Chapter 145

~~Triss~~

Endlessness, everywhere. The infinite cosmos. Space, the final frontier. What the fuck ever.

Triss gulped as she stared up at the night sky. A quick glance around showed no buildings, no trees, no rocks, and no street either. No floor, no nothing. Beneath her was white, but it had no texture. Just, endless white, reaching out before and around her to endless horizons. Endless endlessness.

“Oh hey, I’m naked. Wonderful.” She blinked down at her body, frowning. The tattoos and piercings were there, as they usually were when she dreamed. No clothes though.

She touched her cheeks. Yeap, still gone, replaced with big crocodile teeth. Damn. Sometimes it was nice to dream about being human again.

She stared up again, and smiled. Stars. So many stars, tiny white dots against an endless black. Christ, what sort of infinite fucking universe had her dumb brain decided to invent, for a fucking dream?

She looked down. Below her was her Beast. No need to think about it, no need to convince herself, she recognized its swirling mass of black smoke, and all the strange limbs and claws and teeth and beaks inside it. It was beneath her, in that endless white she’d been in before, when learning crúac rituals. Except now, she was outside of it? Above it?

“Is this ... an out-of-body experience?” Last she remembered was falling asleep in the Circle’s cave. “Cause I’m pretty sure I should be able to look around and see the real world and shit if I was having one, and I don’t see no cave.”

“You are half right.”

Triss spun around quick and jumped back. She fully expected vitae to send her back a good distance, but all she got for her effort was a small leap, totally mistimed, and fell on her ass. Ok, so, no vitae. Shit.

An old woman stood in front of her, hunched, short, with a cloak of tattered gray covering her body and the top of her head. Long strands of dirty white hair hung down the sides of her face, and warts covered her visible skin. Not much visible skin with the cloak, but her feet and hands were visible, and so was her wrinkly, old, sagging face.

She had a cane in one hand. No, wait, not a cane, a walking stick. No, wait, not a walking stick, a fucking witch staff, considering the dangling skulls on top of it. It was thickest at the top, a crooked branch with a curve where the old woman had tied rope to hook through the holes in the skulls. They jingled lightly, making hollow bone noises.

Triss grumbled as she reached for her vitae again. Not there. Definitely a dream, except normally you had some measure of control in a dream, especially when it was lucid. She squeezed her eyes shut and imagined riding a giant dinosaur. Nothing. Damn.

“You’re naked,” the old woman said. Even her voice sounded old, crackly, and not sweet.

“Sorry. I—wait, I’m not sorry. This is my fucking head, my dream, and I’ll be naked if I want.”

The old woman grinned. “If this is your dream, change it. Put on clothes.”

“I’m not feeling very zen, apparently, and it’s not working.”

“Because this isn’t your dream.” After a quiet, disgusting, gargling chuckle, the old woman waved her stick at Triss slightly. Clothes appeared on her, the shit she’d gone to sleep in, a tank top and jeans and her combat boots.

“It isn’t?” Triss gestured down beneath them, at the endless plane of white, and the smoke creature wandering around beneath them, blocked by a floor of glass or something. “Certainly feels like a dream.”

“You were dreaming. But I wanted to talk to you without that nasty Beast of yours getting in the way.”

“So...”

“So I removed you from your dream.” The old woman gestured around with her staff. “You are in between, a place we can talk again.”

“Again? I—” Panic jolted through her limbs, and she took a step back as she looked the old woman up and down a dozen times more. “You! I had to sacrifice a bunch of people for a chance to talk with you!”

“You got my attention.”

Oh god this was happening. Happening happening, it was happening, oh fucking shit. She took another step back, looked around for any sort of exit to the strange dimension she’d found herself in, and sighed. Don’t panic. If the Crone, assuming this was the Crone, actually wanted you dead, she could make it happen, easily. Right?

Or maybe she couldn’t? The Crone was a god or something, and the more Triss dug into the world of dark rituals and shit, the more it seemed like there were divine rules mere plebes didn’t know about. Spirits had to follow rules, apparently, so why not gods and stuff? Which made her panic again, cause that meant maybe the Crone couldn’t hurt her right now, until Triss said or did something wrong. Fuck fuck, how the fuck do you play a game when you don’t know the rules?

“I did? I mean, I did sacrifice—”

“Five hundred years ago, a village, remote, even for that time, sacrificed the first born of their chief to me, a girl of ten years. That sacrifice carried with it enough weight to change the landscape in a way that persists to this day. You, and your paltry sacrifice of the unwanted, barely warranted a glance from me.”

