Sorry for the looong delay. Loved your reviews, so I got a sudden whim to continue the story. I'll

address specific reviews next chapter, so will only say this now :

PLEASE REVIEW!!! I'm a horrible procrastinator, so the reviews really help-even if bad. If you

want to e-mail me- and please do- its on my profile.

It wasn't him. This she could tell even before Kel noticed the slight scar on the young man's

forehead, only partially covered by his coal-black hair. But the nose, the mouth, even the shape of

the eyes were an older replica of Joren's, enough so that she was too busy staring to notice Eng

clearing his throat meaningfully and crouching down to her eye level.

"Now, I'll leave you here with your master and his father," Eng informed her, his voice dripping

with honey. "You be good now, sweetheart." Then with a last, lustful glance, he lumbered to his

feet and wheezed up the stairs.

Slightly stunned by this "change" in Eng, Kel momentarily didn't notice the stares she was getting

from her masters, at least not until the older one began to speak.

"Although you belong to my son, and much more expense," he added, glaring at his son, "than

usual for a single slave, you are a member of my household now. As such, you will refer to myself

as Your Highness and my son whatever he chooses to have you call him."

At this the old man abruptly stopped speaking, waited for a second, then nudged his son who was

still staring at his new slave. "Raston, its your duty."

Raston, as Kel assumed he was called, shook himself slightly, as if to draw himself out of the spell

he had fallen under, and impatiently snapped his fingers. At once, a guard, bare-chested and clad

in only in voluminous silk pants, came to attention and barked an incomprehensible order into the

green tent adjacent to the area they were standing in. A portly man, barely as tall as Kel herself,

scurried out of the tent, and promptly fell flat on his face. As Kel stared and her masters, she

noticed bemusedly, hid laughter, the man got up, dusted himself off, and ran back into the tent,

returning with an ornate gold mosaic box, which he placed in young Raston's hands, and

ungracefully knelt at his feet. Raston reverently opened the box. This time Kel stared for another

reason, his and his father's attention to the contents of the box giving her time to study Raston

unobserved

If Joren was the most beautiful man she had ever seen, Raston was certainly the most handsome,

with perfect, though definitely masculine features: golden brown eyes, a generous soft mouth, black

eyelashes. Kel, rather ignorant of slavery customs, had always assumed that the only people who

bought slave girls, as she guessed she was, were ugly old men who couldn't receive a woman's

company willingly. Apparently, judging by Raston's decidedly sensuous (a word Kel had never

had occasion to use before) mouth, she had been fortunately mistaken.

Raston, after admiring the contents of the box, handed the box to the kneeling slave, who carefully

turned it to show Kel, who was now beginning to think this was some sort of ritual, its insides. It

was an exquisite-even Kel could admit that- amber gold collar, with dark rubies incrusted into a

beautiful geometric design. Raston removed the necklace from the upturned hands of the man, and

beckoned imperiously to Kel, though with a reassuring wink. Kel, who in actuality did not find a

foreigner's, especially one who intended to use her for his own purposes, wink reassuring,

nevertheless strode purposely forward to face Raston. Her attempt at a kneel, as she assumed

was customary, was stayed by a gentle hand at the waist. Raston entwined his hands, though

rather awkwardly with the one holding the necklace, with hers, and raced them to her neck. The

collar flowed magically from their hands to her neck, tightening until achieving the exact fit. Raston

spoke then, his husky voice seeming to break her out of the momentary dizziness the collar

induced. His words, though, were not in common, but an ancient language, one that spoke of the

gods, of flame, of wind, of earth.

"Come with me."

And Kel understood.