The Time of Dragons - The Nail that Sticks Out Gets Hammered Down

---

The streets of Antilla were crowded, filled with horses pulling cards and men and women in all sorts of dress walking this way and that as the activity of midday rushed towards the start of the evening, and everyone was eager to get to where they were going. No one paid attention to a single cloaked figure as she walked down the street, her cowl up to hide her face even when the day was warm, and no one thought much of it when she moved into the alley between two stone buildings, vanishing off the street entirely. Now safely out of sight for the first time in hours, Lady Elise pulled down the hood, letting her golden hair catch the dim rays of the sun that still shone into the darkness.

Unfastening the cloak, she pulled it from her body, revealing the tight clothing she wore beneath it… revealing and almost skintight, it was nevertheless of obvious quality. Dueling clothing, such as a nobleman would wear or a retainer of lords. Certainly, her father wouldn’t have approved of Lady Elise wearing such a thing or being seen in it, but there was much that her father didn’t approve of.

The thought made her want to sob for a brief second before she buried the memories… there would be time for that later. In truth, she had to admit that she didn’t especially approve of the clothing either… it was fine enough, but there wasn’t enough of it, and even when there was clothing, it was far too tight. Lady Elise didn’t think of herself as much of a noblewoman, but she wasn’t a whore either. The clothing was necessary, though… necessary for the same reason she had taken off the cloak and was even now folding it up neatly… too much fabric would be dangerous once she started climbing.

Elise had climbed up from here more times than she could remember… it was one of her favorite portals into the greater city’s rooftops. The masonry of the buildings was as fine as any buildings in the world, but the structures were ancient, and enough of the mortar had crumbled to make good hand and footholds for her. Staying on her feet to find her balance, the blonde noblewoman jumped, catching her fingertips on the same holds she had used a hundred times. A noblewoman’s fingers were supposed to be dainty and used only for embroidery or sewing. Her fingers were strong and callused, easily finding their grip and holding her weight while she planted her feet and began to climb, moving quickly between holds by long-established memories.

Lady Elise had grown up on her father’s estate, but her true home had always been on the rooftops. Before she had died birthing Elise’s youngest brother, her mother had once told her that she had been climbing before she had learned to walk. As a young girl, climbing had given her a way to avoid her chores and the nagging of her nanny, a wonderful way to play. Her father’s estate was ancient, as was their family, and the mansion was a maze of walls and old towers spiraling out to the four corners of the grounds… winding and organic as if they had grown rather than been built over hundreds of years of expansion. Before she was ten, Elise had been leaving the grounds on the rooftops and heading outside into the city… and out there, everything was even more chaotic. While the buildings’ layout was sometimes more orderly, there were so many of so many different heights and hundreds of archways and bridges and gables that would allow her to travel half the breadth of the city a hundred feet from the ground.

The blonde girl loved how it felt when she climbed, pulling himself up a wall stone by stone, fingers, and feet digging hard into the small crevices between stones… feeling the sweet ache it left in her muscles afterward. The air up here always felt impossibly crisp up here… clean and sweet and cold. Arm over arm, she climbed until her fingers fastened around one of the old broken gargoyles, using it to pull herself further up. Elise reached the roof, pulling herself onto the slightly sloped edge of the shingles.

She sat and rested a moment, her feet dangling down as she looked down over the city in a glance. She wasn’t that high yet… only about forty feet, but she was still further up than fully half the buildings nearby, and nearly twenty feet above the walls of her father’s estate, visible just barely in the dimming light several blocks back. Elise could perch for hours among the rain-worn gargoyles that brooded over the buildings, watching it all below her: Merchants trundling on their way, boys and girls at play on the streets, pickpockets trying to work their trade, the slowly rising smoke of cooks tending their fires in the nearby buildings, restless dogs running back and forth in the back alleys, and the servant girls gossiping beside the water well.

Sighing, she rose to her feet and began to stalk across the rooftops, moving over a stone bridge to the next building and up another five feet, then climbed a spire to go up another ten feet as she worked towards the taller buildings in the center of Antilla. Yes, as a child, climbing had been a game, but now it was an escape. Her father had long since forbidden her from climbing… he was relying on her, and it wasn’t proper behavior for a lady to do something like this. She sniffed, painfully aware that his real concern was what if she fell and he couldn’t marry her off anymore.

