Shadows and Shade Box Set Read online

  Shadows and Shade

  Books 1-3 Box Set

  Amanda Cashure

  Contents

  Trigger Warning:

  I. Shadows and Shade

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Epilogue

  Like it? Loved it?

  II. Forbidden Chapter

  Preamble

  Forbidden Shower Scene

  Closing

  III. Shadow and Darkness

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Epilogue

  Like it? Loved it?

  IV. Forbidden Chapter

  Preamble

  Forbidden Cave Scene

  Closing

  V. Kitten and Allure

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Epilogue

  Epilogue

  Like it? Loved it?

  VI. Forbidden Chapter

  Preamble

  Forbidden Larder Scene

  Closing

  Want more?

  Trigger Warning:

  This story contains violence, typical warriors and battle type stuff, as well as typical servant-treated-as-a-slave stuff.

  There is also an instance of torture and noncon in the epilogue of book three. If the torture and noncon is confronting for you, you can skip the epilogue at the end of book three to avoid it.

  Shadows and Shade

  Shadows and Darkness

  Kitten and Allure

  Forbidden Chapters

  Copyright 2019 Amanda Cashure

  All Rights Reserved

  These books are works of fiction. Any references to real events, real people, and real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, organizations, or places is entirely coincidental. Which means I used my memories and google maps to feed my imagination and have no intention of mimicking the real thing. All rights are reserved. This book is intended for the purchaser of this e-book ONLY. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage retrieval system, without the express written permission of the author. All songs, song titles, and lyrics contained in this book are the property of the respective songwriters and copyright holders.

  Book design by – Inked Imagination and Exotic Dancer Guy

  Developmental Editing by – Caitlin Fitzgerald of CateEdits.

  Continuity Edits by – Courtney Pinelli

  Line Edits by – Michelle Motyczka

  Proofreading by – Sarah Williams

  Cover credits – Images on the cover may contain works from PNGTree used with paid account. Design by Cassandra Webb

  Cover Image Copyright 2019

  Alpha and Beta readers… wow, there were so many amazing people who worked on this book. This book was a mammoth task not only because of the length of it and my bad memory, but because of the intricate plot and the easter eggs being dropped in here. I couldn’t do it without community support for this story and these characters.

  Thank you, each and every one of you.

  The pressure of my hand against her back is nothing compared to the pressure of her existence trying to slip beneath my skin.

  I’m the Commander. Ordering her, or any of my small team, should be easy, but as I ride hard at the head of our convoy, her body draped over my stallion’s withers, nothing is easy.

  Rising to the challenges left when Lithael murdered my mother, accepting that I must fight for a crown that I never wanted, following Mother's cryptic instructions, all of it sits heavily.

  Mother adopted Lucif a few hundred years before she found my broken body and gave me shelter. Lucif is Lithael’s father. Lithael wears the crown. But we have never been siblings or allies or even friends.

  None of this was supposed to happen.

  She should have known better, but it’s impossible to know what realities that woman had seen.

  Impossible.

  Like facing my own death – which I was all too willing to do – because accepting my impending death made it easier to suffer through life.

  That was before my eyes met hers. Their grey depths make my power arc and reach from within my fiercely guarded core. Searching. Hunting.

  My insides spark – mine.

  And that’s dangerous.

  I will deliver her to the bonded quarters, calmly of course, and without a hint of this charge inside me. She will stay where I put her, somewhere that they scrub dishes in the basement prep-kitchens, and I will wipe my boots clean of this whole experience.

  Then I can breathe, focus, and life can go ahead as planned. A neat, organized, and completely impossible plan that will probably get us all killed.

  Shade, you are screwed, I admit to myself.

  And not just a little bit. My collar is in the Manor Lord’s furious grip, and I’m very, very screwed.

  Alfie and Bella could have gotten into mischief in the kitchen where Lord Martin rarely sets foot, but no, of course not, not those two. Two jars of wholemeal and one running-flour-fight later, the immaculate rose garden that forms the Manor’s formal entrance now looks like a snow-cloud’s tissue.

  It’s pretty.

