Savage Satisfaction (3 page)

Laid out on the long work counter were platters of bread,
meat and cheese. There was a bowl of egg mayonnaise, green salad, muffins and a
tart for dessert.

“Please help yourself to refreshments.” He indicated heavy
stone-colored plates he used on a daily basis. He’d debated having the
housekeeper pull out china, but considering what he had planned for them it
seemed disingenuous.

The wolf picked up a plate and piled it full of meat,
bypassing both bread and cheese. The falcon picked out a few lean pieces of
meat and a nice wedge of cheese. Rather than using the bone-handled cheese
knife, she put the entire block on her plate. She hesitantly took a seat on the
bench across from the wolf. William made himself a ploughman’s sandwich and
pulled a chair up to the head of the table.

They ate in silence for several moments. William carefully
noted what foods they’d selected and how much they ate. This meal was not
really a welcome into his home, but rather a fact-gathering experiment.

When he found himself staring at the falcon, watching the
way she scooped her hair behind her ear, the rise and fall of her breasts, he
jerked his gaze away. Christoffer, who’d been watching him watch her, smiled,
baring all his teeth.

“She’s gorgeous,” Christoffer said, voice echoing in the
hush of the kitchen.

Mirela’s head jerked up and she put down the chunk of cheese
she held.

“Are you going to fuck her?” Christoffer asked William. “I
always wondered about that. You get a pretty young girl, why not fuck her? I
will say, I think it’s only fair that if you fuck her, you fuck me too.” He
planted an elbow on the table and leaned toward William. “From what I can tell
after last night, Englishmen like to be fucked, not do the fucking. You want me
to fuck you, my lord?”

Mirela winced away, flushing dark red, and William could
feel the heat rising in his face also. “Enough,” he said, pushing away from his
half-eaten sandwich. “You will moderate your language. What I plan to do to
either Mirela or yourself is my choice and mine alone. Do not forget who is the
master here.” He stared Christoffer down. The boy’s face drooped, and for a
moment he looked younger that his words had made him seem.

“Come with me. I will show you to your quarters.”

Mirela rose and followed him, abandoning what was still on
her plate, but Christoffer hung back. William led Mirela through the mudroom
attached to the kitchen to an exterior door. Christoffer hadn’t followed them
out. With a sigh William started to return indoors to fetch him, but Mirela put
a hand on his arm.

“My lord?”

He looked down at her pale fingers resting against his
sleeve. The sword, which he still wore, pressed against her leg. “Yes, Mirela?”

“Are you going to do…what he said?”

Her eyes were wide, her lips parted. If not for the wrinkle
of concern between her brows he would have thought it was desire writ upon her
face, but it was fear.

“What were you told about your service to me?”

“I was born to be yours,” she said quietly. “My mother was
given to my father so her family could share the burden of payment to you. I am
the oldest girl, and so from the time I was small knew what my life would be.
They said that the lord, that you, would demand hunting by the falcon and quiet
obedience from the woman.”

“And was that obedience to include sharing your body?”
William lifted her fingers from his sleeve and cupped her wrist, stroking the
hollow of her hand with his thumb. She drew in a deep breath and they were
standing so close that her breasts brushed his chest.

“I-I don’t know. They never told me. I thought to die
untouched. I thought the lord would already be married. No falcon has ever
returned to the family to speak of her time here.”

“None have returned?” He snorted in disbelief, though he
could understand that Mirela wouldn’t have been told that tale. “What you were
told was neither more nor less than the truth. I will demand obedience from
you, perhaps in all ways.”

He kept his words strong, fighting the public school manners
that demanded he reassure her and promise to leave her alone. Perhaps a kiss
would calm her. He cupped the falcon’s neck and tilted her head up.

“I knew you were going to fuck her,” Christoffer said,
closing the mudroom door with a bang.

“Christoffer,” William growled. Mirela pulled away, her
fingers twisting together. William wanted to take her in his arms and carry her
to his bed.

