The Lioness and the Black Widow 1

As I rode shotgun with The Duchess at the wheel, “THUMP!” “THUMP!” “THUMP!” came from the trunk. The Duchess turned up the music, the bass thundered through the Lincoln drowning out the pounding and scraping sounds that were emanating from the trunk. She looked at me, smiled, then yelled over the music, “Do think their fucking back there?” Then she laughed maniacally and let out a victorious high-pitched scream at the top of her lungs.

The twins followed behind us in the Cutlass. The resurrected Roger rode in the trunk. We stopped in front of a large two-story white house in a clean, upper-middle-class neighborhood. We pulled the two men from the trunk and hurried them to the front door, the four of us huddled around them. Roger was left in the trunk of the Cutlass. He remained still and silent.

An older woman answered the door. Her eyes widened, but she didn’t get a chance to speak before The Duchess barged in with all of us following close behind. The woman slammed the door and whispered furiously, “All of you! In the kitchen now!” We followed The Duchess down a long hall, the voices of several people could be heard coming from one of the rooms on the right. The woman rushed us past the occupied room, through a swinging door and into a large, immaculate kitchen.

In all the adrenaline and movement, I hadn’t paid much attention to the older woman’s appearance. She looked to be in her mid-40’s, her hair was dyed black and hung to the middle of her back. She wore a black corset, a long black skirt and black leather boots with heels. The woman took a deep breath as she looked around at all of us. Her face continued to redden as she tried to calm herself down and maintain her composure. Finally, she tossed concern for the maintenance of her composure to the side and yelled while flailing her arms, “OH JE-SUS FUCK-ING CHRIST!!! WHY?!?!? Why are you doing this to me Duchess?”

The Duchess said, “Calm down. Everything is going to be fine. We just need to use your attic for a little while.”

The woman replied, “I have guests right now.”

“Go tend to your guests. We’ll be quiet.”

The woman stared at The Duchess wide-eyed, “Whatever it is you plan to do, and DO NOT tell me what that is, you cannot do it here! NO! Do you understand? Why the hell do you need my attic anyway?”

“I like way the sun comes through the little window and strikes the hardwood floors at the foot of the St. Andrew’s cross. It’s very poetic, the atmosphere gives me a sense of serenity. It’s chaotic times Theresa, and I need all the serenity I can get.”

“That’s great. Now that I know that psychopath’s have little inspirational moments too, maybe we can move on to the matter at hand. YOU ALL NEED TO LEAVE!”

The Duchess shook her head, opened the fridge and browsed through it’s contents. She removed a package of steaks and tossed them on the counter. “We’re not leaving until we’re done. Go tend to your guests.”

“Do you understand that I cannot have any illegal activity…”

The Duchess interrupted, “You mean like all that dope we set you up with? Illegal activity like that? You should keep your feet out the gutter if you don’t want to shit on your shoes.”

A large woman with a crew-cut entered the kitchen. She was dressed like construction worker and built like a wrestler. She looked at the two men standing cuffed with gags taped in their mouths. Then she looked at Theresa and smiled. Theresa glared at the woman and ordered through clenched teeth, “The get-together is cancelled. Everyone needs to leave NOW!!!” The woman nodded her head and quickly left the room.

Footsteps and voices echoed in the hall as the guests left. Theresa sat down at the kitchen table, pulled up her skirt up to her knees and unzipped her boots, “I ask for just one small phase of pretend normalcy; just a short vacation from the absolute fucking insanity that has been my life since I met you.” She glared at The Duchess as she flung her boots to the side. Theresa rose to her feet in just her stockings, she only stood at about 4 ‘11. The twins snickered and Theresa shot them a contemptuous look, “That’s great. Real grown-up.”

The twin on the right replied, “Damn! You’re always uptight. Didn’t you already do the menopause thing?” The other twin burst out laughing.

Theresa narrowed her eyes and bit her lip, “You two couldn’t spell menopause between you if I gave you an 24-hours to do it, a dictionary and a computer.” The two men stood trembling and sweating as the women bickered back and forth. Theresa pointed at me, “Who’s this guy?”

The Duchess replied, “He’s from the Kastelic’s.”

“Why is he here?”

“He’s my guest.”

Theresa shook her head, “Oh hell no. We’re not going down this road. Send him back.”

“I’m not sending him back till his Matriarch makes good on her promise.”

Theresa looked me in the eyes and said, “You know that’s not why you have him with you.” Theresa looked me up and down, “He’s a mercenary. Send him back.”

“He’s not a mercenary and I’m not sending him anywhere.”

