by Tara Rose
“This is ridiculous.”
She rose, glancing around. Where could she stash the damn thing until morning? If she wanted to put it in her closet, she’d have to move most of her things out of there for the night. What the hell had possessed her to bring it up here in the first place? She had work to do, and she’d turned down a shift, which meant losing tip money on a Saturday night. She should call them back and say she could come in after all. There was still time to salvage half a shift out of the night, at least.
While she was debating whether she could simply carry the portrait back to the basement herself, without the dolly, she heard a sound that at first she thought was coming from the hallway. But when she opened her door and glanced up and down the corridor, no one was around. The sound had come from inside her room, and Chelsea knew without a doubt it had come from the painting, specifically.
No. It can’t be.
She closed her door and pulled the drape off, taking backward steps until her knees hit the edge of her bed. Then she sat down to watch the scene, her mind screaming it couldn’t be real, but every sense telling her it was.
The men took turns using their toys on the woman, who now faced the left side of the frame. Chelsea moaned softly as each toy came down across her breasts. She had her head back, and even with her eyes closed, her face had the look of someone lost in ecstasy. Her arms were behind her back, and Chelsea understood finally what the chains were for. They attached to the cuffs around her wrists.
First the flogger brushed her breasts, then the paddle struck her right across the nipples, and finally the leather strap smacked the delicate tissue, just above them. Chelsea shook her head, her mind reeling and her thoughts confused. She swore she could feel each strike, but it wasn’t painful. Rather, it produced an endorphin rush that was similar to the one she felt when she was in the zone at work, and everything ran smoothly.
But it was more than that. Much more. It was as if every happy thought she’d ever had filled her consciousness at the same time. She’d never been this aroused, either. She wanted to be that woman. She longed to feel those toys on her bare skin, her breasts, her pussy, and her ass.
Chelsea reached into her shorts and panties, rubbing her clit as the men continued to strike the woman. She was lost in the sensations she felt through the actions of the people in the painting. Her moans became the woman’s moans, or perhaps they were one and the same? She could no longer tell, and it didn’t matter. All she knew was that she never wanted the men to stop.
As her climax drew near, she had the sensation of slipping away, and moved her hand away abruptly as she glanced down at the floor. It was dim, almost see-through. But how was that possible? She tried to stand up too quickly and became so dizzy she was sure she would throw up.
Her heart pounding now, she scooted off the bed slowly and tried to take a few steps toward the painting, but there was nothing solid under her feet. She was falling…
Chapter Two
Prince Roland, son of Leland and nephew to King Atheron of Ashdown, was taking a rare but well-deserved ride through the woods near the castle with his two best friends, princes Denver and Archer. All three men were descended from King Reginald, the mysterious and charismatic figure who had discovered the portraits through which women from the other world were drawn into theirs. The mystery of the portraits was all anyone talked of these days, and for good reason.
“How long has it been since Brenna crossed over?” asked Archer.
“Two months.” Brenna Rutherford had been chosen by Denver’s cousin, Prince Parker, and by Roland’s cousin, Prince Jaxon, two months ago, but she’d almost ended up with the triplets soon after her arrival. The three had issued a challenge to Jaxon’s and Parker’s claim after Brenna had tried to escape her suite not more than an hour after crossing over.
“Things are weird now with the triplets gone,” said Denver. “Not that I wish they were back, but everyone is on edge.”
“They should be on edge,” said Roland. “These are still dangerous times, even without them around stirring up trouble.” The triplets, as everyone had called them, had been named Carleton, Channing, and Cheever. Roland and Denver had accused them of poisoning women from the other world that the three had claimed for nearly five years. But it had taken Brenna’s diligence, and her insistence that Jaxon and Parker follow through on their own suspicions, for King Atheron to finally put an end to it.
“My father has officially challenged Sedgewick as head of the Council.”
Roland glanced at Denver. “And what do you think will happen with that?”
Denver shrugged. “I’m not sure he’s a better choice, but it’s about time someone challenged Sedgewick.”
Roland nodded. He agreed with Denver but didn’t want to insult his friend by saying so. Lyndon was only a bit less clueless than his brother.
Denver’s father, Lyndon, was Sedgewick’s brother. Sedgewick was also Parker’s father, but even Sedgewick’s own sons didn’t think he was fit to run their Council.
He buried his head in the sand far too often and had been ready to accuse Brenna of the crimes the triplets had tried to pin on her, before it was discovered the triplets had staged the kidnapping of Molly, Brenna’s former maid. They’d tried to make it look as though the servant had gone with them willingly, even going so far as to send a note to the castle, giving the appearance that Brenna had been in contact with Molly the entire time.
In actuality, Molly had been poisoned by the triplets, just as they’d poisoned other women. Molly had refused their advances, and the triplets had taken their revenge on her for that, and because Jaxon and Parker had made them look like fools when they’d tried to claim Brenna for their own.
Because Jaxon and Parker trusted Brenna so much, they hadn’t believed the setup. Instead, they’d helped her ferret out the truth about Molly and what the triplets had done to other women from her world. As a consequence, the triplets were executed for treason.
