“Kneel,” he ordered, his voice sliding over my skin; an insidious menace, tangible and grimy as I rose slowly to my knees. Keeping my head bowed in submission, I fought back the burning in my nose and the threat of tears at the back of my eyes. Time seemed to slow as I waited for the next instruction, narrowing to the rhythmic sound of his breathing.
The cane touched the front of my throat, pressing firmly as I bit the inside of my cheek to quell the urge to flinch. He slid it over my delicate skin, hooking it under my chin and lifting until I raised my eyes to his finally. “You didn’t come to the Manor last night, and yet you look as though you haven’t slept a wink. Do I need to worry that you’ve found companionship elsewhere?” he asked, quirking his brow as I swallowed.
Everything in me felt heavy, the bone-weary exhaustion of the harvest and the coming struggles of winter weighing me down. “Of course not, my Lord.” I didn’t tell him I’d found that months prior, sneaking around on the occasions when Byron didn’t demand my company.
His knowledge of that would be disastrous for me. My purity was all that protected me from him taking everything. There were many ways to touch a woman, many ways for him to torment me that didn’t rob me of my alleged virginity, but his belief meant that one part of me remained mine.
That one part of me was safe.
“Do you think I did not know about the Mist Guard? What was his name—Loris?” Lord Byron asked, arcing the cane through the air with precision.
It didn’t touch me, but it was enough to make me feel like my eternal soul would jump out of my skin at any moment. Combined with his words and the confession of what he knew, it was enough to make my body go slack and slump as dizziness consumed me.
His cane cracked against my ribs just below my breasts, a hot trail of fire bringing my body back to life as I forced myself to sit up straight. The mark he left burned with the sensation of a thousand needles stabbing me. I barely resisted the urge to cover myself, to cower away from the pain.
Only the knowledge that retreat would cause more punishment kept me still.
I fumbled for words, unable to find the right ones to say. I’d been so certain that he’d have progressed our relationship if he’d known the truth—that he wouldn’t have hesitated to make me into another one of his conquests. “I don’t—I don’t understand,” I said finally, stumbling over my words. Instinct drove me to apologize, as if he had some Gods-given right to my body and it wasn’t truly my own.
I shoved that down, focusing on my lack of understanding. Focusing on the why.
Lord Byron dropped the cane to the ground beside me, tilting his head to the side as if it hadn’t occurred to him I might not have realized he knew the truth. He took my chin between two fingers, the intimacy of the touch sending my nerves racing.
Surely he couldn’t mean to touch me in the Temple?
“You have no secrets from me, Estrella,” he said, releasing my chin slowly. That hand came down on the side of my neck as he bent at the waist, leaning forward until his forehead touched mine. “But remember what happens to men who take what is not theirs. It would be a shame if the Mist Guard learned what he’s done.”
“No, please. You can’t—”
Lord Byron pulled back, glaring at me as if to remind me of who he was. He could, and would, for there was no one to stop him, condemn a man to death just because he’d stuck his cock where it didn’t belong.
I hesitated, sinking my teeth into my bottom lip. “I just wanted something that was mine. A choice I-I could make for once,” I explained. Confessing my sin in the Temple felt like the greatest crime, an apology for something I couldn’t force myself to regret; not when it meant that whatever husband they chose for me would be sorely disappointed in the wife he ended up with.
“I know exactly what you wanted. You are rebellious, reckless, and most often foolish. If you were so determined to ruin yourself for marriage and make yourself into a common whore, the least you could have done was allow me to be the one to do it,” he snapped, the words striking against my skin like a physical thing.
“You would know, my Lord,” I said, my voice curling into a high-pitched mockery. It resembled the well-practiced moans of the women I’d watched him with, who he’d tried to throw in my face over the past two years, when he’d needed to fuck because of the frustration he said I built in him.
Because I’d been off limits—but I hadn’t, and he’d known it all along.
The back of his hand cracked against my cheek, the sound echoing through the empty space. My head snapped to the side with the force of it, my cheekbone throbbing from where his ring struck. “You will remember your place,” he said, grabbing me by my face. His thumb pressed into my cheek on one side, his fingers on the other as he leaned over me with his lips twisted in fury.
“Yes, my Lord,” I mumbled, my voice restricted by his cruel grip.
“You will come to the library tonight. There are things we need to discuss, and I need to calm down from your insolence or I will cane you until you bleed. Thank me for my kindness, Estrella.”
“Thank you, my Lord,” I said, wincing as he released my face suddenly.
“Tonight. Do not disappoint me again,” he reminded me harshly. He straightened his clothing, donning the persona he wanted everyone else to see, his lips tipped up into an appeasing and kind half-smile. Only I seemed to see the truth of who he really was. He made his way toward the doors, the sound of their creaking echoing through the sanctuary as he shoved them open.
Left to pick my beaten body up off the cold stone floor for what seemed like the millionth time in two years, I knew whatever was coming that night would be far worse.
4
I didn't sneak out through my window that night, instead walking straight out the front door as I so often did on the evenings when I was summoned to Lord Byron's private library at Mistfell Manor. There was nothing to hide from my brother—not when I’d been commanded to behave inappropriately on these nights. With my heart in my throat, I tried to sink into the comfort the night usually provided and take solace in the familiarity, before everything changed.
Lord Byron had mentioned we needed to speak. He hadn't said he intended to take my body in the way he hadn't before, and he wouldn't have hidden those intentions from me if he'd had them. He would’ve wanted to torment me through the day, to drive my heart into my stomach and fill me with dread.
I pushed branches away from my face as I moved through them, keeping to the trail. Eventually it would lead me toward the barracks and the manor close to the village center. Even though my walk in the night would be sanctioned if the Mist Guard brought me to the manor, I didn't particularly want to deal with the likely brutal escort I would receive.