Dreamlands

MASON

THE lower levels of Boylston Street were a charnel house. The blast doors to the secure underground section of the building had reopened on their own after slamming shut when something down there had set off the alarm a couple of hours ago. A truly freaky experience, if you asked me, even in my line of work. No one asked.

I went down there with my partner, Wolf Dieter, and a couple of the other Global International Trouble Consultant strike teams along with Jim Murphy, our fearless leader. Murphy looked like he should be an Irish cop in Victorian Boston, and he had all the prejudices they had too, from what I've found out over the years. It was part of the reason he didn't like me, because I was one of the "colored" people. The other part was because I had been in prison. Asshole.

We were all armed to the teeth, so I wasn't too worried about monsters. I was more worried about the blast doors slamming down again and not opening this time. They were made to hold in shit that I didn't want to think about. I was also worried about our pet hacker, Keno Inuzaka, who had been on the wrong side of the doors. I wasn't surprised when Wolf joined me in heading for Keno's room.

Wolf was my partner on a lot of Global International assignments. He was in his mid-twenties, a German national who was in Boston because of trouble back home. I didn't ask him about it, and he didn't tell me. He was a good guy, for an ex-cop. The cop still showed in his buzzed blond hair and his formal manner. He made a good impression when we met the clients. I never did, being an ex-con. For some reason the scars and tats put people off, along with my lack of tact.

Global International was a mercenary organization that was actually a cover for a quasi-governmental agency, called the "Trust" of all things, which hunted monsters, those things that went bump in the night or whenever they fucking felt like it. Not just those monsters you saw out of Hollywood like vampires and werewolves, but creatures that made those things look like gentle lambs.

We didn't always play by the rules, because the monsters didn't. Keno was one of the people we'd broken the rules for.

Keno had been with us for a little over four years, since we'd caught him with his hand in the cookie jar, figuratively speaking. We'd been told to waste him if he caused trouble or bring him back if he didn't. We ended up dragging back a fifteen-year-old Japanese college student who'd thought our database was part of a game site and hacked into it on a whim. It wasn't that our security sucked that much; it was that he was that good. He'd gone through our security like it hadn't been there. I found out later that Keno was some sort of brilliant computer genius who'd gotten a free ride at MIT because he was so smart.

After the first year, I was of the opinion that shooting him would have been better. Keno was a prisoner who never saw the sun and was never treated with anything vaguely resembling dignity. Since he'd been here, assholes had been dragging him out of his room during his off hours for whatever they wanted, mostly computer help or fixing a lab machine. Keno had been turned into after-hours support a few weeks after we brought him in. Not that Keno complained once he figured out what was going on; he just got quieter.

Lately, it had been kind of weird, the few times I had stumbled across it. Almost as soon as he got here, Keno figured out that protesting his treatment wouldn't do any good. Wolf had protested recently, and it had backfired, getting Keno into more trouble. Wolf and I had been sent out to check out a lot of the Trust's American offices after that one to cool us off.

We'd just gotten back to this mess after being out of the city for three months. Nice fucking coming home party.

"I'm worried," Wolf said.

Murphy looked at the two of us. He was pissed because he thought we should be worrying about James Heiseg, the head of research here, and the other people who had been caught down here. People, in his opinion, who were the ones that counted, not a gook programmer who should be thankful he was alive - his words. I stopped Wolf from slugging him, even though I wanted to as well. Murphy looked shocked. I guess he didn't realize what Keno meant to Wolf or me. I felt responsible for the kid because I had gotten him into this mess; Wolf was about the only friend the kid had. Not too good for the head of security not to figure either of those things out.

We got down to C level and Keno's quarters without too much trouble. There was enough blood, guts, and body parts splattered around that level to make three horror movies, and we didn't see anyone left alive. There was a faint trail of gore leading to Keno's room from the main area, the offices, and labs, stuff that got tracked there more than someone getting killed there. I wasn't surprised to see that the place was broken up when we got to it. Not from a fight, but from someone's temper tantrum, it looked like. It was mostly Keno's books tossed around and the models he had built broken.

"By the numbers," I told Wolf, trying to calm him down. "No body parts here."

There had been enough of them scattered about in the main area. What had happened here hadn't been caused by the monsters. A human one, probably, because Heiseg was one of the ones who had been after Keno's unprotected ass, and it was for more than Excel help. But no one would believe me when I said that, not even Wolf.

