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A boggy, fetid smell drifted from the woods, as if somewhere, deep in the shadows, something watched.
“I hope you’re ready for all of us.” Estienne slurred, his fingers finding my nipple and twisting, hard enough I whimpered. “When you scream, you little whore, no one will ever hear you.” Panic exploded into terror and I twisted away, but there were too many of them.
The Lord regripped my hair, dragging me deeper into the garden. I lost one shoe. Then the other. “One of you worthless sots help me.” Berenger growled. “This one’s a wildcat.”
I kept fighting, my bare heels digging furrows in the gravel as the six of them hauled me along, gripping me so viciously I’d be bruised. When we reached the center of labyrinth, they dropped me to the ground.
“Shouldn’t you be celebrating your betrothal to Evangeline?” The question slipped out, while my brain screamedshutupshutupshutup. “Instead of chasing servants around the garden?”
Worse.Taunting a Descendant was worse than fighting back, and I was thrown face first against a tree and pinned down by two of the males, the rough bark scraping the skin off my cheek.
“You will keep your filthy mouth shut about my betrothed. You’re not fit to utter her name.” Berenger hissed, stripping off his belt, my lungs turned ten times too small at the sharp snap of leather. I’d been beaten enough times I knew what was coming.
How much this would hurt.
“Hold her down, and keep her quiet, I don’t want anyone to wander by and ruin our fun.” My wrists were pinned roughly to my sides, sweaty hands held me down as Estienne stuffed something rancid into my mouth, so deep I couldn’t spit it out.
“I am going to whip you for your insolence. Then we will fuck you, after which you can crawl back to the Mistress and beg her forgiveness for disappearing on such an important night.” Berenger leaned close and made a tutting sound, I gagged on the foulness of his breath.
“The night of my Evangeline’s coming of age. I doubt, in all the festivities, they’ll notice your absence until morning.” His voice held an edge of maliciousness that told me, to my bones, I would not be walking out of this garden.
Crawling was far more likely.
Pinned face first to the tree, I thrashed against the males holding me down, tried to spit the cloth out of my mouth, to stop Berenger’s knee from working between my thighs, forcing them apart.
“My guess is, the Mistress will whip you publicly. Shame, I shall be on my honeymoon and will miss the display.” Berenger straddled me, one hand gripped the back of my dress. “But my friends will watch. And if there’s anything left when the Mistress is done, perhaps they will finish you off.”
Berenger tore my only good dress right down the middle, cold air hitting my backside, my privates. His breathing turned harsher; his knee worked higher, nearly touching meright there. Nearly…
I bucked, fought, writhed…but nothing I did mattered.
His soft hand wrapped around my throat, squeezed until I whimpered. “She doesn’t seem to like that, Berenger. Not nearly as eager as they usually are.” Estienne breathed drunkenly; sloppily grasping my wrists.
Is this how they ruined my friends?
Had anyone ever escaped them?
No…but I fought harder, feet kicking back far enough to connect with Berenger’s balls. They crunched beneath my heel, but his low grunt of pain was only the briefest victory.
This was a battle I would never win, no matter how hard I fought.
But I would not make this easy.
I clamped my thighs together, my wrists abraded against the rough bark, hardly caring I was nearly naked. I’d barely sucked air through my nose before the belt cracked across my skin with razor-sharpness.
“I am going to whip you bloody for that, you filthy little whore.” I’d scarcely filled my lungs when the air was ripped from them once more, snot and tears exploding from my nose as I gagged on the cloth, my back burning as the belt came down again and again.
“Harder.” Estienne Rivière grunted. “Whip her harder, Berenger.”
“You like that, don’t you?” Berenger growled. “You can have her after me, Estienne, but I get her first…High Lord’s prerogative, and all.” The belt landed so many times I lost count, until I sagged against the three males holding me down, the dull, rhythmic slap of leather against flesh never ceasing, pain a raging sea I could not escape.
Please, someone help me.
Please, please, please.
The male’s low, creeping laughter faded away as Berenger put every ounce of his rage into beating me.Slap, slap, slap.Until my body stopped jerking. Until there was nothing but the pain.
Until blessedly, he slowed, as if his arm grew tired.
