Seer: Thrall (33 page)

After that, we lay together for a while; I couldn't tell you how long. I was completely boneless and couldn't think, didn't want to think. She could have threatened to drink me dry right then, and I wouldn't have done more than shifted to give her easier access.

"Wow," I said finally. Solange purred her own pleasure, not sharing words. "You may do that as often as you want."

She rubbed her cheek against mine.

Finally I shifted, crawling off of her but then curling against her side, my head against the front of her shoulder, my forehead against her neck. "You're very quiet."

"This is as good for me as it is for you," she replied quietly. "You don't know how hard it is to stop."

"I have an idea."

She chuckled. "I suppose you do. Go ahead and doze for a while if you want."

"Dreams."

"After you come down a little," she said.

And so I let myself sleep.

I don't think I slept that long, perhaps a half hour or so. When I woke, Aubree was in a chair beside the bed. If they were talking, I couldn't hear them. Aubree's eyes shifted to mine, and a moment later, I felt Solange looking at me as well.

"Hey," I said. "More surreal moments."

"I suppose so," Solange agreed. "Are you ready to dream?"

I nodded. "Both of you will stay?"

"We'll stay," she said. "Right here next to your bed."

I nodded and rolled away from her so she could slip from the bed. I adjusted my pillows as she pulled the covers up over me, tucking me in carefully.

"Thanks, Momma," I said with a small grin. "What kind of nightmares will you give me tonight?"

"Look into my eyes, Sidney," she said. "You will be Bistra Miladinova again. You have received a package by FedEx, and it contains drawings, drawings that disturb you greatly." She talked to me for several minutes. I stared into her eyes the entire time, and then finally I felt her wrap her mind around mine.

In spite of what she was going to make me dream, her mind felt good. I felt myself smile.

"So pretty..."

"Sleep, my little seer."

* * * *

The human was already trembling before he stepped into the room. Annoyed, I looked up at him. "What is it, Garrett?"

He was holding a large FedEx delivery envelope. It was opened, which was nothing unusual. Garrett handled much of my business for me. I couldn't be troubled to deal with most of it, after all.

"This came for you, Mistress," he said. "The sender information has been falsified. I have already attempted to trace it."

Still, he didn't move closer or seek to hand me the envelope.

"What is it?" I asked. "And why are you acting like a frightened mouse?"

"Drawings, Mistress," he said. "And a brief note."

"Drawings? You trouble me with drawings?"

At that he moved forward and set the envelope into my hands then backed quickly ahead, his eyes focused on the floor between us.

I growled my annoyance then slipped my fingers into the envelope, withdrawing a small sheaf of papers. I could tell immediately it was cheap copier paper. The first was an unsigned, typewritten note. "I know who you did last summer."

"What does that mean?" I asked.

Then I flipped to the next page. It looked like a police sketch, the sort done from an eyewitness account. I recognized the girl immediately. But if that wasn't enough, I paged through the remaining drawings, and they told the entire story.

I began screaming my rage.

"Who sent this?" I screamed at Garrett. "Who knows? Who sent this?"

"I don't know, Mistress," he said, and I heard the fear in his voice. "The papers had you listed as the sender. It came FedEx from Atlanta."

"That bastard!" I screamed. "Get Gideon on the phone. Now!"

"Yes, Mistress," he said. He had come prepared, pulling out a phone number from his pocket. He walked to the house phone and made a call.

I stared at the drawings for a moment then screamed. "That bastard! If he wants a war with me, he can have it!" I began pacing around the room.

Behind me, I heard Garrett on the phone, talking to some sort of gatekeeper for Gideon, the Master of Atlanta. It didn't sound like he was talking his way past the sniveling human. What would I expect? One sniveler trying to get past another sniveler. I stormed over to him and wrenched the phone from his hands.

"Listen, you miserable worm," I spat. "If you don't want to feel my fangs ripping out your neck, you will get Gideon on the phone in the next ten seconds."

The sniveler's calm response renewed my rage. "I will see if he is available, Mistress, but he asked not to be disturbed."

"He damned well better take my call!" I screamed. "Tell him to get his spineless ass on the phone immediately or I will come there and remind him who is the better swordswoman."

"One minute, Mistress," the human responded. I heard running and gave myself a moment to smile. The sniveler's fear was palpable, even over the phone.

It was more like two minutes, and I was long ready to throw the phone across the room and run to Atlanta myself, but I maintained enough control to realize that would take longer than waiting for the human to find his master.

Finally I heard Gideon's cultured voice. "Bistra," he said, his tone cold.

"You bastard!" I screamed at him. "If you want war, I'll bring you war! How did you do it? Who do you have spying on me? I'm going to find who did it, and I'm going to spend days making his death as miserable an experience as I can imagine. And then I'm coming to Atlanta to remind you exactly who you're messing with."

"Bistra," he replied. "Listen and listen carefully. I received the most interesting packet from you today. It came via FedEx and included the most alarming drawings. And now you call to rant and threaten me? There was a note that said you've grown careless, and I believe whoever your spy is, he is right." Then he was screaming. "How dare you threaten me? How dare you threaten a member of my household?" Then he calmed down marginally. "If you set foot in my territory, I will have you destroyed. I won't bother with slow. I will go for sure."

Then he hung up.

The bastard hung up on me.

Screaming, I crushed the phone.

When I turned, Garrett was cringing near the door. I crossed the room, back handing him on my way past. He slammed against the wall and fell to the floor in a satisfying heap. I ignored him after that.

