Chapter Fifteen: Sleeping Beauty

“…And this hallway contains both your room and mine, conveniently right next to each other. I don’t want you sneaking off or anything, do I?” He winked. “Besides, I might get thirsty in the night.” He led me into yet another room; it was a fairly large one, furnished nicely—if sparingly—but I wasn’t paying attention to that: I was focused on the giant falcon in the corner.

Standing on a perch with not so much as a piece of thread to keep it there was one of the biggest raptors—a gyrfalcon, I guessed—I’d ever seen. Zane immediately gestured to this falcon and said, with a hint of pride in his voice, “This is Meallán, my gyrfalcon.”

“Why isn’t he tethered?” I inquired.

Zane just shrugged. “He won’t go anywhere; he’s already been trained, unlike certain people in this room.” He grinned down at me, then added, “But I’ll get around to you in no time.”
I felt a shiver rack my spine again as Zane made some strange clicking noises in the back of his throat; the shiver turned into pure terror as the gyrfalcon—Meallán—shot off of his perch, wings flapping frantically, and rocketed right toward me.

His talons were stretched out in front of him, and I wanted to retreat, but I found that I was held in place by my own body, which was frozen with fear. So I simply closed my eyes and hoped it wouldn’t hurt too much, when suddenly I felt a bit of breeze, followed by a weight on my shoulder and the feeling of something sharp poking gently through my hair.

“He wouldn’t hurt you,” Zane said; I could hear the smirk in his voice. “And as for his beak in your hair, that’s how he gets to know who people are. He’s taking in your scent right now, and relating it to some various things that even I don’t know about. From now on, he’ll know you’re allowed in here, and won’t attack you unless I tell him to.”

Hesitantly, I opened my eyes to find that Zane was, in fact, watching me with a smirk on his face, and that Meallán was perched on my shoulder, and still poking through my hair. After a few more seconds, he put his head back up and abruptly flew over to Zane’s shoulder.

“Well, this sucks,” Zane said. “Here I am, with a pretty girl who has to do whatever I say, and is locked in my room, and I don’t know what to make you do. I mean, there’re limitless possibilities, and I’m completely clueless. And it’s not like I could ask you for suggestions or anything.”

I simply rolled my eyes and watched as Meallán flew back over to his perch and preened himself; Zane just brushed a feather off his shoulder and sat down on the edge of his bed, looking thoughtful for a short time before shrugging.

“Well, you are a maid,” he said, “so I guess I’ll put you to work. The bathroom needs cleaning—toilet, floors, sinks, the works—and this whole room needs dusting.”

After staring at him in disbelief for probably 5 full minutes, I turned and silently walked out of the room, got some supplies from my bag in the hallway, and headed to the bathroom. Still stoic, I got onto my hands and knees and began to scrub.

And scrub, and scrub, and scrub.

After ages and ages of scrubbing, I finally stood up, out of breath, and saw a sparkling clean bathroom. I then staggered out into the hallway and painstakingly replaced all the bits and pieces to where they’d been before. When I finally returned to Zane’s room, my knees and hands ached, and I had a slight headache from the fluorescent lighting.

But of course, Zane was armed with a duster when I walked in, and promptly—and with a cheery smile—handed it to me.

And so I dusted his room, and a few other rooms; and imagine my disgust when, after all that dusting, Zane greeted me by spilling his soda on the floor and immediately telling me to scrub the floor until you could no longer see the stain that marred it.

By this time, of course, my knees and hands were throbbing with pain, as well as my elbows, neck, and back, and I was generally exhausted beyond belief. I just wanted to go curl up in my own bed and have a good night’s rest. But instead I scrubbed Zane’s floor until, indeed, you could no longer see the stain.

Following which, I was asked to alphabetize his bookshelf.

Quietly cursing Zane’s name, I turned to do so, almost falling asleep at the tedious work, but finally finishing after what seemed to be an eternity of work. By now, my whole body ached, and I was about to just fall over on the floor and pass out. But nonetheless I stumbled back to Zane’s room, and was extremely relieved when he said, “No more hard work for today.”

My heart sank again, though, when he continued: “Instead, you get the honor of hanging out with me for the night.”

