by Tee, Marian
Table of Contents
My Eros (Sub Rosa Secret Society)
About the Book
Eros
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
The gods have come, and the gods are here to stay.
I WAS EIGHTEEN WHEN people started calling me a murderer...and I ended up bound to a god who has existed since the beginning of time.
My story began pretty much like yours.
A new girl who moves to Vermont,
A private school that's beautiful, mysterious, and deadly,
And also—-
Girl meets boy, boy wants girl, but...
Boy was not who he said he was.
And the girl's professor, he was beautiful and cruel—-
And he, too was not who he said he was.
I could tell you the rest, but then I'd have to kill you, in the name of The Ancient Order of Sub Rosa.
NOTE: THIS IS A MODERN Cupid & Psyche (Greek Mythology) retelling with a dirty and dark academy romance theme. High school setting, but definitely NOT vanilla.
About the Book
I'm alone in the woods, and the trees around me are but towering scraggly shadows under the silvery stream of moonlight. There are butterflies everywhere, and they're like nothing I've ever seen, with bodies that glow incandescently and wings that seem to change from purple to red, blue to green, yellow to orange.
I hear footsteps behind me, but before I can turn, I feel myself suddenly being pulled back, and a gasp escapes me when I realize I'm now held captive by a man.
Also: a man who is completely naked, and I don't even have to look over my shoulder to know this.
I can't be mistaken, with the rough, hard wall of the man's chest pressed intimately against my back, and it's only at this moment does it dawn on me that I am the same.
I am naked as he is, and my senses spiral at the thought of how every inch of our bodies are now in burning-hot contact.
I have never been this close to a man before. Never ever wanted to. And though I don't even know who it is that's holding me, I find myself choosing to stay.
Something about this man whose face I've yet to see...
Something about this man whom I can only feel...
Something about him feels right.
My soul seems to know him, and my body seems to have found its master, with the way every inch of me is already trembling in thrilling awareness of his masculinity.
Time dances past, but we remain as we are, a captor holding his captive. There's something between us that's ablaze, and with every thunderous beat of my heart I can feel its flames burning hotter, an unseen swirl of heat that moves wildly over our bodies.
We only have to move away from each other to extinguish it, but because we don't, it's as if both of us want to fan the flames of our desire, prolonging the tormenting pleasure of holding each other without actually touching any part that's private and precious.
The idea of intercourse has always been something I've shied away from, but because of this man, it's suddenly all I can think about.
I have never wondered how it would feel to be possessed by a man.
But now I do.
And now I also know...that I do not want to be taken gently and carefully.
The arm wrapped around me just under my breast is hewn with muscles, and my heart skips a beat when I think of how this arm can keep me imprisoned no matter how much I struggle. Everything about this man is so different from me. He's large where I'm small. Rigid where I'm malleable. And when I suddenly feel his breath against my ear, I can't help but cry out because even the sounds we make are so deliciously contradicting of each other. His is rough and harsh, and mine is soft and tremulous.
I'm tempted to turn around, but before I can seriously think of it, that's when I feel him moving, his other arm going around me, and my breath catches anew as his hands...oh, his large, strong hands—-
They're suddenly covering my breasts, and my chest swells at his first touch.
I slowly look down, and the sight of his hands completely covering the pale globes of my flesh make me feel light-headed.
He starts palming my breasts, and my knees quake as a battery of sensations ravage my body. I feel hot in a way I've never felt before. Restless like I've never been restless before. I feel so many indescribable things, and all of it is making my body react in a way it has never done—-
My nipples...I can't remember them being so proudly erect, and my breasts...I can't remember them feeling so acutely swollen.
There's this ache inside of me that's growing more unbearable the longer his hands stay on my flesh, and I find myself biting down hard on my lip as a cry threatens to rush out of my throat.
Oh please, please, please—-
That's all I want to say.
That's all I want to do.
I want to beg him when I've never begged before. I want to beg even though I'm not sure what I'm begging him for, and oh, when I feel his fingers start squeezing my breasts, that's when the ache inside of me deepens into something more. I'm now throbbing from within, and as my body starts to writhe, that's when I feel it—-
Something long and hard that's throbbing just as hard, sliding and rubbing itself between the cheeks of my ass, and I can no longer keep my cries to myself.
I moan and cry out, and the thick length of his manhood starts moving even faster.
It's one thing to know the man you desire wants you back, but it's another thing entirely to feel it. When desire becomes tangible, when the hardness you feel against your skin is unmistakable, your own need grows—-
Just like mine is now growing more and more—-
And when I feel his fingers tighten around my breasts, tightening to the point that pleasure sharpens with pain—-
My head falls back, and that's when I see...the bestial features of a god.