It didn't matter - Elise had no intention of stopping her favorite thing. For a while, her father had the guards chase her whenever they saw her on the roofs and try to take her back down to the ground. That had been fun… it was like playing a game with her brothers and sisters, except this was a game that Elise couldn’t lose. Not one of the guards could climb worth a damn. He had given up on that, though. Most of it time, it hadn't even mattered... she usually slipped away without being seen. People never looked up.

These days, that was the thing Elise liked the most about climbing… it was almost like being invisible. Like being free.

On the ground, she was never free. Father never spoke of finances with a woman, but Lady Elise had eyes and a keen mind… she knew that they were deeply in debt, their family fortune squandered by generations of living like kings. She didn’t understand why they didn’t just leave the servants, leave the guards, leave the silks and the jewelry and the crumbling mansion, and live sensibly. Her father, of course, wouldn’t hear of it. He was always plotting ways to restore the family name and fortune.

One of her elder sisters had already been married to some other noble family for a handsome dowery, and while it felt cruel to think it, her remaining older sister was no prize. Two of her brothers had already been promised, and she had always known it was a matter of time before her father tried to marry her off.

She had no intention of obeying that edict. She would run if she had to, but her father had never been able to make her do anything before… Lady Elise was not chattel to be sold. She had grown up on tales of women from other lands making their way alone… warriors and artists and musicians and merchants and explorers. In her heart, she knew that was who she was… not a domestic woman to be sold as a wife to a rich man for the benefit of her crumbling family. When she first knew the touch of a man, it would be a man she had chosen, one she loved… not some filthy beast for whom the size of his purse was only surpassed by the size of his gut.

So when her father summoned her today and told her of the marriage he had arranged for her, it didn't come as a shock, but it hurt anyway.

He hadn't even promised to her to a noble. Instead, he had sold her for her name and her beauty to a merchant prince named Tanis... a wealthy man she had never met, from a faraway city. He would provide her family with money, and she would provide him with the noble blood and their family name. The deal was finished, and Elise was going to be taken to him in a week.

Lady Elise had refused, of course, but he had only smiled at her and told her that it was done and there would be no arguing. She knew that he was right... there was no arguing with him. So... Lady Elise hadn’t argued. She had simply left the estate, heading to her refuge on the rooftops, and there she wandered as the sky grew dark. She had no real plan, she had to admit… she couldn’t stay up here forever. Still, it cleared her head to stalk the rooftops, and she could always think better up here. She would think of something and-

The attack caught her by surprise. At the sun set, the roofs grew darker and darker, but the glare of the sun got worse as it reflected off shingles, making her almost blind. She didn’t see the man hiding between a turret, but as she passed, he rose and grabbed her long hair. She cried out as he sharply pulled back, falling onto her back on the slanted roof. Her feet kicked for purchase as she started to slide towards the edge, not finding any. Then her scalp burned as he did not release her hair, and his grip kept her from falling to her death off the edge, her feet kicking just over the open air as her hands scrabbled across the tile, finally finding a crevice to wedge themselves into.

“So what do we have here?” the man said as he looked down at her in the dying light of the day. Elise could barely see him, shadowed by the setting sun, but he seemed older than her by several years, hidden by a black cloak and wearing leather. “I thought the only people who climbed this high were criminals. I didn’t expect to find a whore here.” He knelt, still holding her hair. “Well, it seems I have some time to pass then. Might as well entertain me, whore… what’s your price?”

“Wha… Who… what…?” Elise sputtered as several different thoughts fought for control of her scattered mind. At last, one of her feet found purchase on the lip, and she used it to push herself back fully onto the roof. The noblewoman wanted to ask who he was and what he was doing here. In all the time she had been climbing, she had never found another person. She wanted to ask what he thought he was doing attacking her, and didn’t he know who she was? She would have the guards flay him alive if he touched her again! She wanted to protest that she wasn’t a whore… to strike him for even thinking such a filthy thought. “Let me go!” She cried out at last, her hand holding her hair and trying to pull it free of the man’s iron grip. “You're making a mistake; you can’t hit me! I’m no man’s whore… release me at once!”

