Page 56 of Quest for her Knights (The Lost Souls of Dyconia #5)

When Pyke and Cash leave, the other three continue ransacking the room, tossing clothes all over the place.

Whose stuff is this, anyway? I wonder what they’re looking for, but decide to keep my mouth shut.

I can’t help and don’t care either way. I’m more interested in figuring out where I am and how to get home.

Is this some sort of weird performance I have somehow gotten myself messed up in? But there is no audience… no camera.

What’s the last thing I remember before going to sleep?

I think back to yesterday. I came home from working at my store around five thirty, then I’d made myself some stir-fry for dinner before I started working on my latest song.

I may own a clothing store, but my real passion is music.

I even had a degree in Music from the local University, thanks to my hard earned scholarship.

I’d been working at Amy’s Boutique through my entire four years as a way to help pay my bills.

I hadn’t even known Amy was sick, I was even more surprised to find out she’d left her shop to me in her will.

Apparently, she had no family, either. When I finished my degree a few months later, I couldn’t find any decent paying jobs in the music industry.

They were all assistant jobs that were internships where you just fetched coffee all day.

I understood I needed to start at the bottom, but I needed an income to live, I had nobody in my life I could lean on.

So, I spent most evenings playing on my little keyboard, working on my music.

Hoping that one day I’d have enough courage to put them on YouTube with hopes of an agent or artist finding me.

I don’t want to be famous myself, I just want to write music, but that’s part of the reason why I struggled with putting my face online.

I know I have a decent singing voice, but I don’t want to sing in front of people, I’m far too introverted for that.

Last night I had been working on finalizing the lyrics to my latest song ‘Home at Last’, but I just couldn’t nail the ending.

What did I do after that? I remember curling up on the couch with a fresh cup of hot chocolate.

I was considering pulling something up on my phone to watch or reading a book.

Then I remember frowning at my drink, thinking it tasted like the hot chocolate mix had gone bad, then, I got really tired and must have fallen asleep before waking up here.

Have I been kidnapped? If I had, then why does it feel like these men were trying to do it now?

Was this a double kidnapping? Although, I had to admit that for kidnappers, they’re awfully attractive.

But they also aren’t really acting like traditional ones, at least not yet.

None of them has so much as touched me and they haven’t tried to gag me or tie me up.

My mind flashes to a scene in one of my most recent reads about a woman who fell for a man who liked to tie her up and gag her when they had sex.

I had been extremely surprised at how much that scene had turned me on, I never thought I’d be into something like that.

Cash and Pyke return to the room and my eyes dance between the five of them. What kind of stuff did these guys like to do in the bedroom? Bondage? Spanking? Did they like to dominate or were some of them into being dominated themselves?

I shake my head, trying to rid myself of those thoughts.

Sometimes it’s hard to not think about sex when I seem to have a very healthy libido with zero sex life.

As in, I’m 100 percent virgin at the grand old age of twenty-seven.

Hard to believe, right? But it’s hard to get close enough to have sex with someone when you can’t get close to people in general.

It wasn’t that I didn’t want to get close to someone, in fact, having a family was something I craved. But after being adopted and returned eight times, you start to grow a strong fear of rejection.

“What the fuck is this?” Talon asks, bringing my attention to where he stands by the dresser, holding up some sort of lingerie. It was baby pink, with lace all around the edges. I had to admit, in any other color it would be sexy, but in light pink, it made me wrinkle my nose in distaste.

I realize all the men are looking at me with expressions of anger or hurt. What did I do?

“What? Why are you looking at me like that?”

“Why do you even own this?” Talon asks, shaking it in my direction.

“Who did you wear it for?” Arlo asks through clenched teeth. I can see his hands squeezing into fists at his sides. Why is he so mad? God, this is all so confusing.

“Okay, first of all, that is not mine—”

I’m cut off when Cash speaks. “Oh, so do you often keep other women’s garments in your room?” He raises an eyebrow in expectation of an answer.

“ Second of all,” I say through clenched teeth, hating being interrupted, “this is not my room. And third of all, I hate the color pink, I would never buy that.”

“This is your room, your clothing and you love pink,” Pyke says, crossing his arms, staring at me like he dares me to argue.

“I must be dreaming,” I mumble to myself, rubbing my temples. “That’s the only way to explain this.” Except I know I’m not. I am pretty sure dreams don’t feel this real, at least I’ve never experienced anything like this myself.

Okay, let’s examine the facts here. I fell asleep in my own apartment, in my own clothes, and woke up here.

In some medieval looking room in the middle of a forest. There are five men here who say they know me, that I’m married to one of them?

Wait, did he say ‘ our wife’? Were they all supposed to be my ex-husbands or something?

That would explain their attitudes, I suppose.

They know my name but think I’m fatter than the Freya they know. Am I in some sort of parallel dimension? I didn’t typically read sci-fi stories, but it’s starting to feel like I’m staring in one.

While rubbing my temples, I tune back into their conversation to see what else I can pick up on. If this is a parallel dimension and they are my ex-husbands, what are they doing here and where are they taking me? Am I in some sort of trouble?

“—No, not that one, the green one,” the fifth man who’s name I haven’t caught yet, whispers to Talon. He has brown hair that sits a little long, falling into his eyes when he leans forward.

“No, she said she hates pink, pack the pink ones,” Talon whispers back, making me frown.

“She only said that to throw us off. Look around, Talon. This place looks like a five-year-old girls’ room with all this pink.”

Talon does, in fact, take a look around the room before a smirk covers his face and he looks back at his friend. “You’re right, let’s pack everything but pink!” He starts laughing and I see them rummage through the dresser, grabbing what appears to be medieval undergarments.

