Free To The Princess Bound by Sara King

sunlight.  Real fine, but absolutely beautiful.  There’s some big ones, like the main one running up your spine.  That’s all different colors, though most are kind of a neutral bluish color.”  Then he took a deep breath, lifting his eyes back to her face, fixing his attention back on the violet ramas within her skull.  “Then again, it’s not really a color.  It’s more a feeling of color, you know?  Like the way a pretty red rose feels.  Or the deep blue of a glacier feels when you’re standing beside it.”  He raised an eyebrow at her.  “You understand so far?”
    She nodded warily.
    Now for the big question.  Dragomir cleared his throat and ventured, “I also feel other things, like the links between a mother and her baby, or the ties between husband and wife, or best friends…”  He licked his lips and, eyes on the massive, thrumming connection still dormant between them, he said, “You might actually be able to feel one of them, if you wanted to.  Like, maybe a month ago, you started feeling a buzzing in your chest?  A heaviness?  Or a heat?”  When she said nothing, only frowned at him slightly, he quickly went on, “The same feeling you’re feeling right now, like hot water vibrating within your heart and lungs, overflowing and rushing out…”  And here was the real leap…  “…connecting us?”
    For a long moment, she just gave him a little frown.  Then, “You realize that whatever you’re seeing is just psychosomatic, right?  Your brain is just trying to find a way to make sense of neuron pathways that has never before existed in the human body.  That’s all any mutant is.  You’re taking your own excess energy and inflicting it on others.  The only safe mutation is that of the Royals…that’s why the Imperium puts us to good use better serving the people.”
    “I hadn’t known that,” Dragomir said.  He was disappointed, but not surprised.  He’d heard many of the same things, almost word-for-word, in the propaganda chips that the Imperium distributed all over Mercy, urging residents to turn in ‘mutogenetic anomalies’ for their own safety.
    The princess shrugged.  “You’re a native.  The colonies haven’t really had a chance to fully study it.  The Imperium has.”  She cocked her head at him.  “What’s your name?”
    Dragomir dropped his face back to the bed.  Not only did she not feel their dormant link, but she thought he was insane, to boot.  “Dragomir,” he said, trying not to let his despair show.
    She cocked her head at him.  “Dragomir.  How’d you get the scar?”  She gestured at his right temple, almost brushing the silver hair there with her fingers.
    Dragomir stiffened, remembering the circumstances behind the wound.  “I fell.”
    She narrowed her eyes at him, obviously sensing the lie.  “How did you escape Imperial sweeps?”
    Dragomir grimaced.  He knew of three other ‘mutants’ that were living in nearby villages, and the last thing he was going to do was tell an Imperium Royal Princess how he managed to evade the years of persecution.
    The princess’s face hardened.  “I asked you a question.”
    “And it’s one I might someday answer,” Dragomir said, “once I can trust you.”
    Her mouth fell open.  “Once you can trust me?! ”
    He looked her dead in the eyes and said, “Yes.”
    She snorted.  “I own you, slave,” she said.  “You will obey.”
    Dragomir narrowed his eyes.  Glaring up at her, he said, “You have me bound and helpless.  You do not own me.”
    Her mouth fell open and she stared at him like she could not believe the words she was hearing.  Finally, sputtering, she said, “I am a Royal Princess of the Imperium and I am giving you an order.”
    Dragomir gave her a flat stare.  “Miss, until five days ago, I was quietly serving my village in the foothills of Skitwater Pass.  It’s a farming community—about two hundred people who eke a living out of the Silversand