She had just wanted to get away from Graegor, to vanish into the night. She had not meant to go anywhere like here. She started looking around for a carriage, but how was she supposed to find one if all she could see was the bare, brown, muscled back of the man walking in front of her? She hated this, hated not being able to see, hated how hard it was to withstand the crowd’s heat. Sweat was running down her back and between her breasts, and between her legs, it was just as hot and wet.
A lamppost loomed before her, and she planted her hands on it to become an island in the sea of southerners that surged and swirled around her. She braced her hands on the cool metal and bowed her head to focus on her magic. She had to seal it tight around her mind, tighter, tighter, to shut off the flow of sensuality that charged the air like a thunderstorm.
The lamplight gleamed on the fine white embroidery of her bodice. She should have worn something less closely cut. But she could have worn a holy sister’s gown, and it would not have made any difference to Graegor. He had prepared the ship’s cabin. He had planned the whole evening around bedding her.
Someone said something to her. It was in Kroldon or Aedseli or something else, and she ignored it. A hand touched her shoulder, and she flinched, barely stopping herself from lashing out with her power. They had to leave her alone. It was hard to think, and she had to think. Men and women brushed past her. Everyone was talking so loudly. A woman’s voice, full of concern, spoke to her in Mazespaak, but too softly for her to hear most of the words. A dark face topped with a colorful headwrap leaned toward her sideways, trying to look at her, but she shook her head repeatedly, and finally the woman left.
The air was so thick. Tabitha shut her eyes tight in the heart of the revelry, the sounds of music and laughter tied with the smells of meat and close-pressed bodies. She wanted out, it was torturous to be surrounded like this. She had to escape. She had to stop thinking about the prince’s hands on her sweating skin. She had to stop trembling at the thought of him covering her body with his, right now, right here.
She was a whore. She was worse than a whore, because a whore only did it for money. She was so wet between her legs, and the pressure was growing unbearable. Her nipples were hard, standing straight, straining against her dress.
Why could Graegor have not just let it be? It was too early for them. They could have had a nice evening with the prince, cheerful and pleasant. They could have done magic for him. They could have joined their magic, like they had on her ship, into that incredible rush of power that made her feel like lightning in the sky.
Instead she wanted to fuck. The word was vile, and it flushed her with heat. She did not want to make love, she wanted to fuck. It writhed in her brain and body. She had to get home. She had to get home now. She needed a carriage. Why were there no carriages here?
“Miss? Are you all right?”
Thendalian. That was Thendalian. Tabitha looked up. The man next to her was older, thirty maybe, and he was tall, with the blonde hair and beard and the strong, noble features that defined the men of her race. Muscles flexed in his arms as he elbowed away some other people crowding the lamppost as they passed. His eyes were brown and warm, and they widened as he took in the beauty of her face.
“Are you lost, miss?” he asked, and held out his arm for her to take. “Do you need help to get home?”
Tabitha nodded and moved both her hands from the lamppost to his arm. He would lead her out of here and find her a carriage. His skin was tanned and looked very dark against hers. As they started walking, her fingers started stroking the short blonde hairs that covered his arm.
He did not know who she was. Did he? She looked up at him. He smiled down at her in a reassuring way. Men who knew who she was never did that. As he guided her through the mob of foreigners, he kept looking down at her, and when she stumbled over a broken wine bottle, he hastily drew her closer, turning to wrap his other arm around her waist.
Pressed to him, she gazed at his handsome face, crossed by constant shadows from the people passing before the light. He stared down at her, transfixed, and the same pressure between her legs was also rising between his. “Miss, I …”
He does not know who I am.
She snaked her arms around his neck and pulled his mouth down to hers. It took only a moment for him to kiss her back, with a low growling sound in his throat. One kiss melted into the next, wet and strong, and darkness swathed them like a blanket as they pulled each other into the shadows between two tall buildings. His belt buckle caught on the embroidery of her bodice. She fumbled with it, tugging hard on the strap to loosen it from the prong, and it came free.
Between her legs it throbbed like a heartbeat. It was her cunt. Her cunt. Another nasty word like fuck, perfect for this, perfect. Like cock. He had pulled it out from his trousers and was guiding her hands to it. She could not see it in the dark, but the feel of it was curious and wondrous. It was so long and so stiff, but it had such soft skin, stretched tight and tender. He gasped as she gently squeezed it between her palms, and gasped louder when she wrapped her fingers around it and squeezed again. He grabbed fistfuls of her skirt and gathered it up to her waist to get his hands under it and find the slipknot of her bloomers.
My cherry. He was going to touch her cherry like Alain had. But no, not a cherry, the cherry was the maidenhead, she knew that now. Alain had kissed her clit. That was the word, like fuck and cunt and cock. Vile and hot. Clit. He pulled on the slipknot until it came free, and pulled the lacings out of the holes until her bloomers loosened completely. With both hands he drew the two sides back as far as they would go. Tabitha whimpered, still holding onto the thick meat of his cock. Then he softly touched her clit.
