Agent of the Dragon
Chapter 40

Rhysa knew she still lived when she realized her eyes were closed. She was lightheaded, and just as glad to be lying down. Someone moved around her; the noise was soft, as if whoever it was wanted to avoid waking her. A quickened rustle of fabric and the soft click of a door being shut let her know someone had just left the room.

She opened her eyes, and discovered her vision was blurry. It wasn’t until she tried to rub her eyes, though, that she found she’d been tied down. She struggled against her bonds, but was too weak to do anything of use.

A low, slightly husky voice spoke next to her ear. “If your eyes are blurry, blink rapidly several times. They’ll tear up and clear.” It was said in conversational tones, but the supremely masculine voice resonated inside her. She did so, and they cleared. “Very good.”

She looked down the length of her body; she was not merely tied, she was strapped to something. Straps looped over her torso; each leg was strapped separately, as was each arm. She was also completely naked. What is it, she thought with resignation, that invariably makes people strip their captives? She waited for the man to reveal himself.

He had long hair caught at the nape of his neck with a leather cord. His face was chiseled and his physique was somewhere between lithe and heavily muscled. He looked down into her eyes, and something deep inside her screamed in terror.

“Amilar.” Rhysa was surprised how calm she sounded.

The man smiled. “You do remember me. Good. I’m sorry you have to be strapped down like this, but you’re too dangerous, even weakened from blood loss, for me to allow you to wander around. I’ll let you up when you get closer to the end of your retraining.” He turned to walk away.

“Retraining?”

He turned back to her. “Of course, my dear. When I’m done, you’ll do anything I want you to.” He smiled again. “It’ll leave your skills intact, but with no personal will to speak of. Your entire existence will revolve around pleasing me. Oh, don’t worry, I’m not talking only about physical pleasure. You’ll want to do anything to make me happy.”

Rhysa stared unblinking into his eyes until he left. As soon as the door closed, Rhysa convulsed with a shudder. His voice was so calm and matter of fact, so certain she would be his--mind, body, and soul, and yet it also tantalized.

She thought of what else he’d said. She was weak from blood loss. Well, that would explain why she was lightheaded. She was dangerous. She could be. But he seemed to think she was still dangerous after losing a couple pints of blood. She fell asleep again before figuring out how she could be dangerous to him.

The next time she woke, Amilar was seated next to her bed. He held a tray with a bowl of stew and a glass of water. His manner was kind: a man helping a sick friend recover from a desperate illness. He fed her, held the glass of water to her lips. When she asked, all he said was, “I need you to be a little stronger before we begin.”

When she woke next, a large, very muscular, and silent woman helped her to a privy and a bath. Once empty and clean, Rhysa found herself strapped in again, and discovered she was strong enough to become bored. She said nothing, though, to either Amilar or any of the various attendants who saw to her needs over the next few wakings.

She invoked Sight, or tried to. There was no overlay in any of the areas she moved in. This ran counter to everything she’d ever learned about the nature of the world. She tried to fill her channels, but nothing came through. It was like trying to pull water out of a dried up well. Fear loomed; not yet present, but coming quickly.

Rhysa’s respite ended when she woke to replace Amilar standing at the foot of her bed, lengths of knotted rope draped over his shoulder. His manner was still kind; his voice still tantalized--promising freedom if she would only do what he said. He was almost apologetic as he tied one of the lengths of rope around her upper arm, taking care to place the knot in a certain spot. Then he tightened the rope, and the knot dug into her inner arm, sending pain pulsing down the length of her arm to her fingertips. She grunted, more surprised than from the pain. He repeated the process on her other arm. This time when he pulled the rope tight, she winced at the pain. Other ropes went around parts of her legs.

There was no maliciousness in his actions. Indeed, he was very polite about it. When he pulled the ropes tight, she expected to see a flash of satisfaction in his face, but all she saw was professional calculation, and when he finished tying the ropes, he stood next to her. He looked her over, and she tried to keep her expression impassive. Then with a hand on each side of her head, he grabbed the back of her jaw just behind the ear. This time the pain brought a whimper from her. It wasn’t that the pain was excruciating; she’d never experienced this kind of pain before and had no resistance to it.

He held her jaw for a few minutes, long enough for tears to begin forming in her eyes. When he let go, her head pounded with a blinding headache. He reached for something out of her vision. When he brought his hand back in sight, he held an odd pair of bent, blunt-nosed scissors. He cut the ropes around her arms and legs with four quick cuts. Immediately, her arms and legs felt doused in fire as blood returned to her extremities. The noise she made this time was significantly more than a whimper.

For the next two or three hours, he worked her over. Nothing he did would leave more than a fast-healing bruise; nevertheless, before the first hour was up, she was hoarse from screaming her agony. By the time he left, the world was dimming around her in a haze of pain--from his ministrations, and a lack of oxygen from her screams. The truly inhuman part was Amilar’s kindly attitude, as if he were doing her a favor.

Rhysa lay bound and panting. Gradually, she brought her breathing under control. She used some of the concentration techniques Bryn and Amelia had taught her, and the pain receded to a point where she could think. Jayse had taught her about some of the techniques of interrogation, but this wasn’t interrogation, and he’d never shown these techniques before. While each individual technique didn’t produce much pain, the cumulative effect was astounding.

