At His Majesty's Pleasure Ch. 06

It was probably too much to ask for for his goodwill to remain boundless. His patience - always a slippery, unsustainable commodity - had slowly depleted over the course of the day; even now, his mood was in danger of being replaced by a bored malice.

As he stared into her eyes, however, the force of his hold slowly slackened, little by little, until his touch was gentle once more. He didn't know how she was doing it, but her gaze was so utterly lifeless, her body so limp and still, that it was almost like a corpse was gracing his bed instead of that sensitive, beautifully squirming body from the night before.

"Very well, Alais," he said, silkily. "I will let you have another day to...recuperate. I'll even let you have your solitude." He released her, only to bring his mouth to her ear. "But you'd better find your voice by the end of tomorrow. My patience is wearing thin."

Even if she had been technically obedient to him this day, it went unsaid that he preferred his conversation to be returned, not met with blank and impassive staring. It was almost a conundrum; his usual practice in dealing with behaviors he did not like was to simply do away with the originator of such behaviors, and the problem was solved quite elegantly. But he could not bring himself to tarnish this treasure of his, much less extinguish her life, and so he was deprived of that solution.

But, if she pressed him, he knew he could find a suitable compromise.

*****

Alais thought she had been nothing but amenable - if not just for the purpose of not attracting more trouble for herself, as she withdrew, withdrew, and withdrew. What did he expect from her, really? To have no self respect? To be his eager whore?

And though he had implied that his single day of gentlemanly courtesy was to be an accurate reflection of their marriage from then on, had he not gone on to disprove exactly that? It seemed difficult for him to progress a day without some threat or another, and she could see his patience had already been tested in this short time. No, he was utterly unpredictable.

But he was surprisingly charitable enough (speaking very relatively) not to disturb her that night. They slept in the same bed, but separately all the same. Near the very edge of the bed, she could almost pretend that there wasn't a warm presence under the same covers, could ignore the slight inclination of the mattress toward the heaviness of her husband's body.

In the morning, when she awoke, he was already gone from their chambers. It was actually a little refreshing, having the room to herself. And when she had absolutely made certain that there was no one watching, she helped herself to a little spin and jumping exercise on the very top of the bed - just to let it all the excess energy out, in anticipation for another day of retreating her consciousness into the great unknown.

The maids outside informed her that the King would be occupied that day. She was not required to attend him, and would be allowed her leisure.

That was just as well, for Alais had not, unfortunately, regained her voice. It wasn't even a matter of having lost it. She had simply boxed it up and locked it away, along with so much of her other passions, until she could divine just what exactly she could do with them (for the rest of her life) without also being met with the constant desire to scream her throat raw.

This impassiveness was surely preferable to actively hating him, hating herself, and seriously taking under consideration the prospect of flinging herself off the edge of one of those serene cliffs. But, because she recognized this as being, perhaps, reckless, and a terribly disproportionate reaction to her situation, the next best order of action was to think things over very slowly, and to make something of a permanent choice. She could not be fickle in this, if she truly wanted to survive.

The marks completely faded from the one eventful night, she wore no silk ribbon upon her neck that day, and there were no more reminders of what did happen.

She spent these precious moments of privacy sifting through the books that could be found in the lodge, her hand occasionally drifting toward her locket, her one physical safeguard, in absent minded wariness. There was no way for him to find out.

"The King has...what you would call control issues," she could hear Duke Ethan saying in her thoughts.

"The second danger is, well, his boredom..." Her grip tightened about her necklace.

This couldn't last forever.

*

The King was apparently otherwise occupied that day, and indeed did not encroach upon her privacy for the most of it. The morning and afternoon passed peacefully, without nary an interruption - save from the attention of a gentle maid or two, and only then to bring her meals and entreat if she desired more.

That evening, she was found lying once again on her edge of the bed, face turned away from the door. The blankets were tucked close above her shoulders, her breaths even enough for the pretense of slumber.

