Chapter 49 Antonio #2
I dress quickly, the familiar weight of a shoulder holster and the cold steel of a pistol a comforting ritual.
When I emerge, Grace is running her hands over the fine silk dress covering her.
The navy blue complements her skin and hair, making her look both elegant and strangely innocent.
The dress is too fine, too delicate for such a day.
No doubt she’ll be cold, but I don’t care.
I like her body like this; I like her exposed and pretty for me.
She stands by the bed, her hands clasped in front of her, her eyes downcast. Playing the perfect pet already but I see the subtle set of her jaw, the way her fingers are clenched together so tightly her knuckles are white.
She is terrified. But she is also, I know, looking for a way out.
Let her look. She will soon learn that the outside world holds just as many terrors as I can inflict on her.
“Come,” I say, holding out my hand.
She hesitates for a fraction of a second before she places her cold, small hand in mine.
The private jet’s engines whine down from a scream to a sigh as we roll to a stop on the private airstrip.
The windows are tinted, but I know the landscape outside without looking.
Rural France. The air, when the cabin door hisses open smells of damp earth, distant manure and the crisp, clean scent of money and isolation.
Grace sits opposite me, a pale, silent statue strapped into a plush leather seat. Her hands are clasped in her lap, knuckles white. She hasn’t spoken a word since we left Portugal.
I rise, and she flinches. A tiny, almost imperceptible movement, but I see it. I always see it. It’s a little piece of music to me.
“We’re here,” I say, my voice flat, cutting through the hum of the systems.
I don’t offer a hand. She unbuckles herself and stands on unsteady legs, following me to the door like a condemned man ascending the gallows stairs.
The transition from the controlled, sterile air of the jet to the gusty, open field is abrupt.
A black SUV, matte and menacing, idles a dozen paces away, flanked by four of my men.
They are not the suited, discreet security of my castle.
These are soldiers from my private cadre dressed in tactical gear, faces hard, eyes constantly scanning the tree line, the low-hanging grey clouds. Their assault rifles are not for show.
The drive is short and silent. Grace stares out the window, her breath fogging the glass.
I know she sees the high fences cleverly disguised as overgrown hedgerows.
I know she sees the occasional glint of a camera lens nestled in a birdhouse and I know she sees the men stationed at intervals, their postures rigid, their presence an obscenity against the bucolic backdrop.
Her trembling has returned, a fine vibration I can feel through the leather seat between us.
We pull up to the farmhouse. It’s a picture of rustic neglect; weathered shutters, a sagging roof, ivy choking the stone walls.
It’s a lie. A beautiful, mundane lie.
The security here is even thicker. Men emerge from the shadows of barns, their numbers all wrong for a working farm. There are no animals, no tractors. Only silence and the watchful, armed deadliness of the Brethren.
The car stops. My men exit first, securing the perimeter, their radios crackling with low, terse codes. I watch them move, a conductor watching his orchestra take their positions. This is the prelude.
I look at Grace. A thought, cold and practical, surfaces. I could leave her here. Lock her in this armoured car, have her stay behind and spare her the sight. Spare myself the potential for messy, emotional complications.
But then I reconsider. Fragility can be tempered, and I know fear can be a more effective teacher than kindness.
Perhaps she needs to see this. Perhaps she needs to understand the full weight of the world she has been pulled into, the absolute nature of my control.
Seeing the consequences of defiance, of betrayal, might just be the final key to securing her obedience.
It will shatter any lingering, foolish hopes she might cling to.
I lean back, the picture of repose, watching the farmhouse door like a king on a battlefield, waiting for the deed to be done and victory to be secured.
Grace’s breathing is shallow, quick. She is trying so hard to be quiet, to be still.
I can feel her fear like a physical force, a cold emanation in the warm confines of the car.
The radio on the dash crackles. A voice, stripped of all inflection, says, “Clear. Targets secure. Proceed.”
The performance is over. The main act begins.
I open my door and step out. The air is cooler now as I walk around the car and pull open her door.
She looks up at me, her eyes wide, pools of terrified green.
I don’t speak. I simply reach in, my fingers closing around her slender wrist. Her pulse thunders against my grip like a frantic, captive bird.
