House of Judges (House of Royals Book 4)

  The room is silent for a long time as I remain with my head bowed. I listen hard, hoping to hear breath of relief, they having been convinced of my innocence. But all I hear is silence.

  Until a slow, loud clap sounds. Twice. Four times. Five. I look up.

  “What a story,” Cyrus breathes out. “My, my. She is quite compelling, is she not? Even I am not sure what the truth is. Did Alivia commit treason in the dark? Did she build an army behind the veil of the poor, fatherless child? Or has she been framed by someone so clever that we have never yet seen someone so invisible?”

  He asks questions, but everyone at this table is intelligent enough to know better than to answer.

  “Members of the jury,” he says turning to them. “I want you to carefully consider the tale this woman has told. I want you to think about the personal experiences you have had with her.” He looks at both Lillian and Elle. “And I want you to consider how bloodlines affect the genetic makeup of one’s desires.” Directed to Dorian and Malachi. “The trial will resume in two days.”

  The guards step up and grab hold of my arms. My eyes flit around the room. Elle. Lillian. Raheem and Ian both look worried, constantly wondering if this will be the last time they will see me alive. But they are each helpless to do anything at this point.

  So that they will not fight, so that they will not endanger themselves, I follow behind the guards without a word.

  They lead me once again on a path I will never be able to retrace. Down stone steps, through passageways. Across grand, empty rooms.

  Down and down, up, snaking back and forth.

  The world feels darker, and a sinking feeling settles into my chest as we descend a set of stairs. I know I’m far from the prison. Far from the room I rested in just hours ago. And a black set of doors looms at the end of the hall we proceed down.

  Music dances in my ears as we get closer. Pumping and loud. It shakes the floor. Vibrates the stones. The kind you’d hear at a club, but all the singing is in German, I think.

  “What…” I begin to ask, but I’m so confused that I do not have words to say what I’m trying to put together.

  “King’s orders,” one of the guards says, looking back at me with an amused sneer. “You toyed with his heart, now he’s making you a toy of the Court.”

  We reach the door and the woman pulls it open, letting out a blast of the overwhelming music.

  The scent of alcohol and drugs and bodies is overpowering. Heavy perfume hangs in the air, sickeningly sweet. There’s a long hallway, the walls painted black with flecks of glitter mixed into the dark coats the walls. My guards lead me down the hall and it opens up into a room. A single, regal, high-backed chair sits in the middle of the room. Blood red in color. Purple curtains hang all around. Black lights glow from just behind them.

  Just before the chair, a few feet away, is a floor-to-ceiling steel pole.

  “What the hell is going on?” I demand as the guards shove me to one side of the room, where a hand appears from behind the curtains, holding it back for us to pass into yet another hallway.

  A man wearing only a leopard-print thong smiles sadly at me as he watches us pass by. My heart leaps into my throat, threatening to choke me. For the first time, I tug at my bonds. I slow my steps.

  But the guards force me forward. And I see two girls toward the end of the hall. They wear little more than lingerie. They stare, their eyes running up and down me. A little red glow ignites in one of their eyes.

  A man comes next, wearing only a pair of tight briefs. And then, my throat burns when the next one I walk past is human. But there is no fear in her eyes.

  The hallway suddenly opens up into what appears to be a huge dressing room. A wall of mirrors and dim lights dominate one side, chairs dotting along the counter beneath the mirror. Make up and wigs and all kinds of fake and lustful things line it.

  And there are dozens of men and women in here, Born and human alike. Changing, naked, nearly naked in just bras and underwear. Others strutting around like their nakedness doesn’t mean anything at all.

  “Is this her?”

  A clear voice suddenly jerks me from my wonder and disgust. I look to the side to see a woman standing there, looking me up and down. She’s young, no more than twenty. Long, dark hair falls midway down her back in soft, perfect curls. Meticulous, minimalistic makeup dots her creamy-colored face.

