31 Rapunzel
Holding Zarev’s hand, we shadow hop through Tressa. I beg him to take us down to the village, just so I can see for myself that the people of Tressa are truly dead.
There isn’t a sound to be heard. The ships are sunk in the distance, and the kingdom is eerily quiet. When I spot the first few bodies lying in the street, blank eyes open forever, I turn and let him take us away from this place.
The kingdom is gone. Tressa fell with the wall, and I have no intentions of trying to raise it. Too many died for selfish reasons, and it’s time to let the dead rest.
We flash through the gardens, but the flower that we both arrived in is crushed from the trees and stones that toppled into the garden. Guards that I thought were alive a little bit ago lie dead, and my head swivels around as we zip through the land.
I can’t find Cheshie, which leaves my heart in pieces. My cat might be a man in disguise, but he’s still the only one I could call a friend through the long years in the tower. Try as I might, we can’t locate him as a feline or a person, and with the crushing weight of the dead surrounding us, Zarev makes us leave.
It’s a good thing we can’t talk in the shadows, or I would beg him to stay here longer. When I leave the kingdom, the last of a royal bloodline, Tressa will forever be in the past. There will be nothing left of the life I once led.
As we approach Sherwood, the spirits start to appear. Some look confused, others angry, and I had temporarily forgotten that the spirits can see us in the shadows. I curl into his chest, watching the betrayal flicker across their faces as we leave.
Zarev’s jumps between shadows get shorter and shorter as we go. He’s fast running out of energy, and it doesn't escape me that he chose to save me over reaping any of the dead,
It’s the selfish choice, but I can’t make myself care. I’ve given everything for Tressa, and now there’s nothing to show for the efforts.
Without having to climb over the wall we arrive quickly in Sherwood and Zarev continues to pull us along as darkness falls over the land. We’re in the thick of the woods before he finally stops, dropping us beneath a large tree before staggering to his knees.
I fall beside him, grasping his shoulders. “You've used too much energy.”
But he just shakes his head. “We needed distance between us so the souls don’t search for me. The pull to Tressa is strong right now because of what Midas did. They’re confused and lost, and will need to be reaped soon before they turn volatile.”
I bite my lip, running my hands over his chest. I still worry that my father’s influence will linger. “We could walk from here.”
He shakes his head, sitting more comfortably on the ground. “All the focus right now is on the fallen kingdom. We can rest here for a while until I get some energy back, then we can head back towards The Missing Shoe.”
The idea sounds so… mundane after the past few days. “Will they welcome us there? We could be targets now for the Queen,”
“We always have been,” he reminds me, the words ringing true. “We just didn’t realize how deep her obsessions go.”
I mull over his words as Zarev shifts away from me, dragging out the water skin and digs around in his tattered brown cloak. I’m more than a little surprised when he pulls out that vial of pixie dust, the yellow powder glowing gently in the light.
“Amazing that it didn’t break,” I grumble.
“The glass is blown by fairies,” he tells me, dragging random pieces of wood into a pile. After watching him do this a couple times, I’ve learned that if you pour the pixie dust on something that isn’t living, and it’s flammable, it will catch fire no matter what.
Falling back on my backside, I watch him work. Everything in me wants to give into exhaustion, my eyes so heavy they hurt, but I know I won’t be able to fall asleep.
We’re alive. By all right we should be dead.
When the fire is gently going, I slide over to him and rest my head on his shoulder. I don’t know what’s coming next, but for the first time in my life I know that come what may, I’ll never be alone.
Zarev chose me, and I’m choosing him. Come hell or heaven, we have each other.
Exhaustion drags me under not long after he builds a fire. I think he pulled the seeing stone from his cloak and spoke with Raymundo, but that might be part of my dream.
Ghostly touches stir me awake, and instead of trying to close my thighs at the intrusion I part them wider, the familiar, teasing touch of shadows climbing my thighs as I fight the grogginess.
