Anna's Journal – February 23

I have been unable to continue my exploration of the castle these past few days. She is always here, and I have been sleeping later than I intend to. Sometimes sleeping when I do not mean to at all, and yet, I never feel rested. I am always in the fog of a waking nightmare.

I am making sure I eat as much as I can. I need to build up energy from somewhere. Make up for the restless slumber. Need to stay healthy, need to be at my best. At least the coffee keeps me alert, hones my senses. Makes up for the fogginess this lack of proper sleep is causing. God, I am so very tired.

I must always be vigilant and at the ready! Persistent. I am prepared to have to flee the castle at a moment's notice, should the opportunity arise. I just have to keep looking. Keep searching. Wherever I can, whenever I can. She has to have missed something. She can't have removed everything in this place that is both thin and sturdy enough to pick a lock. I know she has taken away any such items on purpose.

Not that any of my found exists to this place are of any use. Even if I did get the balcony doors, or my window open, they both lead directly into the courtyard. I'd be torn apart by the wolves in no time, and this will have all been in vain. I need to find an exit that gets me past the courtyard, outside of the castle walls completely. I wonder if such an exit even exists. I wonder how far I could make it down the mountain before the wolves found me anyway...

I must not think like that! To do so is to give in to despair. There is still hope, and I must not lose that! Courage, Anna, courage.

I think if I were able to get over to her end of the castle, I could follow her route along the castle wall and climb past the courtyard. But that puts me directly in her path and increases my chances of being found out. If that happens, it will surely be the death of me right then and there. This is also assuming I can make such a climb as a human. From what I can tell though, the wall does have various chinks and footholds. I will need to be careful, but I think I can do it if need be.

I am hoping for a better escape route. One must exist in a place this big.

Finally.

Anna breathed a sigh of relief and stepped away from the window. The Countess had left for the evening. It had taken everything she had to stay awake this long and keep watch. She'd even snuck an extra cup of coffee this morning and hid it in her dresser drawer, drinking it cold to perk herself up.

And it had paid off.

She was awake, and free to explore the castle. She checked Kristoff's watch to note the time, and quickly tucked it back into her skirt purse. She had at least an hour, and at best, until sunrise before the Countess returned. She would never know ahead of time what her time frame would be, but such a variable could not stop her from what needed to be done. A risk, for sure, but one she had no choice in taking.

Out of habit, she started where she always did, the main doors. She knew it was futile, knew it was impossible to just walk out of here the way she had entered, but she still could not help herself from checking anyway. Escape always forefront in her mind. She sometimes wondered if that desperation made her reckless and foolhardy. If the main doors were actually opened, would she rush through them without a second thought? Without analyzing all the risks? Consider at all the wolves?

And yet, try as she might to break from pattern, she was afraid that if she did, it would be the time something wasn't locked. She continued in vain to test every door she had come across before. All locked. Always locked. But at least she knew for sure and wouldn't have doubts.

Don't panic. Just keep going, be methodical, check everywhere.

When she had finished the areas that were familiar to her and sure that they were all locked and useless, she gave a small growl of frustration. She had hoped…well, there's nothing for it. She turned away from what she knew was the front of the castle and looked to the opposite direction. Further in to the castle. She had never gone that way before, the idea of venturing further in always worrisome. What if she became lost? What if she could not get back to her quarters in time?

What if that's where you find your way out?

Endless blackness stood before her, the echo of her footsteps the only sound haunting the still halls.

"Come on, Anna," she told herself sternly, needing to break the silence. "It's not like you've ever been afraid of the dark. Just pay attention to where you are going, write it all down so you can get back."

It was easy enough advice to follow, and hearing the words spoken out loud gave them power, gave her courage. She knew that waiting to be rescued was not an option. She was on her own. She could not trick herself into thinking otherwise simply because she was scared. The only one who could get her out of here was her. She had no time to be apprehensive and give in to fear.

She began the process of checking every door she came across as she worked her way to the other end of the castle's main floor. Ignoring the new staircase she'd found, and focusing on the floor she was on first. She needed to be thorough.

