Then he inserted another finger, moving with a desperate, invasive rhythm. Her cheeks flushed a deep, burning crimson as he seized her lip, his tongue pushing insistently against her teeth until it forced its way past. He sucked it with a raw, devouring hunger, stealing the very air from her lungs until her protests dissolved into faint, desperate muffles. He tasted of smoke and the bitter dregs of old wine.
Abruptly, he withdrew. His hands, now slick with her own essence, rose to her lips. He forced them into her mouth. The taste was sour and metallic—the undeniable flavor of her own violated body. She shook her head in frantic, primal refusal, but the more she resisted, the deeper he pressed, a brutal assertion of ownership over even her revulsion.
Immediately, he stood. His movements were precise, efficient, as he dressed. The clothing settled back into place with an indifferent finality, a shield restored over the violence beneath.
"Aren't you…" Gisela's voice was a thread of sound, frayed with a desperate, shameful hope. "…staying?"
"You are not yet satisfied?" His voice was cold, sharp enough to cut the fragile silence. "Shall I send a guard to attend to you? Or perhaps ten. They could take turns. As it is, I remain unimpressed."
She had no answer. The words hollowed her out, leaving only a shell of cold shame. She could only watch as he left the chamber, the door closing softly behind him, sealing her in with the shadow of his violation.
Then, burying her face into the cool, unforgiving fabric of the pillow, she finally allowed herself to shatter.
---
Henry moved through the dark corridor, a shadow dissecting the deeper gloom. A faint, illicit sound—the whisper of a turning page—drew him to the library door. He pushed it open without a sound.
The sight within gave him pause.
Emily was curled on the Persian rug, an island in a sea of scattered antiquity. Ancient, leather-bound volumes lay around her like fallen leaves. In her hands, cradled with a care that bordered on reverence, was the diary. Its cover was a thick, faded red, the leather worn soft at the edges from years of handling. His gift to her on his own fifteenth birthday—a perverse generosity to a girl of twelve who had brought nothing for the celebrant. Thirteen years ago. She had used it, relentlessly, ever since.
The light from a single candle gilded her profile as she smiled faintly at some private line, a ghost of the girl she had been touching the woman she'd become.
Then she sensed him. Her head snapped up, the smile vanishing into the still air. The diary clapped shut, a sound like a guilty heart stopping.
"My… my lord." The words were a stuttered breath. She scrambled into a posture of submission, forehead nearly touching the floorboards, her form dissolving from a woman reading to a subject prostrated. The ancient books around her seemed to lean away, witnesses to a disturbance in their silent realm.
"Stop."
The word left him sharper than intended. He disliked this—the rigid formality, the bowed head. This was not the Emily who once met his gaze with unguarded eyes, who moved through his spaces with a familiarity that felt like trust. Now, she was a portrait of submission.
Her forehead remained pressed to the floor. "My lord, this is who I am," she said, her voice a strained whisper. "You know this truth. I am a maid. Nothing more. Please… do not make this more difficult. I am only trying to heal."
"Emily—" he began, a rare softness entering his tone.
"Please." The word cut through his, sudden and fierce. She lifted her face, and the candlelight caught the tracks of tears carving through her composure. "Do not tell me more lies. You have not come to see me since your queen… since she insulted me. You left me to swallow that humiliation alone."
The anger in her whisper was palpable, a stark contrast to the stillness of the library. It was not the anger of a subject, but of a woman scorned, and it hung in the silent air between them, heavier than any apology.
"So tell me," she said, her voice a shard of ice as she swept the tears from her cheeks with a sharp, angry gesture. "Have you come to sate your needs? That is all you ever come for, is it not?"
Before he could answer, her hands went to the fastenings of her maid's dress. The movement was not seductive, but furious and deliberate—a calculated dismantling of her own dignity.
"You want it? Then have it."
"Emily—" he began, his voice low with a warning she chose to ignore.
She continued, each piece of fabric falling away like a challenge thrown at his feet, until she stood shivering in nothing but her thin undergarments, her skin glowing in the candlelight, her defiance a stark contrast to her near-naked vulnerability.
"Emily!"
His control snapped. He crossed the space in two strides, his hands closing around her arms as he slammed her back against the cold stone wall. The impact stole her breath. Before she could gasp, his lips crashed down on hers—a harsh, punishing kiss meant to dominate and silence, not to entice. It was a collision of anger and desperation, tasting of salt from her tears and the bitter wine on his tongue.
He broke away just enough to speak, his lips still brushing hers, the words a heated, dangerous whisper in the scant space between them.
"Stop this madness. Now."
"You have ruined me, Henry."
The accusation was a fevered whisper against his mouth before she pushed against his chest, a futile rebellion. He did not yield. Instead, his arms became iron bands, drawing her back into him before steering her with unforgiving force. She stumbled, then fell backward into the plush depths of a velvet armchair, its high wings enclosing her like a confessional.
"Do not confuse your desperation with mutual desire," he stated, his voice devoid of warmth, a correction delivered to the back of her head. His hands closed on her hips, anchoring her in place. "This is not a shared hunger. It is a consequence."
The last scrap of fabric, her simple cotton undergarment, was no match for his intent. It gave way without ceremony, a soft tear in the silent room, leaving her exposed to the chill air and his colder gaze. The act was not one of passion, but of stark, unadorned revelation—the final page of a lesson she had not consented to learn.