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"Terms of Surrender"

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Strict Susan (323)  05.02.2010 @ 16:29	"Terms of Surrender" is a new novel by Wheldrake, edited and published by Strict Publishing. Set some time in the Middle Ages in a fictional realm somewhere (probably) in Eastern Europe, a youthful King and his brother decide to wage war on a neighbouring country, ruled over by a powerful Queen. Having successfully taken one castle just over the borders, it all goes badly wrong. As a prisoner, the King’s younger brother finds himself learning some painful lessons about the power of sadistic women… He was listening with half an ear in anticipation of Jinette’s heavy footsteps, but his chief jailer never appeared. Instead the tall, muscular figure of Delina came suddenly into view outside his cell, accompanied by another female guard with close-cropped brown hair and a powerful, heavy-set body. Like all of the guards apart from Jinette herself, they wore soft slippers as the Queen had commanded, and there had been little sound to warn of their approach. The brunette guard was carrying what appeared to be a piece of black cloth, which Aldric eyed warily. Neither of them had a sleeping mat or anything resembling dinner, which was probably a bad sign. “Up,” said Delina perfunctorily. “On your feet and turn your back to the door.” He obeyed slowly, hating the feeling of vulnerability that came over him when he turned his back and heard the key turn in the lock. The cell door creaked open, and a moment later they were on him. Delina seized his arms, pinning them to his sides, and the other woman pulled what turned out to be a heavy black cloth bag over his head and down to the level of the steel collar around his neck. He was afraid they might punish him if he spoke, but he could no longer contain his unease. “What are you doing?” he quavered. “Are you going to take me down to the dungeon like this?” Sure enough, a strong hand descended on his ass in a powerful slap, and he bleated into the darkness of the hood. “Quiet,” said a voice too sharp and nasal to be Delina’s. “Just come with us.” They took his arms and marched him out of the cell, but to his surprise they turned right – not towards the stair that led to the dungeons, but in the direction of Jinette’s room, the arch that passed into the courtyard, and the main door of the prison-house itself. Aldric’s confusion increased when they eventually steered him to the left, which could only mean they were taking him out of the prison-house altogether. Sure enough, he felt cold fresh air against his naked body a moment later, and dirt and grass under the soles of his bare feet. He could not suppress an indistinct sigh of consternation, but did not resist as the women led him in a straight line across the castle grounds. He had little sense of distance or orientation, and could not be sure where they were taking him. Aldric glumly imagined being hauled into the stables to spend a night locked in a wooden stall, or dragged into the great hall for the amusement of a few revellers who had stayed late at the dining table. Perhaps they were even going to beat him in the fresh air, as Jinette did each morning. Nervous tension gripped him as a door creaked open and he found himself out of the night breeze and walking on smooth flagstones. “Stairs up,” the brunette guard said warningly a moment later, and he found himself climbing a broad spiral staircase in the firm grip of his captresses. That could only mean the keep, and perhaps an interview with Relvere or the Queen herself. He shuddered involuntarily. “Cold, boy?” Delina laughed. “You’ll be warmer soon enough, I promise.” He had only a moment to wonder what she meant by that before her prediction came true. They pushed him into a room where he could smell burning wood and feel the warmth of the fire, and where the floor was covered in a soft carpet. He had grown so used to the chill of the prison house that he had almost forgotten what it was like to be warm, and his naked body greedily drank in the heat. The guards marched him forwards a few steps onto the carpet, then clamped down on his arms to bring him up short. “Stand still, Aldric,” said the brunette in her officious way. One of them took his hand and did something at his wrist, and he realised that they were removing his chains. He made a point of keeping his hands at his sides, neither reaching up to remove the hood nor trying to protect his groin from their scrutiny. He was learning a captive’s passivity and humility. “Now come here.” They took his arms, but moved him only a step or two, guiding rather than pushing. “Turn around. Now sit.” Sit? He shuffled back a little, felt his legs hit something soft, and lowered his ass slowly onto a surface that readily yielded to his weight. It could have been an extravagantly padded stool, but Aldric did not recall seeing anything like that on the upper floors of the keep. He was almost certainly sitting on someone’s bed, and his mind churned feverishly as he tried to work out whose. He had not been counting steps, and he was not sure if they were on the fifth floor of the keep or only the fourth. The main bedchamber on the fifth floor had now been reclaimed by the Lady Relvere, but the one on the fourth was a guest room that would almost certainly have been given to the Queen. He had slept in the guest room himself, during his brief reign as Master of Kaylar, and it did have a fireplace and a carpeted floor. But then, so did Lady Relvere’s bedroom upstairs. “Lie back, Aldric. Come up here.” They hooked their arms through his, one on each side, and pulled him towards what was presumably the head of the bed so that he was lying flat. There did not seem to be a pillow, but it was a relief to be stretched out on a soft fur coverlet instead of a thin sleeping mat on a cold stone floor. He could have luxuriated in the sensation for hours. He lay dreamily in his own private darkness, feeling only the most distant shiver of anticipation when the women moved his arms above his head and buckled them into what felt like soft leather cuffs. He tugged gently and experimentally at the restraints, and found them as unyielding as any steel shackles. However, they were also gentler, in that they did not dig cruelly into his wrists when he had the temerity to challenge them. Firm hands moved his legs apart, and more leather closed around his ankles, which made him feel disconcertingly exposed. He was uncomfortably aware of the tip of his limp cock, dangling between his parted thighs. “Perfect,” said a mellifluous voice that was rather deep for a woman’s. “Now take off that hood. It really doesn’t suit the boy.” Aldric blinked uncontrollably when the hood was snatched off, his eyes feeling assaulted even by the soft candlelight of what was unquestionably the Queen’s bedchamber. After a moment, he looked about him and saw that Arctis was standing to one side of the bed with her arms folded under her small breasts. She was draped in a black silk robe, looser and more enveloping than the white one she had worn in the Riding School, and the expression on her pale, handsome features was one of contemplation and even solemnity. Her face might have been a fine sculpture of white marble as she looked down at his stretched and shackled body. After a moment, she stooped over him, filling his nostrils with a scent like roses, and placed a gentle kiss on his forehead. She straightened and stroked his hair, her eyes searching his face as if she intended it as the model for a sculpture of her own. “Prince Aldric,” she said quietly. “How does it feel to be naked in my bedchamber?” “Less comfortable than it might feel if I were unbound, Your Majesty.” She smiled, but slapped him hard across the face. “I did not have you brought here and bound because I wanted to listen to your fripperies,” she told him. “I think you had better leave us, ladies. There are some things the boy and I must discuss between ourselves. You can wait in the sitting room next door.” She waited until the door closed behind Delina, and then stroked his hair again. “So how does it feel?” she repeated with quiet insistence. “Distinctly unnerving,” replied Aldric slowly, “considering that I have no idea of your intentions. Although, I’m grateful for the warmth, and the softness of your bed.” “Ah, yes. The prison-house is hardly luxurious, is it? Better yet, it will feel twice as miserable when I send you back there after reminding you what warmth and softness are like. I’m rather pleased by that thought.” “Must you send me back, Your Majesty? I thought you might enjoy seeing me in chains enough to keep me here overnight, at least. You could send me back tomorrow morning, when it’s late enough that Jinette will have given up on any thought of strapping me.” “More frippery,” she noted, and slapped him again. This time he gasped in pain, but did not apologise and continued to look up at her. He did not think of it as defiance, but merely a refusal to allow his discourse with the Queen to be too constrained by their respective positions of prisoner and captress. “Tell me what you have learned since you surrendered to me,” she said after a moment. "Terms of Surrender"
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