NOVEL WEB Chapter 4: In Which Master And I Hold Hands For The First Time, And Also The Decisions Of The Past Return To Haunt Us
It was morning, and I had just put my clothes on. Master had watched me the entire time with a languid smile, which didn’t make me exactly more comfortable when doing it, but given that she clicked her tongue at me when I tried to hide my body, I did my best not to actually cover myself up… although I did at least try to stand at an angle that would be less revealing, since I doubt she’d figure that out just from the how I stood.
“Probably not, but you do remember I can hear your thoughts, right?” Fuck.
“Sorry, Master….” I turned to face her, and did my very best not to hide myself as I dressed. It was colder than yesterday, so I pulled on my black stockings, hooked them up to my garter belt, and pulled on a long, black and white dress that reminded me a little of the maid aesthetic. The skirt was split in the back to allow for a tail to poke out. Most clothing for animalfolk didn’t have any particular focus on being super private on how they let the tails out, rather, if anything, some flaunted it… I tried not to think about that….
Well, I reminded myself so as to refocus on something else, the maid aesthetic wasn’t an aesthetic here… maids weren’t a thing here, really, you had slaves, which could be told by their collars, and maybe personal guards for the very rich and paranoid, who would perform cleaning duties in addition to their other tasks– slaves were less trustworthy than wellpaid and respected people, it was generally agreed, just most people couldn’t reasonably afford the cost difference.
“That’s quite a tangent. Trying not to focus on the fact that you’re putting on a little show for me?”
“...um, wasn’t trying to in particular, Master, my mind just tends to wander, so….”
She smiled lazily. “I noticed… as I noticed your arousal.” She slowly sat up, stretched her arms over her head. “Much as I’d like to lie around and use my cute toy all day, I do have some business to get to, though.”
“So... I should just stay here all day?” I probably shouldn’t wander around right after yesterday, but I was still a little disappointed.
She pondered that for a moment, looking me over. “You can come if you promise to be perfectly, and I mean perfectly, obedient during it.”
...this was almost certainly a trap where she’d end up pinning me against a wall and fucking me… but I nodded anyway. It's not like any of my choices would stop her from doing whatever she wanted with me, so at least I could get a nice walk.
She smiled at me, and my tail started to wag a little. “Good girl. Today we’re going to take a carriage to meet an old acquaintance of ours.”
“Hold my hand.“
I hesitated for a moment, but it seemed silly to hesitate… maybe it was something that was needed for the spell to work. I reached out and took Master’s hand, and she lead me towards the tower, and we walked right past the two guards who were standing watching there, with them not seeming to even notice us– rather, they were quietly describing little details of the changing scenery to each other with a bit of bravado, as if it were a contest between the two. I tilted my head, a bit confused, but we kept on moving on.
“I guess you wouldn’t be used to it. It’s a game played by guards, the point is to see more things than your opponent. Most who can afford guards approve of it, or at least tolerate it, because it helps one practice alertnes and heightens a guard’s focus on their surroundings. It does take up a bit of your focus to play it for a while, though, which makes you become tired more quickly, and, as a bonus for us specifically, makes you weaker against mind magic. Not everyone’s minds find it quite as easy to surrender to magic as my pet’s.” I glared up at Master. She smiled, not looking at me, instead peering up the spiral staircase ahead of us.
“If your mind magic can’t fully overpower him, l don’t see the point of asking Count Rushen anything, Master– why would he talk to you after you ruined him?”
She smiled mysteriously and ruffled my hair. “Why indeed?”
Soon enough, we came to his cell, about midway up the tower, with no guard in front of it. It was isolated from the other cells, as were all cells in the Tower of Loneliness– the whole place seemed like constant solitary, this definitely would’ve counted as some sort of war crime or abuse in my world.
Count Rushen stood looking out of a small grated window in the cell, murmuring words softly to himself… I wondered if he had gone a little mad already, or if he was playing the same game as the guards outside in an attempt to keep his mind sharp.
Master started to pull her hand away, and I let go of her reluctantly, not feeling quite at ease in this place… at least it wasn’t very dirty? She bowed to Count Rushen.
“Your lordship.” There was genuine regret in her voice.
“You dare mention ‘Lordship’? From the one who stripped me of it?” Count Rushen– well, just plain old Antony Rushen now… Tony Rushen? Maybe that was too informal…
Antony turned around, and didn’t even look at me… I didn’t know if Master’s magic was keeping his eyes off me, or if I just didn’t count as significant in his eyes, being a slave and all. His once perfectly trimmed beard was now a little more unkempt, and his clothes were closer to a high servant’s than that of a noble’s.
Master placed a hand on her broad chest, and I was reminded I used to be inside that body. “I… was foolish. I don’t approve of what you did, but I didn’t expect your entire family to be expelled. From what I can tell, that’s not exactly the normal punishment for your level of corruption, either.”
Antony nodded once. “It’s just the slightest little bit unusual, yes.” His voice was acidic.
“So… I figure an enemy of your family must have orchestrated this…?” Master’s voice sounded a little confused and uncertain.
“It stands to reason.” He was sounding increasingly impatient.
“Sorry, your Lordship… Er, that is… well, I’m just sorry.” Master looked down at his hands, examining them for a moment, and I blinked as I realized this was something I did… not that I had done it recently, as that always reminded me of my hands being different, and also my breasts… not that this body was the worse, it was just… I realized I was getting distracted from the conversation at hand.
“Noted. Is there anything else you would like to add?”
“Well… I thought if I could find someone in another prominent family that had done the same level of corruption, prove it, and another, maybe the Rushen family would be reinstated…?”