Locked, locked, locked.

Everything locked. When she reached the opposite wall and found the last door locked, she was beginning to feel discouraged. And desperate. She put her lantern down, and took out her journal, scribbling a crude map of what she'd covered so far. She checked her pocket watch. Still time.

Anna decided to walk the area open to her on the main floor one last time before back tracking back to the stairs she'd found that led in the opposite direction of her own staircase—further still into the castle. She had not anticipated scouring multiple floors tonight, but the staircase was there and she had the time. No sense in not getting as far as she could tonight. At the very least, her map would be bigger, and she'd familiarize herself with new area. All things that could help her in the long run.

On to the next floor then.

She hurried up the staircase, dismayed to find that here too, everything was locked up tight. Still she continued on. Each time, quickly pausing to update her map. She explored various staircases, both up and down, shadowed passages—always aware of the time slowly ticking away. When at last she ran out of doors, and happened upon a single last one at the top of a short, narrow staircase with questionable boards. They sank slightly under her weight, creaking with age and rot. She prayed to God they did not give way until she'd reached the small landing.

Once on the landing, she stopped to get her bearings, pulling out her map and deciding that she was now to the far right of the castle, her own quarters a level up and on the other side of the massive estate. The farthest she'd ever gone exploring the place.

As she approached the final, heavy wood door, her heart began to thump madly in her chest. Maybe, just maybe…surely, this far out of the way and out of reach—she grasped the doorknob and turned, a silent prayer on her lips.

The knob would not budge.

No.

She let out a defeated sob, banging her fist on the door before falling against the thick wood with the whole of her body, despair sinking in…and to her astonishment, the door moved. Shifted slightly against her weight.

Anna shoved the door harder, really pressing her shoulder into it, and it scraped miserably against the floor. She stepped back and studied the door. It was indeed still locked, but had fallen off its hinges. Upon closer inspection, the iron bolts holding the hinges together were gone altogether. Probably rusted away with age and decay. This whole wing of the castle much more decrepit than elsewhere she'd seen. No one would even notice such a thing as missing bolts unless they had pushed against the door like she had.

With her full weight and much force, she could probably push the door open enough to squeeze through the entrance. Without a moment to lose, she grunted against the door, pushing with all her might until sweat was beading on her brow, the door slowly giving way to her efforts. Muted light spilled though the narrow opening, and Anna shoved the door harder. The room had windows!

When she had got the door open as far as she could, she sucked in her stomach and moved sideways, keeping her lamp arm in the lead as she squeezed herself into the narrow opening, first her arm, then a leg. It was a tight fit, and she had wriggle and push, but she would make it through. Her clothes snagged on the frame as she shimmied herself, trying to get her weight steady on the foot she'd gotten through to the other side. Only once she found herself stuck, but the door gave a little as she moved, helping her work her body through.

She was almost out to the other side and sped up her pace, eager to get into the new area when the silver chain of her cross somehow got caught on the door hinge in her haste. It pulled taut for only a second and before Anna could react, the delicate silver chain snapped.

"No, no, no!" Anna cried as the cross fell from her throat to the floor and her unable to catch it. In a panic, she shoved herself through the rest of the doorway, scraping her abdomen and banging up her leg, but making it to the other side. She quickly dropped to her knees in search of her cross.

She found the broken chain tangled on the floor, but alas, the cross itself was gone. Holding up her lantern she caught the glint of silver deep within a crack in the floor. She'd never be able to get it out.

"Damn it!" she cursed, pocketing the broken chain, and hardly able to believe that in a few short seconds, she had lost her cross. Still, she had made it past the door and found new area to explore. Area that had been deemed off limits to her. She'd just increased her chances of escaping.

Outside light was the first thing she noticed. Waning moonlight reflecting off the snow, but with so many windows covering the back wall of the room, she hardly needed her lamp at all to see. Her heart ached at the sight. How she had longed for natural light from the outside world in such quantities. This room far more generous in windows than Anna's quarters or the gallery combined, and with a view that did not face the courtyard, and subsequently, the Countess's room.

A parlour room?

