The Lantern: Shadowed Dreams Erotica Read online

  The Lantern

  Shadowed Dreams Erotica

  S.J. Sanders

  ©2019 by Samantha Sanders

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without explicit permission granted in writing from the author.

  This book is a work of fiction intended for adult audiences only.

  Editor: Wright Editing Service

  Cover Artist: Samantha Rose

  Many thanks to all the people who made this book possible!

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 1

  Misty wrapped her arms tightly around herself, the cool autumn air nipping at her face and every inch of exposed skin in the tawdry costume. The day had been warm for Halloween and so she’d thought nothing of foregoing her usual layers beneath her outfit. Then again, she doubted she would’ve had room for it. Her costumes usually have more...substance.

  Shivering, she wondered again why she let her friends talk her into dressing in theme. It was a first. Even though they partied together every Halloween, they’d never taken up a theme before. Misty blamed it on the new girl. Slutty fairytale was more a product of Beth’s imagination Wide-eyed and eager to be one of the girls, she tried almost too hard. Enough to get on Misty’s damn nerves. The costume just added insult to injury.

  Whereas Misty preferred something darker and more unusual in keeping with the spirit of the holiday, she’d donned a shortened dirndl made of ridiculously sheer fabric to carry off her character of slutty Gretel. Her friends had all gushed over the crimson dress with its apron with painted on embroidered flowers. Their entire group had been a hit at the party. Misty had never been so uncomfortable.

  The shortness of the dress guaranteed that she didn’t do anything that required her to lean or bend forward in fear of exposing the black lace of her panties for all to see. Not that plenty of the guys didn’t attempt to catch a glimpse despite her efforts, or glance down into the loose blouse of her costume to get a peek at the matching bra. Normally she had a good time partying with her girlfriends.

  Misty sighed. Maybe it was time to admit that she was finally starting to outgrow the foolishness. Truthfully, she’d debated even going out this year. The idea of handing out candy to cherubic revelers while she did her best to give them shivers had been far more appealing. It had brought back good memories. When she’d outgrown trick or treating, she’d taken to helping her dad rig various haunts and specters around their house as they’d dressed in creepy costumes to make the kids giggle and scream.

  It wasn’t until she’d moved away to attend the university and met her friends that she was pulled into the endless circuit of parties. She was a senior now, much of her time now taken up, she didn’t realize how much she missed the common spooky thrills of Halloween until now. She glanced down at her watch and frowned with disappointment. It was eleven-forty-five, she’d definitely missed all the trick or treaters.

  Misty grimaced as she stomped vigorously around a path of carved jack-o’-lanterns, hoping that the activity might help her warm herself. She took the time to admire their silent, leering faces. It was nearly witching hour. At home her dad would be making cups of hot apple cider as he double checked the flames that lit up the twisted face of their jack-o’-lantern.

  “All the mischievous spirits run wild on Halloween, Misty-girl,” he’d say. “You never turn away a child without a treat, it may in truth be a goblin with a nasty trick in mind. Giving candy to the kids is just doing our part to amuse and satisfy them, but the light of the lantern protects us all the while.”

  When she was little, she’d listened, wide-eyed, and had begged their ghoulishly carved lanterns to keep them all safe. As she’d grown older, she came to admire to the aesthetic behind the tradition, appreciating the various methods employed to make the lantern. Even then, with the belief in the magic of Halloween fading, she’d always been at home well before midnight when the spirits wildly ran.

  Misty shivered, a bit less from cold, when she turned onto a darkened street. One or two miserly pumpkins dotted a house here or there, but their cheerful faces were not comforting like those on the street prior. Instead they seemed to be smiling at her sadly, as if they foresaw some terrible fate. The weak lights jumped as a cold wind blew, scattering the oak leaves around her feet. Goodbye. So sad, they seemed to say.