White teeth flashed in the shadows as he smiled at her, and her head burned as he pulled at her hair again, pulling her back up the roof, onto the turret he had been hiding behind where the ground was flat. “No, you’ve made a mistake, pretty thing. There is no one up here but us. I already told you… no one comes up here but criminals…” He pulled back his hood, revealing a handsome, thirty-something man with a trimmed beard. “Including me. And that means that if I say you’re a whore…” he took his left hand and moved it to her breast where she was laying on her back, squeezing the swell of her tit through her clothing. “Then you’re a whore.”

Suddenly, Elise’s mind was filled with other stories… not the ones about strong women making a life on their own, but the ones about what could happen to young girls alone. The ones that always had made her grateful to live in a house with guards. “No!” she screamed. Help! Help!”

The dark man laughed before kicking her in the side. It wasn’t all that hard, but it was more than enough for a woman who had never suffered an injury before or known hardship… she lost her breath, and her screams broke into gasping coughs. “You’re almost a hundred feet off the ground in the dark of evening. No one is going to hear you, whore. Even if someone does, what do you think they are going to do? Climb up here and save you?” He grinned down at her again. “I think not. Scream all you want… you’re mine.”

Elise was still trying to catch her breath when he was on top of her, sitting on her upper thighs and abdomen. At the same time, he pulled her hands together and began to wrap a chord around them, binding them above her head before his hands found the clasps of her bodice, opening it down the middle to expose her bare breasts beneath it, nipples hard in the cold air. “Nice rack, whore,” he mocked as Elise let out a gasping sob, trying to bring down her bound arms to cover her exposed tits… something she had never shown to a man before. “I’m glad I decided to make you a whore… tits like these are wasted on anyone else.”

He moved slightly down her body so he could grip her belt and begin to undo it, leading Elise to start crying. “No!” she cried. “Please, stop it! I can pay you, please. My family has money…”

The man's eyes narrowed as he glared at Elise, his annoyance palpable. "Offering me money? You really are a stupid little girl, aren't you? I don’t think you understand how being a whore works," he said coldly. "You don’t pay me. I pay you." His hand disappeared into the folds of his cloak, reappearing with a small, cloth-wrapped coin purse.

As Elise opened her mouth to protest again, the man swiftly shoved the bag full of coins into her open mouth. Elise's eyes widened in shock and fear as the heavy purse filled her mouth, the cold metallic touch of the coins pressing against her tongue and cheeks. She felt like she was going to choke; the weight and bulk of the purse made it difficult to breathe. Her throat constricted, and she began to gag involuntarily, her body convulsing as she struggled to expel the intrusive object. Tears streamed down her face, mixing with the strands of her golden hair that clung wetly to her forehead.

"And your stupidity is annoying me now," the man added, his voice dripping with disdain as he watched Elise's futile attempts to dislodge the purse. He leaned back slightly, enjoying the sight of her distress, his earlier anger seemingly appeased by her suffering.

Her belt came off easily enough, and he tugged at her pants sharply, getting off of her and dragging her across the rough stone of the turret as he yanked at her leather pants until they had slid all the way off of her long, slender legs. With his weight off of her, she turned to the side away from him, hiding her breasts and as much of her undergarment-covered groin as possible, but he didn’t mind. Instead, he stood and began to undo his pants. “And now you’re mine,” he said, the whites of his teeth flashing in the dim light.

As his pants came free and dropped, the terrified noble girl caught sight of the rod jutting from his groin, and her eyes went wide. It was the first she had ever seen in the flesh, and it looked nothing like paintings or statues would have had her believe. For years Elise had heard the maids and servants whisper of their lovers, how mighty their cocks were, and how good they felt. This shaft, however, didn’t look good to Elise… it looked terrifying!

Her attacker was fully erect, his cock jutting out eight inches from his body towards Elise’s vulnerable form. It was thick, swollen, and slightly reddened, and its widened head dripped liquid slowly down the glistening tip. “Mmff!” she screamed through the coins serving as her makeshift gag. He couldn't mean to push that thing into her... it would destroy her!

