I shuddered in the dampness. The walls emanated an evil energy. He led me to a slab of rock that was flat and smooth as if carved into a rough throne.
“Zephyr, I don’t like it here.”
He seemed not to register my concern, or maybe he just didn’t care. “Stay right there,” he said before walking away and seating himself in the stone seat.
I did as he commanded. I felt stiff with the chill and the overwhelming sense of fear. Every instinct told me to run—to seize one of the axes from a wall and defend myself with my back to a corner.
Just then, Zephyr snapped his fingers, and I caught movement from the corner of my eye. Two young men approached, masked with wooden bearded faces topped with crowns. The masks looked like they were carved by artisans in the Middle Ages. They wore elegant satin robes, each one a starburst of myriad colors beginning at the neckline and widening as they reached the hem that just touched the floor. In one man’s hands was a tray holding several objects. The closer he came into the light, the more I could identify.
The men approached Zephyr and flanked him on either side of the throne. As they passed, I looked at the brass tray with its intricately painted design. There were various matching containers that held sponges, soaps, oils, and a short stack of small towels. I remained stock-still.
Zephyr lifted a bottle of the oils and sniffed it, approving it with a nod of his head as he replaced it.
He then leveled his eyes at me. “Strip, Biba.”
I thought I’d misunderstood him. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me. Strip. Take off your clothes.”
“I will not,” I defied him. “What is this?”
“This is the price. If you want the truth, you must give yourself to us fully. If you won’t, they will strip you for me.”
For a second, I couldn’t move. In the dank, unheated room, I couldn’t conceive of doing what I was ordered to do. Then, the masked man who wasn’t holding a tray began advancing toward me.
“Wait!” I stopped him.
My shaking hands found the top button of my shirt. I fumbled a moment, but then the button came loose. I felt numb all over as I undid the remaining clasps and let my shirt drift to the stone floor.
“Very good, Biba. Now, the rest….”
The flesh on my torso tightened with the cold. Again, I thought of fleeing, but Zephyr’s commands kept me there like some dark magic. I kicked off my sneakers. My thumbs unsnapped my jeans, then peeled them off, and there I stood in a cotton bra and panties, shivering in the damp.
Zephyr snapped his fingers, and a masked man came toward me. He circled behind me. A second later, I felt a hand on my wrist and then heard a click. Something cold was cutting into my skin. I glanced to my right and saw a handcuff on my wrist. I tugged, but just as quickly, the second cuff latched onto my other wrist. The man pulled a pair of polished brass scissors from his robe and slid the blade beneath the center point of my bra. Holding my breath to avoid being cut, I watched with fascinated alarm and, to my surprise, erotic fascination as he snipped the bra in half and then cut the straps over my shoulders. The bra fell away, leaving my full breasts bare and my nipples hard in the cool, damp air.
The man in the sunburst robe held me by my cuffed wrists and ran the blade of the ice-cold scissors under the elastic at my hip. He sliced through one side of my underwear, then the other, and stepped away. I stood exposed, fully naked.
The other masked man picked up a cloth and the bowl from his tray. He dampened the cloth in the warm water, poured on a few drops from one bottle, and began to wash my body.
“The Kings,” Zephyr began in a tone midway between a lecturer and a priest, “have existed as long as Stormcloud Academy.”
He attended to my face first, the cloth deftly smoothing the warm waters down my forehead, over my closed eyelids, cleansing the curves of my cheeks. Moving down to my neck and shoulders, his steady but gentle pressure paused every so often as his thumbs rotated over my collarbone. It was as if he’d pressed internal buttons in my body and the effect was extreme relaxation.
“Our history is written into the stone of this building. Our fates are sealed in the constellations, our fortunes in the prophecies of tarot cards.”
The cloth moved lower, rinsed over and over again to replenish its warmth. He lightly tapped my belly button—a movement that surprisingly sent chills upward through my breasts. The cloth moved ever lower.
“We count among our ranks generals and barons, philosophers and industrialists, politicians and popes. The Kings do not equivocate, and we do not forget.”