Wolf knew Heiseg was a bastard, but he was a straight bastard. I wasn't going to be the one to tell him that rape was about power more than sex, because I didn't want the damned Boy Scout to know he couldn't protect Keno. I knew Keno was doing all right, because I had someone keeping tabs on him for me while I was gone, but I also knew it was only a matter of time before Keno wasn't going to be okay. My putting the word out about him being under my protection had kept the worst of the predators off him, but there was only so much I could do if I wasn't around.

"No blood," Wolf said, relief coloring his voice. "He's probably someplace else, safe."

I checked the bathroom on the off chance he was hiding in there, and we went to explore the rest of the place. The monsters - Hakarl - were dead, torn apart by something else. Hakarl were fucking walking stomachs really, never stopped eating and weren't too picky about what was on the menu, even if it was each other, but I didn't think that was what had happened here. All that was here was the mess they'd left behind, mostly gnawed on techs with a couple of survivors. Not that they were of any use to us, because they were babbling wildly until the medics hit them with some happy juice. They shut up, and I was sure we weren't going to be getting anything useful out of them about what had happened when they woke up again. There also were the bits of Hakarl scattered about, and I had no idea what had taken them out. I didn't like that.

There was still no Keno, which was beginning to worry me. We found that asshole Heiseg, though. He was very dead, and I was kind of happy about that, because I never had liked the man for a lot of reasons besides what he was doing to Keno. He was half dressed, his pants falling off his hips and his shirt unbuttoned. I didn't like that. He also looked softer and more puddingish than usual with blood tricking from his eyes, mouth, ears, and nose.

"Check to see if he wasn't doing something odd," I muttered to Goose, one of the medics. Goose had been here longer than me and Wolf. He had an air about him like he had seen it all and nothing surprised him anymore. My request seemed to surprise him.

"Huh?" he asked.

Wolf looked at Heiseg and nodded. "See if he was attacked."

I shook my head. "See if the bastard raped anyone, was what I was thinking."

Murphy was glaring at us for still worrying about Keno, and I saw a couple of sessions with the company's head-shrinking psych in our future. Wolf scowled at Murphy, and we headed down to the server level, taking the stairs instead of the elevator. Keno might be hiding down there; it had been his favorite hiding place before we'd been sent offsite, but I was losing hope in finding him. But Keno wasn't among the dead, so where was he?

"Where's the Junge?" Wolf muttered, echoing my thoughts.

I glanced around. No body parts or bodies. No blood really, not like it was on the upper floors. It was all splatter, like a dog had shaken himself down here. Or several big dogs, from the mess on the walls. "He escaped?"

Wolf glared, knowing that was impossible. "I wish," he finally admitted.

Wolf was the one who noticed that there seemed to have been more than a couple of monsters down here recently, someone who was wearing sandals and another someone who was barefoot. Both could be Keno, from the size of the prints. But who was the second person? An intruder? Another survivor? It wasn't like we could get an accurate count on people with all the body parts scattered around.

We got into the server room, which was where all the tracks stopped, right at the door. It was eerie. I half expected to see a horde of the whatevers that had killed the Hakarl behind the door, and there was nothing, just all those machines just humming along happily like they had been working all evening. The fucking things had been off for hours and had turned themselves back on right before the blast doors opened. I didn't know much about computers, but I knew they weren't supposed to do that. Wolf and I stared at each other in confusion.

"I don't think that Keno is here," Wolf finally said after a few minutes of silence.

I thought about the last few years of the kid's life; I thought about my time in prison. "And I think that it's a good thing."

"Mason?"

I was aware of the cameras that were probably recording every damning thing I was going to say and still didn't care. "The kid didn't see the sun or get treated right for as long as we'd had him. There were times that I think that it would have been better if we'd kacked the kid."

"I know," Wolf said quietly.

Wolf had spent a lot of time with Keno, watching movies and trying to be a friend to him because he spoke Japanese. I knew about three words in it and none of them polite. I'd have done it even with the language issue, but Keno was scared of me. He'd probably seen my prison record - double homicide and twenty years in a maximum security prison before I was "cleared" by the Trust in exchange for doing their dirty work - so I didn't blame him for being wary around me. Let me just tell you that it wasn't killing humans that got me in trouble. The people I supposedly killed had been monsters that just looked human, and those were the ones the authorities had been able to charge me with killing. I had been a suspect in couple more killings, but there hadn't been enough evidence to charge me with those. All those killings had been monsters, passing as humans.

