Rapunzel and the Dark Prince (Fairy Tale Heat Book 3) Read online

  She looked distressed. “Lots of people, I guess?”

  “You ought to have friends,” I said. “You should be going to dances and the theater. This is cruel, keeping you in a tower.” I could hardly stand it any longer. I didn’t know how long I would have until the Witch returned, and talking could only go so far. I needed her to feel what I felt. I needed her to know she was meant for me, as I was meant for her. The bond spell would make an aphrodisiac from my kiss. Then, she would understand.

  I slipped my hand around her neck, under that river of hair, and put my lips to hers.

  Chapter Five

  Rapunzel

  I hardly knew what was going on. One minute we were talking and the next minute Dorin was kissing me. My head was spinning. For a second, I resisted. I knew people were supposed to kiss but a part of me wasn’t so sure I liked the idea of somebody else’s mouth touching my mouth. I didn’t know what he’d been eating! It could be something I hated.

  He tasted smoky. His lips were warm. And suddenly a rush of warmth flooded all the way through me.

  My body was reacting to him in a way I didn’t expect. I felt like I suddenly got ten years older, and I understood what he was talking about. I was almost glad I’d never seen a man until this moment because maybe I was meant to wait for this most perfect of all men. I couldn’t imagine anyone else was going to taste as good, or feel as good.

  As soon as I started to react to him, he put his arms around me and pulled me closer to him. It was like my skin caught fire. I was so aware of my body all of a sudden. I put my hands on his back, feeling his strong, solid back. No one had ever held me like this.

  His tongue thrust into my mouth like he was starving for me. I felt like he wanted to drink me up. It was very flattering. His tongue was sliding around inside my mouth, tasting me, thrusting deeper, forcing my own mouth open wider. Or maybe he wasn’t really forcing me, maybe I was just opening my mouth more of my own accord. Our bodies seemed to blur together. I didn’t want him to stop.

  His presence was so overwhelming; his hands steady on my back, his lips and tongue marking me forever with the taste of a man. I was used to being alone a lot of the time, and wandering around the tower sort of aimlessly, trying to decide what to do once the chores were done.

  Now his mouth was telling me what to do and oh, it was good. I would say it was a relief, but it was a lot more than that. My heart was pounding. I felt like I’d had a dream like this once.

  I rubbed my knee along his leg. I didn’t even think about it consciously. I just had this urge to get him to move closer.

  He made a low, approving sound and stroked my thigh beneath my dress, his large hand sliding all the way up to my waist. But then that wasn’t good enough for him; he found the hem of my dress and shoved his hand under it, before repeating the same caress, his palm and fingers on my bare skin. His hand was slightly rough. It was strange that I’d never actually seen a man before, much less touched one, and yet my thought was, That sure is a man’s hand, right there.

  His eyes had been closed as we kissed—although I kept opening mine—but now they crinkled open just a little, kind of like a contented songbird. Or probably not, but of course I didn’t have many comparisons. “You’re not at all what I expected,” he said. “And—I really didn’t expect to feel this way.”

  As he spoke, his other hand slid up my other thigh, and then both of his hands settled around my buttocks. He pulled me so close to him that my nether bits were rubbed against him, and a rush of wetness soaked my underthings. For a terrifying moment I thought I’d wet myself, but it didn’t really feel the same. It almost didn’t seem to matter. He was driving me to lose control.

  There was something hard in his trousers, like he had a rolling pin stuffed in there.

  “Is that—a weapon?” I asked, pointing.

  His eyes widened. And then his expression grew a bit withering. “Holy gods, Rapunzel. Your witch was going to send you to marry the King of the Northlands and you don’t even know about fucking?”

  “It’s—um—no,” I had to admit.

  “It’s how we will make children together.”

  “Oh! I know about that. I mean—sort of. We join. Somehow…?” He was shaking his head a little. “Well, not really, I don’t really know.”