Amilar would escalate until the pain he dealt was well beyond the pain she’d experienced when she was marked by the Kasteryn House Orb. She would have to figure out a way to distance herself from the pain.

No. That was wrong. She realized that was exactly what Amilar wanted. He wanted her conscious mind hiding from the pain. If he wanted her conscious mind gone, she wanted it to stay. So how could she deal with the pain? She would have to accept it and suffer through it. In a peculiar way it made sense--by facing the pain she would defeat the purpose of that pain.

Over the next several sessions, her resolve was pushed to the limit. Time and again she had to fight her natural instinct to let her mind run and hide from the intense pain being inflicted on her. She screamed herself hoarse. She cried herself dry. The pain mounted each session. There was, at the last, one session that left her so exhausted, she could do nothing but stare, slack mouthed and drooling, at Amilar.

He put away his utensils, murmuring something that sounded like, “Finally,” and left the room. The abrupt shift startled Rhysa’s mind into motion, and she realized she had appeared as if her conscious, controlling mind had fled. Now that he’d presumably achieved his goal, what would his next actions be? She’d better remember to feign the dull-eyed, slack-jawed appearance next time he came in.

When Amilar made his next appearance, he brought a different set of tools. Rhysa managed to hide her shock behind the mindless mask--she’d recognized some of the types of tools from Venusia’s house. Could he really be intending...?

Amilar murmured as he worked, stroking her with his voice as he stroked her with his hands. His voice wound through her brain and heated her blood. She felt herself responding to his gentle touches. He traced patterns on her skin, barely touching, teasing her skin into anticipation. Rhysa knew he worked at a much more primal level than her mind. Despite what she was thinking, her body responded as it was designed to do.

For the next two hours, he brought her up the pleasure scale, but never let her release. She tried to face it as she had faced the pain and immediately the pleasure pulled her in. She writhed under his sensate ministrations. She longed for release, very nearly begged him. When he left without letting her go over, she wept with frustration.

As her breathing and her blood returned to normal, she began to understand what Amilar was doing. He was creating a powerful addiction. Without a conscious mind to control interpretation, the addiction to pleasure, the desire for release would become the ultimate goal. No wonder he had been certain. Without a conscious mind, anyone could be conditioned using pleasure as a reward for behavior modification--and sexual pleasure is probably the most pleasurable, and addictive, reward that exists.

Rhysa had failed to resist during the first session, but now she knew better than to face pleasure. Amilar used pain to get rid of the conscious mind, and was using pleasure to attract the subconscious mind. She couldn’t let herself be attracted to the pleasure. To her dumbfounded amusement, the skills Venusia had taught her would help more than any other. Now that she understood what was going on, she looked forward to the next session, though not for the reason Amilar probably assumed.

As she’d expected, Amilar took her to new levels of frustrated pleasure. She let her body enjoy what it could, but kept her mind clear. This time at the end of the session, Amilar used one of the tools on her and she felt the surging and resurging waves of pleasure warp her body against the straps holding her down. A small part of her mind blessed Venusia’s lessons. Rhysa knew exactly how she would have responded if she’d been caught up in that. No--it wouldn’t take long to condition anyone with nymph blood using this method.

Over the next several sessions, Amilar waited an additional session before giving her release. Every session he would murmur with the voice that turned blood to lustful fire, encouraging her to fix on him as the only source of release. He began having someone else try to push her to release. This was getting into dangerous territory for Rhysa. She had to exert enough control so she didn’t release until she was ready--she had to fake the effects of Amilar’s conditioning, and faking became reality all too often. The image of Elise’s death filled Rhysa with despair and purpose enough to avoid succumbing to pleasure hypnosis.

Amilar’s final test of her initial conditioning was nearly too much. He walked into the room and looked her over. “I think you’re almost ready to have those straps removed.” His voice, intoxicating as ever, and his manner no less pleasant than before. “The next man who comes in is going to lie with you. You are going to enjoy it, but you won’t release. Do you understand?” Rhysa nodded and Amilar smiled broadly. “Good. I’ll send him in.”

Amilar left and said something to someone outside. The new man entered and Amilar closed the door behind him. Rhysa nearly shrieked in terrified anger. The man was naked, and he was familiar--the caravan guard who’d raped her.

The guard smirked at her, and for the first time, she was truly afraid she would lose her conscious mind. She looked into his eyes and forced herself to smile. The answering flash of mindless lust in his eyes gave her the beginnings of an idea.

From deep within, she found the strength to pretend passion with this...man. Fortunately, he lasted only a couple of minutes before she felt his release. As he got off her, her idea crystallized.

She looked into his eyes, and did the hardest thing she’d ever had to do. She bit her lip coyly and told him to come back after Amilar was done. Again that flash of mindless lust. If Amilar wanted to use sex as a weapon, she would do the same. This time her smile took less effort.

The guard left and Amilar returned. This time he, too, was naked. His voice stoked the fires in her blood. She let her body respond mindlessly while her consciousness watched and calculated. When he lay on top of her, the force of her body’s release exhausted her. She was beyond sated, and far back in her mind, she realized that had she not been keeping her mind and body separate this whole time, Amilar would now hold the keys to her--mind, body, and soul.

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