My Kingdom Come book 1: The Saints We See

666 standard years after the signing of the Alliance

The song began to fade. No, no, no! Mik grasped frantically at the words as they slipped away, but the melody was gone and Mik was left laying on the cold marble floor sobbing. He realized the assault was over. His body was healed and no longer in pain. His emotions however were in complete turmoil. He curled in on himself and gave his misery full vent.

Chentzo and Isca were somewhere nearby, talking and laughing. Chentzo’s excited malevolence floated in the air like toxic fumes. Isca’s relief and hardening horror swirled through the room as well.

Ice chinked in a glass.

There was a satisfied smack of lips.

The elevator let out a gentle yellow chime. “Come.” Chentzo said. Mik heard the doors open. He could sense and smell three Ulkaar and two Norz exit the elevator.

“Vittesh!” Chentzo’s excitement heightened. “Just in time. I’ve brought a new slut for you to train into the business.”

“What? Not one of your sweet little Durweh boys?” A deep Ulkaar voice said.

“What are you doing sniveling on the floor, slut? Fix yourself.” Chentzo said in disgust.

“Y-yes, master.” Mik did his best to swallow his sobs. Even though his body was fully healed he found it difficult to push himself off the floor and move into the proper waiting position. His emotional state was weighing him down.

“Yes, Vittesh, one of my Durweh boys. He’s proven to be completely useless.” Chentzo turned back to Mik. “Greet Vittesh, slut. You’re going to be spending a long time with him.”

“Good evening, sir. H-how may…” he glanced towards Chentzo from the corner of his eye. Chentzo nodded. Mik swallowed. “How my I serve you?” His voice was shaking.

One of Vittesh’s stone fingers nudged Mik’s chin up. “He’s beautiful.” Lust oozed out of Vittesh. He was missing an arm. His thumb grazed Mik’s lips, Mik shuddered. “What’s his name?”

“He hadn’t earned himself a name until today. His name is ‘Slut’.”

Emotions from all the men in the room were rising, spinning around Mik; lecherous greed and the desire to dominate and crush. Mik’s throat squeezed around the sob trying to push its way out. A tear leaked down his cheek. Vittesh wiped the tear away with a finger. “Don’t cry innocent, little Slut. We haven’t even started the evening yet. You’re wasting your pretty tears.”

Unlike the emotions of the others in the room, VIttesh’s were hard and cold. Controlled, calculating. The greed and hunger he was feeling slithered around Mik like the powerful tentacles of the strangling ongless. The sob Mik had locked in his throat clawed its way out. More tears leaked down his cheeks.

Vittesh hummed in his throat and crouched down in front of Mik. “When I tell you not to waste your pretty tears, I expect to be obeyed, Slut.”

“Y-yes, sir.” Mik tried frantically and unsuccessfully to shove his emotions down and lock them away. Instead, more tears poured down his face.

Vittesh caught another of Mik’s tears and licked it off his finger. “Such innocent grief.” He stroked Mik’s wet cheek. “Don’t worry, Slut, I’ll take good care of you. In this house disobedient slaves receive whatever punishment they need to learn proper obedience.”

Fear squeezed Mik’s chest in a vise. “Th-thank you, sir,” he choked out.

“That’s a good boy.” Vittesh gave Mik’s cheek one more rough caress, then he stood and slowly circled him. “He’s not bonded?”

“Oh, yes. He’s bonded.” Chentzo answered.

“Who’s he bonded to?” Vittesh asked in surprise.

“I don’t know.”

“Oh?” There was an expectant silence that Chentzo didn’t fill. “Give me ten percent of the boy.”

“Ten percent?” Chentzo scoffed. “Do you have any idea how much cora I’ve lost on him already? You’ll be lucky if I give you five.”

“You want me to keep a bonded Durweh under control for you? And you want me to do this while you’re whoring him out?! This arrangement will only work for so long, Chentzo. He’s a ticking time bomb. When he finally breaks if he’s allowed to get out of control you’ll be ruined. Completely ruined. You brought him here because you know I won’t let that happen. If I’m not worth the pay, take him somewhere else.”

