Topic: What a Girl Wants

Eiellani Rose

Date: 2008-10-23 14:11 EST
Chivalry was dead. In fact it was locked in a trunk and hidden in the cellars. Not every damsel wants to be saved from her dragon.

It had started out as a normal day. The weather was perhaps a bit crisp as I watched the sun rise before attending my Lord. But that was the type of weather I preferred. It mad it easier to go about my duties without feeling sluggish and irritable. Things never ended well when I was irritable.

One of my greatest pleasures of the day was helping Lord Travanix dress. The man had a magnificent body and was a joy to watch in motion. It was very rare that I granted this privilege to any of the other tower girls. It usually was only as a reward for exceptional behavior, or because I myself was needed elsewhere. There was a subtle competition among the others related to such mornings.

But that morning it was my honor to be the one.

Many people think that a slave?s lot in life is harsh, and that all masters are inherently and exclusively cruel. This had never been true of Travanix in all the nearly two years I had served him. He showed a dark face to the world, but in the privacy of his tower he could at times be almost kind. One just had to know how to keep from raising his ire. It wasn?t hard really. Be swift and diligent, neat and efficient. Never make assumptions abut his mood. Be sure you have a damn good reason if you ever have to question an order, and then carry it out as instructed regardless. Those were just basics really that any properly trained girl knew.

My Lord was dressed for the day and had given his instructions before retiring to his office to begin his work. Part of those instructions were for me to retrieve a parcel from our favorite apothecary in the market place.

That man had a plan that I had yet to figure out, but he always gave me something extra when I stopped by his shop. Sometimes it was alive. Lord Travanix was amused by my growing collection of pets, each with some deadly quirk. My favorite was the Lover?s Last Kiss. A venomous little beauty she was, and it was her refined and strengthened venom that I was going to pick up this morning.

Some days I wished I could just remain inside the tower walls like the other girls, leading the relatively simple life of a household drudge. The constant air of perfection I was required to display in public could be quite wearing. The smallest slip of high-heeled shoe on the cobbles was enough to bring me near to tears at times. Especially when such an error was caused by others.

He was a tall man, easily a match for Travanix in height. Muscled like a fighter and wearing a worn set of leathers that fitted to him like a second skin. He had bumped into me not thirty feet from my destination, his inattention causing me to slip and skin my knee on the rough stone paving.

Eiellani Rose

Date: 2008-10-23 14:48 EST
To his credit he was quite contrite about causing me injury, to the extent of offering to get me medical attention if I thought the injury warranted it. That is, he was until he saw my Lords mark.

I am very proud of the silver collar that binds me to Travanix. It is in many ways the kindest gift a man has ever given me. It is the safety and security that the wedding rings given me by others had promised but never delivered on. So this man?s obvious disgust was irritating to say the least.

He blustered and stormed, took me by my arm and dragged me of with him all the while proclaiming my Lord and Love a vile beast and a blot upon humanity. Some of his insults were colorful enough to at least be amusing. I particularly enjoyed ?Cretinous Creation of a Callous Catastrophe.? It intrigued me enough that a man could alliterate while in such a state of rage that I let him lead me along a while.

He took me to an out of the way inn, the little hole in the wall types where people often go to vanish. He was greeted there as though he was a familiar sight, and I was given looks of such pity even a whipped puppy would be shamed to get. He took me to his rented room and locked the door behind us.

?Such a beauty deserves better than to be chained and caged. You should be free to live and laugh and love.? I?m sure he thought he was being noble, but his fingers were cold and clammy on my flesh as he pushed me down to sit on his bed. A knock on the door had him moving away to accept a bundle from the inn keep. The bundle was tossed to the bed beside me as he relocked the door.

?Please, change into that. Things are in motion to have you away from here before dark.?

I had not spoken a word to the oaf, my temper was only just held in check by my curiosity. This man acted as though spiriting away the property of another man was commonplace. I wanted to know more so that when I reported the days events to my Lord, I could explain not only the How?s but the Why?s of the situation. So I slipped behind the thin paper screen he indicated and carefully removed and folded my uniform.

I felt naked in the dress he had provided, even though I had worn its like a hundred times over in my life as a so called Free Woman. It was simple cotton in a dull brown color, the kind a day laborer in a field might wear. I hated the feel of it on my skin and longed to return to the familiar soft velvet of my uniform.

The uniform had been another of my Lord?s gifts of kindness to me. I had an intense dislike of wearing the skins of animals and the previous uniforms before my tenure as first had been made of a high quality leather. My unease every time I wore the short black dress was what prompted my Lord to allow me to design new uniforms for all his girls.

