Tarnished Embers: A Dark Stepbrother Fairytale Retelling (Dark Retellings)

I don’t know how many days I spent in the dark, surfacing briefly, only to dive back down into the black because it’s easier to face than the agony of my reality.

“I won’t fucking get her sedated again.” Prince’s angry voice floats into my mind, and a deep sigh leaves my chest at the sound. There’s a comfort in knowing that he’s close.

“Prince?” My voice sounds cracked and bleeding, raw, and the pain in it has my breath stilling.

“I’m here, Sugar.” A warm hand strokes my face, and I lean into the touch, trying to absorb all the security and warmth that it’s offering me. “Can you open your eyes for me, baby?”

The effort to lift my lids is almost impossible, but slowly, I blink them open, and his green irises are all I can see. I hiss a breath as the ache in my soul pulses, his image turning watery as tears mar my vision.

“It hurts so much,” I confess in a hushed whisper, and his brows dip, his palm holding my cheek tighter.

“I know, darlin’, but you can’t hide away from it forever. We all have to face the pain at some point.” His gentle gaze sears into me, and the moisture spills over onto my cheeks, burning me as he forces me to sit in my heartache. “If you don’t, it’ll consume you, Sugar.”

A small whimper sounds in my throat, and I beg him with my eyes to take this agony from me. After a few moments, a soft sigh leaves his lips, his thumb brushing my cheek.

“I can help take the pain away for a little bit, without the meds, if you want me to?” he offers, his other hand moving into my line of sight. Blinking the tears away, my gaze darts to the side. He’s holding my pouch, the one that contains my razors. The tension drains from my body at the sight, a lump forming in my throat.

“Please, Prince.” My voice is barely a whisper, but I know he hears me by the way his nostrils flare, his jaw setting. There’s also a flash of something in his eyes, something that looks a lot like heat.

“Prince—” Cas’s tone is full of pain, a searing agony that I’m struggling to make sense of right now when Prince gives me a nod. All I can focus on is the bliss that the slice of a blade can offer me, and I don’t trust myself to deliver the cut right now. I don’t trust that I won’t take it too far, but I do trust Prince.

“We’ll make sure it doesn’t go too deep, Cas. She needs this, look at her.”

I twist my head slightly, recognising the softness of my bed underneath me as Cas comes into view. He’s sitting on the other side of me, and there’s a fine tremor in his limbs as he stares at the pouch as if it’s poison.

“Please, Cas,” I beg him with every fibre of my being. I need the release from all this torment that’s threatening to drown me. His jaw is hard, his copper eyes locked on mine. He takes a deep inhale, then gives a sharp nod, and my eyelids flutter closed for a moment. “Thank you.”

The bed shifts underneath me, and then his heat presses against my back as he wraps his arms around me and pulls me close.

“But you come back to us after this, okay? Fuck, we’ve been so worried about you, Cinders.” His voice cracks at the end, and my chest tightens as I reach for his hand and tangle our fingers together, using it to eliminate any distance between us.

“I won’t do your arm, Sugar. I’m going to do the outside of your thigh, so you know whose cuts these belong to,” Prince tells me firmly, moving the blanket off me and letting the cool air of the room caress my body. Goosebumps pebble my heated skin, anticipation sending shivers across my nerve endings.

I peer down to see that I’m only in shorts and a tank top, and I wonder how long I’ve been out because I’m sure I wasn’t wearing this the last time I was awake.

“How long have I been…” I don’t know how to finish the sentence. Since I’ve been asleep? Sedated?

“Four days on and off, little sis,” Oct replies in a pained tone, getting onto the bed in front of me. Prince moves further down and lets Oct slip next to me, whose hand cups my jaw, his head dipping before he takes a huge inhale, which given that I haven’t showered in several days, can’t be hugely pleasant, but tension leaves his body as he snuggles closer. I place my free palm on his chest, feeling his steady heartbeat through his cotton T-shirt, allowing it to further calm me.

“Four days, sixteen hours, twelve minutes,” Kit corrects from beyond Oct, his voice sounding choked, and there’s a pain in the back of my throat at how much they’ve suffered over the past few days too.

