The Sky Guard lieutenant looked up at her with the eyes of a snared rabbit. They were lovely eyes, really, she thought, the deep dark blue of a winter sky at sunset. Her captive was a handsome youth, taller than normal among the short, wiry Sky Citizens, leanly muscular under tanned skin, his hair glossy brown with blond highlights from spending time in the wind and sun on an eagle's back. His cheeks and eyes were sunken from the terror of confinement following his arrest, but to Synalon's taste that merely accented the aristocratic quality of the facial bone structure.
Her breath came shallow and fast, as if after lusty exertion. The aroma of her own excitement was hot musk in her nostrils. She wore a pearl gray silk smock that came halfway down her sleek, silvery thighs. It was opened midway down the front. Heavy, well-shaped breasts with skin like fresh cream hung mostly in view, crested by burgundy nipples taut as a drum with arousal. The young man showed little inclination to look at them.
From below came mutterings, scraping noises, an occasional high, sharp cry. The vast aeries of the City, honeycombed below the level of the street and the very Palace itself, buzzed around the clock with avian activity. The almost subliminal sound transmitted itself through the stone flooring of the dungeon and Synalon's bare feet to tickle its way up the inside of her thighs. She enjoyed the melange of sensations, the sounds of martial preparation and breathing with the jagged catch of panic in its rhythm, the erratic orange light of torches set at the bases of arches which formed the groined ceiling of the torture chamber, and the smell of sweat and blood and her own hunger.
The captive sucked in his breath as Synalon trailed fingers along the tight skin of his belly to toy with his limp penis.
'There, there, I wouldn't hurt that,' she said. He quivered as she bent to kiss it. 'Not until the last – if you don't tell me what I want to know…'
He looked resolutely toward the far wall. Synalon frowned and slashed. Another scarlet line appeared across his chest. He howled in pain.
She worked on his body with passion and artistry. True to her promise, she left his genitals alone. She would break this young buck, and then she would enjoy him. And she would make him enjoy her, despite his agony.
It was rumored in the open air markets and the bird riders' barracks that Queen Synalon could bring a corpse to orgasm. The rumors were not far wrong.
'Damn Rann,' she hissed. The pink tip of her tongue peeked out of the corner of her mouth as she studiously flayed a strip of skin from the bulge of the lieutenant's left bicep. The young man ground his teeth on the leather strap she'd fastened in his mouth to keep him from biting his tongue. His buttocks slapped convulsively against the stone slab to which he was fastened. The bonds were leather, lined with velvet padding; no chains or manacles for Synalon. They might damage the subject by accident. Synalon regarded randomness the bane of artistry.
Reconsidering, she wondered whether she ought to curse her cousin. All bird riders were tough and well-trained, but the Guard was a fanatical elite, handpicked and then honed and polished like the finest North Keep blades. Synalon knew that only philosophical principle would cause a Guard officer to betray the throne. The young fool had decided Moriana would make a better ruler for the City than she. And what a Guard decided on principle, he would adhere to with all the fortitude Rann was so expert at inculcating. No, she shouldn't curse Rann. She loved a challenge.
The secret police who had arrested this young man had evidence which led them to believe he knew the identities of the leaders in the conspiracy against her. That was why she chose to interrogate him herself; also, she needed surcease from the screaming frustration of beseeching the Dark Ones to tell her; why?
By layers she stripped away resistance. The apparent carelessness of cuts she had first made was belied by the way she played on them to create a pattern of pain, of blood and tanned skin. And finally, sobbing uncontrollably, the captive was ready to tell everything the silvery, seductive voice coaxed him to reveal. Then the change began.
At first Synalon blinked, thinking it a trick of the light or of sweat dripping in her eyes. Itwas no illusion. The skin blackened before her eyes.
She drew back with a startled exclamation. Did the young man have some loathsome disease that had just entered a climactic stage? Her fingers traced glowing patterns in the air in front of her. She chanted a spell of protection even as the writhing of the bound body became a writhing of the very contours of that body, a change of mass and outline more profound than any wrought by Synalon's knife. The chest expanded, grew so muscular that it was grotesque. The legs shortened and thickened, swelling with muscle until the straps around thighs and shins parted with explosive cracks. The arms grew thicker, too, lengthening so that the huge muscles of the upper forearm burst asunder the straps that had restrained the captive's wrists. The forehead bulged, the jaw became a slab, the nose twisted into a sardonic beak. Eyes like portals to an infinite pit regarded her with infinite amusement.
It was a black Dwarf which lay on the torture table. But a Dwarf taller than any man she knew. The sturdy stone table groaned beneath its weight.
'Don't you remember me, little sister?' The Dwarf shook his gigantic head. 'And after all the caterwauling you've been pouring into the Void I shouldn't think you'd greet me with those paltry protective canthrips you're muttering beneath your breath.' He smiled showing huge perfect teeth. 'Or has it occurred to you that your behavior toward my Masters, alternately whining at Them and demanding that They offer explanation for what you take to be Their deeds, has been scarcely calculated to win Their approbation? And have you thought, lovely one, that the mildest of such punishments I might mete out for your impertinence would have you offering your kingdom and your soul for the chance to trade places with that unfortunate who occupied this berth before me?'
She fell to her knees. Fear and ecstasy numbed her brain, and her heart raced out of control.
'O Messenger of the Dark Ones, forgive me! I didn't realize it was you.' Her hands caressed the gnarled thighs, working upward to their juncture. The Dwarf chuckled and swung to a sitting position.
'Much would I enjoy giving way to your inviting blandishments. You definitely have your uses, though you've given little evidence of that lately.'
'What do you mean?' She flinched back. 'Haven't I served the Dark Ones well? The mightiest seaport of the Realm lies an offering at Their feet. And how do They repay me? By allowing Their chosen folk to make compact with my sister to drag me from my throne, the throne I consecrated to the greatness of the Lords of the Dark!'
The Dwarf threw back his head and laughed like the rolling of a great brass bell.
'How quickly your ire makes you forget the humility appropriate to a lowly servant.' Beams of scarlet stabbed from his eyes. Synalon's smock flashed into flame. She shrieked and leaped to her feet, clawing at the fiercely burning garment. Her fingers blistered as the fabric resisted a moment, then gave way. She flung the smock into a heap by the wall. It flared to intolerable actinic brightness and vanished, leaving only scorch marks on the wall. All the time the
Dwarf's laughter washed over her like oily surf.
Her belly and breasts showed a fiery pink, as though from long exposure to the sun. Her rump felt as if it had been branded. The rancid smell of burning hair choked her. She beat at her head and the juncture of her thighs until the smouldering stopped. And then the realization struck her like a mace. The Messenger read understanding on her face and smiled.
'Yes. You thought you had mastered the fire long ago, and yet in its most primitive form it almost consumed you. Think on that lesson, beautiful child.'