He would have to consider the ramifications of having sex
with her. A sexual relationship had been low on his list of concerns. After
all, what if his falcon was like his father’s? But now that she was here and so
heart-stoppingly beautiful, why should he deny himself?

He did not have to decide immediately; after all, she
couldn’t leave.

“This way,” William said tersely, looking at Christoffer.

Christoffer’s gaze was on the clearly visible erection in
the front of William’s pants. William met Christoffer’s eyes and something
passed between them, something William would have called attraction if that
weren’t so ludicrous. Though he had to admit the boy was handsome.

William took them across the manicured grass to the edge of
the woods. Once at the tree line he turned, not right toward the place where
the fence of the deer park cut through the trees, but left to the outbuilding
he’d had retrofitted for this purpose.

“Where are we going?” Christoffer asked, jogging a few steps
to walk beside William.

William debated responding, but said, “This is where you
will live now.” The corner of the building was just visible through the trees.

“Ahh, can’t let the freaks live in the main house?”
Christoffer sneered.

William winced but didn’t respond. What he was doing was
necessary. He’d lain awake many nights telling himself that what he planned
wasn’t cruel or degrading but prudent.

The building, whose original purpose was forgotten due to
age, was made of rounded gray stone. It was newly mortared, and for all its age
appeared solid and steady.

As they drew closer William’s heartbeat sped up.

He stopped at the heavy wood door. He stared at it,
gathering his courage. William looked over his shoulder at them—his Hunting
Pair—and opened the door.

Mirela was the first to enter, ushered in by a gesture from
the man. William, she reminded herself. It did not seem appropriate to continue
to think of him only as “the man”.

The building he’d brought her to was made of stone, with low
ceilings except for the center, where the angling of the roof gave it more
height.

The floor was stone to match the walls, though the floor was
of large flat rocks rather than the smaller round rocks of the walls. The walls
had been lined on the insides with heavy vertical bars. The bars were spaced
close together and painted gray, so at first they seemed to blend with the
stone.

She took a few more steps into the room. A table and stools,
a plush armchair and several trunks filled the high-ceilinged center of the
rectangular building. To her right a set of bars cut across from one wall to
the other, sectioning off about a third of the total interior space.

To her left there was another wall of bars, again sectioning
off about a third of the space, though there was an additional wall of bars
running perpendicular to the first, dividing the space in two.

There were many carpenters in Mirela’s family and a few stonemasons,
so she knew something of building and remodeling old structures. Whoever had
put in these bars to support the building had been very stupid. It was very
ugly.

The wolf walked up to one of the bar-walls and rattled it.
The sound was loud in the quiet building.

“What the fuck is this?” he growled.

Mirela’s skin prickled with fright. The wolf’s tone was dark
and dangerous. She took a step back, accidentally running into the man—William.
He was warm and solid at her back, and when he put his hands on her shoulders
she felt safe.

“Mirela,” William said, “please put this on.” As he spoke he
released her and went to one of the trunks. He pulled a key from his pocket and
used it to unlock the trunk, pulling out two brass-colored things before
closing the trunk again.

He handed her one of the two things he held.

Mirela took it with a murmured, “Thank you.” It was a
necklace, so stiff that it held its shape on its own. It was made of thousands
of small filigrees braided into threads that were braided into ropes and
finally braided into one large piece, capped by disks printed with the image of
a bird in flight.

She loved it.

The necklace was weighty and beautiful, archaic in look and
feel. She ran it between her fingers, the exquisite craftsmanship alluring to
one such as she who had grown up surround by skilled artisans.

“It is very beautiful,” she said, looking up with a smile.
“Thank you.”

William nodded stiffly. “Put it on please.”

“How?”

He took the necklace from her, pointing out the hinges, then
handing it back. Mirela slipped it around her neck and carefully closed it,
scared of catching her hair in the clasps. When the falcon disks were an inch
apart the necklace snapped closed, as if the disks were magnetic, startling a
yelp from Mirela.

