The Dolorosa had hoped for death. The Marquise was volatile enough to kill her - that much she had learned from Dualscar's filthy tongue. But the fury her unasked-for pity had spurred was too easily quelled by Mindfang's love of irony and games. Of course, she was still punished. Seatrolls always punished insubordination, no matter how amusing.
The Marquise's idea of punishment, however, was endlessly more precise and exquisitely horrible than anything Dualscar could have dreamed up. The Dolorosa's body was first wrenched from her control and given ecstasy she had never experienced. The Marquise had dallied in many romances over the sweeps, and her knowledge of physical pleasure far exceeded Dualscar's. She was almost loving.
The Dolorosa's mind, however, was free to understand the malice with which the Marquise used her - to hear the insults, threats, and declarations of control that her master breathed into her ear like sweet nothings.
When the physical part was through, and the Dolorosa knelt, shuddering, with a cold pail pressed between her thighs, and she thought that nothing could be worse than this, the Marquise made her cry. She reached into her head and ripped out every tightly compacted memory of hurt that she had locked down where she could never think of it. The Dolorosa had learned to live with her past by ignoring it – recalling it was too much. The Marquise relished in her old grief made fresh.
Cradling her slave, the Marquise whispered words of comfort that ate into her mind like the sharpest acid. Reminding her of the pain and telling her to forget it, telling her she was safe from Dualscar's abuse now, but hinting that her own could be worse.
At first the recollections the Marquise dredged were things that Dualscar had done, and the Marquise enjoyed that – she could feel the Marquise in her mind, enjoying her pain – but once she found out why the Orphaner had chosen the jadeblood as his personal whore, her glee could not be contained.
In between gut-wrenching sobs, the Dolorosa heard the Marquise gasp.
"You were part of that rebellion?" she asked breathlessly, eagerly, cruelly. "Oh, darling, that is terrible." She rubbed her long-nails in a mockery of a caress down the Dolorosa's spine. "I cannot imagine how awful that must have been."
But she could imagine, because she was forcing the Dolorosa to relive it, from the attack on the warehouse to the Signless's execution, and every excruciating moment in between. She sobbed still harder, wailing now, because the pain had been bad enough the first time and the only reason she was still alive is because she thought that she would never have to go through it again but here it was and it was worse than before because she knew what would happen next and no, no you can't, please he's my grub he's my grub he's my grub-
She broke into a ragged shriek, and finally, blessedly, the Marquise let her go. She huddled around herself, moaning into her arms, broken, empty, and defeated. The Marquise kissed her forehead and lowered her body to the floor and stepped away. If the Dolorosa had been in any condition to see, she would have noticed the thin sheen of sweat and the shaky breathing the Marquise just could not mask. She might also have heard the Marquise try to whisper something that sounded suspiciously like "sorry."
Soon, another slave was summoned to bring a new shift for the pretty jadeblood and return her to the hold. The Marquise sank into her recuperacoon and leaned her head against the edge, allowing the soothing slime to creep up her neck.
She had only meant to remind the slave of their differences – put her back in her place. Even if their dalliance was red, a lowblood should not be able to truly pity a highblood. Maybe on some futile idea that since a highblood had more responsibility, they were under more stress, but every highblood knew that responsibility really meant freedom to kill whomever whenever they wanted without care. That slave had known far, far too much about her – all the Marquise had wanted to prove that it was the slave who was really pitiable. That was all.
She had counted on physical suffering to do the job, but she had gotten greedy and tried to drive the point home. If the slave could be brought to her lowest point, the Marquise would seem like a savior for any simple mercy. It was an easy tactic, and one the Marquise had used numerous times. But she had never encountered a troll who had loved so passionately.
And it was not even romance! Somehow, this jadeblood slave, this Rosa – her memories revealed her name – had loved the mutant freak who had threatened the Condesce. She had loved him with everything in her, would have done anything for him, and asked for nothing. Wanted nothing, but to see him live happily. To see that level of devotion was unsettling, but to watch it crumble and burn shook the Marquise to her very core. It was no wonder her slave was so cold when left alone. There was nothing left inside her.
The Marquise shuddered and tried to sink further into the slime. She did not need this – whatever awful emotion this was. She had a horrible suspicion that it was guilt, and actual, fully-flushed pity, but she refused to acknowledge it. The slave was back in the hold, and the Marquise would deal with her once she had slept off her emotional confusion.
But she was having trouble sleeping.