“I’m sorry,” I tell them, holding Kit’s stormy stare. His blue irises are so dark that they’re almost black, and there are purple smudges under his eyes as if he’s not slept a wink in all that time. His features soften, and he, too, climbs onto the bed, scooting up so that he’s behind Oct, who shuffles lower, my hand slipping from his chest as he rests his head over my heart, between my breasts.

“No apologies needed, Pretty Thing,” Kit tells me, taking my hand and placing a kiss on my palm. “We know what it feels like to lose someone.”

I flinch, and they all tighten their grip on me, the crinkle of paper attracting my attention back to Prince. A small, silver razor blade glints in his fingertips, and my heartbeat picks up, adrenaline making me a little giddy.

Prince looks from the blade to me, his green eyes sparkling. “You ready?”

I’m breathless, anticipation making me tingle all over. “Yes.”

The fingers of his other hand trails down my outer thigh, more goosebumps following in their wake. “Four cuts, one for each of us.” A small smile tugs my lips upward, remembering that’s what I thought the last time I cut myself.

I watch, transfixed, as he lowers the blade, holding my breath when he places its keen edge against my thigh. Cas’s grip tightens on me, and my fingers clenches his as Prince draws the sharp edge across my skin, the flesh parting. A wave of euphoria washes over me, a deep groan leaving my lips.

My eyelids flutter closed as the sharp sting melts into bliss, all of my pain trickling away like the crimson droplets that drip down my thigh. The agony of my father’s death lessens a fraction, dulling as the blade gives me a release.

“You doing okay, Cinders?” Cas asks in my ear, his voice a husky whisper.

“Yes,” I murmur, and I mean it. The fog I’ve been lost in starts to recede from my mind, the agonising heartache decreasing. I moan when Prince cuts again, and this time, the bliss is sharper.

“Little sis,” Oct growls, rubbing his face over my breasts, his hot breath fanning across my nipples even through the tank top, and my breath catches when I feel Cas’s hard length pressing into my arse making my core ache.

Prince makes another cut, deeper this time, and my fingers grip Kit’s and Cas’s hands, my eyes rolling as pleasure explodes across my skin in tiny pinpricks. It’s never felt like this before. Yes, there’s always been the bliss of release when I cut myself, but never this desire, this desperate need. Maybe it’s because they’re here with me, taking charge and administering the cuts rather than me having to face doing them alone, but whatever it is, I want to have them inside me at the same time.

“Please,” I beg, my voice a pleading whine, my thighs clenching together.

“You want Cas inside you the next time I cut you, Sugar?” Prince asks in a low, rasping tone. I open my eyes, the thought of his suggestion flooding my core with so much heat that I can barely breathe. “You want us to help you forget?”

“Yes.” I hold his stare, the others taking in sharp breaths as my answer settles over us. “I want you all.”

“Take her shorts off, Oct,” Prince commands, and fire races across my skin as Oct complies, hissing in pleasured pain when the fabric touches the fresh wounds on my thigh. The pain keeps me in the here and now, keeps me in the present rather than thinking about the grief that looms at the edges of my mind.

“Fuck, she’s already soaked for us,” Oct comments, swiping his finger through my folds, and my hips jerk as pleasure fills my veins.

Oct grabs my thigh, avoiding my cuts and draping my leg over Cas’s hips and Cas’s hard length teases my entrance from behind, his piercing making me so fucking desperate.

“Please.” I sound like a broken record, but I can’t help it as I try to get Cas inside me, though Kit and Cas refuse to let go of my hands, so I can’t guide him in.

“Shhhh,” Prince coos, and I settle a little at his commanding tone. “Cas is going to push inside that sweet pussy at the same time that I’m going to give you your last cut.” My body quivers at his words, my breath coming in short pants as I try to hold still.

“Good girl,” Cas murmurs in my ear, and then he sucks in a breath between his teeth. “Fuck, Oct.”

I look down to see Oct stroking Cas’s dick, his hand wrapped around it as he pumps slowly up and down. Heat sears my insides, leaving me full of such a powerful lust that I think I might explode.

“You like it when I touch him like this, don’t you, little sis?” Oct asks, and I glance up to see his pupils blown with just a fine ring of turquoise around the black.

“Yes,” I breathe out.

“You’ll like it even more when my dick rubs alongside his inside that sweet cunt of yours,” he adds in a low tone, and I swear my inner thighs grow slick with how fucking turned on I am.