Her vision went blurry, the ground wobbled beneath her. She
cried out, asking what was wrong, what was happening, but the words came out a
garbled mixture of English and Romani. She sank to the ground.

Christoffer backed away from the falcon, who’d fallen to the
floor.

“What did you do to her?” he barked, looking up. The spot
where William had been standing was empty. Christoffer took another step back
and smacked into William, who’d snuck up behind him. Christoffer whirled,
dropping to a crouch. He could smell the damp undergrowth of the forest as he
called forward his wolf. William’s nostrils widened and he fell back a step, in
surprise or fear.

Christoffer hoped it was fear.

He didn’t know what the lord had done to the falcon, but he
didn’t want it done to him. He’d been the last one to enter this little chamber
of horrors, and only shock had kept him from turning tail and running. He
couldn’t believe William intended to keep them in cages. The arrangement
between the wolves and the lord was a civil one, nothing more than a formality
after all these years.

Wasn’t it?

William shook his head as if to dispel the scents of the
forest and reached for Christoffer, a collar much like the one around the
falcon’s neck in his hand.

Christoffer scrambled back awkwardly as the wolf was upon
him, causing his bones to twist and pop as his body changed. He was at his most
vulnerable when he changed. He snarled, the sound echoing, but the lord did not
retreat. He slipped around to Christoffer’s side and reached for his neck, the
collar open. Christoffer batted William away with enough force that his bones,
weak from the change, rattled within the thin confinement of his skin.

With an animal’s whimper, Christoffer bent his head,
breathing through the pain. There was cold against his neck, a quiet snap and
then he knew no more.

William watched as the wolf returned to full human. He would
not soon forget the look of him mid-change—back bulging, face distorted, skin
rippling. He wished it hadn’t happened like that but it was clear that after he
saw Mirela fall, Christoffer would not passively accept the collar.

William went to Mirela and Christoffer in turn, shifting
them so they lay more comfortably. He checked their pulses and breathing and
they seemed fine. He hadn’t expected the collars to knock them out, but wasn’t
totally surprised. The collars were powerful tools.

William dropped down to sit in the armchair and looked at
his Hunting Pair. This was it, the moment when he decided just what kind of
lord he would be. There was a war raging within him—a war between the horrors
of his past and his duty, between his father’s civility and his grandfather’s
mastery.

This building, with its barbaric cages and prison
atmosphere, was a tool, same as the collars. It was a tool he could choose to
use, or choose not to.

A good man, a civil, rational man, would take the Hunting
Pair back to the house, give them rooms and wish them well. A good man would
care for them and protect them, but would politely ignore the other half of the
agreement, the part that stated that in service for protection of the clans the
Hunting Pair would serve and obey the lord. After all, this agreement had been
made when a falcon and a wolf were necessary parts of a household, and
servitude and slavery were common.

A good man…a man like his father.

And if he treated them as his father had treated his pair,
William would have no one but himself to blame if disaster struck.

William took a set of keys from his pocket and opened the
cell doors. He would keep them separate, though the space had been designed for
them to live in the two smaller side-by-side cells. He placed the wolf in the
single larger cage, dragging him carefully across the floor by the arms. William
hefted him over to the camping cot and was able to lift him enough to lay him
down.

Christoffer looked so young. William carefully moved the
boy’s head so it wasn’t at an awkward angle. It was startling enough that the
werewolf tribute was a man—he’d been expecting a female. William stroked the
boy’s high cheekbone, ran his palm along the stubble on his jaw.

What was he doing?

Shocked with himself, William left the boy, locking the cage
door behind him. He unlocked one of the smaller cages, then lifted the falcon
in his arms and carried her to the cot, again struck by her beauty.

Setting her down, he indulged himself by running his fingers
along the skin that showed between the bottom of her shirt and her jeans. He carefully
pulled her long hair from beneath her and adjusted the collar so it wouldn’t
press against her jaw.

He wanted to pull her shirt up, to see what sort of bra she
was wearing. William rose quickly to his feet, stifling the impulse. He felt
like a young man—awkward and hopeless with women.

