Captured by the Dark Lord

by Jaide Fox

  “You agreed I would punish you, if you broke my trust,” he said softly as he cupped one firm cheek.

  She startled at the touch and bucked against him, pushing her upper body upward to flee. He held her lightly, controlling her movement, and whispered a single word. Vines snaked out of the ground at his command, wrapping around her wrists and ankles. She growled and fought the living shackles until they pulled her legs and arms taut and immovable. She tossed her head and squirmed against his thighs, but she could not move otherwise unless he allowed it.

  “Shh,” he soothed and stroked her buttock cheeks through the shift, smoothing a palm down the back of her bare thighs, then drew up the crease where she had pressed her thighs together. The fine hairs on her flesh prickled from his touch, pleasing him in some unnamable way. He inched his fingers under the gathered hem, drawing it up to bare her completely to his eyes.

  He’d intended to spank her, until her skin pinkened from the palm of his hand, but seeing her naked, virginal flesh taunted him. He had no desire to inflict pain, not even the most minute. An entirely different want compelled him now, a desire to possess and claim filled him, searing his mind to all else. He stroked one finger up her slit.

  “Do not!” she screamed and wiggled against him, to no avail.

  “I regret that you give me no choice.” She stilled as he parted her folds with a single finger and stroked it back and forth, separating her moist layers. Her clit was hard, swollen, and he nudged it with his fingertip, slipping in an easy circle around the nub.

  She gasped and tensed, and he flicked his finger against her again, near groaning at her reaction, the delicious tension of her body as she waited to see what he would do next. He knew then no man had ever touched her this way before, that he was the first to probe her femininity, and it pleased him to have her this way.

  He continued teasing her clit, never touching it, and moved a thumb to her passage, slipping inside her tight hole. She shuddered, arching her back as she released a moan.

  Damian’s groin spasmed painfully with the need to impale her, to have her in this position, open and vulnerable to his every touch. He wanted to release her bonds and wrap her thighs around his waist, let her ride his cock until they both reached fulfillment.

  He wanted her as a man wants a woman, and wondered if he’d merely denied the existence of such wants these many years. It was possible. He could detect pressure, the weight of her on his lap, the clenching of her inner muscles as he thrust his thumb fully inside and curved it to her passage, but the joy of touch was gone. The electrifying impulses that spread pleasure along his nerves did not exist in this form.

  Damian stroked the back of her neck, withdrawing his hand from her cleft.

  “Don’t...,” she said breathlessly and trembled. Whether she wanted him to continue or stop, he did not know.

  His fingers glistened with her wetness, pleasing him. He raised his fingers to his face, but he could not smell her musky desire, nor taste the sweet juices flowing from her womanhood. Her wetness was evidence of her desire for his touch, whether she admitted it or not, and it satisfied a need to prove she wasn’t as immune to him as she’d led him to believe.

  “Do you like that, my lady?” he growled and thrust two fingers deeply inside her. She cried out at his force, shook as he roughly rubbed his thumb against her clit, back and forth, faster and faster. He pushed in and out of her tightness, harder and harder. Her muscles clenched against him, holding him, drawing his fingers in to his limit. She made small, animalistic noises in her throat ... soft, husky.

  “Please,” she begged, bucking against him, hands grasping the earth for support. She tossed her head, moaning. He stroked her, saturating his hand, until her juices flowed down the insides of her thighs. She screamed suddenly, her body spasming in release. She heaved for breath, and the tension fled her body as she collapsed weakly.

  He’d brought her to climax, to a release he could not attain. His mind could make his cock hard, but no more. It was the ultimate torment, that he could take her, and yet never come, never realize that intense pleasure ever again. What would happen if he resumed human form?

  Gritting his teeth he banished the temptation, realizing it would drive him mad not to have her for eternity, to find ecstasy in her arms only to have it snatched away again.

  The vines released her, and she pushed away from him, anger and embarrassment flaring in her eyes.

  He could see himself reflected in those gray depths as the monster he was.

  “You beast,” she gritted out and stood, not bothering to dust the dirt from her legs and hands. She turned and ran away from him. He made no attempt to stop her.

  Indeed. He had never denied what he was ... but he could regret it.

  Damian stood and walked to the gate’s edge to retrieve her gown. His shaft remained tight and ached with need, never to be satisfied. It was a torture to keep her here, for she would not give him what he desired, in any way. He was helpless to refuse this starved need to keep her near, and helpless to control the awakening of his soul to the temptation of her body and spirit. He slammed his fist into the stone wall, receiving not even the satisfaction of pain.

  Chapter Five

  Bianca locked herself in her room, collapsing back against the door. Her womb ached, and she rubbed a hand between her thighs, encountering the evidence that this was no dream, feeling the wetness he’d aroused ... so easily. By the gods, she’d enjoyed it! She closed her eyes, trying to deny it, but her body still quivered, thirsting for more.

