A Peck of fanfiction.
It was cold, and the moon was out.
Lucivar stood at the open window and shivered, staring at the circle with just the slightest sliver out of the corner. He was inside tonight, but that meant nothing - nothing good, at least. He looked over his shoulder at the bed, perfectly made and set up, the restraining straps hidden by the blankets. As if if he couldn’t see them he wouldn’t know they were there.
Damn Tersa - seven hundred years! Seven hundred years of waiting and this was what it got him - standing at a window and waiting for the inevitable, unable to fight back because he had something to live for. But that something -
Not a sound, not a word, nothing. He hadn’t seen Daemon for years, now, though the occasional flash of Black rage could only be from him. He shivered when he felt those, though he wasn’t sure if it was with fear or with envy that his brother could destroy them, kill them again and again, knowing what the punishment would be. More shame, more pain, more humiliation.
More safframate mixed with the water, turning it to a drink worse than poison.
Please - let there be a Queen, let there be a Queen I can be proud to serve - soon, soon -
The wood outside the door creaked and the door opened briefly, just enough to shove a tray through and onto the table before it slammed shut again. Lucivar paced over to it, ripped off a chunk of bread and shoved it in his mouth, hunger a tight and familiar knot in his belly. He finished off the bread in moments and devoured the small hunk of meat, half-cooked, that had been left. Meat. A luxury for evenings like this. They must be planning something special. He couldn’t help a mirthless laugh as his hand moved over to the glass, pouring himself a cup of the clear, cold water.
He stared at the glass, swirling the water absently, imagining how it would go. He would drink the water. The lust would begin as an itch, then change to a maddening tingle of pain. Even the slight brush of clothing would become unbearable. And when the desire was an intoxicating flood of need, when he could hardly move or breathe without screaming, then they would come and begin their horrid game and all he could do was struggle and scream with maddening need and pain and disgust.
It was too familiar - it had all been played before.
The cup shattered before it hit the floor as Lucivar dashed it aside, temper flaring. Damn them all. Damn them all to Hell before he would play their cruel games any-
He dropped to his knees, grabbing for the bedpost before he could fall any further, the agony in his groin sudden and piercing. He doubled over, panting, refusing to scream. A sharp knock came at the door.
“Yaslana, drink it or we’ll force you to.” There were no more words, no more threats. They didn’t have to. He knew, too well, what they could and would do to him for trying to resist. He got up slowly, gingerly, throbbing agony lingering in his crotch. He moved over to the table and gripped the sides, head down, trying to breath deeply.
Daemon wouldn’t give in. Daemon wouldn’t drink the water, wouldn’t submit to those damned whores who called themselves witches, wouldn’t flinch from the punishments they meted out. Daemon wouldn’t be a coward, a weak coward who would rather whore his body for those bitches than endure the humiliation of their punishments.
Another stab of pain came through the Ring, making Lucivar catch his breath, the table the only thing that kept him upright as his knees buckled. It wasn’t even the full strength of the damned thing, was only a taste - a reminder. He shuddered.
Daemon wouldn’t, but damn him, he wasn’t Daemon.
He shed his jacket, picked up the pitcher, and strode over to the window. Staring out at the barren land that was the desert of Pruul, he raised the pitcher to the sky, a bitter smile twisting his mouth.
*Please, my Queen. Please, come soon.*
“To the Darkness,” he murmured, and drank.
It was too hot. He’d shed the shirt and his pants as they rubbed on his skin, but sweat streamed from every pore and he couldn’t stop moving, twitching, pacing back and forth and snarling at nothing. He itched all over but couldn’t scratch the right spot, even the cool touch of the breeze through the open window agony on his hypersensitive skin. The room rocked strangely, heat churning through his veins and need for something, something -
A psychic scent flooded the room and he wheeled, eyes glazing, snarling with the surge of mingled revulsion and painful desire that accompanied it. A witch, too young, staring at him with wide eyes full of terror. Bait, he thought bitterly with the little bit of sanity left in him, bait to see if I’m ripe for the rest of them…
She stepped forward, the terror flooding his senses and overcoming the lust pounding hot and red with the safframate through his veins. He wheeled with a roar of fury and turned on the table, slamming into it with all the force in his feet and hands, the clean pain of the splinters in his hands soothing compared to the needful agony in the rest of his body, the table reduced to kindling and the pain, oh Mother Night the pain!
The scream surged in his throat but he gritted his teeth, clenched his jaw and held it in, on his hands and knees unable to breathe for the stabbing pain that drove unrelentingly through the Ring around his organ as the female psychic scents surrounded him, intoxicated him, drove him mad with lust and revulsion and hatred. Their hands on his shoulders - his back - his body - agony in their handprints on his skin as they clutched and held and dragged and he tried to stagger to his feet, to resist and to withstand the unending pain from that damned Ring of Obedience - the bonds, holding his feet and his hands so he couldn’t move, couldn’t thrust, couldn’t -
The faces blurred into one another, sheathing themselves on him, crying out in ecstasy as the pain intensified and intensified to unbearable, unspeakable heights with the need for release, agony pulsing through every single limb -
The scream swelled in his throat, but he clenched his teeth together, refused to scream, refused to give them that satisfaction as he thrashed his head from side to side in a futile bid for release of some kind, the feel of them making his flesh flinch away in disgust even as his body arched into them, seeking some kind of easing of the lust throughout his body -
It went on and on in a bizarre and horrendous rhythm of sweat and moans and agony and bursts from the Ring of Obedience when he snarled and bit at them, trying to beat them away, the ropes chafing at his wrists until they bled as he wrenched at them, trying to get free, to kill them, kill them all - he rode the killing edge, his vision red, fury mingling with lust and hatred and making him giddy with the need to shed their blood, to kill - Mother Night, to break free and kill and howl an Eyrien war cry to the lightening sky…his jaw clenched shut, refusing, fighting - he - would - not - scream!
