The Dancer and the Masks by Bea Paige
Chapter 7
CHRISTY
“There, that’s better,” Nala says, then immediately blushes. “I didn’t mean… I just meant…”
I wave away her embarrassment, staring at my reflection in the mirror and my perfect porcelain skin. There’s no hint of a birthmark in sight. This foundation has even better coverage than the one I’ve been using recently. My shoulders relax a little knowing that I have my mask in place.
“It’s fine. It is better,” I say, giving her a small smile as I lock gazes with her in the mirror. She stands behind me, her hands folded in front of her as she waits. For what, I’m not sure.
Dropping my gaze, I rest my fingers on the bottle of foundation. Like the bubble bath in the bathroom, there’s no label, and the bottle itself is oddly shaped, like a conch shell you might find on the beach. It has a glass stopper, rather than a screw cap to keep the liquid inside. I don’t know of any makeup brand that uses such a design. It seems dated, old-fashioned somehow, even though the contents are definitely twentieth-first century.
“It’s pretty, isn’t it?” Nala says, taking the bottle from me and holding it in her hands.
“It’s unusual. What’s the brand?”
“Brand?”
“You know… Maybelline, Rimmel. Perhaps it’s Chanel?” I muse.
“Oh no. Thirteen makes it.”
“Thirteen? Another Number? But I thought you said there were twelve?”
“Shit,” Nala curses, then immediately covers her mouth with her hand.
“Nala?” I question, turning to face her. The soft cotton of my nightgown swishes over my legs as I move. The material is loose and drops to the floor and the sleeves are long, reaching my wrists. It sits high on my neck too, covering up every inch of skin, but the material is thin, hinting at my nakedness beneath. I’m not sure what The Masks are trying to achieve by making me wear this, but if it’s to make me feel uncomfortable then it’s definitely working. “Nala, please. I didn’t tell them about the fact you visited me in the dungeons. I promise, I won’t say anything.”
She grimaces, then eventually nods. “Thirteen is like you, I guess.”
“Like me?”
“Yes. She doesn’t perform like the others do.”
“Perform?” I ask, so many questions swirling around my head. “Perform for who? What do you mean?”
“She’s here because of what she can do as much as the other Numbers are, except her gift is a little different.”
“Her gift?”
“She looks after the Numbers in a way. She makes things…” Nala unfurls her fingers around the bottle of foundation. “This for example. All the makeup. The bathing milk you washed in. Perfume. Ointments, lotions and healing balms, that kind of thing. She’s never had to entertain the guests like the others. The Masks wouldn’t make her, she’s too...”
“Too what?”
Nala pulls a face, biting her lip. “Too precious. Fragile. She’s their family now.”
“Family? Yet she’s called Thirteen. What’s her real name?”
“No one but The Masks knows and they don’t call her by her name because she wants to be known as Thirteen. When she arrived here a year ago she came of her own accord. This is her home by choice.”
“So it isn’t home by choice for the other Numbers?” I ask, knowing it to be true.
Nala chews on the inside of her cheek. “At least not at first. It’s different once they understand…”
“Understand?”
“They want to be here,” she continues, ignoring me. “It’ll be the same for you, eventually.”
“Wow,” I say, unable to wrap my head around all the new information or Nala’s naivety. She’s young, yes, but she must understand what is and isn’t right. Then again, if she’s lived here all her life, then her impressionable mind can easily be indoctrinated. Perhaps her bringing me food and water was simply a kindness, not an indication that she understood the gravity of my situation and wanted to help me out of it.
“May I brush your hair?” she asks suddenly, clearly wanting to change the subject. She reaches for the antique brush resting on the vanity, hesitating when I stiffen under her touch. “It hurts, doesn’t it?”
I nod. “The skin has long since healed on my back, and the doctors tell me I shouldn’t feel sensation given the damage to all the nerves, and yet I do.”
“I’m sorry,” she says, handing me the brush so that I can pull my long hair over my shoulder and brush it myself.
“Why?”
“You’ve suffered. Just like them…”
“The Numbers?”
She opens her mouth to respond, but the sound of a door opening and closing, and footsteps entering the room beyond the bedroom, stops her. Her eyes widen and she swallows. “They’re here.”
“You’re afraid of them…”
“Nala!’ Konrad calls, making us both jump. “Bring Zero out.”
Nala bites her lip again, then holds out her hand. “It’s time.”
I take her hand, having no other choice but to do his bidding and follow Nala into a sitting area that’s decorated similarly as the bedroom. I would’ve been impressed by the high ceilings and all the natural light coming through two huge windows to my right if I hadn’t been so utterly terrified by the three men standing before me.
“Leave us,” Konrad says, jerking his chin towards the door.
“Yes, Sir,” Nala replies, her eyes downcast. With one last squeeze of my hand, she scurries out of the room leaving me alone with my three masked kidnappers.
