Page 2 of Lord of Dance and Desire

A burst of anger, a flinch, and then nothing as Andrei shut completely down. I didn’t think firing a bullet into his heart would have been more effective.

“You have a choice, Anah,” he said after another long silence, and this time he spoke with his voice. Andrei’s voice. “We can handle this matter between us to the High Lord’s satisfaction, or she will be moved to intervene. And she cares nothing for whatever sentimental personal promises I’ve made.Nothing.What price do you thinkshe’llextract for failure—Mathen’s, your’s,mine?I don’t want to do this.I have to.”

I closed my eyes. The whip wielded by the man who loved me, and regretted my pain, or the whip wielded by the High Lord who saw us all as servants.

“I’ll submit.”

“I’m sorry, Anah. Neither of us has any choice. I didn’t understand that when I was young.” Andrei left the bedroom as I sank to my knees.

Aweek?

I’d go insane.

I sat huddled on the carpet, knees pulled up to my chest when he reentered who knew how many hours later. There was no fightin me. His mental walls remained impenetrable. He'd retreated so deep into a dark twisty cave, I couldn't follow. Couldn’t plead.

Soft footsteps approached, paused. “Anah. Why are you so stubborn? This is nothing we haven’t all endured. All of us. We ask nothing of you we don’t demand of ourselves.”

He knelt, lifting me into his arms, and took me to the bed.

Kissed me.

Stripped me.

Fucked me.

There was no other word for what he did. You couldn't make love to a woman after you ripped her heart out of her chest and stomped it into the ground.

At least he was gentle. . .as gentle as he knew how to be but if he’d bothered to ask I could have told him it didn’t matter.

It still hurt.

I let him learn the hard way. Let myself be reminded of the first half of Phase Three:

Insist More Sex Makes Everything Better

“Anah,” he said gently, braced above me. “The punishment is meant to discipline, not harm. And if I donothing, my mother will question my control over you. You don't want her to ask those questions.”

I lay under him, the energy for speech, much less protest, drained hours ago. His body a hot, hard poker in mine, his mouth on my neck, my breasts, his hands pinning my wrists.

A tear trickled down my cheek.

He recoiled, withdrawing from me and rising on his knees, staring down. He’d released my wrists, his hands hovering over my face as if he wasn’t certain what to do.

Finally, he left, returning with Constin.

“I don’t know what—” Andrei cut the words off in a voice that would have sounded strained if he wasn’t the High Lord torturing me. “I was careful.”

Constin stared down at me. “You had sex with her after telling her the punishment.”

“I thought intimacy would comfort her.”

Andrei’s luudthen turned and slammed a fist into his Lord’s jaw. Something cracked. Andrei stumbled back, blood blooming on his mouth.

“This, my Lord,” Constin said, voice eerily calm, “is what we would call rape. In case you did not recognize the absence of explicit consent.”

“She didn’t?—”

“I will kill you if you don’t be silent.”

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