Panicking, Elise tried to kick at him, but her attempts were feeble and utterly futile... on her back and tangled in the remnants of her clothing, she had no leverage at all. Mercilessly, the larger man lowered himself back onto her, pinning her as he forced her knees apart, exposing her most intimate place to the open air. Her body was only protected by a slight shift of cotton now, and he grabbed it without a second thought and tore it from her body with a loud, ripping noise. Elise flushed crimson as her total nudity added even more shame and terror to what she was already feeling. Her eyes were fixed on his cock, the huge, long thing that would soon defile her. “Pleeshh,” she whimpered, tears streaming down her cheeks and down her chin. “Dnnn! Dnn!”

The dark man did not waste time with her pleading. He wanted her now, and he was going to take her. So, looming over her, ignoring her feeble attempts to defend herself, he grabbed her bound arms with one hand and used the other to guide the head of his cock toward the entrance to her innocent cunt. Elise's eyes widened in horror as she watched him position himself, her heart pounding like a drum against her chest. She tried to squirm away, but his weight pinned her down effectively.

With a cruel grin, he positioned the swollen head of his cock at her entrance, feeling the resistance of her virginity. "Ready or not, here I come," he taunted, his voice dripping with malice. Without any further warning, he thrust forward with brutal force, driving his thick cock into her tight, unyielding passage.

Elise's body tensed in sheer agony as he violated her. The initial penetration was excruciating, the size of his cock stretching her tiny opening painfully wide. She felt like she was being split in two, every inch of his intrusion causing fresh waves of pain to ripple through her body. Her muffled screams were choked by the coin purse still lodged in her mouth, turning her protests into garbled whimpers of distress.

"Ah, yes," the man groaned in pleasure, his hips continuing their relentless advance. "So tight... you're doing wonderfully, whore."

Elise could feel every ridge and vein of his shaft as it pushed deeper inside her, each millimeter an invasion she never consented to. Her inner walls clenched instinctively around the intruder, trying to resist the violation, but it only seemed to spur him on further. Tears streamed down her face, mingling with the sweat that broke out across her forehead from the intensity of the pain.

As he continued to thrust, forcing more and more of his length into her, Elise's mind raced with terror. This wasn't how she imagined losing her virginity—not like this, not to a stranger who saw her as nothing more than a conquest. She thought about fighting back, about summoning some inner strength to resist him, but all she felt was helplessness and despair. Her body betrayed her, unable to escape the relentless assault despite its desperate pleas for mercy.

Elise couldn’t even try to plead anymore. All that came out of her mouth were pitiful cries and sobs as this man violated her and hurt her more than she ever thought possible. Squirming, writhing beneath him, Elise thrashed, throwing her head from side to side even as scream after scream escaped from her gagged lips. She tried to fight him, to kick him or throw him off of her, but he did not even register her efforts, completely unbudging. All he did was grin down at her, his eyes all but glowing with lust and joy in her defilement while he punished her pussy with hard thrusts, forcing his cock deeper into her every time he pushed.

Finally, with one last powerful shove, he bottomed out inside her. The head of his cock wedged itself against her cervix, fully impaling her. Elise gasped through the gag as she felt the fullness of him inside her for the first time, a sensation that was overwhelmingly painful rather than pleasurable. His cock was completely buried within her depths; there was no part of him left outside.

For a moment, he paused there atop her, both of them breathing heavily from exertion and emotion alike. Elise could feel his heartbeat matching hers in frantic rhythm against her skin where they touched. Around them lay evidence of their struggle: torn clothing strewn about them on the rooftop tiles like confetti after a battle won too easily by brute strength alone over fragile hope and innocence lost forever under moonlight's cold gaze above them both now joined together so intimately yet so violently beneath its indifferent watchfulness.

“I knew you’d be a good fuck the moment I saw you,” he mocked as he thrust into her, his grin widening at the sight of the blonde noble’s obvious misery. “But you’re even tighter than I thought you would be. Didn’t think a rebellious whore would be kind enough to save her cherry for me, though,” he laughed cruelly as he continued to deflower his victim brutally. Elise’s entire world had narrowed down to the searing pain in her pussy, the overwhelming sense of defeat and humiliation that came with being utterly helpless beneath her rapist. She could feel him slamming into her again and again, and each thrust driving his thick cock deeper into her tender flesh. The relentless assault on her virginity left her gasping for air, the coin purse still lodged in her mouth muffling her screams into pitiful whimpers.

