“Lord Balam, Prince Kwame, and Sir Kenosi, stay with me and the guards,” Camila said. “The rest of you escort the two prisoners. Come back as soon as they’re secured.”
“Yes, Your Majesty,” Prince Kwame said, bowing slightly.
Camila pinched her skirt and lifted it ever so slightly, extending her slipper-clad toes. The three men she’d ordered to take us to the dungeon obediently filed past her, bending to kiss her foot. She met my eyes, a defiant tilt to her chin and a triumphant smirk on her lips, as if wanting me to admire how well she’d trained them to worship her.
It was over, I realized as the guard cuffed me with the loathsome metal cylinders. We’d go back to the dungeon and await our executions. At least we’d be together. Camila was too busy with her coronation to think about isolating us and driving us insane with solitary confinement. I wondered if this is how she’d always felt when I had six mates and she’d had Gabor. Now, we’d traded places. She had all the love and loyalty of six powerful men behind her, and I had Gabor.
I felt greedy for wanting more. In truth, his love would have been enough if I’d known my mates had found real, requited love with someone who respected them and wouldn’t manipulate or take advantage of them.
I’d had one chance to get them back, and I’d failed. Maybe I should have used my magic, but I didn’t want to enchant them or accidentally hurt them if my magic got out of hand. I wanted them to remember the love they’d had for me and come back to me.
It didn’t matter if they remembered or not, though. They didn’t feel it in their hearts anymore.
We’d lost.
I’d lost everything. Not just the battle for the throne, but my mates. I bowed my head, defeated, as my three ex-mates escorted me and the one guard who had remained loyal to the end out of the room. When I’d started the amulet tour, I’d been so young and naïve. I’d learned a lot on the way, but I still had so much to learn. So much I’d never get a chance to learn or experience. I’d never master my magic or have children or know the fate of the Ocelot Nation. No matter what outcomes I’d predicted at every step of the journey, I’d never expected it to end like this.
But it had.
Sixteen
We stumbled down the stairs with our hands in the cuffs in front of us, my former mates holding each of us by an elbow. I was in a daze, my mind racing so fast I barely paid attention to the other humans bustling up and down the stairs with floral arrangements and food and decorations. We paused for Abigail, another maid I knew, this one carrying an armful of flowers that hid the entire top half of her body and stretched across the entire width of the staircase.
“Sorry, sorry,” she muttered as the five of us flattened ourselves against the wall so she could move up the steps. When she passed me, she hesitated just long enough to pluck a blue rose from the bouquet and hand it to me. I couldn’t take it with my hands cuffed, so Tadeu reached out and took it. I wished Jetsun or Shadow had taken it, that they’d tossed it away before Tadeu saw it and knew what it meant.
The Queen’s Rose.
I felt a twist of despair in my heart. Were they still rooting for me, the humans who had cheered for me when I arrived home, hidden me, put so much hope in me? Had they been excited when they heard the king had announced me as their queen, then crushed when they found out he was dead and that Camila was determined to take the throne? They would be so disappointed in me. I’d been smacked in the face by insurmountable odds at every turn, and now the victor’s coronation would take place while I was locked up in a dungeon, defeated.
Tadeu slid the stem of the rose into the chain between my hands and pulled me forward again. We reached the bottom floor, and a couple maids fell silent as we passed. They glanced at the rose and then smiled at me with hope in their eyes that broke my heart. Behind us, I could hear their hushed but excited chatter as we walked away.
Fuck this. I wasn’t going back in the dungeon without at least fighting.
I called on my magic, feeling the same frustration build behind the block I’d felt when I wore the cuffs before. I could summon my magic, I just couldn’t use it. I needed a power surge to break the cuffs, and I wasn’t going to get an orgasm until I was already locked up.
I glanced at Gabor, excitement rising inside me. Maybe this could work. If they put him in the same cell as me, or even the one beside me, we could break the cuffs and maybe even the cell. When I’d gone into heat, I’d walked through a wall. Of course, the magic of creation was at an all-time high in a shifter in heat, since that was literally what an animal was supposed to do while in heat—mate and create life.
