Shattered (4 page)

The silence following that meek protest lasted uncomfortably long befor
e the click of heels shattered it.  Nathan expected to hear Robin strike the girl and he swallowed down his anger and sympathy ahead of the blow.

What he heard instead was only
soft, muffled gasps and little hums of pleasure.  It took him a while to place the sound.  The rustle of discarded clothing followed it and soon the quiet thing that followed his torturer in was breathing heavily.  Nathan kept his eyes locked to a spot near his knees.

“
It’s just work.  Please Lily,” Robin said quietly.  “I need this.”  The end of her words disappeared into another kiss.

The girl giggled
as the two of them moved off to the left, towards the bed, and the creak and give of springs beneath their bodies echoed around as they moved all over one another.  Nathan imagined Robin’s companion as pure and innocent, true to her namesake, carefree in every way her partner wasn’t.  But he wouldn’t risk looking up, he was content with the fantasy he created in his mind.

Soon that giggling went muffled and not long after Robin
was moaning encouragement.  Nathan studied the floor.  He tried counting the specks in the stone but the flicker of candlelight, dancing on the polish, caught his eye just often enough to distract him.  And when Robin started crying out in pleasure he gave up all together, clenching his eyes shut and imagining himself as far from here as possible.

The
girls traded places enough times that he lost count, though a lot of that was because he knew better than to count.  If he could disappear from here he would have, for this was entirely incompatible with the reality he was just beginning to accept.

Finally their movement calmed and their voices dropped to whispers.  Robin spoke more than Lily
and it wasn’t long before the latter was snoring softly, though that didn’t deter Robin.  She continued to whisper and coo over the sleeping girl.  Nathan ached to know the content of that inaudible conversation, sure that it might shed some light on his own twisted feelings.

**

Nathan
drifted in and out of consciousness all night.  He thought the night might last forever, it seemed like it had already, but soon enough the two girls began to stir.  His spot on the floor had not treated him kindly.  He had been cold the entire time and he ached everywhere, in his shoulders and his knees especially.  The first chance he got he’d beg Robin to let him down, but then he remembered the box and decided again that this was better.

Lily scampered off after a short flurry of kisses, of giggling, after Robin chased her away with firm words that sounded as though they might contain a smile.  But Nathan couldn’t imagine her smiling, not in any way that didn’t prelude some cruelty.

Robin laid around in bed long after the girl left.  She was torturing him with her inattention this morning, when she must know he was bursting with questions that the silence of the room somehow prevented him from voicing.

When she did finally rise it wasn’t to tend to him.  She ignored him as she moved around. 
He heard the rustle of clothing and realized she was dressing, but no amount of temptation would bring his eyes from the floor, for as much as she denied his existence he knew she was keenly aware of it.

Nathan realized he was anxious to begin.  He’d do anything.  He’d scream for her or cry for her, if only it might hasten a meal and release from this position.
  He had never before wanted for food as he did now.  Starvation was an unpleasant mark of poverty and not one he had ever had to endure.

R
obin left him there, wanting, when she left the room.  It was cruel of her, but after a while, in her absence, Nathan found the strength and courage to look around.  His early observations held true, the wealth of this room was not to be understated.  Somehow this orphan gypsy girl had very nice things.

He studied the metal loop on the ceiling and the other in the floor.
  His bindings were anchored there.  There were others too, both high and low against the wall.  His chest tightened as he thought to all the ways she could tie him.  The one he was in now was tame next to his imagination.

The rest of the room offered him no clues.  He had no idea
who she was, how she acquired all this, or even where they were.  His mind began to wander and soon he found himself thinking of yesterday.  He resigned his curiosity at that and turned his attention back to the floor.  Better to study the stone than to think about yesterday.

He
kept his eyes down when she returned and off of her as she dragged a chair in front of him, only bringing them up when she finally took a seat and her boots shadowed his spot on the floor.

Robin held a goblet in one hand and a platter
balanced on her crossed legs.  She took a leisured sip and stared at him for a long time, until the pressure of her attention grew too great and Nathan looked down.

“Eyes up prince,” she corrected, and he obeyed just in time to see her pop a morsel of cheese into her mouth.  Had he not been so thirsty he would have salivated at that.

“You surprised me,” Robin continued on.  She sounded more sure this morning, more collected.  “I didn’t think you’d enjoy the lash.”

“I didn’t
,” Nathan replied. The words came out raspy against his dry throat.

Robin’s boot
slid up the inside of Nathan’s leg and pressed against his balls.  He grimaced and tried to twist away from her, but the ropes held him secure.

“This little guy disagrees,” she said. 
She bounced her foot up and down a few times to emphasize her point before returning her foot to the ground.  “Also, I wasn’t asking for your input.  You’re to be silent unless I have need of your voice.”

Nathan s
wallowed down the urge to cry.  He was trying so hard to ward off hopelessness.

Robin plucked a grape from the plate and
held it out beside her knee.  Nathan strained forward, grimacing against the rope that was already cutting into his underarms and pressing into his frayed skin, but she pulled the bite an inch out of reach.  His strength gave out and he dropped his eyes again.

“Is that all the fight you’re willing to put up for food?  You must not be that hungry yet.”

Nathan tried to hold back the tears that threatened and his sinuses tingled with the effort, but soon they gathered at the corners of his eyes just the same.

“Look at me prince,” she commanded,
but Nathan couldn’t muster the will to obey.  His body was simply too heavy and he sagged against the rope.

