What in the Seven Hells do you think you’re doing? Thorn asked himself as he climbed into the plush interior of his new Mistress’s ship and settled himself on one of the blast couches in preparation for lift-off. Swearing to her you’ll never lie when every damn thing you say to her is a lie? Pretending you’ll be truthful and honest when you’re with her under false pretenses right from the beginning?
Though it had been part of his job in the past, he didn’t particularly like lying and he really didn’t like it now. It rubbed him the wrong way to swear total honestly and obedience to a female he meant ultimately to betray. Even now Greed’lik had gone to prepare a rendezvous where they would meet once he’d gotten into the Library of All Knowledge and his mission was complete.
What would Neh’sa think if she knew?
It doesn’t matter what she thinks, he told himself fiercely, looking down at his bloody knees. And it doesn’t matter what you have to do to get the information about the Hive. The fate of the Kindred and the Earth depend on it. So get over your distaste and just do whatever you Goddess-damned have to in order to get this mission done!
The hum of the engines made him look up from his contemplation of his shredded knees. The damn razor-gravel had really done a number on him. Of course, Kindred healed fast but that didn’t mean getting his skin nearly ripped off his body in places was fun. Still, he’d lived through worse—he would survive.
I’m lucky the damn gravel didn’t get to my shaft, he thought dryly. That might have been a pain even I couldn’t ignore. But he’d carefully kept his knees together when he had slid into position to catch Neh’sa with his back. He’d had at least that much self-preservation left.
Speaking of his shaft, he’d been lucky that the knot of leather around it had been connected to the bands around his wrists which his new Mistress had untied earlier. He’d been able to slip it off along with the steel-leather thongs. Otherwise he might still be running around with a ridiculous and completely inappropriate hard-on.
Looking down at his still naked crotch, he hoped he would be given a pair of trousers without the air conditioning when they reached her estate on Yonnie Six.
“Are you settled?” Her low, feminine voice broke his silent contemplation.
Thorn looked up at her—though not very far. Though he was seated and she was standing, they were still nearly eye-to-eye due to their height difference.
She’d put on a new pair of boots, he saw—these had lower heels than the others which made her even shorter. Goddess, she really was a tiny little thing. Tiny and delicate and beautiful…
Stop it! he told himself sternly.
“I’m fine,” he said harshly and cleared his throat. “I mean, yes Mistress—I’m settled.”
“Alright then let’s get you cleaned up and see what we can do about those wounds.”
She left the small luxurious cabin for a moment and came back holding a large basin of steaming water.
“Wait, I can do that,” he protested as she knelt on the floor before him and picked up a sponge.
“No, you’re my responsibility now.” She looked up at him, her large dark eyes serious. “I own you so I have to take care of you. That’s part of being a good Mistress.”
A good Mistress? Thorn stared at her uncertainly as she began to sponge the blood off his lacerated knees. She seemed to know exactly what she was doing—her touch was gentle but firm and she was very thorough. Her hands when she touched him were warm—almost hot—but it was a soothing heat. For a moment he thought he saw a pinkish glow emanating from her palms as she touched him… but that didn’t make any sense. Thorn decided he must have imagined it.
It wasn’t her apparent medical knowledge that occupied his thoughts though—it was her words and actions.
Whoever heard of a Yonnie Six female caring about the state of her slave? All the horror stories he had heard made him wonder. He had expected to be bought by a sadist, put in a pain collar, and tortured within an inch of his life, in that order.
Instead his new Mistress was kneeling before him, tending to his injuries as tenderly as a parent might tend a child. Her actions put everything he knew or thought he knew about the Yonnite culture into doubt and Thorn didn’t know how to feel about that.
“Well, that razor gravel certainly did a number on your knees and feet,” Neh’sa said, frowning. “I’m afraid these injuries are going to be challenging to heal.”
“No they won’t,” Thorn said confidently. “I only need to clean them and they’ll be fine. Kindred are fast healers.”
“Kindred and what else?” She arched one perfectly formed black eyebrow at him as she sponged gently at the sole of one foot. “You never told me the other part of your heritage.”
“That’s right, because I was too busy being a disrespectful bastard. Sorry about that, um, Mistress.”
Thorn took a deep breath wondering how she was going to take what he was about to tell her. He considered lying to her but he had already done enough of that for one day.
“My mother…” He had to stop for a moment to clear his throat—he almost never allowed himself to speak of his past aloud. “My mother,” he forced himself to continue, “was Enfuego,” he said in a low voice, watching to see her reaction.
She frowned. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard of that people.”
“From the Double Nerix star system,” Thorn told her, feeling a stab of relief. “We have…control issues at times.”
“Oh?” she raised an eyebrow again. “How so?”
Thorn shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. It’s not a problem I have. Or not one I’ve had for a long time, anyway.”
