By the Horns Page 11

  My fate was mine, my own destiny. Shouldn’t I, I thought maddeningly, be the overseer of my own fate?!

  There’d been a brief moment when his eyes flashed that deep maroon, until it swirled with the red, rust swirling, a tantalizing display, to bleed so red it matched the crimson painting my skin and I wondered if he was going to rid himself of me on the spot. I sensed the same apprehension in him I found in myself. None of this made sense, this strange attraction, this sudden nagging need. Yet it felt right. Magick?

  My eyes swung about the room. No dust. No voices. No traps.

  “What was this to be, then?” The beast had spoken aloud, as if functioning on the same line of thought as me.

  When I just stared at him, hunching in on myself protectively when he would have approached, I remembered my daggers and went for one.

  Only, one was missing.

  My eyes widened and I gulped.

  I’d lost one! Where was it?! I’d actually lost one! Damn and blast, he’d actually distracted me and I’d-

  There. Over by the spot my pack had been. Bronze, gold, silver hilt and the pinkish white blade gleamed. I purposely avoided staring at it, lest he spot it and reach it first.

  Again, as if reading my thoughts, his eyes found the handle.

  My heart sank when he marched to it and picked it up, lifting it up to the light as if to examine the strange swirls adorning the shiny piece of functional artwork. Grunting, his brow furrowed.

  “It’s mine,” I fairly snarled, my upper lip curling in a sneer as I glared at him.

  The cool, calm composure that befell the creature, his gaze unconcerned as it met mine briefly, had my nostrils flaring.

  Think him this a fair fight now, does he? Well... Unsheathing my other dagger, dropping my pack to my feet, I moved closer. I’d fight him and take what was rightfully mine back.

  “This?” His eyes roamed about my person as his finger gently pressed into the white and pink tinted tip. A drop of blood welled, making his breath hitch, but he otherwise remained impassive. The matte tip turned red, glossy now, smeared with Tauran blood. It didn’t stop there. Before my eyes the blade blushed, flushing brighter, more incandescent, a glossy glow coating it, absorbing the Minotaur’s unintended offering. Did that sort of make it his now? NO!

  “It’s mine, give it to me.” I was feeling every bit the feral beast as he held what I knew to be mine and no one else’s. Odd physical want of the beast or not, I wouldn’t be persuaded on this.

  “Your hand, the mark, where did you get it?” He set the knife in his left hand, palm out.

  “Which one?” I taunted, holding up my map hand to waggle it at him.

  He blinked, then blinked again, slowly backing up until he was leaning against a weird section of wall, the stones rounder, smaller, forming intricate patterns like a mosaic, the largest squared portion to his left with a sort of pedestal and grooved dents. For a willing sacrifice? My brow beetled as I contemplated the oddity of it. Was I to die this day? Was Peacock’s deal so I’d anger the Minotaur and he’d slit my throat at the altar?

  “Here,” he murmured soothingly. “Take it, it’s yours.” His ears twitched, the tail sprouting out the top of his bum flicking across his rounded, furry rump in a hypnotic, distracting display. Left, right, left, right, the sound smack of his tail slapping his upper thighs was both entrancing and maddening. If it wasn’t for his bored tone I’d have thought him taunting, yet he appeared for all the world as if he couldn’t care less.

  Did the tail flicking mean something? Was this, like so many other parts of this maze, just another ruse?

  Before I knew what I was about I was moving. I’d moved so close I could lunge and reach for my blade now, but would he allow it?

  His hand lifted, making it impossible for me to jump at it and run. I’d have to walk right up to the creature and boldly accept his offering.

  “You’ll give it to me?” I took a step back, the dagger in my hand at my side, fisted.

  “You wish me to give it to you?” His lips twitched, blazing red eyes roaming my person freely. The heat from the steam puffing from his nostrils made my skin prickle.

  “Yes,” I replied without hesitation.

  “Well?” His fingers wiggled.

  Fury filled me but I tempered it. To an extent, he was definitely taunting me, the bastard.

  “Don’t think I won’t,” I muttered, mimicking his unaffected tone.

  Making a clicking sound with his mouth, he gave a half shrug. “Wouldn’t dream of it, vacha.”