"We just got to think about where he might be," I said. "Because he sure in hell isn't here, and he didn't walk past us on the way out. So where the fuck did Keno and those other monsters disappear to?


SAMOJIROU

I WAS practicing my sword kata when my lady returned with the Reavers, her devoted guards, darker than ink, man-sized with a blank mask for a face, the wings of a bat, and claws to rend their prey.

I cut one more dummy apart and sheathed my sword. I was aware of the rank smell of my own sweat and the way my yukata - a casual, cotton kimono - clung to me as she approached. My lady was as elegant and serene as always even though her pets were splattered with blood and other things. She looked tired, and I knew she had journeyed to the real world. Tamazusa had been gifted with the ability to sense and use gates to travel to other realms, a rare talent. It tired her, though, and she didn't do it often. She had been doing it more often lately, probably for some move in the Game she was plotting.

"Samojirou-sama, I have a present for you," she purred.

I raised an eyebrow even as I bowed in greeting. "I am flattered that you thought of me, my lady."

She laughed. It was practiced and empty, the laugh of a trained companion, which was what she had been in the real world. I have never seen the woman make an unpracticed gesture or word in all the centuries I had known her. "I wish that you could have escorted me. The event was boring and the atmosphere dull."

"I am sorry that you did not enjoy your outing," I murmured.

I was content to be my lady Tamazusa's loyal second, the moon to her sun, as she plotted and planned, scheming in the hate that consumed her to become a Lord in the Dreamlands, the lands where heroes and other beings lived after they died.

Tamazusa and I had been banished here, turned into demons - oni - by the treachery and weakness of a coward, Satomi Yoshizane. I had been greedy and disloyal to my lord Jin-yo and deserved my fate, but my lady had been an innocent. She lost that innocence in the hatred she felt when she had been killed unjustly. She cursed the one responsible, Satomi, and embraced the darkness to become an oni in the Dreamlands. Here she had become a personage to be feared, a consummate player in the Game of power that is a passion to those here.

I chose to retire to my studies, uninterested in such things. It seemed I lost my ambition when I died for a second time. I've been unable to leave the Dreamlands for some time now. It was a mild annoyance, even if I didn't want to leave, since there was little in the real world that interested me. Tamazusa didn't usually flaunt her freedom to do so to me. Something must have irked her to make her so careless of my feelings.

"I should have known that the man was common and a bad player," she continued. "He lacked refinement and intelligence in our earlier dealings. The place was a bloody mess. It looked like a slaughterhouse."

"Many are unable to entertain as well as you are," I said with a smile.

To open a gate between the worlds, power was needed. Such power came from the sacrifice of an intelligent being, usually a human. Since my lady Tamazusa had been gifted so, she did not need to resort to that crude method. The practitioners of dark magics were often unskilled blunderers who had a tendency to butcher when a much tidier sacrifice would do. It wasn't the amount of blood spattered about that raised the magic, but the death of the sacrifice.

Her Reavers looked like they had been fighting. That was interesting. Tamazusa generally didn't get involved in the petty squabbles of humans or other monsters.

"He also thought because he had a dangling piece of flesh between his legs that he was better than I," she snarled.

"You know that men have not changed over the centuries. There will always be the ones who think that because they are a man, they are better than you," I soothed her.

So that was what put her out of sorts, dealing with a man who didn't respect her intelligence or her skills. I had thought modern men were wiser than that. I also knew that she had probably changed his opinion of her skill with a demonstration, one he might not have survived, but that didn't matter to me. If the man was a fool, it was better that he didn't annoy the rest of the worlds with it.

"He was thinking with it," she told me ruefully. "I fear that your gift is a bit... bruised."

I looked at her with a puzzled frown on my face. She smiled indulgently at my confusion and clapped her hands. One of her Reavers pushed a bound boy toward me. I shook my head. Bruised was an understatement. He had been beaten badly and was streaked with blood, his dark hair hanging in rat-tails to his hips. He also was naked and limping, shivering uncontrollably, and had a blankness about him that showed he had been pushed to his limits. His left eye was swollen shut, and the same side of his face showed bruises from being slapped or having his mouth forced open. I started to make a comment, when I really looked at him.