“Sit,” one of the men demands. If memory serves me right it’s Leon, though I can’t be certain given the mask he’s wearing covers every inch of his face. “I said, sit,” he bites out, immediately getting my back up.
“If you treat me like a dog, then I’ll behave like one,” I snap back, baring my teeth.
Konrad scoffs, removing his mask. “I told you she was argumentative, Leon.”
Leon. So I was correct.
“And if you behave like a dog then we’ll treat you like one. Maybe she should be collared and put on a leash?” Leon suggests. He looks over at the third Mask, Jakub, waiting for his command.
Jakub nods, jerking his chin at Konrad. “Do it,” he rumbles, his accent thick, dark. It sends shivers down my spine.
“Collar and leash?” I question, my gaze flicking between the three men. “You can’t be serious?”
“Deadly serious,” Konrad retorts, winking at me before turning on his heel and leaving the room.
“No—”
“The sooner you learn that we always follow through on a threat, the better,” Leon warns, cutting me off as he removes his mask, revealing the man hidden beneath.
I inhale deeply, my chest filling with air as he fixes his gaze on me. He’s beautiful, perfect but like most alluring things, there’s a catch. He might have a jaw sharp enough to cut, dark eyebrows that frame stunning green eyes, full lips, a flop of ebony hair that falls perfectly around his handsome face, and a dimple in his chin that most women would want to lick, but that doesn’t hide the truth of who he is.
It can’t hide the fact that this man is soulless.
My skin prickles as he cocks his head to the side and slides his gaze over me in one slow sweeping motion. Straightening my spine, I raise my chin. “I am not someone you could put on a leash. I will bite.”
“Oh, I’m counting on it,” he retorts with a sharp grin as he sits down in the centre of the large roll arm sofa and spreads out his arms along the back. My fingers curl into fists as his gaze focuses on my bare breasts beneath the cotton nightgown I’m wearing. I’m acutely aware that my nipples are hard, not because I’m turned on, but because I’m suddenly cold. It’s as though The Masks have sucked all the warmth from the room and shrouded it in darkness.
“What do you think, Brother?” he asks, turning his attention to Jakub. “Will she keep us entertained or will that perfect mouth of hers seal her fate far too early?”
I settle my gaze on Jakub, focusing on the quietly controlled man in the corner of the room. His stature is slimmer than his brothers, more lean athlete but with broad shoulders. He’s tall and holds himself with an air of confidence that is neither cocky nor vain, just absolute.
“I think she’s trouble,” he observes, his accented voice taut with tension. “I think she doesn’t understand what we’re capable of. I think she believes that she is stronger than we are.”
“Yes,” Leon agrees. “We’ll have to do something about that…” his voice trails off as I meet his frosted gaze. My spine tingles with the threat.
“I won’t make this easy for you,” I mutter.
“Będziesz posłuszny,” Jakub says, drawing my attention back to him. I’ve no idea what he’s just said, and I don’t care to know either. I’m more concerned about the fact that he’s approaching me. “Będziesz posłuszny,” he repeats, removing his mask. He chucks it on the side table beneath the window, then locks me with his steely gaze. “You will obey.”
Despite having met the masked version of him in my visions over the past two years I’m taken aback by his appearance, by his youth. I’m guessing he’s in his early twenties like me, as opposed to late twenties like Konrad and Leon appear to be. It surprises me that as the youngest, he’s clearly the leader of the trio. Then again, there’s something innately commanding about his presence, and it isn’t just the way he holds himself, or the barely contained monster lurking beneath his skin. It’s much, much more than that. Refusing to kowtow to his demands, I shake my head. “No.”
“Wrong answer,” he retorts, and before I can even turn and run, he’s wrapped his fingers around my throat and has me pushed up against the wall, nose to nose. I feel his steady breath on my skin as he glares at me. “You will obey. You will do what we tell you to do, when we tell you to do it,” he continues, his hazel gaze pinning me to the wall as much as his body is. The unusual golden colour of his eyes, flecked with deep browns and dark greens, reminds me of the forest surrounding the castle.
“Every time you refuse our commands, you will be punished. Every time that mouth runs away with itself, you will pay the price. We are not men who you say no to. Understand me?” He releases the pressure on my throat slightly, and I draw in a ragged breath. “Well?”
“I understand,” I reply through gritted teeth.
“You may be Zero to Konrad, but you’re Nothing to me, and you’ll be treated like nothing until I decide you’re worth something,” he says, sliding his hand from around my throat and into my hair. Grabbing a handful, he yanks my head back, pressing his body against the length of mine before dragging the tip of his nose up my exposed neck, breathing in deeply. “Do not fuck with me.”
