nearest man, snatching for her machete, trying to bite on her necklace as two netman threw at once, enveloping her. The machete came free and she struck out under the net, knocking one man back as her teeth sank into her necklace. A third net came down on her as she jerked back to avoid the stab of a spear, tripped and went sprawling backwards. The netmen were on her immediately, grappling her limbs, pulling at the net cords, the spearmen too, one pressing to her neck, another to her belly.

She rolled hard away, her rage already building, and her strength. Indifferent to spear pricks, blows, clutching hands, she fought, biting, kicking, clawing, jerking at the machete were the net trapped it. All her struggles earned her were harder blows, and harder still as her rage grew, bringing her to a mindless crescendo of strength and fury that only ended when her senses went to the blow of a club.

Pain returned first, red light and an all encompassing ache that slowly came to focus on her head, her wrists, her ankles. Fear and despair hit her as she realised she was chained, her front to hard, smooth stone, her wrists high and fastened to a ring, her ankles fixed tight at either side, spreading her knees and buttocks, her waist and neck encircled. It grew worse as her vision slowly cleared, to reveal daylight, a pillared chamber and all four of her companions, also chained, naked and helpless.

Aeisla was closest to her, back to the pillar, her lean powerful body blotched with bruises and spattered with blood. On the pillar beyond was Kaissia, bottom out like Iriel, but with both full cheeks red with whip welts and a broad puddle of urine around her feet. Cianna was next, face forward like Aeisla, her mouth wadded and gagged, blood showing on her chin and one breast. Last was Yi, face front, grimacing in pain and misery as a solidly built guard worked his cock in an out between her buttocks, the bulk of it clearly up her anus.

She closed her eyes, trying to find courage in prayer. Nothing came, only a hotter pain at her bruised temple and she slumped against the pillar once more. For what seemed an age there were only whimpers and the soft squashy sounds of Yi's buggery, at last finishing with a grunt as the man came. Silence followed, broken by the hiss of piddle as one of the other girls let go her bladder, then voices, harsh and commanding, the clash of metal and another voice, soft, amused but heavy with authority.

‘A bucket might have been in order, do you not think?'

‘Apolgies, Serenity Aurac,' the guard answered. ‘I shall fetch one immediately.'

‘A mop also,' Aurac replied, ‘and if you must bugger them, pray wipe up once you are done.'

‘Yes, Serenity Aurac, apologies Serenity Aurac,' the guard babbled, drawing a derisive snort from Aeisla.

Iriel opened her eyes and forced her head around. Several men had entered the room, four of the armed and armoured guards with long purple cloaks hanging from their shoulders. The fifth was younger, dressed in a simple robe of rich purple silk bordered with gold and held with a gold clasp, his face calm, intelligent and strong. In his hand he carried a stiff quirt with a hand's breadth of lash at the tip. Aeisla made an attempt to spit, but Aurac merely smiled as he stepped back out of range.

‘Five in all then,' he stated calmly, ‘remarkable. And your intention?'

As he finished he lashed the quirt across Aeisla's breasts, leaving a long red welt and drawing a hiss of anger from her. She spat again, catching his robe, and once more he hit her with the quirt, and again, drawing twin scarlet lines across the flesh of her breasts to add to the first. Again she spat, but he stopped and walked to the window, scraping the spittle from his robe with two quick, fastidious motions.

‘You need not answer,' he went on, ‘evidently you sought to kill me. Do you really think me so foolish? Four Aeg girls are taken at Erijome Forts and I am not supposed to guess they are assassins? Why would the House Palades send such rare beauties to a dangerous outpost? To be fucked by their military? Hardly! No, it was obvious what Prince Daken intended from the first. I had thought more highly of him.'

Iriel found her voice, determined to show courage and to defend the Prince.

‘His scheme was not so simple. We were to come in down the Ephraxis, as if from the north.'

‘Better,' Aurac admitted, turning to her, ‘but hardly likely to have succeeded. Koran barbarians are hardly common in Vendjome, and so yes, you were sure to be brought to the Imperial seraglio, but as slaves, naked and collared. How did you think to kill me? You would never so much have seen me, save if you were giving service in the audience chamber, and rest assured you would have been well chained.'

‘Chains may be broken,' Aeisla answered, ‘or employed to slay. Besides, Iriel and I had won free, as you know. Had we come on you in your chamber things would have gone differently.'

‘Two men of the Imperial guard stand at my chamber door.'

‘We would have killed them, and given you a weapon to make a fair combat.'

‘Of you, I believe that,' he answered her. ‘Strange creatures, you Korans, as wild and fierce as mandrils, yet constrained by elaborate protocol. Protocol or none, I am glad I have met only the females. And you, tall girl, have your ancestors crossed with trolls or ogres, to be so huge? Are you human at all? Certainly dwarves are no less strange, either in appearance or manner.'

‘We are fully human,' Aeisla answered, ‘and you know me. I am Aeisla, who was with two others, highborn girls with blonde hair…'

‘You are she? Yes, you are, I remember you, only you were not quite so tall. Old Astripod fucked you, didn't he?'

‘Yes, and the Princess Talithea Mund struck you down. I am sorry she did not kill you.'

‘No doubt. Yet I am glad of that blow. Each and every experience may be used to provide knowledge, without that one I might have been less wary on this occasion. As it is, I intend to take no further risks. However, first you will be paraded before the Panjandrum, who has demanded it.'

‘Better you had killed us in combat,' Aeisla answered him.

