The Tangled Tree Read online

  ‘Say it,’ Kohén whispered, easing a second slick finger into me now and moaning as my sex clenched around him expectantly. God, I was going to black out again! ‘Show me how much you want me.’

  I couldn’t say a bloody word, but I could show him and so I sat up, reached forward, tugging on the golden drawstring cord of his pyjamas, watching with delight as they fell away from his perfect hips and revealed his thick, hard and glorious cock, which I fisted greedily. Kohén gasped and thrust into my fist, lips parted, eyelashes fluttering, but before he could give his dog the ‘speak’ command again I bent at the waist and took the bulbous head of his erection into my mouth, sucking on it ardently.

  ‘Oh God…’ Kohén had already been on his knees but now he leaned back and caught himself on the mattress, staring down at me with a rapturous expression. I couldn’t stand seeing the adoration in his eyes so I closed mine and worked him over ravenously, keeping one hand curled around the base of him where I knew my mouth wouldn’t reach, while I clasped his shoulder with the other, holding onto him.

  This feels right! I realised. This feels honest! This isn’t making love, this is earning my keep, and that’s the way it should be between a third-born slave and her master!

  ‘Oh God…’ Kohén moaned again, but he fell silent as I twirled my tongue around his foreskin, and soon enough the only sound in the room was his heavy breathing and the slurping and smacking of my oral assault against his hard-on, which suited me just fine. I wanted to slip my fingers between my thighs and touch myself so I could rub away that hollow, desperate feeling that he’d created inside me, but that would blur the lines between business and pleasure, and if I was going to tolerate this sort of activity night in and night out, I knew that I had to start thinking of everything that I did for him as work, until my feelings for him vanished completely. When the compulsion to pleasure myself overwhelmed me too much for me to resist, I would wait until I was alone and think of Kohl until I climaxed.

  Yes! Yes I need to stop kissing him when we have intercourse, and offer up this sort of thing every time I can, until the intimacy between us evaporates!

  But...

  ‘Lark…’ Kohén panted, tapping on my shoulder a beat later. ‘Lark stop, I’m going to…’

  I wanted him to, and so I began to bob with more eagerness, but he groaned and tried to physically pull me off. ‘Larkin, no. Larkin no… I’m not going to let you… ugh…’ He was saying one thing, but I could feel his cock humming between my lips that communicated another and so I suckled on him more deeply and sweetly, swirling my tongue around him in my impatience to see this done.

  I deserve this! I deserve this! He does not, but I deserve this! I am third-born! I am nothing!

  ‘Larkin you have to stop…’ Kohén moaned. ‘I wanted to make love to you, not be serviced by you…’ he lifted my chin up, but I did not release him. ‘I won’t make you swallow my seed like some slave!’

  If I could have laughed out loud, I would have, but because I couldn’t, I grinned at him and then slid my mouth over him again and moaned when I felt him twitch and thicken against my tongue.

  If I’m not a slave then let me out of the slave quarters! Until you do, servicing you is the only reason why I’ll crawl into bed with you!

  ‘No! The pleasure will always go both ways between us, always! Do you hear me?!’ Kohén grunted and just as I knew he was about to explode, he tore me off him, sheared the rest of my nightgown off my body and then threw me backwards against the pillows. ‘I won’t have anything coming between us Larkin, is that understood?’ I bounced on the springy mattress and tried to sit up, but he grasped my panties and slid them down my legs and off my feet until I was completely naked beneath him- naked save for the diamond choker, of course. ‘Not my brother, not my crown, not your contract- and certainly not a single stitch of clothing.’ He opened my thighs and crawled between them, crawling out of his pyjamas as he did so, so by the time he’d arranged himself on top of me, both of us were completely naked and pressed together. ‘Is that understood?’

  I could only swallow and nod (while silently screaming in my head that I’d prove him wrong in time) and he smiled.

