#dbd reader

Anna lifts you up, you wrap your legs around her, gripping her hair for leverage.

She mutters something in Russian, a harsh tone that causes your thighs to quiver. “маленькая лиса,” she murmurs again, biting into the flesh of your neck. You moan, tightening your legs around her waist. Anna presses you harder against the metal bars, the bolts digging into your back in a delicious way. It felt good to hurt. 

To finally feel something other than the Entity’s talons snapping you in half or a killer’s blade into your gut. It’s exhilarating this way. 

You grunt when she reaches under your shirt, her palms grazing your heated skin in a way that tingles your nerve endings. Anna kisses you then, all teeth and tongue. You jolt when she unhooks your bra, her hands reaching to palm your breasts. 

She grips you so tightly, your hips desperately seeking friction. “Please,” you rasp, breath being pushed out of you. 

Anna nuzzles close to your neck, licking all the way down to your collarbone. 

In any minute those generators could be done, in any minute you will hear the chiming of the clock before you escape. 

You want to stay like this forever, close to the harshness of her tongue and warmth of her body. Huntress remains a terrifying force to be reckoned with in trials, you have evaded her every time. Being able to leave before she could take you down with her throws. 

Anna has always watched you leave, standing before the exit gates while you turn towards her, her pale mask tilting as if curiously examining you. Almost carefully deciding your fate when you two meet again. 

Laurie watches you closely, uncertain of what to make of your disheveled appearance. “Did you survive?” 

You cut her off with a wave. “I just got thrown around a bit, no worries.” 

“But you escaped?” She asks incredulously. 

You huff, worrying about the hem of your sweater. “It’s nothing, I won the trial. So whoop.” 

“You’ve won every single one with the huntress,” interjects Felix, eyeing you with suspicion. 

“Killers don’t leave survivors alone unless they want something,” Jane says. She walks close to you, leaning towards your ear. “Sometimes your body is part of the equation.” 

You feel burned. How could they know? Have the other survivors ever experienced this before too? Have they run into these unfortunate events with the killers. Where agreements take place and you offer them something in return. 

Jane’s eyebrow raises, a smug smile crossing her lips. She watches as Laurie and Felix head away towards the group at the camp. Jane just promises her one thing. “It’ll be our little secret.” 

You had Anna cornered, completely at your mercy. You moved her mask up, the way her throat bobs and her lips take shape to form the perfect curve of surprise.

“Got you,” you murmur, lips utterly close to hers. You wait to see what she’ll do next. Her ax still aimed towards your side.

She doesn’t slash it down to cut, she doesn’t seem to react much at this. To your enjoyment, it clatters down onto the wood of the shack as she wraps her arms around yours to kiss you with fervor. You moan, clawing at her neck, pulling her closer.

You want to swallow her whole and let her digest in your system. It’s ill fated and disgusting the way you desire her. The way you wish to consume her every bit. It’s an eager yearning that seems to implode in the worst way.

You push her forward into the wood of the den, hoping there’s splinters and loose nails stabbing into her skin.

You want her to sense all the emotional hunger she has caused you. To understand exactly what it meant for you to hunt her in such a way. 

She seems to mutter something in Russian, a husky tone shifting her to dig her nails into your waist, dragging them down to leave you marred. 

“You—“ you growl, biting her lower lip, surprising her enough to reel her head back against the wooden walls.

She groans, pulling back to huff. Her mask is still on and your lips are wet from her spit.

You want to feast on her skin so that she’ll only ever think of the wounds you’ve left for her. All for you and none for anyone else. You smile, all teeth and fangs. Anna notices how much of a surprising trump card you are. When you had first joined the team of survivors you had seemed so reserved. Somehow lost and doe-eyed as if you had no clue of what to do. Anna didn’t trust the fawning. She didn’t seem at all fooled by the game of pretend you seemed to be playing at. 

The sort of ease you fell into when she would chase you. Each and every time losing you in the thunder of pallets dropping, the dark mist coiling itself around her sight. Sometimes, when it’s stagnant in mother’s den, when the entity would let the other killers rest on rare occasions she’d think of you. 

