“MDom Not Asshole” continues, now with a name

First: A story featuring a male keeper and a female Kept.
Previous: After a Warm Meal

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Jasper stared at her.  “Mélanie, I promise you, it is not a joke.”  The air shivered with the feeling of his oath and the house seemed to shift minutely.  “I swear it to you.  I intend to treat you like an associate, not like a slave, and if I have given you any indication otherwise, I sincerely apologize.”

“You… you bought me,” she pointed out, in a whisper that was barely a breath.  “And you-” Continue reading →

“MDom Not Asshole” continues

First: A story featuring a male keeper and a female Kept.
Previous: Into the Woods, Into the House

🌳🏚️🌳

When she had filled her belly with soup and her mind had calmed down a little, Mélanie looked up at her new owner.  “So. Sir.”

“Jasper.  or Fox.  Or Crazy.”

“So, Jasper.  What is it that you want me to do for you?  Since you wasted valuable stolen goods on m-”

“Not wasted.”  He steepled his fingers and looked at her  “Spent, yes. I spent maybe a quarter of what you are worth, half because I cheated the slave-monger as a matter of course and half because he had no idea what you’re worth-” Continue reading →

First: A story featuring a male keeper and a female Kept.
Previous: Crazy Like a Fox

The return of “Mdom not asshole”.  I cannot find that I posted this first part, but if I have, I apologize. 

🌳🌳🌳

The gate was still terrifying. Mélanie felt far too relieved by Jesper’s hand on her leg and the warmth of him pressed against her side. She needed it; she was fighting against panic with every step the horses took.

The horses didn’t seem to mind at all. She found that reassuring. They walked through the creepy, terrifying gate, waited placidly while Jasper closed the gate behind them and locked it, and headed cheerfully towards what seemed to all appearances to be a half-collapsed stone stable and carriage house. Continue reading →

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“Mélanie! Stop, please. Stop!”

Mélanie stopped. She didn’t have a lot of choice in the matter. “I’m not going in there.”

“Come back, please.”

Even with the please, it was an order. Even the way he sounded like he was pleading with her, abashed and embarrassed, it was an order. She turned around and walked as slowly as she could back towards him.

“I have too much of a flair for the dramatic, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you were from around here. I didn’t know you’d have heard the rumors.”

She put one foot deliberately directly in front of the the other foot and didn’t look up at him. “Rumors? I’ve seen what happens to people.”

“Oh, so you really are from nearby. There were a couple, yeah. They weren’t scared enough, and they were quite irritated at me. I’d done this and that, you know, and so I, uh, I put a little mojo on them. It should wear off. It should have worn off by now – that was a while ago.”

“I haven’t seen then in a while,” she admitted slowly. “I got – well, I got sold.”

“Oh.” He sounded relieved. “Oh, well, I may have to check. Anyway, this place is, well, it already had a reputation. And there are a couple – they might be ghosts; I didn’t think those actually existed, though – but I came to an arrangement with them a long time ago.”

She was still walking towards him as slowly as she could. “Wait.” She looked up at him. “This place is a hellhole, a real demon-infested place. I know people…”

“Like I said, when people get very close, I have to discourage them, but most of the time, the rumors and some Workings on the gates and the fence keep people away. Nothing in here is going to eat you. Nothing in here is going to make you empty. Okay? It’s all smoke and mirrors and some Workings that I guess were me outsmarting myself.”

“And a couple ghosts,” she pointed out. She let her feet carry her at a slightly more normal walking pace.

“And a couple ghosts,” he allowed. “Or things that may or may not be ghosts. Please?” He held out his hands to her. “We’re safer once we’re inside all those Workings.”

“Safer in the haunted house.” She let herself speed up a bit more. The pressure of the orders was starting to give her a headache. “You know how ridiculous that sounds, right?”

“It might sound ridiculous, but I assure you it’s true. Now, I am sorry. I honestly didn’t expect you to have heard of my little charade. But I assure you, once we get past the facade, it’s lovely inside, there’s food, there’s running water, or at least water that runs, and I can provide you with some better clothing. Please?”

She let herself close the last few feet to her new owner at a much faster pace.

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“That… well, that’s rather ominous,” Mélanie admitted. “Does that mean if I’m irritable at you, I’m going to be, say, an obnoxious treasure? Or some sort of treasure kept in a glass box?”

Being called a treasure was rather pleasant, she had to admit, if she ignored the sense of worry from the ominous part of it.

“It’s more that, if you find me too irritating, you’ll be more of an independent agent who happens to be a treasure, where if you actually find me pleasant to be around – which I suppose is possible; it’s happened once or twice before, and the bond thing might help with that a bit – you’ll be my partner.”

“In crime?”

