Chapter 18

Tara

I feel happy down to my very soul, and I have no idea why. My eyes open sleepily, and I realize I'm in a big soft bed. It takes a minute to remember where I am and what I'm doing, but the large, muscular arms around me are a pretty big hint. Right, my night with Prince Rinan. A night without sex.

No sex, but there was… something. Even just thinking about him gripping his cock, his cock that I think was fairly big, and pumping until he finished makes me feel strange. Hot even. Last night, I'd gotten so wet that my panties had been soaked. I remember feeling it and squeezing my inner muscles, but it didn't help, it just felt like I needed to move. Needed to do something. I'd never been wet before, although I'd heard jokes about it that finally make sense to me.

He was just so sexy. His grip had been so tight, and he'd been staring at my breasts the whole time. He'd even touched me. Does that mean he finds me attractive? I have no idea how men work. I've heard it said that any pussy will do, so maybe that's all I am to him.

And then… he'd exploded. I'd heard about men's cum. I'd been taught about the birds and bees, but I'd never pictured it to be so sexy.

Is there something wrong with me? Or is this normal? I have no idea.

I wiggle within the arms that surround me. Actually, it's not just his arms wrapped around me, it's his whole body. He's pressed tightly against me, with one of his legs thrown over mine, and his arms a cage around me. Strangely, it's pretty damn comfortable… except that something hard is poking my back.

What the hell? Did he sleep with a dagger on?

It kind of feels like the hilt of a dagger jabbing my ass right now. I shift my body down a little to try to see if I can figure out what it is, but I can't. So I move back up and wiggle my body a little to see how it moves. It feels harder than before. I keep wriggling, trying to get a feel for whatever that thing is.

"You have to stop," Rinan groans in a way that doesn't quite sound like irritation.

I stop moving. What's his deal? I wake up grumpy sometimes too, but not like this. He shifts his body against me and takes several deep breaths close to my neck. The hairs on my neck stand on end, and a little shiver rolls down my spine.

"Fuck!" he says with the same groan as before. He moves again, pulling away from me for a bit, then close again, that dagger poking my ass once more. "Shit." He sighs, burying his face in my hair.

What the hell is wrong with him?

I'm frozen, and I don't know what to do or say. He's moving so much and breathing so deep and cursing a lot, but he's still tangled up with me. One of his arms is under my neck. The other rests on my waist. Even his legs are intertwined with mine.

His frustration makes no sense. I like the way we're laying. I never thought I'd enjoy being tangled up with another person, but warmth radiates from his body. Are shifters always this warm? And I like the way his huge, hard body feels pressed against my smaller, softer one. It's like I'm… safe in a big, strong cocoon.

He finally unwinds his limbs from around me. Very slowly. So slowly that it makes my pulse pick up and my body feel even hotter just from the way his body is rubbing against mine as he moves, just the way my body had felt last night when I'd watched him touching himself.

"Fucking hell!" he mutters once he's completely off of me.

I turn to face him. He lays on his back with his eyes closed. Agony is all over his face. I bite my lip and let my gaze run over him, from his huge muscular arms, perfect stomach, and… my eyes are drawn to the blanket. It's tented around his middle in a way that can only be evidence of an erection, and it all hits me at once. What was poking me in my back.

My face suddenly feels hot. I was moving my body all over that. And it's not at all like the boy's dick from the lake. It's huge. Not just proportionate to this man, but disproportionately huge even when attached to a giant man. I'm glad that didn't have to go inside me… right?

It's like my body becomes obsessed with that tented blanket. With a desire to see what's going on below the surface. Last night it was dark, but I swore his dick was beautiful. Not at all like the tiny-dicked man. Now, I kind of want to see it in the light to be sure.

The same as last night, my body feels hot and uncomfortable, and my thighs press together.

His gaze shoots to me, and he inhales deeply. "You need to stop."

"Stop what?" I ask, confused.

"Whatever you're thinking about," he says gruffly.

