Author's note:
I normally do not do an author's note at the beginning of chapters. And I never give trigger warnings. But I'm not going to lie this chapter is pretty fucked up. If this is the chapter I lose you on. I understand. Check out my other books!
Jasper's slow ascent up the grand staircase was unhurried, his steps measured and completely at peace. The moment of serenity shattered abruptly as Hermes, the manservant assigned to him by his parents, appeared. The man bowed so deeply it was ridiculous, his respect for the Crown Prince a heavy weight in the air.
"Crown Prince Jasper, you have been missing," Hermes murmured, his voice laced with concern. "Your Queen Mother has been worried. No one could see you at all."
Jasper knew the reigning kings and queens were watching, their eyes—metaphorical and perhaps literal—on every inch of the castle. They were all chomping at the bit, waiting for the smallest lapse in control: to see which princess would secure her place, or which prince would be reckless enough to compromise a princess, forcing her elimination from the marriage market. These sick voyeurs watched every second of the spectacle. Jasper preferred peace; he didn't like being spied on.
He stopped, his body taut, and turned to look out into the vast hall. It was empty, yet he felt the scrutiny of the rulers of the kingdoms. They were always watching.
"My actions are not for spectators," he stated, his voice a low, dangerous rumble that echoed slightly in the quiet corridor. "If you want to know what I'm up to: ask!" His words were a threat wrapped in an offer of openness. He dared a king or queen to trample on his privacy. He wanted Daniella's power, but it did not mean his own was lacking. Jasper had the strength to go up against the Kings, but if all the kingdoms united against him, he would be at a disadvantage. That disadvantage was the only thing that kept his immense power restrained. His entire existence had been spent under the heel of those with more power, better connections, or a bigger army. But once he left this marriage market with Daniella, no one would breathe down his neck. He would become the ultimate sovereign, the new King of Kings, and then they would beg at his feet.
Jasper turned on his heel and continued up the steps toward the princes' corridor. Behind him, Hermes visibly flinched under the pressure of the unseen, watching eyes of the rulers. The manservant bowed deeply to no one, a clear sign of respect that he knew would still be caught and noted. Then, he spun around to follow his prince, taking up his post outside Jasper's door, ready to assist him in all things.
"Where did you disappear to with my princess?" Eric's words were a lash of cold, icy steel, cutting through the corridor's quiet. His blood-red eyes burned as they tracked Jasper's every movement. He could smell Daniella all over Jasper, and it wasn't her natural, clean scent. This was the musk of lust and sex. Had he defiled her?
Eric's rage swelled, hot and blinding, as his aura began to pulse a violent, throbbing red. With a roar of uncontained frustration, he slashed the arm of his nearby manservant. The loyal man gasped as his blood sprayed out, and Eric, with a guttural sound, instantly manipulated the spilled fluid, coagulating it into a cluster of jagged, razor-sharp daggers made of solid blood. With a vicious flick of his wrist, the deadly projectiles flew toward Jasper's back.
But before the blades could even graze their target, they smashed into a sudden, solid wall of black smoke. The corrosive, poisonous cloud seemed to instantly absorb the blood, devouring it and incorporating the crimson fluid into its own toxic swirl.
"Here we go!" Deacon grinned, leaning against his own doorframe, his eyes alight with amusement as Eric's jealousy boiled over into resentment and blind fury. That prince really did have a stick up his ass about the princess.
Miguel stood completely naked in his doorway, his body a picture of resigned grace. He sighed as he watched Eric prepare to battle someone he could never defeat. Jasper would simply toy with him before destroying him. Until Eric grew stronger, this was a fruitless endeavor.
Linden's vertical-slit pupils assessed the tense hall. His scales were fully exposed, glistening in the hall's low light, as he too stood completely bare, his pronged cock on arrogant display. He wondered why everyone was so obsessed with Daniella. She was only one woman; someone had to give her up. She wasn't even a true prize—a beautiful, enchanting, and sexy cripple who was ultimately useless to their kingdom. Linden knew his brother, Landon, needed to get a grip on himself. He couldn't be swept away by passion; he needed a powerful Queen to raise the prestige of their kingdom, so they weren't always last in line.
