by A. B. Keuser
Late in the week, she stared at him as he worked when the entire castle echoed with chimes.
He sighed, closed his quill in his notebook and stood.
“Another orphan?” she asked.
“Before you arrived, I would have unequivocally said yes. Now? Perhaps it’s brought me another woman to watch me as I work?”
“I’m thinking of ways to incapacitate you long enough that I can escape.”
He smiled, and a prickle of something she didn’t want to acknowledge poked at her heart.
“Would you like to join me?” he asked, nodding his head toward the door. “Maybe the forest is open to let you leave. Maybe it realized its mistake.”
She twisted her lips and scowled at him. He might be teasing, but she’d thought something similar only a moment ago.
They walked through the castle and across the grounds in silence, and she watched as he unlocked the gate with a grimace. The forest was not open to her.
Instead, Arthur had a new charge.
The boy looked like he was nine years old, and in his hands, he held mangled clumps of brass. His face was dirty, his hair a matted mess, and he wore only one shoe.
Shaking, he looked from Arthur to her and swallowed, backing away.
“Don’t worry; we’re not going to hurt you.”
The boy did not look convinced.
“Are you hungry? Were those candies?”
The boy didn’t speak, and Arthur glanced behind them. “Stay with him?” He asked, looking from her back to the hedgerow. “Sometimes it’s easier if Lord Cat Chaser is the one who brings them in.”
When she nodded, he left and she turned back to the little boy.
“Do you want to come in?” She asked, stepping out of the way so he could keep his distance from her if he wished it.
He stared after Arthur and swallowed heavily, dropping the brass pieces before he stepped timidly inside.
*
Arthur found Lord Cat Chaser and sent the boy on ahead of him. Running had been beyond him for many months.
When he returned to the gate, it was closed, and the boy seemed at ease. That changed when he joined them.
Hiding behind Isabelle, he buried his dirty face in her skirt, and Arthur didn’t blame him.
“It’s alright; Master Arthur isn’t half as monstrous as he looks.” Lord Cat Chaser moved around to the boy’s side and took him by the hand. “Let’s find you some clothes and see if the teakettles have left any of lunch in the dining room.”
As they left, Lord Cat Chaser said, “And until you tell me your name, I’m going to call you Baron Loud Mouth.”
“Does that happen often?”
“Every so often.” Arthur said, looking after the boys. “I’m not quite the beast painted in books of lore, but neither am I a pleasant fellow to look at.”
He flinched when she took his hand. “The forest is scary, it’s no surprise they think it’s leading them to something equally as terrifying.”
Swallowing, he forced himself to pull his hand from hers. He could not want. And he could not let her kind words wheedle their way into his mind.
*
By the end of the week, she was ready to smack him over the head with the largest book she could find. But she was tired. And when she reached the library doors, she decided that she was allowed a day of rest.
She turned on her heel and stalked to a parlor she’d found when exploring on her own. But she found no peace there. The gentle tug she felt connecting them made her restless and she ran from the room. She ran from the castle, and she ran from Arthur.
But there was nowhere to go, and when she stopped, she could feel him moving closer. It made no sense, but she could feel his concern. She wanted to be free of the castle and all of the reasons it gave her to stay.
Dew hung on the leaves and branches of every plant in the outer garden. Mist filled the air as the morning's sun heated the nights' residue, and Isabelle sat in the middle of a stone circle, her knees pulled to her chest. She couldn't find a way out. Worse still, she was now thoroughly exhausted.
"Did you enjoy your exercise?" Arthur asked from behind her, a bit breathless, his approach signaled by the noisy shuffling of his cane.
He’d stopped using it, she wondered if he’d managed to injure himself again in some way. Though it would stand to reason that if the boys couldn’t physically change, neither could he. She didn’t answer him.
And he lowered himself onto a stone bench, facing her, though she would have to turn to look at him if she wanted to, which she certainly didn’t.
“Come back inside. The library… feels wrong without you.”
“Why would I want to be somewhere I’m treated like an object to be ignored or bartered? If I wanted that, I’d have gone home without looking at that rose twice.”
He stiffened; she saw it in her periphery and ignored it. Telling him about what awaited her outside these walls—if it still did—would only make it easier for him to try to convince her she had to stay. He was doing a good job of insinuating the notion into her brain without any help from her.
She stood. Not because he wanted her to come with him, but because she’d shifted when he arrived and a small stone was poking into her backside.
He stood with her and for a moment, she considered snapping at him, telling him he didn’t need to worry about manners with her. She said nothing. His face was taut but with each step toward her, that pain lessened, and the tugging she felt eased as well.
“Come with me, please.” His words were a whisper.
He was close enough now; she thought she should be able to hear his heartbeat. She wanted that. But the only thing she heard was the way he breathed. And how it matched her own inhales and exhales.
Nodding, she looked to the ground to keep herself from doing something foolish, like kiss him again. She licked her lips and cursed herself. Every time she did that, she tasted him, as though he’d just removed his lips from hers. Desire was a dangerous drug.
