Mother’s 101 on ‘Relationships for Dummies’

Chapter 3 - Nothing Says “Love” Like Chloroform & Nipple Clamps!

After a few hours, the kids were finally in bed and Mom was ready to break out the newly remodeled phase of her plan. At this point she had completely forgotten why she was doing this. There had to have been a legitimate reason, so she took comfort in her own intelligence and wrote this off as a justifiable cause. While Dad took care of Rozalin, it was her job to chloroform Adell. She couldn’t trust her husband to take care of their son when that blasted pimple would randomly spout things that would give him away.

With grace and love (and outright ruthless tactics), poor Adell was forced to surrender consciousness to her when snuck up behind him and clamped a chloroform soaked handkerchief around his nose and mouth. The act gave her an intense wave of the tingles since this was the first time she actively attempted to attack her son with the intent to succeed. Usually her conscience would kick in partially and prevent her from going any further, but it appeared that Zenon’s curse was becoming a 24/7 ordeal. All the more reason to abandon remorse as she dragged her son back into the house and down the stairs by his feet. Adell’s head bonked casually down every step before she turned him around and pulled him into a chair. Dad was with a passed out Rozalin who was laid gently against the wall whilst they chained their son next to her. His arms were bolted over his head while the rest of his body slumped sideways in the chair.

This plan was a bit more brilliant than the first. Slipping the key to Adell’s freedom into Rozalin’s pajama pocket, she turned to Dad and shooed her hand at him, “Go away now. I’ll handle this.”

“Rape the boobies!” the pimple on Dad’s chest randomly cried out. This solidified why he shouldn’t be hanging around any longer and he took his leave begrudgingly. Mom proceeded to take a quick skim around the room to make sure all of the right tools were here.

“Nipple clamps, bondage outfits, whips, feathers, vibrators, dildos, burning candles, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera…” she said as she pointed to all of the fun toys she brought for her son and his newly captured girlfriend. When everything was ready she walked over to the door and bolted it shut. Even Adell was not made aware of this room she and Dad had installed when they wanted some alone time. Now it would be the base of operations for Mission: Pop Cherries. Satisfaction was painted in waves all over her face as she now loomed over Rozalin with a small vial of smelling salts in her hand. Pulling the tiny cork off of it, she kneeled in and wafted the scent under the girl’s nose. The first few waves elicited a slow response at first, but eventually Rozalin jolted to her senses coughing and sputtering.

“What on earth-! Ugh! My nose is on fire!” the princess then looked up and around to see that she was being held captive, “Release me from this imprisonment at once!” Her eyes blazed through the smelling salt tears when she found herself face-to-face with Adell’s mother. The woman was kneeling in front of her with a smile similar to Gin Ichimaru. “After all that trouble it appears you’ve forced me to use the more direct approach, dear.”

“What do you mean by that?” Rozalin’s voice was shaky but still obstinate to what was going on. A quick flick of the eyes and she saw Adell tethered to the wall, passed out cold next to her. “Adell!?” she could hardly believe what was going on, “Don’t bring that stubborn mule near me!” Her body scooted away until she hit the bedpost, upon which she glanced over and saw an array of objects that one would only find in a porn shop, or Frederick’s of Hollywood. A mortified gasp escaped before she looked over to Mom and saw that familiar dark aura pulsating in all directions. A little droplet of spittle rolled off of the woman’s lower lip as she hovered over poor Rozy and laughed maniacally, “Oh ho ho! My dear girl, you are about to learn the trade of philandering!”

“Philandering!?”

The aura vanished for a split second as Mom replied, “Yes, well…there’s no such thing as a Manizer, which would have been a logistical opposite for a Womanizer so Philanderer will have to do-.” Then all of a sudden the darkness plunged the room into vengeful evil once again, and Rozalin swore she could see ghosts fly out of the woman with pitchforks and horns. Somehow there was an impending feeling that she would die by the hands of a mother who was plagued by parental psychosis. “Is this the true power of my father’s curse?” Rozalin thought to herself in bemused concern.

“Now begins your lessons!” his mother’s voice snapped her back to attention as the aura vanished once again. “Being that both of you are virgins I figured you don’t exactly have a specific preference of play when it comes to romping in the sack, yes?”

“What do you mean by preference?” “~Oh my god, am I actually having this conversation with her?!”

