Wolfsbane

by Nathalie Gray

  He fell on her with the vigor and despair of a man drowning. His hands on her skin, his mouth over hers, their clothes in twisted lumps over their bodies. They were naked before they hit the ground. Wet grass clung in tiny raspy tongues to their legs and backs. Gray dawn light gave everything a pale quality. Except for her hair, which stood out like a flame in darkness.

  His side hurt and bled again, and he noticed her hand did as well. Scarlet shrugged. “I’ve had worse.”

  And he could tell. Anger flared in his heart again. He wouldn’t mind going to Amsterdam and ripping apart whoever had abused her all these years. Actually, he resolved to do just that. The budding plan quickly flew out of his mind when she rolled over him and straddled his middle. Her freckled breasts pebbled with goose bumps, the nipples hard and pointing sharply up.

  She looked down at him, her face an unreadable mask. “I want to love you always.”

  Now is the time to show your true worth, von Innsbruck, he told himself. Only once, no matter her answer. Fredrick looked up and held her gaze. “Would you take my name?”

  Scarlet raised an eyebrow, clearly not understanding.

  “My name, Scarlet, would you accept it as your own?”

  Understanding dawned on her in blushing increments. Tears welled her eyes. “I’m a street woman. I have nothing to bring your name. What will your people say?”

  Fredrick let his hands run up her flanks and trapped both nipples between his thumb and index fingers. She sucked in a sharp breath. “Those who know you will think me a lucky man,” he said, pinching a bit harder. “And those who know me will keep their mouths shut.”

  When she said nothing, Fredrick dropped the matter. Only once, and he’d asked it. With the implications of such a request, Scarlet deserved time to think about it, even if every second, to him, would feel like an eternity walking on broken glass.

  “Sit higher,” he said, releasing her nipples to grab at her thighs.

  Scarlet bit her lip as she scooted up higher over his chest. Her knee pressed against his bleeding side but he didn’t care. Her orchid-colored flesh glistened invitingly only a few inches from his face. She moaned in pleasure when he used his thumbs to part the folds and gave one wide lap all the way up.

  “Again?”

  She nodded emphatically.

  Fredrick obliged, this time putting more force into it. The thin lips stretched taut against his tongue while her tiny pearl emerged from its shell. He lapped again. Scarlet’s thighs cramped noticeably on either side of his head.

  “Again?” he asked, teasing her bud with the tip of his tongue.

  A quick, frustrated nod answered him.

  “Say it.”

  “Again.”

  Another flick. “Again what?”

  “Lick me,” she snarled.

  “You mean like this?” Fredrick parted the folds as wide as he dared and slightly up, exposing her sex like a ripe fruit to his hungry mouth.

  His tongue ached from the strain but he wouldn’t have stopped for all the gold in the world. He lashed, lapped, thrust, flicked her swollen bud until she began to shake. And when he was rewarded by her gushing pleasure, Fredrick felt as though his whole life had been spent in a dark cave until this moment.

  Fire rippled out from her bud to her belly. Scarlet couldn’t keep the cry of pleasure tightening her throat from reverberating in their small patch of paradise. She clamped a hand over her mouth, bit her knuckles. After such a wave of pleasure, she needed a short reprieve and crawled back down over Fredrick, settling on him. She saw him wince.

  “Have I hurt you?”

  He shrugged, looking down at his side. “I can’t seem to heal as quickly as usual. But it should be gone in a few days.”

  She noticed the blood and gasped. She meant to put her hand to it but he brusquely seized it and kept it away. “Don’t put it near. You’re bleeding too. I don’t want to…”

  Scarlet waited for him to say it, but he didn’t. “You mean make me like you?”

  He nodded. A faraway look glazed his blood-colored eyes. “Infect is a better word.”

  “It’s not a disease,” Scarlet began, letting her hand run down his belly to his lance-straight member. He stopped breathing for a few seconds as she stroked him.

  “It is a disease.”

  “Not to me.” Another long stroke up his shaft then down again. He shivered.

  If she could only make him see! He wasn’t a monster to her. He was a man. A man she loved. She would take his name in an instant, only this would mean growing old and dying in his arms. She’d much rather…

  She’d much rather what? Go through the agonizing transformation every moon, suffer his Hell when his body twisted and bent into something not meant for it? Could she do it?

  Scarlet looked down at him, his pale skin and white hair, the thin mouth so gentle, the way dawn made him almost a ghost. Something must have shown on her face for his expression turned horrified.

  “No, Scarlet, don’t even think about it.”

  “I want to be with you,” she countered. “Always.”

  “And you will. I’ll love you every day of your life and cherish you—”

  “Until I die?”

  Fredrick looked away. “When I chased after you and that sick bastard, after I caught him and made him pay for touching you, it was the first time that I wasn’t alone after…”

  “After you changed back into a man?” Her heart swelled with compassion. How lonely it must have been all these years. How frightening, to wake up alone from such a traumatic experience. And with practically no memories of it.

  He nodded. “You have no idea how good it felt to have someone by my side. To have you by my side.”

