Prey

A Fairytale with Fangs

💕✨🌙Part 1 of a mini-serial in 4 parts🌙✨💕

Lamia and the soldier, John William Waterhouse

There was a beast inhabiting the forest, a monster with scales for skin, the long tail of a great serpent coiled about it like armour.

Robert had heard enough peasant tales to give the rumour credence, and what’s more, the village priest had sworn the truth of this one, unwittingly laying his liege lord open to the sin of temptation. The young thane never could resist the lure of a hunt. He pressed forward through the trees silently as a cat, not a twig cracking beneath his steps. Between each movement, he paused, waiting for the greenwood to accept his presence, steady its breath. His patience was as legendary as his hunting prowess. It was also the reason he was alone. Few men could abide playing statues in the forest on a May morning, as one of his fellows had dismissively put it. And Robert’s men-at-arms were, in his estimation, blundering oafs to a man.

Step, pause, listen. Breathe. Robert’s senses sang sharp as a blade. This forest teemed with fangs and claws, and he had no intention of shifting from predator to prey before he’d found his serpent. But birds sang blithely, the greenwood danced in a spring breeze, and somewhere nearby water ran murmuring, soft as dreams. Step, pause, listen. Breathe. Nothing. But he was getting nearer. A sixth sense deeper than the other five told him so.

The water was cool, soft as silk on her skin, and through the sheltering leaves, light stretched warm, dappling fingers that moved with the breeze. A tiny, elfin waterfall ran clear as crystal into the deep greeny blue of the water. Aurelia sank deeper into the forest pool, her eyes closed in bliss.

Behind her, glittering in the water’s depths, bright scales uncoiled.

Lamia, John William Waterhouse. Yes, he seems to have been a little obsessed.

Robert froze, his breath held, his entire body willed to a stillness so complete only the throbbing of his pulse in his ears betrayed that he was living. Something stirred in the pool at the base of the waterfall. He watched, his whole being shrunk to his eyes. There was a woman, bathing in the cool, clear water, here in the deep heart of the forest. Prickles ran up his neck, and the old village tales whispered in his ears—nixie, mab, fair folk… He blinked impatiently. Foolishness for children. This woman was flesh and blood, and, he realized colouring, the flesh was naked. And spellbindingly tempting.

Aurelia felt him before she heard him, before she saw his long silhouette clipping the shadow of the trees. Some deep-born instinct stirred to life inside her, quickening her heartbeat and heightening her senses. Not by the flicker of an eyelid did she betray it, but the water she trickled over her skin kissed it now like fire, and she burned with the awareness that his eyes were upon her.

Behind her, the scales stilled to mirrored stone as if they, too, sensed the huntsman’s presence.

Robert crept closer by inches, entranced, all thoughts of the serpent forgotten. His mind was empty of everything but bright, copper hair, and naked skin like strawberries with cream. He had no thought of what he would say to this naiad when she became aware of his presence. Dimly, he half-registered that creeping up on her while she bathed was unlikely to endear her to him. But he was drawn upon an invisible chain, step by silent step.

Barely six feet from the lip of the pool, he stilled. The woman was singing. Her voice was every bit as exquisite as her body. For a moment he stood, greedily drinking in the sight of her, the sound of her voice. Then, a breeze fluttered the leaves above, and sunlight flashed upon something iridescent in the depths of the pool.

“Lady! Do not move!”

His bow was drawn, an arrow nocked to the string before she had turned, her eyes wide as a startled deer. The scales flashed, the serpent moved, and the arrow flew true.

But the snake was faster.

Sparkling coils flashed, wrapping around him, pinioning his arms, and drawing him in, toward the pool where the woman waited, her red lips drawn back in a hiss that bared sharp fangs at Robert.

“How dare you attack me!”

“You—you are a monster!” Robert gaped, his mind scrambling to work out how the serpent tail fit with the face and body of a beautiful woman.

Lamia, first version, by John William Waterhouse. He probably should have seem someone about this fixation, don’t you think?

“And you are a stupid, clumsy human who should have been quicker! And now,” she ran a pink tongue along perfect white pearls of teeth, “you are prey.”

The muscles of the tail contracted, scales flashed rainbows in the waterfall’s spray, and Robert found himself drawn right to the edge of the pool, a handsbreadth away from the creature, his eyes staring into irises of a deep blue-green that flashed fire.

“What are you?” was all he could think to say.

“You may call me Darling,” she said as she kissed him deep and long, a kiss that stole his senses and dulled his fear, so that, suffocating in her serpentine coils, he would have been content to remain in her thrall forever.

“Darling,” he murmured as she took her lips from his, and she smiled.

“And now,” she breathed, “you may call me Death.”

With long, white fingers she pulled down the neck of his tunic, baring his throat to her fangs, and heaven help him, Robert wanted nothing more but to feel them slice his skin. Her pink tongue came out and licked experimentally along his jawline, down to where his blood pulsed hot beneath flesh that burned in its longing to be torn, and he felt her smile as she paused in anticipation. He ached for her bite.

Then she turned, and he felt the coils unclench from his body, leaving him panting with despair. The snake woman slithered from the pool toward a figure half hidden in the shade of the trees, and as the serpent tail twisted through the grass it shrank and divided, resolving itself into a pair of ankles, slender calves, smooth, curving thighs. As the scales melted into firm, pale buttocks, dizziness overcame Robert, and he sank to the ground, senseless.

“Aurelia! Come! Father wants you!”

“What is so important that it couldn’t wait until I was done with my plaything?”

“Some state business for us both. I know no more than you do.” Her brother held out a gem-encrusted cloak and she stepped into it, hissing in indignation.

Robert awoke when the forest was slipping into dusk, his head throbbing and his throat parched. Startled, he scrambled to his feet, patting himself all over in search of injuries, his ears strained for the sounds of predators. How had he come to be lying senseless there? He recalled nothing but searching for his prey, the sound of running water, and strange, half-remembered dreams.

💕✨🌙✨💕

Copyright notice

© Moll Moonlight. All rights reserved.

Will this be enemies to lovers, or appetisers to mains? And is Robert toast?

Don’t miss next week’s episode:

If you enjoyed the idea of snacking on Robert, or being caught in Aurelie’s coils, please like, restack and tell your friends!

Lamia, Herbert James Draper