LooLooLilly

“You let me take a taxi with you back to your place at the end of the night… You don’t let me in, but you do tell me to meet you for coffee the next morning.”

“Did future me happen to mention Dolly’s Diner?”

“She did, actually,” Johnny nodded with wide ocean eyes, rainbow lights shining in his flaxen locks like a neon halo. He crossed his strong arms over his chest, and his biceps strained against the jacket sleeves. “She specifically mentioned Dolly’s Diner at 8 a.m.—”

“Nine,” you corrected with a knowing half-smile.

“Nine.”

“Well, then, Johnny Storm… I guess we’ll see.”

You handed the stranger the dwindling cig as you walked past him. He didn’t try to stop you when you headed towards the light-up dance floor, where all your friends waited for you on the other side. You made it to the very edge of the flashing neon squares before you turned to look at him over your shoulder. He lingered in place with the half-gone cigarette between his pointer and middle finger, pretty features twisted in a puppy-like pout.

“Well, future-boy?” you called to him. “You comin’ or what?”

Johnny Storm, you soon realized, was a lot of things. Confident, chaotic, and occasionally hotheaded — but a liar wasn’t one of them. His brazen introduction as your future husband wasn’t just a clumsy way of flirting with you, but a promise. And, somewhere down the line, you became Mrs. Storm; and Johnny was the smug sonofabitch who accidentally told the future.

Sometimes, he worries that he may possess certain powers beyond the pyrogenesis kind. That something deep in his brain can actually predict the future, and did somehow manipulate you into falling in love with him that night. As far as he’s concerned, it’s the only plausible reason for your being here.

How else could he have gotten you to wear his ring on your finger? Or sleep in the noisy headquarters of Manhattan that he also shares with the rest of his superpowered family? Or be excited about spending the night babysitting his nephew, over the billion other (arguably more interesting) things you could be doing?

Johnny met you as a party girl in a small dress and go-go boots, full of smiles and wit and cunning. You’re all of those things still, but also his wife. So, yeah, either he is far more powerful than he realizes, or he’s just too lucky for his own damn good.

As Sue and Reed exit their shared bedroom, having finally traded their baggy, milk-stained sweats for fancier dinnerwear, Johnny looks down and realizes you’re wearing those same boots from that night. The white vinyl of them zips up to your mid-calf; the platform heel is slightly worn from constant use. You’ve paired them this time with a patent matching skirt and a black turtleneck — still the same girl from all those years ago, just a little more mature and a lot more loved by him.

Reed’s voice knocks Johnny out of his own head. He shrugs on a pin-striped suit jacket and rambles, “The number to the restaurant and the hotel is on the fridge. Call there if you need anything, alright? I mean it. Anything—”

“Anything,” Johnny echoes with a nod from where he sits between you and Franklin at the dining table.

He digs a pale fist into the box of Lucky Charms in his lap and shoves a handful of dry cereal into his mouth. He exhibits the same sort of gracelessness Franklin does in his high chair, mashing at the chopped banana before him rather than actually eating it.

“Not unless there’s an emergency, obviously,” Sue corrects, half-distracted, with her hands beneath her platinum locks to clasp her necklace. She pairs her mid-length, boatneck dress with the silver F pendant she wears in honor of her baby boy. “If he gets really fussy and nothing can calm him down, just try playing the Beach Boys— He loves that.”

“You know where we keep the breast milk, right?” Reed wonders aloud, anxious hands struggling with his cufflinks. Johnny nods, but the man answers himself anyway. “They’re in packets in the freezer, so just heat ‘em up if he gets hungry. They’re in the exact right amounts, okay? I made sure of that, so make sure you only use one—”

Sue sweeps in then, fastening his silver cuffs for him with steadier hands. “We already fed and changed him, so he should be good to go until tonight.”

Reed flashes a pair of pleading brown eyes over his wife’s shoulder, brows pinched in a pained sort of look. “I’d prefer if you’d just call, though. Every hour on the hour, ideally. Just so I know he’s okay.”

Sue’s icy gaze hardens playfully over her shoulder at the two of you. “Absolutely do not do that,” she instructs with an amused smile.

Johnny blinks like an owl, ocean eyes darting between his older sister and her husband, who he’s only just starting to care for. “I… Don’t know who I’m supposed to listen to.”

“Me,” Sue and Reed respond simultaneously.

“It’s Sue,” Ben answers as he stomps across the kitchen, in a pair of khakis he’s paired with a navy sweater vest and a matching baseball cap. (Ms. Rozman complimented the outfit once, and he never quite let it go.) “It’s always Sue.”

He chuckles at the half-hearted glare he gets from Reed and presses the button for the elevator with a large, calloused finger. The doors ding, and he steps inside — broad shoulders taking up the majority of the narrow space.

“Dinner’s on the stove, kids,” Ben tells you and Johnny as he hits the switch for the bottom floor.

“Thanks, Benny!” you call to him when the doors of the lift start to shut.

He shouts back, “Don’t forget!”

Reed and Sue share a quiet look then. “Ready?” he murmurs quietly to her. The older woman takes a deep breath in and nods wordlessly. They’ve saved the world together a thousand times over, yet you don’t think you’ve seen them look as worried as they are right now.

“We’ll call if there’s an emergency. I promise,” you assure them. “But there won’t be because Franklin is, quite literally, the perfect baby.”

The boy babbles in his high chair next to Johnny, utterly enraptured in his smushed bananas. He reaches across his uncle and out towards you with a tiny arm, offering you the piece of fruit enclosed in his chubby fist.

“For me?” you lilt in a small voice. “Thank you, Frankie…”

You lean down towards him and pretend to eat it. You make a quiet num, num, num sound that makes Franklin grin with all of his two bottom teeth.

Johnny’s pink lips curl into an absentminded smile as he watches you with his nephew, always so effortless in the way you care for him, like you were made to do it.

“Yeah. I’m pretty sure between the two of us and the Beach Boys, we can handle it,” Johnny shrugs, then flashes you a blue, button-eyed look. “Right?”

You nod once with a tight-lipped smile. “Right.”

Reed and Sue leave with a smacking kiss pressed to their son’s chubby cheeks. They enter the elevator side by side and press the button for the main floor. “Try not to burn the place down while we’re gone,” Reed begs, only partly joking.

Sue smiles with an arched brow. “Literally.”

The double doors of the lift close before them.

Only when the parents are out of sight do you and Johnny exhale the pair of wavering breaths you didn’t even know you were holding. Franklin continues his babbling, playing with the mashed bananas on his high-chair table, while the two of you share semi-anxious looks.

“We can handle this, right?” Johnny wonders aloud, itching for an ounce of reassurance.

The two of you have looked after Franklin a thousand times before, during bathroom breaks and grocery trips and ninety-minute children’s movies, but never for a whole night. And never without Ben Grimm, the usual designated babysitter, more than one story away.

“Yeah,” you shrug. “We’ve done it before, kind of… What could go wrong?”

The answer to that, you soon realize, is everything.

And it happens far sooner than you expect.

You and Johnny lay Baby Franklin down for tummy time and get immediately enraptured in watching the boy experience the world on his stomach. So much so that you completely disregard the pasta Ben left simmering for you on the stove, which he blatantly told you not to forget.

The blonde boy sniffs once. “Do you smell smoke?” he asks.

“I think that’s just you, fire-boy,” you scoff.

Then the smoke alarm blares. The beep, beep, beeping is faint and faraway, but it startles Franklin nonetheless. The boy screams — a loud, teary, and grating scream — that’s a whole lot louder than the siren that had scared him to begin with.

While you rush to the kitchen to remove the smoking pan from the hot stove, Johnny scoops up his disgruntled nephew and brings him to his chest. He tries to soothe Franklin with one hand and start the record player with the other. With careful work, the Beach Boys crackle suddenly to life.

“—For I have the warmth of the sun…” the speaker croons. “Within me at night…”

It does little to quell Franklin’s screaming, despite his sister’s past assurance that it would. It’s entirely likely that he can’t hear the music over his pained shrieking, which pierces Johnny like a knife to the chest just now.

The blonde boy paces the length of the living room, bouncing the crying kid in his arms. Tears stream down his round, red cheeks in fat droplets that leave a dark stain on Johnny’s white t-shirt.

“Why isn’t it working?” Johnny strains through gritted teeth, hardly audible over the music and the subsequent screaming.

“It’s probably not the right song,” you answer, running past him in a flash and ducking for Ben’s record player. The record scratches faintly when you lift the needle from the vinyl.

“Not the right song?” he echoes incredulously, blinking at you with a pair of wide cerulean eyes. “He’s five months old, babe— He’s barely sentient. He can’t have a favorite song—”

You shift the arm slightly before setting it back in place. The needle hits the grooves of the record with a faint hiss. The music resumes again. “—Something’s bound to go wrong… But she looks in my eyes… And makes me realize…”

Franklin’s cries quieten instantly at the familiar music. He seems to forget, in that instance, what he’d been crying about in the first place. His pink mouth juts in a dramatic pout as he blinks up at his uncle with a pair of big, wet eyes.

Johnny grins down at him.

“Oh… Is that it? Huh?” the blonde boy coos, swaying the baby in his strong arms. He runs a wide palm up the length of his small back, and Franklin lets out a quiet hum of contentment. “You have a favorite song after all, don’t ya?”

The baby lets out a series of unintelligible babbles as you migrate to Johnny’s side. You rest your head on the boy’s broad shoulder, chest pressed to the outside of his bicep, while you run a gentle hand over the back of Franklin’s head. His still-growing tuft of dark chocolate curls is softer than cotton against your palm.

Franklin grins wide despite the tears still clinging to his round cheeks. Two tiny teeth poke from his bottom gums while his mouth opens and closes in unpracticed motions. He hums faint gibberish that you can’t quite understand, though it’s strangely in time with the crooning from the record player behind him.

“—Everything will turn out alright… Don’t worry, baby…”

It makes you laugh. “Are you singing, silly boy?”

Franklin’s babbling grows in volume at the acknowledgment.

He jerks in his uncle’s hold, tiny limbs failing with an excitement too big for his body. He reaches towards Johnny’s face, for the short flaxen strands just behind his ear. He wrenches the hair there into a tiny, unforgiving fist, and Johnny lets him. This raucous excitement is a lot easier on his heart than the screaming from before.

“Screw superpowers,” Johnny laughs, grimacing slightly when Franklin gives the strands a particularly hard tug. “We’ve got the next Beach Boy on our hands.”

His blue eyes glint with mirth when he turns his head to face you. The tip of his nose nearly grazes yours at the dwindling proximity between you. He kisses you instinctively then, pressing his smiling lips to yours in a chaste kiss.

Johnny’s eyes flutter shut. His long lashes dance over the tops of his flushed cheeks. In that fleeting moment, he feels a strange jerking at his chest.

The stars just beginning to speckle outside the floor-to-ceiling windows seem to align in that very instance. With you pressed so ardently to his side, and with Franklin still squirming in his hold, he feels a strange sense of nostalgia that he knows he shouldn’t. It’s strikingly familiar to him, but foreign all the same.

He gets a faint glimpse of his future then — of you and him and a baby, his baby — that he grieves when you pull suddenly away from him.

“You okay?” you murmur at the pinched look on the boy’s pretty face.

Johnny nods, still swaying softly with Franklin against his chest. “I think I just saw the future…” he tells you, playfully solemn as his brows raise to his hairline.

“Oh, yeah?” you hum, caging your bottom lip between your teeth in a feeble attempt to hide your smile.

“Mhm… And if I’m right, which let’s be real, I am right,” the blonde boy quips, only halfway joking. “Then… I’m gonna give you a baby.”

You meet his knowing grin with a deadpanned look. “Like, you’re gonna steal one off the street, or…?’

“I was thinking maybe we just kidnap Franklin or something,” he shrugs.

“Oh. Totally,” you hum with a slow nod. “I’m sure that won’t have any repercussions at all.”

Your gaze glitters with amusement despite the faux-serious look on your face. You couldn’t hide the way you feel for Johnny if you tried. You seem to carry all your love for him in your eyes. You think you always have. And Johnny sees it, too.

“I mean it, though,” he tells you. “I can see the future you, you know?”

“Oh, trust me,” you scoff. “I know.”

“So just… Prepare to have a baby soon.”

“How soon?”

When Johnny’s pink lips curl into a cheeky half-smile, you know he’s up to no good. He cradles Franklin’s bottom with one palm and smooths the other over the baby’s profile, cupping one ear and pinning the other to his chest.

“Tonight, if I’m lucky,” he quips in a low whisper.

Your face screws, and he laughs.

“You’re incorrigible.”

Franklin, now perfectly content, squirms like a wild little thing in your lap. With his chubby fist in his gummy mouth, he gapes incredulously at the black-and-white television across the room. As his aunt, you felt it was your duty to start him on chick-flicks while he’s still young. Tonight’s choice being Roman Holiday. He’s as enthralled by the moving picture as any baby would be, so you consider it a job well done.

You hold him carefully by the waist while he bounces up and down on your thighs. “Can you say Gregory Peck?” you coo in the baby’s ear, who responds with his own sort of gibberish. You repeat, slower this time, “Greg-ory… Peck…?”

Johnny laughs from where he stands in the kitchen.

The apartment has gone slowly dim with the late evening, lit only by rogue lamplight and the flickering television. He can just barely see your profiles from here, across the expansive apartment, where you and Frankie cuddle in the conversation pit.

“You are aware the kid’s basically a future genius, right?” Johnny laughs with a frozen pack of breast milk in hand. His palm glows a faint red color as the milk turns slowly into liquid. He pours the freshly warmed drink into a glass bottle and continues, “So if his first words turn out to be my sister’s first ever crush, Reed’ll have an actual aneurysm.”

