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Taking advantage of Hancock’s apparent distraction, one of her attendants tiptoed to the edge of the deck, set down a baby seal and slipped away. With winks and nudges, the rest of the crew would soon be alerted, and they’d coo and swoon over the disgustingly adorable creature. Tossing her head in mock annoyance, Hancock would extend a shapely leg forward, kick the seal into the ocean and strike a pose, glowing with satisfaction as the amazons’ cries of horror turned into whispers of awe at her beauty. On the lower deck, the attendants who waited with fishing nets would rescue the seal and put it back into its pool, to be fed and petted and fussed over until the next time the Empress needed a little pick-me-up.
Under normal circumstances, this comforting routine would never fail to soothe Hancock when the strictures of her position got under her skin, threatening to mar it with stress-induced blemishes. Of late, alas, kicking baby animals had lost its deep pore-cleansing magic. Ever since Blackbeard and those smarmy Marines had showed up on Amazon Lily, praise, adoration and even acts of petty tyranny could no longer cheer her up.
The baby seal, unmolested, flapped and rolled its way about the deck until an attendant discreetly retrieved it. With a toss of the head, Hancock stared ahead without blinking until the gaudy banners of the Clown Emperor appeared above the ocean line, flapping in the wind. A drop of cold sweat trickled down her spine as she recalled Blackbeard’s rough hands closing around her neck, draining her power. Silvers Rayleigh had showed up in time to save her from certain death and her kingdom from subjugation, but he had his own demons to fight. Without the World Government’s protection, Amazon Lily needed new allies.
“We’re in sight of the Karai Bari shore, Empress,” Marguerite said with a salute.
“Good. Announce my arrival.” How would Crocodile and Mihawk punish Hancock for the countless small insults and slights she’d thrown their way over the years? The former warlords would make her squirm and plead, of course. Some bowing might be called for, if not required. She regretted not getting her maid to pin her hair up.
Behind her, amazons shouted to each other as they backed the mainmast sails until the ship slowed to a rolling halt. A cannon shot pink heart-shaped confetti, alerting the watchmen of Karai Bari to the Snake Princess’s presence. A few beats later, Karai Bari answered with a rocket that shot into the air and exploded, releasing a portrait of Buggy the Clown that wept and melted as the sparks rained down. The “go ahead” sign; the world trembled before Buggy, but everyone who’d met him, including Hancock, knew that his might was all oversized clothes and bluster.
Hancock raised her head, and Marguerite signalled for the other amazons to lower the small craft that would take the Empress to the shore.
“You four, come with me,” Hancock said, tilting her chin at four of her attendants. “Bring my red carpet.” Normally, she liked to travel with a full retinue that included her maid, her manicurist, her poison taster, her torturer and at least twenty of her loudest adorers, but such ostentation was better left to the old days, when the New World had quaked at her name. From her current position of weakness, it could only come across as delusional. A small company, on the other hand, had two benefits. On the one hand, it communicated an appropriate humility from a supplicant. On the other, it let the leaders of the Cross Guild know that regardless of her current misfortunes, Hancock was not afraid of them.
Amazons helped Hancock into the pinnace and lowered the craft while she remained standing, hands on her waist. Salome's weight rested uneasily on her shoulders. Her back muscles strained under the effort to maintain her perfect posture and her feet, in their overtight stilettos, already ached. Not for the first time since her departure, she wished her sisters were by her side. Now that Luffy and Rayleigh had left her, Marigold and Sandersonia were the only people to whom she could show any vulnerability, the only ones who could still look at the cruel and unfeeling Empress of Amazon Lily and see the girl she had once been.
Sensing her unease, Salome wrapped herself more tightly around her shoulders and hissed. Hancock caressed her pet snake, deriving some comfort from the feel of her cool, smooth scales against her own skin.
Mihawk and Crocodile were not waiting for Hancock at the shore, which she had expected. It would have been out of character for them to take a break from the important business of napping and torturing their followers, respectively, in order to greet an applicant. Neither was Buggy present, which was a little more surprising. Hancock could see the true leaders of the Cross Guild having their boss run their errands for them. Instead, a tanned, black-haired woman waited at the deck, hands at her waist and one hip cocked forward, in a vulgar parody of Hancock’s poise. A handful of pirates gathered at her back, with hangdog looks and submissive poses that hinted at their subservient status.