I stood before my well intentioned savior quietly fuming and waited for his next move.

Eiellani Rose

Date: 2008-10-23 15:15 EST
I did not have long to wait. His clammy fingers were on my cheek, caressing, and on my throat inspecting the collar there. I?m sure the words he murmured were meant to be comforting but the caused shivers of revulsion to travel down my spine. In retrospect, he might have taken them for the trembling of relief.

He made promises of freedom, and whispers of love and passion waiting for me beyond my chains. How could the fool know I had all of that and more in the halls of my Lord?s black tower. For make no mistake he cherished us each in his own dark way, and I above the others because of my faultless care of him. I knew this fact well, though I was careful never to let it on to another living soul.

His clammy fingers continued to caress my flesh. I had begun to suspect that the fool was just drunk enough to expect me to give my body in gratitude for such an affront.

?In an hours time a man will deliver a trunk here, We?ll secure you in the trunk and be over the border before moonrise my beauty. I?ll leave then, and after an hour the same man will collect the trunk.? His fingers were tangled in my hair. I came so near to screaming my frustration that another man would dare the intimacy permitted only to Travanix. But I waited silent still to hear more of his plan. ? Once we are across the border I know an alchemist who can dissolve the metal of that collar. You?ll be free and we can go wherever we want.?

The wandering hands had made their way below the bodice of that horrid brown dress, fondling what should have been sacred were I truly a free woman, and doubly so because I was owned. He was so wrapped up in his passions that he failed to notice when I moved, removing the man?s own dagger from his hip and concealing it in my skirts. The fool would receive punishment for his assumptions in due time. I could do no less now.

When his lips closed over mine they tasted of stale beer and tobacco smoke. It was all I could do not to vomit. Instead I feigned a struggle to push him away. I wanted him enraged, but more importantly I wanted him to delay just long enough for that trunk to arrive.

My Lord had trained me well to think on my feet and adapt should things not go as optimally as they should. Already I was envisioning the feel of the knife slicing his flesh into chunks small enough to neatly fill a trunk. There was an art to stacking body parts really that was just as graceful as any tea ceremony or flower arrangement. My lord had ensured I was as well schooled in this as any noble daughter was in courtly ways.

This was distraction enough to keep my mind from the feel of those clammy cold hands on my body.

Eiellani Rose

Date: 2008-10-23 15:39 EST
The knock came at last on the door, just as the fool had pushed me on the bed assuming that my passion matched his, despite my not having so much as twitched. He motioned me to stay where I was while he answered the door. I was happy to oblige him in this, as bodies are much easier to chop to bits when not lying on the floor.

The trunk that was delivered was an old blue steamer trunk. The brass bound hinges were cloudy with age, and in places the leather was so worn it was peeling from the wooden backing, which was artfully cracked to allow the passage of air. It really was quite clever. A well-worn trunk such as that would draw less attention at a customs point than a brand new piece of luggage.

He closed and locked the door behind the rough looking fellow who had delivered the means of my salvation and returned to me on the bed. It was obvious to look at him that he was aroused. Proudly, manfully aroused. And yet the sigh left me with nothing but a dull resentment. He took me in his arms again, pawing like a schoolboy in his first fumbling with a girl.

The look of shock on his face as I made the first cut just above that proud member is one I shall cherish to my grave. My free hand clamped over his mouth to still the roar I could feel building in his chest. Pain and rage, it made me almost euphoric. He fought the second cut, placed skillfully where neck met shoulder just deep enough to bite the spine. The flow of blood from the wounds felt as sweet as a warm bath after a long day. I can?t recall how long it took him to die after the second cut stilled his struggles. I was caught up in the delicate web work of lines I was cutting into his skin, marking where I would dismember.

When the pieces were all stacked inside the trunk, I slipped behind the paper screen again and used the basin of stale water there to cleanse my skin. The bloody rag that was the hated brown dress was tossed atop the body in the trunk after I had donned my uniform again. The labeling on the trunk was switched easily. The fool had used a simple paper tag that was easily swapped. The trunk would arrive at the tower just shortly after I myself would.

I returned to the apothecary just before he closed for the night. Even the days excitement was not enough to make me neglect my duty. This time the man had several vials of delicately scented oils that he assured me would please my lord when applied to his skin in a massage to accompany the parcel I was sent for. I thanked him kindly.

There was a man who knew what women want. Only to serve and cherish the ones they love. And so I returned to the tower to do just that.