“Sue and I are colluding to get Franklin to say ‘momma’ first, actually. And he’s almost got it, don’t ya, Frankie?” You grunt quietly as you spin the heavy baby in your hold. You grin instinctively when he faces you. “Can you say momma?” you coo to him. “Mom-ma?”

Franklin just babbles to himself, ‘cause he can’t seem to make the m sound quite yet. He just drools onto his onesie instead. You’re wiping the dribble from his chin with his bib when Johnny returns with the bottle.

“Here ya go,” the boy lilts.

“Thank you, honey—” you say, huffing as you shift Franklin in your arms once more. You cradle him in your lap and contort your limbs to check the temperature of the milk on your wrist.

Johnny’s face contorts in offense. He props his hands on his slim waist and frowns. “I tested it already, babe. It’s not hot.”

You look at the boy over your shoulder, eyes narrowed in a challenging squint. “You tested it on your skin?” you deadpan.

The blonde boy nods in response.

“Which has been known to be actively set on fire from time to time?”

Johnny thinks to himself for a moment, lips jutted and blue eyes flitted towards the ceiling.

“Exactly,” you giggle and turn away with the roll of your eyes.

Franklin grabs the bottle in a pair of strangely aggressive hands but still struggles to hold it on his own. You keep it propped up for him while he scarfs down his dinner. Johnny, meanwhile, descends the steps of the conversation pit and plops onto the plush sofa beside you. He sits with his legs spread and his arm thrown along the back of it. You melt instantly into his warmth.

While Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck slow dance to an unfamiliar song on the small, staticky screen across the way, Johnny feels a strange tugging at his chest.

“You know…” he starts with a sigh, cheek squished into your hair. “I think I could do this every day.”

“Watch Franklin?” you respond, half-distracted.

“Well, yeah, but… I mean, if we had our own kid, you know? I think we could do it.”

You turn your head slowly, half-expecting to find him wearing a cheeky sort of grin. Instead, you see something strangely sincere swimming in his round, ocean eyes as they flit back and forth between yours.

A laugh sputters from your lips before you can help it. “You haven’t even changed any diapers yet, Johnny—”

“I have!” he argues, wearing a pout that resembles his nephew’s.

“Or lost out on sleep for days because of sleep regression. Or because the baby’s gassy. Or colic—”

“I’m just saying we could handle it. That’s all,” Johnny shrugs with a shy smile. “There’s no one else I’d rather lose sleep with. Or change diapers with… Or clean up baby puke with.”

You falter for a moment.

It’s a more mature admission of love than you think you were expecting.

When Johnny approached you that sacred night in the smoky, neon dance hall — with the bold assurance that he would some day marry you — you figured you were just the prettiest, glittering thing that caught his eye. And you were okay with that, even more so when he started to love you for real. Far more than either of you was expecting.

Then you got married, and life got a little bigger. The laundry day, joint taxes, and choosing whose TV show gets watched on Wednesday nights, kind of bigger. Somewhere therein, you started to realize what it truly meant to love someone.

Love wasn’t always the prettiest glittering thing. Sometimes love was ugly. And that’s when it was best.

“How romantic…” you deadpan in response, lest you give away the warmth surging in your chest. But then you lean in to kiss him, chaste but lingering still, and Johnny feels all of it anyway.

He takes the empty bottle from Franklin’s tiny hands a moment later. You bring the boy to your chest, patting softly at his back for a few minutes more until his body jerks with a small hiccup. Johnny then laughs at the screwed look of concentration on his tiny features.

“What’s that face for, huh?” the blonde boy chuckles.

He inhales once and answers his own question.

The two of you wear similar looks of vague disgust at the baby’s obviously full diaper. You pass the full-bellied boy off to his uncle. “Here you go…” you mutter, half-strained as you hold your breath.

“Oh, god…” Johnny huffs in response, keeping Franklin at arm’s length as he rushes down the hall and towards the nursery. He hears your pretty laughter following him as he goes.

“I owe you one!”

Franklin’s nursery overlooks the Manhattan city skyline. The floor-to-ceiling window makes stars out of the yellow-lit buildings sparkling outside, like a personal nightlight for the sleeping baby.

You lean against the door frame while Johnny rocks his nephew in his arms. Your eyes follow his towering shadow as he paces the length of the dim, lamplight room. Franklin whines, trying hopelessly to fight his much-needed slumber. His attempts prove to be fruitless, though, when his uncle starts to sing.

“She told me, ‘Baby, when you race today, just take along my love with you…’” Johnny croons quietly, voice low and only slightly off-key. “‘And if you knew how much I love you, baby, nothing could go wrong with you…’”

Franklin doesn’t last long like that — not pressed to his uncle’s warm chest, swaying gently in his strong arms, listening to his most favorite song. Sleep lulls finally over him no more than a few minutes later, and Johnny makes the transfer into his crib with ease.

Franklin doesn’t move an inch when you slink out of the room with the baby monitor in tow. Johnny shuts the creaking door behind him, leaving it slightly ajar and exhaling a relieved breath he didn’t know he was holding.

You stand facing each other in the dim hallway, lit only by the kitchen light down the way. Half of your face is softened with dark shadows as you smile up at the boy. “You’re a real natural, you know that?”

“You are, too…” Johnny grins, pulling you closer by the belt loops of your skirt. Even in the dark, you can see the amused glimmer in his light eyes. “You thinkin’ what I’m thinkin’?” he murmurs quietly.

The bridge of your nose scrunches in response. “That it’s really late, and we should probably eat something before we starve to death?”

The non-answer only makes him smile wider.

“Yeah, I think I could go for something to eat…” His voice trails as he ducks down for your neck. He presses a warm, wet kiss just over your pulse. Your knees threaten to buckle underneath you when his tongue darts out to taste the skin there.

“Johnny?” you sigh, eyes fluttered shut.

“Mhm?” he hums into your skin.

“You… are incorrigible—”

You push him away with a pair of half-hearted hands against his chest. Johnny wraps his fingers around your wrists to pull you gently back into him, anyway. His pink lips are noticeably rosier and slick with his spit when he asks, “How about we compromise, hm? I make you something to eat— without burning it this time, hopefully— and then you give me something to eat, too.”

You meet his smug grin with squinted eyes. “We’re supposed to be watching your nephew, Johnny—”

“He’s your nephew, too, you know? And he’s passed out until morning… The others won’t be back ’til then anyway, so…” He trails off with his brows raised in a playful look. “You owe me one, remember?”

You give in far quicker than Johnny expects.

“Well, then you better get to cookin’, fire-boy,” you monotone, poking him hard in the chest. “’Cause I’m not doing anything on an empty stomach.”

Johnny abides without question. It’s in his nature to obey you, and to keep you full — all in more ways than one.

So it’s only right that you keep your promise, too.

You christen the guest room on the Richards’ hall. Johnny tells you that Sue and Reed wouldn’t mind — that they’d much rather prefer it if you stayed on the same floor as Franklin, rather than a story above where your bedroom sits. You lie in the center of the foreign king-sized bed, as half-naked as the boy above you, while Johnny kisses down your body.

“I think they’d prefer it if we kept our hands to ourselves, actually,” you correct with a pretty laugh, staring down your body at the boy disappearing beneath the covers.

You run your fingers through his short, blonde locks when he presses a searing, wet kiss to your bare stomach. His warm fingers curl under the hem of your panties, sliding them slowly to the side.

“I mean, you are capable of that, aren’t you?”

Johnny’s mouth drools at the sight of your similarly weeping cunt, made of silk and honey. He looks at you from beneath his long lashes, blue eyes dark and dilated with lust. “Do you want me to be?” he murmurs lowly.

The warm breath of his whisper fans across your pussy. It clenches around nothing accordingly, waiting and pleading for his mouth.

You roll your eyes at him despite all that. “Get to work, fire-boy—”

His mouth latches immediately to your cunt. Your quip dissolves into a pitiful whimper when his tongue lolls over your clit. You keep one hand curled in his hair and the other gripping desperately at the silk sheets, trying fruitlessly to keep yourself tethered while Johnny sucks the sin from your body.

He kisses your pussy the way he would your mouth, tongue sloppy and languid against you. He makes a total mess of your thighs and his mouth and the bed sheets below you. His fingertips dig bruises into the plush skin as he laps at you, savoring the honey you leak for him.

He works until his jaw aches, until his neck burns from the harsh angle, until he feels your thighs trembling on either side of his face.

“I’m gonna cum” you squeak suddenly above him. Beneath his low grunts, which send gentle vibrations to your swollen clit, he hears you exhale pretty little whimpers for him. “Fuck, Johnny, I’m gonna cum—”

Johnny makes no mention of how quickly your orgasm finds you. There is no snide remark or smug brag from the silver-tongued boy. His lips just curl into a proud smile against the velvety lips of your cunt, right before his mouth wraps around your sensitive button. He sucks mercilessly there until your hips buck off the bed — until your pulsing hole drools for him and a choked-back scream rises and dies in your throat.

He kisses away the remains of your orgasm until you’re pushing him away. Then he rises to his knees above you — cheeks flushed, lips rosy, chin shining with your cum. He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and leans down over you, blue eyes lidded and glazed over.

“God, baby, I need to fuck you,” he slurs in a low murmur.

You smile deliriously at the ceiling when his mouth locks on your pulse point. His teeth graze over the skin there while you curl your arms around his neck. “Watching me with a baby got you this worked up, huh?” you tease — though judging by the swiftness of your previous orgasm, you’re hardly in a position to talk.

“You get me worked up all the time,” Johnny mumbles into your skin, before dragging his tongue over the bite mark blooming on your neck. “You’re gonna be the death of me at this rate—”

You hardly get a breath in before Johnny’s kissing the air from your lungs, licking fervently into your parted mouth. You taste yourself on his tongue, a foreign sort of salty-sweetness stained on his lips. With his elbows propped on either side of your head, he cages you beneath the weight of his hungry mouth and golden body. Your nails dig into his freckled shoulders to pull him impossibly closer.

He grumbles a dramatic groan of disappointment against you a second later. Your swollen, spit-slick mouths part with a quiet smack.

“Shit…” Johnny huffs. “I left my wallet in the living room—”

Your legs wrap around his slim waist when he threatens to roll off of you. His pinched look of confusion is met with your devilish grin.

“I— I gotta get a condom, babe…” he stammers.

“You can’t exactly fuck a baby into me with a condom on, can you, Johnny?” you lilt with an air of feigned innocence, fingers twirling at the blonde curls at the nape of his neck.

Johnny huffs, like your words have physically knocked the breath out of him. He exhales hard through his nose as his lips quirk into a love-drunk smile. “See what I mean? You’re gonna kill me, baby—”

He’s kissing you again before he can properly get the words out, fueled with a primal sort of hunger that makes not touching your borderline unbearable.

It’s all tongue and teeth. Sloppy and nothing short of ravenous. He bothers not to drag his underwear down his legs, lest he have to part from you for more than a moment. Instead, he tucks the hem of them under his balls before jerking his stiff cock in his fist.

“Want this?” Johnny pants against your mouth. “Want me to fuck you?”

You nod wordlessly, throwing your head back when he drags the weeping, strawberry tip of his cock over your glimmering pussy.

He smiles crookedly down at you as he presses, “Need to hear you say it, baby, c’mon.”

“Fuck me, Johnny,” you plead in a breathless whisper, head back and eyes shut. “Fuck me, Johnny, please—”

And Johnny does what he always does. He obeys you without question, sliding within the velvety walls of your shuddering cunt with a practiced sort of precision.

You share sharply inhaled breaths when he’s sheathed fully inside of you — balls pressed to your ass, coarse thatch of hair above his cock grating your soft clit. His thrusts are painfully languid, and measured in a way that drives you wild.

“Please, go faster,” you beg against the shell of his ear. “Please. I need it…”

He shushes you gently. “Just let me make you feel good, baby…” he slurs into your neck. “Let me hit that spot…”

He rocks his hips, tilting them slowly forward until he hits somewhere deep inside of you. Only when you make a pretty noise for him does he creep back out again. He never pulls all the way out of you, just keeps your hips caged beneath his own until the pressure on your clit makes you keen.

You wrap your legs around his hips with a choked-back whimper, heels crossed and digging into the base of his spine. Your cunt suckles him further inside as the angle shifts. Johnny grumbles a moan into your neck.

“Oh, yeah— There you go…” Johnny praises, tucking his fingers into the curve of your waist as he sits back on his haunches.

His golden wedding band presses against your burning skin and glitters in the low lamplight. Yours does the same, small diamond glinting where you fist at the silk sheets.

The measured, unhurried rocking of his hips never ceases. A feeble whine sounds in your throat. His praise makes you as dizzy as his cock, and he knows it. “Yeah? You like that?” Johnny grins.

You nod, hair wild on the pillow.

“What happened to all that mouth you had before, huh?” Johnny pants, smiling deliriously at your fucked-out face. “You don’t have anything else to say? Huh?”

You only moan in response. He knows you don’t have the words to answer him. He knows he’s fucking you far too stupid for any of that.

“No…. You just wanna cum, don’t you? Want me to fuck a baby into you?” Johnny continues to tease despite his own breathlessness. You nod again, pussy fluttering around his twitching cock. He has to remind himself to breathe. “Then cum for me.”

The thread at the pit of your stomach snaps at his permission. Your body tenses underneath him — legs trembling around his hips, nails digging crescent shapes in his shoulders. There’s a fleeting moment of numbness when your cunt clenches tightly around him. It ebbs into a more blinding, white-hot pleasure a second later when you cum for him, leaking around his cock and onto the bed sheets below you.

Johnny’s not far behind.

You watch his orgasm roll over him through fluttering lashes. His jaw clenches, his neck tenses, his flushed chest heaves with heavy breaths.

He always talks a big game when he gets you all sweet and pliable underneath him. He likes to play dominant from time to time, likes the rare moments when he gets to tear you apart. But when his own orgasm crawls up his spine, he loses all of that bawdy confidence from before and leans back over you again.

