And the sex.
Let’s not forget about that.
As if she could.
Dream rolled onto her back, closed her eyes against the brilliant light of the sun, and stretched. She groaned, lifted her arms high above her, and stretched her legs to their limit, extending her toes horizontally. Then, when she could stretch no more, she let her muscles go slack and she settled back into the plush feather mattress. She blinked, squinted against the sunlight, and took in her surroundings.
King’s room was, if anything, more impressive by daylight.
The room was just huge, bigger even than she had perceived last night. A small family could live in this room and not worry about invading each other’s personal space. The rows and rows of floor-to-ceiling walnut bookshelves made her think of libraries at great universities. She thought maybe the books were just for show. How could anyone ever read this many books in a lifetime?
Unless, she reminded herself, one’s lifetime encompassed several centuries.
So, she thought, back to that again.
Well, there was no avoiding the subject. Her new lover was a supernatural being with powers that both awed and frightened her. Absurd. But undeniable. The exhilaration of her flight through space and time was still fresh in her mind. But so was the memory of what she’d seen in that underground place in England. The slaves. The degradation. Death. And there was another place just like it somewhere beneath this house. While she luxuriated in this incredible bed-easily the most sensually decadent bed she’d ever slept or fucked on-somewhere below her people were suffering.
She shifted ever so slightly on the bed.
She still didn’t want to get up.
Even the reflexive guilt she felt wasn’t sufficient enough to change that. The French doors stood open, allowing her a view of the balcony and green mountainside. The warm sunshine felt good on her nude body. It was like a lover’s lightest touch, fingertips gliding over trembling flesh. She ran a hand along an inner thigh, shuddered at a sense-memory of King’s caress, and touched herself.
She remembered being perched at the edge of the bed.
Her favorite position.
Another shudder rippled through her. She could almost feel him inside her. She was often too shy with new lovers to broach the subject. When she was with someone new, she invariably put up with the standard alternations of boy on top and girl on top for weeks before working up the nerve to tell them what she wanted. They were always enthusiastic, which just made her feel silly for being so bashful. Of course, some of them were confused by her request, thinking she wanted it in the ass.
Dan thought that.
Of course—
Well, she hadn’t made the connection until now.
It made her giggle.
This is just insane, she thought.
Here she was, surrounded by madness, and she was giggling … and sort of lightly masturbating.
What’s wrong with this picture?
She knew she ought to be getting up, putting her clothes on, making preparations to get out of this place. No sane person, knowing what she knew, would hesitate. Somewhere on the floor was a tangle of clothes. She envisioned getting off the bed, sorting through them, and going out to look for Alicia and Karen. Her friends were somewhere in this house. She had to warn them.
She didn’t move.
The thought came again: What’s wrong with me?
Had she been drugged? She didn’t have any of the familiar symptoms, and she knew them pretty damn well from her time in the hospital and the institution. That spaced-out, numb feeling wasn’t in evidence. Dissociation, they called it. No, this was nothing like that. She had never been more in touch with her senses and her feelings. In fact, she seemed hypersensitive. The hand at her sex felt like a warm, vibrating glove.
Hmm … some weird libido drug?
She jerked her hand away when she heard the sound of a doorknob turning. Dream’s head lolled to the left, and she saw Ms. Wickman enter bearing a tray. She set the tray on a folding stand next to the bed, folded her arms beneath her breasts, and said, “The Master wanted me to tell you he’ll be along shortly. He has some business to attend to.” Her gaze traveled the length of Dream’s exposed body before she added, “There’s a robe for you in the closet, should you find yourself feeling … modest.”
She turned and exited the room before Dream could formulate an appropriate reply or inquire after her friends. The door clicked shut, and she was alone again. She perched herself on an elbow and examined the contents of the tray. A porcelain cup brimmed with steaming coffee, and there was a little plate with a cute arrangement of chocolate truffles. Dream’s stomach growled, and she realized how much time had passed since she’d eaten-not so much as a bite had passed through her lips since discovering Dan in flagrante delicto.
She scooted to the edge of the bed, picked up a truffle, and nibbled. Crumbs tumbled from her mouth to the mattress. She brushed the crumbs off, got out of bed-finally!-and went to the closet. The large space was filled with expensive, tailored suits, things a modern bigwig would wear with pride, but there was a curious assortment of clothes from other eras. She saw vests, shirts with ruffles, Edwardian jackets, and tweed coats with arm patches. There was a shelf for hats. There were fedoras, bowlers, top hats, and a leather cowboy hat with a braided band around it. Some of it looked like stuff that belonged in the Smithsonian or some other museum. She wondered how long it had been since he’d worn some of these things. Why would he keep such old clothes?
Could a thing like King feel sentiment?
Dream pulled a terry-cloth robe from a hanger and slipped it on, shuddering at the way it felt on her skin. Her conviction that something was enhancing her senses grew a little stronger. She drew the sash tight across her waist, cinched it, and returned to the room. She picked up the tray and carefully carried it out onto the balcony. She set the tray on a table and moved to the edge of the balcony, where she gripped the railing with both hands.
Her voice was a breathy whisper. “Oh … my. …”
The view was spectacular. She had a greater appreciation now for the distance she and her friends had traveled the night before. And she must have been too tired to have a real sense of the size of King’s house, which appeared to be perched atop some high point, perhaps at the very peak of a tall mountain. It hadn’t seemed that way on their approach last night, but she was beyond questioning these inversions of reality. The rear of the house stretched for what seemed like a mile in either direction. Dozens of gabled windows overlooked the same breathtaking panorama of mountains and greenery. She saw a lowlying cloud roll lethargically through the slash of land below.
It was gorgeous.
Heartbreakingly so.
She felt weak in the knees, so she made herself go to the table and sit down. She settled into the wicker chair, picked up the still-warm cup of coffee, and sipped from it. Delicious, as she’d somehow known it would be. She set the cup down, reclined in the chair, and stared in rapt awe at the scenery.
What would it be like to wake up to this every morning for the rest of her life?
She sensed that King wanted that.
She smiled at the memory of his fairy-tale analogies.
Me, she thought. A queen.
Imagine that.
She sensed other things about King, as well. Things gleaned from the unique bonding of the out-of-body experience. Insights few humans could ever perceive. The most readily apparent thing was the change under way inside him. He maintained a convincing facade of menace, but she had a notion his heart wasn’t in it anymore. He’d reveled in his nature for centuries, glorying in sadism and cruelty, but wasn’t it possible even truly evil beings could grow bored with their existence?
It wasn’t as if she’d read his mind. But these things had been easy enough to intuit. In the altered state of incorporeal consciousness, feelings and thoughts possessed something close to form and substance. Subtle permutations of light and color, hot and cold. She’d detected the strongest indications of his changing mood during
