At first the stone had felt good. Now and then she twisted to leg the air touch the soreness. Of course the abraded flesh was much healed from last night's ordeal on the Bridle Path, but she still suffered, and she knew tonight she was surely destined for more torment.

Not the least of it, however, was her own passion. What had the Prince awakened in her that after one night of no satisfaction, she should feel so wanton? It was the stirring between her legs that first brought her out of sleep in the Slaves' Hall, and now and then she felt it as she stood waiting.

The room itself lay in shadow and unbroken stillness. Dozens of thick candles burned in their heavy gilded holders, the wax spilling in rivulets through the traceries of gold. The bed with its tapestried draperies appeared a gaping cavern.

Beauty closed her eyes. She opened them again. And when she was again on the verge of dream, she heard the heavy double doors thrown open and suddenly saw the tall, slender figure of the Queen materialized before her.

The Queen moved to the center of the carpet. Her blue velvet gown cleaved to her girdled hips before flaring gently to cover her black pointed slippers. She gazed at Beauty with narrow, black eyes tipped up at the ends to give her a cruel expression, and then she smiled, her white cheeks dimpling though an instant before they had seemed as hard as white porcelain.

Beauty had lowered her eyes at once. Petrified, she watched covertly as the Queen moved away from her and seated herself at an ornate dressing table, her back to a high mirror.

With an off-handed gesture she dismissed the Ladies who stood at the door. A figure remained there, and Beauty, afraid to look, was certain it was Prince Alexi.

So her tormentor had come, Beauty thought. Her heart pounded in her ears, becoming a roar rather than a pulse, and she felt the bonds holding her helpless so that she could not have defended herself against anyone or anything. Her breast felt heavy, and the moisture between her legs greatly agitated her. Would the Queen discover it and use it to further punish her?

Yet mingled with her fear was some sense of her helplessness, which had come over her the night before and never left her. She knew how she must appear, she was afraid, but she could do nothing and she was accepting it.

Maybe this was a new strength, this acceptance. And she needed all her strength, for she was alone with this woman who had no love for her. Without words, she evoked a memory of the Prince's love, of Lady Juliana's affectionate touch and warm words of praise, even of Leon's caressing hands.

But this was the Queen, the great powerful Queen who ruled all and who felt nothing but coldness and fascination for her.

She shivered against her will. The throbbing between her legs seemed to slacken and then to grow slightly more intense. Surely the Queen was staring at her. And the Queen could make her suffer. And there would be no Prince to witness it, no Court, no one.

Only Prince Alexi.

She saw him now, moving out of the shadows, a naked form exquisitely proportioned, the dark golden skin making him seem a polished statue.

"Wine," said the Queen. And he was moving to pour it for her.

He knelt at her side and he placed the two-handled cup in her hands, and as she drank, Beauty looked up and saw Prince Alexi smiling directly at her.

She was so startled, she almost made a little gasp. His large brown eyes were full of the same gentle affection he'd shown her last night when he passed her at the banquet table. Then he made his mouth into a silent kiss before Beauty looked away in consternation.

Could he feel affection for her, real affection, even desire, as she felt desire for him when she first saw him?

O, how she ached suddenly to touch him, to feel just once for an instant that silken skin, that hard chest, those dark, rose-colored ni**les. How exquisite they were on that flat chest, those little nodules that seemed so unmasculine, giving him a touch of feminine vulnerability. How had the Queen punished them, she wondered? Were they ever clamped and adorned as her br**sts had been?

They were piquant, those little ni**les.

But the throbbing between her legs warned her, and it took an act of will for her not to move her hips.

"Undress me," the Queen said.

And from beneath her half-mast lids, Beauty watched as Prince Alexi obeyed the command skillfully and deftly.

How clumsy she had been two nights ago and how patient the Prince had been with her.

He used his hands but seldom. His first duty was with his teeth to unsnap the hooks of the Queen's dress and this he did, quickly gathering it as if fell down around her.

Beauty was astonished to see the Queen's full white br**sts naked under a thin chemise of lace. And then Prince Alexi removed her ornate mantle of white silk to show the Queen's black hair hanging loose in ripples over her shoulders.

He took the garments away.

Then he came back to remove with his teeth the Queen's slippers. He kissed her naked feet before he took the shoes out of sight, and then he brought back to the Queen a sheer nightgown trimmed in white lace, the fabric a lustrous cream color. It was very full and pressed into a thousand pleats.

And as the Queen rose, Prince Alexi pulled down the chemise that she wore, and rising to his full height put the nightgown over the Queen's shoulders. She slipped her arms into the deep pleated bag sleeves, and the garment fell about her like a bell.

And then with his back to Beauty, Prince Alexi on his knees again tied a dozen little bows of white ribbon to close the front of the gown to its hem above the Queen's naked insteps.

As he bent over for the last of these, the Queen's hands played idly with his auburn hair, and Beauty found herself staring at his reddened bu**ocks where he had obviously been recently punished. His thighs, his tight, hard calves, all of this enflamed her.

"Pull back the curtains of the bed," the Queen said. "And bring her to me."

Beauty's pulse deafened her. It seemed there was a pressure in her ears, in her throat. Yet she heard the tapestries being drawn back. She saw the Queen recline on the coverlet amid a nest of silk pillows. The Queen looked younger now that her hair was free, and her face was without a trace of age as she stared at Beauty. Those eyes were as placid as if they had been painted in her face with enamel.

Then with a shock of unwelcome pleasure, Beauty saw Prince Alexi before her. He obliterated the vision of the menacing Queen. He bent to untie her ankles and she felt his fingers deliberately caress her. When he rose in front of her again, his hands up to free her wrists, she smelled the perfume of his hair and skin, and there seemed something utterly lush about him. For all his hardness, the squareness of his build, he seemed some great spicy delicacy to her, and she found herself staring right into his eyes. He smiled and let his lips touch her forehead. And they stayed secretly pressed to her forehead until her wrists were entirely free and he was holding them.