Eros
A Modern-Day Cupid & Psyche
Dirty & Dark Academy Romance
Sub Rosa Secret Society #1
by Marian Tee
Copyright 2021 by Streak Digital Publishing
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
Prologue
The Third War was nothing like we imagined. It didn't involve weapons of mass destruction.
It wasn't even started by humans. And that was why we never saw it coming.
We prayed without realizing it wasn't just God who was listening.
By the time we knew better, it was too late.
We are now ruled by gods, and
the world was never the same again.
Excerpt taken from Dear God: A Post-3rd Diary
SUMMER HAD TURNED AGATHA'S office into a boiling-hot oven, and although all of the windows were flung wide open, the only thing that blew in was a cacophony of noise from the streets below: an angry exchange between a landlord and a shop owner, drivers impatiently honking their horns in the midst of heavy traffic, and the mind-numbing drilling sound from a construction site in the next block.
Such disharmonic racket would've been more than enough to ruin anyone's mood, but so great was Agatha's relief at that moment all of it only sounded like music to her ears. She was just so terribly glad, so, so glad that she couldn't even make herself care that her decade-old ceiling fan had made its last dying spin, and its untimely death had now left her cooking in her own fats.
Agatha had been with Social Services since her first year out of college, and her first case at that time had been a three-year-old girl named Halyna, whose parents' death had been ruled as fated. It was a Post-3rd addition, and deaths in this category were considered thoroughly avoidable and automatically ineligible for any post-mortem investigation. Fated deaths involved humans voluntarily interacting with the divine...and dying as a consequence.
Children made orphan because of fated deaths were often seen as carriers of misfortune and left unadopted. In Halyna's case, however, the child had been so tremendously lucky, with Agatha successfully finding her a match for adoption in a matter of months.
She had hoped it was the last she would see of Halyna. In her line of work, not seeing a former case subject was always a good thing, and as the years went by, Agatha had eventually forgotten about little Halyna...until the call.
The memory had Agatha reaching for her mouse, and she worked the scroll button to move the screen back to the top. She wanted to re-read the email one last time, just to be sure she wasn't imagining anything.
A concerned party who wishes to remain anonymous has written to us...
Our legal representation has thoroughly reviewed Ms. Mariposa's case and has come to the conclusion that she is by no means a danger to society in any way...
If this meets your approval, and in the condition that her parents also consent to her transfer, we at Rosethorne School would be delighted to welcome her as a student in the next academic year...
She read it again and again, but she just could not find any loophole, and Agatha finally closed her eyes and allowed herself to lean back against the soft leathery padding of her chair.
The day she got the call, she had been about to leave her office, and she could still remember how her heart dropped to her stomach as she listened to the voice at the other end of the line, telling her it was the police calling about a person she had previously worked with.
18-year-old Halyna Mariposa, found unconscious in the old music room of her school, along with thirteen dead bodies. Of varying ages and genders, and all of them naked and heavily mutilated.
The forensics team had done their best to find any clue that would identify their killer, but the amount of blood extracted from the crime scene was excessive to the point that it had become more a hindrance than a clue to exactly what had happened in the eighty-plus minutes Halyna was unable to account for.
Although no charges had been made due to lack of witnesses, motive, and evidence, it hadn't made any difference to public opinion. Even when the families of the victims themselves believed the girl was innocent, the die had been cast, and the girl subsequently subjected to harassment both online and in real life. She had been labeled a mass murderer, and her old school wasted no time in sending the Mariposas an expulsion letter that explicitly stated there was no chance for the decision to be subject to reversal.
Unlike before, the gods seemed to be conspiring against the dear girl, and for months now, Agatha had been secretly panicking she would be unable to find a school willing to take the child in...until today's email.
Halyna's parents had told Agatha they were willing to go to the ends of the earth if that was what it took for their daughter to have a normal life again, and in a way that was exactly what they'd have to do.
The family was based in California while Rosethorne was tucked all the way up in the mountains of Vermont. Not only that, but Rosethorne was also strict with its boarding school policies, and no exceptions were to be made for Halyna's case. The girl was free to stay with her parents every weekend, but Mondays to Fridays she would have to reside on campus, and while Agatha wasn't sure if Halyna's parents were ready for that...
They really hadn't any choice.
Rosethorne, for better or for worse, was Halyna's only chance to put the pieces of her life back together.