I let out a gasp as he bites down on my earlobe, drawing the fleshy part between his lips. “Please,” I beg, hating myself for being so weak. Anger burns in my stomach, but this time I clamp my mouth shut knowing that unlike Konrad, Jakub doesn’t do well with someone combative. That’s abundantly clear.
“My brothers may need someone to toy with, and that is why you’re still breathing, but know this, Nothing, I will have no problem teaching you a lesson if you speak to me with disrespect again,” he warns.
Pig.
My hands itch to push against his chest, to shove him off, but his threat and the lazy way he trails his lips across my cheek prevents me. When he reaches my mouth, his lips hovering just over mine, my heart stops beating altogether and for the tiniest moment, no more than a millisecond, my body concedes and I allow myself to accept whatever is about to happen.
Our lips meet.
Time stills.
Breath hitches.
Everything fades away as the scent of fresh pine leaves and damp earth rises up from his pores.
He smells like… life. Familiar, yet frightening.
My pulse thumps in my neck as he draws in a deep breath, his eyelids fluttering closed.
“What is that…?” he mumbles, breathing me in.
When his tongue slides across my lower lip, my mouth parts of its own accord. When his fingers loosen in my hair, the tension in my muscles releases. When his hand cups my arse, squeezing me through the thin material of my dress, an ache forms between my legs.
“Here we go… Brother—?!”
Time speeds back up, untethering us from the strange attraction that has wound its way around us both like the snake around Eve’s heart. My stomach lurches as reality seeps back in. What the hell was that?
“Fuck!” Jakub swears, releasing me with a shove as he steps back.
My back slams against the wall behind me, pain shooting down my spine as nausea twists my stomach. Did we just kiss? Did I want his kiss? Jakub strides over to Konrad and snatches the leather collar and lead from his hand, chucking it at Leon who catches it.
“That was quite the show, Jakub,” Leon remarks, one brow arched as he rises slowly to his feet, and snaps the leather between his tattooed hands. Dark swirly shapes cover the back of both hands, creeping up each finger. They remind me of reeds in a pond, the kind that could drown you if you happened to get tangled up in them.
“I thought we agreed not to indulge until Zero has learnt her place,” Konrad remarks, folding his arms across his chest and levelling his gaze at Jakub.
“We did. That was… What the fuck did Thirteen do?”
Konrad frowns. “Do?”
“I can smell one of her damn lotions on Nothing’s skin,” Jakub accuses, jabbing a finger in my direction. “She smells like… like. Fuck this!” he rages. “Leash her. I need to speak with Thirteen.” With that, he grabs his mask and storms out of the room, slamming the door behind him.
“Well, I’ll be fucked,” Konrad smirks, darting his gaze from Leon back to me. “Looks like you got under his skin, Zero.”
Leon shakes his head, snorting. “Doubtful. He seems more pissed with Thirteen. He doesn’t like to be caught off guard. Besides, she’s not really his taste.”
“He looked pretty caught up to me. You’ve got to admit, she’s quite alluring, isn’t she?”
Leon runs his gaze over me as he fingers the leather collar. “Maybe.”
“Come on, Brother, you must see what I see,” Konrad continues. “All that fiery red hair and long limbs. Aren’t you just the least bit curious to find out what she looks like beneath that dress?”
“Not really. I am interested in how loud she screams though,” he retorts, stalking over to me.
My mouth parts, a cutting retort on the tip of my tongue, then I remember what Nala had said and instead I force myself to be quiet.
“Where do you think you’re going…?” Leon asks as I slide along the wall, backing away from him. A wide grin splits his handsome face. It’s the kind of smile girls with no sense would fall for, only seeing the beauty and not the beast beneath his skin. There’s a reason why some of the deadliest things are so alluring.
“I—”
“Running wouldn’t be wise…” He pauses, cocking his head and dropping his smile. “What should I call you?” he muses, thumbing the leather collar in his hand. “Looks like Jakub thinks you’re Nothing, and Konrad has already named you Zero…”
“How about Christy?” I say, instantly regretting my moment of bravery.
His lip curls. “How about Nought?”
“Nought?” My throat closes over and tears prick my eyes. I see what this is. Take me away from the people I love. Strip me of my name, my clothes, my identity. Make me a number. No, make me less than a number. To them I’m no better than an animal, a dog they can leash and force to obey.
I’m Zero, Nothing, Nought, to these men.
“Yes, from now on I shall call you Nought. Heel, Nought.”
My jaw grits, my nostrils flaring. I look from Konrad’s amused gaze back to Leon’s cruel one. If they think they can treat me like this, they’ve got another thing coming. I would rather die than allow them to reduce me to that.
“I said, heel!” Leon repeats, snapping his wrist so that the end of the leather leash catches my bare feet. The sharp pain registers within my tormented heart, pushing me over the edge just as my fingers reach the handle of the door.
“Fuck you!” I snap, ripping the door open and slamming it closed behind me.