Page 20 of Pawn of the Cruel Princess
But this man told me that between me and Vienne, he would choose me. Maybe I took that sentiment to heart more deeply than I thought.
He doesn’t like me as a person. He thinks me strange and cruel, which I am. But he’s my thrall, and he has no right to speak to me so boldly.
I strike his cheek twice, so hard my palm stings. “You have displeased me, thrall. From now on, do not come into my presence unclothed unless I command it. Do not proposition me, or try to seduce me. I am not here for your pleasure. Do you understand?”
His eyes snap with anger. “Yes, my lady.”
“Crawl out of the room backward,” I order. “Ask the servants for some clothes that are suitable for exercise. I’ve already ordered a wardrobe for you for Summerglee, but until then you’ll have to make do with whatever is available.”
I watch Captain Adraxas Ducayne crawl out of my study, backward, with his cock bobbing untouched between his thighs. He’s furious with me.
He needs to be punished for showing the anger so openly on his face.
So I bring the nipple clamps with me to our training session.
We run the gauntlet first. It’s designed so two people can go through the obstacles at the same time—a race of sorts, and it’s immediately obvious that neither Ducayne nor I want to be the loser. He’s powerfully built, a warrior with actual training, while I’ve had to train myself. But I’m lighter, quicker, with better balance. While he’s swinging by his muscled arms across the series of overhead bars, I’m running along the narrow beam nearby. He pulls ahead on the rope climb, but I leap across the series of upright posts faster. In the end we both crash onto the final platform at the same time, sweating and panting.
“A fine course,” he says, breathless. “Do you run it often?”
“Almost every day.”
“And you do weapons training as well? You like knives, I know that much.” He jerks his head in the direction from which we came. I took off my knife-laden corset and thigh sheaths for the run, and they’re lying on the starting platform, where my two watchful bodyguards can keep an eye on them.
“Yes, I like knives,” I say. “But my father has not allowed me to train with weapons in a combat style, against an opponent. I know how to torture with them, how to throw them, how to attack an inanimate dummy, but I’ve never been permitted to train as a warrior.”
“Why not?” He wipes his wrist across his forehead.
“I suspect Vienne convinced him otherwise.” I shrug. “Every time I’ve requested such training, I've been rerouted to archery lessons, rock-climbing lessons, swimming lessons, anything but full combat with weapons. No wrestling or hand-to-hand, either.”
“Perhaps she knows you’d be a more formidable opponent if you learned those skills,” he says.
“Perhaps.”
He grasps the front of his tunic, pulling it away from his sweaty chest. “Permission to remove the shirt, my lady?”
“You may.” I reach into a small pocket of my pants and take out the tiny, jeweled nipple clamps. “I couldn’t help noticing your angry expression when I refused you earlier.”
His mouth tightens, and he glances away. “I’m a Captain, Highness. Not a very good one, perhaps—I never had the same mentality as most of the other soldiers—but I’m used to giving orders. And I’m accustomed to succeeding in my pursuit of women. Being commanded by you, rejected by you—yes, it made me angry.”
“This reality is new for you. I understand. But you can’t treat me as an equal. You must learn to control your expressions and submit to me, at least outwardly. You’re an enemy, a prisoner of war, not a willing courtesan or an idle noble enjoying a leisurely holiday.”
A muscle along his jaw flexes. He still won’t look at me.
“Take off your shirt,” I tell him.
He shucks it off, over his head, and lets it fall.
“Come here.”
He’s only a few steps away, but he comes even closer, looming over me. I can feel the heat of his body, the surge of his breath, the male dominance of him. And for the first time I feel menace, too—a resentful violence seething under the surface. The interaction between us earlier humiliated him. I think he hates me now.
My gaze fixes on the tattoo around his right bicep—moths, thorns, ravens.
He can’t hurt me.
“I think you need a reminder of what you are,” I tell him, in the soft, deadly voice I use for interrogations. “You’ve forgotten it, and that is my fault. I’ve allowed you too much freedom. Let these be a reminder of your new role.”
His stomach sucks in and out with his rapid breath as I lift one of the clamps to his breast. I pinch it open and center it over the bud of his nipple. Then I release, and it squeezes his flesh tight.