His fingertips felt coarse, a worker’s hands. His touch slowly deepened, and he rubbed her wet clit in a sweet rhythm, deep then light, deep then light. Her breaths became gasps, became silent, fierce cries muffled in his chest. Without even thinking about it, she rubbed her thumbs on the silky skin at the tip of his cock, in the same circles that his fingers were tracing on her clit. He moaned, and his hands took hold of her bloomers, and with three fast tugs, he tore them apart at the seam, from where the lacings ended all the way to the back. For a moment as her skirt billowed, the sensation of being open and exposed was thrilling, daring, freeing.
His hands slid under her bare bottom, where no one had ever touched her before. He lifted her and she swayed, and she let go of his cock to grab his shoulders. Then her back met the wall, and she could feel the lines of the bricks through her dress. She wanted him to smother her breasts with his mouth, but her bodice was too tight to pull down. She spread her legs, and his hands under her thighs boosted her up higher. With shallow, loud breaths against her neck, he stroked his cock against the wetness seeping from her cunt, until everything was slick and smooth and hot. Then he boosted her even higher, and his cock thrust into her.
It had never felt this good. It had never felt this good. This was what Alain had wanted to do to her. This was what Nicolas had thought he was doing to her. This. This. She braced her hands on his shoulders and gasped with each sweet impact. He was fucking her, fucking her in an alley, not three paces from hundreds of people who could be watching, and it was glorious. His cock was so thick and so hard. It fit her perfectly, filled her perfectly. He reached the deepest part of her with every thrust, over and over and over. Yes. This. This was what she wanted. His cock in her cunt. In her cunt. She screamed.
She heard him moan, and felt him standing rigid, and smelled his sweat and his seed, but it was not done for her yet. She had to have more. He knew. He thrust hard again, once, twice, crushing her to the wall, once more, again, again, and then the world burst apart and she screamed with no voice, blindly squeezing her legs around him, keeping his long hard cock buried deep inside her, through the very center of her, holding fast to an ancient, primal glory.
Breathe. She had to breathe. She heard him panting and swallowing. The bricks at her back were cold and rough.
>
What …
No. No no no no no.
He gently lowered her to the ground, and he slid out of her. He sagged against the wall, covering her, pressing his cheek to hers. “What’s your name?” he asked between heavy breaths, his voice warm and eager.
No. Oh, God, no.
Her knees folded, and he squeezed her tight to support her, but she was collapsing under the weight of pure horror. Graegor would know, he would know—
Her power surged, shoving her backward, down to the ground on her bottom, and flinging him against the other wall with a sound like cracking branches. His body folded into itself and fell with a thud. A scattering of broken bricks tumbled out of the wall and landed on him, but he did not move.
She did not have to look. She knew he was dead. Like Alain and Nicolas. He was dead. Oh God. Oh God.
Graegor called to her. She gasped aloud and drew in all her power to shut him out and protect her mind. But he kept shouting at her, kept demanding that she answer him, and when she did not, the white edge of his rage closed over her, shrinking her until her magic felt like a single silver bead compressed beneath a mountain. Within a mountain, pressed within the center of the earth, tiny and insignificant.
But she refused. She would never let him in. He knew what she had done.
His magic boiled against her, trying to drown her. Was he closer now? Was he coming after her? How far away was he? Where was he? Dear God, where was she?
Then he stopped. His mind retreated, so fast and so completely, that within the space of a breath, she could feel only the faintest hint of him. She took another ragged breath, and another, waiting, dreading, but he was gone. He was gone.
She curled up against the brick wall in the darkness of the alley, her hands over her face. Her head hurt, and her skin was damp with sweat.
And seed. His seed. He was lying a pace away from her.
She had to leave. She had to leave.
Every heartbeat shook her as she staggered to her feet, holding onto the wall, pushing her fingers into the depressions where mortar met brick. His seed ran down the inside of her thigh. Her bloomers were ripped. She leaned against the wall and tried to pull them up, one leg at a time, back over her hips. But once she got them there, they would not stay, because they were ripped. He had ripped them apart to get to her. The lacings were snapped short. She could not tie them back together. She could not see what she was doing. Light was spilling into the alley from the street, but she was huddled in the blackest shadow. She hated it. She hated the dark, hated it. The worst things happened in the dark. Alain. It had all started there, in the blackness of the attic.
She had to leave.
She turned toward the street and the light. Thick groups of people still moved past. Laughter, shouts, and singing accompanied the distant music. Without meaning to, she looked for other Thendals in the sea of brown and tan faces, and although she caught glimpses of pale skin passing under the light, there were no others of her own race. No one who seemed to be looking for a lost companion.
She had to leave. She could not stay here with him. But she was shaking so badly.
What if Graegor was chasing her, tracking her down? What if someone recognized her?
My hair. She always wore it bound. When she put her trembling hands to her topknot, she realized that it had already slipped halfway down the back of her head, the hidden hairpins straining to hold the unbalanced weight. She managed to pluck out enough of the hairpins to let her golden locks fall free around her shoulders. Almost no one had ever seen her this way. In the night, in this neighborhood, no one would know who she was.
