Knights and Kink Romance Boxed Set (47 page)

The ice-crotched Egyptian and her two henchwomen
back me into a corner. “At last, Lady Louisa, we are alone,” she
hisses. I half-expect a forked tongue to start flicking in and out
of her mouth.

I point over Madam Jasphet’s shoulder, which is bare
save for a gold snake wrapped around her upper left forearm.
“Actually, we’re not alone at all. There’s a few hundred other
Harlots roaming around the ballroom, after all.”

“Who might as well not even be here,” she retorts,
her voice frigid as dry ice. “They know better than to cross me.
I’m sure you’re aware of my reputation yourself.”

I decide the only way I might stand a chance against
this evil ice queen is to try calling her bluff. “You mean the fact
that it’s rumored you poison your enemies to death if they piss you
off too much?” I say. “Yeah, I’ve heard all about that. And I’m not
sure I believe it.”

Madam Jasphet, Mabel, and Prudence all raise one
eyebrow apiece, incredulous.

“I mean, where’s the proof?” I go on, grasping for
whatever ammo I can come up with out of thin air. “Nobody’s ever
found anything that links you definitively to any of all those
other Harlot’s deaths. For all I know, all those other ladies just
came down with a random case of smallpox or something, and you just
took the credit for their deaths to make everyone afraid of
you.”

I actually might be onto something here, because
Madam Jasphet just turned eleven shades of purple.

“How dare you!” Madam Jasphet sputters. “How
dare
you!”

“How dare I what?” I reply saucily. “Expose you as a
fraud? Because it seems that’s exactly what I’ve just done.”

Hey, not too shabby for taking a stab in the dark,
huh?

Madam Jasphet continues to choke on her own tongue,
so I decide to press a little further. “You’re nothing but a big
bully, do you know that?” I seethe at her. “A big bully with no
guts, having your two little toadies here do your dirty work for
you. Which is really too bad, Mabel and Prudence, because the two
of you have considerable talents in the sex department that you’re
just putting to waste slaving away as evil lackeys for the Egyptian
Ice Crotch here.”

Mabel and Prudence both blush beet-red and stare at
the floor.

“And what the hell was that crap you poured all over
me when I was knocked out in your chambers, Madam Jasphet? I had a
rash for days.”

“I see no reason to reveal my secrets to you, Lady
Louisa,” she chirps.

“Oh yeah? How about the fact I know that you’re just
a big fake?” (Even though I don’t know for
sure
that she’s a
fake, but I don’t dare say this out loud). “Hell, I wouldn’t be
surprised if you’re just some flunky from the middle of Kansas
someplace who just happens to know something about Ancient Egypt.
For all I know, Lord Verdigris just captured you, brought you here,
and
forced
you to play the part of some bitchy Cleopatra
clone.”

Madam Jasphet bites her lip, sighs, stares at the
floorboards. Finally, she speaks, her voice tinny and small. “How
did you know?” she asks.

I’m almost too shocked to speak. That was a shot in
the dark too—and the right one at that. “I’m a fraud, too,” I say.
“I’m not Lady Louisa of the Crossroads. I’m just Louise Jackson, a
tollbooth worker from New Jersey. Lord Verdigris kidnapped me in
the
Medieval Worlds’
men’s room, brought me here, and gave
me a new name and persona. I figured he probably did the same with
you. With most of us, in fact.”

Madam Jasphet keeps looking down at the floor.
“You’re right,” she says. “I’m not really Madam Jasphet. I’m not
even from Ancient Egypt. I’m Jaclyn Moffet, from Topeka, Kansas. I
used to be a junior-high social-studies teacher. I met Lord
Verdigris in the Mummies department at the Topeka Natural History
Museum where I was taking my class on a field trip. Next thing I
knew, I was trapped here in the Hall of Harlots, dressed up like
Cleopatra and having sex with everything that wasn’t nailed
down.”

I reach out and squeeze her hand. “We’re both
prisoners here, Jaclyn. We’re all in the same boat. There’s no need
for us to be enemies.”

Jaclyn sighs. “I suppose not. But how did you know I
was from Kansas? Are you psychic or something?”

“I dunno. Maybe.” Then I smirk, remembering how I
opened Lord Verdigris’ time portal myself using nothing but my
mind. “In fact, I think I
am
probably psychic. But I’m still
figuring out how that works.”

Jaclyn frowns, not really understanding. “O-okay. So
I guess we aren’t enemies anymore. But I wouldn’t say we’re exactly
friends, either.”

