4. Cora
Cora
Over the next week, I look for the man from the shadows everywhere I go, but I do not see him. My mind plays tricks on me and I start to think I’ve imagined him.
I think I might see him in the great hall each evening at dinner, but then the person turns around and it is a barmaid or another member of the court, and it can’t be him. After three days, I sneak out of my rooms at night and roam the halls, looking for him.
There are few stewards and guards about at this late hour, so I mostly do not have to explain myself. If I am questioned—and I am usually not questioned—I tell them that I couldn’t sleep, so I am taking a walk to settle my mind.
When there is not a ball being held, the ballroom is dark aside from a few sconces burning by the windows. The chandeliers remain unlit. I do not cross the dance floor. Instead, I make loops of the balcony above, then pace aimlessly through the connected rooms.
I look for him on the outer balcony and do not find him.
Although his masculine scent seems to drift toward me.
Quickly I turn, hope and an ounce of fear blooming in my chest that he is close, but I find the space empty.
His broad shoulders cloaked in shadows are nowhere to be found.
It makes no sense that my mind should linger on the man, given he refused to even speak to me.
And yet, my imagination runs away with me nearly every night when I dream of him touching me…
taking advantage in ways no one has ever dared before.
I should be enraged by the disrespect he showed by not responding to a princess…and yet, the things I dream of are more than disrespectful. They’re downright sinful.
Sullied with thoughts I should not have, I go back to my rooms with my mind unsettled with desire. I find myself alone once again when I shut the heavy door behind me. Alice and Blanche have long since gone to bed.
Even so, I check to see that my rooms are empty. I lock the door from the inside.
Then I strip my nightgown over my head. I carry it with me to the bed, lay it across the blankets, then take off my undergarments, too.
Naked, I blow out the candle on the table by my bed and slide beneath the covers. They’re cool to the touch from how long I have been gone. Goosebumps slip along my skin as I shiver, waiting to be warmed from the covers.
And still, so many days later, I think of him. Of all the worries that plague me, my mind wanders to the man in the shadows.
Why would he wait for me on that balcony if he was going to disappear?
Why can I still feel his presence in the castle when he won’t show himself?
I smelled him. I know I did. That was his scent in the air, as if he had been standing there for quite some time, waiting for me, only to leave as soon as I arrived.
Or perhaps he left because I was about to arrive. Perhaps he does not want to show me who he is. Perhaps he knows I thought of going to him, and that’s why he slipped away while I was in thought. I let my mind wander as a soft pleasure pulses within me.
Maybe he is no prince but yet, he craves me. Maybe he felt he could not control himself. That at any moment his restraint would snap and he would cross the space between us and embrace me. If he covered my mouth—with his hand or with kisses—no one would hear me cry out.
No one would hear any sounds I made. Perhaps even sounds of pleasure.
And perhaps he thought afterward, that he had made a mistake. Perhaps he went to wherever he was staying—in the castle or in the village—and regretted putting such distance between us.
Perhaps he has been thinking of it ever since that night, with regret burning in him, until finally he can no longer stand it.
Perhaps then, he might do something reckless. The very idea is intoxicating. Warmth dances along my skin…along every inch.
It is nothing but a fantasy, but I allow myself to indulge.
I imagine him moving through the shadows so that no one notices him coming and going. His footsteps make no noise, and he knows the castle so well that there are many entrances for him to choose from. No guard notices or stops him. No servant sees him or questions him.
There’s nothing to stop him coming to the door of my rooms and opening it.
There would be some sound. A soft creak of the hinge and a groan from the wooden doorway. I close my eyes and imagine that I have just heard that sound—the movement of air and then an even quieter noise as he shuts the door.
I must pretend to be sleeping. What this man wants cannot be anything he would have asked for on the balcony.
Anything he might have asked then might not have been polite, but he would not have dared to take much more of a risk.
Not when it would have been so easy for me to flee back to the ballroom and the safety of all my father’s guests, not to mention the guards that would come running at the first sign of trouble.
No—what he wants now is something uncontrollable and forbidden. That’s why he had to sneak through the shadows and into the castle and into my bedchamber.
I know that if I opened my eyes, I wouldn’t find a man at my door, waiting for his breathing to settle so he could move closer, but I imagine it anyway.
I imagine I can hear him breathing deeply. Control is nearly impossible for him.
I slip my hand underneath the covers, exploring my body.
My fingertips softly and deftly make their way across my heated skin.
With no corset to constrict me and no gown to weigh me down, I’m open to exploration.
Gently, I pinch my nipples and make them peak, then cup my hand around each of my breasts.
I slide my hand over my flat stomach to the curls where my legs come together.
The sensation causes a soft moan to spill from my lips.
He’d love that sound, wouldn’t he? He’d want more of it and more to touch. More to explore.
With a groan of the bed and rustling of the sheets, I spread my legs and stroke my fingers just above my clit, teasing myself before dipping them lower.
I am already wet. My heart seems to be in my throat. I have never dared to do this, and now that I am learning the shape of myself, I cannot believe I waited so long. I seek out my hot, tight entrance and slide a finger inside, then withdraw it, my body shaking.
I find the bundle of nerves higher up and give it a few tentative strokes. It does not take long to find a rhythm that makes pleasure build under my fingers.
The man from the shadows crosses the room in my fantasy.
He cannot help himself. By now, he’s noticed that I’m not sleeping.
He tells himself he should stay back and watch, but he takes one step away from the door, then another, drawn to me as if a moth to a flame.
I’ll be his undoing, and yet that’s all he craves.
He wonders if I’m dreaming or having some nightmare he should wake me from.
But finally he’s close enough to see my shape under the blankets, and he knows what I’m doing.
