Читать книгу Barbarian Brides - Cecily Royce - Страница 5

Linira was so shocked she just stood still next to the table, but apparently Casi didn't feel the same. Linira heard Casi make a sound of ridicule, and then the other woman spoke.

"Chickens my ass," Casi stated, taking one definite step toward the two men. She didn't seem the least bit scared of them.

"Turn around and go back wherever you came from, or a fuss is the least you'll have to worry about. In case you were wondering, that means we two can protect ourselves," Casi said. She folded her arms across her chest, her eyes squinting tight and sharp.

"It appears we must prove that that contention is not so," the same man said, both of them still grinning. "We will take care to do you no true harm, little chicken, yet shall we take you with us."

And then the first man headed for Casi as the second began to move in Linira's direction. There had been times in her life when Linira had hesitated before acting, unsure whether or not she was doing right, but just like the last time this kind of thing had happened there was no hesitation inside her at all. Almost without thinking she picked up her nearly-empty mug and threw it, hitting the man coming toward her right in the temple. He dropped like a stone, of course, letting Linira look around to see Casi use two kicks on the other man, both of which sent him down to the floor to lie unconscious like his friend.

"Not bad for a couple of chickens," Casi said with a small laugh as she turned toward Linira. "I'm tempted to claim that that throw of yours was an accident, but something tells me it wasn't."

Linira felt so terrible that she groped her way to the chair she'd been using and dropped into it. She'd done it again, just as she had the last time, and that brought back everything Ricord had said.

"What's wrong?" Casi asked as Linira sat with one hand over her eyes. "Linira, tell me what's making you look as if you did something awful."

"It wasn't awful, it was unforgivable," Linira blurted, finding very little comfort in the dark behind her hand. "I'm a freak, just like Ricord said, and no one in his right mind could ever love a freak."

"Is that what that asshole said to you?" Casi demanded, her tone completely outraged. "Linira, don't you know that no one takes an asshole seriously? Come on, tell me what happened to make the asshole say something like that."

"I—it was the last time I saw him," Linira found herself saying, the words suddenly pouring out. "I'd met him at the restaurant where we usually had lunch together, and halfway through the meal a crazy man came running out of the kitchen. The crazy man was screaming as he ran, and he held a gigantic knife in his hand. Ricord and I jumped to our feet, just like almost everyone else in the restaurant, and Ricord was so pale I thought he would pass out. I was just as terrified, and that's why I didn't stop to think before grabbing a heavy glass candle holder from the table and throwing it. I never miss when I throw things, and the crazy man was knocked out."

"So that's it," Casi said with satisfaction, and Linira realized she'd dropped her hand and was now looking up at the other woman. "The asshole was frozen in terror, and when he finally came out of the funk, he had to blame someone for his lack. He hated you for being more of a man than he is, so he said something meant to shatter you. Are you going to let the lies of an asshole ruin your life, or can you make yourself understand the truth? You are not a freak, you're just not a victim like the asshole. You're a competent human being, while he isn't."

Linira stared up at Casi, noticing how certain the other woman looked. Could it be possible that what she'd just said was true?

"But… If I'm not a freak, why do I feel like one?" she finally got out. "No one else I know can throw things the way I do, so doesn't that mean—"

"No," Casi stated, interrupting flatly. "You're not a freak, you're someone with a talent, like singing or writing or dancing. And the only reason you feel like a freak is because you were silly enough to believe an asshole. Are you going to keep on being silly, or will you take my word about how lucky you are to have a very special gift?"

Linira shook her head just a little, not refusing Casi but trying to get her thoughts straight. It was hard to go from considering yourself a freak to seeing yourself as someone with a gift, but…

"I'm going to try taking your word for it," Linira finally said with something of a smile. "I can't promise I'll succeed, but I'm definitely going to try."

"There are fools who refuse to accept the idea of trying, but I'm not one of them," Casi answered with a much better smile than Linira's. "When you're willing to try, more often than not, you succeed. And now I'm going to call resort security to come for those two sleeping beauties before they wake up. I don't know where they came from, but I'm damned well going to find out."

Linira felt a jolt that she'd forgotten all about the two men, and she glanced at them as Casi headed for the phone. But then her attention returned to Casi, because the woman had paused in the middle of reaching for the phone. It wasn't clear why Casi had done that, and then Linira's heart began to race. Casi was folding silently to the floor, looking as if she were passing out, and then Linira noticed a sweet scent that first made her dizzy before the dark came and encompassed her.

