XXXV: Tainted
Feyd scoffed. "You doubt my ability?"
Amusement showed on the Baron's face. It did not match the insult upon Feyd's.
He misread his nephew.
An oversight, I hoped, one day, earned him his death. At Feyd's hand.
"Of course not. I only ask to be shown the next in line." The Baron flicked his wrist at me. I was no more than another slave to his purpose. "A father should be proud of what he's made. An heir! That is what you boast. Now, show me what you've done for our bloodline."
There was no piece of Feyd that would release me to be exposed so personally toward that man. My skin paled from how hard he pinned my arm to his person. My only anchor in these tumultuous seas.
The resentment I held for the Baron paled in comparison to Feyd's. There was too much. Too much history. The guilt of living, being torn away from everyone he knew and left alone to defend himself, while being given everything in the world he wanted. It was a conflicted path. One that I knew he, at times, struggled with.
The tension he had on the flight over only showed how much this change disturbed his control.
Control that he held so dear. Control that kept him up at night, on alert, pacing.
Too much mattered. Our lives, his success, everything. We had to bide time in the favor of the Baron if we wished for any of those things to come to pass.
My arm wretched away from his hold. I approached the doctor under my own will. It went against every natural instinct. Still, I denied myself a look in Feyd's direction.
"There's a witch." The Baron rumbled his encouragement.
My dress dragged across the floor. The little scratches of sand against the cold stone floor was all that filled my ears. Against the frantic attempts of the pulse inside my ears.
I submitted myself to the Baron's control. I was under his power. Should he strap me to this table and eat me alive, there was no power in the Imperium to stop him.
"Bene Gesserit are difficult creatures to catch," he said. "Tougher to keep, unless they want to be kept."
It worked well to batter my nerves to pulp.
I was no witch.
The Baron knew. He had to know.
This was a trap.
"The ones I know do not have a taste for men like they do one another." The levitating chair moved closer. It followed my haunted steps toward the altar at the front of the room. It rose up from the floor. A solid stone slab, flat and cold. "The desire to see what is inside you capable of pleasing a man strikes my mind."
My mind flooded with ice cold waters. All sense of emotion wiped away to nothing but a human skin.
"We are human, my Baron." My mouth moved on its own accord. "We are many and one."
That quote came from nowhere. It was spoke through my mouth without meaning. I did not know where it came from.
Nor who said it.
Sound of rushing air through the Baron's chair stalled as his fingers struggled with the lever to move himself.
I laid flat against the stone altar. Unnatural cold seeped from the stone into my flesh, through to my bones. My skin puckered. Every hair, raised and sensitive, ignited me awake with shifts in the atmosphere.
Numbness was now gone. The animal hide was too thin to protect me this time.
Feyd followed behind the Baron. I listened to each footstep as it came closer. My eyes stayed locked on the ceiling above my head. I did not care that the doctor asked my top to be lifted to just below my breast. Luckily, I hadn't worn a dress.
A subtle intake of Feyd's breath filled my ears with high alert. I tensed myself for conflict. None came.
Only the very audible grip of his fist against the hilt of his side sword broke the silence.
The doctor's hand touched flat against my stomach as he slipped the contraption around my stomach. He secured the tight fabric against my body. Nodes turned on. Their subtle hum filled me with tingles. Each place their metal sensor touched bare flesh, I felt the zap of its power as it coursed through me.
A handheld screen, like before, showed the image of the infant attached to my body with its cord. My internal organ was presented to the Baron the same as it would be if he requested the organ be cut from my body and served for him to feast on.
"So tiny," the Baron marveled. "So fragile."
"It is sized appropriately," the doctor assured him.
The Baron held the screen in his hands. His eyes watched the image of the child for many long moments before he spoke. "Life is a strange thing. It can be strong and weak. Same born into the universe. The weak taking more than the strong."
Feyd was silent. His eyes stared at me presented on that altar.
I was paralyzed with fear. Did the Baron intend to kill me?
Feyd looked ready to jump across that space to pull me off the stone table.
The eyes of his uncle upturned. A small drooping his eyelids marked a change to his face. Tenderness, if I knew it in Harkonnen form, showed for his young nephew. "If it survives, you will do well to teach it the ways of the strong."
Then, a heavy weight touched against my abdomen. It was sudden that I near jolted out of my skin. My body shut its shock down as soon as it felt the stingy prick of sensation. My only saving grace.
The Baron's hand held the space of my womb, pressing into the flesh.
I felt each fingertip. Every finger extended from his palm touched me, spreading deeper through me that just the surface. Its sickness sank down to the swelled organ that carried my child.