The sun was rising, daylight pouring in through the window. Lucivar woke cold and alone, his heart thumping loudly in the utter silence of the stone slave pens. Curled in a fetal position, he tried to move, every muscle afire and aching, still mostly naked. They hadn’t bothered to dress him after they’d finished using him, just thrown him back here like a worn out toy. Which was approximately how he felt.
He crawled over to the bucket of water, hardly caring what it was laced with, and tried to open his mouth to drink. It was locked so tightly shut that it took him fifteen minutes of working the muscles to loosen them enough to move. He drank, and to his relief the water was clean.
He stumbled to the grate and dragged himself to his feet, leaning on the bars. “More water,” he tried to say, but the words would not come out. His throat ached.
He wondered if he had screamed.
Title: Seven Hundred Years
Fandom: Black Jewels Trilogy
Character/Pairing: Lucivar Yaslana, Daemon Yaslana
Summary: They have both been waiting for such a very long time...waiting, yearning, desiring.
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Implied rape.
Seven hundred years.
Seven hundred years of waiting, of enduring the lash and the pain and the constant humiliation. Seven hundred years of searching, watching the skies for a sign, casting out the desperate message to the Darkness: *Are you there? Are you there?* Seven hundred years of being held down and drugged and used for the pleasure of Dorothea’s bitches, her puppet Queens, full only of avarice and lust and ambition, raping everything the Darkness was: the land, those who truly sang to its heart…Seven hundred years of yearning, of longing that was soul deep and deeper. Seven hundred years of fighting, of futile battles that he could win but a war that he had no choice but to lose, but that he had to struggle for because if he lost himself, if he lost the scraps of honor that a pleasure slave could maintain, he could never allow himself to serve her. Seven hundred years of dreaming of her, of Witch, of a Queen he could be proud to serve, a Queen who would own him body and soul and for whom he would sacrifice everything, everything… Seven hundred years of hoping, hoping desperately that when he could serve her, she would not be ashamed of him - she would not look at him and see a dirty, half-breed slave - would see an Ebon-Gray Eyrien Warlord Prince who could be her protector, her right hand, even her slave, if necessary, but hers…he would belong to no one else.
Seven hundred years.
Seven hundred years of hating, despising the witches who kept him here, played their vile games with their weak minds, when he should be wandering, looking the world over for the Queen of the Darkness, the Lady that Tersa had promised. Seven hundred interminable years of needing, of waking at night shuddering with hungry desire that had nothing to do with the body and everything to do with the psychic scent that haunted him with its nearness and tantalized him with its distance. Seven hundred years of praying with everything he had, with every drop of blood shed in every painful punishment he was forced to endure: *Come to me. Come to me.* Seven hundred years of waiting for a witch, for Witch: for the Queen he could be proud to serve, the Lady he could be glad to love. Seven hundred years of playing the Sadist, of sinking so deeply into that role, into the mask that became reality that he could no longer remember what it was like to live without it…could no longer remember a time before he was Daemon the pleasure slave, when it had been just Daemon Sadi. Seven hundred years of prowling the ruins of the Terreille courts, tied to the leash of whatever puppet Queen owned him currently, watching the decay of society and the spread of Dorothea’s foul corruption, always watching, always listening for her, for the psychic scent that drifted through his dreams…seven hundred years of believing that he was born to be her lover, that he would do anything just to serve her and love her as he’d never served anyone before, of believing that she would see past his shame and the years of soul-decaying agony and love him as well…he could not believe anything else.
Several thousand years.
Several thousand years of weaving, of hearing the dreams of kindred and witch and Warlord and weaving them all into the great web.
Several thousand years of weaving, of making web into dream again, and remaking dream into flesh.
Several hundred years of waiting for the time to be right, for the world to be ready…and several years more of the weaving of the dream-and-flesh to the world.
And now, at last, all was ripe.
Dreams could be made true flesh at last. She had come.
Witch was alive.
Title: Mercy
Fandom: Black Jewels Trilogy
Character/Pairing: Leland, Philip, a little Jaenelle
Summary: Leland and Philip have a conversation just moments before the storm, and Jaenelle's mother comes to a realization at last.
Rating: PG
Warnings: Language
Something was going to happen.
