When the awful deed was done, he took hold of my two hands, and pressed our forearms together. Our blood mixed together as he clutched my fingers. “Good girl,” he said. Though as he began to push me down into the water so very slowly, he smiled y. “You’re mine now, Rita. For all time. Mine.”
Sinking beneath the water was so strange. It was already tinged with the colour of our blood, and I could just make him out, though I saw that he sank into the boiling hot water with me. He didn’t leave me alone. Not for that awful journey.
The last memory I have of that world was the neighbour’s TV. So loud and clear through the water, I could hear the newscaster.
“...Many presumed dead. The outbreak seems to have began at a local drug testing facility, though no official word has been offered as of yet. All citizens are warned to stay inside. Police and emergency services are assessing the situation. If you are suffering from effects of the illness, be aware that it seems to take but two hours for the metamorphosis to take hold and...”
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BIOGRAPHY
J.E. & M. Keep love to combine fantasy, scifi, horror, romance and mystery into exciting and titillating novels.
They are long term, loving partners in a very happy relationship and because of this, they love to torture their characters. Dark romance touches all of their stories in one way or another, from elicit trysts to forbidden love.
Some of their work contains dubious consent and erotic pain, so it’s not for the faint of heart. Their stories are often called twisted and arousing – at the same time.
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Sold to the Dragon
By
Alara Branwen and Christie Sims
Copyright © 2013
“You sold me? To a dragon?!” Kara growled, hands on her hips. The rough homespun of her apron itched against her raw palms. She’d been in the fields all day, trying to get the blasted mule to hoe a straight row while her father went down into the town to sell the last of her mother’s pearl pins to buy more seed. The little ones had tried to lend a hand, but they were more hindrance than help to be honest. They were much too small to do anything more than basic housework.
The oldest, Penelope, would be only seven at her next birthday. And young Jamie, the only boy among them, aside from her Papa, was barely two. It was mostly left up to the four year old twins, Gertrude and Sarah, to keep him out of trouble. Since their mother had died last winter, everyone in the house had to do their part to keep them all from starving. Kara knew that. She had accepted the fact that she would have to plow fields, chop wood, and hunt game.
She had not been prepared for her father to come home from the village, aglow with good news, and tell them their money troubles were over. Nor was she in the least bit expecting him to say that a man in the village had offered to purchase her in exchange for a wealth of gold. Papa flinched at the edge in her voice. Even the little ones huddled down behind him, trembling.
Kara sighed, trying to reign in her anger. It was hard. Her mother had always said she had a temper as fiery as her hair. “Tell me again, Papa. Slowly this time.”
He rubbed a gnarled hand against his stubbled cheek, not meeting her eyes. “I was down in the village, hawking your poor mam’s pins to buy the seed, when a grand lord rode into the square. He were all in fine clothes and had a servant with him carryin’ a banner with a great dragon blazing across it. Everyone stopped what they were doing, waiting to see what he wanted. And then, right outta the blue, the servant calls out ‘Which o’ you men is Angus MacPherson?’”
She dropped into the chair opposite her father, her heart doing a tight little flip. “He had a dragon on his banner and he asked for you by name? And you didn’t find that odd, Papa?”
They’d all heard the dragon’s roaring from on top of the mountain. So far, no one had spotted the great beast, but everyone had a story about the last dragon attack (which Kara well knew hadn’t been for a hundred years or more) or a theory on what would bring him down upon them.
“Found the whole thing right odd to tell you the truth.” He scowled at her. “I’m not dim, Carrot.”
She gritted her teeth at the hated nickname. “I know that, Papa. But...” She trailed off, shaking her head. Her father took it as a sign to continue.
“Anyway, before I could speak up, the tanner’s boy, Aloysious I think he’s called, points to me and says ‘That’s him’. Next thing I know, I’m at a table at the Gilded Swan with a small beer and a pile of coins. And this lord and his man are saying as how he needs a woman of virtue to...” He trailed off, face going tomato red as he mumbled the rest.
Kara didn’t catch the words, but she thought she understood the meaning well enough. Her father had sold her maidenhood to some vile foreign lord for a pile of gold. And the gods only knew why he was willing to pay so much for a poor farmgirl.
“He wants to buy a wife?”
Papa coughed, face darkening toward purple. “Well,” he said, drawing out the word. “No, not exactly.” He caught sight of the little ones and scowled at Penelope, thick white brows beetling low over his prominent nose. “You lot go outside and play! Now!”
Jamie and the twins scampered quickly out the open door. Penelope was slower, casting worried glances back over her narrow shoulder at Kara. She tried to give her younger sister a heartening smile, but feared her expression was more grimace than grin. “Papa?” she asked as soon as Penelope was out of earshot. “What, exactly, does this ‘grand lord’ want with me?”
Angus MacPherson rubbed his hand along the back of his neck, not meeting her eyes. “Seems as how his family line has dwindled down to just him.”
“I can’t imagine why,” she muttered under her breath. Her father shot her an aggrieved look and continued.
“He needs a lass of good, sturdy stock to provide him a few heirs is all.”
Kara’s mouth fell open, flapping momentarily at her father’s words. “Is all? Is ALL? You mean I’m not just to give this stranger my maidenhood.” Her father flinched, but she bowled on. “But I’m to bear him children as well? How long am I meant to stay as his brood mare? Forever?”
“No, no, no. Just until he’s gotten a few healthy babes off you. Then you can come home!” Angus smiled wide, as if it was a simple matter of going to the market for tea cake they were discussing.
She shoved herself away from the little, rough-hewn table and began pacing. They were desperate. She knew it. Without money, the children would starve. Jamie had already become sickly, and the twins didn’t look very well lately. The last of their winter stores were gone. Honestly, even with the meager seed the pins would buy them, they wouldn’t last much longer. Papa had begun talking about sending the girls down into the village to find jobs as servants and even giving up little Jamie to foster.
But with the money this lord was promising, her family would all be fed. They could stay together, and Papa coul
d hire a boy to work on the farm. Maybe even make some of the improvements that were so desperately needed. All she had to do was go live with this man for a time and let him into her bed. And her body. Could she do it? Could she lie with a man she didn’t know, bear him children, and walk away?
Little Jamie tumbled into the dirt, coughing and crying. Kara sighed. She didn’t know if she could do those things. But she did know she couldn’t afford not to try.
***
The lord, whose name her father had said was Mervyn, arrived right on schedule. He rode up on a fine white palfrey, dressed in dark blue velvet and silken hose, with long golden hair tied back in a queue. His servant trailed behind him on a huge, black destrier. The beast suited its rider well. The servant was nearly as big and broad and dark as his mount. He led a lovely blue roan mare behind, presumably for her.
“Be nice now, Carrot,” her father muttered. Kara clenched her fists.
“I will be as nice as I’m able. But if you call me that name in front of them, I may strangle you all and to Hell with the bargain.”
Angus MacPherson wrung his hands. “Don’t let Lord Mervyn hear you cuss, poppet. I told him you were gently reared.”
“You lied, you mean.” She snorted. “He’d purchased a brood mare, nothing more. What should he care if I’m mannerly or not?”
Her father sighed, but managed to plaster a smile on his face as he pushed open the door to the cottage to welcome their guests. “Ahh, and here you are, my lord, just as you said! Please, come in, come in.”
“Is the girl ready?” the servant asked. His wide face, with its high cheekbones, was quite handsome Kara noted. His long, dark hair brushed the collar of his shirt. The lower half of his face was obscured by the thick fur of his close-cropped beard, but his eyes were a nice, clear blue as they scanned the front of the cottage. Looking for her, she guessed. His voice, too, was pleasant. Deep, like the rumble of stones sliding down the mountain when the dragon roared.
The little ones cowered and hid when the beast keened in the night. Even her father trembled in his bed. But Kara had a secret, one she’d never even whispered to her mother’s grave. The sound always made her shiver, aye, but not in fear. She felt a strange and overwhelming urge to comfort the creature. It sounded so forlorn, that rumbling cry. She wanted to wrap herself around it and give it solace with her body.
That, perhaps as much as the tired faces of her siblings, had driven her to agree to this mad plan. She wanted to see him, this dragon. And she reasoned this lord either was him, or was bringing her to him. The coincidence was too much. Now, looking at the slender, blond man on the white horse, she felt disappointed.
He was handsome, she supposed, but too pretty for her tastes. The servant was more appealing to her. He looked a proper man, with wide shoulders and muscled thighs. Looking at him, his full lips pressed into a thin line as he studied the farm, Kara felt a shiver go through her. Her breasts felt suddenly heavy, her nipples tight and aching.
“Why don’t you have a bit of supper with us, my lord? Kara’s cooked a fine meal,” her father was saying. The servant ignored him, leaping down from his immense horse and unstrapping a small trunk.
The golden haired Lord Mervyn shook his head. “We have to continue on immediately in order to reach my home by nightfall.”
Angus’ mouth flapped open. The servant offered him the chest, but he merely stared, not taking it. Finally, the big man set it at her father’s feet roughly. The chest tipped, spilling gold coins. Her father snapped out of his trance at the sight. “Kara! Girl, come on out. It’s time for you to go.”
She gritted her teeth, shouldered her meager pack, and kissed her siblings goodbye. “Be good now. I’ll be back as soon as I can.” Little Jamie, and Gertie and Sarah, too, didn’t really understand what was happening. They knew only that she was going away. But she saw the knowledge in Penelope’s solemn eyes. The little girl hugged her hard.
Tears stung Kara’s eyes as she stepped outside, but she kept her head high. She brushed a brief kiss on her father’s cheek, murmured, “Goodbye, Papa,” and walked over to where the servant waited by his enormous horse. She handed him her pack with a small curtsey. “Please tie this to my horse.” She tilted her head at the mare. “I’m guessing that one’s mine. Unless you mean me to ride this great, dark beast.” She patted the destrier’s side. It whickered in greeting.
“And if I did?” the servant rumbled. Kara quirked a thin reddish-blond brow at him.
“Then tie the pack to him, by all means.” She bobbed a small curtsey again and strode the several steps over to the other man. She looked up at him on his fine horse and he looked down at her. He smiled. Again, she noted that he was handsome in a way. “And you, I presume, are Lord Mervyn?”
“I am,” he answered, his voice light, with an edge of amusement.
“Then you have bought me, my lord. Fair and square, I suppose some would say. But know I’m only coming with you because you hold me hostage to my starving family. I find that, and you, despicable, sir.”
“Kara!” her father moaned in mortification. She ignored him, turning on her heel and marching back to the mare. She stopped beside the horse and stroked her neck, speaking gently to her. The horse whinnied and nuzzled against her. When she was satisfied the mare had gotten used to her, she turned to the burly servant. He was watching her with an odd expression. He seemed torn between amusement and shame. Perhaps on his master’s behalf, since that one didn’t appear to have any.
But a servant’s expression didn’t matter, she told herself, and motioned him forward. “Please help me up.”
She expected him to offer his laced hands as a step, but he grasped her waist and lifted her effortlessly into the saddle. Kara stared down at him, skin tingling at the touch of his hands, amazed at his strength. She was no willow sapling like the rich girls in the village. She had hips and breasts and bit of a belly. “Thank you,” she remembered to whisper. He nodded, turned, and climbed back up on his own mount.
Kara gave her father a final wave, blew a kiss at the kids peeking from the cottage window, and turned her horse’s head to follow after the men.
***
“We’ll bed here for the night,” the servant informed her as they reached a clearing on the mountainside. The sky was quickly growing dark.
Kara frowned. “I thought your master said we would reach his home by nightfall.”
A muscle in his jaw twitched. She saw it even through the heavy beard. “These are Wyvern lands. Technically, we are home. But we won’t reach the keep until midday tomorrow.”
“Your master’s name is Mervyn Wyvern?” She giggled, pressing her fingers to her mouth to keep it from growing into a full guffaw. The servant’s eyes crinkled slightly at the corners.
“Does sound ridiculous, doesn’t it?”
Kara glanced around, surprised he’d say such a thing with his master around. But she realized he wasn’t in sight. The big, dark man again grasped her waist and lifted her down from the horse. Her body pressed briefly against his, her breasts to his chest, his thighs to her pelvis. She shivered, blood going hot again at his nearness.
“Where did he go?”
The other man shrugged. “Off a bit. He’ll be back. Let’s get a fire started and make some supper.”
“What’s your name?” She spoke the question without really thinking. But the servant fascinated her much more than the lord. He gave her an odd look that she couldn’t interpret.
“Garen.”
She nodded, bobbing another brief curtsey. “A pleasure to meet you, Garen.” She turned back to her mare and began rummaging in her pack. She heard him gathering would and stacking it for a fire.
“Why are you being nice to me and not to him?”
Kara didn’t even bother looking over her shoulder. “You didn’t buy me to bed me,” she said bluntly.
“I might have,” he replied just as bluntly. She spun, hands coming up to her hips.
“And what
is that supposed to mean?”
Garen shrugged, arranging the firewood into a cone. “Perhaps I’m the one that told him about you, a pretty farmgirl I saw one day out in the woods. Maybe he got the idea in his head because of how I described the color of your hair and the curve of your lovely arse. Would you still be so nice to me then?”
She stared at him, mouth open. A mixture of emotions swirled within her. Anger at the idea that anyone thought to purchase her, but a bit of sorrow also that this man had maybe found her beautiful and told his lord and would now have to watch her be another man’s bedmate. Pleasure and desire, too, that he found her form as attractive as she found his. “I... don’t know,” she answered honestly. “Did you?”
He looked up at her then, blue eyes dark as he met her look straight on. “Aye. I did. D’you hate me now?”
Kara pursed her lips, studying his face. He remained still, letting her look. After a long moment of silence, she gave a grunt of frustration. “I don’t know!” She pulled the small bag of food she’d brought along out of her pack, hurling an apple at Garen. He caught it, teeth flashing white in his dark beard.
She watched him start the fire. It was no wonder she was so drawn to him and not his master. All those nights she’d spent listening to the dragon roar, she’d imagined it as a magnificent beast. When the rumors had begun to circulate in the village that the dragon was also a man... well, she had pictured him a certain way, she supposed. A human form as magnificent as his beastly one. Mervyn’s sunny gold locks and slender build, as handsome as he was, just didn’t possess the same power and magnetism as the big, burly Garen.
She narrowed her eyes at him as he spitted two of the rabbits he’d felled during the day’s ride. “None for your master?”
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