Page 57 of Caged By Dance and Desire

I didn’t black out. My knees collapsed and my kidnapper scooped me up, walking with an unhurried stride to the coach where I listened as we entered, and it rolled into motion. He settled me onto a bench, saying nothing as he secured me.

I couldn't move. I couldn't see beyond the white blur, my ears stuffed with cotton wool.

He’d imprisoned me in a cage of my own blood and bones.

I generated emotion, and I formed mental images. Those feelings and images filled my mind, but I couldn't ensure transmission to Andrei. I didn't know how the bond worked, or what affinity the abductor had used to incapacitate me.

I tried to pay attention to turns and distances and unique sounds, but that stuff only worked in the movies. There was no practical purpose in panicking, but that emotion rose and began to choke off my breath.

The man sighed. “I suppose we should begin.”

He sounded so bored that I had no warning before the pain began.

Couldn’t scream. Couldn’t arch my back or claw at my arms. Couldn’t do anything but endure and even that I couldn’t do because though I was a friend of physical pain, never like this. Nothing like this.

“The geas should allow enough through that your pain will alert your Lord and ensure his cooperation when we contact him. And again.”

I lost track of how many times he wracked me with pain. Bloodless pain, because he never touched me.

“You’re doing very well. Still conscious, which makes matters cleaner. And again.”

“And again.”

A chorus of agains.

“You probably want to know why,” he said, still in the offhand, conversational tone. “They always do, and closure is important. You have done nothing wrong. Your pain is undeserved. Unfortunately, your Lord is making inquiries into matters he shouldn’t, disrupting distribution. We want him to stop. I offer this information as a courtesy, as well as allowing you to know that it is unlikely you will survive. Take time to make your peace with this. It's the only kindness I can offer you.”

Andrei’s voice in my mind, a string of broken Cassanian words then his attempt to gather himself, offer comfort. But nothing on my end reached him, except for the agony.

“Breathe,” the abductor advised. “If you hyperventilate you could pass out. The geas renders you immobile and dampens your senses, but it doesn't affect your breathing or your heart rate. If you’re useless to us, that lowers your chances of a clean death.”

His voice was calm, almost indifferent. I wasn't certain if I should allow that to reassure me. Maybe if this was a political kidnapping, they wouldn’t rape or maim me. At least this touchless torture left no injury. My legs and feet would be okay. I would still be able to dance if Andrei rescued me.

But not knowing if he would be in time caused more panic.

“And—”

The coach lurched to a stop, and I heard the click of heeled boots, some dress shoes, and the Cassanian version of athletic shoes against the cobbled streets as well as voices in quiet, sharp conversation.

The coach door jerked opened, and someone spoke in a language I didn't recognize, the vowels lyrical but interspersed withguttural consonants. A sharp crack as if someone had been slapped across the face, and a grunt then a dull thud.

The muscles in my body weren’t under my control, or every single one would have seized.

Someone lifted my limp body; the new scent almost herbal, and a meditative pattern of breathing.

“The geas laid on you will fade in a few moments, Lady Hasannah,” a liquid masculine voice said, the accent not Cassanian. It reminded me almost of Cora when she was irritated. “I have notified Lord Andreien of your location and he will retrieve you soon.”

We traveled, stopped, and from the sounds I'd been taken inside a dwelling and into a room where I was carefully laid on a bed of cushions.

“I apologize for my people,” he said. “There have been some upheavals in my District, and I fear some may have chosen to take unwise advantage of perceived opportunities to increase their influence. They'll pay with their lives, of course, and I’m annoyed enough to take my time, though I have little of it.”

He'd added the last almost thoughtfully, a soft rustle of clothing and the sound of his voice more level with my prone body.

“Ah, I'm remiss. I am Lord Ashlyun, of the High Court, and master of your late District of residence. I am not an enemy of your Lord, and you are safe here with me until he arrives. The sensory dampening spell should be wearing off now.”

As he spoke, feeling flowed to my fingers and I began to tense and stretch each of my muscles, waiting with forced patienceuntil my vision and hearing were normal and I could access my nervous system, commanding my body to sit up.

It took another moment to control my harsh breathing and blink back tears of panic. Dignity and poise. If there wasn’t much else I could offer Andrei, at least I could keep from embarrassing us in public by crying like a schoolgirl.

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