  ‘Good, then keep your eyes on mine while I make love to you, so that I know you’re here with me, or know that I will kiss, tickle and tease this beautiful body of yours until you do.’ His arm came under my neck then, nestling my head in the crook of his elbow, and as his lips fluttered down to land on mine in a sweet, soft kiss, his fingers trailed from my collarbone, over my breasts and down between us. I undulated under the feather-light touch, my body lifting to meet the barely-there caresses, so that by the time his fingertips were trailing over my pubic mound, my hips were lifting to meet them and my lips were parting so that our tongues could tangle. Only instead of using his fingers on me when he finally brushed against my vulva, he took the opportunity to guide his cock inside me instead, opening me up slowly and purposefully, his rock-hard rod feeling like silk as it slid into me. I was still sore from the night before, and yet I threw back my head and gasped as the impalement caused my nervous system to collapse.

  ‘Yes!’ Kohén’s firm ass clenched beneath my traitorous hand as he rocked into me slowly and then withdrew, paused, caught my eyes with a pointed look of his own and then rocked into me again. His pupils dilated on every thrust in, his firm ass flexed, and with every retreat, his lips found mine, keeping us connected- holding me captive with his beautiful eyes. ‘Mine…’ he breathed, and feathered his tongue against mine so sweetly that I would have groaned had I the voice for it. ‘Mine… mine…’ his breathing was erratic now, as was my own, and I felt his heart thud against my breast as he opened me to his erotic assault and then began to hum with the beginnings of his climax. And the moment he began to do that, I began to clench and spasm around him, holding onto him with all of the strength that I had left while his seed unspooled inside me and my tears trickled out of my eyes.

  Then, with his final thrust, he pressed his lips against mine and whispered what I knew to be true, at least when it came to the subject of our chemistry: ‘Ours.’

  5.

  Kohén continued to assume that I was giving him the silent treatment because I was angry with him over Kelia and my imprisonment until we fell asleep that evening, and that was okay with me for the time being, because I knew that he was still feeling guilty enough to admit that he’d warranted being frozen out, and satisfied enough by our love-making to make his peace with it at least for now.

  But my intentions to pass my silence off as intentional were obliterated when he asked me what I wanted for breakfast on Thursday morning. Still half-asleep and devoid of an appetite, I moved my mouth to answer in the negative, before I remembered that I was mute, and the fact that I was obviously trying to speak but failing made Kohén realise that there was nothing intentional about it. He grew concerned and went off to fetch my poor healer again while I panicked, wishing that I had an encyclopaedia of incurable diseases that I could peruse while I waited for help to come, so that maybe I could find some symptoms to fake in order to support a theoretical illness- perhaps something rare.

  Preferably, something sexually transmittable.

  But I didn’t have any medical journals lying around, so I walked into the privacy of my bathroom, opening my mind for just long enough to inform Satan: If concealing your hold over me is your prerogative, then forcing me to bite my tongue is wrong way to go about it! You think I’m curious by nature? Ha! Just you wait and see how deep a hole Kohén will dig, if it means getting to the bottom of some truth about me!

  To my horror, Satan’s response was quick and striking:

  If doing what is right is your intention, stop burying your head in the sand! Try as you like, but you are not cut out for this life, and the sooner you stop playing along with this Companion farce to make amends for your wrong-doings, the better off all will be for it!

  I gasped to hear her voice so clearly in my head and immediately regre
tted instigation dialogue with her again, but I couldn’t do anything about it now so I walked back into the main room just as Kohén’s voice filled it.

  ‘...come to think of it, I don’t think she’s said a word since…’ he looked at me, his expression perplexed, and I almost snorted to see that he’d come back with a vacuum cleaner in his hand- one of the few electrical appliances that was used daily in Eden. ‘Actually, I don’t know if I’ve heard her say a word since I… since I showed her Kelia’s body yesterday afternoon. Gosh, could it be grief affecting her so?’

  ‘Possibly. So you’re saying that you haven’t heard her speak a word since after noon yesterday?’

  ‘Yes, I guess that’s right...’ Kohén was examining me strangely, and I knew he was trying to remember if I’d spoken since he and Kohl had agreed to kill Kelia. I had, but he hadn’t heard it and that suited me just fine. Let them think I was in shock if it spared me a thorough medical investigation!