But still. I was sure I could bend the bars with my magic even if I couldn’t walk through them. And if they put us in cells far apart, I could still make myself come, especially if Gabor was there to talk to me, or watch me, or let me watch him…
I was getting tingly just thinking about it. My pulse beat quicker as hope returned to me.
It took me a second to realize the guys hadn’t led me down the flight of stairs into the subterranean level of the castle. They were leading us along a hallway bustling with noise and activity, servants and maids racing back and forth along it as they set up the throne room for the coronation. Three sets of ornately carved wooden doors stood open to the main hall. My heart lodged in my throat at the memory of the last time I’d been dragged into that room, that time through a side door near the throne. Now, we entered through the main doors at the far end of the room, where the guests would enter and approach the throne.
I checked Gabor again, but he was stone-faced and silent, his head held high. Of course he’d march to his death with his honor intact.
I already knew I liked life more than honor.
“Why are we here?” I asked, digging my heels in to slow us. Had Camila decided to execute me directly after her coronation, just to make sure everyone knew I wouldn’t be challenging her again? I wouldn’t put it past her, but I’d been there when she told them to take me to the dungeon.
“Just shut up and move,” Tadeu said, wrenching me forward so hard I stumbled. My cuffed hands shot out as if to break my fall, but Jetsun caught me before I hit the floor and righted me on my feet. He hadn’t said one word to me since he’d fallen for my sister. I wished we could talk. I wished he’d tell me anything, even that he liked loving Camila with no shame.
“Don’t push the princess around like that,” Gabor said, his voice low but edged with danger.
“What are you gonna do about it?” Tadeu taunted, then shook his head in disgust when Gabor just glared at him with icy hatred.
“Then tell me where we’re going,” I said, balking again, leaning back and keeping my legs stiff as my feet planted on the floor.
Tadeu grunted in annoyance, scooped me up, and threw me over his shoulder. “Guess I’ll have to carry your ass,” he said, marching into the throne room while I beat at his back and shoulder with my metal cuffs. The man was a fucking giant, though, his shoulders at least twice as wide as mine and as solid as they’d always been from his work in the stables. He’d stolen horses from my father, but I couldn’t picture him on a horse anymore. He was almost as big as one.
We stepped into one of the preparation rooms off the throne room, and Tadeu slammed the door behind us and roughly deposited me on my feet. I stumbled backwards this time, cursing the cuffs that held my hands from pinwheeling to keep balance.
Gabor leapt forward, but his hands were cuffed, too. I was halfway to the floor, anticipating my head slamming into the cobblestones, when Shadow caught me. His eerie green eyes burned into mine with their strange glow as he held me suspended, halfway to the floor. After a second, he dragged me to my feet, pushed me against the wall, and kissed me hard. His hands fisted my hair as he dragged my face to his. His tongue forced my lips open and plunged into my mouth, his teeth crashing against mine as he shoved his thigh between mine, flexing until my jeans bit into my soft flesh.
I tasted blood from the violence of his kiss, but
I couldn’t tell if it was his or mine. I didn’t care. I was so relieved I melted against him, moaning into his mouth for more. Lifting my cuffed hands, I looped them over his head, letting the chain fall behind his neck. He growled and rocked his hips against mine, pushing his erection against my belly. Without breaking the kiss, he undid my jeans and shoved them down around my hips. His fingers dipped between my thighs, stroking my newly shaven pussy, and this time, we both moaned. Shadow shoved down his pants and nudged my thighs open, positioning himself at my slick entrance. A shudder of arousal ran through me, and I felt my magic seeping out of the cuffs.
He braced a hand on the wall beside my head and thrust into me in one quick, powerful motion, driving upwards and burying his cock to the hilt inside me. I cried out, my head dropping back against the stones as my mate took me roughly against the wall with the three others watching. I wouldn’t have cared if the entire kingdom watched. Shadow drove into me deep and hard with each thrust, bracing both hands beside me and pinning me with his hips, watching my face intently as he pounded me. My arm began to burn, his mark glowing brighter. The pain contrasted so sharply with the pleasure he was giving me that I couldn’t hold back.