A small voice tries to tell me that this is wrong, that I’m grieving and shouldn’t be seeking pleasure so soon, but I shake my head, ignoring the doubts and knowing that I need this reprieve, this reminder that I’m alive and have something worth fighting for if I’m to face what’s coming.

“You ready, Cas?” Prince asks, and Cas mumbles an affirmative against my neck, sucking the flesh there and making my nipples harden to fine points. “Now.”

Before Prince has finished speaking, Oct has lined Cas up and then he’s pushing inside me just as the fire of the last cut races across my skin.

It’s too much. Too much sensation for me to hold inside myself, and I shatter with a cry, stars bursting across my vision as I come so hard my entire body goes rigid.

“Fuck, Cinders,” Cas growls in my ear, fighting my clamping inner walls and pushing deeper. “You’re like a fucking vise around me right now.”

I can’t reply, because another wave hits me when Prince lowers his head and traces the fresh cuts with his tongue. It feels so fucking good, my mind fractured into a thousand pieces as I continue to climax.

“Little sis, you still with us?” Oct’s amused voice asks several moments later when my body has gone liquid, and I open bleary eyes to see him smiling at me.

“Shit,” I mumble, and they all laugh, Cas’s still very much hard dick jerking inside me. “That was…”

“We’re not done yet, beautiful. You said you wanted all of us,” Oct reminds me, his blue eyes full of a fire that I want to consume me. My heartbeat thuds inside my chest as I nod.

“I need all of you, Oct.” He gives me a heated look as he kneels up, his hand trailing down the valley between my breasts before tugging my tank top down to expose one rosy nipple.

Prince reaches into my bedside drawer, then hands Oct the bottle of lube that I keep stashed there, and he pumps some in his palm. My cheeks heat knowing that they must have seen my dildo in the drawer too. It’s a beautiful lilac and turquoise one called Wolfman as it’s, well, got a knot and all sorts of delicious ridges.

Oct pushes his shorts down, his long, hard length springing free. My mouth waters at the slight curve I know will have me screaming again in no time, all thoughts of my dildo forgotten.

Wrapping his hand around the base, he slides his fist up and down his dick, making it glisten as he coats it with lube.

“You just tightened around me, Cinders,” Cas murmurs in my ear, and I shiver when I hear the lust in his tone. “You enjoy watching him stroke his cock, seeing what you do to him, to us.”

My eyes dart up as my fingers are wrapped around a velvet cock, the ridge of metal on the underside letting me know that it’s Kit’s.

“You make us crazy with need, Pretty Thing,” he tells me, covering my hand with his and pumping both at the same time. Oct steals my attention back when he lies back down, his legs tangling with Cas’s and mine as he moves into the right position, his gaze locked on the place where Cas and I are joined.

A gasp falls from my lips when he pushes against my already full pussy, his hand guiding his hard length alongside Cas’s.

“Relax, little sis,” he instructs in a rasping tone. “That’s it, baby, let me in.”

I breathe through the sharp burn as he pushes inside, stretching me so full, my nails digging into Cas’s hand and my grip tightening around Kit’s dick the more Oct sinks inside me.

“Fuuuuck,” Cas moans behind me, and I want to say the same, but I’m so full, my nerves in shreds as Oct bottoms out and we lie there, connected. Sweat breaks out across my skin as they let me adjust to having them both inside me.

“You take them so beautifully, Sugar,” Prince praises, and I clench around Cas and Oct, who groans with pleasure. I twist my head to see Prince kneeling at the end of the bed with his fist around his rock-solid shaft. “Can you take Kit in that pretty mouth of yours too?”Content (C) Nôv/elDra/ma.Org.

My mind blanks, but then my hand is released from Kit’s cock, and someone grabs my hair in a fist and tips my head back. Kit is there, towering over me on his knees by my head, his dick right in front of my mouth.

I open for him, wanting to taste him again, and as he slides inside my mouth, his musky flavour bursting on my tongue, Oct and Cas move and I am lost to the sensation of having them all here, three of them inside me.

I let them use me, the pleasure they’re giving me in return the stuff of dreams as another orgasm fast approaches, my core tightening as my nerves tingle.