You and your grin, your hand coming up to fight her off when she carried you to a hook. Sometimes, at mercy she’d release you, examining you at every inch. The muscle in the planes of your arms and the way you crawled to her indignant on survival. 

It made her inhale sharply at the scent of copper, fortitude and need. Anna has never been this fascinated by a specific survivor. Not one like yourself. Others couldn’t even compare to being as special as you. 

It made her suck in her breath, tongue rolling against her teeth. She prods the appendage against her canines harshly to taste the blood. She wanted to bite down, to completely leave you full of marks. Your skin and your body at her mercy. An innate need to consume. Instead, Anna had fallen into your grasp. She had lowered herself to let you do as you please. You tongued her neck, biting against the flesh and nibbling. Anna’s hands drifted to your hips, feeling them roll against nothing. Insatiable creature, she thinks. Merciless in your need to have her close. 

Anna hums when your tongue moves to her collarbone. She makes a noise of appreciation when you bite down, sensing the smile against her skin.

The world begins to crumble again, everything becoming a race against time. A moment to have each other.

It would soon vanish like the rest of this piece together.

You pull back, looking at her. You grasp her chin, thumbing her lower lip and dragging it. 

“‘Till next time,” you murmur. You leave then, finding the exit. You leave her there lost and worn. 

Her mind reels itself, hammering and reminding the way it had held you seconds before. Now leaving and to see each other on the entity’s terms. Anna grits her teeth, her hands fisting themselves. There will be a way to get you back. To have you here. Only with her. 

You made your way down the path. It had been simple enough, you had smiled. A part of you feeling on cloud nine at what you had all accomplished. Huntress was now in your grasp and that’s all that seemed to matter now. 

In this very moment you had her captured, a hare caught in the snare. The hare struggles to escape as you approach. Interested in the way it squirms, cries out to be freed. In the same way you know she must be feeling. It’s simple enough. 

What you did not expect was to be summoned by the dark talons of the entity. The world cuts itself open to move you through its many realms. You had ended up in the Red Forest, back here. The world shifts around you and you sneer. This could only mean one thing. You were starting in a trial. 

Except there was no sounds of generators being done and the crows seemed to hover in one area. They were watching you behind their beaks, curious eyes blinking at you from afar. You really had no way of knowing how you had ended up here. Unless the entity may be making special offers only to some. You frown at that, uncertain of what you would be initially doing here. 

The suddenness of an ax flying beside you causes you to duck. It passes by you in a spur of wind and you look to see the obvious answer. 

Huntress stands there, heaving as she holds the other weapon in her hand. You grin at her. “Well, well, look who we have here,” you say. You feel the flutter in your chest and the pulsing in your blood. This could be an easy way for you to get what you want. Maybe the entity was trying to give everyone what they wanted. A cease and desist to this cat and mouse game that seemed to drag everyone else into the fold. 

It only left you and Anna charged with each other. The lingering taste of one another on your tongues. “Did you call me here?” You ask her, strolling up to her. Not in the least bit concerned by her weapon, by the way you can see her dark eyes through the mask. 

She’s always been good at observing. She hides beneath the scenery, blending in and getting to analyze her targets in this way she can bring them down more efficiently. In this case, she doesn’t seem beholden to this. She won’t hurt you. Not in the way she should be, anyway. 

This had been only a game. To see how you could toe the line with the item of your attraction. Your obsession really. It had been about grace, about wanting. Really, it was to entertain you. You had been bored. The way the monotonous tone of this world, the surviving. You had been too strong for the entity to placate you. You had known immediately there was one you could get some enjoyment in the purgatory of horrors. You could find your own way to be sated. 

It was easy. In your past life, sex had been nothing. It had been easy to lead someone to your bed, it had been nothing but a game. A win for both parties or more. Anna had been different for you. She is a different conqueror, it takes a usurper to win over the power she holds. 