But what if someone did?
She had to leave now. She could not be found here. She needed to get to the townhouse and clean herself. No one was there right now. The servants had the night off on summer Solstice. It was tradition. A proper tradition. If she could just get there, she could stop worrying about being seen. If she could only stop shaking.
Calm and still. Calm and still. Calm and still.
It did not work. Graegor knew what she had done. Would she ever feel calm or still again?
She had to leave.
She took a step out of the alley. She took another step. Her bloomers slipped, and she pressed her damp, itching thighs together to keep the bloomers from falling. She walked. She got behind a group of couples who were talking together so much that their steps were suitably slow and she could keep up with them while keeping her bloomers from falling. Babbling constantly in horribly accented Mazespaak, they reached an intersection, and Tabitha realized that she was not sure which way to turn to get back to the townhouse.
She kept following the group of couples. She was not lost. Sorceresses did not get lost. She knew that she could retrace her steps all the way back to Contare’s ship, and from there retrace the carriage’s route back to the theater, and so on. But that meant going back toward Graegor. She could not go anywhere he might be, which meant she had to avoid the Academy, the Hall, and in fact the entire Central Quarter, since she knew all his friends planned to be at the main marketplace tonight for all the entertainments. There had to be another way back to her neighborhood from this one.
If she headed north, straight north, she would eventually reach the city wall’s northern stretch. From there, she would be able to see the Hippodrome. She had ridden from the townhouse to the Hippodrome a few times. North.
But which way was north? She could not tell without the sun.
It itched and it hurt to walk with her legs pressed together. She needed a carriage. The intersection was broad, and she glanced hurriedly to the left and then to the right, over and over as she crept along behind her unwitting escort. Finally she caught sight of a large, yellow-painted wheel, and she pushed past several people in her haste to reach it.
It was not a carriage, but a ricsha, and the garish paint on its wooden wheels covered its poles, seat, and canopy as well. She had seen ricshas before, but had never ridden in one, since it was not how rich or noble ladies traveled. The driver, a middle-aged Medean with short hair and no beard, had just collected his fee from his last passenger, another middle-aged Medean, and he smiled at Tabitha when he noticed her. “M’lady?”
“I would—” Her throat felt rough, and she had to clear it and start over. “I would like a ride.”
The driver smiled and gestured proudly to his vehicle. “Of course, m’lady.” He barely had any accent at all. “Going home?”
No. Not home. The neighbors would notice a ricsha, and wonder about it. Wonder where she had hired it, and why. “The basilica,” she ordered as she backed into the seat, tucking her skirt behind her legs so it would not catch on the enormous wheels. Sitting was uncomfortable, with her bloomers torn and damp with his seed.
“Yes, m’lady.” He picked up the poles, and her seat tilted back, back. The driver started walking, and soon sped up to a trot. The jostling and swaying proved just as bad as in a carriage, but not worse. The strangest part was being so close to the ground, even as her eyes were naturally directed upward by the reclining chair.
She itched. Dear God, she itched. Ants crawling on her. Wasps stinging her.
Graegor had felt what she had done. She had refused him, walked away, and fucked someone else. She knew that she had hurt him to the bone, to the heart, but she could feel nothing from him now.
He would tell his friends about it. They would tell the entire Academy.
He would tell the prince about it.
Go home. Change clothes. Hide.
She focused on the wheel to her left and concentrated on watching it turn. The spindles blurred like a ruined painting.
He loved her and she had fucked someone else.
He would never let her touch his magic again. He would never join it to hers and let her ride it, control it, let it rage through her and make her feel powerful. Like her own should, like her own should, but it itched and burned and betrayed her.
Get to the townhouse. Change clothes
. Get out of the city and go to the manor house. Go to my chambers and never come out.
No.
A carriage rolled by on the left, gleaming black in the streetlights. On the right, a circle of old women laughed heartily as they raised their mugs and clinked them together.
If I run away, everyone will believe him.
She had to stay. Stay, and if he told anyone about it, if anyone said anything to her about it, she would call the words vicious slander. She would make sure everyone believed her instead of Graegor. Everyone, including her prince.
Should she go to join her friends, after changing clothes? Act as if all was well? Normal?
But what if she could not act normal?
She had managed to act normal after Alain’s death. For a while. Until he had been found. Then no one had acted normal.
It was safest to stay at the townhouse. If Isabelle or Clementa or anyone else called to her, she would say that she and Graegor had had a fight and that she wanted to be alone.
If they called to her. No one had called to her all night, because all her friends knew she was supposed to be with Graegor. Did they think she was sleeping with him? She had no idea. She did not talk about things like that with her friends.
Another thought struck her. Would not one of them have called to her, if they had heard, or sensed, what she had done?
No. No, of course not. She did not talk about things like that with her friends. Even if they had sensed something, none of them would embarrass her by asking about it.
Except, maybe, Velinda. Velinda would have tried to be casual about it, but she would have called to Tabitha by now. Just to find out how her evening was.
So what did that mean? If her magi had not sensed what she had done, then was she sure that Graegor had?
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