Casi felt as if she were floating, but floating in what, she had no idea. She had only a vague awareness of floating. Her body was so far away she had no control of any part of it, and that left nothing but a floating mind. Then she became aware of a voice, a male voice, speaking so softly that she could only just make out the words. It sounded far and distant but she knew without a doubt that it was real.

"I don't understand this," the voice said. "I know this is the last time we'll be selling females to the savages, so we took five instead of the usual two. But it was supposed to be five of those obnoxious females, not just three along with two innocents. This isn't right."

"I agree with you," a second male voice said, speaking just as softly as the first. "As long as it was nothing but obnoxious females we took, I didn't mind being involved. These two aren't the same, but I don't know what we can do to change things. They're already here."

"We can't do anything right now, but later will be a different story," the first whispering voice replied. "At some point in their training we'll have a chance to get them away and back to where they belong. If you won't help, I'll just have to do it myself."

"No, I won't refuse to help," the second voice whispered its own assurance. "We'll have to treat them just the way the others are treated, but when the time comes we'll do the right thing."

"Agreed," the first voice said, and then there was silence. Casi tried to think about what she'd heard, but thinking was too much trouble. She drifted back into a dreamless slumber.

Eventually, with time, the fog over her mind started to thin, and then awareness of her body returned. She was lying on something soft, but there was also something odd about the feeling. Not until her eyes blinked open and movement became possible again was she able to figure out what the oddness was, and then the answer became perfectly clear.

Whatever she was lying on, she was doing it stark naked.

That bit of knowledge gave Casi a very good reason to move around, so in another minute she was propped up on one arm and looking around. Rather than seeing the room she last remembered being in, she saw what seemed to be a very large tent. It was the kind most often called a pavilion, and there was nothing in the way of furniture in the place, although the entire floor was carpeted. In two places, hangings concealed whatever was behind them, but in another two places—opposite one another—the sides of the pavilion were raised to let in air and sunlight.

And arranged around the pavilion, in a large circle, were five wide… pallets, she thought they were called. Four other women, one of them Linira, lay on the pallets just as Casi now half sat on her own, and all of them were only just beginning to move around. The others were just as naked as Casi, and it looked like they would be finding out about that fact soon too.

The view through the open sides of the pavilion wasn't in the least encouraging. There was nothing but sand to be seen in both directions, which had to mean they were a good distance from the resort. It wasn't even possible to figure out in which direction the resort lay, but that was a problem to be tackled once she and Linira and the other women were out of this pavilion. Perhaps there was a hill she could climb, or a tree, to see the landscape and discover where to go. Since no one else was around, now was the perfect time to try and escape.

Casi frowned as she continued to sit where she was. Her intention had been to get to her feet and go over to Linira, but for some reason her body wasn't cooperating. She had no idea why that would be—until she noticed the thin bands around her wrists and ankles. The bands were restraints usually used by police to control prisoners, but now a different kind of prisoner was being controlled. She had done nothing to warrant this type of behavior. What was going on? Why had she been taken?

"Damn," she muttered, knowing that with the restraints closed on a prisoner, even being unconscious didn't keep that prisoner from having to obey any orders that were given. The bands acted like a set of memories connected to your nervous system, making sure you did nothing your captors would disapprove of. Casi was able to shift into a cross-legged seated position, but that was as far as she could go.

While waiting for the other women to wake up, she thought about the short conversation she'd overheard. Two men had decided to save her and Linira, but not until she and Linira had been trained to a certain extent. What did that mean? The men had been speaking too softly for their voices to be recognizable, and something told her the two would not be the only men around. Figuring out which ones the two were might be impossible, at least until they came to free her and Linira. But there was something strange about this whole setup that she couldn't quite put her finger on.

"What the hell is this?" a female voice demanded, her tone strident and blurry. "I'm gonna have somebody's head, you just wait and see if I don't!" Her tongue was sharp but her words weren't nearly as tough sounding as she intended.

Casi looked over to where the voice had come from, seeing the member of the rowdy group she'd had words with in the dining room about the loud music. The girl sat on her pallet almost the same way Casi did, and her two friends were up and looking around just as she was doing. Linira was also awake and sitting, but with her legs together and bent to the right as she tried to cover herself with her arms and looked in Casi's direction.

