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SERENAI

It was in the room with her again— Serenai could see its red eyes glowing. And this time she was sure it wasn’t a dream.

“Oh Goddess , please ,” she whispered, her throat tight with fear.

The evil red eyes were floating there in the darkness at the foot of her bed but what if they came closer?

Just last night, she’d seen them by the wardrobe and the night before that they had been over by the door. It seemed they got closer every time!

She’d been sure she was having nightmares before, but now there was no doubt—she was wide awake and something—some evil creature—was in the room with her.

It wasn’t just that she could see it—she could sense its presence—a malevolent force filled with hatred and rage and all of it was directed at her.

Serenai pulled the covers over her head and huddled in the stuffy darkness, praying the evil thing with the red eyes wouldn’t try to follow her there.

She had never felt more alone and frightened in her life than she did now, curled up in the middle of the vast, ornate bed she’d inherited from her mother.

The bed wasn’t the only thing she’d inherited from her mother—she now had a vast estate here on Yonnie Six .

She owned a dream gas mine and also an entire, sleek skyscraper in the middle of downtown Opulex , the capital city of the entire planet.

She was rich beyond the wildest dreams of avarice…

and yet she’d never felt more unhappy, unsafe, and alone.

It wasn’t just the thing with the glowing red eyes that made her feel that way—though it certainly didn’t help. Being the sole heir of the late, fearsome Mistress Bloodlash came with a lot of responsibility—responsibility that Serenai hadn’t been trained for.

She’d spent her entire life on Peaceful Prime —a small, backwater planet mostly populated by religious sects devoted to meditation.

Serenai had been raised in the Convent of Sacred Serenity where the motto was: Modesty , Purity , and Integrity .

It was inscribed over the stone archway at the entrance to the Convent as well as into the hearts and minds of all the girls that were raised there.

The population of Sacred Serenity was almost entirely female. Days there were spent in studying, working in the vegetable garden, and meditation. Everyone wore modest clothing, spoke softly, and was in bed before nine on any given night.

Such an upbringing hardly qualified Serenai to replace her mother, who had been one of the most ruthless Mistresses on all of Yonnie Six .

She had ruled her empire with an iron fist and disciplined her subordinates with a pain-lash that left lasting scars.

Serenai had seen them on the servants—some of them even had cruel, curling scars of her late mother’s whip on their faces, disfiguring them permanently .

Such sights made the tender-hearted Serenai feel sick to her stomach. She had no idea how her mother could have treated people with such cruelty. The very idea of wielding a pain-lash was horrifying to her. Almost as horrifying as the glowing red eyes at the foot of her bed.

She risked taking a peek out from under the covers, hoping the eyes would have disappeared. But no…they were still there, glowing a malevolent scarlet. She had no idea what that creature was, but she could still feel that air of malice emanating from it. Clearly it wished her harm.

Serenai dipped back under the covers again, shivering miserably. She wished she was back on Peaceful Prime in the Convent . Safe in the dormitory with the other girls, she never felt lonely or afraid. And she never felt like people were looking down on her or comparing her with her mother, either.

Here in her mother’s penthouse suite—which took up the top five floors of the massive skyscraper she now owned—she felt like everyone who saw her was measuring her against the former Mistress Bloodlash …and finding her lacking.

But I wasn’t trained for this! she thought resentfully. How can I know how to run all of Mother’s business ventures and rule over her empire when nobody ever taught me anything but modesty and humility?

She believed that her mother had intended to train her—probably a few years after she came of age. But she’d died suddenly and unexpectedly, leaving Serenai to fend for herself.

Well, at least she was of age and didn’t need a proctor to oversee everything. Although honestly, it would have been nice to have a guiding hand. She felt so lost and alone…and so frightened.

I need someone to help me—someone to protect me, she thought.

Her first choice would have been to get one of the girls she’d grown up with at the Convent to come stay with her.

But none of them had any idea of how to live such a radically different lifestyle either.

It would have been the blind leading the blind.

Also , how could another girl protect her from the red-eyed threat that had invaded her room?

Serenai continued to turn the problem over in her mind.

Maybe I ought to get a bodyslave. All the other Mistresses have them.

The only thing was, all the bodyslaves she’d ever met were male.

Yonnie Six was a female-run planet where only women were allowed to hold positions of power.

Males were only deemed fit to serve a woman’s needs and indeed, most of the men on the planet were owned by women.

