Club Carnivorous was in an even more dangerous part of the city than Neh’sa’s Mercy Clinic. More dangerous because it was crowded with a substrata of the entire Opulex population, both high and low, and all of them seemed to be milling around the club.
Bonded body-slaves fitted with pain collars hurried down the packed streets, their eyes downcast, clearly out on errands for exacting and impatient Mistresses. There were also free males who belonged to no Mistress. They wore ragged clothing and scowling, resentful looks on their haggard faces. Most of them were homeless, Thorn recalled, from his research into Yonnie Six, and none of them had any hope of moving up in a society where males were considered less than dirt beneath a wealthy Mistress’s feet.
Mingled among the males both owned and free were street urchins—also all males, Thorn noted—who dodged in and out of the press of adults.
In front of the club itself were six or seven huge, heavily muscled armed guards which looked to have been cybernetically enhanced. Bouncers to keep the male riff-raff away from the well-heeled Mistresses. The high society females were emerging one by one from their luxurious floating hover-cars leading one or two or sometimes even three body-slaves on long leashes attached to collars.
Thorn reached up reflexively to feel for the collar which encircled his own neck. Of course, it wasn’t a pain collar like most of those poor bastards were wearing. His was plain black leather without even a clip for a leash—Neh’sa believed that a proper body-slave should follow his Mistress of his own free will and be where she needed him at all times. The collar was unremarkable to look at with just a tiny square in the center with Neh’sa’s family crest stamped on it in pale blue and gold.
But the Spartan appearance of the collar belied its true value. It was made of vadin hide—a rare predator which lived in the northern mountains of Jarvel, an ice world in a different solar system from Yonnie Six. The hide had to be aged for no less than twelve cycles and then tanned in a process that took another twelve cycles. It was then dyed with an expensive indelible pigment made from black pembla-flower blossoms. A thousand flowers had to be plucked, winnowed, and crushed in order to make enough of the pigment for one collar and their cost was extraordinarily high.
The result of all this labor, time, and effort was a butter-soft leather which was as pliable as silk and as strong as plasti-steel. It was so thin Thorn felt he ought to be able to rip it off his neck like it was made of paper. But after tugging on it—Neh’sa had invited him to do so—he realized that his head would come off sooner than the collar would.
“This collar will remain around your neck for as long as I own you,” she told Thorn, sealing the black leather around his neck with a heated laser key which she then hung on a chain around her own neck. “No blade or flame can cut it from you—only by my hand will you be freed.”
“Yes, Mistress.” Thorn had been kneeling to allow her to place the black collar around his neck. It gave him a strange sensation to feel it close around his throat—the strongest feeling yet of being owned by her.
Somehow, he didn’t mind.
You will mind when you can’t get the damned thing off after this mission is over, whispered a practical voice in his head. But Thorn chose to ignore it. Right now the end of the mission seemed very far away. All he could see was his Mistress’s lovely face when she placed the collar around his neck and marked him as hers. All he could feel were her soft hands and, as her sweet, feminine scent filled his senses, he briefly wished he could never leave her side.
Which was foolish, Thorn reminded himself as they waited in their hover coach for their turn to step out onto the plush purple synthi-grass carpet which had been unrolled from the huge double doors of Club Carnivorous. He was only here to get information on the Hive from the Library of All Knowledge—he had to keep his end objective in mind and not allow himself to be swept up into some fantasy where he and his Mistress fell in love and decided to run away together or some damn thing like that. He—
“Oh, dear.” The dismay in Neh’sa’s soft voice drew Thorn out of his contemplation.
“What is it, Mistress?” he asked.
“Just look.” She nodded at the line of hover coaches that snaked down the block, waiting their turn to disgorge their passengers onto the purple carpet. In the coach directly ahead of theirs, Thorn thought he saw a familiar face.
“Fucking hell,” he muttered as the door opened and a long, skinny leg appeared, “That’s—
“Lady Wraith’neck,” Neh’sa said and sighed again. “I wonder what trouble she’ll cause tonight. If we’re fortunate she’ll completely ignore us.” She shook her head. “Unfortunately, I doubt we’ll be that lucky.”
“What in the Seven Hells is that creature she has with her?” Thorn asked, frowning.
For instead of leading a regular body-slave out of her hover coach, Lady Wraith’neck had the strangest thing Thorn had ever seen at the end of her leash.
It was tall and thin—taller than him, he was certain—with a skeletal frame and odd, bony protuberances extending from the ridge of its spine. Its skin was a pale, ghostly white and it didn’t appear to have any eyes at all—just a round, bulbous head with a mouth full of long, needle-like teeth.
The teeth were only partially hidden behind a tytano-frame muzzle and its freakishly long arms were strapped to its sides as well. This kept its long fingered hands, all tipped with deadly looking claws, from reaching for anyone—though Thorn saw them opening and closing in frustrated fists, as though the creature was angry at its forced captivity.
“What is that thing?” he asked again, “It doesn’t look very fucking safe to bring into a crowded club—that’s for damn sure.”
Neh’sa’s dark eyes were wide and she shook her head uncertainly.