Locking her cell behind him, William turned off the lights
and left the converted shed, which he’d mockingly nicknamed “the pen”. Twice on
his walk back to the house William turned around. The impulse to go back, to check
again that they were well, to let them out, to beg their forgiveness for
putting the collars on them, was strong.

But each time he forced himself to turn back again. He’d
made his choice. They were creatures of another age—one where magic existed and
might made right. They were stuck in this modern world, as he was, but that
didn’t mean they were going to play by modern rules.

* * * * *

She awoke in the dark.

Mirela rubbed her eyes, opening and closing them several
times. She had a moment of panic, thinking she was blind, but then she picked
out a faint strip of light. It wavered, as if the light were dancing. She laid
her head back—on a surface that was not hard but not soft either.

Had she dreamed what had happened?

Her fingers crept to her throat, finding the necklace there.

But it was no necklace. It was a collar. He’d collared her
as if she were a dog. She twisted her fingers around it and pulled.

Try as she might she could not get it loose. She remembered
the way the collar had snapped together.

Panic scurried up her spine on little mouse feet.

Reaching her hands out, she oriented herself then sat up.
Pressing her face against her knees, she chanted quietly. After a few moments
she was calm enough to lift her head.

The light, which had seemed to waver, was really a thin
strip of daylight showing beneath what had to be a door. There was no other
light, meaning no windows.

That gave her a moment’s panic, but Mirela reminded herself
that at some point the lord would have to come back, and when he did she would
fly out.

Standing now, she moved around the bar-walls of her prison.
Along two of the walls she could push her hands through the bars and touch
stone. She carefully passed her hand over them, feeling for air that might
indicate a shuttered window. Nothing.

It did not matter a great deal, because only as a falcon
could she fit through the bars.

How foolish she’d been to believe the lord was anything but
a monster. She could see now why her mother and sisters had wept at her fate.
Had they known this was what he intended to do to her and, knowing that, sent
her here anyway?

That was an unfair thought, because she knew that if her
mother had the choice she would have kept Mirela from this fate.

She turned back to the strip of light. What time was it? What
day? She didn’t know how long she’d been unconscious. Would the lord be
returning soon?

Either way, she wanted to be ready to escape when he came
back.

Mirela backed away from the bars she’d been leaning against,
crouched and spread her arms. The cold bite of high air, the scent of
sun-warmed leaves and wind-caught flowers surrounded her.

But the scent faded.

With a frown, Mirela lowered her arms. She’d never before
failed to call her falcon.

Raising her arms, she tried it again.

And again.

She stopped to clear her mind, counting to one hundred in
several Romani dialects, then tried a fourth time.

Her falcon would not come.

“No, no,” she chanted, jumping to her feet and pacing back
and forth across her prison. Panic came again, though this time it was like a
wave, drowning her. “No. I need the sky. No.”

“Can’t change, can you?” The voice came from the dark, warm
and rich. Mirela thought she smelled the forest, musky and wild.

“Who’s there? My lord?” Her heart beat wildly.

“No, he’s gone.”

“The wolf?”

“Present.”

“Oh.”

“Try not to sound too enthusiastic,” he said, voice dry.

“Can you get me out of here?”

“No.”

“Then why should I care about you?”

Silence filled the dark and a part of Mirela was aware of
her rudeness, but she was too panicked and scared to care.

“Indeed, why should you or anyone care?”

He fell quiet and the only sound was her footsteps. Mirela
stopped pacing long enough to try to call her falcon, but again failed.

She sank to her knees, throat tight with panicked tears. “I
cannot live like this.”

“Yes, you can.” His voice was hard and angry.

“I cannot,” she wailed into the dark, tears now spilling
down her cheeks. “I need the sky.”

“Please don’t cry,” he said, the anger gone from his voice.
“I hate it when girls cry. I’m very macho in that way, though I try not to be
so guy-like.”

“Guy-like?” she asked, confusion briefly distracting her
from her tears.