  “I’m not vacha,” I grumbled, “I’m-” About to give him my name, I paused.

  “Yes?” he said slowly, a small, lazy smile tipping his lips.

  It looked strange, so very strange. Smiling bull men? What was to be next? Singing toads? And yet that twist of his lips sent a mass of butterflies fluttering inside me.

  “None of your business,” I hissed, contradicting the warm and fuzzies flushing me, and rushed him. I had my knife in hand but found a thick arm banding around my waist, spinning me ‘round and ‘round, to squeeze. I wheezed as the world spun, the black bladed dagger I gripped ripped from my hands as I clutched at the white tipped one. “NO!”

  A hand dug into my braid, clenching, wrenching my head back. The motion pressed my chest out, my breasts straining, fighting to break free of these stupid scarves crisscrossing them for support. I cried out at the action, then sucked in a sharp breath, chest heaving as the cold touch of my own dark dagger pressed into my neck.

  “I must warn you now, little sorceress, I don’t take kindly to games. You will cease whatever nonsense you have befallen me and take your leave. Your queen is no ruler to me.” The tip pressed harder, the unmistakable feel of my skin pricking, warmth slowly trickling, overwhelming me.

  Throat tightening, eyes squeezing shut tight, my worst fears had come true. Melancholy washed over me. “Do it,” I whispered hoarsely, gasping. If I was to die this night, it would be by my own doing. “She’s no more my queen any more than she’s yours, beast.” Or she hadn’t been anything to me, as far as I was concerned, until most recently.

  My scalp burned, eyes watering until they leaked. I was forced onto my tiptoes, the tips of my boots barely scraping the ground. The blade moved away.

  A slice across the throat, it would have been a swift, if ugly death, but honorable, as far as I saw it. Disembowelment? Bile rose in my throat, thinking about the scene in the room just beyond this, and the altar just ahead.

  What was my life in the scheme of things, or his for that matter? We were but expendable pieces, weren’t we? My thoughts were depressing yet accurate.

  A small whimper escaped me.

  His hand stilled and he stiffened. “You confuse me,” he admitted.

  “I’m no more a sorceress than you are a bull out to pasture, you great beast. You- You randy heathen,” I got out between gritted teeth.

  His laugh was mean, making me want to say something else, knowing I’d gotten under his skin, just as he had me.

  This strange, possessive feeling he incited in me, a sort of want-hate balance, made my head spin.

  “Think me a fool, wingless pest?” His hand twisted, bruisingly tight. My neck ached, scalp burning.

  That fire in me just burned brighter. “Yes?” I choked out on a gasp.

  His hand in my hair jerked my head back until I was bowing back to the point of grimacing discomfort, nape clearly exposed.

  “Ah.” I would have cried out but refused him the satisfaction.

  My neck strained, pinned in this awkward position. Each tugging wrench of my hair had my stomach twisting. For every harsh pull and stab of pain, my cleft throbbed anew.

  I was broken, sick. And being pinned down like this by him, helpless as he had his fill, and look he did, his eyes repeatedly dipping to the v of my poor excuse for a gown, I reveled in it. I’d yet to find a sense of gratifying sexual tension, gratification like this.

  I’m a dirty bastard, but dirty
enough for the likes of him? The pole tenting his groin was thick and prodding, jamming into my ass cheek.

  “What be you, then, beast?” I hissed, only able to glare at him through the corner of my eye, knowing he flinched every time I used that word. My free hand reached up, clawing at his hand at the back of my head. “I see an unnatural being before me, and yet I’m the anomaly?”

  Using my nails like claws, I drew blood, could feel it as flesh collected beneath my fingernails.

  “Anomaly?” That voice deepened. If I was hurting him he didn’t take notice or react. “This.” The arm banding my waist dipped, pressing to my lower belly, dagger in hand, his fist pushing my bum and lower back into a cast iron hard rod. “This.” That dagger hand hesitated as it started to delve lower, the hem of my dress askew. “Does this feel like I think you an anomaly, female?”

  The set of my face dared him to, eyes narrowed and shrewd but curious, mouth set yet soft, cheek twitching.

  He stopped at my curls, at the top of my mound, using his thumb and forefinger to grip the knife, the rest of his questing digits free to explore, as if waiting for me to object.

