As soon as he heard the noise, Lucas called out, “Occupied!”

  That wasn’t so surprising. The Prince’s private vil seemed to have a standard of service that went well beyond anything that was expected at Parin Manor, as well as most of the other homes of the rich he’d visited.

  What was surprising was when the door cracked open behind him, and the maid's voice from earlier said, “Is everything to your liking, my lord?”

  “I, uhhh, yeah,” he said, sinking down to his neck to hide his nudity, even though he doubted very much she could see him through the steam. “This is great, thanks. Could you maybe close the door, though? You’re letting out all of the hot air.”

  “Of course,” the woman answered. Closing the door softly.

  Lucas was just about to rex. Then, when he heard the sound of quiet footsteps traipsing across the tile floor. That was when he realized that she’d closed the door but stayed in the room with him. Lucas turned and immediately regretted it. He couldn’t see her clearly through the steam, but it was impossible not to notice the outline of a nude woman.

  “Ahh, what do you think you’re doing?” he asked, fixing his eyes on the far wall, even as the maid got close enough that he could smell her perfume.

  “I just thought that you might need a little help in the bath,” she purred. “You were so filthy that I thought that you might need some help getting clean…”

  “That’s very thoughtful,” he said, willing himself to stay calm, “But I’m good I…”

  He froze when he felt her touch on his back. First, it was a warm wash cloth, which wasn’t so bad because he really was filthy. However, as soon as the thin coating of ash was repced with a soapy film of bubbles, he felt her naked breasts press against him, too. He pulled away, but her hand tightened on his shoulder as she clung to him.

  “You need to learn to rex,” she breathed, “This is just a treatment we give to very important people like yourself.”

  “I told you, I’m good,” he repeated more forcefully as he pulled away from her.

  “You certainly are,” she purred. “More than good, really. I think—”

  This time, he turned to face the woman, maintaining eye contact despite all odds. “I am a man in mourning. I’m not here for a good time or whatever it is your guests usually require.”

  “I… I’m sorry,” the nude maid said, not dispying a shred of remorse, even after she bowed and started to withdraw. “You just let us know what you need, and we will provide it for you, my Lord. Anything at all.”

  Then, finally, she was gone, and Lucas was alone.

  “Fucking VIP treatment, huh?” he whispered to himself as he y there. “More like the Prince dumped me in his own private whorehouse.”

  This was not what he expected, but it should have been. The Prince was used to getting his way, and right now, he wanted Lucas to be pliable. This was certainly the wrong way of going about it, though, and part of him was as offended as he would have been if Danaria really had been dead. To cheat on one’s fiancé was horrible, but to cheat on her less than a day after she died?

  Motherfucker really must have been hoping to dose me, Lucas thought wearily. Drugs did funny things to people, of course, but he wasn’t sure that he’d suddenly drop his morals along with his pants and start banging the help no matter how high he was.

  Lucas resolved to be more clear with the staff in the future to prevent any other misunderstandings they might try to take advantage of as he got out of the tub and dried off. Then, as he pulled the plug and the tub started to drain, he checked to make sure there was no one hiding in his room to ambush him.

  The first thing he did once he shut the door, though, was check his system to see if it had counted this crazy situation as cheating. When he found the stupid achievement was still sitting at one, he breathed a sigh of relief. Then he quickly put on his boxers and the provided robe and left the room to find the dining room. If he lingered here alone and undressed, he had no idea who might try to do what next.

  During the meal, which was exquisite, Lucas finally noticed that there didn’t seem to be a single footman in the household. The entire pce was staffed by beautiful women, as far as he could tell. The food was a chicken cutlet on noodles with a white sauce. It was excellent, but he couldn’t help but notice that the wine was spiked with euphorics thanks to helpful pop-ups. So, he ignored that and ate quickly.

  “Is the wine not to your liking, my lord?” another maid asked as he was finishing his meal.

  “I haven’t fallen low enough for day drinking, I think,” Lucas said, resisting the opportunity to reveal that he knew what was in it. There was no need to show his hand just yet. They might get suspicious if he avoided every effort to drug him into submission, but avoiding alcohol was perfectly reasonable.

  “Well, could I get you some juice or perhaps a dessert? My Lord seems famished.” As the new girl spoke, she moved toward him, but Lucas waved her away. He was done trying to be polite in this house. He was going to set some fucking boundaries.

  “The food was excellent,” he answered, even as he set his silverware on the pte and stood. “My compliments to the chef.”

  “She will be pleased to hear that,” the woman beamed. “Should I tell her to prepare anything special for dinner?”

  “I don’t need any sort of special treatment,” Lucas answered dismissively. The maid looked at him like she was hurt by his cold tone, and for a second, he almost apologized, but when he noticed that she was wearing some sort of push-up bra, he realized the game hadn’t actually ended.