"We've been taken prisoner by someone," Casi said to Linira with a sigh. "But let's not panic until we find out what's going on. It could be a joke or something." She didn't feel as though it were a joke, but there was no reason to startle or scare anyone.

"Even if it is a joke, I'm not laughing," the brat who'd spoken earlier snarled, giving Linira no chance to answer. "My father will cut the balls off whoever is involved in this, and I'll laugh while I watch. Now, I want my clothes back and a way out of here!"

The girl's last demand had been screamed at the top of her lungs, the kind of spoiled-brat tantrum a child would throw, and then her friends got in on the act. They began to chant, "We want out! We want out!" and the first girl joined their chant with vengeful enthusiasm. Linira looked questioningly at Casi, but she just shook her head. Casi wasn't sure of much, but she knew with dead certainty that joining whatever the troublesome group did would not be a good idea.

And a couple of minutes later that conviction proved itself correct. A big man with dark hair and eyes came through one of the curtains, followed by four other men. All five were dressed in slacks and shirts and comfortable shoes, and not one of them seemed amused by the continuing chanting. They all appeared to be only a little older than the women they'd taken captive, which Casi found to be distantly odd. None of them looked the least bit barbarian, like the men who had attacked them in the resort.

"All right, that's enough," the man in the lead said mildly. The noise stopped immediately, even though it was perfectly clear to Casi that the girls hadn't stopped their noise voluntarily. The restraints the girls wore were doing their job, which made the girls furious and outraged.

"That kind of behavior won't be tolerated," the man in the lead said to the girls, his voice just as mild as it had been. "Now that you're all awake, you can be told what your new situation is, and my advice would be to adapt to the changes as quickly as possible. Refusal and misbehavior will be punished, and that goes for all of you."

The man turned his head to include Casi and Linira in what had been said, then he returned most of his attention to the three obnoxious girls.

"What's happening is perfectly simple," he went on. "You young ladies will become the wives or the slaves of some of the savages of this world. Which position you qualify for will depend on how you respond to the training you'll be given. No one knows that we've captured you, so no one will come looking for you. If anyone tries to check on your whereabouts, they'll discover that you left our home planet, Cosimia, and then disappeared. Other young ladies have been paid to pretend to be you, and since they know nothing about your actual fate, even if one of them is caught, she can't tell anyone anything that would help you."

Linira looked at Casi with wide-eyed alarm, but Casi just shook her head again. Taking everything they were told as gospel would be stupid, but arguing would probably be worse than a waste of time.

"I refuse to be anyone's wife, and I sure as hell won't be a slave," the first girl stated, staring straight at the big man. "My father won't ever give up looking for me, and when he finds me, you and your buddies are dead. Be smart and let me and my friends go right now, and maybe we won't press charges."

The two other pack members added their agreement to what the first had said, all of them just as brash as they'd been at the resort. They knew nothing bad would ever happen to them, and if something bad did happen then their parents would certainly get them out of it. They showed not a hint of fear.

"You've been all but ruined for normal life, haven't you?" the man responded quietly, looking at the three girls. "You expect to get your own way forever, meaning you've never grown up beyond the age of four or five. I'd say it's a lucky thing we took you, otherwise your lives would end up being very lonely ones. Well, the savages won't let you be lonely, especially once you're properly trained. Let's start the training with you."

The girl he pointed to was the one who had done most of the talking. She was a blue-eyed blonde like Linira and quite beautiful, but her attitude turned the beauty into something close to ugliness. When the man pointed to her she shook her hair back in what looked to Casi like a practiced gesture, then she showed a nasty smile.

"Go screw yourself," she pronounced clearly. "Not only do I not take orders from members of the common herd, I don't even see them."

And with that she deliberately looked away from the man and toward her friends, the two other girls snickering at their leader's behavior. They all thought that what the girl had said and done was clever, but a moment later they were taught better.

"Get to your feet and walk over to stand in front of me," the man barked out to the girls, the words a clear order. Casi could see that the girl expected to be able to ignore him, and the horde member was more outraged than shocked when she began to obey. She was also furiously confused, and when she stopped to stand in front of the man he smiled faintly.

