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"Why, your grace, you look wonderful this evening. I hope I won't trouble you by asking for a dance?"

The Emperor politely unfurls his paw, but the Prime Minister sits in slowly building anger. He brushes a singular lock of his mane from his eyes, confirming, re-confirming what he sees, as though he hoped that what stood in front of him were a mirage, a terrible prank played by an equally unfunny prankster.

When he realized it was not, the Prime Minister said plainly, "I wish I could say the same for you, Your Majesty."

"Not so happy to see me, I see."

"Seeing as I killed you not a few hours ago, no. I am not happy to see you, Your Majesty."

The Emperor is a beast from the desert kingdoms, a bugbear with claws like black daggers, brutish paws the color of sand. His coarse fur brims with strength underneath his vest, as though he wore bricks of muscle stacked like walls. And yet despite that, he carried himself with all the grace of a high-born noble: Cordial, sophisticated, confident.

The nerve.

The Prime Minister is a leonine half his height with olive-brown fur, dressed in elegant regalia. He smiles. His face wears the gesture no matter how angry he becomes.

He convinces himself that not even the Emperor could risk something sordid with so many people present, and decides against hostility by gingerly taking his paw. It carefully pulls him from his chair. From behind them at the banquet table, the Zendaran royal council quietly commiserate their fears with frantic whispers.

The Emperor guides the leonine to the ballroom floor by hand. A revolving gambol of dancers stop to applaud. They bow, then give them room.

Alone together, they pause at the center of an eagerly-murmuring audience below a crystal chandelier. The Emperor cradles the Prime Minister's hands; He looms over him like a shadow, smells faintly of vanilla, some fragrant incense, like the gentle smog billowing from a pipe.

The waltz begins with a flowering overture. The Emperor leads him into the flow, and they start to revolve. Paws locked with hands, steps gentle and considered despite his bulk. A light shines on them both. They glide as though they are heavenly bodies on the marble floors. Everyone's eyes are on them.

The Emperor leans into his ear as they dance, and says in just above a whisper: "My dear Lancelot, rumors of my immortality are drastically understated."

Lancelot refuses to react, smiles at his people, matches the Emperor's large steps with his supple ones. He cranes his neck at the Emperor and speaks as though to a disapproving father. "I don't believe you. No man can be immortal. Not even the infamous Gaur." He says the name as if it were cursed.

Gaur laughs quietly. His voice is guttural and pleased; his four tusks gleam in the pale light. "Yet here I stand. But we are not men."

The orchestra plays a song on gentle strings and warm piano. Lancelot is reminded of home: Green pastures, low hills, brisk northern winds running through windmills, dandelions sifting through fields of grass.

Something heavy tightens in his chest. His hands are damp and his fingers tremble. Lancelot knows that in front of him stare the jaws of death. He dances with it kindly, keeps his head high to show it no fear. All that he is, and can be, feels painfully miniscule in front of it.

For months, they planned the Emperor's assassination. Once he fell, the desert kingdoms would follow. They ran the scenario a hundred times over, carefully considering every angle, swearing their deepest circle to secrecy upon the statue of the Goddess. Each clergyman of the council agreed to take this to their graves. Not even the King knew of the plot.

And still, they failed.

The people think a miracle of politics unfolds in front of them, but Lancelot wonders if he will disappear from his chambers tonight. Maybe he will sleep and wake to a dagger gliding across his throat. And wouldn't he deserve that for his failure?

He searches for his sworn men: The Kingsguard, hiding among the audience with crests of the holy winged sword on their white mantles. They wait silently, their eyes watching, wolves prowling in herds of sheep. Each one has their hands on the hilts of their silver swords, ready, waiting.

Gaur and Lancelot slide into the next step of the waltz. The music swells to a crescendo, and the Emperor asks coyly, "What are you looking for, darling? Have I bored you already?"

Lancelot's eyes return to him. "You will rue the day you set foot in this castle, warlock."

Gaur's stomach rumbles with more laughter. "Those are bold words. But I've seen what you're capable of. They're empty, as empty as the throne your King sits upon."

Every slide into step brings them closer to the end of the song. Every step, Lancelot thinks, closer to a dagger's edge. His ears ring for a moment. A thin, peculiar, echoing sound. It fades quickly.

"And I suppose you sit upon mountains of gold? I know what they say about you. Everyone knows your shame," says Lancelot.