Theresa turned toward The Duchess, “If he wasn’t a mercenary, we wouldn’t be having this discussion. You wouldn‘t have an interest in him if you didn’t intend to use him, and you cannot use him unless you take him. You can‘t take him if he‘s loyal to his Matriarch, now can you? If he is up for grabs like that, he‘s a mercenary and a liability.”

“A liability, yes; a mercenary, no. This is beyond your understanding. It’s a Matriarch-thing.”

Theresa stared at The Duchess shaking her head in disbelief. She threw her hands, “Fuck it! It’s your decision anyway, right? Don’t you think that the Second-Chair should spend some time with him before we allow him to get too comfortable?” A chill went over me and goose bumps raised on my skin when I heard “Second-Chair”. I remembered the role “Second-Chair” played in the other house, when Lavinia held that position and later, when Damijana and Sally shared it. I knew that I definitely did not want to spend time with the woman who held the position of “Second-Chair”.

The Duchess asked, “Where is she anyway? I told her that I wanted her around today.”

Theresa responded, “I have no idea. I told her not to be here because I was planning to have normal fucking people over for once. She stayed away.”

“Go with the twins and take these two upstairs.”

“Look, you can’t kill these guys here. Chris comes home in a few hours.”

“Who the fuck is Chris?”

“I told you about him, he’s my fiance.”

“You said you had a slave. You didn’t say anything about a fiance. What the hell are you doing over here? Do you think you’re Betty-Fucking-Crocker or something?”

“He is my slave and he is my fiancee. You don’t understand…”

“I don’t want to understand. Go get some clothes, your purse and go meet your fiance wherever he is, and take him on a vacation somewhere. We are using this house for a few days.”

“Bullshit! You can’t just flush my whole life down…”

“If your fiancee comes home while we’re here…I’m killing him. If you don’t want that to happen, get your shit and go.” Theresa grabbed her boots from the floor and stormed out the room. The Duchess pulled out a frying pan and opened the package of steaks. The meat sizzled when she placed it in the pan. She looked at the two men and said, “I wonder how long I will have to starve you, before the sound of your own flesh sizzling this pan arouses hunger and causes your mouth to water.” She called out to the twins, “Girls, take those two up to the attic.”

After the twins left, I asked, “Who sits Second-Chair?”

“I’m impressed. That’s a good first question to ask when you become involved with a house like ours. Her name is Antigone. You’ll meet her before the day is over. And you will be spending some time with her in the near future. She needs a good grindstone to sharpen herself against.”

“I would prefer not to…”

“Fuck what you prefer. Let me explain something to you. Anyone who has ‘it’ will rule over you completely, for as long as they have you engaged. You have as much choice in the matter as you do over your skin color or who your parents were. This is why Theresa called you a mercenary. She’s wrong, because that would mean you have choice. You have no control over who the Goddess sends you to. You have a function and you will fulfill that function. I don’t have to threaten you. I don’t have to read your mind. If I command you to do something, you’ll do it as sure it rains.”

She gave me a challenging smile. “Am I wrong? No, I am not.” She went to a cub-board, got out a cup, pointed to a chair and said, “Wait there.” She exited the room and came back a few moments later. She set the cup down in front of me and said, “So, they had to hold you down to pour urine down your throat, huh? I heard that the thought of drinking someone else’s urine horrifies you. Is that true?” She pushed the cup toward me, “That’s my piss in the cup. I want you to drink it, for me, all of it.”

I looked at cup and fought the urge to vomit. I lowered my head and shut my eyes tight. I clenched my hands together in my lap. I wouldn’t do it. As I thought about my refusal, my hand went to the table and grabbed the cup. The Duchess said, “You’re gonna drink it anyway. You may as well sit up straight and have a little fucking dignity about it.”

I sat up straight, gripped the cup, raised it to my lips and drank. I slammed the cup on the counter when I was finished and wiped my lips. The Duchess looked at me, her eyes showed delight. She said, “The Goddess acknowledges my strength of will and I have Her blessings as a Keeper of Her Altar. That is why I have control over you. Later, you will encounter other women, from other houses; they will seek the same blessings and acknowledgement. If they can’t take ‘it’ as quickly and easily as I just did; then they are an imposter and you won’t give them a fucking thing. Got it?”

I nodded my head.

“Good. It’s time to play with our friends upstairs. I love it when I have multiple people to torture. It means that I can make person a sit and watch their peer suffer, and endure unbelievable amounts of pain and agony before it’s their turn. The terror and dread that person feels when he sees his friend being castrated, disemboweled and skinned alive a few feet in from him…I don’t know quite how to describe it. It just emanates from my victim filling me with this intense feeling of euphoria. It’s like…it’s like the first time I went to a ballet.”