CHAPTER 5 - QUEENMAKER
Fiona
I want to go home.
I've never felt this lost. Even the lowest of the low, even those literally reduced into slavery, still have a place of succour and continuity, within themselves. I would know.
The girl I used to be - confident, combative, ambitious - has been reduced, humbled, cut down to size, but she's found refuge in the most secretive corners of my psyche. A part of me has always held out. Always refused to let go completely... no matter how much Maggie chastised me for it.
But when you can't even trust your own mind anymore, that's when you are truly lost.
The days blur together. Sleep bleeds into wake. The sunrises join the sunsets. I'm fucked, toyed with, then fucked some more. The mansion is the maw, and the maw is my world, the entirety of my perception. I don't even know how long it's been, since Mistress loaned me to Lene. I miss Margaret so terribly that every fibre in my body aches with the pain. And... yes, I miss Mistress, too.
I really would like to go home now, please, please, please... I promise I'll behave. I won't be stubborn anymore. I'll fall in step with my owner when leashed. I'll never let go of Maggie's hand again. I swear, I swear, I swear.
Have they forgotten I exist? Have I spent an eternity in Lene's service, and failed to notice?
That's not the only thing bothering me, though. Something... isn't right.
It's hard to put my finger on what it is, though. It's like looking at a familiar photograph, and getting this sense of wrongness, but you can't tell which detail is out of place. It's the uncanny valley.
The familiar is the foreign.
When was the last time Lene went to the office for work?
I blink, slowly. What a weird question to ask myself. What do I care? I don't have a clue how Black Opal works from the inside. Maybe she's just working from home. And anyway, it is hardly any business of mine. I'm just a dog. A girl made of clay.
I'm a girl adrift in a river of raw, pure, distilled feeling. Lene has wrung so much pleasure out of me that I feel hollowed out. Feverish.
You can't trust a dog's judgement. I definitely can't trust mine.
So why do I have this insistent sensation that something is amiss?
I haven't seen the overseer in a while. The buzzer hasn't really been ringing. I spend most of my time in Lene's quarters...
And so does she.
That must be what feels wrong to me. I feel like it's a pattern that I should recognise, by association it makes me think of Ragnaring... except I don't know what the association is. Not consciously, anyway, not yet.
Mistress Lene is just really dedicated to breaking me in, I know that. Yes, that must be all there is to it.
And yet, she doesn't seem that harsh anymore. She seems pretty... relaxed. And of course, she's right to be, I represent no threat. There is not one ounce of resistance left within me. I hide no secrets from her, and I should be glad that she's finally satisfied that it's the truth.
It makes sense that she wants to enjoy the fruits of her hard labour. Now that I've been successfully acted upon, she gets to lie back, and enjoy my service, my ministrations. It only makes sense.
But when was the last time she went out to work?
She's here. I'm on my knees, and she's crouching before me, nursing me the way someone would nurse a porcelain vase they themselves have shattered into a thousand pieces. Her long, sleek fingers trace the line of my jaw.
"You truly are a prize, Fiona," she says, running her fingers through my purple hair. "Clever, beautiful... wasted, really, on a pup like Elizabeth."
The words make me shiver. They cut, like jagged ice. I can't trust my perception. She's the Lene I've learned to know, clearly, entitled and proud, ambitious and commanding, and nothing is amiss. Nothing at all.
Yet, her hands tremble slightly as they caress every curve of my body. There's a... tremulous quality to her, now.
I don't know how long it's been, or when it's started, but I know it's there.
Her moods shift more frequently, her desires less predictable. Sometimes she still uses me roughly, making me shrivel under the cold radiance of her blue eyes. Other times she lies back and has me service her gently, almost reverently, her eyes distant and melancholy.
I am confused by her caprice, the waxing and waning of her moods. Slaves prize clarity very highly. When your life is in someone else's hands, understanding the rules to live by can make all the difference. I find myself watching her carefully, attuned to each subtle shift in her demeanour and direction.
Lene seems...needy, somehow. And distracted.
At times, she obsesses so utterly with me that nothing else in the world could hold her attention. At times, I wonder if she has forgotten I am here. She stares right through me, even as I kneel naked before her. It is as if she sees something else, something beyond this room, this moment. Her attention drifts further away with each passing day. Then, it suddenly refocuses, like a lens... but it's distorted, somehow.
I tell myself it is not my place to understand. But I can't really stop the questions from coming.
The weirdest thing of all is that, no matter how long I spend looking deep into her cold, hypnotic blue eyes... sometimes I get the impression that she's looking into mine.
Right now, she's looking into my eyes from below.
That only makes sense. She's lying back, resting luxuriantly, like a goddess in a Renaissance painting, reclining languidly upon silken sheets, ready to enjoy the fruits of her hard labour.
My hands see to her needs, massaging fragrant oils into her pale skin. She sinks deeper into the mattress, almost like she's enjoying a cozy, warm bath. Her body is pliant, relaxed.
Free of tension.
"Kiss me, pet," she says softly, and I comply, my lips meeting hers in a gentle caress. I let her tongue push its way past my lips, exploring my mouth, but when she breaks the kiss, I know to follow my training. I trail kisses down her neck, across her collarbone. She sighs as I lavish her body with affection, arching into my touch like a cat stretching in the sun.
My hands glide over her soft skin, rubbing the oil deeper in as I bend to take a tight pink nipple into my mouth. She sits up with a soft gasp, tangling her fingers through my hair to pull me closer.
I look up at her through hooded eyes as I gently suckle at her nipples. She's watching me with an intent that I do not understand.
Her grip on my hair falters for a moment, when her eyes meet mine. A flicker of something like concern passes over her face. Concern about what? What could possibly worry her? But then, the doubt seems to dissipate from her mind. She runs her hand through my hair again, clutching it tighter, like a set of makeshift reins.
Lene guides me lower and I comply, kissing down her taut stomach until I end up between her legs.