“I’m coming,” I gasped out, my walls clenching around him.
He growled in response, his eyes flashing the brightest phosphorescent green, and slammed into me a final time. I felt his length expand, and his cum shot into me, as hot and harsh as his movements had been.
“Oh, fuck yeah,” he said, his raspy voice filled with relief.
Shimmering blue magic wrapped around us, not the blast I’d had in the arena, but a tingling, electric feeling that made my toes curl and my climax go on a little longer. I barely remembered I had the cuffs on until I felt them slip off my hands. They clanged on the stone floor, and Shadow stepped away from me. I met Gabor’s eyes, and a jolt went through me. I felt suddenly naked, cold, and exposed with my jeans around my knees and Shadow’s cum running down my thighs. I was so used to all or at least several of my mates being around when we were intimate that it hadn’t hit me that we were doing something the rest of the world might consider scandalous or shocking.
We’d been on the tour when our group formed, and so many moments were life and death, and so many nights might be our last, and so many couplings happened spontaneously, when we didn’t have the opportunity for privacy or had simply been too carried away to seek it out. Even when we could have had separate rooms, like in the Tiger Empire, I hadn’t wanted it. I wanted my mates around me, enjoying me as I enjoyed them, even when we were just lounging around talking. I craved their closeness, their comfort and support, their brilliant minds and protective natures, their laughter, and yes, their roughness and masculinity and dominance, too.
I’d grown so accustomed to being watched that it hadn’t occurred to me until that moment that Gabor might not like the arrangement I had with my mates. Most feline shifters had one mate for life. I’d been so relieved to be in the moment with Shadow, feeling him come back to me with each thrust as he fucked away the spell Camila had cast on him, that I’d forgotten Gabor was there, watching for the first time.
I dropped his gaze, and before I could even begin to make an excuse, Jetsun stepped in front of me, tipping my chin up and kissing me lightly. “I went to the Spirit World to talk to Tsewang,” he said. “He said my mother was already with child when they met.”
“Isn’t that convenient?” Tadeu rumbled, rolling his eyes.
I narrowed my eyes at Jetsun, but he wouldn’t meet my gaze. Instead, he knelt and tugged my jeans over my feet, pulling them off with my shoes. When he stood, I took one look at his beautiful face and swallowed my words. Whatever he had to believe, I’d believe it with him. My heart jolted, and I forgot all about Gabor in my happiness. “That means everything,” I said, throwing my arms around Jetsun’s neck. “We can be together now.”
He pulled his cock out before lifting me off my feet. I wrapped my arms around his neck and my legs around his waist. He gripped my ass, his long fingers spreading to support my weight as he pushed into me. A rush of relief and pleasure rolled through me, and I moaned aloud. I closed my eyes, letting him take control, letting him have me completely, wrapping my magic around him and waiting for the True Mate mark on my arm to burn like fire, like the first time.
It did.
Joy filled me as he spilled into me with complete abandon, and I gave myself just as thoroughly. My magic increased and snaked around our entwined bodies as he gave a final, powerful thrust, his hands protecting me from the harshness of the stone wall. My arm and my walls throbbed in rhythm with my heartbeat, with his. I had been terrified that I could never get them back, that they’d never be mine again. Now they were proving otherwise, that they still wanted to be mine and to possess me as completely as they had before the ocelot potion had stolen them from me.
When Jetsun pulled back, he smiled shyly and pulled up his sleeve, rubbing his hand over his moon-white, single mark. “It worked,” he said, turning to show off the sign proudly to the others. “I’m free.”
“What’s going on?” I asked. “I thought you were still under Camila’s control.”
“We’re not under her control,” Tadeu said. “But yeah, we still love her. Or, I do. You?” He looked to the other two, who shook their heads.
“Then it’s my turn,” Tadeu said, stepping up to me.