It was quite late into the night when she heard the creak of the door. Footsteps padded across the floor, before darkness fell across her - evidence of a moving shadow.

"Good evening." It was the King, of course.

Her eyes closed slowly, the back of her head still greeting him in all its mundanity, and still she said nothing.

She felt the blanket being drawn down, unearthing her from its protection. Miserably aware of their differences in strength, she did not try to cling back onto her sheets, and remained (again) silent.

"Alais," he said, "I suspect you are awake. Aren't you?" His fingers were upon her arm, turning her toward him. After a pause, he ordered, quietly, "Open your eyes."

Careful deference is key, said the Ethan-voice in her mind.

Her eyes blinked open, but they were turned more toward the ceiling than to him.

"Hmm. I see that you are still obedient, at least. And what of the rest of your charade?" he inquired. He tilted his head, such that the candle cast an odd light upon his features, and the scar that was etched there. "Speak."

Alais had made her mind much earlier, unfortunately for the Ethan-voice protesting in her head, that speech was one order she was not quite ready to obey. Not now. She had not yet finished formulating her ruminations, did not yet want to be forced to confront this reality. She wanted more time. Blinking, she remained eerily silent.

The King's eyes narrowed; not too far from her, she could see his fist tightening its hold over the blanket, a white flush creeping over his knuckles. A dangerous edge crept into his voice. "I grow tired of this."

Oh. That was too bad.

Is what she might have said if she felt like speaking, or behaving foolishly. More foolishly.

He suddenly shifted away, his footsteps striking an angry echo as he crossed the room. There was more movement, more pacing; his frustration was almost palpable. Finally, he slowed to immobility before the window, staring outside at some unseen point.

A few moments passed in silence.

When he turned back to regard her, his voice had become oddly (unnaturally) calm again - and almost unsettling so, for the lack of transition. "Very well, Alais," he said, silkily. "If you are to be obedient to me in all but speech, it would be a waste not to make use of you as you are. Wouldn't it?"

Her eyes closed, heart beginning to beat a little faster despite herself; she never trusted his shift in moods, and her intuition was telling her that his manner of making use was not going to be pleasant. She turned back to her side, withdrawing deeper into herself. Just as she was found.

"Take off that slip."

Her eyes blinked open again, breaths faltering just slightly. So this was it - he planned to push her in a different way, testing the bounds of her self-imposed rules (silent compliance) when his orders became intrusive and intimate.

The King crossed his arms, going so far as to raise his eyebrows, as if expectantly, though his lips were tinged with a smirk.

There was at first a delayed response, as though she might ultimately refuse, but after the uncertain moment, slowly and surely, she pulled herself into a sitting position, with her legs off the side of the bed.

She began to lift up the bottom hem of her slip from below her knees, shifting slightly so as to bring it out from under her, and eventually over her head, silken hair tumbling into her face as she pulled the thin material away. There was nothing inherently sensual about her undressing, and it was certainly nothing he hadn't already seen; such was her reasoning, even as she complied in the most mechanical fashion she could.

Alais didn't stop there, and actually began carefully folding the shift into a neat arrangement in front of her (almost obstructively), just like laundry.

The King raised his brow at this meticulousness. "Leave it - " he began, but of course she was already finished, the gauzy garment folded pristinely before her. He laughed. "...Very good."

He circled closer, around the bed, like some sort of languid predator drawing ever closer. His gaze roamed suggestively over her naked form - the contours of her porcelain skin, the supple curve of her breasts - his appreciation perfectly blatant.

"How compliant," he observed. "Just as a wife should be," he added, his lips twisting to accommodate an awful grin - he was definitely goading her on purpose, as if to tempt a reaction.

She saw through this ruse easily, and did not dignify it - of course - with a response.

The King looked only marginally disappointed. "Lay down," he said, moving on. He reached out, not for her, but for the clump of silk that she'd so carefully folded, and swept it to the ground, idly undoing her work.

Obligingly nonetheless, she rested back onto her side with an arm strewn over pale breasts, staring off the edge of her bed as she was known to - this time without her clothes.

