A Lamentation of Swans

by Desiree Acuna

  “Who is Artimus?”

  “Evil bastard!” Dragon growled. “A wizard.”

  “A very powerful wizard,” unicorn agreed.

  “And powerfully evil,” Caelin growled. “Your father.”

  Gwyneth blinked at him in shocked disbelief. “My father?”

  “So he says, but he is a liar besides being an evil bastard,” Dragon growled. “And I cannot fathom why he wants to use his own spawn as sacrifice. It seems to me that he would use someone else’s.”

  Gwyneth felt cold wash over her when she’d only begun to get warm. A strange buzzing began in her ears. “He … wants to sacrifice me?”

  Unicorn nodded. “At the temple. That is why we were sent to collect you and take you there. He is a wielder of black magic and I suppose therein may lie the answer, for it is dark magic. Evil. No doubt the spell he plans to use you for will be more powerful for the sacrifice of his own daughter.”

  Gwyneth felt tears of terror well in her eyes. She swallowed convulsively several times. She hadn’t expected anything like this. They were so calm about it that she was almost tempted to believe it was some sort of jest, but it occurred to her that there was no reason for them not to be calm about it when it was her life that hung in the balance. In truth, she had often heard the men-at-arms discuss such things with a callousness that had made her blood run cold, but she had always perceived them as monsters. She had not considered that these men could be the same. “But … I don’t want to die!”

  Dragon turned to look at her in surprise and more than a little irritation. “That is absurd! You are mortal! You are bound to die … sometime.”

  “Yes, but … I don’t want to die now!” Gwyneth wailed.

  “It will be quick and relatively painless, I am certain,” unicorn said soothingly. “Most of the time they simply stab the sacrifice in the heart and that cannot take more than a few minutes at the very most.”

  Gwyneth clutched at her chest, feeling as if her heart would stop beating right that moment. She struggled to catch her breath.

  Caelin cleared his throat. “As to that, there may be a problem.”

  “What sort of problem?” Dragon demanded.

  “She is no pure maiden.”

  “No maiden?” dragon and unicorn demanded almost at the same moment. “She’s supposed to be a virgin!”

  Caelin shrugged. “She spread her legs for the guard right before my eyes. She is certainly no virgin and, as she did not fight him, nor showed any great surprise, or was even particularly upset afterward, I would have to say she is a very well used piece indeed,” he said angrily.

  Outrage flickered to life briefly at Caelin’s assessment of the situation, but it didn’t last. All three of them turned condemning gazes on her. Gwyneth shrank away from the anger she saw in them, but since it occurred to her forcefully that she was of no use to them if she lacked her maidenhead, she wasn’t inclined to tell them she still had it. She was, in point of fact, very sorry that she had allowed Alyce to convince her that sodomy was far better if she must endure being rutted since she could at least avoid having her belly filled with unwanted babes. To think that she had endured that so many times when she would have been far better off, babes or not, if she had gotten rid of her maidenhead!

  “Well! This is a fine mess!” Dragon growled angrily. “Why did you even bring her if she was useless?”

  Caelin shrugged. “I didn’t know what else to do. He expects us to bring her, by the gods! And to present her before the next full moon. I thought I might think of something!”

  Dragon settled to studying her broodingly—they all did. Gwyneth mopped the tears from her face with the blanket and stared at the fire, wondering what they would do with her now that they’d discovered she was not of any use to them.

  After a few moments, dragon leaned closer to her and dragged in a deep breath. Gwyneth studied him uneasily, wondering if he was considering eating her since she appeared to be useless for anything else. A look of satisfaction flickered across his face and Gwyneth had heart palpitations, wondering if he might be able to smell her maidenhead.

  “She is fertile,” he said in a rumbling voice.

  Caelin and unicorn turned to look at her speculatively.

  “That is interesting, Drake,” unicorn said dryly, “but I don’t see it as being of any benefit to us.”