“Why not?”

Jaclyn jerks her head towards her two costumed
lackeys. “Well, Mabel and Prudence, for instance. They’re not the
brightest stars in the sky, either one of them. The only thing they
really know how to do besides fuck is render their fellow Harlots
unconscious. I’m not sure they’d understand why I’m suddenly not
trying to kill you—figuratively or not. And they both enjoy their
jobs far too much to just stop doing it.”

Having been rendered unconscious at Mabel and
Prudence’s capable hands, I know their talents in this department
all too well. “That’s not necessarily a bad thing,” I offer. “We
could always use that to our advantage.”

Jaclyn looks lost. “What do you mean?”

I pull Jaclyn over to the side a little, out of her
minions’ earshot. “Forgive me if I’m overstepping my bounds here,
but I get the distinct impression that you’re pretty unhappy about
being stuck here in the Hall of Harlots for all eternity. In fact,
I bet you’d like nothing more than to get back to Topeka so you can
go back to teaching school. Am I right?”

Jaclyn nods. “Though I admit I would miss all the
sex. God knows there isn’t a lot of hot action in Topeka, as much
as I love my hometown. But we’re both stuck here with no way out.
Why get my hopes up about something that will never happen?”

“That’s where you’re wrong,” I say, and squeeze her
shoulder. “I’ve already figured out how to open Lord Verdigris’
time portals. I still have a lot of kinks to work out, but I think
I should be able to travel back to my own time and place soon. With
your
help, maybe even sooner. I can take you back to Kansas
someday, too—but not if you or your two sexy love-slaves here keep
trying to kill me. So how about it? Will you call off your dogs and
partner up with me?”

Jaclyn thinks it over for a minute, then nods. “I’ll
will. But I can’t promise that Mabel and Prudence will get on
board, too. They
like
it here. A lot.”

I shrug. “To each her own, I guess.”

A medieval harp-and-recorder band strikes up some
chamber music in the ballroom’s far corner, and a group dance I
recognize from the history books as a French
pavonne
begins
in the middle of the room. As dozens of Harlots and knights join
the dance while dozens of others mill around, muzzy from the spiked
punch, I see an opportunity. “Jaclyn, we’re free to roam anywhere
we want in the castle during the ball, right?” She nods. “Well,
then let’s go. I want to see if I can find some more of Lord
Verdigris’ time-portals.”

“But what if somebody follows us? If His Lordship
finds out what we’re doing—“

“Everybody else is either drunk or dancing.
Nobody’ll even notice we’re gone.”

Jaclyn reluctantly agrees. “All right, if you say
so. But I hope you know what you’re doing.”

I chuckle. “I hope I do, too.”

Chapter
14

I’m leading Jaclyn up a set of narrow stone stairs,
following nothing but a hunch. Some unseen force is pulling me up
the stairs that lead—I think—to the castle’s embattled roof.

“Where are you taking us?” Jaclyn asks, breathless
as she struggles to keep up with me.

I don’t answer; I just keep taking the steep, narrow
steps two at a time. When I finally reach the top, I pause on the
landing and look back. “I think this door here leads out to the
roof. Something tells me that there might be a portal out
there.”

Jaclyn looks bewildered. “A what?”

“A portal. A
time
portal. One of the openings
into another dimension that Lord Verdigris uses to travel through
time.”

“How the hell’d you figure that out? ESP?”

I grin. “Yeah, probably. You know, it’s funny—I
never used to believe in ESP, or time travel, or any of that
paranormal crap until I ended up here at Bellweather Castle. Now
not only do I believe in it, I
have
ESP. Pretty weird,
huh?”

“Almost as weird as you and me being friends after I
tried to have you killed.”

I cut Jaclyn a sidelong look. “You didn’t
really
try to kill me. You just sent two very hot chicks to
introduce me to red-hot lesbian sex so I could die from too many
orgasms. Which, I might add, would be a very pleasant way to die,
if one could actually die from too many orgasms.”

Jaclyn’s deep green eyes twinkle. “Actually, it’s
been known to happen. But it usually happens to men, not women. And
by the way, the rash I gave you was from poison ivy oil. I keep a
couple poison ivy plants in my bedchamber. I can give you one if
you like. They can really come in handy for emergencies, like when
one of the knights gets too rough in bed.”

“In
my
bed, the knights aren’t the ones who
get rough,” I say with a wink. “Rather, it’s the other way
around.”

Jaclyn’s eyebrows raise. “I’ve heard that about you.
Though I wasn’t sure if it was true.”