“She’s close,” Cas grits out, thrusting hard and making me moan around Kit’s dick in my mouth.

“So am I,” Oct replies through clenched teeth, his fingers digging into my hips as he matches Cas’s hard and fast pace.

Fingers find my swollen clit, and at the first brush, I’m spiralling, my pleasure exploding through me as I let out a muffled scream. Once again, my body tightens as sheer fucking bliss drags me under.

With my eyes closed in ecstasy, I hear the yells of Cas and then Oct, both thrusting so far inside me that another orgasm hits before the last has even finished. I can’t think, can’t breathe, and can only feel as I’m consumed by rapture, my body clinging to them like it never wants to let go.

Kit pulls out of my mouth, his ladder piercing clinking against my teeth as he withdraws, still rock-solid. Opening my bleary eyes, I gasp when Oct and Cas withdraws, the rush of wetness between my thighs obscene, but before I can miss them too much, Kit is taking Oct’s place, pulling me on top of him.

“I–I can’t, Kit,” I beg, my limbs refusing to obey as I drape myself over him, my knees either side of his hips, and he just chuckles darkly.

“You still have two brothers to please, Pretty Thing,” he teases, lifting me slightly, and then he’s at my soaked opening, thrusting inside me.

A pained moan escapes me at the same time as he groans the sexiest sound I’ve ever heard. His piercings drag along my inner walls and fuck, they’re incredible. I lie against his chest, my face buried in the crook of his neck, my fingers digging into his pecs, unable to move much, but that doesn’t seem to deter him. He grabs my hips and moves me up and down his shaft, waves of bliss flooding me once again.

I gasp when slick fingers toy with my puckered hole, one pressing inside me in a way that has my limbs trembling and excitement flooding my veins.

“Anyone ever fuck you here before, Sugar?” Prince’s low drawl caresses my skin and I shake my head against Kit.

“N–no, n–never.” I can only just get the words out, my body so full of exquisite pleasure that my brain is struggling to keep up.

“Good.” He adds another finger, pumping them in and out in time with Kit thrusting his dick inside me, and another climax begins to build.

“Shhhit,” I moan when Prince withdraws his fingers, the wide head of his lubed-up dick pressing against the tight ring of muscle.

Kit pauses, and a whine escapes my chest when Prince pushes past the barrier, slowly sinking inside me, inch by inch. Fuck, it hurts, but it feels so good at the same time too.

“Fuck, darlin’. Your ass is so fucking tight.” His fingers dig into my arse cheeks, his grip tightening the further he goes until his hips meet my backside, and we all take a moment to just breathe.

“I can feel him inside you,” Kit groans, one of his hands coming between us to rub around my clit in maddening circles. “They made you to take us, Ember.”

A deep moan leaves my throat when Prince withdraws, and I scream when he pumps back in, hard. Once again, I lose myself to the rhythm of our dance, my body a vessel to hold these gorgeous men. The noise of our fucking fills the room, accompanying our cries and heavy breathing.

“Come for us, Sugar,” Prince orders in a strained tone, his thrusts becoming harder and more erratic. His fingers tease along my thigh, finding the cuts and pressing down at the same moment that Kit pinches my clit, and I explode.

I scream their names, the waves of ecstasy drowning me in a way that leaves me boneless and utterly spent. They sink deeper inside me, both filling me up with their own climaxes as they groan my name while I’m lost in the bliss that’s holding me captive.

My body is boneless, weightless, and I barely make a noise as they leave it. The noise of the shower being turned on suddenly fills my ears, and then I’m lifted in muscular arms, but I can’t open my eyes to see who has hold of me, even when the warm water cascades over my skin.

I let them take care of me, my stepbrothers looking after me as though I’m the most precious thing in the world to them. Gentle fingers clean my cuts, and after drying me off, ointment and a bandage is placed over them.

Soon, I’m back in bed, the smell of fresh sheets enveloping me as I sink into the soft mattress. It dips behind and in front of me, the wild, floral scent of Oct and the lime, mimosa, and cedar scent of Kit telling me it’s the twins who have joined me.

“Sleep now, little sis. We’ll keep you safe,” Oct whispers in my ear, and I drift off knowing that they will keep the nightmares away. That I can hide from my new reality for just a little bit longer.