Mistress of Night and Dawn (33 page)

And following that enigmatic statement, Aurelia knew neither Madame Denoux nor the grey-haired woman would willingly convey any further information about the nature of the tattoos or the way the Ball functioned. It was what it was.

After her shower, she sat by the desk, her eyes poring over the sheer delicacy of the Bonsai tree in its earthen pot, the small pair of scissors that she or PJ would use to snip stray leaves, the exquisite watering can that could have belonged in a child’s toy set. The miniaturist intricacy of its branches, the quiet equilibrium of its upward and sideways growth was a form of silent meditation in its own right and, to her great surprise, Aurelia found she could watch it for long periods at a time, entranced by its formal beauty.

Time passed. Aurelia glanced out of the window. For a change it was not drizzling and the sky was a grey shade of blue. She had no watch to check the time of day, but realised Madame Denoux or the other benign interrogator with grey hair must be late today. Which was unusual. For months now life had become a predictable routine even if the nightly experiences all differed, and she had grown used to it, to the extent that as dusk loomed daily, her whole body was already in a tremulous state of sexual anticipation, welcoming the coming spectacle of flesh she would be presented with, even if in her heart she always saved a nugget of hope it would actually be Andrei on this occasion, or that she would recognise the smell of his breath, the hard softness of his skin or the characteristic way he would fuck her, regardless of position or situation.

There was a knock on the door.

The older women who had been supervising her never knocked.

‘Come in . . .’ she cried out.

Tristan came through the door.

Aurelia felt a pang of disappointment, although she was intrigued by his presence and this break in the orderly routine she had been following for what felt like ages now.

‘Good morning, Aurelia.’

‘Hello. I wasn’t expecting you.’

‘I know,’ he said, his eyes running lustfully across the liberal amount of skin peering through the open flaps of the kimono she had slipped on after her shower and in which she was lounging in expectation of the women’s visit.

Realising her parts were on full, impudent display, Aurelia blushed and instinctively pulled on the thin belt of the colourful silk gown and closed it as best as she could, even as the more practical side of her was all too aware that Tristan had already seen her naked, not only on the island at the Ball but, in all likelihood, many times during her training, and might well have been an active participant too. If he had, she had never recognised him in the same way that she always knew Andrei.

‘Yes?’ she mumbled.

‘Andrei, the Ball’s Protector, should be here instead of me,’ Tristan stated, ‘but he is out of town for another week, so it’s my duty to instruct you in his absence.’

‘What about Madame Denoux and . . . ?’ How annoying that the other woman she knew as Mrs Greysuit had never revealed her name.

‘Miss Morris.’

‘Is that her name?’

Tristan nodded. ‘That part of your training is now complete,’ he informed Aurelia. ‘They remain in situ, and will answer your command should you wish to consult them.’

He continued, ‘But there is still a lot you must learn before you become the Mistress of the Ball, and I have been commanded, in the absence of the Protector, to put myself at your disposal to this effect.’

Why could it not be Andrei? Aurelia wondered. What more pressing duties could he have?

Instructing her.

Holding her in his arms.
Loving her.

Tristan was not always in a position to answer all of Aurelia’s questions.

One of the most pressing ones she had concerned her parents. From the elliptic conversations she’d had initially with Andrei and later with Madame Denoux, she had learned that her mother was born to a previous Mistress and had, all along, been destined for the role. At the expense of the Network she had been privately educated in Europe but, when she had returned to the Ball on the death by natural illness of her own mother, the previous Mistress, she had quickly fallen in love with the design engineer who had been recruited from the mundane world just a few months earlier to contribute new sketches and ideas for the following Ball, which was planned to take place near Niagara Falls and would involve much play and improvisation on the theme of water. Aurelia’s mother had not yet initiated her training by the time she passed away, and as the day grew closer, she rebelled against tradition and convinced the engineer to elope with her.

What could he tell her about her father? Very little. Just a name. No one now remembered him properly.