  Drake smiled, a toothy smile that made Gwyneth exceedingly uneasy. “Think, Faine! A babe is pure, is it not? Virginal, innocent? If we plant one there, how will Artimus be able to tell whether it is the babe in her womb or her? His magic will detect only the purity.”

  Faine stared at him for a long moment, glanced at her and then at Caelin. “That is evil and I will have nothing to do with it!” he growled angrily. “I do not know how you could contemplate allowing your own seed to be used as a sacrifice!”

  “My seed is to be sacrificed!” Drake bellowed angrily. “The evil bastard has my mate’s egg! She will die if I cannot free her from him and I am far more interested in saving my mate’s progeny than the spawn of this human, by the gods! In any case, we will not know who has fertilized her egg if we all fuck her! And it is not as if it will be much more than a seed if she is to be sacrificed at the next full moon! It will be very little different from wasting one’s seed.”

  “It is worth a try,” Caelin said thoughtfully if a little doubtfully. “You do not think that they will check her maidenhead when we give her to them?”

  “If they do, we are undone!” Faine said grimly.

  “I cannot think of anything else to try,” Drake growled irritably. “If you do not like the idea, then come up with something else.”

  Gwyneth watched them uneasily as they pondered it, wondering if it would do the least good to attempt to run.

  “No,” Caelin said decisively. “I cannot think of anything else. Lie down, wench, and spread your legs.”

  Gwyneth blinked at him.

  “Hold on now!” Faine said.

  Gwyneth glanced at him hopefully.

  “I don’t see why you should have the first turn.”

  “I captured her,” Caelin said pointedly. “I should be first. I will be first!”

  “Well, I am not going after Drake,” Faine said angrily. “Once he has wallowed it out there will be no touching the sides!”

  Drake scowled at him in outrage. “She is a female! She is made to stretch, by the gods! It will go back!”

  “But when?” Faine snapped. “That is what I am worried about.”

  Drake caught his cock in his hand and shook it at Faine. “It is not even nearly as big as a babe and she could pass one of those.”

  “But I haven’t,” Gwyneth said a little fearfully. “And it causes a great deal of pain when a woman has one!”

  “Well, it is not as big!” Drake said.

  “But it is still too big,” Gwyneth argued, too unnerved by the idea to keep her tongue. “I would far rather not.”

  Drake studied her sullenly. “This is a magnificent cock!” he growled. “And I am a golden dragon! You should be honored that I am willing to share it with you at all!”

  “But I’m not! I’d far rather you saved it for someone else!”

  “Gods! It is not going to do us any good if he saves it for someone else!” Caelin snapped. “Be reasonable, wench! We must all fuck you so that none of us know who has sired the sacrifice!”

  Gwyneth’s chin wobbled. “But I don’t want it!”

  Drake studied her for a long moment. “Please?” he growled.

  Gwyneth felt the blood drain from her face, for there was nothing supplicating about the way he’d said it, regardless of what he’d said.

  “You might as well have saved your breath,” Faine said testily, “if you were only going to bellow at her!” He smiled soothingly at Gwyneth. “Caelin and I will go first and then you will be filled with seed and it will be easy enough for him to slip that club of his in. You’ll see. You will hardly notice the difference.”
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br />   She wasn’t convinced, but it occurred to her that there was no escape. He was a dragon. He would only transform himself and capture her if she tried to run and then he might be more inclined to eat her.

  She wasn’t certain that would be worse, but it seemed worse at the moment. Stiff with fear, she settled the blanket on the ground and lay back, promising herself that if it did hurt, she would simply leap up and run and take her chances. She was not completely against their plan. It had occurred to her very quickly that it was a very good way to rid herself of her maidenhead and she thought she might avoid being used as a virgin sacrifice without it, regardless of what they thought to the contrary.

  It might not have been quite as bad, Gwyneth reflected later, if she hadn’t braced herself for the pain she expected. Unfortunately, she knew from all the talk in the kitchens that the loss of one’s maidenhead hurt, and she tensed in anticipation of it the moment Caelin leaned over her and began to probe her. It took all she could do to refrain from lifting her hips as she usually did and trying to convince him to use the other hole, or guide him toward it. As Alyce had pointed out, men really did not care where they shoved their rod so long as they had a hole to push it into and, quite often, they did not seem to know the difference.