She stared at him intently for a long moment and he wondered if she was guessing at the “control issues” he’d had in the past. It didn’t matter now, though, he told himself. He’d kept the fire inside him in check for years—he wasn’t going to let it out now.
When Neh’sa spoke at last, her tone was deceptively soft.
“I can tell you have very tight control over yourself, Thorn.” She finished his feet and knees and straightened up to begin bathing the lacerations on his bare shoulders and upper arms. Her touch was warm…soothing. “You’re going to have to let some of that go if we’re going to make you into a good submissive.”
“Let go of my control?” Thorn gave an incredulous bark of laughter. “Believe me, Mistress, you don’t want that.”
She eyed him sternly.
“Actually, I do.” Her eyes softened as she finished cleaning his shoulders and dipped the sponge into the steaming basin again. “Look, Thorn, I can tell the idea of losing control—of giving it up to someone else—is frightening to you. But it can also be very freeing, especially for a male wound as tightly as you seem to be. You’ll see.”
Thorn made a noncommittal noise and then sat quietly as she cupped his cheek in her hand and dabbed lightly at the cut over his cheekbone. Once more he could feel a healing kind of heat radiating from her hands…and he could feel his body reacting to her gentle touch.
It disturbed him that he couldn’t seem to stop himself from getting hard when she was near him, touching him. Goddess, she was so close—her perfect face and those lush red lips…not to mention her scent which was driving him crazy…
“I’m already giving you more control than anyone has ever had over me,” he pointed out in a slightly strangled voice as she smoothed antibiotic cream over the small wound on his cheek. “I’ve never allowed another to tend my injuries since I was a small child.”
“There’s nothing childish about giving power over your body to another,” Neh’sa told him seriously. “It takes a very strong person to allow someone else to direct your fate. You might even say it takes more strength to submit than to dominate.”
Thorn could certainly believe that was true. He shifted uncomfortably in his seat, wishing she would stop touching him and wishing she would never stop at the same time. He could feel the fire, buried so long within him, flaring to life with each soft stroke of her small hands. Gods how he wished she would touch him lower! But that would mean giving up even more control because he was reasonably certain he wasn’t going to be allowed to touch her back.
He wondered how it would be to sit back and let her stroke him without touching or kissing or stroking her in return. The thought gave him an uncomfortable feeling—his natural male dominance rose up in him, making him want to take control of the situation, even in his imagination. But he wouldn’t be able to do that, Thorn reminded himself. He was going to have to get used to letting someone else—letting Neh’sa—call the shots, at least until he got what he needed from her.
From the time he had left his home planet at the age of eighteen cycles he had been in control of his own fate. But now, at least for a little while, his fate was in the hands of another.
Thorn frowned. Though he had told himself and others that he wasn’t worried about submitting to a female, he’d been thinking of the submission as another form of torture to be endured. He’d envisioned vicious beatings and forced penetration—not her soft hands on his face and skin, driving him to distraction with lust.
He shifted again in his seat as her gentle touch drew feelings from him he didn’t want to have. He didn’t know how he was going to bear his new Mistress’s tender ministrations if she kept this up—torture would have been so much easier. Why didn’t she just put a pain collar on him and be done with it?
Neh’sa seemed to notice the way he was shifting in his seat. She sat back and regarded the long, thick erection rising from between his thighs with a contemplative look on her face.
“Sorry,” Thorn muttered, feeling his cheeks heat. “I can’t…seem to help it. When you touch me…”
“It’s all right. The touch of your Mistress’s hands should bring pleasure and healing as well as pain and punishment at times,” she said. “Does it bother you that your body reacts to mine? Or is it more that your reaction is so obvious, dressed as you are?”
Thorn scowled. “Both, I guess. I’m not used to…”
“Being out of control?” She raised an eyebrow at him. “It always comes back to that, doesn’t it? Well, I’m afraid you’ll have to get used to it. We have a long way to go, the two of us together, Thorn.”
“When are you going to put a pain collar on me?” he burst out, unable to help asking. “Isn’t that how Mistresses on Yonnie Six control their slaves? Are we waiting until you get home to find just the right one?”
Neh’sa frowned at him.
“First of all, I never use pain collars or harmful nerve conduction devices on my submissives. It damages sensitivity and it’s unnecessarily cruel. Secondly, you have to earn your collar from me, Thorn.”
“Earn it?” He stared at her incredulously. “Why would I want to earn a collar?”
“To please your Mistress,” Neh’sa said lightly. She cupped his jaw in one hand and leaned forward to brush a soft, teasing kiss over his lips. “And don’t you want to please me, Thorn?” she murmured, sitting back on her heels to look at him.