The strange woman was taller than Hancock by a few inches, and worse — almost as pretty. Her skin glowed, as if lit by some inner light, and her black eyes sparkled with evil mischief. A cocky grin tugged at the corner of her lips, which she’d painted an attention-seeking shade of red. Hancock threw a haughty glance at her rowers, intent on blindfolding them, if necessary, to protect them from the trollop’s wiles. Their wide eyes and hanging jaws told her the damage had already been done.
This was a catastrophe. Unlike most women’s, Hancock’s beauty was not merely decorative. A coy smile, an arched eyebrow, a judicious tilt of the chin could brute force through her opponents’ defences and leave them paralyzed. Even powerful men were not immune to her charms, if she caught them in a moment of weakness. Alas, proximity to other beautiful women nerfed her abilities. Hancock remained the most beautiful, of course, but people were less likely to fall for her if they were within easy reach of a consolation prize. If she had been home in Amazon Lily, she would have scoffed at the threat, confident that her martial skills and her kingdom’s might could compensate for her devil fruit’s slight loss of effectiveness. In this hostile territory, she would need to show exceptional caution.
“Snake Princess,” the trollop said with a curt nod. Astonishingly, outrageously, she blew a large bubble of gum and popped it. Hancock gasped, struck speechless, though as a small mercy, the woman did not seem to expect an answer. “Since our dear emperor is currently tied up,” and here she chuckled as if she’d made a joke, “I’ve been sent to receive your, uh, delegation, or whatever this is supposed to be. I’m Captain Alvida, the most beautiful woman of the seas.”
“How unfortunate for you that we are on land,” Hancock said before she could stop herself. It was a bad idea to make an enemy of this woman, who’d once co-captained the Buggy and Alvida Pirate Alliance and had probably wheedled, charmed and blackmailed her place at the Cross Guild leaders’ side since then. However, against her better judgement, Hancock found herself intrigued by her attitude. Alvida’s laid-back attitude, insolence, and obvious indifference to Hancock’s charms reminded her of someone she’d once met, someone whose memory filled her chest with warmth. The only man she’d ever loved: Luffy, future King of the Pirates.
Alvida’s eyes narrowed, though she decided not to respond to the slight. Far from sharing Luffy’s kindness, she struck Hancock as the the type of person who whipped up a mental notepad to list the transgressions of everyone she met, to be reckoned with through small-minded acts of revenge when the opportunity presented itself. “So you’re thinking of joining the circus,” she said. “Come along, and I’ll give you a tour of the place. Trust me, you’ll want to know what you’re getting yourself into before you sign on the dotted line. I would have appreciated a head’s up myself.”
“Thank you,” Hancock said, with a slight inclination of the head. Her retinue retrieved her red carpets from the craft and unfolded one of them before her to prevent her shoes from being contaminated by grass and dirt.
Instead of walking ahead, as might be expected of a guide, Alvida took up a spot at Hancock’s side, helping herself to the red carpets. She was not quite impudent enough to throw an arm around Hancock’s shoulders, but her chummy tone was scarcely more agreeable. “You may have heard we’re not a traditional criminal organization,” she said. “Positions are merit-based around here. It’s not just a matter of brute power, either. You need wits and beauty to win the race to the big top.” She gestured at a large and gaudy tent that towered over the rest of the circus, and which presumably housed the leadership’s headquarters.
“Is this how you ended up running errands for…” Hancock almost said Crocodile and Mihawk. “Buggy?”
“Around here, he’s called Emperor Buggy. We both know what the title’s worth, but you might as well get into the habit.” Alvida walked briskly. While Hancock could match her pace with ease, the amazons scrambled to roll up each carpet behind them, run ahead and unfold it again fast enough to keep up. One of them tripped, and Hancock made a mental note to herself to flog the girl later. Her responsibilities as Empress had forced her to undergo this mortifying ordeal for the sake of her country, which meant its citizens owed her a little stress relief in exchange.
