Chapter 17

Chapter Seventeen

Your immortal burden cold and lonely,

Hear! Rule until the bloody finish.

For the mighty never stirred at dawn,

They burst forth at dusk,

Into toothed beast's yawn.

" A waken."

The cold voice sent chills through me, and no wonder when the voice was ice itself.

My eyes opened to notice a roof that wasn't crumbling or made of dirt. They saw cobwebs and a chandelier, while my skin noticed the soft, night breeze, and my body recognized that this bed was more like a cloud than anything I'd experienced excluding one other time.

"I am in your palace then," I stated.

A small exhale. "You are sound. You haven't spoken in a lucid manner the other times."

"What times were these?" I croaked. "For how long have I slept, King See?"

"For two months and one week. You have woken with more frequency this last month, and so I wondered if you would wake soon for good, whether ruined or whole."

My heart sank at all the time I'd missed, but speaking this disappointment to a king who'd slumbered for one thousand years seemed tactless. For the first time I appreciated how lost and bitter the kings might have felt after their slumber. Everyone they'd known would have passed except for the five of them, and the world had become so foreign also. "Have I been in your palace the whole time? I apologize yet again for your blindness if so."

"There is a freshness to blindness, I am learning, and I have found myself often out of the palace where my sight was sound while you slumbered."

He was quiet as I gathered enough scraps to stitch together what had happened.

"He designed to anger you," I told him, worrying at the stitch along my bottom lip. "Change said as much before charging my person."

"He succeeded in angering me." King See paused. "Mistress, give me leave to say that the thought you just spoke was most ancient indeed."

"Whatever can you mean, sir?"

"But that you have always possessed a delightful manner of speaking in monsterdom, and that your arrangement of words has grown to be most intriguing. I was struck in this particular moment by the towering heights of your articulation and well-rounded phrase."

I couldn't hear these things myself, but I still wondered at the delightful and intriguing parts, let alone recent additions—though I garnered that, as usual, recent slumber was behind any change. Would my power have grown again too?

"Thank you kindly, sir. Could you please tell me what transpired?"

"I arrived with King Bring to find you harmed and unresponsive. I did not like that only my princes could carry you, and yet I felt grateful they could because leaving you in Change's kingdom was insupportable. You were dead for a long time after that, and I became worried you weren't monster enough after a week, but then you rallied beautifully, drawing threads of forbidden hours to bandage yourself. I fear that King Bring glimpsed you in the process of saving you, and no manner of dirt could disguise your magnificence from him. He has sent many envoys to request I release you into his care, and they had begun to irk me greatly for I knew he meant to work on you during slumber to open your mind to the idea of concubine. He now wishes for you for reasons other than blinding me, and I am driven to rage over his lust for your body."

That was a lot to take in.

I wasn't sure I could entirely.

My thoughts centered instead on whether King Change had returned his snuffing share to Hotel Vitale, and so odd was that thought against the landscape of being dead for a week and of bandaging myself in threads of forbidden hours that I had to take note of my obsession with the snuffing shares again.

I'd had the thought several times, but why was I so obsessed with the notion? I'd rejected a king's claim to get one, which could've killed me if See had taken offense. For another share, I'd walked into the ballroom of a king who operated on whim and drained life for a purpose. Then to gain a third, I'd made a vague deal with a very dangerous third king who made no secret of his plan to wreak havoc. Why was I so driven to see them all returned?

"I am obsessed."

" What ?"

I blinked at the roll of his power. "Why do you fury?"

"Because you dare to utter your obsession with Bring in my presence with no care for my sentiment. Did I so destroy things between us at our last meeting?"

Our last meeting floated to the top of the pond that was my mind. "I speak not of obsession with Bring, sir. And I had not recalled our… rendezvous until this moment." How far away that felt. How could a monster feel weary after slumber? I felt so very ancient, more ancient than when I was last awake. And there was my answer. I was more ancient than before. That spoke for the emotional distance I felt from the memory served up by See.

"Let us speak of that night so that we might be easy with each other again," I said to him.

King See shifted in his armchair in the corner of the room. He was in his true form and closer than he'd been since I entered monsterdom. That only reinforced that I was stronger and more ancient than before this slumber.

