She woke to a shadow in her doorway.
Jasmine's eyes flew open, her body tensing before her mind understood what she was seeing. A man stood at the threshold of her bedroom, tall and broad, his shoulders filling the frame. The moonlight behind him turned him to silhouette, but she could see his eyes burning, low and red, like embers waiting for wind.
Her scream caught in her throat.
He moved before she could make a sound. One moment he was in the doorway; the next, he was beside her bed, his hand clamped over her mouth, his weight pressing her into the mattress. She thrashed, her legs kicking, her nails clawing at his wrist. He did not flinch.
Shh, he breathed, his voice low, rough, intimate. Do not wake the dead, little one. There is no one to hear you now.
She knew that voice. She had heard it in her dreams for months, years , a whisper at the edge of sleep, a promise she could not understand. But this was no dream. His hand was real, warm and hard against her lips. His body was real, pinning hers to the bed. His eyes, those burning red eyes were real, and they were fixed on her with an intensity that made her stomach lurch.
He lifted his hand from her mouth. She screamed.
He let her. He sat back on his heels, straddling her thighs, and watched her with pleasure as her voice tore through the empty cottage. She screamed until her throat burned, until the sound broke into sobs, until she had nothing left.
No one came. There was no one to come.
"Good, he murmured. I wanted to hear it. I have waited three years to hear that sound".
Three years. The words lodged in her chest like a stone. She stared up at him, at the sharp cut of his jaw, the scar across his brow, the terrible beauty of his face. He was not human. She knew it with a certainty that went deeper than thought.
Please, she whispered. "Please, I don't , I don't know what you want "
"You do not know what I want?" He laughed, low and dark, and the sound of it vibrated through her bones. I want you, Jasmine. I have wanted you since the first moment I saw you. And now, after three years of waiting, I am going to have you.
He moved off her, and for a moment she thought he was letting her go. She scrambled toward the edge of the bed, toward the door, toward anything but his hand caught her ankle and dragged her back.
She fought. With her nails, her teeth, her feet. She clawed at his face, drew blood from his cheek. He let her. He let her hit him, scratch him, scream in his face. And then his fist connected with her cheek, and the world exploded into white light.
She crumpled, half-conscious, tasting copper. He gathered her into his arms, lifting her against his chest as if she weighed nothing. Her head lolled against his shoulder. Through the haze of pain, she saw her grandmother's chair, empty by the hearth. The photographs on the wall. The door to the garden, hanging open.
No, she sobbed. Please, no.
He carried her through the cottage, past everything she had ever known. The garden lay silver under the moon, her flowers still blooming, her stone wall still standing. But beyond the wall, the air had split. A rift hung in the darkness a wound of violet and black, crackling with power that made her skin prickle.
He stepped into it, and the world fell away.
The rift swallowed her.
For a moment, there was nothing. No light, no sound, no air. She was suspended in darkness, in cold, in something that pressed against her from all sides like a hand closing around her lungs. And then a comfortable soft bed hit against her back. She gasped, her body arching from the force, her lungs burning as they remembered how to breathe.
She lay on a bed . A slab of black covers, covered in furs that smelled of fresh flowers.
She tried to move. Her wrists were bound above her head, leather biting into her skin. Her ankles, too. She was naked.
Panic surged through her, raw and primal. She thrashed against the restraints, felt the slickness of her own blood on her wrists, felt the leather cutting deeper. The room spun. Her cheek throbbed where he had struck her. Her ribs ached from his grip.
He was there. She had not seen him enter, but suddenly he stood beside the bed, watching her struggle.
He had removed his coat. His shirt was open, revealing a chest carved with muscle and scars, the skin pale as moonlight. His eyes had not changed. Still burning. Still fixed on her.
Please, she gasped. Please let me go.
He tilted his head, considering her. No.
She pulled against the bonds again, her body arching off the stone. He watched, unmoving, until her strength failed and she collapsed, sobbing.
He reached out then, tracing the line of her collarbone with one finger. The touch was light, almost curious. She flinched, but he did not stop.
