Melena Read online

  Melena (Mine To Take 4)

  Jacquelyn Frank

  All rights reserved.

  Copyright ©2018 Jacquelyn Frank

  BIN: 08386-02709

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  Publisher:

  Changeling Press LLC

  315 N. Centre St.

  Martinsburg, WV 25404

  www.ChangelingPress.com

  Editor: Margaret Riley

  Cover Artist: Angela Knight

  Adult Sexual Content

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  Table of Contents

  Melena (Mine To Take 4)

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Jacquelyn Frank

  Melena (Mine To Take 4)

  Jacquelyn Frank

  Valerian Jorku must decide how far he is willing to go to escape the reach of his violent brother. He will do whatever it takes to protect Melena. He hadn’t planned to raise a rebellion, but Vicktor has left him with few other options -- there is no reasoning with a madman.

  Melena never planned to become Valerian’s willing submissive, but as she is brought further and further into Valerian’s world of dominance, learns to enjoy his rough attentions. But trying to master the master is a dangerous game. One that could get them all killed and promises to ignite a war unlike anything the Jorku nation has seen before.

  Chapter One

  Melena was bone weary. They had been traveling for days on end and all she wanted to do was stop and rest her cold, aching bones. Valerian Jorku had bundled her up and spirited her away from Vicktor’s fortress in the breaking dawn some two and a half weeks ago. Since then they had traveled nonstop at a steady pace, although not necessarily a fast one, spending all the few daylight hours on horseback and stopping for nothing save to strike temporary camp and sleep.

  It was the dead of winter so it was bitterly cold, the frigidness adding to her aching and keeping her sore muscles tensed throughout the day. She was bundled up in furs, but it wasn’t enough.

  What she did prefer was when Valerian lifted her from her saddle and sat her in front of him. Then she shared his intense body heat and didn’t have to worry about directing her horse. He did not do this with the other two women who followed their group. In this way he made her feel special and marked her as special. As his favorite… of the moment, in any event. She couldn’t help but feel special, however. She had never had a man pay her this much attention. She had been a fixture in the life of her brother. A tool like any other farm instrument. There, useful, but not something you gave consideration to until it was broken or it disappeared.

  It was a cold assessment of her brother’s affections, but it was true.

  She had been a woman. A daughter. As a woman of the lower classes she was expected to toil beside her husband and make sons for him. But she had had no husband when she had been taken away to be a slave in the Jorku nation as their army plundered her homeland for riches. She had had no children.

  She had not even known the touch of a man, which had made her more valuable as a slave, something she had been grateful for after her sister had been raped by soldiers simply because she had no value as a virgin.

  Melena’s fate had been similar… yet very different. Her virginity had been preserved, and she had traveled long and hard in a wagon with dozens of other slaves, a journey not too much unlike this one. At the end of that journey she had been selected for her fairness and beauty and had been brought to the emperor’s fortress for use at his leisure, where she had been given as a gift to this man… to Valerian.

  At first she had thought him cruel, savage. But though he was hard on her body, taking pleasure in the pain he inflicted, she was learning that it wasn’t pain he was interested in as much as the pleasure she felt in the wake of that pain. And when she thought of what the alternative had almost been, of what his brother would have done to her, she was grateful Valerian had chosen her and rescued her from that fate.

  He had introduced her to pleasure in his own idea of a gentle fashion. And he had made it clear that as his shisha, a favorite woman of his harem, she would never be treated as a tool again.

  He had also proven he would go to great lengths to protect her. He had the power to rescue her sisters from slavery and bring them safely into his household -- something he had promised to do in trade for her obedience, which she now gave him gladly.

  The funny thing was that she didn’t think her sisters’ comfort was the reason why she let him have his way with her. Not any longer. Just as she believed he didn’t want her to give him her loyalty just because she wanted to see to her sister’s comfort. And yet he kept reducing their relationship to a barter system, never allowing her the opportunity to profess her loyalty to him with honesty.

  Although… she wasn’t sure she was completely loyal to him. It depended, she supposed. She was loyal to him above his brother. Above his harem women. Above almost everything. However, she was also loyal to her brother. If the two were to cross paths, she didn’t know whom she would be loyal to.

  Then again, were there degrees of loyalty? Wasn’t loyalty an absolute thing? It should be. She believed it should be. How could she ever swear complete loyalty to a man who had been the cause of so much trauma in her life?

  No. It was best that she keep any feelings of loyalty for him to herself… and even keep them at bay within herself. He didn’t deserve her loyalty, she insisted to herself stubbornly. Even though he had done some things worthy of her appreciation, he had not done enough to make up for all the harm he had caused her.