Elise’s mind was a whirlwind of agony and terror. She felt every ridge and vein of his shaft as it relentlessly invaded her most private place, each movement accompanied by a fresh wave of pain that seemed to ripple through her entire body. Her inner walls clenched instinctively around the intruder, trying in vain to resist the violation, but it only seemed to spur him on further. Tears streamed down her face, mingling with the sweat that broke out across her forehead from the intensity of the pain.

She couldn’t believe this was happening to her. It felt like a nightmare, each second stretching into an eternity of torment. The realization that this stranger was tearing her apart, this monster who saw her as nothing more than a conquest, filled her with despair so profound it threatened to consume her entirely. She tried to summon some inner strength to fight back, to resist him, but all she felt was helplessness and despair. Her body betrayed her, unable to escape the relentless assault despite its desperate pleas for mercy.

The dark man knew he was rapidly approaching his climax, Elise’s misery and pained screams fueling his arousal as he plunged his thick cock into her as hard as he could. He didn’t want just to take her virginity; he wanted to plunder every bit of her completely. “Yes…” he groaned, his voice thick with lust. “You’ll make a fine fucktoy.” He wasn’t sure if Elise could hear him and didn’t really care. He closed his eyes as he felt his balls tightening, her cunt clenching around him and milking his cock to climax against her will.

Elise felt him shudder above her, his movements becoming jerky and uncontrolled as he neared his release. The sensation of his impending climax inside her only added to her horror, knowing that he was about to mark her in the most intimate way possible. She wanted to scream, to beg him to stop, but the gag in her mouth rendered her silent except for muffled sobs and whimpers.

“Take it, whore! Take my load again like a good cunt!” With one final, powerful thrust, the man reached his peak. Elise felt his hot seed filling her insides, a feeling that was both disgusting and devastatingly final. Holding her down, the dark man laughed as he felt his cock spray a huge load deeply into the helpless girl, whose cries became more shrill as she felt his hot semen splash against her tormented inner walls. He didn’t stop raping her as he came, however…  instead, he kept slamming his length into her until his balls felt empty and his load was all inside. Only when he was completely finished did he collapse atop her, spent and satisfied. She lay there trembling, feeling soiled and broken. The weight of his body pressing down on hers only served to emphasize her utter powerlessness in this situation.

As he began to pull out of her, Elise felt an emptiness that mirrored the void inside herself. His cock slid free wetly, leaving the Elise a sobbing wreck on the rooftop. The physical pain was almost unbearable, but it was nothing compared to the emotional trauma that threatened to overwhelm her. She curled into a ball in a desperate attempt to protect herself from further abuse. Elise lay there silently sobbing, the reality of what had just happened sinking in with brutal clarity. She had been violated in the most horrific way possible, and there was nothing she could do to change it.

“Thanks for the lay. You weren’t a bad whore,” he mocked as he pulled up his pants, then pulled the hood back up over his head. “Good luck,” he said with a grin before he vaulted the turret wall, striding into the darkness of the night with a carefree whistle.

Elise lay there on the cold, hard stone of the rooftop, feeling the remnants of his violation seep out of her ravaged hole. The sensation was both humiliating and terrifying, a constant reminder of the brutal act she had just endured. She listened in terror as the distant whistling of her attacker faded into the night, each note seeming to echo in her pounding heart. Only after the sound had completely vanished and an unbearable half hour had passed did she dare to move.

Her wrists were bound tightly by rough ropes, a cruel echo of the control he had exerted over her body. It took Elise a few minutes to finally spit out the pouch of coins before she could bring the knotted rope to her mouth, her teeth working desperately to loosen it. The fear and adrenaline coursing through her made her movements clumsy, but eventually, she managed to slip her wrists free. The relief was momentary; the reality of her situation crashed back down upon her.

She reached for her pants, pulling them up over her bare legs with trembling hands. The fabric brushed against her sore crotch, and she winced at the unwelcome touch, aware that she was smearing his cum onto her clothing. Each movement felt like a betrayal of her own body, a concession to the violation she had suffered. Elise fumbled three times, trying to close her bodice, each attempt more frustrating than the last. Her fear-hardened nipples rubbed painfully against the stiff leather cups, adding to her discomfort and humiliation.

