by two burly ogres.
“I must admit, I am surprised at her lack of struggle, Lord.” Beside the red and black robed figure, a black stone jar with a single roiling, green eye, watched the scene, a lascivious smile on its lips.
The Aracan Katuvana shrugged.
“You do not seem happy that she has been captured so easily.” The Jar’s eye swivelled around the outside curve of its body as the Aracan Katuvana turned and stalked back to the throne.
He sat down with one gauntleted hand disappearing into the shadow of his hood and stared at the window.
Gmichi picked the Jar up and scurried across the room, depositing his burden on a pedestal beside the throne. The Jar alternated between watching the window and looking at the Aracan Katuvana.
In the window, the ogres had carried Freya and the wheel over to the wall and slid it onto a large axle poking out of the stones. Below the wheel sat a large trough. The wheel had been positioned with Freya lying horizontal above the glittering water and in which teamed a school of fish. They leapt and snapped at her left foot and hand, which were just inside the inner rim of the wheel.
“What are you planning, Lord? This introspection is most unlike you,” the Jar murmured, frowning.
With a wave of his hand, the Aracan Katuvana increased the volume on the window.
“How in Tyr’s name did I get myself into this?” the voluptuous girl groaned.
Securely lashed to the wheel on the wall of the Torture Chamber, Freya watched the approaching Dark Mistress with some trepidation.
“Forget how you got yourself into it; how did you get me into it!”
Across the chamber, the barred side of the holding cell allowed its occupants a ringside seat at the entertainments provided for the Dark Mistresses.
The current incumbent, pressed himself up against the bars, an irritated expression on his handsome face.
The Dark Mistress paced ever closer, her silver plaits tipped with shining golden blades, swaying with her sultry walk. Her long red leather skirt, had slits on both sides, showing legs with soft dark skin above thigh-high black leather boots.
Freya closed her eyes, hearing the tap, tap of the steel-heeled boots echo around the cavernous room.
“Now this is going to be good,” the Jar said.
The Aracan Katuvana grunted and waved a hand at the Jar, who fell silent.
* * *
“If you hadn’t run off ahead of us, you wouldn’t have got captured,” Freya retorted, watching the masked woman perusing a selection of instruments and whips hanging on a nearby rack.
“If you would just act the way a proper maiden should, I wouldn’t have been in that position,” Vrenstalliren hissed. “I was scouting ahead to make sure that there was nothing going to attack you.”
“For the last time, Prince Vrenstalliren, I am not a maiden! How could I endure the life I have had to this point and still be a maiden?” Freya felt like strangling him with her bare hands. The amulet Kraarz had given her was in pieces on the floor, having fallen off while the wheel had been put in place and stood on by an ogre. What was the point in guarding me against magic when I was abducted physically?
The Dark Mistress turned and slapped Freya across the face, her sharpened nails leaving bloody furrows across Freya’s cheek.
“You will not speak so to the next King of Alethdariel.”
Vrenstalliren blinked and stared.
“My sister is next in line and my brother after her. I won’t…” his voice trailed away and he frowned.
The woman paced over to the bars, and slowly ran her fingers drown his bare chest.
“The Aracan Katuvana will not see such a fine specimen of Elven Royalty wasted.” Blood from Freya’s cheek inscribed lines over his skin.
“Do I know you?” He pulled away from her touch.
“You’ll get to know me soon,” she purred and reaching through the bars, grabbed the waistband of his leggings, pulling him towards her. “As soon as I have finished with my current task, you and I shall
Rhonda Riley
Edward Freeland
Henrik O. Lunde
Tami Hoag
Brian Keene
Cindi Madsen
Sarah Alderson
Gregory Shultz
Eden Bradley
Laura Griffin