by ERIN BEDFORD
After what felt like an eternity, he breathed against my neck, “I found you.”
His hands slid around my waist as he brought my body in line with his. The swell of my breasts pressed against the hard plains of his chest. My eyes fluttered open to look up into the dark blue eyes set in an unblemished face.
They were even darker than usual. They were almost so black that the pupil swallowed the iris. It could have been because of the night shadows, but I knew it was from something far more primal. If I had had a mirror, I was sure my own face would have shown that same look.
I kept my hands against the tree, not daring to touch him back. My eyes flicked from his eyes to his lips and back. I moistened my own with my tongue, his eyes fixated on the movement. His dark hair held back by a single clip threatening to slip free as he angled his face down to mine. His face hovered above mine, teasing me with his lips, just a breath away from kissing me.
The forest’s occupants quieted their whispers. Their urgings became a held breath in the wind, waiting. They waited for someone to break, for someone to close that final space.
I’d like to think he moved first, but in all honesty, I think we both did. My fingers tangled in his dark tresses, pulling his mouth closer to mine. There was no pretending anymore. Nothing keeping me from showing him how much I needed him. We melded our mouths together as if trying to climb inside the other.
Eventually, when kissing wasn’t enough, he lifted me up by my thighs, pressing my weight into the tree’s base. I came up from the kiss, gasping at the new sensation of him pressed hard between my legs. Our bodies began to rock against each other, slow and building until heat radiated from where our bodies met through the material of our clothes.
His eyes locked with mine, before pulling the bodice of my dress down, exposing my chest to his hungry gaze. Moving his eyes from mine, his mouth fell on the flesh there, his mouth hot against my skin. I cried out against him, the pleasure building up until my body begin to quake.
“Close,” I whispered into his hair, breathing in the smell of him. He smelled dark and rich like a triple-shot mocha latte, and I couldn’t drink him up fast enough. As if reading my mind, he lifted his face back up to mine, capturing my lips in another searing kiss.
Keeping our mouths locked, he moved away enough to slide a hand between us as he unfastened his pants, causing me to make a small sound of objection in my throat. His other hand took the brunt of my weight as I wrapped my legs around him to help ease the effort, not caring that we were out in the open and had an audience. All I could think about was how I needed more skin.
Before long, my gown was up around my waist, and he was deep inside me. The bark of the tree bit into my back as we moved with swift determination, each of us seeking our own pleasure. The sounds of our love making echoed through the forest, our audience quiet with anticipation.
I could feel it as it built in the air. Not the pleasure that flowed through our bodies, but something more tangible. It made the air thick and heavy as if it were a swelling pulsating organ ready to burst at any moment.
Magic.
Our coming together was nothing short of spectacular, and the Underground responded by opening itself up just as I had opened myself to him. My gaze found his, awe reflecting in our eyes. Each stroke made the magic press against our flesh, making each movement, each touch more intense. It pushed until I was once again on the edge and couldn’t hold back any longer.
My legs tightened around him as I cried out, his voice echoing mine. It had been what the magic was waiting for. It gushed over us in a tidal wave of energy, alighting each nerve from the very ends of my hair down to the tips of my toes.
When we had caught our breaths we glanced at each other and laughed. We were high on the feel of each other’s skin and even more so on the pulse of magic still clinging to us. Who knew such a thing would happen? We certainly didn’t.
He adjusted his grip slightly getting ready to put my feet back on the ground no doubt, but that slight friction was all the magic needed to push against us again. In that moment we weren’t spent anymore, we were ready and willing to go again and again. If that was what it wanted.
Now I’m not against multiple orgasms in one night, let alone ones that are the result of a dark dream fantasy, but when the magic built us up again for the third time, making what was a leisurely pleasurable act into a painful frantic need, I knew something was wrong.
I pulled my mouth away from his, tightening my grip on his hair to keep it that way. He didn’t even pause or open his eyes to question me. His hips just kept moving in the tantalizing rhythm I had come to fear.