  “But I know something inside you is very eager to find out,” he said. Under my skirt, one his hands found the waistband of my homemade drawers and tugged the drawstring loose. Then the hand slid around my hip, down my tailbone, past my buttocks, and straight to the wet folds between my legs. He slicked his fingers across them. I don’t think I breathed this whole time.

  “The ‘weapon’ in my trousers goes here,” he said, several large fingertips probing a little deeper.

  “Oh…” I was slightly paralyzed at this point, partly because I was considering how impossible that sounded, and partly because whatever he was doing to me felt incredible, kind of like scratching an itch magnified by a hundred. Two of his fingers were stroking up and down along my folds and I was starting to see little sparkles.

  “It’s very, very pleasurable,” he said. “Although I think you already have an idea of that.”

  “Mmmaybe.”

  He glanced at the ceiling. “You will have to learn to act more serious, as will befit your station.”

  “What did I do wrong?”

  He paused and then shook his head a little. “Never mind that for now. This joining…it’s something we need to do as soon as possible. Bonding spells don’t wait for wedding nights. In fact, by Yirvagnan law we are already married. The spell is legally binding. I know humans have a ceremony first, but…”

  This whole situation felt very much like a dream. I wasn’t sure if I was eager or scared, so I split the difference and went for bewildered and confused. I didn’t say anything at first and when I did it was, “But what about the Witch? And the King of the Northlands? And I can’t get out of here and what if I had a baby and what if you can’t find a way to get me home and even if you do find a way to get me home what if I don’t like it there and what if I don’t know how to act in your court?”

  He wrapped his arms around me and carried me over to the bed while I was talking, my hair dragging along behind us, and dropped me onto it on my back.

  “I don’t think I even have proper clothes,” I said. “I don’t own shoes. Unless slippers count. And I think courts have lots of etiquette, don’t they? And I’ve never ridden a horse.”

  He took one of the marzipan pigs off the table and put it in my mouth. “Suck on that a minute,” he said.

  I don’t know why, but even the way he said that made me even more wet between my legs.

  He regarded all of my hair, which had turned into quite a mess because usually, as soon as the Witch departed, I combed it straight again and braided it. But I hadn’t done that when he came up, so it was everywhere. It dragged over the side of the bed, it ran across the floor, and some of it was snagged on a chair.

  I held the sweet marzipan in my mouth, and he gently gathered up my hair at the nape of my neck and swept his hand down, drawing the strands back together again. It felt really wonderful, the way this motion gently tugged at my scalp. He twisted the strands so they would stay together, and kept going down, until he had a good length, and then coiled some of it around the bedpost. He kept going, twisting and coiling and untangling my hair from the rest of the room when necessary, until the bedpost couldn’t handle any more hair, but by this time what was left was manageable and it would be easy for me to fix up later.

  I was fascinated watching this tall, handsome man, who was all dark edges and hard strength, neatly straightening out my soft golden hair.

  Of course it also didn’t escape my notice that he had basically tied me to the bed with it.

  “Wha ih the Wick comes?” I asked around the marzipan.

  “The Witch will certainly take some time to get to town and buy a whole dowry for you,” he said. “And by the time sh
e gets back, I will have laid my claim and she’ll have to contend with it. She won’t be able to give you to the King of the Northlands anymore. A king isn’t going to want a girl another royal house has already marked as their own.” He pushed up my skirt and pulled down my underclothes again, sliding a hand between my legs. “Your desire is already rising to meet mine, Rapunzel. Even if your mind doesn’t fully realize it yet.”

  I couldn’t help a sigh. His hand did feel so good, and I sucked on the marzipan, tasting the sugar.

  “I’ll get you out of here, and when I bring you to my court, I will make sure to find the most patient ladies-in-waiting to teach you everything you need to know about etiquette and dress, and the most wise and kind tutors to give you the education you’ve been lacking. If you prefer small gatherings instead of grand balls, then we shall have small gatherings. And through it all, I will be at your side. You’ll learn to be a great queen.”

