by Cara Wylde
He moved his finger inside her and licked her clit harder and faster. She pulled at his hair and shoved his face between her thighs as she whispered his name and came. It felt like all her muscles were turning to jelly. Her knees started shaking, and all the nerves in her body tingled pleasantly as she rode her orgasm. When she finally came down from her height, Tavian was still between her legs, licking her clit lazily, then moving lower to clean her folds and her entrance as he removed his finger. She felt empty and far from satiated. She knew she needed more, much more.
“Come here,” he said.
He stood up and offered her his hand. She got out of the tub, and he spread all the fluffy towels he could find on the floor, so she could lie on top of them. He would have taken her back to her room and made love to her on the bed, but there was no way he could do that without being noticed. For now, they had a bit of privacy here, in the bathroom, while everyone thought she needed time for herself.
Rose started pulling at his clothes. She managed to get rid of his shirt, but he had to take off his trousers himself, as the things were too tight to handle right. When he was finally naked, she took a step back and studied him from head to toe.
“Like what you see?” he asked cockily.
“Oh yes…” She licked her lips, wondering what he tasted like.
Her eyes traveled from his square jaw to his large chest, rock hard abs, and strong thighs. His cock was jutting from between his legs, long and thick, the engorged head glistening with pre-cum. Running on instinct, she knelt before him.
“Rose, you don’t have to…” It was weird to see the Princess kneeling in front of him, ready to take his cock into her mouth. Because it was clear that was what she had in mind.
“I want to.”
She ran her hand up his thigh until she reached his round, heavy balls. Her pussy clenched when she cupped his sack and squeezed it lightly, weighing it in her palm. The skin was soft and warm. Her fingers found their way to the base of his cock, then up the length, tracing the visible vein on the underside. She wrapped her hand around the rod and aligned it with her mouth. Her tongue darted out to taste the translucent liquid that had gathered at the slit. She moaned at the delicious, tangy taste, and decided to take more of him in.
Tavian grunted when Rose’s hot, moist mouth enveloped his cock. She licked the head thoroughly, which earned her even more tiny beards of pre-cum, then worked on fitting as much of him as she could into her mouth.
He was too big for her, but she didn’t care. She relaxed her throat and guided his length down, stopping when her lips rested against his balls. Slowly, she moved back up the massive pole, swirled her tongue around the head, then moved down and swallowed him whole again. The sensation was exhilarating. At that moment, she knew she had complete control over him, and that made her feel more powerful and confident than ever. This man, this gorgeous man who was ready to risk his life for her, was at her mercy.
“Oh, my love, if you go on like that…”
He couldn’t take his eyes off her. The sight of her sucking his cock could throw him over the edge if he wasn’t careful, but he still couldn’t avert his gaze. He was mesmerized. She used her other hand to massage his balls, and he nearly lost it.
“Rose, you need to stop…”
He caressed her hair, and she let his rod slip out of her mouth. She looked up at him with those big, blue eyes, and his heart skipped a beat. Her lips were glistening with pre-cum and saliva, but her smile was still warm and innocent. He could almost feel guilty for having corrupted her. Almost, but not quite.
“I want you inside me,” she said.
Tavian moaned and knelt in front of her. He took hold of her breasts, harshly, with no regard to how swollen and sensitive they were, and dived down to take a nipple between his lips. She moaned with abandon as he chewed on the hard nub, then pulled at it with his teeth and moved to the other one. Her pussy was soaked, and her walls clenched so hard that she thought she’d go insane if he didn’t claim her soon.
“Come on,” she whispered as he kept sucking on her left nipple. “I’ve been dreaming about this for so long… Take me.”
Tavian released her nipple and looked into her eyes.
“Say that again.”
“Take me. I love you, make me yours.”
His bear let out a loud growl, so loud that Rose almost felt the vibrations coming from inside his chest. He pushed her on her back, and she didn’t protest. Instead, she spread her legs so that he could position himself between them. The next thing she knew, the head of his cock was pushing against her entrance. For a second, she remembered this was supposed to hurt, then she relaxed and chased her fears away. She wanted him. It all felt right, and she had nothing to worry about.
“I’m ready,” she encouraged him.
Tavian looked straight into her eyes as he buried himself inside her inch by painful inch. He went in slowly, carefully, trying his best not to hurt her or make her feel uncomfortable.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“I’ve never been better.” She smiled up at him and wrapped her legs around his waist, her heels digging into his buttocks to make him move faster.
“So tight,” he moaned. He stopped when he was buried to the hilt, and gave Rose some time to adjust to his size.
The sensation of being stuffed full was incredible. She flexed her muscles around his cock and moaned in approval. It felt too good to be true. His impressive girth was stretching her to the limit, yet it didn’t hurt. Not in an unpleasant way, at least.
“Move.”
Tavian smiled when he realized that was an order. Not a plea, not a request. An order. He happily complied and pulled almost all the way out, only to slam his cock back in. She sank her sharp nails in the skin of his back, and the slight pain turned him on even more. Even as the engorged head swelled as if it was ready to explode, he tried to keep his emotions in check and his bear under control. That was… until Rose scratched him and demanded that he went faster.