“Do you like being handled gently or roughly? And then you have to think about what parts of your body are the most sensitive to touch. Do you like being the aggressor or the submissive? Do you like to role-play or just get straight to the point? Are you kinky or common? There are all sorts of things to consider when you have sex with someone.”

For the time being it was just her and his Mom talking woman-to-woman on the matter. As she pondered the questions a little, she finally blurted out, “Oh, I know what you mean. Fine then, I like them rich and handsome!”

“No you don’t,” she replied, “That’s what you were ingrained to desire. But I know damn well you’ve got a precocious streak within you. That naïve aspect is only going to lead you to a disillusioned happiness when you’re finally ruling the roost instead of your father.” “Whom my son is going to beat into a bloody pulp and make you his wife even if I have to forge the papers in your blood! Mwahahahha!!” Again Rozalin leaned away as a foreboding sensation tingled her demon senses. It would appear that there was more to do than to just demonstrate her point to the brainwashed girl. Standing up she made her way over to Adell and gave his limp body a warm smile, “Sorry, dear, but this is for your own good.” With quick claws she grabbed the neck of Adell’s sleeveless shirt and ripped it completely from his body with ease. For now she hoped this would be enough to take care of things auto-magically, but the test was yet to come. If it weren’t for the fact that Rozalin was paralyzed with disturbed fear she would have attempted to run. Instead she found herself at mother’s mercy when her left hand was plucked away and whirled onto her feet and around the room before finally dropped down against something.

Her eyes didn’t want to acknowledge where she knew she was heading. But her body was already picking up a heightened sensation of touch as she opened her eyes and realized that she was seated in Adell’s lap and leaning against his bare chest. The truth seemed to always come out in subtle methods as her mind raced with short flashbacks of Adell’s kindness to her. At the very most they held hands when he was rescuing her from falling off cliffs in mid-abduction from Prinnies. “Stupid gits” her brain dialogged for a moment when thinking back on that scenario. Then obviously there was the botched summoning ritual where she practically ended up force-feeding her breasts to him on accident. It was his fault he made her do that.

But here in this moment there was silence as her body draped against him. Her fingers pressed down on the contours of his pectoral muscles which were firm and battle-toned. Then her hair tickled against her left ear as she noticed something that continued to force her silence. Delicate breaths glided along her face, and soon her eyes crawled up to see his slumbering face passed out so gingerly against his shackled arms. A long strand of bang that looked more like a fishing lure undulated to his steady breathing. Adell hadn’t taken a shower yet that evening since he had spent most of his time outside after their bickering. The scent of must and sweat tingled at her nose, but her baser instincts delighted in his pure masculinity. For this brief moment all time stopped as she suddenly became more aware of the fact that she was attracted to him for some insanely bizarre reason.

Having almost forgotten that his mother was still in the room with her, she finally shoved something metallic in front of her face to remind her of the woman’s existence. Eyes crossing at the displayed item in front of her, Rozalin grabbed the small clamps and quizzically tried to figure out why these were handed to her. “Since you two can’t stop arguing, I can imagine that maybe the rougher route might be more entertaining,” his mom instructed as she picked up a remote that seemed to be wirelessly linked to a little box. It was then Rozy noticed that the clamps in her hand had small wires dangling down to greet it. “Let’s give my son a little love yank from Slumber land, shall we?”

Ah! This was making sense! Electric shock therapy! Quickly Rozalin looked at Adell and tried to figure out where she could put the tiny clamps on his body. The nose would be too big, the lips might be amusing, but it appeared that the earlobes were the most plausible solution. As she was about to clamp the target, Mom’s hands stopped her in mid-motion along with a ‘tsk’ of disapproval. Before anything further was said, the princess found her hands wandering further down before stopped at the pecs and just over his small nipples. Even Rozalin was shocked at the thought, and pain wrenched subjectively at her own chest as she imagined this method of torture being done to her. It wasn’t fun. But then again…

“…I’m not the recipient!” she blurted out with glee, and without further ado the little clamps were attached to the tender area awaiting their next command. As the remote of pain was handed off to her, she accidentally pressed it for a mere millisecond. The jolt of electricity caused the muscles in Adell’s body to tighten and flex as his movement startled her. A fearful shriek was made as she leapt to her feet and stared intently to see if that woke the boy up. He stirred momentarily, but his tongue clicked absently as though his mouth was dry and then became motionless once again.

“You’ve got the idea now,” Mom coaxed her on with a jingle in her voice, “Time to release a little of that pent up aggression and see where I gets you.”

