Alternate Reality Romance
Divinity Warriors Book Three
An outcast because of her psychic abilities, Paige doesn’t expect her people to rescue her when a zealous sect of Faerians sacrifices her to their gods. Thrown through a fairy ring to a new dimensional plane, drugged on ambrosia, she is compelled to seduce the first man she meets. Only when the effects wear off and she’s left with an insatiable husband expecting more than she’s willing to give, does Paige discover the true extent of what the fairies have done.
Ordered by the king to marry, Sir Aidan of Fallenrock is dead set against taking a bartered bride. He believes his people should be patient and wait for the gods to bless them. When the beautiful Lady Paige comes through the sacred rings, kissing and touching him like she knows their joined fate, Aidan’s sure he’s being rewarded—until his new bride tries to back out of their marriage.
Great Forest, Faerian Territory, Parallel Universe
“Oh, blessed fairies of the great forest, givers of spring, and givers of life after the cold! Take our autumn offering to grant us safe winter and bring life after the snow. Take our offered sister and make her a queen of your realm.”
“Let me go, you crazed heretics!” Paige screamed, kicking and jerking her limbs to be free of the hands that held her high over a sea of ivy-crowned heads. Outrage pumped hard and fast through her veins until she felt as if her heart might burst from her chest in little pieces. “You don’t want me. I’m not a believer. I will curse you with dead trees and wilted flowers. My father’s people will not stand for this!”
All right, so the last part was a lie. Her father’s people wouldn’t care what the Faerians did to her. In fact, she half expected they traded her to the crazed women to be rid of the last of her cursed family. How else would the heretics have known where her hunting ground was located? Or that she’d be there following the buck migration.
The Faerians ignored her pleas and threats, answering the priestess’s words with random exclamations of, “Oh, blessed fairies!” and “Take our Forestter sister. Grant us life!”
Long, drifting branches passed over her, the yellowed leaves falling with each push of the breeze. They hit her chest and hips, and fluttered onto the female heads surrounding her only to tangle in their flowing locks. A tiny giggle mingled amongst the swaying treetops and Paige stiffened in horror. Soon the first laugh was followed by more mischievous sounds, as if a choir of fairies watched the procession. She couldn’t see them, but that didn’t mean they weren’t there and very real.
Paige didn’t need to see the ground or the pathway in which they traveled to know what was happening. They took her to the sacred circle, to the fairy ring of the great forest to be sacrificed. The trees gave way to a grassy clearing. A ring of stone pillars created a large circle, each roughly carved and three times as tall as the women. Their towering height imposed as it impressed. The believers carried Paige between two of the pillars.
“At least give me back the clothes you stole from me. Don’t send me like this!” she screamed, shaking now that they were drawing to the end of the journey. Everyone knew about the fairy rings, had been warned as children to avoid stepping within the fairy playground. Paige’s own grandmother claimed to have come through them when she was a young girl. “At least give me my bow. Have some compassion. Don’t send me to the fairy world unarmed.”
Paige believed in the possibility of fairies, though she had never seen one for herself. From what she had been told as a child, they were mischievous, somewhat vengeful creatures and they liked nothing more than to play tricks on non-worshippers.
“Oh, blessed fairies, here is our sister!” the priestess called. The woman ordered her lowered and Paige felt the cold chill of a stone altar at her naked back. The flimsy gauze they’d wrapped around her waist like a belt hardly counted as clothing. As the material snagged on the rock, the pin holding it close to her hips dug into her flesh.
Paige struggled to be free. A ring of mushrooms grew in the center of the stones, so innocuous in appearance that if a person didn’t know about their hidden magic they might be tempted to step inside. Was this truly the fairy ring, supposed doorway to fairy realm? The truth was Paige didn’t know where the ring would lead. No one did. She doubted even the Faerian priestess knew all the fairy secrets. Her grandmother came through and it wasn’t the fairy world she had been living in.
The priestess stood over her as countless hands pinned Paige down. The woman’s white gown formed tight to her bodice only to flow in long waves along her waist and hips. The skirt trailed behind her in a long train. Tiny gold flowers were embroidered along the hem. Her followers wore the same outfit, minus the embroidery and train. Long, straight black hair seemed to stir around the priestess’s oval face, the thin strands dancing like snakes. The woman lifted a wooden cup she had carried with her from the village.
“Drink of the ambrosia,” the priestess urged, her gorgeous brown eyes round and filled with promise. “Taste the nectar of the fairy goddess and feel the pleasures of old magic. Let it take you. Let it show you.”
Paige clenched her mouth tight, struggling violently as fingers pressed into her cheeks to force her teeth apart. The priestess’s expression didn’t change as she leaned over and slowly poured the cup’s contents into her prisoner’s mouth. Wherever the liquid touched, tingling erupted, almost burning in its intensity.
Paige tried to resist, spitting the liquid out over her face, but it was too much. She was forced to choke down several gulps or drown. The tingling spread down her throat into her stomach and over her cheeks from where trails of discarded liquid touched her flesh. She tried to resist the alluring magic, but it was as useless as resisting the falling rain.
The instant the cup was empty the Faerian women let go, leaving her free to run. Paige shot up on the altar, ready to bolt into the woods to hide, only to be brought short by a transparent winged creature flying in front of her face. Paige jerked back in fright, sliding her ass on the rough stone. The fairy’s gown matched that of the priestess, with the train trailing down past her feet as she fluttered about in the air. The creature’s eyes looked too big for her face and her skin glimmered, tinged with pale blues and silvers. Silver threads wove in delicate patterns over her wings. Soon more small beings began to appear to her, each tinted with different shades of nature.
Paige couldn’t move. The strange sensation of the ambrosia traveled through her blood, leaving her stomach to conquer her limbs. Even her fingernails and hair seemed to prickle. With each passing second, the fairies became clearer. They flew around the gathered worshipers, perching on their shoulders and heads, completely unseen by those who did not drink. Several pulled at the priestess’s hair, combing the locks with their fingers to create the snakelike effect she had noticed earlier.
They buzzed around her and Paige jerked, trying to follow them with her eyes. But, when she looked too quickly, the forest blurred into streaks of impossible colors. The Faerians became excited at Paige’s apparent visions.
“What madness is this,” Paige whispered, swatting at the pests. The flat of her hand managed to smack one across the body and send it flying. Instantly, the others became enraged and attacked. Though Paige tried to fight them off, they swarmed her, pinching her flesh, pulling the long locks of her red hair and the gauze of her belt, pushing wherever they could touch—along the soles of her feet, her exposed sex, her nose and breasts. Paige grunted, flailing about in an effort to be free. With surprising strength, the fairies slid her ass over the coarse surface of stone toward the center ring. For a moment they held her suspended in the air before tossing her at the ground into the ring of mushrooms.
Paige screamed for salvation, but the only answer she received was the high-pitched screech of fairy laughter and the incessant droning of, “Oh, blessed fairies! Take our sister, grant us life!”
End Excerpt
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