Lips Like Ice Read online

  In the center of the room there is a depression. It is filled with a pool of water easily as big as four hot tubs, deep enough that Lydia doubts she could stand with her head above the water, and is the source of both the steam and the slightly spicy scent. Another, free-standing bench along one side of it holds glass decanters of thick, colored liquids that Lydia assumes are soaps, more towels, what appears to be a drinking glass of something that smells like wine, and, incongruously, a book. Too large for her to hold comfortably, true, but a real book--leather binding, ink-printed paper, and all.

  The creature has drawn a bath.

  As inviting as the water is, Lydia is still in desperate need of a pee, so she keeps investigating. Around a small wall and in an alcove the size of a walk-in closet, she finds something that looks a bit like a hole in the ground with a cushioned rim. There is a lid over it, and when she pushes it back on its hinges, the faint smell of outhouse drifts upwards. Toilet.

  She doesn't want to sit. The hole is too big and she might fall through, so she straddles the cushions and squats, hoping against hope that the creature won't walk in when she's in such an embarrassing position. It doesn't. There's no toilet paper, so she closes the lid and grimaces at the unclean feel.

  The bath is now more tempting than she can resist. She folds her towel quickly and neatly onto the bench. Like the mattress, it is far too high for her to scramble onto with any kind of dignity. She tests the temperature of the water with a toe. Just this side of too-warm, but she can't wait any longer.

  Lydia slides into the water, spice and something musky like incense ticking at her nose, and she ducks under the water to test the depth. Maybe seven feet, she decides, breaking the surface and finding a scooped out place in the wall of the tub that is probably meant to be a comfortable place for the creature to sit. For Lydia, it is just deep enough that she has to kneel. She tests the liquids in the decanters and when she finds one that froths and suds in the water she hauls herself onto the ledge, scrubs thoroughly, even her hair, and then jumps back in.

  She holds her breath and scratches at her scalp, willing away the grime and oil. Her hair tangles, and she wonders idly if one of the other potions in the bottles is some kind of conditioner.

  When she breaks the surface again, it is to the sight of a long, bare, blue-green foot right beside her head. Lydia yelps and ducks back under, covering herself with her arms, and stares up at the creature. It is sitting on the bench, one leg resting at the ankle on the opposite knee.

  "First she is sick and I have to coddle her, and then she has the presumption to rob me of my bath," the creature says, and Lydia can't tell if its tone is one of amusement or anger. It pauses, ice-peak lips pursed, and Lydia realizes that it is waiting for an explanation.

  "Sorry," Lydia whispers. "I smelt."

  "She did," the creature agrees. "And if she is well enough to desire to be clean, and intelligent enough to work out how to go about getting so, then I am going to have to reassess all the research on her people that it exists within our libraries, and guess that her species is cleverer than my father assumes."

  "I know soap when I see it," Lydia mutters, mildly insulted on behalf of the whole human race.

  "Apparently."

  Silence hangs between them, thick as the scent of the spices in the water and just as heavy. It gets squirmingly awkward very, very quickly. Lydia drums her fingertips against the backs of her shoulders, presses her elbows against her breasts, and waits for the creature to say anything else. It doesn't. Right.

  Lydia shifts and moves closer to the edge. "Look, I'll, uh... I'll get out. Can you... look away? I just want to get a towel."

  "And modesty, too!" the creature says, and this time it is with delight. It even raises its hand in what she assumes is a gesture of great mirth. "Body shame, even. How fascinating."

  "You can dissect my psyche when I'm dressed, okay?" Lydia snaps. "A towel. Please."

  The creature holds out a fresh towel, but does not turn its back. Fine, Lydia thinks. She hauls herself out of the water and takes the towel from its hand, and wraps herself in it. She squeezes water out of the ends of her hair. It's not elegant, but it works.

  It's not until she is standing beside the creature that she realizes it too is completely naked.

