by Wyatt, Dani
In taking care of her and looking after her, I found new purpose and peace. I bathed her in clear streams and warm springs. I made her safe and looked after her. I spoiled her fucking rotten with my attention.
At long last, I knew where I belonged. In those beautiful, borrowed days, I let her see more of me than I had ever shown anyone, perhaps even myself.
On our last night, I made our camp on the far side of a meadow, next to a crystal-clear pond under the overhanging catkins of a weeping willow. If I could have drawn out the next day’s ride into another week or a month, I would have. But I knew that would be impossible.
So instead, I took special care to make that final night together one that we would both remember, as if every fucking second with her wasn’t memorable enough already. Though I didn’t know what was to come the next day, I did know that things were about to change for both of us, forever. For that night, I wanted to pretend as much as we possibly could that nothing would ever change.
We made a simple dinner of fish that I caught from the pond, along with roasted potatoes that we had bought at a roadside stand we passed earlier in the day. Sara picked blackberries from wild bushes nearby, and we sat tangled up together after dinner, feeding them to each other, laughing as we played a game, taking turns closing our eyes then the other would call the blackberry some horrid item not meant to be eaten as it was popped into the other’s mouth
After the lightness and childlike manner of our game, I laid her down on her back and unfastened the buttons of her low-cut blouse, pulling my own shirt off and tossing it aside. She loosened my pants then, and I pulled them down off my ass before hiking her skirt up to reveal her magnificent pussy and a glimpse of the birthmark that had changed everything. The light was low but I could see a row of bite marks along her thigh, and I soared with the knowledge that they were mine, that I had given them to her the night before and they would remain for days.
Damn, how I loved the way my teeth marks looked on her flesh.
“I marked you,” I said, tracing the scalloped edge of the marks on her creamy thigh.
She leaned up to get a better look. She looked so fucking beautiful—her innocent face and those womanly curves.
“I love having your marks on me,” she said. “I wish you could mark me all over, erase the marks that nature gave me and we could go back to being simply Bors and Sara.”
I took one of her hands in mine and held it back against the blanket, next to her face. Then with my other hand, I slid down through her wet pussy and gently rubbed the flesh just in front of her puckered ass, listening to her purr as I teased her sensitive hole.
I pressed forward, penetrating her with my finger first. We’d fucked so much that her pussy lips were swollen, even now. Made me so fucking proud to know that I’d done that to her. And that I was about to make them swell even more.
She gripped one of my thighs as I fingered her, always keeping my thumb on her clit. I leaned down and sucked hard on the side of her neck, where she was most sensitive, giving her plenty of tongue. It never mattered if we’d had a long, hot day of riding or if she were freshly bathed—she always tasted so fucking sweet. Always.
Once her pussy was warm, soaked, and ready, I drew her knees up and pushed them slightly to one side in order to give me maximum access to the deepest parts of her body. With her knees bent against my chest, I slid my cock inside her, right where I belonged.
“You always feel so fucking good,” I growled as I entered her. “So tight, so wet, so perfect.”
She laughed a little and nibbled my ear. She still had blackberry juice on her lips. Double-sweet. “You feel perfect too,” she said, her breath catching a little as I hit her cervix.
I fucked her as slowly as I could, savoring every withdrawal and entry. I let her legs come down on either side of me, grabbing her ass, one cheek in each hand, and tucked my head beside her. I felt her pussy tighten as she began to hold her breath. She was getting close.
“Breathe,” I whispered. “Relax. Let it come.”
She embraced me tighter and I could tell she was about to cry. I knew why; of course I did. But fuck me. If she started to cry, I’d start to cry. And I couldn’t let her see me break.
“Everything is fine,” I told her. “I’ve got you. I will always have you, princess. Who am I?”
“My king,” she murmured.
“Louder.”
“You’re my king,” she repeated, more forcefully. “My king. My everything.”
“Good girl,” I said, and bit hard into the side of her throat.
She let go then, surrendering completely. Her orgasm started deep inside and I felt her clench my cock with long, intense, rippling waves of pleasure.
As she came, I came with her, thrusting my hips one final time so that I spent right against her cervix…the alter and entry of her womb.
Filling her with my baby was my obsession. Maybe I’d already achieved my aim, maybe not. Either way, I wanted to be sure. When she started to swell with our child, nobody would be able to deny us.
* * *
In the dim light of pre-dawn, the fire now embers, I dozed lightly. I broke from my half slumber when I heard the sound of creeping footsteps in the grass.
What the fuck now?
My heart thundered. Someone was upon us.
Whoever they were, they were well trained. Far better than those Johnston bastards that had attacked us at the house. These were professionals, elites, and I knew it would serve me well to pretend they’d caught us unawares.
I kept my eyes closed, assessing their numbers in my head. I lost count after thirteen. Fuck, we were surrounded. I needed a plan or things were going to turn ugly fast.
But one piece of luck was on our side.
My stallion whinnied loudly as one of them passed where he stood tethered. It was all the distraction I needed.
I listened to their whispers, then the sound of a slap, a stick or whip cutting the air, then hooves as they released our horses. The noise was enough to cover my tracks.