“Fine. Eight percent for you, two percent for your men.”

Vittesh let out a soft chuckle. “Give me ten percent. I’ll make sure my men are satisfied.”

“Alright then. Ten percent of the boy is yours. He doesn’t need to eat, or sleep. The only thing the slut needs to do is to make me lots and lots of cora. There are no restrictions on how he can be used, but if he’s killed…well, he’s under the protection of the Jurverian. If someone wants his death, they will have to buy him. Oh, and Vittesh, this is important. I don’t ever want him to see the sun again.”

Vittesh ran his fingers through Mik’s long silver hair. “Of course, sir. I assume you want me to start his training now?”

“Oh yes. I want to see him broken and groveling before I go tonight.”

Vittesh laughed quietly. “I can make that happen for you, sir.” He reached down and tugged lightly on the chain hanging from Mik’s neck, then he turned away. “Come with me, Slut.”

Mik numbly got to his feet and stumbled after Vittesh on shaking legs. He didn’t even try to regulate his ragged breathing. What was the point? ’You are on your way to hell,’ the words echoed through his mind again. God’s, please… Please, help me, he begged, wondering if the gods would even hear him. Would the music come back to help him?

A narrow decorative table was standing against the wall. It had a few knickknacks on it. Vittesh directed his men to clear the table, then he pulled it away from the wall towards the end of the couch where Chentzo was sitting, sipping his drink, his vicious excitement growing.

Vittesh put his hand on the back of Mik’s neck and pushed him towards the table, then forced him to lay his upper body across it.

Mik squeezed his eyes shut, his mind frantic. Help me. Please, help me.

He thought again about the music that had come to him earlier and his mind grabbed onto that line of thought. Where had he heard it before?

Mik’s wrists and ankles were attached to the legs of the table with force cuffs. The cold bite of energy sank through his skin and tightened around the cellular structures of muscle and bone there. It was a loose web of uncomfortably vibrating energy, for now. If Mik moved too much or struggled against the cuffs the energy would expand further into his arms and legs, tightening, squeezing them into submission until he was still again.

Mik was hyperventilating. He tried to calm his breathing out of habit. He kept his mind focused on figuring out why the music had sounded familiar.

Dachvinder.

Mik’s eyes flew open in shock. The music was the song that Dachvinder had sung to him the last time he had seen daem. Did I bond to Dachvinder?!

Unbidden, the memory he had hidden inside the black butterfly rose up in his mind’s eye. The petite body embracing him, kissing him. He had called them ‘queen of my heart’ Dachvinder was not female…but Hosaik had queens. Was the person in that memory Dachvinder?

Emotions of greed and eagerness to impose suffering rose in the room, twining with excitement. Rough hands were on Mik. His body tightened in anticipation of pain. If all this is for Dachvinder- agony speared into Mik. He was swept up, thrashing and spinning in a maelstrom of mindless terror and revulsion.

Dachvinder’s sweet voice washed over Mik.

“Do not fear the pain, the pain will fade.”

Mik latched onto the song. It grounded his consciousness. He could hear himself screaming. The cuffs had tightened, the force field spreading up his arms and legs, squeezing unbearably tight. His bones were compressing under the force.

“Allow the pain to flow through you, out of you.”

Mik imagined his body as a conduit. A pipe, a wire that allowed the pain to travel through him, not into him. His violent efforts to free himself began to calm.

“When you can no longer stand, reach for me.”

Mik forced his mind to release its frantic grip on fear, and turned his impulse to clutch and claw towards the music instead. His energy was freed from struggling against the pain and instead concentrated on how to work through it. The screaming helped. He pushed his suffering into his voice and screamed it out of his body. The force restraints relaxed their grip.

“Lean on me, my love, and together we will stand.”

Mik remembered watching Dachvinder kneeling on the stage singing, raising daer head and wiping tears from daer cheeks. Dachvinder walking towards him, waking a longing flutter in Mik’s chest.

“Do not fear the path, the pain will fade.”

For you, Dachvinder, my sweet friend…my queen, I would go to hell for a thousand years.

“This is the path that will lead you, lead you home.

Come home to me my love, come home to me.”