Leaning back against the rooftop, Elise let the tears flow freely. She wasn't sure how long she lay there, lost in a whirlwind of pain and despair. But as time stretched on, a new fear began to gnaw at her: what if he came back? What if she was still here when he returned? That thought galvanized her into action.

With a renewed sense of urgency, Elise scrambled across the roof, her steps wary and uncertain. The night had fully descended, but it wasn't the darkness that made her cautious—it was the lingering trauma of what had happened. Her once-beloved rooftops now felt like treacherous terrain, each shadow a potential threat. She moved like a frightened animal, ready to bolt at any moment.

Her mind raced with thoughts of escape and safety. She needed to get back to her father's estate, to find some semblance of refuge in the familiar walls of her room. Sneaking across the rooftops with heightened vigilance, Elise finally reached her favorite point to climb down. She descended the wall with a haste born of desperation; her movements hurried and less graceful than usual.

Once on solid ground, Elise sprinted towards her home, not daring to look back. She burst into her room and locked the door behind her, collapsing onto her bed in a heap. The exhaustion and shock finally overwhelmed her, and she broke down completely into sobs, each one a testament to the profound violation she had suffered.

---

Lady Elise wasn’t sure when she fell asleep, but she didn’t wake up until nearly the next sundown. Food was delivered to her room, but no one came to see her, and she wasn’t about to step outside. Her father no doubt assumed his rebellious daughter was sulking over her arranged marriage… and for once, Elise was grateful he was such an uncompassionate father because she didn’t want to look at him or anyone else right now. She sulked for hours, scrubbed herself so raw in a bath that her skin was nearly crimson, and cried for a few more hours. After a few more hours of that, however, Elise didn't feel like she could stare at her walls for another second.

She was done with pity... now she was furious. She was not going to be defeated by some man in a black cloak! She had explored the rooftops for nearly a decade without seeing another soul… one night was not going to spoil it for her. Oh, she was going to be more careful, but the heights above the city were her safe spot, and she refused to give them up.

Still, just to be safe, she climbed up in a different spot.

For the rest of the night, she prowled the dark rooftops, becoming increasingly confident as she worked her way higher and higher up the city, sure that her sanctuary was still hers… until she heard his voice. “I love whores that want a repeat customer.” For a split second, Elise froze, terrified… and it was enough for the man in the dark cloak to step out from behind a broken gargoyle and strike her in the stomach, driving her to the ground and holding her down as he climbed on top of the sobbing girl again, fighting even more ferociously this time as he proceeded to rape her again before leaving her facedown in the cum that had leaked out of her when he came.

This time, it took her two days to leave her room and find another alley. She stared at the wall for over an hour, visualizing the handholds as she tried to work up the courage to climb. She was still doing it when a man grabbed her from behind, a hand pressed against her mouth. She could feel his lips against her ear as he growled into them. “I love it when the whore’s can’t get enough of me.” This time, she almost couldn’t even bring herself to fight against him she was so stunned. How… how had he found her? She wasn’t even on the rooftops this time, just standing in an alley… but there was still no one around to save her as he forced her to the group and held his hand over her mouth while he raped her again, leaving her sobbing before he strode out of the alley like nothing at all had happened.

When Elise walked back to her room this time, she felt like a zombie… she didn’t look at anyone, didn’t speak to anyone, didn’t even see anyone. She wasn’t even sure if she cried or not before falling asleep, and the noblewoman wasn’t sure how long she slept before waking or how long she was awake before she slept again. She only knew that when the man in black crawled through her window and woke her by pouncing on her in bed, she was too full of despair even to be shocked. Her wails of despair and misery muffled by her ripped panties, he raped her again in her own bed while whispering in her ear that he had gotten tired of waiting for her. That every whore gets favorite customers... and he was hers.

When he left, her left her naked in bed, a few coins stuffed up her ass. Elise couldn’t bring herself to get dressed again or clean herself up before passing out. That was how her maids found her the next day… wordlessly, they cleaned her up and prepared her to be taken to the carriage her father had gotten for her to ride to her promised Merchant Prince. Lady Elise no longer felt capable of objecting. The idea of an arranged marriage no longer seemed anywhere near as abhorrent to her… not when it would get her out of this city and away from the man who was preying on her. Her father didn’t even come out to see her off, but her brothers and sisters did… she hoped she wasn’t too rude to them, but she really didn’t know what to say or want to talk to anyone.

