Chapter 1 #2
Her lavender outfit was now red in the front, drenched and darkened with blood, chunks of flesh sticking to both her skin and the fabric. Her face was also splattered crimson, and Emmy’s breath caught, but from respect, not horror.
She appreciated the fact Kendra hadn’t worn black to hide the mess. She was glorying in it, showing it off, rather than trying to obscure it. This is what I do to those who harm us. This is who and what I am.
“She’s a beauty, isn’t she?” Zander asked, walking back onto the stage with a different whip in his hand. “A master at her work. Let’s get a round of applause for Kendra before I finish this portion of our criminals’ punishment.”
Emmy let go of Felix’s hand to clap as hard and fast as she’d ever clapped for a performance, her palms stinging with the force of it. She noted some other of the flock did so as well, but many gave a half-hearted round of applause. The vampires and others in the audience were just as mixed.
“It’s perfectly normal to rename slaves, and I find I want to do so with our Slavic slaves. Ironic, isn’t it? Those of us who’ve lived long enough know the word slave comes from the fact the Slavs were the ones being enslaved, millennia ago. And so, I will rename them…”
He paused and walked so he could see their faces, standing between them. The silence stretched, anticipation building.
“Svetlana is now Serva — fit for nothing but service. Vladislav is now Vassal — also completely fitting to his new station.”
The crowd murmured, the names a fresh lash, their Slavic heritage twisted into chains. Emmy felt the weight of it and approved: the erasure of identity, the reduction to function. Serva. Vassal. Not people anymore. Just slaves. Things.
Zander walked back around, still facing the crowd. “Apologies, but I want to hear Serva’s screams while I finish shredding her back. I won’t turn them back on until I’m ready to get started, though.”
Emmy’s pulse quickened in anticipation. She hadn’t been able to fully enjoy Alistair’s whipping because she hadn’t thought the punishment fit the crime, but this?
She’d nursed her friends back to health twice, and then she, personally, could have fucking died.
She’d been so sick, she’d thought death would be a release from the pain.
So yes, the motherfuckers deserved everything Zander and Kendra were doing, and more.
Zander had been holding the whip rolled up, and he grasped the handle and let it unfurl, drawing another gasp from the crowd when its full length settled around him — eight feet long with multiple silver barbs braided into the thick weight of it.
It looked deadly, vicious, a sinuous length of intent snaking across the stage like a living being, as though it’d been given purpose rather than shape, brought to life specifically to dole out punishment and pain.
And these were obviously pure silver, based on the way they caught the light, gleaming like stars against the dark leather. Emmy was surprised Zander had held the coiled whip in his hands the way he had.
He stood behind Serva first, and Emmy appreciated the name change for the woman who’d been behind making her so sick, who’d have killed her without a thought. Without hesitation. Without mercy.
And now Zander was punishing her without mercy. It was fitting.
Zander handled the whip skillfully, and she glanced at Spence near the side of the stage, standing tall, watching with an expression that showed respect without emotion.
She looked back to Zander, each strike a deliberate arc, the silver searing into Serva’s ruined back, her screams once again filling the room, and Emmy agreed he’d been right to turn them back on for this.
Vladislav roared through his screams as before, the twelve lashes digging deep, the silver etching the damage permanently into his back.
When the last fell, the theater held its breath, the message clear: hurt Zander’s protected, and this is your fate.
Pillories were brought onto the stage, and while they were set up, Zander forced dental gags into the vampires’ mouths and cranked them all the way open.
Zander stood and supervised while attendants moved the vampires onto the pillories, and then he announced, “Paying guests may use any hole for the next five hours, fifteen minutes at a time before you must get in line again.”
He looked into the audience, met Emmy’s gaze for a few seconds, and then scanned the audience again.
“For the six hours after that, anyone in the silo — and that includes security personnel who aren’t on shift, kitchen staff, maids, flock — anyone may fuck whatever hole you wish, as many times as you wish. ”
Spence hadn’t told Emmy that part. Had he known about it?
She watched as a vampire walked onto the stage, released his dress pants enough to free his cock without showing his own ass, and plunged it into Vassal’s asshole. The vampire bellowed, but the man didn’t slow.
Someone did the same with Serva, though Emmy couldn’t be certain which hole they were in. Others fucked their mouths, and four lines formed.
When the time came, later in the day, she wanted to strap a dildo on and fuck them, too. In a perfect world, she’d be able to use a troll dildo and destroy all their holes, but that wouldn’t be fair to those in line behind her.
Unless Zander might let her go last.
While the freshly branded and broken slaves were fucked for the first time as helpless chattel, Emmy watched without flinching, and she let the grunts, the wet slaps, the choked gasps around cocks buried in throats — she let the sounds of degradation settle into her like data points.
These two deserved worse than death, and she approved of Zander’s decisions.
His goal was to make an example, to show what happens when someone hurts people under his protection, and to do so in a way that people would speak of in hushed tones for centuries.
And he’d executed it with ruthless elegance, ensuring the story would serve as a macabre warning long after the screams had faded.
Zander stepped to the front of the stage and said, “If you’re a vampire oathed to me, you’ve noted more power coming to you. I’m sharing what I’m getting through the slave drains.”
He glanced at Emmy, and she had the idea he was meeting the gaze of most on the dais. “When I’ve taken in their assets, a portion will be distributed to the flock members made sick by their actions.”
He looked back to the audience as a whole. “Anyone else who was harmed, financially or otherwise, should get with Spence, who will send you a link to a form you can fill out. Those who wish to stay may do so, those who wish to leave are hereby dismissed.”
Felix kissed her cheek and was gone. Toby looked at her, considering, and said, “Part of me wants to stay and watch, but mostly, I think I’ve seen enough.”
“Are you going to fuck them?”
He tilted his head. “No. Are you considering it?”
She laughed. “Never had to consider it. I knew right away I would. I mean, what better closure can I get than literally fucking the people who made me sick?”