At my crestfallen face, he insisted, “Oh, don’t be that way. It’ll be fun; we’ll watch some movies, talk a while, maybe make some cookies or something…just hang out, get to know each other. After all, we’re going to be spending a lot of time with each other from now on.”

“Do I get a choice?” I asked. “’Cause if I do, my answer’s no.”

Zane shrugged. “In that case, no, you don’t get a choice,” he answered matter-of-factly, then grabbed me swiftly around the waist and effortlessly lifted me up and over his shoulder, like a sack of potatoes.

He then carried me over to a couch and set me down. He slid himself down next to me, slinging his arm casually over my shoulders, but I could tell that he would tighten his grip if I tried to run for it. Then he grabbed a remote and flipped on the TV, channel-surfing for a while, until he reached a channel that was playing The Princess Bride.

“Perfect,” he said, without a trace of sarcasm, “a love story with swordfights, perfect for boys and girls alike. Have you seen it before?”

Scoffing, I rolled my eyes. “Are you kidding me? It’s a classic, for God’s sake! Of course I’ve seen it before. It’s one of the best movies of all time, and Westley is the original—and much better, might I add—Edward Cullen. Except he’s also a ‘pirate’ and a swordfighter and all that.”

I quickly clamped my mouth shut, having not meant to say that much, but Zane just grinned good-naturedly and turned up the volume, also tightening his grip and tugging me in a little closer to him. His grin turned into a smirk as he leaned his head on top of mine.

“Could you not?” I asked. “I may be single, but you’re so not my type.”

Rather than responding, he just cackled evilly and turned the volume up a little more. “Just watch the movie,” he finally said. “It’s just starting, I think…”

Before I knew it, I was free of Zane’s clutches, free of the freaking dress, free of everything, and spending my hours with Westley and Inigo Montoya, who I’d prefer any day to Zane. But before long, I felt my eyelids growing heavy, my breath slowing, and—to my horror, and his intense glee and amusement—my body slipping a little into his grip.

My eyes snapped open so that I could glare at him, and I shoved away. He shrugged nonchalantly and went back to the movie. I couldn't help but notice, though, the mischievous glint in his eyes.

I tried my best to remain alert, but it wasn’t long at all before I found myself drifting off again. Zane took the opportunity to sling his arm casually over my shoulders again, which woke me up immediately. I shot him a scathing look and grabbed his arm, throwing it at his own lap.

“Would you lay off?” I snapped, gesturing at his arm. “Seriously.”

Being Zane, he unflappably replied, “No,” and drape his arm yet again over my shoulders.

I elbowed him in the ribs. “What if I said that maybe—maybe—I’d kiss you willingly someday later, if you laid off with the arm thing, and maybe showed me to my room?”
Zane looked thoughtful for a moment, then replied, “I would say ‘Great,’ but who needs willing when I could just make you do it any time?” To accentuate his point, he leaned over and brushed my forehead with his lips, tightening his grip when I struggled.

Then he chuckled softly—and almost predator-like sound—and loosened his grip once more, straightening and turning back to the almost-forgotten movie.

“Fine, I’ll just find my own room,” I grumbled, stood—which made his arm fall off—and began walking towards the only visible door.

He grabbed my waist and stood up with me, purring, “How about I show you and then take a bit of payment for it?” He took a few steps forward so that he was even with me, one arm still around my waist, and looked amusedly down at me; I noticed that his sandy blonde hair fell attractively in his face, obscuring part of his crooked smirk.

Although my heart had admittedly sped up, I muttered, “No thanks,” and walked hurriedly out the door, taking a right, then a left, then another right, without thinking. Within a few minutes, I was hopelessly lost—and I knew it.

Feeling a little desperate, I opened the door in front of me, to find…nothing. I then took a few steadying breaths and opened the next door down—still nothing—then the door after that, and the door after that. When I finally found something, it was the last something I’d been hoping to see.

That something was Zane, who was lounging on the bed. I felt a foreboding sense in my stomach the moment the leer crept onto his face, and that sense was justified when he shifted a little to the side and asked, with a perfectly straight face, “Care to join me?”