"The weak do not serve us and we do not carry their weight."
I wished to crawl from my own skin to remove that feeling on his hand upon me.
My body refused to calm. Numbness fled in place of hot stinging pain. It consumed me. I wanted to scream, to vomit, to throw myself from the balcony.
Instead of being dead to the world around me, I was now sensitive to it. Every motion caught my attention. Smells alerted me. Sounds, no matter how soft, pricked my attention away from everything.
The door for the chambers was pulled back as I stepped down to the floor once more. The short relief of being released faded when I witnessed the hefty shadow of The Beast march in through those doors.
He stopped short when he saw me.
Feyd ignored his brother; he strode up to me. A finger ran along the under edge of my jaw. He watched me adjust my dress, subtly yanking my shirt down to cover my chest better as my fingers struggled to remain functional with all their shaking.
"Rabban." The Baron motioned for The Beast to come closer.
He fell to his knees at his uncle's feet. He bowed until his forehead touched the ground.
"Your lord na-Baron Feyd-Rautha has slain Muad'Dib." It was said with careful exactness. "Spice is once again tamed."
It took a minute for the man to rise from the floor.
"What of the rats?" Glossu Rabban asked.
"They fled. They, too, have bowed to our control. Under Feyd's hand."
Feyd offered out his arm. I took it with haste. This new world was unsteady around me. I needed his experience to lend me the strength to withstand it.
His lips curled in their corners as he faced his brother, next. The taunting delight that met his brother's gaze was like so many aspects of the na-Baron. Complicated.
It may have been genuine delight he felt in besting his brother, but so much more of the moment stripped that joy away.
"They act like rats because they are," The Beast declared. "They grow in number out of sight. Mating in corners -."
"They are defeated!" The Baron barked suddenly. "The state of our house, you let fall, has been risen upon your brother's shoulders. He has done all you cannot. Our bloodline continues, thanks to his efforts. We will be endless."
Glossu Rabban responded in a stunned silence.
"His consort carries a child."
"A consort. A child, Baron. You- he is given allowance to have a child?"
The Baron chuckled. "How do you expect my line to carry on, Rabban? Our list of relations grows thin. Feyd-Rautha has a duty. A duty, you have failed to uphold."
"I asked permission -."
"A little slave girl is not a proper wife. You'd have eaten her within the year!" The Baron hit his fist against the thick arm of his seat. "You are a mockery of this family."
Feyd snickered.
The Beast stood suddenly. His face clenched in anger.
His large arm swung an accusing finger directed straight at Feyd. "You have not defeated Muad'Dib. The desert does not go gently. Muad'Dib will not die unless he takes one of us with him."
My arm clutched to Feyd for the altercation that would take place.
"You address your superior, Rabban," Feyd sneered. "I am your na-Baron. You will call me as such. Say it. Say it right now."
The Beast looked at his uncle for help.
"Get on your knees," was all he was told.
Knowing his defeat, the large man sank down to the floor. His face lost all sense of purpose.
"My apologies, my lord na-Baron."
Feyd approached. He lead me along. The tip of his boot scraped the floor with each long stride. It taunted his older brother with each haunted step closer.
As soon as he was close enough, he kicked the Beast in his ribs. It was not enough to collapse him to the floor.
Nothing more was said. Feyd and I marched out of the room, past the brother that struggled to breathe.
The palace was no longer a comforting memory. Already Arrakeen was tainted by the Harkonnen poison. My stomach soured. It hurt with each passing moment. I could not wait for my chambers to be readied. The staff had not landed. Rooms were empty. Undusted. Not stocked with personal belongings.
One look from my eyes convinced Feyd to not make me wait to be served; it had to happen now.
There was nothing in the chambers that I observed. It was an open space that prevented me from comfort that much faster. I dashed into the bathroom. Feyd was left behind at the front doors.
A shower head hanged in the middle of the bathroom. I pulled the long cord. Warm water cascaded down my body. The leather deflected most away. Except my head. Rivers washed down my scalp, my neck, beneath the layers of the outfit.
I remained suffocated despite the freeing wash of the water down my flesh.
My fingers set about removing each taut pieces of clothing. It was exhausting. Water and leather were natural enemies. Neither cooperated when the other was involved. It was heavy. Awkward.
A frustrated whimper left my lips as I tried to release my fastenings behind my back.
I hadn't heard him approach. Nor did I realize how close he was.
My mouth gasped when his hands touched me.
He said nothing. He only awaited me to recover from the surprise. A frown took a permanent residence upon his mouth.
Finally I allowed his help to remove the clothing off of me. I threw them across the room. They would not touch my body ever again.