No, as Anna ventured forth into the space, the room was clearly masculine. She could almost feel the presence of a young gentleman still here, the room so well preserved in a memory of a time long ago. It was evidently a set of rooms where a man would pass the time in bygone days. A gentleman's smoking room or odd room at one time, perhaps. She suspected the adjoining doors would lead to a sitting room and bedchamber.

A layer of dust covered the room's surfaces and Anna absently ran her finger along the top of a small writing desk, making her way to the windows. The view too open and vast, she suddenly didn't want to look out of them and be reminded of her impregnable prison, but a whole level lower than her own might offer her better climbing options.

But these windows did not open. Purely decorative, and as Anna peered out at the landscape, she knew why. Nothing but perilous cliffside and rockface. She sighed, if not a route out of the castle, then perhaps there was something else in here that could help her. She should take her time and look.

It was strange, but she found herself wanting to linger here. This room felt distinctly different from anywhere else Anna had been in the castle. Even time itself seemed to slow down to a indolent sort of crawl.

It lacked the Countess' presence, she realized. The stain of that awful woman did not seem to permeate through the air here. Anna could hardly bear the company of that woman any longer. For weeks now, she'd been unable to free herself of the Countess, feeling her everywhere she went.

But here, for the first time in what felt like forever, Anna did not feel stalked. Hounded. She felt, oddly enough, safe—such a startling idea in this God forsaken place. It'd been so long since she'd felt any sort of security or comfort that it felt foreign to her. Unrecognizable, somehow.

Here was a place she could sit easily; her heartbeat could slow. She could take a moment and just breathe. The air calm, peaceful. This place a room where she could gather her thoughts and write her accounts at leisure and accurately. Out from under the Countess' ever watching eye.

It was an excellent idea.

She made her way back to the small writing desk and placed her lantern down on the surface before sitting down at the desk. She took out her journal, opening it to a fresh page, before it occurred to her to check the desk drawers for anything of use. Strange that she had not thought of doing that immediately.

Warped with age, she had to use some force, but the single drawer pulled open revealing a leather bound book and something rolling around in the back of the drawer hidden behind it. She reached her hand into the drawer and yelped, pain shooting through the pad of her index finger. She withdrew her hand quickly, having pricked her finger on something sharp. Instinct drawing her finger to her mouth to nurse the small wound. The metallic taste of blood had her fishing out her handkerchief, a small drop of blood already beading the tip of her finger the moment she went to wrap it.

"Damn it all,' she muttered to herself, grabbing her lantern and trying to peer into the back of the drawer. Something sparkled when the light hit it, and she made another attempt to retrieve the object, this time reaching for the dull end. A jewelled stick pin. Set with a brilliant, square cut pink tourmaline, it was a stunning piece. Much longer and thicker than any of her hairpins had been. Anna quickly tucked the pin into her skirt purse, unable to believe her good luck in finding such a boon.

The leather bound book was in hideous shape, bits of the spine already crumbling away with age when Anna picked it up. Curiosity took over. She carefully laid it flat on the desk and gently opened it, finding it was someone's journal, though the pages started to disintegrate to dust at her touch and the ink was faded beyond deciphering. She closed the book, reopening it from the back, finding the last few entries were a bit more legible and began to read.

'…Another serving girl was found dead today. The poor thing, she was the one who used to smile at me when she brought me my afternoon cake and coffee. She'd fallen down the stairs like the last one, though I really do not believe that to be her cause of death. It's absurd to believe that in three weeks, two women who used those stairs daily should be clumsy enough to fall to their deaths. I think they died before that and the stairs were staged. No one is saying it, but this one too had those small, strange puncture wounds on her neck…'

Anna squinted, trying to make out the rest, but to no avail. She skimmed on, looking for something else legible, finding only odd bits and pieces.

'I thought I heard a baby crying last night, but that is impossible. There are no children here…it's these hours I'm forced to keep. I just want to be finished my work and leave.