The first day it had been hardly more than a subtle nagging in the back of one’s mind, a mental itch that couldn’t be scratched. The second day it had been like a knock at the door, a constant thump against the first barrier of one’s mind. And today…early in the morning it had been an insistent banging, a flood of power that washed over and around her in a dizzying flood and yet somehow didn’t touch her or anyone else; and now, just like that, it was gone. There was utter silence. Oh, the birds sang and the normal house activity continued, but in her mind - silence. Nothing. Except for a small, distant hum that she imagined she heard once or twice…but that was only her imagination, her imagination combined with that odd sense of foreboding.
Leland Angelline rose from the chair at her desk and paced a few steps anxiously as the night drew in around them, wondering about that strange, unnatural silence. The servants were hushed as well, a collective pall fallen on all of them, knowing that something was going to happen, something unimaginable, something terrible.
She wandered over to the closet and began going through her dresses, one by one, until she came to the one she remembered, that perhaps she had been looking for. The dress from so long ago when she had taken Daemon Sadi shopping and he had talked her into trying on this dress, and others…when Jaenelle was still Jaenelle and not - whatever she was now. Before she’d ever heard about the High Lord of Hell, before Chaliot had well and truly crumbled into Dorothea’s greedy hands. Before there had been a Twilight Realm and a Queen of Ebon Askavi.
She shut the door of the closet firmly and moved away. Philip would be coming soon, and it would not do to dwell on these things, the maybes and might-have-beens and regrets. For there were regrets…regrets about Briarwood, especially. How could she not have seen? How could any of them have missed-!
She glanced at the clock as it intoned the hours. Eleven. The humming was louder, still just at the edge of hearing but not yet clear. The door opened and she sat up straighter, trying to drag herself away from that mesmerizing sound.
It was Philip, his eyes strangely unfocused and distracted. “Leland, are you all right?” he asked in a strange voice.
Leland stood up and went to him, trying to catch his gaze, but his eyes were truly somewhere else. “I’m fine,” she said warily. “Why? What’s wrong?” Perhaps it was that hum…perhaps with his darker Jewels it was even more intense.
“I don’t know - just - something.” He blinked and came back, rubbing his eyes tiredly. “It feels like I’m on the edge of a cliff, or something…like the whole world is on the edge of a cliff. It’s too quiet.”
“You’re just edgy,” Leland said firmly, putting her arms around him. “The visit to Kaeleer got to all of us…”
He stiffened in her embrace. “Do you ever wonder?” he asked suddenly.
“Wonder what?”
“If we were wrong. If Alexandra was wrong. If Jaenelle was - really was what they said she was.”
“Dorothea said…”
“Dorothea’s a liar.” Philip snapped. “I’m asking you, Leland. I’m asking you what you think…if maybe we picked the wrong side.”
“We didn’t pick a side,” Leland said fiercely. “This is family, Philip, this is our home…are you saying we should have listened to those - those - to Daemon Sadi and his bastard brother?”
“Maybe…”
Leland fell silent and stared at him. His eyes were distant again and she could feel him withdraw, even if he didn’t pull away.
“Jaenelle-“ She gritted her teeth and forced the words out. “Jaenelle was completely mad…you know that. That’s why we had to send her to -“
“Briarwood,” Philip hissed, “We sent her to that place. Because she was talking about unicorns and dragons. And you’ve heard the tales…about the beasts that live in Kaeleer…”
“She couldn’t have gotten there!”
“But if she had…if she had…”
Leland wanted to put her hands over her ears to keep from hearing. But even if she denied it, it was only the echoing of the thoughts that had been circling her since Alexandra had died, stripped of her Jewels and utterly hopeless, watching the territory she had held for years crumble and succumb to the reaching talons of Hayll.
“If she had…we sent her there for that, and kept her there because of what she was saying about Robert and the other men, the other “doctors”…” He laughed mirthlessly.
“It’s not true,” Leland said desperately, clutching his arms. “It’s not true…”
The humming was louder, closer. Philip looked over his shoulder. “What’s that noise?”
“It’s been doing that all day…haven’t you heard it?”
“No…” He looked all around the room. “Mother Night, how is it not driving you crazy? Like a worm boring into my head…” He held his temples. Leland moved over to him, fearful now. Perhaps it was a spell, something targeting males, something targeting Philip. The humming was louder, more a buzzing, like a mad swarm of bees drawing ever nearer.
Her glass shattered.
One after another, the glasses all exploded as though suddenly filled to breaking with some force too great. Leland gathered her power and dove into the abyss, preparing to erect a shield, something to protect Philip and herself from whatever was attacking, whatever was -
The instant she reached the abyss, something drew her in, the edge of a ferocious vortex, pulling her down. She fought, wildly, screaming as it dragged her under into unfathomable depths. There was no way up, no way down, nothing but darkness and power deeper and darker than anything she had ever felt or imagined before, stripping mind from body and power from mind and tearing her apart in a wild maelstrom, a spiral of power-!
Where had she felt that before?
Once, only once, that single time in the Keep at Ebon Askavi, when she and Philip had been waiting while the Queen of that mysterious court spoke to Alexandra - when she came back broken, stripped of her power but not of her mind.