“Well, that too, I’m sure. I do a bit of that. Crime. I mean, if we can call it crime.” He gave her a very charming smile. “After all, it’s not as if there are that many laws anymore… right?”

“Well, you’re the boss.” She was smiling back at him again, how did he do that? And what’s more, she’d missed ten minutes of scenery while she ws smiling at him. She looked around, trying to figure out where they were.

The road was overgrown with weeds; to either side of the road was almost entirely choked with greenery, and through the trees she could see one white shingle of what had, at some point, presumably been a house. She had never been through here before – wait. Once, back just after everything went to shit. She peered at the house; with effort, she could make out the picket fence with the elaborate designs carved into the pickets. “I wanted that house so badly,” she whispered. “It looked like a fairy tale.”

“I guess a lot of our fairy tales died in the End Wars.” he patted her shoulder, sounding, for a moment, far less flippant. Then the moment was gone, and his voice lifted up. “On the bright side, we can make our own tales.”

“What, like ‘the cautionary tale of how not to end up in a slaver’s cage?’”

“Well, that’s a good one. To be a proper fairy tale, you’d either have had to upset several grannies at crossroads, or been under a curse, or, let’s see, it’s your origin story and your handsome prince is going to rescue you.”

“Or I’m going to rescue my handsome prince, but he doesn’t know it yet,” she countered.

“Ah, a modern woman.” He grinned widely at her. Mélanie tried to ignore the surge of warmth. It wouldn’t last. It never lasted. “Wonderful. I’m absolutely certain I’m going to need some rescuing along the way. So. Your fairy tale. How did it begin? ‘Once upon a time, there was a beautiful princess…’”

“-Swineherd,” Mélanie countered. “I mean, also dairy maid. Mostly dairy maid.” She ducked her head. Who’d have thought the monsters would come that far out of the cities? “Until she happened upon a hungry dragon who was eating her herds.”

“Oh, it’s one of those stories. A beautiful dairy maid who tried to defend her herd against the dragons. but-”

Mélanie bit her lip. “But the dragon was too big for her, the end.”

“…aww.” he patted her leg gently. “I’m sorry. Sometimes the stories we make up are better than the ones rooted in truth. So you’re going to rescue me, are you?”

Mélanie rallied and gave him a weak smile. “I think that’s the way the story’s supposed to – where are you going?” She reached for the edge of the cart, even though she knew, knew, that running away was futile when one was Kept.

“Oh? This place is my home. Don’t mind the ghouls and goblins; there’s just there for ambiance.”

“You do not… no. Oh, no, you don’t.” She jumped over the edge of the cart before it could drive through the gate made of spider webs and giant spidery legs of steel, skulls and bones out of no monster that should be known to mankind. “No, this- I know this place.” She was backing away from the cart back down the road even as he stopped the cart and hopped out. “Everyone knows this place. No, you might be mad, but you are still not dragging me in there.”

“Princess dairy maid… Mélanie….” He walked towards her, hands out, his smile gone. “It’s safe for you and me, I assure you.”

“People die when they go in there! People come back empty!”

As stupid as it was, she took off running.

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Mélanie raised her eyebrows at her new owner.

“You enjoy making no sense?”

“Well, yeah. Wouldn’t you?”

“I, ah. I can’t say I would. Sir. Well…” She gave it some thought, mostly because of the cheerful eyebrow-wiggle he was aiming in her direction. “Well. I… sometimes, with certain annoying people, yes. But I don’t think that I qualify as that – at least not yet? – do I? Sir?” She was starting to get a little nervous. She managed to keep a smile on her face, but that was almost entirely because it had already been there when she started.

“No. Hardly not. In the five minutes I’ve owned you, you’ve been a champ. An absolute dear.”

The praise made her feel better enough – made her feel more than better enough, but she could cope with the surge of elation. That, she remembered, faded in time – enough that she could give him a little playful smirk right back. “Oh, come now, it’s been at least seven minutes.”

“Has it? Oh, dear, we’re getting precious close to that ten-minute mark where you’ll stop finding me entertaining and start finding me irritating.”

“Do tell me when that’s suppose to be?” Oh, no, she was playing along. That was going to be harder to cope with in the long run than passing elation. “I wouldn’t want to get it wrong.”

“Mélanie, you strike me as the sort of woman who is going to be an absolute blast to own.”

“I hope, sir, that you mean that in the ‘fun and entertaining’ and not the ‘explosive and shooting into space’ sort of way.” She shot him a smile that she would absolutely regret later, but right now was way too much fun to not let out.

“Oh, but what if I find ‘explosive and shooting into space’ to be fun an entertaining?” He grinned widely back at her, showing a mouth of teeth that was clean, very clean, and startlingly white.

