I placed him in his mid-twenties, a bit older than me. He had tanned skin and a thin mustache above thin lips. He was somewhat toned but clearly didn’t work out or fight for his dinner. He’d said as much.
“But it gets so fucking boring here,” he went on, “that I keep venturing down to the party. Booze and sex were really fun for, like, five years. Then it was a pleasant distraction. Now…I’m just shame-fucking, you know? And if I’m not shame-fucking, I’m shame-eating. I used to do hobbies and shit. And, I don’t know, make use of myself. Now I just do whatever that hot incubus tells me. He’s got me banging ladies. I don’t even like banging ladies! But I do it. Why not? It’s not like I have any self-respect anymore.”
I grimaced. “That’s dark. How old are you exactly?”
“When the curse first started, I was twenty-six. And since we’re frozen in time…I guess I’m still twenty-six? There are different schools of thought on that subject, but we’re pretty sure we’ll emerge from the curse how we went in, just with a lot of terrible sexual experiences under our belt. I’m going to be so vanilla after all this, I am not shitting you. Zero kinks after this. I’ll be a new man.”
“Wait…what do you mean, frozen in time?”
His brow pinched, and then cleared with a smile. “My apologies. I completely forgot your whole deal. Yeah, you guys age and get sick with the curse, right? We don’t get sick, but we’re stuck in time. Everything here just stopped. No idea why it’s different between the castle and the villages, but there you go. I’ve been twenty-six for sixteen years.”
I didn’t know what to say.
“Anyway, yeah. Super dark.” He pulled open the nightstand drawer before closing it again. “We need to get you some vibrators. You’re not allowed to go to the parties—I wish I hadn’t been allowed to go to the parties. Anyway, you’ll probably want something to take the edge off. They’re these little demon-magic-powered fuck sticks. They’re awesome. I have one that, like, sucks my cock while spinning around, and—it’s the stuff of legends. Or…it would be if I wasn’t mired in a puddle of boredom turned self-loathing.” He paused, pointing at me. “Are you into butt stuff?”
I made a sound like “Whuh” and envisioned myself clutching a strand of pearls in an iron fist. Now I knew what Hannon always felt like.
He nodded like that was an answer. “I’ll make sure and get you one to try out. They’re all clean, don’t worry. We don’t reuse or anything. The demons keep us in stock. What else?”
“Am I to be kept in this room…all the time?”
“She’s going to need a fuck-ton of candles…” He headed over to the far wall and started poking around in a chest of drawers. “I don’t know, are you?” He looked around. “I should hope not. Nah, I don’t think so. He wouldn’t confine you here. Not when…” His eyes widened, and he went back to poking in the chest.
“Not when what?” I edged forward.
He shook his head. “We have a magical gag. If we talk about…some things, the gag locks up and we suffocate to death. Do you know how many people have died from activating the magical gag? A lot, let me assure you. For a while, we would try to get others drunk and talk about…things they weren’t supposed to talk about, just to see if they’d fuck up and die.”
“So you tried to trick them into killing themselves?”
He lowered the lid of the trunk. “It sounds like a real shit thing to do when you say it like that. But at the time… Well, that was right about when I started shame-fucking. We’d all kinda lost touch with reality by that point.”
“This place is…”
“It’s a nightmare. Cheers!” He smiled and looked around. “Damn it. I don’t have a drink.”
It was clear that was a common theme around this place. In a way they were living a life of luxury, but the curse hadn’t spared them. Whereas our people were physically suffering, these people were mentally suffering.
Sadness overcame me at the thought of my village, and tears welled up. Best not think about home right now. I’d end up in a darker hole than Hadriel, and it seemed that path led to shame-fucking.
“Goddess spread on a cracker, what is this…” Hadriel had the doors to the wardrobe open and was pulling out dresses like they were covered in chicken poop.
A frilly pink dress was thrown aside, puddled on the ground like frosting. A blue number with ruffles and lace went on top of it.
“Whose dresses were these?” He threw a bright orange frock onto the pile. “Whoever made them should be stabbed.”
“Was this…was this someone’s room before mine?” A dangerous question for my mental wellbeing.