Johnny cages you beneath his warm weight and the mattress while his thrusts go messy and erratic. He buries each of his pathetic whines and whimpers into your sweat-slick shoulder, babbling a string of nothingness in your ear.

“Fuck, honey. Oh, fuck— I’m gonna cum— Gonna fuck a baby into you— Shit—”

He punches into you once, hard, and then stills suddenly over your body. His cock jerks within your pulsing confines, spitting three ropes of warm cum inside you. Johnny trembles through every single one of them, slow to relax on top of you.

His golden body, radiating with heat and hunger, softens over yours in time with his sensitive cock. You lay like that for several long moments — sweaty bodies twisted in the sheets, pressed and melting together. The quiet bedroom fills with the sound of your heavy breaths.

“We’re gonna have to wake up early to wash the sheets before they get back,” you whisper to him, breaking the honeyed silence.

Johnny nods against your shoulder until the words catch up to him. “I know…” he sighs.

He rolls off of your body and dissolves onto the mattress below. You waste little time leaving it, mourning his warmth as you squirm out from under the sheets and out of bed. You disappear into the adjoining bathroom, careful to keep your thighs together on the way there to prevent making a bigger mess than you already have.

You spend a few minutes cleaning yourself up, then return to the dim bedroom to toss Johnny a fresh rag for himself.

He wipe your slick away from his stomach, thighs, and still-sensitive cock, while you drag your panties up your legs. He flashes you a shy smirk across the bedroom and pulls his own underwear back over his hips. “Think it took?”

You shrug and pluck his t-shirt from the floor to drape it over your bare body. It just barely covers your ass. “I don’t know… Maybe.”

Johnny props his weight on his arms, sheets still twisted around his waist. His blonde locks are wild from your fingers as he blinks the remnants of bleary pleasure from his glassy ocean eyes.

“We can always keep trying if it doesn’t. We aren’t in a rush… Right?”

“Yeah…” you hum with a quiet grin, eyes glinting with mischief as you take slow steps his way. Johnny throws his legs over the edge of the bed, and you stand between his scruffy thighs. You drag your palms over his burning chest and hum, “The trying part’s pretty fun, actually…”

“You’re telling me,” he scoffs, obediently lifting his chin when you lean down to kiss him.

Your lips lock in something much more chaste and innocuous than before. Until a cry crackles from the baby monitor on the nightstand, anyway. It’s a garbled sort of whine at first, like Franklin’s just annoyed at having woken himself up. Then it turns into a full-blown wail the second he realizes he’s alone.

Neither of you says a word as you part from each other, leaving the sanctuary of the golden-lit bedroom to tend to the crying baby.

You head straight for the nursery while Johnny migrates to the kitchen. He retrieves another packet of milk from the freezer and heats it in his palm, all in practiced motions. He returns to you and his nephew with a fresh bottle in tow and finds you rocking the fussing boy in your arms.

He can’t shake the feeling that he’s looking at his future in the flesh.

Franklin takes to the bottle immediately when you give it to him, suckling at the milk like it’s the first and last time he’ll ever get to do it. You keep it angled for him with one arm and cradle him in the other. Johnny stands at your side and wraps his strong, golden ones around you. He keeps you pressed to his warmth as he sways you gently back and forth.

“I hope my sister knows she’s never getting this baby back,” he quips with his cheek pressed to your hair. Your giggling fills the dimly lit nursery, and he grins. “I mean it, babe. He’s ours now.”

You turn your head to flash him an amused look, eyes laced with a quiet sort of exhaustion. “You’re crazy, Johnny Storm, you know that?”

“Crazy for you…” he croons before pressing a smacking kiss to your flushed cheek.

Your subsequent laughter paints the lamplit room in flaxen shades of gold. Something about it pierces him deep in the chest. He loves you so much it hurts.

“How am I supposed to ever give this up, huh?”

“Well, we’ll have our own one day, right?” you ask him, smiling reminiscently at a memory that hasn’t yet happened. “We’ll give Franklin a cousin to run around with… And another baby to annoy Ben all the time.”

Johnny laughs at the thought of your baby climbing over the towering man like a jungle gym, the same way Franklin does. You feel the vibration of his chuckling against your arm. “The big softie,” he scoffs.

You cage your bottom lip between your teeth as you look at the blonde boy behind you. Your eyes go all squishy around the edges as they scan over his features, almost like you’re trying to memorize them.

“I hope our baby looks like you…” you confess in a honeyed whisper.

Johnny warms at the sincerity but hisses through his teeth all the same. “Well, now we’re in a dilemma, honey— ‘Cause I want a baby that looks like you. So… Now what?”

You shrug with a sardonic smile. “Guess that means we just have to keep trying until we get one of each, then, huh?” you lilt, all sarcastic and knowing in a way that makes him grin.

“Dammit, you read my mind.”

The first rule was clear. Some days your boyfriend would get everyone screaming his name, except for you. Fight nights... how you hated them! Not only you had to wait anxiously for him to come out of that octagon alive, but he just refused to touch you afterwards.

He claimed it's for your own safety. He just gets too worked up during his fights... if he couldn't mesure his strength, if he ever lost control around you, he wouldn't be able to live with himself.

You were fine with it, most days. Well, of course you felt like rewarding your champion, but that could wait... the stress you went through during the fight and the days of preparation got you too tired to complain about it.

Well, most days...

There was this specific occasion, a very important fight for his career. Dalton had been training for so long, you felt absolutely neglected. Being the supportive girlfriend you are, you didn't say anything, though... you knew how important you were for him, and if he heard you were feeling like that, he would feel like the worst person in the world. And not only you didn't want to hurt his feelings, you didn't want to distract him and cause him to break any bones.

All you could do was wait.

Honestly? It wasn't that bad. Dalton always made it up for you. The days after his fights, before he started preparing for the next one, were the BEST. He got so clingy. He wouldn't let you go anywhere without him. His scary fighter face would be hidden under the sweetest permanent smile and kind doe eyes he only had for you. He would use his fat paychecks to spoil you. Buy you new jewelry for every fight he wins. Take you for dinner anywhere in this planet. And God... fuck you against every surface he saw.

Maybe it's because you had those things in mind and got too eager... maybe it's because this specific time he went too long without touching you... you weren't sure about why, all you knew was that the night after he won the fight, you were absolutely unable to sleep.

The discomfort between your legs was unbearable. You kept tossing and turning in bed, and he was so exhausted, so deep asleep, that not even your restless state right beside him was enough to wake him up.

You sighed frustratedly, looking at his face. God, he was so beautiful you felt like crying. It didn't help the way he never wore anything but those black boxers to sleep.

He was so tired... maybe he wouldn't notice if you touched yourself...

Yeah, that's the second rule. You're not touching yourself without his permission.

But... he would understand, right? Only this time...

Your eyes were glued to his face as your hand slid inside your underwear.

You were dangerously close to him, his body pressed against yours...

It felt like you were committing a crime. Unfortunately, that only turned you on more.

You were so fucking wet you were afraid he would wake up from the sounds your pussy was making.

Well, he didn't fully wake up, but something in him did. You froze when you felt him move. Except that he didn't really move. What you felt was his cock hardening against your thigh.

You wanted to cry. He felt so deliciously hard... what a fucking waste, you needed him so badly... you rubbed your clit so hard, but that wasn't it...

You might have lost your mind just for a second. But the next thing you knew was that you were grinding against his erection like your life depended on it. At this point, all you wanted was for him to wake up and fucking take you.

He didn't wake up at once. As he gained consciousness, he was fully convinced that was all a dream. He remained on that half asleep/half awake land, without moving a muscle. And you kept grinding on his clothed cock so fucking good. So deliciously hard... leaking more and more and... oh shit.

His eyes shot open as his orgasm started to build.

"Shit! Y/N, what the fuck?!" He grunted, voice still so sleepy...

You didn't stop. He grabbed your arm harder than he would like to as he filled his underwear with cum. So much cum it leaked all over your ass as you kept rubbing it against him.

"Oh for fucks sake..." He pushed you away. Fucking pushed you away. He had NEVER done that. "Look at the fucking mess you've made..."

His harsh touch didn't hurt half as much as the loss of contact.

"Dalton... please..." You whined. "Didn't cum..."

"Yeah? Good." He grabbed your hand, forcing you to stop touching yourself. "What the fuck was that?"

"M'sorry..." You squeezed your thighs together. "Needed you too badly..."

"That's the worst behavior I have ever seen in my life." He took a deep breath. "And you couldn't have pissed me off at a worst time."

You had no words to defend yourself. It was true, you broke two rules at once.

"I am so fucking exhausted... and have wake up in the middle of the night to deal with a brat." He continued, his grip still burning on your arm.

"Baby... please... I'm so sorry..." You insisted, burying your face in his chest. Your hands went to his abs, tracing it slowly and he tensed up.

It was obviously not only difficult to you, those days without any touch. But he would rather suffer a bit than risk hurting you or losing the fight.

"Oh my sweet girl..." He cooed, hand stroking the back of your head. "You know I have to be harsh sometimes, yeah?"

You looked at his face again. His sweet expression kept you calm, but his words didn't.

"You understand that I have to punish you right now, don't you?" He asked nicely, like you had a choice. "That I do what I do because I need to keep you obedient..."

You nodded shyly.

"Good girl." He sighed. "Tell me, my princess... when you were touching yourself without my permission... you didn't cum, right?"

You shook your head quickly.

"Do you need to?" He asked and you nodded immediately. "Yeah? How bad? Use your words for me, darling."

"So bad, needed it for so long..." You explained, eyes filling with tears.

"Hey, hey, hey..." His hand went to your cheek, stroking it lightly. "You need cock so bad you're gonna cry, angel?"

You felt humiliated. All you did was look at him. He had a huge smirk on his face.

"That's fucking pathetic." He mocked. "Spread your legs for me."

When you did, he ripped your underwear like it was nothing, throwing it somewhere in the room. The way his eyes landed on your pussy made your stomach churn.

He knew you were ready, so he immediately shoved two fingers inside, bending them, rubbing your walls just so right...

Your eyes immediately rolled back. You were so close before he caught you, it surely wouldn't take you too long to get there now.

"Does this feel good, baby?" He asked, fingers never stopping. "Is that what you needed?"

You nodded eagerly, hips moving uncontrollably as you felt yourself getting there... you grabbed the sheets and closed your eyes, god, you were right there, growing and growing and growing in your belly...

"Too fucking bad, slut." He said, removing his fingers from you at once. His sweet tone was nowhere to be seen now.

Before you could start crying at the loss of contact, he gave your pussy a loud slap. You gasped. You were used to Dalton being rough, but not that rough.

"What did you expect?" He mocked you again. "That I would just solve your fucking problem? Do you think you deserve that?"

When you didn't answer, he slapped your pussy again. "Thought I asked you a fucking question."

"I don't deserve it!" You admitted. "But I did what I did because I was too desperate... because I need you too badly..."

"You just had to wait until the morning, you know that." He explained.

"Couldn't wait... I couldn't." You whined. "Slap me again, please?"

His eyes widened. "You're trying to come from your punishment? Do you have any idea the kind of trouble that would put you in?"

"No... not thinking, just need you..." You moaned, arms wrapping around his neck, bringing him close. "Come on, baby... don't you miss me?"

"Y/N..." He groaned. "Can't do this right now."

"Why?" Your eyebrows furrowed.

"Because I'm fucking mad at you." He shut his eyes, like he was trying to tell himself that. He needed to tell himself, because he was getting hard again.

"No, you're not mad at me for real." You insisted. "Come on..."

"Am I not mad for real?" He raised his eyebrows.

You bit your lip and shook your head.

"Do you think I'm in the mood for playing?" He asked, looking at the clock on the nightstand. "At 3am?"

"I'm sorry... I won't do it again..." You pouted.

He sighed, his eyes on your lips as he licked his. He rested his hand around your neck as a warning to stay still while he leaned to kiss you. You melted into the kiss, hips trying to grind against his leg. His hand tightened around your neck.

"Quiet." He said against your lips.

He pressed his body against yours and you could feel how extremely hard he was again already. You had never met a man with that stamina. Well, everyone knew there was no other man like him...

"Listen to me. Carefully." He said, pressing his erection harder to your core, making you roll your eyes in lust. "I'm gonna fuck you now and then I'm going back to sleep. And if you wake me up again, I'm not gonna even look in your direction for a week, do you understand?"

You nodded with a certain difficulty, considering how his hand squeezed your neck.

"Do. You. Understand?" He asked again.

"Yes, sir." You replied weakly.

"Smart little brat." He chuckled. "Turn around."

He stood up to remove his underwear and you laid on your belly as fast as possible.

The sharp slap that laid on your ass didn't surprise you the slightest, but you still moaned.

He pulled you closer like you were nothing and started stroking his cock. He knew you were more than ready, but his cock was still a bit sensitive from the harsh stimulation you kinda... forced him into. So he entered you slowly, inch by inch. You couldn't believe how good it felt.

"Fucking missed this pussy, baby, I'll admit that." He said, movements starting slow, but deep. "Just wanted it to be more romantic, you know? Take you somewhere nice... in a pretty dress I'd ruin later..."

"M'sorry..." you cried out. When he was that deep inside you, he could get you apologizing for things you didn't even do.

"Yeah, but my girl doesn't like romance, right?" He grabbed your waist and started going harder. "She likes being treated like a fucking slut. A very fucking ungrateful one."

"S'not true..." You moaned.

"Oh am I crazy, baby?" He gave you another slap. "You wanna keep disrespecting me? Knowing you, you might get sick from the lack of attention..."

"I would!" You replied, desperately. "Could fucking die..."

"Dramatic fucking whore." He chuckled. "Listen to me now. Very serious."

You tried your best to concentrate. It helped that his hips stopped moving.

"You're gonna tell me to stop immediately if I hurt you, won't you?" He asked, in the most serious tone you've heard from him.

