Beauty's Release - By A. N. Roquelaure & Anne Rice Page 0,71

back and forth across the floor for nothing more than an afternoon’s diversion. But it would do just what the Queen wanted it to do. It would make a gorgeous slave out of him. After all, everyone knew she had trained her own Prince Alexi this way, and he was incomparable.

Lexius was taken away. We did not even look at each other to say farewell. But I had more important things to think of.

“And now for these two, these ungrateful rebels,” the Queen said, turning her attention to Tristan and me. “When will I not hear discouraging reports of Tristan and Laurent?” Her voice showed genuine irritation. “Bad slaves, disobedient slaves, and ungrateful when freed from the Sultan’s bondage!”

The blood pounded in my face. I could feel the eyes of the Court on me, the eyes of those I knew, had spoken with, had served in the past. How much safer the Sultan’s garden seemed, with its preordained roles, than this deliberately temporary servitude. Yet there was no escape from this! It was as absolute as the garden had been.

The Queen drew near, and I saw her skirts before my eyes. I couldn’t move to kiss her slipper or I would have done it.

“Tristan is a young slave,” she said, “but you, Laurent, you served Lady Elvera for a year. You are well trained and yet you disobey, you rebel!” Her voice was caustic. “You even bring back the Sultan’s servant on a whim. You are determined to distinguish yourself.”

I heard myself whimpering in response, my tongue touching the leather belt over my mouth, my cheeks burning against it.

She moved closer. The velvet of her skirt touched my face, and I felt her slipper against my nipple. I began to weep. I couldn’t contain it. All my ideas about the things that had happened to me left me. The fierce Master who had trained Lexius on the ship was vanquished again, wouldn’t come to my aid. I felt only the tension of the Queen’s disapproval, and my own unworthiness. And yet I knew I would rebel again, given half the chance! I was truly incorrigible. Nothing but punishment was right for me.

“There is but one place for you both,” she said. “The place that will strengthen Tristan’s uncertain soul and quell your strong spirit thoroughly. You will be sent back to the village, but you will not be sold from the auction block. You will be delivered over to the Public Pony Stables.”

My crying increased. I couldn’t stop it. It seemed the leather belt did little to muffle the sound of it.

“And there you will serve night and day all year,” she continued. “And strictly as ponies—to be rented out for the pulling of carriages and carts and other draught work. You will spend your waking hours harnessed and bitted with the proper horsetail phalluses fitted into place, and you will know no reprieve from this to enjoy the attention or affection of any Master or Mistress.”

I closed my eyes. My mind traveled back to the time so long ago, it seemed, when I had been brought through the village on the Punishment Cross, and the human ponies had pulled the cart, Tristan among them. The image of the black horsetails streaking from their backsides, their heads held high by the bits, obliterated all other thoughts in an instant. It seemed infinitely worse than marching with my hands tied to the bronze phallus in the Sultan’s garden. And it would be done not for the Sultan and the royal guests but for the common and thrifty people of the village.

“Only when that year is passed will your names be brought again to my attention,” said the Queen, “and I give you my word that you are more likely to find yourself on the village auction block than at my feet when your service as ponies is ended.”

“An excellent punishment, Your Majesty,” said the Captain of the Guard softly. “And these are such strong slaves, well muscled. Tristan has already tasted the bit. For Laurent it will do wonders.”

“I wish to hear no more of it,” said the Queen. “These are not Princes fit for my service. They are horses to be well worked and well whipped in the village. Get them out of my sight immediately.”

Tristan’s face was red and streaked with tears when I finally saw it. We were both lifted again on poles, as we had been before, and hurriedly carried out of the Great Hall, leaving the