“No. Stop.” My voice sounded distant and echoed in the dark forest and was completely ignored by my fantasy prince.
My mind fought against the need, even as I reached that edge again. I tried to drop my legs to keep my hips from moving with his, but I was frozen in a dance that wouldn’t end until the magic released me, or I broke the dream.
Since I didn’t believe for one second they would just let me go, I tried to think of something else. Anything else that would douse the flame inside me. Meat-jelly sandwiches. Moss-covered gnashing teeth. Mrs. Jenkins wearing a golden string bikini.
The last thought made me shudder as the blood in my veins began to cool, and the sound of a pipe playing in the distance surfaced in my brain. I focused on that sound, pushing at it with my new control. I didn’t drift out of my dream as much as I got ripped from it.
My body still throbbed where the prince had been. I could feel my clothing, what little of them there were, pressed against my heated flesh. The music I’d heard in my dream had long since stopped, and in its place was the sound of a male voice chattering around me.
My mind was still a bit garbled from my dream, even as my brain began to panic, though a small part of me wished I had stayed with the blue-eyed UnSeelie prince.
What was up with that anyway? If I was going to have a fantasy about anyone I would have thought it would be Chess. Not the prince, who besides a tension-filled dance and a heated kiss, had been a pain in my ass from the get go. I was never going to be able to look him in the face again.
“Shut up stupid! You’re going to wake her up!” The gravelly voice smacked the other male, followed by a languid, “Sorry.”
I groaned and shifted, finding my arms pulled taunt above my head and my legs spread out to either side. My panic began to build into full out hysteria. Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck. What do I do? What do I do!
“Now see what you did,” the first voice chastised the other. “Don’t struggle. You’ll just make it worse for yourself.” He tsk’d, his warning doing nothing to pacify me. “You should have stayed asleep. Enjoyed your little fantasy. You would have missed this whole part.”
I forced my sleep-encrusted eyes open and screamed at the creature staring down at me. At near seven feet, stood a satyr. His broad shoulders and bulging pectorals did nothing to hide the fact that he was naked, save for the fur covering his legs and hooved feet. Chocolate brown hair was pulled back tight in a ponytail. The same hair trailed across the edges of his jaw and chin. His human face was attractive in the strong Adonis kind of way, but the black lust-filled eyes beating down on my visible skin was as much of a turn off as the protruding horns on his head.
“Please don’t scream. I have a hard time performing when a woman screams.” His voice was smooth and buttery. Very gentlemanlike, as if he had just stated the time of day. It was nothing like the one before, which meant someone else was there, hiding from my view.
I tried to glance around to see where the other voice was, but could only see the hulking monstrosity blocking out the rest of the world. He leaned on one hand against the stone I was tied to, his other tugging on the thickness hanging between his legs. I would have blushed at the sight had I not been so frightened, my prudish sense of decency null and void.
“That doesn’t make me want to scream any less.” I opened my mouth and screamed as loud as possible
. The satyr before me covered his ears, bending over enough to let me see my surroundings. As I continued to scream, I took in where the satyr had taken me.
I was in a large square courtyard surrounded by tall green hedges. I’m still in the hedge maze. That was good to know. In each corner of the courtyard were tall trees, reaching up and above the top of the leafy walls. From where I was splayed out, if I cranked my head back enough, I could see a fountain against my back. The water sprayed out of the mouths of scantily clad women just out of reach.
“Make her stop, Piper! Make her stop!” The becoming even less and less attractive satyr shook his head at my pained screeching.
I paused to take a breath and watched as a smaller satyr popped his head out from behind the crying giant. There was nothing remarkable about him. He had the same coloring as his larger companion, but he wasn’t near as handsome. He was the average Joe of satyrs. Not that I had more than him and his crying friend to compare them to. I wouldn’t have given him much more thought than that had it not been for the pan pipe in his hands.