"Yes." You couldn't contain the excitement that phrase ignited in you. Should you be scared?

"I mean it. You won't get punished and I'll let you cum if you still want to. But you have to be honest, baby, I... I couldn't live with myself." He insisted.

"I promise, baby." You assured him. "You won't hurt me, I can take it."

"Yeah?" He chuckled again. "Well, you fucking asked for it."

After making sure you were as comfortable as you could get in your position, he forgot what the word mercy meant.

His thrusts fast and deep, his sounds animalistic. Hands on your hips leaving bruises... and if you could speak, you'd thank him for it. It was more than you expected... more than he ever gave you. But it sure was what you needed... and it didn't take too long for that familiar feeling, the one you had been craving all night, fuck, all week, start to build.

"DALTON, PLEASE!" You started by begging already, because you weren't in position to do anything without his permission, no matter how much you needed it. "PLEASE, I'M SO CLOSE..."

"Fuck, me too..." He said, never stopping his hard thrusts. "Come for me, pretty girl... hurry up..."

The relief your body felt as soon as it got his permission allowed your orgasm to build and build and explode harder than you could take it... all you could do was scream his name among incoherent words.

He followed right after you, filling you up so deeply...

As soon as he was finished, he wrapped his arms around you and laid down, holding you close.

"Are you okay, angel?" He kissed every inch of your skin he could reach.

"Fuck, I am now..." you sighed and both of you laughed a little.

"I'm sorry, baby..." His sweet tone was back incredibly quick.

"You didn't hurt me, I promise." You assured him.

"Good... But I'm not apologizing for this... I'm sorry that I neglected you for so long." He caressed your face gently. "You're so much more important to me than all that bullshit. I just..."

"I know." You cut him, offering him a reassuring smile. The look in your eyes meant all the words you couldn't say. Specially not at that moment.

"You do, don't you?" He sighed relieved. You were his ride or die. And he couldn't imagine what he would do without you. "I'm so lucky to have you."

"Well..." You shrugged playfully. "Guess that means it's all forgiven."

The customs would have it that on the very night of a maiden’s wedding she would perform the act of consummation first in front of the highest members of the court to prove her purity and then proceed with the act for her lord husband’s eyes only.

But this wasn’t a fucking barn, and people would learn to do things with manners.

Or at least, that had been the way Prince Nicholas had put it when the councilmen had insisted upon it during the wedding preparation. Their insistence upon watching the soon to be queen being defiled could’ve been equated to regular old traditions and care for traditions. The princess herself believed it to be what it was, old men hungry to devour with their eyes and feast on the most embarrassing moment of her life.

She would curse her mother and maids for the rest of her life for not having taught her the basics on what was expected of a wife or what would go into these “nightly performance” she would have to endure. Part of her knew better though, not only because her mother would pull her by the ears until they pealed off and not only because it was unbecoming of a young girl to complain but also because she had done everything in order to not follow the regular education that highborn ladies had to follow.

Because the princess had chosen to be none other than a prince.

As overly simplified as it was, it was the clearest way to express the life she lived or life as she lived it. Less than a choice, it was simply what made sense. From the moment she could stand on her two feet she was made to run after her brothers rather than walk slowly and with poise like a lady would. She was meant to chase and scream and throw herself at the nearest danger because what was danger for the crown but the daily life of any of the people they ruled over ?

While she learned to wield the sword, mount the horse and shoot arrows, she also learned what it would entail to be a princess, one day to be married. And seeing some of the men offering themselves to become her husband, she did regularly wish a battle would kill her first. A battle, or the trouble her mouth would get her into. Of course, she had learned and knew all there was to know. All except that. Sex.

With a father like hers, with a mother like hers, she was almost certain she would never marry so why waste her time learning about sex, right ? Luckily appearing like a good omen, Nicholas did not simply see himself as worthy. The initial discussion had not even concerned a marriage proposal.

When he had arrived in the neighboring kingdom, his proposal concerned trades and the opening of a route through his seas in exchange for three troupes of their best soldiers to be sent into his realm and help the thieving crisis raging through his lands. It was true that the knights of your home were known to be the greatest there ever was, loyal and strong, one of them could equate to a fleet of ten. Of course anyone would want them.

And he had wanted her too. As soon as she had walked in, dragging his lord commander by the cloak for blocking the way to the council room.

She hadn’t meant to hurt anyone, she just wanted to make sure her father was fine and so were her brothers. The man at the door was unfamiliar and truth be told, rather rude. It was a misunderstanding and her response was unwarranted. She had apologized, the prince had laughed. Surprising response.

For the rest of the meeting, she had been allowed to stay and she would’ve focused on the information being shared and the heated debate between both councils had she not been busy staring at the man she knew to be staring holes into her. His heated gaze felt like the sun shining directly unto her, melting away her mind and the mere thought of reason. She felt herself crumbling in on herself the longer she sat there to be undressed in public.

He hadn’t intended to stare with such insistence. He had even tried to look away, attempting to return to the discussion. He had. Had it ever been so difficult to look away from a woman ? Never, not when thousands of them had vied for his attention since he had come of age. Yet here he was, victim to his passions, digging into her flesh with his eyes, trying to move on from the gust of wind which had blew his way when she had walked into the room, carrying the sweet scent of honey. He had wanted nothing more but to leap to her feet and run his nose along her soft neck to engorge himself in her sweetness.

She hadn’t known whether to curse her father or thank him for offering them to stay longer than intended, stay until they reached an agreement on the details of their agreement. He had spent the night and from afar she was almost certain she could feel the heat of his body next to hers, warmth radiating through the dinner they had shared and through the halls of the castle, from his chambers to hers.

He hadn’t spent a better night, sitting in his bed, kept awake by the thought of the divine princess sleeping only meters away, peaceful yet clawing at his mind as if a parasitic fungus taking power over his body. She awoke every molecule forming his being, all aware of one another, uncomfortably held together by nothing but a thread of desire and melting resolve. Poor prince who wished to be back home in that moment, in the privacy of his quarters, far from prying eyes and then need to keep up appearances. Poor Nicholas who wished he could stroke his hardened cock all night, relieved of the ache burning in his loins, and ruining him from the inside.

With very little sleep in his system and his mind and body banding together against his better judgement, he had not moved from the position he had been occupying for hours now, but his head had snapped towards the door when he had heard the noise outside his door, footsteps as light and almost inaudible, had he not been wired towards her from the moment he had seen her. He knew it was her, and the sound of clinking metal and rushing maids confirmed his suspicion.

That morning, he had listened as she was being prepared to go on a morning ride. Interesting she was, the girl of his dreams. She kept quiet while her maid tried to dissuade her from going, she would need to be there to greet the guests. She assured she would be there to break fast with them. He would admit it, he had rushed to his balcony to watch her leave.

It was still dark, but he knew she had seen him, and he had seen her, both locking eyes for a moment before she had left. She had promised to be at breakfast, he wanted her for breakfast, but he would content himself with what she had offered. In the meantime, he had slept lulled to sleep by her eyes staring at up at him. It was enough, all he needed.

She had needed to clear her head, but her head hadn’t been any clearer when she had returned as soon as the first rays started shining. She knew she had gone mad when while hurrying to meet with the rest of her family, she suddenly found herself very conscious of her body, her mind and her appearance, so conscious she thought they would all leap out of her body to be stared at by anyone looking in her discussion. The meal was difficult, but madness was kept at bay, hidden from the public. The prince invited her to join the council that would follow, her presence being of great importance to him.

Again, the councils were boring, and this one was not moving anywhere. While the proposal was good, requesting for such a number of men in exchange for a route into a neighboring sea could’ve been good but it simply was not enough, not to the lords of the councils and slowly, not the King. Madness, she had equated her strange behavior to earlier. And as a great scientist, she had confirmed it when in a burst of genius, she had made a proposal.

She remembered how her mother would speak of her father coming to offer himself as a marriage prospect. The princess had been young but the look in the queen’s eyes, she recognized it as the same she had that morning, the look they had shared together before she rode off into the night. As her mother would often say, she had seen that man and had to have him.

“Why not offer a union instead. Your kingdom united to ours in exchange for all the men you desire for as long as you desire.” Had she said, like a princess who had seen the man she had to have.

Less than an offer, it sounded like a statement, one he had accepted before it was even uttered, a statement he would obey like a soldier would obey their ruler. All noise quieted, the Lords, princes of the realm and the King stunned into silence by her words. It had been the first time she had even looked at him purposefully, looked at him like he was already dancing in her palm, a puppet to her every whim.

Before being a good king, he was a good father and as he liked to say, anything she would dream of, he would provide. She had looked at him, his little girl and he could see her assurance, almost like an impenetrable wall. He had watched in silence as Prince Nicholas smiled, accepting the proposal while dreaming of a life of love which had never interested him.

This had been the most ridiculous decision she had made but it had been made, a glorious proposal in the minds of all the councilmen, all rejoicing at the thought of killing two birds with one stone, one of these birds being her and the other being the bird of decency she was meant to keep on her shoulder.

That girl was insane, but she was getting married.

For the next months, she walked almost aimlessly, only ever coming alive when he was in her orbit. She had tried to reassure her mother the day of her departure by claiming that she would learn to love her future husband. How was she made to tell her loving mother that she had fallen as soon as she had seen the man and that this whole marriage was nothing, but a tantrum hidden under negotiations ? As awkward as she was, poor girl left her home, three of her brothers with her off course to assist her and all her maids following. The prince was strange, he had agreed to everything she had requested before leaving, even accepting to take her horse on the journey to her new home. Everything about this had been strange, all of it but she was not one to go back on her words, not when this opened such a great opportunity for both kingdoms.

She swallowed her confusion and walked in the shoes of the princess she would need to be, a role which was less arduous to play when her soon-to-be husband seemed to agree to anything and everything she could want, everything except being around her.

For the seven months which had preceded their wedding, she had grown to crave his company and attention, flowers of love blooming brightly in her chest and crying out to him, crying out for his eyes on her, like he had done that morning. She wanted him in more ways than the ones she kept to herself, and he seemed more interested in everything there could ever be. She had hoped that on the night of the wedding, they would cross the bridge together and finally, she could learn about him from his mouth and not from those of the people of the castle and the court.

Nothing had changed and here she was, the moon high in the sky, her feet cold and bare as she fidgeted with the fabric of her nightgown. The cold air was nothing compared to the warmth radiating out of her skin and seeping through the thin cloth covering her nakedness.

“What are you doing here ?”

She jumped in terror, so busy rationalizing and overthinking that she hadn’t heard the door opening or closing. Turning to face him, she wished she could die instantly, wished to be swallowed by the floor below.

There he was, just out of a bath which had taken more time than necessary but still needed to clear his head. He enjoyed to privacy of his chambers, a robe covering his manhood from her gaze. His eyes were fixated on her as soon as he had walked in, dark and tempted, he remained at a safe distance, observing as she tried to speak, gathering her thoughts and looking away before speaking.

“My apologies, husband… I… I wanted to see you…” Seen she had. “It was… It was urgent.”

“Are you okay ?” If worry spread through his mind, he made sure to hide it. He watched her nod before letting out a discreet sigh of relief and taking a seat on the chair that faced his bed, next to the chimney. “What could be so urgent that you would need to come see me so late and in such clothes ?”

She remained quiet and so did he, barely focused on his own state but entirely aware of how little she was dressed and how much he could see. Adjusting himself in the seat, he swallowed a groan, one meant to calm his nerves and snapping him out of whatever he was doing.

“I… We… We have been married for a month now, my prince.” Her voice was low and soft like the summer breeze and burning away at his decorum. He stared at her as she straightened her back and raised her head, reverting to the girl she’d been when he first met her. “We’ve been married for a month, and you have not touched me still… I do not want you to think that it is something I think of often as it would be a stain on my character that I could not withstand but… Have I done something to displease you ? Perhaps if you tell me I could fix whatever it is, and we could move on as newlyweds.”

He heard the way her breathing picked up, almost able to see her heart beating out of her chest as she spoke, trying to explain herself while he stared in silence, pathetic victim to his weakened spirit and the images it spread through his mind while she spoke.

Of course he wanted to touch her, ravish her, devour her whole. There was nothing more on his mind, no other thought consummated Prince Nicholas’ mind like the thought of her crumbling in his sheets did. He could almost feel it in her scent wherever she went, the sweet taste of her nectar on his tongue. If he allowed himself to dream more, he could feel her tightness around his length, holding him nicely while she squirmed under his body. He wanted nothing more than to have her whenever he saw her, her stature in front of his, so breakable and frail. The thought of his arms enveloping around her and engulfing her whole, like a wave.

How delicate and marvelous she was, his darling wife. How could he even think of touching her when he knew what he would do to her was beyond salacious ? How could he do that to her and ever go back to being cordial with her after ? He knew that she was poison to his mind and to his tongue, one single bite and he would never ever be able to go without. How was he meant to live a life when he dreamed of living in her skin, grinding himself down into fine powder to be breathed into her lungs. How could that ever happen ?

He had almost sworn himself to a life of sleepless nights, attempting to quench his thirst for her in the dead of the night with his hand on his cock, before she had walked into his room covered by almost nothing, asking why he had not bedded her yet.

Nicholas stood quietly, walking up to her with a dark expression on his features. He was so handsome, the most beautiful man she had ever seen, his hair still wet and his body glistening in the night.

“Are you asking me to bed you, dear wife ? Is that what you want ?”

He stood millimeters away from her, her air wrapping around his body and seeping into him. That damned scent, honey so thick and sweet he prayed to drown in it. She looked up at him, frozen by his tone and proximity. She could feel the warmth of him in her and wanted more, but a highborn lady could not want such things. Could they ?

She looked down, her eyes twinkling with disappointment and shame. This had all been wrong, a mess she had made and would have to deal with.