Landon clenched his fists, wanting to step forward and fight for Daniella, to throw his hat in the ring and make these two know that he wasn't to be underestimated. He felt the burning desire to go toe-to-toe with them for the princess. But the shame of his previous losses was a bitter taste in his mouth. He knew he couldn't beat Jasper, and Eric was just as impossible to defeat in a direct, honest fight. It wasn't in his nature to be sneaky and underhanded, but he felt the desire in him grow—to do whatever it took to get Daniella.
Jasper's grin was wide, feral, and self-satisfied. With a casual hiss of expelled smoke, he released three identical copies of himself. These were devoid of his soul, mere illusions of black smoke given form, and their bodies all began to emanate the same toxic, swirling black cloud.
"Where is she?!" Eric hissed, his hands pumping as more blood rose, instantly displayed as thousands of tiny, glittering darts. They were all prepared to slice into Jasper. They wouldn't kill him, but they would definitely make him bleed.
"I can tell you where she was." Jasper's eyes gleamed with visceral triumph as he lightly touched his lips, which were still a little swollen. "I bet you can smell her."
"It means nothing. I'll get her no matter what. Either I have her and you die, or you get her and I kill you both!" Eric screamed, his voice cracking with pure, unhinged fury.
His deranged rambling was accompanied by a visceral scream of rage as the blood darts all flew toward Jasper at breakneck speeds, too fast for even the real prince to react to.
Eric watched, a small, twisted smile cracking his lips as his blood darts all sliced through every copy of Jasper. Only for that smile to falter, then shatter, as all the illusions simply dissolved into smoke. None of them had been the real Jasper. Eric stared at the spot where the copies had stood. Only a faint, oily residue of black smoke remained, a sharp, metallic scent that stung the throat—the lingering signature of Jasper's dark power.
Up ahead, he heard the faint creak of a door opening. He looked out to see the chaos in the hall still swirling, a cloud of black smoke where his target had been.
"He frowned as he looked at Eric in the cloud of smoke. Are you still playing with my illusions?" Jasper's voice drifted down the corridor from the doorway of his luxurious room. He smirked, the sound of it a painful slap to Eric's ego. "Hermes, bring me a maid." He said before closing his door with a solid, resounding click.
Eric's blood boiled hotter than before. He had been fooled again. He hadn't even been fighting Jasper. The Crown Prince hadn't stopped walking; he'd gone straight into his room and left behind toys for Eric to play with. No one understood Jasper's power, which was what made him so difficult to fight. Jasper barely showed the surface of his abilities; no matter how much his opponent pushed, they could never get down to the core of it. So, they were always the idiot being tricked.
"He really is an asshole," Deacon chuckled, his amusement now tempered with a slight eye-roll. "And for God's sake, stop defiling all the princesses. You're dirtying the pool." Now that the fun was over, he pushed off his doorframe and went back into his room, closing the door behind him. He had a few corpses in his room that still needed his attention.
Eric slammed his own door shut as he entered his chamber, absolutely furious for being tricked and made a fool of in front of all the other princes. He couldn't stand that Jasper didn't even extend him the slightest bit of courtesy as the Supreme King's son.
Miguel silently went back into his room, completely undisturbed by the unrest in the princes' wing. With so many soon-to-be Kings, or possible Kings, in one place, it was bound to be loud.
Linden gave his brother a disappointed look before he went back into his room, Landon doing the same, the desire still a growing knot in his chest.
Hermes rushed down the hall, seizing the first presentable maid he could find by the arm and efficiently hauling her back up to Prince Jasper's room. With a light, respectful knock on the massive oak door, he waited for Jasper's permission to enter.
"Come in."
Hermes pushed the door open, bowing deeply as he ushered the young maid inside the neutral-toned, spa-like chamber. The room was a study in regal relaxation—pale stone floors, silk-lined walls in soft cream and beige, and a massive canopy bed draped in fine white linen. It was designed to soothe a savage soul, grounded with heavy, ornate Regency furniture that gave it an imposing, powerful aesthetic. The manservant quickly closed the door, sealing the horrors that would ultimately unfold behind the thick wood.