  Of course, they were usually too drunk to find their cock without both hands, but one would’ve thought they would notice something was not quite right. She certainly felt it.

  It began to burn the moment he wedged his cock in her hole in point of fact. She panted for breath. He panted for breath.

  “It is bone dry here,” he muttered in disgust when he’d drawn away to see what the problem was and pushed his finger inside instead. “Can you not produce a little moisture?”

  She looked at him fearfully.

  “You will have to spare the time to warm her up a bit,” Faine advised him.

  Caelin glared at him. “I did not need warming up,” he said pointedly.

  “By the gods! You have been with a woman before?”

  “I will not dignify that with an answer!” Caelin growled. “I have been with many elfin women. She is not, and, as Drake said, if I am gracious enough to allow her to have it, she should have the grace to produce a little moisture!”

  Chapter Five

  Faine and Drake exchanged a look. Irritated, Caelin got up, signaled for them to join him and walked a little distance away after Caelin had ordered Gwyneth not to move from the spot.

  “What is the problem?” Drake growled. “I do not believe for a moment that you have no notion of how to warm a woman up! I know, and I am a dragon!”

  “Well, I’m damned if I know what that has to do with it!” Caelin said testily.

  “Dragon women do not need to be warmed up because they are ready to mate or they will not let a male near them. She is human, but even I have been with a few. You must cuddle her a little and give her a few kisses and when she relaxes, then you can sheathe your sword!”

  Caelin glared at him, annoyed that they would question his knowledge and experience of women. Did he look so green behind the ears as to have no knowledge of women?

  He had found the entire business repugnant from the very beginning, before he had ever set eyes on the girl. Nothing short of what Artimus had used would have convinced him to have any part of it—but there was the rub. He had no choice except to turn his back on the woman who had given him life, and he could not do that. He had convinced himself that there was enough hate in his heart for her father to carry him through what he had to do, or that, at the very least, he could simply close his mind to her.

  He had begun to have problems with that from the moment he had met her, though. It was bad enough that he must be intimate with her to see this through. He thought he could manage that. He had certainly had no trouble feeling desire for her. He knew, though, that he could not afford to behave as a lover—in any way—or he was lost. It was not a battle he could win. “I know that! I do not want to cuddle and kiss her, gods damn it,” he growled. “It is bad enough to fuck her when she is to be sacrificed in no time at all. I would rather not think of her as anything else, thank you very much!”

  Drake glanced at Faine.

  Faine shrugged. “He has a point. It was easy enough to consider what Artimus had in mind when we had no one to think of but ourselves and our problems. She is a pretty little thing. It would not be hard at all to grow fond of her, and then where will we be? Worse off than before!”

  Drake glared at Caelin. “I will warm her up. I am a dragon. It will not bother me at all.”

  “Just do not forget yourself!” Caelin said tightly. “I go first and then Faine and then, if she is to be ruined by you, it will not be of any consequence to our plan.”

  Gwyneth’s eyes nearly bugged from their sockets when Drake stalked toward her and dropped to his knees. He caught her by her ankles when she tried to scramble up and run, tipping her onto her back and falling over before she could sit up again. She tried to swim backwards using her feet and elbows, but he outmaneuvered her. Grasping her arms, he pushed them above her head and manacled them with one hand. He settled his belly against her pelvis to finish pinning her to the ground.

  The fight went out of her abruptly. She stared at him wide-eyed, panting for breath. She swallowed convulsively. “I thought you were going to be last?” she croaked.

  Drake frowned as he listened to the wild, frightened tattoo of her heart in her chest. “I am. I am only going to be first to kiss you,” he murmured in a rumbling voice. “That is nothing to be frightened of, is it?”

