The Hated (Sleeping With Monsters Book 3) (3 page)

“Do you know that in eleven days you’ll be my King?” I asked him. I’d taken to addressing him as a person as a way to alleviate my fears. Who was he? What kind of man would he be, once released from stone?

I’d been wondering those questions for months now, ever since the celestitians had chosen him. There were five thousand stone warriors trapped in their chamber far below – how did they know he was mine?

Zoomers the size of urshaks had brought him up from the Zaibann Chamber’s depths and carefully placed him in this room – a room until then whose emptiness I had never questioned, in retrospect. All of the council members were present, along with their families and selected slaves, and there’d been a great feast at the long table set up in the room in front of him. He stood, and I sat beside him, and everyone cheered and chatted and was kind to me – even Railan. I was unused to so many people talking to me all at once, but it was delightful. Everyone was so happy for me, how could I not be happy for myself?

It was only later during the terrible silence after their departure that I could hear myself think enough to have questions – questions that had never been answered since.

At the time, I thought I had to trust in my council. But soon after that I learned about my magic on the floor in this room – and now I was learning to trust in it, too.

Which was why when it brought me into the Zaibann’s chamber I didn’t question it. I stood there, looking up at him as I often had. He would be someone to talk to, to dance with, to sleep by at night. I wondered about so much of him – how he’d act, who he’d be – what it would feel like to be near him. I wondered too if, in his own slow-stone way, he was equally curious about me.

“Are you ready to live again?” I asked. Of course he didn’t answer.

He’d seen us in this room before, playing, practicing – as much as anyone who was stone could – but this time I wanted him to see just me.

I set the screen down but held onto the scepter. This was definitely not why Railan had gifted it but my magic wouldn’t be denied. Not when it was thrumming inside of me like a lilan’s note, long and pure. I lay down on the floor in front of the warrior, and unfastened my dress from the top to the bottom. It fell upon the floor beneath me, showing me to him like an unwrapped present.

He’d seen me naked in front of him before – but I’d never showed him that I was ready to be his Queen. Not like this.

I waved for his attention with the scepter, feeling silly and feeling brave, and then slowly brought the emerald bulb to my lips to feel its chill. Then I rolled it down, rubbing it against my nipples in turns, spinning it so that what was hot became cold, and what was cold became hot. My magic started growing inside my hips, that feeling of aching and longing that needed release.

I brought the gemstone up to my mouth and kissed it, taking it in, sucking on it, until it was warm and wet, and then I pushed it down to my own petals where Beza had rubbed me not long ago. The stone was smooth perfection and as I nudged myself with it my hips began to rock in arcane time. My magic moved inside of me and I moaned at feeling it, listening to the sound of my pleasure echo in the chamber.

I changed my grip on the scepter and pushed it lower, until it was nestled outside my soft place, and with a few smooth strokes I pushed it in. I startled at the cool straightness of the scepter’s shaft, but my magic roiled again, and soon I stroked madly, half-lidded eyes looking up, imagining that it was
him
.

Yes – it was cold – but – I could – my magic -- in my dark place – make it hot – and wake him. I closed my eyes tight and imagined his transformation as I rocked the emerald in and out, seeing him come to life, the color of his stone changing like the mountains at dawn, until he was leaning over me, taking me himself. The vision of it was so real that I didn’t feel the scepter anymore or know it was my own hand, it was him, mounting me, thrusting, and I released with a soft shout, imagining him falling over me, a creature of flesh instead of stone, shouting himself in my ear, suffused with the power of my magic.

My magic curled me up again and again, pulsing through me until I collapsed, exhausted. I kept my eyes closed until it was finished, trying to write the future with my imagination, before I pulled the emerald out of my tightness with a low groan.

“And that’s how I will wake you,” I said, finally looking up. His countenance had not changed in the slightest. “And after that, they will take us off to another palace, where you and I will rule forever and a day, just like all the screens promise.”

I smiled up at him and turned over to fall asleep on the floor under the ever-watchful eyes of my King.