Anna seems to fight you, fight the familiar desire and sexual advances; yet she seemed all the more willing to lean into them. In a way she won too. She received something out of it, a distraction of sorts. 

She approaches quickly, grabbing your hair and thrusting her close to you. Her body seems to be on fire, like molten lava. A volcano prepared for eruption. You only sigh, feeling at home with this sort of defiling. It could be everything. It had been. You wanted this to be a long lasting feeling for the two of you. You knew Anna had nothing better to do. She may have gotten dozens of people with her looks, but you know better. 

You know she could never fully have you in the way she wants. 

And that makes your blood pulse and your body quiver with anticipation. You sidle up to Anna, kissing her neck. “Let this be a reminder,” you murmur against the heat of her skin. You brush your lips against the freckles on her tanned skin. 

You can feel her tense at this. “You can always come back to me,” you finish. 

When you leave, Anna’s eyes have closed into themselves. She counts down, hearing the familiar hum of an old tune; a lullaby from memory. A time long gone. 

You returned back, confident and thriving. Nothing could ever be this close to tasting some form of victory. Huntress had been in your grasp for sometime; this just solidified it. You hear footsteps encroaching and you see Jane, smug and arms crossed. 

“You’re a deviant, aren’t you?” She questions, you turn to her, not really up for any interrogation. 

You smile, a sharp thing, not wanting to deny the woman in front of you anything. She could know much more than you, have that over your head. You will not let her have the satisfaction of flaying you alive in some sick way. “I know what I am, but do you know what you are?” 

Jane smirks. “I would love to know what I seem like in your eyes.” 

You sigh, dropping your arms from the defensive. “We’re similar, in a way. Aren’t we?” 

Jane shrugs, knowing exactly what you’re referring to. “We all want what we can’t have.”

She continues, circling you, knowing exactly where you’ve been. “Sometimes we get a bargain in this shit ass place, something we can’t say no to. So we all do it, sometimes with the same killers or sometimes with others.” 

You look at her trying to read her expression. You feel a flare of jealousy, imagining a wanton Anna with a curvaceous Jane, her body rolled like a gift from the Gods. Jane grins then, serpentine. “Don’t worry,” she says softly. “You’re a rare one for the Huntress. She never holds any interest in any of us. You’re her favorite pet,” she whispers close. 

“Who else has been involved in something like this?” You ask, already curious which survivor seemed to have offered themselves up to the entity or the killers in such a way. 

Jane shakes her head. “There’s no telling, some of them are too honorable for that. Not me, though. And not you either,” she points out. 

“Honor’s fake,” you say. “There’s never been anything like it. It holds you back to what you really want.” 

“Oh?” She prods, delighted at your response. 

“To be able to control another being with just our presence.” 

Jane’s eyes glint, tilting her head to look at you in another light. “I knew I would like you, fox,” she hisses. You feel like you’ve heard something similar from Huntress before. A familiar phrase in her native language that seems to remind you.  

It had been time to give your monotonous routine some fun while being ripped apart by beasts and killers alike. Jane seemed to understand it, but the rest of the survivors looked upon you as if you had stepped from the fiery pits of hell. You would be covered in blood, needing a wash of some kind, but they all seemed to know. They knew you were only doing it to be able to get something you want. 

It wouldn’t be the first time someone existed in such a way, so you wouldn’t be the last to do it. 

It was unadulterated bliss on his face. Bliss from the murder of your friend. Or… Whatever this was. You never got used to how many of your friends died, how many times you died. You all came back. Fit as a fiddle for the next round, but just a little bit more tired and a little more desperate. How many times has your skull been crushed in? How many times has your body been torn apart? How many times has your fingers been bitten off? How many days since this began?

When did he decide that you were his?

He was such an odd character. A bright spectacle with human normalcy that stood out amongst the murk and darkness. But it was nothing but a colorful façade, that of a peacock showing its feathers. He was just as ugly as the rest of them. His mind just as fucked.

“Sing for me.” He’d purr, face so close to yours you could feel the wind of his breath. It was neither hot nor cold. Didn’t even have a smell. He wasn’t human was he? Not any more.

