Page 107 of Joy Guardian

Trepidation prickled down my spine with icy needles. I had put on a brave face for Dawn, but maybe she was right insisting on having the guards by the door. I said I trusted Kurai, but how could I trust a man who did not trust himself?

As the last word of the spell fell from our lips, the metal of the manacles had heated to scorching hot. I cried out in pain, jerking my hand away.

Kurai howled in agony, straining his muscles and rattling the chain. He knew the time would come when he could no longer control himself. So he made sure I was safe, no matter what, by chaining himself to the pillar.

My trepidation faded, and my confidence grew.

“I trust you.” I kissed his arm, then touched the chain again to make sure it had cooled now, sparing him any added pain.

“Don’t…” he begged, gasping for air through his torment. “Don’t touch…me.”

I took my hand from him quickly, feeling confused.

“If I don’t touch you, how can I help you?”

“It hurts—” a groan of pain cut his words short.

I ran around the pillar to face him.

His hair had fallen out of its tie. The thick, wavy strands dropped over his forehead, slicked with sweat. His wide chest rose and fell with his heavy breathing. And his skirt in the front moved.

“It truly is happening,” I gasped in awe.

A golden glow filtered through the material of his skirt. Thin rays of light rose from above his belt. The skirt over his groin undulated, as if shrouding a nest of snakes.

When the pain seemed to let go a little, Kurai slumped in his restraints, dropping his head to his chest.

“We have to take this off.” I reached for the closure of his skirt. He jerked from my touch, and I held back. “Let me see it, baby.Let me help you.”

He lifted his head. Need warred with fear in his eyes directed at me.

“You want me” I pleaded with him. “You need me, Kurai. You don’t have to be afraid anymore. We made sure you won’t hurt me. Remember? We put a spell on you.”

A shadow of agony dimmed the light in his eyes. His muscles contorted in pain again.

“Release me!” he roared, making me jump a step away. “Let me…” he started reciting the spell in reverse, tripping over the sounds and missing some words.

The spell didn’t work to release him because I wasn’t reciting it with him.

“I need…” he begged. “Please, please, stop this…”

His voice descended into tortured moans of pain, and I couldn’t bear it any longer.

“Let’s do this.” I came closer and yanked his skirt away.

Then…stared in awe.

The area that had been so boringly and innocently smooth before had bloomed with a giant chrysanthemum of tentacle-like appendages. Ink-black on the outside of the cluster, they shone with gold in the center of it. And they were all prehensile, moving and undulating like marine life in the undercurrent of the ocean.

“It’s…beautiful,” I mumbled, stunned.

Despite Dawn’s warnings and instructions, I felt completely unprepared to deal with this. But Kurai groaned again. He stared at me and he no longer seemed to see me, blinded by torture.

It wasn’t fair that his kind were born to suffer like this. It wasn’t fair that our first time had to be like this. But this was our reality, and there was no time to lament the unfairness of it all.

Willing my hands not to shake, I reached for him.

As if sensing my movement, the slim tentacles shifted and stretched in my direction. I brushed their tips with my fingers, and Kurai roared in pain. My touch increased his agony. But touching was the only way for me to end this for him.

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