He released a breath. "I am glad you have opened yourself to a resolution. Let me speak first, Perantiqua, for I have had months to consider my words. I start by saying that night was transcendent. For me. I have been furious many times that you did not feel as I. But your last words of that night haunt me along with the memory of your breathless moans and small arches. You said that I had forgotten the newness of your monster. I have since grown to feel that you would know your newness best. I implore you to explain that to a fuller degree, so that we might make amends, and so I might speak proper apology."

Things were much clearer from this side of slumber. What turmoil I'd been in before Change gifted me more rest. "I can do that, sir. You see, I stored great faith in your ancientness. When you looked upon me that night, I felt something never experienced. But I did not fear this great feeling because of my faith in you. Then, when I sought an end to the torment, you did not deliver. I lacked outlet for everything inside, and I felt betrayed that you had led me to such a state, then left me there alone, crying, and confused."

"I am informed. You trusted me to guide you, and I failed." He exhaled. "To be clear, to ensure I understand completely, what torment did you seek an end to, mistress?"

My lips twisted, and I wondered at the new certainty in myself. "I wanted you to pleasure me, King See."

There was a slight jolt to his blur as he stiffened. " Mistress ?—"

"I had not been aroused before, sir, and what I wanted from you—after being sent away in such a cruel manner—was left to fester into shame. The lustful thoughts I had were an embarrassment such that I could not admit them to myself."

He seemed struck to silence, though his breaths were rapid. Eventually, he said, "But… never aroused?"

"Never. When I started to guess what arousal was about, you ordered it ended." And so I'd hidden away in oversized clothes instead of finding the courage to ask him a simple question.

I asked him now, "Why did you order me to stop touching my body? Did the sight repulse?"

I, even quite ancient, squeezed my eyes closed in wait.

"Do not speak of yourself so."

My hands twisted in the black silk sheet as his rage pushed against me. I'd never heard him so angry.

"Mistress," he said tightly. "Do not suggest that you repulse me again. I find it infuriates me beyond reason. Beyond anything. Is that what I made you feel that night?"

He cursed in a language I did not know and paced across the room.

"I will have you know that I asked you to stop because I felt the power I held that night far exceeded yours. I expected that you must have felt arousal in the past, but I assumed you could not have been much aroused in your short life, and never aroused by an immortal king. You would have done all I asked that night and played the part beautifully. Perantiqua, magnificent Perantiqua, how I longed to make you do my bidding—to probe, to circle, to pinch. I am the greatest fool, perhaps, for turning from such sights and scents and sounds, yet I feared you would hate me after if I continued. This stopped me when I did not want to stop and when my senses were filled with your longing and desperation, your fear and trembling. How I stopped, I cannot say, and I might sorely regret such a path in time after hearing how you wished my body united with yours that night."

His voice hitched. His words were deeply felt, and I couldn't help but respond in kind.

"My embarrassment and shame after felt boundless," I confessed.

"Do you feel this way still?"

"Time will tell, sir." If I paused to reflect with my more ancient mind, I could connect that King See was half responsible for the symptoms of that night, but not the cause of my distress. He couldn't have made me feel embarrassed and ashamed if I didn't already feel that way about my stitches and patches.

"What might convince you to feel neither?" he demanded.

"The way I feel about myself is not something to demand away, sir." Only I could help myself. The time drew nearer when I must make good with my monster. But would I go the way of Change after? Or would I love her? My future could be altered by the monstrous sight of me, so I couldn't underestimate the importance and weight of this task, nor would I rush into it. I must prepare as best I was able.

"You do not feel like an exquisite creature?" King See was dumbfounded.

I pressed my lips together. They didn't align to achieve the expression. "Why can't I tell you things that I can tell others? Why do I place more importance on how you might respond?"

"I do not like that others might know you better," he replied.

"I fear your effect on me, sir. That is it. I fear your effect on me more than ever after the night we spent on your landing. I will not answer your question about how exquisite I feel or do not."