Sweet fucking christ.

“Well sorry I didn’t really feel like sacrificing—”

The old bitch tapped her staff on the white not-glass beneath them, making a quiet click click. More than enough to shut Triss right up.

“I said I noticed you, not the sacrifice.”

“Oh, uh ... sorry.”

The Crone managed a weak grin. “You’re smarter than you look. I can see the wheels turning in that tiny little brain of yours.”

“Turning pretty slow right now, honestly. Why did you notice me? Who the fuck am I?”

“You’re a sad little girl, who’s lost her lover. And because you’re smarter than most, you’re dipping your toe in the water to see how cold it is before you take the plunge.”

“You’re ... talking about Julias, and what I’m doing to ... try and bring him back.”

“I warned you once to let him go, Beatrice.”

Something about hearing a deity use her first name was freaky as all fuck. Slowly, Triss’s gaze fell, and she stared down at her boots like a kid caught with her hand in the cookie jar.

“Yeah.”

“You ignored my warning.”

“Yeah.”

“I knew you would.”

Triss winced and looked away. “Well, yeah. Black Blood and Jacob told me it was possible, and I believe them.”

“I somehow doubt they told you only that.”

Doubt? So the Crone or whatever she was wasn’t omniscient. Good to know creepy weird larger-than-life creature things weren’t watching them through the rooftops with x-ray vision.

“Yeah, it’ll be hard. Yeah, there’s a good chance it’ll never work, they said as much. Yeah, I’m getting deeper into some pretty nasty shit, but ... but I have to try.”

When she finally managed to lift her eyes again, the old woman was smiling at her, the sort of smile a mom gives her kid when they trip and fall. Which of course sent rage surging through Triss, indignant and bitter. Which of course the old bitch saw coming, and her mommy smile faded, replaced with sadness.

“You should let him go, Triss. You have a good second life now, don’t you? He’d be happy for you and this new life you’re building for yourself. And that Sándor creature might even be interested in you, yes? Julias would want you to find love again. So let him go.”

“I don’t want to.”

“Yes, I know.” With a heavy sigh, the old crone gently waved her staff.

The world came to life around them. Dirt flowed out from under Triss’s feet, and she squeaked as she jumped up. She landed on her ass, again, but dirt was a soft enough cushion to land on.

By the time she lifted her eyes up from the dirt, the rest of the world had come to join her. Grass, small rocks. Trees. Bugs! She snarled and swatted away a beetle or something as it crawled across her hand, and she quickly got back up to her feet.

Forests were supposedly romantic, but she’d never been in one. Born and raised in Dolareido, and embraced before she’d ever gotten a chance to visit other places. And it wasn’t like vampires often packed their bags and went places when sunlight equaled death. Now that she was in a forest, she was glad she’d never visited one before.

How the fuck could anyone think of a forest as romantic? Maybe it’d be better in the day, but at night, it wasn’t much better than that jungle nightmare world of Fiona’s. Bugs buzzed around and made high pitched clicking noises. Distant rustling in the darkness she couldn’t see announced wandering animals, raccoons and birds and shit. It was cold and windy; didn’t bother a vampire, but still. A glance up showed the stars were mostly blotted out by trees, mostly pines, and another glance down showed the dirt and grass were mixed with bits of bark and twigs, and wriggling things.

This sucked.

“Oh god, why? I’m a city girl.”

“Yes, of course you are. Witches everywhere cringe.” After a quiet, grandma chuckle, the old crone waved her staff again. A fire emerged between them, and Beatrice shrieked as she jumped back. She hadn’t shrieked like that in literal decades. “Calm down. You have no banes here, vampire. We are between.”

“Uh huh.” Triss eye the Crone suspiciously, but sighed after a while, and looked down at the fire. Circled by stones, it crackled and popped, and Triss found herself drifting closer. “You’re ... sure?”

“Of course I’m sure.”

Nodding, Triss came closer, and held out her hand. Waves of warmth hit her skin, and faint smoke drifted upward.

“It feels real.”

“I’m very good,” the old hag said, smirking. “Sit. We should talk.”

Triss sat. When a god comes to visit you, you fucking do what they want. That might change as the conversation went on, but for now, shut up and do as ordered.

