Chapter 326: Farewell Secret Lover**
Ren shrieked, twisting her body with the frantic grace of a startled cat, and swung her cast-iron skillet in a blind arc toward the whispering voice in the dark.
But Vex’s hand effortlessly snatched the edge of the pan mid-air.
Before Ren could even calm her nerves, a muscular arm shot through the gloom and wrapped around her waist. Vex clamped his other hand over her mouth, stifling her panicked squeal. With a swift motion, he yanked her backward into the pitch-black void.
Ren’s spine collided against a row of thick, vertical pillars.
It was a cage. Vex was locked inside a reinforced wooden cell situated in the center of the dungeon. A little while prior, Vex had shifted into his giant beast form in a desperate bid to shatter the enclosure, but the timber was ridiculously strong, dense, and firm.
Ren couldn’t see him at all. She had put her glowing mushroom into her inventory and was considering getting it, but she thought it’d be a bad idea to risk any light leaking out of this place.
The air inside the dungeon was harsh. The spice from her pepper bomb was still drifting through the cracks. Even through the fur tied tightly over her nose and mouth, the capsaicin was burning the back of her throat and making her green eyes watery.
"Are you here to save me, Little Rose?" Vex purred smoothly against her ear, his breath tickling her neck. "How incredibly sweet of you."
Ren frantically reached up, prying his large hand off her mouth. But the moment she freed her lips, Vex tightened his other arm around her waist, effortlessly keeping her pinned flush against the rough wooden bars of his cage.
"Let me go, you idiot!" Ren hissed furiously in the dark, struggling against his iron grip. "I don’t have much time! The guards are going to come back soon!"
Vex ignored her frantic warning. His free hand slowly, deliberately ventured up her torso, his long fingers tracing the curve of her waist.
"I am going to die very soon, my little rose," Vex murmured, his tone dropping into a dark, seductive register. "The least you can do is let me touch you one last time before the Snake King takes my head."
"You aren’t going to die!" Ren argued passionately, swatting blindly at his wandering hand. "I am going to save you! I have a plan!"
Vex’s hand instantly stopped moving.
"Oh?" Vex asked, genuine surprise lacing his tone. "So you are really here to save me, Little Rose? Did you get the key to the cage?"
Ren’s brain stalled.
A key. Of course there was a key. She had managed to open the main door, but she had completely neglected to consider that Syris would put the trickster fox in a cage within a cage. She couldn’t even see her own hands in front of her face, let alone locate a tiny keyhole on the dense wooden logs.
"Um..." Ren swallowed hard, her confidence rapidly evaporating. "What does the key look like?"
Vex let out a long, exasperated sigh.
"If you do not already have the key," Vex stated flatly, "then you truly shouldn’t bother trying to save me. You will never find it."
His large hand slid upward, firmly cupping her soft breast through the silk of her dress. "I suppose I will have to make do with this lovely farewell visit."
"Vex, stop!" Ren gasped.
She bit her bottom lip to hold back an embarrassing moan as his thumb found her sensitive nipple, pinching and rolling the hardened peak right through the fabric. His grip remained incredibly firm around her waist, keeping her trapped against the wooden bars while his hand ravaged her chest.
"No, listen to me," Ren panted, her resolve warring with the sudden, intense rush of heat pooling between her thighs. "I am going to find the key. I am going to save you!"
Vex paused his torment, his hand resting warmly over her breast. "Why?" he asked, a rare edge of genuine curiosity piercing through his arrogant facade. "Why would you want to save me? Don’t you want me dead too?"
"We are partners!" Ren reminded him in a fierce, hushed whisper. "We made a deal! We are supposed to cure the feral madness together!"
Vex was quiet for a long moment. Then, a low chuckle vibrated against her back.
His hand abandoned her chest, sliding smoothly down her stomach and diving between her parted thighs.
"Is that the real reason you risked your life to sneak down here?" Vex teased, his long fingers expertly finding her swollen, soaking wet cleft. He applied pressure against her clit. "Or are you simply falling in love with your secret lover?"
Ren’s face flushed a brilliant red. "I am absolutely not falling for you! Do not flatter yourself!"