The Queen - the Queen of the Darkness - the Queen of Ebon Askavi - Witch -
Jaenelle. She reached out with her mind, aware that any minute, any second she would be less than a flicker in the Darkness, and she half imagined she felt a familiar touch, a familiar brush of a mind so very, very, vast and so very, very dark, that she had only found in one other place, one other person the one time she had dared to look at her daughter’s mind…
There was no other way. *Jaenelle!* She screamed, trying to drown out the howling of the maelstrom. *Jaenelle, help me! Please!* She choked on a sob of desperation. *Jaenelle, have mercy on me - have mercy, Jaenelle, daughter, please…*
It was such a small thing, just a small brush, a small touch of recognition from that great power that swirled close to tear her to pieces, and then it was gone and Leland closed her eyes in despair, sure that now everything was over.
But she was not broken - she was not lost - she was safe, cradled in a cocoon of power while the storm swirled on around her, locked in place as the howls of the storm raged and cascaded and finally subsided around her and she surfaced from the abyss, gasping, into clean air again.
“Lady? Lady!” It was an unfamiliar voice. Leland forced her eyes open and blinked at the sunlight, stunned. She was lying on a strange, grassy hill she had never seen before in the full light of day, her dress tattered as though she’d been through a storm.
“Where’s Philip?” She asked, looking everywhere. “Where’s the house -“
“Lady, Mother Night just be glad you’re alive…no one knows what’s happened but half the aristos are gone and vanished into thin air…”
Leland sat up, her head spinning, and looked around. Empty. All grass, forever, except for a dim patch of wood on the horizon and a small village behind her, people milling about, frightened and confused. Leland sent a thought out on a Rose thread. *Philip?*
There was no answer…not even a flicker.
Leland buried her face in her hands, feeling the urge to cry.
“Lady?”
I’m alive, she told herself. I’m alive, Jaenelle spared my life, Jaenelle didn’t destroy me as she destroyed everyone else…I have my Jewels, my sanity, be grateful for that, be grateful, damn you…
All she could feel was fear.
Her fist was clenched around something. She opened her fingers and pulled out a hard little scrap of paper and unfolded it. Something fell out, but she was busy reading the note, written in a language she couldn’t decipher and translated at the bottom.
For remembrance. As a reminder.
She picked up the piece that had fallen, trying to understand what it was. A fragment of something spiraled and hard, made of something like ivory. She touched it gently with one finger.
“What is this?” She asked the man.
He stared at it, and suddenly her, as if she’d sprouted fangs. “Where’d you get that? It’s forbidden to have any of that…it’s unicorn’s horn, a fragment of it anyway…if one of the kindred finds out you’ve got it you’ll be dead for sure…”
“Unicorn’s horn,” Leland murmured, a sad smile touching her mouth. For remembrance. As a reminder. She stood up slowly. “Ah, Jaenelle…”
Do you ever wonder if we were wrong?
We were, dear, Leland thought, staring at nothing. We were so very, very wrong.
Title: Going Back
Fandom: Black Jewels Trilogy
Character/Pairing: Jaenelle Angelline
Prompt: 007. Awakening
Word Count: 440
Summary: It is quiet in the misty place. Quiet, and beautiful, and safe.
Rating: PG
Warnings: Nothing specific.
It is beautiful in the misty place. Her, away from my body, the mist cradles me and holds me close and tenderly. I can watch them all from here; see Satan pacing back and forth, leaning on his cane, afraid for me. The Prince stirs restlessly in his sleep. Lucivar stands at a window, his golden eyes bleak. He worries for me - all of them worry for me. I wish I could soothe him and them, but from the misty place I cannot touch, only watch. It is enough.
I sit on a rock outside Briarwood and wait. Rose cannot come here, but there are others here to see. It might be cold, but I cannot tell, even dressed as I am in the lightweight, white nightgown of the girls.
Any wind that blows here brings no chill.
In my body, I have left them an empty shell with blank eyes, the slight rise and fall of my chest the only sign that I am still alive. They will try to make me do things, yell and hit and scream and me, but when they grab my arm or touch the body it will burn them.
I get up and move over to the frame of a half woven web and weave another strand, adding it carefully. “Briarwood is the pretty poison,” I whisper to myself. “There is no cure for-“
“Jaenelle.” A voice breaks into the misty place. It should not - no no no they will not have my safe place. They will not! I descend into the abyss, gathering the Darkness to push them out.
“Jaenelle?” There is fear in that voice. Wilhelmina’s voice. I struggle upwards and register sunlight, real sunlight, on my face. It is time to go back. I open my eyes, replacing the mask.
“It’s okay, Wilhelmina,” I say in the voice that belongs to the mask. “I’m here.”
I look up. Alexandra’s mouth is a tight line. Phillip puts an arm around me, his eyes unhappy. Leland’s eyes are wet. Only Bobby looks cheerful, and I cannot look at him without feeling nauseous.
“This is just a visit,” Alexandra says tightly. “The doctor says you’re no cooperating and a week at home may help.”
I don’t bother answering. It doesn’t matter, anyway. Phillip hugs me tighter. “Jaenelle, sweetheart, please try to get better. I want you home with us. If you try really hard…maybe this year you can be home for Winsol.”
I close my eyes again. “Briarwood is the pretty poison,” I murmur softly. The carriage rocks a little. I can feel Wilhelmina’s fear, but it doesn’t matter. I am going back.
