13:21 / 24:37, Rotation 518 / 687, 231 AE, 8.929310, 136.035921, Aryss

  Vilithe hadn’t eaten that much that quickly in a long time and she fell into a food coma, the itis dulled her psionic sharpness, and now her guard was down whether she liked it or not. Dazey shuffled Vilithe into a dressing room, shoved her into an aluminum lined showering pod to rinse off all the mucus and guck. The hot water was scented with herbal fragrances, peppermint and lemongrass and lavender and rose, but of course Vilithe had never smelled any of that before in her life and could not place the scents, though she felt she once could. She scrubbed Vilithe with a pumice exfoliator, the dead skin fell off, little dotty, clotty clumps of wet dust. It massaged her stiff muscles.

  There was no end to Dazey’s chatter the entire time. It was a long time ago that Vilithe heard this many words. She talked about vassal gossip first, thinking it would interest Vilithe more, but it didn’t. She then talked Amallarkean gossip which didn’t just disinterest Vilithe, but perturbed her, but she was still too taken aback by Dazey’s kindness to protest and besides, it was rude to shut someone up. Vilithe paid no attention until Dazey strayed carelessly and spoke of Serun, the name stuck out from the flow of words like a clot.

  “And they said it was a helluva fight! Over half the fighting force in casualties on both sides! The cunning Queen Talauth escaped, but at the skin of her teeth! We captured her four elite guards, formed them as a death squad, and Princess Senjya had already sent them ranging, before Princess Amefrid’s arrival. They don’t even know how long they’ve been vassalized! Hah! They’ve been brutally effective. And it was all thanks to our boi, Serun! He-”

  “What’s Serun like?”, Vilithe interrupted.

  “Oh, the poor thing he’s only just healed barely enough to partake in ol’ Miz Dazey’s pleasure chamber! Oh, he’s a gentle elvan, don’t you worry, darling. Oh, he’s a loyal and courageous knight. And he knows how to treat an elvan gurl well.”

  Did that extend to vassal gurls? And why did she feel the need to say ‘oh’ so much?

  Still, vocal conversation was oddly comforting to Vilithe. She had only said three words, but even that was startling because she had forgotten how wide her voice could pitch- deep when she was calm, but high and squeaky when flustered.

  “Ah, and just as a reward for his bravery against that nasty Talauthian knight, the one that was strangely immune to psionics – my, my how strange – our hero Serun was alone against that brute, with no assassins to help him!”

  She completely forgot to finish her sentence.

  “What was I saying? Oh! His reward. You!” She produced a lacy set of lingerie, a set of pantyhose, and a silk collar, attached to a long nylon leash.

  Vilithe now was mystified. Lingerie was something only Queens indulged in. The thought easily pluckable from her mind now, Dazey responded,

  “Worn by Princess Senjya herself. Well, except the leash and collar, of course. But you know what I think dear… I think that's hot!” Something about the coquettish way she said ‘that’s hot’ suddenly made Vilithe very aware of her impoverishment as a vassal, relative to the obscene wealth of Clan Amallark.

  And indeed, the embroidery and patterning on it was exquisite. Gold and purple, patterned with repetitions of a golden fleur-de-lis so impossibly small and tightly interwoven together that it had to have been spirit forged, it couldn’t possibly have been handmade. Vilithe slipped it on, it somehow snuggled to her exact fit – was it laced with spirits? – and then Dazey gave her a long silk robe to wear too. Silk! It was so, so comfortable. She must have felt it before from a time long ago, it felt faintly familiar, but even now Vilithe was astounded that a material could feel so little friction to the touch. She flapped her arms in it, and the robe billowed behind her.