His cold stare watched me shiver in the warmth.
Water moved in thick streams down my bare flesh. Steam rose from the falling water. And I could not stop shivering.
He did not disrupt me. Though he did not leave. Nor did his eyes leave me. There was a back and forth motion of his body as I stood below the cleansing shower.
Cleanse, it did not.
I felt the pressure still.
The weight of that hand. On me. Atop my bare flesh.
It was like it'd been burned into my body.
My hands cradled the space. My intimate space. It was Feyd's and mine. Our place that we'd made something wonderful.
Tears surged my eyes. I could have fought them. If I had wanted to.
But no.
Sadness was a welcome reprieve the strange chaos alive within me.
My face leaned into the falling water. It washed away the hot tears of my body. Arrakis, again, claimed more of my life water as its own.
The desert's thirst. It had to be paid.
It would have been easier to give it my body.
Suddenly a pair of hands touched over mine. They were soft and sticky.
Feyd's hands were filled with soap. The bubbles lathered in the water. His large hands moved mine, washing away the filth that had gathered on my stomach. He used my hands and his to clean my lower torso.
We did not stop until each of my legs was thickly coated in the suds of residue.
I heard his voice over my shoulder, as low and soft as it could manage.
"I know, sweetness."
It broke me even further.
My tears fell harder. Broken sickened sobs fell from my throat.
They had to be silenced. Their sound disgusted my pride. My fingers latched tight over my lips and sealed it shut.
Still my body quaked with the rattling of my body. It seized harder, as the tears built and built.
Feyd moved my body just outside the stream. Only the faintest touch of coolness dribbled down my hair and back. It rivaled the heated touch against my front. His hands were so large and warm. They held my stomach.
He dropped to his knees. Lips accompanied his hands against my body.
They kissed away my sadness. He kissed my body. The warmth of his lips, too, pressed deep into the taut expanse down to my womb. It healed the sore that was formed there.
It was his space. Both of ours, held that part of me, in control.
Instead, it gave me a hollow sigh of relief. His body near mine managed to calm my woes, as it knew to, somehow. I blamed it on our instincts. The connection of our flesh just settled the discontent bottled within our souls.
My hands ran along his arms to broad shoulders.
Hot kisses caressed my body. They moved down from my bellybutton into lower, sensitive flesh. Slips of his tongue teased me. It dangled the thrill of lust at the tip of my literary tongue. The distraction of his moving hands - caressing all my open flesh with their delight - hid the intention of what he meant to do to me.
Just below was a sacred place that was only his.
He intended to keep it that way.
A large flat tongue ran along my pussy. Tingles zapped through me. The tip of his moist tongue then slipped between my lips, stimulating the sensitive bundle of nerves buried within. He rolled his tongue in circles.
Hefty breaths left my lungs in a rush. I gripped him harder.
It'd been so long since I felt lost in his pleasure. My chest clenched each breath harder. Reckless lust washed my skin with building excitement.
Feyd pressed harder into me. His tongue, his weapon. He used it like the flickering beat of a thopter's wings. Then it switched to slow flat licking around, painful compared to the haste he'd battered my clit before. Everywhere he licked hit nicely then moved away, never aiding the build of my relief.
I whimpered as each swipe moved away.
I did not want denial. It hurt harder with the passing moments I was not screaming. My leg was hoisted atop his shoulder. It pulled him closer against my aching pussy.
Feyd grinned, groaning in approval as he did so. "Sweetness."
It radiated up. I felt every rumble from his throat with my sensitive nerves. It felt delicious.
Hands slithered up my naked body to the two mounds. Each was cupped against his palm. He massaged them tandem, growing rougher. My nipples were twisted, pulled, and slapped.
I gasped with its stinging warmth. It was followed by the violent throttle of my clit.
My edge neared. Pitch of my moans changed higher, pleading with him to finish me.
It was the brink of my high - the explosion of a star - when he revoked his tongue. A sharp pain replaced the pleasure.
His teeth bit the tender flesh of my inner thigh.
"Na-Baron," hissed from my mouth.
"Too soon," he mumbled back. "I'm not ready to be done with you yet."
He hoisted me up, swinging the back of my other knee atop his shoulder, balancing me against his face with only his hands supporting my back from total freefall. I teetered in discomfort. The open air below me was unnatural. It raised my fear to primal instinct. There was no choice but to tense my legs harder against his back. This only buried my pussy harder against his mouth.
There was no escape.
It was sensitive and in need of gentle stroking, yet he flicked the slippery wet tongue against me in a frenzy. He ground his entire face inside my warm pussy. The lips, the clit, my hole met the touch of his mouth. A loving suckling turned feral. The gush of my pussy waters lit another fire inside him. One that only my orgasm could douse. The battering of my clit began again with an aggressive pressure that went from nice to painful in an instant.
