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To Dream of Darkness

A story by DoggyStyle57

Chapter 37, Written February 2012

===

Chapter 37 - Endings and new beginnings

While Lord Pennington contacted the church to make the arrangements for his brother in law's funeral and interment in the family crypt, Sarina led Lu Chen up to her sitting room.

The Chinese wolf boy was amazed at the opulence and size of the mansion. "Mistress is a princess? This is a palace!"

"I am not a princess, no, Lu Chen. This mansion belongs to my uncle, Lord Pennington. He is rather wealthy, however, and his family is of the nobility in this country, as am I. He is not even close to being so high as a prince, but the family is well-respected," Sarina said. "They have even been welcomed in the courts of the Queen of this country."

"Ah! They are what in my land would be called Imperial courtiers, then? Those high enough to have access to the Court of the ruler of the land are still very important people. It is still almost beyond my imagining, Mistress! So much more fine than even the Governor must have had in Hong Kong!" Lu Chen said.

Sarina opened the door to her sitting room, and said, "Please have a seat by the fire, Lu Chen. I wish to talk with you privately."

"As you wish, Mistress," Lu Chen replied.

Sarina sat in a comfortable chair beside the fire, while silently signaling to Asha to keep herself hidden. Then she spoke to Lu Chen, and said, "You have served my family very well, Lu Chen. I am grateful for your loyalty to me, and to my father."

"Mistress has always been kind to me. You always spoke to me in such perfect Chinese, and could read and write it as well. Your father spoke some of my language, but was never as fluent as you are. I always found it hard to believe that you were not born in our country. Very few foreigners have been able to master the Chinese language. It is a rarity for a disrespected half-breed such as me to serve such a well-educated and noble Lady. It is even more unusual that such a noble lady would treat her servants as well as you do."

"My ability with languages is a magical talent, Lu Chen. But it has caused me a difficulty. You see, I had taken it for granted that you could talk easily to me, and that therefore there should be no difficulty with you talking to my uncle, Lord Pennington. But you can hardly understand a word that he says, can you? I know he can't understand you at all." Sarina said.

"I understand a few of his words, Mistress. But you are right that most of the people here I cannot communicate with. I had only learned a few of the terms that your father used in requesting things of me, when he tired of trying to use the right Chinese words for something he wanted. But I did manage to make it here in spite of that," Lu Chen said, with a small measure of pride in his voice.

"That you did, and I appreciate that. But I had hoped to reward your service to me by asking my uncle to employ you here, where you would be safe from the deadly Fever that claimed my father's life, as well as from the intolerance of your own people to your half-breed status. Here, you would be a foreigner, but no one would care you were only half Chinese. But I cannot leave you here if you cannot communicate with my uncle, or his other servants," Sarina began.

"L-leave me here? Mistress does not want me to continue serving her? Have I failed you in some way, Mistress?" Lu Chen asked, visibly distraught now.

"You have not failed me, Lu Chen. But where I must travel soon, I fear I cannot ask you to accompany me. Have you heard of the Japans?" Sarina asked.

" I know only that their island is forbidden territory, Mistress," Lu Chen replied. "No one goes there or comes from there anymore. They are said to be deadly warriors, and enemies to my people."

"Well, I must go there, forbidden or not. You see, I believe my mother came from that land, before they closed their borders to travel. She is dead now, but there are things I must know about her people, so I may better understand myself. I believe that my magic can keep me safe, but I could not keep you safe there," she explained. "So I have some options for you to choose from."

"The first option is that I could do as I originally planned, and leave you here, serving my uncle as best you can. If you choose that path, I will ask him to provide a tutor to teach you his language. It may be difficult for you to learn, but you seem intelligent, and I think you could do it. You would be safe, and have a good job here, and a nice room to live in, here, or in an apartment of your own nearby. In time, I may come back here, and if I do, I may be able to take you back into my service then. But it is by no means certain that I will return, even if I am successful."

"The second option is that I can return you to China - to Hong Kong, or to Canton, or to Shanghai - where you would be among people you understand, and who understand you. But you would be on your own there, with no employer or other benefits, save for a final payment from me in thanks for your service to me. As with the first option, I may in time be able to return to where I left you, and seek you to work for me again. Or I may never come back into your life. I cannot say which is more likely."

"The third option is that I could send you somewhere else, to a place of your choosing. Perhaps you may wish to go to America, to seek your father? What would you choose, for your future?"

"But travelling with you now, and continuing to serve you now, is not an option?" Lu Chen asked. "It is not a difficult choice then, Mistress. I would never seek my father. He disowned me once, and would not be pleased to see me in his homeland, seeking him. To serve your uncle in this splendid mansion would be much nicer than any employment I could gain in Hong Kong, or anywhere else in my homeland. But I do not see how I could serve him well without knowing his language. There is little for me in Hong Kong, or elsewhere in China. But at least there I belong to the people of that country, and I can communicate. I can find a new employer there, I am sure. I would ask to travel back to Hong Kong then, Mistress, and hope that someday I may serve you again. It is a long journey, but I suppose I must undertake it."

"It will be a very short journey when the time comes, Lu Chen, for I will use my magic to take you there. I have recently studied under an expert in... well, call it travel magic... and I can now return you to Hong Kong faster than you may believe possible. But for a few more weeks or months you may serve me here. I must remain here until the funeral, and that will take at least two weeks to arrange." Sarina said.