So close to fire, instinct told Triss to back the fuck up before a random spark set her on fire, but a glance to the old woman and a nod from her told Triss it was alright. Well, if this wasn’t real, or wasn’t physical or whatever ‘in between’ was, and the Crone had pulled her out of a dream, then maybe the fire wouldn’t turn her into ashes the moment it touched her. She wasn’t stupid enough to stick her finger in the fire, but she got closer than her vampire instincts wanted.

Fire, was mesmerizing. The way it danced, the waves of heat that matched the flickering flame, the sizzle and pop of the wood, god damn. Fucking beautiful. A pretty sick joke that it was any vampire’s bane.

“The flesh witch,” the old woman said, “Elen.”

“What about her?”

“She is a broken thing. There’s little left of her mind, and she won’t last much longer.”

“She’ll die? Jacob thinks she’s immortal.”

“Malachi is correct. She’ll live on, even as her body breaks down. But another decade or so and there won’t be much left of her brain. After that, she’ll be nothing more than a pulsing mass of flesh, like cancer.”

“Damn, that’s rough. Do ... do you know who gave her immortality?” A dangerous question to ask a deity. But knowledge was too damn fucking tasty to resist.

“I do.”

“Wanna tell me?”

“No.”

“Uh huh. Was it you?”

“No.”

Triss rolled her eyes. “Alright, so what about Elen?”

“I’m sure you have guessed that she cannot create a replica of Julias to the exact degree you think is required.”

Oh shit oh shit. That was either very good or very bad.

“You saying I don’t need it to be perfect?”

“It needs to be perfect.” Very bad then. “If you summon his soul into a body it doesn’t recognize, the results will be as horrific as you’ve guessed. The stuff of nightmares.”

“God fucking damn it!” She buried her eyes in her palms and rubbed them against her skull, before looking back up at the crone. “I was going to look for a ritual that could maybe ... I don’t know, help somehow. Maybe get a piece of Julias somehow? Maybe ... maybe get a piece of me, a memory, to help?”

“Smart.” The old woman chuckled, a hoarse and horrible sound. Slowly, she walked over to a nearby bolder, and sat against it, as if sitting on the ground would be too much trouble for an old woman like her. “Tell me, do you know why members of my Circle use torture to learn rituals?”

“Because it forces them to find, uh, inner tranquility, I guess? To go zen and shit.”

The Crone laughed again. “Close enough. It lets you speak more directly with your Beast, and your Beast is capable of communicating across...” She gestured around her.

“Sounds like Jac—Malachi was right then.”

“Malachi is too smart for his own good. It’ll lead to his death.”

Triss raised a brow at that, but didn’t question it. She wanted to, but a little voice in her head told her this Crone thing wouldn’t randomly drop a line like that, if she had any intent on explaining herself. Don’t poke the bear.

“So crúac rituals come from you?”

“They don’t come from me, not truly. But I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have a hand in stupid vampires like yourself finding them.”

“And ... what are they, exactly? The rituals?”

“If I answered that, what fun would there be in being a witch?”

There was some truth to that, Triss supposed. Half the fun in all the dark witchy stuff, was the mystery of the forces they connected with. But it was also how witches got themselves killed, according to Jacob, and Lovecraft.

“So, am I being zen then, right now? To be able to talk to you?”

“No. Like I said, you got my attention. Or, maybe it’s better to say, you’re ... relatable.”

“Uh, I’m sorry, can you repeat that? Cause it sounds like you just said I was relatable, me, and you’re, uh, something I’m guessing is the equivalent of a goddess.”

“Close enough.” Chuckling, the old woman reached into her cloak with her free, wrinkly hand, and pulled out a small bag. Old school didn’t do justice what the bag looked like. Must have been a flap of deer skin tied together into a shitty bag by a shitty string made of who the fuck knew what. Which honestly made it pretty awesome. And she tossed it to Triss casually.

Triss caught it. “What’s this?”

“A ritual. A memory. Open it later, and it’ll help with building a vessel for your lover.”

“Oh ... oh fuck, really? I was thinking I’d have to go through some serious torture, zen out while Jacob ran barbed wire up my ass and right out my mouth. And we’d have to do it while bathing in the blood of a newborn baby or something.”

“That might have worked, yes. Your Beast would have called out to the beyond, and someone would have answered. But let’s skip that part, shall we?”

“Holy fuck you are being way too nice. What’s the catch?”

“Time.”

“Time?”

“You’re running out of it.”

