Six

 

Briska waited for the girl to go back to sleep before she dared to use the mirror to contact Mistress Kun again. Even then, she took the mirror outside to use it out of sight of the pair.

"What is it?" Kun asked in irritation. Though Briska could not see below the woman's shoulders, she could see enough to know she'd roused the woman from bed. Briska would wager Kun had been pulled from a lover's arms instead of a dream, for Kun was too alert to be newly woken.

"You have made a mistake. They are not a suitable match at all, but brother and sister. Hansel and Gretel are their names. Mistress, to make these two fall in love would be an abomination." Briska stuck her head inside and eyed the sleeping pair on the other side of the lattice, another of Kun's gifts. Kun had provided her with a modest bed, cooking utensils and a book to instruct her in using them and the spices from home, though djinn didn't need food, sleep or warmth. She had to appear like a normal human to these northern barbarians, apparently. As if a queen, albeit an exiled one, was anything close to normal. "I will not make this match!"

Kun's eyes flashed. "You serve me, and I order you to make this match. Do you hear me, djinn?"

"Yes, Mistress," came out Briska's mouth, unbidden. Before her tongue could betray her again, she hissed, "I hear you, but I will not!"

Pain erupted in her head, like nothing she'd ever known before.

"Welcome to your enslavement. As long as you refuse to obey, the pain will worsen. Obey me, and it will fade as if it had never existed. Make the match," Kun said.

Blinded by pain, pressing her head to the stone floor in a desperate attempt to alleviate the agony screaming from one ear to the other, Briska was barely aware of the mirror returning to mist once more before she lost her senses to the darkness.