Through open tent flaps, Hancock caught a glimpse of daily life at the Cross Guild. Men in clown suits making balloon animals for a Marine strapped to an interrogation chair. A performer juggling human skulls to an audience of attentive dogs in tiny hats and vests. A contortionist sorting piles of bills with her toes under the watchful eye of a mime with a machine gun. A tent exploded close enough for the blast to muss Hancock’s perfectly coiffed hair, generating no interest from the locals that she could discern.
At Hancock’s side, Alvida prattled, blathered and blabbed. If there was anything of substance in her self-satisfied drivel, it went over Hancock’s head. She was too busy analysing Alvida’s face to find weaknesses. From up close, the strumpet had several flaws that should have marred her beauty, some faded freckles, a mouth that was a bit too wide, a nose that was a little crooked, as if it had been broken before. Infuriatingly, her rogueish good looks survived these minor imperfections, coming out even stronger from the adversity.
“As charming as this conversation has been, I’m having some trouble seeing where it’s leading,” Hancock said. She found herself wanting to egg Alvida on, to see what would happen if she went too far.
“Hold your horses. I haven’t even shown you your coworkers’ quarters yet. Though perhaps we’ll finish processing your application first.”
They approached a tent that reeked of wild animals, a feral, musky scent, tinged with blood. Several pirates sat on a fence, spectating a combat between a giant lion and a man in a strongman’s tunic.
Alvida cleared her throat. The pirates turned their heads. “It’s Alvida, the most beautiful woman of the seas!” they exclaimed, in a display that Hancock immediately recognized as staged from having organized similar ones in the past.
“And this is Boa Hancock, the most beautiful woman in the world!” Hancock’s amazons replied, in a surge of wounded patriotic pride. The two groups eyed each other belligerently.
“Looks like there’s already discord in our ranks,” Alvida said, turning to Hancock with a smarmy laugh. “If we are to work together, us leaders will have to come to an agreement. Of the two of us, who shall be deemed the most beautiful? I vote for myself, of course.”
“Beauty speaks for itself,” Hancock said courteously.
“Yours seems a bit tongue-tied right now, if you don’t mind me saying so.”
“You’re both pretty,” one of Alvida’s pirates said, visibly anxious to break the tension. “It doesn’t have to be a contest.”
“It’s a cutthroat world out there,” another chimed in. “Women ought to support each other, instead of competing over trivialities.”
“True beauty is on the inside, anyway.”
“Enough! Stay out of this,” Alvida said, glaring at her henchmen, who froze as swiftly as if she had a petrification ray of her own. “Well, what do you say, Snake Princess? Who is the most beautiful woman in the world? Answer carefully. Your ticket to the Cross Guild hangs in the balance.”
At once, Alvida’s scheme became clear. Knowing Hancock wouldn’t easily bend the knee, the woman had conceived to humiliate her in front of both their crews with this juvenile hazing ritual that she’d probably planned weeks in advance, giggling to herself at Hancock’s embarrassment. Well, the joke was on her. Hancock had no intention of submitting to this pathetic show of schoolgirl politics. “There’s only one person who can be called the most beautiful woman in the world, and it’s me,” she said.
Alvida seemed taken aback. Perhaps she liked Hancock, after all, and had intended to go easy on her. It had to sting to have her kindness flung back to her face. “There’s no room for big egos in the Cross Guild, aside from mine,” she snapped, a back-alley coarseness creeping into her voice.
Hancock’s retinue watched her with neutral expressions, though she could sense, beneath the blank faces, the disappointment they were too frightened to express. She would have to choose her next words carefully. Thanks to her looks, she could be forgiven minor sins, like kicking puppies, but even she could not get away with refusing the help her kingdom desperately needed on account of her pride. “I would do anything to save my country,” she said, more to her followers than to Alvida, “except lie about the one thing that matters the most. After all, whatever power my country has, it owes to my beauty.”
“Anything?” Alvida repeated, recovering some of her assurance. “Are you sure? I can make this so much worse for you.”
“Are you sure?” Hancock asked. “I’m a potential ally of the Cross Guild. It would reflect badly on your organization if you make me lose face.” She was beginning to enjoy this. Even when her opponents seemed to have all the cards, a true queen always came out ahead.