  Scarlet pulled herself up on her hands and backed over his thighs. His member glistened invitingly. Licking her lips, her gaze on his face the whole time, she took the tip of it into her mouth.

  A violent shiver shook him. Scarlet used her mouth and her hands to bring him almost to the edge. She knew it was cruel but she had no argument as strong as this one. She loved him too much for half measures. She pulled away and sat on her heels. “Make me like you, Fredrick.”

  Terror flared his eyes. “What? No!”

  “Yes, make me like you. I want to be with you always, not die in your arms.”

  He pushed away from her and knelt, his member heavy between his thighs. “I’d never curse anyone, especially you to a life like mine.”

  “But you’d curse me to a lonely death?” she said, coming closer and cupping his face in her hands. “I’ve never had anything good in my life, until I met you. And I sure won’t lose you now.”

  Fredrick squeezed his eyes shut and let his forehead rest against hers. “What you’re asking of me, Scarlet…think about it. The pain, the shame. And it’s dangerous. If you ever come close to people, either they’ll hunt you down and kill you, or you’ll hurt them without meaning to. There’s nothing but grief and loneliness. It’s a curse, Scarlet!”

  How could she make him understand? Her love for him transcended her mortal coil. She didn’t just want to love him as man and wife, she wanted to understand him, share with him everything, every shred of her soul, every breath, every day of joy and pain and boring things like the weather. She wanted to be with him in every possible way.

  “Fredrick,” she began, hoping her humble words would be up to the task. “All I have is you. All I want is you. Please, don’t let me grow old and die alone. I’ve been alone too long.”

  He took a deep breath. His mouth opened but no words came out. He grew still, his gaze lost in the distance somewhere over her head. Her insides began to churn when she feared he’d deny her request. So she would die in his arms. This, to her, was the real curse.

  Slowly, Fredrick reached to his flank and began unwrapping the bandage. Tears welled his eyes when he looked down at her.

  Her salvation couldn’t have been sweeter. Scarlet undid her own bandage around her hand and exposed the gash
in her palm. She flexed it wide and hissed when the wound reopened. Blood trickled from it down past her wrist. She offered her hand to Fredrick, who took it as though it were the most fragile thing in the world.

  “Think about what you’re asking me to do,” he began, faltered. “You’ll be just like me. A monster.”

  For reply, she pressed her hand against his bleeding flank and held it there. Her blood seeped onto his wound while his own essence soaked her skin. Wet heat transferred from him to her then back to him. A complete circle. A long sigh escaped him. Joy and sadness and a slew of emotions flashed in his eyes.

  “I’ll take your name, and I’ll take your fate as well.”

  “Scarlet von Innsbruck,” he said, clearly relishing the taste. “The best picker of locks.”

  When he kissed her, Scarlet sensed a difference in him. As though he were no longer afraid to break her, or scare her away. His hand was gentle but demanding when he wrapped it around her breast and pulled it to his mouth. She arched back, his arm around her waist to keep from falling. She’d finally broken through the layers of isolation and distrust around him. She’d picked the lock at his ankle just as she had the one around his heart.

  “Scarlet,” he growled as he sucked one nipple after the other.

  She still couldn’t get used to this man saying her name in so many different ways. In his mouth, her name was like a warning, a plea, a sigh, or like just now, an expression of pure joy.

  A gasp escaped her when Fredrick pushed her down on her back and lay on top of her. The wiry muscles at his shoulders corded when he backed down, parted her thighs with his elbows and dove at her with an energy that left her panting. His mouth was rough as he gorged on her, his fingers stretching her wide, slipping inside both her sheaths. He brought her knees up over her chest while he kept one palm pressed against her cleft, his middle finger curled in and rubbing fiercely. Soon, her sensitive bud began to burn.

  Scarlet meant to open her knees wider but Fredrick held her securely with his arm wrapped around her legs, his own knees on either side of her hips. As though she’d unleashed him, he knelt triumphantly behind her raised legs, his angular face hard but his eyes loving. A snarl curled his lips as he slipped his fingers deeper, searching, probing. Claiming.

  Scarlet closed her eyes when a wall of pleasure hit. Fire burned in expanding rings and although she wanted to spread wide, open herself to him, she couldn’t move her legs. Twisting, she grabbed at blades of grass above her head.

  “Fredrick,” she moaned, not caring if she sounded less than honorable.

  As she came in his hand, he grabbed her in the crook of a hip and flipped her on her knees. Another cry of pleasure left her when he parted her cheeks wide and used his whole palm to rub her slicked cleft. With his other, he reached under and captured a breast, which he reduced to a throbbing mound of flesh with his forceful fingers.

  Bending under the weight, she sprawled on her belly with a great humph. She meant to climb back up on her knees, to better savor his thrilling ardor. She’d no idea he could be so…feral.

  “No,” he growled, putting a flat hand between her shoulder blades and pressing her back against the ground. With his knees, he spread her legs wide apart. Blades of wet grass tickled her exposed flesh.