…it's strange…and maybe it's simply the lack of sleep, but the Countess looks different…younger? Her eyes are still just as cold and just as cruel though. There is nary a thing about her to tempt me, not even her deep pockets anymore, but I must continue to play the gentleman and act her companion even though I do not like the way she looks at me. Those too wide grins and dead eyes are bone chilling.'

"Tell me about it," Anna murmured, comforted to know that someone else had felt the same.

'…Her portrait is almost complete. I'll finish it tonight despite her strange night-time parties. It has to be tonight. I cannot bear to stay here any longer. For months, I've been telling myself to just keep my head down, do my job and then leave, but I cannot keep ignoring the plain truth before my eyes. Countess Elsa is a monster, and I wholly believe she means to continue to keep me here as long as she can.

Once I finish the painting though, she'll have no choice but to pay me my gold and send me on my way, our contract at an end. It'll be enough to buy my own place, and there are always other patrons…I can forget this place and all its horrors."

Anna stared at the page, rereading the last paragraph. No…it couldn't be…

The author was also her artist.

She immediately looked up from the book to take in the rest of her surroundings. An easel on the far side of the room caught her attention. She left the desk and book behind to investigate.

The canvas was bare, giving away no insights to its owner. But the side table beside it filled with long abandoned artist's supplies would. There was only one artist whose work she'd found in the gallery that mixed their own pigment, and here laid before her, were the supplies to do it.

This was where he stayed.

She dipped her fingers into the marble mortar, rubbing the finely ground clay that remained inside it between her fingertips. It was an odd choice for pigment, as common as any dirt. Surely there were better clays, but then he'd also had the skill to work with almost anything. And who knew what was available in these mountains.

He was resourceful, she decided, the appraiser in her briefly taking over. He had to have made it out of here.

Of all the rooms she could discover, she felt it was good luck that she had found his. Her mystery artist. His work had helped her keep her sanity these past few weeks. His portrait the one she conversed with the most. It felt like fate being in this room where he once was. And now she'd read his journal and had found a kindred spirit. Someone else had gone through what she had, and she no longer felt all alone.

Anna left the art supplies and went back to the desk to write out her findings. She opened her own journal and began to write. Writing until her mind began to dull and her hand began to cramp. It was so peaceful here, so warm. She tucked her journal away, finished. Stifling a yawn, drowsiness swept in and covered her like a thick wool blanket.

Funny, she thought to herself sleepily, the moonlight hasn't even shifted.

She'd hardly been in here very long at all, and yet she was so exhausted. She yawned again, wider this time, and stretched her arms up over her head, trying to keep her heavy-lidded eyes open. Perhaps a short nap. Just a small one. There was a chaise right over there, the cushions still plump. She didn't even care about the layer of dust, or the cobwebs. What was some dust when there was peaceful rest here?

The Countess' absurd warning about sleeping echoed in her mind. It had been frightening at the time, such an unnerving thing to say, but now it felt silly.

Why should Anna not fall asleep in any other rooms in the castle but her own? It was only a room, no different than her own, except for how lovely this one felt. How cozy and warm she felt here as though she was back in Kristoff's arms, safe and sound. No bad dreams to be found here.

She did not want to return to the gloom filled rooms of her own, the rooms steeped in the Countess and her never-ending nightmare hold over Anna. She wanted to stay here and rest just a little while longer in her quiet sanctuary from the Countess.

She went to the chaise and sat hesitantly on the surface, a sigh escaping her lips when yes, yes it was just as plush, just as comfy as it looked. She could certainly curl up here in the back corner of this room and sleep…just for a few minutes.

Anna could also not deny the pleasure she felt in disobeying the Countess. Deliberately going against what she had been explicitly warned not to do. It was but a small sip of rebellion to wet her parched lips and taste freedom from this cage she'd been caught in. She rubbed her eyes, yawning again, and laid down, sinking comfortably across the length of the chaise as her eyes flickered shut, sweet slumber beginning to overtake her.

She was not alone.

She knew this before she had even opened her eyes. Adrenaline quick in her veins. She felt it. A presence. It was almost the way she felt when the Countess was near, but also different. Somehow, very different. She couldn't quite put her finger on it.