He had power, magical and intoxicating, that called to me.

I studied him a few moments longer and then looked sharply at Tamazusa. If the boy recovered his wits, he would be a powerful magic user, a talent not common here. If he didn't recover, he would be merely a well of power to be dipped into often by those who could manipulate his magic, such as my lady. He would be a tool to be enjoyed in other ways by me.

"You play with fire, my lady," I said softly.

She smiled coyly. "You just see some of it."

Tamazusa reached out and stroked his hair. The boy flinched. She moved his hair off his left shoulder, tracing a mark there with her fingernails, leaving faint scratches on his skin. My eyes widened when I saw it; the boy was marked with the sign of one of the Hakkenshi. That probably was the source of the magic in him.

The Hakkenshi were descendants of Satomi, the one who had caused our demonhood, the coward who couldn't keep his word, even to his own family. His unjust killing of Tamazusa had caused her to utter a death curse, saying his descendants would be beasts because he had no honor. Those cursed were the children of his daughter Fuse, and they had been scattered across the Kanto region of Japan before they were born by magic to other families.

Satomi's grandsons, the Hakkenshi, had been drawn to the man when they had reached manhood, to defend him against his enemies, of which I had been one. Their adventures had been legendary, filled with sorcery and heroics. Most of Satomi's grandsons were now here in the Dreamlands. Satomi, fortunately, was not. I had fought and tormented Satomi and the Hakkenshi when I was still able to travel to the real world. Our hatred had carried on here, at least on the part of the Hakkenshi. I had tired of the hate after a while. Tamazusa focused hers on playing the Game.

"You are bold," I commented.

She laughed. "They will say nothing."

I stepped forward to claim him. Tamazusa laughed again, and the prisoner shivered harder. If they discovered it, the Hakkenshi would rage over the fact that I was in possession of one of their avatars. However, he was here now and mine.

"What is your name, boy?" I demanded.

"Keno. Inuzaka Keno," he said hoarsely. I sensed that the boy had screamed himself out to sound like that. What had happened to him?

Then I realized what he had said. Keno had been the name of my lover, one of the Hakkenshi, since all of their family names had started with the kanji for dog - Inu - fulfilling my lady's curse that they were to be born beasts. I had seduced Keno to corrupt him. I had fallen in love instead and lost him. Now I stared.

Tamazusa smiled back. "How could I ignore that?" she asked.

"I am deeply in your debt," I said humbly.

I was. She had no use for such attachments or indulgences, but I, upon occasion, wanted companionship of an intimate nature. I also thought that she liked seeing me occupied in such a manner since ours had never been an intimate relationship. To give me my former lover's avatar was something she knew would please me. That he was magical was a bonus.

"Just enjoy him," she said. "The fool had no idea what he had. I killed him."

I slowly reached out and touched the boy, expecting his shudder. I wasn't insulted by it. Keno looked like a beaten dog. He was aware enough to understand our conversation and was expecting the worst from us.

"Come with me, and we will clean up," I said gently.

He was still shivering and resigned to whatever insult I was going to offer him. I smelled more than blood on him and sensed the truth behind my lady's words. Keno had been raped. I was stirred by anger I couldn't explain. I didn't know the boy; what did it matter to me what had happened to him? The power that filled him was what should have mattered, but knowing he had been hurt still filled me with an odd rage.

I guided him to the onsen to bathe and untied the ropes on him. "Wash," I told him.

Keno obeyed wordlessly, cleaning himself thoroughly before slipping into the hot spring. I studied him out of the corner of my eye. He was biddable, probably beddable, and under the bruises, beautiful. Not like his namesake, this Keno had the fragile beauty of the sakura - the cherry blossom. His ancestor had been elegant, possessing a sharp and wicked wit. He also had been a deadly warrior, skilled beyond belief. I had loved that Keno beyond reason, and he had banished me here to save me. Our punishment had been that he could not join me. Sometimes I wondered if that was not better, because there were times now that I didn't know if I had loved or hated the man.