  Hugging herself tighter, Misty ducked her head and shuffled on, her kitten-heeled boots clicking loudly on the pavement. She blinked back tears as she neared the end of the street, well past the gentle glow of light. Just ahead a wooded park loomed, the limbs of the trees stretching like skeletal fingers in the moonlight. Her street ran the length of the park, and she already knew that it would be even darker and gloomier. She’d been the only one on the street to do anything for the holiday. One apartment in a small building at the end of the street.

  As she turned onto her street, she tried not to look at the heavy line of trees, thick with shadows, that seemed to move and twist upon themselves. The childish part of whimpered. If I don’t look, nothing will see me. Keeping her eyes firmly on the toes of her boots she walked at a brisk pace, her boots sounding even louder to her ears.

  Click, click, click.

  Click, click, click.

  Click, click, CRACK.

  The sound of something big crashing through the trees, turned her blood cold. Misty instantly froze. Even with her inner child screaming not to look, Misty slowly turned and looked. The trees seemed to bend toward each other, creating almost what seemed like a dark tunnel between them. An eerie light flickered there in the depth of the darkness. Her heart sped up and her breath panted out from her lungs, rising in icy puffs around her face at the sudden drop in temperature. Even the tears gathering in the corner of her eyes were icy cold.

  Little pulsating lights darted through the field of her vision. Misty closed her eyes. Fairy light. She tried not too look, but she could see it still behind her eyelids, tugging at her. Without permission from her brain, her eyes slowly opened, and her feet began to move, following the trail of the little lights as they danced down into the hallow heart of the trees. She couldn’t stop herself from following down some unseen path, leading her deeper into the woods. Surely the park wasn’t so big?

  Heart pounding, she tried to stop the forward progression of her feet, to no avail. All the warnings from childhood stories of following faeries and crossing between worlds flashed through her mind. The fae and otherworldly beings were not sweet, pretty little beings. Although there were those that were beautiful, and there were those that could be kind, many were wild, monstrous in form and unpredictable...and dangerous.

  In desperation, she jammed her hand into her purse, accidentally crushing the emergency joint she kept in there, looking for her lighter. Success! Yanking her hand out, she clicked open her dragon zippo and lifted it in front of her, the flame flaring. A thin sound, like a muffled shriek, surrounded her and the lights pulled away into the trees, but she did not miss the reproachful snarl from up ahead. A gust of wind blew back toward her from the direction of the terrible sound, throwing the flame back against her finger.

  Hissing in pain, Misty instinctively let go, and cursed as it disappeared from sight in the thick bed of leaves at her feet. The moonlight should be enough to reveal the sheen of steel if she were inclined to linger and look for it. Misty was more of mind to get while t
he getting was good before whatever the bellowing creature came looking for her.

  Free from the enchantment of the fairy lights, Misty spun on her heel and ran. Gnarled limbs of trees seemed to reach for her as she raced past. She ran for the longest time, scrambling over rocks, circling obstructions and ducking beneath fallen trees, certain that at any minute she’d break through the tree-line and be back on her familiar street, even though said inner child moaned and wailed about being trapped in the fairy world. She sternly ignored it and ran until her lungs burned and stitch developed in her side.

  Trees moaned, the branches shaking as another hard gust barreled through, but with it the unmistakable sound of pursuit. Not the muffled sound of boots that might come with children or young adults playing a prank. The stride was too wide and the sound sharp and scraping as if made by something far from human. There was no escape from the woods, or from it.

  Clutching her side, Misty slowly turned, determined to meet her end with some dignity. To go down fighting if it came to it. The shadows lengthened as something inhuman pushed through the trees, a curve of horns catching in the light. A low unmistakably familiar growl surrounded her. It had come for her.

  Chapter 2

  The thing that came out of the woods was a hulking nightmare. Possessing a thick hide in a greenish brown hue, the creature blended easily with the forest. At that moment he was clearly visible, and Misty wished that she hadn’t seen him.

