The Wildest Woods

by S. K Munt

  My formal uniform was a black, long-sleeved top made of a thickly-woven mesh that was flame retardant, and though the sleeves and back of it were mesh too, the chest and torso was covered by a thin, supple leather that was finely ribbed. It was a constrictive garment, made to feel like a second skin and it was definitely too tight to feel comfortable in, but it made me look muscular and I appreciated that for the first time that night because when I’d stood before Cairo Kingslater, Sam and King Raphael earlier, I’d felt a little like I’d come down with a case of spontaneous dwarfism myself! Honestly, what was in the water here that made its men grow like weeds? I was almost as tall as the king had been and only an inch shorter than the mind-reader, but due to my sagging spine, I’d felt like a mouse being batted around by lions. And Kingslater… yikes! If Saul-Yin wanted to help me take him, she’d have to tackle one end while I went for the other because he was the biggest man I’d ever seen! If Karol was jealous of me and how I’d grown, I could only imagine how quickly he’d have Kingslater taken out, evil pirate or not!

  The top had a pair of black combat pants to go with it, just as my everyday uniform did, only these ones were made of a thick, silk-blended linen instead of black denim, so they felt softer and allowed my legs to breathe more than in their tighter, less formal counterparts, and had a black leather belt to match that was adored with golden spikes- real ones. It was secretly my favourite part of the uniform because it made me look a bit like a bad-ass, but I knew that it was a waste of money so I always felt guilty about liking it so much.

  Once that had been clicked shut around my waist, I retrieved some wet toilet paper from the bathroom and quickly polished my boots until they gleamed and once they were on I added the final touch: my golden sash, which was supposed to be worn across my chest. I always felt too much like a show off when I did that though, like a ribbon-winning horse on show, so I’d taken to wearing it on my hip when I was out of my superiors’ sights, securing one end of it to my belt loop and tucking the other into the waistband at the back of my pants, allowing the ribbon and all of the badges on it to drape a little over my thigh and around my hip. That made me feel like a bit of a tough guy too because it was one of the few ways that I’d ever managed to successfully rebel against my older brother’s rigid rules, but it must have looked as cool as it felt because the other soldiers had started doing it too, so I was a bit of a trend-setter I guess; black sheep or not.

  The uniform was attractive-looking and I knew that I looked good in it, but it served more purposes than met the eye, and I’d hated it because of them and wore it as seldomly as possible as a result. There were golden details everywhere, from the spikes on the belt, to the zipper on my fly to the gold-plated tread on the bottom of my boots and the zippers on my numerous pockets- not to mention the wrist cuffs, rings and chain that I was supposed to wear with it, and every single detail mocked me because they were a thinly-veiled reminder that I needed protection against Larkin Whittaker- especially as far as access to my pants was concerned- because she was allergic to gold. Yes, every time I zipped up my pants, I was reminded of how much I’d fucked up, and of what lengths Karol would go to, to keep me and my libido in line, and to make it that much worse, he’d gone and announced his reasons for plating the fastenings in gold when he’d unveiled the uniform publicly, so everyone else in Calliel knew it too and ribbed me accordingly.

  But there was a chance that no one would learn about that embarrassing fact here, so I rebelled against my brother’s distrust of me by forgoing the jewellery that I was supposed to wear with it, and donned the mask that had been left out for me instead. I’d spent the last two years feeling like I was being paraded around in a costume in order to be mocked, but this was the first time that I’d get the chance to prove that I was more than the mask I wore, and I was looking forward to taking advantage of that and of fostering a good relationship between this seemingly great nation and my own.

  Spritzing on the only cologne that I’d ever liked enough to wear, I downed another glass of champagne and moved my mask into place over my eyes, telling myself that the only thing that stood between me and a fresh slate here was my throbbing dick- I had to keep it tightly zippered away and keep my hands, eyes and thoughts off the beautiful Companion, even if that meant giving in and knocking on Saul-Yin’s door after and asking Ambrose if he’d mind sharing her for an hour or so.