Chapter Two

I woke inside the dream-cradle with a pain in my hip. Its walls were currently pulsing a pleasing shade of purple supposed to, I thought, entice me to stay inside of it longer. But every time I woke up inside of it, I was more tired than when I went in – I rose up and pushed the lid open, finding Joshan waiting right outside.

“To your bed, my Queen?” he suggested.

“Please.” He reached in and swooped me up from the cradle, carrying me across the room to lie atop my bed -- it was massive and had metal posters that rose up like trees with mechanical lilans nestled in all the branches to chime pretty songs. Despite my bed being bigger, the cradle out-massed it somehow, taking up one whole corner of my chamber, conduits snaking out of it in all directions, sinking into the floor and up into the ceiling. The cradle looked like a cocoon which, I supposed, made me its butterfly, only I never felt very pretty upon leaving it. It was right though, to sleep there – I was the Dream Queen, and sleeping in the cradle was how I fed the people of Aranda, with the essence of my dreams.

Except I hadn’t been doing a very good job of it, if Mazaria was starving. I knew the feeding was metaphorical, though the spirit of the land was my spirit – it was yet another reason why I couldn’t leave the palace. Secretly I chafed at the responsibility – and maybe that’s why they were starving? Because I didn’t give as freely of my love as I used to? I hoped not.

Joshan returned to my bedside, with the screen and scepter he’d found beside me in front of the Zaibann. “My Queen, would you like me to stay here?”

I – I didn’t know what I wanted right now. But the pain in my hip persisted – I reached into my robes and found the strange object I’d rescued from the zoomer yesterday. Was it just yesterday? I looked at the pattern the light made on the walls – it was morning now, I’d been in the cradle overnight. Days inside the palace were hard to follow, and I needed to count them now, with Tide’s Day coming – I pulled the object up and out and looked at it.

It looked…like a screen. Like a broken screen, one that only showed one page at a time. It took me a moment to realize what it was, my brain still slowed from the cradle – but I thought I held a book.

I showed it to Joshan. “Have you ever seen anything like this?”

He took it, inspected it, then gave it back. “Never, my Queen.”

Neither had I. But I had read of them before, on screens, ironically. I flipped from page to page, looking to find meaning. I was sure it was covered in words from their placement, but none of them made any sense to me.

“Would you like food, my Queen?” Joshan offered.

“Please,” I said, waving him away.

By the time he returned, I was no nearer understanding it but more certain that it was meant to be understood. No one would have taken so much time to draw so many symbols if they had no meaning – this wasn’t a robe or a rug for mere adornment. Someone had handwritten this book with care, and if it was as old as the vase it’d been found in what kind of stories would it tell?

I wanted to know. I stared at the words, willing them to mean something to me, waiting for something in my mind to shift so that I could decipher them. When that didn’t work I looked around the room for something, anything, that could help me, and Joshan walked in.

My servant set a tray of food on a nearby table and bowed before leaving again.

“Joshan – wait.”

He wheeled on one heel, looking back. “Yes, my Queen?”

“Come here. Please.”

He did as he was told, coming nearer. He was in his robes now, but I knew what he looked like out of them. I knew how strong his arms were when he carried me, and I knew how impossibly gentle he could be with his hands, even though they were twice the size of mine.

“I need your help, Joshan. Lay on my bed with me.”

Without question, he lay beside me. I reached for his hand, bringing it to my lap and pushing it down. Layers of fabric kept him from actually touching me, which was fine – I wanted to access my magic, yes, but I wanted to keep it dulled enough to stretch it long.

“I need you to – yes –“ I said, as he began to rub. Joshan always knew what best to do. And with him touching me at my brightest spot, my legs only open wide enough to let two of his fingers press, I held the book up and stared at it with intent.

My magic didn’t take long to answer him. I could feel it being swirled up with each soft movement he made. I tried to channel it through myself, imagining myself able to read the strange words, summoning visions of light pouring out of my eyes and understanding pouring in.

But nothing happened. I closed my eyes in frustration and let myself move with Joshan instead, my hips rocking their own accord, wanting more than just his subtle touch – and when I opened my eyes again words flickered on the page.

“Stop,” I commanded, pressing my hand on his forearm.

“My Queen,” he said, and waited.