  Nor the thick, curved fuchsia colored cock that stood out blatantly from his body, the rigid length bobbing in time to his quick steps. It seeped a pale green fluid from its tip with carnal eagerness that she couldn’t miss. Her attention was so riveted with blatant dumbstruck fascination to it that she jumped when he leaned forward and she got a good look at the rest of him.

  A dull, boney exoskeleton protected his head from the bridge of its nose up to the multitude of sweeping horns, leaving deeply shadowed eye sockets that glowed with yellow light. It was a sharp contrast against the velvety soft cat-like ears that twitched from among piles of long black locks of hair. It swung free from behind the horns and fell past his shoulders, sweeping against the exoskeleton that continued across his chest and spine. That didn’t seem to in any way impede the movement of his lean, muscular limbs. He alternated from bipedal strides to dropping down to all fours when it suited him as he stalked closer to her, climbing over obstacles that she’d had to race around in her escape, as if they were less than a minor inconvenience.

  Misty’s heart leapt nervously and the muscles in her legs quivered with the need to run again. Yet she stood there, her eyes once again drawn the sole vibrant splash of color on its body as if it were a beacon. She licked her lips slowly as she watched it swell noticeably. Tiny frills which she hadn’t seen before lacing along the shaft from root to head, fluttered responsively to her attention as more precum leaked out in thick, copious amounts.

  Despite the logical part of her brain that insisted that such fascination was simply the effect of facing something so horrific that her mind was having difficulty believing what it was seeing, she couldn’t deny that something within her responded to the sight. The fluttering frills increased their tempo, the edges of them jumping at such high rates that it was near orgasmic just to watch them. Her pussy clenched and, to her embarrassment, her panties dampened with her arousal. A raspy moan escaped from her before she could contain it.

  His ears flicked forward and his massive head dropped lower as he eyed her. He growled and sniffed the air, the nostrils under the tough, boney plating on his face flaring. A long thin tongue, the same hue as his sex, dropped from his gaping jaws and snapped forward, flattened, to trace the slope of her neck as he ran it up the length.

  Heat flared through her in response to every exposed part of her skin it touched as if she were being drugged. It was like a natural aphrodisiac that sent warm tingles shooting through her skin that connected to the pulse between her thighs. She shuddered, desire driving through her as she watched through hooded eyes as he creeped forward, sliding his body in front of hers. It was only then that she caught the scent rolling off him. A decadent sweetness that reminded her salted caramel apples and exotic musk.

  Misty watched a thick stream of precum drool off the broad, flared tip of his cock and wondered if it tasted as good as he smelled. She’d never been one for giving oral sex, but how this one enticed! Her lips parted around her soft gasps of air as she breathed more and more of his intoxicating scent in. Her eyes dilated as he leaned in again and swept his tongue lower, drawing it across her collarbone and over the swells of her breasts peaking out from above her costume.

  She turned her head to the side, breathing deeply, trying to regain some semblance of stability through the overwhelming haze of lust. She couldn’t be attracted to this thing. He wasn’t even remotely human. His elongated face looked more skeletal with its boney structures. He was not beautiful, yet the more she looked upon him, she found his strange appearance appealing to her. She didn’t know if it was because his saliva was drugging the hell out of her or of her more forbidden fantasies was responding to him.

  How many times had she imagined, when alone in her own bedroom, to be ravished by something not of this world? She had an entire drawer in her room devoted to unique sex toys capturing some of the most imaginative phalluses she’d ever seen. At night she’d work herself to ecstasy with them, imagining she was being topped by all manner of creatures of mythology and fantasy. Her satyr fantasy was by far her favorite and was assigned a thick knobby number that never failed to hit every spot.

  Still, fantasy and real life were two very different things. She couldn’t help trembling in in fear even as everything within her surged with blatant, undeniable hunger. He was far more monster than she’d ever imagined among her more humanoid fantasies. That was something that both repelled her and drew her in.

