She didn’t want to die, but this didn’t feel like death.
The edges of her sight sharpened, and her mind put names on her surroundings. Whitewashed walls instead of metal bars. A bed beneath her instead of a flea-ridden pallet.
She recognized none of it, but the sweetness of it all acted as a drug in her veins, keeping her from panicking. Safe, she thought, even though she had no reason to know they wouldn’t hurt her here too. Home, she thought, even though she was sure she’d never seen it before.
Curiosity nudged at her until she lifted the sheet. Clothes! Well, maybe that was too strong a word for the soft worn shirt that draped her body and stopped mid-thigh. Her memory was hazy, limited at best, but clothes were new, she was sure of that much.
The sight of her torn and mottled skin tainted the daydream. And the pain rang true.
She peeled back the soft fabric to inspect her body. There were the usual marks, crisscrosses down her back and thighs she could feel with her fingertips, torn skin where the restraints cut into her wrists. There were new cuts too, but these didn’t look like the ones from a whip. Uneven scratches all down the front of her body.
Scuff sounds on the wood floors grew louder, her only warning before a looming figure filled the doorway. For one terrifying moment, her mind translated the image of his thickly muscled form and scowling face into a childish nightmare. A monster come to get her because she’d left her foot hanging over the side of the bed.
Then reality snapped her back. Not a monster, not exactly. A master.
Her training kicked in. It didn’t matter how she had ended up here in this strange, comfortable room at the mercy of this strange, sinister-looking master. She knew what to do. Her limp body slid from the bed and dropped to its knees. The movement awakened a thousand new aches, but it couldn’t be helped. She bowed low, praying she looked properly worshipful.
The threat of danger prickled her entire body, set her hair on end, but the fight or flight response had been beaten right out of her. Either reaction could get her killed, or more likely, hurt so badly that death would be preferable. So she waited on the floor, letting the cool knotted wood bruise her knees, her arms, her forehead.
She waited for an order, because that was what she’d been taught to do in the presence of a master. No command came, and the air tingled with expectancy.
As the seconds ticked away, anxiety rose. Should she do something, try a new position or ask how to please him? But any variation from her pose would be punished, she knew that.
The booted feet approached. Boots humiliated – they hurt. She held still, accepting. Probably she had done it wrong. Her heart sped up, but she fought the instinct to cringe away, to cover her head and vital organs, to beg for mercy. The pain of a kick echoed through her body, and he hadn’t even touched her yet.
Large hands clamped beneath her arms, hauling her up. He tossed her onto the bed, where she landed in an ungainly sprawl.
Even terrified, she kept her gaze lowered. Never look them in the eyes.
But he wasn’t saying anything, and she’d already done one wrong thing. Once was a mistake. Any more would be considered willful disobedience. What did he want her to do?
She slowly looked up, already berating herself for the audacity.
Thick eyebrows made harsh lines across his face. His skin was tan and peppered with an uneven beard, as if it had been scraped at with an old blade by an impatient hand.
How long had it been since she looked directly at another person?
The long raised scar down his cheek shocked her. Only human, it said. But the cold cast of his eyes disabused her of that notion quickly. No understanding, no trace of pity. Uncontrollable shivers racked her body.
Impossibly, he frowned further.
She was an idiot. God, she knew better than to look directly at him, to show her fear without prompting. Hadn’t they taught her? Over and over again. The memories flashed.
She needed to show him that she hadn’t meant it as defiance. He wanted her on the bed, that much was clear, but based on his tacit displeasure, he wanted something else from her. She couldn’t ask, not without making everything worse. Her mind scrabbled desperately for some way to show her deference, her subservience, without words. Knowing it would fail but desperate, she bowed again atop the rumpled sheets.
Rough hands tightened on her arms once more and flung her back against the pillows.
“Stop that.” His voice rumbled through, over her.
She relaxed her body across the bed. Let him do with her what he would. Sex, violence. Her mind reached for that faraway place where none of this mattered. Where none of it was really happening anyway.