Lucivar stood at the open window and shivered, staring at the circle with just the slightest sliver out of the corner. He was inside tonight, but that meant nothing - nothing good, at least. He looked over his shoulder at the bed, perfectly made and set up, the restraining straps hidden by the blankets. As if if he couldn’t see them he wouldn’t know they were there.
Damn Tersa - seven hundred years! Seven hundred years of waiting and this was what it got him - standing at a window and waiting for the inevitable, unable to fight back because he had something to live for. But that something -
Not a sound, not a word, nothing. He hadn’t seen Daemon for years, now, though the occasional flash of Black rage could only be from him. He shivered when he felt those, though he wasn’t sure if it was with fear or with envy that his brother could destroy them, kill them again and again, knowing what the punishment would be. More shame, more pain, more humiliation.
More safframate mixed with the water, turning it to a drink worse than poison.
Please - let there be a Queen, let there be a Queen I can be proud to serve - soon, soon -
The wood outside the door creaked and the door opened briefly, just enough to shove a tray through and onto the table before it slammed shut again. Lucivar paced over to it, ripped off a chunk of bread and shoved it in his mouth, hunger a tight and familiar knot in his belly. He finished off the bread in moments and devoured the small hunk of meat, half-cooked, that had been left. Meat. A luxury for evenings like this. They must be planning something special. He couldn’t help a mirthless laugh as his hand moved over to the glass, pouring himself a cup of the clear, cold water.
He stared at the glass, swirling the water absently, imagining how it would go. He would drink the water. The lust would begin as an itch, then change to a maddening tingle of pain. Even the slight brush of clothing would become unbearable. And when the desire was an intoxicating flood of need, when he could hardly move or breathe without screaming, then they would come and begin their horrid game and all he could do was struggle and scream with maddening need and pain and disgust.
It was too familiar - it had all been played before.
The cup shattered before it hit the floor as Lucivar dashed it aside, temper flaring. Damn them all. Damn them all to Hell before he would play their cruel games any-
He dropped to his knees, grabbing for the bedpost before he could fall any further, the agony in his groin sudden and piercing. He doubled over, panting, refusing to scream. A sharp knock came at the door.
“Yaslana, drink it or we’ll force you to.” There were no more words, no more threats. They didn’t have to. He knew, too well, what they could and would do to him for trying to resist. He got up slowly, gingerly, throbbing agony lingering in his crotch. He moved over to the table and gripped the sides, head down, trying to breath deeply.
Daemon wouldn’t give in. Daemon wouldn’t drink the water, wouldn’t submit to those damned whores who called themselves witches, wouldn’t flinch from the punishments they meted out. Daemon wouldn’t be a coward, a weak coward who would rather whore his body for those bitches than endure the humiliation of their punishments.
Another stab of pain came through the Ring, making Lucivar catch his breath, the table the only thing that kept him upright as his knees buckled. It wasn’t even the full strength of the damned thing, was only a taste - a reminder. He shuddered.
Daemon wouldn’t, but damn him, he wasn’t Daemon.
He shed his jacket, picked up the pitcher, and strode over to the window. Staring out at the barren land that was the desert of Pruul, he raised the pitcher to the sky, a bitter smile twisting his mouth.
*Please, my Queen. Please, come soon.*
“To the Darkness,” he murmured, and drank.
It was too hot. He’d shed the shirt and his pants as they rubbed on his skin, but sweat streamed from every pore and he couldn’t stop moving, twitching, pacing back and forth and snarling at nothing. He itched all over but couldn’t scratch the right spot, even the cool touch of the breeze through the open window agony on his hypersensitive skin. The room rocked strangely, heat churning through his veins and need for something, something -
A psychic scent flooded the room and he wheeled, eyes glazing, snarling with the surge of mingled revulsion and painful desire that accompanied it. A witch, too young, staring at him with wide eyes full of terror. Bait, he thought bitterly with the little bit of sanity left in him, bait to see if I’m ripe for the rest of them…
She stepped forward, the terror flooding his senses and overcoming the lust pounding hot and red with the safframate through his veins. He wheeled with a roar of fury and turned on the table, slamming into it with all the force in his feet and hands, the clean pain of the splinters in his hands soothing compared to the needful agony in the rest of his body, the table reduced to kindling and the pain, oh Mother Night the pain!
The scream surged in his throat but he gritted his teeth, clenched his jaw and held it in, on his hands and knees unable to breathe for the stabbing pain that drove unrelentingly through the Ring around his organ as the female psychic scents surrounded him, intoxicated him, drove him mad with lust and revulsion and hatred. Their hands on his shoulders - his back - his body - agony in their handprints on his skin as they clutched and held and dragged and he tried to stagger to his feet, to resist and to withstand the unending pain from that damned Ring of Obedience - the bonds, holding his feet and his hands so he couldn’t move, couldn’t thrust, couldn’t -
The faces blurred into one another, sheathing themselves on him, crying out in ecstasy as the pain intensified and intensified to unbearable, unspeakable heights with the need for release, agony pulsing through every single limb -
The scream swelled in his throat, but he clenched his teeth together, refused to scream, refused to give them that satisfaction as he thrashed his head from side to side in a futile bid for release of some kind, the feel of them making his flesh flinch away in disgust even as his body arched into them, seeking some kind of easing of the lust throughout his body -
It went on and on in a bizarre and horrendous rhythm of sweat and moans and agony and bursts from the Ring of Obedience when he snarled and bit at them, trying to beat them away, the ropes chafing at his wrists until they bled as he wrenched at them, trying to get free, to kill them, kill them all - he rode the killing edge, his vision red, fury mingling with lust and hatred and making him giddy with the need to shed their blood, to kill - Mother Night, to break free and kill and howl an Eyrien war cry to the lightening sky…his jaw clenched shut, refusing, fighting - he - would - not - scream!
