Princess of Thieves Read online

  Princess

  of

  Thieves

  ~

  Bella Beaumont

  ~

  The Hearts of Carroen

  Book 1

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or, if real, are used fictitiously.

  Copyright © 2020 by Bella Beaumont

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a review.

  Join Bella Beaumont’s steamy newsletter (with free ebooks every week!) at BellaBeaumont.com

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Princess of Thieves (The Hearts of Carroen, #1)

  PART | I

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  PART | II

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  PART | III

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Also by Bella Beaumont

  Little Big Man Series

  Professor on the Prowl

  In Too Deep

  Professor’s Plaything

  Three’s Company, Four’s a Crowd

  A Teachable Moment

  A Big Hard Lesson

  When in Doubt, Stretch ‘em Out

  Working Out the Kinks

  Put in Her Place

  Forbidden Lust Series

  Played By Him

  Awed By Him

  Used By Him

  Controlled By Him

  Humiliated By Him

  Trained By Him

  The Futagirl’s Journey Series

  Rose Filled with Love

  Rose Trains Her Professor

  Rose Reveals Her Huge Secret

  Rose Receives Her Punishment

  Rose Gives Him the Shaft

  Rose Submits to Her Prey

  Rose Takes Care of the Nurse

  Rose Falls for a Trap

  Rose Meets Her Match

  Taming Ms. Steele Series

  Punished by the Stud

  Back in the Saddle

  Stable Full of Stallions

  Broken by the Bronco

  Hot to Trot

  Best in Show

  The Futa Girl and the Trap Series

  Big Packages Come in Small Things

  Too Big for Her Britches

  The Bigger They Are, the Harder They Come

  Her Royal Hungness

  Dominated by the Cosplay Cuties

  Give Them an Inch, They Take a Mile

  The Viking’s Hunger Series

  Raiding Her Fertile Garden

  The Taboo Voyeur

  Can’t Stop Won’t Stop

  No Shame in Their Game

  Spilling the Family Secrets

  Mothers Know Best

  A Taste of His Own Medicine

  Conflict of Interest

  Triangle of Lust

  Triangle of Lust

  Giving in to Daddy

  My Kinky Fun Summer

  Making a Sissy

  Not Your Everyday Dom

  Her Big Morning Surprise

  Bonding Over the Bimbo

  For Love’s Sake

  Losing Her to the Alpha

  Business or Pleasure

  Ganged Into Submission

  The Futa Mistress

  Submitting to the Futa Maid

  Tag Teaming the Quarterback

  Putting the Bullies in Their Place

  PART

  I

  Chapter One

  Nemya Sonastra wandered through the dusty streets, a tumult of confused, erratic people streaming by her on all sides. The chaos was caused by the sudden arrival of the Royal Sefyr Army, the vanguard of a heavily-armed regiment stomping down the roadways in a uniform march. Their heavy boots lifted clouds of grime and dust into the air as they filled the streets with soldiers numbering five abreast, with the body of the regiment snaking back hundreds of feet toward the city’s entrance.

  A standard bearer near the front of the column swung his banner, signifying all to move aside or get trampled. Embroidered into the banner was the royal crest: a red rose inside a white triangular shield.

  In case the flag was not enough of a warning, a band of marching drummers pounded their skins, the boom a rumbling thundercloud that reverberated off the city’s buildings and walls, down its alleys and crannies.

  Townsfolk and peasants leaned out of their opened windows, gawking at the passing troop below. Women on the street level gathered the hands of their children and pulled them aside, backing up against stony structures so they’d not be stampeded. Merchants wheeled their wares out of harm’s way, into alleyways and inside opened doors. Shop owners stepped outside their storefronts to watch the proceedings.

  The citizens of the Royal City of Sefyr gazed at their protectors and champions marching toward the only place Nemya could imagine they’d be going—the Town Square, which usually served as a bazaar for sellers and traders. It was the only region large enough to house such a massive contingent of militiamen and women.

  Stumbling back into the hard wall of a building, Nemya was pushed aside by a squall of running children—three in all, heading for the bazaar. She nearly spun in place as the echoing din of those drums met her ears, coming from behind her on the road.

  Balancing against a wall with her palm, she slowly turned. Her eyes widened at the mass of humanity headed in her direction.

  Finally, she thought, they’ve arrived.

  She threw the hood of her cloak over her head, hiding her shimmering blonde hair. Her golden skin, covered only to her knees and elbows by her grimy clothes, would soon be covered in sheens of dirt if she didn’t outpace the soldiers behind her. The sandstorm they brought in their wake looked choking and hazardous.

  Like the yelling children before her, she turned and hurried down the street, squeezing by curious spectators and frozen-still citizens. The cobbled path led in a zigzag through the main artery of the city’s poor district.