Considering the chosen theme of the Ball, it was sadly ironic that the couple’s death shortly after Aurelia’s birth had occurred by drowning. It was as if the gods presiding over the destiny of the Ball were taking a subtle if cruel revenge on those who had let them down.

There had been previous occasions during the course of history – and the origins of the Ball were lost in the mists of time, although many of its traditions persisted – when it had not had a proper Mistress, a function that ideally passed from mother to daughter through the blood. Whenever this had happened, a Protector had been appointed by the Ball’s Council, and later by the Network.

‘In the absence of a Mistress, what is the role of the Protector?’ Aurelia asked, still puzzled by Andrei’s true role.

‘He looks after the Ball and . . .’

Tristan fell short.

‘And what?’ Aurelia continued.

‘He is tasked to determine the next Mistress.’

‘How?’

‘He tests new women to see if they carry pleasure in their blood . . .’

Aurelia’s stomach tightened.

‘You mean . . . ?’

‘Yes,’ Tristan replied, a hint of cruelty painted across his full lips.

Aurelia fell silent.

‘But there was no real need to test you,’ he continued. ‘Once we had tracked you down, we knew you were your mother’s child and a genuine Mistress-in-Waiting.’

‘How does one know? If a woman can be a Mistress, I mean. That is if the line of succession has been somehow interrupted or broken?’ she queried.

‘The burning heart,’ Tristan said. ‘On your pubis.’

‘But you and so many others also have one,’ Aurelia replied. ‘A mark, at least, if not in the same place.’

‘Just the one on the underside of our wrists. It’s not a real one. It has to be tattooed. A real tattoo once we’ve been accepted into the Ball as one of the servants. We have many rituals. Too many if you ask me . . .’

‘But mine?’

‘Yours is genuine. The Ball flows through your blood and the mark will appear unbidden when . . .’

Aurelia remembered how Tristan had gone down on her in the antechamber of the forest on the island in the Puget Sound and how she had been unable to stem the inevitable flow of pleasure, the evidence she was joyfully wanton and a creature who was a willing slave to her senses.

The conversation paused as a crowd of thoughts jostled inside Aurelia’s brain.

Finally she replied, ‘You said you were born on the same day as me, if I remember.’

‘So I discovered after we’d identified you. An omen, no?’

‘And you’ve always been with the Ball, also born into it?’

‘So to speak. I’ve always suspected Walter was my father. Like you, I never knew my mother.’

‘Really?’

‘You know that once you become Mistress, the Protector will no longer have a role to play.’ Tristan seemed unwilling to elaborate on his own origins.

‘Would that not be my decision?’ Aurelia asked.

‘Not really,’ Tristan continued. ‘Although by tradition the Mistress can choose a consort . . .’ he added.

Aurelia reflected, just a hint of pain stabbing her heart on the thought of losing Andrei, that now that she had found him, although the knowledge of having shared him with all the other women he had ‘tested’ also triggered a pang of doubt, even if she knew that he had witnessed her taken by so many others as part of her training. That had never been kept a secret, though. Andrei had known before she had that this would be a part of her role. Why had he never told her about this aspect of his life? Was he still actively engaged in it?

‘Where is he now?’

‘Travelling.’

‘To what purpose?’

‘Only he knows.’

Tristan straightened his back as if he had taken a sudden decision and looked Aurelia in the eyes.

‘Choose me,’ he said.

‘Choose?’

‘Over him.’

‘Why?’

‘I am younger. We have more in common. I find you beautiful, uncommonly so. The two of us could run the Ball, make it shine again for future generations, assure its heritage. We were born on the same day. Some would call it fate, surely? Think how it makes sense, how it is meant to be.’

‘And if I don’t?’

‘I will challenge him.’

‘How?’

Tristan explained. Aurelia held her breath. After he had concluded his explanation, she remained silent. It made sense, in a crazy sort of way. By the strange logic of the Ball’s magic, it would be a way to know for sure if her future really did belong with Andrei or if her obsession with him had been simply a crush. She was a different person now. And she had barely seen Andrei of late. Had he been prevented from visiting her? Or had he chosen not to? She had no way of knowing, but the thought of his abandonment left a bitter taste in her mouth. It was like picking at a wound. She just couldn’t help herself.