"On your back," he directed, lazily. He was standing at the foot of the bed now, his hands resting on the edge of the mattress.

There was another pause as she assessed which direction this was (obviously) headed, uncertainty tempering her movements. Nonetheless, she turned onto her back, her arm still crossed over her and one leg sliding subtly over the other.

"Good," the King said, the emphasis of the word nothing but condescending. "Now," he continued, his smile growing wicked, "spread your legs."

Her next pause was the longest of them all, such that it gave the impression that it might not even end. Another skip in her breath, though faint, managed to escape. There was not enough detachment in the world for her to voluntarily expose herself in this crude fashion; theoretically she wanted to attach nothing at all to her bodily actions, and mentally disassociate from this interaction as a whole. But this came a little too close to what she had been suppressing to begin with, and it was that which made her hesitate.

He made a tsking sound, though his expression could not justifiably be described as genuinely surprised. "How disappointing," he said - though, in fact, he almost looked the opposite. It was clear to her that the whole thing was an intentional exercise in testing her boundaries. In a falsely put-upon voice, he mused, "Always have to do everything myself."

Alais was staring at the ceiling rather than at him, so it came as a surprise when she felt the coarse texture of rope encircle her right ankle. Before she could react, the knot tightened, and her leg was being drawn toward the corresponding corner of the bed.

Her breath hitched, and it took every ounce of reserve not to let sound a yelp of surprise as she was all but dragged down. A glimpse to the foot of the bed saw the King affixing the other end of the rope to the bedpost with a series of more knots, his manner quite methodical - as if this were the most ordinary thing in the world.

As one leg was pulled, the other had followed instinctively, trailing after from some innate impulse to prevent from being spread apart. But the King did not allow this for long. He took hold of her free ankle, and, with an uncompromising firmness, dragged it far and wide - splaying her open. She gasped this time, attempting to squirm out of his hold, but his grip was like iron around her flesh; despite her panicked struggles, more rope encircled and then tightened, his fingers working dexterously to entrap another limb. Her legs were now pulled sharply to opposing corners of the bed, held there forcibly by the bonds.

With a thrill of alarm, she scrambled down to grab at one of the knots, aiming to loosen or untie it. Before she had made it halfway, her wrist was caught by a strong hand, and then dragged over and upwards; it was kept pinioned there by more rope, knotted right below her bandages. And though she clutched her final arm to her chest, it took frustratingly little effort for him to yank it away and subject it to the same treatment.

Finally, the King stepped back, his gaze roaming over her nude and restrained form, as if admiring his handiwork.

She was now tied spread-eagle over the bed, each limb stretched taut and tightly restrained to their corresponding corners - the position of her legs felt especially vulgar, forced wide as they were for his viewing pleasure. Despite knowing better, she strained and pulled against the ropes, but only succeeded in writhing uselessly against the soft bed; the rope held firm, the knots tight and secure.

He chuckled. "Struggle all you like," he said, the amusement clear in his voice. "You won't be going anywhere. Not until I'm done with you."

It was true: bound as she was, she was utterly at his disposal, to do with as he pleased - for as long as he pleased. What did he have planned now? The unsteady patterns of her breaths were ever more visible with the bared rise and falls of her chest. Her head turned to her side, eyes averting feebly so as to shut away her ability to see her debasement.

His fingers brushed against her ankle, and then continued upward, trickling over the contours of her naked body - past her leg, hip, and swell of her breasts. She longed to pull away, but she was held fast by the rope and unable to move an inch under his leisurely appraisal.

"I must admit, you are full of surprises, and this has been an interesting...experiment," he told her. His hand settled, idly, over her breast, slowly caressing. "But it has gone on long enough, don't you think? I have no interest in the company of a lifeless puppet."

She shifted unsteadily under his touch, her hands restrained from covering herself up.