“Oh it’s true, believe me,” I reply, fiddling with
the heavy wooden roof door’s rusty iron lock. “Though I was as
surprised as you when I first discovered I had a talent for
dominating men.”

“And how exactly does one discover one has a talent
for dominating men? I always thought we dominants were
born
knowing what we were. Just like we’re born knowing whether we’re
male or female, gay or straight, or in-between.”

After one final heave, I finally manage to break the
rusty lock off the door and force it open. “Well, then I guess I’m
proof your theory is wrong. And if you are as dominant as you say
you are, why do you need to keep poison ivy in your chambers to
keep your submissives in line?”

Jaclyn doesn’t seem to have an answer for that. I
decide to let the matter go—at least, for now. Because if the plan
that was fast growing in my head comes to fruition, I have a
feeling that Jaclyn and her unconventional dominance skills could
definitely come in handy in my quest to find and open all of Lord
Verdigris’ time portals.

Starting right now.

I lead Jaclyn through the doorway and out onto the
roof. And now I know what unseen force pulled me up here—for I spot
Lord Verdigris standing on the far end of the battlement, flanked
by Pembroke, the Rose Knight, and a hulking guard I don’t
recognize. Lord Verdigris is pointing something out on the ground
to the three men and boasting in his usual booming, lilting
voice.

“And hence, ye can see the new portcullis, ‘tis made
of an exotic Arabian alloy that is impenetrable from both within
and without,” Lord Verdigris booms proudly. “’Tis impervious to
boiling oil, battering ram, flaming cannonballs, and all other
available castle-storming technologies. And ‘tis impossible to
raise from within, unless ye have the secret code. The lock, ‘tis
mechanically coded, just like the locks of the mighty Templars in
the Holy Land!”

“Most intriguing,” Pembroke says, obviously bored to
tears. He hasn’t noticed my presence yet.

But the hulking guard has. “My lord, beware!” he
shouts, drawing his blade. “Intruders!”

Lord Verdigris spins around, his own blade drawn,
but immediately relaxes when he meets my gaze. “Sheath your weapon,
Geoffrey,” he orders the guard, who immediately obeys. “’Tis only
my two favorite courtesans—Lady Louisa of the Crossroads and Madam
Jasphet. Greetings, ladies. And how, pray, did ye two lovely
blossoms of womanhood find yourselves upon my embattled roof?”

Jaclyn opens her mouth to speak, but I give her a
subtle sign to be silent. “We were merely searching for Your
Lordship,” I explain, all cool and kittenish. “And my woman’s
intuition just led me up here.”

Lord Verdigris sweeps over to where Jaclyn and I are
standing, gives us both a deep bow, then reaches forward to kiss
my—and only my—hand. Jaclyn flinches at the snub, thinking I won’t
notice, but I do. “Lady Louisa, the site of you is like sweet milk
and honey,” he says, oozing his trademark charm. “I was just
thinking about how much I enjoyed our most recent encounter.
Verily, I troth that I have just refuted at least nine different
requests from my vassaldom this afternoon for your charms so that I
may keep you all for myself for all time. This night I am resigned
to giving up a great deal of gold for the pleasure of having you
all of my very own, for no one else to touch, at any price at
all.”

I almost choke. “Verily, sir? I may give my charms
to no one else? You speak true?”

“Yes, milady. I have just come to the decision a
moment ago, at Master Pembroke’s insistence. For he seems to
believe I shall put you at unnecessary risk if I make ye open for
all my vassals’ paid affections.”

I cough, and shoot Pembroke a subtle
what the
hell
look. He shoots me back a not-so-subtle
chill out
look. But I’m not about to chill out.

“But Your Lordship! Don’t you forfeit potentially
huge sums in gold and goods by taking my charms off the market?” I
cast a sidelong glance at Jaclyn, who is growing noticeably tense.
“And won’t the other Harlots become jealous of my new position as
your exclusive? Surely you don’t wish to sow such discord in the
Hall of Harlots.”

Lord Verdigris smiles. “Ah, but ye are perceptive,
Lady Louisa. True, I do lose income by keeping ye all for my own,
and yea, ‘tis true jealousy will be abrew in the Hall. But jealousy
in the Hall among the courtesans, ‘tis nothing new. The Hall always
hath survived it afore now, and ‘twill survive it again. Pray,
Louisa, by my troth, I feel a swelling in my loins for ye charms
even now. Let us retire to your chambers, and go abed.”