  At that moment she was watching the sun as it sank in the backdrop of the mountains before them. They had traveled north for the first week, and had since turned west, toward her home she realized. Toward Moglu, the land that had given birth to her.

  Moglu wasn’t a very big country, thus making it easy for the machine that was the Jorku nation to overrun them and bully them into submission. She liked to think they had put up a good fight. That they still did. Her brother had become a leader of a large rebel group that strove to retake their lands from the Jorku. It was obvious to anyone paying attention that that would never happen. Even if the entire Moglu nation were to rise up, they would never be able to fight off the massive troops of the Jorku. She knew this to be the truth… although it was nice to dream about their little nation defeating the evil emperor and his brother, the man who led Vicktor’s armies to victory.

  The man who presently had his arms around her. He had taken her onto his horse again, giving her his warmth. She was lying back against his chest, feeling the thick play o
f his muscles through the furs they wore. The furs were so soft, but he was so hard.

  “There! There it is!” The leader of their group called out, stood up in his stirrups, and pointed onto the horizon. Melena squinted into the sun to see what he was pointing at.

  It was an encampment. A huge encampment. They were on a plateau that stretched out for miles, and for at least one of those miles there was a massive wave of tents and men.

  Good gods. And they had thought to defeat a beast like this army with their little country? It was madness to even try.

  Despite her surprise and dismay, she felt enormous relief wash through her. Their journey was ended. She could rest at last. There would be no more endless days on horseback. Not for a while anyway. It seemed that the closer they got to the camp the more her body seemed to ache. When they finally drew up in front of a huge, grand tent, she was ready to scream from her bone-jarring discomfort.

  Valerian dismounted first, leaving her in the saddle a minute as he barked out some succinct orders. Then he reached for her and brought her down onto her feet. She wobbled a little, but he held her steady.

  “All right?” he asked.

  “Yes, I’m fine,” she assured him.

  His attentiveness to her comfort perplexed her. When they were having one of their sessions, he was demanding and almost brutal with her body. He caused her significant pain. Now, now he was as gentle as any lover might be to his sweetheart. She knew this had to be an illusion. He was setting her up for the next session of pain. He was merely softening her up. Fattening her up before the slaughter, she thought grimly. She had avoided the harsher aspects of his attentions these past weeks. Her location beside him in his bedroll was incidental. He kept her warm and protected her as they slept, nothing more. Thankfully. It had been too cold for anything more amorous. She had no doubt, no doubt, that that was going to end tonight.

  He led her into the tent. It was larger than all the others, flags flying from all four corners and the peak at the center as well. He led her past its large flap, and waited patiently as she drank in the sheer opulence around her. This was no rough living, she realized. The tent had all the comforts of his rooms back at the fortress. It was warm, a series of large cast-iron stoves dotted throughout the massive tent, filled with burning coals that gave off a heat that was almost oppressive in contrast to the bitter cold outside. She pulled at her furs, stripping them away from her face and body. Before she could even ask, there was a servant at her elbow taking the furs into his hands. She was left standing in her riding clothes, a dress with the skirt cut up the middle to allow her to sit astride. There were several layers of underdress, meant to keep her warm, and all those layers were also split down the middle. The overdress had been sewn closed along the insides of her legs so she would not be bare to the cold, but it did make her feel as though she had to waddle a little to accommodate all the heavy layers.

  “Come.” He beckoned to her as he walked over to a desk sitting in one corner of the room. “Get undressed.”

  She hesitated. “Here? With so many people around?”

  He looked up at her, his dark brown eyes trained steadily on her. She shifted a little in discomfort. When he looked at her like that it was as though she were already naked and exposed to him.

  “Are you questioning me?” he asked with a disapproving frown.

  “No! I only meant… we are not private. I do not wish to be on display to others.”

  He continued to keep his eyes trained on her, coming back around the desk and approaching her slowly, stalking her like a great cat might do to its prey. She swallowed hard just as he reached her.

  “Your wishes are not important. What should concern you are my wishes and how best you can go about satisfying them. If I wish to put you on display, then I will put you on display. Do you understand?”

  There was no arguing with that tone. Yet she argued all the same. “I won’t sit here naked where anyone can see me!”

  “I have just traveled leagues to protect you and your life, you ungrateful little thing. The least you can do is make things easier for me, not more difficult!”

  Guilt washed around inside her. He was right. He had uprooted his entire household just to keep her safe. She should be showing him gratitude. Still, despite the fact he had displayed her in the past to a servant, she didn’t want total strangers ogling her.

