“We’ll see…”
I can’t help but whip my cloak around dramatically as I leave Alex’s side, and I hear him snort at my theatrics. I expect the Magician will provide me with the clothes… or lack thereof... but instead, two of the guards peel off and come to gather me. As they walk, I notice something that I had missed before; the guards are women! Their shapely legs reveal themselves behind the swishes of their cloak, and I feel much more comfortable knowing that my fellow women would help with my costume.
I try to see past the empty black holes of their eyes, but I still can’t see anything besides the flat white of their masks. It’s very unsettling, but I shake off my uneasiness as they usher me from the entrance room, through a door, and into a large bedroom. The bedroom is decorated in blacks, whites, and silvers, and interspersed on the brilliant white comforter are several slinky outfits, all very boudoir, and insanely revealing. A thrill runs through me, knowing I’ll be wearing one of these with Alex all night. There is no way he can resist me now.
One of the silent women finally speaks. “Choose,” she says, motioning toward the different outfit choices. I walk around the bed, tapping my lips with a finger as I consider them. They’re all scandalous in their own way. I guess the queen and duchess outfits must be in another room.
One outfit catches my eye. It’s a bra and panty set like most of the others but made of black lace with three velvet straps attaching the bra to a choker collar. What sets it apart for me is that the cups behind the black lace are solid silver, like the wings of my mask, and silver filigree runs along the waistband of the panties. The silver stiletto of my shoes, the silver waistband of the panties, the silver cups of the bra, and the silver wings of the mask all interspersed with deep, dark black. I love when things come together like this.
“This one,” I tell the women, who only stare back at me silently. Um, okay. I guess I have to change in front of them.
My face burns, but something tells me I am far from the first person to do this tonight. I change quickly, covering myself with my cloak as I do. I button the choker collar on, and I’m ready. I wonder where I should leave my dress, but they just extend a hand indicating for me to give it to them.
Alex is waiting for me back in the foyer, no longer wearing his cloak, with a snifter of whiskey in his hand when I enter. He watches as I walk in, and I know he’s waiting for me to show him my outfit. For a second I consider not showing him, only letting him catch glimpses of me as the night goes on, but I’m impatient. I want his reaction now. I drag the cloak away from me, so it is just my body framed in a sea of silver-black fabric.
Alex sucks in a breath before he laughs sarcastically. “And here I thought nothing at these masquerades could surprise me anymore.”
“Do you like it?” I ask quietly.
He raises a single eyebrow at the question, coming to my side and putting his arm around my waist to usher me into the principal part of the party. I guess he will not bless me with an answer. Too bad for him. I already know how much he must like it. He can play hard to get if he wants, but I’m his wife, and he can’t fool me.
One of the guards helps me to take off my cloak and I stand beside my husband with nothing but my three piece lingerie. I feel totally self-conscious given the fact he’s in a tuxedo and I’m barely wearing anything. I feel weird, truly like a courtesan accompanied by her client or something.
Two of the guards open an enormous set of double doors for us, and I gasp as we enter the main part of the palazzo.
It’s part carnival, part formal ball, and part sex club. We are on a circular walkway, and down a short staircase is a sunken ballroom. I can see an orchestra playing. The music is upbeat and seductive, wrapping around me like smoke. All the musicians are dressed in black with full black Venetian masks, but they are the most modest in the sunken ballroom by far. I lean over the railing of the walkway, hardly believing my eyes.
The dance floor is black marble, shot through with red veins. Behind me, red velvet curtains conceal the walls, like at a theater, and everything is lit by candlelight. The sparse illumination causes everything, us included, to cast long shadows. The effect is sensual, and a little eerie.
There is a duchess or two dancing, but the nude women totally overshadow them. The “slaves” and “courtesans” are wearing either lingerie or only collars and are pressed close to their men of choice as they dance. Some of the men are shirtless as well, but from what I can see, only the women are completely nude. The atmosphere is dark, and some couples are clearly doing more than just dancing.
“Want to join them?” Alex asks.
“Shush, you,” I mumble, causing Alex to laugh. I watch the dancers for a moment more. “Are we going to have to do that?”
“Even if I was going to touch you, I don’t think I’d have you naked on the dance floor. There are so many other…” He runs his hand down my back, grazing my ass. “More interesting things to enjoy here. Especially with a novice like you.”
“What more interesting things?”
“Let’s go find out, why don’t we?” Alex says, taking my arm in his again.
We walk the huge perimeter of the walkway. Every few feet a hallway or room breaks off from the circular room, each one full of something new. Alex leads me into the first room, and we have to push a curtain out of the way to see the entertainment. It’s a woman in a tightly wound corset and the skeleton of a ballet skirt blooming around her hips, only bits of ragged tulle hanging on. Her mask is equally strange. It looks like it was meant to be a doll with rosy cheeks and red lips, but one side is peeling away. She dances on pointe, twirling and sweeping her arms on top of a tattered platform while tinny music plays. A broken music box ballerina.
We watch for a moment. She makes me feel sad for some reason, and I tug on Alex’s sleeve, showing I want to move on. The next attraction is up a set of stairs off the main walkway. There is tiered seating, like a circus, and in the middle of the floor is a man dressed as a ringmaster. At his feet sit three women, the first holding a single torch, the second holding three, and the third a hoop. They are scantily dressed in thongs, corsets, and thigh-high fishnets.
The ringmaster motions the women to stand, and they make their way to three different places around the ring. Suddenly, he grabs the first woman and pulls her to him, kissing her deeply. The make-out session is uncomfortably long, but when he releases her, she staggers back as if in pain. Her body heaves before she throws her head back, and to my absolute shock, spits a gout of flame into the air six feet above her.
I yelp, covering my own mouth as if fire could come out of me too. The fire-breather holds her single torch into her fire stream, lighting it, and throwing it to the second woman as her flame dies down. The second woman immediately begins to juggle her now four torches. On the first rotation, she touches the flaming torch to her tongue, and on the next pass, she touches an unlit one to her tongue. It ignites like the first. She continues until they are all lit before throwing one to the third woman.
The third woman catches the flaming torch and holds it to her hoop, and it ignites. She spins it around her waist in a hula-hooping belly dance, and as she does, flames lick up her clothes, burning them away bit by bit, until she stands nude, spinning the flaming hoop around her naked figure until at last the flame dies down and the hoop falls to the floor.