A sob rips from my throat. It’s a raw, broken sound. I can’t hold them back anymore; the tears come in a silent flood, streaming down my cheeks. I don’t make a sound beyond that first gasp, but my shoulders shake with the force of my crying. I hug my own arms, but my skin is too slippery to get a grip. I can’t even hold myself together.
The maids look away, uncomfortable. This display of emotion is clearly not part of the preparation schedule.
Mrs Vale unfolds her arms and takes a step forward. She doesn’t look uncomfortable, she looks annoyed. She stops behind me, her reflection looming over my shoulder in the mirror like a dark spectre.
“Cry all you want,” she says, her voice low and cold. “Get it out now or sob your way onto that stage. It makes no difference to me, to us. If your new owner likes your tears, I’m sure he’ll have ways to make you cry often, and if he doesn’t? Well, you’d better learn quickly how to stop being such a baby.”
She turns me away from the mirror, away from the shattered girl crying in the glass.
“Now,” she says, all business once more. “The dress.”
The maids jump to action, relieved to be back on familiar ground. I stand there, still as a statue as they begin to dress me. The fear hasn’t left, but it’s nolonger a wild panic; it has crystallized into a hard, dread certainty in the pit of my stomach.
I cannot escape this. I cannot stop this.
There is nothing I can do to get out of this. I’m on a freight train, hurtling towards the end of the line and I know when I crash, it’s going to hurt.
She stands tall, unnervingly so. Her back is ramrod straight, but I see the tremor beneath the surface, the way her knuckles whiten where she grips the edge of the cart. She’s putting on a brave face for the crowd, and a part of me admires that.
God, she’s so like her mother. That pride, that determination. It’ll make it all the more satisfying to break her.
Her dress is sheer white, a stark contrast to the shadows of the hall. It clings to her, revealing a silhouette that’s both youthful and deliciously plump. If you stare, you can make out the ample curve of her breasts beneath the fabric, the swell of her hips. Her hair, freshly washed and carefully styled catches the flickering torchlight, like a golden halo against her pale skin.
She looks like some sort of renaissance painting, a real life Botticelli with all those creamy curves.
Her eyes dart around, wide with terror, scanning the faces below. She sees the lecherous grins, the cruel laughter, the predatory stillness. She’s terrified, petrified even, but she’s fighting it. Digging her nails into her palms I imagine, trying to summon that unnerving stillness.
It’s pathetic, really. Pathetic and doomed.
I watch from the shadows, high in the gallery, hidden behind a heavy velvet drape. Below, the cavernous hall is a furnace of humanity. Men in fine silks and leather, their eyes gleaming with predatory hunger. Powerful, dangerous men gathered here tonight not just for pleasure, but for sport. For the spectacle of Grace Ratcliffe’s degradation.
She is a spoil of war, a piece of meat everyone wants a chunk of.
They use a fancy cart to transport her, dragged by slaves gripping chains thick enough to choke a horse. The cart itself is ostentatious, painted in dark, gaudy colours. The slaves have to fight their way through the baying crowd.
It stops before the raised dais where Conrad is already waiting for her, hauling her up to where everyone can get a good look.
Around me the other Lords murmur, their voices a low, ugly buzz. They’re dissecting her, not as a person, but as an object.
“Look at that figure, those tits…” one drawls.
Another laughs, “Clearly they haven’t been starving her these last few years. She’s got more fat on her than a Sunday roast…”
“Who doesn’t like a bit of fat?” Someone else replies. “Gives you something to grab onto when you’re hanging out the back of ‘em…”
“Bet old man Ratcliffe is turning in his grave tonight...”
“He didn’t stand a chance,” Someone scoffs. “Stupid fuck, Magnus crushed him like a bug.”
“Wonder how he’d feel knowing his wife’s a whore, and his daughter’s about to become one…”
I hear it all, every crude word, every mocking laugh.
My blood runs cold, but not with sympathy. It churns with a dark, possessive rage.
Mine.She belongs to me. And before the night is done, every man here will know it, will understand it.
She’s tied to a massive metal wheel, its spokes gleaming under the torchlight as she struggles. It’s crude, brutal, designed purely for display.