I'm about to ask more, but he rubs his hands over his face and hair in a way that speaks of complete frustration. Is it because of his hard dick? I'm pretty sure I've heard before that a hard dick makes a man frustrated. I wonder if that's why he played with himself last night? So he wouldn't be frustrated?

"Are all cocks similar?" I ask.

His gaze swings to me, and his eyes are widened in horror. "Wh-what do you mean?"

I lick my lips and stare down at his erection. "I recently saw a man's cock and–"

"Mine?" he says, a strange note to his voice.

My cheeks heat. "No, I couldn't get a good look at yours with your hand around it and the shadows–" I clarify, intending to keep speaking, but he interrupts me.

"When did you see another man's cock?" Now, he sounds pissed.

I shrug, unsure what to say.

"If it was one of our men, the bastard will lose his fucking head," he growls.

I startle, surprised by the rage in his voice. "No, no, it wasn't one of your men! It was back at my castle."

He rolls onto his side, far too close to me. "Who? I thought you were a virgin…"

My cheeks feel hot. "I am. I'm just trying to, just let me explain. I saw him bathing in a lake, well, going in a lake, then fucking another witch."

He's quiet now. Waiting.

"And I saw his dick. Only, it was a lot smaller and hairier than I thought it should be. So, I'm wondering if all men are roughly the same. Yours didn't look the same, but I can't be sure."

He stares.

I wait.

He gives a little shake of his head, and then a slight smile curls his lips. "No, men's dicks are not all the same."

I gesture to his crotch area. "Because yours looks a lot bigger, although there are blankets in the way, so maybe they give it the impression it's bigger than it is."

His nose scrunches up. "No, I assure you, the blanket isn't giving it any kind of impression. My cock is big. Impressive, even."

I study him, smiling. "To be fair, I don't have much to compare it to, so you could just be saying that."

He wraps an arm around my waist and pulls me closer, a wolfish grin on his face. "Believe me, princess, my cock would impress you even if you'd seen a thousand dicks before."

I laugh. "Good to know."

He releases me with a long, drawn-out breath and rolls back onto his back. His cock is there, tenting the blanket still, and I wonder how long erections last. Should it have… shrunk by now? Okay, I'm not going to ask him that. I need to ask him something less personal.

"How'd you sleep?"

His expression changes to a frustrated one once more. "It was the worst night of sleep of my life."

What? Because of me? I've often suspected I move around a lot in my sleep, given that the blankets often end up wound up around me, or kicked all over the place, but I've also never slept with anyone before, so I couldn't be sure. If I spent the night kicking and harassing him, I"d feel awful.

I sit up in bed, glad that my nightgown is high in the back, preventing him from seeing the scars on my back. "Really? I'm so sorry. Did I move a lot? I've never shared a bed before." It occurs to me that maybe something else could have been the problem. "Or did I snore?"

He stares at me with his mouth open a little. I wait for him to say something, but he doesn't. He just stares, then his gaze travels down my body, making me feel like I'm wearing a lot less than I am, like he can see right through my nightgown.

"I need to get the fuck out of here before I do something stupid," he grumbles, but he doesn't move.

Leaning back down on the bed, I lay a hand gently on his chest. "I'm sorry. I'll try to be less annoying in bed next time. I know I can be a little wild and maybe a bit loud, so I can try very hard to just lay still and behave."

His gaze drifts to my lips. "You've got to be fucking kidding me."

I shift closer, needing him to know that I'm serious about working on this. He's the only one of the shifter princes who seems to be able to stand me, and that won't last long if I keep him up at night. "I'm not kidding. I'll do exactly what you want me to do in bed."

He leans up, so there's almost no space between us, and one of his hands digs into the back of my hair. He uses the hand to tilt my neck, and he buries his nose into my throat, inhaling deeply. I feel the shudder that rolls through his body, and I feel hot again. Too hot.

"What do you want me to do? I'll do anything," I say.

A groan slips from his lips, and then he's rolling off the bed. Like a man being chased by angry bees, or just a man trying to escape his unwanted bride, he scoops up his clothes and races for the door, but something makes him freeze. His back goes rigid, and he turns slowly around, sniffing the air.

