Page 64 of The Captive's Curse
Enzo.
His warmth, the strength of his hands, the spark in his eyes when I provoked him, the mischievous gleam they took on when he invented some new insulting nickname or offered me a phallic vegetable. His kisses. The shelter of his arms, and the delight of taking him in mine…
My eyes fluttered shut against the darkness, and I focused on Enzo to the exclusion of everything else. My magic settled, glowed, strengthened, as if the tiny flickering flames in a pile of kindling had licked up the sides of a piece of oak and caught it at last. I almost thought I could feel him at the edge of my consciousness: a steady, powerful presence, solid and reassuring.
As I opened my eyes, my magic welled up from the core of me, suffusing me from the tips of my toes to the crown of my head and flowing gently to my fingers, pulsing with energy, ready for me to direct it as I wished.
I’d never felt like more of a mage. And if I died here, it’d be as a man I could respect.
I moved over a few feet so that I was slightly behind where the door would be when it opened, got down on my knees, and drew a deep breath, summoning the desperation and need that overcame me when my curse assaulted me.
“Ohhhh,” I cried, rising to a pathetic wail. “Oh! Please!”
Silence. But it had a fraught quality to it that suggested they were listening rather than ignoring me. Well, of course they were listening, the perverted assholes. Men like that enjoyed mocking my kind—but their sneers usually hid a prurient desire to be the one to sate a dawn mage’s overwhelming lust. After all, no one else was going to beg them for a fuck.
“My curse,” I moaned. “Oh, gods, I need a man to help me! Please, fill me…” I broke off in a high, keening moan, interspersed with little panting groans, as if I were ejaculating then and there.
Fuck, nothing. They weren’t taking the bait, and how unbearably foolish would I feel when I had to simply stop moaning and sit here in silence? I kept going, my cheeks burning nearly as much as they would have from my curse’s fever, making sounds that might’ve embarrassed even the most experienced brothel madam.
And then there were low voices, and the key scraped in the lock.
Finally! I’d been running out of moans and also out of dignity. I put on one last burst of needy whining, slumping over as if too overcome to even lift my head.
But under my lashes, I kept my eyes fixed on the floor by the door. One set of boots. I needed both of them, come on, come on…
And then a second set of boots. Yes.
And then, even better, as I’d hoped—they shoved the door shut. They wouldn’t want to share, and they wouldn’t want to getcaught, either, depending on whether they were discovered by a fellow soldier or an officer.
“Don’t worry,” one of them said. “We’ve got what you need.”
“I do,” the other replied. “He’s never satisfied anyone but your mother.”
They both laughed, and I had to bite my lip to keep in my own reply—any of the dozen that came to mind, in fact.
“Help me up?” I whispered, and reached up my hands, spreading out my arms so that hopefully they would…
Thank gods. Each one took me by a hand.
And with my skin touching theirs, my magic had no barrier at all.
Enzo.
His name rang in my mind like a bell, and his strength filled me, and my magic surged like the tide, unstoppable and deadly for all its gentle appearance.
I followed my instincts, giving my magic an intent rather than specific instructions.Darknessandsilenceandstealthwelled out of me and flooded the men whose hands I gripped with a strength that probably surprised them—for the two or three seconds they were aware of it.
One of them let out a low, choked groan, and the other a sort of gargling rattle, and they both collapsed to the ground like their strings were cut. Someone’s skull cracked into the flagstones, and I winced, extracting my hands from theirs and shuddering, rubbing the sweaty residue of their touch onto the legs of my trousers.
I shoved to my feet, trembling in the aftermath, my breaths coming in heaving rasps. Fuck. Two men down, lying at my feet, and I had no idea if they were alive or not.
I really ought to take one of their swords, or at least a knife. But the thought of touching them to search for a weapon,or to try to find out if they’d survived, almost had me heaving my bare supper of bread and water right back up and over them. Fuck it. A sword would only get in my way and occupy a hand that I might need for something I’d be better at than trying to use it.
I picked my way around their prone forms, faintly illuminated by the light under the door, and tugged the door open a crack. A single torch had been placed in a wall sconce, and it had guttered down low, allowing me to see no more than a few feet in either direction.
From the direction of the courtyard, I couldn’t hear anything at all, either. The other way, I caught a faint murmur: maybe some men had gone to Enzo’s dining hall to eat, drink, or even spend the night.
I wrenched the door open enough to slip through, having to shove one of the guards’ bodies aside to do so, and shut it silently behind me. After an instant’s thought, I turned the key to lock the door and left it there. At a casual glance, it’d look like I was still secured, and that perhaps the guard had gone to find the garderobe.
