Thread: A Slave for the Prince (Lovely and Psionic)

Prince Kelto'Zexion was, in some ways, considered the embarrassment of the royal family. He seemed to embody none of the ideals of the draconian race despite his highborn status. Kelto was a withdrawn individual and was never driven to hone his body for a superior physique, so he wasn't a great warrior like his mother, Queen Selda'Orloa'Zexion or his older brother, Prince Movex'Orloa'Zexion. Kelto spent most of his days reading books, yet he never displayed more than a mediocre talent for magic, unlike his father King Kalash'Novias'Zexion. Kelto had yet to make any accomplishment to earn himself an honorable title to the middle of his name. Not only that, but as his other brothers and sisters were given provinces or cities within the kingdom to manage over the past few years, Kelto was the only one remaining at the Royal Palace with no authority. He was given some administrative or diplomatic duties from time to time, his parent's attempt to groom him into something useful to the Zexion Dynasty, but even that often left Kelto feeling overwhelmed. Movex who was also still at the Royal Palace was never any help, Kelto's older brother often looked down on him as well. The older Prince was strong and skilled as a fighter, but also avoided a brash demeanor, and often in fact kept a deceptively level head. It was no surprise Movex was named successor to the throne last year, and was being eased into more high-level duties by the King and Queen. All this left Kelto as the odd one out. Kelto, the failure. Kelto, the one who hadn't amounted to anything, and didn't seem like he ever would. He wasn't needed at this point, so it was most convenient for everyone to just ignore him, public pretend he didn't exist, even. None of the palace servants worked for him personally, they worked for the King and Queen first. Everyone in Kelto's life was distant his family kept him at arm's length, the servants treated him with indifference, he had not formed any friendly bonds with anyone else. The young draconian might have been a little introverted by nature, but that didn't make him any less lonely . It was getting to the point that Kelto felt he might go stir-crazy from everything he was bottling up. Today, he was going on another walk through the draconian kingdom's capital city, Helvaniat, in an attempt to find something, anything, that could occupy him. It wasn't unusual, it was sort of a tradition for those of the royal draconian family to sometimes dispense with ceremony, identifying regalia, and honor guards to simply mingle with their people. Thus, Kelto was walking through the streets in decently fine, but not extraordinary clothing. He didn't stand out among the crowds of draconians of every color and all walks of life. Kelto was shadowed closely by a plain-clothes bodyguard of course, but a random one assigned to him by his parents. Kelto wasn't a fool, and he could tell that his bodyguards often seemed to almost treat being assigned to him as babysitting duty more than anything else. Kelto didn't even know the name of the guard assigned to him today. Nothing really caught Kelto's eye...not until he got to the city square, that is. Ah, it looked like there was a significant slave auction going on. It seemed the theme of this one was pleasure-slaves. Setting eyes on it made Kelto think. That's right, slaves were trained to be loyal, weren't they? The trainers would go out of business if they weren't. And pleasure-slaves, as opposed to slaves kept for labor or combat, were intended to be kept for frequent and close interaction with their Masters. Kelto didn't really have any better ideas for anything to be doing at the moment, so he stepped into the crowd of bidders for the slaves as he watched each one displayed on stage and sold, one at a time. Draconians were quite different from most of the other common races on the continent. They were the only civilized race if any of the other races could be called 'civilized' to be clad in scales. Naturally, this set them above all the soft-skinned races by being the closest to the image of the most superior race true dragons. Draconians were wingless, and had a range of physical builds similar to that of other so-called humanoids, but they had three-fingered instead of four-fingered hands, elongated and somewhat lizardlike faces, and sported a wide variety of crests, ridges, spines, horns, and-or frills their heads. And of course, there was their metallic, iridescent scales that came in an equally wide range of colors. Solid-colored scale hides were the majority, though some rare draconians had multicolored patterns. Kelto himself was a sky-blue drake, neither short nor tall, but thin in build. He had brow-ridges that curved and swept back around the sides of his head, giving him a flat-topped skull. As he inserted himself into the crowd of bidders, the last auction, a human female with very long black hair, was led away to her new Master. The next slave for auction was brought up to the stage. This female was a rarer elf, her long pointed ears prominently protruding from her shoulder-length curls of reddish-gold hair. She was dressed in a sensually provocative outfit, and began standing on stage with her expression downward. After a moment, the auctioneer made her lift her chin and look out on her potential buyers. In that moment, by chance, her eyes locked with his. Kelto blinked. Most of the other slaves in line, the way they stood, the way they moved, they just didn't seem like they would be...interesting conversationalists. He couldn't describe it. While he of course didn't imagine any of the slaves to be stupid, the elf he was looking at just looked like...the kind of person who not only could listen, but maybe understand . Well, he didn't have much of a reason to not give this a try. He couldn't think of any other way to get close enough to someone to just...give him the company he needed. A draconian began to bid on her, followed by a second male marginally raising the bid, and the first marginally raised in return. Kelto knew he couldn't let this chance pass him by. With a little bit of awkward timidity, he stood forward and raised a hand with one finger to interject into the bid. Ah, I'd..l-like to.. He started to say with a slight very ungracious stutter, but he caught himself, cleared his throat, and spoke up a little louder and surer. Two hundred mettalins. He named his bid price. Some of the other draconians, particularly the two who had begun the bid, glanced in his direction. He had outbid them by about four times. The auctioneer took it easily in stride. Two hundred mettalins! Will anyone else meet that? Anyone? He said smoothly out to the crowd. None of the other draconians stirred--it was clear that whoever this young blue drake was, if he was serious enough to jump the bid that high, that no one else wanted the elf badly enough to compete with his bid. Two hundred mettalins, going once...going twiiiice... The auctioneer drew out the pause, making completely sure that he wasn't going to get a better deal for this slave. Sold! To the bold blue! The elf found a lightweight but strong chain leash attached to the shackles binding her wrists in front of her as she was led off the side of the stage, where the young blue draconian was approaching to make the transaction final. Kelto presented several letters of credit for the sales draconian to total up to the bid price. You look like a man of fine taste. Would you like a more decorative collar for your purchase than the basic standard? Only fourteen mettals! Pocket change for one such as yourself! We have a good selection! The sales draconian asked the young blue, and the blue seemed a little flustered but acquiesced to take a look at their stock, before he picked one and handed over an additional fourteen coins. The collar he settled on was promptly buckled around Gaylia's neck. It was a comfortably padded leather collar, slightly on the thick side, and the outer surface was embroidered with a vine-like floral pattern of shimmering red-blue-gold thread...the colors of Gaylia's eyes and hair. The end of Gaylia's leash attached to her shackles was given to the blue draconian...and that was that. She was now owned by a permanent single Master. She was led away from the city square and the auction block. Her new Master kept a sedate, relaxed walking pace, with slack in her leash, and he walked alongside her rather than in front of her. After several moments of silent walking, the draconian turned his head to give Gaylia a closer look. So then...what is your name? He asked, in a slightly awkward and hesitant tone.