Author: Black Widow
Rating: R
Category: Fantasy, AU, Drama, Angst
Summary: Crossover with the Black Jewels Trilogy by Anne Bishop, but set thousands of years later. Read to find out more. CONTAINS MAJOR SPOILERS to Black Jewels.
Archive: Ask and you shall recieve.
Warnings: Shonen-ai, slavery, torture, angst, crossover, possibe m/m incest between BJT characters (this isn't written in stone, mind you.), really messed up stuff.

Princes of Shadow (Prologue)

He will come to see me today; I will pour the wine, and we will talk, and I will pretend not to see the pain in his eyes.

And tomorrow the boy will come, and he will find my web...he will be upset, I know, but the web must be seen, and he is the best suited, the only one who could see and understand.

And I cannot wait any longer.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Daemon Sadi, Warlord Prince of Dhemlan, known also as the Sadist, the Peacekeeper, the Enforcer, Priest of the Hourglass, heir to the High Lord of Hell, and former Consort to the most beautiful, terrifying, perfect Queen ever to walk the Realms, stared sightlessly into the fire.

Waiting...again...for something seen in the web of a mad Black Widow, invisible to all others who looked. He had been waiting for twenty thousand years, his Guardianship commencing the day his Queen had died.

Tersa's web, found after the old woman's death, was carefully shielded in his workroom, preserved for millenia. He had searched for another who could see in it what he had seen, but he was alone.

Only he could see the taint, the disease, slowly creeping back into the Blood. Only he could see the return of the corruption, the pain it would bring. Only he could see-

They thought he was mad.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Heero's mind was blank as he thrust into the Queen beneath him. He ignored her, ignored his surroundings, ignored what he was /doing/ and just got it done.

It had been this way ever since he was brought to the Hidden Court.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chang Wufei, a half-breed Eyrian bastard, cursed his eyes. Dark and slanted, rather than golden like those of the Eyrian race, they were what had betrayed his ancestry...

/"Fucking Jhinka!"/

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The half-Dea al Mon boy watched from beneath his red-brown thatch of hair, waiting. The wolves had told him something was coming, a human, and not one of those that his clan recognized and welcomed. The Children of the Wood did not suffer fools or tresspassers lightly, and the Barton clan was no different. He nocked an arrow to his bow, and sat silently, waiting.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Quatre Raberba Winner stepped from the Dark Altar clutching something to his chest.

His Jewel.

Gray, beautiful and uncut, it shimmered and glowed with an inner radiance as he held it. It fit neatly into his palm, as though made for him.

He hated it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Zechs Marquise, formerly Milliardo Peacecraft, clenched his teeth.

He would not scream.

Once he had been a Glacian Warlord Prince, a member of a prosperous and respected family that could trace its roots all the way back to the Dark Court, to Karla herself.

He wouldn't scream.

He hadn't always been a whore, a slave, forced to see day after day the repulsive creature his little sister had become. He hadn't always worn a mask.

So he /wouldn't/-

(It took two and a half hours of torture just to make the slave scream.)

TBC...