He knows I’m pleasuring myself. He knows I’m thinking of him.
And he is not just here to watch. He’s here to steal me away.
That is why he stayed hidden. That is why he will not let himself dwell on what he is doing. Because he wants to steal me from the palace and take me to a shelter only he knows about.
He wants to use me for his pleasure.
“No,” I whisper. “Please. Don’t. I swear… I’ll do anything…” I plead with him as the warmth grows between my thighs and I circle my clit harder.
The words feel silly at first, and then they are not silly at all. Then they only add heat between my legs. My fingers are covered in slick arousal, and I rub furiously at those nerves. I want release—I want to come—but I don’t want it to be over yet. Not when I’ve finally let myself do it.
I let my legs fall open wider, stroking slower to try to make it last. I can’t get enough air. It’s so hot under the blankets, and it’s only from my body. It’s only from my desire.
In my fantasy, the man bends over my bed. His arms go around me before I can scream, and I’m lifted away from the mattress. There is no one to stop him from taking me. My maidens are not here. There are no guards in the hall. And the man from the shadows knows every hidden path out.
No matter how hard I struggle, I can’t get free.
“Where are you taking me?” I whisper, and then I become even bolder. “I’ll do anything you want.”
Casen
She’s fucking gorgeous. So easily taken by her own touch. I’m haunted by my desire for her, although I could never have her.
Princess Cora may not know it, but she has opened her eyes several times.
She keeps them squeezed shut while her fingers work at her pussy. It’s driving me mad that her decadent curves are hidden below the blankets. She writhes beneath them and I know exactly what she’s doing. My cock is harder than it’s ever been in my life.
I fucking need her. And she needs a punishing fuck for what she’s done to me.
The princess cannot know just how mad she has driven me, because she keeps looking toward the door of her room, and I am hidden in the shadows of her balcony.
It is unguarded.
If she were mine, I’d have ten men on that balcony every minute, but Cora’s father, the king, seems to believe that no one would want her enough to find a way to this place.
It’s far too obvious his mind is focused on loss.
I have sorrow for the man, but I am not too noble to take advantage of his sorrow.
I’ve already undone my trousers and taken out my cock.
The pain of it pressing against the fabric was too much to bear.
I could not drink in her whispers and her face and the shape of her body under the blankets, so I freed myself and wrapped a hand around my shaft.
My cock is already leaking cum. I fucking need her. Truly and deeply.
I did not intend to find my own pleasure tonight. Not as I watched her for other purposes.
My hand does it anyway when she whispers no, please, don’t… I swear, I’ll do anything.
God, she wants it. Look at her. She’s turning herself into a mess in the sheets. I can hear the slick sounds of her fingers fucking her cunt.
Then she turns her head to the side, almost as if she wants to make it easier for me to hear, and whispers where are you taking me?
And then she whispers I’ll do anything you want. I have to suppress the groan in my throat at her admission. Fucking hell.
I know she would do anything I tell her. She’s in need in the worst way. I heard the courage in her voice on another balcony not so long ago, and I hear the longing now. She is filled with lust, and she is thinking of me.
I force myself to stroke slowly, though I want to speed my fist along my shaft and come. My balls are too tight. I want her too badly. And it is even worse that the innocent Princess Cora wants me.
And she wants me in such a filthy way. Roughly and savagely.
I would never have considered stealing her from the palace.
It’s one thing to attend court without many people taking notice of my presence.
It would be another to carry the crown princess in my arms out of the castle, through the village, and away.
She may not think she means much to the people of the land, but she does.
I would give her that fantasy, however. If I could do it, I would give her the fantasy she’s having now.
I can already imagine how her lips would part as she came on my cock.
I don’t approach. I drink in the sight of her writhing under the covers.
Her legs are spread so wantonly that I can almost see her pussy despite the blankets.
She’s tangling herself up in them, panting with her lips slightly parted, and it takes a great deal of concentration to keep my strokes even and quiet. I cannot give myself away with a sound.
I don’t want to come before she has, either.
And Cora is fighting off her orgasm. She sighs and gasps and moans, tipping her head back on the pillow.
“Oh, not yet,” she whispers, and I nearly come at her words in spite of myself.
Cora hums and breathes deep, trying to relax, though by this point it is impossible. Her body trembles with the need for release. If I were in bed with her, I could show her what she really wants.
Perhaps he could control me in bed. Isn’t that what she said?
Princess Cora had been so forward with that joke that I know it was not really a joke. Now she’s trying her hardest to play both roles, but if I were there with her—
I could show her how pleasure is multiplied when someone else controls it. When I control it. Guilt consumes me. This is wrong. So fucking wrong.
I hold my breath, willing my own pleasure not to end too soon.
I never could have imagined how fucking perfect she could be.
I don’t know whether it frustrates or arouses me that we are so similar at this moment, Cora and me.
We’re both trying to make it last, but she doesn’t know—she has no way to know—that one orgasm doesn’t mean there can’t be more for her.
That pleasure can only intensify. That if I had her in my arms, and in my bed, I would control her just how she likes, until she’s so spent that she cannot imagine another orgasm.
Cora turns over and whimpers into the pillow, her bottom lifted under the covers and her hips rocking into her own fingers.
I let myself get a little bolder, a little harder, with my strokes.
My shaft is slick with precum. It’ll happen soon, whether I plan it or not, so I brace one hand against the outer wall of the castle.
“No, I can’t,” Cora mumbles into the pillow. “No, I can’t. Don’t make me. Please, I’ve never…I’ve never been touched before, no one has ever—”
“You don’t have a choice,” I whisper.
Cora cries out again, her whole body shaking as she comes. I’m watching her so closely that my own release seems like an echo of hers.