“I… I apologize, your grace… I did not mean to offend… I will go… Please, forget this ever happened.”

She held her hands tightly together to ground herself, taking long strides towards the door to prevent her tears from humiliating her further. She had barely reached the door that a large hand blocked the way by slamming the door shut. She jumped, surprised that all her years of training were not enough to help her notice whenever he moved around her.

She suddenly felt so small in front of him, her husband towering over her, large hands boxing her in his space. She could hear him breath softly, almost out of breath and sounding strained.

“Where do you intend to go exactly ?” His voice was deep as he spoke, shaking from the vibration it sent through her. “What… What do you think you are doing exactly ?”

He sounded pained by the very words, but she kept still, too scared to see where this would go if she turned.

“I wanted to return to my chambers, your grace…” In this whole conversation, this had been the clearest she’d been. All to say she was leaving, how annoying.

He chuckled and she was almost offended, because what exactly was so funny in this discussion ?

“You intend to return to your chambers… dressed like that ?”

Now she was offended. Was this truly what worried him ? One month married and he hadn’t touched her, but he worried about how she was dressed ? Of course, she knew why he worried, but she would still be angry at him for it, because why not ?

“The answer I gave earlier remains unchanged, your grace. Or would you prefer if I stripped completely ? Maybe then you would move out of my way then ?” There she was, the princess he had met that day, unbent by his titles. He could’ve almost laughed had the image she had planted in his mind, of her roaming bare in the halls, not angered him enough to go deaf.

He kept quiet and she almost thought he had died behind her before hearing the sound of fabric moving. Looking down at her feet, she saw the rope holding the robe closed on the floor and before she could process what was going on, she felt him move behind her pushing her into the door, his bare front against her, cock pressing into her backside as deep as she could feel it.

“You think… You think I would let anyone see you ? You think anyone ever deserved to see you ? Huh, dear wife ? Do you think anyone could ever dream of seeing you ?”

She couldn’t speak but he could hear her reaction in her breathing as it picked up, more erratic and less rhythmic. Her who had managed to remain somewhat composed until now was suddenly as quiet as a mouse, squeaking below him while he pressed himself into her.

If she asked, he would admit the jealousy and possessiveness he’d been feeling for her. Everyone could see it, but she remained clueless, too busy hiding from him. The bedding ceremony had been his last straw. Prince Nicholas was never known for losing his temper, so imagine the surprise of the lords of the court when he had raised his voice at them and his own father for attempting to keep the tradition of the bedding ceremony ? He had refused it, categorically, the idea of hungry old decrepit men staring at his darling in a moment that was form them only. Never. He would kill all of them for even thinking of it.

“I burn at the mere thought of you, your scent being the only thing I need to lose every bit of education I have ever received and… You think I would ever let you out of this room ?” His left arm wrapped around her shoulder, keeping her still. He tried not to lose it, feeling her push into him, her soft hands still holding onto her gown. He raised his other hand to move her hair out of the way before bending down to leave open mouth kisses on her neck. Deliberate and controlled, he wanted to go as slow as he could, savoring the moment. His tongue grazed her veins eagerly wherever his lips would go while he tried to keep his hips still, failing miserably and rutting into her. He could already see how nice and warm she would be around him, his sweet wife. His tongue on her skin wasn’t enough to satisfy his hunger for her. “You want me to bed you, sweetness ? Fine. »

Every word he has uttered up until now had ignited something within her which a proper lady could never dream of letting out in their lives, but her instinct called for change in that very moment, the kind that was meant to undo all she had built herself to be in front of him. Because as condescending and arrogant as he might’ve sounded, she indeed, wanted nothing more than to be fucked. Partly for the sole purpose of experiencing the act as a woman, but also because the feelings she had started to feel for the man she had slightly tricked into a union were growing out of her control and called for some form of relief. Presently, the most adequate for would be the pleasure of the flesh, which she craved to indulge in.

« Tell me no, my dear… » He pleaded in a soothing voice she had only heard on their wedding night. « Deny me the pleasure of you and I will escort you to your chambers myself. »

She had expected more roughness from him, somehow. Almost ready to be unceremoniously dragged to the bed and stripped bare, she found herself melting more from the softness of his touch on her neck. His nose ran along her veins while his hips rutted slowly into the crevice of her backside. The wetness pooling between her legs dripped like poison, influencing the madness in her. As she took hold of the hand on her shoulder, she moved it to lay flat on her lower stomach. His fingers dug into her flesh, almost to pull her closer than she already was and yet, in truth, to scare her, maybe, into refusing him like he hoped.

The complexity of his mind in the moment made him almost just as deezy as she made him. He could almost feel delirium clawing at him, new senses appearing in him. Yes, he could feel her. The tightness of her pussy and the taste of her juices. He could all feel it. The prince was indifferent to the possibility that this was all in his head. The things which had been brewing in that same head for weeks now made it all the more necessary for him to listen for once. If he denied himself the pleasure of his wife, he would go mad. For weeks now, the prince had tried to act as friendly and neutral to her, even indifferent in the days when the pull towards her was too much to handle. He had tried as hard as any man could to deny himself pleasure both out of loyalty to her but also because no other woman could ever compare to her in his mind. Not when his nights were spent relieving a hard day’s work of ignoring and avoiding his wife. But in truth, how could he ever face such a beautiful being and taint her with the gunk flowing through him ? He couldn’t control the lewd images of her in his mind and until now, he’d almost managed to keep himself in check. Until she appeared in his bedchamber, demanding he touch her like she deserved and like he dreamt.

That did not change the fact that the woman he had tried to ignore for so long had grown a place for herself in his heart, a place that made it impossible to not give her the possibility to refuse what would ensue.

« Tell me no, my love… » He muttered, lips glued to her shoulder, as one last attempt to keep things how they were, to do things the right way, someday, maybe, when he wouldn’t be as weak to his passions as now.

And as she turned to look into his eyes, Prince Nicholas knew. In that moment, he knew he was destined for a life of allegiance to his wife and her every whim. With these beautiful eyes of hers, his princess had reiterated her earlier statement. Her answer, silent but acted remained unchanged.

« I don’t want to say no… » She whispered to him, their lips ghosting over the others.

No human word could ever fully grasp whatever followed next. Her whole body was suddenly caught by a force never seen before and spun around, her husband almost overjoyed but too taken by her lips to express it with full focus. She’s never tasted anything as sweet as his lips and he could say the same. The warmth of one another’s tongue, dancing in the others mouth, hoping, Prato to burn the other’s taste into their psyche, this was what this battle for control could be described as. Beyond control, they sought to catch up on lost time and feverishly discover as much as they could about the other.

Their lips encased perfectly into the others, Nicholas’ of course more taken and familiar with the act. He had tried to show decency and control, but the feel of her hot lips on his, shyly moaning into his had uprooted all forms of control.

His hands roamed, seeking for something to hold onto, anything to either ground him or feed his hunger for her. He found her wrists, her smaller hands back to holding onto the fabric of her nightgown. In that moment, he almost felt jealous of her and the opportunity she had to live in her own skin. He who could only dream of momentarily touching her could never be satisfied with the short amount of time he would get to spend with her. Years by her side would never be enough, not when he dreamt of their skins being merged together.

While his lips busied themselves on hers with fervor, his hands explored, touching, gripping, moulding and burning the feel of her in his mind. From her soft cheeks in his palm to the burn of her breasts on his bare chest, the prince did not know where to focus. His hand seemed to struggle leaving her cheek, keeping himself as chaste as the moment allowed to reassure her before moving to her neck. His fingers grazed the soft of her throat and she remained still, a willing victim to his increased thirsts.

When the princess moaned for the ninth time in his mouth, her lips parted and swollen, he pulled away from her to admire the mess below him.

« I haven’t even begun to explore you, my dear that you’re already so weak to me. » He chuckled, kissing the top of her nose and her forehead. Oh how fun this would be for the evil him looming on his shoulder.

He pulled away, allowing air and rationality to settle between them and for a second they remained still and quiet, drinking in the sight of one another. His exposed body had to be the most magnificent thing she had ever seen, a Greek statue in the flesh and dancing in the crevice of her palm. She stared at him like never before, a whole new sight granted to her and exposing him in his truth to her, the prettiest man she’d ever seen. So handsome and so willing to bend to her every desire.

Her eyes roamed around like the painting of a landscape meant solely for her sight. She reached his hips and bit her lips, her imagination running away from her control and painting the picture of his cock entering her repeatedly. She’s heard from her brothers about the steps of the act, and while the fear of confusion had been palpable initially, it had been a complete other feeling spreading through her at the moment. The princess was hornier than ever and the her insistent eyes on her husband’s hardened cock prodding out of the robe he wore did not make it any less evident.

A grin spread across the princes’ lips, just as into being watched by her as he was to admire in return. Him who had tried to not let his eyes wander could see freely now, the way her gown barely hid her peaking nipples or the way she’d kept her thighs tightly glued together as soon as he had stepped back.

The princess he had sworn fidelity and loyalty to now stood in front of him, sleeping gown falling off her shoulder and exposing more than just her cleavage.

When she reached towards him, her hand commending him to move and do what duty demanded, he wanted to laugh. There she was, his spoiled girl, leading him astray.

« The ache between my legs, husband… You are the source of it. I believe it to be your duty to soothe it. » A newfound confidence had crept its way in her veins and it intrigued him even more. To see her finally come out of her shell and demand of him, the prince, her lord husband. Nicholas took careful steps towards her before kneeling. His left hand found her right and took hold of her, their fingers intertwining tenderly.

With his free hand, he lifted the hem of her gown to expose her legs, rushing the fabric in his fist as he kept going higher, until reaching her hip. With some of the fabric still held up by his thumb, the rest of his hand slid along her flesh, and a sigh of relief escaped him. Deep and desperate, his head dropped as he pulled her closer. He let his forehead rest on her belly, nuzzling against her and kissing wherever he could reach.

His right hand which had still been holding the fabric of her gown slid under her thigh to part her legs. The prince let go of her hand and the fabric before laying a tender kiss over her bellybutton. He pulled back and signaled for her to open her mouth before gathering the gown and placing it between her lips and telling her to bite down. Like a good wife, she went along with his commands, holding onto his shoulders when he guided her palms towards them.

One of his hands came up to her backside, grabbing a handful while his right hand slid in between her legs to reach her mound. When his fingers plunged inside her, she almost felt her legs give out under her. Never had she felt such a sensation. His two fingers seemed to stretch her apart, too much already yet enough for her to quickly want more of whatever it was they provided.

« Shh, breathe. » He muttered, his hand unmoving.

She looked down to meet his eyes, her own glistening with tears from a foreign presence inside her. She blinked back tears while nodding softly and attempting to take a breath. She inhaled and exhaled slowly, her breaths ragged and trembling in concert with her trembling body. He nails were digging in his skin, crescent shaped marks littering his shoulders but his gaze never wavered, always on her. When she was certain that the pain had passed, she nodded slowly, gaining a smile from the man.

His fingers started going in and out of her while his lips kept kissing over her stomach. He could not take his eyes away from her, not at a moment like this when she was slowly starting to feel the pleasure of his touch. He could’ve, evidently, began with an other way of easing her into the act and the look of pain on her face truly made him want to peal his skin off. Now, as things would have it, she needed to be prepared before taking anything else and from the tightness of her pussy around his fingers, he would enjoy spreading her out to take him.

The more he thrust his digits in, the more she failed to stand on her two feet. Slowly, her body seemed to fold over his, melting down and loosing strength in her limbs the more space he took in her. When he inserted a third finger, the moans of pleasure she had tried to keep in grew louder. Her lips could no longer hold the gown in, to busy pushing out sounds each more obscene than the last. Her knees slowly gave out, her legs spreading wider and her juices dripping out more and more with each thrust. And when she was certain to have finally gotten used to whatever he was doing, he started spreading his fingers in rhythm with her moans.

« Oh, Lord, please… Please, oh, oh God… » She moaned, slowly loosing control over her actions.

Nicholas never looked away, too enticed by the sight of her. The more she folded on top of him, the tighter his grip on her became and soon, his moans met hers. Loud breathing muffled only by skin, she could only fall a little more while he kissed her side. His three fingers were drenched and the prince would be lying if he said that he wasn’t jealous of them in that moment. To get bathed in her nectar would be a paradise for him.

Her arms slowly wrapped around his shoulders, using his back as support while her legs shook from his treatment of her. She had completely disregarded her gown which covered her intimacy. It was an interesting position to be in, covered yet bare for his eyes to see and hands to hold.

And while he busied his fingers with her cunt, his tongue focused on roaming her sides from under the gown which now covered his head. His kissed, licked and hit into her ribs, leaving open mouthy kissed and marks of his teeth behind him. It still wasn’t enough, not until Nicholas found her nipples, ready for him to do whatever he pleased. When his tongue grazed over the soft bud of flesh, a yelp left her mouth, and when he started sucking on it, her voice grew louder.

Everything he did, he marked it down in his head, memorizing everything she liked and disliked in the moment. Her pleasure was his only goal at the moment and in life.

Her grip changed and soon her nails were digging into the skin of his back, her walls tightening around him and her sounds louder and louder. His fingers continued at the same speed while his teeth and tongue battled each other for a taste of her tits in his mouth. One was graced with his teeth, bite marks around the areola while the other enjoy his tongue and lips sucking little marks all over. Either way, they both were getting pleasure out of it. Even he, couldn’t deny that his end would come rather quick. As soon as she would cum, he would probably follow, beyond satisfied by the sound of her alone. But the prince did not want to let his cum of hers go to waste, already daydreaming of watching it drip out of her.

No, this would all be for her, his cock and his cum would all be for her.

« Hum, my sweet girl… You demanded I take care of the ache between your legs, did you not, princess ? » He expected an answer, enjoying the torment he was causing her. « I’m speaking to you, pretty girl. »

« P-Please… » She pleased instead of speaking up, too aware of how impossible it was for her to repeat such a thing without feeling shame.

