Chapter 11
At the end of eight days, Sasha lay in a strange bed in a strange room, looking up at a ceiling with rococo plaster patterns curling over it from end to end.
Her body felt like Maura had tied her to the floor and commanded every member of their home walk over her while wearing metal boots. She hurt everywhere, but her mind felt clear for the first time in forever and waves of clenching agony no longer assaulted her.
Sasha knew this was a pain of recovery.
Sharing a mattress, Lanny and Lilla were still asleep, the three-minutes-younger Lilla snoring into her sister's ear.
A warm gratitude for their presence made her heart glow. She felt like they had helped her stay alive through the cycle, forcing her to eat and drink, pulling her back more than once from the edge of crazy.
And Kane, who had been there with his voice, his purr, and his body. She felt her face redden at the vague images of a beautiful, shirtless Kane in her bed.
What had she done?
A niggling embarrassment twitched around the edges of her consciousness. She sorted through thoughts and memories, trying to understand what had happened the day her heat started on the way to the doctor's office. The Warlord Alpha's presence took center stage in each recollection.
He had purred for her. He had killed for her. He was firstborn son and heir to the king.
He had called her father, the person she’d most loved, a slave owner.
Why had she come here?
With a long, self-indulgent groan, she rolled out of the bed. Her muscles ached and her legs wobbled, unbalanced. She really needed to pee.
Sasha took one noodly step from the bed and fell like a stuffy without stuffing, straight to the floor.
"Sasha!" Lilla cried, climbing over her sister, who woke with a yelp and a knee to her belly.
Sasha held up her hand to stop her friend. Her head felt too big to lift. "Nope. Don't get up. I'm fine. I can do this."
Lilla giggled.
Lanny groaned. "Then can you come help me, Sasha? Lilla punched my stomach under the bed and I can't find it."
"Sure, sure. Coming, dear Lanny. Just give me a moment."
Sasha watched Lilla go to a box on the wall and push a button, yelling into it when a light came on.
"Miss is awake!"
A moment later, a male voice replied from the box. "You do not need to yell. We can hear you clearly."
Lanny pushed the button again and yelled louder, "Okay! Miss is awake!"
Sasha could hear the exasperation in the male’s voice. "Yes. Thank you."
"You are making boyfriends already, Lilla? Is he cute enough that you have to talk to him before you help me stand in the bathroom? Can you at least bring me a bowl or a pot, or something? I need to pee."
Lilla and Lanny both laughed. It was so good to have them here.
The little room she was in had two doors. One led to a private bath and toilet that Sasha thought was big enough for several families to live in comfortably. This sector clearly had no issues with water waste. Didn't anyone know there was a shortage?
The room had a clean, wild scent, like Kane, and the countertops, sink, and toilet were extra-large in size. She almost fell in the toilet.
The girls coaxed her out of the big sleep shirt she was wearing and into the tub, holding her hands like she was a toddler at risk of falling and drowning in the deep, steaming water.
She couldn't be annoyed; Sasha couldn't swim, the thing was Kane sized, and she did feel like a toddler learning to walk.
She reached for Lanny. "Your hand?"
"Healed fine. You sew body parts better than you do clothes." Lanny smiled.
"Here." Lilla offered Sasha a funny round cake of soap. It made silky bubbles, washed clean, and didn't have a smell.
"What is this? We need to make us some of this." The cake was perfectly sized, enough for her body and hair.
"It's the alpha's. We want you to ask what it is. It even leaves your hair nice, unlike our stuff." Lanny was holding a towel as big as a blanket.
"Come on, Sasha. Food is coming. Aren't you hungry? And your alpha wants you to have a medical check-up too"
"My alpha? I don't have an alpha yet, and I don't have the energy for food and a doctor. Has Warlord Kane said when he's making us leave?" She sank down in the water with a groan, letting it lap at her chin. "I think I just want to sleep some more. Can't I sleep right here?"
The twins replied as one. "No."
"When did you guys get mean?"
They giggled.
*
She was standing in front of a full length mirror, holding Lilla’s hand to keep herself steady and trying to dry herself with the other.
Sasha had always felt like mirrors were the enemy, always showing her the image of a body that felt like it belonged to someone else. She didn't like her triangular breasts, nor their puffy areolas and too obvious nipples that had developed when she was a ten-year-old.
She also didn't like her wide thighs or round-as-a-sausage torso of baby fat. Born chubby, she’d stayed chubby in spite of a rigorous daily schedule and days of deprivation. She had her breeder biology to thank for that.
