by Sunny
"Oh." I closed the distance between us and took his hand in mine. "Never think that. I'm not afraid, just a little embarrassed."
I gave a short laugh. "Hardly dressed upstairs and naked the last time you saw me."
I brought his dear hand to my cheek, felt the brief caress of his palm and the lightest touch of his sharp nails against my skin before he turned his hand over and brushed me with the back of it, turning those lethal nails aside.
"I'm glad you came," I said fervently. "I am always, always glad to see you."
"Ah, Mona Lisa." He carefully drew his hand away.
"Stay for a while, if you can."
He searched my eyes, deeply, intently, before saying, "I can."
I smiled. "Good. Then do. Is there anything else I can get you? That you need?"
He studied me for a long moment then shook his head.
"We'll talk more later, after I get Mona Carlisse and her people settled." With that promise, I left.
He was such a lonely man, I thought sadly. And that loneliness was seen most sharply when he was among others, lonesome in a crowd. There was an invisible wall between him and the rest, a wall of fear, a shield of caution. Separated by his differences. I'd met him in a sun-dappled meadow before I knew what he was. I knew him only by the fruit of his actions alone there in the wilderness with him, unprotected. And his actions had been that of a gentleman, kind and concerned, that of a friend. I'd teased him and held his arm before I knew that those deadly nails, when lengthened in his other form, could slice off a man's head with one easy stroke, that the demon dead could take the form of a beast far more fearsome than Dontaine's Half Change.
My elegant demon prince. He'd saved me, brought me back from Hell, and told me that he loved me. And I had asked him to find another to love, for both our sakes. Were I less scrupulous, less stringent in my morals, he and I would be lovers as well. Although perhaps it was less morals and more fear that kept me from reaching out to him. Fear of losing the precious love I had only just found with Gryphon and with Amber. It was hard enough bridging the differences between us without throwing a new friction into the mix. I sighed. I'd gone a lifetime without love and now an abundance of it threatened me.
There was no aphidy, no chemical pull between the demon prince and me. Just a short wealth of trials and experiences that had bonded us. Pure emotions. I fell for the heartbreak of his agony. Suffering drew me. Some inbred instinct in me wanted to ease it gone, caress it away.
In truth, had it been Halcyon that Gryphon was throwing me at, I may not have resisted.
"Another strong warrior yet you add to your fold," Mona Carlisse greeted me upon my return to the elegant parlor. She shook her head disbelievingly. "How fearless you are." And then more quietly so that I had to strain to hear her, "You shame me."
"Whoa." It took me a moment to realize what she was talking about. "Do you mean Dontaine?"
"Yes." Mona Carlisse was conspicuously alone in the room. "I hope you do not mind. I sent the others away."
"Why?"
"I wished to speak with you alone."
I lowered myself onto the oversized armchair across from her. "How can I help you?" I asked softly.
Tears glistened for a moment in Mona Carlisse's pretty eyes before she veiled them with her long lashes. "Is it so obvious then, that I need help?"
I chose my words carefully. "Forgive me. Your hands betray your distress."
She looked down at her clenched fists, opening them. Her nails had dug half crescents into her palms. She gave a brittle laugh, and self-consciously relaxed her fingers.
"Are you well?" I asked gently. She was a beautiful woman, this Queen that I had somehow befriended. The only decent one I'd met so far.
There were other things that I had noticed about her but did not mention. Other things that had also hinted of trouble. Her hair, for one thing. Its length was coiled back in an elegant knot, revealing the purity of her large brown eyes and delicate oval face. It was an attractive arrangement, but Monère Queens usually wore their hair long and loose, flaunting their beauty, their availability, their power. Mona Carlisse had worn her hair bound back like this when I had first met her, held captive by a band of rogues led by Amber's outlaw father. Sandoor had faked both his and his Queen's death, so that no one had known Mona Carlisse was still alive. She'd been at their mercy for ten long years and they had showed her none. It was an experience bound to leave ugly scars. It actually spoke greatly of her strength that she had emerged from the ordeal with her sanity intact.