With the over-familiarity Hancock had come to despise, Alvida leaned forward to whisper in her ear. “In that case, what do you say we continue the application process in private, your majesty?”
Before Hancock could answer, Alvida drew away with a laugh. “Just kidding!” she said. “That was the test, and you passed. The Cross Guild can appreciate a woman who stands by her principles, regardless how misguided they are. Isn’t that right, boys?”
Relieved, her crew laughed. “Sure is, ma’am.”
“Come now, Princess. I’ve got some paperwork for you to fill out. My crew will show your people around. Make these girls feel at home, boys.”
“You got it, ma’am.”
“Stay here,” Hancock told her retinue, striving to keep her voice cool. Alvida’s grin had returned, which was less than reassuring.
“Is the snake venomous? Never mind—leave it too. I hate animals.”
Hancock almost refused, but she couldn’t run the risk of Alvida losing patience and sending her packing. “I’ll be back soon,” she promised, kissing Salome on the nose before entrusting her to one of her amazons, who did not seem thrilled with the responsibility. Hancock could feel the snake’s forlorn gaze at her back as she turned away to follow her hostess.
“Anything, you say?” Alvida grumbled when they were out of earshot. “I’ll hold you up to that, Princess. It’s too bad - I wanted to go easy on you, but you had to go and make life hard for yourself.” She navigated the uneven ground of the circus with ease, in spite of her impractical high-heeled boots.
Unused to treading on grass, Hancock struggled to keep up. Her mind was racing. “Where are we going?” She had schooled her tone to be more polite, even though she hated herself for it. Some cringing part of herself was trying to resurface after years of hiding, the little girl that desperately sought affection and approval from whoever she perceived, however wrongly, as an authority figure.
“Oh, yeah. I’m glad you ask. I’ve got a wild animal to tame. You want in the Cross Guild, Snake Princess? You’ll have to work with me.”
“I’ve always found violence to be effective with mine,” Hancock offered, relieved to find herself on familiar ground.
“Good. I’ve got a talent for that.”
The tents around them looked increasingly derelict as they made their way deeper into the circus town, away from the shore. The animal stench grew suffocating. A chorus of hisses and whines greeted Alvida as she neared the cages in which the Cross Guild kept its predators—at least, those that walked on four legs. Lions, leopards and cheetahs crouched behind the bars and licked their lips as they anxiously watched Alvida’s approach.
A fat man who’d been dozing before the door of the cage woke up with a start. “Get out of here, Mohji,” Alvida told him as she selected a leather crop from the stand.
“Sure, but you’ll owe me one.” He slunk away with a lewd smile at Hancock she did not appreciate.
Without replying, Alvida unlocked the door of the cages, one by one. “Come out,” she ordered. Heads hung low, tails lashing, the beasts exited their cages and circled her. A leopard lunged first and sank its teeth into her shoulder. One by one, the others followed suit, until Hancock could barely make out Alvida under the furry, writhing bodies. Alone, a cheetah sat on its haunches, waiting with a sad resignation that looked almost human.
Incredibly enough, Alvida remained standing under the throng of beasts. Not only that - she threw her head back and laughed. Seeing that their teeth had no effect, a few of the wild cats released her and slunk away. The leather crop, unforgiving, lashed out and distributed blows at their retreating backs.
“You have a devil fruit,” Hancock said, unnerved. She’d never heard of the woman before and had sensed no great power emanating from her, but it was just like Crocodile to collect devil fruit users that liked to keep a low profile.
“Yes. I’ve eaten the Smooth-Smooth fruit, which makes all attacks against me bounce off as harmlessly as a kiss. You can see I’m not helpless against you, Princess.” The remaining beasts released Alvida. She strode up to the stand and picked out a collar and leash, which she fastened to the neck of the only cheetah that had not attacked her. “Come with me, Chiquita. The rest of you, get back in your cages,” she ordered the other cats, who obeyed with a last resentful look at her. “Make yourself useful, Princess. Lock their cages for me.” She tossed the keys to Hancock, who did not move to catch them. “Great. Now you’ll have to pick them up.”