  A finger entered her. Then another. She gritted her teeth when a soft breeze caressed her nether hole. The hot, wet band of his tongue passed over and produced the sharpest pleasure yet. While he thrust with his fingers, he made slow and leisurely passes of his tongue. Scarlet felt another wave coming. Tilting her backside up against his face, she buried hers in the grass, wrapped her arms over her head. She was almost there.

  Then everything stopped. When she looked back over her shoulder, she noticed the blood dribbling down from his flank to his hip. But it was his eyes that stopped her heart. Entirely bloodshot. He was changing!

  Scarlet emitted an excited, panicked squeal as Fredrick bore down on her, pulled her up against his poised cock. She came right as he stabbed in. Pleasure exploded out of her. His name came out twisted when she snarled it. His brutal thrusts shook Scarlet, lifted her knees off the ground, bounced her small breasts. Yet as much as his transformation had frightened her at first, she could tell it wasn’t complete. He was still the man, only imbued with a feral spirit that left her breathless.

  Fire radiated outward from her engorged sex. She cried out as her pleasure deepened, flowed through her as though her blood were quicksilver. She wanted him to assail her, wanted him to prove to her he didn’t think she was too fragile to take his love. Scarlet turned to look at him, lost in his own pleasure.

  “Hold my hands,” she said, bending her arms behind her and letting her cheek rest against the ground.

  He slowed for a few seconds, his eyes focusing on her. With a smile as ferocious as it was loving, he gathered her wrists in one hand and continued pounding himself into her.

  Scarlet bit her lip against the onslaught. Never had she taken pleasure from being powerless. But this was different. She trusted Fredrick.

  After a particularly violent shove that made him snarl incoherently, they both slumped against the ground, him on top of her, his weight a comfortable protection. Sweat bonded them from knees to neck.

  “My love,” he murmured through her disheveled hair. “My one love.”

  After a while, he rolled off her. Snuggling up against his side, she wrapped an arm over his heaving chest and looked up at the brightening sky.

  Sometime later she felt him tense.

  She rose on an elbow. “What is troubling you?”

  “Now that we’re both…the same, we’ll have to take certain precautions.”

  “If you’re afraid that we’ll get with child, I could always go to the chemist. I’ve accompanied other women, I know how it works.” She’d accompanied them to the barber surgeon as well, a much worse place, but hoped it wouldn’t come to this.

  Fredrick turned to look at her. Anguish flashed in his gaze. “We’ll never be able to produce a child, Scarlet. I’m sorry…my seed has long been barren.”

  Relief flooded through her, though she fought to keep it from showing in case it hurt him. “Then we’ll lavish attention to the children around us. What sort of precautions, then?”

  “With both of us changing on the same night, I doubt we could be close to each other, in case one would attack the other. I’ll have Frank prepare a comfortable place for you to change. I used to do that the first few years.”

  A special room for her to change into a werewolf. Scarlet tried to picture what it would look like and couldn’t. “How did Frank learn about you?”

  “Years ago, while the change loomed near, I made the mistake of coming too close to a town. I must have made somewhat of a racket for people laid chase to me, they were unrelenting, and I was too arrogant to know better. At one point while I was still a man, but barely, they cornered me near the top of a ravine. All I remember, all I could process in my mind was the wind in my face as I jumped into the river below.”

  When Scarlet gasped, Fredrick stopped and laid a reassuring hand on her belly. “I came to lying beside a fire, with a young lad watching over me like a hawk.”

  “Frank.”

  He nodded. “He’d been fishing by the river, he explained, and saw me floating by, still in wolf form. As he was tugging me in, I began to change back. The shock he must have had.”

  Rising over his chest, she planted a kiss on his cheek. “I’m sure glad he didn’t finish you off like those rabid people who chased you.”

  “They weren’t rabid, just afraid. It’s something we’ll both have to deal with now.” Fredrick yawned wide.

  She liked how the word “both” sounded. “We will.”

  His smile brought warmth to her soul. She could spend eternity like this, snuggled in the grass, safe in his arms.

  “What now?”

  “We wait,” he replied, kissing her forehead. “But this time, I’m not waiting alone.”

>   She agreed with a nod, stretched far to her left and came back with the rose in hand.

  He looked at it, smiled and sighed deeply. His eyelids lowered in increments. “Promise me you’ll be there when I wake.”

  “Always.”

  About the Author

  I am a mother, spouse, older sister, writer, ex-soldier, high school drop-out, dog owner (or dog owned), half couch potato/half intermittent jogger, wannabe renovator and avid reader who watches too much television, sinks too much money in clothes, likes animals more than humans, recycles, wore braces, never downloads copyrighted stuff, was a nerd without the grades, has a belly laugh that turns heads in theaters, can’t stand bullying, is mother hawk more than mother hen, votes even if candidates aren’t that great and thinks formal education is highly overrated (probably because she has none).

  Email: croco_wallet@hotmail.com

  Nathalie welcomes comments from readers. You can find her website and email address on her author bio page at www.ellorascave.com.

  Also by Nathalie Gray

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