The half-darkness kept me hidden as I rolled, crawling on my elbows away from the small encampment, hoping to catch their attention and keep them from Sara.
Using the willow for cover, I moved around behind the approaching men. Seventeen of them, from what I could tell wearing the garb of Queen’s Guards. News had reached the castle, then, but it struck me as odd that the king hadn’t sent his own soldiers.
At a run, I darted out from the cover of the tree as soon as they passed, and drove my knife into the back of the nearest man’s skull. Ducking into a roll, I thrust my knife up into the balls of the next, and as both of them dropped—one silent, one screaming—I fell and stayed still.
All hell broke loose. I saw Sara awaken, dazed at first, sitting up, then she began screaming my name.. My plan hadn’t unfolded as I’d hoped and the men formed a defensive ring, letting me know who their leader was, as Sara got to her feet and ran.
“Grab her!” shouted a strong voice. “Don’t let her get away!”
The men broke rank, half a dozen chasing after Sara while a few moved nervously around their captain, searching the low lit forest for danger. I knew it wouldn’t be long before they realized I hadn’t fallen along with their comrades.
When one stepped too close, I took my chance. As Sara was caught and surrounded by men, and a fury took hold inside me. I rose to my feet and grabbed his crossbow. He cried out, as I’d expected, and I kicked him as I stepped back toward the willow tree. Before I ducked back into the darkness, I fired off a shot at their captain, missing by a whisker.
Crossbow never was my strongest weapon, but it had the desired effect nonetheless. The other guards turned, mistook the standing silhouette for their enemy, and the man I’d just tackled fell with two bolts in his back.
“There’s more than one of them,” said the captain of the Queen’s Guards. “I saw another shadow before that one fell. Fall back. We don’t know how many.”
Sh
it. They grouped up fast, training kicking in, protecting their captain—and now Sara—as they moved together toward the edge of the meadow.
I couldn’t fire into the group without risking hitting her, so I hung back, but when one of them broke rank I took my chance. The bolt sailed over the meadow and hit its mark square in the chest. A little ripple of triumph flitted through me: crossbow wasn’t so bad after all.
Unfortunately, I’d given away my location in the process, and they wasted no time using that to their advantage.
I ducked as crossbow bolts flew above me, thudding and creaking as they slammed into the tree’s trunk and branches. I watched as the group moved away, cursing that there were so many of them, and I wasn’t, as they believed, one of a group.
Still, there was nothing else for it. Sara needed me.
I was just rising to me feet, preparing to go after them, when a stray bolt slammed into the branch above my head, drawin my attention.
I lept sideways but wasn’t fast enough. As the branch came crashing down, I fell into a deep trench, disguised by leaves and branches. It was a trap left for animals and as I struggled against the side of the dirt wall, the branch hit it’s mark, and everything went black.
Sara
Once the guards carried me into the castle, everything became a fast-moving blur of stone stairways and gargoyle faces.
I had seen such carved stone faces before, on the corners of our chapel in the village, but these faces were angry and menacing, like the stuff of nightmares. They streaked past, grotesque and unkind, mocking me in their imitation: screaming as I screamed, crying as I cried.
I tried desperately to keep track of where we were going, in case I had a chance to find my way out to Bors, but one hallway turned into another and one spiral staircase twisted into the next until I didn’t know north from south or east from west, but only had the sensation of moving down, down, down.
I fought the guards with all my might, but they were too powerful and too experienced for my panicked fury to have any effect. Most of them left, dismissed to their daily duties, while the remaining two carried me on, but I was no match for even two trained soldiers. I had the feeling this wasn’t the first time they had carried an unwilling person through these hallways and secret corridors, nor would it be the last.
“Please,” I begged in a brief pause while the guards opened yet another massive oak door and locked it behind us as we went. “Take me to see the king. I wish no one any harm!”
They gave no reply. They never made eye contact with me, nor gave any indication that they knew who I was or wasn’t. As they dragged me along, it was strange to think that I had, perhaps, been somewhere in this massive castle once before. But I had been too young to remember, of course.
From what Bors had told me, it was a lifetime away, as if it had happened to a fairytale version of me, and not the real me at all.
The guards came to a halt in front of a curved doorway, with huge iron bars locking it in place.
The oldest guard, gray in the beard and temples, took hold of the huge latch by its handle and tried to wrench it free, working against years of scaly orange rust. Wherever we were, it had been an age since anybody had passed through this door. And that realization filled me with terror.
The second guard made as if to help him, but with one quick maneuver, the oldest guard dropped to his knees with a gurgle. I looked down in horror to see a gaping, hemorrhaging wound at his throat.
The guard who had done the killing wiped his blade on the sleeve of his shirt, with no more emotion than a butcher dispatching a hog. The smell of human blood cut through the mildew of damp stones and turned my stomach.
“Mark my words. That’s what loyalty to King Rowan will get you, girl.”
If loyalty to the man that might be my father could get a guard killed, then what fate awaited me? With sudden realization, I knew I had to get out of here; my present and my future depended on it.