She walked beside him and back up to the library. When the doors shut behind them, she was suddenly glad that they hadn’t run into any of the boys. She didn’t know what she wanted anymore, and being around any of them wasn’t helping. But at least around Arthur, her other pain lessened.
He handed her a book when they got to his work table and she realized he’d pulled one of the wingback chairs up so that she could sit close beside him. The book was the more personal gesture. It had no title or author on its spine, but when she opened the leather binding, she found the same tidy handwriting that covered the drawings in front of Arthur.
After the first page, the book was filled with diagrams and notes. She studied the drawings, reading each of the notes until she’d determined there was nothing more she could learn from them.
Arthur was silent, but she was ever aware of him. So it surprised her when something sharp tugged at her chest and she looked up to find him ignoring his work.
She couldn’t ignore the irritated look on his face, or the pained squirm as he fought with something on his back.
“Let me help you.” It was a command, and for a moment, his face clouded, but Maynard growled at him and he did not argue.
“There is a cog in the center of my back, I can’t reach it, and it’s driving me crazy. That’s all.”
“Then let me fix it so you can stop being such a grouch.”
He sat gingerly on the bench in front of his notebooks and covered project, removed his waistcoat and leaned forward.
She hesitated, suddenly realizing this meant she would have to remove his shirt. She supposed it was only fair that she be uncomfortable, if she insisted on making him so. Gently tugging the shirt from his waistband, she tried not to notice the way his muscles moved as he removed the thin fabric covering his skin.
Remembering the jolt of electricity they’d shared before, she touched him gingerly, ready to pull away if needed. His smooth skin sent a sizzling warmth through her; it wasn’t as
startling this time. There was something… right about it.
Her gaze fell to the cogs sprouting from his back. The sheer number made her stomach turn. He had to be in agony.
They glittered in the sunlight streaming through the library windows, but the skin around the one Arthur fussed over was raw, red, and when her hand hovered over it, she felt the heat radiating from him.
She sent Maynard away for clean cloths and moved to where she could look Arthur in the eye. “It’s been infected. I’ll have to clean it, and that is going to hurt.”
He looked down to where her hand still rested on his arm—then he looked sharply away. “It might be best to leave it as it is.”
Isabelle stared at him, and when he did not turn back to her, she asked. “What was the castle like before Agathina?” Because she couldn’t bring herself to ask what he was like before the dark fairy had hurt him.
“More adults, less children… cleaner. Otherwise, much the same.”
“Where did the rest of the castle go? There must have been a full staff.”
“They vanished. If I knew where they went, I would feel better. I hope they’re safe, but I’ve come to terms with the possibility that Agathina killed them.”
Maynard returned, leading a processional of boys: the first with clean cloths, the second—the Duke of Hasty Pudding—held a basin of water. His face was twisted in a look of extreme concentration and he set the bowl down three tables away. When he looked up, an eyebrow quirked and he glanced from Arthur to her. She didn’t want to know what he was thinking.
“It’s not going to do me any good over there,” she said, pointing to the place she’d cleared off on the table beside her.
“I’m not taking it any further.” He squeaked and ran from the room, the cloth carrier dogging his heels.
Arthur snorted a laugh and leaned forward. “They think I’ll bar them from another part of the castle if they do any more damage.”
Maynard leapt to the table beside Arthur and licked his paw. He paused only to look up at them. “I assumed you didn’t want me to carry them in my mouth, and I couldn’t have brought you the water at any rate.”
With a flick of his tail, he turned from them and jumped into one of the cushioned chairs where he continued to bathe himself behind the semi-privacy of the chair’s arm.
Carefully moving the bowl of water, she set to cleaning his wound. Every dab was met with a wince, every apology met with a growl.
When she was done, she pressed the palm of her hand to the only space on his back void of any bit of metal, and he shivered, twisting away from her and quickly caught her by the wrist.
Something in his eyes sparkled dark and dangerous. And before she could stop herself, she leaned forward and kissed him.
He stilled at first, and then, he pulled her close, his mouth devouring hers, his tongue slipping into her mouth. Something powerful welling inside her. The same way she felt his presence tugging at her from across the castle. Something about them fit and even though she didn’t want it, she didn’t question it.
*
Arthur couldn’t do this.
That was wrong. He could definitely do this, he just couldn’t do it from this angle. Twisting around more, he surged to his feet and pulled her into him.
“Damnit, I want you, Isabelle.”
“I want you too.” Her hands traced over the brutalized skin on his chest and arms, patterns that sent electric waves through him.
“I need to be sure we’re talking about the same thing.”
She pulled away, long enough to scowl at him and say, “I know what you mean, this isn’t my first time.”
“Good.”
“Agreed,” she hopped up to sit on the table and drag him closer. “Now, where were we?”
She didn’t shy away as his left hand snaked under her skirt, his hands tracing lines of pure bliss up her thighs. She didn’t flinch when he flipped up her skirts or when he lifted her just enough that he could drag her drawers off. Bared to the cool air, bared to him.
He needed this. Something in his blood told him they couldn’t stop.