  She squeezed her eyes shut for a moment and slowly opened them allowing herself to focus in on something else. Anything else. A sea of fairy lights darted around them as if they were in the epicenter of a spinning galaxy full of stars. She felt herself rapidly becoming lost in them, so she snapped her eyes back to her pursuer.

  He drew his head slowly back and tilted it is as if curious. He breathed in deeply, his large body shuddering and his phallus suddenly pulsating violently as if vibrating as he stared down at her. The wide arc of his horns gleamed under the moonlight and Misty had to admit to herself that while he may not have been what anyone would consider pretty, he was hauntingly majestic He was like some ancient being that had existed before humanity walked the earth and human conception of beauty of form. His form was raw and of the woods itself rather than from a page of human fantasy.

  “What are you?” she whispered.

  “Mawrgol.” The voice growled at her, a low raspy sound that reminded her of the brush of dry leaves.

  “You are a mawrgol?”

  “I am Mawrgol, ruler of the wood. There is none but me.”

  At first, she worried that she’d offended him, and she’d soon find herself at the other end of the terrifyingly sharp fangs that drifted ever closer to her as he continued his perusal. However, his words were spoken in a matter of fact way, almost as if unconcerned if the subject were truly inconsequential to him beyond correcting her error. Misty rather wished that some of her professors had been available to take note.

  The yellow light of his eye seemed to swirl inward as if narrowing his focus as he inspected her. Whatever else he felt, he seemed exceptionally curious about her, his nose at times brushing the length of her hair and nudging at various dips in her body.

  She shivered as his nose bumped along her belly to her pelvis, his hot breath fanning her through her dress. She twitched, her hips flexing forward instinctively. She was surrounded by his low sound of appreciation as he suddenly leaned forward and inhaled deeply as he ran his nose from her crotch to the valley of her breasts. He drew his head lower again and snaked his tongue out to caress
her feminine flesh through her panties. Her underwear was already soaked with her own desire, but his tongue completely ruined them. A hot flush ran through her. Misty whimpered.

  She needed more. She brought her hands up, curled her fingers around his horns. He stilled under her touch briefly, and then a visible tremor rippled through him as he leaned into her touch. He pushed forward against her, dropping her backward onto her ass. Her hands popped off his horns with a startled shriek followed by a pained wince at the impact as she rubbed her bottom.

  In the next breath he was all around her. His large body caged her in, appearing improbably largely than he’d seemed crouched across from her in the grass. His dripping cock pointed toward her like an arrow as he crouched lower, bringing his pelvis against hers. She shuddered as she felt the slick nudge of it against the barrier of her cloth. He growled in frustration as he ground uselessly against her, his nose dragging along her shoulders and breasts as he bathed her long, slow licks of his saliva.

  Each swipe of his tongue drew her up tighter. Her hands snapped around his horns again, holding onto to him with need as she arched her pelvis.

  “Wait,” she groaned. “My clothes...I need to take them off.”

  It wasn’t just that she needed full contact with him, though she did, her body was simply so aroused that the clothing was the worst kind of torture against her over-sensitized skin. She wiggled against him.

  Mawrgol’s eyes narrowed to slits as his gaze dropped down her clothes, his claws flexing as he studied them as if really noticing them for the first time. He growled, the sound harsh, rippling through her from his body to hers. Misty panted, lifting her hips again to push against his sex.

  “Please,” she pled.

  Drawing his lips back from his fangs, he flattened his pelvis against hers to keep her still as one clawed hand lifted to the top of her dress. Misty’s breath left her, and a flash of uncertainty cut through the endless race of her need. To her relief, they barely touched her flesh in more than a sensual graze as they caught on the fabric of her dirndl and ripped through it loudly, and then again repeatedly until it lay around her in a nest of baby blue ribbons of cloth. Her breasts, free of even her bra, bounced light as she shivered from contact with the cool air, her nipples pebbling into sharp points.