"And what do they know, my dear?"

"That you make your bed with djinn, and break bread with demons."

"Just imagine what your papers will say tomorrow morning of our dance," The Emperor swings Lancelot into the next leg of the waltz. "'Emperor of Kaffa Dances With Prime Minister.' They will gossip about this night for years to come."

"What dreadful business that will be."

They revolve in silence for a while, and then Lancelot asks, "Do you remember the knight you so voraciously defiled in front of the Kingsguard?"

"Hmm. Do you mean my chamber boy?" Gaur says placidly.

Lancelot's nostrils flare.

The Emperor's lips twist into a grin. "It's sad he couldn't be here today. Waltzes are couples' dances, no? I thought I'd offer my hand in his stead. You should know that I'm taking good care of your husband."

He leads Lancelot into a retreating spin and the leonine twirls. Gaur then pulls Lancelot back and tightens a barreled arm around his waist for only a moment, enough to have their faces inches from one another, enough for Gaur's smiling glower to loom over Lancelot's glare. The Emperor releases him and they glide back into dance.

The audience applauds.

"It must be difficult to control the army now with Arthur gone. Still, you have your claws sunk deep into the King. That still counts for much."

Lancelot has grit his teeth, hissing his words. "I'm tired of playing this game with you. What do you plan to do to me? Kill me in front of everyone here? Or will you send an assassin for my head? Every nation north of the rivers will become your enemy. They'll know it was you."

Gaur shakes his head, eyebrows raising in condescension. "I have no interest in conquering your people. But your allies are strong, and you've become too brave. This situation necessitates control."

"Enlighten me on how you plan to do that."

The Emperor's eyes linger on Lancelot's, as if he regretted saying any more, and then they rise from him to the ballroom throne above. "Look for yourself."

Two grand staircases lead to a balcony that overlooks the ballroom. Two thrones sit at the top, and upon the royal throne to the left sits the Holy King of Zendara, a proud white-maned leonine in blue and white regalia. Next to his throne is the chair of the Prime Minister who sits another, a leonine with olive-brown mane and a smile glaring with teeth, staring pointedly at Lancelot.

Lancelot blinks, catches something in his throat.

He whispers. "What-"

The leonine sitting next to the king leans into his ear, whispers something, then licks his cheek with a red, winding, snake-like tongue. The monarch's face is placid. A bead of drool drips from a corner of his lip.

Lancelot's feet stop, he trips, and the Emperor catches him just before he hits the floor. "Careful now. You wouldn't want to embarrass yourself."

Lancelot stares at Gaur but sees nothing. The waltz has seemingly gone on for an eternity. He is trapped in a hellish dance with a fell beast out of some bedtime story. These monsters should only exist in folklore. In fables. But they are here. Alive, well, and godless.

"You plan to replace me with some pathetic mimicry?" His voice is incredulous, loud enough for the entire ballroom to hear. "You think no one will see your treachery?" Lancelot refuses to dance any longer and rips himself away.

The audience applauds.

Lancelot turns to the crowd and screams over them, one voice against a herd, indignant. "Enough! Kingsguard, arrest this vile savage!"

The crowd applauds even as Lancelot looks at them, eyes frantic, heart throbbing in his chest, ears hot. They continue to clap as though they can't hear him.

"What are you all doing?!"

Clap. Clap. Clap.

From behind Lancelot, Gaur has taken a deep bow. Their attention is transfixed to him, enamored with him, as if nothing else in the world were more interesting - or even existed.

The Kingsguard emerge from the crowd, and for a moment, Lancelot is relieved. But the soldiers come at him fast, binding his arms, turning him around as he roars, folding his arms to his back and forcing him to kneel to the ground. He thrashes against them like an animal caught in a cage. The evening has turned sideways; everything unfolds in a virulent slowness.

He yells, "Filthy traitors, every last one of you, every last-!"

The Emperor's deafening footsteps force the audience to cease their applause. The waltz is the only thing left to play for the silent crowd.

The music fills the room, climbs to the embellished ceiling, slides into the ears of anyone who would hear it. Lancelot gazes around him, panting, to see something that was not there before: The people's irises strobing with color. The soldiers, the council, the dancers in their gowns, the musicians in their tuxedos; rings of yellow and purple oscillating in a loop, faces devoid of unauthorized emotion.

