Read Claiming Crystal for Free Online

given her the chastity chain after her first bleeding, and it had been one of the few times in which they met face to face. He had explained that she was special, and because of her lineage she must be contained in mint condition, and then he presented the chain and told her it was a symbol of that promise and prosperity. That was the last day she had seen him privately, and certainly the last day he had spoken to her, but she had received numerous summonings from him through messengers and maid mothers in the years between. When he failed to show to her suitor's ceremony she had come to wonder if she would ever see that elusive man again.
    She wondered no more.
    The lord of this kingdom strode out from the crowds of guards and began making his way through the field towards her and her mate, a stern look on his face to hide any revulsion. The man beside her had managed to dress himself with a beautiful grace, and looked quite presentable by any standards, but she remained on the grasses at his feet, naked and blushing from the rush of heat and joys that she had experienced against him. Even her eyes were dilated, and she breathed with a rasp of exhausting that was more delectable than it was tired, as if she savored her exhaustion the way of an jouster after his triumph.
    She glanced up at the nameless man, and was relieved to see him smirking at the entire scene. It seemed that not everyone was afraid of her father, and his courage gave her the strength to stand and gather up what remained of her gown and lay down over her female parts. Her father was practically storming towards them both, and she might not have had the time to regain her modesty if three of her maid mothers had not rushed in front of the lord and halted him in his tracks, begging her case for forgiveness and insisting that the stable man forced himself upon her.
    ‘ It was not Crystal's fault,’ they pleaded with the lord. ‘That man is not even an official suitor! She came to him to demand that he leave the province of the kingdom because he snuck into her ceremony last night, and she did not take any guards with her – the foolish woman! She is headstrong, as you know, and she did not count on the man being as strong as he is. He has taken your daughter's chastity without her permission!’
    Crystal only heard some of this. She only watched the darkening expression on her father's face, and the numerous expressions of concern that were growing on the faces of the guards in response to this. It suddenly occurred to her that that the lord might execute this man if she did not speak for him, and when she turned to tell the rogue as much she was dismayed to find him still watching the unfolding conflict with an expression of bemusement that was charmingly contrasted with the fear in the faces of all the other men who watched what has happening, knowing the rages that could possess a father upon discovering such a thing.
    ‘You must go,’ she told him.
    The man who had been hired to clean the shoes of the broncos simply shrugged, returned to the wild horse and resumed his duties. ‘I could run nowhere a man of your father's statue wouldn't find me,’ he replied. ‘Let him come. Things happen as they must.’
    Crystal made a step towards him, intent on lecturing some common sense into that fool's head, when she came to understand the meaning underneath his words and bemused expression. This man was speaking like someone who had just experienced something of such profound and moving joy that he no longer feared death, and indeed Crystal found herself overtaken by a similar calm – her body washed and rinsed of the tensions that made her fret over petty matters.
    ‘Yes,’ she heard herself say. ‘Things happen as they must.’
    She returned to face her father, who had broken through the maid mothers and resumed his approach.
    ‘Let him come.’

II
    Crystal did not hear her father's words, as if he had come to her to speak a new language through the