  Un-fucking-believable, he swore silently to himself. Besides Skyra, he hadn’t been treated like a piece of meat very often, but even when he had, he’d never been hunted like this before. He wasn’t rich or handsome enough for this sort of attention, and it made him feel like he was on an episode of the Twilight Zone.

  “And let me know when my new clothes are here,” he snapped before leaving the room.

  He felt like a dick, but it couldn’t be helped. He’d been nice enough to every member of the staff in Parin Manor and in Bckgate, but in neither case was the help trying to sleep with him, and he was sure all the women that were coming on to him were being paid well enough to make them quite enthusiastic about their jobs.

  The first thing he did was stalk the grounds to find out where he was and wasn’t allowed. His guest suite was, of course, avaible to him. In the short time he’d been gone, it had been cleaned thoroughly, and the sheets had been changed. He even noticed a candy on the pillow, and when he checked to make sure it wasn’t drugged, too, he scarfed it down.

  The rest of the house seemed rgely accessible. It didn’t seem rge enough for servants' quarters, but in the city, he supposed they could live somewhere else. The first floor contained other bedrooms, and the second floor had a library and several sitting rooms, along with a couple other guest suites simir in size to his.

  The third floor was dominated by a midsized ballroom. The fourth floor had a hall with several floor-to-ceiling windows to take advantage of the commanding view it had over the city, but it was mostly taken up by what he was pretty sure was the master bedroom, which was locked. That made sense if it was the Prince’s room, but it could just as easily have been the pce where the man kept his favorite hooker. He had no way to know.

  The backyard was more promising. The pce was a smallish townhouse as far as the nobility was concerned, and the walls around the garden were quite high. Despite that, it was a lush pce filled with topiaries and flower beds. There was even a beautiful elf back there sunning herself, but he gave her a wide berth.

  No, not an elf, he realized, as his eyes wandered past her nearly naked body to the sprig of leaves and the rich pink blossom that was growing in her hair. A wood nymph. Huh. I wonder how rich you have to be to import mythological creatures as sex toys.

  Wood Nymph’s Blossom (fresh): Euphoria 8, intelligence -4 poison 2, endurance 2. Enhances the effects of any arousal-focused compounds by 50%.

  The stats on the reagent made him smirk, but he said nothing to her. Instead, Lucas briefly inspected the gardens for any other useful reagents. Almost all pnts had some alchemical properties, but none of these caught his eyes as being particurly rare or potent, so eventually, he wandered back inside.

  He’d pnned to go back to his room then and wait for proper clothes, but he had a change of heart at the st minute. Just to see what would happen, he went to the front door. That, at least, was guarded by men who looked more than formidable. “I’m guessing that you guys won’t just let me walk out of here if I wanted to, right?” he asked, half joking.

  “An important guest like you?” the captain in shiny armor said. “I wouldn’t dream of it. Don’t you worry, sir. The Prince will collect you when the time comes. For now, just try to enjoy his boundless hospitality.”

  The man said it with a straight face, and despite the way his men ughed, he didn’t smile. Lucas had been expecting that, and instead of mouthing off, he simply thanked him and returned to his room. Escape would be easy enough with his ring, but it had all the same problems it would have had if he’d simply avoided the whole situation in the first pce; someone would just use magic to track him down, and they might find out things he didn’t want them to find out along the way.

  The way the guards and the maids reacted, Lucas couldn’t decide if it was common for the Prince to send other people here or not until he got what he wanted out of them. He considered whether this treatment was routine or rare as he returned to his room.

  Ultimately, it didn’t matter. It strengthened his determination either way.

  No matter how much that rich asshole tried to tempt him into losing his way, Lucas wasn’t going to take the bait. He would have liked to believe he wouldn’t have even if Danaria really was dead, but there was no way to know that for sure.

  As soon as he was back in his room alone, though, and he’d shooed all the attractive young women who seemed either eager or willing to satisfy his every need, he sat down and immediately started drafting letters. The first one wasn’t to Danaria, though, or even Kar’gandin; if they weren’t going to let him leave, then there was no way they were going to let him reach out to anyone like that.

  Instead, the first one he wrote was to his Heisenburgle, inviting him to visit in curt terms that spoke of alchemy broadly and said nothing objectionable. Then, after that, he sent another message to his dancing instructor, inviting him to come and restart their lessons at his new address. The letter said nothing of swords but mentioned that he had limited equipment here because of the fire. He was confident that would be enough.

  Once those were written, he wrote one more to his tailor, inviting him to attend and take his measurements for a new wardrobe. ‘I lost everything and everyone in the fire, you understand,’ Lucas expined in the letter. ‘Surely you know how devastating that can be.’

  He knew all of his letters would go to the Prince, of course, but he also knew that the man wanted him to get back to normal and was not likely to reject reasonable requests and keep him in isotion forever.

  All this perverse attempt at bribery and distraction had done was strengthen his resolve. He was going to kill Skyra or die trying. It was impossible. He’d only brushed against the barest amount of her strength in both forms. He was going to need a lot of help if he hoped to succeed in such an insane mission.