Jasper's hunger had returned with a vengeance. It was as if every moment he spent away from Daniella, the need grew in intensity. He had never had to deal with this before. He would need to speak to his father, to ask him how he controlled the gnawing hunger, the simmering darkness that lived beneath his skin.
His power was pressing out of his pores. Thick, greasy tendrils of black smoke were now surrounding him, needing an escape valve for his pent-up, violently aggressive tension.
"Get on the bed and strip," Jasper commanded, his voice raw.
The compliant maid quickly unbuttoned her dress, the expensive fabric pooling on the floor as she walked toward the bed. Her knees touched the plush mattress, and like a well-trained dog, she hiked her hips high into the air, her face buried into one of his custom pillows. Her thighs spread wide, revealing the dark hair around her womanhood.
It was different than Daniella's.
The thought was a cold, sharp blade. He didn't like that it was different. He wanted Daniella, and this stupid, compliant maid would have to satisfy him for now.
Her body shivered as he climbed onto the bed behind her. He reached out and gripped the back of her neck, hauling her upper body up. Her chest bounced with the rough force of his pull, and his teeth instantly sunk into the flesh of her shoulder. She whimpered, a small, pathetic sound, but didn't struggle. A thin trickle of her blood trailed down her back until it slipped between her folds.
With his teeth still clamped onto her skin, he guided his cock between her folds. Her own blood served as a sick, natural lubricant as he slid into her. She moaned, a high, desperate sound, like an animal in heat, and he hadn't even moved yet. It was frustrating.
His powerful cock slammed into her hard and fast, filling her to the brink. He could feel the end of her narrow canal, and it was not enough. She hissed in pain and groaned, trying to keep up her forced moans as his solid length filled her, colliding with her soft, cavernous walls.
Jasper released his teeth from her skin with a wet, tearing sound, then reached into his breast pocket. He retrieved the panties he had taken from Daniella. The delicate, expensive fabric was still soaked with her rich nectar. His fingers clenched the tiny piece of cloth, his knuckles white with tension, as he brought it to his nose, breathing deeply. His eyes suddenly turned completely black, the whites disappearing entirely as he was lost to the pure, consuming madness of Daniella's scent. He thrust into the maid harder and harder, his tongue darting out to lick at the drenched fabric, a violent, electrifying taste of Daniella's essence flooding his senses. The taste was a memory made real, the sudden, overwhelming connection sparking his horns to rip through his scalp.
"Your Majesty," she cried out, her voice a desperate, dying plea for him to slow down.
He kept thrusting, a desperate animal driven not by pleasure, but by the need to extinguish this fire. She's not her, she's not her, the thought screamed in his mind, only making him bite down harder.
Jasper's nostrils flared, and two thick, curved horns began to grow out of his skull, tearing through his skin. He lunged forward and bit down again, this time on her upper spine. He could feel the bone beneath her skin give way under his teeth as he forced her chest to press back into the mattress. He kept thrusting his hips, harder and faster. He heard the sickening crunch of cervical bones shattering and a final, guttural gasp before silence from the maid.
And he still kept going, furiously fucking her lifeless corpse.
He continued to thrust into her, his body rigid with agonizing need, until he finally met his release. Daniella's panties hung from his lips, the fabric stuffed in his mouth, as he sighed in a perverse, tormented ecstasy. He pulled himself free of the wasted flesh beneath him, the maid's body falling slack. Shoving her contorted body off of his bed, the thick, heavy thud of her corpse hitting the carpet was enough to alert Hermes that his prince was done.
"Take her away. And bring me another maid."
Hermes quickly entered Jasper's bedroom, his eyes fixed firmly on the ground. He efficiently removed the maid's lifeless body before rushing off to get another. That night, the manservant brought the prince seven maids. They would need to be looking for more staff very soon.
Author's note:
This is the man that Daniella calls a softy. Am I the only one that loves their pet names. Lunatic and psycho are so cute! Vote comment and power stones all appreciated. You know I love all the things.