Seduced By The Alphas Ch 14

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Learning Anew

The passage of time is swift in its passing, in only three months so much to speak of, so many alterations in my physical conditions and the state of my mind. From a slave to abuse and hate, to a slave bound in love, and in looking back I feel a sense of wonder and vast bewilderment at my transformation. All in just twelve short weeks? I feel I have lived a lifetime encapsulated in as many months that comprises only a passing change of season.

It was hard to think of him as only Frej, but it was important for me that I did. It was also a blessing Master Svend kept me from his contact. For the longest time my existence here was a secret, and Frej did not even think to look for me. He had I believe troubles enough of his own. He had gone to ground, no one could find him, family or friend, but I digress for am quite ahead of myself.

It was not easy, not at the first. That first morning I woke beside this man who was now my new Master. I felt an emptiness that I had not expected. I fought the strong urge to cry, he could not hear it, he could not know. I had given myself to him after all, on his terms and conditions. I could expect no quarter, and on day one it felt like a mistake. Yet I could not say why.

My fingers were at the collar and the ring suspended at the base of my throat, cold and smooth. Its newness, like his newness, familiar; yet not at all the same as my previous ownership.

I regarded him in his sleep,

could he keep me safe? I hoped so.

He had the resources undeniably. He was strong, equally as strong as his younger sibling, but mentally far stronger. I acutely feared this man's mental acuity, I always had, I knew he would employ it to trip me up and free me from the shackles of my past. However the path toward this I instinctively knew would be fraught with pain.

He was sound asleep, the morning light seeping in to cross his recumbent, peaceful features. My fertile mind had begun to asses him with more intensity than before. I now felt a great need to know him well, not in the cursory manner I had attributed him previous. After all he must from this day forward become the center of my universe, and I must push my previous expectations aside.

Frej, damn him, he was always there. Hovering in my dreams, my twilight world. It did not help my cause the brothers looked so alike. I must shake his hold, this man before me would demand I was his and his alone.

I thought more on his words of last evening, were they wise or indeed spoken in haste? I could not know. He could not love me he had said. Words that left me hollow and worn, defeated before I had begun. Was I really only chasing a phantasm, yielding myself to more of the same, another hard uncaring man?

I held on to the fact I knew he loved Ona, passionately, without reserve. It would be my failing if I could not garner his love, but to do so I would have to give him my heart. A heart that was bruised and closed. I had opened it once, and I had learned to fear offering it again.

This midsummer morn I regarded him carefully, he was easier to study as he slept. I wondered, had he got the tattoos that adorned his arms and mighty shoulders in his youth, and did he regret them now, or were they part of him? Did they in fact have a meaning? One day maybe I would feel brave and at ease enough to ask.

Of course I regretted mine, but then mine had been forced on me in a drugged flurry of tears. I already knew he did not approve of my defacement.

I dared to touch him then, gently, tracing the meandering designs, more art than bodily graffiti, boldly and beautifully executed. Demons and eagles running into the other, swirling circles and archaic runic phrases in greens reds and black. They only added to his masculine wiles. I suddenly found I had opened my mind to him, I wanted to know him with far more intimacy and fervor than I had before.

Black sheets of Egyptian cotton, smooth and fresh smelling. He was highlighted against them, a showcase for his masculine perfection, golden and strong. Yet I thought of a lighter shade of gold, the gold of his brother.

Where was he now, what was he doing?

He crept into the corner of my mind no matter what I did to push him aside, he was as much this man who lay naked and sleeping before me as he was himself. Svend, Frej, they were as one.

I felt hot shame at the tangent of my thoughts as his golden eyelashes fluttered open, gray eyes regarding me. He smiled, still luxuriating in the comfort of half sleep, he had a lazy satisfied smile on his lips.

He pulled me to him wordless, I knew by the intensity of his grasp what he demanded. I set to work appeasing him as I would have my previous owner, however his hand stayed me well before I could lift the sheets.