“Give it to me harder. I can take it.”
“As you wish, my Princess.”
He pounded her harder, faster, with abandon. The sound of skin slapping against skin filled the room, and a sheen of sweat covered their bodies. Rose curled her toes and arched her back, her orgasm close.
“Yes! Fuck me! Like that… harder…”
He clenched his jaw and used some of his shifter speed to increase the already maddening rhythm. He was close. He loved the way her breasts bounced in time with his thrusts, and he was amazed that her body could take his assault so easily. She was clearly the right woman for him. Her curves fit perfectly against his chiseled muscles, and she was strong enough to meet him half way and impale herself on his cock.
She screamed, and her walls clenched around him as she came hard. With a low growl, he poured himself inside her, thrusting a couple more times and coating her pussy as it milked him hungrily.
“Oh, Rose… My Rose… I love you.”
“I love you too,” she whispered, not quite having recovered from her orgasm.
He released one last stream of seed, then collapsed on top of her. They stayed like that, connected, for a long time. She snuggled against his chest and flexed her pussy muscles from time to time, just because she loved the feel of his cock inside her. She should have been cold by then, but she wasn’t. Her bear-shifter hero was so warm that she could barely breathe under him. Or, was it the fact that he was heavy and he was kind of crushing her?
“I can’t feel my legs,” she said.
He laughed and kissed her nose before pulling out and rolling on his side. Rose moaned when she felt his seed trickle down her thigh, and immediately decided it was one of the best sensations ever.
***
Princess Rose’s and Prince Tavian’s wedding was the most spectacular event The Lost Kingdom had ever seen. Everyone, rich and poor, celebrated it for three days and three nights, forgetting all about their problems and concerns. Now that
the curse had been lifted, everything was going to be fine and the kingdom would start to prosper. After all, it was a mythical place that had just reappeared on the map of the world. Tavian had promised the King and Queen that he would use his fortune, his influence, and his knowledge of the past one hundred years to show the rest of the world that what they thought was a myth was actually real. Once they accepted that, he was sure their neighbors would be ready to help them catch up and adapt to the present times.
Rose was the happiest and luckiest woman alive, and Angel, Juliet, and Talia learned to live with that. Now, they were truly her friends, after Rose had forgiven them. The Princess was still careful around them, but she was confident enough to know when someone was lying or telling the truth. After a couple of months during which she had tested them, she was glad to notice the three girls had learned their lesson and would never make the same mistake again. Soon, they all found good men to marry, and when Rose and Tavian took the King’s and Queen’s places on the throne, they accepted to stay at the court as their courtiers.
The King and Queen lived a long, happy life. Given that Tavian knew more about the present world than they did, and his unique senses and instincts made him a great leader, they figured it would be a good idea to retire sooner and let the young couple rule. Now, all they wanted was a grandson. They were lucky too, because a year after Tavian kissed Rose and broke the curse, Rose gave birth to two wonderful twins: a girl and a boy.
King Tavian was fair and brave, and Queen Rose was beautiful and wise. When her children were born, she didn’t invite any sort of fairy to the palace. They celebrated peacefully, with family and friends, and kept the twins away from magic and weird plots. She knew her children wouldn’t need gifts of beauty, grace, wit, song, and dance. They would learn everything from their parents. With a mother who had spent one hundred years asleep, paying for the simple mistake of not being confident enough in her own judgement, and a father who had let himself be turned into a shifter to save the love of his life, the two royal children were fine. They had the best teachers one could ask for. No fairy in the world could have offered them a more precious gift.
THE END
SCARLETT AND THE BEAR
A retelling of Little Red Riding Hood
The day of The Choosing is coming, and Scarlett has just turned 18 and become eligible to be chosen as tribute for the werewolf who has been terrorizing her village for years. Scarlett is not a damsel, though, and she will not go down without a fight. She has been training with her father’s hunting daggers since she was a child, and she is certain that if she ever comes face to face with the evil wolf-shifter, she might just have a chance to kill him and free her people.
Braden is a bear-shifter who has taken it upon himself to hunt down evil shape-shifters who use their supernatural powers to enslave humans. He arrives in Scarlett’s village just before The Choosing, and in time to meet her and realize she is his soul mate. Unfortunately, Scarlett believes all shifters are cruel. When she is chosen and sent as tribute into the woods, it’s up to Braden to save her and show her he is different. He will do anything to keep her safe and happy, even risk his own life. But will it be enough?
CHAPTER ONE
Thwack! The hunting knife buried itself into the fence post.
Thwack! Its twin buried itself just millimeters to one side.
Scarlett ran over and pulled both her hunting daggers out of the fence post, turned around swiftly and – thwack! thwack! – sent them flying into a fence post on the other side of the garden. She could keep this up all day, running from one side of the garden to the other, picking a target and hitting it with both knives each and every time. She had the best aim of anyone in the five villages, man or woman.
The five villages were nestled in a fertile valley overlooked by the foothills of the great snow-capped mountains. Once upon a time, they each had a separate name, a unique identity. But now, they were simply known as “The Five Villages” because of their subjugation by the wolf-shifter.