I shrieked in frustration and pleasure. Neither were the total relief they should have been.
The noise of the shower left my notice. I only heard the slurping, sucking, and licking from the center of my thighs. It was a music that I typically did not enjoy.
However, the relief it brought. It did me well. I welcomed its melody with my vocal accompaniment.
Feyd gave me one orgasm in this position. I begged him to let me down.
Instead of greeting the floor with my toes, I was laid atop the bathroom vanity like a dining table for his appetites. He pushed me flat. Fingers slipped within my sensitive pussy lips, bucking my hips in response.
Feyd continued this motion, fascinated by the intensity my orgasms brought. He reveled in the seizing quiver of my body as he moved circles - AGAIN - around my erect clit. His eyes did not close. Their coal-black depths absorbed every detail. They watched every motion of my body, the shuddering of thighs that locked around his forearm to stop him from continuing.
Every quick breath pulled from the air in hope of relief
Relief he did not give.
The whole of his three fingers entered me. My back arched.
"How is pleasure your pain, sweetness?" He murmured in awe. The fingers reached high inside me before they slipped slowly out. He watched as they revoked from my body, only to shove them back.
Were it possible I'd sworn I felt his fingertips brush the bottom of my heart.
"Even now. You love me. But pain. I see it cross your face when I bring you pleasure," he murmured. Darkened teeth glistened from within his mouth. He bared them. Then, he leaned down at nipped the thin skin that covered my ribs. "What do I do that displeases you?"
When my silence angered him, he stopped motions completely.
I gritted my teeth. "Nothing."
"Liar," he hissed harshly.
How would he understand that it was not what he did that displeased me. It was my own displeasure at myself for being in love with a man of many complexities, beautiful and twisted, that made each peak so high, and the comedown after so devastating.
I loved a man who murdered. A man who tortured. A man who ate the body's flesh and drank the body's water.
That was the monster I loved. Without fault. And continued to love despite his monstrous actions.
My true soul mate was a man with no moral compass, no compassion, no empathy for other life. How could I not hate myself for being so happy in love?
What pleasure was there, when his very essence, was pain.
I tried to assemble an explanation. But his frustration worked much quicker.
Fingers roughly shoved back inside of me. There was a taut pressure as he spread the fingers as wide as he could manage. The edges of my pussy were hot and sensitive as he pulsated his fingers. In and out they entered and exited. It was agony and pleasure. There were times where his knuckle would drag along the underside of my clit just right that it filled my body with trembles before it returned to the hard pressure once more.
He pinned me with his other hand. My shoulder blade pressed into the hard stone vanity unable to lift me up or push me away from the sensation.
All at once, I was then being stimulated with fiery hot breath against my clit. The touch of his ragged angry tongue moved against me.
Tingles turned to fire. I was pushed to the point of utter agony. Floods of sensation built beneath my skin ready to burst me into smoke the moment I peaked. Howls of my animal soul left my body with power like I did not know. My hips squirmed, trying to break the contact of his tongue against me. He chased me back, pressing himself flush, so that the more I fought against him, the more I stimulated myself.
There came a time where I raised my fist against the mirror. Broken shimmering pieces splintered and fell.
Feyd did not stop. It spurred him onward. The anger, he enjoyed. His fingers and tongue worked faster at me. My screaming encouraged him. It was a whip to his tongue. With each flail of my legs, he upped the pace of his tongue.
Sensation bled downward. Straight toward my pussy with a face buried in it. Trickles became raging rivers as all of the sudden, I was washed in its tidal wave.
I arched my back up off the vanity. My breathy scream shook the walls. I pushed all the air from my lungs, unable to breathe as the last of the waves shivered down my thighs.
Feyd stood. Instead of a delighted smirk with a smug sound of satisfaction from his chest, an hollow expression tightened his face. He pulled me to my feet. His hands guided me safely down to the solid ground before he released them.
I refused to release my hold on his arm. The metal armor plating cut the stretch of my palm. A sliver of pain slipped within my hand.
"Feyd." My voice steadied in a firm tone. Orgasms brought fleeting joy. My mind was not in the place to contain it. I breathed it out. And every breath inside my chest was tainted by this sickening air. The taste of reality, a bitter taste. "He touched me. H-he." I swallowed. The saliva was thick; it struggled against my efforts to swallow.
"You are strong, Mintha."
"He touched our child. He marked what was yours with those… hands."
I held my stomach, horrified.
I was another ruined thing by the Baron's reach.