The ringing sound returns to his ears. The orchestra's instruments, Lancelot has realized, glow gently with amethyst magic.

Gaur looms. Kneeling as he is, Lancelot's head only reaches up to the Emperor's thighs. From here Gaur seems as though he were a titan; impossibly tall, with gravity to every movement of his arms, his legs. The world seems to fall silent in his wake.

"Make him kiss my feet," He commands. Lancelot turns his lip in confusion but a soldier's hands grip the back of his head instantly, pushing him down. He struggles but cannot stop it, beating his shoulders into the soldier behind him until his face has touched the top of the bugbear's furry feet, right above the toe ring, his lips scrunched to the brown flesh, screams muffled.

"Good." Gaur's laugh sounds arrogant, vain. His is the only voice in the room echoing along with the music. "Very good." More quietly this time.

"Bag him and take him back to the capital."

The soldier lifts Lancelot by the waist over his shoulder and another slides a hood over his face. He screams as they carry him out of the ballroom, writhes and thrashes as they disappear with him beyond the crowd.

The Emperor bows again and the audience applauds. They clap and cheer for so long, eyes widened, faces locked in perpetual joy. Nothing was more divine than a performance from the Emperor.

*

Lancelot wakes to a faint hum. A low whirr. Electricity vibrating in the earth beneath his feet.

Where is he? The salty, almost stinging scent of cum, the metallic rust of iron bars - a dungeon? A brothel? There is a prison window at the crest of a wall that filters dull sunlight. How long had he been asleep?

His eyes feel bleary, heavy. When he tries to wipe them, he feels as though a weight holds his hands and hears the rattling of chains. A look around reveals his wrists and ankles have been moored to the walls by translucent shackles, ephemeral and purple, crackling with the static electricity of magic. He pulls at the chains and they jostle uselessly, giving no ounce of relief.

To his right, behind metal bars, a hallway with more cells. To his left stands a leonine at attention in the shadow of the cell, arms folded behind his back, eyes gently strobing with magic. Lancelot knows his fur would shine a brilliant red if it were pulled into the light, and despite his shaved mane, he can see a familiar jawline. One that he's caressed in his bedchambers a hundred times, a strong jaw he's slept under back home.

His voice is a whisper, almost pleading. "Arthur?"

"He helped me carry you down here." In front, at the wall, Gaur emerges from inky darkness as though he were a tendril of shadow, eyes glimmering in twilight like condensed suns, body towering almost to the ceiling.

Lancelot squeezes his eyes shut, grits his teeth until it hurts. He thrashes his wrists against the chains. Curses under his breath.

Gaur is at the window, staring out of it. Sunlight spills across his face, casting him in amber. "It's not easy to resist my magic. So for that you have my respect. But there are other ways to subjugate you. Other ways you can learn your place."

Lancelot's head is in his chest, but venom still drips from his words. "Fuck you."

Gaur's voice is assured, confident, almost boastful. "Slave, come here."

Arthur's eyes come alive with magic. He steps forth, leather boots on the floor, the spikes on his harness glimmering as they're briefly revealed by the light of the window. He arrives next to Gaur, stands still, faces Lancelot with his arms folded to his back.

"Good slave," says the Emperor.

Gaur kneels next to Arthur, looks at Lancelot; his smile has twisted itself into sadistic pleasure. He fondles Arthur's bulge in his harem pants, rubbing, massaging, squeezing. "This is mine now. He doesn't seem to be complaining about it, either."

Arthur stares straight ahead, eyes and lips unmoving. Lancelot watches. Something falls through him again. That horrific slowness. A crawling of time, an emptiness that throbs in the middle of his chest.

He begins to tremble. The day has torn open. The light from the window is a narrow, cruel suggestion of freedom.

Gaur pulls down the waistband of Arthur's pants and reveals his cock, angrily erect, trickling pre. He appraises it with the tip of his claw as if it were merchandise, then rises, leans into his ear, whispers just loud enough for Lancelot to hear, "Undress yourself for me."

A current of obscene pleasure flows into Arthur's face. "Yes sir," he says too eagerly. A chuckling mass of furry bodies emerges from behind Lancelot, great warm beasts, their pungent, virile scents flooding his nostrils. He can't turn his head far enough to look, but he rattles along with his chains as a colossal paw hoists them up easily. Lancelot is pulled down from the wall.