How long has it been since you were stuck in this realm? His realm? You never woke up by the campsite anymore. Only here in this tiny back room of the Crotus Prenn Asylum. You figure out this was the only place that would allow him. You weren’t aware that these monsters would be able to harm each other until he came hobbling back, covered in blood with the rabbit woman’s axe deeply embedded into his shoulder. He coexisted with the clown and the floating woman dressed in old time nursing clothes. You wondered if she pitied you by the way she lingered for a moment or two. She never stayed long, especially not when he was around. You supposed even killers had their limits. Or maybe she just didn’t want to see him knuckles deep inside you, forcing you to scream for all that you were worth. You supposed that was more of a mercy on her part.

You knew for a fact he was getting more pleasure out of this than you ever could. By the way his mouth hung open, drool pooling at the corner of his mouth and eyes heavy lidded mumbling something in Korean far to fast for you to understand. His finger nails digging into all the fresh cuts he made on your skin, forcing more blood to rivet down your arms and legs. You never screamed anymore, just let small grunts and gasps escape you as he sunk deeper into your warmth over and over again. You were hesitant to make anymore noises than that, lest he get the newfound inspiration to produce more of his "music" with you being his muse and starlet.

The King’s madness descends upon his people. His cruelty, his benevolence. It is all due to him and his succession to the throne. His singular purpose.

What granted him this position had been by his great grandfather.The Great Usurper, they had called him before his march to the scaffold. He had entered into the kingdom with a hundred man army, a grand coup that fell rightfully into their lap. Swiftly and easily.

And with this his reign had begun.

The King’s great grandson now, Alaric, had married a duchess north of their kingdom. A young lady with manners and a weak constitution. She never once looked him in the eye during the coronation, the grandest wedding that all came to seek out. From peasants to the finest noblemen.

She had been adorned in the finest lace. It had taken the lace-workers three years and one hundred expertise hands to complete.

And she did not once look up. Not to seek him out, nor to wish him anything other than her silence.

Alaric could only scowl.

Wretched woman. They would only be good for one thing.

When it was time for them to consummate their marriage, she had been quiet. He had been over her body, her warm flesh, none of it satiated him.

Fiora was her name. A witch in the flesh. A lamb to all. She could only walk forth to her slaughter.

Fiora had blessed Alaric with twin sons. Strong. Forthcoming. Soon to be heirs. They grew to be strong, until one of them passed in battle. The other had become ill, eventually passing at the youngest age of twenty.

All Alaric had left was her.

The princess. She had been five, all too young for this. Fiora could not speak any longer. She would awaken in the middle of the night howling in pain. In agony. She would rip her hair out in clumps, and scream for hours.

The priest had come the days passing, convincing Alaric his wife had become bewitched.

“She is cursed,” he muttered solemnly. “She is to burn if we do not treat her soon.”

Alaric sneered, despising her all the more for her foolish behavior. “Isolate her,” he decides. “Throw her in my tower. Let her release every demon she has.”

The princess would come day in and day out visiting her mother. She welcomed her mother with old tomes written in another language. She had been entranced by the illustrations. Begging her mama to read her the story, to translate what she could.

Her mother would eventually relent, only allowing her to sit upon her lap. She would run fingers through her hair, and hum a tune that did not sound of this world. Mama never read, she never spoke. The only thing she had was her haunting song.

This is all the princess could remember.

Rage is a light word for the princess. She has decided to become ravenous.

She refuses to listen to the orders of her father, and in her own rebellion has drawn enemies. Since her mothers untimely death, nothing could quell her. Lest she forget her wrath.

The princess, despite all her beauty, has bared her teeth and snarled at every suitor her father has chosen for her.

He throws her into the tower after the umpteenth embarrassment.

“You will never see the light of day, child,” he threatens. She spits in his face. Alaric wipes it with a cloth from his pouch. “Rot here for all I care. Don’t feed her!” He barks out the orders, and leaves the tower to let her seethe.