We settled into the hot water, and Keno's shivering eventually stopped. He asked no questions, and that worried me. Too frightened? Too tired? Or knowing too well one of the reasons my lady had given him to me? I wasn't surprised that he didn't recognize me. I didn't know why I was angry that the boy was bruised and obviously abused, since he was not my lover, only a pale echo of him. I noticed that not all the bruises were new, so the fool had been abusing him for a while. Keno was also pale, as if he hadn't seen the sun in a while. Had he been ill?

We soaked quietly in the hot water for a while before I announced, "Enough. Back to my quarters."

Keno's shivering started again. I wondered what else had happened to him besides the obvious. He dried himself off and waited for my orders; I decided to test his control and his reactions. I went over and kissed him deeply.

Kissing was a Western custom Tamazusa had told me about. It was interesting. Keno yielded dutifully, letting me explore his mouth with my tongue. He was not unaware of the custom either, but he was letting me play with him like he was a doll. I caressed his body, my fingers straying toward a very intimate spot. He involuntarily made a small sound of pain when I touched his nether opening. I didn't enjoy that sound. I broke off our kiss and studied him. With his downcast eyes, he was the picture of submission... or fright.

"At this time, I doubt that I will be interested in more. You seemed to be injured," I explained. I was tempted to see how much more than kissing he would be interested in, but I knew that right now he was too frightened for anything more than kisses, if even that.

"I'm fine," he whispered. "It doesn't matter...."

Fright it was. The fool who had been Tamazusa's pawn, if not others, most likely had abused him more than this one time. But there was something else there. Resignation and a dullness that spoke to me of long-term mistreatment colored his tone of voice. What had been happening to the boy?

While Hakkenshi were in the Dreamlands, still they had avatars in the real world, their descendants, one for each of Satomi's eight grandsons in each generation. They had occasionally been called upon to repeat their ancestor's heroism when Japan needed it.

While I never had seen my Keno in the Dreamlands, I was aware of the others. We ignored each other. Surprisingly enough, I had a civil relationship with their mother, Fuse. I knew that she protected her sons' avatars with a fierceness that would surprise many who knew of her gentle nature. She would have protected Keno. Something had happened so that she couldn't; that was going to be to my advantage now.

"Unlike that fool that my lady took you from, I have no taste for abuse," I said harshly.

He shuddered at my tone of voice. "What do you have a taste for?" Keno whispered.

I smiled, trying to reassure him. "Pleasure. For both of us."

He looked at me, shocked, before he dropped his eyes. Keno didn't believe me. I bit back my anger because someone or ones had nearly ruined him. I had seen and caused enough pain in my existence to have no desire for it in my bed. But I might be able to use it to my advantage. Kindness from me after the abuse would bind him close to me. Tamazusa would be able to manipulate his power easily or have someone teach him how to use it for himself, if I desired.

I slipped into a clean yukata and handed one to Keno. He took it uncertainly and put it on. He wore it correctly, which I was relieved to see. The boy wasn't a barbarian, at least. I had heard many complaints from others here that the Nipponese people were becoming too Western and foreign. Keno wasn't one of those, apparently.

"Follow me," I said.

He was quiet, but I sensed he was studying his surroundings, even with his eyes obediently on the floor. He was an interesting mixture of fear and curiosity. I would enjoy seeing his reactions to discovering the world he was in now.

We passed by one of the maids, and I instructed her to bring us a meal. She nodded and sped off to the kitchen, eager to spread the gossip that I had a companion. The servants knew my lady and I weren't intimate, living as siblings rather than lovers. I have never been interested in women, preferring the joys of men.

We arrived at my apartment. Keno walked in after hesitating for a moment and seemed to be at a loss. He stood there dumbly, and I fought the urge to snap at him. How bad had his life been that he couldn't think without orders? All that power he had, and I could make it all mine. Did I want that? Or did I want a companion more than a doll?

"I fear that I have been rude," I said. "I have not given you my name. I am Samojirou Aboshi."

"What... what do you wish to do with me, Samojirou-san?" Keno asked me softly. He showed no recognition upon hearing my name. I shouldn't have hoped he would.

"You are an unexpected gift from my lady," I said with a slight smile. "I have not thought that far ahead."

Keno flinched. He was too docile, as if he had been a prisoner for a long time. Tamazusa would tell me, but I was reluctant to ask her. It would show that I hadn't been paying attention to her schemes as much as I should have. But since she was also a woman who kept her own counsel, I thought I amused her with my indifference to her plans. It was as if our roles had been reversed: I was the dutiful consort she returned to after her adventures, and I was the one to impress with her stories and to comfort her on her setbacks, the rare times those happened.