“Help me! I am the lost princess!” I screamed as loud as I could, my words echoing back from the cold, damp stone as I hoped against hope that some sympathetic ear would hear me.
The guard clapped his chainmail-covered hand over my mouth, silencing me. The metal grated against my teeth and pinched my lips so hard that tears sprung to my eyes.
“Stop your damn screaming, you little bitch,” he said, and then maneuvered my face down to the dead guard at our feet. “Unless you fancy your blood pooling with his.”
I shook as terror silenced me. There was a time, not so long ago, when my life was of far less value to me than it was now. Bors had changed that.
He had shown me another possible future, a future about which I had begun to dream. And now I was watching that future turn cold and dead, just like that first guard.
As I tried to keep control of my senses, another man joined us from around the corner, holding me captive while his companion finally unlatched the ancient wooden door.
Then, with a kick and a shove, I landed on the wet stone floor. The impact winded me and I gasped for air. As I struggled to get my breath, the door slammed shut and I heard skittering s rats scampered away and the foul scent of human waste turned my stomach.
Bors. Please, Bors…
His face spun in my mind as the clench of flesh, and the dried mixture of our lovemaking between my legs reminded me that only hours ago, I was in bliss. A man I loved, a man I believed would keep me safe, took me on the forest floor and I believed we would find our own happy ending.
“We need to find the queen,” said a voice outside my cell. “Before the king gets word.”
Once I calmed myself and slowed my breathing, I listened for any sign of life outside the hole in the bricks. I heard no human voices, but far in the distance I heard the sound of crashing waves and seagulls.
Though I knew little of life in the capital—and still less of the layout of the castle itself—I had once seen a drawing of it at a traveling magic lantern show that came to Weschail when I was very small.
I remembered the castle was built up against the sheer, steep cliffs that ran down into the sea.
“No man can scale those walls,” the magic lantern man had said. “Not if he wishes to come out alive.”
The old oak door was the only way in or out of my prison. I yanked on the handle until my palm was raw, but it didn’t budge; the door didn’t even rattle. The only light came from a tiny window near the ceiling, where two bricks were replaced with a thick iron grating that allowed a small amount of fresh air inside.
I slumped down on the wet stones and rested my forehead on my knees. Part of me felt like screaming until I was hoarse, but the guards had made my fate clear if I chose to scream for help. They’d return to kill me, I was positive. It was up to me to find another way to freedom and back into Bors’ arms where I belonged.
I shook my head to clear away the thought of what his fate must have awaited Bors after I was taken away. I wouldn’t think of that. I couldn’t. I had to believe he was all right, even if he believed me lost.
Crawling on my hands and knees, I searched for any loose rocks, either as a way to escape or as a weapon to defend myself should they return. But I had hardly begun my search before the noisy hinges of the old door creaked and it swung open again.
Now there were three guards, the two I recognized and another. I noticed now that they wore matching leather belts, emblazoned with three flowers, and I knew that symbol at once—I remembered it vividly from the traveling lantern show. It was the Rose of Beatrice.
The men who had taken me were Queen’s Guards.
Things were becoming clearer to me. Loyalty to the King, my father, had gotten the old guard killed. The Queen was behind this, I was sure of it. Lore had stories of the evil of this queen although in my simple life, in a far distant, small town that nobody here had probably even heard of, it touched me not. But now, here in her dungeon, the stories and tales of her cold heart spun around me in waves of dread.
The men s
eized me like they were inspecting a mare to be bred. Two of them grabbed me from either side, pulling my blouse. It tore down the center, and the third man inspected me like I was cattle, lifting my breasts and grunting dismissively.
“Skirt,” he said, and before I could wonder at that the others bent me at the waist and threw up my skirts.
I wrenched my neck to see the one on my left, holding my arm, had dark eyes and a dangerous gaze. His companion walked around behind me, grabbed at my ass cheek, his breath warm on my flesh, and I knew he was looking for my birthmark. Then he wetted his fingertips with saliva and tried to rub it away. The friction of his fingers against my skin made my stomach twist and bile seared the back of my throat.
“If I am who they I say I am, raping me will get you killed,” I said desperately, hoping that my status would stay their hands.
The one who had checked my birthmark scoffed, standing and coming to my side, shaking his head as the other two let me fall to the floor.
“Make yourself decent if you can, cunt,” he said, and the three of them left without another word.
In spite of myself, half-naked there on the dungeon floor, I began to cry. All of this, every gaze and every touch, a violation of not only myself but of Bors. I didn’t know how much more of it I could bear. When the door swung open minutes later, I met the sound of the creaking hinges with a stifled sob.
This time, however, it wasn’t yet another set of lusty guards.
Instead, I saw the weaselly minstrel that my father had said was his go-between. Bardo. And beside him stood a woman I had never seen before, but who I recognized at once, both by her manner and her crown.
She was tall and shockingly thin. Her skin looked like it was gauze, pulled over the bones of her face, giving her the look of a living corpse. Though she had once surely been beautiful, her looks had faded, leaving her with a bitter coldness.