Naeme felt like a pawn in a complex game. All the players were in place, but she didn’t know the rules. She didn’t know whether to be titillated or afraid.
Chapter Ten
Baylor and Valen were avoiding her. It was inconceivable that she hadn’t managed to corner either one of them, or that they couldn’t spare a few minutes to tell her what was going on.
Her frustration grew as the day waned. Dismissed by the Queen to prepare for the evening’s festivities, she took off to Baylor’s quarters to confront him. Finding him absent, she did a cleansing and removed all traces of herself from the uncluttered room—her scent, the imprint of her essence, the memories she had imbued into the walls, which he could recall and relive if he chose. He’d be furious, but then so was she.
In a huff she absconded to a friend’s house.
“Well, you certainly are making a statement.” Tiri stood on the threshold wearing the traditional apparel, the sheer long-sleeved garment with a single tie just above her mons veneris. Her dusky nipples and shadowed cleft were clearly visible through the shimmering material, her ebony tresses rippling down her back like a cloak.
Naeme on the other hand had bucked tradition. She was in a mood. She had dressed herself in unadulterated red from neck to feet with no fastening in sight, bound her hair back in a garnet clasp and braided it. She’d taken a further step and done the unthinkable—she’d donned undergarments. They clung to her body like a second skin, bespelled to deny access to her lower orifices, but translucent to show her charms. She’d never had a lover ignore her after they’d spent the night together—she was used to her men dancing attendance. His insensitivity had pricked her pride, but much worse, he had kept her in the dark, treating her like an empty-headed idiot.
“Yes, I am. What do you think I am saying?”
“At the very least, ‘Fuck you’.” Tiri laughed as Naeme slipped her feet into flat leather slippers.
“That’s a start. I’ll have much more to say before the night is over.” She caught Tiri’s hand, and together they ran from Tiri’s quaint cottage and joined the throng making their way to the great hall. Knowing what to expect if the event followed the norm, Naeme was keen to see how the evening would unfold now that Titania had added an element of danger to the proceedings.
* * * *
She slipped into Titania’s privy chamber. Titania’s auburn brow arched as she caught sight of Naeme. “It seems to me, Naeme, you’re garbed for a war rather than a night of loving.”
“There are battles.” Naeme met Baylor’s irate stare with bland indifference. “And then there are battles, your majesty.” The Queen’s attendants watched with avid interest.
The Queen’s lips twitched. Her gaze shifted between Naeme and Baylor.
“If I may have a word in private with Naeme, milady, before your august guests arrive.” The request made between Baylor’s clenched teeth drew snorts and chuckles disguised as coughs from the other people in the room.
“By her attitude, you may have left it too late, my captain.” Titania chose to be entertained. Mirth danced in her eyes as she tilted her head to an alcove at the far end of the privy chamber.
Baylor gripped Naeme by the elbow and led her away. “What the hell is wrong with you?”
She gave him an overly sweet smile. “Whatever do you mean?”
“You eliminated all that was you from my rooms.”
“Oh, wonderful, I did a good job then. Well, if there is nothing else, I will take my place in the Queen’s retinue.”
“Just wait a damned second. What are you in a boil about?”
She folded her arms under her breasts and stared at him.
“You’re pouting about something, but I don’t know what.”
“Let me say this slowly so you’ll understand. Valen returned—with Puck, I am assuming by his perkiness. I do have some interest in the matter since it was my recollection that is blurred.”
“Shite, I spent the day marshalling our forces, shoring up the protection spells. After that I scouted the perimeter.” Impatience tightened his face and he reached for her, but she stepped back, not wanting him to touch her. Her resolve would weaken.
“One of you scouted the perimeter…” She let the last word hang in the air. Baylor looked around him to see if anyone was in hearing distance. He dragged his hand over his hair and down his nape to work the tendons there. Now that she looked past her hurt feelings she noticed the weariness on his face.
Shamefaced, she mumbled, “Sorry.”