  Cherry gave him a sharp look. ‘And that didn’t strike you as being cause for alarm until now? Your highness… perhaps you need to brush up on your conversational skills. I confess that I didn’t realise that Larkin wasn’t speaking yesterday either… but I was only with her for a few minutes. But you…. well… I’m fairly sure that if I were engaged in a one-sided conversation, I’d notice that something was amiss well before the second hour was up, let alone the eighteenth.’

  I snorted gently and Kohén flushed. ‘I knew that she wasn’t talking to me,’ he defended himself, looking sullen. ‘I just assumed that she was giving me the silent treatment intentionally for-’

  ‘For…?’

  ‘For keeping her in here... for her protection.’

  ‘Well yes, I suppose that is grounds for the silent treatment. Question is- will you do anything about that now that you understand how upset she is?’

  ‘Not if it puts her in danger.’

  ‘Because this situation is a healthy one, of course.’ Rolling her eyes as Kohén scowled at her, Cherry motioned for me to get onto the bed. I complied and she listened to my heart, felt my pulse, pressed her hand against my forehead and stared into my eyes, and then, with a grim expression on her face, pronounced that I was in shock and told Kohén that nothing would heal that but time and a lot of comfort- and still more fluids. Her voice was more gentle now, but the contempt in her eyes had not lessened, and I suspected that she suspected foul play, both towards myself and Kelia now.

  Shock? I thought, relief coursing through me. That sounds better than demonic possession! I can work with that!

  After agreeing to let me rest, Kohén saw Cherry out the door. But he’d only just returned and turned on the vacuum cleaner (we’d both been wearing slippers or shoes on my glass-covered floors since the day before) when a knock on the door sounded again. Irritation contorted his handsome face, and he did not open the door again until he’d asked who was there. Cherry answered that it was her again, and so he turned off the vacuum cleaner and opened it a crack.

  ‘What is it?’ he demanded. ‘I cannot have people coming and going and expect to keep Larkin secure. Why do you think I’m performing the maid duties myself?’

  ‘I’m sorry, your highness, but your mother is at the harem door asking to come in, and because the guard you’ve stationed there has refused to let her in without your consent, she has asked me to appeal to you to give it.’

  ‘No!’ Kohén had paled already. ‘No, and I’ve already told her that! There are people in Eden who wish to steal Larkin away, so I cannot permit a single soul to enter here without due cause!’

  ‘I know. And I understand that it is not appropriate for her to come into the harem while Resonah and Rosina still dwell within- but couldn’t you allow Larkin out so that they may talk in privacy somewhere else? A bit of maternal affection and fresh air will do her a world of good, you know.’

  I knew it was pointless to hope that Kohén would break his rules for me, I gave him a pleading look anyway.

  Oh please, please let me go! I cannot talk to her, but I could at least nod and shake my head and communicate the fact that Kohl is in danger here somehow, right?

  Kohén scratched his morning stubble (something I’d not been aware that he even got until we’d become room mates) and studied me, but eventually shook his head while I deflated. ‘I’m sorry Cherry but no- my mother hordes her maternal affection for my twin, and has none left to spare anyone else, so I don’t see Larkin benefitting from girl time with her right now.’

  I pinched at my bottom lip with my fingertips, wondering if Kohl had upheld his end of the deal that he’d made with Kohén to placate their mother. Was she coming to throttle me for breaking my promise to be with her favoured son? Or was coming to sneak me out? I desperately wanted to know the answer to that, at least!

  But Cherry frowned. ‘Well, with all respect your highness, I have worked here for eighteen years, and not once in that time has the duchess cared enough about anybody in the harem to deign asking for entry so that she might visit with them-’

  ‘Which indicates to me that she seeking an audience with Larkin to scold her, not comfort her!’ Kohén slid onto the bed next to me and folded me in his arms. ‘Ask my mother to leave please, and assure that I am more than capable of giving Larkin all that she needs- which is precisely why she chose to stay in Eden with me in the first place. And tell her that she and Kohl have already talked this out with no hard feelings left on either part, so her concern for Larkin and her favourite son is unfounded anyway!’