  She tries not to stare at the expanse of dark skin, the smooth, featureless chest, the sharp jut of hipbones and knees. Her eyes skim over the shadow of its groin and she doesn't catch any details or impressions beyond hairless.

  The creature laughs. It is musical and the dual-tone shifts towards soprano-and-tenor as it giggles. "And interest in my own body! Comparing the differences!"

  "Yes," Lydia snaps. "I am a fully cognizant, sentient human being! I get it! Har har!"

  "Human beings. That is her species' name for itself?"

  Lydia sobers abruptly. "Yes. What... what's yours?"

  "We do not have one, not really," the creature says. "Many people from many worlds have many names for us. Extra-terrestrials. Gods. Elves. Monsters. So many names in so many languages, and on her world there are many more. I have been watching her world since my father gave her to me. Since I realized that she was cleverer than I had anticipated. And even now I am surprised again by her ability to reason. Your species has advanced, and rapidly."

  "Gods?" Lydia echoes weakly, and her knees feel like they're about to go out from under her. "Elves?" She gives in and sits on the ledge of the bath, feet dangling in the water, and breathes heavily to fend off a panic attack. She curls her hands around the edge of the towel and squeezes, as if the rich texture of looped thread against her palms could hold sanity inside her body. She clings to the one bit of reality out of his whole speech. "How do you know English?"

  One of the creature's long, thin fingers pokes at a place between her shoulder blades. Its nails are blunt, but the place is tender and she hisses in surprise discomfort. It feels like a very large, recent bruise. She jumps up and walks over to the windows--there is just enough reflection there to use as a mirror--and she twists and contorts until she has a good view of the patch of skin. A set of thin white lines curve along her spine, looking nothing so much as like someone carved some hybrid of Celtic knot work and satanic symbols into her skin with a scalpel.

  "What is that?" Lydia breathes. "What have you done?"

  "Not I," the creature says. There is a soft splash as it slides into the water of the bath. For all that the furniture is outsized for Lydia, the creature is only nine or so feet tall--it can sit in the seat easily, the bathwater coming up to the tops of its shoulders. "My mother. She is a strong spell-worker."

  "A spell?" Lydia feels faint again.

  "Translation. Forgetfulness. And... compliance."

  She whips around to stare at the thing in the bath. "What?"

  "A pet must be content in its new home, and must be able to both understand and obey," the creature says with a Gallic shrug that makes the water ripple.

  Lydia's knees give way a second time and she finds herself sitting on the stone floor, dazed and sick with disbelief. "You chipped me?"

  She reaches desperately for a memory, any memory. She can recall her fish, her apartment, but there is no feeling with them. Her parents, she can see their shapes, their faces, but they are behind a shroud of gauze. There is no sense memory, no smell, no attendant sound of laughter. There is no detail, no tangibility. Her friends... surely she had friends... and colleagues. And a job? Was there a job?

  Lydia covers her mouth with her hand and retches, fear and horror rising quick and sharp, burning acid on the back of her tongue. She swallows and swallows, panic making her heart race and her lungs clench against the strange, thick, spicy air. She can imagine things, she can conjure the shadow of people, she can compare them, but she doesn't see, not clearly.

  She can't remember. And worse than that, she doesn't care.

  The creature picks up the decanter of soap and gestures with its other hand, clearly a beckoning gesture. "I do not kn
ow what that means. Here, come. If she is so determined to share my bath, she may wash my hair."

  "No!" Lydia sputters, aghast. She doesn’t want to be anywhere near this thing, let alone touch it so intimately. Not when it's... stolen... violated...

  The creature narrows its eyes at her. For a moment it looks like it's about to shout, then it takes a deep breath, sets down the decanter, and cocks its head, lizard-like. "Ah. I see. This is her testing her limits. I have read that this is what new pets do: attempt to determine the boundaries of the leash."

  "I'm not a pet!" Lydia protests.

  The soprano-tenor laugh ripples along the stone walls and the surface of the bathwater. Lydia covers her ears with her hands, trying to muffle the ringing echoes, not caring how juvenile it might look.

