Chain of Kisses by Angela Knight

Author:Angela Knight
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Romance
Publisher: Changeling Press LLC
Published: 2011-07-22T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Five

In far too little time, Mjölnir reached Tor. I still felt bitterly torn when I boarded the prince’s sleek little captain’s launch for the flight down to Asgard, the capital city. With Arles piloting the craft, I sat alone in the rear passenger section, watching out one of the long viewports as the planet swelled around us in shades of green, blue and ocher.

We landed on the palace’s small flight pad in the center of the vast green maze that was the royal gardens. I looked up, heart beating hard with anxiety, as Arles came into the back of the craft to collect my leash. “Come, Gisel.” His grin looked twisted. “Our public awaits.”

“Lovely.” I rose to follow him toward the airlock. He glanced back at me just before he opened it, and I thought I saw a flash of guilt in his green eyes. Then he straightened his shoulders, turned around, and strode down the gangplank, my leash wrapped around his fist.

I followed, three paces behind on the end of the thin chain, out into the glare of the Torrean sun and the gaze of the media.

The Palace of Valhalla spread before us, familiar to me from countless childhood visits -- a massive structure built of silicaslate blocks that glittered in the afternoon sunlight. The walls appeared white at first glance, but with every step you took, a rainbow of iridescent color rolled across them. Between the silicaslate and the palace’s astrogothic architecture -- all tall, arched windows and soaring spires -- Valhalla looked as mythic as its namesake.

Emperor Ragnar strode down the garden’s winding silicaslate path, a tall, broad-shouldered man dressed in silver-trimmed black velvet, his shoulder-length blue hair braided with gemstones that clicked as he walked.

“Father!” Arles walked into his arms, and the two men thumped each other’s backs as they hugged in joyous welcome. Unlike my mother, Ragnar had never seen the need for emotionless royal reserve.

I winced as I saw a cloud of tiny devices fly past the royals, headed right for me. Though no bigger than a pea, each cambot was equipped with powerful visual and auditory sensors, as well as the artificial intelligence to use them. The cameras transmitted the vid they shot to their respective news agencies, which would edit the footage, package it with appropriate arch commentary, and beam it out to the ten worlds of the Torrean empire.

The cambots darted around me like a swarm of bees, each projecting the three-dimensional logo of its home newsie, each shooting vid of me in my jeweled chains. I resisted the urge to swat.

A princess of Swanhilde turned sex-thrall. My mother would have my head on a pike.

At least Arles had allowed me to wear something a bit more modest: a white gown that bared my arms before skimming the length of my body to flow around my sandaled feet. I’d piled my long, red hair atop my head and bound it there with fine gold chains and emerald gemstones to match my manacles.

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