About five months ago, Dalton, a former Council member had been executed for treason as well, but for very different reasons. His death, plus the deaths of the triplets, had been the first executions of princes in over a century.
“My father says the threat from within the Council is gone now that the triplets plus Dalton are dead,” said Archer. “They were the ones helping Enfield spies into the castle.”
“I don’t believe it’s true that the threat from within the Council is gone,” said Roland. “My father told me that the king believes there are guards within our walls who were also allies with the enemy, and they still are. They will need help from a Council member or a prince to continue any plans they have. And let us not forget that one of the women poisoned by the triplets wrote a note indicating there were other Council members in league with spies from Enfield.”
“Then maybe we should look at our own families as well as the remaining Council members?” asked Archer.
Roland gave him a dark look. “Maybe we should, indeed.”
“And if any of us have occasion to choose a woman from the other world,” said Denver, “we’d best keep a better eye on her than Jarrett and Colton, or Jaxon and Parker have done.”
“They did their duties,” said Roland.
“How can you say that?” asked Archer. “It was Abigail Dawson who went exploring the night of the Spring Solstice Ball, and was apprehended by Dalton and that spy from Enfield… What was his name?”
“Willoughby,” said Roland. “And if she hadn’t gone exploring, she wouldn’t have overheard Dalton and Willoughby admit what they’d done.”
“True,” said Denver, nodding.
“And we might not have discovered that there was at least one Enfield spy who had been made a castle guard.” Dalton had seen to it that Willoughby was given that distinction. But now, both men were dead. However, Roland didn’t believe for a moment that Willoughby had been the only Enfield spy to be made a guard inside this castle.
“But if our cousin
s had been more careful with Abigail out in these woods,” said Denver, “Enfield might not have discovered the portraits at all.”
Roland couldn’t argue with that. Jarrett and Colton, Parker’s brother, had gone for a walk with Abigail too close to the wall between Ashdown and Enfield. They’d been overheard talking about her crossing over by Willoughby, among others. Shortly thereafter, the homes where the artists who made the new paintings lived had been broken into. Atheron had moved the artists to the castle to keep them safe, but Roland wondered how safe any of them were these days.
“’Tis a sad day indeed when we cannot even safely take a walk or a ride through the woods near our own castle,” said Archer.
As Denver and Archer debated whether it was wise to allow the women from the other world to wander through the castle unaccompanied, and what part they might have played in the recent events that unfolded inside their castle, Roland let his thoughts wander to the strange and convoluted circumstances which allowed him and other men descended from Reginald to choose these women as sexual companions in the first place.
It was difficult to imagine all this had started because of a spurned king from Enfield, three thousand years ago. Enfield was the kingdom to the west of Ashdown, and this particular king had a powerful curse placed on all the females of Ashdown because one had refused him. The curse had endured, and it still affected all their women.
Once they reached child-bearing age, they had to take a mate from Enfield or they became barren from the moment they tried to conceive. Since it was forbidden for any of their women to take a mate from Enfield, their women were barren.
The curse was designed to wipe out the ruling princes of Ashdown, but the princes found a way to keep their bloodlines from dying out. They took brides from among the Wythmail women. Wythmail was the kingdom to their east. But to prevent having another cursed placed on them they did so in secret. The women were offered protection and comfort, and became citizens of Ashdown upon their marriage to an Ashdown man.
A fourteen-foot-high brick wall with razor wire at the top was built between the lands of Enfield and Ashdown, and to this day, guards still patrolled it on both sides. The Great Lake to the north and the Wastelands to the south protected Ashdown’s other two borders. Passage from Wythmail to Ashdown was freely allowed, but most of the princes and Council members feared that Ashdown’s relationship with Wythmail might become tenuous as well if current trends continued.
Over time, a shortage of Wythmail women willing to submit to the sadistic sexual perversions of the men of Ashdown arose, and the rulers of Wythmail eventually put an end to what they called the kidnap and rape of their women. The princes of Ashdown realized they had to do something, so now any marriage between an Ashdown man and a Wythmail woman included a contract. Money, property, and possessions changed hands, and Wythmail had grown quite wealthy because of this. They knew they held all the power over Ashdown.
As the centuries went by after the original curse, groups of Ashdown princes only grew more lustful, and weren’t content with brides from Wythmail who wanted equal power and standing in the kingdom. Over time, two distinct classes of nobility developed. Those who kept the bloodlines going by marrying Wythmail women and making them Ashdown citizens, and the current ruling class of princes to which Roland, Denver, Archer, Jaxon, Parker, Colton, Jackson and others belonged.
The only bloodline of those particular princes left were the men descended from Reginald. Most of them still preferred kinky sex, and lots of it, and had no wish to marry or produce heirs with the Wythmail women, or with any woman. It was their birthright as descendants of Reginald to choose women from the other world who crossed over through the magick of the portraits.