  He reached to the back of my dress and unhooked the fasteners. All of my dresses were made so I could slide them off my hips instead of over my head, because getting a dress past my hair was quite an endeavor. He swept my clothes off me and tossed them aside.

  Was I supposed to be shy? I sort of thought so, but I wasn’t. “My ripe little plum,” he said.

  “Oo really inta plums huh?”

  “You know, the idea with giving you the candy was so we could maintain a sensual silence,” he said.

  “Ur ‘alkin’.” But I realized that maybe he was better at setting the mood than I was. I pretended to lock up my lips and toss away the key.

  “We do grow a lot of plums in Yirvagna, yes.” He unfastened his jerkin and threw it in the pile with my dress. He untucked his shirt, and unfastened his trousers, and I finally got a look at what was actually in his pants. It wasn’t a rolling pin but it was almost as big as a rolling pin and I still wasn’t entirely sure what he was going to do with it.

  He stroked it a couple of times while looking at me. I wasn’t used to having anyone look at me, much less a man who seemed overwhelmed by the sight of me, like I was doing things to him.

  Then he climbed on top of me—almost pounced—with a sharp grin. I wasn’t sure how to react. I was used to being told what to do by the Witch. I usually resented it, deep down in my gut. But I didn’t want to make her cross, and she always brought me more presents if I was good and sweet. So I tried to bury those feelings down inside me, and I suppose that was why sometimes I would whack the furniture with my broom in the middle of the night. So that I could hide my anger from her forever.

  Now he was being about as bossy as the witch, but in a very different way. I had this sense of absolutely burning anticipation.

  “Since you are tragically uninformed, let me tell you how to fuck,” he said. “I’m going to slide my cock into you, and you’re going to take the whole thing. You’ll be surprised at how good it feels, how much you can take. If it hurts a little, just keep eating your marzipan and taste the sugar on your tongue. And once I’m inside you, I’m going to fuck your little pussy. It’s a little like a dance.” His cock was now slowly sliding between my folds, stirring the sparks into my eyes again. “And the longer the dance goes on, the better it will feel, until one of us reaches the very peak of our desire. And by that time, you better be done with the marzipan because you might want to scream.”

  As strange as this sounded to me, I trusted him. Oh yes, there was definitely something going on inside my body, something that wanted to be filled and fulfilled.

  The shirt he was wearing was white and had a low enough neckline that I could see his collarbones. His skin was pale but with a slight tinge of gold, so he was not sickly pale but more of a glowing pale. His hair was dark, too long to be short, too short to be long. It was right in the unruly middle, soft locks that curled a little, especially at the ends. I wanted to touch him everywhere and see how he felt.

  I wished he would take off his shirt, but I didn’t ask. I was still afraid the Witch might come back, and he would have to hide. I thought he might be thinking the same; thinking he should not be too vulnerable.

  But he had left me so vulnerable. He had left enough give when he wound my hair around the bed post, that I could twist my head from side to side but could not quite sit up.

  The head of his cock nudged me open and I could already tell that he was going to be so wide. He was barely inside. There was no way I could take the full length of him. He would split me open.

  I bit fervently on the candy, letting the nutty sweetness overwhelm my tongue. Usually I was very careful when I ate animal-shaped treats, politely biting off ears and tails and then arms and legs… (Or was I actually torturing the poor treats?) Well, this poor little pig was crushed under my teeth.

  “Lift your hips a little,” he said.

  As he slid into me, I felt his tail wrap around my hips, holding me against him at the small of my back, like a rope drawing me toward him from behind as he pushed into me from the front. His cock drove into me inch my inch, stretching me from the inside, touching me places I had never been touched, never known could be touched. The tip of his tail slithered around my stomach, reaching down between my legs like a finger stroking me. It was blunted but pointed like an arrow. It twitched against the bud of my desire.

  I swallowed the last of the marzipan in a gulp and gasped out, “Dorin!”

