She got to his door, expecting to find it locked. Instead, it opened easily with only a little creaking. Wow, Lady Pope’nose was really confident in her security system. Either that or some careless slave had left the door unlocked.
Somehow Maggie doubted that. Considering that even a minor infraction could result in mind-bending agony, it didn’t make sense for the slaves to be anything less that super scrupulous about every task they did.
No, it was more probable that the door was unlocked for the same reason that Lady Pope’nose left the key to the prisoner’s chains inside the cell with him—it was just another form of torment. A way to taunt him with the freedom which was so close and yet so maddeningly out of reach. A way to—
Maggie’s thoughts cut off abruptly when she got a look inside the cell. The prisoner was sprawled on his back with his head in the stream, unmoving.
“Oh my God!” Quickly she closed the door and ran to kneel beside him, almost tripping over her high heeled shoes. “Hey,” she whispered as loudly as she dared. “Hey, you. Uh…” She didn’t know what to call him. “Hey, wake up!”
To her intense relief, his eyelids fluttered open, revealing those strange, pale blue eyes.
“You,” he murmured again, just as he had when he first saw her.
“Yeah, it’s me,” Maggie told him. “And I’m going to get you out of here if I can. Just hold on a second, okay?”
She hopped up again, nearly tripping on the shoes again, and ran to get the key. When she got back to him, she realized she would have to roll him over since his hands were chained behind him and he was lying on his back. But this was easier said than done.
“Oof,” she gasped as she shoved at one broad, muscular shoulder. “You weigh a ton! And I thought I ate too many cupcakes.”
“Haven’t eaten…much of anything lately,” he groaned and gave a hoarse laugh. “Sorry…not much…help.”
“It’s okay,” Maggie told him. With a final shove she rolled him up on one side, exposing his bound wrists. A very tight, muscular ass was also exposed and she realized, to her embarrassment, that he wasn’t wearing any kind of underwear under the ragged loincloth. Well, what did you expect—silk boxers? she asked herself, quickly pulling the cloth back in place. It’s not like Lady Pope’nose’s dungeon is a five star resort hotel! He’s lucky to have anything on at all.
Trying to put the glimpse of his naked flesh out of her mind, she got back to the problem at hand. His wrists were chained together and connected to the wall behind him by an even longer, thicker metal chain. But there didn’t seem to be any kind of keyhole or locking mechanism in either part of his restraints. Maggie looked at the chains and then at the strange, knobby key in her hand. How the hell was this supposed to work?
Experimentally, she waved the gray metal knob key over his bound wrists. To her relief, the chains parted immediately and simply fell off with a clank and a clatter.
Perfect—now to deal with the collar.
Maggie was a little afraid to touch it after the huge jolt she’d gotten earlier but she set her teeth and forced herself to reach for the latticed metalwork with its blinking yellow lights. To her relief, she felt nothing but a mild tingling in her fingertips as she touched it. It had a complicated series of rods and levers holding it closed but Maggie loved puzzles. After a few moments of fiddling with various components, she found the pattern and was able to pull the horrible thing off him. It fell with a clatter and a splash into the little brook and the blinking lights went out.
Good riddance! Maggie turned back to the prisoner and noticed that he had yet another collar on. This one was a plain, flat black leather one with no lights but it still made her fingertips tingle when she touched it. Hmm…well, that one would have to go too.
“Wouldn’t do that,” the prisoner growled softly as she set to work, trying to find the opening to it. “That’s my…inhibitor. Dangerous…without it.”
Maggie paused but only for an instant. “Is it giving you pain?” she demanded, still tugging on the collar.
Slowly, he nodded. “Always.”
“Then it has to come off.” She reached into the pocket in the folds of the ridiculous green dress and produced a small, sharp pair of nail scissors. She hadn’t had any idea what she would do with them when she stuck them into the hidden pocket—maybe she’d imagined using them as a lock-pick of some kind. But now she was glad she had them.