"But food will be brought soon," I said. "After that, you can rest and heal."

"I'm fine," he said, sounding panicked and frightened. "You don't have - "

"But I choose to," I said with a touch of steel in my voice. "And you are not 'fine', you are injured! Or have you been in pain for so long that you do not know any better?"

"Just... just get it over with," he said tiredly.

"It?" I asked, confused.

"Hurt... hurting me," he stuttered. "I'm just property. It - "

"What happened?" I demanded, though I was trying to sound gentle. I didn't know why my heart ached to hear him so broken. It wasn't as if I had one after I turned into an oni.

"It wasn't a game," he said simply.

I didn't understand him, but the maids arrived with the food at that moment. We both stood there as they set the trays on the table. I gestured for them to leave, and we heard them giggling in the hallway as they scurried away. I rolled my eyes in annoyance. Keno looked tired and confused. I didn't think he expected the maids to be such happy little things. Their kind always were. The maids are kashin, flower spirits, eager to serve and almost incapable of an angry thought.

"Please eat," I ordered.

Keeping half an eye on me, he knelt at the table but didn't touch anything until I started eating. It was a simple meal of rice and vegetables, but he devoured it eagerly. I wondered when he had last eaten, from the speed in which the food disappeared.

"Sleep now," I said when he was through.

I got up and guided him to my bedroom. My futon had been laid out already. Keno stopped when he saw it, shivering a little.

"Was this the first time that you have been raped?" I asked bluntly. I didn't think being delicate would work with him.

Keno flushed bright red and dropped his eyes to the floor. "He... Heiseg had been touching me for a while. Since... since he was sort of told that he could do anything that he wanted to me. It was weird. He... he has... had a girlfriend, and I thought that I was just imagining things, because who would want me?"

I refrained from asking the boy if he knew what a mirror was. Actually, Keno seemed to be older than he looked, but humans always looked young to me. I wondered if that was why he thought he was property, if he were too damaged to think on his own or believe in himself. Would I enjoy the challenge of fixing that damage? Or should I just take advantage of it? As I had said, Keno had been an unexpected gift. I would have to think about how I would mold him to my needs and pleasures.

"But tonight," Keno continued. "He came into my room, and I didn't know what was happening. There were monsters with him. He... he had them drag me out of my room for him. He smashed all my models."

Keno sounded bewildered as he recalled what had happened. Idly I wondered what a model was.

"We went down to D level. There were more monsters there, eating the lab techs. Heiseg ra - hurt me. He hurt some of the techs while the monsters ate the men. The ones he hurt were all women. Then he hurt... hurt me again, hitting me and telling me that he should let the monsters eat me too. He was still shouting crazy things when that lady showed up. He started screaming, 'cause I think that he knew her and then... then he just seem to swell a bit and explode. Inside."

"Ah...." I knew that spell. My lady Tamazusa was quite skilled with it, since it was one of the few that she knew, since it was something that as a lord of the Dreamlands she was able to wield. I had no idea what a lab tech was, but I could see why Keno was in shock. He seemed unused to all violence, not only violence against himself.

"Lie down," I coaxed. "Sleep. While I am interested in your body, I am in no hurry to claim it."

Keno obediently curled on my futon, making himself as small as possible. I stared at him thoughtfully before fetching a scroll to read. I would have to treat him gently, which wouldn't be a chore, with whatever plan I chose. The boy was exquisite, and fortunately, he didn't remind me of his namesake, which might have influenced the decision I made.


KENO

I WOKE up to my captor staring at me thoughtfully, almost in the same position he had been in when I fell asleep. It was the same way that McGann used to look at me when I first woke up in Boylston Street. McGann was an executive with the people who had held me prisoner and the person who controlled my life, such as it was. I had to ask her for anything I needed, from a toothbrush to books. She was also the one who gave me all my orders, from hacking into someone else's system and stealing information to helping researchers with setting up a computer - basically anything the Trust wanted me to do. She was the first person I saw when I woke up after I had been kidnapped from my dorm room. McGann was the one who told me that the rest of the world thought I was dead. I didn't exactly hate her, but I was afraid of her and knew that I depended on her for almost everything in my life. I hated that.