A low, deep growl vibrates through his chest. His eyes are suddenly ringed by yellow. "Don't move," he whispers in a low, angry voice.

Don't move? Why? My head swings from left to right, trying to find any reason that Prince Rinan is upset, but I see nothing. I'm about to say as much when there's a flicker of movement by the balcony. My lips part to say something, when a massive furry shape is suddenly there. Its movements are faster than I can follow as it comes leaping on the bed above me.

Claws slash at my body as I twist and turn, trying to escape them as a panicked sob threatens to escape my lips. Pain explodes from my chest as the bear's claws slice through my flesh. I feel blood coating my skin, and I reach for my magic, not sure what to do, but knowing I have to do something.

Prince Rinan is there in an instant, slamming into the side of the bear and sending it flying off my body. Then, Rinan is on top of the bear, baring his teeth and throwing punches at his face.

When the bear goes to attack, Prince Rinan leaps off of him, several feet away, and shifts into a light-brown wolf. They fight, claws and teeth flashing in the morning light. Growls roll through the room and through my heart, filling me with terror.

Can Prince Rinan defeat the bear? He's so much smaller.

The bear clamps down on Prince Rinan's back, and a whimper explodes from the wolf. Prince Rinan claws the bear's face, and the bear throws the prince across the room. The wolf tries to get up, but stumbles. The bear is on him in an instant, pinning him to the ground.

Reality comes crashing over me. He's going to kill the prince! I leap from the bed and race to my chest of weapons. Throwing it open, it only takes me a minute before my fingers close around a throwing star. Without thinking twice, I spin around and fling it at the bear, hitting him right in the eye.

His roar shakes the walls of the room, but it doesn't stop him from attacking Prince Rinan. The prince is pinned under him, biting back, preventing the bear from getting ahold of his neck, but the bear's teeth and claws are finding flesh, and the prince is moving slower by the moment.

He needs my help. I have to save him.

Grabbing my sword, I race up to the bear, trying to find the right angle to attack, but they're moving too much. The bear slashes the prince again, and a whimper explodes from the pinned wolf. The bear"s claws strike this time across his chest, and Prince Rinan isn't quick enough to avoid them. The bear uses the prince's weak moment to get his jaws around his throat, and then, the bear has him.

Please be enough. Please be enough.

Aiming for the center of his back, where his heart should be if I push the sword through far enough, I drive my sword into its back.

The bear roars, a terrible sound, but I just keep pushing, deeper and deeper. His claws try to reach me, but he can't. I'm out of his reach, and his movements are weakened and confused. I pull the sword out and push it in again and again and again with all my might, until the bear collapses on top of Rinan, unmoving.

"Rinan!" I cry out, mentally pleading "please don't be dead" over and over again as I struggle to lift the bear's body off of him.

It isn't easy. The bear is a giant compared to me, and he's all dead weight, but I finally manage to leverage myself against the ground and roll him using my back. The bear goes sliding to the side, not far, but enough that I can reach the wolf.

Prince Rinan is lying there motionless, his fur matted with blood. He looks… dead, and the thought fills me with horror. He can't be dead. He just can't be.

Panic washes over me as I slowly kneel next to him, reaching out for his throat and feeling for his heartbeat. It's faint but steady. Thank the gods! I press my fists into the ground and take a deep breath trying to hold back tears of relief.

The wolf's eyes open. And I'm surprised, they're the same light blue shade as Prince Rinan's.

He begins to shift until Prince Rinan is laying in front of me. He's covered in gashes. Blood is everywhere. His gaze is filled with pain.

"It's okay," I tell him. "I'm here. I'm going to get you help, and you're going to be okay."

His hand is suddenly on mine.

I squeeze it, tears prickling my eyes. "You did really well. You were really brave." A sob tears from my throat. "I'm so sorry."

There's a sound behind me. I leap to my feet, sword in hand, pointing it at my would-be attacker. Bear or human, I don't care. But there's not another threat. Princes Arlys and Drogo are standing in the doorway, eyes wide, mouths hanging open.

I drop my sword and collapse back to my knees. Everything's going to be okay.