“Because of Elen?”

“No.”

Triss stared at the old woman, blinking, a lot. “You uh ... wanna tell m—”

“I can’t tell you more. The rules don’t allow it.”

“Rules? What the fuck are you talking about?” They did have rules then. Bingo.

“You’ve spoken too much, old crone,” a soothing, motherly voice said.

Triss jumped to her feet and her eyes snapped around. Not her voice, or the Crone’s. But before she could open her mouth, the Crone gestured to Triss dismissively. Not an enemy then? Then—

Light cut through the forest canopy. A glance up showed that the moon, which hadn’t even been there before, was now very much there, and shining down on them with its soothing light.

Rustling around the fire forced Triss to jump back. “What the fuck?”

Next to the old woman, was a wolf. A white wolf. It sat on its hind legs beside the Crone, and watched Triss with the classic, cold, analyzing gaze of a wolf.

Ok, information overload. Having an out-of-body experience in some sort of in-between realm where a god had decided to have a chat with her, and help her out, for no reason at all, was already blowing her fucking mind. And now a white wolf with a soothing, feminine voice, was here to chat as well, right after the moon mysteriously appeared and decided to play spotlight.

“You’re ... the moon? Like, the one I heard the werewolves talk about? Luna?”

The wolf slowly nodded. “She catches on quickly. I can see why she interests you, hag.” Spoken without moving its ... her lips.

“Don’t be rude,” the Crone said.

“Funny, coming from you,” the god damn mother fucking moon said.

Beatrice threw up her hands, palms forward, surrendering. “Ok. Pause. Time out. I can’t handle this.” Clenching her eyes shut, Triss slapped herself. Hard. As hard as this weak fake dream-not-dream body could handle; not very hard, but good enough. Except other than a harsh spike of pain, nothing changed. She opened her eyes, looked for anything different, and groaned. Fuck.

“Don’t do as the Crone says,” Luna said, steady gaze on Triss, wolf mouth still unmoving.

“Uh, why? She just gave me a fucking shortcut to finishing making a vessel. I am damn well going to finish it, and then—”

“And then what, vampire? Reach across the endless oblivion, across the Abyss itself, and pluck the threads of your dead lover’s soul? Will you weave them together yourself?”

“I—”

“What gives you the right, vampire? You think you can defy the rules of life? Defy what gives life purpose?”

“I don’t—”

“You don’t have the right!” The wolf growled, baring her fangs. “You don’t get to pluck the essence of Soul from the beyond, because you are sad! Who are you, blood leech, half dead creature, balancing on the edge of life itself, to think you have the right to defy rules not I nor the Crone have ever managed to defy?”

Triss stared at the wolf. If this wasn’t a dream, it stood to reason she could very well die here if one of these fucking gods decided she should. Which wasn’t fair at all.

“Luna, please,” the Crone said, slowly shaking her head. “Let the vampire try. This isn’t about us.”

“Isn’t it? Why else would you pick this girl, if not because of what she is trying to do?”

“There is more to this than this vampire’s aching heart. The acts of Mict—”

“Do not speak his name!” Not so soothing or motherly anymore. Luna’s voice shook the forest, and Triss gulped as she steadied herself.

Sighing, the Crone waved a slow, dismissing hand toward the wolf. “Fine, fine.”

Triss dropped her hands, and fell on her ass by the fire. No point in standing anymore, and she couldn’t even if she tried.

“Can one of you throw me a bone and tell me why you’re both talking to me? Like ... the fuck?”

“I came to help you with resurrecting your dead lover,” the Crone said with a gross, toothy grin. She didn’t even try to hide that she had ulterior motives, and Triss could respect that.

The wolf shook her head. “She knows you’ll fail, vampire. Fail like we all have.”

“Like you ... all have?”

With a heavy snarl, the wolf stood up, and stepped around the fire toward her. Triss didn’t bother getting up. At this point, she might as well accept that her fake dream-not-dream muscles weren’t going to do a damn thing here, not against these two.

“You’re not the only one who’s lost someone close to them, who’s lost a lover. Who are you to defy the laws of life and death, vampire, when I have spent thousands upon thousands of years unable to reach mine? Me. Me!” The moonlight over them brightened, feeling less like the moon, and more like a searchlight.