Robin had a hand beneath his chin a moment later and his eyes met hers as she tilted his face up. 
The sudden jerk freed some of the moisture from his eyes and sent it down his cheek in a single streak.  Dull grey scanned his face, back and forth, until she satisfied herself with whatever answer she sought.  When she dropped his chin again it was with a little snort.

“Take it,” she said
and forced the tiny bite into his mouth.  After that she fed him piece after piece in silence.

When the platter finally sat empty
Robin turned her attention to her goblet, contemplating its contents before downing the whole thing in three quick gulps.  Then she stood and left, only to return a minute later with another.

She sat before him again and brought the cup to his lips. 
The sharp, acidic smell of wine drifted up.  It stung his nostrils at first, until the sweeter undertones played out.  He didn’t normally drink wine, but if he ever craved a glass it was now.

He wouldn’t think about what he had done to earn this.  He was so focused on the drink, the relief it brought his
cracked throat and the warmth it spread over his body that everything else faded away, and when she pulled away the cup he gasped for breath.  His eyes stayed on hers though, he remembered that much.

Robin
crouched before him and ran her gloved hand over the rope across his chest, tracing it until it disappeared beneath his arms.  She touched at his taut muscles and tested the tension of the rope with one finger.

“
Your handlers will take you down and clean you.  Don’t fight them prince.  They are not your enemy, only tools I employ.  Save your fight for me.”

Robin
patted him once on the cheek before taking a blindfold and tying it over his eyes.  Locked again in darkness reminded him of his trip here – of the blurred hours and his throbbing head, of his inability to distinguish reality from delirium, of the isolation, of uncertainty.  It reminded him of the box.  But the wine was already dulling his aches and the food sat warm in his stomach, and right now this darkness wasn’t so bad.

The specters, his handlers
, came in shortly after Robin left him.  As soon as they loosed the rope holding him to the ceiling Nathan fell sideways and curled his knees to his chest.  When they unbound his wrists he found he couldn’t move.  Everything was simply too stiff.  A sturdy set of hands had to lift his body while another moved his arms out from under him.

He groaned as they repositioned him onto his back and stretched out his aching limbs.  Fingers, warm and naked, worked the tension out of his
muscles.  When they finally had him relaxed he was lifted to his feet, his arms draped over a pair of shoulders, and carried out from the room.

Nathan thought to memorize the path they traveled and was disappointed when it was simply a quick turn from Robin’s room to this new pla
ce, where they stopped and he was made to stand there in a room he didn’t know.

The hands never left him long.  Nathan
was anxious when they did for they were his only point of contact from where he stood, there in his prison of darkness.  The quiet voice of his subconscious broke through every now and again to mock his obedience.  The handlers didn’t have him bound, he could just as easily rip the blindfold off his eyes, but he couldn’t will his hands to rise from his thighs.

W
ater was dumped over his body and they scrubbed him down.  Those soapy, warm sponges rubbed the sweat from his back and worked free any remaining knots in his muscles.  They moved over his legs, his shoulders, and his arms with pressure enough to banish all stiffness from his bondage.  But they were indifferent to his tattered front and the same pressure applied there made him groan and tense.

Nathan fought back any respons
e to the cleaning.  It was bad enough Robin saw him hurting.  He need not show that to these faceless specters as well.

As if speaking her name in his mind summoned her Nathan heard the familiar sound of her approach.  It felt like a weight was being applied to his chest and his heart had a mind to beat free from
its ribcage prison.  One by one the hands touching him fell away.

‘
Take the blindfold off and swing at her,’
his mind seemed to scream.  ‘
They won’t be able to stop you before you hit her, break her nose, something. Fight.  You’re dead either way.’

Nathan’s fist clenched at his side but otherwise he didn’t move.  The clicking had stopped just before him.  He could reach out and touch her.

Robin touched him first.  Nathan knew the feel of leather anywhere, it was imprinted on his mind now and permanently.  She ran her hand over his chest, where the rope had been, and lifted his arm to allow her fingers to trace it around.  He heard the click of her boots as she followed the tender pathway around behind him and up to his shoulder blades.  Her fingers lifted off one side and came down on the other, beneath his arm again, until she stood in front of him once more.

Hands were on him after that.  He felt them at his wrists, binding something to them
, but there was no tension when they released his hands back to his sides.  Nathan tried to bring one hand around to the other, to feel at whatever implement they just fastened to him, but his handlers returned his arms to his sides.

“
They’re leather wrist guards,” Robin explained. “Since you can’t seem to hold still… they should protect your wrists from further chafing when I have you tied again.”

“Why do
you…,” Nathan mumbled, but Robin’s fingers on his lips silenced him.

“Nothing I said needed a response
, prince.  I’m getting tired of reminding you of that.”

His handlers too
k charge of him again.  They turned him and walked him forward a few paces.  Nathan felt the change in flooring, from smooth to grate.  Then one more step to smooth again.  Strong hands on his shoulders forced him to kneel against some contraption with his shins pressed into a plank of angled wood.  Another thin plank was brought around and clicked into place beneath his thighs.  His knees were tethered apart and a draft of cool air caressed his backside.  His face went warm in embarrassment, as he was suddenly reminded of his nakedness, and any effects the alcohol had been playing to calm him disappeared.

It was like
being forced to squat, only less strenuous, since the weight of his body was supported by the seat beneath his thighs.  He was pulled down by his wrists and they were fastened to his ankles.  Without sight there was no sense in keeping his head up.  He let gravity take his chin to his chest and his hair fell over his forehead.