  But it won’t come to that… I thought, setting my jaw in determination as I stepped out into the hall once more. I’ll go see Paisley and the others now to remind me of how much they depend on me doing the right thing, and after the ball, I’ll pay them a visit again and sleep at Theodore’s side like a dog if that’s what it takes to keep me temptation-free!

  Feeling defiant and determined (albeit exhausted and scared) I turned to the left- and found myself staring directly at the wild beauty that I’d just been swearing off and just like that, the only part of my body that I was more aware of than my dick was my suddenly pounding heart. She was being pressed up against the wall by the knight, only now he was dressed like the pirate he was, and had his large hands wrapped around the girl’s shoulders as he shook her gently.

  ‘What’s come over you darling? Explain yourself!’ he glanced back up the stairs and past her as Sam bustled out of the curved stairwell at the end of the hall above them, looking vexed.

  ‘What do you care?’ Erika adjusted her mask so that it was sitting on top of her coiffed, pale pink wig and for the first time I wondered if she was a blonde or brunette beneath it. ‘You’re leaving me, remember?’

  ‘You know I could never leave you!’ Cairo exclaimed. ‘I was hurt and upset and I needed a minute to process it all... but I don’t doubt our connection the way you do, and I won’t let either of you convince me that I should!’

  I felt completely and utterly exposed, and yet none of them spotted me there so I froze, not knowing if it was safer to stay frozen, or flee. He’d left her? Over her reaction to me, or over some other quarrel? It would be joyous news to hear, if only he’d stayed gone! If only she hadn’t so lovingly reached up to touch his black velvet eye mask then and whisper:

  ‘You want to eat the cake too, don’t you?’ she threw out her arms and giggled. ‘Let them ALL have cake! Didn’t Marie Antoinette say something like that?’

  ‘Who cares about what nonsense Mario Antoinette spouted, when you’re behaving this way?’ The pirate cupped her delicately beautiful face and stared down hard into her eyes. ‘I’m not kidding my love, I want to know- what did you take?’

  ‘You don’t want to know Cairo, so just leave it, okay?’ Sam said, looking resigned. ‘She’s happy and calm if nothing else and I won’t begrudge her that, not today.’

  ‘Thank you Sam…and I must admit that I feel fantastic right now!’ The girl closed her eyes and tilted her face towards the ceiling, smiling loosely while wearing a rhapsodic expression. Gone were the tears, and her make-up looked as if it had been airbrushed back onto her perfect face, and I couldn’t help but wonder where she had just come from, and if the harem was on the top floor because I’d only counted five from the ground earlier. ‘Besides, I’m not your love Cairo… I’m your treasure, remember? You’re inadequate pay off for a job well done!’ She opened her eyes and grasped his face in hers, smiling an enchanted smile. ‘And you don’t want to love me… you want to pillage me. To take me back to your ship and-’

  ‘I’m going to make you walk the plank on my ship so the freezing cold water snaps you out of this state unless you snap put of it yourself, right now!’ Cairo shook her again, and I felt my charge return to me as my concern for her welfare increased. ‘Tell me why you’re acting so strange! Are you drunk? Stoned? What did Lady Lucida give you?’

  ‘Can’t I be both?’ the Companion shoved Cairo gently and stood up, smoothing her skirts. ‘You two get to let your hair down all the time, so isn’t it only fair that when I finally do it, I get to do it thoroughly?’

  ‘I don’t get drunk!�
�� Sam protested, looking irate. ‘Not in front of you anyway, so don’t drag me into this.’

  ‘No… you can’t get drunk in front of me, can you Sam?’ She giggled and turned my way, running her hand along the stone wall as though it was made of silk that demanded caressing. ‘If you did, you’d probably end up hitting on me too, right? Then you’d be the one that Cairo has pinned to the wall, and being worried about Calliel discovering us would be the least of either of your problems…’ she was still laughing when she saw me, but her eyes widened and her mouth fell open in an ‘O’ while behind her, her two friends remained completely oblivious to the fact that I was witnessing the entire exchange.