Samojirou looking at me in the same calculating manner frightened me even more than she had. I knew McGann hadn't been interested in doing that to me, and he was, from the kisses and touches last night.

I hurt in places I hadn't thought possible. I shifted and had trouble biting back the low moan of pain. I didn't want to move ever again.

"Do you want to see the healer?" Samojirou asked.

"I'm fine," I insisted.

I wasn't, but I hadn't seen a doctor in a while, not since the Trust got me. Heiseg had raped me, but there wasn't anything I could do about that. I couldn't forget the way he sounded when it happened or the searing pain I felt when he... when he did that to me. And I was now the property of a man who wanted to do the same thing. And I didn't know where I was or why the name Samojirou Aboshi sounded familiar to me.

I wondered if I could find a knife and just end it all.

"I do not think so," Samojirou said with a frown.

"Just get it over with," I muttered. For a moment I thought that I'd spoken my last thought aloud, but it seemed Samojirou was just commenting upon my condition. I never wanted to be noticed or thought of as a bother, because that might lead to McGann or her superiors deciding I wasn't worth their time and getting rid of me permanently. I was surprised when Samojirou didn't hit me for being rude to him, muttering like that. Most everyone would have hit me for that comment.

"The maids will be bringing breakfast soon," he said. "I suppose that there is no harm in letting you follow me about for today. Do you practice the art of the sword?"

I curled up smaller, trying to ignore the pain. "I used to."

Samojirou smiled. "Then we can start on your training after breakfast." He hesitated. "I must ask. Do you feel that there is an injury? Are you bleeding?"

I blushed when I realized what he was asking. I didn't feel anything odd since he let me take a bath, but it wasn't like I had a lot of experience in this. I was scared that I was going to have too much experience with it in the future. "I don't think so. But... um... how can you tell?"

"After breakfast, we will visit the healer," Samojirou said smoothly, not bothering to answer my question. "Tan'yu-san will be delighted with the company. I would like him to check on your eye also. Then I will go to the samurai's practice grounds with you."

I nodded, and we waited for breakfast in what I thought was a strained silence. I studied him the way he had been studying me, even if I kept my eyes on the floor. I had learned early at the Trust that people got mad if I looked them in the eyes.

Samojirou was tall and slender. He reminded me of a snake, from the way he moved and from what I had seen in the bath last night. I hadn't been trying to look there either, but we were both naked, so it was kind of hard not to look. Or at least look look, as in checking-out looking. Mason had explained the difference to me once.

Samojirou's hair was shorter than mine, falling to just below the middle of his back, and it was dark brown rather than black. I guess people would have thought he was attractive. The scary lady had been beautiful too. Tall, slender, and elegantly dressed in a very nice kimono, she reminded me of the geisha who wandered around Tokyo, not that there were many of them anymore. Both she and Samojirou were very traditionally Japanese, very sophisticated, and I felt like a country bumpkin next to them. I had been teased in school because my family was very traditional, but now I felt alien, Western, with these two.

It didn't take long for food to be delivered. A couple of giggly girls dropped off a traditional Japanese breakfast: miso soup, rice, tea, and assorted fruits, vegetables, and fish. Samojirou's tray had a note on it. He read it with a faint smile. I wondered what exactly his relationship with the lady was. He was impressive and made me nervous. She was scary, and I was relieved she hadn't wanted to keep me, even if I had to do that with Samojirou. She definitely reminded me of McGann with the confidence and power that I saw in her, though I doubted McGann could kill someone with a thought.

I wondered where I was. The place had looked odd from what little I could remember, lush flowers and forest roads, nothing at all like the Boston I remembered from before my imprisonment. This place was rural and underdeveloped. There hadn't been a sun out when we arrived, and it looked like there wasn't one now. From what I could tell, it was like a weird twilight, no sun. But I hadn't seen the sun in years, and I might have forgotten what it looked like.

I was surprisingly hungry, and I ate my breakfast quickly, not eating the fish. I'm a vegetarian, which I never told the Trust, because I hadn't wanted to seem weird or make them think I was too much trouble. It led to a lot of missed meals, but it kept me from being noticed. Samojirou finished his breakfast at a slower pace.

"Were you not fed by your captors before?" he asked.