  She wears a simple black dress that stretches to the floor, though exposing all of her cleavage.

  “This is her,” the guard says, tightening his grip on my arm. Were I human, I’d be deeply bruised. “You have the King’s orders, I presume?”

  She cocks an eyebrow at me, a small smile on her lips. “He was very specific. She must have really pissed him off.”

  The guard chuckles and shoves me forward, just as the female guard jabs something into my back, right above my heart. I hiss in pain, pulling away from them.

  “You’ll do as Madame says for the next two days,” the male one says. “Or the implant will explode, as will your heart. He’s got cameras everywhere in the club, so don’t try anything clever.”

  He pushes me from behind with enough strength to send me to my knees. I barely catch myself from falling on my face since my hands are chained together.

  “You’ve got the controller,” the female guard says. “If she steps out of line, the King says not to hesitate in setting it off.”

  “I understand,” the woman they refer to as Madame says. “I’ll take it from here.”

  I look back to see the male guard giving me a smirk before they both turn to leave.

  “Stand up,” Madame says. “Our clients here will know you’re a Royal, seeing you on the ground like this could go from one extreme to another.”

  Slowly, I pick myself up from off the polished marble floor. I’m still looking around, taking it all in.

  There’s a woman, completely naked, talking to another woman while she preps herself in the mirror. She laughs, acting as if it’s no big deal that her breasts are out in the open, for all to see, or that her voluptuous back end is exposed.

  Yet none of these people seem bothered by the nudity. They don’t steal glances, don’t look at all. As if they’re completely desensitized.

  “I’m sure you can guess what this place is,” Madame says, dragging my attention back to her. It’s then that I realize her accent is American. “We dance here, for men or women. Some of the clients are here for more…extreme forms of pleasure, blood or skin. I’m in charge here. I hire the employees, schedule appointments. Make sure everyone is doing their job. And the King has sent you here, to me, for the next two days.”

  “I don’t understand,” I say as sweat prickles along my skin.

  “Oh, I think you do,” Madame says as a flat smile pulls on her red lips.

  “Please,” I say. Because I think I do, too, but I just can’t quite accept it. “Spell it out for me.”

  “Okay,” she says as she starts walking around me in a circle. “King Cyrus can hold a grudge like you wouldn’t believe. For being thousands of years old, his memory is impeccable. He forgets nothing. And fresh on his memory, is how you misled him. How you made him believe.”

  She reaches out and gathers a handful of my shirt. She gives it a great yank and rips it clean from my skin. As startled as I am, the expression on her face is calm. As if she is simply doing her job. She gains no pleasure or sadness from her actions.

  “You thought it a good idea to play with the King, and now he is going to turn you into the Court’s favorite new, shiny toy,” she says. Once again, she rips my clothing from my body, leaving me in only a dirty bra and underwear and simple flats.

  I’m exposed, left defenseless in every way.

  “You played with the King, and now he is going to whore you out to his descendants.”

  “SHOWER, AND THEN NATALIA WILL help you do your hair and makeup,” Madame says as she walks with me to the far end of the dressing room. She does indeed stop at a
shower. But there’s no door, no curtain. “And don’t worry about being a prude. No one back here cares about your body.”

  Embarrassment spikes in my blood as I look around once again. No one is paying me any mind, they’re all busy prepping themselves, or talking, or sitting and reading as they wait to go on stage, I assume.

  “Hurry up,” Madame says impatiently. “I really don’t have all day.”

  I want to fight. To knock her on her back and bolt. But there’s still the dull ache in my back where the guard implanted the explosive. If I make a wrong move, she’ll detonate my heart, and I’ll be dead for good this time.

  So, I turn my back to her and strip out of my underthings, hiding my father’s necklace in my clothes.

  Barely warm water washes over me. But as I scrub my skin, wash my hair, I only feel dirtier, exposed to this disgusting place. I keep my back turned to the room, cleaning myself as quickly as I can. The minute all of the suds wash off of my body, I shut the water off.