Scarlett ran across her garden, pulled her knives from their target and turned, selecting another post to be the wolf-shifter as she quickly aimed and, once more, hit her target – the ugly, ferocious beast, right between its glowing red eyes. She knew she had a fair chance of freeing the villages if she could just get a clean shot at the shifter that controlled them and extracted his yearly tribute from the villages. But while everyone else acknowledged her skills with her knives, none of them thought she could kill the semi-mythical monster.
Thwack! Thwack!
She sent her knives flying to their target again, longing for the day that she could prove everyone wrong. She paused as she pulled her knives free, looking past the fence to the edge of the forest. Was he there now, she wondered. Perhaps he was watching her…
She raised her hand, dagger at the ready, but nothing came out of the forest.
“Scarlett!”
Scarlett turned to see her mother calling her.
“It’s time to come inside and eat,” her mother said.
“Okay,” Scarlett said and slipped her knives back into their sheaths before trotting into the house.
Inside, her mother and grandmother were already sitting at the kitchen table, and there was a bowl of stew in front of each of them. Her father had been lost on a hunting trip when Scarlett was just a small girl, and she had been raised by these two women who dedicated their lives to giving her everything she needed.
“So, have you given any more thought to it?” Scarlett’s mother asked.
Scarlett didn’t need to ask what her mother was talking about. There was only one topic on everyone’s thoughts at this time: The Choosing. The time of the year when one of the five villages had to pick a woman to give to the wolf-shifter. Tomorrow was the day when The Choosing would take place.
“No.”
It was all Scarlett could bring herself to say.
Each of the older women had lived their lives with the threat of being chosen hanging over them, and now that Scarlett had turned eighteen, she too was eligible to be chosen. She looked from her grandmother to her mother and back again. Would she choose to trust to luck like her grandmother had, and simply hope she would never be chosen in the next twelve years, until she was thirty and over the age preferred by the beast? Or would she choose a more drastic action, like her mother had?
Scarlett watched in silence as her mother ate, more aware now than ever before of the burn scars which disfigured half of her face. Could she do that to herself, as her mother had? It was a sign of great strength and supreme cowardice, at the same time. Scarlett was the prettiest young woman in the five villages, but if something were to happen and she ended up with a huge scar or an ugly burn on her face, she would be taken out of the draw. Beauty was dangerous.
Scarlett thought of her hunting knives, the one thing of her father’s that she still possessed. She subconsciously sat up straighter in her chair as she ate. She could never refuse to face her fears. She would stand tall in the village square tomorrow, and if her name was called, then she would walk into the forest and face the wolf-shifter with a dagger in each hand.
“It’s the only way to be sure,” Scarlett’s mother said, her voice soft and pleading.
“I’m not afraid,” Scarlett replied.
“Think of your grandmother and me,” her mother insisted. “What would become of us if you were to be lost?”
Scarlett had nothing to say to that.
“I’ve already lost my husband. Don’t make me lose you as well.” She reached out a hand to hold Scarlett’s arm. “You are all I have left.”
Scarlett pulled her arm away and stood up.
“If I am chosen tomorrow, mother, I will at least go down fighting.” She emphasized her point by drawing out her knives.
“Scarlett!”
Her mother sat back, shocked. Even her grandmother was startled.
“I’m sorry.” Scarlett put her knives back into their sheaths and sat down.
“You know how I feel about you and those knives,” her mother said. “I don’t mind you playing with them outside. But I’ll not have you draw them in the house.”
“I wasn’t playing, mother,” Scarlett said grumpily. “I was practicing.”
“Whatever you were doing, you know that shifters can’t be killed by mortal weapons,” her mother said for the umpteen time. “If that were the case, our finest hunters would have killed the wolf long ago.”
“Yes,” Scarlett’s grandmother said.
“I’m sorry…”
Scarlet’s mother put her hand on her arm in comfort. Scarlett’s grandfather had been killed in an ill-fated attempt to kill the shifter when he had first appeared many years ago.
“It’s fine, dear,” Scarlett’s grandmother pushed her chair back to stand up. “I’ve long since accepted there is nothing we can do about the wolf-shifter. Nothing at all.” She stood and walked away from the table. “I’m going to take a nap now,” she said as she left the room.
Once her grandmother had closed her bedroom door, Scarlett’s mother turned back to her and hissed: “See, you’ve upset your grandmother now!”
Scarlett felt her blood boil, but could do nothing except sit there with her fists clenched as her mother started to tidy away the dishes.
“What are you going to do now?” Scarlett’s mother looked at the fire and then back to Scarlett.
Scarlett pushed her chair back and stood up. “I’m going outside to practice.” And she hurried out of the house.
***
Braden had arrived in the village early in the morning, just as the people were getting out of bed to tend to their animals and eat breakfast. He had traveled overnight but wasn’t tired. He didn’t need as much sleep as normal people, especially when he was in bear form. Once shifted, he could travel for days without rest, stopping only briefly to eat once a day. In this way, he could cover long distances quicker than humans could.