Again, that people-pleasing part of Hancock resurfaced. She ought to shove it back in the darkness, where it belonged, but she was strangely reluctant to do so. The Celestial Dragons who had raised her as a child had taught her to bow, and cringe, and simper, to expect the blow before it came. She would have liked to forget the knowledge, but sometimes it came back to her, unexpectedly, when she left her guard down; and to her horror, this desire to please came with a flushed and guilty sensation that felt almost like pleasure.
Fortunately, she never had the occasion to express this part of herself, forced to project an unflinching arrogance to prevent greedy hands from tearing her down from her throne. At times, however, she wondered what it would be like to let go again; to let someone else call the shots, as long as she could afterwards return to her throne.
With a haughty look around to see if anyone was watching, she crouched and elegantly picked up the key. The animals blinked at her as she neared their cages. “Have you considered you would save yourself a lot of work if you simply made them love you?” Hancock asked, extending a hand into one of the cages to run her fingers through a lion’s mane.
“That part comes next.” Alvida left behind the reeking cages without another look at Hancock. Flushing already at the disrespect, Hancock nevertheless followed her. At some distance from the majestic black, gold and purple tents that presumably belonged to Mihawk and Crocodile stood a smaller but no less luxurious tent of pink and red silk. Men and women holding bouquets of flowers and boxes of bonbons lined before the entrance, waiting for its occupant to make an entrance.
“Get out of here!” Alvida said, distributing stings of the crop left and right to her admirers. “I need to have important business discussions with the Snake Princess. And my pet cheetah. Yes, run! I’ll have your hide if you come back! Chiquita, be a dear, pick up one of those bonbon boxes for me,” she told her pet as she parted the heavy curtains of the tent.
The interior was decorated with gaudy garlands, colourful drapes and glittering baubles, in the tacky image of its mistress. There was only one seat in the room, a pink plush armchair inset with gold leaf. Releasing the cheetah’s leash, Alvida picked up a handful of long ribbons from her dresser and sat down with a small sigh. “Come here, Chiquita.”
Even though its leash was no longer being held, the cheetah obeyed without hesitation. “You can see I’ve already done a number on this one,” Alvida said, scratching it between the ears. “I do not have to scream at her or strike her to make myself heard. I could even replace her leash with a ribbon and she would make no effort to free herself at all.”
As she spoke, her long fingers deftly undid the collar around the beast’s neck and replaced it with a pink ribbon, which she tied with a bow. The other end trailed on the ground. Alvida fished something that looked like a dry pink sponge from her pocket and waved it. The cheetah slavered and extended its neck to reach it.
“Catch!” Alvida said, throwing the treat across the room. The cheetah stood up and took a few steps towards the treat but, reaching the end of its ribbon, sat down again and stared at it forlornly. “You see, Snake Princess, that it does love me.”
“What my followers feel for me is love,” Hancock said. “That creature is terrified of you.”
“All love has terror at the heart of it. Come here. I don’t want to turn my head to talk to you.”
Hancock, who had been pacing around the tent to inspect the furnishings, paused before a mirror. She had been thinking. While it made sense for the leaders of the Cross Guild to mildly embarrass Hancock by sending one of their subordinates to greet her, that controlling bastard Crocodile wouldn’t want to offend someone as volatile and dangerous as Hancock when he wasn’t around to deal with the fallout. Alvida was overstepping her bounds, badly. This meant that Hancock could play along with Alvida’s games for as long as it entertained her, before turning her into stone without consequences. With any luck, Crocodile and Mihawk might even be grateful for getting rid of this insolent upstart.
“What do you want now?” she asked, pretending her steps had naturally brought her to stand before Alvida’s chair.
“I rather like those ribbons you’ve tied around your waist,” Alvida said. “May I have them?” Her tone made it clear that refusal was not an option.
“I don’t think so,” Hancock said, resisting the urge to cross her arms around her waist.
“I was given the impression you’d do anything for your country,” Alvida said, with mock regret. “Clearly that was all talk, like the rest of you. Yes, there you go. It’s just a few ribbons, isn’t it?”
The ribbons had kept the sash around Hancock’s waist in place. Without them, her dress threatened to gape open. She held it closed with one hand, ignoring the heat that rushed to her cheeks. Alvida admired the ribbons. “Such beautiful workmanship! Much nicer than mine.”