After almost losing Zarev a few times in the last several hours, I desperately want to feel connected to him.
Cracking my eyes open, the star-filled sky illuminates his dark hair and red-orange eyes, his body tilted above mine as the shadows play. He’s lost his cloak, and even in the low light of the fire I can tell he’s missing his shirt too.
I reach up, trailing my fingers across his skin. He’s as real as I am, and I refuse to let him go. He leans down, ghosting his lips over mine as lightly as the shadows touch me, and that just won’t do.
Gripping his arms, I drag him down to me, his body slamming into mine with that pleasant, familiar weight. He growls, deepening our kiss, and I wrap my arms and legs around him to keep him against me.
His kisses turn to nips, and I’m reminded of the wolfish side I’m still getting acquainted with. Turning his head, he bites down hard on my neck, and I moan into the night as he pulses his hips against me.
“You look so good in the starlight,” he grunts, and the shadowy hands push up beneath the tattered dress, pressing against my dripping core as he teases. I am so ready for him to touch me, his teasing driving me mad. “And you’ll look better coming on my cock.”
I grin beneath him, dragging my nails down his torso. They are broken from the last few days, leaving faint lines on his skin. “And you’ll look better coming inside me.”
He flashes me a grin before the shadows push up and I feel the shadows form fingers that plunge deep inside of me.
I cry out, but he lifts a hand, and shadows envelop my face like a dark mask. I gasp, the sound disappearing as the shadows swallow them.
His hands are all over me, ripping the front of my dress to tease my nipples. I shake beneath him, thinking of all the ways he can use me if I can’t see. I want him to shut off my brain and let me think about nothing but pure sex for a while.
His weight shifts, and the shadowy pressure grabs both of my arms before they are pinned over my head. His real hands disappear for a moment as well, and I whimper at the loss.
Then the shadows open, just for my mouth, and the thick head of his cock presses against my lips. “Open for me, little Life.”
I moan at the nickname, something about it making my insides twist pleasantly. It’s not Princess or Golden Girl or anything else I’ve ever heard before. It’s something that only Zarev can call me, because he’s the only one who knows how much I can really control.
His cock pushes to the back of my throat in one hard thrust, and I realize he’s kneeling at my shoulders, his hands reaching through the dark to grip my hair. My nails find his thighs, digging into the skin, and he grunts as he pumps into my mouth.
His shadow fingers continue to play with my pussy, another teasing my ass. I can think of all the ways I want him to touch me tonight, but all I can do right now is lie back and take it as he fucks deep into my mouth, making me choke around him.
“Such a good girl,” he grunts, his pace punishing as he keeps me pressed to the ground. I wish I could see something, but not knowing his next move heightens my senses.
His shadows pull out of me to spread my pussy lips wide, and then he’s entering me again. I gasp and whimper at the intrusion, trying to lift my weight and seek more from him. IT’s shadows, so there’s no end. He can fuck into me as deeply as he wants.
“Be good and sloppy, Princess,” he growls, making me choke again. “You want me nice and wet when I take your ass too.”
My body tenses for a moment at the thought, realizing this is going to be painful, but his shadows continue to fuck into me, pulling and teasing my nipples until they are oversensitive, and the worries fall away.
He can take care of me as well as he can punish me. And right now I need to feel something real.
Lifting my head a bit, I try to match his thrusts, but it just sends my head flying back into the dirt. The shadows must cushion my blow, and I feel his real hand slide from my hair down to my nose, pinching my airway closed.
I shudder beneath him, the shadows picking up speed at every hole, and one is edging into my ass too. I don’t know which way to shake, and every thrust enters as he pulls back in a different hole, so I’m never empty for a whole second.
It’s overwhelming. Overpowering. I come with a violent scream, one he dissipates the shadows just to hear.
His eyes are red when I see them again, a primal look on his face as he releases my nose and I suck in air. “You might be my personal death, Princess.”
