Page 5 of Velvet Folds (Velvet)

Chapter 5

In which our heroine takes her prize

A chill has set in and I thank my luck. No one will ask questions if there is nothing for them to see.

Scarf bundled tight around my neck, coat buttoned up snuggly around me, I gather the herbs I collected before dusk last night and make my way into the village.

The people are somber, the square is deserted, and the cobbles are shattered where Felicia’s father was broken hours ago.

What’s left of him is gone, but I hear the whispers.

They know why he suffered his fate. They know not to make the same mistake in the future.

I might thank the man who steps in front of me for keeping my smile at bay if he didn’t make me frown so deeply.

Robert, the tanner’s son, sees me before I can divert my path and I briefly wonder if he was waiting for me.

“Where have you been, little mouse?” He chuckles when I step around him and then follows me when I ignore him.

He is not dangerous… not to me, so I don’t bare my teeth at him or snap or growl to tell him to go away. Hurrying to get in my way, he makes a scolding sound.

“I know you have better manners than that, Cia.”

“Some of us have work to do.”

He shuffles to stay in my path, smiling and smirking… the only one in the village unaffected by what occurred last night.

I’d like to slap the smile off his face, but he’d probably take it as an invitation.

I’m even more certain of that when he says, “Marry me, and the only work you’ll need to do is lying on your back.”

The idea is so unpalatable, I almost laugh, but even men who are not dangerous can become so with the right impetus.

“Ask my father for my hand.” I tell him. “If you’re brave enough to do that, I might consider it.”

He balks—just as I knew he would—and then mutters something before he wanders away to bother someone else.

There is a reason my father doesn’t come in to town anymore. They don’t trust a man who cannot see and is still capable. They are suspicious and superstitious and on bad days, I consider leaving carefully placed nettles in pants hung on half the town’s washing lines.

I consider letting their favorite tea leaves go to fertilizer instead of drying, or delaying a harvest of mallow.

But those thoughts are better left to angry teenage girls, not women who know better than to retaliate in such obvious ways.

The woman in the shop stall I stop at is among those who make me consider changing my mind.

She crunches on crimson acorns that stain her teeth black and grins at me like we are friends.

We are not.

“What do you have today, girl?”

She only ever calls me girl and I don’t call her anything at all. “Nothing new or special, just your usual order.”

The woman’s hair is tied up higher today. The leather strap is new and decorated with a flower carved from bone.

“Not trying to astonish me with a fresh bunch of hot cockles this far out of season?”

“We both know you wouldn’t buy it, anyway. You’d just call me a witch.”

She snorts an agreement, chuckling as she tosses a bag of coin on the stall counter.

It sounds hollow and when I pick it up, I keep a tight hold on the basket, letting it hover over the counter.

The bag is light and I narrow my gaze. “You know I’ll have to count this. Is it going to be short?”

She squares her shoulders. “That’s all I’m paying you.”

Pulling the basket back and letting it dangle on my elbow, I pour out the bag. Counting each and every coin, I slide them back in the bag and toss it back to her.

“Have a pleasant day,” I say, plucking up the basket I left behind last week. She goggles at me and when I turn away, she screeches after me. She calls out any number of things, though never my name—I’m beginning to think she doesn’t know it—and I don’t turn back.

I know what she sells my herbs for. I know what she can afford to pay me. If she wants to waste my time…

Her shoes clatter on the cobbles and schluck in the mud as she finally catches up. “That’s no way to negotiate!”

I let her get in front of me and level an uncaring glare at her. “We negotiated already. You pay what we agreed upon, or I go. Those are your only options.”

“But—”

“No. No ‘buts’. No ‘ifs’. No ‘what abouts’.” I would let these herbs go to fertilizer before I let her take them from me for a pittance.

“Fine.” She pulls out a second bag and holds it out to me like she’d rather throw it.

I take it from her, but I don’t thank her as I step to the side, counting it to be certain before I hand over the full basket.

“Be grateful I did not demand more for the irritation.”

She spits into the gutter and says, “You drive a hard bargain.”

“No, I demand what’s fair. If you want to buy less, you can pay less. But after this, don’t expect me to be quick to do you any favors.”

She mutters and grumbles as she walks away, clutching the basket tightly

And I only have a moment to enjoy it before a blur brushes past me, hand grabbing my arm and pulling me out of the street.

“Felicia? What’s going on?”

She gasps for breath, looking every which way but at me. “A strange man came to the house, asking about you.”

“Asking about me?”

She nods, and for a moment, it seems as though her head could tumble clean off her shoulders. “Well, he asked about the woman who took my place when the moon bled.”