He snarled, pacing faster. "But I do not like what you've implied with your non-answer. Shall I tell you that I took my length in my hand after you left my palace? Shall I tell you that I pumped my body for hours because the torment of our night would not exit my mind? Shall I tell you how the arch of your body made me ache and pain? Of how I shattered and regrew my teeth clenching them as I imagined pulling that suit of yours taut between your folds? You wanted me to pleasure you, Perantiqua, and I wanted to do that and more. I had forgotten I was king. I'd forgotten my purpose. The need to claim you might have seen me defile you that night."

My chest rose and fell. "What does that mean? To defile?"

"It means that I expose your most feminine parts in a casual way that doesn't befit you. It means that I use you at my leisure as deeply and quickly or as slowly and shallowly as I desire with little or no regard for your fulfillment. I make you believe that you deserve such treatment and I make you want it. Defilement means that I leave you displayed with the traces of my pleasure slickening you so that every king knows I've been there first and ruined you for anyone else."

He cut off, breathing hard, and even blurred as he was, the passion he spoke with entranced me.

King See faced me. "There, I have been more honest with you than with myself. That is why I stopped you that night. Because I had you in the palm of my hand, and I lost trust in myself to treat you as you deserve."

The picture he'd painted was monstrous. I was enamored. "You desired me greatly, sir. You desired me so much that you wished to put me in a state where others would witness your control over me. You wanted me to lose myself to you."

He turned away, resting a hand on the wall. "A vice I was unaware of in myself until that night. And still I wonder, would you have let me do such things?"

Didn't he know that everyone in existence had a vice? At least he'd spoken his aloud and reined such darkness when needed. Some of what he'd said, though I wouldn't tell him, had elicited a forbidden shudder in me.

I answered, "I would have that night, yes. Since you have been very honest with me, shall I tell you what I might have wished for that night?"

"Yes," he hissed, still facing away. " Tell me ."

"I would've wished your mouth on mine, your body too. I would've wished to look into your eyes as you entered me. I would've wished your hands on me, and mine on you. I would have wished to see you."

For the first time in our acquaintance, I could see his clothing in clearer detail. I'd seen his embroidered boots many times, but he didn't wear the heavy velvet coat that I recalled. His shirt was black silk like the sheets concealing me and hinted at the strength of his towering, lean frame. Did he have chalky, white skin like his princes? I couldn't tell, though long black hair rested against his shirt. What I could see of him excited me more than I could say.

I sat up in the bed, knowing well and good my white dress wasn't on anymore. My unsymmetrical, stitched-on breasts were bare for his view above the black, silk sheet pooled around my hips, and I tried not to think of them too much.

"Mistress, how I mourn none of that will be," he said, and turned.

His sharp inhale was music to my ears, the most delightful medley. I'd shocked him as intended.

"You are uncovered, mistress," he breathed. "Your dress was filthy when I found you, and I had my princes undress you under the strictest supervision. They did what they could to preserve your dignity with the sheet; however, you are nude."

My lips twisted. "King See, do not worry yourself. I am aware of my nudity."

His breath quickened, and he paused in the midst of focusing elsewhere. "You seduce me then."

"Is that what you are? Seduced?"

"Seduced. Struck down, I know not a word for what you inspire in me." He exhaled. "You are not of this place. The sight of you uproots me, and I do not feel comfortable in that for there is much I must be securely grounded to do."

His discomfort was heady. "Take yourself in hand, sir."

"Myself," he echoed, and I purred at his stupefied state. I was doing this to a king, and that excited me.

"Your cock, King See. Take it in hand."

He hesitated, and I imagined the war in him. Glee filled me when he crossed to the armchair in the corner and loosened the laces of his trousers. I could not see what he did, but I didn't need to see. I could sense. So I leaned back on my pillows, arching my back to push my breasts higher for him.

I was ancient indeed this dusk.

His scent filled the room, and I inhaled. Somehow, though I only fathomed it now, I'd always been aware of See's smell and the lightness that clung to my skin and clothing after our visits. I listened to his soft groan and the brush of his silk shirt as his arm moved against his torso.

I listened to him pleasure himself.

"Ah," he sighed.

King See didn't feel ancient right now. He might still feel in control, but he was wrong. I was in control.