Every single thing in Feyd life was ruined by his hand. His touch. The mark, of the ruination of his bloodline.
"You won't want me anymore," I breathed. My chest rattled in horror. "He touched me and now you won't!"
"Mintha," he said sternly.
"He's tainted me. He touched our…" My hands clasped around my swollen belly.
"I know," he softly grumbled. "I know."
He stared deep into my eyes. Their bodies were glossy, lost in the depths of my soul. I felt kinship. Another being who knew the powerless disgust that came from that man's hand.
A palm touched the center of my stomach. In between my clutching hold, his one palm protected the growing body of our own love inside.
"I know," Feyd said again.
I nodded. The horror swallowed back to the pits of my despair.
Our foreheads leaned together. The power to stand upright came from each other, not our own power.
"One day, this will be our past."
"It shouldn't be our present," I bemoaned. "I never wanted you. But I got you, so dearly." My hands ran along the backside of his muscled and armored arms. "This child, too. I did not want this to be my path, yet I've grown to adore it." A lump blocked the back of my throat. It made words difficult to say without wincing. My hands frantically held his neck. The pressure grew against our heads as they pressed together harder. "We deserved better, Feyd. I deserved you in a way that was not filled with treachery and guilt. And you. Deserts blessed, you deserved more, and less. Less death. Less horror. Less perversion."
His hand raised. The weight landed against my chest. The heat of his palm pressed against my breast bone with the leeching strength to reach my heart.
His fingertips clenched slightly into my flesh.
He held my heart.
Figuratively and literally.
"You deserved a love that was true. You deserved to find a girl out there on your own, by your choice, to make you a family that you crave. It probably wouldn't have been me, but it's still what should have been. You, happy."
"I found you on my own," he said. "You were not given to me. I found you and made you my own." He kissed my forehead. "Not one man can stand in between us."
Sounds of the chambers sounded outside the bathing room. Large trunks thudded down from their lifts. The footsteps of many as they tossed my belongings inside drawers and wardrobes.
Vishti's voice was loud. Their instructions directed each person to make the rooms suited for me.
The golden tea kettle was left out. For me.
Feyd overlooked his shoulder. Our bodies slid away from one another.
"Stay here," he said.
He stomped into the bedchamber. The noises died.
My lips frowned. There was plenty of reason to fear him. The fact they did, however, made me sad.
An animal deserved pity. Even when it struck out with instinct, it didn't know any better. The world had not been kind enough to teach it mercy when all it knew was pain.
Feyd emerged with a dress. It was a sleek fitted dress of shiny metallic fabric. The sleeves were long, drapy with slits up to the elbows. The deep grey shimmered against the light like precious gemstones.
"Will it fit?" I asked with doubt.
"Yes," he said. "You are not so big to need new clothes yet."
The skirts bundled against the back of my legs. A puffy bunch of fabric was the only design choice styled with thought other than how low a neckline should go between the breasts.
The Beast and Baron would melt if they saw their na-Baron assist his witch consort into an outfit all on his own. Sans attendants.
Although when I considered amusement, it did not surprise me with his capability. He enjoyed his clothes. The flair for fashion was not uncharacteristic.
It did not feel all that astonishing that he could do it. Only that he would.
The brushes of his fingers against my spine as he zipped the long dress up, tightening the fabric as it climbed, seldom eased the growth of new fears that took shape in my thoughts. The Emperor's visit coupled with the defeat of Feyd's desert rival Muad'Dib was lucky timing. And yet it was not so lucky. Our hand could be forced into action. By the Baron. Or we could be forever stilled by a circumstance we did not foresee.
Feyd desired fatherhood. He desired children and a family. All of which took place without the constant fear of their deaths on his mind.
So much had to happen. The loss of life, catastrophic.
Could I live with it, the guilt of surviving when others did not?
Feyd ran a comb through the soaking wet ends of my hair. He was silent. The work did not change the look in his eyes. He then pulled my hair back tightly against my head. His fingers knotted and pulled through some of the hair.
My hands leaned against the stone vanity when it was all said and done. I was a complete work of his art. As always.
"We deserved better," I said.
"It is better this way."
Our eyes met through the reflection.
"Is it?" I snipped in disbelief. "We've lost a child, a child I cannot even mourn because its death may be a blessing compared to the life we give the other. We lost our childhoods, our chances at a happy life. We've lost our humanity, Feyd-Rautha. Is it better this way?"
His fingers slid against the back of my neck. They gripped me firmly and yanked me to standing. His breath touched the curve of my ear as he pressed his lips against it. "Yes. It is better. You are better, whatever way, Mintha."