She told herself she didn't care what she looked like. Her father had told her that her value was not in her looks, but in who she was as a person. Sasha had always agreed with him.
But the person in the floor-to-ceiling looking glass wasn't the one she remembered.
For the first time, she saw what she expected to see.
Her breasts had become larger, the nipples pointing up instead of down.
Her torso had thinned at the waist and flared at the hips.
She had lost weight. Even her butt seemed altered, sticking out behind her like an upside down heart, full and plump.
She was by no means skinny—she jiggled everywhere—but like a woman instead of a child.
She had gained her hourglass shape.
"What happened to me?" she asked in wonder.
Her dark blue eyes sat bigger in her face under arching brows and over cheeks that had lost their apple shape. Her chubby butterball of a face had become delicate and lovely, except for her mouth, which was still too plump for Sasha's liking.
The last time she looked in the mirror, covered in a rainbow of sparkles, her face had been that of a plump little girl’s. Today a beautiful young woman looked back at her. She had reached her maturation, and she looked exactly like her mother.
"That's why you need a check-up. You breeders get all the perks. I'll never have a shape like yours. You're still tiny, though." Lanny stood up on her tiptoes to look down at the top of Sasha's head.
A female voice called from the other room. Sasha recognized it as the servant Davila’s, who she'd met shortly after her arrival here.
"Hello? I brought breakfast."
The twins helped Sasha finish in the bathroom, picking out clean clothes for her.
Sasha took the underthings, which were new, and the fitted comfy pants, but kept the top she had slept in.
It fell past her knees and the neck slipped over her shoulder, but the fabric felt perfect against her skin.
She couldn't bring herself to accept anything different.
When all three girls gave her knowing grins, she let her eyes slide to the food, pretending she was hungry.
Sasha was going to introduce everyone, but it seemed the drones had already made friends. Being of a similar age, they were comfortable like they had known each other for years.
When Davila tried to leave, Sasha made her stay. With enough food for all of them and at least three alpha soldiers, Sasha pulled all the girls into bed with her to talk and eat.
She had so many questions for Davila. She knew nothing about this house. What was expected of her now? What had been going on?
Lanny poked at Sasha's belly. "We have so much on you, you will have to do our laundry for the next ten years."
Sasha winced at the poke. Her muscles hurt like she'd stretched and pulled them repeatedly.
"We knew you could be bossy," Lilla said.
"I didn't know. I've never seen anyone boss Alpha Kane. That's suicide," Davila said.
Lanny grinned and grabbed up a piece of fruit. "Sasha is always getting in trouble for trying to boss the alphas."
Sasha grimaced. "And how is Merrick? How did you two get here? How is Silas and everyone at home? What happened after I left?"
"Everyone is fine at Dover's End. Merrick was scary for a bit, but instead of hurting anyone, he made Silas and Patrick take him to where they'd last seen you. They came back that night without him. He was still looking for you. We haven't seen him since. Then the alpha’s men came."
"The alpha? Constantine Kane?"
The girls looked at each other, then at Sasha with helpless shrugs. An alpha had told them not to say anything. So, they wouldn't.
"You can ask Ruell Zinanno," Davila offered.
"Who?"
"He is the new Terasa, the new secretary. He's not really new, though. He was the house controller. Extremely organized. A perfectionist. He's not a terrible person, but he is hard to please. If you are feeling up to it after your check-up, you can meet him today."
"Where is Terasa? Kane was mad she put me in the harem. He didn't kill her, did he?"
"Kill her? No. But she needed a healer when he finished with her. The alpha always inflicts corporal punishment upon his breed. Drones just get fired, unless they’ve done something bad like lying."
Sasha remembered the mess she had gone to clean up her first day here. "How many people got in trouble that day I got into Kane's meeting?"
"What do you mean?"
Sasha thought a moment and rephrased the question. "I snuck in to see Kane eight—no, ten days ago. It feels like a lifetime. Has anyone else been punished in that time? Is the housekeeper named Mary okay?"
"Oh. Mary is fine. She did get a scary lecture from Terasa. I remember that. In fact, all us drones have a 'security essentials' meeting coming up."
Sasha continued to stare at Davila, waiting, knowing there was more.
Davila shrugged. "I don't know for sure, but three guards had to be replaced. Two betas and an alpha."
"I'd feel bad if he killed them."