The sun was rising, daylight pouring in through the window. Lucivar woke cold and alone, his heart thumping loudly in the utter silence of the stone slave pens. Curled in a fetal position, he tried to move, every muscle afire and aching, still mostly naked. They hadn’t bothered to dress him after they’d finished using him, just thrown him back here like a worn out toy. Which was approximately how he felt.
He crawled over to the bucket of water, hardly caring what it was laced with, and tried to open his mouth to drink. It was locked so tightly shut that it took him fifteen minutes of working the muscles to loosen them enough to move. He drank, and to his relief the water was clean.
He stumbled to the grate and dragged himself to his feet, leaning on the bars. “More water,” he tried to say, but the words would not come out. His throat ached.
He wondered if he had screamed.
Title: Seven Hundred Years
Fandom: Black Jewels Trilogy
Character/Pairing: Lucivar Yaslana, Daemon Yaslana
Summary: They have both been waiting for such a very long time...waiting, yearning, desiring.
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Implied rape.
Seven hundred years.
Seven hundred years of waiting, of enduring the lash and the pain and the constant humiliation. Seven hundred years of searching, watching the skies for a sign, casting out the desperate message to the Darkness: *Are you there? Are you there?* Seven hundred years of being held down and drugged and used for the pleasure of Dorothea’s bitches, her puppet Queens, full only of avarice and lust and ambition, raping everything the Darkness was: the land, those who truly sang to its heart…Seven hundred years of yearning, of longing that was soul deep and deeper. Seven hundred years of fighting, of futile battles that he could win but a war that he had no choice but to lose, but that he had to struggle for because if he lost himself, if he lost the scraps of honor that a pleasure slave could maintain, he could never allow himself to serve her. Seven hundred years of dreaming of her, of Witch, of a Queen he could be proud to serve, a Queen who would own him body and soul and for whom he would sacrifice everything, everything… Seven hundred years of hoping, hoping desperately that when he could serve her, she would not be ashamed of him - she would not look at him and see a dirty, half-breed slave - would see an Ebon-Gray Eyrien Warlord Prince who could be her protector, her right hand, even her slave, if necessary, but hers…he would belong to no one else.
Seven hundred years.
Seven hundred years of hating, despising the witches who kept him here, played their vile games with their weak minds, when he should be wandering, looking the world over for the Queen of the Darkness, the Lady that Tersa had promised. Seven hundred interminable years of needing, of waking at night shuddering with hungry desire that had nothing to do with the body and everything to do with the psychic scent that haunted him with its nearness and tantalized him with its distance. Seven hundred years of praying with everything he had, with every drop of blood shed in every painful punishment he was forced to endure: *Come to me. Come to me.* Seven hundred years of waiting for a witch, for Witch: for the Queen he could be proud to serve, the Lady he could be glad to love. Seven hundred years of playing the Sadist, of sinking so deeply into that role, into the mask that became reality that he could no longer remember what it was like to live without it…could no longer remember a time before he was Daemon the pleasure slave, when it had been just Daemon Sadi. Seven hundred years of prowling the ruins of the Terreille courts, tied to the leash of whatever puppet Queen owned him currently, watching the decay of society and the spread of Dorothea’s foul corruption, always watching, always listening for her, for the psychic scent that drifted through his dreams…seven hundred years of believing that he was born to be her lover, that he would do anything just to serve her and love her as he’d never served anyone before, of believing that she would see past his shame and the years of soul-decaying agony and love him as well…he could not believe anything else.
Several thousand years.
Several thousand years of weaving, of hearing the dreams of kindred and witch and Warlord and weaving them all into the great web.
Several thousand years of weaving, of making web into dream again, and remaking dream into flesh.
Several hundred years of waiting for the time to be right, for the world to be ready…and several years more of the weaving of the dream-and-flesh to the world.
And now, at last, all was ripe.
Dreams could be made true flesh at last. She had come.
Witch was alive.
Title: Mercy
Fandom: Black Jewels Trilogy
Character/Pairing: Leland, Philip, a little Jaenelle
Summary: Leland and Philip have a conversation just moments before the storm, and Jaenelle's mother comes to a realization at last.
Rating: PG
Warnings: Language
Something was going to happen.
