AllFreeNovel
Share Us
But it didn’t matter.
I knew he was listening, watching, probably laughing his ass off whenever Galantia and I argued over the most ridiculous things, only to end up fucking five minutes later.
Sometimes gently.
Most of the time rough, leaving her ass red, her voice a bit hoarse, and her cunt sore. But I was not Domren; I always kissed her in between, telling her how much I loved her, assuring her that I would take care of her after. And I always did, bathing her, putting salve on whatever marks my love had left on her. Then I kissed her, held her as she drifted off to sleep in my arms.
She always fondles my ass now if the position allows it. And I let her, taking the pleasure from it that she wanted to give me. And sometimes, just sometimes, I let her penetrate me with her fingers or whatever nearby object proved smooth enough. There was no more anger after it, no more shame. Because she was not a Brisden.
There was nothing wrong with me.
There was nothing wrong with her.
Or maybe, there was something wrong with both of us, but who cared? Even if we were both broken, then put together, her cracks matched up perfectly with mine.
“I made her cry, you know,” I mumbled. “Two weeks ago, she suddenly couldn’t shift anymore, making us all think that she was with child. Obviously, she blamed me for taking her ability to fly. It was hard not to laugh with how overwhelmed she was, tears streaming down her face as if she hadn’t been very eager in participating.”
I took another sip of wine. “It got us talking about names. For a girl, Valora. A boy, Quaelin. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it? It’s what you would have called your first child, or so Asker told us, had it lived. She isn’t pregnant, so maybe it was stress. Still, it showed me that a child will have to wait, and I don’t mind. There is still so much she wants to see. After how isolated she grew up, I can’t keep that from her. So we decided tolive a little. I hope you don’t mind that we did settle on those names for when the time comes.”
I slowly sat up, almost wanting to groan with how quickly the heat left my spine, and tossed the waterskin off the roof. “Once the winds calm, I will take her to Lanai. Show her where you came from.” I rose and readied myself to shift, but not without tilting my gaze skyward once more. “Thank you for all you did for us.”
My shift came about slowly, courtesy of lazy heat and perhaps a bit too much wine, taking us up along the Tarred Road. We rounded the perch, then dove down along the cliff. One swoop to the left, and we reached the dungeons set into one of our old, defunct mines. Something Galantia hadn’t discovered yet during one of her many excursions. Luckily.
A single guard bowed as I shifted and strode past him, and even that precaution was probably unnecessary. One of the few things I appreciated about humans; they couldn’t fly, making them easy to catch and even easier to keep locked up. No need for tightly woven steel, iron nets, or tangles of rope.
Only three hooks and crows.
I strode into the last cell to the right, grateful that I wasn’t a pathfinder. How the jailor could breathe through the stench of urine, shit, and infection was beyond me.
My gaze wandered over the motionless lump of meat that dangled from chains at the center of the room. “Is he dead?”
“No, Your Highness,” the jailor said, who was stirring up a new paste of ground seeds and tallow on a candle-lit table. “Merely passed out from the fever.”
Something that would have made me grin a few weeks ago now just… annoyed me. For years, I’d imagined the many ways I would torture Brisden. How satisfying it would feel, to make him a whore to things far worse than what I had endured. And it had been oh-so satisfying…
… for a day or two.
Until I’d come here to quench my hate by watching him suffer, only to return to the keep and find out that I’d missed how Galantia had finally hit the target with Sebian’s bow. Or that one night when I’d returned to our nest, only to find her awake because she’d had a nightmare, and had waited for me to hold her before daring to fall back to sleep. Along with another bunch of mundane, but all the more precious, moments.
And I’d missed them.
The light. The joy. The love.
I covered my mouth and nose with the sleeve of my shirt as I stepped up to Brisden, the skin around each of his shoulders visibly inflamed even in the dim light. It couldn’t be avoided, given how most of his weight hung from the hooks embedded into his flesh. The third one disappeared into his asshole, only to come up again around the area where his penis was.
Or rather, where it had been…
With a swat of my hand, I shooed off the crows that perched on his thighs and buttocks. I’d tried ravens at first—leftovers from someone’s unkindness—but alas, our wingspan took up too much room. Crows were much smaller… more fond of carrion, too!
That was what his asshole looked like, the stench of rot and the maggots crawling around the pecked opening, sending a wave of nausea up my throat. Brisden was nothing but dead meat, and he would have long died if I hadn’t instructed the healers to keep him alive. But what for? Right this moment, Galantia might enjoy a bowl full of mashed apples in good company.
I could be there.
Yes, I could be there, holding her, listening to Asker’s stories about how I did this as a boy, or how he’d taught me that. Instead, I… looked at Brisden’s asshole. If it could even be called that anymore…
When the jailor walked over with the leather funnel he’d filled with the mixture of tallow and seeds, I squatted beside Brisden’s reddish face. I stared at his closed eyes, expecting a rush of delight when the funnel was pushed into his ass. Or a sense of justice when Brisden’s eyes snapped open, and he released a grunt when the jailor squeezed the mixture into his rectum. At the very least, a hint of vengeance when the crows all came fluttering back, digging their sharp beaks into his rear to make him a meal.
But nothing like that came.
What if Marlahadmade mashed apples?
“This is starting to bore me,” I said, holding Brisden’s gaze, although I was pretty certain his mind was too far gone to understand who was doing this to him as he screamed in pain. No, not scream; he mostly grunted. Probably because I’d gagged him with the salt-dried remnants of his cock. “For ten years, I thought that this would bring me joy. It doesn’t. There is only hate to be had here, and that has started to bore me, too.” I gave the jailor a curt nod. “No more healers. Once he’s dead, dispose of his body. No need to inform me.” I brushed a strand of Brisden’s brown, greasy hair behind his ear the way he’d done it with me. “This pretty Raven boy is going to eat some mashed apples now.Caw. Caw.”