As she then said the words, she instantly regretted opening her mouth, but she was already too far gone. ‘Tell me about the other women Andrei has known . . .’

‘I can do better than that,’ Tristan said. ‘I can show you.’

Aurelia noticed the hint of relish in his voice, but she ignored it. However moral or otherwise his intentions were, he had piqued her curiosity and she couldn’t turn back now. She followed him out of the suite of rooms and to the elevator that serviced the administrative floors throughout the building, for which he held an electronic key fob. A prickling sensation ran up Aurelia’s spine to the nape of her neck as Tristan pressed the button to the basement. It was an area she had previously not been granted access to and, having spent so many months essentially living within the enclosed perimeter of the garden’s glass-walled prism, she felt anxious about the prospect of going underground.

The soft hiss of the elevator’s doors sliding open when they finally hit the lowest level of the Network’s headquarters made Aurelia jump. Tristan let out a low chuckle.

‘You’re not afraid of the dark, are you, Mistress?’ he teased. He used the title as if it were a joke and this irritated Aurelia. She knew that she wasn’t the Mistress yet and she had no right to accuse him of disrespect, but that did not prevent her from smiling to herself as she imagined all the ways in which she could take him down a peg or two if given the opportunity. Perhaps she would agree to make him her consort, but only on the grounds that he agreed to wear her collar. The thought of having Tristan bow at her feet and perhaps even allowing her to take him from behind with the leather harness and ivory phallus that Madame Denoux had demonstrated using PJ as a subject during part of her dominant training made her immediately wet and also conscious of a burning sensation between her shoulder blades as her twin Chinese dragons began to flare into life.

Would she ever feel the same way with Andrei? She couldn’t imagine it. He had never shown any indication of submissive traits. That part of her had never surfaced of its own accord during their lovemaking. Whether or not she wanted it to do so was another matter and one for which she had no answer. And perhaps there were as many aspects to his psyche that she would be unable to fulfil and for which he might always look to other lovers to provide.

The only thing that Aurelia was sure of was that she was unsure of everything.

The corridors that Tristan led her through were pitch-black. Not so much as a crack of natural light had managed to wend its way into the bowels of the Network’s office block and Aurelia could not even make out the outline of his broad shoulders as he walked ahead of her. His hand was cool when he grasped her fingers to prevent her from stumbling. She was now completely disoriented and if he had abandoned her here, Aurelia was not certain that she could have found her way back to the lifts or if, without his key fob, she would even be able to access the upper floors. If they had passed a set of emergency stairs, she hadn’t noticed.

Of course she knew that Tristan was aware of all this. It was the unspoken play of power between them that lit the spark of attraction that had never been fully ignited, but that lingered between them still like the embers of a fire that with a dose of the right fuel, might explode into a raging inferno at any moment.

He finally stopped walking, but so suddenly that she took one step too many and came to an abrupt halt against the firm pillow of his back. The warmth of his body and the strength that was barely concealed beneath the thin T-shirt that he wore was like an accelerant to the already flickering flames of desire that Aurelia was struggling to rein in. She didn’t want to let him know the effect that his presence was having upon her and she knew that it would show if she let it. The markings upon her flesh were beginning to itch and, with little more encouragement, the road map of her lust would be seared across every inch of her exposed skin.

When Tristan switched on the electric light switch, the sight that met Aurelia’s eyes doused her senses in metaphorical cold water immediately.

They were in a vast room – perhaps half the size of a football pitch – lined with shelves against every flat surface besides the far wall, upon which hung a huge screen. It was like a cinema without any seats. The shelves were covered with neatly stacked and labelled archiving boxes, books and miscellaneous papers that filled every inch of the cavernous space.

‘Film?’ Aurelia asked in surprise as Tristan approached the only section of the archives that was free from a liberal coating of dust and pulled down several large black cased reels.