The Vampire & Her Witch-Chapter 554: While I’m Breaking Things…

The following day, Ashlynn’s face burned a brilliant shade of crimson that Nyrielle would have found adorable if she had been present to witness it. Her dress, the green satin and brocade one with the daring, plunging neckline that she wore to tempt Nyrielle into ravishing her, hung haphazardly across a high-backed chair halfway across the room where Nyrielle had thrown it to ’get the delicate treasure out of the way.’

Remarkably, the dress had survived with only a minor snag of a bit of lace that would need a bit of mending when it was laundered. Her bed, however, couldn’t make nearly the same claim.

One of the bed’s four intricately carved bedposts had snapped clean in half when Nyrielle used twisted sheets to bind Ashlynn’s hands above her head. Ashlynn had expected that her struggle against the binding might tear the sheets, but she’d never in her wildest dreams imagined that she’d become strong enough to snap a bedpost that was thicker than her wrist, or that the bedpost would snap before the silk sheets tore.

The bedpost wasn’t the only casualty of their ’rough’ evening either. The bedpost in the opposite corner had cracked and now stood at a slight angle after Nyrielle aggressively pinned Ashlynn against the post while plundering the young witch’s lips. Gingerly, as Ashlynn traced her fingers across the space between her shoulder blades, she found tender bruises that likely matched up to the carvings on the bedpost.

If they had only cracked or shattered two of the bed posts in their excess the night before, she might not have been as embarrassed as she was presently, but when she slid out from beneath the sheets, she found that one side of the bedframe had collapsed, leaving the feather mattress to sag almost all the way to the floor. frёeweɓηovel.coɱ

Even more embarrassing was the fact that she couldn’t recall which of them was responsible for the damage, though she had vague memories of losing control of her body when she finally begged for Nyrielle to sink her fangs into her and Nyrielle responded by drinking deeply from the artery that ran along the inside of her upper thigh.

Of all the places that Nyrielle had fed from her, while a bite on one her full, ripe breasts felt the most adoring and affectionate, just above her heart that pulsed with love, a bite to the thigh filled her body with the most intense, mind shattering pleasure that left her too overwhelmed and disoriented to move until she finally fell asleep in her lover’s arms.

"I wish Heila were here," Ashlynn muttered, covering her still crimson face with her hands as she thought about how she would explain the damage to the staff who were tending to her needs while the first member of her coven watched over Ollie during his extended vigil. "At least I could tease her about what Ignatious has in store for her if she said anything about this..."

Not that the servants in the castle would say anything they shouldn’t when Ashlynn asked them for help, but she was certain that rumors would fly within hours of her request, especially with a formal engagement dinner rapidly approaching on the night of the new moon.

It was one thing for the staff to know that she and Nyrielle were intimate, that wasn’t a secret they kept from anyone, and their open affection should have made things clear long ago. But for people to see the... aftermath of last night’s intense activities was something else entirely.

"It’s fine," Ashlynn told herself as she padded across her bedchambers to the washroom to clean herself up and prepare to face the things she still needed to do today. Her steps were unstable as she walked, and more than once, she had to pause to steady herself as she found that her movements put unexpected strain on one of the many bruises scattered across her body.

The shape of Nyrielle’s hand could clearly be seen in a brilliant purplish-yellow bruise on her left breast with five dark red lines at the tips of each finger where her nails had bit into Ashlynn’s tender flesh. Another handprint marked the hip opposite of her witch’s mark and both of her wrists bore rope burns from Nyrielle’s efforts to restrain her as the evening escalated.

Of course, Ashlynn had left her own set of marks on her lover’s alabaster skin, including a perfectly shaped handprint on Nyrielle’s slender, toned buttocks following what Ashlynn claimed was a perfectly deserved spanking for how naughty Nyrielle’s hands had been. Nor had Ashlynn stopped there, choosing to leave several ’bite marks’ of her own on her lover’s pale, alabaster skin as if she was extracting some kind of revenge for every small bite Nyrielle had ever left on Ashlynn’s tender flesh.

None of the markes on her body were serious injuries, and by this time the following day, the rapid healing she received along with her other gifts from Nyrielle would erase all but the deepest of marks from her skin but that didn’t mean that they didn’t sting at the moment as she gently washed her body with a soft cloth and rose scented soap.

A short half hour later, she had dressed in a high-necked dress with long, flowing sleeves in a shade of dark maroon that always made Ashlynn feel more like a vampire’s seneschal than a witch. The spills of dark lace that fell from her wrists, throat, and hips only added to the feeling of a gothic beauty who had fallen into a world of darkness and blood.

"I wonder what Jocey would think if she saw how my wardrobe has changed," Ashlynn mused as she finished the outfit with a simple black traveling hat that complemented the darker hues in her wardrobe. "I suppose I’ll find out soon enough," she said, setting the hat in place and giving herself a final inspection in the mirror.

"Once I deal with Owain, I’ll bring her back to the Vale. And who knows," she added. "Maybe I’ll get a chance to take her shopping in High Fen City for a few new outfits of her own before the real battles begin. Hopefully, if I can show her enough of the bright side of the Eldritch world, it will be easier for her to adjust to the changes that are coming for our family."

For now, however, Jocelynn’s rescue would need to wait, and Ashlynn firmly pushed down the butterflies that tried to form in her stomach when she thought about what her sister must be enduring in Owain’s company as she was forced to take her sister’s place in the marriage her father had arranged.

One way or another, she would never allow Owain to actually wed Jocelynn. Thankfully, based on the information she’d been able to gather from Samira during her visit to the Summer Villa in the spring, she still had several months before Owain would declare her dead to the public. Then there would be a period of mourning before her former husband could announce that he was taking a new wife who had ’consoled him through his grief.’

There weren’t many months left before she would need to make her move, but Ashlynn intended to use each and every one that she had to train her coven and prepare for the conflicts ahead. Originally, she had intended to leave with Nyrielle to visit her family in Blackwell County, but it would take weeks of travel in each direction, and she no longer felt like she could indulge in such a selfish desire when so much was at stake.

For now, while Ollie and Virve underwent their trials, there was still one more person she needed to speak with about adding his magic to their own strength. But to do that, she would have to break the curse that kept young lord Hauke trapped as a prisoner of his own mind...