“Hold still,” she warned the prisoner. “I don’t want to slip and cut you.”
“All right.”
“Uh…” She hesitated again, the scissors poised to cut.
“What?” He looked up at her, one eyebrow arched in question.
“It’s just…I mean…you’re not going to kill me once I set you completely free, are you?” Maggie blurted. “I mean…I really don’t want to die. I’m only twenty-five and—”
He surprised her by laughing hoarsely. “Don’t you think… you should have thought of that… before you started stripping off my chains?” He spoke haltingly, as though his tongue was too thick in his mouth.
“I…I guess so,” Maggie whispered.
“You must think I’m a real bastard. No, blondie, I won’t…won’t hurt you. I’m…in your debt…” He looked up at her, his eyes meeting hers. “And you…you’re in my dreams.”
“I dreamed of you, too,” Maggie whispered as she snipped the black leather collar from his neck. Was it her imagination or did those strange, pale blue eyes turn briefly red? “For the past few weeks. I…I don’t know why.”
“Neither…do I.” He coughed weakly. “Water…please.”
“Oh, of course!” Remembering how thirsty he had always been in her dreams, Maggie cupped one hand and scooped up some cold, refreshing water from the little brook. Then she tilted it carefully into his mouth…or tried to anyway. Because try as she might, the water wouldn’t go past his lips. It slid past his mouth and over his cheeks but something always seemed to keep it from going in. Maggie tried again and again until he shook his head.
“No use. Must…break the barrier.”
“There’s a barrier around your mouth?” Then she remembered what the evil Lady Pope’nose had said. “Of course, it’s this damn dust, isn’t it?”
She stopped trying to tilt the water into his mouth. Instead, she scooped up a handful of water and tried to wash the verium dust off his face.
It didn’t work. Though she tried first with her hand and then with one of her dress's ridiculously trailing sleeves soaked in water, the silver-gray dust wouldn’t come off.
“What the hell is going on?” she muttered at last in frustration. “Why won’t this damn stuff come off?”
“Told you…must break the barrier.”
To her alarm, his voice sounded weaker again and his eyes were fluttering closed.
“Break the barrier? But how?” she begged, patting his cheek. “Hey, come back to me. Tell me how to help you!”
His eyes opened again, their strange, oval pupils so much like a cat’s looking into hers. “Kiss…of life.”
“I don’t understand. You want me to kiss you? Why?”
“Must give water…mouth to mouth. Only skin unpolluted…by the varium… can disrupt its field.”
“Mouth to mouth? You mean you want me to take a mouthful of water and then…” Maggie couldn’t finish.
He nodded weakly. “It’s…only way. Please…so thirsty.”
It seemed like an incredibly strange and intimate act to be performing with a stranger but Maggie didn’t know what else to do. Kneeling down, she got a big mouthful of the cold, clear water. Then she pillowed the prisoner’s head in her lap—which wasn’t easy because all of him was heavy—and pressed her lips to his.
The moment she let the water rush from her mouth to his, she could tell it was working. He drank from her thirstily and not a single drop was spilled from the side of his mouth.
When she finally pulled away from the strange kiss, he looked up at her, his eye
s blazing and whispered, “More.”
“Of course," Maggie whispered.
She did it again, taking another mouthful and sealing her lips to his. And then again and again. It occurred to her after the fourth or fifth time that if the seal was broken, she should probably give him water from her cupped hands instead. But by that time she was kind of enjoying herself. It had been a long time since she’d kissed anyone—Donald considered the activity unsanitary and unnecessary—and she’d never kissed anyone even remotely like the prisoner.
Her heart beat harder and her lips tingled when she pressed them to his. His mouth tasted faintly of cinnamon or maybe some other exotic spice. Plus he was so huge and yet so helpless with his head still pillowed in her lap. If he’d been standing up or even kneeling, she would have felt intimidated by his size and muscular physique. As it was, she felt perfectly confident and also protective of him. I have to do this—I have to save him, she told herself. There's no choice if I want him to live.
