Blaine stood dutifully in the courtyard and watched Princess Berry’s carriage pull away. The four white stallions at the lead trotted down the winding stone drive, the clacking of their hooves bombarding the still, night air with their rhythmic cadence. A dainty, white-gloved hand waved from within the darkened window, a lace handkerchief clutched between pinched fingers, its owner shrouded by shadows. Blaine didn’t need to see her to visualize her auburn hair spilling down her shoulders, her lightly sun-kissed skin, her deep brown eyes, her baby pink bodice laced so tightly around her petite frame that Blaine feared she might actually have suffered a broken rib or two.

He raised his gloved hand and waved back, the smile plastered on his face growing less and less sincere as the carriage drove farther away toward the black iron gates that surrounded the grounds. Before the carriage reached them, Princess Berry released the handkerchief, leaving it behind as a token for her betrothed. The lacey fabric billowed in the air, floating freely in the wake of the carriage as the team gained speed and bustled away.  The evening breeze caught the handkerchief, swirled it through the air, and then settled it on the lawn. Prince Blaine stared at the thing, a white stain on the lush green grass, his lip curled in disgust.

“Would you like me to fetch that for you, Your Highness?” Sebastian, the captain of the prince’s guard, asked with a smirk.

“I don’t give a fuck,” Blaine muttered, turning angrily from the moonlit scene and storming away.

“Where are you going, Your Highness?” Sebastian called after him, a thinly veiled taunt in his voice. The day spent guarding the awkward couple had been dreadfully dull and long for Sebastian, but it was worth it to watch the prince forced to play nice for that vain and shallow fiancée of his. “What should I tell the king if he asks for you?”

Blaine yanked off his gloves and chucked them one by one over his shoulder.

“If he ever removes his dick from the downstairs maid, you can tell him I’ll see him in hell!” Blaine snapped without slowing his stride.

Sebastian shook his head, watching noble Prince Blaine stomp away like a spoiled child. Sebastian knew he was pushing his luck teasing the prince the way he did, but he possessed more luck than most to push. He and Blaine had been friends since birth. Both nursed by Sebastian’s own mother, they were nearly brothers. Sebastian knew Blaine better than anyone in the kingdom, definitely better than the prince’s parents, which was why, despite all his taunting, his heart broke for Blaine. He saw the prince’s footsteps falter on the cobblestones as he made his way with a purpose toward the stables, and knew the man was holding back sobs … or screams.

Or both.

Sometimes the worst curse in the world could be the circumstances of birth, for rich and poor alike.

Blaine didn’t choose who he was or the way he loved, but the fact of the matter was that Blaine was born a prince. He had duties and responsibilities. He needed to be a role model - a shining example to his kingdom. Those responsibilities included marrying well … and producing an heir.

Sebastian turned to the rest of the complement watching their prince with interest, the scene most assuredly feeding rumors that would circulate like wildfire later in the drunken revelry of the evening. One or two guards even wore the shadows of grins on their faces. Sebastian scowled, and their grins beat a hasty retreat.

“None of you know where the prince is headed, do you?” Sebastian bellowed to the guards. When no one answered, Sebastian repeated loudly, “Do you!?”

“No, sir,” they answered in unison.

“Good,” Sebastian said, knowing in his heart that keeping them quiet through fear only worked for so long. “Keep your mouths shut and you might not be working in the kitchens come morning.”

***

Blaine concentrated on the click of his footsteps on the stones to scrub his mind clean of Rachel Berry - his intended - and her inane chatter. She talked all day long about everything and nothing, rarely giving Blaine’s ears a rest.

“Oh, Your Highness!” she blathered over breakfast. “What an amazing pianoforte you have in the palace! I’m sure I’ll never tire of playing while I’m here. It’s my one true passion!”

“Did I tell you, Prince Blaine?” she jabbered during their walk in the garden after lunch. “I have the most marvelous design for a tabletop that I would love to paint for my sitting room!”

“Does the prince enjoy theater?” she chittered as they took a carriage ride over the grounds. “Oh, I do love the theater. The costumes, the singing - especially the love stories …”

She sat close by his side and put a bold hand on his knee. Then she proceeded to sing from her favorite score. She sang and she quipped and she barely drew a breath. So many times he wished he could scream, ‘Do shut the fuck up!’ Blaine wasn’t ashamed of his indifference toward the girl. He had no intention of leading her on. He was sure that he had made it quite clear on several occasions that this ‘marriage’ was one of no consequence to him. He wasn’t marrying for love.