They look like they would come down to my knees, and not only that, they were also someone else’s. “Uh, guys?” They both glance over at me in surprise, freezing in the middle of shoving underwear in the bag they hold between them. “You may as well not bother packing those, I won’t wear them.”

Talon stands up a little taller, smirking as he asks, “why, cause they’re not pink ?”

“No, because they’re not mine . I’m not wearing someone else’s underwear.” I cross my arms over my chest in defiance.

“Fine, if she doesn’t want them, we don’t pack them, saves us space,” the fifth man shrugs and tips the bag over, dumping the contents on the ground. They both watch me for some sort of reaction, but when I just lift an eyebrow at them, they frown back at me.

I roll my eyes and turn my attention to the others.

“Hey, Princess?” Cash asks from the dressing table I hadn’t noticed yet.

I step over to him suspiciously. “Look, we didn’t pack anything for you, no clothes, no hair brush.

” He grabs a hair brush off the table, waving it at me as he continues.

“No fancy creams or anything. You know how long this trip will be, so are you sure you don’t want to pack anything?

” He doesn’t seem quite as angry at the others, but I’m not sure why.

I bite my lip, turning my gaze from the hairbrush to him. “How long, exactly, is this trip? Are we taking separate cars?” I hope I don’t have to be stuck in a car with all of them, in tight quarters, for a long road trip. No, thank you.

“Car? You mean a carriage? No.” He shakes his head. “We assumed you’d have your trunks packed and ready in the carriage, but since you don’t seem to require much from here, we’ll just take the horses.”

“Horses?” I ask in surprise. Arlo had mentioned something about horses earlier, but it hadn’t really registered in my head yet.

“Yeah, I saw your horse, Beauty, in the stable when we took ours in there, so you can ride her.”

“I—I don’t know how to ride a horse!” I exclaim in shock. It’s not like there are horses anywhere near my sketchy neighborhood.

“Freya,” Cash says, placing his hand on my shoulder and dipping his head a bit to meet my fearful eyes.

“You’re a champion rider. You’ve won several trophies.

But nice try.” He points towards a shelf on my wall and I wander over to it.

He’s right, there are several first place trophies that all have my name ‘Freya Highcrest’ engraved on them.

I run my finger over my name, this is crazy .

The Freya from this world seems nothing like me so far.

This entire world seems pretty far off from mine.

Carriages and horses? Maybe I’ve just gone back in time? But that wouldn’t explain my name.

“What year is it?” I ask, spinning to face the room, looking for someone to answer me.

“Seriously, Freya?” Talon asks, exasperatedly. He turns to his brothers asking, “are we done packing yet? I’m tired of this shit.” He looks at me with disappointment as he randomly grabs a green dress from the wardrobe and shoves it in the bag with a bit of extra aggression.

“Yep, let’s move out,” Arlo says, swinging a small bag over his shoulder. They all close up their bags and head out after him without a glance back. Am I supposed to go, too?

My eyes dart to the dressing table where Cash left the brush.

I head over to it, deciding I don’t have a problem using someone else’s.

That would be way better than dealing with the rats nest my hair was sure to become on horseback.

I scan the dressing table, looking at everything.

A brush would do, but I’d prefer a comb.

With my mass of wavy hair, it was best to comb it out when wet and let it dry naturally or in a braid.

I pull open one of the drawers and a beautiful silver comb catches my attention.

I hold it up to the light and notice the beautiful flowers painted on it.

Loud footsteps draw my attention to the door, where Arlo comes thumping back in and heads straight towards me with a scowl on his face.

“I just wan—Oh!” I’m cut off as he bends over and lifts me up, throwing me over his shoulder.

I grip onto the back of his shirt as I yell, “Arlo! What are you doing?”

“We’ve been waiting over a year for you, Princess, we’re not wasting one more minute.”

What did that even mean? They’ve been waiting a year for me? I don’t think this is the time to ask, while I’m upside down, bouncing on Arlo’s shoulder as he storms down the stairs. Besides, I’m suddenly distracted by the rest of this place.

It’s gigantic, the foyer has to be at least three stories tall. I try to turn my head to take everything in, but before I know it, we’re outside and I gasp as the sight of the building we exited comes into view.

“It’s a frickin’ castle!” I exclaim.

“Of course it’s a castle, where else would a princess live?”

Wait— what?! I thought they were using that nickname sarcastically. Am I really a princess in this world?

Arlo dumps me on my feet and I watch as he attaches his bag to the side of the horse we’re standing beside. I take a step back to look at her. She is all white with a… “Is her mane pink?” I ask in surprise.

“Yes. Only you would dye your horse’s hair to match your own.”

“What?” I shriek in horror, grabbing strands of my hair and quickly pulling it in front of my face. I let out a deep breath when I see it’s my natural brown. “You scared me!”

“Well, it was pink the last time we saw you,” Arlo says with a huff as he finishes tying a bag that Pyke passes him to the other side of the horse.

I realize I’m still holding the comb, so I check my dress, happy to find it has deep pockets hidden within, where I immediately store it.

I feel a piece of paper in my pocket, but ignore that in turn for asking another question.

“And when was that, exactly?”

Arlo turns his whole body to face me with a deep scowl on his face.

“A year ago. Fourteen months to be exact, since you are two months past the date you agreed to come back to Silverthorn Castle to fulfill your end of our deal.”

“Deal? What deal?” I ask, finally feeling like I was getting some answers. He bends forward, resting his palms on his knees so his face is level with mine.

His gaze darts between my eyes before he answers with steel in his voice. “The deal where we give you one year to live on your own as you please, before you come back to bear us children so we can carry on our family name.”

With that frightening statement, he grabs me by the waist and practically throws me up onto the horse.

Continue reading in Taken by her Princes, available now.