“Unlike your mass-produced rubbish, all our clothes and jewelry are handmade by our expert artisans,” Hancock said.
“My belongings are stolen, not mass-produced,” Alvida said, visibly insulted.
“Give me my ribbons back, then,” Hancock said, extending her free hand. “If you want them, you’ll have to take them.”
“Actually, I don’t want them anymore. They look better on you.” Alvida fastened one end of a ribbon around Hancock’s wrist and stood up, twisting Hancock’s arm behind her back. “I’m trying to finish taming my pet and you’re being a distraction, Snake Princess. Hold still.” From behind, she took Hancock’s other wrist and bound the other end of the ribbon around it.
“It would be ludicrously easy for me to break out of this,” Hancock said, voice shaking with indignation at this gross underestimation of her strength.
“It would, but, like Chiquita, you won’t. I’ve already begun to tame you. Sit down and be quiet,” she told the cheetah, who was whining. “You too, Snake Princess.”
“There’s nowhere to sit!”
The leather crop lashed out. Hancock gasped as the sting as it struck her exposed breast. Her unprotected white flesh turned pink and angry. Heat rushed to her cheeks again and also, unsettlingly, to the cradle of her belly, between her legs. “You’ll figure it out,” Alvida said, recovering her good humour.
Still reeling, Hancock carefully knelt down on the ground. Turning Alvida into stone would not be enough. Hancock would turn her into stone, break her limbs, one by one, bring her back to life and turn her to stone again. “A true queen always looks down, regardless how low she is brought,” she said.
Alvida ignored her. “Chiquita, darling, your coat is a mess. Fetch me your hairbrush.” She untied the ribbon from around the cheetah’s neck and nudged it into action with the tip of her crop. After a confused spin on itself, the beast stood up and wandered around the room.
“No, your brush,” Alvida repeated as Chiquita brought her a cushion. The crop snapped. With a whine, the cheetah backed away and resumed its search, bringing back the desired object this time.
“Good girl. Sit.” Alvida ran the brush through Chiquita’s fur. “Did you know that animals have to be tamed twice?” she asked Hancock without looking at her. “Once, to break their spirit.”
“And the second time?” Hancock asked through gritted teeth.
“To make them love the hand that broke them.” Alvida’s arm lashed out. The hairbrush flew across the room and smashed a mirror. “Oh, no. I dropped my brush.” She fluttered her lashes at Hancock. “Would you mind fetching it for me?”
“I’m not-” Hancock began. The tip of the leather crop parted her silk dress and slid down her chest, pausing thoughtfully at the red sting mark it had previously left. “Untie me, at least,” she pleaded, close to tears.
“I don’t think so.” Alvida sat back in her makeshift throne and tapped the side of a boot with her crop, smiling. “Not now, at least. Perhaps if you’re good and do as I say.”
Part of Hancock wanted to stand up until she towered over the minx and crush her windpipe with the back of her heel. Another wanted to feel the hairbrush tenderly going through her hair, someone else’s fingers wiping away her tears, a voice calling her good and telling her that everything would be cared for, that it would all be all right. She was also inconveniently turned on, unbearably so, and terrified of looking down at herself, for fear of seeing her own flesh throbbing and exposed to Alvida’s scorn. “Fine,” she muttered.
“You are listening at last, Snake Princess. Is it really for love of your country, or are you finally learning to love me?”Alvida scratched her cheetah between the ears without looking at Hancock. The cheetah purred.
Turning away to recover some semblance of her dignity, Hancock tried to stand up and realized it would be difficult without losing her heels or tripping over the edge of her dress. Making the best of the situation, she crawled on her knees and moved pieces of the mirror aside delicately with her tongue before biting down on the hairbrush.
“Ugh, my boots are filthy,” Alvida said, noticing for the first time the signs she’d gone for a walk. “When I take that hairbrush from you, I want you to lick them clean.”
Hearing this, Hancock refused to yield the hairbrush, even when Alvida struck her with the crop. Alvida sat back. “I suppose that’s just as well. I’m tired of the sound of your voice.” She took another of Hancock’s ribbons and fastened it around her throat. “Come with me, now.”