The shadows don’t stop fucking me as he pulls back, and I half help him roll me on my stomach. I brace my hands into the dirt, prepared for the pain as much as the pleasure, and his shadows spread me wide as he preps.
His hands grab my hips, pulling me up and back as the shadows continue, putting me on my hands and knees. Another shadow shoves beneath my chin, tilting my face up towards the sky.
Zarev hums, and I feel his wet cock pressing at my tightest hole. I gasp, eyes widening as he lines himself up. The shadow at my ass stops moving, and I feel more ghostly touches on my skin, rubbing against my clit. But Zarev’s real hands press against my butt before stretching my cheeks open. “Don’t worry, little Life. You’ll love this, too.”
I gasp at the sudden intrusion, the flicker of pain reminding me why the one time I was asked to try anal, I turned the offer down. There’s a slight burn, but the shadows playing with the rest of me help to distract. He keeps his palms in place as he slides in, not exactly gentle but not tearing into me either.
I’m panting, my nails scraping up clumps of the earth as he works his way in. I’m pretty sure he will split me before he bottoms out, or maybe that’s just the pain talking.
“Shh, you’re doing so good, Princess,” he grunts, one hand moving to smooth over my hair. I throw my head back, the touch both comforting and stimulating, and he switches to twisting his fingers into the locks and pulling.
I moan, rocking back into him and taking the last inch that leaves me gasping. “Harder.”
He chuckles, tearing my head back so the sky greets me. My back arches at the touch, and my ass shakes against him as he thrusts deep, making my body thrive with need. I don’t know what to do with myself while I can’t see him, my moans echoing in the space around us and getting lost in the trees.
His other hand releases my cheek, smacking my ass hard enough I buck back into him. The pain is quickly replaced by pleasure as I ride the high that only Zarev can take me too.
With his free hand, he does something I can’t see. I fall forward on my forearms as he rams harder into me, making my body rock with every thrust. It’s too powerful, the anger and pain from the last several days building between us to an explosive level.
Then something wraps around my throat. Not the shadows, but my hair like rope. He pulls hard, and I gasp around the homemade necklace he’s fashioned for me, one that’s cutting off my air in the best way.
“Come around my shadows, little Life,” he growls, tightening his hold on the hair that wraps at my throat. His other hand returns to my hip, speeding up his thrusts, and I press my cheek down into the ground and cry out around him.
The shadows in my pussy pulse, widening, making my eyes roll. There’s no comparison between Zarev’s magic and anyone else, not when he also comes with a cock that makes my body ache in the best ways. I claw at the dirt, moaning as he fucks deep into both of my holes, my breathing ragged as he takes me hard.
“Come,” he growls, and he pushes deep inside my ass. The knot he told me about before latches us together, widening the stretch, and I cry out as waves of pleasure slam over me.
The shadowy touches linger, continuing to work my body like a toy, easing the ache of him buried deep inside me as he rides out his own orgasm. I groan when his shadows leave my clit, rocking back into him before they gently slide from my drenched core too.
I’m breathing so hard, I know everyone in the woods around us knows what we were up to. If anyone is out there looking, we will be easy to find.
But truly, who could scare us after seeing the Mad Queen and Midas all in the same day?
He squeezes my ass as he releases the hold on my hair, and the silky locks spill forward around me. I slump as he slowly pulls his cock free, making me whimper at the feel. When his cock pops free, he holds my hips and guides me over to lie on the ground. Something soft is beneath me, and fingering the material I realize it’s his missing cloak.
Above us the stars shine on, and other than our panting breaths the world is blissfully quiet.
After a moment Zarev slides in behind me, pulling me back and tight into his chest. I snuggle in, rubbing my cheek against the arm that slips beneath my head, and he drags the extra material of the cloak over to cover me. My eyes are already closed as his other arms wrap around my middle.
“Sleep now, my sweet princess. Tomorrow, your world is brand new.”