===

Sarina arranged for a room that Lu Chen could stay in at the mansion, though he complained that it was much too nice for one of his lowly station. As she went on various errands around the town over the next few weeks, she allowed him to attend her, and carry her parcels, or merely escort her, so she was not seen to be going about her business alone, while in mourning. Many of the trips were not particularly necessary, but gave Lu Chen a good chance to see the city and its people. She rather hoped he would change his mind, and decide to stay here, in spite of the language difficulties. He did not.

Though she had no emotional need to mate, she briefly considered allowing Lu Chen to serve her also at night, in her bed. But she decided that wouldn't be fair to the boy. If she used him as a lover, it would be difficult for them to retain a Mistress and Servant relationship. He was happy in his role, and blurring the lines would only needlessly confuse him. If she wanted physical relief before her uncle was willing to come to her bed again, she could always go back to the inn for a few evenings as Heather, and work as a whore, or hire Meridith or some other whore to please her for an evening. Or she could seek physical comfort from Asha, who had indicated her willingness to provide erotic service to her Mistress. But she hesitated there - primarily because she truly did not know what might happen if the sexual intimacy worked with the elemental as it had with Sarina's other lovers, and opened Asha's mind fully to Sarina. Could Sarina handle receiving all of the memories of an unnatural creature that had lived for over 700 years? Or would that drive her insane? She wasn't sure she wanted to risk that.

When she wasn't running errands, she would leave Lu Chen at the mansion and go with Asha to the rented magical workshop, to study further the books that she had taken from the Chinese mage, Jiang Wu, and to finally remove all the traps and wards on the mage's strongbox. The chest contained a handsome quantity of precious gems, silver and gold, as well as five unique magical artifacts. She sifted through Jiang Wu's memories, but could find only a vague idea of what three of the magical items actually did, and nothing at all about two others, save for how the mage had obtained them. Apparently Jiang Wu himself had obtained them by various means, and yet had been unaware of their full power or true purpose, so he had set them aside to study. Sarina decided that was a wise course, and left them in that strongbox, after transferring the gold, silver and gems to her main strongbox. She locked the mage's strongbox, resetting the traps on it, and returned both chests to her necklace.

===

The day of Lord Edward Randall's funeral arrived, and Sarina put on a suitable show of grief at the old fox's passing, drawing from the expected responses that she could sense in the minds of other mourners, and the very real grief of several of them. To Sarina herself it was a strangely numb experience. She had grown fond of Edward as a lover, and yet losing him meant very little to her emotionally.

When the time came in the ceremony, at her own insistence, Sarina herself placed the small silver reliquary containing Lord Edward Randall's ashes into the marble niche with the ashes of Lady Mary Randall, and hidden behind that, the ashes of the real miss Sarina Randall. The vault was sealed again, and the ceremony proceeded with no one the wiser about the extra set of remains in the family crypt.

After the funeral, Sarina went with Lord Pennington back to the mansion. For a full week she continued to wear mourning clothes and a black veil.

Once her period of mourning was over with, Lord Pennington took Sarina to meet the family barrister, the lawyer that saw to the Pennington Estate's legal needs. She was shown the will that Sister Meghan and Lord Pennington had drawn up, naming Sarina as sole heiress to the Pennington family estates. Now that Sarina had reached the age of twenty one, she was legally able to manage her own affairs, while she remained single. It chafed on her when the lawyer suggested that her funds from the Randall estate should be placed in a trust account, to be managed by her uncle, until such time as she found a suitable husband, who would then take her fortune and add it to his own, managing her financial affairs. The lawyer was of the opinion that women were incapable of managing their own finances. Sarina countered that since she would be leaving the country shortly, that would not be acceptable, and used just enough of her magic on the lawyer and her uncle to make them accept her argument. In the end, it was agreed that when Lord Pennington met his maker, Sarina should present herself to claim her inheritance, preferably in the company of her husband, or a suitable male guardian. If she did not appear to make the claim, the barrister's firm would safeguard the funds until she could be located and allowed to claim the inheritance.

===

Two days after the visit to the barrister, Lord Pennington at last appeared at Sarina's bedroom door, after Lu Chen had retired to his room, and the other servants had gone home for the night. The Lord was already in his nightshirt and wearing a dressing gown over that. He knocked timidly.

Sarina answered the door, wearing nothing but a smile. "Good evening, father," she said.

"Ahhh, good evening, Sarina dear," he said when she opened the door. "Er, may I come in?"

"Of course you may, father. I have been expecting you," Sarina said, closing the door again once he had entered, and leading him through the sitting room and into her bed chamber.

"Um, what of your servant, Ashley? Is she here?" he asked hesitantly, looking around as if expecting an embarrassing intrusion at any moment.

"She will not appear unless I ask her to, father. Perhaps you would like to enjoy both of us at once? She can assume any mortal female form. She could take the form of your daughter Amara, and you could fornicate with both of your daughters at once. Would you like that, father?" Sarina teased.

"B-both? I don't know that my old heart could stand it, my dear. Look at me... I am trembling as if it was my wedding night. For all that we shared before, this is different, now that we are certain you really are my daughter. And you look so much now like my sister, Mary, as well. You are so beautiful. I can't believe that you're willing to mate with your old father. Is this a dream?" he asked.

"A pleasant dream, if it is, I should hope. Come to bed with me, father, and take your daughter in your strong arms, and mate lustily with me. Mate with me as if you wanted to plant a baby in your own child's belly, my darling father! " Sarina said, as she took off his robe, unfastened the front of his nightshirt, and held him tightly to her.

"Oh Sarina!" he exclaimed, as the last of his resistance melted. He no longer cared if it was wrong or perverse to want to mate with his own daughter. He just knew that she wanted him, and that he had to have her, and to mate with her, with a burning passion.