"What's a cute thing like you doing all the way out here? You're pretty far from home, meat." A foreign paw seals itself around Lancelot's mouth. His eyes widen, his cries muffled, unheard by Arthur as Gaur pushes him to the bench.

Four or five enormous paws cradle and guide Lancelot to the floor. He sits on the warm stomach of an orc, who holds his hips firmly. A bugbear holds his chains, keeps him upright, and when that paw leaves his mouth, a voice commands: "Open it."

Lancelot feels the helmet of a dick pushing against his lips. He tightens them, denying entry, but a thick digit forces his lower jaw open, holding it ajar until the spear of flesh sinks into his warm mouth, as though it were a sword sinking into a sheath.

Lancelot's snout meets the crotch and his throat bulges. His head tingles. He gags. The beasts laugh.

There are cocks bobbing all around him, animals waiting their turns, creatures let out of their cages. Sweat cascades down their bodies, monsters encircling his nearly naked form. It's clear they're here for one thing, and Lancelot bears the poor misfortune of being chosen to provide.

In front of him, between two bodies, Lancelot can barely see them: Gaur and Arthur, one pushing against the other. The Emperor shoves his husband face first into the bench, the leonine's tail raised, wagging patiently for its prize. Gaur's gargantuan cock pulls free from its loincloth, hovers closely to that ring, prods its entrance, threatening to dive in. The pucker between Arthur's cheeks flare for that cockhead, as if kissing the bulbous helmet that prodded its rim.

Lancelot cries for Arthur, muffled. Interrupted by hips bashing his face, crotch hairs smashing his nose, shaft exploring the tight cavern of his wet mouth. A voice says, "Come on slut, suck my cock!"

Each thrust delivers a tingle. A prick at the back of his mind. Resistance, then acceptance.

What is happening?

Beastly hands glide up on Lancelot's damp fur, arriving at his chest, where fingers seal around his nipples, twisting them, teasing them. To Lancelot's right, one of the beasts strokes his cock next to his cheek. A third beast strokes himself to Lancelot's left. He can't see below, but he feels the warm breath of someone at his loincloth. What shames him isn't the torture, it's the fact that despite his rage, his own cock jumps at the attention.

Hips bash frenziedly on his face. That tingle again. It lasts longer this time. His cock fattens, swells, throbs full mast. His mind seems to expand, his senses lit on fire, then the wall of resistance returns.

Tears bead at his eyes, but Lancelot opens them, squinting through the pain, realizing that the cockring at the base of the thrusting shaft is engraved with domination runes. The familiar alchemical symbols glimmer as they make contact with his lips. Not good.

Somewhere below, a monster chuckles, peeling the loincloth aside, taking Lancelot's member into his mouth. It glides to the back of his throat.

All of this is wrong, isn't it?

But here, it is right.

Cocks barrel through hands, through mouths. Lancelot opens his eyes, looks over at Arthur. His husband is screaming, begging as Gaur fucks him into the bench. "Please fuck me harder, Master! It feels so good, your cock makes me feel so good! Harder, please Master, harder!"

Lancelot hopes that Arthur will not look at him. He cannot bear the shame. The moment he thinks this, Arthur's gaze wanders to the others, and the cock at Lancelot's mouth pistons harder.

This is wrong. This is all wrong.

No, it is right.

Lancelot's walls are eroded, one thrust at a time. As though the cock at his mouth were cleaning out his brain, leaving no thoughts within, save for debauchery, pleasure, and obedience. Arthur is enjoying himself, why shouldn't he enjoy sucking cock? What point does it serve to turn your head when these beasts ask you to look? Cock tastes good, smells good; the musk is so salty, thick. He wonders how the cum will taste-

And finally it blooms: Virile, potent white spills forth as that cock spasms. Lancelot catches it on his face and mane, his tongue, his chest, every flexing rope. Dripping like wax, the rest oozing down his stomach, cock resting between the cleavage of his pectorals, twitching. A gruff sigh leaves the beast as his orgasm subsides.

Lancelot swallows. It tastes so good.

The firsts' climax triggers a chain reaction. The monster to Lancelot's left strokes rapidly, wet skin slapping his hand. With a guttural moan, out pours a hose of seed, painting Lancelot's face, his mane, more on his chest. He tries to hold his mouth open for it, moaning as it paints his tongue. He doesn't mind the taste, hasn't minded it for a while, his cock flexing in another monster's mouth, twitching, hips gyrating as that alien tongue circles and twists around his humid flesh. On the brink.