Anna risked a peek, barely opening her eyes and looking through her lashes so as not to alert the intruder that she was aware of their presence.

She must be dreaming. She had to be caught in that funny place between dreams and consciousness, that twilight place of fantasy, because there was man standing there in the moonlight. A man, but the room had remained untouched by his presence. No dust disturbed, not a single footprint.

Dreaming, her brain assessed, for he threw no shadow. Simply a dream.

There was nobody in this vast castle but her and the Countess. This truth calmed her mind. Lulled her into a state of passivity that was not a normal reaction for her, especially to lie so familiarly in the company of an unacquainted male.

Unacquainted, yes, but recognizable. Her body thrummed in both excitement and approval. She already knew him by sight. He was the man from the exquisite painting. Her favourite painting.

He stood before her, watching her quietly, more stunning in real life than he was depicted in paint. Clothed as a gentleman in private, he was far too intimately dressed for her to see him as such, and Anna felt a great rush of heat flush across her cheeks. A scandalized thrill coursed through her body, flooding her with an unnatural desire. The apex between her thighs growing slick with liquid heat.

Dear God, her face burned at her body's reaction to him. Hardly appropriate. She was spoken for! Try as she might to conjure up images of Kristoff, she could not seem to draw up his likeness in her mind. Instead her thoughts were filled only with him.

She couldn't help but open her eyes fully and look at him. Admire his handsomeness, bask in his beauty, his mere presence commanding her full attention. Rich auburn hair, the moonlight casting a coppery sheen over his silky tresses; his strong, lithe physique cut to perfection. Trim waistline, broad shoulders—she ached at the sight of him. The most alluring green eyes, like cut peridots, shining at her with coy interest. With promises of illicit acts the likes of which she could hardly stand to imagine. Carnal pleasures no upstanding woman should seek to find. Her heartbeat quickened as the wickedest thoughts crossed her mind.

At the same time, his beauty made her uneasy. He was almost too pretty, too tempting, making her think something about him wasn't quite right, dangerous even. Like a carefully placed mask hiding a wolf underneath. It was, however, quite difficult to keep hold of that idea. Her brain feeling hazy and muffled. Likely the dream erasing all rational thought, as dreams were wont to do.

His head cocked inquisitively to the side, still watching her silently, keeping her eye. Wolfish. She thought back to the night of the wolves and how they had terrified her upon arriving at the castle. How the Countess had kept them at bay as though she held sway over such vicious creatures and they bent to her command.

Her blood ran cold, a chill going through her body, mingling with the heat of unspoken passion, making every last one of her nerve endings tingle. She was alert. Alive. She stared back at him, locked in his gaze. Trying to find that strand of thought that spoke of danger, and unable to recall it.

His tongue flashed a seductive pink across his lips in a lick that had Anna drawing in a breath. God, how she wanted that tongue on her, and in places she'd never dared allow Kristoff to go.

Forgive me, Kristoff, she pleaded silently, but she was going to kiss this man. His perfect lips were made for such pleasures. Soft, supple—a mouth crafted for bliss.

He grinned as if reading her thoughts, his teeth pearly white and canines elongated and sharp, like the Countess' teeth, but rather than shirking away, Anna drew towards him. Wanting that mouth on her, teeth and all. Her nipples went instantly stiff at the thought. Pleasure as they rubbed against the starched fabric of her corset with each breath she drew, her body and mind aroused beyond reason under his gaze.

No amount of guilt or propriety was going to be able to stop her. She'd never known temptation until this man, and, God forgive her, but she was not going to resist his advances. Even if she had wanted to, she wasn't sure she had the strength. The willpower to refuse such a request.

Knowing this truth terrified her, because he was as the Countess was, and yet she wanted him. She was repulsed by his otherworldliness, and yet, equally aroused by it. Enthralled by him. This man was a creature of nightmares and dreams, and he held Anna somewhere in between. Calling to her in a way that sang to her soul, and she yearned for him, and him alone. The forethought of his touch almost too much to bear.

He stepped slowly towards her, so smoothly that it was as though he were gliding across the air and not the floor, and Anna couldn't deny that it must be so, because the dust remained undisturbed. He held her gaze, compelling beyond all sanity. A dance with danger she should refuse, but could not resist.