“…is your innate power Personal Dentist or something?” she asked before she could stop herself.

He snorted. “No. Not exactly. But, ah. Well, I can explain that later. Let’s just say I like good hygiene, shall I?”

“So you’re the world’s cleanest Robin Hood?”

“Oh,what gave you the idea that I was Robin Hood? I mean,” he fake-shuddered, “he gave his earnings away.”

“You know, I thought that his scheme of setting up a ‘toll booth’ in the middle of a forest was quite clever, though. As long as you could move the toll booth from place to place.”

He eyed her for a minute, while the horses ambled down the road. “You really are going to be entertaining to own.”

“I live to please, sir.” She bowed from her place on the bench. “So. Where are we going?”

“Oh, to a little place in the middle of the forest where I keep my findings.”

“And I suppose I count as a finding?” She hoped he didn’t live in a cave. She thought she could handle most living situations, after living in a slaver’s cage, but she wasn’t so sure about a cave.

“You count as a treasure. We’ll see, once you’ve decided I’m no longer amusing, what else you count as.”

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She desperately wanted to know what they were doing, why she was pretending to be something she wasn’t, but it wasn’t like it was the first time she’d had to pretend. Mélanie let that lazy little smile grace her lips and swept her gaze over the place like she was slightly too good for the sleazy little slave pen and everyone in it.

“Very good,” her new owner murmured, and Mélanie nearly lost the act.

“Sir,” she replied, in the same quiet tone, “if you make me giddy…”

“Ah, my apologies. You’re new, and it’s been a while since I’ve had anyone new. We’re nearly there, just this little crowd of toughs…”

The little crowd of toughs was five very tall, very broad, very creepy looking men and three collared men, all of them smaller than the free men but none a single bit less creepy. Mélanie pretended to consider the collared ones for sale – she wouldn’t have bought any of them, except maybe that one with the handlebar mustache, and he needed a bath – and then the thugs themselves. The shortest of those might have been nice, but he would have fought the collar forever, and she was not generally a fan of such things.
The cart brought her back to herself. It was just that – not a carriage or a wagon but a cart hitched to two big draft horses. She looked it over and did not show anything, because she was practicing not showing anything at all.

“Up on in,” he urged her, and lifted her in just as he said it. Mélanie didn’t have time to complain or even to wriggle before she was sitting on the bench seat of the wagon.

“It’s not a limo,” he said dryly, to – well, she wasn’t showing anything, so she didn’t know what he was responding to, but he did. “But it will get us where we’re going. And it doesn’t stick out.”

“Yes, sir.” What else was she going to say? Well, there was the obvious question. “Where are we going, sir? And… why…?”

“Why were we leaving in such a casual hurry? Because there are people there that think I owe them money, and it behooves me to not be looking flush. They won’t demand you in payment, but they might think if I’d paid for you I must have other liquid assets… you see?”

“I… see. And, ah…” His openness made her brave. “Do you owe them money… sir?”

“No. Well.” He clucked at the horses and got the cart going down the road. “That’s open to a certain amount of interpretation.”

“As in, you think you don’t, but they have reason to think they do?” Oh, returned gods, he was going to turn around and sell her back.

He laughed. “No, no. As in they think that I owe them ‘rent’ for crossing over their property line, and I think if they can’t stand there and collect their tolls, it’s not their land. And the deer wasn’t even on their property…”

“You’re a poacher!” She was horrified to find she was delighted.

“Guilty as charged, although I like to think that mostly I just take things that other people have forgotten or ignored. And certain people do think their borders extend further than they really ought, by any measure except their own pride and arrogance.” He grinned at her. She found that she was looking at his face, that it was a handsome face, if a bit scruffy and with an interesting scar across one cheek, and that she very much liked his grin.

She also found that she was grinning back at him.

“This sounds like a very interesting profession. But… you didn’t poach me.”

Now why had she said that? Oh, for that waggle of eyebrow. “Or did I?”

“… Did you?”

He leaned back on the bench seat and laughed happily. “No.” The laugh slid away. “Unfortunately, it’s precious hard to steal slaves and almost impossible to steal Kept. So, instead, I stole the goods I used to buy you. Some here, some there, but I hope that slaver doesn’t try to sell them in the local market. Well, okay, I don’t actually hope he doesn’t try to sell them, because he’s an asshole and deserves everything he has coming to him, but there’s a possibility I might need that market again.”

“Okay.” Mélanie took a breath. “So. You walked into a slave market past people whose taxes – tolls, extortion – you haven’t paid, bought a slave with stolen goods – did you steal the goods from those thugs? – and walked back out. Right?”