  “See, that wasn’t so hard, was it?” Madame walks back over, extending a towel out to me. I quickly wrap it around myself. “This way.”

  She leads me to the wall of mirrors and instructs me to sit on one of the stained, padded stools. “Natalia,” Madame yells down the row.

  Natalia is obviously a man. But he’s painted as a beautiful woman. Wears an overly sexual teddy. “Oh, everyone out there is going to love her,” Natalia says when she reaches me, raising perfect eyebrows at my dripping wet appearance. “She’s gorgeous.”

  “She’s to be the star of the show tonight, so make her shine,” Madame says with a smile as she lays a hand on Natalia’s arm before walking away.

  “It’s what I do best,” she says with a bright smile.

  She starts brushing through my wet hair, adding in a little bit of product. She produces a blow dryer and soon my hair is being tugged and pulled and blown every direction.

  “So, you’re a Royal, I hear,” she says when she’s finally done drying. She moves on to a curling iron. “Is it true?”

  I bite my lower lip, looking up at her heavily made up eyes. I’m terrified to be here. I want to get this over as quickly as possible. Conversation wasn’t expected. Finally, I nod.

  “So, are you a descendent of Dorian or Malachi?” she asks as she winds my hair around the hot iron. “Because, girl, around here, it seems to matter more and more these days. I swear, someday Malachi’s posterity will just wipe out those of Dorian, except their numbers are so large, they could never actually stand a chance if it ever came to battle.”

  Natalia goes on and on, not actually expecting any response from me. And, I find she’s actually fascinating to listen to. She shares far more information than I bet she’s supposed to.

  I learn that all the dancers here are descendants of the exiled grandsons. They’re Born, but have never had any claim to royalty. They’re the only exiled allowed in Roter Himmel. They make up about two-thirds of the employees of Klub Blut und Lüste, which I assume is the name of this club. Humans make up the other third.

  There’s some kind of hard feelings between the Born and the human dancers. The clients who come to the club often prefer the humans because they’re allowed to feed on them while they engage in…activities. But they do have a large turnover rate. Not everyone who visits the club has good control.

  If the humans are turned, they’re killed the minute they wake up as a Bitten.

  Less pay as a Born stripper, but better job security.

  Natalia never once stops talking as she moves from my hair to my makeup. And she takes her time. Foundation. Contouring. Heavy, heavy eye makeup. Lipstick.

  I watch myself in the mirror as she transforms my face. I’m radiant. Glowing in the dim light. In some ways, I feel beautiful. But that face looking back at me, it isn’t me. I’m buried under five pounds of cake.

  And it makes me feel better about this new prison I’ve been sent to. It’s not me that’s going to be forced to do whatever they have planned for me. I’m buried under the mask. Hidden deep inside until this passes over.

  “Look at you!” Natalia coos as she finishes with me. “They are going to love you tonight!”

  She sets the last of her tools on the table and lets me take it in one last time.

  “Thank you,” I say through a thick throat, trying to smile. “You did a wonderful job.”

  “It’s what I do best,” she repeats once again, flashing that brilliant smile. Looking around, she spots Madame and signals her over.

  “Nice work, as always, Natalia,” she offers with an approving look-over. “I think Joanne needs you next.”

  I’m almost sad when Natalia flitters away to whore up the next victim. She kept my mind off of what was coming up next.

  “This is your costume for tonight,” Madame says, holding out something on a hanger. “Get dressed and then we’ll give you some pointers.”

  I take the hanger from her, but I’m not even sure how to put this thing on. Lace and straps dangle all over the place.

  “Please hurry up,” Madame says as she walks over to a man, who’s fully dressed, and takes a black box he offers.

  I stand and make my way to the darkest corner of the dressing room. Once again turning my back to everyone, I attempt to figure out the contraption.