He had his suspicions that neither was she, she was simply better at masking her displeasure. She might hold some disdain for him, but she stood to benefit a great deal better by their marriage than he, so she had more reason to act cordial. His father could back out of this arrangement at any time.

He could, but Blaine knew he wouldn’t.

The bastard.

Blaine made his way to the stables, pleased to see the windows glowing with lamplight from within, so much warmer and more inviting than a single room in the whole of his palace. He had already undone the buttons to his coat, tearing a few in his haste to be rid of the damned thing. This one in particular fit too tightly around his chest and restricted his breathing, but he was allowed to wear no other - another cage that being royal kept him confined in.

He burst through the door, sighing in relief at the sight of Kurt, pitchfork in hand, laying fresh hay for the horses in their stalls. Through his loose-fitting linen shirt, Blaine could see the muscles in Kurt’s arms shift and stretch, bulging beneath flawless, pale skin. Blaine admired how Kurt kept his skin perfect despite the labor he performed every day. Though Blaine would rather see him stationed in the palace, sleeping on a bed of feathers instead of a humble mattress of hay, covered in satins and silks, and bathed perfumes, within a stone’s throw of the prince’s own bedroom.

But then they might not be able to do what Blaine had come here for.

“Why does it always reek of horse shit in here?” Blaine asked to announce his presence.

“Because this is a stable, Your Highness. It’s full of horses and their shit.”

Kurt did not turn from his work, but spied the prince loosening the collar of his shirt from the corner of his eye, and nibbled his lower lip in secret. But from Blaine’s perspective, Kurt continued on as if he weren’t there, effectively ignoring the prince and his mounting frustrations.

“Well, do you think you could cease shoveling and spare a moment for me?”

“A moment with you will turn into the entire evening, sire.” Kurt chuckled. “Let me get these poor animals fed so I can take my time with you.”

Blaine pushed past Kurt and headed for the rear of the stable, straight to Kurt’s quarters.

“Eager tonight, aren’t we?” Kurt prodded. “But that will not hurry me along, I’m afraid.” He heard the prince curse underneath his breath and chuckled. He had no desire to incur the prince’s ire, but he liked taking advantage of the fact that here, in this stable, where he had total control, he had permission to treat his prince so familiar. Besides, he caught a glimpse of the prince’s ‘playdate’ with the Princess Berry. Kurt knew very well the prince’s pain.

He carried it as well.

Kurt gave the broodmare in the stall an extra helping of oats and patted her on the back. She would foal soon, and it made Kurt’s chest tighten with bittersweet hopes and dreams, each one fracturing a bit every day that the prince’s wedding drew near. Horses had such simple lives. They lived in the stables and galloped in the yards, their every need provided for. They ran where their wills took them, and they fucked where they pleased. In the stable of the king, the horses were neither traded nor sold, and his favorites, cared for by Kurt, never went to war. How wonderful it would be to live out his life as a horse, Kurt thought.

Then he rolled his eyes at his own foolishness.

He followed the prince to his room and saw him struggling with his clothes. He managed to tear off the coat and toss it on Kurt’s bed, but the shirt, along with the corset underneath, was giving him some trouble.

“Could we just get this started?” Blaine growled, nearly ripping off the uncooperative garments. Kurt caught the shirt when it finally slipped from Blaine’s shoulders and hung it along with the coat on a dull hook in the corner. Then he helped Blaine remove the corset. He loosened one lace at a time slowly so that Blaine’s lungs didn’t fill too quickly and cause him to pass out. Kurt could appreciate a sturdy corset, but not like this one, worn solely for looks. But this wasn’t vanity. In the case of the prince, Blaine’s father forced it on him to keep him from slouching in the presence of the princess - so he didn’t show with his body the resentment he felt.

Blaine far from needed a corset. His shoulders broad, his waist trim, his arms muscular, he cut a handsome figure in a properly fitted coat. Kurt could see that figure now, emerging from underneath cotton and bone. And though Kurt didn’t approve of the corset, the marks it left behind, running vertically on Blaine’s olive skin, made him hotter than a brick oven cooking in the middle of July.

