The Drow Queen of Glaley [Very NSFW]

[GamesMaster]

"Be glad -- this is what her attention feels like," groans Krem. 

[Lux]

"That is... very valid," Lux admitted with a moue. "Spice is nice but she's pretty much on fire."

[GamesMaster]

"Spice?" he grunts, confused. 

[Lux]

"Heat," Lux answered with a smirk. Which faded when Krem's expression didn't change. "You know... heat? Like-- spicy food isn't just the taste, it hurts a little to eat. A good hurt? A... pleasurable hurt?"

[GamesMaster]

"Ah. I never thought to compare this to spicy food."

[Lux]

"Well, not this," Lux clarified, sweeping a hand to indicate Krem's current condition. "As I meant to indicate, she's abandoned actual spices for alchemist's fire. We are..." Lux shivered a little. "We are glad we do not particularly appeal to her." And ashamed of feeling so glad every time we see poor Jessi. It's not as if we could truly help, not beyond patching her up when we can, but... 

[GamesMaster]

"Things were never this bad before, were they?" asks Krem, with a sigh. "I liked the ability to do my work without... all these power games."

[Lux]

"They... no, not entirely. It was always bad really. Almost 'not bad' when she was away but still..." Lux sighed, eyes closing as he looked at memory instead. "Better than now, in most ways. But... honestly? You just didn't see a lot of it before. She's not bothering to pretend anymore."

[GamesMaster]

"I'm sorry," he sighs. "That's fucked up. She's fucked up."

[Lux]

A look of chagrin formed on Lux's wickedly handsome face. "Do not mistake me, ymay iendfray," a phrase rarely spoken with sincerity by native speakers of abyssal, "what you are suffering... that is not something either of us has ever had to experience. Cruelty, yes, pain, yes, but this kind of violence? No." His expression shifted to a caring smile and he gently, lightly, rested a hand on Krem's cheek. "You amaze me, ymay iendfray. Your bravery and will, to have sought us out when so very hurt.

[GamesMaster]

"Violence I can handle. Violence is kind of my thing, after all. But the head games, that's what gets to me."

[Lux]

"Four cracked ribs-- one nearly in two-- two dislocated fingers, your knee was bent nearly thirty degrees sideways and less than half your skin is free from cuts and bruises," Lux recited hotly. "No-one is meant to handle those sorts of injuries. If Nathaniel hadn't been looking for fireflies through the window, it would have just been a race between bleeding out or driving bone splinters into your lungs that killed you."

[GamesMaster]

He winces. "The ribs got away from me. I was angling to get hit in the softer bits, the less dangerous bits. But he got me in a chokehold and then went to town while I was nearly unconscious."

[Lux]

"Monster," he muttered darkly, eyes taking on a very subtle yellow glare. "I know the person he was is gone and not responsible but... it's no different than an undead to me."

[GamesMaster]

Krem nods. "If she ever gets me like that, kill me," he says, dead serious.