"No, I am not well." Mona Carlisse angrily wiped away a tear that had spilled over. "I had returned to speak with Healer Janelle, but she cannot help me because…"
"Because it is not your body that is injured," I finished quietly for her.
"No," she said sadly. "What ails me, she knows not how to repair."
Were it any other woman, I'd have taken her in my arms and soothed her like a child. But the presence of a Queen was abrasive to another Queen. Prickles of hot awareness was already a low stinging buzz against my skin just sitting this close to her. Distance, a lot of it, was a more natural order of things between two alpha gals. Nature's design to help propagate our species—disperse wide and rule. So on and so forth, and all that other crap.
Mona Carlisse's wounds were not on the surface. They were deeper, darker… her heart injured, her trust betrayed. Serious injuries. And yet, her spirit had not been broken. Frankly, she needed to see a shrink. But somehow, I doubted the Monère had anything like that available. For one thing, they hadn't evolved enough for something that… unnecessary; that's how they would see it. A doctor for the mind was a luxurious matter, really, not something the brutal Monère society would have advanced to yet. It was a harsh culture. If you were that weak and fragile, you died, simple as that.
"Do you have any psychiatrists in your… I mean, our society?" I asked.
"What is that you speak of?"
Mentally, I groaned. Times like this, I hated being right. "Do you have any counselors, priestesses or wise women you can speak with?"
"No one," she said, looking at me intently. "No one but you."
Great. I pitied her. Fixing things was not one of my talents. Destroying things or people that threatened me or mine… that came far more naturally to me.
Yeah, yeah… I was a nurse and I'd had some basic training in psychology. But I'd never taken any advanced counseling courses. Those hadn't been offered to mere nurses. But it seemed that I was all she had. Poor thing.
"How can I help you?" I asked again. Maybe if I asked enough times, she'd finally tell me.
Her brown eyes dropped back down to her hands. They had tensed again. She spread them deliberately, fanning them flat on her lap. When she spoke, it was so softly that I had to strain forward to hear her. "I cannot bear to be intimate with any of my men. I cannot stand to touch them or have them touch me."
Pity stirred in my breast. "It's only been several weeks since you've reclaimed your rule." And her freedom.
She shook her head. "It only worsens with time, not eases. My people, my men, do not know how to treat me. I am so different from what I was before. So much less."
"All your people were returned to you?" They'd been scattered, absorbed into other territories when all had thought that she had died.
"Yes, but perhaps it was a mistake to call them back to me. They all remember me as I was, and are disturbed greatly, unsettled at what I have become."
"And what have you become?" I asked gently.
"It takes a great deal of arrogance, of natural fearlessness to be a Queen. To rule a people."
"Does it?" I said, my tone sardonic. "And here I thought it was just nasty personality traits that came from having too much power."
"We are raised such, for a reason," Mona Carlisse said somberly, looking at me with her wounded doe eyes. "Even you have it in natural abundance."
I winced. "I don't consider it one of my good points."
&nb
sp; "It is an important part of what makes you a good Queen, Mona Lisa. And yet you temper it with kindness, with compassion. With love."
I winced again, more and more uncomfortable. Especially with the last word. Four-lettered words were almost as bad as three-lettered ones.
"I have spent a great deal of thought on the matter and have concluded that it is the combination of hardness and softness that draws your men to you, that binds them to you with a strength that is even stronger than demon chains." Mona Carlisse sighed, and it was a sad, lost sound. "I have no arrogance left in me. No confidence. And I am too afraid to risk kindness or love. Indeed, I live in constant fear and distrust."
"What are you afraid of?"
She smiled sadly. "That someone will betray me once more. Fake my death. Steal away with me as Sandoor had once done." Her knuckles whitened as her fists balled up once more. "I would truly rather die than put myself at the mercy of such men again. But I cannot rule this way, mistrusting my people, having them unsure of me."
She looked up and whispered, "And I fear what I am becoming. Miguel, my guard… he has grown stronger in my long absence." She laughed harshly, unhappily. "He possesses not even one half the power of your Dontaine. And yet, many times as I lay alone in my bed unable to sleep, I considered killing him before he became too great a threat to me." Her eyes were a luminous brown floating in a sea of welling tears as she said softly, "I loved him once."