When he reached the chaise, Anna lay in wait, fraught now with the agony of anticipation, for a kiss she desired above all else, a single touch of their skin waiting to happen. He did not stand towering above her for long, the way the Countess liked to, imposing her command, asserting her authority over Anna and making her quake. Instead, he dropped to a crouch, kneeling beside her. Gentle and attentive, like she had swooned and he was the utmost gentleman seeing to her health and comfort.

But those eyes. There was something there in his eyes that belied such a notion.

She could hear her own heartbeat thumping loudly, a steady pulse beat as her blood quickened in her veins. Hot and alive, calling to him. Such a strange notion…

"At last, the lady comes of her own accord," he said in a voice that was melodic and sharp like finely cut crystal. "It is now my right to begin."

He leaned in towards her and she nearly threw herself into his arms, needing his touch more than anything in the whole wide world. She could feel his heated breath on her bare neck, the sensation of warm air on her skin making her gasp. His lip quirked up, amused. Those sharp, white teeth gleaming. He did not kiss her as Anna had expected, had wanted. She almost sounded all her pent-up frustrations aloud when he pulled away from her throat.

"My, aren't we a neglected, pretty thing," he said softly, his hand grazing her thigh.

Such a bold move, done in such an innocent manner, his fingers hardly touching her at all.

And wrong.

That thought jarred her.

Where had that idea come from?

So wholly wrong, but undeniably pleasant. She struggled again with her thoughts, trying to remember why this was bad, and came up empty handed.

Compulsion filled her suddenly, those green eyes practically glowing, and she was reminded of what it was she really wanted. What it was she truly desired. She lifted her hips off the chaise in an attempt to get more of him, the lull of the dream making her just as bold, helping her remember the lines to a play in which she was acting in.

A husky laugh rumbled from his throat, all smoky and sex, the sound shooting straight to her loins, making her blood sing for him in the highest notes.

"So touch starved," he mused softly, more to himself than to her as she squirmed impatiently for him.

He swept his feather light fingers up her thigh, so swift over her hips and groin, the pleasure so fleeting that she did cry out. Cut off too quickly from a feeling she could hardly describe, but wanted nonetheless. He seemed to delight in this, toying with her, watching her wriggle for his attentions until finally he'd had enough of teasing.

With a great force that didn't quite fit his pleasant gentleman's face, he shoved her skirts up, bunching them around her waist. The shock of such aggression should have been frightening, but instead it thrilled her, and she aided him, encouraged him, lifting her hips as high as she could so that he could remove her drawers with ease.

Somewhere, in the back of her mind, she had cried out in offense, in outrage. This is indecent! Are you mad? What are you doing?

But such thoughts were quickly silenced by the tearing of fabric and his bare hands on her bare thighs, gripping her tender flesh to the point of pleasurable pain. The heat of his touch searing her, blinding her to anything but him. His desire. Hers. So carnal, so demanding—she'd give him everything. He need only take it from her.

He kissed her then, wild and hard, a ferocity of passion Anna had never known existed in the world. This was no chaste courtship kiss. No hesitancy, no manners. He claimed her mouth as though it had always belonged to him. She moaned, shuddering in his embrace. He tasted of wine, the sweetest the summer vine had to offer…but on his tongue a bitter warning, once again calling to her that something here was amiss.

The thought snapped off, shattering in an instant and replaced with untold pleasure coursing through her body. He'd touched her. His hand down there, caressing her womanhood, his fingers seeking out her heat, her wetness, fondling her with the most intimate of touches.

And she writhed for it, rocking her mound into his clever palm, craving him. Allowing his fingers to rub her slick folds, to enter her, not one, but two, allowing him to touch her in a place no one else ever had.

She groaned in bliss against his lips, quivered and panted for him, cried out for him as his lips travelled downwards, tracing the pulse line of her neck, nipping at her sensitive throat. His kisses far more urgent, far more violent, the farther down he went, and Oh God how she wanted him! Wanted him to lose all restraint with her.