Long moments passed. The magic he’d coaxed up in me held, trembling inside with desire, but the words didn’t change. Had I imagined things?

“Again – but, more slowly.”

He stroked me again, his hand moving beneath mine, rubbing with soft gentle patience. We’d spent hours like this before, over the course of one day, him stoking the fires of my magic only to let the embers cool before stoking them again. It’d been a delicious torture, done as much for pleasure as just to see if we could, how long we could walk down this path together and me still stay Queenly and sane.

I breathed heavy and refocused on the words. “Come to me,” I begged them. “Let my magic make me see.”

My hips rose under Joshan’s hand, my body begging for what my mouth wouldn’t command, and he rubbed me harder but even more slowly. My breath caught and my eyes almost closed, tempted to end this experiment, throw the book across the room and command him to enter me – I knew he was ready, his cock pressed against my thigh – and as if he knew I thought on it, he pulsed his hips against me, one time.

“I want to know,” I told the book and the powers hidden inside me. “I want to see.” My free hand twisted lower to grab at him through the fabric of his robes, and he began to thrust into my hand. “Please,” I begged the book, my slave, my magic. “Please –“ I made the word into a hiss as my magic coiled, ready to spring, and I didn’t have the self-control to order Joshan to stop. “Joshan –“

His hand rubbed me faster, knowing what I needed from frequent practice, and the bed bucked beneath us both as he thrust against me hard. “My Queen,” he whispered, his breath hot in my ear as he answered me.

It was all I could do to hold the book up over us, as my body tensed, the full force of my magic coming on.

“I want to know!” I commanded, and then my magic was upon me. I screamed low to high as it raced through my entire body, emanating out, making me shake uncontrollably in its wake. Joshan still rubbed but his weight was against me, his hips thudding into my hand, his smooth cock stiffening until, with a helpless shout, he relented, following me.

I moaned. Somehow my free hand still held the book up and I looked at it with half-focused eyes, the end of my magic roaring in my ears, as I caught my breath from the force of its passage.

And when I next blinked – or the blink after that – or the blink after that – I could see.

The words on the page didn’t change – but something inside my eyes did, so that I knew what they said. And I read, “The History of Queen Airelle,” as clearly as if it were written on a screen.

“Joshan,” I breathed.

“Yes, my Queen?”

“It worked – it worked!” I sat up in excitement, leaned over to kiss him joyfully, and moments after that I fell back to bed to begin to read.

I was right – it was a book, and I was proud that I had rescued it from the mover. I read through the night and up until dawn as the lilans chimed the passing hours outside.

It told the story of Airelle, a distant-distant Queen. Yzin had never mentioned her in history lessons – and despite the fact that the book purported to be her history, it was easier to believe that it was a convoluted work of fiction, or even a child’s tale, because so much of the story was impossible to believe. She had magic that flowed out of her like fire – she was allowed to leave the palace – she was allowed to lead an army!

There had been no war on Aranda for thousands of years, but fighting seemed to be the only thing Airelle did – there were painstakingly drawn maps on multiple pages that explained where they were fighting, and then other pages explaining why, and how – with weapons I’d never heard of, men mounted on creatures I’d never seen in the Living Hall – the sheer imagination of it as a work was overwhelming.

Each battle was presented without comment, as though it happened every day, all the time. In fact, it seemed like the historian had gone out of his way to make such fascinating subjects dull – which, oddly, made it feel less like fiction as the story unfurled.

A pearl rolled in as I blinked dry eyes and looked up to see Joshan waiting hopefully. I rolled it back to him directly. “Play freely with one another, but leave me be.”

He nodded at this, and set off to find Beza. Soon I heard the sound of their pleasure from not far away – it made me ache, but my curiosity to finish the strange story I was reading was stronger.

The fighting inside the book became more fierce. A distant country – Rix -- joined the war from across the ocean, carrying weapons of metal that no one else could understand. The only thing that seemed to work against them was magic – but magic was in short supply. Airelle couldn’t be on all borders, fighting all battles at once. She was exhausting herself, when her advisors came up with a desperate plan to close Aranda’s borders with a shield from shore to shore. If they could manage that, they thought they would have a chance for their own technology to catch up to match the Rixans.