Chapter One
Monday | Wednesday | Friday
0800h - 0900h Creaturae
0910h - 1010h Scientia
1020h - 1150h Istoría
1150h - 1250h Ora gia gévma
1300h - 1430h Mathimatiká
1440h - 1540h Naturae
1550h - 1650h Mirykasmós
Tuesday | Thursday
0800h - 0900h Scientia
0910h - 1010h Creaturae
1020h - 1150h Physica Educationem
1150h - 1250h Ora gia gévma
1300h - 1430h Glóssa
1440h - 1540h Aesthetica
1550h - 1650h Istoría
I'm not sure of what to think about my class schedule. It's printed on parchment paper for one, which I admit is a classy touch.
And...pun intended, naturally.
Class. Classy.
You get it, right?
But I digress.
The whole thing is also written in a mixture of Greek and Latin, and it's the latter that gives me pause. If Greek is now the new French, Latin is, well...it's still a dead language, and I have no idea why Rosethorne is trying to resurrect it. Outside the clergy, the only other kind of people I know who speak Latin are those who directly work for the gods, and...oh.
I fidget restlessly in the backseat of my Uber as an unexpected possibility occurs to me. Is that why Agatha has been so evasive when answering my questions about my new school? She's never lied to me, but if this school is what I suspect it is, then she probably thought lying was the only way she could get me on board with the whole start-fresh-in-Vermont thing.
Agatha knows how I feel about the divine, and the more I think about it, the more things start making sense. The gods are big on privacy, and Rosethorne being patronized by the divine could be why I wasn't able to find any info about it on the Internet.
The sides of my temple start to throb, and I quickly turn my gaze outside in hopes of distracting myself and preventing the onslaught of a major headache.
THE DRIVER SEEMS TO sense my discomfort, and the older man takes a peek at me through the rearview mirror. "We can lower the windows if you want," he suggests gruffly. "Fresh air never does anyone harm."
"I'd like that," I say with a grateful smile. "Thanks."
A gentle breeze sweeps inside the car as soon as the windows go down, and the older man starts talking to me about how late September in Vermont means the weather is still the "friendly" side of cool, and how the views outside are something I should take my fill of, while everything's still lush and green.
It's sensible advice, so I do as he asks and focus my attention on the scenery, which is admittedly a lot more picturesque than the suburban cookie-cutter garden plots I'm used to.
Tall wild grass grow freely on my side of the road, and between them are vibrantly colorful clumps of heleniums. Flowers play a huge role in Post-3rd education, and so I also know that the heleniums will say goodbye come the last day of summer. Once leaves start to turn red and brown, flowers of autumn would blossom to life, and alongside them, I'll also be starting anew as a transfer student in Rosethorne School...and wait a minute, did I just compare myself to a flower about to bloom?
The realization nearly makes me gag, and I quickly urge myself to think of something else, li
ke...
Shit.
An old memory resurfaces to replace the disgustingly poetic nonsense my mind has conjured, but it's unfortunately something a lot less desirable. I squeeze my eyes shut, but it's already too late.
I'm twelve again, I'm back in my old bedroom in my parents' house, and I've just had this genius thought of looking up my biological parents online.
I only knew their names at that time, so all I was hoping for was to dig up a couple of photos.
But instead I got more.
A bad kind of more, like tons of newspaper articles that not-so-subtly derided my biological parents for their stupidity. Apparently, those two had been foolish enough to challenge the gods when no one asked them to. And so they died without having to. And I became an orphan when I didn't have to be.
I know the gods aren't to blame in any way, but a part of me does blame them, and since then, I've stayed as far away as I could from anything that has to do with the divine. People think I'm weird for it, but I really can't care less about what they think.
All I want is to lead an ordinary, magic-free life, but we don't always get what we want, do we?
And the crisp sheet of parchment between my fingers is proof of it.
Everything about this piece of paper screams divine, and although a part of me wants to tell the driver to please turn the car around and take me back to my adoptive parents—-
It's pointless to go against the gods.
That's the first thing humans learned Post 3rd, which - in case you've been living under a rock for the past century or so - is short for Post Third War. The world has changed so much in the last hundred years that history has basically been restructured and divided into two timelines. Pre-3rd was when humans didn't know any better and prayed to the gods to come and save them. Post-3rd was when humans did know better, but by then it was too late.
The gods have come, and they're here to stay.
MY SUSPICIONS OF ROSETHORNE'S ties to the divine worsen as my Uber begins climbing up a winding mountainside road, and I have my first glimpse of my new school...which turns out to be an entire town all on its own.