Arthur is riding Gaur's hips. His screams rise to the sky. "Please Master, cum! Please cum! Cum inside me!"

Gaur roars savagely, an animal releasing seed into his prey. Cum spills from Lancelot's tongue as he opens his mouth to scream, and out comes his own climax, spasming into the mouth of a monster, his miniscule load eaten by a lavishing tongue. The cock behind Lancelot sprays its bounty on him, over his shoulder, down his back. Their bodies are gleaming, sweat dripping from every pore, semen dripping down their fur.

Arthur's ass drips a steady trickle of seed. Droplets create a puddle below him and the Emperor. He moans sweetly for his Master, lays on his stomach, rubs the bugbear's pectorals in deep worship.

Lancelot watches them in a fugue state. Face surrounded closely by flaccid cocks, lathered in seed, barely awake.

*

On a dais, Arthur and Lancelot dance to an invisible song, a music-less waltz, waiting on each other hand in hand, whirling passionately into each other's arms.

The slave broker's accent is heavy, his voice loud, charismatic. "The merchandise speaks for itself," he hawks. "Look at how madly in love they are. It makes any sand louse drip at the fangs with envy!"

The Zendaran pair seduce the audience with their bodies: Flagging their tails over their shoulders, pressing their cheeks together, trading playful licks. Arthur tugs at Lancelot's harness and purrs, gyrates his hips, dry humps his husband to the floor as their strobing eyes watch the audience. There is some elegance to their crude performance, and the crowd of monsters feel arousal swell in their loins.

"Who will take this happy couple home? Programmed to obey this quartz necklace." He lifts the glimmering stone to them. Its sapphire glow shines with the couples' will. "Properly house trained. No limits."

Brutish hands unanimously rise to bid in their native tongue.

On a balcony above the center stage, Gaur folds his arms on a balustrade. To his left, the sound of a soldier's greaves approaching. They stop next to him. The soldier salutes Gaur with an Imperial bow. The Emperor neither turns nor greets him.

"It's done, Sir. They'll be sold off to Gromkul, the Headsplitter."

Gaur asks placidly, "And when he's done with them?"

"They'll be sent overseas. No one will know who they are."

"That is all."

"Sir."

The soldier bows again. The metal of his clinking greaves fade somewhere behind Gaur.

Below, an orc warrior steps to the dais, approaches both leonine, grabs a fistful of one's hair.

The Emperor lifts his arms off the balustrade and exits through the corridor behind him. Two bodyguards flagging the doorway follow after. The roar of the auction house recedes, until all that is left is the sound of their deafening steps echoing on walls, to the domed ceilings above, all of the world silent and still in their wake.

There are no waltzes here. No dances. No music. The walls of these buildings are grafted with murals of military victories, the history of the desert and its people, the guidance of its leaders, embellished ornamentally, geometric designs leading the faithful to sites of worship.

The northborn arts find no place in Kaffa, and neither do the enemies of the Emperor.

*

In the royal bedchamber, the fake Lancelot brings the rugged King's face to his cheek as though he were a precious object, a prized trophy. "Oh, I am overjoyed to be with you, my King. Forget everything about that cheating Lancelot and just focus on me."

He cups the King's head in his hands, widens his eyes, brings them mere inches from his. The King repeats robotically, as though he were having trouble remembering. "Yes, I'll focus on you..." His speech slurred, voice heavy with fatigue.

The fake Lancelot's eyes spin with hypnotic red rings, and the King's eyes spin too. Infectious magic wordlessy imparted from one to the other.

The fake Lancelot smiles. He keens joyously, flops with the King on the bed. "It was so much trouble impersonating that laborious Emperor all the way to the banquet. So much decorum to uphold, and faking his death was a feat all in its own," His face drifts to a frown but quickly returns to a smile, as though he had trouble staying angry. "But if it wins me a kingdom, the end more than justifies the means. We're going to be so close-- you and I. I can hardly wait to see the children we'll be making. Oh, I love you so much, my King." He turns over to hold the King's head, presses a kiss to his lips, explores his mouth with a red, snake-like tongue.

The King tries to nod, spit dripping from his mouth, red rings spinning rapidly in his eyes. "I love you too."