What mother in her right (or left) mind would permit such a cruel act? Although Rozalin couldn’t exactly say she wasn’t tempted to continue. Here she was being sexually harassed by his mother and he was sleeping like a baby through the whole ordeal. A giant twitch formed over her brow and without remorse her thumb slammed down on the precious red button of electric death. The tiny shock from before might not have been enough to wake him, but with several amps of electricity screeching through his body Adell’s eyes snapped open. The yelping bounced off the walls while his body arched and writhed forward. As his pelvis thrusted in their direction, the chains on the wall held his arms firmly over his head and he looked like a fish dangling on a hook and rod for a moment. “AHHHHH! Stop! Stop!” he cried out loudly, which finally appealed to Rozalin’s better nature and removed her finger from the trigger. “I guess you’re awake now.” She had to admit that it was quite satisfying to see that happen. Not only was her anger satiated for the moment, but watching every toned muscle in his body writhe under her torment was a turn-on.

The room was spinning from his point of view, and he found parts of his body involuntarily twitching every now and again. When he was finally able to regain focus, he saw Rozalin and his own mother (with an utterly pleased look on her face) staring back at him. “Mother!?”

“Oh good you’re awake, Adell!” she said happily as she leaned in to greet him, “Sorry about the trouble we’re causing, but I can’t exactly have the two of you bickering anymore. It’s just holding back your progress at finding Overlord Zen-,” her words were cut short as her son arched forward again from another way of electrical retribution from the scorned princess. When everything stopped, they both turned to the blond and she shrugged as though it were an accident, “Whoops.”

Adell tried to assess his current predicament and finally realized that he was chained to the wall via steel shackles and small, “…why are these things here?!” he practically shrieked as he saw the tiny metallic jaws biting down on two sensitive regions. “Did you do this?!”

“Yes,” she admitted without skipping a bit, “It’s for your own good, Adell.”

“For my own good? You’ve hooked me up to something that could kill me and handed the remote to a lunatic princess and you call that go-,” another wave of pain pulsed through him, and Rozalin’s glare now had a look of unrelenting cruelty to it. His mom finally saw that little Rozy was enjoying this for all the wrong reasons and quickly snatched the thing from her hands, “Okay dear, that’s quite enough. You’re supposed to be enjoying this, not-“

“-Oh but I am enjoying this,” she replied in a sultry tone of voice, “Complete and total revenge for calling me a stuck-up princess? Thinking I’m an insolent spoiled whelp who doesn’t know where her father is. Mocking my unmatched prowess of power. You bet I’m enjoying this.” But deep down she wasn’t enjoying this as much as she claimed. Tears were being choked back behind the veil of unbridled loathing as she felt hurt by the fact that Adell had been so verbally abusive to her. For such a long time he had been acting like a noble prince, and lately his true colors were getting uglier. Or at least that’s the way her reality warped the perception of him. Mostly she was just confused about the entire ordeal. If she helped him find her father, the guy would try to kill him. But in essence she was mostly worried that Adell would get himself killed attempting such a stupid feat of dumb fuckery. She couldn’t deny that she cared for Adell and his family, although she would die a thousand deaths before admitting this bit of information. She didn’t want anything bad happening to them, and she didn’t want them to be sad if something really bad happened to Adell. A lump in her throat formed every time she contemplated it, and her dreams had been intensifying lately with all sorts of prophetic visions and symbolism. Why couldn’t the stupid brute see that?

Click.

Rozalin blinked before realizing that during her moment of mental zen pondering all of this, Adell’s mother took it upon herself to also chain her to the wall. A hand reached into a small compartment on Rozalin’s body and soon she was chided with, “I guess you won’t need this,” along with a soft giggle.

“What did you-,” Rozalin stammered as she yanked several times at the wall. Her chains kept landing on Adell’s head each time she tugged. Any protests made from the guy went unnoticed. “Did you just chain me to him!?”

Sighing, Adell looked up at her hap-hazard and replied, “I tried to tell you she was doing that, but you had completely spaced out.”

‘Embarrassing’ could not begin to describe what she was feeling as Mom pocketed the keys and suddenly got serious, “Look, Adell made us a promise that he would find Overlord Zenon and restore us back into humans. I like you Rozalin, and I know Adell can be a blockhead at times, but he really needs your help. And Adell-“, she glared over to him, “-honestly, I think you’ve been unnaturally cruel when you address her these days. I think it’s time to hammer down the walls and make amends so that you both can get back to finding Zenon and taking care of business. As punishment, the two of you will be staying down here tonight.”