  She stared at him warily, but her heart began to slow. He shifted upward a little, supporting the bulk of his weight off of her chest with his arms and lowering his face slowly toward hers to allow her a few moments to accept. She turned her face away when he leaned close enough to brush his lips to hers. Impatience flickered through him, but he ignored her effort to elude him and brushed his lips along her cheek instead, lightly. Beyond being pleasing to his eyes, she had a pleasing scent, he decided, breathing her essence into his lungs, tasting her as he nibbled the smooth skin of her cheek only with his lips. He lingered there, waiting until her curiosity stirred and then he slowly made his way back toward her lips. That time, she turned ever so slightly to meet him.

  Triumph wafted through him. He explored her lips with the same leisure that he had her cheek, waiting for them to part on a breath before he slipped his tongue inside. He felt a jolt run through her, felt an echo within his own body and a flash of heat. She was sweet, he thought, savoring the taste of her as much as he enjoyed the soft slick walls of her mouth and the friction of rubbing his tongue along hers.

  Slowly, he felt the tension melt from her, felt the muscles straining against him relax and still he kissed her, enjoying it far too much to stop right away. It occurred to him after a time that there was a good deal more of her to explore.

  Deciding he might as well, he took one last savoring sweep of her mouth and pulled away, sucking lightly at the softness of her throat before he moved lower to explore the soft mounds of flesh below that. The tips puckered for his mouth. He plucked at them lightly. The tiny little buds that had never been suckled fascinated him.

  She gasped, shuddered, moving restlessly against him. “It feels strange,” she whispered.

  “Does it, my dove?” he murmured. “How does it feel strange?”

  She swallowed audibly. “It makes my belly feel strange.”

  He smiled against her skin, plucking at the tip and then covering it with his mouth and suckling. “When I do this? Or this?”

  “Both.”

  He moved to the other breast. “Does it feel as strange here?” he murmured.

  “I feel very strange all over,” she whispered shakily.

  He sighed and stared down at her breasts, reluctant to yield his prize now that he’d warmed her. He’d agreed to, he reminded himself. One more taste, he decided, nuzzling his face against her delightfully soft little mounds before he kis
sed each one lingeringly and finally rolled away.

  Discontent filled him immediately when Caelin took his place. Frowning, he got up and moved a short distance to wait, watching Caelin keenly as he seated the head of his cock in her and began struggling to claim her sheathe.

  It disturbed him that it seemed a very tight fit when Caelin’s staff was not as big as his and doubts began to niggle at him. She was a little thing, but then they all seemed little to him, and he’d plowed a fair number of them.

  Caelin wasn’t certain if he was more angry or more randy from watching Drake ready her, but the moment he pressed his flesh only a little inside her, he forgot his pique. She was warm and wet and her depths beckoned—and it was still an uncommonly tight fit, especially for a woman he was certain had vast experience.

  Ignoring it, unable to think beyond getting sheathed before he shamed himself and spilled his seed without managing it, he moved in and out of her shallowly until he could feel her moisture coating him, could feel easier movement. Shifting then to give himself a little better leverage, he drove swiftly and … not so smoothly to the hilt.

  He felt the pop of the flesh he’d pierced the moment he tore past it. A jolt went through him. His mind erupted into chaos. Gasping for breath, he levered himself up to stare at her ashen face and he knew, he knew he had been duped!

  He discovered it didn’t matter, not at the moment. Her body was squeezing his so tightly he could barely breathe. He didn’t think he could’ve ignored his instincts to move if his life had depended upon it.

  And it was too late to worry about it in any case.

  With a mixture of fiery lust and temper, he withdrew and plunged again, driving into her over and over until he felt his seed erupt from his shaft.

  Huffing for breath, he finally levered himself up far enough to stare down at her face accusingly, but it was a wasted effort. She had squeezed her eyes tightly closed.

  Pulling out of her, he got to his feet and stalked to the pool to wash himself, his mind in turmoil.

  She could not have been a maiden, he told himself! He had seen her couple with that bastard with his own eyes!