I pull her out, her body unwilling, stumbling slightly on the uneven gravel.
She’s barefoot, and I know she can feel those sharp stones digging into the soles of her feet.
“Stay beside me,” I command, my voice low. “Do not speak. Do not stray. Look only where I tell you to look. Do you understand?”
She nods with a quick, jerky motion. Her wrist is clammy in my hand, but I don’t let go. I lead her like a falconer with a new, skittish bird towards the decaying farmhouse.
The exterior is a masterclass in deception. The door, however, is solid steel, reinforced, with a keypad and a retinal scanner. It clicks open with a heavy, hydraulic hiss. The transition is jarring, designed to disorient.
We step inside and the air changes.
It’s filtered and temperature-controlled, carrying the faint, clean scent of antiseptic and lemon polish. The rustic illusion is utterly obliterated.
We stand in a vast, gleaming atrium. The floor is polished concrete, warm from underfloor heating. The walls are stark white and lining the hall, on both sides, are cells. Not dungeons. Not cages. They are sleek, modern enclosures fronted from floor to ceiling with thick, flawless glass.
In each cell is a woman.
Some are curled on pristine white beds, staring at the wall. Some pace the limited space, their movements restless, haunted. One is tied to a bed with soft-looking restraints, her head lolling, sedated.
Another, heavily pregnant stands at the glass, her hands pressed against it. Her eyes are empty of everything but a profound, soul-crushing despair.
They are all beautiful.
They are all alone.
They are all Brethren property.
I feel Grace freeze beside me, her feet rooted to the polished floor. Her trembling intensifies, vibrating up my arm. I hear a small, choked gasp escape her lips.
“Master…” she whispers, her voice barely a breath. “What, what is this place?”
I don’t look at her. My gaze sweeps over the cells, an owner inspecting his stock. It is a satisfying sight. “These women here broke the rules, just like your parents did.”
“So why aren’t they in Oblivion?”
My lips curl. She really doesn’t understand that there is more to us than Oblivion. That that place is the end, the finale. If we sent every naughty Lady there, we’d have none left to continue.
“Their bloodlines are too precious.” I explain, stepping up close to where the pregnant woman is pressed against the glass.
In slow motion I drag my finger down, toying with her the way one does a tiger at the zoo.
“These women here are all technically Founders. Bastard Founders, but Founders all the same. Lords will pay a good price to mix their bloodlines with them.”
“Don’t they have wives they can have children with?” Grace replies.
It’s hard not to laugh at that. Christ, she’s so fucking innocent.
Instead, I tighten my grip on her wrist and pull her forward, forcing her to walk the length of this gallery of beautiful ruin.
Her head is on a swivel, her horror palpable.
She sees the women; she sees the silent, white-coated attendants who move between the cells, noting charts, ignoring the inhabitants.
She sees the utter, dehumanising efficiency of it.
We reach the end of the main hall and pass through another secured door into a commercial-grade kitchen.
Stainless steel gleams under bright lights.
It’s spotless, sterile. A kitchen not for nourishing a family, but for sustaining inventory.
The contrast between the humanity in the cells and the clinical coldness here is not lost on me. It is the point.
There is one more door, heavy and unmarked. A guard opens it, revealing a staircase leading down into a basement. The air grows cooler, carrying a faint, coppery tang that the lemon polish upstairs can’t disguise.
This is where the day’s real business awaits.
The basement is a contrast to the sleek modernity above.
It is raw concrete, utilitarian. Drain set into the floor.
, hosing equipment on the wall. This is a place for messy work and in the centre of the room, on their knees, are three figures.
Bound. Gagged. Their eyes wide with a terror that is both immediate and primal.
Two women, one man. My men stand around them, impassive.
I release Grace’s wrist. She stumbles back a step, wrapping her arms around herself and I leave her there.
I walk forward, my footsteps echoing in the damp space as I stop before the older woman.
She’s old, her afro hair streaked with grey, her face a map of refined living now twisted in fear.
Even like this, dishevelled and terrified, the resemblance is uncanny.
She could be her sister’s twin, Ines’s mother’s mirror image.
Ines’s aunt. The matriarch of the little rebellion.
A slow smirk stretches my lips. It feels good on my face.