"We are not the same." His voice passionate and deep, harboring no remorse. Something quivered deep inside, some nameless thing, this clever man had indeed read my mind. I lowered my eyes in a voiceless admission of my sin and in abeyance to his superior intellect, letting him lead.

He crushed me to him, not an embrace of force or pain, but one of overwhelming power. I melted in his grasp. His lips sought mine his eyes were closed, was he deep in her? No time to dwell on this, I lost myself in the sensation of wanton deliciousness, his lips on mine, his tongue in my mouth.

Oh it had been so long since I had had such a kiss. It was more erotic to me than anything, even being bound and powerless before a muscled god. It did not come to me with the trappings of fear, it was only of an aspect of pure joy and love. Ona was indeed a lucky woman to have captured such a man's affections. Could I?

I came many times long before our morning dalliance ended in coupling, and it occurred to me as I lay there recovering my breathless rapture, and muddled thoughts in his arms, he was right, he was not the same.

*****

The first few days of my new ownership were hard. I was glad this time he did not resort to tranquilizers to calm me, though I guess the presence of the baby had made that decision for him.

It was difficult to transpose this more senior man's mastery over me and accept it in my own mind even though I had invited it. I was shell shocked. I could not believe I had surrendered to him. I always imagined Frej telling me I had been freed. The shame and self torture of abandonment, not this. Part of me really needed to hear those words from his lips so I could have a sense of closure. However given the circumstance it was not possible.

Life was very different yet it was in many ways the same. Master Svend was even busier than his younger brother had ever been. He had meetings to attend, worksites to supervise, and rich customers throughout Europe to court.

It was odd as he still used English to address me. I had to admire him for it. It appeared he could amazingly speak multiple languages, and had attended of all things Oxford at his father's insistence. He was not the barbarian I had painted him. I felt both humbled and unworthy in his presence, driven mainly by my exodus of the education system at fourteen.

My first week in his company was fraught with self recrimination, and confusion. I feel such depressive guilt, though he cares for me and takes me for his own I feel love still for another younger, more violent man. A man who does not deserve my feelings, but I find to my chagrin cannot cast them aside. When we are alone together in the dark I reach out and I imagine I touch him still. All he was, and is, will not leave me be.

My hand strays often to my throat, devoid of his token of ownership, replaced by another. I look at my new Master, I am not worthy. I hang my head I already know why, I have never called him that not once. I cannot bring myself to. I do not deserve him.

Hesitancy dogged my every act, and the title Master I could not bestow on him.

To begin with he centered me with a very rigid routine. His orders simple and concise. He was demanding and hard on me. I had no time to dwell on the past. He wanted things from me I knew, things I could not supply. He wanted to know so many confidences, dark duplicities I was most uncomfortable with. Intimacies I knew of his wayward brother. I did what I had learned when I felt cornered, I revealed nothing. I invited his frustration and wrath, and for many days he vented neither.

I swam in a sea of guilt, I could not shake the thought of the child I had stolen from him. Even though I now carried another very real new life soon to be born. I saw the way Master Svend reacted to my pregnant state. He was not like Frej repelled by what he had made, he was entranced by it, doubly fueling my guilt at what I had done. He would rest his large hands on my belly often, walk up behind me and just stand and feel the kicks of the child. It was not his, but he behaved as if it had been.

I had been at the sink still doing the dishes by hand, he laughed at this and showed me the dishwasher. It felt wrong to use it, it was like cheating. However I could not reason with his logic the china washed his way felt far cleaner than that which I had labored long over to both wash and towel dry.

It was his usual habit to put his arms about me at the sink, always when my hands were occupied. He seemed to enjoy this game. He was ever curious of the child and the changes in my body, and even at times when I felt repelled at some of the things that were now happening to me he drank them in and made me feel beautiful.

The hard last quarter of pregnancy was setting in. I had begun to want my body back, it seemed I was no longer me, just a vessel for the life I contained. I felt, tired, bulky and unattractive, not to mention being on occasion alarmingly short of breath.