So soft, he murmured. So untouched. I knew you would be. I watched you for three years, Jasmine. I watched you sleep. I watched you laugh. I watched you touch yourself in the dark, chasing a pleasure you did not understand.
Her face burned. She tried to turn away, but his hand caught her chin, forcing her to meet his eyes.
"Do you know how many nights I imagined this?" His voice was low, frayed at the edges. "How many times I opened rifts just to watch you breathe?" "You are the first thing I have wanted in centuries, Jasmine. The only thing".
He released her chin and moved down her body, his hands tracing her perfectly curved breasts, her ribs, her waist, her hips. She trembled beneath his touch, her body betraying her with shivers.
"You are going to learn, he said, his mouth against her belly, his breath hot on her skin. You are going to learn to take what I give you. You are going to learn to beg for it".
No, she whispered.
He laughed again, that low dark sound that made her stomach clench. "You will".
He moved up her body, his weight settling between her thighs, his face hovering over hers. She could smell him, feel him . His eyes held hers, unblinking.
"I have waited three years for this night, he said. I have dreamed of your screams. I have imagined your tears on my tongue. And now, Jasmine, I am going to take what is mine".
His hand moved between her thighs. She tried to close her legs, but his body prevented it. His fingers found her, probing, testing. She cried out, more from shock than pain, but the pain came fast behind it.
He was not gentle. He did not pretend to be.
He pushed a finger inside her, and she screamed. He watched her face as he did it, his eyes dark with something she could not name. She was dry, tight, untouched and he did not care.
Please, she begged . Please, it hurts
I know, he said. He added a second finger. She sobbed.
He worked her open with a patience that was worse than violence. She felt herself tearing, felt blood slick his fingers. He watched her face the entire time, drinking in her pain, her humiliation, her terror.
When he was done, he withdrew his hand and brought his fingers to his lips. He tasted her blood, her body, and smiled.
Now, he said, you will know what it means to belong to me.
He positioned himself between her thighs. She felt him, his hard , hot, enormous cock pressing against her entrance. She tried to pull away, but he held her fast. There was nowhere to go.
He entered her in one slow, brutal thrust.
She screamed. The sound tore from her throat, raw and animalistic, and he groaned above her, his head falling back, his hands gripping her hips hard enough to bruise. He filled her completely, stretched her past what she thought her body could endure.
Look at me, he commanded.
She could not. Her eyes were squeezed shut, tears leaking from the corners, her body trembling with the effort of enduring.
His hand closed around her throat. Not squeezing , not yet but a warning.
"Look. At. Me".
She opened her eyes. He was beautiful, even now, even with his face twisted in pleasure, even with his hand around her throat. His red eyes burned into hers, and for a moment, she saw something beneath the cruelty. Something desperate. Something that looked almost like need.
You are mine, he said. Say it.
She shook her head.
He thrust deeper, and she screamed again. Say it.
"I'm yours", she gasped. The words were ash in her mouth.
He rewarded her with a kiss, rough, claiming, his tongue forcing her mouth open. Then he began to move.
He fucked her with a brutality that left her broken. He used her body like a thing he owned, because he believed he did. She lost track of time. She lost track of herself. There was only the pain, the rhythm, the weight of him above her.
He spoke to her as he fucked her. Words she could not understand, a language that was not meant for human ears. They vibrated through her, through the blood she was losing.
When he finally finished, he collapsed beside her, his chest heaving, his body slick with sweat. She lay still, her thighs wet with blood, her wrists raw from the bonds, her mind floating somewhere far away from her body.
He reached up and unbuckled the leather around her wrists. She did not move. She could not.
He gathered her into his arms, pulling her against his chest, her back to his front. His arms wrapped around her, possessive and absolute.
"You will learn to accept this, he said against her hair. You will learn to want it. And when you do, Jasmine, you will realize that you were made for this. Made for me".
She closed her eyes. She did not answer.
In the darkness behind her lids, she saw her grandmother's garden. The lavender, The roses, The wall at the edge of the woods. She held the image in her mind like a prayer, like a promise.
She would escape. She did not know how, she did not know when, but she would escape.
But for now, she lay in the arms of this demon , and she let the darkness take her.