Traveling with gentlemen, p.1
Traveling with Gentlemen, page 1
TRAVELING WITH GENTLEMEN
A Tempting Monsters Novella
KATHRYN MOON
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Traveling with Gentlemen, A Tempting Monsters Novella
First publication: July 10th 2023
Cover art by Kathryn Moon (don’t laugh, okay, it’s a freebie.)
Editing by Jess Whetsel
Formatting by Kathryn Moon
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Published by Kathryn Moon
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CONTENTS
Foreword and Content Information
1. Mermaids on the Mediterranean
2. The Midnight Market
3. Crocodiles on the Nile
4. Domestic Days
5. A Dangerous Invitation
6. Decadent Parties and Illicit Bargains
7. The Performance
8. The Tomb of King Birsha
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
About the Author
FOREWORD AND CONTENT INFORMATION
In the Tempting Monsters timeline, Traveling with Gentlemen takes place between the last chapter and the epilogue of A Lady of Rooksgrave Manor. Events in chapter eight of this novella are described in minor detail in The Company of Fiends. This is primarily a slice of life and scenes of smut story, but there is a family adventure included!
This story was originally posted in draft form on my Patreon! If you’d like to see smutty art from many of the following chapters (as well as tons more art and more completed stories) please consider subscribing.
This story contains the following: explicit sexual content including but not limited to penetration, fingering, blow jobs, oral sex, group sex, shifted sphinx sex with mythical beast features included - as well as gore, violence, and mercy killings of long suffering monsters.
CHAPTER 1
MERMAIDS ON THE MEDITERRANEAN
“Go on without me," Jonathon groaned as I combed my fingers through his hair.
I snorted and flashed a wry smile at the others. Auguste sighed and slipped into the room. We had a nice collection of rooms all in a row on the best floor of the ship carrying us through the Mediterranean to our destination of Cairo. For the sake of human propriety and not shocking all the other passengers, I was traveling with Auguste as my “husband.” Despite my objections, Booker was attending Jonathon as manservant. Ezra had offered to travel invisibly without a room, but Amon had insisted.
"I wish you could let Mr. Tanner out for some rest," I said.
"Unless the big guy gets seasick too, then we'd just have twice the trouble in our buckets," Ezra quipped.
"I'll stay with him," Auguste offered, stroking a hand over my back. "It's too complicated pretending to eat anyway."
"I could do it," Ezra offered. "I worry about staying visible."
"We should all just dine in our rooms," I suggested.
"Noo," Jonathon moaned. "Leave me in peace with Auguste. I don't want to smell your dinners while I'm like this anyway."
"Enough. We should let the doctor rest. Ezra, you join Booker for dinner. I will escort Esther to the hall for the evening," Amon said, calling our attention. When I frowned at the separation of the arrangement, his tone softened. "Just a few more weeks, my star. And tonight is the full moon. Our kind will gather together and perhaps we might find a witch who can offer a solution for Underwood's ailment."
I hesitated as Jonathon rolled over in the bed. His skin was dewy with sweat, but he was less green than when we'd arrived to bring him to dinner.
"Take good care of him," I said to Auguste.
"Always, mon coeur. We'll join you later." He leaned in, kissing my lips with a gentle scratch of his fangs. Then he took my hands and pulled me up from the bed, spinning me and sitting down next to Jonathon.
"The two of you together should stir up some good gossip amongst the humans," Ezra mused as I linked my arm with Amon's.
I shot Ezra a warning glare and he vanished with a wink as Amon and I exited into the hallway, his arm slightly stiff beneath my hand. "I'll speak with him," I whispered to Amon.
Amon softened and his head tipped, eyes warm on mine. "It's only that the rogue is right that pricks my pride."
"Mm, we're all annoyed when Ezra is right," I whispered back. A sharp pinch answered on my ass, and Amon stifled his laughter at my squeak. "Will Egypt be different?"
Amon hummed as we approached the stairs, other passengers exiting their rooms and joining us, each set of eyes glancing twice in our direction. "In my circles, yes, very different. Even tonight. You'll see. Our kind won't blink," he said, the significance in the words pointing to his meaning. Monsters wouldn't care about the contrast between mine and Amon's skin.
"I like the company you keep best anyway," I said, squeezing his arm and holding his stare as we walked up the stairs. "Besides, it's not as though I care if I'm scandalous or not."
Amon's lips curved and I felt the soft vibration of his purr against my side. I wanted to rise to my toes, arch into my sphinx and present my lips in offering to that purr, savor its echo against my tongue.
We still had weeks left on the ship. I was sure sooner or later we would all thoroughly shock the other passengers, but perhaps it would be better to behave a little longer. The anticipation in Amon's stare was certainly worth the wait.