  "She is far more amusing than I first assumed she would be," the creature says.

  "I'm not a pet!" Lydia repeats, and forces herself back onto her feet. Hands balled into fists, wrapped in only a damp towel, her hair dripping, she fumes. "My name is Lydia and I am human. And you can't keep me here!"

  "Can I not?" the creature asks. That foreign, eerie laughter fills the bath chamber again, and a hot lump burns in the hollow of Lydia's throat. Fear prickles the bottom of her feet, urging her to run, to skirt the bath and escape into the bedroom, and through that into the parlor. There must be another door there somewhere, and beyond that a hallway. And then what? A house? A palace? More of these creatures? And how far could she reasonably expect to get, nude and wet and unarmed? And if she did manage to escape this building, then what? The city outside of the amber windows is huge, and unknown, and wrong. Where would she find clothes? And shelter? And food?

  Despair and realization swims across her skin, pricking and honest. There is no way to escape unless this thing lets her go, releases the... the spell... and escorts her home. There is nowhere to go. Even the streets may be better than luxurious captivity, but not streets that are unfamiliar, dangerous, inhuman. A sure and unwavering death.

  Versus, what? A slow, comfortable one of ennui, of half-remembered and mostly indifferent homesickness? Absolutely unacceptable.

  "You can't keep me!" Lydia snarls, hoping the thing won't see through her blustering bluff of anger to the quavering woman within. "I'm an intelligent and sentient creature. I'm not some dumb animal. I'm not a pet. And I'm not a slave. I won’t let you take away my agency and I won't do as I'm told, either! Now, I don't know what you are, or who you are, but this has clearly been a massive mistake on someone's part. So you're just going to give me some clothes and then send me home."

  The creature just laughs.

  Lydia can only clench her fists around the tuck in the towel, over her heart, and shake.

  "I am her master. I shall do no such thing," the creature says when its amusement has ebbed. "Which leaves us with two choices. In one, she is obedient and does as she is told. I would much prefer that over the alternative."

  Lydia crosses her arms under her breasts and scowls. "Which is?"

  "The second is that she is disobedient and I punish her."

  A fission of terror crawls up her spine. She remembers the weight of the thing's hand on her throat, feels the phantom press of palm and fingers. The creature is bigger, stronger, and has already proved that it can move more swiftly and silently than she. It would be nothing for it to swat her face and break her nose, or hold her under the water, or to snap her leg to keep her from fleeing, from ever being able to do so much as walk without its assistance, its say-so. She swallows heavily.

  "You... you wouldn't," Lydia stutters. She wants it to sound defiant, but she wonders how much of the plea the creature can detect.

  "Would she care to test that assertion?"

  Lydia raises her chin, insubordinate, and holds her ground. Inside, her stomach twists and her soul trembles. The creature raises a hand from the water and performs a series of small, intricate motions with its fingers. It looks a little like it is conducting an orchestra and Lydia opens her mouth to spit invectives. But before she can get a word out, the scar between her shoulder blades begins to sear. She screams, the heat and the pain so quick, so intense, and so unexpected that she bows her back and howls.

  The pain shoots in both directions along her spine, filling her head with fire, her eyes with agony, and contorting her back in a rictus of anguish. Every nerve ending burns.

  It lasts seconds, and hours, and a lifetime. When it is over the rippling echoes of agony are so strong, take so long to fade, that she barely realizes that it is done. She comes back to herself by inches, her towel in disarray as she is sprawled on her front on the stone floor. Her fingers and toes still twitch with residual suffering, like a high school science frog hooked up to electrodes. Panting, chest heaving, tears leaking out of the sides of her eyes, she flips herself onto her back and presses her abused skin to the gloriously cold marble.

  "Fuck you," she whispers, stunned and shocky. "Oh my god. Fuck you."

  The suck-click scoff again. "Also an option," the creature says lightly. "Though one I was not entirely considering until just now. Do her people also engage in sexual pursuits for pleasure?"