Kurt removed the corset completely, and Blaine stood before him shirtless, back turned, chest heaving in anticipation. Kurt took a moment to appreciate the body of the man who’d started coming to him more and more recently in need of release … and sometimes, in need of comfort. Kurt rounded on Blaine and stood before him, stripped off his own shirt and tossed it aside, allowing the prince time to lay eyes on his body. He wore only his leather work pants, the material clinging like a second skin to his thighs. Kurt let Blaine’s eyes wander where they pleased, let him gawk openly, but once Kurt saw the bulge in the front of Blaine’s pants grow with interest, he knew Blaine had seen enough. Kurt pointed sharply to the ground, and seeing the signal from his Dom, Blaine lowered his eyes to the floor.

“Arms out,” Kurt commanded, no more need for ceremony or fancy titles now that Blaine had silently shown his willingness to submit.

Blaine raised his arms and grabbed the posts at either side of him, keeping his eyes downcast while his Dom worked. Kurt bound Blaine’s wrists to the wood, wrapping them with leather straps and pulling the ends tight. The prince sighed when the leather bit into his skin.

“You like that?” Kurt ran a hand up Blaine’s spine, rubbing his shoulders and pushing down on his bowed neck. “Of course, you do. You always do.”

Without permission to speak, Blaine stood obediently and listened.

In the confines of Kurt’s quarters, his sub didn’t always have permission to speak.

He had permission to scream, but that could be taken away.

Kurt stole a moment to clean up, washing the filth from his body with water from a basin beside his bed. He grimaced when the water turned brown with dust, as did the cloth he wiped down with. He wished he could wash himself a bit more thoroughly, but that would require drawing a bath.

They didn’t have that kind of time.

He opened a chest on the floor and pulled out a braided whip, along with a pair of leather gloves, both gifts from the prince after the first time Blaine wandered down to the stables in search of Kurt’s services. At the time, Blaine barely knew himself, barely understood where his strange urges came from. He had noticed Kurt before. Of course he had. Who but the blind could not? He was fair and strong, but kept mostly to himself. God, he seemed so quiet, so innocent to Blaine’s eyes.

After watching Kurt spend the afternoon breaking a new pair of stallions – a gift from the Belgium ambassador – Blaine simply knew.

He knew what he needed, and that night, he sought Kurt out – to have Kurt break him like one of his horses.

They taught each other, learned together, and as time passed, Blaine came to Kurt almost nightly, until the marks on his back frightened his servants. They would have sent most of the household into a fury had it not been for Sebastian and his uncanny ability to stop wagging tongues.

Falling in love with Kurt … well, that was something that Blaine hadn’t expected.

Kurt slipped the gloves over his hands, and then ran his hands all over Blaine’s body, starting down at his ankles, drawing his hands up Blaine’s legs, firmly massaging the muscles of the prince’s thighs, brushing over the outline of his hard cock aching in the restrictive pants. Kurt would have taken great pleasure in grabbing the impressive length and stroking it until Blaine came, but he knew that wasn’t what the prince needed. His hands traveled up Blaine’s flanks and his chest, pinching both nipples hard and soliciting a stifled groan. Kurt hugged Blaine from behind, fitting their bodies together so that Blaine could feel every plane of his body against him.

Kurt felt Blaine lean back toward him, longing to be close to him.

“That’ll come soon enough,” Kurt said. “That’ll come as soon as you do, sweetheart.”

Kurt released him and stepped away. Blaine whimpered beneath his breath.

“Was there something you wanted to say, sweetheart?” Kurt picked up his whip, feeling the weight of it in his hand, holding it so the braid didn’t brush against the dirty floor. He came back to where the prince stood and rested his head against the man’s shoulder.

Blaine shivered, holding on by a thread, and Kurt hadn’t even started yet.

“Please …” Blaine breathed, his voice heavy with desperation. “Help me …”

“Alright, sweetheart,” Kurt whispered, letting the words fall over Blaine’s shoulders and slide down his skin.

Kurt moved away, and without any warning, snapped the whip. The first crack of Kurt’s whip didn’t connect to Blaine’s skin; it was only meant to prepare him for what was to come. The sound of it, the promise in that sound as it struck the air, filled Blaine’s body with a surge of heat. It loosened every muscle, unbottled his inhibitions - gave him permission to be a man, not a prince. Kurt ran the leather braid over Blaine’s skin with light strokes, watching goosebumps blossom on the prince’s tan back and arms. The prince’s skin, pulled tight over his muscular frame, made Kurt’s mouth water. He knew how it tasted, how it felt beneath his tongue, how it felt against his back when Blaine pounded into him from behind.

