“You may remove your blindfold, Pet.” He barely finishes his sentence before I’m tugging free the obstruction and launching myself across the room. A white sheet covers a structure beside Ares. It’s almost as tall as he is. I stumble toward him, gather the fabric in my fist and pull.
A gilded cage greets me. The occupants chirrup in a flurry of frightened wingbeats, and when they settle, I stare at two bright orange–red birds.
My heart lurches and breaks, because just like me these birds were intended to be free. But humans took them, bred them, and raised them in captivity, and here they are in my cell. Kindred spirits. We are the same, stolen, and yet now that they are here, I can’t possibly let them go. I can’t set them free, because then I’ll be all alone again.
Tears track down my cheeks, unchecked. Is this how Ares feels? Torn between wanting to see me flourish, exultant in my freedom, and needing to keep me locked away for his own sanity and peace of mind?
He cups my face between his warm palms and kisses the tears from my cheeks. “I thought they’d make you happy, Pet.”
“They do,” I whisper on autopilot, but we both know these are not tears of happiness. “What are they?”
“Red Factor canaries. My mother bred them when I was a child. The males have the most beautiful song.”
Keeping pretty things in cages runs in Ares’ blood.
As if on cue, the brighter of the two birds sits taller on his perch and sings a sweet, trilling melody that brings a smile to my face, and buoyancy to my chest. For months now, all I’ve heard are low, graveled commands, moans, the sound of his belt and my corresponding screams, and the quiet hum of the air through the vent in the ceiling. It’s almost hard to believe that there is a whole world outside this room.
I sob as Ares wraps his big arms around me, and carries me to the bed, and then I fall apart as I listen to my new cellmates serenading me with their saccharine chirps and lilting songs.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Ares
Ibathe Pet and dressher in a long floor-length silver gown. It’s made of fine silk, and her nipples bead and press indecently against the fabric, begging to be touched, pinched. I adjust my cock and look her over with an appraising eye. Her makeup is done expertly—by herself of course—because even with thirty slaves under my belt, I still haven’t the faintest idea of how to present a woman when it comes to makeup. Thankfully it’s ingrained in most of them, and it appears it’s a skill this one hasn’t forgotten.
I tie her hair in a braid, remembering those long ago days when I used to watch my mother do this. I’m not good at it either, but with Pet’s help, we managed to give her one of those overly stressed braids that looks messy and effortless.
“Why are you forcing me to get made up?”
“Enough—”
“Questions, I know,” she finishes, rolling her eyes. Pet stands before her birds and makes hushed clucking sounds. The male begins singing, and an easy smile flits across her face as the smaller female cozies up to her fingers for a scratch. “I know you won’t answer them anyway.”
“Then why ask, Pet?”
She smiles as I tug her braid and pull her toward me. “Maybe I’m hoping you’ll throw me a bone.”