“Luna, be calm,” the Crone said. “I’m helping her not because I think she’ll succeed. Even she doesn’t believe she’ll succeed. But she’s going to do it anyway, and I’d prefer she try before ... Well, I can’t speak about that either, I suppose. In any case, this witch has potential, and if things don’t go as ... he ... expects, then I would have her learn the futility of her pursuits. Only when her dreams are ash will she be a worthy student.”

“Uh, what? He? Student?”

“We cannot discuss he,” Luna said.

“But,” the Crone said with a small wave of her staff, “if he can flirt with the rules, so can we. And I think you would do well, following in Malachi’s footsteps, Beatrice. You have the potential to be a grand and powerful witch.”

Ok, so Malachi wasn’t ‘he’ then. Black Blood? She wanted to ask, but they’d made it clear they couldn’t talk about whatever was going on. And the Crone said his name was Mict...

“Th ... Thank you, for the gift.” She motioned to the bag in her hand. “And ... and I can’t even begin to understand why you’re both here, talking to stupid, worthless me. But, it’s not like I don’t understand, you know?” Slowly, she forced herself to make eye contact with the white wolf. She might as well have been staring into two galaxies, each contained within their own glass marble. “About how what I’m trying to do is fucked up. But vampires are already fucked up, right? We’re half dead. And ghosts—”

“It’s not the same,” the Crone said. “A million others have attempted what you’re attempting, Beatrice. You don’t understand the weave, and how it draws the dead back to it. You don’t understand what death does to a soul, and...” Sighing, the Crone shook her staff gently through the air, causing the dangling skulls to jingle and make hollow thuds. “You’ll learn, the hard way. That’s why I like you.”

“Thanks ... I think. But I have to say, it’s really fucking unnerving that a ... a ... whatever you are, took notice of me. Like, I’m not special.”

“No, you are not special,” the Crone said.

Kinda hurt to hear her say that, but Triss recovered quick.

“You two, um ... ever visit Jack? If anyone’s special, that kid is—”

“The boy,” the wolf said, “is not special. He’s poisoned by the echoes of a menace.”

Ouch for Jack.

“There are two in this city we could consider special,” the Crone said. “Women, paranormal creatures who have lost more than you could ever understand.”

“Women who ... oh.” Samantha, and Athalia.

“Enough of this,” the wolf said, and she growled quietly for a few seconds to seal in her point. “Beatrice, if you continue with this foolishness, you’ll find only pain. And the dark currents in your city will—”

The Crone shook her staff over the fire toward the white wolf. “Don’t. You want him to have even more freedom? You’ve already caused enough trouble with what you’ve done in this city. Don’t be angry because your little pet project Eric is taking so long.”

Triss felt like a little kid, eavesdropping on her two parents arguing, learning about things kids weren’t supposed to know about, like taxes, and adultery. Don’t move, don’t make a sound, and maybe she wouldn’t get drawn into it. Of course, the stakes were higher here, and getting drawn into it could very well mean a dead and sad Triss.

“Eric?” Shut up shut up shut up before you get yourself killed.

“Nevermind about Eric,” the wolf said, growling again. “I’m warning you now, vampire. If you keep going down this path, you’ll find only pain. Pain for yourself, pain for Jack, and pain for that poor woman Samantha whose hopes you’ve raised. Pain for everyone tied to this sickening cycle.” Damn this moon bitch was angry. Assuming she actually was Luna, a moon spirit goddess thing, and not a wolf, maybe she should have picked an angry, snarling badger or wolverine for this encounter? Would have fit better.

“I ... still have to try.”

“Of course you do,” the Crone said, chuckling, complete with a little old-woman phlegm. “I know you do, sweetheart. Luna knows, too. I tried, as did she, as did he.” He, again. They couldn’t speak his name? Jacob? Black Blood? Who the fuck could Black Blood have ever lost, though? “You’ll try, and you’ll fail, and that failure will leave its mark on you for the rest of eternity. And you will become a great witch because of it, one of the greatest. If you survive the ages.”

“But ... I thought you said I’m not special?”

Waving her staff slowly over the fire, the old woman sighed, and nodded. “You’re not. Yet. Now, open the bag.”

The wolf growled, snorted, and walked back around the fire to sit next to the Crone.

With a heavy gulp, Triss looked at the bag. Just a simple, little animal skin bag, and a pluck at its shitty string was enough to have it open in her palms. She had no idea what to expect, but as the flaps spread around her hand, she stared into the small, floating dot of red, and watched as it hovered up to her necklace. It sank into the small crow skull, and the world exploded.