I stood on the bed, drawing the silk sheet with me. He pumped harder. I looked to where his eyes might be, then dropped the sheet, baring myself in full. A deep groan, a pleading whisper of my name.

The power I held was heady.

I lowered to my knees and sat on my haunches, then I spread my knees wide to give him a tiny glimpse of where I wanted him to be. As he jerked, I turned from him to crawl up the bed, exposing my most feminine parts so that he might dream of defiling me.

A thought occurred to me, and on all fours, I reached to drag my middle finger up through my folds.

He roared, and the sound squeezed my mind. I embraced the sensation, relishing that I'd made him come undone so completely. He'd been unable to resist the end.

I grinned at the bed frame where he couldn't glimpse it.

Schooling the enjoyment on my face first, I draped the black sheet around me and stood beside the bed as footsteps pounded toward us. King See must be a mess. He was slickened with his own pleasure, and he'd wanted it. Doing that to him had felt fantastic. I'd never experienced more power over another, and I better understood his point of view from that night on his landing. Perhaps his vice would become my own in time because I only felt awe that he'd stopped himself from doing the same to me.

"My liege," said a frantic Has Been. "What has happened?"

A silence fell that somehow managed to say everything.

The three princes gaped at their king, who was covered in his own fluid, and then glanced at me clad as an empress in a dark toga.

I padded to the doorway. "To think that you might have done this to me that night, sir. I might have been happy with the outcome. We shall never know. I am not such a new monster this dusk, and now you are defiled."

"I am," he said hoarsely. "I feel it. I yearn for it again, and so you have done what I could not."

My smile was twisted, and I wondered if he could guess at how my body ached for him.

"We will not spend another night this way, King See," I said. "I value your acquaintance too much, and now I perfectly understand what transpired in your tower. There is no unbalance of power, nor the memory of it to get between us."

"I thank you," he said sincerely. "But to be most clear, I do not seek acquaintance with you, mistress."

"No, but that is what you will have."

"Kings do not get told what they will have." He rose to his lean and impressive height, but my thoughts were on his unlaced trousers and on wishing I could see what I'd done to him. He was unashamed of his three princes witnessing his state. I coveted his self-confidence very much.

I should try to be more assertive about what I deserved, just like him. "Kings do get told when it comes to me."

" Has the lady's phrase always been so articulate and well-rounded? " Is whispered to Has Been.

Neither I nor the king reacted to his bewildered question.

"Be sure that you do not play the game I wish, Perantiqua," said King See. I could hear the humor in his voice.

"You wished for this?" I gestured at his body.

"I am pleasured and satisfied, while you…" he lowered his voice, "you will think of me until dawn, and then until dusk again. You think of me right now, and so you will touch yourself in the privacy of your room, and you will despise me as you explore for the first time—it will be as if I am present and watching you struggle. As your cheeks flush and your thighs press, you shall remember how I prophesized this in front of my princes. You shall worry about meeting them next for fear they'll know all you've done to yourself. And they will. Through all of those thoughts and worries, you'll think of me speaking these words, and continue to touch yourself until you find the pleasure I already feel."

A blush tinged my cheeks. The aching in my body intensified, but I tilted my chin, deigning not to answer.

"That is the game I wished to play." He walked toward me across the room. "Who is more defiled out of us?"

I couldn't speak. The sheet around my body had chosen that moment to distract me with its whispering sensations.

"You are not a new monster, but you are a young monster sometimes," King See said when he was as close as he dared. "Magnificent in every stitch and wonderfully wonderful. Articulate and intriguing, delightful and well-rounded, yet not monster enough to tell a king he is confined to acquaintance. Rid yourself of the notion. We are not meant for such."

I found my voice again. "I am certainly more ancient this evening, but I will hear what you believe we are meant for, sir." My heart thumped faster as the words left my uneven lips.

"You feel what we are meant for, Perantiqua. Soon, you will admit it to yourself. But this is what I believe—clinging to the cliff has lost its appeal since you blinded me."

I frowned. Whatever did he mean? "So you'll fall to your death?"

"Or fly, mistress. I will fall to my death or fly. And you will fall to your death or fly with me."