Maggie wasn’t sure when her life-giving gesture—what the prisoner had called the kiss of life—turned into an actual kiss. She only knew that one minute she was sealing her lips to his to give him water…and the next his tongue was stroking lightly over hers.
Her eyes drifted closed and she cradled his head closer, forgetting to go back for more water. Instead, she concentrated on the warm, cinnamon taste of his mouth and the feel of his tongue exploring her.
The prisoner seemed to be enjoying the kiss too. He made a low, approving growl at the back of his throat that seemed to vibrate through her entire body.
The sound shook Maggie out of the strange trance she’d somehow fallen into. With a little gasp, she pulled back from him, breaking the kiss. Her heart was pounding and for a moment, she felt frozen to the spot.
The prisoner opened his strange blue eyes and looked up at her. His tongue traced his lips, as though he enjoyed the lingering taste of her mouth on his.
“Why did you stop?” he murmured in a soft, deep voice.
“I…Because I…” Maggie shook her head. “We can’t…we have to get you out of here. There’s no time for this…this kind of thing.”
He arched an eyebrow at her. “Afraid you’ll have to make time. If you’re serious about getting me out.”
“What…what do you mean?” Her heart was still pounding so loudly she was sure he could hear it. “I unchained you and took off your collars and broke the verium barrier. You should be good to go—right?”
“I would be…if it wasn’t for all this damn dust.” He nodded down at his skin which was still coated with the silver-gray verium. “Need you to wash it off me. Should be able to…now that the verium seal is gone.”
Maggie was half appalled, half embarrassed…and maybe just a tiny bit lustful? Was he actually saying that she had to wash the dust off his entire, mostly naked body?
“Can’t you?” she asked awkwardly. “I mean, now that you’re feeling better…”
“Still…weak…” He closed his eyes and groaned expressively. “Please…need your help.”
Maggie hesitated—she was engaged. There was no way she ought to be putting her hands all over a mostly naked man. Especially an extremely hot and mustcular mostly naked man. But in this case, she decided, she would have to make an exception. There was nothing else she could do if she wanted to save the prisoner. And there was no point in coming in here and freeing him from all his restraints only to leave him lying on the floor, unable to move because she felt too guilty to do what had to be done.
“All right,” she said. “Here goes.”
She started with his face, pouring cool handfuls of water over his cheeks and forehead and hair. Now that the seal or barrier was broken, the dust came off easily although it seemed to help when she stroked the water through his hair and rubbed his skin with her fingers. She tried using the sleeve of her green dress again but that only seemed to smear the dust. After trial and error she found it came off best when she used skin-to-skin contact.
“Feels so good,” the prisoner groaned softly as she finished his face and started on his broad, muscular chest. “Your hands…so soft and gentle.”
“Thank you.” Maggie could feel her cheeks getting hot but she continued on, scooping up water from the stream and brushing it over the broad, flat planes of his chest. “I’m…uh, glad you’re feeling better.”
“Felt better the first…minute I saw you.” He looked up at her again, his eyes holding some emotion she couldn’t read. “You wept for me…shared my pain. Why?”
“I don’t know, exactly.” Maggie shrugged awkwardly. “I just…can’t stand to see anyone being hurt like that. It’s awful.”
He frowned. “Just felt sorry for me, huh? Can’t stand to see an animal tortured.”
“No, not like that,” she protested. “I just—”
“I thought…maybe because of the dreams.” He coughed. “Didn’t know…if you would come back.”
“I couldn’t just leave you here—especially now that she has that terrible Hurkon collar. If I would have known what she wanted to use it for, I never would have agreed to bring it!”
Maggie finished with his chest and back and started on his legs. They weren’t as saturated with the silver-gray dust as the upper part of his body was so it wasn’t too hard to get them clean—although she did blush when she rubbed water over his knees and lower thighs. Thank goodness for his loincloth—she really didn’t need to be seeing every single part of him while she was giving him an impromptu sponge bath.
