#liandros

Duli nodded. “My birth name is Dulira, and my father was the 4th Baron of Colerst-“

“Colerstar. Which would make your eldest brother the 5th. My father’s great-aunt married Indric, 2nd Baron of Colerstar. I believe we’re cousins, my dear,” Liandros droned. “How did you find yourself in this profession?”

Duli shrugged. “Well, our house was never the richest, and father made several poor investments and squandered a large portion of what little we had left. When my father died, my brother took control of our house. I told him that I would work for our house, that the new Baron would have nothing to worry about.”

“And then?”

“He sold me. Outright, for a small sack of gold,” she answered, her face still. Liandros expected a quiver in her jaw, or her eyes to water at the corners, but Duli held her head up and looked directly into his eyes.

He stared back with calculating eyes, then waved a hand out. “Fascinating story, my dear. Our own families are often the first to betray us.”

He slid his body over Duli’s head, and clasped his palms on the backside in front of him, and pulled himself forward. The owner looked back at Liandros with a toothy grin and hazy, dark colored eyes. The king’s blonde locks dropped onto his cropped black hair.

“My king,” he giggled.

Liandros modded. “Yes, I am very much your king...Belaxar?”

“You may call me Bel, my king.”

Duli pulled her way up through Liandros’s thighs and made her way onto his back. “Bel, your majesty,” she said, “is the son of an Iisyrian singer. He has a beautiful voice himself.”

Bel smirked and nudged Duli with his foot. “Mind your business, girl.”

Liandros chuckled. “Don’t be modest,” he said his voice suddenly deep and serious, . “Let me hear.”

Bel cleared his throat and sucked in a deep breathe, then let out a long, beautiful note that filled the air like sweet wine in Liandros’s ears. His voice hopped and danced across notes as he serenaded the King, who sat back into Duli’s arms, watching Bel intently with his deep blue eyes. 

Liandros eyed Bel, then turned and looked up at Duli. She was funny enough, with charm, and her noble blood granted her great beauty. There was something in the upturn of her mouth, the childishness of her smile and youth. Bel’s eyes, on the other hand, told Liandros that they had seen much. They were beautiful and tired, but had a happy glint, and there was mystery behind them, some sad past left behind. And this beautiful voice that he was eager to hear. 

He stood and shrugged Duli from his back. Then he reached down and pulled her and Bel from the pile of bodies, and walked them to a large cushioned sofa. He laid them down together and led their lips together with a finger on each of their chins. 

“Yes,” Liandros said with a small smirk. “Kiss for your king.” He strolled across the room, his eyes rarely leaving Duli and Bel’s embrace. He returned in a thin blue silk robe that he left open, and tossed a purple silk robe at Bel, and a powder blue, lace slip at Duli. 

“You two belong to me now,” Liandros proclaimed. He clapped his hands twice, and a squat man with grey hair dressed in a butler's robes wattled in. 

“Your Majesty?” 

Liandros stared down at Duli and Bel. “Contact Duli and Bel’s handlers. Tell them that they belong to the king now, and pay them each...oh, four hundred gold bricks.”

“Four hundred!” Duli shouted. “My last master sold me for ten copper and a sack of flour.” 

Bel giggled and kissed Duli’s neck. 

“You are worth much more,” Liandros snapped, a fierce look in his eye. “Much more. If I offered your bumbling masters and their peers a basin of my piss in exchange for their eldest grandchild, they would take it the deal and consider it a gift from the King. Four hundred gold bricks is nothing to me and everything to them, my dear.”

Liandros waited till her servant scampered off and waved a hand toward the door. A tuft of blue smoke, followed by the faint trail of butterflies, pushed the door closed. The smoke drifted around the room and placed three glasses and a bottle of wine on the little butterflies wings, and floated toward them. Liandros twirled his fingers around like a coundictor, guiding the glasses into each of their hands and filling them to the brim with dark, burgundy wine. 

“How do you do that?” Duli asked.

Liandros shrugged. “Naturally. Do you remember my mother? Queen Irona? That woman was one powerful witch,” he said, a blank look on his face. “Excuse me, sorceress. I inherited all of her affinity for magic and more. Boosted by the strength of the Arandus clan. That golden blood that runs through....”

Liandros paused and stared into the air. After a beat, Bel leaned forward and asked, “Don’t you love it?”

Liandros stared back down at Bel and caressed his hair.  “More than anything…” He bent down and pressed his lips into Bel’s and looked back up. 

“I feel such tremendous power coursing through my finger tip at every moment,” Liandros continued.  “Begging to escape. Do you know that it takes all of my focus to hold it in? This infinite rage that fuels my magic. It’s hard to stay this composed. My mother’s curse…” 

Duli stared up at Liandros, her eyes wide, and nodded. She slid her hand up the king’s hard stomach and chest through his robes, then back down. She leaned forward and kissed just above his belly button. 

“Now, now,” Liandros said, his voice pleasant and soft. “Slow down. We have all the time in the world, my dear.”

Just then, a faint sound of fluttering took Liandros’s attention, and he spun around. A purple light shone from across the chambers, and the air vibrates around it. 

“Out!” Liandros yelled, his voice suddenly shrill and frantic as he scrambled across the rugs and pillows. “I SAID, GET OUT, YOU WHORES!”

The room shook and blue smoke rose up from the floor and whipped around the room like tendrils. 

The prostitutes scrambled, toppled off of the bed and out of the doors of the bed chambers. Duli and Bel pulled their robes closed, and grabbed each other’s hands as they followed the crowd. A wall of blue smoke rose in front of them and solidified, separating them from the scrambling prostitutes. The wall curled around them, and pushed them backward. 

“You! Duli, Bel! STAY!”

Duli and Bel stared back at Liandros, wide eyed. Hesitantly, Bel led Duli back to the sofa and pulled her closed, and they watched the blue tendrils of magic fling a furniture toward the doors of the chamber, while the king stomped toward his large, stained oak dresser. 

Liandros stared down at a small brooch, in the shape of a moth, with pearl eyes and diamond covered wings. The brooch let off a milky purple light and began to tremble and glow and Liandros yelped in excitement and tapped his feet like a child. The moth rose and began fluttering its wings slowly, until it lilted around gracefully. The blue jewels that made its eyes shone bright and the diamonds on his wings caught every light. 

“Hello, Liandros,” the moth brooch chirped with a tiny, funneled voice in the god-tongue. “I see you have been waiting for me.”

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*Author’s note*