‘Had I my choice it would have been so,' Aurac answered.

He turned on his heel, nodding to a senior man among the guards as he left. The guard bowed, then turned to his men as the door closed with a thud.

‘Audience is within an hour. Wash them, apply coffle chains to their wrists, collars, waists chain and ankles. Hold blades to their throats as you release them. Take no chances, it is best not to think of them as women, but as wild beasts.'

‘It is hard not to think of them as women, Captain,' one guard answered, reaching out to take a handful of Kaissia's bottom flesh.

Kaissia spat and cursed, wriggling also, but only succeeding in jiggling her buttocks against the man's hand.

‘Fuck them if you must,' the Captain stated, ‘but be brief, and leave the giantess.'

Iriel closed her eyes in shame and bitter misery as a guard immediately stepped close, to lift his tunic, press his limp penis between her bottom cheeks and take her breasts in his hands, fondling them as he rubbed in her crease. Another had gone to Yi, and the one behind Kaissia already had his cock free, stroking it as he pawed the heavy globes of her buttocks. The one who had buggered Yi stood back to watch, while the Captain stepped forward to explore Cianna's breasts, drawing a look of pure fury from her even as he brought her nipples to erection under his thumbs.

Thinking of the bladder bag of troll sperm in her tuppenny, Iriel pressed herself close to the pillar, determined to deny the man entry. He took no notice, continuing to grope her breasts and rub, his cock stiffening rapidly in the sweaty groove between her buttocks. Only when his erection was a rigid pole pushed hard in between her cheeks did he speak.

‘She doesn't want her cunt fucked, this one, so I suppose I shall be forced to go up her arse!'

His companions laughed and Iriel closed her eyes in burning shame, yet relaxed her bottom ring, determined not to risk a fucking. His cock moved down, finding her hole, the head pressing to her muscle. Eyes tight shut, she pushed out, doing her best to accommodate him in her ring and hoping she was slimy enough to let it go in. He pushed, grunted, there was a moment of pain and her hole had popped. The guard sighed as he began to force himself fully into her rectum.

She was buggered, his cock pumping rapidly in her anal passage, her ring pulling in and out. Halfway through her bladder gave, urine exploding against the pillar and back over his balls to splash on the floor beneath her. As her pee came, so did her tears, and she was sobbing and gasping as the buggery went on, only to have him force a hand around between the pillar and her belly, to rub her off. She came quickly, helpless to prevent the responses of her body, and making her anus contract on his cock, which brought him to orgasm up her bottom.

He pulled out immediately, leaving her shivering against the pillar as her bottom ring dribbled sperm down between her legs. Beside her, both Kaissia and Yi were still being fucked, bottoms and breasts quivering to the men's pushes as erections were worked in cunts. The Captain her come, masturbating over Cianna's belly and tuppenny mound as he fondled her breasts.

One man spunked, then the second, leaving Kaissia and Yi limp against their pillars. The guards dispersed, to return with water and the long coffle chains, also two middle-aged women. The girls were washed, their hair brushed, their welts and bruises attended to, their bottoms and faces smacked to a warm pink. The coffle chains were applied and each released, one by one, with swords held to their throats.

Two guards took hold of the ring linking the front of the coffle chains, another two at the rear. The Captain took the lead, the two women still fussing around the girls as they descended stairs and ramps, walked broad corridors and at last came out in a hall walled in a marble of delicate pink veined with gold. At the end was a door as high as the gates of the keep in Aegerion, with a guardsman at either side. Both saluted the Captain, who called a halt to address the girls as the doors swung wide without apparent aid.

‘Say nothing. Under no circumstances address the Presence.'

The girls were marched forward in their coffle, Iriel entering last, to a vast chamber. Pillars supported a high ceiling, with a dome rising higher still, to perhaps thirty times her own height. Dome, ceiling, walls and floor were of pink marble inlaid with turquoise, malachite and cinnabar in intricate patterns. Marble fountains stood to either side, clear water rising from the mouths of entwined fish and water nymphs, with couches beyond and silk cushions littered on the floor for the courtiers and slaves, all bright with silks of viridian; copper-gold, fuschia, vermilion.

Most of those present were girls, save for ten guards and a few effeminate youths. The girls were clearly slaves from the seraglio, collared at their necks and either naked or dressed in loose pyjamas of brightly coloured gauze, their limbs oiled and their jet black hair set with jewels and flowers. Three men stood out from the others, Aurac, standing patiently beside a colossal throne apparently made of solid gold in which lolled an enormously fat man, his cloth of gold robe bulging with ream upon ream of flesh. His head was a blob, his eyes barely visible among the folds of flesh, his tiny mouth open around the erect cock of a black skinned Cypraean boy who stood to his side.

‘This is the Panjandrum of Vendjome,' Aeisla remarked, ‘beside whom even Uilus is a model of restraint and manliness.'

‘Silence!' Aurac snapped, just as the boy came, the Panjandrum swallowing greedily before turning to face the chamber, come and spittle dribbling from the corners of his mouth.

A eunuch stepped quickly forward with a cloth to wipe the Panjandrum's face as the girls were hustled into a line at the centre of the floor, facing the throne. Aurac spoke.

‘As you see, Resplendence, five barbar girls, nothing more, crude and ugly. I suggest they be put to death with despatch.'

For a long moment the Panjandrum said nothing, apparently having trouble focussing his eyes. When he did speak his voice was high-pitched and petulant.