The fire rose inside him so fast and hard he could barely breathe. Every muscle in his body tightened and his cock surged hungrily. Gods damn it, why couldn’t he control his body’s reactions around her? He wanted to grab her and crush her to him—wanted to plunder her soft mouth and strip her naked and cover her sweet body his own larger, harder frame…wanted to fill her over and over with his shaft until she moaned his name and gave herself to him completely while he spurted his seed inside her.
But no, Goddess-damn it—he couldn’t do that. Couldn’t blow his cover or take her against her will. He would simply have to work harder on controlling the raging lust she seemed to have wakened inside him along with the fire.
“Yes, Mistress,” he heard himself saying hoarsely. “Yes I…I want to please you.”
“That’s good, Thorn.” She tilted her head to one side. “I don’t know what the motes of light in your eyes are but they’re beautiful—especially when you get upset.”
If only she knew how dangerous the sparks in his mismatched eyes truly were. If only she knew what they meant—that the fire inside him was getting closer to breaking free—she wouldn’t speak of them so lightly, he was sure.
Thorn didn’t tell her. Instead he shrugged his shoulders.
“They’re part of being half Enfuego,” he muttered.
“I see. Well, I think you’re as cleaned up as I can make you for now.” She stood and picked up the basin of now pinkish water. “I’ll do a complete inspection once I get you back to my building on Yonnie Six. But before I do, I have a Devotion Ceremony to attend to.”
Thorn frowned. “A Devotion Ceremony? What’s that?”
“It’s where a submissive swears his lifelong devotion to his new Mistress. It’s something I always do when I give one of my submissives to a new owner.” She looked sad and proud at the same time. “It can be very touching, especially if the two are well matched, as I believe these are.”
“So you don’t keep the slaves you buy?” Thorn asked.
Neh’sa shook her head, her long hair brushing against her shoulders.
“No. I train them for a year and then find a good situation for them with a Mistress who can understand them and give them what they need.”
“Sounds like you’re running some kind of a fucking animal shelter,” Thorn growled. “Finding the poor stray slaves a good home.”
She frowned reprovingly.
“I prefer to think of it as more of a matchmaking service. Most Yonnites have no use for males other than as sex toys and slaves. But just because males are the subjugated sex doesn’t make them weaker or less worthy of love than females.”
“That’s very big of you,” Thorn said dryly.
“It’s just the way I see things,” Neh’sa said simply. “Though we Yonnites do not believe in allowing a male to penetrate a female as they do in most societies, a male and female can still have a deeply committed and loving relationship.”
“What—with her penetrating him?” Thorn demanded. He couldn’t help thinking again of the huge leather strap-on phallus he’d seen his new Mistress wearing in the holo Commander Sylvan had showed him of her when they had been planning this mission.
“Penetration takes a measure of trust and commitment some slaves and Mistresses never reach,” Neh’sa said quietly. “But it can be very satisfying—it can deepen a relationship immensely in both intimacy and pleasure.”
“And are you planning on penetrating me?” Thorn heard himself asking, though he knew he probably shouldn’t. “Are you going to strap on a phallus and fuck me with it, Mistress?”
Neh’sa put down the basin of water she’d been holding and came over to stand in front of him. Locking his eyes with hers, she asked him quietly,
“Do you want me to fuck you, Thorn?”
“No! No, of course not,” he growled, scowling. He lifted his chin. “But I can take it if I have to. It’s just another kind of torture.”
“Loving and consensual penetration isn’t torture. But it is both the ultimate symbol of trust and the ultimate loss of control,” she said softly, still holding his eyes. “I promise you this, Thorn—for as long as you live with me, I won’t penetrate you and fuck you until you beg me to.”
“I could promise you the same thing, Mistress,” he growled softly, eyeing her lush, curvy form. “The minute you ask me to, I’ll be happy to penetrate you—as long and as deep as you want me to.”
Neh’sa’s cheeks went pink for a moment but she didn’t look away, though her breathing sped up a bit. “You know we don’t do such things on Yonnie Six,” she said, a bit breathlessly, Thorn thought.
He snorted derisively. “And we don’t do what you’re suggesting where I’m from. So I guess we’ll never get around to it either way.”
“We may not,” she said steadily. “But I hope in time you’ll come to trust me enough that the idea of giving yourself to me completely isn’t totally repugnant to you.”
“Give myself to you?” Thorn tried to make his voice scornful but somehow it came out sounding uncertain instead.
Neh’sa didn’t answer—she just looked at him. Gazing into the endless black ocean of her lovely eyes, he tried to imagine it—tried to imagine opening himself to her, spreading his legs and losing control completely as she filled him the way he lusted to fill her.
No, he told himself. No, I could never do that willingly—never in a million cycles. If she forces me, I’ll have to take it—that’s just part of this mission. But I could never ask for it—never actually want it.
But as he watched his new Mistress walk away with the basin of water, her full hips swaying gently with the motion, he couldn’t help the surge his cock gave or stop remembering the soft brush of her lips against his.