  How could she face him now? And would he even allow her to go outside? Chances were unlikely that he would trust her again.

  She’d thrown away her only chance to leave this place. Growling in frustration, she tore her shift off and flung it to the floor, then climbed onto the bed and under the covers.

  How could he claim he was only illusion when he felt so real? She punched her feather stuffed pillow and buried her face in it, hoping to suffocate herself and end her humiliation. It didn’t work--she still clung to the urge to breathe.

  A gentle rapping on the door reached her muffled ears. She turned bleary eyes to the sound, surprised he didn’t just open the door and prance inside.

  “Go away!”

  “I wish to speak to you ... and not through this door.”

  “Accustom yourself to it, my lord.” She turned back on her side and drew the covers up to her neck in case he decided to break the door down.

  Minutes passed in silence, and she thought perhaps he’d taken the hint and abandoned her. She sat up, narrowed her eyes, and glared at the door as though she could see through it.

  “I want you to accompany me to dinner,” he finally said, breaking the silence.

  Bianca crossed her arms over her chest, hugging the blanket to her breasts. “What if I decline?”

  Another pregnant pause. “I don’t think you’d wish to do that.”

  “My lord, you do not know me well enough to assume the inclination of my mind.”

  * * * *

  Damian raised his hand to splinter the door asunder and banish her argument, then stopped, thinking better on it.

  She couldn’t face him. The door was a shield to her feelings. He had unnerved her. She was just as disturbed by her reaction to him as he was to her. Likely she was just as mystified, as well.

  The turn of thought tickled his memory, and Damian thought back to the curse that plagued him, wrapping his mind around the words. By the healer’s hand and love’s demand, you will live and love no more....

  He’d focused solely on the healing aspect of the curse, but perhaps in that, he’d made his most grievous mistake. Bianca was a healer, pure of heart, and she didn’t respond to him like he was not more than a monster. Healer’s hand and love’s demand.... Could it mean without both her healing power and love, he would live and love no more?

  Hope pricked the bleakness with which he’d insulated himself. There could be no other interpretation. A
fter all this time, it finally made sense, and he’d been a fool for not seeing the easy solution sooner. All those wasted years ... the unceasing torture of absolute solitude....

  He could have ended it long ago. But then, according to her father, there was no one else like her. Bianca had to be the key to his salvation--the only key.

  But could he make her love him? Gentleness and wooing had been lost to him long ago. He was unused to humanity, for in the years following his damnation, vile anger had consumed him. He had embraced his darkness, reveling in the fear he provoked--all in an attempt to frighten away any would-be visitors. No longer the hero, he’d despised the flaunting of their life and his lack of it, and one night in a century was but a brief taste of what he’d had, more hell than heaven.

  But Bianca ... she was different from the others. She did not fear him as a death knight, but as a man who aroused her hidden feelings. To give him her body was to give him her heart--he knew that, implicitly. If he seduced her....

  Only then would she be willing to banish the chains of his damnation. Only then would she have the power to heal.

  Only if she loved him....

  * * * *

  Despite all her arguments against the folly of going, in the end, Bianca grudgingly conceded to go to dinner. Not to bow to his wishes and satisfy his belief that he could force her to his will, but because frankly, she was hungry.

  Bianca dressed in the gold gown because it laced up in the front, and she did not want to give him any cause to touch her again. She did not like the strangeness he evoked in her. It was far safer for her to allow some distance between them.

  Damian met her outside her room, giving no indication of being smugly satisfied she’d come out to him. It was fortunate he could restrain himself. In spite of her efforts to remain aloof, he took her arm in his and escorted her through the long corridor and into the great hall to the rear. Near the throne was a door leading to a private chamber, and inside a long, slender table was set for one. Candelabras dotted the length of the table, giving off a warm, mellow glow.

  “I thought you would be dining also?” she asked, stopping in the door.

  “I have no such needs. I will enjoy watching you eat and serving you.”

  Damian was being very polite, almost suspiciously agreeable. Had she thought he had another objective beyond that need for her power, she would have been worried. As it was, she dismissed it and nodded absently, sitting at the head of the table as he insisted. He gently pushed her up to it, then poured wine and presented plates for her to choose portions of baked goose, steamed and shredded potatoes, and vibrant, brightly colored vegetables.

  Damian sat to her left once he’d finished serving her. She chose to ignore him but he was not one to be disregarded. She couldn’t help glancing up every few seconds to see why he remained quiet. Each time, she caught him watching her, following the movement of her lips and throat as she placed food in her mouth, chewed, and swallowed. Rather than feeling uncomfortable under his scrutiny, she found his steady gaze arousing, titillating in a most basic way. She couldn’t stop thinking about what he’d done to her outside, how he’d laid her over his lap and controlled her. He stroked his chin with one finger, that same finger that had parted her folds and touched a place no man had ever dared. He’d caressed her with a pulse quickening boldness, as if in that moment, she would belong only to him, forever and always ... her body was his to master. He’d thrust inside her, so foreign and hard, she’d climaxed almost immediately.