“That’ll do for now.” A brief grin flitted across his face before it fell into sober lines. “Something is coming at us, something that should not be possible. Everything appears as it should be, but I can feel it, taste it. I hear the worried murmurs from the earth, the forest creatures. It comes to me like a sigh on the wind, but I can’t catch the words. The Fae have grown complacent, Naeme, arrogant in our belief we are invulnerable. It may prove to be our downfall.”
Now she understood—the thought of failing his Queen, his race, her, weighed heavily on him.
She framed his face with her hands, surprised to find his skin chilled. She exuded heat to banish the coolness.
“What can I do to help?”
“We won’t know until we are confronted with our enemies, but follow your instincts. They’ve saved us before.”
“It’s time,” Titania called out then. She placed her hand on Oberon’s proffered arm, regal in her blood-red ceremonial gown, a diadem of rubies on her head. Her gown was transparent and it clung to her lush curves. Her scent exuded earthiness, adding to her allure.
Naeme thought of Titania as an arrogant, wilful bitch, but she felt pride in her Queen as Titania walked out undaunted to meet her adversaries, and a prick of something akin to desire.
The Fae convened for a Greening were a spectacular sight. Their bodies smouldered with heat born of arousal, pulsed with an inner melody that would rise to a sustained crescendo when they began to love. Laughter and words, flirtatious and seductive, hummed through the vast chamber.
Conversation fell to low whispered murmurs as the King and Queen glided to their thrones. The participants shifted to clear a path from the door to the platform. This gave the people flanking the royal couple an unhampered view of anyone who entered the room.
Trumpets blared and Eldritch, King of the Waterfolk, strode into the hall, tall, slender as a sapling, dressed inexplicably in furs. He bowed to Oberon and clasped Titania’s offered hand and pressed his lips to its back. “I hope you know what the hell you’re doing for all our sakes,” he mumbled, and stepped back as the pixies swarmed into the room to buzz around Titania before they moved back. The brownies and the forest lords came next.
The tap of hooves heralded the arrival of the satyrs. Naeme’s mouth dropped open when Panos lingered in the doorway, his eyes glittering with malicious triumph. The seal of the satyrs hung from his neck.
He tottered forward and nodded at Oberon, whose eyes narrowed at the insult. Bending over Titania’s hand, he fixed his attention on Naeme.
Pulling her hand back, Titania flexed her fingers as if to rid her hand of something nasty. “The new overlord of the satyrs, I assume.”
The satyr planted his fists on his furry hips, and puffed out his chest. “Panos at your service, your majesty, Titania, Queen of the Fae.” Legs braced apart, he allowed his mighty cock to emerge from the coarse tufts between his thighs.
Titania flicked a brief glance at his member and looked away as if she wasn’t impressed by his show of virility. “We were told by the late Pyric that Puck was heir.”
“He was absent from the invocation ceremony, so I declared dominion over my clansmen.” The triumph was smug and blatant in his grin.
“Oh, but he is found.” This bit of news banished the smirk from Panos’ face. “Our dear Valen found him asleep, frozen in an unnatural slumber. His memories were muddled. Very similar to the way Naeme’s were blurred. Puck?”
He
aring his name, Puck trotted out, followed by several satyrs. Things wouldn’t go well for Panos. After Titania had meted out her punishment the satyrs would rain down reprisals on his head for his traitorous acts.
Panicky at Puck’s appearance, Panos seemed at a loss for words. But there was no time for him to gather his wits. An icy mist drifted across the floor. Pale as an icicle and just as cold, the Frost Queen sailed into the audience room carrying with her a blast of frigid air.
The impossibility Baylor had feared had come to pass. They were in the height of summer—she should be asleep, hibernating. A sharp tang of alarm filtered through the room and the masses shifted, restive, prepared to flee.
They looked to Titania and she smiled benevolently. “Arine, you came.”