  As if reading her mind he said, “I will not allow others to stare at you. I will not allow them to make love to you with their eyes. I only wish to have you at my feet, giving me comfort and pleasing my eyes. If others come in and see you, they will pretend not to unless I invite them to do otherwise.”

  “They will pretend not to see me, but they will see me all the same.”

  “And why shouldn’t they? You are a beautiful woman. They should stop and stare and appreciate you for the beauty that you are. Now stop arguing with me and get undressed. If it makes you feel better I will allow you to sit with a fur over your lap, but your breasts must be exposed so I can see you… so I can touch you as I desire.”

  Her cheeks burned red with the coming embarrassment. She wanted to argue further, but he looked very tired right then, something he would not, she believed, have exposed to anyone else. She realized then that he was constantly on display. He had to project this vision of strength and power and unending fortitude. He was a man of legend, and he must constantly live up to that legend. He could show no weakness. He could ask for no reprieve. He could not argue with anyone over whether or not he should be on display. It was merely his lot in life.

  And this was hers. She had been put there to give him some kind of ease in his unending struggle to be seen as all-powerful. She knew it was not his ego that drove him… unlike her, who was driven by her ego to oppose him. He knew others depended on his strength. He could not afford to let them down. The livelihood of hundreds of thousands of people rested on his shoulders. The balance of nations depended on his ability to bear up under duress.

  She realized then he slept very little. Even when they had encamped for the night, and he had wrapped his body around hers for warmth, he must not have slept much at all. Whenever she awoke, he was already awake. She had never seen him sleeping. He was always the first up and the last down.

  How exhausting that must be.

  The tent was so warm she was beginning to sweat under her clothes. He, too, had begun to shed his outer layers. She began by untying her skirts and letting them fall down around her ankles. She stepped free of the massive pile of fabric, and she felt a cool breeze against the bare skin of her legs as the wind rustled the tent flap a little. She next untied the gatherings at her wrists and throat, allowing her blouse to hang loose and free on her torso. She hesitated, feeling him watching her, but then threw caution to the four winds and stripped out of the blouse.

  She was naked.

  She turned and faced him. He was staring at her so intently she immediately blushed. Yet she did not try to cover up. She knew that would only displease him. She did not want to give him displeasure. Quite the opposite. She found she wanted to be the place where he could relax… be himself. Be more human.

  She moved to his side and knelt at his feet. There was a thick rug covering the ground, but she could still feel the cold of it seeping up. The tent must have been newly struck, for even though the interior was warm, there had not been enough time for the ground to warm beneath it yet.

  Still, it wasn’t anything intolerable.

  She leaned against his leg, rubbing her cheek against the fabric covering his thick thigh. She felt his warmth, smelled his scent. There was something so comforting in leaning against all that strength. That was when she realized even she was expecting him to be strong at all times.

  For the first time she felt a deep emotion toward him. She couldn’t put a name to it… or she didn’t want to because part of her was still resisting him, but it was a warm and empathetic feeling. She was coming to care about him, she realized. The under
standing floored her. In a matter of weeks she had gone from hating her conqueror to feeling empathy with him.

  How had that happened? What had he done to deserve such consideration from her?

  He had protected her life with his own. He had taken a stab wound to his shoulder, stepping in the way of the knife that was meant for her. He had uprooted his entire household and fled for leagues and leagues just to keep her safe. She owed him her safety and her life. It didn’t matter that she wouldn’t have been in the situation to start with if it weren’t for him; she understood that only a twist of fate and his distinct choice had kept her out of the perverse hands of his brother.

  She could only be grateful. And she had to show him that by obeying his wishes and commands. By being the comforting place he needed.

  “Let me ease you,” she said softly, turning her face up to him. “Tell me what you need.”

  A corner of his mouth kicked up, and he reached to pet her over the rise of her cheek. “Seeing you like this is enough for now.”

  He sank down in the chair behind the writing table that had been set up for his work. There was another table in a dining area and yet another covered with maps and charts.

  There was then a curtain, sheer enough that it could be seen through but without any real definition. Beyond it she could make out the shape of a bed.

  As he settled in the chair she slid between his feet and rested her cheek against his thigh. She stroked her hand over his opposite thigh and said softly, “You must bathe and rest. We have traveled hard these past weeks.”

  “Do you wish to bathe? I’m sorry, I should have thought of that. I will have water heated right away.”

  “I would like that… but you must join me.”

  “I fear there isn’t enough room in such a narrow tub for both of us,” he said, indicating the large copper tub standing in a corner of the tent. It would barely be able to accommodate a man of his bulk… certainly not comfortably.