Forever frozen in some barren place. The princess smiles, unsheathing a blade from her person. If she is stuck here, she will draw some blood to make it good practice.

Time is on her side.

When the princess stabs her dagger through the neck of one of her guards. It is vilifying. Gratifying in the most cathartic sense. He gurgles, clutching onto the final remaining breaths left in him as he collapses forward.

She watches him writhe until he moves no longer. The blood seeped deep into the stone underneath her feet. She wipes her hands on her dress, smearing the blood all over until she can escape from this hell hole. If she has to take down any more she will. Until it’s her dying breath.

Let there be blood to feed.

Alaric receives word during dinner. One of his kingsman comes rounding the corner muttering to another. The knight hastily approaches, lowering his head. “Sire, we have some news from the south tower.”

The King gives one final wave to his company. A few dukes from the north and east, discussing trade matters and preparing for the upcoming winter.

“What,” he hisses.

The knight swallows. “The princess has escaped.”

Alaric’s smile disappears in a matter of seconds. Eyes sharpened like daggers, a snarl curling on his lips. The knight can smell a hint of mead on his breath. “Find her, or I’ll take you to my gallows where you’ll never see the light of day.”

Alaric leaves, the swish of his robes following him in finality. “Come round, come round. Let us toast to a new companionship, men!” His tune changes quickly when he returns to his table of guests.

The knight struggles to breathe, knowing what his majesty has threatened will come true. He calls upon the south tower to quickly pick up haste. She couldn’t have gone far. She couldn’t have, surely.

It had taken the King’s men several days, and there was nothing left to mark where the damned girl had gone.

Alaric smashes his hands on the table of his study. “I want her head,” he promises. “I want her blood to be riddled here. Her cursed blood. Insolent child!” He muttered angrily to himself. His main guardsmen watch his reign of terror, the simple blade he keeps close to himself is stabbed deeply into the center of the wooden table.

“Sire,” the commander whispers cautiously, hoping to end this tirade.

The king looks up, hair thrown around him, eyes blazing. “What?” He replies venomously.

The man swallows, adding in confidently. “People talk in the kingdom. There are a group of mercenaries. They bounty hunt, searching for heads. Of powerful men ruled by a Hungarian man by the name of Tarhos.”

Alaric’s eyes widened in interest. “Bounty hunters?”

The guardsman nods.

Alaric’s smile grows wide like a cats. He licks his teeth. “Bring them to me. I want them to serve me in every way to find my insolent blood.”

He dismisses them, his smile never leaving his face. He slicks his hair back. “The princess will meet her match.”

Tarhos’ claymore slashed down the sides of the remaining accompaniment.

The laughter surrounding him was Alejandro near him continuing the bloodshed.

Tarhos groans, collapsing in on himself. One of those men had cut into his side.

“Quick! We must take the sire to the healer, one not so far from here.”

Tarhos swats them away, gritting his teeth through the pain. The burning coiling deep in himself, something that makes him sweat and see two mirrors of his three closest men.

He shakes it away, rising by using the hilt of his sword dug deep into the carcass of one of the slain.

“I can still continue on. I won’t die here.”

Durkos watches him, a keen eye that doesn’t leave him. “Say it, Durkos,” Tarhos grunts out, removing his helmet from his person. Damn those imperial armies. Their weaponry had much more arsenal than their own; yet still not strong enough for them. They had mutilated all of the ten in a matter of minutes. It’s why they’re known across the kingdoms, Tarhos and his Guardia Compagnia. His faithful three.

They rose in battles, the last standing over mounds of deceased. They were known for their knighthood, loyalty to a certain cause, and their prowess on the battlefield. Men keep themselves close to earthly desires; money, sexual pleasure, or notoriety among bloodshed. Tarhos since as long as he could remember, has been swimming in blood. Born from the mountains of the dead as a child surviving the plague. They had taken him into the convent of monks and priests, raised him well until he set off on his own. He trained under mercenaries, skilled swordsmen, and bounty hunters. None of them followed authority except only their loyalty rode with them for the people who hired them.