  Made even nicer by the fact that it’s pissing Lord Martin off.

  Which wouldn’t have happened if his Lordship didn’t have Cook on her hands and knees, scrubbing the sitting room floor, and me outside the garden walls with a scrubbing brush and a bucket of soapy water, fine detailing the rough brown stonework. The stones! Every servant is scrubbing or polishing something, and we have been for days. Whoever the Lord is expecting to ride up that road is either rich or royalty.r />
  Lord Martin lets go of my collar, but I’m frozen in place, no more than an inch away from him. The scent of burnt tobacco assaults the back of my throat as he slaps the empty flour jars from my hand. They shatter on the ancient cobblestone path, and he glares at the broken glass like that’s my fault too. My fault, and now he’s trying to decide which fist is going to get the pleasure of bruising my face first. My heart wants to rip through my chest – it still wants to get out of here – but I push every bit of my energy into holding myself in submission – holding my mouth in submission and keeping my tongue quiet. Because my mouth has a mind of its own, but right now, that would make things oh, so much worse.

  His gaze brushes down past my eyes, over my cheeks, and comes to rest on the point where my collar opens to reveal skin. I feel it and hate it, clamping down the urge to vomit or whimper – or both.

  “Tell me again that it wasn’t your fault. That you didn’t let those kids ruin my garden. Go on, I want to hear it. Say the words again,” he lets the order out through snarled lips and a half-smirk of pleasure.

  “You want me to say the words again?” I ask, almost rolling my damn eyes because I’m going to get myself killed.

  He reaches for the black leather whip tucked into his belt, and I cringe – ready for the blow.

  “I’ll chain her up, Sir,” Jake says, appearing out of nowhere to grab the back of my tunic.

  I’m yanked back so hard that I’m stumbling out of the Lord’s reach before either of us know what’s happening.

  For a few breaths, the time it takes Jake to drag me from the roses to the high stone wall around the kitchen garden, Lord Martin doesn’t move.

  “What are you doing?” I hiss at Jake, while trying to get my footing and, in a weird way, trying not to get my footing.

  Lord Martin is a man who enjoys inflicting and observing pain. The more it looks like I’m in distress, the less chance he’ll storm after Jake with a second-wind of fury. Jake needs to be in the Lord’s good graces, just the same as I do, and he shouldn’t be sticking his nose into my punishments.

  Shouldn’t – but is.

  He’s a servant like me, raised in the soot. We have each other, but that’s about it since his mother died. Popular theory is that the Lord was the end of her; not sure how, but it probably involved a whip.

  Now, stupidly, Jake steps in for everyone, even Cook, and that woman can wield a rolling-pin like a deadly weapon. The beating Jake gets for testing Lord Martin’s patience is so much worse.

  As Jake drags me back through the crumbling arch of the kitchen-garden’s high-stone wall, I get a last glimpse of Lord Martin shaking off his hesitation and surging after us.

  “New plan,” I gasp. “Just throw me on the ground and laugh.”

  “If I put you on the chain, it’ll be over,” Jake says.

  “No, he’ll target you instead!”

  “I can handle it.”

  “I know you can bloody handle it,” I hiss. “I screwed up, Jake, so I’ll take the punishment.”

  “Not happening, Shade. You can’t have everything your way,” he mutters.

  “It’s okay, Jake, it really is. I know you’re not thinking straight because I kicked your ass at darts last night,” I say. “You chuck like a child – that’s not your fault.”

  The words escape my runaway mouth, almost as background noise. Everything in me is focused on the empty gateway in the stone wall and the scary-ass Lord about to charge after us.

  Any minute now.

  That’s how my brain works, I think to myself. Twisted inner dialogue and random runaway thoughts while my mouth takes matters into its own hands.

  “You have to live long enough for me to take back my trophy,” he says, pulling me between the second row of vegetables.

  I almost laugh – no one here has ever beaten me in darts.

  “You know I’m grateful, right?” I say, but before he can answer, and before Lord Martin comes around the corner, I elbow Jake in the back of the ribs.