  I wasn’t sure if the gasp was from pleasure or pain, and I quickly decided it was pleasure. There was some physical pain but in the end, it was nothing much. Perhaps the real pain I was feeling came from the fact that I had never felt before. I had never touched someone’s skin and looked in their eyes and known that they wanted to talk to me and touch me and show me things.

  He stroked my hair. “It won’t hurt for long, my sweet. We were made to go together.”

  “Do you know that for sure?” I asked. “That we were meant for this?”

  “Of course. A spell like this cannot lie.”

  “You promise?”

  He paused. “What are you afraid of?”

  “It’s just—are you really going to bring me to Yirvagna? Take me to see all these things? Because—I’ve never wished for that. I knew it would never come true. And if you make me a promise like that and it never comes true…”

  He scoffed. “Is that all? I never worried about it, not for one second. Of course I will take you home. That, I can promise, without hesitation. You will never have to worry about anything ever again, as long as you follow my instructions. I will protect you and every hair on your head, for the rest of your life.”

  He took my breasts in his hands and gently tugged my nipples. The skin pebbled. Some of my focus shifted to the stirring feelings there, and that helped as he pushed a little farther. “You should feel the bonding as I do, now.”

  I certainly was. Of all the feelings swarming my mind now, the most prevalent one was a yearning ache. His cock pushed into me deeper, and deeper, and my head fell back. Considering I didn’t even know about any of this an hour ago, I couldn’t believe how delicious the sensations were. This was just another thing the Witch kept from me. She didn’t tell me about men, she didn’t give me love stories to read… I couldn’t even really dream about this as a possibility. I needed this feeling, needed something to fill all the emptiness I had hardly known was there.

  “Dorin…Dorin…” He was close to me now, and I slid my hands up under his shirt, tracing out his body beneath. He was hard everywhere that I was soft and I was fascinated.

  “Your bones are like my bones,” I said. “But so much larger.”

  “Well, yes. But let’s save that anatomy lesson for another moment.”

  “I’m sorry if I talk too much. It’s all so new.”

  “I know.” He kissed my forehead. “You are very flushed.”

  I kept thinking I couldn’t handle any more of him, and then there was more. I always felt like I was on the verge of too much. His hips drove deeper, his tail holding me closer still, his body d
ominating mine. It all seemed like a dream. He was rocking his hips into mine, and with every rocking motion, his tail tightened and loosened, sliding against the sweet spot between my legs. He felt so strong, his body covering mine, his warmth making me sweat. My hands fell back. I was too overwhelmed to talk anymore. A part of me wanted to respond to his motions, wanted to rock my own hips deeper against him, and a part of me just wanted to drink it in. He was such a fierce creature in some ways, so untiring. He didn’t even look strained. I was a little afraid I might mess him up if I tried to move with him.

  I decided it was best to let him do the fucking, but I lifted my hands and ran them through his hair. I found his horns and wrapped my hands around them, and pulled his face closer to me. We started kissing again, and sometimes I broke away from his mouth to kiss his face.

  I felt like he was changing me from the inside, as if every stroke of his thick length was unlocking new pieces of me. The part of me that followed a strict regimen of hair maintenance and house-cleaning had been kicked out of the tower, and now my only task was to let him shatter me open.

  I moaned. The feeling was getting stronger, as impossible as that seemed.

  “I like it when you moan,” he growled.

  I moaned louder, my body tensing. My legs twitched. I had almost forgotten his hands were playing with my nipples, because everything else was getting so overwhelming, but then I was reminded when he started fluttering his fingers across them very fast. When I started convulsing a little he reached down and stroked my thighs, urging me wider.

  I screamed. Just as he said I would, and I didn’t hold back. My pleasure was reaching an unbearable apex, and he was going faster and faster, with encouraging grunts. He was breathing harder, spurring me on, and this—another living being, so close to me, so intimate with me, the very sound of life in his body—perhaps that was what brought me the greatest satisfaction of all.