“How are we going to sleep!?” Rozalin protested as she yanked at the bonds again, slapping Adell once more in the face with the metal chains.

“You’ll be sleeping on kindness and sympathy tonight. Better get comfortable,” with that the rosy demeanor returned to Mom and placing her hands briskly on her hips she replied, “Good night you two!” and marched off leaving them tethered to their own devices. As Mom made her way out of the bolted door (making sure to relock it again), the two were left staring at one another. The small lamp on a nearby dresser table the only form of light they had left in the room. For a while they simply stayed visually glued to one another, neither moving nor speaking regardless of their precarious predicament.

When enough time had passed that was deemed ridiculous to him, Adell finally gave in to his more gentlemanly self, “Look, I’m sorry if I said anything to upset you. I’m just frustrated that’s all.”

The words seemed to have been absorbed but it was a while before a reply was given, “You don’t think I’m frustrated too?” For once her voice wasn’t condescending, but meek and almost helpless at the same time, “I swear to you I’m not lying about who I am. But I thought I had a special bond with my father, and finding him shouldn’t have been a problem. I don’t understand-“

“Please, sit down on my lap. Let your legs rest a bit.”

“What?” her voice went cold all of a sudden, but Adell wasn’t in the mood to argue with her. “Look, don’t get the wrong idea. My arms are tethered too high and I can’t lie down. You’ve got a little longer chain than me but you won’t even be able to make the wood floor your bed tonight even if you tried. I know I’m not royalty, but it seems that I’m you’re only cushion.”

“Hmpf!”

“Well, I hope you have some amazing powers to sleep where you stand, because that’s about all we can do for the moment.”

“You mean you’re just going to give up without getting out of these?”

“The chains are magically imbued, and my mom just took off with the only method of our freedom. So what’s it going to be…?”

Biting her lower lip, she stalled for a moment before deciding to finally relinquish to their unlucky fate. She had no idea how best to sit in his lap since just the mere thought of it made her blush and gag all at the same time. For a moment they tried it with her sitting properly to one side with her legs swung over his lap. But the positioning of her own bonds forced her hands up into her face so that was a no go. A spooning style forced her arms back, and was insanely uncomfortable. Rozalin’s only remaining option was…

“Oh!” Adell gasped a little under his breath as he came face-to-face with Rozalin’s chest for a period of time. He felt her lithe legs climb up on him before they each shifted over his lap in opposite directions. When her butt finally plopped down on his legs he saw that she had decided to straddle him so that she could be cushioned and that her chained hands would drape over him towards the direction of the wall. Her lean arms each rested on his shoulders and for a moment they felt awkward at how comfortable this position was in comparison to the rest. Despite all his griping about girls, Adell was now feeling a lump well up in his throat as the sensation of her mounted on top of him was registering in some dark corner of his mind.

“I guess we’re stuck like this until the morning,” she pouted, clanking the chains that held her behind his head, “I knew your mother was a little off, but I didn’t think she’d pull a stunt like this.”

“Thank your father for that,” he replied bluntly, and the two gave each other a bitter look before sighing in defeat. No matter how much they argued it wouldn’t change their current situation. “By the way, could you do me a favor and remove these things,” he said as he tried to flex his pectorals to show her what he meant. She blushed as she saw the total control he had over the muscles in his body. Obliging, her fingers ran down and softly put pressure on the handles to release and extricate them. The skin was reddened and flushed from the direct contact of shock. Not only that, but there were purplish indentations from where the teeth of the clamps had bitten down to cling to him. Adell gave a little wince as he was finally released from the torture, yet he was still in a little pain now that the blood was re-circulating in those two areas.

Shutting his eyes, Adell breathed calmly through his nose to meditate in hopes of reducing the pain. Rozalin watched all of this happen and couldn’t help but feel sorry at the fact that she resorted to physical violence against him just to oblige his sex-crazed mother. Wanting to help ease his suffering, she reached over and gently pressed her fingertips against the taught areolas. The feeling sent new electric waves through Adell’s body, but not the kind that elicited pain. She ran her forefingers in circles around the nipples, occasionally moving to the tips and giving them a few ginger pinches in order to mold the tiny bits of flesh back to normalcy. Originally Rozalin had no ulterior intentions other than to simply make the pain go away. But as a few gasps escaped Adell’s mouth, she looked up to find that her minstrels were inducing a euphoric belaboring of his breathing. Sheer curiosity now plagued her mind as she went back to massaging the pink spots of flesh while watching his face intently. Adell was trying to keep his brain in check as his body began responding on its own accord to the stimuli.