“What did you tell him?”

“I said I didn’t know.” She rubs at her arms. “But I don’t think he believed me.”

I should have guessed that he would send one of his servants after me in the daylight hours. I left Adrik with unanswered questions.

Thinking his name makes the bite marks at my throat pulse, the sensation shooting straight through me to my… velvet folds.

I close my eyes at the memory of his touch, tamping my sudden need down.

I left him with unslaked curiosity… I left myself with it, too.

“Have you seen the man since?” I ask.

“No, but I don’t think he’s—” Her words cut short and she inhales a tiny gasp.

“Is he here?”

She steps closer, clasping my hands and whispering, “Yes, but I don’t think he’s seen you yet.”

Squeezing her hands right back, I tell her, “We’ll punish Clade for abandoning you tomorrow.

She nods and I don’t wait for her to say anything more. I slip between the houses, dodging under washing and then sprint for the treeline. I don’t slow until I’m far enough away to feel safe.

Touching my throat, I take a deep breath and tromp through the forest.

Last night had been necessary. I won’t think of it as a mistake, but placing myself in Adrik’s path was not the wisest of choices.

Felicia needed me.

Straying into Adrik’s path again would be folly.

And yet…

My boots scruff on the stones when I reach the path that zig zags up the cliff face to the castle.

Even though it’s the last place I should go right now, I have commitments to keep, and in the hundreds of visits I’ve made to his home, I haven’t encountered Lord Adrik once.

He doesn’t wander the castle in daylight. Today will be no different.

No one sees me enter through the stony arch hidden by shrubs. No one notices me slip through the halls.

I’ve been inside the castle for nearly an hour before a gruff old woman—wrinkles tugging her face into a permanent scowl—pauses to peer out at me. Mrs. Pegg, the housekeeper, lingers only for a moment.

I hope she doesn’t notice the scarf still tied around my neck. Or, if she does, I hope she thinks it’s simply another of my distasteful quirks.

This courtyard, set in the middle of the castle seems too small for the grandeur of the rest of the enormous building with its wings and towers, but it is bursting with roses. And that makes it my favorite part of the ancient edifice.

Bushing the dirt from my hands, I pause to smell one of the larger, darker blooms and wish that they would let me plant roses that grow through the whole year, instead of these ones that spend too many seasons as thorny sticks, cut back for their own survival.

But I do not get to decide which kind of flowers they grow, I only get to make sure they do grow, and that they keep on growing, despite better choices that could have been made.

I slip the gardening apron from around my neck, and clean my hands as thoroughly as I can. Mrs. Pegg will come to scold me if I linger too long. She doesn’t want to have to keep track of me.

Normally, I would come to do my job and slip away before anyone but Mrs. Pegg knew I was here.

Today shouldn’t be any different.

But it is.

A heat in my blood pulls me deeper into the castle.

I feel him.

I wonder if he feels me as well.

No one guards the entrance to the dark halls that go deep under the castle.

No one needs to.

Only a fool would trespass on his slumber.

A fool… or a woman whose need has begun to override her good sense.

Slipping out of my boots, I stash them and my bag in a little alcove, just beyond the halo of light from the intersecting hall.

The hallway could extend for miles or could end in mere feet. The darkness is all consuming.

I pause only long enough to light a candle and give thanks that no one has stopped me, then, I hurry along, moving quickly enough that no one will have the chance to.

The stones are smooth beneath my feet, the walls ornately carved. These are places I am not allowed. Places even the people who live here with him consider forbidden.

But I can’t turn around. The marks on my neck pulse with the need to have his teeth again.

The memory of the way my body opened to his touch…

It makes me shiver.

There is a need and a hunger inside of me that I know cannot be quenched without him.

The dark hallway is long, sloping downward, but when I reach the bottom and it opens, it’s to an enormous room. Like a cavernous bubble beneath the castle, this place feels as though it doesn’t belong in the same realm as the world outside.

In the depths of that cavernous space, I hear him breathing.

Being close to him eases that thrum in my blood, but he still tugs at me.

I don’t have to search for him, my body knows and my feet follow the invisible path to him.

The old stories say he sleeps upside down, hanging from the ceiling. But he doesn’t.

He is laid out on a bed wide enough that his wings can expand in either direction.

By moonlight, he was terrifying, but candlelight…

There is a softness to his features that makes him seem almost human. But he’s not human, and—I realize suddenly—I wouldn’t want him to be.

I set the candle down as far away as I’m willing, and as close as I dare, and go to him.