“You did send an invitation. How could I resist?” Her eyes, a glacial grey, settled on Oberon, the avarice patent. “As it happens the climate is much colder than it usually is so I can prolong my presence here indefinitely.”
“Not after the Greening,” the Fae Queen declared.
“Your numbers are diminished, Titania. You must be able to generate heat to sustain the summer. You can expect an early winter and it will be long and bitter.”
“Well, that’s what you’d expect after all the time and effort you expended to ensure your presences here tonight,” Titania said agreeably. From experience, Naeme knew that at her most pleasant, Titania was at her most dangerous.
“What are you blathering about?” Arine snapped, not at all sure of herself anymore.
“You’re greedy, Arine, and I can appreciate that as a woman of great appetites myself. I didn’t pay much attention to you when the chill lingered way into the spring three cycles ago. I have such delightful distractions.” She exchanged a warm glance with her consort. “I noticed when it stayed cooler for much longer the next year past the cusp of summer. That’s when I realised what you were up to. I am afraid I can’t allow you to unravel the finely tuned changing of the seasons or have Oberon. He is a rogue, but I like him that way. So I watched and waited—well, we watched and waited.” She grinned at Oberon who responded with a roguish smile when Arine sent him a baleful glare. “And here you are exactly where I want you, when I want you. The mistake you made is thinking you could use the satyrs to befuddle my adventurous Fae women and keep them hidden to weaken me. It’s not the numbers, Arine, it’s the will and needs of my marvellous lustful Fae. And now you must be taught not to encroach on what’s mine.”
Titania rose to her feet, and her robe slid off her shoulders. She was glorious in her nudity, full breasts topped with plump red nipples, her long torso sloping down to her curvy hips and drawing attention to the patch of auburn hair between her thighs.
“Oberon.” The single word had her man moving to her side.
He shed his clothes. “My love.” Naked, the Fae King wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her back against his body, pressing his ever-ready cock against her ass.
“Valen.” She patted her mons and Valen fell to his knees and buried his face in the silky hair on her muff.
Why, that naughty boy, he’d been keeping secrets from her.
“Naeme.”
Startled at hearing her name called, Naeme jolted. Gulping, she stumbled to the Queen’s side, gasped when Titania cradled her head with a palm and drew her to her breast. She latched onto the nipple to slake the thirst riding her. The heat flowed through her body. She’d never feel chilled again.
“Baylor, evoke your claiming.”
Naeme quivered when Baylor flipped up her skirts, ripped away the barrier she had put in place. He grasped her hips and grunted when he nudged her damp opening with the bulbous head of his shaft. With short thrusts, he pushed into her. Was he larger or was it because she was needier?
Titania addressed the room at large. “Commence the Greening, my children. Share our bounty with the pixies, the forest lords, brownies and elves.”
She deliberately excluded the satyrs. Panos would seethe with rage. He would be aroused to the point of madness with no outlet to slake his lust.
All around, couples came together. Threesomes, quartets and daisy chains of bodies started to line the room. The Fae writhed against each other, creating friction and heat. The Greening had begun.
Titania was pulled downward. Oberon bent his mate over the throne and thrust his erection into her sheath. Valen crawled up behind him and slid his cock deep into his ass.
Titania pulled Naeme’s head back by the hair. “Don’t you ever fuck Oberon again.”
Body jerking from the pounding Baylor was giving her, Naeme stuttered. “Not without your permission, your majesty,” she replied saucily. It was hard to work up sufficient penitence when the woman’s cock-filled cunt was only a foot away from her face.
“Impudent wench.” Titania laughed and pressed a kiss to her lips, slipping the tip of her tongue into her mouth before she released her. Hmmm, a new experience to explore. Freed, Naeme fell down on all fours, and pushed back onto the cock ramming into her. She was very aware of everything going on around her, Baylor’s manhood in her sheath, his hands on her tits and the sound of bodies slapping against each other.
Heat flooded her belly, infused her limbs. Every Fae experienced the same thing. This magical harvest of their feverish fucking seeped into the floor, sank into the ground and spread far and wide.
