Chapter one
A dream
Yellow autumn leaves circled and fell from the trees. Arel recognized this place – exactly there Nikto brought him long ago. There, for the first time, Prince Arel knelt down, asked Nikto to make him his slave and accepted slavery of his own free will. And he agreed to the brand. He agreed to wear a black tattoo on his face forever and received a dog collar on his neck as a gift. This time there was neither Amba nor her dog. It was this time autumn there, and the trees were all adorned with golden foliage.
Arel suddenly realized that he was wearing a woman’s dress, white with a pile of fluffy satin skirts and a tight corset laced up in the back so it was hard to breathe. At the same time, his chest remained open, the corset began a little lower. On the rings inserted into his nipples, large teardrop-shaped pearls now additionally hung, and strings of mother-of-pearls were beautifully stretched through the rings, encircling his chest and hanging down in semicircles onto the corset.
Arel wore a woman’s dress a couple of times in his life as a joke or for a loss at cards, so he knew these sensations, but he never tightened the corset so much that it was difficult to breathe. He was sitting on the ground covered with fallen leaves, dazed, breathing convulsively, pearl drops quivering on his chest. Nikto stood before him.
“Hug me,” Arel asked. Nikto sank to the ground, pulled him to himself and gently touched his lips to his. Arel reached out to him, kissing him back and taking his lower lip towards him, stroking his tongue and touching the rings that were threaded through it. Nikto closed his eyes, thickly painted black; his eyelids twitched.
“I’m your bride,” Arel whispered, barely audible.
No one threw him to the ground, continuing to hug him with one hand, and with the other lifting up the fluffy skirts of the white wedding dress. Yellow leaves rustled beneath them, surrounding them with the tart scent of ripe autumn.
“Just don't leave me! Just don't leave me anymore! Nik, I beg you!”
Nikto turned him over, burying his face in the fallen leaves. Arel’s shoulders trembled from the jolts, and the rigid corset didn’t allow breathing. He didn’t see that Lis was standing very close to them, near the orange tree.
He only noticed him when Nikto let him go, but maybe Nikto noticed Lis before?
“Fox, don't be jealous, I fell in love with Nik,” says Arel somehow lifeless. “Sorry,” the last word sounds guilty.
But contrary to his expectation that Lis would understand, his face twisted into a grin.
“I'm jealous?! Advice and love!”
Nikto doesn’t move, but Lis falls as if from a blow. His red hair mingles with red foliage. He lies without moving or getting up.
“Don't do that,” Arel pleadingly asks Nikto. “Let him say what he wants. I'm not offended at all. Don't punish him.”
Nobody pulls out his box of “medicine” from the bag. It is not a syringe that he pulls out of it, in his hands there is not a glass rod and steel, but a beautiful and thick gold ring. It is smooth and shiny. Engagement?
“Well, come to me,” Nikto calls, and Arel gets up, comes up, not taking his eyes off the golden ring. But contrary to his expectations, Nikto doesn’t take his hand, he is not going to put the wedding ring on his finger as his bride, but stretches out his hands, raising them higher and unclenching the ring, and tries to insert it into Arel’s nose, right into the nostrils. Arel recoils in confusion, not wanting to have a dubious adornment, and then Nikto pushes him, throws him to the ground, leaning on his back again with his whole body, and, opening it, inserts a gold ring into his nose, pushing it into his nostrils. Arel feels how the decoration painfully tears the septum in his nose, feels how it widens his nostrils, interferes with breathing, feels heaviness.
Lis slowly rises from the ground, several fallen leaves tangled in his wavy hair. He looks at Arel, who now has a gold jewelry sticking out of his nose, with some horror, and Arel feels a burning shame.
“Nik, don’t,” Arel tries to say, but his tongue twists, as if it’s swelling in his mouth, and all he gets is a kind of mooing through force.
“Don’t…”
“Prince Arel! Arel! Wake up!” Lis shakes him by the shoulders. Dear Lis, so dear and homely, sleeping in bed nearby.
“What are you humming there? More nightmares? It's the same every night!”
Arel looks at Lis with eyes still dull from sleep, not understanding:
“Lis,” he finally says, and his gaze clears up, “Nikto will return in autumn.”
“You’re delusional,” he chuckles and at the same time asks, “but what, the man you sent to the Royal Route for news has not returned yet?”
“No,” Arel shakes his head, “he hasn’t returned, but I think he will return soon. And Nik, Nik will be back soon too!”
He jumps out of bed:
“I dreamed that I was in a white wedding dress…”
“Oh no! Not that! I'm not going to listen to your nonsense!”
A tattered piece of “Upper Messenger” lies on the table in front of Lis: “The Son of the Devil, nicknamed Nikto, made a daring escape from the Royal Prison, using the Black Sorcery… je opened a mysterious portal leading straight to the Underworld… hidden in the depths of the ancient catacombs, where no man has gone…”
Lis looked up at Valentine, who was standing next to him.
“Has the owner already seen this?”
Valentine nodded in dismay:
“Yes, he told me to show it to you as soon as you return from the hunt.”
“I see. What else did he say?”
“He ordered to bring wine,” Valentine trembled. “And this … this Son of the Devil, will he come here? Sir?”
“I don’t know!” Lis got up. “It's not your concern!”
“Yes, of course, I'm sorry,” Valentine, bowing, scared back to the door.
Lis entered the prince’s room without knocking and saw the already pretty drunk Arel.
“Are you drinking?” He winced with disgust.
“I celebrate the victory!” Arel raised his glass. “Join!”
“Hmm, a victory?”
“Don’t play the fool, Lis, you understand everything perfectly! My Nik made them all and escaped from prison, right from under the noses of these pouty sirs! And they thought they were so smart! He'll be here soon, you'll see! He will return! Soon!”
“Do you believe in this nonsense?” Lis threw the “Messenger” sheet on the table. “The Son of the Devil bewitched Karina, daughter of the head of the Royal Security Service, when she brought him medicine and food. This is complete nonsense!”
“No-no,” Arel happily shook his head, “this is not nonsense! I was there, Balthazar asked her to go down to Nikto’s cell and make an injection, since he himself didn’t want to climb the stairs!”