“If you hadn’t brought it, you never would have seen me,” he pointed out. Then he looked pointedly down at her hands. “Hate to ask you but…there’s a lot more dust to wash off.”
“What? Where?” His skin looked mostly clean to her. It was a deep, dusky tan which made his pale eyes and his white teeth stand out even more. His hair and stubble, as she had expected, were a rich, glossy black like a raven’s wing and his hair seemed to have a slight curl to it when she ran her fingers through the springy strands.
“Under.” He nodded down at the loincloth. “Sorry…she made sure to coat me everywhere.”
Maggie stopped for a minute, stunned. “You…but can’t you…uh, do it yourself?”
“Still weak.” His eyes fluttered closed as though in exhaustion. “Please…can’t move until…all the dust is gone.”
Maggie took a deep breath. Well, she hadn’t gone into this rescue expecting to handle some stranger’s business but that was hardly the point. She had started this and now she had to finish it. And besides, maybe she could just pour the water over him without touching anything at all.
That was what she intended to do, anyway.
Her hand shook as she raised the loincloth and she gave a little gasp at what she saw beneath. Even only half hard, he was big. Way bigger than anyone else in her limited experience—especially Donald whose equipment reminded her of a shy, skinny worm afraid to come out of its hole. In contrast, the prisoner had a python between his legs.
Trying to put the size comparison out of her mind, she concentrated on the matter at hand. As he had said, the prisoner was coated with the gray dust from his hip bones all the way down to his upper thighs. Clearly it had to come off.
She reached for a hand full of water and dribbled it over his naked hip but it barely touched the thick dust that coated him. Well, great—that clearly wasn’t going to work. It was going to be a hands-on job, whether she liked it or not.
Taking a deep breath, Maggie got another handful of water and began to rub the area vigorously. But the prisoner caught her wrist in a surprisingly strong grip.
“Careful,” he murmured, opening his eyes to look at her. “That’s…sensitive territory. Be gentle.”
“Oh, of course! I’m so sorry,” Maggie exclaimed. Feeling even more nervous, she scooped up double handfuls of water and poured it over his crotch. But though the silver-gray dust ran off his flat hipbones in rivulets, the central area—say it, Maggie, she tho
ught, his shaft—was not coming clean.
The prisoner seemed to realize this because he looked up at her again.
“Sorry, blondie…looks like you’re going to have to touch it.”
“I…but I…” Maggie looked at him helplessly.
“It’s all right.” He gave her a taunting little grin. “It doesn’t bite. I promise.”
“All right,” she said at last, her heart drumming in her ears. “I…I’ll try to be careful.”
“I know you will,” he murmured. “You’ve got a gentle touch.”
“Thank you,” she whispered awkwardly. Reaching for a handful of water, she took a deep breath and stroked it gently along the length of his long, thick shaft.
The rod of flesh seemed to pulse in her palm but her hand wasn’t nearly large enough to cover his entire length. She reached for more water with her other hand and spread it over his thickness, using both hands to work on him now.
The prisoner groaned low in his throat and his hips pumped once, almost involuntarily. Maggie felt her cheeks heating—it was almost like she was jerking him off!
But I’m not—not really, she told herself hastily as she got more water. I’m just getting rid of the dust. That’s all. But if that was so, why was she now working in rhythm, stroking his shaft up and down, letting it slide through her curled fingers as the prisoner moaned and pressed up into her hands? And why was he now completely erect, a pearly drop of precum beaded at the thick head of his straining cock?
“So good,” he groaned as she added more water and rubbed him even harder. “Gods, your touch is amazing. Your sweet little hands…”
“That’s enough!” Maggie stopped abruptly. “You’re all clean now,” she went on, when he looked up at her uncertainly. “You…you should be able to get it up. I mean, get up,” she amended hastily, her cheeks burning. God, how was she going to explain this to Donald? What would he say when he knew what she had been up to?