Roland knew that the women who came here didn’t understand their ways, but he had trouble understanding theirs, too. They thought they’d traveled back in time, but that was wrong. They’d slipped through a wormhole. They were in an alternate universe, and from what Roland had observed through speaking with them and other princes who had chosen them, not everything was as different as they’d first imagined.
People were still people. Some had good intentions and were merely doing what they’d been born to do. Others had evil intentions, and it didn’t matter if they were born to royalty or not. They didn’t live to sow good or peace in their world, only discontent and evil.
“I would have liked to know Reginald,” said Archer.
Archer’s words pulled Roland from his thoughts, and as he glanced ahead, he noticed they were nearing the castle. He wasn’t worried about riding this far out as they had their valets with them, plus a contingent of armed guards. “Why is that?” he asked. “What would you say to him if you could?”
“I want to ask the man exactly how many women he seduced, and what his secret was.”
He and Archer laughed, but then Roland was once again lost in thoughts, this time concerning his ancestor, the infamous King Reginald I. He’d lived two hundred years ago, and was the person responsible for placing the spell on the paintings. He’d asked for the power to seduce women—all women—and was given it by a powerful sorcerer.
But no one knows why the same magick was infused into the paintings, why it still worked, or why those powers had been passed on to Reginald’s descendants. The original paintings were rumored to be portraits of the women he’d seduced, but no one knew why the same magick worked in new paintings.
It was also still unclear how the women from the other world crossed over, or why they did, or how the exact twins of the portraits got into their world to begin with. They each crossed over during a full moon, but not every cycle. And they each told a similar story of having discovered the painting in an odd or unexpected place, and of having felt compelled to acquire it.
Once they got it to their homes, or sometimes even before they did, more details began to emerge. Then, just before they described a sensation of falling into the portrait itself, or of feeling as though they were about to fall, the figures in the painting moved.
“I’d ask him what the deal is with the paintings,” said Denver.
Roland nodded. “So would I.”
Historically, not all of Reginald’s descendants chose women who crossed over. A few still married and produced heirs, but since that meant the bloodline was, of course, mixed with Wythmail women, it could hardly be called any purer than another bloodline. But the people believed they were pure, and each of the princes was raised to believe it.
Because of the curse from Enfield, most of their bloodlines were recorded with fake documents. The idea was to trick Enfield into believing their women were still able to produce heirs, should any of those documents fall into enemy hands.
But it didn’t take a genius to figure out that couldn’t last forever. And, unless the princes who now chose women from other world began having children with them, Reginald’s sons would one day die out, as well. It was a convoluted, confusing set of rules that changed slightly with each new generation of Council members, and Roland got a headache if he thought too long about it.
And now that Enfield knew about the portraits, some surmised that Enfield believed Reginald’s descendants were having children with the women from the other world. Either way, it made the men of Ashdown look like fools in the eyes of their enemies, and most of the Council believed that Enfield would use the knowledge of the paintings as a way to drive a wedge between Ashdown and Wythmail.
It also put Enfield one step closer to discovering that the men of Ashdown had been falsifying their birth documents for centuries. They wanted Enfield to believe they’d found a way to keep a ruling class of princes going, despite the curse, but that was about to blow up in their faces.
“Do you think Enfield knew about the portraits before Willoughby overheard Abigail, Jarrett, and Colton talking in the woods?” asked Denver.
Roland shook his head. “I have no idea.”
“I’m more concerned with how the king expects to ferret out who else is involv
ed with Enfield,” said Archer. “Are we to trust no one now?”
Roland had to agree with his friend. It was difficult to know who to trust these days.
“Would you choose a woman from the other world?” asked Denver. “Either of you?”
“I would,” said Archer. “But I’d only share her with you two. No one else.”
Denver laughed, but it carried a nervous undertone. “I’m not sure I could have sex with a woman while the two of you watched.”
“We wouldn’t watch,” said Roland, grinning. “We’d participate.”
The other two chuckled, but Denver shook his head. “I don’t know how they do it. The other princes. Aren’t they embarrassed or uncomfortable?”
Archer rode close enough to Denver to give the man a punch in the arm. “What’s wrong? Afraid your cock wouldn’t measure up to mine or Roland’s?”
“My royal cock is fine, thank you. I just prefer to fuck a woman without an audience.”
“Well, that’s fine then,” said Archer. “Roland and I will choose one and you can wait out in the hallway and listen.”
Roland couldn’t help but laugh at the image Archer’s words conjured up. But secretly he, too, wondered how his cousins, Jaxon and Jarrett, were able to relax enough to enjoy having sex with the women they’d chosen while Parker and Colton, respectively, were in the mix at the same time. He wouldn’t mind finding out, but only because he was very lonely. Seducing servant girls and the occasional peasant woman had long since lost its appeal for him.
But he certainly wasn’t ready at age thirty-eight to give up on companionship, or even love. Was it still possible? Did the stars predict that for him, or was this his life now? He hoped not. His friends were loyal and true, and he enjoyed their company, but he longed for what his cousins each now had. He longed for a woman to love, and one who would love him in return. Even if he had to share her with another man, or two. Even if that were the case.