Kurt walked back a few paces and watched Blaine prepare for the first hit, his muscles tightening to absorb the blow. It made Kurt immensely hard to watch such a powerful man like Prince Blaine, shrewd and clever, feared by his enemies and loved by his kingdom, submit. He took his time, eyeing the area right beside his spine where thin, white marks had already healed over other lighter, silvery marks. He raised his arm, but before he could bring the whip down, he heard one last, soft plea from the prince’s lips.

“Kurt?”

The whip cut through the air, the end of it slicing Blaine’s back. The tethered prince threw his head back and screamed through clenched teeth.

“God!” he groaned, breathing out quickly.

“I love the way you sound the first time,” Kurt moaned. “I love hearing you scream.”

“More,” Blaine begged. “Please, or I’m going to go mad.”

“No one told you to speak,” Kurt said with delight, holding his whip at bay.

Blaine dropped his head and whined, pressing his lips into a tight line to keep from making any more remarks, one in particular on the tip of his tongue that would most likely have him untied and sent home.

Kurt watched Blaine’s breathing slow, his body relax, and when calm had overtaken him, Kurt brought the whip down again, moving closer so more of the braid bit into his back.

“Augh! Christ!” Blaine growled, his arms shaking, tugging reflexively against the straps binding his wrists and pulling them tighter.

Kurt held tight to the whip handle, feeling his heart race in his chest. Another crack of his whip cutting into Blaine’s back made the prince’s knees buckle. He grabbed at the wooden posts and held firm, righting his feet beneath him. Kurt brought the whip down again, harder than before, and the scream that escaped the prince’s throat morphed into a moan. His knees buckled again, and this time, he almost fell to the floor.

“Now, now,” Kurt tutted, swallowing down the stirrings of his own erection, begging to be free from his pants. “We wouldn’t want you breaking your pretty little wrists. Stand up like the good boy you are.”

Blaine regained his footing, his knees wobbling as he waited.

Kurt reached down a gloved hand, snaked it beneath the waist of his pants, and grabbed his cock. He held himself, squeezing below the head, suppressing the craving to stroke. Holding his hard length in his hand, he brought the whip down again, and again, harder, and then less so, letting Blaine’s mutters and groans fuel his desires. Blaine held on to the posts, fingers straining, knuckles white, while his body slumped and his knees fought to keep him upright. Four more stripes and Blaine’s back was nearly painted red, but still he begged for more.

“Do you want to cum, Blaine?” Kurt asked, his voice low, merely a rumble in the back of his throat. He approached the prince slowly, letting Blaine hear every footfall on the floor behind him. Kurt surveyed the crisscross marks on Blaine’s back, wondering how it felt, how he could get off on being whipped the way he did, but the look of them, slightly grotesque and swollen, knowing that Blaine enjoyed them, made Kurt long for release himself. “Do you want me to make you cum?”

“Y-y-yes,” Blaine mumbled, his voice struggling to be heard past the chattering of his teeth.

“Do you want to cum off the end of my whip, Blaine?”

“Y-y-yes.” Blaine’s voice was nearly inaudible this time, but Kurt didn’t need to hear him say it. The answer was the same every time.

Kurt retreated again, forgetting the pain of his erection to focus on what he knew would happen next. He brought the whip down lightly on Blaine’s shoulder, but it was enough to make him weak. One more time on the opposite shoulder almost obliterated his grasp on the wooden post.

“Oh, God,” Blaine whispered into the air. Kurt could tell from his breathy gasp that he almost had him. The whip snapped at Blaine’s lower back, in those dimples where Kurt loved to fit his hands when they got the chance to make love. Blaine’s hips lurched forward, and a quiet, “yes,” passed his lips.

One more. Kurt knew he only needed one more, and he picked his spot carefully, a spot that had taken hours of practicing on those nights when he slept alone to perfect.

A spot that had become the prince’s favorite by far.

Kurt snapped the whip out along Blaine’s waist, where the braided length wrapped around his hip and hit his throbbing cock, with enough force to sting, but not enough to do any damage.