  Panting for breath, I held my tongue. Fuck me, I was so wet. And that’s exactly what I wanted. Needed. Craved. Fuck me.

  A wet, cold snout snuffled my neck.

  My eyes fluttered and I shivered, my flesh prickling from head to toe with gooseflesh. A long, thick tongue, rough and hot, snaked out, tasting, teasing, testing. A soft sound erupted from my throat, right as that long tongue crested the shell of my ear, his ring finger finding the small pearl at my cleft. I jerked and moaned, trying to muffle the sounds but failing. My hips jerked, chasing the feeling when he would have moved on.

  That probing digit came back to play. His heart was thundering into my back, his breath growing as choppy as mine as his tongue tasted and his fingers played.

  That finger slid lower, his pinky joining, and lower, until it found my wetness, teasing my opening.

  “More,” I found my wanton self-mumbling, pleading. His gentle exploration was proving to be my undoing.

  The meaty cock at my back gave a jerk and his hips shifted. He wanted to play to. I was aflame with want.

  A single thick finger breached my pussy, pressing deep, and I bit my lip hard enough to break the skin. It was all I could do not to cry out. Flat teeth teased my ear lobe. I jumped at the second harsh nip to the soft cartilage. My hips began to rock as his hand pressed into my flesh, pushing the hilt of the dagger against my clit, the motion rubbing it with every stroke of his hand. The hot, cold, of his hand and then the butt of the blade driving me mad.

  Nothing. Ever. Had ever felt like this.

  I wanted him, wanted that insane looking mess of skin cradling his cockhead to pull back, exposing his manhood. I wanted it all.

  The beast was possessing me, one slow, sensual touch, taste, at a time.

  Mesmerized, hyperventilating as I stood in place, knees wobbly, I almost forgot how to breathe. Noting he was suffering from the same malady, I reached back, sliding my hand down his thigh. He wasn’t expecting it when I reached behind me, my ring and pinky fingers testing the weight of the huge sac that housed his balls, making him groan. With a twist of my wrist I tapped the spot with the tip of my knife.

  “Now,” I whispered, pressing the tip in a little harder, glaring at him from the corner of my eye when he grunted and froze, “creature, you may release me, lest I unman you.”

  Unfazed or uncaring, he refused to relinquish his hold. “Mayhap,” he muttered, lifting me up higher until I had to adjust my knife, pressing it into the spot where his groin met his thigh. His finger left me and the knife in his hand pressed to my lower belly. “Mayhap, I wish to go out with a smile on our faces.”

  His hips lowered, my ass lifting automatically. The tip of his manhood slid lower, grazing my bottom, then lower, until it was prodding the skin between my sex and my anus.

  “Do you wish for this, my little wingless pestilence?” His breath was a warm hiss of a whisper in my ear, his words dripping with invitation. His hand tightened, my back arched, his cockhead slipped along my slick folds, once, twice, pressing against my entrance.

  He was thick, even with just the bulbous head slipping inside. Already his invasion began to burn. I wanted him to ram home, claim me, fuck me until I screamed.

  My pussy clenched. I groaned when he didn’t press any farther.

  “Addie,” I blurted, blinking rapidly. Moisture dripped from my eyes, but it wasn’t in frustration or fear or anger.

  He held still, waiting. That insane tongue swiped across my face, uncaring of the caked blood, catching a tear as it fell. “Addie,” he muttered, his voice low and guttural, animalistic. Steam puffed from his nostrils, large eyes closing as he bent closer and nuzzled my face. He puffed that steamy smoke right over the bridge of my nose.

  Squirming on the tip of his cock, clenched up so tight it felt like I was intentionally fighting the invasion, I loosened up all at once at his next words.

  “Addie-mine.” So sweetly spoken, a sing-song, crooning my name like it was exactly what he wished to hear, his face nuzzles sending warm breath across my face. It was like a kiss, this strange face rubbing.

  I’d never felt more owned, nor wanted to be more so than now.

  I wanted, needed, him to say it again.

  “Mine,” he rumbled out, groaning when I pressed down on his turgid flesh.

  His hips bucked when my sheath flexed around him, attempting to accept his thickness.