  Oh shit… I thought, as our eyes locked and my body throbbed. This is going to be the longest, hardest night of my life, isn’t it?

  ‘You came onto her?!’ Cairo demanded, sounding outraged and suddenly, very far away for the blood rushing to my head. ‘I left her alone for what, ten minutes while I tried to get my head together! Talk about moving fast!’

  ‘What? No! I’ve never said a word to her about-’ Sam stopped talking as soon as he’d started when the Companion girl snapped out of her shock and threw her head back, laughing uproariously while pointing at me.

  ‘Oh! Oh I never…’ she clutched her stomach and collapsed into the wall beside her, and suddenly I wanted a share in whatever she was high on too. ‘It’s prince Kohén, guys, live and in the delicious flesh!’ the other two broke apart and came staggering after the Companion, but she hurried over to me and to my shock, dipped into an elegant curtsy. When she looked up, her eyes were on mine, but mine were looking down her dress and glassing over as a result. ‘Good evening, your highness- I apologise for my current state and the conversation that you just overheard, it’s just that, as I’m sure you’ve already learned…’ she straightened and stepped into me, resting her hands on my shoulders and pressing her lips to my cheek as she whispered: ‘I haven’t forgotten how your lips felt on mine as you have, so I tried to get drunk enough to make myself forget, you see? Now everyone’s upset with me because apparently, they’d like me better if I could forget my history too.’

  Whoa! We’d kissed? Jesus, I’d been quite the little multi-tasker, hadn’t I? Where had poor Larkin been while all of this was going on? Hadn’t it been enough for me to have a bevy of beauties waiting for me back in my own harem when I’d been fourteen? Where had I gotten off, stealing a kiss from another prince’s favourite?

  And yet, my self-loathing did nothing to smother the desire streaming through my blood, and I was so breathless with need that it felt like all of the air had been sucked out of the room. I was very aware that Cairo was stalking up behind Erika and looking to break us apart, and possibly break my face apart too, but I couldn’t help but ask:

  ‘Did it work?’ I searched her eyes, and glanced longingly down at her mouth against my better judgement. ‘Have you forgotten what my lips felt like on yours, my lady?’

  In response, her eyes narrowed, and she smirked, like she’d expected me to say something exactly like that. ‘No.’ Erika fell back from me, and did not fight Cairo as he snatched her arm and dragged her past me, heading towards the grand staircase and out of my reach. But she called back over his shoulder: ‘And I’m starting to fear that I never will, no matter how hard I scrub them!’

  And then she was gone, and I was left alone in the hallway with Sam, who looked nothing sort of heartsick as he gazed after her. Erika was right, and I couldn’t believe I hadn’t seen it earlier- Sam was so protective of the Companion girl because he was head over heels for her too!

  ‘You too, hmm?’ I asked, and was not surprised when he shoved me into the wall hard as he stormed by, pursuing the not-so-happy couple.

  ‘Your fly is undone... golden-boy,’ was all he said, and that was all it took to snap me out of my own temporary state of euphoria, because it was proof that even in this kingdom full of second chances, I was still destined to be the exception to God’s ‘equality for all,’ rule.

  Oh well, if I was going to do the time anyway- why not do the crime? Forgetting to give a fuck about what anyone thought of me- ever again- I sidled off after Sam, wondering what my chances were of stealing a second kiss from the most beautiful girl in the world.

  But only if it was given willingly, of course.

  40.

  Château Aztaroth, Raphael

  Larkin Aztaroth

  I didn’t so much walk as I did whirl, and I didn’t so much drink as I did giggle down breathless mouthfuls of fizzing bubbles, and although that I knew, deep down, that I was going to be very embarrassed by my ostentatious behaviour when I sobered up, I clung firmly to the simple truth that I deserved this happiness- this complete and utter ecstasy, and if my subjects didn’t like it, then fuck ‘em. They were my subjects, after all, and the fact that I hadn’t fucked them all already put me ahead of every other leader of the free world, didn’t it? Lord knew what Karol had poked his prick into since he’d been given absolute authority over Arcadia, but I got the feeling that when he was prancing about Eden on the prowl, even the dogs hid!

