“What did you do?” It came out as a scared whisper this time.
Marathin raised the hand not currently supporting his weight, and with the faintest of touches, he traced a circle around the outer edges of her mark.
“I blinded you,” he murmured. “Really, Selma, you must have known deep down what we really are. Through every evaluation and every drug they gave you, you must have known.”
She stared up into his eyes, trying to deny his words from taking root. He was right—of course he was right. Deep down, that nagging feeling nurtured by all the questions that couldn’t be answered—the ones that had plagued her for years—had never been silenced... Like how a young woman without weapons could have left that scar on her calf, or why some of them would follow her when they saw her staring at their otherness.
She’d never dared to think the thought through, because if she’d actually acknowledged the concept, she’d have lost her mind.
The shaking in her hands moved up her arms and down through her body until she was trembling like a leaf in the wind.
“Don’t be scared.” Marathin stroked an unnaturally hot hand down her arm. “Let it settle in. You’re special, sweetheart. And so very valuable.”
It wasn’t that his touch soothed her, but it did jolt her out of her downward spiral. She flinched away from him, unwilling to give him any doubts about her feelings. “What do you want from me?”
His devilish smile returned as he boxed her in fully, placing the hand she’d shied away from against the wall next to her head. Selma swallowed nervously as a few flashes of how he’d touched her body during the “procedure” passed through her mind. This time there was no doctor’s coat and no professional persona to hide behind—there was just the very large creature who’d tricked her into spreading her thighs for him, and her own raspy breathing.
“It is not a matter of what I want; it’s what I need. You don’t understand the value of what’s between your legs, my sweet. You’re a perfect Breeder, so incredibly rare. I thought you were just a regular Breeder—valuable, but nothing like what you truly are. Most we come across cannot tolerate a Lord’s magic, but you... you see the blinding mark. Your innate resistance to our magic is strong enough that you can survive being mated by one of our most powerful.”
“B-Breeder?” There was that uncomfortable word again, the one he’d scribbled underneath the diagram. “You want to... breed me? L-Like an animal? Are you out of you mind?!”
Monster or not—strike that; the fact that he was a monster definitely made it worse—that was not something you should want to do to people!
Marathin chuckled. “No, definitely not ‘like an animal.’ You will be bred by one of my kind, not another human. Your womb would be wasted on the rats already overpopulating this planet.”
“I don’t...”
She was about to tell him that she didn’t understand, but stopped before she finished the sentence. There was nothing to understand—not now. She could mull over everything later when she was safe. Right now, the only thing that mattered was that she was alone with a man talking about breeding her.
“HELP!” She screamed at the same time as she drove the heel of her right hand into his ribs, swinging the other at one of the arms keeping her trapped against the wall. “SOMEONE HELP ME!”
Marathin grunted when she impacted with his chest, but that was about all her fighting did. Even when she kicked at his shins, he barely flinched, and when she tried to dive underneath his arm, he easily caught her. He pulled her in, twisting her around to constrict her movements by locking his arms around hers, pressing her back against his chest so she couldn’t bite him.
“LET ME GO!” Selma tried to headbutt him by tossing her head backwards, but she only connected with his rock-hard chest, which seemed to hurt her more than it did him. She screamed again, struggling wildly against his grip, but he didn’t budge.
“There seems to have been a minor miscommunication,” he purred in her ear. “You appear to believe you are in danger; that is not the case. I took away your Second Sight so you could be more comfortable—nothing more. Calm down, sweetheart.”
There was nothing more she could do—he was simply too strong. She went limp in his arms with a defeated whine, breathing heavily from exhaustion after her short, but wild struggle to get free.
“Good girl,” he murmured, bending his head to rest it against hers. “You have nothing to fear.”
Selma drew a shuddering gasp when he breathed in deeply, obviously taking in her scent. Something hard started growing against the small of her back, stirring terror in the pit of her stomach.
“Please don’t rape me.”
It was a ridiculous request, of course. He was some form of a... a monster, and his kind had no qualms about imposing their desires on others with or without consent, as she had seen from the three who’d attacked that girl. Not to mention the things the doctor had already done to her under the disguise of a concerned healthcare provider.
The monster chuckled against her ear. “Selma. What did I say? You won’t be harmed, sweetness. You’re much too valuable, and I am duty-bound to kill anyone who would do damage to your beautiful little pussy.”
His erection suggested otherwise.
“Y-You say you won’t force me...” She drew a deep breath to calm her nerves as the thing at her back reached full size. “Yet you want to... breed with me. And I don’t... I don’t understand!”
“Shh, calm down.” Marathin cradled her closer against his chest—and by default, his straining cock—as if to soothe her with his body heat leaching through her clothing and into her skin. It didn’t work.
“I will explain, little Breeder.”
“Stop calling me that!”