A wailing scream echoed hollowly through the cavernous room. Steam rose off Arine. Her haggard face filled with hate, she twirled and fled from the balmy room leaving a wet trail behind her. Back to where she whiled away the hot summer months.
Eldritch crept up beside them, cock in hand, and held it to her lips. “If I may?”
Naeme glanced back at Baylor. His mouth twisted into a grimace. He gave her a jerky nod. She parted her lips and sucked on the sweet stick the Elven offered. The night was young and she was eager. And there was so much to explore and savour.
Epilogue
Spring
With a laugh and flutter of her wings Naeme evaded Baylor’s hands. She raced ahead of him, zipping back and forth to lure him deeper into the forest. Nothing like being chased to heat the blood. As she dashed into the clearing she sought, he caught her by her skirts, pulled her into his arms and bore her down to the ground. Baylor twisted his body so he cushioned her fall. He lay under her, grinning up into her face. She traced the laughter lines around his beautiful mouth, proud that she’d put them there.
They’d returned to the Fae bower at her request. Their burgeoning was upon them, and she had never needed or desired a man as she did at this moment. Her wings slipped seamlessly into her back. She removed their clothing and pressed her lips to his, moved down to kiss his chin, licked and nipped her way down to his groin. Settling on her knees between his thighs, she lapped at the ruddy knob on his rigid cock.
“Let’s create a Fae!”
One black brow quirked. “I don’t think we can accomplish that from this position. Why don’t I show you how it’s done?” He sat up and pulled her across his lap.
“Hmmm, I clearly remember someone telling me I was too impatient, and needed to learn the pleasure of anticipation.”
“Which fool told you that? Someone wiser taught me to grasp every pleasure that comes my way. I like that philosophy better.” Baylor rolled her over onto her back and sank his shaft into her.
There was a time to go slowly and a time for speed. Either way, at that moment her existence was blissful.
Also available from Total-E-Bound Publishing:
Surrendered
Sarah Mäkelä
Excerpt
Chapter One
Summer’s warm magic glittered in the night air. Nature drank deep of it and flourished with life and growth. The delightful party playing out around Niamh McNamara didn’t interest her one bit. As a member of the light court, she should’ve enjoyed the merry festivities that Midsummer’s Eve brought on, but her sour mood wouldn’t let go of her. Then again, she’d never b
een like the rest of her people.
Darkness constantly ached within her chest beneath her golden appearance. Before she’d been able to ignore it, but now it wasn’t so easy, especially after overhearing whispers about her from the other members of court. Hiding away had helped, but she couldn’t always stay hidden.
Queen Titania had requested her presence back at court for a while, and when the queen asked, one didn’t say no. The queen held a special interest in seeing Niamh, as a female noble, commit to a worthy relationship. At Niamh’s age, she should’ve at least had one potential suitor, yet she did her best to avoid them and had been fairly successful.
Niamh took another sip from her goblet. The faeries around her sang, laughed and danced, yet she could barely gather the enthusiasm to smile. How cruel life was that she had to watch their happiness while she didn’t share their feelings.
There were men who seemed determined to court her. The more she dissuaded them, the more eagerly they flocked to her. A familiar male elf took her elbow to sweep her off to dance, but she brushed off his hand. “Sorry, I’m not interested in dancing at the moment.”
Another reason why she preferred to stay away from court these days. She hated presumptuousness and what tended to happen next.
His face fell, and confusion creased his brow. The lady next to Niamh gawked at her like she was crazy before grabbing the male’s hand and waltzing away with him. The lady leaned close to him and whispered something, causing them to both break out into laughter.
Niamh bristled. She didn’t want to feel like an outsider amongst her own people.
A happy, albeit drunken, pixie flew by her, nearly colliding with her shoulder. The tiny being apologised in a high-pitched tinkling voice, then it was gone, darting away to join a group of pixies near the mead.
Fae High Summer Hunt Page 6
