My stomach knots as I guzzle down the rest of my wine. “I don’t understand. Why me? What did the crone say?”
War smooths his palm over the hilt of his dagger but never takes his eyes off me. “That finding you would free us from servitude. That you would let us reclaim you and keep you forever. And then we would remember how tolove.”
He grinds his teeth as he speaks, as if he still doesn’t even believe it himself. Love has never been a part of the Wild Hunt. It’s predator against prey. Nature versus nurture. He can barely say the word, let alone entertain the thought of it.
Famine chuckles, his usual sadistic amusement returning. “I knew it when I caught your scent in the woods. Your arousal. All the ones we sacrificed before you, screamed until their last breath. Their only scent, fear. You filled the woods with your longing, your lust, and your carnal desire to be worshipped. I didn’t need to see the mark. I knew you as I have always known you.”
His revelation threatens to steal the breath from my lungs. “Wait… you’ve been looking for me for centuries? And you never gave up…”
Death stalks toward me and clasps my hands in his. “Never. You belonged to us before you belonged to your body. Your soul and ours, like scattered stardust searching for its source. We took what was promised. And in return, you will never be without anything you want and need.”
I don’t know why this changes things, but it does. I’m not some random peasant girl they found in the woods. I am their virgin queen, though no longer a virgin. I have always been theirpossession to claim. This explains the depth of their lust. The extremity of their hunger for me. And my own as well.
They will never hurt me. Not unless it’s for my pleasure. It makes our games more addicting, my obsession with them stronger. And it lessens the burden of my guilt. There wasn’t an outcome that didn’t end with them claiming me. I couldn’t save my sister or my village. The mark on my thigh made sure of that.
But something else gnaws at me. “And what of all those innocents you sent to the slaughter? What were their lives worth to you?”
War huffs. “We are soldiers, Imogen.Deathbringers. Tasked to fulfill a duty. We didn’t make the rules, we just followed them.”
“Until you broke them… for me. Am I to believe you did it all for love? For freedom?”
Conquest folds his arms to his chest, annoyed. “What other reason could there be that’s more noble than that? Even monsters need love.”
Perhaps he’s right. Maybe it’s a concept I will never understand. “I know little about love between men and women. How amIto teach you?”
Death caresses my cheek tenderly. “You know more than you think, sweet doe. Love is pain. It’s sacrifice and torment. Burden and release. We will learn more together.”
That is not what the fables teach. The fairy tales read to me as a child were filled with gallant knights, delicate princesses, and good triumphing over evil. In my story, they will speak of how I let the villains win.
But there’s a fine line between good and evil, a slippery slope that favors the brave but also the most persuasive.
As I sit here eating this delectable feast while dressed in a gown that rivals the heroines of those long-forgotten fables, I know this was to be my fate all along. The prophecy hummedin my bones every time I ever dared to dream of a simple life. I couldn’t hear it until now. They’ve awakened me with the very power that flows through their veins.
But it makesmea villain too.
I stab another piece of meat with my fork. “You must promise to teach me the Wild Hunt.”
Their eyes light up around the table, pleased with my demand. Death comes around to the back of my chair and slides his hands down my chest. “Your primal instinct, your yearning, only makes us want you more. You will have everything you desire.”
He unlaces my corset, freeing my breasts from its tight fit. My breath hitches as he hoists me from the chair and lays me down on the table. “Have I become part of the feast, my lord?”
Famine chuckles as he dribbles mead across my nipples before licking it off. “Youhave always been the feast. Of course, you taste better than anything else on this table.”
War drags his knife through my skirt, shredding it open. He stares at my bare pussy, licking his lips as his mouth waters. He dips his finger into a thick lemon custard and smears a glob of it down my slit. “This is how I prefer to eat my dessert,” he declares.
I gasp as his fiery tongue lashes at my clit before he slides it farther down and laps up the custard from my flesh. He moans into it, exhaling his hot breath inside my cunt. “The gods are good. But we are better,” he growls against my thigh.
Conquest feeds me grapes from his mouth, sliding the crisp fruit across our tongues. I squeal in delight when it bursts in my mouth, the tart juice sending a sharp tingling to my glands as he kisses me hungrily.
Death taunts me with his blade, gently caressing my belly with the tip. He draws circles around my belly button. “Your blood is ours to taste. Isn’t that right, Imogen?”
As I gaze up into his dark eyes, the ache in my core deepens. His silky hair hangs loose around his shoulders, black as night. I reach up and wind a strand of it around my finger. “You may taste anything you wish, my lord.”
A deep growl erupts from his chest as he bows his head and tickles the tips of his strands across my belly, sending goose bumps across my skin. “Is this what you want, my love?”
I moan as he travels lower, letting his strands brush against my cunt while he leaves a trail of soft, sensuous kisses down my slick entrance. It’s impossible to understand how they anticipate my needs before I have spoken them or even know of them myself. “Yes, please.”
War presses the flat of his blade against my thigh. “If you are to let Death whisper sweet nothings inside your cunt, then you must let me roar. Let me mark you with my brutality. That way, if you should ever wake in fear in the middle of the night, you will be reminded of the beast who slays the nightmares that dare to torment you.”