“Not to say that I’m not all male.” His voice was lazy, as
if he were talking to himself. Perhaps his brain was addled.

“What else would you be?” she couldn’t help but ask.

“Could you really be that innocent? I heard gypsy girls were
virgins until the wedding but you dress like prostitutes, so I figured that was
a lie.”

Mirela jumped to her feet. “Do not talk about my people like
that. I am not gypsy. I am Romany, you ignorant, stupid man.”

She spit at him through the bars, knowing she wasn’t close
enough to hit him but wanting to strike out.

There was a scrape of shoes against stone. “Hissing and
spitting like a kitty? How very grown-up.”

“You are stupid.”

“Is stupid the best you can do? Didn’t they teach you any
real swear words?”

Mirela cursed at him in the Romani dialect of her father’s
people. She let venom slip into her words. He wouldn’t know that only a few of
the words could be considered swear words.

“Ahh,” he said, talking over the top of her tirade. “You
can’t curse in English. Perhaps you don’t know English that well.”

“I know it well enough,” she countered, reverting to that
language. “Perhaps you do not know it well. You are not from this country.” The
last bit was a guess, but Mirela was fairly sure his accent, so different from
the lord’s, indicated he was foreign.

Thinking of the lord reminded her of her situation, and
Mirela put her back to the bars and slid down them until she was seated on the
floor.

“You’re worrying again, aren’t you?” His voice was gentle,
and Mirela realized something.

“You said those things to make me angry, didn’t you?”

“Yes. I really don’t like it when girls cry.”

“Oh.” She pondered that for a moment. “Thank you.”

He laughed and it sounded like a dog’s bark. “You don’t have
to thank me. I was an ass to you.”

“An ass?”

“You really don’t know any good curse words, do you?”

“No. What is an ass?”

“Ass,” he said, his footsteps echoing slightly as he moved
about, “means butt, rear end, posterior. I think it’s also a donkey or
something in English, but I don’t know for sure.”

“To be called an, an ass is a bad thing?”

“Yes.”

“The lord is an ass.” She whispered it, unsure of the word.

“Don’t whisper, shout it out. And you’re right. He’s an ass.
An arrogant English ass, whom I underestimated.”

Mirela’s back was beginning to hurt from the bars, so she
moved to the cot and lay down again.

“I should not say such things,” she said. “You should not
either.”

“Why would you defend him? He just locked us up in here.”

“But that is his right,” she said.

“His right?”

“Yes, we are his to command. He is our master, our lord.”

“If that’s what you really think, then why were you crying
and screaming?”

“He’s taken away my falcon,” she said, words heavy in the
dark.

“You mean you cannot change.”

“I must have the sky. It is all I ask. I will fly from his
wrist at his command, as long as he leaves me free to fly whenever I please.”

“So really you’re not so obedient as you pretend. You want
your freedom, same as I.”

“I don’t know what you want, but I want to be able to fly. I
need the sky. It is my home. I will serve him however else he commands, but he
must let me fly.”

“However he wants? Are you going to have sex with him?”

The rude question startled Mirela. “I don’t, I haven’t… Do
you think he’ll want that?”

“He wants you,” the wolf said, sounding wistful. “He’s a
handsome man, though he seems a bit stiff, probably no good in bed. Though if
he offered I wouldn’t say no.”

“You would sleep with him?” Mirela propped herself up on one
elbow and turned to look at the wolf, though she could not see him.

“Yes.”

“But you are a man. And he is a man.”

“Ahh, didn’t pick that up, did you?” There was a smirk in
his voice.

“You talk to me as though I am stupid. I am not. You’re the
one who doesn’t make any sense.”

“I’m saying that I like men.”

Mirela blinked once, then again, then lay back. She’d heard
about men who liked other men, though it had been through whispered conversations.
She’d certainly never met a man like that, and her father and uncles, when
alluding to the depravities of people who were not Romany, warned that such
people would be evil.

The wolf didn’t seem evil, though perhaps that made him all
the more evil.