I looked up from my tray. How had he known I had been a prisoner before? I hadn't said anything, but there might have been something in that note. Or the scary lady could have told him something when I was asleep.

"I am not a seer," he said with a smile, seeing my reaction to his question. "But you are so docile, I thought that it might explain how you are acting. Also there was the small matter of the injuries that idiot inflicted upon you. Not all of them are recent."

"Years," I whispered, not bothering to lie. It didn't matter, really. "I... I had made a mistake."

"What kind of mistake?" Samojirou asked.

I hesitated, bowing my head. "It wasn't a game, Samojirou-sama."

I thought I had told him something like this last night. I remember food and getting cleaned up, but everything else was a blur. But I had no doubt that Samojirou was a lord wherever this place was. San - mister - was an acceptable form of address in Japan, but sama - lord - seemed to fit much better.

"You mentioned that before," he said softly. "I do not understand."

"I thought that their servers - it's a place called the Trust - were a game site, and I hacked into them," I said. "I was caught, and they took me back to their headquarters, and I haven't left there for years. They wanted me to hack into other databases and to protect theirs. The rest of the world thinks that I'm dead. My parents...."

Samojirou looked confused. I knew that we were speaking the same language, Japanese, even if his had an old-fashioned sound to it, like he was my grandfather or something. He didn't look any older than Wolf did, his late twenties. The scary lady looked like she was my age. But both of them felt older, for some reason, and not just because of the dialect of Japanese they were speaking.

Samojirou didn't know what I was talking about. He didn't show it, but I knew he didn't understand. Not because he was stupid, but because he hadn't heard of such things, telephones or servers or video games, which was almost impossible in this day and age. There was also something odd about the maids, now that I thought about it. It wasn't anything that I could name, just a feeling that they didn't look right.

"That explains much," he murmured.

"A server is like...." I didn't know how to explain this to someone who didn't have the basic concepts. I realized that this place didn't have electricity or running water. It was like I had stepped back in time to the Tokugawa era, from what I had seen. I didn't remember how I had gotten here, because one moment I was being led to the server room by the scary lady and her Reavers, monsters I knew about from working on Heiseg's reports, and then we were all here. Wherever here was. It didn't seem any better than Boylston Street, because I was still a prisoner and this Samojirou person wanted me like Heiseg had. I shuddered at the thought.

"Does it matter?" Samojirou asked after I fell silent. He looked concerned for a moment but then smiled. "If you are done, then we should seek out Tan'yu-san."

"I'm done, Samojirou-sama," I said. Why did it matter if I was done? I was his property, and he could do whatever he wanted with me.

He got to his feet gracefully. I was less than graceful and ended up stumbling and falling. I was surprised when Samojirou managed to catch me, because he had been across the room a moment before. I still flinched at his touch.

"I should have known," he murmured. "No matter. Keno, please trust me."

"Do I have a choice, Samojirou-sama?" I asked softly.

I waited for the hit I deserved for questioning him. Most of the Trust personnel would have hit me for being that rude. The techs had a tendency to slap me - "to keep me in line" was the phrase they used. The strike teams just grabbed at me in odd places and called me a pretty boy and other names. Early in my captivity, I had taken to hiding down in the server room to avoid both groups. I had known for a while that what Heiseg did to me was going to happen, since my door didn't lock. I just didn't know that it would hurt so much.

"Not really," he admitted ruefully.

Samojirou leaned down to kiss me again, and I let him. This kiss was just as demanding as the last one had been. It hurt a little because of the bruises on my face too. When he finished, Samojirou had an odd look on his face. He wasn't happy about how I kissed, or maybe it was because I just let him kiss me. Well, it wasn't like I really knew what I was doing. I hadn't been interested in kissing anyone before the Trust grabbed me, and afterward, the one guy I had wanted to kiss acted like I was a kid.

I'd had a huge crush on Wolf Dieter for the last couple of years, which was stupid because he was the man who had dragged me out of my dorm room and taken away my life. But he was the only one who really talked to me, since he spent time with me in either the cafeteria or my room when he didn't have to. I knew that it was stupid to have a crush on Wolf when I knew he was straight, but I was pathetic enough to have the hots for the man who had imprisoned me. I thought part of it might have been that I wanted Wolf to be my first, no matter what happened afterward. It didn't happen though, and now I was the captive of a scary man who was trying to be nice to me.