In spite of Amon and the others' claim of the full moon, as the evening dwindled to midnight, I was sure that too many of the human passengers on our boat would remain awake, preventing the monsters from relaxing. And then as the moon rose higher, beaming through glass windows to cast blue shadows over the polished floors, people rose from their tables and drifted away from the railings outside, a slow but steady parade down into the sleeping cabins.
There were only a handful of diners sipping cocktails, and just one wait staff behind the counter, when Auguste and the others appeared. Jonathon was pale and looking a little wobbly, but he sagged into a seat at our table with a great whooshing breath of relief.
"Almost time," Auguste said, glancing around at the other travelers, and Amon nodded in agreement.
I took another look around us, realizing that some of those still remaining must be monsters! Vampires? Or those who shifted forms, perhaps? They certainly all appeared human.
And then a young couple yawned, rose from their seats at the bar, and drifted away. Their heads disappeared below the stair railing, and the room burst into action. An elderly pair of women reached up, unpinning their dinner veils from their hair, which immediately transformed into crowns of glittering feathers, beaks appearing where their noses had just been. Another massive man yanked loose his neck tie, his skin flashing a deep forest green, and brilliant white tusks appearing in his smile.
I turned to my own party only to watch Booker slowly take off his white gloves, the human illusion of pink flesh vanishing and restoring his lovely white and dark veined marble. I let out a delighted laugh as the small gathering of travelers shed their disguises of bespelled brooches and charmed cravats, until the company surrounding us had almost entirely appeared entirely changed.
"Witches," Ezra whispered, appearing suddenly in a flicker between Auguste and I, nodding his head at the lovely trio of young women at a table in the corner.
"Ooo, is your former paramour here?" I teased.
Ezra's eyebrows bounced, "No, and you ought to be glad of it, puisin. But just in case she's spread word about me, I'll hang back while someone else solicits them for the doctor's help."
Jonathon winced and pressed trembling hands to the arm of his chair, but Amon waved at him in dismissal. "Allow me, Jonathon. Rest."
"Wait!" I jumped up from my chair as Amon did, his eyebrows rising in question. "We're alone now? No more humans?"
"Just you," Amon answered, lips twitching.
I blushed at the reminder. It was easy to forget sometimes that I came from a different world. I belonged in this one, with my gentlemen. I stepped forward and threw my arms around Amon's shoulders, beaming up at him and rising to my toes. He met me halfway, and his lips tasted like the dark wine he'd chosen for us at dinner, and a lick of salt. Amon purred as we kissed, hands bracing my back and drawing me forward, fingers digging into me.
I nibbled on his mouth like it was dessert, nuzzled against him, and pulled away to find his eyes bright and shoulders straight. "Thank you, my king," I murmured, just for him.
Amon's smile softened. He'd been patient in our travels, and I knew it wasn't in his nature to sta
"Always, my star," Amon answered, resting his forehead briefly against mine.
I settled back at the table just as Ezra appeared, briefly visible, handing Jonathon a collection of paper-wrapped candies. "They're ginger. Nicked 'em from one of the staff at dinner. Should help until the witches can brew you something better."
"Using your specialty for good at last," Auguste teased Ezra as Jonathon eagerly unwrapped one of the candies.
"S'pose I better earn my keep with you lot," Ezra said, grinning.
I giggled, spun in invisible arms across the yacht deck as a pair of imps tried to out-fiddle one another above the balcony. The full moon was high and every so often its light would strike Ezra, creating a hazy vision of him in front of me, the rest of the monsters and their merriment visible through him. I dug my fingers into his shoulder and laughed against him as he turned us, almost crashing into a young troll couple in their dancing.
"Be careful!" I cried out to Ezra, adding a quick "Sorry!" to the couple.
"Sea legs don't seem to extend to dancing," Ezra said.
I snorted, but I couldn't fight my smile as he tugged me closer, our bodies flushed.
"I'm getting better at holding my focus and staying visible, but it's nice to not spend the whole evening concentrating for once," Ezra said, slowing our steps with the music of the imps, a sweet waltz now floating over our heads.
"It's good for all of us to take a night off," I said, glancing over to the railing at the prow of the boat, where the rest of my gentlemen were huddled together, Mr. Tanner having taken over for Jonathon and standing huge and steady at the very tip of the boat.
Auguste turned to us at that moment, eyes bright in the brilliant light of the moon, and waved. "Esther, come see!"
Ezra gave me a final turn, my dress spinning around my ankles, and then together we crossed the polished deck to the prow.
Booker and Amon stepped aside and Mr. Tanner turned, eyes glancing warily over my head at the rest of the passengers, before tugging me in front of him. His body framed mine, thick arms and broad shoulders nearly blocking out the rest of my men.
"Look. Just there, little one, on the rocks," Mr. Tanner said, his voice low and quiet and gritty.
I narrowed my eyes and peered into the dark, to the left of the boat, but all I saw was a broad horizon of water surrounding us. "I'm not sure my vision is up to the challenge," I admitted.
"Of course, we should've considered," Auguste said.
