Iona
Numbness had taken over and I no longer cared what he did.
My existence had only a few coins attached to it.
Dornovia was a distant memory as was my mother.
This was Talaksia, home of the beast and beastly people.
I buried my face in the bed as his fingers began to move and the balm began to build an unwanted heat.
It reminded me of vines wrapping around everything that they came into contact with.
It did not stay where he placed it. The warmth crept outward slowly, the way a single vine sends out its first tendril before it finds purchase, curling low in my belly before it found something to climb.
My thighs. My spine. The place low in my back that no one had ever thought to touch with anything but a blade.
I pressed my face harder into the bedding, my breath uneven against the coarse linen. The heat did not burn. It coiled instead, tightening with every slow drag of his fingers, until I understood the balm was not content to sit upon my skin. It meant to root itself in me.
My fingers curled into the sheets. Not to resist him. I no longer had the strength to pretend that was why.
Something low in my belly clenched, unbidden, each time his touch circled closer to where I ached the most. The heat gathered there, thick and insistent, spreading like ivy left too long against stone, working its way into every crack until there was no part of me left untouched by it.
The monster did not speak. Perhaps he was not as deceitful as us, but everyone had flaws. No one was perfect.
I allowed myself to be taken away from my reality, floating away from the castle and back in our orchards. Where the sun was warm and the scent of blooming flowers from the trees filled the air.
His breeches pressed against my legs and I felt his member press between my cheeks.
It was hard once again. I was tempted to ask for mercy, but one must possess a heart first. I took a deep breath as he pressed harder.
Pain followed as he forced me open. The balm helped ease the thick tip of his member.
There was no care as he thrust forward and breached me. I clung onto the pain even as I screamed. I thought I would die when he began to move. I sobbed into the bed, clutching it as he continued to forge his path inside. It felt like a hot iron poker working its way into my rear passage.
Just when I thought his cruelty could not become worse his hand worked around my hips and his fingers pressed down on me before they began to rub me in a circular motion.
“Even as you bleed, you soak my fingers,” he said, his voice low with smug satisfaction.
The slow rhythmic strokes began to build the wretched heat once more and he began to thrust deeper. I grunted and tried to relax my muscles to lessen the pain. His fingers continued to move and this time, I felt how wet they were. Tears coursed down my face and the cotton beneath me grew damp.
“Yes,” he murmured, gripping my wrist and pulling it back. “Use your hands and hold yourself open for me.”
My head sank lower as I reached back and spread myself open for him.
He began to thrust harder and faster. Tension began to curl in the pit of my belly as his fingers rubbed more forcefully. My body rocked on the bed with my scarred cheek rubbing against it.
I wanted to scream no when my release came. His laughter echoed around me. A sob caught in my throat, but it was cut short as he slapped my hands away to grab my hips. He began to pull me back and forth on his member. I do not know for how long, but then a terrible roar filled the room.
I prayed that he was finished.
His seed flooded my insides and I sagged on the bed, feeling the warmth of his release pour into me.
“I might keep you an extra day.”
I shuddered and almost asked him to finish me now.
But I suspected that is what he wanted.
? ? ?
I hissed as I stood up from using the chamber pot.
Everything ached, inside and out. The sorcery of the balm was long gone.
My legs trembled as I straightened my back.
His tunic fell to my knees. It was the only clothing suitable for me to wear comfortably.
It did not matter that it drowned my small form.
I tossed the rag on the floor, beside the chamber pot.
As I hobbled back to the bed, tears began to well up once more when I remembered him using a similar rag to clean himself before he took me again. Thankfully, not in my rear. I sniffed and used the long sleeve of his tunic to wipe my nose.
I was carefully climbing onto the bed when the door opened behind me.
“No more, please,” I croaked.
“Borin, brought three foods.”
I held onto the bed as relief flooded through me.
“Thank you, Borin.”
He happily placed the tray on the bed. He began to chatter about how he beat his new pet. I inched under the covers.
I ate, drank and fell asleep.
Only a few more days left.
? ? ?
The beast did not return for two days. I jumped each time the door opened, but it was always Borin with food and some vile-tasting potion. It looked and smelled different, but I would rather feel my muscles ache than try one of that monster's balms again.
The silence was its own kind of cruelty. I had grown used to fear having a shape, footsteps I could brace against, a door I could watch. Without it, there was only the waiting, and waiting left too much room for thought.
I turned to my side, resting my cheek on the soft pillows and staring at the window. The birds still chirped. The wind still blew, but my body and mind felt fractured, cracked like a porcelain dish.
The world outside had not paused to grieve with me.
It never did. My mother's death had taught me that much—that the sun rose regardless of what was buried, that other women still hung washing and called to their children while somewhere a girl wept into a pillow that was not her own.
I envied them their ignorance. I envied the birds most of all, who had never known what it was to belong to someone who did not want you, only used you.
I prayed to the old gods. The forbidden ones. I did not pray for rescue. I no longer believed rescue was owed to me. I prayed only that whatever remained of me by the time my days ran out would not be too small a thing to carry into the next world.
The tears continued to drip onto the pillow.