“Is it painful?” she asked him, now slowly realizing just what Mom may have been alluding to. His eyes creaked open a little and his chest heaved up and down from the exertion of trying to regain control the rest of his body. “Not anymore. It just…burns a little now. But I’ll be okay.” Did she have any idea what she was doing to him? On top of that, why was he enjoying this so much?

“Ah, burning,” it made sense, although there was no ice in the area to cool him off. But a thought sparked in her mind that was offensive as much as it was vulgar. Cheeks flushing a light pink, she could only mentally chide herself at the disturbing visual she managed to concoct that could help relieve the symptom. “That is beyond unladylike!”

The myriad of mixed emotions that toiled both of their minds remained unspoken as Rozalin continued her minstrels. It felt like she was playing with a dark magic beyond her imagination as his lower body had now responded to her in kind. No longer was his lap soft and cushioned, but a new occupant was now trying to usurp her dominant authority. “What on earth are you performing at this moment?” Again she spoke with the blunt, uncaring tone in her voice. “Do you enjoy being this…this…vulgar before a member of royal blood?” Her feet struggled to find the floor so that she could distance her virginity from the saluting pole that was attempting to stab her.

What was he supposed to say in response? Sorry, but my penis thinks on its own? This was the exact reason why he couldn’t stand girls. Eleanor was the one to kick off this whole detesting (more like fear) of them. However, with the way Rozalin was currently tether and clinging to him, a second voice that he had never heard before was suddenly speaking up. Unfortunately, it was sounding very similar to the crass growth on his father’s chest. “It’s not like she isn’t trying to seduce you at this point, Adell. Why not test the waters a little?” If it weren’t for his intense level of personal ethics coming into play, he would have been no different than any other guy and would have tried to dry hump her by now.

“No words coming from the big, mindless brute?” she said wryly with that sexy flash of a cocky, confident smile.

“What do you want me to say to you?” finally deciding to give in to her boorish attitude, “Should I respond the same way you’re treating me?” Perhaps it was the mental exhaustion of putting up with her that finally broke him down. Without a moment’s hesitation he leaned his face into her bust and clamped down on one of her breasts with his teeth. It wasn’t the most accurate nip considering she was wearing some thick pajama fabric, but it was enough to get an awkward slap upside his head.

“Oh my lord, what kind of hellish act of sexual assault are you trying to perform on me?!”

Ignoring the mightier-than-thou remark, he leaned in again and made a second attempt that was more accurately placed this time around. His teeth bit down on her right nipple and as she yelped again in pain, he eased up a bit and nipped playfully several times. The chains holding her to him clanked, and a few times Adell took more blows to the head than he usually did in an all-out demon brawl. Eventually, however, the shrieks of horror subsided. Rozalin wasn’t exactly moaning, but she had become dead silent with an occasional tiny squeak of enjoyment. It was the only word he could really use to describe her bizarre vocal outbursts.

Never in all of her life did she feel such pleasure. Certainly this unscrupulous act of barbaric lust was never practiced inside of the castle. How many years had she lived there without ever having explored these sensations before? By now her brain had shut down too much to take an accurate count of the time. Closing her eyes, she gripped the chains that bound her to him tightly as she savored the foreign act of passion, or perhaps revenge, upon her bosom. His tongue and teeth stroking her nipple through the soft fabric of her hand-me-down pajamas elicited chills down her spine as it hardened for him as a sign of a job well done. When he pulled away to catch a breath, he was greeted by something else instead.

She tasted like iron metal and strawberries. An odd combination, but perhaps all demons had a different taste to them? He wouldn’t have known too well since she was the first girl he had seriously kissed. The two lingered on each other’s lips as they tried to make sense of all these crazy feelings they were processing. Was this whole thing just the culmination of a love-hate relationship, or were they simply feelings of primal lust given the precarious predicament they were in at the moment? Neither could really tell, but slowly Rozalin sat back down on his lap, erection and all, before making any further moves. The clanking of chains followed by the scraping of the chair as she pulled herself upon him and dove in for a better meal from his mouth. If only Adell had use of his arms, which he had now lost all feeling of them, he would have grabbed her soundly by the hips. The only movement he could make now was to grind his hips up into hers in hopes of satiating his wanton desires of her.

