The Shadow Games: The Chronicles of Arianthem VI (18 page)

The Empress gazed down at the dark-eyed woman, who seemed engrossed in the bruise she had created on her inner thigh. Melusine kissed it gently, and came away with a small amount of blood which she licked from her lips. Those dark eyes flicked up to her, magnetic and terrifying.

“Almost as if you were a virgin,” she said, “and I just broke you.”

It was a bizarre sexual statement, one as intriguing, enigmatic, and petrifying as the woman herself. Then, as if nothing at all had transpired between them, Melusine stood up, wiped her mouth on her sleeve, then turned to leave.

“But—“

“Your ointment is on the nightstand,” Melusine said, interrupting her. “I must go.”

And Aesa was left staring at an empty room, so stunned by the events it barely registered that, once again, the door neither opened nor closed with the woman’s departure.

Aesa stalked the castle. She had again hidden in her chambers for several days, but upon emergence, exited with a vigor that had many talking. It seemed the young Empress was taking some kind of inventory, for she combed every room, every nook and every cranny of the structure, and many thought she must be planning a remodel in the infant prince’s honor. The Emperor vocally hoped this was true and he surely would support the endeavor with the imperial coffer. Aesa even deigned to spend time in his court, her eyes moving about the crowd with a lively interest that he observed with pleasure.

“And what happened to your advisor?” Aesa said in a bored tone. “You seemed quite bewitched by her.”

The Emperor turned to his young wife in surprise. Was that what this had been about?

“I assure you, my love, I am bewitched by no one but you.”

His tender protestation merely irritated Aesa as she waited for an answer.

“Melusine has been working on a project, buried in the bowels of the castle where she chooses to stay. I offered her the choicest of chambers, yet she prefers her solitude in the basement. She is quite an odd creature, but the court loves her, and I have found her invaluable.”

“The basement? How strange. But isn’t the basement a dungeon?”

“Most of it, yes. But the north quarter was once dedicated to housing troops and still is set up as chambers. They are crude, but from what I’ve seen, Melusine little values wealth and luxury. She insists she is quite content down there, and wishes only her privacy.”

“I see,” the Empress said.

Aesa grew silent, so the Emperor decided to press forward with a conversation he had desired to have for a fortnight. He put his hand on his wife’s knee and leaned toward her to whisper.

“Since you are feeling so much better, my love, do you think you might come to my bed tonight?”

The hand felt like an iron weight her leg, but not as heavy as the one on her heart. When she spoke, her voice sounded shrill even to her own ears.

“I fear I’m getting a headache, my dear. Perhaps tomorrow night? I’m sure I will feel much better then.”

The Emperor was disappointed, but he would not press the issue. Much longer, and he would invoke his husbandly right. But he did wish for his young wife to be healthy.

“Very well, my love. Tomorrow.”

Aesa retired to her room and the tedium of the day was endless. She could not pass through the castle unnoticed by day, and even at night she was likely to be seen. So she stole into her handmaiden’s room, the small chamber adjacent to her own, and took a dress, an apron, and a hooded cloak. They were rough garments, the clothes her servant wore outside the castle walls, but they would serve Aesa’s purposes perfectly.

She waited until late in the night, when she was certain even the libertines of the court were fast asleep, and crept from her room, clothed like her servant. She found her way to the basement without incident, passing guards who merely nodded, thinking her one of the array of minions who worked around the clock to keep the castle running. Once at the steps to the vast cellar, however, her nerve faltered. She had never been below the main level, and if she became lost, she could not explain why she was there. But she steeled herself, both anger and desire driving her on, and started downward.

It was simple to avoid the dungeons, less simple to find her way through the maze of passageways that threaded the troop quarters. The lantern she carried flickered, and she cried out, fearful of being trapped in the darkness. But the light steadied and so did she, and she carried on. Finally, she saw a room ahead with a light shining beneath the door, and it did not occur to her to wonder why this woman was awake, or why Aesa knew she would not find her sleeping.