She was rapidly running out of time. Her stinging nose could tell that the burning pepper scent in the air was becoming fainter by the second. The capsaicin cloud was settling, which meant the guards would be returning to their post any minute.
She desperately needed to redirect the conversation before she completely lost her mind to his highly skilled fingers.
"I haven’t forgotten the soup I promised to make Vara!" Ren blurted out, her hips involuntarily twitching against his hand. "She must be starving by now! And she will need someone to take care of her while you are in this cell!"
Vex was very amused. He rubbed his thumb in slow, torturous circles over her sensitive pearl. "When exactly did you get so nice and caring, little rose?"
"I was always nice and caring!" Ren scoffed, glaring into the dark. "And I am a woman of my word. I do not make promises and then fail to keep them!"
Vex hummed thoughtfully, his mind rapidly piecing her visit together.
"Ah," Vex concluded smoothly. "So you did not come down here to stage a daring rescue. You came here to find out where my secret cave is."
Ren didn’t deny it. "Yes. I want to help Vara. I want to help her unborn cub."
For a moment, the dungeon plunged into silence.
"How do I know this isn’t a trap?" Vex asked. "How do I know you are not trying to get the location of my cave to hand it over to your petty snake husband?"
Ren shrugged her shoulders, leaning her head back against the thick wooden bars. "You’ll just have to trust me, Vex."
The silence returned, stretching between them. The only sound in the freezing, pitch-black room was their ragged breathing and the frantic, echoing thud of Ren’s racing heart. It sounded incredibly loud to her ears, especially because his warm hand was still resting between her thighs, two of his fingers gently teasing her slick entrance.
Finally, Vex broke the silence.
"Listen carefully," Vex ordered, his voice dropping to a barely audible, hushed whisper.
As he began to speak, his hand sprang back to life. He stroked her wet folds, parting her lips as he gave her specific, complicated directions involving a submerged rock formation on the outer western edge of the swamp.
"Vex," Ren whimpered, trying to focus on the landmarks he was describing. "We do not have the time for this—"
"If you fail to save me tonight," Vex interrupted, his voice thick with raw, primal lust as he forcefully hoisted her emerald silk dress all the way up to her waist, "I want to ensure that I die a very, very happy beastman."
Ren bit down hard on her own hand to muffle her desperate moans as he finally slid two long, wet fingers deep inside her. He scissored his fingers expertly, hitting her most sensitive internal spots while his other hand pinch and twist her sensitive nipples.
She was completely powerless to stop him. She couldn’t deny him what he wanted, her treacherous body had a frustrating way of dictating her thoughts and actions whenever a handsome beastman touched her.
Behind her, she heard the soft rustle of fabric. Vex had stripped off his loincloth.
"Lean forward," Vex commanded.
He pushed her hips slightly away from the bars, forcing her to bend over at the waist. The thick wooden pillars of the cage were spaced just wide enough apart for his intent.
Vex guided his cock right through the gap in the wooden bars, and thrust smoothly into her soaking wet entrance from behind.
"Ah!" Ren gasped.
He couldn’t go all the way in. The thick wooden bars of his cage severely limited his range of motion, pressing painfully against his pelvis and keeping him from burying himself to the hilt.
But it didn’t matter. Vex gripped her bare hips through the gaps in the wood and thrusted into her as far and as hard as he possibly could. The intense, shallow friction focused entirely on the most sensitive nerve endings at her entrance. Every time his hips slammed against the wooden bars, a dull, rhythmic thud echoed in the dark, sending blistering waves of pleasure shooting straight up her spine.
"You feel incredible," Vex growled, his thrusts becoming faster, more desperate.
Ren was rapidly losing herself to the lustful haze. The stinging pepper in the air was completely forgotten, replaced by the musky, primal scent of the trickster fox and the wet, slapping sounds of their desperate union.
She bucked her hips backward, chasing the limited depth of his thick shaft.
But suddenly, the magical, lustful bubble burst.
From the corridor outside, the sound of loud, rasping coughing echoed through the dark.
The snake guards were returning.