Slipping his head out from under her gown, his eyes found hers again, piercing and dark with lust, he was unrelenting with her pussy as much as with his demand.

It was only after he had slowed down, silently threatening to stop if he did not get an answer.

« No, no, no ! Please husband, p-please ! » She cried out, parting her legs and reaching her hand down to push him back in. Despite his grin, she knew he would not let it go and folded. « Yes… Yes, I asked you to make me feel good… »

His face remained neutral until a smile spread again, this time with his teeth, on his face. Without a word, he dove back in, face under her gown. She squirmed in his grip, feeling her end near as it had been described by her maids and feeling the warmth of his breath over her cunt. He kept her stable and stunned before diving in to get a taste and suck in her clit like he had done her tits earlier.

This time with more fervor, his tongue danced over the bud of flesh as she wailed louder and louder from pleasure. He pulled her impossibly close, his forehead buried into her belly while his lips kissed all over her pussy. He kissed it like he kissed her, with desire unrivaled by even the loneliest of beasts. Nicholas showed her clit just as much love as he has shown her when he kissed her. He kept fucking into her with his fingers, more and more enthusiast as her fingers moved from his back to his hair, running through his blondish locks and pulling at the root. She moved in synch with him, bouncing on his fingers like a woman starved of her release until she came loud and hard all over his fingers.

« Yes, yes, yes ! Oh, God, more, please more ! » She screamed as she crumbled over him.

He kept pushing into her, deeper and deeper while she tried to process her first orgasm. Her hips kept moving up and down, following his rhythm and slowing down slowly. She was left panting and sweating, her cum dripping along his forearm. Never had she felt like this before, all thoughts and words escaping her but his name remaining. And she looked so magnificent above him, he could’ve died a happy man in that moment. If he wasn’t a selfish one before anything he would’ve been content with this, but Nicholas was selfish and he needed to feel her cunt squeeze around him like it had squeezed his fingers.

Hiking her leg up and draping it over his shoulder, he pulled his digits out before diving in mouth first to suck in her swollen folds and droplets of cum. More than being selfish, he was also greedy and that greed burnt the delicious taste of her in his mind. Never had he been so desperate for a woman. He wanted her spread in his sheets for life, taking over his space like she did his heart.

He kept devouring her pussy while she trembled, too sensitive to handle more of his treatment of her. The prince looked up with desire, admiring the state he had left her in. He needed to see more.

Detaching his lips from her with great dissatisfaction, he rose to his full height, taking her with him and lifting her up before taking a could of steps and dropping her onto the bed. Not even a second had gone before he kneeled onto the bed and grabbed her gown by the top before ripping it apart.

« Nicholas ! » she screamed. It amused him and he apologized with a kiss to her forehead.

« I’ll have a hundred more made of the finest silks for you. Not that you will need them much in the future. »

He pulled whatever was left of the gown and his own robe, tossing them out into a corner of the room. His eyes scanned her body from top to bottom, painting down the picture of her in that state. Oh how he wished to have his mouth back on her cunt at the moment, drinking in her taste and enjoying the sounds of pleasure she produced. Instead, he satisfied himself with his fingers, sucking on all three as he took his cock in hand and stroke along the shaft. His balls were tight and full, he could feel them ready to burst from the sight of her alone. Even now, drops of cum leaked out of his slit to coat the veins running all along his member. His movements were slow and sensual, his tongue lapping up all over his fingers before licking down his arm to swallow all that had poured on him. How good did she taste, his princess, his wife. So sweet and sensitive, he couldn’t keep fucking into his hand when knew that the only thing that could provide him with the pleasure he needed at the moment was her.

She’d been watching this whole time, panting and aching even more for his cock to push inside her and make her his in the eyes of traditions. She could see it glistening with pleasure, pulsating and she wanted nothing more than to taste it the way he had tasted her. Everything about his anatomy was so new and yet, she wanted to dive in and discover him intimately. She would demand they stay in that very room and be allowed to discover his wants soon enough, but for now, the night called for more classical things. The pleasure of the flesh and hunger for one another demanded they follow customs.

Nicholas pulled out his fingers from his mouth, coated in his saliva and slipped them into her mouth while his other arm wrapped around her waist to pull her up and have her sit on the sheets. Bare in between the red and golden fabrics, she looked ready to be devoured and just like she would demand, he would get to that later. For now, he pulled her to his chest and grinned wider when she kissed his stomach, pulling out the fingers she’d been sucking to mirror his earlier actions.

For a moment, a veil of tenderness enveloped them both, softness settling between the married couple to awake a need to hold and kiss the other. Her arms wrapped around his torso and her face nuzzled into his chest, kissing whatever she could reach. A small laugh was his response, as well as soft caressed on her shoulders and cheek.

« You’ll get all the time you want to kiss me, my love. Let me do what I need to do, hum ? » He kissed her forehead after she had nodded, again more than satisfied by her obedience. Thought he enjoyed it, he would not lie, following her around and obeying to her every command was more what he liked.

Laying her down flat on the bed, his hands parted her legs to give him more space to move. From that position, he kissed her collarbones while guiding his tip in the direction of her entrance.

« I promise to go as slow and gentle as you want me. Just tap my shoulder if it gets too much, okay ? Speak for me. »

« Okay, the shoulders. Understood. » She repeated, nodding animatedly.

Her eagerness was palpable and truth be told, the apprehension of him nestled within her did made her fidget a little. But the hunger for him to stretch her out to his girth was even more taking. It but at her core and made the earlier ache return with more bite than before.

« Hum… Your grace ? » At the sound of her voice, the prince immediately stopped, looking up at her. « I… I’ve never done anything of this sort before…”

Something in the way she had spoken breathed joy within him. Not only because he was the one she had chosen to be her first but also because she had felt comfortable enough to tell him. The wall they had built around one another had been crashing down in a pile of cement leaving them exposed to the other. And through that both seemed to breath for the first time around the other, finally able to express the truth of their desire.

The lips etched onto her collarbones moved to kiss up her neck before reaching her cheeks and lips again. As soon as his lips met hers, she eagerly reciprocated the act, following after him in search for the taste of his tongue on hers. The tip of his cock had been rubbing along her slit and clit and she couldn’t help but want to see what would follow. Always the dutiful husband, Nicholas was, of course, a greedy man first. His left hand came up to her face to hold her neck tightly and her jaw in place. He pinched at the bone and forced her small mouth open with a smile before sliding his tongue in in concert with his cock sliding into her.

« Oh, God ! » She cried out, suddenly aware of how much bigger he was while inside than in front of her.

Her legs shook slightly, struggling to keep still while her insides were torn apart once again. Despite him stretching her earlier, this would’ve never been enough to prepare her for the girth and length of his cock digging into her canal and stretching her to his side. Tears welled up in her eyes and her bottom lip trembled in pain, it was all too much, too new. She couldn’t breath and should’ve been scared, yet the soft caress of his fingers on her throat grounded her just right.

« Just like earlier, sweetness. Breathe slowly. » He commanded and despite struggling to do so on her own he obeyed.

Slowly, her ragged breaths were replaced by even more ragged breathing but this time out of pleasure and eagerness. The space he took inside her demanded to be expanded and she needed to have a taste of the darkness dancing in his eyes. His eyes, hadn’t moved away from her at any point. Focused on her eyes while he kissed away her thoughts, his tongue and hers danced together, teeth clattering occasionally while drool dropped out of the corner of her mouth.

Neither of them would get over kissing the other anytime soon and it was for the best.

The prince wasn’t sure how long he’d been still within her tight walls, kissing her but he knew that the tight hold she had on him would soon drive him insane. With each hiccup her walls squeezed around him tightly. With each breath, she had him throbbing harder inside her and through all he managed to stay still. Not for much longer though, not when she wrapped her legs tightly against his waist and her arms around his shoulders before pushing her face into his.

« Move, please, Nicholas… » She muttered against his lips and like a soldier ready to attack, his hips started moving. Slowly his pace shifted to go faster and deeper, his cock fucking into her cunt with more and more grit.

Soon the room echoed of the sounds of pleasure she created as well as his grunts of pleasure. Now on her ribcage, his hand rose to her breast to squeeze one in his palm while his other hand laid flat on her back. It slowly lowered to soon reach her ass that he squeezed too, using it as support to keep her close while he bottomed out inside of her.

The princess’ senses were like heightened by pleasure, her ears picking up on the sounds of the bed creaking and banging on the wall harder with each thrust. She could also hear the sounds of his groans and moans, all different and each more obscene. Of course she could hear the way his cock fucked into her warm cunt, his heavy sack slapping against her with more strength.

She could barely form a coherent thought to explain the way she felt and the sensations running around her body. All she knew was that she wanted more and so did he. He couldn’t begin to tell how good it felt to finally be inside her and feel that sweet tightness he had daydreamed for weeks before tonight. She held onto him tighter with each thrust and he knew she felt good, so good even that she pulled at his hair again, this time screaming her pleasure from up close into his willing ear. Like a symphony of pleasure and lust, the prince had never heard any sound as beautiful as her voice crying out to him in pleasure while he dug his cock into her guts.

He was quick to find the spot that would have her falling apart, a bundle of nerves which had her begging for his cock deeper and harder than before. And Prince Nicholas was a good and obedient man, whatever his wife wanted she’d get.

Leaving her lips, his mouth moved with his face to suck on her breast again, licking her nipple before his arms moved to cross behind her. Both his hands took handfuls of her ass before lifting her up and down on his cock. The prince started moving her body in tandem with his thrusts. He couldn’t hold himself together for long, he knew it as soon as he saw her in his room tonight, and his voice was the first tell. Growing louder and louder, the prince lost himself inside his princess.

« F-Fuck… My love… Oh, yes… F-Yes, yes, take it, sweetness… Take me good, my love…Yes ! »

This time it was his turn to leave crescent shaped marks on her flesh, his nails digging into the thick of her ass. She couldn’t compare to anything she’d even seen before but the prince fucked like a man possessed, his pants of pleasure louder than the next each one after the other. Moans and cries could be heard all though the room and even beyond, both knew it.

« M-My… Oh, oh, oh, hum ! » She had tried to speak but his pace accelerated again, his cock going deeper and slamming into a wall of flesh as well as the spot he had reached earlier. “Fuck ! Ah, ah, ah, m-my… My love… S-s-slow down ! »

Her voice trembled of pleasure, the kind that neared on insanity. Now, both her hands were in his hair, finding something to ground herself on amongst the thick curls on his head. Feeling the tip of his cock get even deeper, she looked down to see it through her stomach, a bulge forming on her lower belly. Repeatedly, the large mushroom tip of his dick pushed into her cervix, showing itself to the lovers.

Nicholas’ forehead rested against hers, following her gaze while he bit hi slips to contain himself but failed. There he was, all the way inside her smaller body. He was suddenly way more aware of how small she was in comparison to him, his cock wide enough to make such a visible image inside her. She watched his furrow his eyebrows, almost looking and sounding in pain. He couldn’t handle the events. From the taunting him in her little question to calling him her love. This would kill him. But he would die a happy man.

« Oh… Oh sweet… I-You kill me, sweet love… » He could only say while trying not to look down again. He buried his face in between her breasts to hide from the obscene vision. He would come quickly and so would she, he knew it.

Her breasts bouncing against his skin was pure agony, just like it was our agony to feel her squeeze him as tightly as she was. To reciprocate the « suffering » his hand came down to push her stomach at the place he had been pushing into. She bit her lip to keep in another cry of pleasure that would quickly be replaced by more incoherent screaming while his thumb came down to rub on her clit.

He needed her to cum around him and quickly or he’d go insane. He toyed with her bud of flesh while looking at the way his cock went in and out of her, stretching her out to fit him while he fucked her within an inch of her life. A ring of cum had formed around him, white and thick. That vision alone fed into his need to cum. He needed to see more of this.

« Come for me, sweetness… » He groaned with as much control as he could muster. Her eyes rolled to the back of her head while his own crossed, his mouth falling open to let out a string of animalistic grunts and moans. Both synchronized for a moment, her meeting his thrust with her own eager movements while he pushed into her harder and harder until both came in a string of cusses.

She almost felt like she had gone blind for a moment, white light clouding her vision as well as the groundbreaking sensation of her second orgasm raging through her. And if she thought this was it, she was quickly thrown back into that coital state by his cum spurting out of his cock into her warm cunt. The princess felt her husband spread through her and fill up every crevice of her pussy. Warm and thick, she felt his cum dance inside her for the next minutes as they both came down from their end, sweaty and panting.

Both were still moaning, the prince too out of his mind to keep himself from thrusting inside her some more. He didn’t want to pull out, not when she felt so good.

Instead, he chose to rut inside her tight pussy while kissing her jaw and throat. Her own hand caressed the back of his neck while she blinked away the sleep. His kisses were so soft and tender, she couldn’t help but to reciprocate, kissing his ear and into his hair.

« Have I satisfied you, my love ? » He muttered, falling on her. His body was covering the whole of hers as she laughed.

« More than that, my prince… » Her voice was small in that moment, just as sweet as her and filled with unspoken warmth.

He was still panting on top of her, holding her close and basking in the scent of her body enveloping him as she bathed him in tenderness. Both fell asleep slowly, his lips whispering sweet nothings into her ear and kissing her into a well deserved sleep. Through the night they remained connected, holding onto the other and keeping his cum and hers deep inside her.

The next morning, when the maids came up to the Prince’s chamber to notify him of the princess’s disappearance, they were quickly thrown out, all squealing in shame from witnessing her on top of him, bouncing and taking her early pleasure from him without a care in the world. Luckily she hadn’t seen them or even heard, too busy treating herself to a morning ride, but he had and he would not have anyone disturb his wife while she enjoyed herself on him.

