Stone Song by D. L. McDermott Read Free Book Online Page B

jeans—aroused.
    “Show me this piercing,” he said.
    “No.”
    The Prince snapped his fingers. “Come,” he said in a voice that Sorcha could tell was resonant with power. The iron allowed her to hear through it, to understand the sense of the word without responding to its command.
    Tommy had no such protection. He leaped up like a dog and trotted to the Prince’s side, eyes alive with terror and guilt.
    “I’m sorry, Sorcha,” he sobbed.
    “Quiet,” said the Prince.
    “It’s all right, Tommy,” Sorcha said. “This is my fault, not yours.”
    “How gracious,” said the Prince. “I knew you had no family, and I feared you might have no attachments, possess no lovers or friends. That would have made it hard to convince you to act in your best interest. And then I would have had to hurt you to compel obedience.”
    The knife reappeared in his hand and he tossed it high in the air and said, “Catch!”
    Tommy dove to the floor and caught the knife, clumsily, blade first, his fingers closing around it convulsively, blood running down the blade.
    “No!” Sorcha cried. If the blade cut his tendons, he might never play again.
    “No?” asked the Prince. “Perhaps Mr. Carrell should try again.”
    Another blade winked in the Prince’s hand.
    “I’ll do whatever you want,” said Sorcha. “Just leave Tommy alone.”
    “You will consent to let me train you as a Druid?” he asked.
    “Yes.”
    The Prince nodded, crouched to retrieve his blade from Tommy’s bleeding fingers, and wiped it clean on the fiddler’s shoulder. Tommy sat huddled at the Prince’s feet, clutching his injured hand.
    “Now,” said the Prince, “show me this piercing.”
    “I don’t see how that’s related to training me as a Druid.”
    “Iron is a Druid weapon against the Fae. So long as you wear it, I won’t be able to trust you. And I won’t unleash the power of a Druid I cannot trust.”
    “You mean a Druid you can’t control.”
    The Prince shrugged, as though they were one and the same. “Show it to me, so I can determine what kind of threat it poses, or we have no bargain.”
    And he would go on hurting Tommy.
    She reached for her collar. Her fingers felt numb, the silk of her blouse slippery. She started with the hook and eye at the top and unfastened every single button below, hoping the Prince would lose interest. Instead, his interest only grew.
    She had not anticipated that the Prince might find her appealing in that way. Keiran had favored models, the smooth perfection of youth, girls of fifteen and sixteen he picked up from photo shoots and parties. Gazelle-like creatures with the coltish slenderness and dewy skin of adolescence. Not women like Sorcha.
    Evidently the Prince was different. It wasn’t the slow striptease that aroused him, she realized. There was nothing sexy about the goose pimples beading her pale skin, nothing sensual about the frayed elastic strap or the worn nylon cups of her bra, thin and glossy with age. It was her humiliation that turned him on, that held his eyes riveted on her breasts.
    Her nipples were hard from the cold. She could see them—and the Prince could see them—through the threadbare fabric of her bra. The iron ring was clearly visible as well, tucked up under her left nipple, a hard outline beneath the cloth.
    The Prince reached out and traced her offending aureole, careful not to touch the iron ring even through the cloth, making a complete circle and then sliding his palm beneath her breast to lift and test the weight of it.
    He sighed. “These,” he said, handling her breasts, “please me, but cold iron is an ugly metal. I could rip it out, and see if you scream as prettily as you sing, but that would damage you permanently and make it impossible to replace the ornament with silver, later.”
    Her skin crawled at the thought.
    “For now, though,” he added, “there are other ways to motivate you.”
    He drew a small, stoppered bottle from one of his deep