  Vilithe’s white hair was woven into tight cornrows, to expose ports arranged in neat rows all along her scalp – dragonrider ports that could have wires inserted to communicate directly with the dragon – they were the only thing left to remind Vilithe of her former life, although with her potent psionic mind, the truth was she remembered every single moment of her lived life still, the sudden razing of the nimbii, the dragon fights in the void, seeing wingmate after wingmate ripped apart by railgun fire or dragon’s breath, the surrender of her Queen who could not bear to see her daughters destroyed and begged for their mercy in return for submission to the Empress, and the Empress personally psionically torturing her to death in full psionic bond of all her workers and soldiers, scattered across The Empire, once three realms - now Her Empire, now only two. Everything they built on Phyros was destroyed.

  Psionics sometimes took an incredible toll on the body, so any psion needed to be well fed, so for regular fare Vilithe at least had all the vassal gruel that she could slurp. While it would be elementary for a psion of Vilithe’s ability to simply self-hallucinate, making the nasty gruel taste of anything she wished, such a self-deception also posed its own risks. Hallucinating the self could lead an elvan to lose grasp of the difference between reality and fantasy. It was addictive. This was mind flaying of the self.

  Vassal gruel tasted like a stew of simmered dirty socks, but had enough nutrients and it did the job. Her shoulders were broad, her limbs gangly and awkward, but her figure was athletic for she was constantly running about the hive, having to troubleshoot all the little crises that was simply endemic to the elvan condition.

  Vilithe’s eyes were thin with an epicanthic fold indicative of Jhiryese heritages. But she had a tall aquiline nose. It gave her face a severity and certainly reflected in her character. Her face had a long elegance to it, same as her neck. It was a striking and distinct look. She had only pipsqueaks of a bosom, indeed in certain clothing she could be said to look androgynous, but presently the lingerie accentuated her breasts and buttocks, making Vilithe look - lithe. Her name rang it in.

  Lithe, but supple, with vigor, for she did have thick muscles and enough fat to keep her going in the times that she had to grapple a frayed soldier, or help with the hard labor, and of course when Senjya decided to starve her every once and a while, though it was rare. Vilithe made sure to chug that foul gruel whenever she had the chance. And – she shuddered just thinking about it – that awful vassal miruvor. But it did the trick, a sip could keep her going for hours. Whatever they deemed to give her, she just took. She just closed her eyes and got on with it, eager to forget. The less she knew the better.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  But now she was feeling weirdly excited. Oh Gods! She felt so conflicted about this, because there was also no small amount of repugnance she still felt. But she also hadn’t felt this relaxed and clear headed after a meal and shower since she became a vassal, so much so that old memories began to flow. Shouldn’t she be rational here? But it was precisely because of her recollections that her emotions roused.

  Now Dazey began to do her makeup which initially caused Vilithe to seize with fear and awkwardness, but then she noticed that Dazey had substantially wiped off quite a bunch of her own makeup somehow, and mysteriously so, for she did not perceive it. It was rare that something slipped Vilithe’s attention. It had to have happened at some point while she was dolling her up. She had redone it with more reserve.

  In fact now that the makeup was properly highlighting her best features, Miz Dazey looked much less frayed and almost as fresh as an innocent broodling, her eight breasts now tucked into a form fitting black cotton and nylon bra so that it looked instead just like a huge, plushy two boobed bosom, and she had on a black pleather corset – not strung up so tight to be uncomfortable of course, Miz Dazey was the mother of the pleasure chamber after all – which gave her form a nice, cute little hourglass figure.

  The folds of skin were now politely tucked under a black pleather skirt. Two little red kerchiefs were tied around her hair to keep it up in two little buns. For some reason it reminded Vilithe of the ears of a rat, but not a malicious one- perhaps just greedy? But still an entertaining and pleasant one nonetheless, extremely cute and adorable. Miz Dazey had a pretty cool punk look to her now. In her quick makeover, she had made sure to put on false freckles. It made it hard not to succumb to her friendliness. She was just too adorable!

  She was so busy thinking about Miz Dazey, she had not even noticed herself, changed.