As mentioned earlier, she would have him disregard his duties for the day so that she could have a taste of his cock herself and he would gladly oblige in exchange of a taste of her sweet cunt on his tongue.

It became tradition to find her in his chambers or the other way around. She enjoyed being chased by him at the hours of the night in her gown to be carried back to her rightful place in his bedsheets. The knights and the maids knew better than to look. The princess on the prince’s shoulder was for his eyes only. And when both found themselves in her chambers it was due to his need to smell her on him at every turn. More than once he’d sneak in her bath with her and before he could even speak, the maids would scurry out of the room.

When both became king and queen, nothing much changed except now, no room was left untouched, the throne room first to be christened.

While the Lord is being requested to settle the unfortunate altercation, the musicians continue playing their melodies inside the Great Hall. The crackling sounds of the large fire pit and the joyful tune make it easy to forget the terrible intentions hidden beneath one’s mask.

As the guests become more intoxicated and well-fed, a mysterious figure, one among the King’s delegates, makes their way toward Lady Maggie’s table.

The woman dons a flowing gown made of dark velvet and adorned with elaborate needlework. Despite the fine quality of her garment, the dull choice of color makes her almost invisible among the opulence flaunted by other high-ranking members.

She makes her way through rows of drunk guests, her eyes sharp as that of a hawk, and her face cold and stern, making her appear unwelcoming and intimidating to the weak-willed.

Lady Maggie’s discerning eyes catch the sight of a peculiar gold pendant hanging below the old woman’s neckline, depicting an oak leaf. The two handmaidens accompanying her also bear similar accessories. Only theirs are made of iron.

The Lady’s brows arch. Not out of surprise, but intrigue. It seems she has expected this special guest’s arrival.

“Please accept our gratitude for the hospitality and care you have shown to our princess, my Lady.”

After greeting the Lady, the old woman receives a small golden box from one of her maidens and places it in front of Lady Maggie, who graciously acknowledges the gesture. The women silently return to their seats, avoiding any further conversation. Regardless of the old matron’s motives, she must not be seen socializing with the kin of the Usurper.

As the Lady opens the box, a dazzling piece of finely crafted jewelry catches her eye. It is exquisite, but not particularly remarkable, especially coming from someone like the old woman.

However, only Lady Maggie can see that the box’s interior is narrower than its external profile. After studying it for a brief moment, the Lady allows her steward to take it back to her chamber. Leaning back against her chair, a pleasant smile spreads across her face as her plan is set in motion.

Her watchful eyes gaze upon the heavy gate of the Great Hall, wondering what has taken her brother so long.

The weight of the cape presses against your shoulders, keeping you warm and protected from the prying eyes. You can feel the glaring behind your back and hear the muttering among the servants.

The Lord is walking beside you, surprisingly mirroring your pace with small steps. His jaw tightens as firmly as his grip on the hilt of the sword. He must be extremely angry, you can tell. His enemies have made themselves comfortable in his home, drinking his wine, and laughing as if the bloody war never happened.

And now he must forgive one of them.

For what? To maintain the illusion of a truce? This is asking too much of him.

The Lord, of course, has no intention of rejoining his sister in the Great Hall. Your “very serious” injury presents him a convenient excuse to extract himself from the noisy, inebriated crowd.

He accompanies you to your chamber and summons the old physician to attend to your wound. You want to decline. It is only a tiny scratch, and you can perfectly take care of it on your own.

You are about to protest, but the moment your eyes meet the Lord’s, you quickly swallow your words. The incident has left him furious, and he is still fuming over it. And it does not seem wise to cross him at this moment.

After fulfilling his duty, the physician bows and takes his leave, leaving you in the room with the Lord.

You have expected your husband to return to the feast or his chamber, seeing there is no reason for him to still linger here. And yet, he remains. His presence stretches the stillness in the air. At least the warmth emanating from the fireplace brings you some comfort, fighting off the harsh winter winds.

“Thank you for aiding me.” Suppressing your nervousness, you utter a few words to disrupt the awkward silence.

The Lord did save you during that commotion. Whether he did it out of the gallantry in his heart or because he saw the royal family as an eyesore does not matter (though it is most likely the latter). What matters is that he did you a favor he was not obliged to. And he graciously walked you back to your chamber, shielding you from the curious stares of the servants.

“Why did you forgive her?” The Lord’s brows furrow, a familiar sight when he gets frustrated. His voice carries a subtle annoyance, unable to comprehend the rationale behind what he considers foolish mercy.

While he harbors no affection for you, he was not about to let the King’s dogs bear their fangs in his domain. If you didn’t stop him, he would have cut that crone down. And a few others, just to be thorough.

You never expect to be asked such a question. You hesitate, searching your head for the right answer. It is difficult when you can't seem to understand why he would ask you such question.

“It is not my wish for anyone to die because of me.”

Indeed, you detest that woman, and there were, undeniably, times you have dreamed of her demise. But you have no desire for any bloodshed.

In the years spent learning from your mother, you witnessed more deaths than you could count. And it was under that guidance that you took a healer’s oath, sworn to save lives, not take them.

Moreover, her death on the Lord’s ground would only further complicate the situation between the King and House Gyllenhaal, would it not?

Any transgression from either side will be used as leverage against the other. And the last thing you want is to be the cause of it.

The Lord responds with a dry laugh. He finds your explanation very—irritating.

Given your status as a bastard, he can imagine the mistreatment you faced from people. And that old crone, in particular? It certainly was not the first time she struck you.

He recalls the days he used to serve under the King. Even then, he wouldn’t have batted an eyelid at the sight of your misery. He may pity you a bit. However, people of his status rarely prioritize the suffering of the unfortunate mass, unless there is something to gain from it. You would have been just another poor bastard whose entire existence is shameful and insignificant.

Everyone values lineage and legitimacy. His family, despite all the tales of heroism and altruism woven by his brilliant sister, is no exception.

You should be angry. You should not have asked him to spare that woman, but you did, and it is baffling to him. He finds that kind of empathy a nuisance, a weakness. It’s the kind of weakness that ends up as the blade to your back.

“Your wish? I can’t tell if you are arrogant or naïve. Her insolence is enough of a reason for me to take her life.”

He takes a step closer to the bed, where you sit, as he looks straight into your eyes, wanting to dig out your misplaced compassion. He cannot explain why, but it is upsetting him.

“Had she died, it would be by my will and my hand.”

“I understand that.” You concede softly.

“You understand nothing.” The Lord’s voice is snappy yet quiet, startling even the man himself.

He finds it absurd that he is standing here instigating an argument with you for a petty reason.

You were not at fault, and he knows that. Your only guilt was that you did not choose to act as he would.

He takes a moment to collect himself, calming his nerves before leaning down, closing the gap between you and him. With only the flickering fire illuminating the side of his face, his expression is unreadable.

“Only a fool spares his foes, expecting them to show him the same mercy he did. She threatened you, did she not? Spare her life does nothing but give her another chance to bite you. You are safe here, but what about the old healer you spoke of?” His voice is soft, almost a whisper.

The Lord notices the slight twitching on your forehead. He knows he has touched a nerve.

Although he is in no way comparable to his sister when it comes to the elusive art of reading people, he can still uncover little weaknesses others hold close to their heart.

That woman, the healer you spoke of, must be very important to you, since every mention of hers draws a powerful reaction. When his sister confronted you about your letter or when that woman used her name against you, you became agitated, betraying how much you care about that healer.

She is your weakness.

The fabric of your dress is crumpled into a small heap between your hands as you are unable respond. The Lord’s words are as sharp as a blade, driving into your chest.

It has been a long time since you parted with your mother. You haven’t been able to write to her, nor have you heard anything from her. You have kept your composure, but the truth is, missing her is driving you mad deep down.

The Lord sighs, exhausted from having to remind such a simple logic to you.

You, who have the misfortune of being a part of this undignified marriage. How are you going to survive when you can barely put up a fight? When you don’t know when or how to strike your enemies? You are just so… so shortsighted and unguarded.

“My Lord!” You let out a small yelp.

The sudden chill of the Lord’s fingers grazing your cheek catches you off guard. As your body meets the softness of the bed after being pushed, you let a gasp escape your lips.

His form looms above you, pinning you down by the shoulders. In the dimly lit room, you catch an orange glimpse of the hearth fire reflecting off his long lashes.

When was the last time you observed your husband so closely? You can’t remember.

Your muscles tighten in response, a surge of tension coursing through your body, feeling unprepared for whatever will happen.

“What are you doing?” You swallow the lump in your throat.

Your hands press into the fine fabric of the Lord’s garment as you brace his weight on top of you. The memory of his body heat against the cold, dark cellar suddenly resurfaces, vividly replaying in your mind. Your eyes dart away, unable to meet the Lord’s penetrating stare.

“What does it look like I’m doing? Indulging in my privilege as your husband.” His retorts, his voice low with a hint of enticing charm you rarely witness.

His face inches closer, bridging the distance between you. The heat on your cheeks intensifies, and you are unsure whether it’s from the Lord’s breath against your face or the blood rushing beneath your skin.

As he leans in to meet your lips, the air is filled with the faint scent of wine, enveloping your senses. The sensation isn’t exactly unpleasant, but neither is it entirely enjoyable.

His touch is gentle as he seeks to coax your rigid jaw to relax, but nervousness holds you in its grip, making it difficult to comply.

This is unlike any of your previous intimate encounters, if they could even be labeled as such. The first time was agonizing and humiliating, while the recent incident in the cellar left you feeling embarrassed and uncomfortable. However, now, it feels as though the Lord is actually taking his time with you. Just you, not his spiteful enemy, not a substitute for his long-gone beloved.

The sensation is indescribable.

You wonder if the pounding in your chest is a normal reaction. Surely it must be, right? After all, the Lord is a man in his prime, undeniably handsome, too. It’s not unusual to be captivated by his uncharacteristic tenderness.

Regardless of the circumstances, you two are still husband and wife. You should expect these things, or at least, you were taught to expect them. Still, you struggle to make peace with the situation.

On complete instinct, you turn your head to the side, denying him the touch of your lips.

The Lord’s eyes capture every expression on your face, even when your eyes clench shut and your brows knit. He rises from you, a finger smoothing away the creases on your forehead.

You hear a drawn-out, weary sigh.

“See? You freeze up like a scared little lamb. Are you going to lie still and wait to be slaughtered?” The Lord asks, as he moves away and gives you back the freedom of movement.

You find yourself speechless, your head still spinning from the surge of excitement.

The Lord silently muses himself, savoring the colorful expressions on your face. He finds himself no longer upset.

It hasn't been a full day and he has spoken to you more than he ever had in the past. Somehow, he derives much comfort from these interactions, despite your severe lack of common sense. At least, he does not have to exert his mental strength like the times he converses with his sister.

The Lord is taken aback by the sudden wave of emotions he experiences in your presence. He is absolutely confident that he doesn't hold any genuine fondness for you.

Even if illegitimate, you are still the King's daughter, and that fact continues to leave a bitter taste in his mouth. You can't never by fully trusted, as blood and allegiance always matter in his world.

If it were up to him, he would have you removed from his domain. Be it setting you free or a less merciful alternative, you wouldn't be sitting here and being a thorn in his side.

Yet, if you are still being kept around, it can only mean Lady Maggie sees you as being of great use.

In the end, no matter what his sister has planned for you, you will not emerge from this war unscathed.

It is a pity.

As he prepares to leave, he turns around to look at you one last time, his face obscured by the darkness, disallow you to read his expression.

The door soon closes behind him, separating the two of you. You are left with your own thoughts amidst the soft cracks of the fireplace.

A few days have passed since the incident. The Lord's tolerance has been severely tested by the delegates' constant display of arrogance in his Keep.

They strut around, ordering the servants and making snide remarks about the absence of luxuries.

His sword arm has been itching non-stop. He should have executed a few when he had his wife as an excuse. It is a relief to everyone that the delegates are to leave soon. If this goes on any longer, Lord Gyllenhaal will make sure peace is no more, because he will skin these royal stains alive.

The festivity ceases and everyone goes back to their usual work.

Well, everyone except you, that is.

The Lord forbids you to work as a servant. Too many people have seen your face when you sat next to him that night, and words spread. He is indifferent about what you do as long as you are not posing a threat (and he thought you should try to be useful anyway), but the servants and even some of his men have given him strange looks.

No one knew your face when you first walked through that gate as the princess-bride. But now, more than a few people have seen you running around in servant's clothes. They are not blind.

The "new maid" who has been cleaning the stable and working in the kitchen turned out to be the Lord's wife. Royal princess or not, you are their lady Gyllenhaal. And this stirs people's curiosity, as well as their gossiping.

Truth be told, you have no qualm with his decision because the Lord is not the sole recipient of the judgmental stares.

The maids with whom you shared friendly conversations just a week ago are no longer interested in talking to you. They will respond to your queries, with ‘my lady’ appended to whatever they say. But they are only willing to speak when specifically asked. And even then, they speak with a distant, apathetic demeanor.

You are not surprised by their attitude. The Lord's enemy is not exactly welcomed in this place. They attribute your labor, perhaps, as a form punishment from the Lord or something akin to that.

Still, it hurts to lose the few genuine companionship you have gained.

And there is another issue contributing to your distress. People talk, and oh, do they talk? More than a few times, you've caught people stealing glances at your midsection as if they are looking for something.

And then it dawns on you.

A few relatives of House Gyllenhaal who greeted you during the feast had the same gazes, and at least one of them insinuated you might be carrying the Lord's offspring. Even your husband admitted that Lady Maggie was involved in spreading those rumors to ease the family’s concerns about the continuation of his legacy.

The siblings know you are useless as a political hostage at this point, but their subjects don’t. Even if you have no status to pass on to your children, at least you can make yourself useful by performing your “duty”.

It isn’t long before you hear whispers of your supposed development. The servants don’t confront you directly, but you catch the fragments of their conversations as they scrub floors or tend to the fire. And it’s not just the servants either.