With one hand he pulled her closer to him, and with the other, he pressed a finger inside of her and went painfully hard. She’d run from him the last time they’d even come close to this, but he wasn’t about to start rushing, now.
Arthur pressed her back, until she looked at him from a point reclined on her elbows. In spite of the fact that she’d fled before, she looked as content as could be with her skirt bunched around her waist and her delicious womanhood bared for him to see. Though he might kill anyone who walked through that locked door at this moment.
Sinking to his knees, he pulled his finger from her with aching slowness. When he kissed her wetness, using his tongue to tease her lips, he watched in abject fascination as her whole body stilled save for her face. The expression she made as he licked and sucked were only outdone when he pressed his finger back inside her. His errection stirred as she let out a low moan.
This was what he had always hoped his life would lead to, a woman who wanted him as much as he wanted her. A woman who had no need to hold anything over him. He wanted to gain his own pleasure simply by giving it to her. She keened with each flick of his tongue over the hard bundle of nerves, so he slipped a second finger in, and lazily pumped.
He was never going to get over the way she tasted. When she cried out and moved her hips toward him, he was certain he was going to die once he was inside her.
Her knees fell further apart, and he twirled his tongue over the sensitive nub at the top of her opening and he could swear she said his name in the same breath as a curse, but she thrust her hands into his hair then and pulled him further toward her. Swallowing a laugh, he let out a sigh of relief he hadn’t realized he was holding in and worked his fingers with the rhythm she set against his ministrations.
Seven
Arthur pulled back and looked down into her eyes. What he saw there was a startling, silver clarity. Hauling himself back to his feet, he kissed her again and pulled her forward on the table, thankful the drawing he’d been surveying was large enough to keep her from getting splinters.
“Do you want this? I don’t have any way to protect you and we find a way for you to leave, there could be consequences. And…” He swallowed and said, “You’ve seen my back. The rest of me is much worse.” He looked away, unable to dwell on how her sweet face would contort in terror if she saw the rest of him, but she pulled his face back and held his gaze as firmly as her hand gripped his chin.
She pressed her lips together as though she hadn’t thought of that, but when she shook her head he felt that painful tug on his sternum again—or maybe it was his heart—and he stepped back. She caught him by the shirt and pulled him back.
“That’s not what I meant.” She kissed him deeper and began unbuttoning his trousers as he fought to push her skirts further up.
He wanted to take the damn thing off, but she pulled him forward as soon as his trousers pooled around his boots, and there was no thought in his mind that would distract him from what she was offering.
She pulled him in for another kiss and when their lips broke apart, she stared him in the eye and said, “I want this.”
He stroked her again, using her wetness to cover over the head of his and then, looking into her clear, fearless eyes, he notched himself against her entrance. “Isabelle?”
She smiled and pulled him closer, biting his lower lip as she kissed him. Pushing her legs further apart so his metal disfigurements didn’t scratch her, he pressed slowly inward, reveling in the tight, wet heat that surrounded him.
No imagination was good enough to have brought him this. This was heaven. He froze, opening his eyes at that thought and found himself staring into hers. A smile played across her lips and she tangled her fingers in his hair. “Don’t make me beg.”
She pushed him back and looked down to where their bodies joined, her eyes glazed, her mouth open and her breath
ing unsteady.
He rocked into her slowly. He didn’t want to do anything that might hurt her… he planned having her again, and soon.
She took away his choice, grabbing hold of his ass just as he’d fantasized, she squeezed tightly enough that her nails bit into his skin. She pulled him into her until he was completely sheathed, and she let out a single whimper, but before he could ask, she was moving against him. He took hold of her hips and kept her still. He was not going to let her rush this.
Drawing back, he worked into her at a steady rhythm, enjoying every sound that slipped from her lips. He wanted to kiss her as she keened. Wanted to swallow those sounds and make them a part of himself.
He pulled her up until she was almost sitting, and she wrapped her legs around him, keeping him from drawing too far away from her. When he kissed her, she met him with a fervor that should have scared him. It only made him drive into her harder.
Tensing, she cried out his name.
She bit into his neck and gripped his shoulders as she clenched around him and the motion of her shot his control straight to hell. He came as her orgasm faded and he held her in his arms, feeling utterly sated and empty all at once.
His grip loosened, and he laid her back on the table. They remained joined as he leaned over her, breathing hard, and trying to recapture his thoughts.
When she sat upright again, he pulled out of her and shivered at the loss of her heat. He looked down to where they had joined. He still rested against her thighs… that delicious expanse of creamy, perfect skin was marred with blood. She had shallow cuts on each side from the cogs in his legs and hips. He cursed his idiocy and stepped away. Suddenly too aware of how well they’d fit together.
She tensed, and he cursed inwardly this time, before he bent over and kissed her again.
Kicking his pants off his ankles, he swept her into his arms and ignored the tug in his chest when she gasped. He didn’t know if it was from surprise or fear. It served him right.
He carried her back to the corner he’d kept to himself. If there had been anyone to see them: him naked but for his boots, her, seemingly clothed except for her missing shoes. They would have been an odd sight.