Taking only the moment required to release the clasps and buttons holding my clothing together, I let my skirt slide to the floor and send my blouse to join it.

The bed is soft and dips beneath me as I climb up and Adrik makes a sound, but he does not wake.

It’s foolish, I know, to come to him in his sleep. But he’s mine .

Something tells me I’m safe with him.

I don’t know what compulsion tells me that’s true. I only know that it is.

The faint candlelight shows me his smile as I straddle him and his hands go to my waist, sliding up, even though his eyes do not open.

“What a perfect dream,” he says, claws brushing through my hair. “My little sacrifice, come to give me her velvet folds.”

And then, his eyes open wide, a bright glow in the soft dark.

“Are you here?” he asks me, fingers trailing over my cheek. “Are you real?”

I hardly know.

“I need you,” I tell him instead of answering that question.

The truth of it sings in my veins, as he pulls me down to him, kissing me so deeply the desire overtakes me and rock my hips against his stomach.

“Greedy needy little sacrifice,” he murmurs against my lips. “Did you touch yourself after you ran away from me? Did you think of me in your bed while your velvet folds ached to feel my touch again?”

“Yes,” the confession is so quiet I barely hear it, but his fingers tighten around my waist, and I know he has.

My need soaks through my chemise bunched underneath me and makes sliding across him easier, it makes my aching harder. I want him to touch my velvet folds again

I need to slake this need.

“Let me taste you,” he says, voice gravelly.

I sweep my hair out of the way, but he shakes his head. “No more blood from you this time. Let me taste your velvet folds.

He sits, his wings pushing him upright, and I slide down him into his lap.

“I want you to come apart on my tongue the way you came apart on my fingers last night.” His touch is whisper soft as his fingers coast over my skin. “Can I have that, sweet sacrifice?”

“Yes,” I say, and then, I whisper, “Please.”

His teeth glint in the candlelight when he smiles and his hands find the bottom of my chemise, sliding it up my body. His gaze doesn’t leave my face until I raise my arms for him, giving him silent permission.

When that slip of soft fabric is free of the tangle of my arms, he tosses it away and his gaze drops to devour the sight of me.

His hands trace over my breasts, my stomach, and when he reaches my thighs, he groans and says something in a language that feels heavy on the air.

He lifts me and I am on my back in an instant. He is on his knees and the candlelight glints off his wings, casting shadows across his body. My eyes go wide as my own gaze drops to the stiff cock between his legs, emerged from the pocket that had held it.

He catches my hand when I reach for it. “Not yet,” he coos. “Soon, you may do whatever you like to me. But first, I feast.

Hands spreading me wide, he moves us both until he can settle in between my thighs, placing my legs over his shoulders as he lowers his mouth to me.

His tongue parts my velvet folds, and I melt into the mattress.

When he groans in ecstasy, his lips finding my clit, I close my eyes on a whimper.

He’s attentive and greedy at the same time. His claws are going to leave marks, but I don’t care.

I want more.

My hands grasp at the sheets and my back arches as his tongue reaches deeper inside my velvet folds, teasing me in ways I didn’t know were possible.

“Adrik,” I whisper his name, the sound hoarse from my strained throat.

I don’t say anything else. I don’t know what else I could say.

I slide my fingers though his hair, holding him down as he turns his entire focus to my clit.

Whimpering and wailing, my orgasm hits me like a shattering ember and I go rigid with pleasure.

Every part of me feels frozen in place, the strain and the tension coiled tight and then releasing in a burst…

Adrik doesn’t stop his worship until my body gives up its fight.

Only then does he raise up, his heavy cock dragging along my belly as he crawls over me and presses a wet kiss to my lips.

“Let me sink into your velvet folds,” he says. “Let me ease our need.”

Dipping his head, he kisses my breast, tongue exploring

“Yes,” I arch against the sharp pull of his lips on my nipple. “Please, Adrik.”

“Anything you want, sweet sacrifice, I will give it to you.”

“I want you.” I need him.

What had been a low flame before is now a roaring blaze in my blood.

His thighs spread mine wider and he places the tip of his cock against me… against my velvet folds.

“Fate placed you on that stone. It brought you to my bed.” He exhales heavily and his smile frightens me a little. “Fate knows you are mine.”

His cock spreads my velvet folds wide and I squirm as he enters me. I need this. I need him. My body aches with the desire to claim him and be claimed.

Fingers holding tight in the ruff of his neck, I rock my hips, trying to take what he wants to give.

“Your body was not made for mine, sweet sacrifice.” He eases back, working into me again. “We will have to make me fit.”