I walk slowly and awkwardly to the hashery. I feel too exposed in this getup, and I hate it. How am I supposed to fight in this? I keep checking to make sure everything is covered as I walk, despising the hot air that’s touching too much of my skin. It snakes between my thighs as I walk, and I bristle at the lack of a barrier there. I try not to seethe too obviously. We’re nude often here, either to fight off the oppressive heat at night or because the masters have ordered us to train that way for the day. It’s not the lack of clothing that’s putting me on edge. It’s being forced to feel even more vulnerable than we already are for the Orders. Like we really needed one more reminder that we’re less than, that we’re nothing.
Surviving this long in the ludere brings a certain level of understanding and expectation. We can be stripped down and know which guards or masters might push to take advantage. Time here reveals to all of us which of our fellow savages might ask to play under the cover of night, or worse, not ask. Life here is brutal, but there’s a kind of safety in knowing where the threats lie. I’ve figured out a way to traverse the hazards, learning quickly who and what might come for me when I’m vulnerable. However, it won’t be like that with the Orders.
We’ve all heard stories about this one and that, but none of us really know what’s going to be coming through the outer doors in a couple of hours. Great houses of assassins are coming here. They’re a combined threat to each other as well as us, and Tilleo wants us to bear the weight of all that while worrying if our cunts and tits are showing, which potentially could invite more trouble than any of us have ever deserved.
I suppose I should expect nothing less from a skin dealer. He sees us all in aurems, counting our worth and cost with every breath we take. I should be grateful I’m here instead of being sent off to some brothel or sold to a private, more nefarious collector, but gratitude isn’t something I can muster much of these days.
My stomach growls, but I don’t smell anything being made or prepared for us in the kitchens as I pass them. There’s a flurry of activity and plenty being cooked and baked, but I know it’s not for us—it smells too good. We never get anything that smells like that.
I wander into the hashery and find all of the male blade slaves waiting. They stand around wary and bored, having taken far less time to prepare for tonight’s festivities than we girls have. I scan Leto, a desert-darkened force to be reckoned with and the only male I’ve ever given permission to touch me. He and all the others have freshly shorn heads and are wearing flowing salwar pants in the same deep blue silky fabric as my dress. A silver chain holds a pendant with Tilleo’s crest between their defined pecs. They’ve been oiled up to accentuate the dips and mounds of their muscular, hardened frames. Each of them is lethal and capable, just like me and the seven other females who’ve made it this far.
Leto moves toward me like he always does when we train together. He jokes that I’m the sun his moon is always drawn to, which makes no sense with the way I look. Either way, I shut that kind of talk down whenever he starts it. The only thing I ever want to be to anyone is the last thing they see before they die. I watch him lithely stride closer, noticing that his flowy draped trousers hug his hips and his ankles, but the sides flap open, exposing his thick toned legs as he walks. It seems Tilleo has made the males just as accessible as he’s made the rest of us.
Sparkling russet eyes run up my body before settling on mine, and Leto offers me his go-to sly smile that always makes me think he’s up to something. “I guess Tilleo didn’t want to give you many options for where to hide a blade,” he teases, and I scoff.
“You know I don’t need one if I really want to do some damage,” I reply flatly, and his smile grows even wider.
“Meet me tonight on the roof? One last time before this place is nothing but a memory,” he asks, his lips mere inches from my ear as his whisper dances over the skin of my neck.
My nipples harden in response, and I look around to ensure no guards are watching as I cross my arms over my chest to try to hide my body’s reaction. Leto steps back, his own eyes scanning our surroundings in search of threats. He’s the only slave I’ve let myself get close to in years. I’m not sure what it is about him that made me want to lower some of my walls, even though I know it’s nothing but trouble, but time in this place is lonely. It wears on all of us, no matter how hard we fight it. It’s not friendship, that’s too dangerous. It’s contact, a tenuous connection, and some days, that alone is the only tether to sanity.
“I’ll try,” I tell him quietly. “If I’m assigned to one of the tents though…” I trail off as he nods in understanding.
The palatial manor next to the ludere can accommodate many guests very comfortably. But we’ve been told that some Orders prefer more solitude than the manor provides. I’m not sure which ones don’t play well with others, but according to some of the guards, the tents are just as cozy and luxurious as the main house is. They’re still inside the walls of the stronghold, but they’re placed out in the large expanse of empty sand between the manor and the ludere.
I’ve been inside the main residence once. I don’t recall cozy luxury. All I remember is warm brown sandstone everywhere, blinding fairy lights, and fear. The masters told us that we’ll be assigned to serve an Order while they’re here. That’s why they’ve gathered us in the hashery, to give us our assignments. If I’m tasked with serving someone in the tents, it could make sneaking off very complicated.