“Exactly. I didn’t steal the goods from those thugs; those came from a different set of thugs altogether. But you have the basics right. So, hello. My name is Jesper Lune. In certain circles, I’m called Fox-Crazy.” He held out his hand to her.

She had to be dreaming. Things this weird just did not happen in real life. “Hello, sa’Fox-Crazy. My name is Mélanie; I’m called Shadows at Dawn by certain people. And… you just bought me. Why?”

“Because I liked the way you looked.”

“Shivering and terrified?” She wrinkled her nose at him. “I’m not sure that’s a compliment.”

“Not that part. They had to chain you up to make you comply. You weren’t broken, you weren’t ready to be obedient.”

“…you just risked murder or worse to buy a slave that wasn’t ready to be obedient. Are you aware, sir, that you make no sense?”

“You see, that’s the fun part.”

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The slave market was exhausting. Mélanie felt like she was in a constant state of panic, twitching at everyone who walked by and shivery when she wasn’t twitching. Someone was going to buy her. And if they didn’t buy her, she was going to be punished again. She’d been on short rations to save money since the last slave market, since she’d been cowering in the corner and hiding from everyone who walked by.

This time, she was chained so she couldn’t hide, and she’d been told if she hid anyway, she’d be beaten. They hadn’t beaten her yet, and she didn’t want to find out what it was like. So she smiled cautiously at everyone who walked by and tried not to look nearly as terrified as she felt.

“A little skittish, isn’t this one?” The voice, in other circumstances, might have been pleasant. In this situation, it made her lift her chin just a tiny bit and hope that she looked pleasant and buyable and not nervous or intractable.

“Oh, she’s just eager to get out of the cage and serve someone. You know how they can be.” The slave factor’s voice had too much forced cheer in it. Mélanie took a step forward – a half-step, as that was all the chains allowed for – and smiled hopefully. Maybe it would be enough.

“She looks scared out of her mind. I can’t be that frightening, can I?”

“A new situation is always a little nerve-wracking, isn’t it, sir?” There was so much oil laid onto the factor’s tone that it had to be giving the customer pimples. Mélanie certainly felt like it was making her break out.

“Bring her out here. I want to see her before I make my decision.”

“But sir…”

“Oh, if she’s eager to be bought, she won’t make a run for it, will she? And if she’s not, well, I’d rather know before I brought her home. Bring her out here.” The customer’s voice was implacable. Mélanie couldn’t quite hide a shiver.

“Fine.” The slave factor was sulking. He opened the cage and unhooked three of the chains holding Mélanie in place before tugging her outward.

She wasn’t going to run, of course; she had nowhere at all to run. But the slave factor couldn’t know that, and neither could this guy.

His shoes looked well-kept for. He – or someone who worked for him – had oiled them, so even though they were worn, they looked good. His pants were hemmed with no ragged lines. Not jeans, but something like denim.

She kept her eyes on those shoes and those hems. It was safer that way.

“She’s underfed.”

“Aren’t we all, these days?” The slave factor patted what had once been a fat belly. “Aren’t we all.”

“And shivering.”

“Well, she’s eager, sir.”

“And freezing. I’ll take her. But for the price you’re asking, you’re throwing in that jacket you’re wearing. It doesn’t suit you anyway.”

“My jacket?” The slave factor took a step backwards. “This is mine!”

“And she’s going to be mine, and a large portion of my trade goods are going to be yours, and you’re going to give me the coat. Now.”

Something in his voice brooked no argument. Something in his voice, Mélanie noted from a distant place in her mind, was terrifying.

She wasn’t listening to that place. She was paying attention as the slave factor, bitching and whining the whole time, put his jacket around her shoulders and even held it for her to get her arms in. It smelled faintly of tobacco and, strangely, not of anything worse. It almost smelled clean.

“There. Now. I’m going to pay you forty pounds of trade goods. And she’s mine?”

“By the terms of that agreement, this slave is yours. You’re his now.” The factor gave her a little shove.
Mélanie shook her head, trying to clear the sudden strange feelings as ownership transferred. The new man caught her by the wrists. “Mine,” he repeated quietly. “Let’s get you into that wagon and pay for you, shall we? Don’t run off,” he added, his voice so quiet she thought maybe he meant the order to be a secret. “Stay within sight of me if you can. I want to get us out of here.”

“Yes, sir.” She nodded politely at the man and didn’t even try to pull away. “Where are we going, sir… in case I lose sight of you?”

“My cart is on the far side of here, the east side, just outside the gate. Now, can you hold your head up and not look like you just got bought?”

“I – yes.” She shifted her shoulders and thought about better times, lifted her head up and pulled on a smile a much earlier incarnation of herself might have worn. She was proud. She was with someone she was happy to be with. She was clothed and her main item of clothing was even mostly clean. She could be proud for a bit.

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