For moon_fox‘s prompt, after
Second Pressing (LJ)
Planting Future (LJ)

The end of this didn’t really seem to end for me, but I’m not sure what else to do with it, either

“Fruity, with just a hint of tar.”

Onyx enjoyed the blind taste testings at the smaller competitions the best. She could put on her best part-of-the-furniture expression and simply listen while people talked over her. If her Lord was in the room, of course, people watched their words, minded their descriptions, even around a minor lord like her master.

But when they were facing simply a row of slave vintners, the tasters felt no such need to be careful, mindful, or even polite. And the things one learned when people who had been tasting wine all day stopped being polite were… interesting. Often educational.

“Isn’t this in the fruit wine category?” one younger taster frowned. “I can’t taste anything but oak and ashes.”

“Ah,” an older matron answered, smirking and reaching for the boy’s glass. “I bet I know who that is. They have the same problem every year.”

Onyx didn’t smile, of course, but inwardly, she was giggling. She knew that one, too. Their vintner, a freed slave, was an arrogant punk who never took advice. Next to her, his assistant was trying not to squirm. Maybe she should talk to her Lord about buying the poor girl; she had a good feel for the wine and didn’t deserve her boss.

“Ah!” That was the third taster, sipping the purple wine that was Onyx’s offering from her master’s odd fruit. “This is… interesting.”

It was her turn to try not to squirm. Interesting could mean so many things.

“Interesting,” the woman repeated. “Sweet, with a nice oaky note and… boysenberry, I think. Nice.” She looked up at the three of them waiting, three very nervous slaves whose livelihood depended on her words. She couldn’t know which of them had worked on this wine, but her eyes landed on Onyx anyway. “Nice. Very nice.”

Onyx relaxed, her head bowed to hider her smile, as the others tasted her offering. “Cocoa nibs,” the boy exclaimed, smiling, and, “…campfire?” the older woman exclaimed. As she had expected, the color, and the strange fruit, brought out what they expected to taste: success at last.

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For stryck‘s prompt.

Names by @Inventrix. The unnamed gentleman in the story is Karl ap Jolanda
It wasn’t Onyx’s fault that her master’s vineyard had gone bankrupt, but that didn’t stop her from being put up for auction with the property, the equipment, and the other vineyard slaves to pay his debts. Nor did it stop the taint of the failed vineyard from coloring her like the purple on her fingers and toes.

Lower-levels slaves found new homes – either in other vineyards, or in other field work. Field slaves were always needed, and trained, broken-in field slaves especially so.

The foreman, the field doctor, many of the other mid-level slaves were likewise valuable, and likewise, while as purple-stained as Onyx, less tainted by failure. But long after the auction had ended, she, the field manager, and the girl who had managed the publicity and tours for the vineyard were left sitting in their cages, disconsolate and miserable.

“So what happens to us now?” Keri, unlike Onyx and Taris, had been taken from America, and bought directly by the master for his vineyard project. She’d never sat in a room like this before.

“If we’re not lucky,” Taris muttered, “it’s field work for us. If we’re lucky…”

“If we’re lucky, it will be a business position somewhere,” Onyx cut in firmly, before Taris could scare the girl more. “Someone will see past the failure.”

“It’s not our fault,” Keri whimpered.

“No, it’s not.” The rich male voice that cut into their conversation took them all by surprise; they’d assumed they were alone in the holding cells. Panicked and nervous, Onyx and Taris fell into kowtow position, their foreheads to the floor, pulling Keri down with them.

The man kept talking. “The wines vinted in Jeffery ap Paulina’s vineyard were of sublime quality. The complexity of the Sauvignon Blanc, especially, was very impressive, and the ad campaign for the mead was beautiful.”

Onyx felt a small spear of hope rise inside her. The Sauvignon Blanc had been one of her best efforts.

“Sit up,” he added, and they did, beholding a handsome man – grey eyes, no slave collar, Onyx noted, as she was sure Taris was – with a long ponytail of jet-black hair. “I have a vineyard that specializes in some very strange fruits, and I would like you three to help me develop it.”

He held out his hand and, from the air, a long coil of vine began growing, studded with bright red berries.

“Would you work willingly for me?” he asked, as they stared in awe.

Next: Planting Future (LJ)

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For anke‘s prompt.

Content warning: this story includes mentions of slavery and nudity.

Jane liked going to the mall, hanging out with her friends there, like most of the people she knew did; like, she was pretty sure, teenagers everywhere did.

So when family moved from a small, middle-class neighborhood in the burbs to an upscale one with her mother’s second promotion in a year, she prevailed on a new friend in her new school, a shy boy named Andrew with a shock of red hair but no ap to the end of his name (immediately giving him and Jane something in common), to show her the mall.

“It’s not going to be the kind of thing you’re used to,” he warned.

Jane scoffed. “I can handle a mall, Andy. It’s not like I grew up in the ghetto or something.” Even though, to the super-rich and royals they went to school with, she might as well have.

“All right. If you flip out…”

“I know. Do so quietly. Geez, Andy. I’m not an American or something.”

He’d only smiled weakly, and agreed to show her around, because, really, what else was he going to do?

Freak out quietly. She wasn’t going to freak out. She wasn’t a country bumpkin. She really wasn’t. But this mall… if mall you could call it…

“Andy, tell me I don’t look like a country bumpkin.”

“You really don’t,” he assured her. “Do you want to put me on a leash? You’d fit in better.”

She eyed him thoughtfully. He looked serious. He sounded serious. And there certainly were any number of people wandering around with collared slaves, some on leashes, some not. She smiled, a slow thing that seemed to start at her toes. The stores were fancier. The floors were fancier. There were naked slaves in a store window right there, practically in front of her nose. Naked! Her family was well-off, but Jane had only ever seen two or three slaves up close, and never quite this close.

She wrapped her arm around Andy’s waist, getting a small smile from him. “I think we’ll do just fine,” she said, feeling it becoming true as she said it. “Let’s just window shop.” The blonde in the window was pretty cute, after all.

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