I pushed him back, wanting answers. “Then how is this possible?” I asked. “If you love her, shouldn’t you be throwing us in a dungeon right now?”
“We still had our minds,” Shadow said. “At least… Eventually enough of it came back to us to remember what loving you was like.”
“Love does make us all a little crazy,” Tadeu said. “I can attest to that. Now open up for me, Princess.” He slid a hand between my legs, fingering my dripping pussy.
“But… If you love her, how can you be with me right now?” I asked, trying to keep my wits about me when he pushed a long, rough finger into me.
“People in love can still fuck around,” he said, flashing me a grin as he slid his finger out and undid his belt.
“No,” I said. “They can’t.”
“Maybe it’s because we’ve been with you before,” Jetsun said. “Because we know what real love feels like, with a True Mate. With her… It was different. I knew she had made me love her, and I resented it. It didn’t feel how it should. How it feels with you.”
“Less talking,” Tadeu growled, picking me up around the waist. “More fucking.”
He lifted me with one arm, holding his giant horse cock with the other. With one swift movement, he brought me down hard, impaling me on his massive cock. Even after the other two had loosened me up and left me streaming with cum, my body could not be prepped for the impossible size of him. My whole body tensed with shock, my walls clenching even tighter around him. The breath was knocked out of me, and I could only open my mouth and try not to choke on the pain.
“Fuck, I love feeling your pussy grip me so tight,” he panted, holding my body tight around the middle while he gave his hips a sharp thrust, forcing himself deeper. “It feels like my cock’s going to rip you wide open.”
“I can’t take more,” I gasped at last, finding my voice amid the racing of my panicked heart. I tensed up, terrified he was going to make me take it all again.
“Oh, don’t lie to me,” he purred, rolling his hips and working his cock in and out of the length it had already passed. “I know you can take it all, you little slut. I’ve seen you do it. Just open those legs like you did for the others and let me feel my balls slapping your ass while I pound that pussy.”
He drove deeper into me with each thrust, and though it was agony, the pleasure of him stretching me that way made me nearly swoon.
“I love to watch your face twist up in pain when I get it all the way in,” he said. “Make that face for me, baby. I’m almost there.”
I clenched my teeth against the bruising ache of his intr
usion, but I was determined to take it until he came and broke Camila’s spell. When he finally drove his cock to the hilt, though, I couldn’t hold back the sob that ripped from my throat. Tears poured from my eyes, and for a second, all I could feel was pain. Through the blur of tears, I saw Gabor step forward. He braced his feet wide and, before I realized what he was doing, swung his cuffed hands.
They clanged off the side of Tadeu’s head, and he fell backwards with the force of a falling tree trunk. Gabor caught me, tearing me away from Tadeu as he fell, hitting the floor so hard I heard his head make a sound like a cracking melon.
“What the fuck,” I screamed, spinning on Gabor. “Did you just—did you kill him?”
“No,” he said, scowling fiercely back at me. “If I wanted to kill him, I would have killed him. I just knocked him out.”
I gaped at him, wiping away my tears to see him more clearly. “Gabor,” I said slowly, though adrenaline was spiking through my veins. “You can’t knock out my mates when we’re having sex.”
“He was hurting you.” He said the words flatly, as if they were the simplest thing in the world.
“He can’t help it,” I said, gesturing to my tiger mate, who lay flat on his back, his inhumanly large penis still erect and jutting up at us, slick with my juices and the cum of my other lovers.
“And I can’t help what I did,” Gabor said, not dropping his gaze from mine. I knew he must be horny as fuck from all the magic I’d released during my two orgasms, but he wasn’t letting it affect him. If he had been, he’d have pinned me against the wall and taken me after he got Tadeu out of the way. Instead, he was looking at me with his stubborn, stone face.
I gathered the magic back into myself as well as I could, trying to call it back and absorb it to use later. When I was done, I sighed and picked up my jeans. Apparently, Tadeu would not be breaking his enchantment today. He was out cold.
Fallen Princess Page 23