  She had expected the Royal Army to arrive in a more prosperous district of the city—perhaps through the west or eastern gates—where they would’ve been met with glorious cheers from the nobility and the upper rungs of society.

  But, no, they had come through the south gate, choosing to show their force to the poorest people in town.

  It was this reason alone that gave Nemya the understanding of why they had come. The soldiers, however grimy and filth-ridden they might have been from marching, did not appear wounded or disheartened from battle. In fact, these men and women had probably not even seen battle yet—they strode with straight backs and a consistent march.

  But their duty aimed for a different end—one that Nemya
had been awaiting for days.

  “By the gods, why are there so many soldiers in the streets?” a stooped old woman asked the elderly man by her side, as Nemya was passing. “Shouldn’t they be out in the fields, fighting the Gereads?”

  She paused for a moment, noticing the old man’s hapless shrug.

  “A recruitment drive,” Nemya said, her voice low but stern. The two decrepit folk turned their eyes on her and looked at her as if she were an unwanted foreigner.

  Nemya simply nodded to the disgruntled strangers and continued down the road. She passed a few more confused passersby, and then made it to the bazaar, where the scene was even more chaotic than in the streets leading to it.

  The large open-aired marketplace was still inhabited by a plethora of carts and tents and squabbling merchants desperate to sell their wares. But those tents were rapidly getting taken down, the carts wheeled away. Not every merchant here had a permit to trade in the Town Square, and even if they did, it was clear that the entirety of the space would be needed for the approaching regiment.

  It caused a scene of disarray among the traders, as they all led their goods away as quickly as possible, cursing under their breaths that the day’s trade was ruined by the impending arrival of the army.

  Though no one could have known about the Royal Sefyr Army’s sudden encroachment, Nemya was not like everyone else. She had not only been informed of their arrival, but had anticipated it.

  Nemya Sonastra knew people who knew people.

  As she stepped into the rapidly-clearing Town Square, her eyes shifted above the buildings surrounding the large circular plot, and landed on the towering spires of Sefyr Castle in the distance. She could only see the tips of the monolithic spires from her vantage, but even those were enough to strike awe into the most fearless hearts.

  The Royal City was named after the keep it housed in its walls: Sefyr Castle. It was the capital of the Sefyr Kingdom. These intermittent recruitment drives by the military had been random but frequent throughout the last months, as the war between the Sefyr Kingdom and the neighboring Geread Kingdom was heating up in ferocity.

  Typically, the army made its way to smaller towns and districts, consigning the poorest and most destitute of the citizenry—the men and women who had nowhere to turn but to the war, in order to stave off starvation for their families.

  This intrusion into the capital city proved two things for Nemya: Firstly, that the war was becoming dire and bloody, and secondly, that the Sefyr nobility was becoming more desperate for bodies to throw into the fray.

  Both of these were satisfying for her—especially the second fact.

  Because it meant that the sky-scraping castle on the horizon of her vision, Sefyr Castle, would be undermanned and poorly guarded.

  NEMYA STOOD IN LINE behind two young men, impatiently stamping her left moccasined foot on the ground. She had been in line for hours, as it slithered around the circumference of the Town Square.

  Once the bazaar had been abandoned by the merchants, a raised dais and makeshift station had been erected by the Royal Army, to set up shop.

  A herald spoke from the raised platform, to the congregation of huddled peasants below him. The announcement had confirmed Nemya’s belief that this was indeed a recruitment drive.

  As the two men in front of her cleared from the station table, Nemya stepped up. She unfolded her arms from under her bosom, so as not to appear impatient or angry—she knew that would get her nowhere.

  The man in front of her was seated at the other side of the table. He had a pudgy red face, though the rest of his body didn’t seem overweight. He wore the badge of a sergeant on his shoulder pad.

  The sergeant leaned over a sheet of parchment, a quill in his hand. His simple steel helmet rested next to his scroll, acting as a paperweight for other sheets that might fly away into the grimy wind.

  It was a humid, steaming day in Sefyr City, and the bazaar was quickly becoming like a desert. Nemya could hear the coughs and groans of the peasants behind her.

  “Name and occupation,” the man said in a gruff voice, without looking up at Nemya.

  “Nemya Sonastra. Minstrel, sir.”

  The man caught the feminine voice and slowly glanced up. It wasn’t very often that he laid eyes on a woman applying for recruitment.

  A twitch of a smile curved the corners of his mouth. With a raised eyebrow, he leaned back in his chair and seemed to relax. He ran a hand through his damp brown hair and said, as if asking for clarification, “A minstrel, lass?”

  Nemya nodded, her hood bobbing on her head. She fixed the man with her stark sapphire eyes, her lids narrowing. “A poet, sir.”

  She didn’t exactly want to out herself as unemployed, nor as a whore.

  But the soldier wouldn’t be tricked. “So you sing to the inebriated, lustful men of the brothels and taverns in our fair city?”