"Oh, honey."
"I considered giving up my throne," she confessed in a quiet whisper, "but then what would I do? My people would be absorbed elsewhere as they were once before. But who then would protect me? You called me a good Queen and I was once, but with this killing dread in me, I fear that I may easily become the bloodiest Queen of them all." The horror of it was clear in her shaky voice.
I made myself take a deep, calming breath. "But you didn't kill him."
"What?"
"You said that you thought about killing him, but Miguel is still here, alive, by your side."
She nodded, hugged that fact to her in comfort. "I wish to reclaim that part of myself that I have lost. But I do not know how."
And she hoped that I did.
The solution was obvious to me, but I didn't think she would like it. But you know that saying: Nothing ventured, nothing gained. Trite but, oh, so true. "Choose one of your men. Take them to your bed once more."
Mona Carlisse just looked at me with those swimming eyes. "It was once a great joy to me. But that seems so long ago, a distant memory. Any pleasure I once felt in mating has long been pounded out of me."
I winced at her choice of words. It was unfortunately literal. The rogues had not been gentle with her.
"They used me like a whore and beat me when I did not glow beneath them. They not only raped my body, they raped my mind, turned it so that I had to make myself feel pleasure as they rutted over me. All I feel now is disgust and dread at the thought of being intimate once more with any man."
"You said under them."
"What?"
"You said that they forced you to submit your body, your will, your pleasure to them. Why don't you turn it around, vent some of that anger and resentment that you have bottled within you?"
Mona Carlisse looked confused. "What are you suggesting?"
Good question. We'd see if the answer was as good.
Chapter Nine
We were back in what I thought of as the dungeon. It wasn't, really. It wasn't even in the basement, probably because houses in flood-prone Louisiana did not have basements. The houses here in this wet state were actually perched up on blocks of brick or stone.
The dungeon was just a room set back in the house, not far different from the other rooms in the house. Only this room had chains of silver manacles secured to the wall. There were a few changes to it since last I saw it. It was clean for one thing. And instead of Wolf Boy, those chains now contained Gerald, the less powerful of Mona Carlisse's guards. One she had never taken to her bed before. He was shackled in those chains in his full naked glory, slender but well muscled.
If I was uncomfortable there was no one else to blame but myself. It was my idea, after all.
No, we hadn't tackled Gerald to the ground, stripped him of his clothes, and snapped those manacles around him. He'd actually removed his clothes and willingly stepped forward and allowed us to secure him in those strength-draining chains.
We, or more accurately, I, had explained to Gerald what we were hoping to do. He'd looked at Mona Carlisse, his Queen, with naked, yearning devotion shining in his lovely hazel eyes, and replied, "Yes, anything."
The brilliant idea was to have the man completely at Mona Carlisse's mercy, to put her in total control. To have her take him.
Of course, I hadn't expected to be in the same room when she did it.
"I will not be able to do this thing without your presence," Mona Carlisse had told me.
"But don't you want some privacy?" I'd wailed. Obviously not. "You make me feel safe," she said. I had looked at her blankly.
"You stopped Amber from raping me when he was filled with bloodlust and barred inside that hut with us. You risked yourself instead."
Not quite the whole truth. "I did that not really to save you but for a more selfish reason. I didn't want Amber declared rogue for raping a Queen." I shrugged. "I was willing. It wouldn't have been rape."
"Nevertheless you saved me, and then again later, as we fled from there. I feel safe in your presence. I will not be able to do this thing that you ask of me otherwise."
And so I found myself stuck inside that little room, backed into the farthest corner, not knowing where to look after I had secured Gerald's shackles, placed the key down on the ground next to his feet, and backed away. Gerald didn't seem to mind. He was slender but well muscled, and down below, heavy and full. He stood there pointing at full mast, face serene. The chains had enough length so that he stood several feet out from the wall, a willing captive, arms and legs slightly spread, patiently waiting for whatever his Queen desired to do to him.
"You may not receive any pleasure or satisfaction. Much less power," Mona Carlisse had warned him.