The wagon ride was a long one, more than a week of travel to the city of Taylentis where her promised husband awaited. It didn’t matter to her how ugly he was or how vile a man he might be… all that mattered was that she had left Antilla behind. She could find new safe places here, a new life for herself. She didn’t have to bow her head to her husband… she could still be the woman she had always promised herself she would be.

The mansion they stopped before was a grand one… nothing like her father’s crumbling estate. The merchant prince Tanis was as rich as she had expected, and idly, she wondered how much he had paid her father to receive the most beautiful girl he had as his bride. As she stepped out of the carriage, she hated herself for almost feeling free again, even though Lady Elise knew she was about to step into a set of shackles… she was trying desperately to convince herself it wouldn’t be that bad. Her two handmaidens followed after her, carrying the chest of her clothing and important belongings up the stairs… the rest of her belongings would follow after, or be provided new by her new wealthy husband, she knew. Lady Elise was left behind to await her new husband in the main hall.

“Welcome to your new home, my bride,” a man said from behind her.

A familiar voice.

No…

Slowly, her back rigid, fists clenched at her sides, Elise turned around. The man before her was dressed in gold and crimson silks, embroidered with a coat of arms of a dragon. His hair was coiffed tightly, and he wore no beard… but she recognized him instantly. “Y… yy…” She stuttered, disbelief coloring her tone. Denial fluttered through her head. How had he found her here? Had he followed her? Followed the carriage on the long trip?

Her rapist smiled as he took a slow step towards her. “Yes, of course me. You didn’t think I would pay such a rich dowry for you without seeing that legendary beauty of yours for myself, did you?” He grinned at the noblewoman’s stunned face. “Oh, your father warned me you would be difficult, that you thought you were too good for marriage… that you wanted to be different. I told him that that wouldn't be a problem. That I would be more than happy to educate you about what a woman's place should be." The look on her face must have been horrified because his smile widened, and he chuckled. “Oh, of course he knew. I didn’t exactly tell him your da what I planned to do to you, but I think he knew. He had given up on you, you know? Your reputation preceded you… almost everyone he approached to take your hand in marriage turned him down, knowing what a rebellious girl you were. That your beauty was not worth the shame you would bring on them. He was going to settle for a tiny dowry if I hadn’t made my offer. It’s not surprising he didn’t look overly hard at what I had planned for you.”

Elise didn’t realize she had begun to cry, her makeup running down her cheeks. “Why…” she asked in a small voice.

Tanis smiled, stepping forward again… he was just feet away now, but Elise was frozen to the spot. No matter how much she wanted to flee, she couldn’t do anything but breathe quickly on the verge of utter panic. “Because I wanted to sample you to see if you were worth the price. Because I wanted to. Because I could. But mostly… because that’s what happens to girls who don’t fit in. You had your head all filled with fantasies and tales of heroism and independence… but the world doesn’t work like that.”

He lifted one hand and brushed a lock of her blonde hair out of her face. “You’re a woman. You have only one purpose in this life… to serve a man. So I wanted you to understand the choice you have in front of you.” He took a final step forward, and then his hands went from gentle to brutal in an instant. One hand grabbed onto her hair tightly behind her head, ruining her perfectly coiffed mane, while his other hand groped her tits through her fine dress. “When I first saw you, you were wearing almost nothing… leather dueling clothes fit for the adventurous, independent, tough girl you thought of yourself as. Now you’re wearing a fine dress and makeup. You get to choose now. You can be my wife… marry me, live in this mansion and have everything you need, satisfy me, give me children, and bring my family into the nobility…” he moved his hand down to grab at her cunt through the fabric of her dress, the silks brushing against her thighs like the kiss of a snake’s tongue. “Or you can be my whore, and I’ll just do whatever I want with you.”

He glared at her, but the smile on his face never changed. “Choose.”

Elise sobbed, and made her choice.

---

Like this story? You can buy the anthology it belongs to here: