Enthralled

by Darling, Giana

  The third strike had proven too much for the girl with the dead eyes, and she’d succumbed to her demons by taking her own life.

  My heart twisted up, bloody and used like an old tissue as I watched Alexander cut her down from the tree and gently lay her to rest under an old rowan tree. He smoothed by that carroty hair, crossed her arms over her chest and then bent his head over her prone form in silent prayer.

  “They’re worse than beasts,” I murmured through the fog of my exhaustion when Alexander swung up behind me on the horse. “Because they know better, and they still act this way.”

  “Yes,” Alexander agreed, wrapping me up tight and taking the reins as we began to navigate through the forest.

  Random shouts still echoed through the dark, but less now since most of the girls already had been captured hours earlier. I knew Astor was scouting ahead and would probably alert Alexander to any incoming hunters, so I allowed myself to relax slightly against his warm body.

  “Why do you do this with them?” I asked.

  I had to know; my heart was turning into two, one dark and one light, one-part Alexander’s and one-part mine. I needed to know the intricacies of his atrocities before I could allow myself to sink deeper into the darkness.

  “I told you, I was born into this and raised by their rules. It should be rote for me to be one of the Order’s disciples just as so many other things in my life are my born obligations.”

  “Should be,” I tested as I tucked my head under his chin and pulled the jacket he had placed at some point over my shoulder, closer around me. “But isn’t.”

  “I thought for years I was destined to be my father’s son, and I hated the idea of it. Then my mum died, and the man I’d always been unsure how to love when I hated his actions became the only person left in my family. It made the burden of being my father’s son and heir even harder to untangle myself from.”

  “Maybe family isn’t everything,” I murmured, unaware of how my words could have applied to myself as I sank deeper into my exhaustion and began to fall asleep. “Maybe it isn’t enough to make decisions based on them. After all, you have to live for yourself.”

  It was strange to return home to a place I had never seen from the outside but knew intimately from the interior. I’d spent so many of my early days at Pearl Hall wandering the halls aimlessly, my only distractions the many eccentricities of the architecture and design. I knew my reflection from the many angles of in the Mirror Gallery built by one of Prince Regent’s many mistresses, the widowed daughter of the 6th Duke of Greythorn. The faces in the Long Gallery that reached from one end to the other of the second floor were more familiar to me than those of my long-ago friends in Napoli.

  It was like falling in love with a man you’d never seen the face of even though you knew all his inner workings, how he ticked and the sound of tock and why he gave pause when he did.

  We crested a hill on a little road carved out between thick trees of pine and cedar, rowan and ash and then a gatehouse appeared.

  “Welcome to Pearl Hall,” Alexander said from beside me, watching me take in my first sight of the estate.

  The gatehouse was long and tall, more like a fortress wall with an archway carved out of the stone for us to pass through to the other side. I wanted to ask if it was manned, but I could see the security cameras winking in the low light and the man who waved to us as we passed through before he turned to close the massive iron gates.

  “We get a lot of tourists fancying a tour of the grounds,” Alexander explained. “As you know, this is a private estate, and it would be… dangerous for outsiders to wander about.”

  “Hmm,” I said, biting back my smile. “Because of the herd of wild deer?”

  “Those… and other predators,” he responded drolly.

  I didn’t bother to hide my giggle, and when I shot him a sidelong glance, he was staring at me in the way he had that wasn’t a quite smile but somehow more intimate.

  “You continually confound me, yet you refuse to explain yourself to me.”

  I tipped my chin at him and then moved my gaze out the windows again. “I may be a slave, but I am also a woman, and therefore I am under no obligation to make sense to you.”

  I wanted to talk to him about so many things. About Landon Knox and Edward Dante, about the future of his position in the Order now that he had caught the “Golden Fox” and Sherwood had reluctantly granted him a “boon.” I wanted to ask if I’d already been through enough in the first six months of slavery to warrant setting me free before my five-year term was up at the same time that I wanted to ask him to keep me by his side forever.

  I didn’t, though, because he’d been moody and contemplative on the ride back from the Highlands, and I doubted he would answer my questions honestly.

  We drove for another few minutes after that along the winding road until we descended into a valley that unfolded between the broad frame of forested hills to reveal the entire expanse of Pearl Hall.

  It was breathtakingly lovely, the scope so large it seemed impossible that so many wonderful acres of land could belong to one family.

  There was a temple on a small hill, a large pond that stretched in manmade perfection from one end of the grand house to the other beyond the studied maze in the back garden. A large fountain made of black marble burst from the center of the circular drive before the house, a chariot half submerged in the water with the great Greek god Poseidon at its helm.

  The Davenports had a thing for Roman and Greek mythology, which wasn’t surprising given their history, secret society connections, and predilection toward sexual assault.

  It was the house itself, though, that brought tears to my eyes.

  The three-story structure was a study in symmetry even though Noel had told me once it was a hodgepodge of Palladian and Baroque architecture. The roof was steeply gabled over the main house with a decorative and fantastical dome behind that like something I was used to seeing on Italian cathedrals.

  A palace.

  Every girl dreams of a palace at some point in her life, usually as a child, but I never had.

  My dreams had been considerably more pedestrian.

  A house without leaks in the wet season, with clean water and more space for four children to grow. I had no care for a father with a crown, just one that didn’t drink himself half to death at least once a week or wile away what meager wealth we had over cards and horses.

  I had no real dreams for myself, just those of my siblings.

  But looking at that beautiful house, for the first time in my life, I felt my own dream take shape.

  Deep in the secret recesses of my heart, I dreamt that I might one day be more than just a servant at Pearl Hall and a slave to its Master. I hoped beyond all reasoning that one day, I might be mistress of its halls and mistress of his heart.

  It took precarious form and flight, too delicate to survive for long like a child’s blown bubble, but that didn’t make it any less beautiful to me.

  The car pulled to a rolling stop in the limestone gravel drive, but I waited for Riddick to open the door for me before alighted from the vehicle.

  Servants were waiting in a neat row beside the front doors, Ainsworth at the head all the way through to a meek, young lad I recognized from watching him lay the fire in the library at night. They greeted their Master and he them in return; his face stern but not unfeeling.

  I watched the pomp and circumstance with my arms wrapped around my belly. I still felt wrong in my skin after the Order had usurped our lives, and I didn’t know how to center myself properly. Although I had a sinking suspicion that a scene with my Master would probably do the trick like nothing else could.

  Riddick stopped a young manservant from taking the blacked-out cage where Astor was housed by gently slapping his wrist as he walked into the house with him. As the servants broke formation to grab our bags from the car and hurry back into the house, Alexander strode over to me. I watched as his thick thighs worked benea
th the butter soft fabric of his trousers and how the dark grey dress shirt pulled just right over his pecs.

  My pulse moved into my core.

  When I looked back up at his face, his eyes danced with dark, sultry desire. He held out a hand and waited patiently for me to hesitate and then take it before he moved us away from the house around the side of the building.

  “I have a present for you,” he said. “Something beautiful and fierce enough to suit you and your bravery this weekend.”

  “I don’t need a present,” I told him honestly. “Other than the ability to talk to my family more frequently and… and you back in my life again.”

  His hand spasmed in mine as he led us down a beautifully landscaped path toward an outbuilding that looked distinctly like the stables.

  “I’ll have Riddick get you a phone with international texting. It will be monitored, so remember that when you converse with your family, but you can text them whenever you wish.”

  I tugged at his hand to stop him and then went on my tiptoes to press a light kiss to the edge of his jaw.

  “Thank you, Xan,” I said softly.

  There was a growing tenderness around my heart that seemed to bloom just for him. It made me feel uncharacteristically shy and vulnerable even though it felt beautiful flowering in my chest.

  He looked slightly stupefied by my voluntarily affection for a second, before his eyes smiled and he shook his head.

  We continued up the gently sloping hill in silence. He pulled me through the huge barn doors and into the hay-sweetened air of the stables.

  Immediately, the great black head of Alexander’s horse, Charon, poked out from his stall so that he could whinny at his master.

  Alexander chuckled and moved over to brush a firm hand down the horse’s long nose.

  “Do you like horses?” he asked me, reaching into a bag to produce a red apple that he fed to the happy beast.

  I nodded, lifting my hand tentatively to stroke Charon’s velvet snout. “I rode one a few times. A family friend, Christopher, used to take us to the vineyard for holidays, and we could ride the horses there.”

  Alexander made a clicking sound in his mouth and another head appeared over the stall beside Charon’s. I gasped as I moved toward the gorgeous horse with my hands outstretched.

  It was entirely gold. From the crown of its gorgeous, wavy mane to the very bottom of its hooves, the horse was a shimmering, pale metallic gold.

  “She is the very same shade as your eyes are in the sunlight,” Alexander explained. “She’s a Golden Akhal Teke, a very rare breed from Turkmenistan.”

  “She looks like living sunlight,” I told him as I stroked her nose. “I’ve never seen a creature so beautiful.”

  “Suitable then, that she’s yours.”

  I blinked into the horse’s golden eyes and then into Alexander’s silver ones. “Excuse me?”

  He shrugged one shoulder as if it was no small thing to buy me a rare and probably insanely expensive gift. A gift that would go on living well past the time I was determined to spend at Pearl Hall.

  “You’ve been through a lot in the past few weeks. I wanted to bring you some joy again.”

  My heart clenched like a cramp, painful and so long I thought I might die.

  “Why would you care about my joy?” I ventured quietly.

  Alexander leaned against the wood wall and watched me from under low lids as I pet his horse. “Do you know why I call you topolina? Because you are a little mouse with no defence against me. I may experiment on you, hunt you down and feast on you or feed you to other beasts as easily as I please.” I shuddered at his words and shot him an unhappy glare that made his lips twitch. “But there are a few fables where the little mouse turns out to be very clever indeed and dupes the cat or the elephant or the falcon into falling for their own tricks. You, my little mouse, are playing this game of ours so well, I’m not quite sure who is winning any longer.”

  I licked my dry lips and shrugged as I leaned in to smell my horse’s warm, clean pelt. “I’ve learned that it’s wise not to be taken in by the innocent airs of someone who has previously proven themselves to be dangerous.”

  Alexander’s grin was wicked. “Smart girl.”

  “Not really,” I whispered to my golden beauty, as if it was the horse I was giving my secret to.

  “I have no skills,” I admitted, and it felt as if the words were torn from the delicate fabric of my soul.

  It was my biggest weakness and shame.

  I was nothing but my packaging, pretty paper wrapped tidily around an empty box.

  There was no reason to expose myself further to Alexander’s absolute power over me, yet I felt an overwhelming need to.

  It could have been a testament to his conditioning of me, but I thought it was something else.

  I’d never met a man so like a maze. Around every corner lurked another shock, some horrific dangerous beast of a kind I could never begin to understand, but others softer, fair like summer Fae. Even his beautiful creatures were hazardous to my health, the seducers and destroyers working in tandem to eviscerate me to my very soul.

  Alexander’s heat pressed against my side a moment before he turned me into his arms and lifted my chin with his fingers. “Have I not given you some?”

  I snorted. “Fine, I guess I’m a seasoned cocksucker now.”

  His frown was fierce. “I don’t like that crude, filth from your lips. Yes, you please me in all the ways a woman can please a man, but I think you’ll find, if you really look, you’ve learned other skills. Riddick says you nearly beat him at foils last week, you’ve learned how to play chess, some cookery from Douglas and some needlework from Mrs. White. You know self-defence, and you speak English now as beautifully as you do your mother tongue.”

  He dipped down to run his nose along the length of mine. “These are not the qualities of a stupid, talentless girl. These are the attributes of a queen who was made to think she was only a pawn.”

  My heart beat slow and hard in my chest, knocking against my ribs as if waiting for Alexander to answer the door and claim it for himself. A lifetime of insecurity had been neatly squashed under Alexander’s expensive heel as if it were a mere cockroach. I felt the death of that shame in my psyche and sighed as its spirit drifted away.

  “You know, topolina, I am very tempted to keep you here with me forever,” he continued.

  Sometimes I wondered if he was a telepath or if there was something symbiotic about our Master/slave relationship that gave him privileged access to my thoughts.

  Hadn’t I just been wishing for the very same thing?

  “I know that won’t be possible for a myriad of reasons, but I want to make sure that you will always remember you belong to me. You will remember when I am absent, and you will feel the loss of me in your cunt, mind, and chest. You will feel the phantom press of my hand against your throat like a necklace you can’t take off. And, my beauty, you will wear the symbol of my bloodline on your skin for anyone who might dare get you naked to see as the bend you over to fuck you.”

  “What are you talking about?” I asked before Alexander’s hands on me turned to shackles and he tugged me to the end of the stables where a brick hearth sat well away from the hay filled stalls, crackling with a small fire. Something roasted in those flames, an iron pole submerged in the depths.

  Fear flooded through me, turning me on even though I was terrified because my conditioning had taught me that fear at the hands of Alexander could also bring pleasure.

  He pushed me up against the bricks, placing my hands on either side of my head for me to lean into and then pulling out my hips, kicking my feet apart so I was displayed exactly to his liking. I shivered as he placed kisses and gentle bites to my neck while his deft fingers undid my wrap dress and let it fall to the ground beneath me. I kicked it to the side, which earned me a pleased hum and his tongue tracing the rim on my ear.

  His rough hands moved over each cheek of my bare ass, pul
ling them apart and kneading them like dough.

  “Such a sweet arse,” he praised. “Tip it higher for me.”

  I canted my buttocks at a steeper angle for him and was rewarded with his finger tracing down my crack into the wet seeping from my pussy.

  “You love being displayed for me like this,” he confirmed, dipping one finger and then another just inside me so I could feel the teasing stretch.

  My hips thrust back, seeking friction. He laughed cruelly and stepped to the side so that I could watch him slowly unbuckle his belt.

  He watched my eyes flare and stopped. “I was going to take a crop to you, but it looks like my beauty is craving something a little harsher.”

  I squirmed against the wall, my lips parting as cool air kissed my swollen folds.

  “Answer me.” His voice whipped across the space and landed on my skin like an electric shock.

  “Yes, Master. I want something harsher.”

  “I love to hear that lush mouth form the word Master,” he admitted with a sexy groan. “Now,

  “I’m going to give you fifteen lashes with my belt until your skin blooms redder than a rose, and then I’m going to fuck you against the wall like the beast you claim me to be,” he told me in his silky, soft voice, his word binding me to his will. “Would you like that, topolina?”

  He was hot in the way of nuclear blasts and raging wildfires that tore up the earth and razed it down to nothing. He was hot in a way that was elemental and truly, painfully dangerous to human health.

  I decided then and there, as he looped his leather belt between his hands and snapped it taut in preparation, that I wouldn’t mind a little heat.

  “Yes, Master,” I said as he stepped behind me with his hand raised.

  The crack of the leather met my skin like a hot kiss in the next instant. My hips bucked forward trying to escape the pain as it tunneled from my skin into the muscles and through to my aching pussy.

  “You move again, and I will still fuck you, but I won’t let you come,” he warned.

  I gritted my teeth and presented my ass.