Even through a layer of cotton, Rozalin gasped as she felt him try to thrust himself against her. If only they weren’t in such a damn awkward position because at this point it was she who had the upper hand. “You’re just a vulgar brute,” she chided him playfully this time as she sat herself down hard into his groin to force a groan of pleasure from him. When he stopped seeing stars from the erotic euphoria, his response to her was, “Save it for your peons, princess.” Her hand came down across his cheek again, but this time it was barely hard enough to actually hurt him. The two locked lips once again as their bodies tried to fuse together despite the obvious issues that would fully prevent them from any actual debauchery. But this was not to be an issue for long as Rozalin’s curiosity was expanding at the same time her stamina, due to the lack of beauty rest, was waning. Who knows how many hours they had been stuck down there since the lamp could not really measure time in a calculation of hours. With no windows to see moonlight, and no clocks to tell the time, it was like an oasis of eternity where the two of them fought out their frustrations on each other the way his mother intended.

Breaking away from the onslaught of kisses, Rozalin decided to be bold and trail her affections down his neck and along his collar bone. For someone so sheltered, he was amazed at how courageous she was being with him. The only thing he could do was sit and wait for the inevitable to happen. In the back of his mind, part of him wanted to object to this whole situation. For a brief moment he groaned out, “I shouldn’t do this-“ but that was quickly cut short as he felt her tongue drift over his chest and his erection throbbed with eager anticipation to be next in line for her services. The moral center was beaten down by raw, carnal desire. It felt like ages were passing by as she slowly tortured him with astounding pleasure beyond his belief. The lamps had now burned down to bottoms of their wicks leaving the two in darkness. Both of them were listening to nothing more than the sound of the other’s heavy breathing. All went still, and for a while Adell waited on baited breath to figure out what she was going to do next. The weight of her head still lying against his chest, his mind reeled with the desire to be released. Even if it wasn’t gentlemanly of him to think these things, he had now crossed a point of no return, and it was up to Rozalin to free him.

Eventually he heard her breath calm down and still his loins yearned for her finish him. Was this mad desire part of her game? Part of the ultimate plan? Did his mother teach her this trick? As he waited and anticipated for what felt like eons, his ears perked up to something that struck fear into his heart and a rush of pain from his lower body. It was very faint at first, but soon it built up to an even more terrifying confirmation of his worst fear.

“You’ve got to be shitting me!” he bellowed with no avail in disturbing Rozalin, “Did she just-”

“Zzzzz! ZZzzZzzzz!” the sounds of snoring rang over and over in his head and with panic and rage, finished up his sentence with, “FALL ASLEEP ON ME!?!”

All of that for nothing! It was the worst torture he could endure. How cruel was she to arouse the sleeping beast and dangle meat in front of its face from behind the cage bars and then not be so kind as to allow it to eat? Even though Adell exercised every curse word in the Veldime dictionary (including things like ‘Neophyte Flautist”), it did not awaken Rozalin from her deep slumber. Apparently he was not interesting enough for her to finish what she started. Banging his head backwards a couple of times against the stone wall, he did everything in his power to not think about his erection. Somehow he would have to cool his head and find solace in the fact that at least he did not do something he would eventually regret. Now, more than ever, his dislike of women was strengthened with the power of Rozalin’s neglect. In a way he should have thanked her, otherwise he knew it would be even more difficult to face his mother’s eager grin in the morning.

He took deep breaths while moving as little as possible so that nothing would disturb his meditation in climbing back down from the brink. All the while he analyzed his situation. The only way to handle this whole ordeal would be to blot it out of memory as best as possible. Despite his newly discovered self-admission of his feelings for the pampered princess (as bizarre and self-abusive as they were), no good would come of the relationship. It was as she said during mealtimes: She was royalty, he was a common peasant. No way would the two merge together victorious in love and war. Besides, he doubted that there would be little love between the two after he killed her only family…or vice versa.

No, this was for the best. By the time he had disseminated these feelings internally, he realized that he was coming down off of his ‘high’ from her tepid seduction. At last relief was coming back even though his hand and arms were numb from still being tethered upwards toward the wall. Now that he had his mind back in the right place, exhaustion had overtaken him, and little resistance left, he nodded off as well. His cheek resting gently upon the top of her head, and the two slumbered peacefully like caged doves unable to fly.