The first day it had been hardly more than a subtle nagging in the back of one’s mind, a mental itch that couldn’t be scratched. The second day it had been like a knock at the door, a constant thump against the first barrier of one’s mind. And today…early in the morning it had been an insistent banging, a flood of power that washed over and around her in a dizzying flood and yet somehow didn’t touch her or anyone else; and now, just like that, it was gone. There was utter silence. Oh, the birds sang and the normal house activity continued, but in her mind - silence. Nothing. Except for a small, distant hum that she imagined she heard once or twice…but that was only her imagination, her imagination combined with that odd sense of foreboding.
Leland Angelline rose from the chair at her desk and paced a few steps anxiously as the night drew in around them, wondering about that strange, unnatural silence. The servants were hushed as well, a collective pall fallen on all of them, knowing that something was going to happen, something unimaginable, something terrible.
She wandered over to the closet and began going through her dresses, one by one, until she came to the one she remembered, that perhaps she had been looking for. The dress from so long ago when she had taken Daemon Sadi shopping and he had talked her into trying on this dress, and others…when Jaenelle was still Jaenelle and not - whatever she was now. Before she’d ever heard about the High Lord of Hell, before Chaliot had well and truly crumbled into Dorothea’s greedy hands. Before there had been a Twilight Realm and a Queen of Ebon Askavi.
She shut the door of the closet firmly and moved away. Philip would be coming soon, and it would not do to dwell on these things, the maybes and might-have-beens and regrets. For there were regrets…regrets about Briarwood, especially. How could she not have seen? How could any of them have missed-!
She glanced at the clock as it intoned the hours. Eleven. The humming was louder, still just at the edge of hearing but not yet clear. The door opened and she sat up straighter, trying to drag herself away from that mesmerizing sound.
It was Philip, his eyes strangely unfocused and distracted. “Leland, are you all right?” he asked in a strange voice.
Leland stood up and went to him, trying to catch his gaze, but his eyes were truly somewhere else. “I’m fine,” she said warily. “Why? What’s wrong?” Perhaps it was that hum…perhaps with his darker Jewels it was even more intense.
“I don’t know - just - something.” He blinked and came back, rubbing his eyes tiredly. “It feels like I’m on the edge of a cliff, or something…like the whole world is on the edge of a cliff. It’s too quiet.”
“You’re just edgy,” Leland said firmly, putting her arms around him. “The visit to Kaeleer got to all of us…”
He stiffened in her embrace. “Do you ever wonder?” he asked suddenly.
“Wonder what?”
“If we were wrong. If Alexandra was wrong. If Jaenelle was - really was what they said she was.”
“Dorothea said…”
“Dorothea’s a liar.” Philip snapped. “I’m asking you, Leland. I’m asking you what you think…if maybe we picked the wrong side.”
“We didn’t pick a side,” Leland said fiercely. “This is family, Philip, this is our home…are you saying we should have listened to those - those - to Daemon Sadi and his bastard brother?”
“Maybe…”
Leland fell silent and stared at him. His eyes were distant again and she could feel him withdraw, even if he didn’t pull away.
“Jaenelle-“ She gritted her teeth and forced the words out. “Jaenelle was completely mad…you know that. That’s why we had to send her to -“
“Briarwood,” Philip hissed, “We sent her to that place. Because she was talking about unicorns and dragons. And you’ve heard the tales…about the beasts that live in Kaeleer…”
“She couldn’t have gotten there!”
“But if she had…if she had…”
Leland wanted to put her hands over her ears to keep from hearing. But even if she denied it, it was only the echoing of the thoughts that had been circling her since Alexandra had died, stripped of her Jewels and utterly hopeless, watching the territory she had held for years crumble and succumb to the reaching talons of Hayll.
“If she had…we sent her there for that, and kept her there because of what she was saying about Robert and the other men, the other “doctors”…” He laughed mirthlessly.
“It’s not true,” Leland said desperately, clutching his arms. “It’s not true…”
The humming was louder, closer. Philip looked over his shoulder. “What’s that noise?”
“It’s been doing that all day…haven’t you heard it?”
“No…” He looked all around the room. “Mother Night, how is it not driving you crazy? Like a worm boring into my head…” He held his temples. Leland moved over to him, fearful now. Perhaps it was a spell, something targeting males, something targeting Philip. The humming was louder, more a buzzing, like a mad swarm of bees drawing ever nearer.
Her glass shattered.
One after another, the glasses all exploded as though suddenly filled to breaking with some force too great. Leland gathered her power and dove into the abyss, preparing to erect a shield, something to protect Philip and herself from whatever was attacking, whatever was -
The instant she reached the abyss, something drew her in, the edge of a ferocious vortex, pulling her down. She fought, wildly, screaming as it dragged her under into unfathomable depths. There was no way up, no way down, nothing but darkness and power deeper and darker than anything she had ever felt or imagined before, stripping mind from body and power from mind and tearing her apart in a wild maelstrom, a spiral of power-!
Where had she felt that before?
Once, only once, that single time in the Keep at Ebon Askavi, when she and Philip had been waiting while the Queen of that mysterious court spoke to Alexandra - when she came back broken, stripped of her power but not of her mind.
