16. Chapter Sixteen #2
I make myself orgasm three times as I envision murdering him for the unnatural cruelty of denying me completion of the pleasure he brewed.
My fingers move in and out with a rage I want to take out on him.
I gasp and moan as his eyes in my mind cause my body to release and finally go limp.
There’s not enough satisfaction in it, but it’s enough to return my wits.
I clean myself up from our food fight, drain the water completely, and give myself one last bath to feel completely clean.
How foolish I can think of screwing the king and not finding the items I need to save my family.
My rage remains, but it’s more at myself than the king, who is acting exactly as expected.
I get myself dressed for the day in a simple white dress and tights.
The castle is quiet, with no servants bustling from room to room as usual.
I return to the library, and the librarian seems nowhere in sight.
A drawer is open in the catalogue, so I pull a card open and can’t make sense of the symbols on it.
A cat skull maid pushes a cart through the large entryway and starts dusting shelves. She stops when she sees me. “I hope I’m not disturbing you.”
“No, not at all. Please don’t let me stop you from doing whatever you need to do. I have a question?”
She curtsies. “I will do my best to answer it.”
“Is there a place in the castle where there are many keys? It would be a place where everyone is allowed to go.”
“Yes, in the northern wing there is a room with hanging keys. They’re only decorations. That’s what I’ve been told, and they’re tied up like that is true.”
“How would I access it?”
“You go through the servant’s quarters and there’s a conservatory. It’s in there just beyond the aviary. It's the place the king gives us to enjoy ourselves when we're not working.” She stretches up to dust off an upper shelf.
"The king gives you a place to have fun?"
"Yes, and there are things to play games and build community." She explains where the servant’s quarters are and curtsies one last time before moving on with her cart.
It takes me a moment to recover from the idea that Zyon might actually care for his servants and not just see them as things he can use to his benefit.
Finding the key is a priority, but I also want to see the space he's given to them.
I follow her instructions and open the blue door to find several skeletal animal people moving from one room to the next.
What I guess to be around thirty people sit in an open area eating bowls of something savory at long tables.
The skull shapes all look like they could be about any animal imaginable.
Everything they eat puddles on the floor beneath them, and I wonder at the point of them eating anything without tongues to taste or bodies to hold it in.
Aldric did mention the servants eat for the sake of normality.
Four large steaming pots are at the front along with plates of rolls and teapots.
I capture the attention of the room as I have to stroll through it to get to the next hall, and the chatter turns quiet as they all lean in to whisper to each other.
All the other doors are closed, but the one at the far end is glass.
The door opens easily, and a few of the servants are interacting with blue butterflies that flutter through a colorful tulip garden.
The loud chirping leads me to the aviary where red, blue, and yellow birds fly from the many branches that touch the transparent roof.
There is an open area, where two skeletons are kicking a red ball back and forth.
One has fish skull, and the other a bird.
My arms tingle, and it changes into pinching the closer I get to the next entrance. When the sensation moves to my chest, it becomes very clear one of the objects is close. I duck when an orange bird shoots from the ceiling and nearly knocks into me.
In the next room, brass, gold, and silver keys with intricate shapes and patterns dangle from blue strings. They are tied to end around my shoulder all the way from the tall, golden ceiling. Each string has several stacked keys to create a decorative chain.
I follow the invisible tug on my arms and legs to the middle of the room, and it’s a small silver key with a black rose carved into the top.
My stomach flops, and I go to untie it. The minute my hand touches it, it’s flung back and stings, like the key has a bite.
I remove the dagger from my upper thigh, but my blade soars across the room when I go to cut the string.
No matter what I try, I can’t get the key.
I grab hold of several other keys, and they all let me touch them without harm.
The keys clang like little chimes when I swipe my hand through them and scream.
I’ll have to make peace with Lazzus only so I can ask him about why I can’t touch the key.
I yell his name four times, but he doesn’t show.
Maybe Zyon was right, and I can’t finish the quest. My incompetence from the start of the entire ordeal didn’t just slow my progress.
It kept shoving me further and further behind.
I resist the urge to rip all the keys from the ceiling and fume all the way back to my room, angrier at myself than I’ve ever been at anyone.