  He drops his grip on my shirt, and I crash to the ground, letting out a fake yelp of pain. I ignore the accusing look in his bright eyes set against dark skin; we can argue about this later.

  “No, Jake,” I cry. “Don’t hit me.”

  Jake is bent slightly over the top of me, trying to recover from my bruising. I take the opportunity to crawl backward toward the kitchen door and the thumping-great wooden pole that stands tall next to it.

  Lord Martin snickers, taking heavy steps into the garden and around the raised timber beds.

  Before he can get to me, I inch my way toward the wall and use it to push myself to my feet. There’s genuine fear on my face when my eyes lock onto Lord Martin’s.

  Jake laughs, an echo of something deeply humoured that he’s begun to perfect.

  “Get out of here, boy. Go whip those kids.”

  Music to my ears.

  They’ll cry out, but it will all be acted. Cook will paint their hands with a reed dipped in beetroot juice, and they’ll make themselves scarce for as long as it takes.

  Jake hesitates, but with a sharp wave from the Lord, he takes the hint and gets out of here. Lord Martin’s eyes, or what little of their bloodshot color I can see in the creased-with-anger slits that are left anyway, bore into me.

  A single iron cuff hangs from a length of chain connected to a wooden post that protrudes from the Manor’s stonework. Built into the design of the home hundreds of years ago, just for this purpose.

  “You’d like that, wouldn’t you? You think I’m going to chain you and walk away?” he asks, stepping closer, leaving barely a handspan between us.

  If he hits me at this distance, my head’s going to bounce off the wall that’s already pressing a stone pattern into my back.

  “Not this time,” he draws out the syllables, a slow sneer tracing his lips. “Not this time. This time, I’ll tie you down.”

  The words stab into me, and I don’t dare breathe for fear I might actually begin to bleed.

  “I have plans for you. In a year, you’ll know the difference between mercy and hell. I will be your mercy, girl, and whenever you hear music, you’ll thank me for rescuing you.”

  I have only a second to piece together the music he’s growling about – the minstrels pass through in the next few days – but that’s it before a bell sounds, short, sharp rings that signal someone is riding along our road. A hard, echoing tone that almost makes me sag with relief.

  Lord Martin grabs my wrist and shackles me to the post with quick precision.

  “After,” he says, mostly to himself because he’s already turning toward the rose garden.

  When he gets to the gate, he lets out a loud growling sound, as if he’d forgotten the complete mess still there.

  “Clean this up!” he hollers, as he disappears from sight.

  One breath.

  Two, I inhale.

  Three, exhale.

  Four.

  I relax enough to peel myself from the stone wall. My left wrist is locked in the chain tethered above my head. As a kid, my feet hung off the ground, and I would try to wedge my toes in the stonework to support my weight. Grown to my full height, and perhaps my full lifespan at a total of eighteen-years – because over my dead body is Lord Martin getting me undressed tonight – I can stand here with my feet on the ground. My wrist and arm, however, are still fully extended above my head. A gardener was once left hanging here for five weeks; the man’s shoulder seized, and he couldn’t move it at all by the time he was released. So, Lord Martin had him hung in the top field.

  As was, and is, the right of the Lord.

  I wrap my fingers around the chain, using it as leverage, and the wall as footing. With a jump, push, and swing, I perch on top of the timber support with the second-story wall at my back. My wrist is still heavily chained, but rests in my lap in a vaguely comfortable way. Watching other people suffer has this weird side effect of teaching a person how not to suffer.

  And
the view up here is fantastic, but whoever is on their way here isn’t in my field of vision yet. The dominating feature, past the road and the first fields, all of the way, way, way back, is the Enchanted Forest with the barest sliver of a waxing moon almost lost in the blue sky.

  Enchanted Forest. How original. They couldn’t call it the permanently-shrouded-in-spooky-green-mist-and-smells-like-death-when-you-get-near-it forest. Or the dangerous-shit-escapes-from-in-here forest. Or the considered-cursed-because-it’s-the-only-place-that-didn’t-burn-in-the-great-fire Forest.

  Nope, they make it sound like something out of a bedtime story.