Leto gives me a nod and a wink before he backs away slowly, enfolding himself in the grouping of males like the ghost we’ve all been trained to be. Low chatter hums all around me, but any time any of us hears movement in our direction, we go silent. The masters don’t like us talking to each other too much or doing anything else that could give the impression that the killers they’re training might be looking to turn on them. We know better, and the crossbow-laden guards that walk the outer wall above us at all times guarantee that no one would get too far even if we did start to haveideas.
Slowly, the other females trickle in. We wait, all of us standing together but not too close, not too comfortable. I’m relieved more than I want to admit that Wilik has done something different and impressive with all of the female blade slaves’ hair. She wasn’t only singling me out for trouble like I initially thought. Each of us self-consciously tugs and tucks the scraps of fabric barely covering us as we wait. I watch many uncomfortable glances move around the room and a couple silent invitations being passed back and forth from slave to slave.
I sense the moment the atmosphere of the ludere changes, like my blood not only runs inmyveins but in the drab floors and walls of this place too. A heavy severity ripples through the building, and I can taste an encroaching tang of fear. I straighten and tense right alongside all the savages in the room. My eyes stare straight ahead. My muscles lock. I pull in a deep breath and hold it. Tilleo is coming and that is never a good thing.
ChapterFour
The thump of boots against gritty sandstone drums in my ears like the warning it is. In my periphery, I see the guards who always precede Tilleo as they enter the room. Their sharp eyes sweep the space, searching for threats as they push aside two of the four long tables that we eat on in here. Sweat drips down my spine, and I curse myself for standing too close to a window and the rays of sun it’s feeding into the room.
At least I didn’t stand in front of it like Sennet did. If Tilleo takes too long, she’ll need to see a healer for the burn her pale skin is guaranteed to get. Most of us have darkened and adapted to the punishing environment all around us, even me. The fair red-haired blade slave has a harder time of it though. It seems her skin is as stubborn as she is. It refuses to adapt and make things easier on her.
Magicked fans whir above us, the leafy blades circling so fast that they’re a blur. The hot air they stir up plays with the silky fabric all of us have on, but each and every blade slave is as still as a statue while we wait for the man who condemned us to this life to grace us with his presence.
Carob-colored eyes shrewdly survey his crop of savages as Tilleo saunters into the hashery, decked out in an explosion of gems and jewel-toned silks. An extravagant swish fills his steps as he glides to the center of the room to pompously survey his property. The fans dare to disturb strands of his long, limp, dusty brown hair, and he smooths back the wayward locks with a hand that’s the same color as the desert sand at high noon.
He pulls in a deep breath, the bejeweled vest he’s wearing falling open to reveal the skin of his chest. Unlike the weapons he’s honed us to be, his body is soft, the kind of soft that happens when everyone around you does everything that’s hard. He’s not round like Figg, but it’s clear he’s not missing any meals, and he’s not dining on the same gruel we’re expected to survive off of. His pants are the same style as the male blade slaves’, a style favored by the desert dwellers of the Day Court, or so Figg likes to brag, as if she’s ever left the walls of this place.
I see him, but I don’t, because to look at him directly is an offense that will get you cut up and killed. I got away with it when I first met him, chained up and empty in Dorsin’s office, but the next time my unknowing eyes met his, it took me weeks to heal from.
“Our guests will be here within the hour,” he informs us, his crisp, brassy tone filling the room with ease and ringing authority. “You will greet them and follow them to their quarters where you will do anything and everything they require of you,” he orders, his eyes moving across our stone-still line as he looks each of us over.
I can feel his gaze picking us apart, searching for flaws or anything that requires punishment. Each of us holds our breath as his gaze runs its course, knowing that any little thing at any moment could change our fate in his world just like it has for so many others.
“Linae, Kirid, and Ency, you’re dismissed,” he calls out indifferently as though the last two words spoken into this room didn’t just end the aspirations and dreams of the three fae. I don’t know what it is about them that displeased him, but just like that, their hopes of finding a place in an Order and escaping Tilleo’s cruel clutches are over.
“No,” Linae pleads, and my stomach drops at her idiocy.
I want to snap at her to shut up. She knows better. But I fight the urge, standing frozen in my stance of submission, becauseIknow better. My mind silently whirs with thoughts of what they’re going to do to her for daring to speak without permission. It’s one thing to risk it with the guards or masters, but Tilleo is a whole other matter. Kirid and Ency stride out of the hashery noiselessly, accepting whatever fate now awaits them at Tilleo’s fickle hands.
“Master, please, whatever you find wanting, I will fix it,” Linae begs, and I hear the tears in her tone that I’m certain are now dripping down her face.