He must have been the one playing pipes that I had followed in the hedges. I wished I had never heard those pipes to begin with. It was my fault for being naïve enough to think someone would help me.
Piper, as the other satyr had called him, brought the mouth piece of the pan pipe to his lips and began to play. Calming tones floated out of the pan pipe, ceasing my panic mid-scream. All the tension in my body rolled off me.
Why was I screaming? There was nothing to fear. I was safe. The satyrs would take care of me. I sighed into the stone beneath me, not at all bothered by the restraints holding me in place.
“That’s a good girl.” My eyes rolled up to the larger of the two, who stroked himself in time with the pipe. I wasn’t so worried about the girth of him now. In fact, I was eager to please him. I arched my hips off the stone beneath me, trying to get closer to him.
The satyr gave a throaty laugh. “Hold on there, girly. All in good time.” He bent down to the top of my pants and tried to pull them down my hips, but the positioning of my legs kept them from moving more than a few inches. The satyr frowned at his friend playing the pipes. “Why won’t they come off?”
They weren’t the brightest Fae in the Underground. They caught me easily enough but were too stupid to take my clothes off before they tied me up. When Piper stopped playing to argue with his friend, my head cleared once again, and panic seeped back in. Part of me still wanted the satyr to touch me while the other half urged me to start screaming again.
So Piper wouldn’t play the pipes again, taking my free will, I fought against that urge. I was on to their little game. Let them think I’m still affected.
As I tried to think of a plan, my eyes couldn’t help but be drawn to the large appendage hanging in front of me. Even if I was willing, there was no way that thing wouldn’t hurt. It reminded me of this one guy in college I dated, Travis.
He majored in sex therapy and thought he was God’s gift to women. One drunken night I had let him talk me into exploring my unbridled sexuality. It sounded like a good idea at the time. That was until he shed his pants and let me see what I’d be working with.
Though he wasn’t as long as the confused satyr in front of me, the girth of him was about the same. It had taken a whole lot of foreplay, and almost a whole bottle of strawberry-flavored jelly to make it even bearably comfortable, and in the end, he still had to fight for every inch. I doubted the satyrs before me would be thoughtful enough to have brought lube – strawberry flavored or otherwise.
Not willing to take the chance, I shifted my hands in their binds, judging the knots there. They were tight, but not so much so I couldn’t wiggle one of them out if I had the time. Thank God for sloppy workmanship. If I could get the piper away, I could get one hand free while lug head was distracted.
Gulping my fear down, I tried to channel my inner porn star. I winced when my voice came out more running a marathon breathy, than ready for a good time breathy. “Untie my legs and then you can get them off.”
The two quit arguing to stare at me. Piper frowned. “If we untie you, you’ll just try to get away.”
Fuck. Not as dumb as he looked. I tried to channel every bad porno I had ever seen as I bucked my hips up with an exaggerated moan. “But I need you now!”
“She won’t leave, Piper.” The larger one smirked down at my writhing form. “See. She wants me.”
“I don’t know. Maybe I should play some more.” Piper brought the pipes to his lips, but at that moment, my curiously absent feathered friend swooped down and snatched his pipes away. “Hey! Give that back!”
I watched as Piper ran after the owl to the tree on the other side of the fountain. He hollered over his shoulder in between cursing the blessed bird. “Don’t do anything before I get back, Romp.”
Romp, the larger satyr above me, snorted and bent down to untie my legs. “Damn voyeur. Like I need him to fuck.” He smirked up at me. “I’m going to fuck you real good before he gets back.”
I bit my lip to keep from crying out in protest as he cupped me between the legs. “If you don’t bleed too much, I’ll let him have a go at you before I fuck you again.” I dug my teeth into the inside of my cheek until it bled as he stroked me through my pants. “If you survive we’ll keep you around, maybe even make you our wife, but if you don’t–” He shrugged his shoulders as if he weren’t talking about rape and murder. He stroked my face with his large hands and smiled. “I really hope you survive.”