There had been strangers working in the house on the upper story, a crew of painters. This intrusion had made me nervous, outsiders always did. Thankfully he had sensed this and kept me from their prying eyes, closing the door of the office as I sat on the plush carpet by his feet while he worked.

He would at intervals stop to stroke my hair. He was stoic toward me but he could still be loving, possibly not in the way a man and woman can let go of themselves and be completely immersed in love. However I did feel it to a lesser degree, or was it merely charitable pity? Life with him had begun to take on the essence of a sanctuary.

Thus he stood firm and warm behind my back dwarfing me with his stature, he too still insisted on my nakedness. I had learned long ago not to be remiss with it. I did wonder if I erred would he beat me too just as Frej had? I certainly did not know him well enough, nor would I risk finding out.

"I have something to show you." He said close to my ear. "This can wait." His hands on mine in his insistence I complied immediately.

I put the plate half dried down as he turned me away from the sink, pressing me before him to the foot of the stairs. For a fleeting moment I thought he might usher me to the direction of the basement, he was swift to assure me no, rather he wanted me to go upstairs. I relaxed a little, his hand on my shoulder and back guiding me towards one of the upper rooms.

It had been a spare room, one of many, and now it stood transformed. Bright yellow paint on the walls, fresh and new. Colorful murals, a plethora of toys, and child sized furnishings. The kind of vista that only presented to me in a catalog, filled with forbidden things that I penniless, could never expect to provide.

I was speechless, but my tears spoke for me. In that first week he had already set about providing a nursery. I could not believe his act of altruistic kindness. I fell to my knees and cried. He did not question, he did not pry, he accepted my tearful offering of thank you with his usual stoic acceptance. I knew then no matter what happened to me this child I carried would always have a loving home, and a mentoring protector. Even if its real father had failed.

Torben visited in those early days as well in the capacity of Doctor. He looked me over saying little, just a nod or a low thoughtful 'hum' as he inspected me at times too closely for my liking.

Master Svend held me his grip firm, his iron gray eyes daring me to misbehave. I suffered through the demeaning physical at his behest, though my eyes left no secret I did not wish it done. Neither man appeared to care, and Torben assured Master Svend that everything was progressing well and he would make sure I could get an appointment for an ultrasound in the next few days. It seemed my new owner was not afraid to be proactive over my vague status and undecided future.

This morning he took me out into the garden, he held my hand. I was not sure why, perhaps he thought I would run. I was too enamored by the flowers to do so. His garden like his home is a thing of overwhelming loveliness. Great clumps of heavy rhododendrons, lilies, roses, and so many other botanical wonders I in my ignorance could not put a name to.

He was telling me about the Tivoli gardens, he made me want to see them, and then the world. However I realized somewhat crestfallen as I felt this I could never do that alone, I need a hand to hold just as surely as I was clutching his.

*****

I am most stiff and sore today. However I am proud of myself I held out, my secret shame not revealed. The ache in my back, shoulders, across my kidneys descending to my rear and upper legs is delicious, yet makes me feel weary and ancient. I had figured quite wrongly my advancing pregnancy would spare me his wrath.

In many ways he is not who I paint him. He has begun on me in the style of an interrogation. Like his brother he chose to beat me with a leather strap. He showed it to me after dinner, holding it between his powerful hands still in his business shirt. A savage in the trappings of civility.

My eyes went to his wedding band as he gripped the threatening broad leather, he still wore it to honor her. He loved her still. Fear rose in me immediately and a sense of crushing disappointment. I had painted him as more. He was in love with a ghost, and not me the living flesh and blood who crouched before his powerful magnificence. I was merely a substitute for her, a husk for his usage. I had information he wanted, something he could not, and would not ask of his brother. He would work on me until I divulged it. Unlike his younger sibling he would have the patience and perseverance to continue without being distracted.

I was again at his feet, frightened this time. I was already shaking and breathless. He was harder tonight, as though he had stepped back and observed me all week that he may see how best to continue. In the back of my mind I had been waiting for this very evening to occur.