“I’m not sure what it is.”
“Well can she bring it into the club with her?” Thorn demanded. “The bouncers aren’t going to allow that, are they? If that thing gets loose—”
“Unfortunately, as long as she has it properly restrained, she’s within her rights as a high-ranking Mistress to bring any kind of male body-slave with her she wants—even into public places.”
Neh’sa didn’t sound too happy about being in close proximity to the strange white, bony beast with its needle sharp teeth and clawed hands and Thorn didn’t blame her one damn bit. He was doubly glad he’d insisted on coming with her tonight.
“Well, it’s definitely male,” he growled. For between the strange creature’s legs rose a long phallus, shaded a dull, angry red and roped with veins. At the base of it, a thick black band was placed to constrict around the creature’s member and keep it erect.
Thorn knew he himself would have to wear something similar tonight. In fact, Neh’sa had it with her in the small, beaded purse she carried which matched the gorgeous blue and green and turquoise sequined gown she wore. It was called an “everlast constrictor,” but she had declined to put it on him back at her domicile.
“I’ll put it on you in the readiness room at the club. You shouldn’t have to wear it too long,” she told Thorn as she was dressing for the club earlier that evening. “Just during the banquet and the announcement and naming of the new member of the Sacred Seven.”
Thorn’s ears had pricked up at that.
“The Sacred Seven?” he asked carefully, trying to sound casual. “Who are they?”
“The keepers of the Library of All Knowledge,” Neh’sa told him. “It’s a vast repository of learning located on Villala—the smallest of Yonnie Six’s moons. I am one of the Sacred Seven myself, which is why I cannot miss tonight’s banquet.”
“So what are your duties—as one of the, uh, Sacred Seven?” he asked with studied off-handedness. “Do you have to go in and look around every once in a while—make sure the place is being run right?”
“Oh, it’s not a library that’s open to the public.” Neh’sa had sounded shocked at the idea. “Only the Yonnite Council of Mistresses can visit it—along with any female scholars who have applied for entrance that they deem worthy. In fact, for most of the time it’s locked tight and no one can get in or out without the retinal scan and fingerprint of one of the Sacred Seven.”
This was news to Thorn, who hadn’t been able to find out exactly how to access the library. He’d had an idea that maybe Neh’sa had a key of some kind which had been entrusted to her as one of the Sacred Seven. But now she was telling him her key was her body.
It gave him a very uncomfortable feeling to realize that in order to get into the library, he would have to force her to let him in. It would have been so much easier if she had a key or some other opening device he could steal and use on the day of the Ceremony he knew was coming up at the Library itself…
However, now wasn’t the time to think about that, Thorn told himself. Tonight he had to concentrate on keeping Neh’sa safe during the banquet—while parading around with his cock out and hard.
Gods, this planet was so thoroughly fucked up.
“Well, it looks like the guards are allowing Lady Wraith’neck’s new slave to accompany her.” Neh’sa sighed. “Get ready, Thorn—we’re up next. We’ll go straight into the club to the readiness room to put on your everlast.”
“Yes, Mistress.” He watched with a frown as Lady Wraith’neck tugged on what was obviously a reinforced leash to force the tall, bony white creature to follow her, hissing and spitting, into the club. And then Neh’sa’s hover coach moved into position and the door whooshed open.
“Come, Thorn.” Neh’sa slid from the coach and straightened her dress, which fell like a waterfall of blues and greens, clinging lovingly to her full curves and outlining her lush ass.
Thorn couldn’t help staring at her as she moved. The dress, which she wore with ease, seemed designed to torment him even as it showed off her assets to perfection.
The front of it had a low, rounded neckline which bared her breasts, though the tips of her nipples were hidden with fingernail-sized golden modesty patches which didn’t extend far enough to hide the dark pink circles of her areolas. The bottom of the dress was cut to match, clearly revealing tiny golden panties which were no more than a series of triangles arranged in an artful pattern which hid her pussy lips while leaving her slit in the center bare.
Thorn had to admit he was looking forward to the moment of Neh’sa’s announcement into the banquet for then he would be allowed to kneel before her and kiss those tiny panties…and maybe more.
Gods, he really shouldn’t have let himself go down on her last night! It had awakened all kinds of instincts in him—instincts that were purely male and in no way rational.
The Kindred part of him was telling him that he was already halfway to claiming Neh’sa since tasting was usually a part of the Claiming Period most warriors went through with their mates. The Enfuego part was insisting that he keep her locked up somewhere no other male could steal her. Just the thought of anyone else being near to his Mistress made the fire inside him rise, which was going to be a problem if any other male got too close.
Keep it together, he lectured himself sternly. You went almost twenty cycles without a flame-up so you can go another two hours, no matter how crowded it is in that Goddess-damned club.
But his self control, once as hard as rock and as cold as ice, had been eroded little by little by Neh’sa’s training. From her first touch his control had started crumbling until he wasn’t sure what might happen if she was threatened in any way.
I’ll be fine, he told himself uneasily. I have to be.
And he followed Neh’sa through the vast double doors, painted the color of dried blood, into the club.