He yanked her top down, her breasts spilling out from her bodice, impossibly free of her blouse and corset, exposed in the chill night air and ripe for the plucking. His mouth suckled each steepled bud until she was moaning for more. Begging him. The occasional graze of his teeth on her sensitive flesh nearly undoing her.

His fingers at her cunt were relentless in their pursuit as her pleasure began to build, mounting with each practiced stroke, each kiss, each nip of his teeth, and further down he went still, his head finally stopping to meet his hands between her thighs.

She was lost then, now and forever, as his kiss met her most intimate parts. She thrashed beneath him, bucking, a creature of his night, wanton and feral, seeking his passion and crying out for her release, pleading with him to make her feel whole. He'd built her pleasure up so high, the sweetest torment as he kept her tethered to the edge of a passion so foreign and unknown to her, and just out of her reach. His touch convincing her that she needed him more than anything else she could fathom.

Him. Only him.

He nuzzled her innermost thighs with his face, rubbing along her skin like an animal. Licking and lapping, nipping, kissing her hard. His fingers pumping in and out of her in delicious fashion, sliding with such ease as his thumb pressed against her swollen clit. Playing with her, teasing her, keeping her right on the edge of pure madness and bliss. Euphoria a mere touch away should he give it.

And he would.

She could feel it in him, in his kiss upon her thigh. The increasing urgency in his touch, his control slipping, the press of his mouth against her, the growl in his throat, the distinct indent of his teeth upon her flesh, the sudden, sharp prick of pain—

She was near wild for him in that moment, half crazed for his touch, responding to him in the way only the most ardent of lovers would. She could scarcely recognize herself in his arms, only wanting, only lusting. Only needing him. The moment of carnal release finally at hand as his thumb circled her wet pearl faster, his fingers deeper inside her with urgent thrusting, his mouth locked on her thigh in a kiss that would surely leave her bruised, his moans matching her own—and she could feel it rising, the pleasure arriving swift and hard—Oh God! She was going to—

In a flash she felt something else. Awful and cruel, a presence she knew and recognized and loathed. Instantly it robbed her of her moment of sheer, unadulterated ecstasy as she was cut off from him. She screamed in tormented outrage. Her shriek piercing the rafters. It was like having her soul wrenched from her body and doused in ice water.

The Countess had arrived and she was livid.

She ripped him off of Anna with an unholy strength, and he hissed at her like an indignant beast, more animal than man. Caught by the neck in the Countess' grip, she threw him across the room in a fit of rage the likes of which Anna had never seen from the woman before.

"How dare you touch her?" the Countess seethed, her voice like a growing storm as she advanced towards him. "How dare you cast eyes on her when I had forbidden it?"

He bared his teeth at the Countess, snarling like a wolf in reply, but stayed where he was.

"Back, I tell you," the Countess commanded, her displeasure clear as she placed herself directly between Anna and the man. "You know this woman belongs to me! Beware how you meddle with her, or you'll have to deal with me."

Anna was stricken to silence and fear by such a voice, but the man, half sitting up from the floor, merely wiped the back of his hand across lips and laughed, a hollow, mirthless sound that filled the room.

"You yourself never love; you never love!" he taunted back as though he took both pleasure and pride in his disobedience.

The Countess sighed, her voice falsely gentle, "Yes, I too can love. You know it from the past. Is it not so?"

The look her gave her was scathing.

"Fine," she snapped bitterly in contempt. "I promise you that when I am done with her, you shall kiss her at your will. Now go! Go! Before she comes out of it."

"Am I to have nothing tonight then?" he asked as he rose up from the floor.

At this, the Countess nodded to a bag she had evidently brought, a small sack wriggling on the floor.

Anna shrank back in horror. The sound of an infant's muffled wail filling her ears. With ungodly speed, the man pounced on the sack the way a cat would a mouse—and Anna quickly looked away, averting her eyes and catching sight of her exposed upper thigh, smeared red in blood—her blood—Oh God! He—

The wailing came to an abrupt end.

She felt herself begin to fall, and everything faded to black.