His priest had told him peace will come upon him. Tarhos knew better. He was a child of death. Reborn again to live, just like Christ himself. “He walked after three days and three nights, he had risen from his tomb to set out on showing his proof. Perhaps, you are a mirror of him. Like in his image.”

Tarhos was. In many ways was the mirror image of a God.

A demigod they would call him. A monster on the battlefield and his three men beside him, the four horsemen. The righteous. The deathless.

Tarhos sets off somewhere down the tree line, Durkos trailing behind him closely.

Sander grunts, spitting off to the side, unsheathing his weapon as it makes a squelching sound after being removed from a smashed head. The blood smearing on the side of his trousers.

“Where to next, sire? The healer isn’t too far from here,” Alejandro states.

Tarhos grouses something incomprehensible. “None of that, I go where this path will take me. To the nearest village.”

“Aye,” Durkos says. “How should we welcome them, then?”

Tarhos sniffs, his lip curling. “With our blades.”

Tarhos and company await for the massive gates to open forth.

The men surrounding the perimeter eye them with vigilance. Durkus spits off to his side, wiping off the grime from his head. “What do ye think of these people, sir?” His accent is thick and hoarse from previous rampaging. Tarhos’ hands twitch beside him.

“Do they think we are foolish?” Alejandro murmurs, his sword weighted in his palm. He considers thrashing it again over the lifeless body of the last man he maimed. Alejandro does so in dominance. The sickening crunch resounded in the courtyard.

The other guardsmen make no other move, but the man who comes forward looks like the king.

He claps his hands, the strong palms echoing as the rest step away from the carnage. Sander lifts the head of one of his men, holding it up as a mockery of a white flag. Tarhos speaks then. “We come in peace, your majesty.”

The king grins wickedly. His hands open wide with appraisal. “Ah, Tarhos Kovács and the Guardia Compagnia.”

He then walks across the courtyard, not minding the blood beneath his feet. “I am glad you can show your skills to me for a heavy price.”

“What is that you demand of us, King?” Tarhos asks. The weight of his armor burning against him. He has exhausted himself after this brawl, feeling already lightheaded from the loss of some blood and a few aches in his ribs.

They had attacked him and his company ruthlessly, but these men were no match for the awful four and their strength. Tarhos knows pain. He has experienced it since he was a young boy. In his roots, he holds the deepest fascination with blood on his hands. The gritting in his teeth and the ringing of silence, he chases after that familiar sensation. The simple thrum of battle. Tarhos has banded together a strong number of men, willing to fight for his own gain. In this mission, he will be able to ride on horseback and live in a tavern with no other exceptions. Tarhos imagines the gold against his palms, and the joy of his three men once they finish what is made of them.

The King‘s smile is serpentine. “Come, men. Come feast in my kingdom. We welcome you!” He announces, the surrounding men jeer and Tarhos doesn’t relax.

“Do you wish to stay here?” Sander asks by his side.

“As long as we’re needed,” Tarhos responds. It is a simple statement. One his men do not understand. Conquests come and go, but following the orders of a King is not always one they come upon.

They eat alongside the table, gorging on fat duck, beef, and roasted potato slathered with spices and a gulyá dish that makes Tarhos devour it in one sitting.

The King sips his wine. “So, my knight and his company,” he announces. They don’t look up and the King continues regardless if they’re listening or not. “My daughter, my flesh and blood has escaped me.”

Tarhos’ slows his chew. “A retrieval for a person?” This should be interesting. He’s had to bounty hunt previously, offering the heads of many noblemen for a fine price. Some alive and others mostly dead.

For a woman. Now that would be different.

Tarhos grimace does not go unnoticed. The King’s smile is gritty, all yellow teeth and decay. “She has left, only for me to mourn her. Now, make no mistake. She’s dangerous.”

“What are her transgressions, sire?” Tarhos asks, suddenly curious. What kind of creature was she to evade a king and his men? Someone much more conniving than they take credit for. Obviously the king cares less about the girl. It’s not about saving her, it’s about having control over her.