  That mental image cracked me up and I snorted a few bubbles out of my mouth, catching my father’s eye over the top of the dinner table. There were no words to describe the way he’d been looking at me since Cairo had practically slammed me into my seat at the head of the table beside him, tucking me like a child at bedtime, but ‘bemused’ and ‘startled’ would have been a good start! He knew what I’d done of course, because good ol’ Sam had already run his mouth about me playing patty-cake in the mirror with my wench of a mother, and although I knew that he was as dismayed by the turn that the night’s agenda had taken as I had been earlier, I was apparently entertaining enough when I was drunk on hellfire to warrant a smile or two despite his distress.

  Taking Satan into me had been a lot less invasive than I’d imagined, and I was a bit shocked to realise how quickly I’d probably do it again if this was what the end result was. I’d been too angry to look at her or even talk to her when I’d gone through with it, but I’d lifted my hands to touch her palms through the looking glass under Lady Lucida and Siria’s instruction, and then it had felt like static energy had streamed right through me while susurrus, and indecipherable voices had started whispering through my mind- whispering ancient secrets I could not translate as Satan had stepped through the glass and more and more into me. Within seconds, every appendage had gone numb, even in that special place where I always felt my wings now, and then as soon as that numbness had washed over me, it had begun to retreat, making every cell in my body feel buoyant with energy- so buoyant that I’d been certain that I was floating off in a bubble. I could still remember everything that was unpleasant with the world, but I just couldn’t bring myself to care, because there was so much wonder to behold anyway.

  Then, once Siria had assured me that the dreaded moment had come and gone, I’d staggered back from the mirror, staring into it and expecting to see my mother there, but all I’d been able to see was light- rainbow swirls of light, and sparking stars. I’d gasped, looking around me, tracking those swirling constellations and feeling like I’d been trapped inside a kaleidoscope, but before I could become too disoriented or motion sick, everything had snapped back into focus. I’d been in my room again, only I’d seen and felt everything more clearly than I ever had before- the scent of the Jasmine blooms, the fact that Siria’s teeth were whiter than Gabby’s, the fact that my furniture was pearl not white and most importantly at all- the realisation that I loved every single thing and everyone in that room, even the stuff I hated.

  Too moved to verbally communicate that, I’d flung myself at Lucinda and had stroked her bare shoulders whispering that she was pretty, and Lady Lucida had snorted before palming me off to Sam, who had been watching me the whole time from the corner of the room, telling us that this was the stupidest idea that anyone had ever had and that we were all going to regret it.

  ‘Oh Sam…’ I cle
nched him tightly in my arms- so tight that he eventually yelped for me to knock it off. ‘You’re pretty too.’ I tugged on his hair. ‘Can I scalp you and wear this like a collar? I’m sure Riesling would be able to turn it into a stunning cloak!’

  But before he’d been able to say anything in response, Inoborna had come in and started barking at me, so I’d chased him down for a hug and had been devastated when he’d snarled at me and then had turned, racing out of the room. I’d followed him, demanding to know why he was being a killjoy and that was when it had occurred to me that I could barely walk or move, so heavy was my body, and so light was my head.

  ‘She’s had too much,’ Gabby had said quickly, coming to scoop me off the floor. ‘She needs to sleep some of it off before she tries to go downstairs.’

  ‘How could she have had too much?’ Siria had demanded. ‘Satan was only in her for a blink!’

  ‘Yes but they’ve already got the same blood, so I guess Lark-’

  ‘Erika-’

  ‘Right, Erika, is more susceptible to the thrall of her mother’s energy than we thought. See how Inoborna went off at her? Animal’s pick up when something’s not right with a person, so it’s safe to say that our queen isn’t just high on her mother’s energy, but drenched in it on a cellular level.’