She did not knock, but rather opened the door which was unlocked. Melusine looked up from a concoction she was mixing, neither surprised nor apparently pleased to see her. She glanced at the rough-hewn disguise with mild scorn.

“You should not be here.”

“And yet I am,” Aesa said defiantly.

Melusine stood upright from her vials and tubes, examining the Empress. Although she did not seem pleased to see Aesa, she did not seem displeased. Rather her look was impassive with an air of inevitability.

“And why are you here?”

“Because you draw me like some pathetic little moth to a flame. You burn my wings then send me away.”

“Would you rather I pulled them off?”

The threat took Aesa’s breath away; she was not used to being spoken to in such a manner.

“Perhaps it would be better.”

This brought a slight smile to those beautiful, haunting lips.

“You should be careful what you wish for.”

Melusine’s air changed to one of contemplation, one possessing even more of the sense of the inescapability of the events transpiring.

“Come here.”

It was a command, not a request, and as always, Aesa was compelled to obey. She stood before the woman, feeling frail and vulnerable next to that voluptuous frame. Melusine loosened the sash on her robe and it fell open, revealing that she was naked beneath. The Empress gasped, for although the skin was pale, it was darker than hers, and the breasts were large and topped with dark red aureoles, so different from her pale, small, pinkness. Her eyes went to the flat, firm stomach, then to the patch of dark hair so artfully groomed to a single strip, something Aesa had never seen before. It was beautiful.

“On your knees, Empress,” Melusine said in languorous command.

Aesa slowly kneeled before her, and Melusine guided her unresisting head between her legs. Aesa was timid at first, for she had no idea what she was doing, but contrary to her expectation, both the taste and smell were pleasant. She kissed that mysterious place first, then more boldly began to explore with her mouth.

Melusine looked up at the ceiling, for the girl was far better than she expected. Indeed, the Empress was approaching the act with an enthusiasm that was extraordinary. And even more astonishing, Melusine felt the stirrings of a response within her, and slowly began to move her hips in sync as her breathing increased to keep pace with that tongue.

“That’s right,” she said with slight encouragement.

And Aesa was encouraged, for she felt the stirrings of the response and felt empowered as well. So empowered that she wrapped her arms about Melusine and pressed her back until she was against the near wall. The act excited the woman, for her hips began to move more as her breathing quickened further. This was most unexpected and rare for her, and perhaps it was the thought that it was the Empress of the House of Farlein going down on her, but she realized she was actually going to come in that beautiful little rosebud of a mouth.

“Yes. Yes,” Melusine murmured, barely able to get the words out. The tongue worked, the lips feathered, and in an unscripted flash of inspiration, Aesa thrust her fingers up inside the woman, pushing her right into her climax. And Melusine gasped and grasped Aesa’s head, riding the mouth, the lips, and the fingers, completely uninhibited. And for Aesa, it was glorious as she wrung every ounce of orgasm from the woman she kneeled before.

Melusine was again staring up at the ceiling, her nipples still hard as her body relaxed. And as she stared up at the ceiling, she sighed, for the other hunger stirred, always so interrelated with the first. Both so sexual. It was appropriate that orgasm was often referred to as “the small death.” She looked down into the Empress’ eyes.

“Well, that complicates things.”

And before Aesa could interpret the strange statement, Melusine lifted her bodily from the floor with a strength that was not human and shoved her against the wall. Aesa dangled from the grip, her toes brushing the floor as the woman held her seemingly without effort. And then she bit her on the neck, a violent but passionate act that was both painful and erotic. It hurt, but the pain felt good to Aesa and she wrapped her legs about Melusine who facilitated the position by holding her in place. And as Melusine drained the life from the Empress, Aesa no longer cared and moved her hips against that lean stomach so that she would climax one more time before she died. And she did, again and again as her blood flowed into the vampyr, and the only thing that stopped the waves of pleasure was that her body gave out for lack of blood to rush to that core of being between her legs.

Melusine held the Empress who now dangled in her grasp, still seated upon her like a sleeping child. And she pulled away from the wall, still carrying her with no more effort than one would carry a child. And she laid her down upon the cot, then stretched out on top of her until the eyes fluttered open. The Empress was very pale, and her voice was very weak.