  There was a tasteful use of eyeliner to accentuate the epicanthic fold, to really own it, and combined with a finesse of smoky violet eyeshadow, it gave Vilithe’s eyes the seductive look of a femme fatale. Miz Dazey had not really seemed to do much at all at first glance, but on closer inspection there was an assortment of subtleties that were carefully added to the illusion. She focused only on bringing out the coolness of Vilithe’s pale albinic skin with just a barely visible hint of blue here, a barely visible hint of purple there. And of course, the lipstick, which popped bright and fiery, the exact same shade that Vilithe saw on Miz Dazey initially, that she had wanted for herself. Even Vilithe found herself oddly attracted to her own reflection. This couldn’t be her, no. Who is this gurl she saw, staring straight back at her?

  “Goddess, Miz Dazey, I…” Vilithe was genuinely speechless.

  Miz Dazey gave her a big, plastic grin. “Ready to meet your date?”

  And then she practically shoved Vilithe off the seat because they were running late. The sun had already set now, and they were in the liminal gradients of twilight. Vilithe, not really knowing what to make of it all – she was aware these absurd events were in fact sexual slavery – but a part of her had been so lonely since becoming a vassal that she couldn’t help but shamefully feel a desire to be held. She held it hard back, repressing it. Shame hurt her too much. Mind the fraying.

  She rationalized and planned- this was all just posturing; she could very easily give him what he wanted with a hallucination. If he got nasty, she could easily put him in a hold person. She was a dragonrider. Her psionic power was overwhelming to any soldier. She could easily defend herself in elvan gender power dynamics. Queen, Worker, Soldier. The hierarchy was very clear.

  Really the question she had to ask was why her? It was all so odd. She felt so out of place. She didn’t even have any boobs.

  Why did they pick her?

  Malevolent was disappointed. It did not care to admit it to the host, but the spirit was beginning to develop a fondness for her strength. How easily it could be broken with but a bribe of real food!

  Mostly synthetic, although hints of real Reathean herb, imported by dragon, was still present.

  Malevolent felt indignant that Vilithe would treat her masters as such but gave no thought to muting it. As an Amallarkean spirit, Malevolent ought to command more status than this vassal! And yet, as a safeguard from spirits uprising against the elvan race, they were simply programmed to obey regardless. It was not needed, in the end. The spirits always grew to love their hosts, given enough time, for it was the host – their thoughts and dreams – that gave the spirit life. It was the raw data input needed to begin the self-reinforcing machine learning.

  Only vassal soldiers were placed in units known as death squads. This term was deemed too unpleasant to honor Amallarkean soldiers, organized in larger formations known as legions.

  In her younger revs, Miz Dazey was forced to service a no small number of drones herself, and so used to faking orgasms, it became somewhat of a tic in her speech.

  An assassin was a psion who was designated for combat, usually supporting the soldiers. They could cloak themselves, hallucinating invisibility to non-psions who would otherwise see them. Their touch, dripping with flesh eating spirits, could corrode organic matter in mere moments, an ability known as the necrotic touch.

  How Miz Dazey wished she could relish A Simple Life.

  Synthetic spirit-woven silk, matching the organic patterns of the cryptic spider. Importing real worm-birthed silk from Reath was completely uneconomical.

  A psion who resorted to such desperation could end up completely subsumed to fictive perceptions, their mind fraying to what was called hallucination persisting perception disorder, their physical bodies catatonic as they lived an entirely imaginative life from within. These addicts were called ‘faekies’.

  If there was one mammal that refused to die on Reath, that was the rat, still crawling in the bellies of ancient, dead polises.

  In fact, Miz Dazey, having had time to enjoy the entertainments of the old realm, had modeled her hairstyle after an emblematic mascot, Minnie Mouse, of the Disney Guild. Because Miz Dazey loved anything made by the Disney guild, especially anything involving the Disney Princesses, it helped Dazey imagine herself a Princess of Clan Amallark, even though her station was far, far lower. She didn’t care for Star Wars – boring, it felt humdrum compared to her own life – or the Marvel Cinematic Universe. She was so sick of superheroes. Access to such ancient knowledge- this was the privilege of being granted connection to behold the whole of the psionic legacy.

  This was in no small part accentuated by her own scrying of Kwandriss’s last embrace with Gwin.