“She must be with child,” they say. “Why else would she go into hiding like this? I used to see her in the stable all the time.”

“Haven’t you heard? The Lord commanded her to stop working, his intention is obvious.” they say.

Soon enough, it’s as though everyone in the Keep has come to a silent agreement.

They wait.

You feel their eyes on you constantly, searching for signs of life beneath your gown, scrutinizing every gesture, every bite of food you take—or don’t take.

But, of course, there is no child. You are quite certain of it. The idea of carrying the Lord’s offspring is as far-fetched as the whispers themselves. You haven't even shared a single proper night with your husband.

And even if he lay fingers on you, well, you haven't forgotten the potion Lady Maggie's asked you to take the day after your supposed consummation. You have an inkling feeling not everyone wants you to carry the the Lord's child.

Though, you must admit, the incessant gawking and whispering are really getting on your nerves. You stay away from others as much as you can.

It has got to the point where your own chamber becomes a suffocating prison cell. And you do not enjoy the look of maids who bring you food. So, you often wander in the courtyard, letting your feet and mind roam.

"…Your Highness."

An unfamiliar voice breaks through the haze of your thoughts. It takes them several attempts before you realize someone is addressing you. You turn around to a face you have never seen before. Judging by his clothes, he is a member of the delegates.

It's puzzling that any of them have needs to speak to you.

Discreetly scanning the area, you breathe a sigh of relief upon noticing several Gyllenhaal guards stationed within eyesight. At the very least, you hope to avoid a repeat of what happened the other night.

"Who are you?" With caution, you ask.

The man's lips curl into a sly smile.

"I merely wish to bid your farewell before I depart, your Highness. And perhaps…" His hand reaches into his robe, producing a small, folded cloth. "To present a parting gift, directly from His Majesty, the King."

With hesitation, you extend your hand, accepting the fabric. As you unfold it, a few strands of hair tumble out.

Time stops, and you are left breathless.

There, in the palm of your hand, is a silvering lock of hair. It takes everything in you to steady your knees, to keep your expression unchanged.

This color. This texture. You recognize this.

Your mother's hair.

The man leans in, his voice a hushed murmur, barely audible.

"My princess, I hope you have not forgotten the King's order. He is growing very, very impatient."

A sick chill bubbles in your stomach. The King's order. You have brushed it aside, pushed it into the recesses of memory where you thought it would fade.

Kill the Lord? You would never have the heart to follow through with it, nor have you ever intended to. But here is this man, this messenger, holding a piece of your mother in his hand as a warning.

Forcing yourself to calm down, you ask, “What is it he expects of me?”

The man’s eyes gleam, sensing your hesitation. His feigned smile disappears.

“The end of this foolish war, in exchange for this woman's safety. His Majesty hates waiting. Perhaps… this reminder will motivate you.”

“Leave me,” you try to keep your voice low, to appear fearless. But no matter how hard to try, you can't control your shaky breaths.

It takes all of your strength to be able to stand on your feet.

The man chuckles.

“Very well,” he replies, a smirk spreading across his face. “Do give this matter some thought, my lady. The King awaits good news.”

He pauses, his gaze sweeping over your body with a mocking glint.

“And, ah… my congratulations. Lord Gyllenhaal must be overjoy.”

You aren’t sure how you left the courtyard.

Your knees threaten to buckle if not for the cold stone your hand is tracing.

The nobleman’s threat is almost overshadowed by the unbearable ringing in your ears. Perhaps it is your mind’s way to block out the dread.

The vision of your mother being harmed is consuming your thoughts, leaving your stomach churning with each step. Your cheeks are feverish, but you don’t even have the mental strength to discern if it’s your own tears or you are falling sick.

You have intended to head back to your chamber, to a place you can be with your thoughts and feel safe. But your mind is all foggy as your trembling feet carry you all the way to one of the Keep’s corner towers.

It’s a place you rarely venture, and you don’t even know if you’re permitted here. The realization that you might be somewhere you are not allowed to be brings you back to your senses.

Just as you’re about to turn around, a warm, earthy scent drifts through the air. It catches your attention.

Burning incense.

At the far end, a pair of heavy wooden doors stand, one slightly ajar. The scent flows from within. A chapel, perhaps?

The reeling in your head is clouding your thoughts and making it difficult to focus. You slowly move closer to where the incense is coming from, driven by an instinctual pull. Your thoughts drift among the whirling, fragrant smoke.

You’ve never been particularly devout, but with everything that has happened, a prayer might offer some momentary peace, allowing you to clear your mind.

There isn’t much you can do right now, but pray. A meager prayer to any higher power that is willing to listen.

As you peek through the door, your eyes are immediately drawn to the majestic sculpture of a grand oak tree towering at one end of the room.

A feminine figure is carved right into the tree’s main body. As her hair weaves through the branches and her limbs meld with the trunk, it appears as though she is an inseparable part of the tree itself. With eyes filled with benevolence and wisdom, she looks upon those who come before her like a loving mother. Ever knowing. Ever caring.

The intricate craftsmanship of the sculpture leaves you so mesmerized that you almost overlook the man kneeling in front of the goddess, hands folding together with utmost reverence.

“Have you come to gloat at me, sister?” Speaks the kneeling man. You are taken aback, realizing whom that voice belongs to.

“My apology, I didn’t mean to intrude,” Stepping back from the door, you apologize frantically, your heart pounding in your chest.

As the Lord turns his head, he notices the terror on your face. Contrary to what you assume would happen, he appeared more relieved than upset by your untimely interruption.

“It’s fine. Better you than my sister.”

Despite his bitter tone, the Lord seems to tolerate your presence.

A slight curiosity arises in you as to why he wouldn't wish to face Lady Maggie. But it is a question that you don’t have the right to even ponder.

He shifts his gaze back to the statue, still in the kneeling posture, leaving only his back to you.

You would never guess that he could be a devotee of any religion, much less one centered around the Oak Mother.

The Oak Mother Cult.

It’s an ancient belief that very few still hold on to, even fewer in the Capital city from where you came. Your mother used to tell you stories about it, but not much.

And there is a reason for that.

The royal family outlawed the worship long ago in favor of a more loyalist religion, but they only truly cracked down on it after House Gyllenhaal’s rebellion.

Originally, they rejected it because many of the Cult’s beliefs clash with what the royal family deemed crucial for maintaining their rule. However, the court turned a blind eye and allowed people to continue the worship.

Not that there were many believers left by the time you learned about their existence.

After Lord Gyllenhaal’s capture and his subsequent escape, things changed.

The few remaining shrines were all burned down and the priests and priestesses were forced to convert or be executed in public. It was forbidden to discuss the event, but there were rumors of the Cult having a connection with House Gyllenhaal. Thus, the King deemed its followers traitors.

“Are you familiar with her?” The Lord asks, a little more casually than you expect. His eyes never leave the solemn goddess figure.

“Not much, my Lord. The King does not permit the worship or teaching of the Oak Mother.” You answer in earnest.

“What do they claim, that she is the perverse goddess of prostitutes and thieves?” He whispers in a sarcastic tone. Words travel far. He knows of the twisted words the King has spread.

You are unsure of how to respond. The culling of the Oak Mother followers was bloody, and with many awful accusations, which you cannot repeat in front of this man.

“I was told the Oak Mother was the protector of the less fortunate,” You carefully pick your words from the modest sleeve of knowledge you possess. “She was once the patron of healers and midwives.”

You vaguely remember a small carved oak tree pendant you used to own. A little trinket you stole from one of the court healers because you wished to be like them. This was before you were taken under your mother’s care. That thing was buried a long time ago to avoid trouble from the King when he began persecuting Oak Mother followers.

“Too impractical for the mass. She does not bestow influence nor does she grant wishes of wealth.” A soft laughter escapes the Lord’s lips. “The pantheon sanctioned by the King is more enticing, don’t you think? Those gods promise abundance to those who obey and power to those who rule.”

Rising from his kneeling position, the Lord slowly turns around to face you. The light filtering through the windows cast a shadow over him, concealing his expression from your eyes. The lonely silhouette of the man beneath the towering goddess causes a lump to form in your throat.

You have an inexplicable urge to say something to console him, but words fail you at that moment.

He doesn’t seem to expect any answer from you, however. The Lord takes a few strides toward the door, but abruptly halts right beside you.

“Have you been crying?”

A gentle warmth brushes against your cheek. His unexpected remark, almost a whisper, and the sensation of his finger on your damp, feverish skin startle both of you. Retracting his hand promptly, he hurries towards the door, moving so fast that it seems like he’s fleeing.

Your hand reach up to touch your face, feeling the lingering ghost of his fingertips.

No, you shouldn’t. You must not. He’s not someone you could—

You felt something similar once, years ago…

“What’s this thing?”

Curious fingers felt around the wooden object falling from your satchel.

The man, with his eyes bandaged and bored out of his mind, was fiddling with your possessions. He resorted to this activity to ease his immense boredom, with no other options in sight (not that he had any at that moment).

“Don’t touch my stuff.” You wrestled the small wooded oak out of the man’s hand and tucked it back into the satchel.

“It’s a healer’s charm. The King doesn’t want to see people donning it though, so I’m hiding it.” You explained.

It took you so long to obtain this. It was so hard to sneak into the healers’ quarter too. What a shame that you couldn’t put it on. You could not be seen with this thing. The King had enough reason to hate you already.

“It’s not a healer’s charm. It’s an Oak Mother insignia. There is a woman on it, yes?” The man asked, unimpressed by your lack of knowledge.

It seemed he spoke the truth. The face was worn down, but one could still make out a feminine form edged into the pendant. You only knew that the guards were checking people to find anything oak-ish.

“You stole it?”

“I did not.” You huffed, digging a small pit in the corner of the shed before placing the small pendant inside.

“Well, the owner dropped it, so it’s mine. Finder keeper.” You pat the dirt a few times to make sure it looked completely flat.

He let out a disapproving sigh. But, considering you had saved his life, he wasn’t in a position to lecture you. He brought a hand to his bandage, tugging at the fabric. But you soon swatted his filthy paws away from the covered wound.

“It’s really itchy.” He complained.

“The wound is scabbing. Let it be.” You lifted the bandage a little to make sure everything was dry. Dry means good. No more blood and puss.

“Will I be able to see again?” He asked, his voice quieter this time.

“Yes, for the thousandth time. Your injury is external. It was the infection that spread to your eyes. The blindness is only temporary.”

You understood why he was anxious, but bothering you with the same question every day would not make his wound heal any faster. You counted on your fingers. The blindfold should come off in the coming week.

“Not to mention, your body also needs time.”

When you looked at him, you couldn’t help but notice his emaciated appearance. When you found him, he was so mangled and starved that you didn’t realize he was still alive.

His unruly beard grew into a thick, tangled mess, but he was adamant about not letting you shave it off (after you’d nicked him a few times and almost sliced his throat). He at least allowed you to chop off his hair after your bedding was infested with lice.

“Hey, Jackal. What’s Oak Mother, anyway?” You scooted closer to him to get some well-deserved warmth, mindful of the injuries on his arms and shoulders.

His brows knitted, still not pleased with the nickname you gave him.

“What, you are a healer and you don’t even know her?” He scoffed. His lips perked up as he turned his left ear to you. For some reasons, he seemed a lot more willing to talk today.

“I’m not a he— I mean, of course I am! Just tell me.” You pouted and poked his gangly forearm, making him hiss in feigned pain. “Don’t play with me. Your left arm wasn’t hurt that badly.”

“Hmm, the Oak Mother is old, much older than all the gods they taught you about. Healers and midwives used to revere her as their patron goddess. Some of them still do, such as the person you stole from.”

You had to hold back the urge to strike your patient. But it was exceedingly rare for him to engage in a conversation with you, practically never, so you let this slide.

“In the eyes of the common folks, though, she is hailed as the savior for the downtrodden.” He continued smoothly, as if he didn’t just call you a petty thief.

“You worship her?” You asked. How else would he be so knowledgeable about such obscure belief?

His hand moved instinctively towards the bandage over his eyes, but you intervened in time. Again.

His answer was brief, spoken in a gentler tone.

“I prayed to her.”

You understood what he meant. A person in his situation couldn’t do anything but pray. Had you not been in the right place at the right time, you couldn’t imagine what would have happened to him. He would have been left for dead, or worse.

“How do you know so much about her?” You were curious.

No one had ever mentioned the Oak Mother. You had seen healers wearing her symbol, but people in the court always wore all sorts of regalia you didn’t know about. Moreover, no one was willing to talk to the King’s bastard.

Jackal didn’t elaborate further. He didn’t want to.

Instead, he reaches out, his hand brushing against your cheek, in a “If you won’t let me touch my face, I’ll touch yours” manner. His thumb and index picked at the soft flesh.

A jolt of pain grazed your cheek, making you yelp and recoil from his touch.

“You— what’s wrong?”

He was sure he didn’t pinch you that hard. He meant no harm, just wanted to tease you a bit, so you could stop your incessant inquiry. But there was a sensation under his fingertip he couldn’t ignore. A small patch of toughened skin, slightly raised and warm to the touch.

“It’s nothing. I’m used to it.” You shrugged and sighed, rubbing your sore cheek.

The head maid always finds some reasons to strike you. Even if you did nothing wrong, it didn’t matter. This was considered a light punishment.

Jackal’s hand hovered in the air between you.

What do you mean ‘used to it’? A quiet anger brewed inside his chest. He felt completely useless in this state. Even his sword arm wasn’t moving well. He bit back the words he wanted to say, knowing they would be meaningless.

With a heavy sigh, he unclenched his jaws and dropped his shoulders. He searched in the dark to reach out to you once more. His touch this time was feather-light, brushing a stray strand of hair away from your face.

“Take care of yourself.” he murmured. You could barely register his voice, as it was no more than a whisper.