Oh joy. I was going to be raped not once but three times. And if I didn’t die I would get to be their little wife forever, or until I died of internal bleeding, which was more possible than me ever being their wife. But at least I was in my right mind now, if he would just hurry up with the ropes before pipe brains got back.
While Rump focused on the ties on my legs, I twisted my one hand in its constraint, wincing at the rope rubbing my hand raw. Once it was free, I began working at the knot of the other one. I kept glancing down at my hopefully not-soon-to-be-husband and gave him what I hoped was a come hither look. He responded by groping one of my breasts, stopping his work on my remaining leg. I don’t care what my sister says, I’m a great actress.
Though, the fact that I was more concerned with what my sister thought of my acting abilities than the danger I was in was more disturbing than I could process. I’m going to need to see a shrink when I got home. If I got home. One problem at a time, Kat.
“Don’t stop now. We’re almost there. Quick, before he comes back.” If he was smart he’d realize he could take my pants off with only one leg loose. I was betting he wasn’t that smart.
“I’m trying.” He grunted as he pulled on the ropes. “There we go. Now let’s–”
As soon as the ropes gave, I kicked out one heeled boot into his low hanging bits, causing the satyr to cry out before doubling over in pain.
“You bitch!” Romp coughed out, grabbing his wounded parts.
Thank you, Chess! I was never going to complain about wearing high heels again. Or at least, not until I wasn’t in a Beauty and the Beast does rape situation.
I pulled on the remaining restraints on my wrist. I kept peeking over my shoulder for Piper’s return. It wouldn’t do to get caught right after I got free. I couldn’t imagine how much worse they would treat me after my attack.
When I was finally free, I jerked my pants back into place and stepped up to the groaning giant lying on the ground. I didn’t even hesitate when the heel of my boot connected with the side of his head, knocking him out cold. The human part of me was guilty for causing another being pain, but another part of me, a dark part, held a deep satisfaction for the blood that trickled out of the wound my heel had made in his skull. It was a part of me I couldn’t deal with right now.
Walking around Rump, I searched for the nearest exit, which as luck would have it, was right next to where my feathered savior was playing keep away with the pan pipe up on the tree branc
hes.
I inched my way toward the exit, Piper’s back to me. There was no way I was going to be able to get out without him seeing me.
Piper tried to climb the tree, but his hooves just didn’t give him the leverage he needed to get him up it. As I approached the tree, the owl dropped the pipe when he saw me. I held my breath as the satyr grabbed the pipe off the ground, shaking an angry fist up at the owl.
“You better stay up there! I’ll feed you to Romp for dinner!” He turned around grumbling under his breath. When he saw me he opened and closed his mouth, gaping like a fish. “You!”
The hand holding the pipes moved toward his mouth, but this time I was ready for him. I grabbed ahold of the other side of the pipes, but the little devil held on fast. A tug of war began over who would get the pipes. I used my other hand to dig my nails into the back of Piper’s hand until he jerked his hand away with a yelp.
“Hey, give it back!” He cried out, jumping on his short legs to reach the pipes I had just out of his reach.
I cackled and waved the pipes above my head. “Not so tough now are you?” I turned the pipes over in my hand, contemplating smashing them. “What should I do with you now?” I brought the pipes up to my mouth and gave it a test blow. I winced at the high-pitched note that sounded.
“Stop that!” Piper screeched grabbing his ears. “Are you trying to kill us all?”
“It would serve you right.” I gripped the pipes in my hands so tight that my knuckles began to turn white. The fact that I had almost been raped had finally sunk in as I stared down at the wooden instrument in my grip. They had almost–if I hadn’t gotten free–
“To try and force me to–” I screamed the last part out loud. My anguish clear in my voice as the wood cracked beneath my hands.
“Careful now! That’s mine.” Piper gave a frantic cry, his hand outstretched. “Give it back.”
“How do I know you won’t use it again to try and attack someone else?” My throat was raw from all the yelling.