“Yes… perhaps….” Antony looked out the window for a long moment. This is the same man who had had Master… no, not the current Master, nor me, precisely… had had this body kidnapped, at one point. This was why I had been so focused on exposing his corruption, but I turned up more dirt than I thought. Perhaps I shouldn’t have turned it over to the crown.
“It’s a solid plan”, he said after a while, but there was little hope in his voice. “I’ll tell you the two families that have some interesting little goings-on. Are you going to be able to remember this?”
“I’m not the best at memorizing long lists of details, that’s why I brought Sasha– she’s good at memorizing!”
Antony’s flickered over to me for a moment, but while there was a flicker of recognition, now that he noticed me, there was no emotion there– I was simply a tool to him, and he had no love or hatred of tools. “I see.”
He started to chant off an array of details of various laws and corruption scandals, in the softly-rhyming way that was used to memorize details in this world orally… books weren’t quite so ubiquitous in this world.
I nodded my head slightly in time to his rhythm as I had seen Master do when she was memorizing, but it was mostly in one ear and out the other, since I was missing both all the cultural references and laws he was citing.
Meanwhile Master watched with a slightly confused expression on her face, her head moving slightly in time to his rhythm despite her efforts to hold back– this sort of memorization was engraved in her, and here she was memorizing it.
Soon enough, though, the chant came to an end, and Antony raised an eyebrow.
“Are we finished?”
“Uh… yeah, sorry again about everything… I didn’t intend for things to go this far….”
“What’s done is done.”
“Is there anything else I can do for you?”
“You can slit your throat.” There was no malice in Antony’s voice.
“Well, that’s a little….” Master opened her mouth, paused, and then closed it, shifted her position a bit, looking particularly uncomfortable. I… I didn’t look that foolish when I messed up... did I?
Antony turned away regally, and looked back out the window without further comment.
Master looked down at me with a slight smile, and took my hand as we walked down the stairs, past the guards standing there and playing their little game, and back down the street, back to the carriage she had rented.
Once we were inside the carriage, she tilted her head to one side. “Do you understand what happened there?”
“Um… you got information so you could get the Ruthen family reinstated?”
“No, that royalty would reinstate them is, essentially, unthinkable. I floated that plan because I thought Count Ruthen would believe I believed it. Count Ruthen’s actual plan is to set me against his old enemies. He’s the sort of man who would set a ship on fire if he was dying on it.”
I stared at Master for a long moment. “So… why are you doing that?”
“Corruption matters little to me, in the greater scheme of things, but they’re either going to follow or not follow precedent with every following noble family. If they follow precedent, we get rid of a vast swathe of the current nobility, leaving a massive power vacuum. If they don’t, or better yet, only do for some, it will make the nobles paranoid. Either way, it will lead towards the sort of chaos that can turn into a nice war.”
“...isn’t war a bad thing, Master?”
“Undoubtedly, but it is one of the very best things for producing change. Maybe if we’re lucky, I can just pull off a coup.”
“You’re going to hurt a lot of people….”
Master shrugged and reached over to ruffle my hair. “A lot of people are hurt every day, cutie.”
“...yeah but… I don’t like you being a part of it….”
Master stared at me uncomprehendingly. “You used to hurt people every day."
“Yeah, but those were bad people, and…” I faltered. I certainly didn’t know how to explain normal morality to Master, and after a moment, I shook my head and switched topics. “...so, like, what was royalty’s goal in taking down the entire Ruthen family? Even if they were manipulated, they must have something they’re thinking of doing… otherwise why do something so potentially destabilizing?” Master blinked a few times, then smiled down at me with the sort of pride you’d have in your pet dog for figuring out a trick. Maybe she hadn’t even thought of that, and was trying to cover it up…?
At that thought, she laughed. “No, no, it’s just… that’s a good point, Sasha… I didn’t think you’d think of that.” She scritched behind my ears with both hands, and it felt really good and made it hard to think further. “But the answer, sadly, is that I don’t know the true answer to that question yet. Maybe I’ll find out in the process, but it’s more important that I have a good excuse to investigate everyone for corruption and call up a storm across this land.”
It was my turn to blink a few times. “...Like, literally...?”
“...no, that’s called a metaphor, pet. See, rather than the literal meaning–” I growled, cutting Master off.
“I know what a metaphor is!”
She smiled in response, and pulled me into her lap.
During the entire ride back, she was teasing me, both with her words and her hands, and so when she led me back towards our room at the tavern at a languid place, I was already wet. It’s not like I could resist her, so I might as well enjoy it, right…?
She took my shoulder and pinned me against the wall as she kissed me deeply, not caring if anyone else was in the hall to see, and I moaned into the kiss, only the fact that we were outside stopping me from touching myself as her tongue explored my mouth.
She pulled out her key and put it into the door, the door moved slightly open with a creak, and she suddenly pulled back, glancing around, and then looking over at the door. My eyes followed hers, and she pointed with her hand to the handle.
I realized there was a hole in the wood to the side of the door, splinters of woods on the ground, and the lock mechanism was still firmly in place– someone had broken into our room by physically forcing the door open, and the weakest part – apparently the flimsy frame, here – had cracked.
She waved her hand at me, and I stepped back, and she opened the door to our room, closed it, and started cursing under her breath. She shook her head, took my hand, opened the door, and stepped in. On the floor, with a cloak lying underneath her, was the tiger-girl I had seen getting beaten up earlier, curled up, with her tail around her. Up a bit closer now, and not hyperfocused on her aggressor, it was easier to see all her scars… and with all the bruises and wounds she had on her body, she seemed to be only adding to her collection.
“So this is the one you ‘rescued’? This is why you should never be nice to cats.” She shook her head. “So much for that incident remaining low-profile.”
I blinked a couple of times. “Why do you say that?”
“This woman was once one of the most infamous gladiators of all time– Valenz the Coward.”