The Queen - the Queen of the Darkness - the Queen of Ebon Askavi - Witch -
Jaenelle. She reached out with her mind, aware that any minute, any second she would be less than a flicker in the Darkness, and she half imagined she felt a familiar touch, a familiar brush of a mind so very, very, vast and so very, very dark, that she had only found in one other place, one other person the one time she had dared to look at her daughter’s mind…
There was no other way. *Jaenelle!* She screamed, trying to drown out the howling of the maelstrom. *Jaenelle, help me! Please!* She choked on a sob of desperation. *Jaenelle, have mercy on me - have mercy, Jaenelle, daughter, please…*
It was such a small thing, just a small brush, a small touch of recognition from that great power that swirled close to tear her to pieces, and then it was gone and Leland closed her eyes in despair, sure that now everything was over.
But she was not broken - she was not lost - she was safe, cradled in a cocoon of power while the storm swirled on around her, locked in place as the howls of the storm raged and cascaded and finally subsided around her and she surfaced from the abyss, gasping, into clean air again.
“Lady? Lady!” It was an unfamiliar voice. Leland forced her eyes open and blinked at the sunlight, stunned. She was lying on a strange, grassy hill she had never seen before in the full light of day, her dress tattered as though she’d been through a storm.
“Where’s Philip?” She asked, looking everywhere. “Where’s the house -“
“Lady, Mother Night just be glad you’re alive…no one knows what’s happened but half the aristos are gone and vanished into thin air…”
Leland sat up, her head spinning, and looked around. Empty. All grass, forever, except for a dim patch of wood on the horizon and a small village behind her, people milling about, frightened and confused. Leland sent a thought out on a Rose thread. *Philip?*
There was no answer…not even a flicker.
Leland buried her face in her hands, feeling the urge to cry.
“Lady?”
I’m alive, she told herself. I’m alive, Jaenelle spared my life, Jaenelle didn’t destroy me as she destroyed everyone else…I have my Jewels, my sanity, be grateful for that, be grateful, damn you…
All she could feel was fear.
Her fist was clenched around something. She opened her fingers and pulled out a hard little scrap of paper and unfolded it. Something fell out, but she was busy reading the note, written in a language she couldn’t decipher and translated at the bottom.
For remembrance. As a reminder.
She picked up the piece that had fallen, trying to understand what it was. A fragment of something spiraled and hard, made of something like ivory. She touched it gently with one finger.
“What is this?” She asked the man.
He stared at it, and suddenly her, as if she’d sprouted fangs. “Where’d you get that? It’s forbidden to have any of that…it’s unicorn’s horn, a fragment of it anyway…if one of the kindred finds out you’ve got it you’ll be dead for sure…”
“Unicorn’s horn,” Leland murmured, a sad smile touching her mouth. For remembrance. As a reminder. She stood up slowly. “Ah, Jaenelle…”
Do you ever wonder if we were wrong?
We were, dear, Leland thought, staring at nothing. We were so very, very wrong.
Title: Going Back
Fandom: Black Jewels Trilogy
Character/Pairing: Jaenelle Angelline
Prompt: 007. Awakening
Word Count: 440
Summary: It is quiet in the misty place. Quiet, and beautiful, and safe.
Rating: PG
Warnings: Nothing specific.
It is beautiful in the misty place. Her, away from my body, the mist cradles me and holds me close and tenderly. I can watch them all from here; see Satan pacing back and forth, leaning on his cane, afraid for me. The Prince stirs restlessly in his sleep. Lucivar stands at a window, his golden eyes bleak. He worries for me - all of them worry for me. I wish I could soothe him and them, but from the misty place I cannot touch, only watch. It is enough.
I sit on a rock outside Briarwood and wait. Rose cannot come here, but there are others here to see. It might be cold, but I cannot tell, even dressed as I am in the lightweight, white nightgown of the girls.
Any wind that blows here brings no chill.
In my body, I have left them an empty shell with blank eyes, the slight rise and fall of my chest the only sign that I am still alive. They will try to make me do things, yell and hit and scream and me, but when they grab my arm or touch the body it will burn them.
I get up and move over to the frame of a half woven web and weave another strand, adding it carefully. “Briarwood is the pretty poison,” I whisper to myself. “There is no cure for-“
“Jaenelle.” A voice breaks into the misty place. It should not - no no no they will not have my safe place. They will not! I descend into the abyss, gathering the Darkness to push them out.
“Jaenelle?” There is fear in that voice. Wilhelmina’s voice. I struggle upwards and register sunlight, real sunlight, on my face. It is time to go back. I open my eyes, replacing the mask.
“It’s okay, Wilhelmina,” I say in the voice that belongs to the mask. “I’m here.”
I look up. Alexandra’s mouth is a tight line. Phillip puts an arm around me, his eyes unhappy. Leland’s eyes are wet. Only Bobby looks cheerful, and I cannot look at him without feeling nauseous.
“This is just a visit,” Alexandra says tightly. “The doctor says you’re no cooperating and a week at home may help.”
I don’t bother answering. It doesn’t matter, anyway. Phillip hugs me tighter. “Jaenelle, sweetheart, please try to get better. I want you home with us. If you try really hard…maybe this year you can be home for Winsol.”
I close my eyes again. “Briarwood is the pretty poison,” I murmur softly. The carriage rocks a little. I can feel Wilhelmina’s fear, but it doesn’t matter. I am going back.