He smirked. "After all, I prefer my puppets to at least be entertaining." His thumb rotated lightly about her nipple, which was involuntarily stimulated under his attention. "So...if you're going to persist as you are, I suppose it falls to me to be the one to excite a little life back into you."

He pinched, just hard enough to be painful, and laughed at the flinch he elicited. "I think I'm up for the challenge."

The King grinned again, before finally withdrawing his hand. "I'll be right back," he said, as he stepped away. He was terrible enough to add, "Try not to wander."

His footsteps retreated into the distance, leaving her alone in the room again.

Her gaze shifted warily in the ensuing silence, her wrists beginning to test their new constraints. Her knees tried to shift experimentally together; nothing would budge. The bounds were not so tight that they pained her physically, but where had they come from? Did he really keep ropes hidden in the room? Just in case he needed them? Was there not something at least slightly ridiculous about that?

As she let her body adjust, somehow, to the irregularity of its strained position, the cadence of her heartbeat somehow managed to steady itself. It was difficult, but she forced herself to think. He wanted this - wanted her to squirm and struggle, wanted her to panic for his amusement. Doubtless he was deriving pleasure from it.

The surest way to frustrate him was to not react at all.

The more Alais paid mind to her rapidly growing discomfort, the greater her outward trepidation, and the more signs she showed, the more satisfaction for him. It was to be a loss for her, to tempt his irritation, but all the greater her loss must have been if he succeeded in shaking her back into the palpable world, where all sensation was heightened and terrible. It would only play into his hand. (That, and a small and irrational part of her yearned to make what little resistance was left to her, now that she had already crossed the threshold of displeasing him.)

So she retreated further, then, aspiring to become more and more detached to the point of no longing comprehending what was happening. That was the unachievable, fantastical ideal, anyway. Back to blotting him out, back to indifference, and it wouldn't matter how she was splayed for him.

In her mind, she attempted to return to the beautiful cliffside views, in that distant world where she had never encountered a Duke Adrien. It did make the ordeal a little more sufferable. For as long as she chose not to acknowledge her compromising position, it could not affect her mentally. Her only recourse was to wait - and he couldn't ... leave her like this forever.

Could he?

The King was evidently in no hurry, as it was not before several minutes elapsed that returning footsteps resounded. She persisted in looking away from him, but she could hear the door open and close, the drawing of a chair to the bed, and the ominous sound of items being arranged near the foot of the mattress.

"Now that we are married," he told her, pleasantly, "I must let you know that I have certain preferences when it comes to my partners. Among them is, ah..." He paused, as if considering his phrasing. "Unencumbered access."

His gaze flickered down briefly to her womanhood and the dark curls that covered it - still forcibly exposed by his crude means.

What did he mean? What did he mean? Her thighs seemed to tense at first, ever so slightly, and her gaze nearly wandered to ... whatever it was he was doing, before she willed her limbs to relax and trained her eyes to the ceiling in that disconnected way again.

"I hope you don't mind," he said, insincerely, his grin broadening. His hand went to her hip, lifting her incrementally as far as her bonds would allow. When she settled again, she felt the fluffy thickness of a towel under her.

She swallowed thickly, suppressing reactions still from the way those coarse fingers handled her. If he meant - what she thought he meant...

"I've heard it feels cleaner this way," he said, as if he were soothing her. "I would even say that most Obsivian women prefer it, once they've experienced the change."

It should not have surprised her that he thought he had entire claim over her body, to be modified to his desires. She was to be plucked bare to his liking.

Alais swallowed. It wasn't as if she was attached was what she told herself. No, that wasn't strictly true. Technically, she was attached. Technically, the strands were all physically attached and rooted in a way which almost prompted her to wince. But she wasn't emotionally attached, and there was no need to give this any significance, she reasoned, with as much conviction as she could muster.

The bed dipped toward her feet, as he settled between them; she longed again to close the distance, especially at this new threat. "The process is a little painful - regrettably," he said, his concern ringing false. "But," he continued, with a taunting note, "since you're currently so impassive, I'm sure the effects will barely register."