  Cherry looked at me, obviously perplexed again and clearly aware that I would like nothing more than a few minutes alone with Constance Barachiel, (and obviously still convinced that I’d not volunteered myself for this particular job) but I was still too floored by the idea of her having worked there for eighteen years to give her anything in return but a slackened jaw. She looked twenty-one, tops! Had she been working since she was three? Or was she deceptively older than she looked, like Karol, who seemed to be permanently stalled at twenty-one, and Elijah, who didn’t look a day over thirty-five even though by my calculations, he was ancient?

  They get graceful ageing and awe-inspiring powers and what do I get? Beauty that gets me screwed and a green thumb! Terrific!

  ‘But… the Artisan concert is being held on the common in central Arcadia today, isn’t it? I was of the impression that you yourself were performing. I hear that Amelia-Rose Choir is looking forward to your recital very much… seeing as how you weren’t there to greet her when she and her father arrived yesterday afternoon.’

  ‘Well, she will have to be disappointed because I am needed more here than I am on the stage.’ Kohén scooped me up in his arms and wriggled me back to the top of my bed, pulling back the covers and sliding me under them, and I willingly went because I was exhausted from his nocturnal ravishments and weakened with hunger to the point of trembling. ‘Please inform my mother of that too, and assure her that I will touch base with her later today, all right?’

  ‘Yes, your highness,’ Cherry said softly, and left us alone, and though the lock hadn’t clicked shut behind her, Kohén’s arms were binding enough.

  ‘Boy, she’s getting nosy…’ Kohén muttered after Cherry had left, and I raised my eyebrows at him. Who wouldn’t be fascinated by the sight of the castle’s long-standing agitator- me- acting like a malleable lump of moulding clay all of a sudden? He took in my expression and exhaled softly, looking abashed.

  ‘I’m sorry, you’re right, why wouldn’t she with all of the odd things that have been happening?’

  I turned my face away from him, staring blankly toward the boarded up window. ‘Odd things’? Could such a simple term be applied to the loss of someone’s liberty? The murder of a dull-witted virgin? The destruction of a fraternal bond? A tear burned in the corner of my eye and scorched a trail down my cheek and onto my eardrum. Yes, the fact that I hadn’t seen sunlight in days now was odd indeed. The fact that I was now used to feeling my best friend’s b
ody warmth against my naked skin, and that I was beginning to crave it and nothing more- that was odd. The fact that I’d been feeling too listless to eat or even read for two whole days- yes that was very odd.

  They were more than odd events though; they were symptoms. They were evidence of the fact that I was dying from the inside out, and it hurt me that he didn’t realise it. If he had ever loved me at all, shouldn’t he be able to see that I was falling apart?

  But that’s the thing, isn’t it, Little Bird? Satan’s voice taunted me. He never has loved you, not really not if he can stand to see you suffer like this- and you know it. The only reason why you’re not riling against him is because you don’t love yourself enough to fight back, not anymore. And I don’t see why! Virginity has always been highly overrated in my humble opinion...

  I moaned softly, rubbing at my brow as I chastised myself for letting her back in. She was as bad as Kohén! Obsessed with you one moment, holding a grudge the next!

  You’re onto something there, little bird. You think Kohén went to astonishing lengths to get his hands on you? Just you wait and see what I will do!

  My stomach tightened in anger. You’re already raping my mind and holding my voice against my will! And like Kohén, you wonder why you always came in second-best to your greatest rival? Ugh- I’d choose God and Kohl over you two assholes any day!

  You little-

  God! Help me God! Save me God! Satan’s after me God! God, God, god, god GOD!

  ‘Headache?’ Kohén asked, and I nodded slowly, moaning softly again as Kohén began to rub the wings of my shoulder blades gently, melting some of the tension I’d had stored in there almost immediately. I had a lot more going on inside my head than pain, but Satan had evidently been shoved out of my mind as I’d prayed to our creator, so I made a mental note to do that until God himself showed up and offered to absolve me and then fly me the hell out of there.