Chapter 17

Seraphina.

Tears roll down my cheeks as I sit in the bath, but I don’t notice them. I wipe them away quickly. Me and the prince—I’m surprised I’m this affected.

The warm water caresses my limbs, washes off the stress of the morning. Gods this was a long day, I think to myself. I get a flash of Ivy’s bruised face. Her arm bent the wrong way, her dark hair encrusted with dried blood…I shut my eyes tightly to make the memory go away.

My fingers brush the skin on my collarbone.

No more Alaric. No more soft touch on the small of my back. No more hard muscles rippling beneath my fingertips.

My hand moves down lower.

The frank gaze of his eyes on my body. The only person I’ve ever let see me in my entirety. The only person I’ve ever felt safe enough to let in.

But maybe if I hadn’t been with Alaric I would have noticed that Ivy had been away. Maybe I would have been able to find her before she’d gotten hurt.

I put my head under the water to cleanse myself of what could have been.

What kind of a world would it be if Alaric and I could be together without fear? A world in which my parents would still be alive.

But that’s not this world. They were so foolish. I won’t repeat their mistakes.

Still the prince’s eyes torment me, and the pulse between my thighs quickens in response. The memory of him can’t hurt me. The memory of him can’t cause me pain.

I remember the frank beauty of his cock standing at attention for me. A bead of wetness glistened on the tip. I felt drawn to it like a moth to a flame — as soon as I saw it I wanted it inside me.

I imagine what it would be like to kiss his hard cock. How the soft skin of it would feel against my lips.

In my fantasy I run my tongue along the shaft and perch my lips on the tip of his cock. My hand moves down lower between the water, brushing my navel.

“Miss Darkwater?” comes a woman’s voice from behind the door. Before I can get out of the water, white-robed Lady Luna Silverthorn has burst through the door.

“Oh Gods!” she exclaims. “I’m so sorry!” Her face reddens and she rushes back behind the door, robes swishing behind her. I catch a glimpse of her expression and see jealousy there. It only takes a split second.

I hide myself from women as well as men. After seeing me, women always grow to hate me. They resent me — don’t trust me after they’ve seen me.

“Ivy is recovering well,” says Lady Silverthorn with a muffled voice from behind the door. “However she may have some difficulties later on. I’m doing everything in my power to ensure her full recovery.”

What does she mean by difficulties?

“Thank you Lady Silverthorn,” I say loudly, though I want to sink my head beneath the water and forget she ever saw me naked — and unveiled — in the midst of recalling the cock of Prince Alaric Thornheart.

“You’re welcome Miss Darkwater,” says Lady Silverthorn, and shuts the door firmly, leaving me to finish my bath.

I heave a big sigh and lean back into the water. It’s incredible that Lady Silverthorn is even willing to touch a low-born like Ivy. It speaks to her compassionate nature that she is willing to look past our low caste. To many in the palace we are considered unclean.

Gods, I think, what a complicated world this is. One in which the poor are not considered human by those in power. I shudder to think of how narrowly I missed death at the summer festival just a few short days ago. When I first saw the ice blue eyes of the prince…

Who could have thought that we make love, Alaric and I. And what might it be like to be together again?

The thought of him reignites the flame between my thighs. I move my hands down my body, caressing it, imagining that my hands were his.

This is how I can have him safely.

I remember the feeling of his lips on my nipples. The way he flicked his tongue across them, sucked on them… I pinch my nipples and imagine that it’s Alaric nibbling them. I caress my full, pert breasts and imagine that it’s his touch.

My wet breasts glisten in the lamplight, floating gently and breaking the surface of the bath. I wish that Alaric were here to see them, to admire them as I do. It’s only in his gaze that my beauty doesn’t feel like a curse.

On their own accord my hands move lower, running over my stomach, my hips, my inner thighs. I picture his body wet with river water that night that we first saw each other, the night that started all of this.

I imagine what it would have been like if we had gone to each other that night in the river, if my fear hadn’t gotten the better of me.

I remember the moonlight reflecting off of the river water, Alaric’s hard body emerging from the mist. Moonlight illuminated his alabaster skin, hard muscles.

I picture myself moving towards him in the water, staring directly into his piercing light blue eyes. In my fantasy I run my hands over his hard chest and kiss his neck. He grips me tightly to him, and breathes hard as I grip his hard iron.

In the bath I touch my cunt delicately, teasing myself, building myself closer to orgasm.

I envision Alaric’s soft lips on mine, his tongue teasing mine. In my fantasy his cock slides between my legs in the river water, exciting me.

I picture him entering me in the river, taking me right then and there. His hard shaft throbbing within me. I give myself to him completely—

My whole body tenses and shudders with a powerful orgasm.

I sink back into the water glowing with the memory of Alaric Thornheart. Lamplight softens the room.

Suddenly, I feel a change in the air. I feel cold, though the water is still warm. My vision begins to cloud, grow dark.

Ice. I feel as though my core is frosting over, as though something has gripped my heart in a vice. I shake with fear. What is this?

“Sssseraphinaaaa,” hisses a voice as though coming from within my own soul.