  It’s not quite as intimidating as I thought at first. A deep red lacy bra that actually hides nothing has little crisscrossing straps that stretch down my sides, attaching to the panties, leaving my stomach and back exposed. The panties are lacy, as well, and ride up my crack, exposing most of my butt.

  A pair of black heels, five inches tall, accompany the number. I slip them on and am surprised when they’re not as impossible to walk in as I expected.

  “Yes, you’ll do nicely,” Madame says in approval as I walk back over to her. “Although, those certainly mar the appeal a bit.”

  I cover my stomach with my hands, embarrassed. The two red scars that stretch up from my panty line stand out in bright contrast to my pale skin.

  “No matter, their focus isn’t going to be on them,” she says, setting the black box on a chair and opening it. “But on this.”

  From the box, she produces a crown.

  My crown.

  The golden one with the raven symbol affixed in the center of it. Upon closer observation, I see it is not my actual crown. But it’s a nearly perfect replica.

  So not only are they going to get a rise out of my station, Cyrus has chosen to publicly shame my entire family and House.

  “Don’t fight it my dear,” Madame says, lifting the crown and placing it on my head. “As I said, the King was very specific about his orders.”

  “I will serve my penance,” I say with a false smile.

  “That’s a good girl,” she says as she leads me back to one corner of the changing room. She pulls back a curtain and yells for someone, speaking in German. Two girls follow us in. We enter into a smaller room, lit only with a black light. And standing in the center of the room is a pole.

  Madame speaks to them again in German, fast and quick. I wonder where she is from. When she speaks English, her accent is perfectly American, but she seems to speak German with perfect ease.

  “Watch them closely,” Madame says, turning to me. “They will show you some basics. You’ll need all this for tonight.”

  I can’t believe I’m here, watching these two girls grind and swing around this pole. I can’t believe I’m being forced into this. I can’t believe how quickly life can change.

  But there is something hypnotic about it all. Something primal. Carnal.

  Even I can’t seem to look away from their movements, and I’ve never been attracted to a woman.

  Klub Blut und Lüste. So fitting.

  “Now, you,” Madame says, waving her hand for me to take the pole. “I need to be sure you aren’t going to go out on stage and just awkwardly hump the pole.”

  I’m a little offended, but I can’t say she’s wrong.


  I’ve never done this before.

  The girls’ movements are still fresh in my mind, so I do my best to repeat them. Sliding up and down, swinging with one leg wrapped around it. I feel so exposed and open, like everything I’m wearing is going to fall apart and leave me naked and bare.

  “It’s not perfect, but it’ll do,” Madame says. She turns to the girls again and says something in German. They exit the room.

  “You’ll go on in just a few minutes. The first stage of all of this is just a dance,” she explains. She’s so calm and collected about it all. I wonder how much of her immortal life has been spent here in the basement of the castle, managing these girls and boys. “The clients aren’t allowed to touch the stage dancers. Any money they might offer will be split between the employees. You’ll be informed about stage two shortly.”

  My heart starts racing as I hear the thumping song begin to wind down. Madame leads me out, back into the dressing room, to another curtained wall, which she pulls back to reveal a hallway.

  Down we go, but not very far. The dark hall lightens, and I hear many, many bodies on the other side of a curtain.

  Suddenly, two women step through it, barely giving us a side-glance before they walk by.

  A voice booms through a speaker system. I don’t understand the words, but I certainly recognize when they announce “Lady Conrath.”

  “That’s you,” Madame says. Suddenly, her hands are on my back, and she shoves me through the curtain.

  Lights temporarily blind me. Blue and purple laser lights dance around the space. Slowly, more and more of the scene processes through my brain.

  Black walls. Dimly glowing lights set along them. The stage I stand on has lights along the edge of it. And down below, there are so many chairs. Booths, tables. A bar lines the back of the big room.

  And filling every one of the chairs, is a body.

  Men. Women.

  Each of them staring at me with lustful eyes.