But it was all he needed.

“Fuck!” Blaine moaned and came with a string of muttered curses, his knees giving out and his wrists pulling on the leather straps until Kurt thought they might dislocate. Kurt dropped his whip and rushed over with a tall stool for the prince to drop down onto, giving Kurt time to undo the leather straps from the posts, and then from Blaine’s wrists, taking care with the sore, broken skin.

“Kurt … I …” Blaine muttered with his eyes half-lidded, lust blown pupils searching Kurt’s body while he worked. The fingers of Blaine’s freed left hand toyed at the strings of Kurt’s pants while Kurt worked to untie the left.

“Blaine …” Kurt warned, panting as tired, shaking fingertips brushed the head of his neglected erection.

“Kurt,” Blaine mumbled, “I want to …”

“No, Your Highness,” Kurt said firmly. He wrapped his arms around Blaine’s waist and lifted him from the stool, helping Blaine limp his way onto the bed. “You can barely stand.”

“I don’t … need to stand … for what I have in mind,” Blaine stuttered. Kurt suddenly got a vivid image of his gorgeous prince on his knees, pink lips stretched around his cock, taking him down his throat to the hilt, sparkling hazel eyes staring up at him with no shame, no superiority, no lines or borders or boundaries between them. It was almost a tempting enough image to make Kurt give in, but he couldn’t. It wouldn’t feel right. It would feel like taking advantage of a tired and wounded man.

“Maybe when you can stand on your own, I’ll let you,” Kurt said, trying to think of anything he could to make his persistent hard-on die.

There was a bull calf in the north quarter that he’d need to castrate on the morrow, he reminded himself, sure that that would do the trick.

It didn’t. In a way, it only made things worse, which, in turn, made him question his moral compass.

He laid Blaine down on his stomach. He emptied and cleaned his basin, then refilled it with clean water. He dusted the cool liquid with herbs that he remembered his mother using to heal cuts and bruises when he was younger, long before he entered the king’s service. They worked well against infection and cut down the sting, but most of all, they sped the scabbing of the wounds. Any mark on the prince’s skin stabbed at Kurt, regardless of how erotic whipping him felt.

Kurt emptied and refilled the basin three times before the prince’s wounds were well cleaned. He undressed the prince, pulling off his shoes, pants, and stockings, exposing him to the cool, soothing air. Then Kurt disrobed and climbed onto the bed beside him. Blaine reached out instinctually to find Kurt, to hold his hand or touch his shoulder, anything to let him know that Kurt was there beside him. Blaine had often said that Kurt was his anchor, and that without him, he would feel adrift, floating here and there with no place to call home.

It was difficult to believe those words sometimes, considering all that would befall them in the days and weeks to come, but they were nice to hear all the same.

“You will be staying on here, will you not? After I am wed?” Blaine asked. It was a question made of more than one feeling. It was a statement, a command, a prince relaying an order that would be followed without dispute; but it was also a plea, a hope, a gentle request.

“I was not commanded otherwise,” Kurt replied, sheltering his smile. Blaine laced their fingers together. He brought Kurt’s hand to his mouth to kiss his knuckles.

“Will you be telling Princess Berry about us then?”

Blaine’s kisses stopped, and Kurt wished he could take his question back, but he also needed to know.

“Why would she need to know?”

“Well, she is to be your wife,” Kurt said matter-of-factly. “Don’t you think she deserves to know?”

“No,” Blaine said, a catch splintering his voice. “No, she doesn’t. I will not share you and I will not lose you. Do you understand?”

“But I’m sharing you,” Kurt grumbled.

“It’s not the same and you know it.”

“But …”

“No, Kurt! It’s different! You understand, don’t you?” Blaine let out a shuddering breath. “P-please say you do.”

Kurt sighed, sinking further into the thin mattress with his arm wrapped around the prince’s middle, avoiding putting too much pressure on his back.

“Yes, Your Highness.” He leaned over to kiss Blaine’s cheek. “I understand.”

Kurt drew his blanket over them. He kissed Blaine softly on the nape of his neck, feeling the body in his arms relax at the touch of his lips. Kurt let his breathing follow Blaine’s till they inhaled together and exhaled together, drifting off to sleep with a sympathetic Sebastian guarding the stable door, ready to wake his prince before dawn.