"Those bands you're wearing are an aid to proper behavior," he explained to the angry girl. "By the time we're finished with you the bands won't be needed, but right now they are. We'll start by giving all of you names, but not ones that will interfere with the ones you'll eventually be given by the savages. Who you were before no longer matters. Forget that life."

He then turned and pointed to Casi as he said, "One," then he designated Linira as, "Two." The next horde girls were named Three and Four, and the girl standing in front of him became Five.

"If you forget the name you were given or fail to respond to it, you'll be punished," the man concluded. "Now, Five, get on your knees in front of me."

"My name isn't Five!" the blonde girl snarled, her fists clenched as she glared up at the man. "My name is Five."

It took a moment for the girl to realize what she'd said, and then she became furious.

"I gave you an order and you failed to obey," the man observed, still calm and unruffled. "It's time you learned what kind of punishment you've earned. Turn to your right and bend over with your hands on your knees."

As the girl turned in the direction Casi was sitting and bent over, it was perfectly obvious that another buried order had been found. The girl was even angrier now, but the man she stood near wasn't paying attention to her anger. Instead he was taking what looked like a thin branch from one of the other men, and when he had the branch, he used it to strike the girl across her seat. The girl gasped as her eyes widened in shock, but she didn't scream, and she certainly didn't straighten up again.

"All of us who train you will be carrying switches like this one," the man said as the girl he'd struck bounced a little where she stood. "If you do something wrong you'll be given a single taste of the switch. If you disobey, you get three strokes. If you do something that's completely unacceptable, you'll find five strokes going across your pretty bottoms even if you were given other strokes earlier. From time to time one of us may use a hand rather than the switch, but don't expect that to be any easier to take."

The next stroke of the switch across Five's bottom made her gasp again and widen her eyes even more, and after a short delay she was given a third stroke. That one made her bounce harder where she stood, even more shock to be seen in her light eyes.

"You can straighten up now," the man told her, making no effort to give the switch back to the man he'd gotten it from. "As you can probably tell, you aren't being allowed to rub at the ache in your bottom. That's part of the punishment, of course, the punishment for disobeying. Go to your knees in front of me."

The girl called Five looked up at him and the switch he still held, her expression telling Casi that she was still angry but now worry was crowding in. The girl wasn't so far out of touch with reality that she didn't know she would be switched again if she disobeyed again, a punishment she wasn't likely to have ever experienced before. She didn't want to do what she'd been ordered to, but if she refused it would be far worse for her.

Just as the man seemed about to say something, the girl went to her knees. She moved rather carefully, but she did kneel before she was ordered to bend over again. Casi found the situation intriguing in a weird way. They'd been conditioned to bend over when told to, but not to kneel. It took a moment, but then Casi thought she understood. They wanted certain actions to be trained into their captives rather than programmed, and the aim of the training could well provide a clue about the ultimate aim of these men. Was this a game to them? Did they intend to sell the girls to the savages as they claimed? She could not trust anything spoken by the men. After all, they had kidnapped them and were holding them against their will.

"Very good, Five," the man said, clear approval in his voice. "Keep your head down just the way it is right now, and lean back on your heels. You don't have to come in contact with your heels, not when that would be rather painful right now, but I do want you leaning back."

The girl shifted around on the carpeting Casi had only noticed in passing earlier, and then she settled back between her heels rather than against them. It wasn't possible for Casi to see the girl's bottom, but the chances were good that the three strokes of the switch were clearly marked on her flesh. She didn't wish to experience the same form of punishment, though the thought did elicit a response as a warmth trickled through her body. Casi did not dare admit such glee to anyone, not even herself.

"If one of us calls to one of you girls, that girl is to take this position at the man's feet," the man said to all of them. "Your hands are to be put flat on your thighs and not moved until or unless you're told otherwise, and your head is to be kept modestly down. If you have to address one of us, you'll call us 'Master.' But you won't say even a single word unless you're answering a question or acknowledging an order. You'll be given a short while each evening to speak to one another, but that privilege will be revoked if it produces unacceptable behavior. All right, Five, get back to your feet."

The kneeling girl stood up carefully, then followed when the man gestured her after him. She looked sullen and very unhappy, but she still limped after him to the hanging he walked to, then through the hanging. When the two had disappeared, one of the other men stepped forward. He held a switch very visibly in his hand, he and the others no longer hiding the things as they'd done at first.

Great, Casi thought. The show does go on.