  My hips started to move, his hand at my stomach, fingers digging in, holding me in place. My ass bumped against his groin and abdomen with every roll of my hips, slow press of his cock inside me, grind of my pelvis. His hand in my hair loosened as he started to thrust in earnest. It burned but my body acquiesced. I was so wet he was coated with my essence. That newly freed hand went right for my breast, jerking the material covering it away, gripping, squeezing the freed flesh in time to his pumping thrusts.

  He was still trying to work himself inside me, my body resisting, the thicker he grew towards his base.

  I was going to take all of him. My hand slid down my belly, snaking lower. My fingers rubbed at the bud throbbing there, inciting the beginnings of an orgasm. The clank of metal tumbling reached my ears too late. I glanced down in time to find my black dagger abandoned on the ground, the white one lying right next to it, and then the world spun.

  “MINE.” The pedestal by the wall almost sent us tumbling, knocking the wind from me as we bumped into it. We fell against it, a heap of heated flesh and the wet, slapping noises our bodies made as we came together.

  We were in a frenzy, overcome with desire. This wasn’t normal—I’d barely just met the male—man—beast—couldn’t decide if I admired him or wanted to maim him, yet I never wanted this to end.

  Gripping the grooves along the wall for support, enjoying the way the altar pinned me in place, making it easier for him to drive his cock deeper, I bucked back against him.

  We both groaned as he gained more ground. Thick, warm hands gripped my hips for leverage and he pulled out almost all the way to the tip to slam back inside me.

  I keened, legs trembling. It was a tight fit.

  A lowing groan tore from his throat, more animal than man. His head thrashed, horns flashing in and out of sight, as he ground against me, desperate for that last few inches, to slide all the way in to the hilt.

  He wasn’t terrifyingly long, gaining girth where his length was no more than Thessen’s. The base of him was so thick I felt my pussy lips straining to accommodate him.

  When I started to squirm he snarled, his hips pinning mine in place before he began to move again.

  My Minotaur lover’s hands slapped down on either side of me, fitting into the larger grooves just above mine. Hand holds, a pedestal... A harsh scraping sound had me glancing up to find his horns scoring the wall before us. Red dust flaked off, sending bits everywhere.

  The beastma
n groaned my name, nipping at my nape in teasing, distracting bites that had me crying out, my inner walls convulsing around him. It was the picture that slowly peeked free, the ominous rattling of the walls as they suddenly shook, that gave me pause.

  As if to mimic our positions, a woman lay draped over the pedestal, just like I was, her well hung bull male mating her from behind. The beings floating above them, however, as if spectators in a sport, pointing at the pair, had me inwardly cringing. Faeries. Winged beings. Fae alike. My gaze slid towards the ceiling but the hands sliding over mine to entwine our fingers found me meeting a lust filled pair of vibrant red eyes.

  Leaning in closer, he licked my face, literally licked it, with one long swipe of his tongue that brought it over my chin, across my lips, and clean to my forehead. This should disgust me, I should be freaking out. A soft sigh left me as his snout pressed to my forehead and he let out a warm puff of air. The gesture was so heavily laced with affection I was stunned speechless. Why? I wanted to demand of him. And why me? But I didn’t dare.

  Rocks tumbled around us from above, icicle shaped spike formations. They crashed to the ground and exploded, each a burst of colors, reds, purples, greens, golds, a dazzling display right as I tipped over that could only mean one thing—yet more magick.

  Peacock had extracted my word I’d try to tempt the beast—well, fuck the Minotaur, were his exact words—and I’d done just that. Had we set off some sort of... event by coupling? Was that the trick of it?

  My Minotaur bent over me, shielding me with his wide frame, giving one last harsh thrust, forcing his cock as far inside my quivering sheath as it could possibly go to hold himself there, his hips jerking as he ground into me, emptying himself. “MINE,” he snarled out viciously.

  We stayed like that long after the dust had settled, a glittering display that covered the entirety of the dirt cave floor.

  I kept wanting to asking myself what the hell I’d been thinking, but then a wide hand would span the side of my hip, the curve of my ass, his breath hot on my neck, as he pressed his forehead to the back of my head, his massive horns on either side of me, muttering my name between harsh, panting breaths, and I told that part of myself to go sit on a rusty nail.