  Lydia sobs.

  "Hmm. In that case I would much rather provide orgasms as an incentive, than pain as a punishment. I much prefer reward training. The books say it is far more effective, and I do not know what foods she would consider a treat. No, much better to provide the exercise of intercourse and the hormonal release of orgasm."

  She covers her face with her hands, pulling the towel up with them and hiding her breasts, her groin, her expression. She curls on her side with her sore back to the creature. There is a soft splash, the sound of bare feet padding on stone, and a large, wet hand against the side of her head, fingers snagging on the tangles in her hair.

  "Oh, poor small thing," the creature croons. "I did warn her."

  Lydia just tucks in tighter, lost in the childish hope that if she doesn't look at the monster, it will go away.

  It doesn't go away.

  Instead the creature pulls the towel away, curls arms under her knees and shoulders and lifts her to its chest. Cradling her like a child, like the small, skittish animal it clearly thinks she is, it gently pulls the towel away and steps back into the pool. It settles back into the seat and manipulates her limbs until she is leaning back against its chest, her bottom between its legs, face still covered with her hands as she tries not to hyperventilate with her sobs.

  She doesn't push, or kick, or bite, because what would be the point? She can't even seem to stop crying.

  Her ribs throb, and she isn't sure if it is from the hard fall to the floor or her tears. A headache is forming and she doesn't have the strength, the energy to push the creature's hands away when its long fingers began to massage some sort of oil into her hair.

  The chill touch sweeps down her neck, across her shoulders, pressing, massaging, soothing, until finally, weary with fear and terror, she drops her hands into her own lap, and leans her head back against its shoulder. There’s literally nowhere else to go, and sitting up, away from it, is making the small of her back ache.

  "There we are," the creature soothes, mistaking her defeat for compliance. "Shush. Shush. I am not an unkind master."

  "It hurt," Lydia protests, but her voice is nothing more than a small, cracked whisper.

  "She defied me. I did warn her of the outcome of defiance."

  Lydia whimpers, shivering away from its attempt to lay what is probably supposed to be a soothing hand on her forehead.

  "No, no," the creature whispers. "I shall not punish her again if she obeys."

  "What... what do you want?" Lydia asks, and she is both appalled and terrified of her own bravery for voicing the question.

  "Only companionship," the creature says.

  "And obedience."

  "Of course."

  "When can I go home?" Lydia whispers.

  The creature cups its hand and carefully rinses the oil from her hair. I
t runs its fingers through her tresses, over and over, until they are smooth and tangle-free.

  "She is home," it says.

  II

  Later, when it has bundled Lydia in a towel like a human burrito, they sit in the parlor. Lydia is a little more used to the excess oxygen now, a little more able to deal with the surfeit of calmness and light-headedness it brings. Though, the extra store of energy is just translating itself into a jittering in her leg that she can't seem to still, and the urge to pick at her water-softened cuticles. It doesn't help that she's feeling caffeine withdrawal something fierce, and she's got a headache like a jackhammer going to town on the back of her eyes.

  The creature is hunched over some sort of desk and a great deal of what Lydia assumes is correspondence, and Lydia stares at it from the deeply piled rug by the grand fireplace, where it had put her. Like a dog, she can't help but think, blood boiling with resentment. Meant to curl up on the rug by the fire! Instead she clutches her knees in her arms and glares.

  There is a credenza behind the desk, and over the creature's shoulder she can see several silver dishes and tureens. Some are covered, but on the ones that are not, food glistens and gleams.

  Lydia's stomach growls and she presses against her navel with a palm, urging it to silence. She will not, she will not go to the creature’s knee and beg for a treat. Besides, Persephone had been trapped forever by just six measly seeds. What would an entire grape do? An entire plate of them? And cheese? And bread, god, bread that is still steaming gently. Her stomach gurgles again, and she presses her forehead against her knees, eyes stinging with shame.