He had trained in the arts of pleasure and protection, as well as healing. He had made his muscles strong for her, this soon-to-be Mistress of his heart, and studied all the classic literature and vids, for he wanted his mind to be as pleasing as his body. He wanted her to find him handsome and desirable—well-trained and well-educated to meet her every need and fulfill her every whim.
They made me into a whore, he thought bitterly. A whore willing to sell myself for the pleasure of whatever crumbs of approval my hypothetical Mistress happened to toss my way.
He cringed now, remembering the hours of labor and sacrifice he had put in, all in the service of the elusive “Mistress” he hoped to one day meet and be owned by. The scientists who had mixed his DNA and the instructors who had trained him had persuaded him to sacrifice everything in the hopes of one day being the perfect slave.
Thankfully, that hadn’t come to pass. When he was nearing his twentieth name day, which was the age when the “perfect Body Slaves” (as they were advertised to the Mistresses of Yonnie Six) were sold, a Kindred raiding crew came calling.
They had heard of the misuse of their DNA and were angry on behalf of the Mod-Kindred who had been grown specifically to serve the cruel Mistresses of the female-run world. Ty had been one of the number they had rescued when they burned the slave station to the ground, destroying the Kindred DNA the escaping scientists might have otherwise used to start again.
Then had begun a gray area of his life—a deprogramming of everything he had ever been taught to believe.
“You were brainwashed,” Kairn, the Beast Kindred who had taken Ty under his wing had explained. “Of course, there’s nothing wrong with finding the right female and loving and protecting her for life—that is the Goddess’s will for our people. But the idea that you must submit to being owned and serve a female slavishly, acting more like her pet than her mate, is wrong and insulting. The Goddess gave us all free will—she expects us to use it.”
In time, Ty had come to see that his new mentor was right. Because Kairn was in the Elite Espionage Corps, he had joined also. And thus had begun a whole new way of life—in service to his people, rather than to some elusive Mistress, Ty had finally found his calling. For he was able to carry out difficult and dangerous missions without losing his free will, which had become everything to him.
It had been twelve cycles since that day and he had never looked back. In fact, he hardly thought about his strange beginnings at all anymore.
Except now, when Commander Sylvan was bringing them up.
“You’re not asking me to go undercover as a Body Slave, are you?” he asked Sylvan suspiciously. “Because I must tell you, Commander, that I would have to respectfully decline such a mission. Despite the ‘deprogramming’ of my early teachings, I believe I might still have certain…tendencies which might compromise a mission of that kind.”
Of course, the tendencies he feared were the tweaks that had been made to his DNA to force him to love and serve a Mistress who claimed him as though she was the Goddess herself. It wouldn’t do to put himself in the vulnerable situation of pretending to be a Body Slave and then having the ruse become his reality.
For if he ever allowed himself to serve a female the way his makers had intended, if he allowed himself to fall in love and give his heart to her completely…
It would be the end of me, he thought, frowning. The end of my free will—the end of my autonomy. Every action, every decision I made would be determined by her. I wouldn’t be able to think for myself anymore—I’d only want to serve her blindly until the end of my days and I wouldn’t give a flying fuck about anything else as long as she was safe and happy.
He knew it was true—knew it to the marrow of his bones—which was why he guarded his heart so carefully and refused to put himself into any position where his genetic vulnerability could be exploited.
But Commander Sylvan was shaking his head.
“No, Ty,” he said, frowning. “I would never ask you to put yourself in such a situation. No, the mission is not to serve as a Body Slave to a Mistress. Though it is to guard a female ruler of a nearby planet—the Potentate of our new allies, the Chorkay of Helios Beta.”
“Really? Explain, please.”
Ty frowned and folded his hands loosely in his lap, prepared to listen thoroughly before making a decision.
Sylvan had explained rapidly about the recent mission his fellow Espionage Corps member, Commander Asher, had made to the planet of Helios Beta. He told of how Asher had foiled an assassination attempt and how the new ruler—the Potentate—was now vulnerable because her entire cadre of personal guards had been compromised and implicated in the plot.
“The Chorkay are our allies and they have asked for our help specifically because they know that we Kindred revere females and refuse to harm them,” Sylvan had explained. “This is a temporary mission only. I’ve already sent some Kindred troops to keep her safe but I need a seasoned warrior who’s a good judge of character to head them up.”
“Oh? Why so?” Ty asked. “What would my job there entail?”
“You’d have to personally guard the new Potentate and pick a new squadron of guards from her own people—males who can be trusted to be loyal to her once we are gone.”
“That doesn’t sound too