He sighed as though what he had to impart was heavy on his conscience."I can see you know no more of the act of submission than the pain and brevity of it. It's not your fault it's simply what he taught you. We will be working in the coming days on unlearning it Lidia. You seem to think not to speak is what is required, that less is more. For now then to avoid confusion we will communicate by his rules."

I quailed at this, was he really prepared to do so?

"Scars little one, they mark the passage of our lives, of both good and bad memories." He touched the jagged still healing one on my breast tenderly, his words bore the same care.

"I've waited and I've been patient, but tonight I want answers from you. Many answers."

I closed my eyes, ready for this war of attrition, and the pain I knew he had the power to inflict. He would have the upper hand.

"So, lets start with something easy shall we?" He raised my face from the floor, my eyes glanced away from his. "A girl hides nothing from her Master," he said. Ominous words indeed, and I knew tonight would be a face off, his will against mine. "Tell me, did he do this?"

I had only the strength to nod, my eyes still firmly entrenched on the brown leather he held clasped in his right hand dreading its application which I knew must come.

"Yes, very like him," was all he said, but I knew he was thinking far more heavily than his casual words belied.

He paused for a time and as I had fearfully predicted he went right to the throat of the sleeping dragon. My Achilles heel. As he had done in the past he held my wrists palms upward before me on the carpet, baring my suicidal shame.

"I want to know of the cuts Lidia, why you did it. I know it was you. My brother is cruel but he would not have done that to you. So tell me?"

He let me go then and slapped the leather threateningly on his outstretched palm. I knew he would use it. I could all but feel its caress on my flesh though it had had not yet been applied.

"Tell me?" He coaxed in a gentle voice that belied his savage intent. "Tell me Lidia, tell me all."

He waited, and I cowered. I hoped my dejected posture would curb him. I could not answer, and I had no believable alternative story to ply him with. I had all my life been the most unconvincing of liars. My timidity always gave me away, it was better to just remain doggedly silent. Master gave up eventually in these kind of instances, it was fortunate he often got distracted easily. I had to hope Master Svend would be the same. So I let him hit me.

I braced myself for his hurt, body tight. He did not tie me nor restrain me in any manner. I remembered Frej's words on blind obedience.

Did this man believe them too?

I was prepared to run if it got too bad, however something unexpected happened. I stayed there on all fours while he hit me, and surrendered to him completely. Even more alarmingly I came. I gripped the carpet, my body undulating in mute ecstasy in between the waves of ragged pleasure and hurt.

"You won't tell me will you?" He looked down at me, the strap still gripped tightly in his fist.

I gazed up at him blankly I would not look to challenge him. Instead I glanced away to the peace of the garden beyond, I had not even cried. I was ashamed at my reaction and shocked as well, I had never thought of myself as a masochist. It was a first, and it scared me.

He knelt close by, I knew he was in a bind. He wanted what I knew but unlike his younger and very rash brother he dared not hurt me more. His sense of mercy was not for my sake but for the child's. Things would be different after the birth I instinctively knew. He had the capacity to hurt me I had no doubt, and I had witnessed it before, the shades of his darkness. He had them too just like his brother's dark excesses, and I would not forget.

His large warm hand ran down my back from the tingling nape of my neck beneath my hair to my rear. I felt like a horse being appraised for soundness at the horse market, though the vision was soon quashed as I felt the intrusion of his finger into a more intimate place.

"So what happened, so many unplumbed mysteries my little one? Tell me?"

He did not remove the invading presence, and I did not speak. My eyes to the carpet in minute study of the pile, anything rather than focus on what he was doing and saying. He shrugged and stood shifting his feet, I knew he was not entirely finished.

"And one more thing girl I know it's giving you difficulty, and I have yet to hear the word, but I look after you now, you are mine. I expect you to address me as Master."

I could not bring myself to call him any more than Sir. I hung my head, he was right and I had been a shamefully ungrateful slave.

I know he had thought he would break me easily and he was challenged and perplexed by his failure to do so. I believe he is now more determined than ever to plumb my dark crime. I am very scared.