There were a few free males outside of Opulex , but they were only tolerated as long as they didn’t make trouble.

Serenai didn’t really know what to think about men.

She’d grown up most of her life never seeing any of them at all.

Well , except for Geordo —the eighty-year-old gardener who slept in a hut near the vegetable garden at the Convent .

He was a kind old soul but almost completely deaf, so you had to shout in his ear to talk to him.

The men she saw around her in Opulex , however, were completely different.

Most of them were big and muscular and often they were half-naked, showing off their oiled chests as they followed their Mistresses around on long leashes attached to the pain collars around their thick necks.

They seemed like a whole different species to Serenai and she was more than a little afraid of them.

“Males simply cannot be trusted!” Aunt Nibblegrim had warned her. “ You must keep a pain collar on them at all times or they can turn on you!”

Aunt Nibblegrim was her mother’s younger sister. She wasn’t quite as rich as her older sister had been—in fact, she lived in the building that Serenai now owned, on a lower floor—but she was still willing to offer advice.

She had even offered to manage the whole estate, if Serenai wanted to sign a few legal documents she’d had drawn up on the off-chance her sister died early, but Serenai hadn’t been willing to do that.

As much as she wanted a protector and someone to help her manage things, she wasn’t quite sure that her Aunt Nibblegrim was the one to do that.

She seemed a little too eager and her quick, pushy way of speaking put Serenai’s nerves on edge.

Still, she didn’t know anyone else in the whole city, so it was her Aunt who she wound up taking advice from more often than not, even if she wasn’t ready to let her manage her inheritance completely.

Serenai risked another peek over the edge of the blanket to see if the red eyes were still there—they were.

She wished she dared to turn on the light—maybe that would frighten whatever it was away.

But what if she reached out from under the covers and felt a cold hand grab her wrist in the darkness?

Then she remembered something—the lights in her mother’s bedroom were voice-activated.

In the Convent , nothing was automatic—everything had to be done by hand.

If she wanted to turn a light off or on, she had to get up and go do it manually.

But in the extravagant penthouse suite everything was automated.

She wished she had remembered this during the past two nights when the eyes had menaced her, but she’d been so sure they were just a bad dream.

“Lights on,” she whispered, but her voice must not have been loud enough because nothing happened. Clearing her throat, she forced herself to speak louder. “ Lights on!” she almost shouted into the dark room.

At once, the glows in all four corners of the room popped on.

The brilliant light blinded Serenai for a moment and she thought she heard a skittering sound—like a rodent scrambling across the floor.

She tried to see if the red eyes were still there, but for a moment she could only blink as her own eyes adjusted.

When she was finally able to see straight, the room seemed deserted. At least, the red eyes weren’t there anymore. Though Serenai supposed they could be hiding somewhere behind one of the pieces of heavy, ornately carved furniture which filled the suite.

She stared across the room to the large mirror hung on the wall and saw nothing but her own frightened face peering back.

She had long black hair, creamy brown skin, and large, dark eyes.

Her mother had chosen DNA from a small planet called “ Earth ” when she’d gotten herself impregnated at the Procreation Center .

It meant that Serenai looked different from the other girls she’d gone to school with at the Convent , but she didn’t mind—she loved how she looked.

Even down to her extra-full curves, which many of the other Yonnie Mistresses sneered at when they met her.

But the Sisters at the Convent had always preached tolerance and understanding as well as accepting yourself the way you were. Serenai had absorbed these lessons early and she wasn’t willing to hate herself just because she wasn’t thin and pale like most of the other high-ranking women in Opulex .

However, the face staring back from the mirror didn’t look happy or self-confident—she just looked scared. Serenai thought about getting up to look around the room and see if the red-eyed thing menacing her was really gone…and decided not to.

But she didn’t want to turn off the lights again either because it might come back.

She would just have to sleep with them on, she decided reluctantly.

In the Convent , no lights had been allowed in the rooms at night, so she was used to sleeping in complete darkness.

She supposed she’d just have to put a pillow over her head and hope she could get back to sleep.

But tomorrow I’m going to go find myself the biggest, strongest bodyslave I can to stay by my side and keep me safe, she promised herself.

She wasn’t sure where she could buy one, but she was certain that Aunt Nibblegrim could tell her. In the meantime, she was going to have to do her best to get to sleep with the lights on.

With a sigh, she turned over in bed and pulled an ornately embroidered pillow over her eyes. Goddess , but she missed the Convent !