"Here, use these," Amon said, passing me a pair of small golden binoculars.
I raised them to my eyes and searched the water. Now everything was a jumble of waves, and it took me a long stretch of silence before I finally found anything of note. Just a lump of black interruption at first, and then—
"Oh!" I gasped as I made out the first rock, and the figure seated on top of it. Even with the binoculars, they were blurry and small. "Is that a…" It looked like a woman! A woman at the edge of the Mediterranean, seated atop a small outcropping of rock, a wet dress glittering and clinging to her legs.
"Mermaids," Amon said.
I pulled the binoculars away from my eyes in my surprise, and then huffed when it took me just as long as before to locate the rocks again. There was a horizon of land behind them, and they were spread out in the water, but on each high tower of wet, black stone sat at least one mermaid. Those weren't dresses at all that they were wearing – they were fins!
"I wish we were closer," I said, passing the binoculars to Ezra.
"It's for the best that we aren't," Mr. Tanner said.
"Mermaids are very dangerous," Amon added with a respectful nod. "And from here, you're missing the sight of their claws and fangs."
"Tails strong enough to drag a man to the bottom of the sea," Auguste said, pale eyes staring out over the water.
"I can hear them," Booker said softly. Around me, Amon, Auguste, and Mr. Tanner all hummed in unsettled agreement.
And they must not have been alone, because the imp's music had fallen into silence, and when I stretched to look around Mr. Tanner's protective frame, I found the railing of the yacht now lined with all the monsters, each one facing left, staring over the water. Listening.
"Close your eyes, little one," Mr. Tanner rasped, one arm holding me tight to his body.
I did so, and his heartbeat was steady in my ear. A hush fell over the ship, over the sea, a peaceful stillness. And then a breeze carried the mermaids' song, a painful melody, a pleading harmony. A cry for help and a promise of peace. I arched into the music and tried to push away Mr. Tanner's arm, but he held me fast.
"Watch Ezra," Auguste warned in a whisper.
"I have him," Booker said.
Their voices were pure yearning, and tears pooled in my eyes at being restrained, my heart aching. But there was comfort in Mr. Tanner's embrace too, his familiar warmth and rich scent. He reached his free hand up to tuck my head against his chest, covering my ear and breaking the spell. I sighed and sagged against him.
"We're lucky we're not closer," Mr. Tanner said, his voice rumbling against my muffled ear. I couldn't hear the answer from the others.
"Are there mermen?" I asked, probably a little too loudly with my ears plugged.
Mr. Tanner didn't pull his hand away, but I felt his laughter as a warm and cheerful vibration surrounding me.
One by one, I kissed my gentlemen goodnight. My eyelids were heavy and the sky behind me was a soft blue-gray. The rest of the ship staff would be up and at work soon, and the monsters were retiring from their night of revelry at last.
"I'm glad you're feeling better," I said to Jonathon as we paused outside of his suite door.
He hummed and stroked his faintly stubbled cheek against mine. "Tomorrow night we'll all enjoy you in my room together, if you like. The witches gave us a charm for privacy, as well as my cure."
My eyes widened at that news, and Jonathon kissed me before I could suggest we go to bed together now rather than later.
"Sleep, Miss Reed," Jonathon murmured, pulling away and flashing a smile at Auguste over my shoulder. "Put her to bed."
I sighed and stepped back into the circle of Auguste's arms as Jonathon closed the door. "Do you want to sneak up to the deck and watch the sunrise together?" I whispered to Auguste. It was what we'd done most mornings since Amon's gift of turning Auguste into a daywalker, and I liked our little ritual, liked watching Auguste's face light up with wonder as the sky did.
"Mm…not today," Auguste said, holding onto one hand and sliding away, leading me to our own door.
"Are you tired?" I asked, eyebrows raising.
We were still learning the effects of Amon's gift, and I tried to recall if Auguste had spent an entire day and night awake yet. He was pale now, but he was always pale, and preferred to keep out of direct sunlight when it was high in the sky.
"A bit," Auguste said, opening our door and guiding me inside. His lips curved in a calm smile and I released a nervous breath.
I was grateful to Amon for arranging me in a room with Auguste. After nearly losing him to Birsha in the underground tunnels of Rooksgrave, I still suffered from anxiety when we were separated.
"Come here, mon coeur," Auguste whispered as I closed the door.
I turned to reach him, my eyes falling shut and a long breath releasing as Auguste pulled me close. His face pressed to my throat as I arched into his arms and he groaned, breathing heavily against my pulse.
"Oh. You're hungry," I said, smiling and blinking up at the ceiling.
Auguste's arms tightened around my waist and he ground his hips against mine. He was growing hard. Hungry and aroused went hand in hand.
"I've missed your bites," I said, reaching up and thrusting my fingers into his inky curls, holding his face to my neck. His mouth opened, but he only lapped at me with long, wet strokes of his tongue.
