Karen Chance - Masks

“Then how do you know?”

Heavy shoulders raised in a shrug. “He’s been seen reading and writing at least a couple of languages, and he speaks five that we know of.”

“As do I. And I was born in an Athenian slum.”

“Yes, but you learned it after, like me. But look at him. He can’t be more than a few years out of the dirt. And no newborn has the presence of mind for something like that! So he learned it before. And his clothes were good quality, if worn. I’m thinking some noble sprout down on his luck.”

“Perhaps,” the woman said, noncommittal.

The vampire consulted his notes again. “So you said educated, noble or close enough to fake it, and pretty.” The man glanced up and looked Mircea over. He frowned briefly, probably wishing his boys had been less “enthusiastic,” but he decided to make the best of it. “He’ll clean up,” he told her jovially.

“He isn’t the usual type for Venice,” the woman said mildly.

“Type, type!” the man scoffed. “What type? He’s young, he’s well-built—and well endowed,” he added, nodding at one of the soldiers. “Your clients’ll like that.”

The woman didn’t respond. But she also didn’t stop the soldiers, who moved toward Mircea with obvious intent. He’d already been on a low boil, hearing himself being discussed like a horse to be traded. But at that, something in him snapped.

He broke the first arm that reached for him, and then lashed out, kicking the nearest guard in the stomach with enough force to send him staggering back. And into another, who was just standing there, looking bemused. It seemed that prisoners weren’t supposed to try to escape.

Fuck that, Mircea thought viciously, and lunged for the still-open door.

He never knew how close he came, just that the next time he blinked he was on the floor. And the second after that, he was being hauled up and slammed back into the wall, hard enough to have broken a human’s bones. It didn’t feel like it had done his any good, either, but worse was the sensation of shackles being clicked shut around his wrists and ankles.

Mircea thrashed against the bonds, which the triple damned guards jerked vengefully tight. But they weren’t normal metal. He could bend solid steel, one of the few perks of his new condition, but these didn’t budge. But he kept struggling anyway, jerking on the chains and cursing and panting in hopeless fury.

Which did nothing to keep his last remaining garment from being stripped down his thighs.

He was left naked and wild-eyed, and splayed against the wall like an animal up for inspection. Or gutting, for all he knew. It was not a nice thought to have as the woman stepped forward and put a hand on his chest.

The leather of her glove was strangely textured, almost reptilian. And cold, as if it still carried the chill of the streets outside. Mircea shivered as she began to trace the muscles in his torso, the vulnerable skin of his stomach, the deep V of muscle below his navel.

And then followed it down the crease of his leg, to the inevitable conclusion.

He was soft, of course, never having felt less aroused in his life. But the woman was a vampire, too, and she didn’t need his cooperation. A single finger ran down his length, calling his blood as easily as he could summon it from a human’s veins. He watched helplessly as his flesh swelled and lifted, rising eagerly up to meet her touch.

But she didn’t appear impressed. She glanced at the condottiere. “Too big.”

“First time I ever heard a woman say that!” he laughed.

“Then you must not have bedded many women in Venice.”

“I’ve bedded plenty!”

“Then you should know: women or men, they all want the same thing here. Slender boys with pink cheeks, a languid manner, and faces as pretty as a girl’s. Not muscles and body hair and a stallion’s girth.”

She looked amused as she explored the extent of the latter, pulling more blood into his already engorged heat, testing Mircea to his limit and then pushing beyond. Until he jutted out thick and aching, larger than he’d ever been, his skin stretched tight around a truly desperate need.

A small smile began to play around her lips.

“He’s pretty enough—” the condottiere insisted.

“For a commoner, perhaps. I need courtiers.”

“But he’s noble—”

“So you say.”

“He was trained as a knight! I know the kind of muscle hefting a sword builds!”

She shrugged. “Keep him for your watch, then.”

“I’ve better things to do than nurse an infant.”

“As do I,” she murmured, and began to stroke.

Mircea stared at her in disbelief, even as his body cried out for release. Did she actually expect him to perform for her, to spill himself like a whore for the amusement of her friends? It seemed impossible, ludicrous. But her actions were unmistakable, as was her power. It thrummed through him, tightening his body, escalating his need.

But there were other needs, and outrage lent them strength. In his own land, he had been a prince. Death had robbed much from him, almost everything, but it hadn’t taken that. It could never take that. And he did not perform like a trained monkey in a square!

And it seemed that in this, at least, she could not force him, because she abruptly let go.

But only to strip off her glove.

“He doesn’t need strength to roll around in the sheets,” the condottiere said contemptuously.

“But he does need refinement—a great deal of it.”

“Trimming those eyebrows alone might take a week,” a blond murmured. He was male, Mircea realized with a shock. He hadn’t noticed before, since the peacock had been dressed every bit as sumptuously as the women, with a ridiculous red velvet cape that fell in costly excess to the floor.

“And the more I have to do to make him useful, the more it costs me.”

“Damn it, Martina!” The condottiere exploded. “You told me to find you something different—”

“And you interpreted that to mean an over muscled oaf?” One delicate eyebrow went up.

“Then what do you want?”

The blond cleared his throat, and made an exaggerated bow. The condottiere cursed. And the vampire Martina grasped Mircea again, this time skin to skin.

And he’d been wrong, he realized in creeping horror. It wasn’t the glove that was scaly-smooth. It was the hand underneath.

His body shuddered as she met his eyes, revulsion battling with desperate need. And fury and shame and more than a little fear. But greater than any of those was confusion.

Why was she doing this? If she wasn’t interested, why didn’t she leave him be? Go find herself some other poor bastard who better fit her demanding specifications?

“I have other buyers—” the condottiere threatened, apparently wondering the same thing.

“Then sell him to them.”

“But I acquired him with you in mind. I wanted to give you first choice—”

They kept haggling, but Mircea was finding it increasingly hard to concentrate. Perhaps because she had turned her attention to the globes between his thighs. The horror of her touch caused them to try to retreat into his flesh, but her power forced them to drop heavily into her grasp, like two ripe fruits.

“Forty?” the condottiere was outraged. “That’s the price of a nag of a horse! I couldn’t take less than two hundred.”

“And I can’t offer more than fifty.”

“Now I know you’re joking. I could get more for a human slave than that!”

Martina said something else, but Mircea didn’t hear. She had started rolling him across her palm, as expertly as a gambler manipulating a pair of dice. And the slow, deliberate, over gentle pressure was maddening.