Triss sat up with a hard jolt. She looked around in a panic, but nothing was out of the ordinary. Just her and Jennifer, cuddled up next to her. Jen was still asleep though, and that was weird. Vampires woke up at the same time, and not gently.

She looked across the cave. No one bothered closing their curtains anymore, not with how close they’d all grown lately. Madison slept beside Othello, where he also slept, the two of them naked and halfway out of his alcove.

Sleepiness hit Triss like a truck, and she collapsed back onto the sheets. The dream had woken her up from torpor. Holy fuck, that was a powerful dream.

But the sun was up, her Beast knew that, and the heaviness of torpor dragged her back down into sleep. She smiled as it did. She had a new ritual to try out.

~~Damien~~

“I don’t think Michael killed her.”

Damien sighed as he sat down in front of Maria’s desk. “I ... didn’t ask that.”

“You were about to. It’s in your eyes.” The elder smiled slightly at him as she typed a few things on her keyboard, before leaning back in her grand chair. Within her den below the cathedral, the elder had regenerated her arms well enough to use them as any kine would. Soon, she’d be as fit as the night Avery had nearly killed her.

He was tempted to ask how she’d use her renewed strength in the war against Garry. But he avoided the topic, for now.

“I ... do think Amanda’s death sounds like the perfect catalyst for this war that Michael wants. Too perfect.”

“It does.”

“And she may have been a neonate, but was no fresh fledgling. She’d been embraced near Jack’s embrace.”

Maria nodded. “It is hardly fair to compare her to Jack. The boy has survived trial by fire far too many times. Half to grit, and half to pure luck, I am sure.”

“Still, she had a few years on her. She was good enough to avoid getting caught by some errant flames. So I can’t see any other reason for her being dead, unless Michael killed her.” He trusted any Mekhet with a few years under their belt to dodge fire easily enough. “Coincidence aside, why do you believe Michael didn’t kill her? The man is—”

Maria shot him a glare, and he shut up fast. She might as well have cut through a glacier with a sword.

“You do not understand Michael. Do not judge him so harshly.”

“I ... You’re right, I don’t understand Michael. But you could tell me.”

Her stare only hardened. “No. I could not. Do not ask again.”

And that ended that conversation.

~Sorry Jack. I asked, and she shut me down hard. I think I made your job even harder.~

~Damn. Alright, I’ll be careful. Thanks~

Sighing, Damien put his phone away, and went back to his apartment. With the war bubbling under Dolareido’s surface, he didn’t feel comfortable going to Fiona’s. As much as Damien wasn’t technically Invictus anymore, he still worked for them as a close ally, and functioned as one. It made perfect sense for Garry to want to kill him as much as anyone else, and he didn’t want that shit following Fiona. He’d give Fiona a call, and they could go somewhere secret to spend some time together.

Of course, that was difficult to do, with Fiona apparently in his apartment and not her own.

“Um, Fiona?” he called out. He smelled her the moment he came into the apartment. Damn Begotten could get to so many places they weren’t supposed to, as long as they’d been there once before.

“In here!” In his bedroom. “Help me! Please!”

He knew her panicked tone, and this wasn’t it. This was her ‘I spilled the nail polish!’ tone. Still panicky, but not like she was being attacked. Smiling, he slipped out of his coat and shoes, and still wearing his suit, walked past his streamlined, fancy, borderline useless apartment, and entered his room.

“ ... what in the Lord’s name happened here?”

“I tried to do, um, tie myself up, ye ken?”

“I can see that.” He stepped up to his large bed, his ‘American Psycho’ bed according to Fiona, and grinned down at his girlfriend.

She was tied up, sort of. Apparently she’d managed to tie her ankles to the corners of his bed, spreading her legs. She’d obviously spent a lot of time focusing on a harness for her torso, and the black rope hooked around her shoulders, neck, breasts, and ribs in a symmetrical, beautiful pattern. And she’d also managed to get the soft-looking rope around her waist and chest, and behind her to bind her hands against her back. At least, that’d been her plan.

She looked like a cat who got tangled up in yarn. She squirmed and wriggled, ass in the air, hands behind her, but her hands weren’t together. Right hand too high up her back, left hand struggling to get it lower but only making it worse, every attempt she made to get her hands free pulling her right hand tighter, while getting her left hand caught closer to her ass. Something had clearly gone wrong in how she’d arranged the pattern.