Chapter Two
She’d heard it. She was certain she had. Something had snapped. And just a few feet away. Her heart began thundering inside her chest.
Royla turned her head to look toward the dell. The two guardsmen had stood up. They were peering into the forest. Had they heard it too? Could they sense it?
The sight of them sent a shiver racing down her back. Had theynotbeen standing there, it would have been possible that one of them had made the noise. As it was, that could not be. It had to have been something else. Or someone else.
Her mouth fell open to call out to them. A moment before she shouted, she thought better of it. Perhaps it was just something small. Everything always sounded so much larger in the woods. Maybe it was a rabbit or a squirrel. Something harmless.
But her body wouldn’t let her believe it. She had to fight to bring herself to move at all. The earth and the air seemed to be holding her in place. She turned to look the other way.
Her eyes met nothing but the dark green shadows of the deeper forest. Suddenly her blood was hot, coursing through her veins. Her muscles were tense, ready to springto one side or the other if thesomethingrevealed itself.
The basket she’d been holding fell from her hands. The sound of it landing on dried branches and leaves crackled through the cool air between the trees. The two handfuls of berries she’d managed to pick spilled out, some of them splitting and oozing their sweet red juice onto the forest floor.
Royla cursed herself for being so careless. All that work for nothing. A finger of calm wormed its way into her mind.
“I’m being ridiculous,” she whispered as she shook her head. She began to explain it all away. The forest made all sorts of sounds. She’d just been so absorbed in finding the rootberries it had been easy to ignore.Thissound had just been louder than the rest. That was all. Wolves didn’t hunt during the day.
Taking a deep breath, she willed her trembling hands lower. She picked up the basket and closed her eyes, grateful to have something to hold onto again. Something that was real, not the paralyzing fear she was trying to quell.
A few moments later and with the berries that could be saved safely inside the basket again, her breathing returned to normal. She sighed and smiled, chiding herself for being on such an edge. Wolves indeed!
The hand that wrapped around her mouth stifled the scream that came tearing up from her belly. The ground came up against her cheek. She tried to push herself up, tried to make her legs kick but they, too, were held in place.
Thething, the terrible thing covering her mouth and pressing against her back was holding her down.
She tried to thrash her arms but soon found them pinned behind her back. Her hips were lifted. She gasped as the thin loincloth she was wearing fell away from her most intimate places.
And then a hungry hand was between her legs.
Her mind was spinning, frantic and shocked by her predicament. And yet her body was screaming something completely different.
Through the fear, through the blazing panic the attack had ignited, she felt something soften inside herself.
The hand was pressing against her opening. A strong, thick finger, almost like a claw, was gliding up and down her now dripping slit. It plied her folds apart, probing and insistent. It slipped into the mouth of her tight sex, causing her to moan.
Where were the guardsmen? Surely, they’d seen her? Surely, they were racing to her aid at this very moment?
She could hear nothing. Not their shouts, nor the whistle of their spears sailing through the air.
The finger dipped into her honeyed tightness again.
She shuddered at the hot pulse of pleasure that rushed up her spine from the intrusion.
Thethinggrowled behind her.
Something swollen and hard came to press against her flower. A hot and throbbing thing, easily as thick as her wrist.
Through her struggling, through the frenzied, hopeless wriggling, she fought with her own waning will. Even as she knew she should be thinkingno!, her body was betraying her. She opened her mouth to suck in a breath.
The musky damp scent of thething’s palm invaded her senses. Her resolve wilted. Her body opened. Her voice still muffled by the paw, she nonetheless could not resist the words that bubbled up from her belly. “Oh, Gods of the mountain, yes!”
The swollen thing pierced her. It stretched her soft folds and made her moan again. It furrowed into her tunnel, stretching her with slick wet sounds.
Drowning in lust, Royla lifted her rump, impaling the thing deeper inside herself.
Another growl came rolling up her back, making her skin crawl in the most delicious way.