“You are a vampyr.”

“I am,” the woman said. “My name is not Melusine. It is Pernilla.”

Aesa’s eyes drifted over the woman’s features, examining that haunting loveliness as if committing it to memory.

“I am the Head of the Shadow Guild,” Pernilla said, “the upper echelon of all assassins in Arianthem.”

“And why are you here?” Aesa asked softly, somehow not even caring. She was very near death and her lack of blood was making her lethargic. It was not an unpleasant feeling.

“I am here to complete a contract.”

“And who is your target?”

Pernilla gazed down at the young woman. “You.”

Aesa merely sighed. “And who sent you here to kill me? Who was your contract with?”

“Your husband,” Pernilla said with the brutal honesty of her profession. “You have provided an heir. He loves another. You are to be gone.”

Aesa again sighed. It seemed a fitting end, to fuck the vampyr her husband sent to slay her, on her deathbed.

“And so now you will kill me.”

“Well,” Pernilla said. “Yes and no. I have no choice but to fulfill that contract.”

“So what is the ‘no’ part about it?” Aesa said sarcastically, the emerging brashness of this infant pleasing to Pernilla and solidifying her fate.

“This,” she said, as she raked her nails over her breast just above the nipple. Blood began to flow downward, covering the red aureole with a deeper red.

“And now, you’re going to drink.”

Raine sat staring at the Empress for a very long time. Aesa herself seemed lost in the world of the tale she had recounted. She started, as if waking from a deep sleep.

“I’m sorry,” she stammered, “that was probably unnecessarily graphic.”

“No, no,” Raine said, clearing her throat, “it was, um, well-told.” She was thoughtful for a moment. “So Pernilla turned you to vampyrism to fulfill the contract.”

“I am dead,” Aesa pointed out. “So that did, in truth, fulfill the contract.”

“So what happened next? And how did you wind up in this tomb?”

“I spent many years with Pernilla. It was exciting and exhilarating, and I experienced everything a pampered young girl could not. I did many things of which I am not proud. Pernilla was not kind to me, but that is not really what I wanted from her, and nor was she cruel. I would say that those years with her were the best of my life. Or death. It is all so confusing.”

“So what happened?”

Aesa sighed and her eyes darkened with sadness. “More and more I felt my will subsumed to Pernilla. She always had the ability to compel me, but it grew and grew. I realized how very powerful she was compared to the other vampyr, and I felt myself turning to a thrall.”

Raine frowned. She did not know a great deal about vampyrism, but she was fairly certain it did not work that way.

“But you took Pernilla’s blood. A thrall is one who survives the bite alone.”

“I think Pernilla is different. As time went on, I could refuse her nothing. It amused her, she mocked me, told me that I would make an excellent thrall. I knew I could never be her equal, but I would not stay with her as a mindless slave.”

Raine stroked her chin but said nothing.

“And so I left. I planned everything so carefully, terrified that she would find out. I found a wizard, a very powerful one willing to provide the spell for the seal. I did not contact him directly, but through intermediaries.”

“What was this wizard’s name?”

“I don’t remember,” Aesa said, “it was so long ago. But I had information he wanted. The location of some deeds and titles on land that was in dispute, documentation that favored the Tavinter people.”

“Isleif,” Raine said, breathing out the name.

“Yes,” Aesa said, startled. “That was his name.”

“Well,” Raine said under her breath, “no wonder no one could get past the seal.”

They grew silent once more as Raine contemplated the situation. With evident reticence, Aesa broke that silence.

“And so why are you here? Who sent you to break the seal?”

Raine hesitated, but only briefly. The Empress had been completely honest with her, so she could do no less.

“I was sent here by the second in command of the Shadow Guild, a woman by the name of Malron’a.”

Aesa shook her head. “I have heard the name, but I do not know her. As close as I was to Pernilla, I knew very little about the inner workings of the Shadow Guild. I have never even met anyone else who knew her by name.”

“I know her only by name. I have never met Pernilla.”

“But why did Malron’a send you here?”