The King swishes his wine, taking a rather large gulp. “She has committed treason against me.”

“Quite a large declaration on her part,” Tarhos responds.

The King only grins, leaning forward. “She is the same blood from her cursed mothers womb. She wishes to kill me, her father? I sent her off to one of the towers and somehow she escaped, killing two of my men.”

Tarhos raises his brow to that. Interesting, he feels a familiar hum in his veins, his mouth watering. The onset of a bloodlust wishing to set him free. He pushes it down, relishing what remains of it yearning to escape him.

“And the girl? If we were to capture her?” His three men cease their movements of enjoying their meal, intent on what their employer is to say next.

The King laughs, a deep belly chortle that echoes in the dimly lit dining hall. “Bring her to me alive,” he says, his face lengthening, dark eyes inflamed by the lamplight. His smile looked wider than normal, teeth sharper. “Death is what she wishes to meet.”

“What an odd woman the King has,” Alejandro says beside Tarhos. “Women should be more susceptible to our charms, no?”

“They’re fearsome things,” responds Durkos. “They’re just as lethal as we are, dangerous beings with just as much charisma.”

Sander nods, rubbing at his chin. “With the girl, if we were to find her–”

“When,” Tarhos interrupts him, teeth gritting. The weight of his claymore against his back is the only grounding sensation he feels. “When we find her, we’ll make her kneel.”

The threat of his promise lingers among his men, he ascends forward to the front of the group.

The princess has become public enemy number one. She travels on horseback, her clothes dingy, hair wrapped into a tight veil, a mask covering her face. No one recognizes her as a nobility. They can’t in any way know.

She had taken the dagger given to her by her mother. Her mother had used it on herself to escape from her frightening, beast of a man who was her husband.

The needle point of it had burned when she sliced it over her features, she had done this to ensure her father would never find her a suitor among awful men. He had been furious, had locked her away with nothing to eat for hours, maybe days.

He had punishments for her disobedience, her insolence. The princess held such a strong anger towards him, feeling an insurmountable rage. It’s what carries her onwards, to get back at him. She lives only out of spite.

He may be on his way to finding her whereabouts, but she knows she is much more elusive than what they give her credit for.

Tarhos sets plans to depart on the fifth day, heading towards the west.

Sander gives a quiet grunt off to his left.

“Do we know where we’re going, sire?” Alejandro asks, leading a horse down the mountainside.

It was very vague directions the King gave them. He had pulled them out in one of his cupboards, a sloppily drawn map of the surrounding areas of the kingdom. “Here, you can look at this. We look beyond the stars and follow this one,” he gestures to a bright one in the sky. “Follow this and it will lead you to the nearby town.”

“What does your perpetrator look like?” Tarhos had inquired.

“Édesem,” she hisses, mockingly. She throws his earlier name for her back at him. “I do not take orders from unruly men.” Tarhos doesn’t react, his looming presence not nearly as daunting as she thought. Perhaps she wounded his pride.

Alejandro grabs a hold of her. She kicks him in return, completely missing and he laughs. “This one, Tarhos, is quite the fighter.”

“She needs to come home in one piece,” Tarhos recalls, albeit begrudgingly.

Durkos snorts. “We’ll see if she doesn’t return bruised.”

Tarhos bristles at that, something overpowering coming over him. He slams his sword down, ceasing everyone's actions. Sander stands resolutely by his side.

“Were ordered to return this one back to her people. We do not threaten her for it is a liability. It’ll cost us our head.”

Durkos grunts. “I see no reason to keep her in one piece, she is acting as if she holds no tact. She disrespects you, my liege.” He takes a knee then. In a way apologizing for disobeying his leader. She makes a face of disgust.

Sander then grabs her by the face. Tarhos walks to her, removing the armor from his face to the young woman. She blinks, not nearly as shocked to find a normal man beneath the weight of chains and metal.

“I promise you this, princess. I’ll take you back where you belong,” he promises, through gritted teeth. She sneers. Tarhos has bowed to her, to this ungrateful young lady.