  Not that it’s any of your business, Nemya wanted to reply, but she kept the comment to herself. Instead, she simply shrugged. “Someone has to do it, sir.”

  The man barked a laugh, showing yellow teeth for an instant. When he stared back at her, his jowls were clenched, the skin at his flabby chin turning into folds and creases. “And you have a family to support? Is that why you’re drafting yourself?”

  “I do, sir. Aye.”

  “And what about your husband? Would it not make sense for the man of the house to apply, rather than the wife?”

  “Dead, sir.”

  The man grunted, but offered no apology for his crass remark. Nemya was used to condescension from the soldiery, the nobility—basically anyone who wasn’t in the same pitiful social standing as herself—and she took no offense. She’d grown a thick skin over the years . . . had to, to stave off this wretched wind and skin-biting dust!

  The rich and prosperous patronized and sneered at the very people who protected them in these costly, bloody wars. Because, of course, it was never the moneymakers of the kingdom who fought in the battles—they delegated that to the destitute and desperate.

  The sergeant examined Nemya for another drawn-out moment, his eyes absorbing her slender waist and full breasts underneath her thin clothes, her hourglass figure—all but raping her with his eyes. Nemya grew tense, and wanted to reach over and throttle the lecher.

  But she knew she could do no such thing, unless she wanted to get thrown into the stockades, where all the worst things of her nightmares would come true.

  Finally, the man sighed and looked down at his paper, then scrawled a few things. Nemya visibly relaxed, exhaling from her taut disposition.

  “Very well, Private Sonastra,” the man grumbled. “You shall receive three Royal Sterlings per week, three square meals, and accommodations while engaged with the R.S.A. Understood?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “If you have children, which I assume you do, you’ll have to find a suitable living situation for them while you’re away. Understood?”

  “Yes, sir.” Nemya nodded along, not bothering to tell the sergeant that she had no children, had never been married, and her dead husband was just a vague lie she told people to try to squeeze out some sympathy in certain situations.

  The man nudged his chin to his left, toward another table. “Shuffle down there and speak with Sergeant Cloras. He’ll inform you of your assignment—where your regiment will meet—and your station.” He passed a felt badge over the table, a simple pin in the form of a white shield with a red rose, to show that Nemya was now part of the Royal Sefyr Army.

  “Thank you, sir,” she said with a bow, then took the badge and scooted over into another line.

  Minutes later, she was standing before another sturdy soldier, though this one didn’t bother to give her the once-over as the first sergeant had.

  The man looked down at his parchment and frowned. “Nemya Sonastra.” His eyes narrowed. “Female.”

  “Evidently,” Nemya answered.

  The man glanced up. “Don’t get snarky, lass. Your ti
me as a poet is over.”

  “My apologies, sir.”

  “Now, you’ll be a respectable member of the Royal Army. You understand your duties in protecting the king and royal family and country from foes both within and without?”

  “Aye, my lord, I do.”

  “Say it, then. Give your oath.”

  Nemya straightened into a salute, punching the fist of her right hand against her left breast. “I swear to protect King Cartherus Sefyr and his estimable family from violence, foes, and wanton acts of treachery from his enemies and friends alike. I give my solemn oath to champion the rights of the kingdom and all its citizens, while I wear this royal badge, and after, forevermore.”

  “Good,” Sergeant Cloras grunted. “As I’m sure you’re aware, we’re in a raging war with the bastard Geread Kingdom. It is why this recruitment was settled in the first place.”

  “Aye, sir, I’m aware.”

  “Then you’ll know that we need any and every soldier at the frontlines.”

  Nemya gulped, then slowly nodded.

  The man frowned, looked down at his parchment, then back up at Nemya. Now he gave her a similar gaze as the first sergeant had—never too late for that. “But, because of your physique and . . . background . . . which is entirely foreign to any martial qualities, I’ll not send you to die on the frontlines to start.”

  Nemya didn’t know if she should thank the man or criticize him for his claims. My physique? Oh, you mean because I have tits and have never been an iron-headed rust bucket like the rest of these sad men. Please, sergeant, don’t mince your words. Speak plainly.

  Nemya had a snappy oratory in her own mind, but she had never been known for speaking it, unless absolutely necessary. In fact, many would call her meek . . . weak-willed, even.

  It was just that Nemya tended to only speak when she actually had something to say. And to disagree with this sloth of a man, now, would undermine the entire point of her being here.

  So, she stayed quiet.

  “For the reasons I’ve stated, I, Sergeant Cloras, hereby assign you to the Third Protectorate Regiment. You are to meet with your superior forthwith, at the southern barracks. Do you understand?”

  “The Third Protectorate, sir?” Nemya asked, feigning ignorance. She slightly tilted her head, and a lock of blonde hair came streaming free from underneath her hood.