Defeated, eyes blurry with tears, Hancock followed her to the best of her ability. Alvida matched her pace and only whipped Hancock when she paused, an unexpected kindness for which Hancock was disgustingly, embarrassingly grateful. She was led to a pile of cushions at which she stared with a mixture of dread and anticipation.
“Lie down,” Alvida ordered.
“No,” Hancock wanted to say, “It’s gone too far,” but she could only whine. The crop struck her, again and again, until she stirred and stretched herself out as best as she could on the cushions. The ribbon that was binding her hands came undone. She kept her hands behind her back, trying not to look sly.
“You thought I wouldn’t notice, did you?” Alvida said, taking her wrists and binding them in front of her this time. “There, now there’s no hiding yourself.” With the crop, she caressed Hancock’s face and then, slowly, made her way down the vulnerable expanse of her chest, past her stomach, hovering at the cusp of her belly, above the combed tuft of black hair between her legs. “It’s not all I can see. I know what you want. I’ve seen it ever since you first looked at me.”
Hancock shook her head, clenching her legs shut, feeling betrayed by the wetness she felt between her thighs. Alvida only laughed. “Am I wrong? Don’t be so quick to say no. There’s value in having an ally who knows you - truly knows you, as you are, along with all those deep and shameful desires you hide from the rest of the world.”
She slid the crop between Hancock’s legs and parted her legs, exposing her throbbing cunt. Hancock gasped and almost let go of the hairbrush. Alvida contemplated her, the tip of the crop resting above Hancock’s clit, exerting a slight and infuriating pressure. “I’m proposing an alliance, Snake Princess. You and me against these loathsome men.” Her crop travelled back and forth between Hancock’s legs. “Think about it, Princess. You could come and see me whenever you want. We have their love and their power now, while we’re beautiful, but beauty doesn’t last forever. It’s always good to have a backup plan.”
Hancock spat out the hairbrush so she could speak, but Alvida, predicting her response, turned her over and spanked her ass several times with it, businesslike, before gently restoring it. “Don’t answer me now. Think about it.” Unexpectedly, she went down on one knee next to Hancock to dip her fingers and wet the handle of the leather crop. “You are so fucking beautiful,” she said as she spread Hancock open with her fingers and inserted the crop inside of her. “The only one who comes close to me. Come, now, and ride me.”
Hancock’s muscles clenched and unclenched around the crop, this painful but pleasurable intrusion that was an extension of Alvida’s hand. With one hand still holding the crop, Alvida’s mouth approached Hancock’s clit, until Hancock could feel her breath, the heat almost painful in her current state of arousal. “So beautiful,” she repeated at last and, falling silent, she pressed her tongue to Hancock’s clit.
The leather crop revolved inside of her, filling her stomach with a pleasant fullness, while Alvida’s tongue did its work. Having learned her lesson, Hancock clenched her teeth around the hairbrush and took the pleasure in silence, throwing her head back when the orgasm washed over her. “Here,” Alvida said, taking the brush from her and running it through her hair. “You did good. Now what do you say, Snake Princess?” She stood up and resumed her seat on her throne. “Don’t speak. If you’re tame, you will come here and clean my boots.”
Dripping wet, the front of her gown gaping open, Hancock made her way to Alvida on her knees and bowed down to run her tongue up the black leather. “Good,” Alvida said. “We’ll do great things together, you and me. Now there’s just one last thing we need to settle. Who’s the most beautiful woman in the world?”
Hancock stood up, tottering, and freed herself from the ribbon around her wrists. “I am,” she said, with an unexpected sense of regret. “And you shall love me.”
Alvida opened her mouth in protest and froze. The coldness of stone had touched her tongue first. Her arm reached for the leather crop she had dropped and never made it. Her boots were still crossed, cockily, when the stone charm finished its work. It seemed the attraction had been mutual, after all.
Hancock sat on her lap and made herself comfortable as she dried herself up on one of Alvida’s sashes and laced up the front of her dress. “Now that you know so many of my secrets, I look forward to learning yours,” she said. “But in beauty as in war, there can only be one winner.”