  Beneath her skirts, her thighs felt hot and sticky with remembered sensation. She didn’t know if she could make it through this dinner in one piece.

  He smiled, as if he knew the turn of her thoughts. His eyes darkened as she licked a crumb from the corner of her mouth, making her clit throb with awareness.

  She had to stop thinking like a madwoman and ignore the heat he conjured with a look. Bianca cleared her throat and toyed with her food, clenching her thighs together as she tried to ignore the uncomfortable wetness between them. “I-I would like to understand what happened to you ... more fully.”

  “I don’t remember all that happened. It was many years ago.”

  She could tell he was lying, that he just didn’t want to tell her the truth. God knew she needed something to distract her from the hollow ache of her womb. “Perhaps some tidbit? The least likely detail could give me some clue.”

  “I thought you did not want to heal me. You made that apparent today.”

  She ignored his reference to her earlier actions. Her frustration channeled her thoughts away from her sensuality. “If you do not help me, I cannot help you.”

  He sighed and touched his breastplate, his hand over his heart. “Do you see this hole?”

  Bianca leaned forward. Yes, now she could see there was a hole bending the metal plate in. It was a thin slit, barely visible. She’d not noticed it before. “What of it?”

  “I was struck with a cursed blade. The moment it pierced my skin was the moment my cursed existence began.”

  “Perhaps then if I saw it....”

  “The wound has long since disappeared. No, you would do well to improve your powers. If not, you may never leave me.”

  It was cruel of him to mention it again, when she had no hope of bowing to his wishes. “My father will come for me.”

  “Aye, he likely will, but he’ll not find Helmskeep. No one can unless I choose to reveal it. He could wander this valley for weeks and circle it a hundred times without knowing he did so.”

  He continued talking, but she refused to listen. He’d effectively dried the well of her desire.

  Never would he reveal his secrets, yet without full knowledge, he was damning her to fail. His determination to shut her out frustrated her, perhaps nearly as much as being unable to heal him and being unable to escape. It was odd that years of his existence hadn’t erased his unfavorable human traits when much of his good had likely long since departed. More so than all of that, she felt as though some twisted destiny had thrust them in one another’s paths, but she was helpless to know why ... or to do anything about it.

  Damian’s attempts to draw her back into conversation fell flat on her mood. Would he really let her father hunt her endlessly? Did he truly want to keep her that badly? Her own father teased her mercilessly about selling her to the lowest bidder, for she was headstrong and aggravating in her own right. Damian’s patience was vast, but she could frustrate anyone, including him.

  No matter, she would make it outside Helmskeep the next opportunity, for certain.

  She noticed a sudden silence and glanced up, wondering what he was about.

  “Now who is acting the child? You’ve scarce uttered a word in all this time,” he said finally, a slight smile on his lips as he leaned back and crossed his arms.

  She frowned at him, her attention caught. He’d made no mention of forcing her to converse, and she resented his implication. “Is it any wonder? I have good reason to.” She was not acting like a child. She simply ... didn’t have anything to say to him.

  One corner of his mouth hitched higher, and he arched one brow. “Come, I did not ... beat you.”

  Bianca’s skin heated as she blushed at the reminder of what he’d done. What sort of lowborn man would bring up such a thing at the table? Never mind the fact that she could scarcely draw her thoughts away from it. Just looking at his long, tapered fingers made her weak inside. “No, you did not.”

  She lifted her glass to sip some wine, and strangled as something touched her foot beneath the table. Bianca coughed and sputtered, near jumping out of her seat. She patted her lips with a linen towel and surreptitiously looked down to see his foot disappear beneath her skirt. She felt the soft leather slide up her calf. He stroked it up and down, moving higher each time. By all that was holy--she wanted him to touch her again, wanted him to soothe her ache--but she couldn’t allow it.

  Bianca wiggled in her seat away from him and shook her legs, but he persisted. If anyt
hing, he seemed more determined now than ever. Perhaps if she showed no reaction, he would cease and desist. Any response he aroused in her only seemed to provoke him further.

  Resolutely, Bianca ignored him, until his foot slipped up between her thighs. She clamped her legs tightly together, and he grinned. Actually grinned at her! He was using her weakness against her.

  Her fork clattered to her plate as she dropped it and glared at him.

  “Am I disturbing you?” His smile increased.

  If she’d not been on the receiving end of his teasing, she would have laughed. At this moment, he was so unlike what he normally projected himself to be. It gave her hope that anyone could change, and she found his reversal enormously appealing.