Instead, I flew to the stairway leading into the deep basements, the basements where I kept my most special playthings. There were three now, all women, little more than girls, and they heard me coming. By the time I arrived, they were all kneeling on the floor facing the barred doors of their cells.

They had learned what I did to them when they didn't kneel quickly enough.

They were naked, of course, and far the worst for wear. Only Danette in the furthest cell was remotely in good shape. She had amused me in the past, and so I had kept her healthy. But these other two were dull and witless. While their misery amused me, Danette's begging for more abuse is what had kept her alive for nearly two years.

That was about to end.

I went to the first cell. I didn't even remember this one's name. I had taken her from college a few months ago, right out of her own bed while glamouring her roommate to sleep through the experience.

She had struck my fancy, small, cute, with red hair and big, trusting eyes. Her eyes had lost their trust, but she kept her hair brushed and her body clean.

She didn't like what I'd done when she'd grown lax.

The cells didn't use keys. Instead, there was a simple mechanism that required a simple squeeze, but it was a squeeze requiring vampire strength to open. It was nothing for me to enter the cells, but the slaves couldn't free themselves. And so I strode in. I didn't bother with words but simply picked her up by her arms and began to carry her from the cell, holding her feet off the ground.

She began to whimper and cry. I hadn't even started in on her, and she was already crying.

We turned right and proceeded past the other cells to a stout wooden door at the end of the corridor. I shoved the door open and stepped into the playroom.

Anyone else might have called it a torture room.

With a push, I dropped the girl. She fell in a heap.

"When I get back, you will have locked yourselves into one of the devices," I told her. "If you have not, you get the shoes, and after I have burned your feet from your body, I will suspend you over a low fire. It will take days for you to roast to death."

"No, Mistress!" she screamed from the floor. "I'll be good, Mistress! I'll be good. Which device, Mistress?"

She'd experienced the shoes once, only briefly. They were steel and locked around her feet, and then I could begin to heat them. I'd burned her only a little, and I'd even healed it afterwards, but the threat of the shoes had kept her complacent and obedient ever since.

I smiled down at her. "Your choice," I said. "Choose wisely."

I turned my back on her. I knew she'd do what I'd ordered. There wasn't anywhere to run, after all, and I never bluffed.

I stormed back to the cells, this time entering the one opposite the first cell. This girl was called Maude. She had given me poor service when I'd been out shopping, more interested in texting her boyfriend than doing her job. But she was beautiful and proud.

Breaking her had been a great deal of fun.

I stared down at her, my feet inches from her head.

"Beg."

"Mistress!" she said immediately. "Take me. Please take me. Take my body. Please." She crawled forward and began kissing my boots. She continued to simper and beg. She had learned if she begged sufficiently, what I did to her wasn't as extreme, and she had gotten quite good with her words. But in the end, they always failed her.

She was no Danette.

I bent down and picked her up, setting her on her feet.

"Go to the play room," I ordered. "Strap yourself into whatever device the other one orders."

"Yes, Mistress!" she said, and then she was running from her cell.

I followed her more slowly then moved to Danette's cell.

"Mistress," she said. She dared to look up at me, and she was smiling. "You don't need them. I can please you."

I returned her smile, my fangs out. "We're going to play a new game, Danette," I said. "You're going to like this game."

"I like your games, Mistress," she said. "Will you bite me?"

"Eventually," I said.

Her smile grew. "Thank you, Mistress!"

I bent down and picked her up. I didn't have the patience to wait for a slow human to climb to her feet. I pulled her into an embrace, and she kissed me eagerly, intentionally cutting her tongue on my fangs. I squeezed her arms tightly in punishment for her insolence, but she simply moaned in pleasure and stuck her tongue between the fangs and into my mouth.

I sucked the blood from her tongue, and she moaned again.

But then I pushed her away. "Don't do that again."

"Yes, Mistress," but I knew if she got another chance, she'd do it again.

"Go," I said, pointing. "I have something special planned."

She ran from her cell, waving her ass at me on the way. I thought about cutting long slices in that fine skin and then licking the wounds as they slowly healed.

I arrived at the play room, closing the door with a slam. Danette was abased on the floor again, waiting for me. The other two girls were partially strapped into two of the devices and struggling to finish the job.

The first girl had chosen one of the most harmless-looking but versatile pieces of furniture. It was basically a padded bench about four feet from the floor. She was bent over it and had buckled her neck and one wrist into the locking harness on the other side. Her other wrist was slipped into place, but she couldn't tighten the harness. And she had skipped her ankles. They were waving free a few inches from the floor.

No matter.

The other was seated on a stool on the other side from the first, facing her. It seemed like a harmless position, but I knew her ankles were locked into place below her, and she would have had to impale herself on the stiff, ahem, protrusion sticking up from the center of the stool. From her motions, I could tell she was trying to bind her wrists behind herself, but she wasn't finished.

"Get up," I said to Danette. "Finish securing them. Nice and tight. Change that one-" I pointed to the one on the stool, "-so her hands are pulled above her head."

Then I stood back and watched.

Danette climbed to her feet. She went to the first girl. She wasn't gentle as she tightened the existing straps and finished buckling the one loose wrist.

The bench was such that the girl could bend her legs, and then her ankles could be secured to the legs of the bench, spreading them wide while entirely immobilizing the girl. Danette didn't even ask what I wanted. She finished securing the girl.