"Anything you desire, my Queen," Gerald had replied in gentle understanding. "Even blood, even pain."
I don't know that I could have made such a promise knowing what she had gone through.
Mona Carlisse reluctantly walked to him now, still fully dressed, a folded black tie in her hands and uncertainty in her face. Gerald averted his eyes and lowered his head, as if he knew it would be easier for Mona Carlisse to tie the cloth around his head and blindfold him if he did not stare at her. He may not be the strongest of her men, but he was worthy of her.
She stepped back hastily as soon as she had knotted the cloth, her face pinched, her hands trembling, wary of being so close to a man, even one of her own. She stood there a moment, a shudder passing through her body, and I had a moment's thought that she would not be able to do this. But the inner, unbreakable core of strength beneath the soft pretty surface that had kept her alive and enduring and sane for ten long years came to the fore then. Mona Carlisse let out a tremulous breath, squared her slender shoulders with determination and lifted a delicate hand. It stayed there, lifted, airborne, in uncertain promise before slowly, slowly, moving forward to touch Gerald's hair. His hair flowed just beyond shoulder length, loose in soft waves, released from its constricting tie, a rainbow of colors from rich brown to the palest yellow, like grains of mixed sand blended together, rippling with a healthy sheen.
The silky strands lifted and twined about Mona Carlisse's fingers with a bouncy life of their own as she caressed them, stroked them. She sighed and closed her eyes as she felt the fine, silken loveliness under her hand. Lifting her hand away, she brought her fingers to her own heavy coil. Pins dropped to the wood floor with little pings of sound, and her own hair loosened and unraveled, falling down and down, past her hips, a thick swath of extraordinary chestnut brown shot through wi
th strands of gold.
And as her hair was freed, part of the tension that had gripped her unraveled as well, flowing from her, seeping away. Stepping past the chains, she moved to stand at Gerald's back. He stood calmly, unmoving, without tensing, though he must have sensed her closeness. Trust like that, devotion like that was a bit scary. There was a lot of anger, a lot of bitterness and fear in Mona Carlisse. Even I did not know what she would do to him, beat him or fuck him. Either would make me hugely uncomfortable, but for his sake, I was hoping for the latter. Of course, she might not do anything at all, which would then entail another session like this all over again. How fun.
And yet not doing anything but just standing there, they made a beautiful picture. And an erotic one. Mona Carlisse's dark fall of hair and flowing black dress was a stark contrast to the naked loveliness of Gerald's pure white skin. She was fully dressed while he was nude and exposed, vulnerable in chains, wholly at her mercy. It was an intriguing study of black, silver, and white, a play of textures, colors, and light. Standing behind him, she looked the part of a black widow spider dangerously gazing at her captured prey, pondering whether to mate him or devour him. There was a terrible, stark beauty about the scene and, God help me, I was becoming aroused despite myself. I fought to look away but my gaze was drawn repeatedly back to the portrait of them.
Mona Carlisse's eyes captured mine. "Do you like what you see?" Her voice was darkly inviting.
I swallowed and nodded, knowing she could smell my arousal. I was unable to hide my body's reaction to her; no use trying to lie.
"You are beautiful together," I whispered and looked away, embarrassed.
"No. Watch," she commanded, and I could not help but do as she bid. Mona Carlisse stepped closer behind Gerald so that she barely brushed him, her hands rising to touch his slender hips.
"You were beautiful together," Mona Carlisse said softly to me. "Amber and you, when you made love. You made what had become an ugly act for me beautiful once more."
Mesmerized, I watched. Her pale hands, framed by the blackness of her sleeves, drifted lightly over the flat plane of his stomach. Gerald tensed, then shuddered, his abdomen ridging as her hands glided upward over the gentle swell of his chest. Closing her eyes, giving a soft little sigh of pleasure, she embraced him, wrapping her arms completely around him and holding him tight, finding comfort. There was great pleasure to be had in just holding someone, of being held. Humans and Monère alike seemed to have that deeply ingrained need in them for the comfort of physical touch. I wondered how many years it had been since Mona Carlisse had been able to hold another man like this, of her own free will.
