Chapter 492: Chapter 491- Mirrors for Live Broadcast

"The Mistress," she said, with the , composed dignity of a woman delivering information she finds simultaneously professional and somewhat extraordinary, "wanted to receive you properly."

He looked at the petals.

Then at the corridor.

Then back at the petals.

’She spread flower petals.’

He thought about Eliantra Westing — the dark-circled, file-reading, county-managing, aggressively-competent woman he had met in this mansion less than a week ago — and tried to reconcile her with a woman who had scattered rose petals on a corridor floor.

He couldn’t.

He chuckled anyway.

"Really."

Internally: ’Elena. Your mother is spreading her legs for me. What are you doing right now, I wonder.’

He kept walking.

His hand, in passing, found Rihana’s waist.

She leaned into it.

Outside the chamber he stopped.

Looked at the two women.

Gestured.

The , clear, ’wait here’ gesture of a man who wants witnesses in reserve but privacy first.

They understood.

Rihana folded her hands. Settled against the wall. Looked at the ceiling with the expression of a woman who is going to be listening very carefully for any sound from inside that chamber and is at peace with that.

The old woman gave a small bow.

He opened the door.

She was at the window.

The chair positioned to face it — a small, cushioned thing that belonged at a writing desk but had been moved — and she sat in it with the , composed, ’arranged’ posture of a woman who had been sitting here for a while and had been aware of exactly how she looked in this light and had decided this was the light she wanted.

The moonlight was coming in.

Full and white, the clear, light of a good moon over a city with little cloud cover, falling across her in the , unfiltered, ’honest’ way that moonlight falls — not flattering, not harsh. Just: ’this is what is here.’

And what was here was Eliantra Westing.

The white night-gown. The full, soft, generous weight of her — the thick-figured, warm reality of a woman who had at some point been a person rather than a county administrator, and that person was currently visible in the moonlight in a way she wasn’t at the ledger table.

Her hair loose. Gray threading through the dark of it — the same dignified gray as her brother Vareth’s but softer in the way that women carry it differently.

She held her tea cup in both hands.

Her eyes were on the city through the window.

She heard the door.

Turned.

Found him.

For a moment neither of them said anything.

The , weighted silence of two people who have been moving toward a conversation for several days and are now in the same room with it.

"How are you," she said.

Her voice was even. The practiced level of it. The voice she used at negotiations.

He looked at her.

"So you’re agreeing."

She closed her eyes.

"Yes."

"Why."

She looked at the window. At the city. At the same city that had been a collection of corruption nodes forty-eight hours ago and was now, because of the man standing in her doorway, something she might actually be able to govern again.

"Because I regret what my daughter did."

He walked.

His hands at his trousers. The buckle undone, the fabric loosening, the underwear nudged down in the , completely-unceremonious way of a man who has decided that ceremony is not the point of this evening.

His cock came free.

Still soft — the thick, dark, limp reality of a man who has spent two days doing things that would have finished a lesser body, still ’substantial’ even at rest, the crimson head catching the moonlight with the , frank presence of something that is what it is and has opinions about nothing.

He stopped in front of her.

She looked at it.

Her throat moved.

"What Elena did was wrong," she said. Still looking at it. The , honest voice of a woman who means what she’s saying even while her eyes are doing something different.

"You agree with that."

"Yes."

"Then you also agree," he said, "that I can punish her."

She looked up.

At his face.

The moonlight on his jaw, his purple eyes finding hers with the direct, patient, completely-unhurried quality she had come to understand was simply how he looked at everything.

"I cannot speak to that," she said. A pause. "She is my daughter."

"Fair enough."

He looked at her.

"You’re surrendering to me tonight."

She inhaled. Slowly. The breath of a woman organizing herself around a decision already made.

"If that—" A pause. "If that relieves you. Yes."

He stretched. The comfortable, casual, slightly-theatrical back-stretch of a man taking his time.

"I want something else as well."

She looked at him.

"Rihana," he called, toward the door.

Then the old maid’s name.

"Bring whatever magic crystals are available in this mansion."

Eliantra’s brow furrowed.

"What?" The shift in her — immediate, puzzled, the confusion of a practical woman receiving an unexpected request. "Why do you need—"

The old maid’s voice through the door, soft: "Forgive the interruption, Master Viktor. There are no magic crystals. The Mistress broke them when—"

"What," Viktor said.

"They’re all broken, sir. The Mistress doesn’t require them, as she—"

"How do you record anything."

A pause.

"Record?" The old maid’s voice. "Why would you need to record—"

Viktor looked at Eliantra.

Reached forward.

Found her hair.

Gathered it.

Her cry — soft, the compressed sound of a woman whose scalp has been grabbed with the , comprehensive grip of someone who is not being gentle — as he pulled her head back slightly, tipping her face upward, looking down at her from above with the full, patient, purple-eyed consideration of a man who has decided something.

"Because," he said, "I want to send what happens tonight to your daughter."

Her eyes watered.

"No—" Immediate. "You cannot—"

"I want her to see what her mistake costs." His voice was even. Not cruel. The , flat, ’this is simply true’ quality of a man making an argument he believes. "I want her to watch her mother. And understand."

He placed his cock against her cheek.

Flat. The full, warm, soft weight of it against her face — the , immediate sensation of it, the warmth of him and the , vein-mapped thickness of the shaft pressing against her cheekbone, the head near the corner of her eye.

She went still.

The , absolute stillness of a woman receiving something she has no prepared response for.

Her breath hit him.

Warm.

"Should she not suffer?" he said. Quiet. Just for her. "Should she not see? Should she not ’regret?"

The emotional architecture of it — the , targeted, entirely-understood pressure on the exact place where a mother’s anger at her child and a woman’s guilt and a county administrator’s sense of justice all live in the same room.

Her jaw worked.

Her eyes were wet.

She could smell him. The , complicated, overwhelming male-and-more smell of a man who carries something in his chemistry that is not entirely human and which her body had been quietly going insane about since the bathhouse.

She breathed in.

Her thighs pressed together.

"Bring the two mirrors," she said.

Loud enough for outside the door.

They brought them.

Rihana and the old maid, each carrying one — the full-length dressing mirrors from the adjacent room, heavy, the carved frames requiring both arms.