Sleeping Beauty 01 - The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty by Anne Rice

Author:Anne Rice [Anne Rice]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin USA, Inc.
Published: 2012-03-22T01:36:16+00:00

THE QUEEN’S CHAMBER

HALF THE night was gone before the Queen came.

Beauty had dozed, then awakened again and again, to find herself still chained in the ornate bedchamber as if in a nightmare. She was bound to the wall, her ankles cuffed in leather, her wrists up over her head, her buttocks pushed against the cold stone behind her.

At first the stone had felt good. Now and then she twisted to let the air touch the soreness. Of course the abraded flesh was much healed from last night’s ordeal on the Bridle Path, but she still suffered, and she knew tonight she was surely destined for more torment.

Not the least of it, however, was her own passion. What had the Prince awakened in her that after one night of no satisfaction, she should feel so wanton? It was the stirring between her legs that first brought her out of sleep in the Slaves’ Hall, and now and then she felt it as she stood waiting.

The room itself lay in shadow and unbroken stillness. Dozens of thick candles burned in their heavy gilded holders, the wax spilling in rivulets through the traceries of gold. The bed with its tapestried draperies appeared a gaping cavern.

Beauty closed her eyes. She opened them again. And when she was again on the verge of dream, she heard the heavy double doors thrown open and suddenly saw the tall, slender figure of the Queen materialized before her.

The Queen moved to the center of the carpet. Her blue velvet gown cleaved to her girdled hips before flaring gently to cover her black pointed slippers. She gazed at Beauty with narrow, black eyes tipped up at the ends to give her a cruel expression, and then she smiled, her white cheeks dimpling though an instant before they had seemed as hard as white porcelain.

Beauty had lowered her eyes at once. Petrified, she watched covertly as the Queen moved away from her and seated herself at an ornate dressing table, her back to a high mirror.

With an off-handed gesture she dismissed the Ladies who stood at the door. A figure remained there, and Beauty, afraid to look, was certain it was Prince Alexi.

So her tormentor had come, Beauty thought. Her heart pounded in her ears, becoming a roar rather than a pulse, and she felt the bonds holding her helpless so that she could not have defended herself against anyone or anything. Her breasts felt heavy, and the moisture between her legs greatly agitated her. Would the Queen discover it and use it to further punish her?

Yet mingled with her fear was some sense of her helplessness which had come over her the night before and never left her. She knew how she must appear, she was afraid, but she could do nothing and she was accepting it.

Maybe this was a new strength, this acceptance. And she needed all her strength, for she was alone with this woman who had no love for her. Without words, she evoked a memory

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