She leaned her forehead against his chest and sighed. When she looked at him again, sorrow had hollowed her features. “The Daggermen rise in status based upon the number of assassinations they carry out, who it is they kill, and the number of wives they have. There are no bed maidens, thougha Daggerman wife is often treated worse. Ceybold had one wife and only two kills to his name.”
“Let me guess,” Bron said. “A disciple of little worth with few chances of surpassing his fellow assassins until he brought an itzuli to his master.”
She nodded. “Luda and I been with the Daggermen a few months, sheltering with others as the war raged around us. I’d already figured out that Ceybold’s rescue of us wasn’t that at all, and every word out of his mouth was probably a lie. I hadn’t yet met the Hierarch, but word had passed through the ranks that he was coming to this particular den to meet the code breaker wife of one of his followers.”
A slow, red rage rose inside Bron. “What did he threaten you with?”
Sparks of old anger danced in her eyes. “Harm to my loved ones. Marrying him would raise his status to that of salar in their brotherhood. In exchange, Luda and I would have protection. As he already had one wife and wasn’t attracted to me any more than I was to him, my role as wife was simply ceremonial.” Contempt curled her upper lip on one side. “I refused at first. It was bad enough that I owed him a debt of gratitude. The last thing I wanted was to be tethered to him in one more way. He told me if I didn’t agree to it, he’d sell Luda to the first Daggerman willing to pay a bride price.”
“If he isn’t already dead, I’m going to kill that fucker.” Bron could barely get the words past a snarl.
Her smile was tight with the blackest amusement. “Not if I get to him first.” She cupped his face in her hands, and her face softened. “Breathe, moon boy. I’m no longer shackled to him, and he isn’t worth your fury.”
Bron closed his eyes, letting the urge to put his fist through the nearest wall bleed away. When he opened them again, Disaris had leaned against him, wrapping her arms around hismiddle. Her cheek was pressed to his chest, and she stroked his back in a soothing rhythm.
Her explanation for marrying Ceybold still didn’t quite answer why she’d cut Bron out of her life three years earlier, but he chose not to pursue that question for the moment. He was still caught in a vortex of astonishment over what she just revealed. Astonishment and a joy that bordered on euphoria. The desire that had gone cold as she spoke of Ceybold and his threats ignited once more. He tilted her head back, studying the face that had haunted him every moment they’d been separated. “Legis is right,” he said, sliding his thumb down to her chin. Her lips parted, exposing the edge of her teeth and the pink tip of her tongue. “You are my woman.”
He kissed her then, a deep consuming kiss that seduced and claimed and declared herhiswife in every way. The thrust of his tongue inside her mouth matched the thrust of his hips against her thighs. She swallowed his groans when her teeth scraped across his bottom lip, and he buried his hands in her hair, stumbling towards the narrow bed awaiting them. The frame creaked and the ropes stretched under their combined weight, but the sound was a faraway annoyance, drowned out by the heavy thud of his heartbeat in his skull and Disaris’s sweet moans in his ears. She lay beneath him, her shift bunched up between them and her thighs spread wide to cradle his hips.
When they paused in kissing long enough to take a breath, she stared at him, unblinking. “You are my greatest weakness,” she said. “And I’m blessed for it.”
Her words hit him hard, straight to his soul’s center. He wanted to tell her he felt the same, that for too long he’d been only half alive, existing but little else. Little else until he discovered her huddled among the dead in a crumbling ruin amid the inhumanity of war. Instead he kissed her again, this time slowly, softly, worshipping instead of devouring. “Let mebe your greatest strength,” he whispered against her mouth. “As you have always been mine.”
The bed ropes creaked as she twined around him, offering all that he asked for with murmured endearments and loving hands.
He relearned every part of her, from the length of her back and slope of her shoulders, to the curve of her hips and the dip in her waist. Her ribs were more prominent and her breasts smaller than he remembered, but her nipples still tasted as sweet in his mouth. She undulated under his caresses and moaned into the blanket she pressed against her mouth when he pulled her legs over his shoulders and thoroughly fucked her with his tongue. He took her to the edge of climax only to back away.
She begged and cursed him by turns, digging her heels into his back hard enough to leave bruises as she arched off the bed. He pushed her down and rose above her, his cock nudging her entrance. He reached between them to glide a finger along the tip and capture a drop of the semen gathered there. Disaris watched him with eyes that burned in her flushed face. She caught his hand and brought his finger to her mouth, sucking it clean. The sight almost made him come right there, and his belly cramped as he held back.
Her legs slid down to grip his hips and pull him forward. “Stop teasing, Bron. Stop.”
“If that’s your wish, Disa.” He slid an arm under her buttocks, lifted her and slid inside her with one smooth thrust. His groan echoed hers as he set a slow pace, then a faster one as the sweat dripped off his chin to splash her throat. She came before he did, lunging up to sink her teeth into his shoulder. That stinging bite sent his own climax slamming through his body, and he came inside her with a shuddering gasp.
Disaris held him in her arms, stroking his slick back as her body twitched under his, and her interior muscles clenched and unclenched on his softening cock. She lifted his head to plant a long, luxurious kiss on his mouth. Her smile when she pulled back was teasing. “Did I break you?”
His chuff of laughter sounded strained as he strove to catch his breath. “Not yet, but not from lack of effort. You should keep trying.”
She enthusiastically embraced his suggestion and nearly succeeded as the night aged. Vengeance for his earlier teasing was sweet as she knelt before him and milked him dry a second time with her mouth and tongue. Their rest after that bout of lovemaking didn’t last long before Bron bent her over the bed railing as he’d warned earlier, one hand busy teasing her sensitive folds while the other held her in place as he fucked her from behind. She moaned into the pillow she clutched when he came inside her again.
Afterwards, he sprawled the length and width of the bed, catching his breath while Disaris trailed a lock of her hair across his throat. “Am I crushing you?” she asked. “I did eat all of my supper and the rest of yours earlier. And had cake.”
She lay atop him, elbows braced on either side of his head so she could look at him. All but one candle had burned out, and the light that remained painted shadows across her sleepy face. They’d kicked the blankets to the floor at some point, and Bron was far too content where he was to retrieve them. She was slippery against him, and he cupped her buttocks, anchoring her in place. “I wear armor heavier than you.”
A tiny frown formed between her eyebrows. “I know you’ve been a soldier a long time and aren’t a green boy anymore when it comes to fighting, but I live in fear for you. I used to dream of you dying and calling my name, but I couldn’t reach you in timeto save you.” She shuddered. “I’d rather dream of being eaten by a leviathan.”
He stroked her back with one hand. It would be easy to offer her empty platitudes about not worrying, but he respected her too much to do that. Her fear was the fear of all families with loved ones serving in the army. His mother had once expressed the dread she felt every time he left home for Burnpool and her relief each time he returned. They were both justified in their worry. He’d lost count of the number of times he’d come close to dying. He chose not to mention that to Disaris. “You sound like a soldier’s wife, except for the leviathan part. That would be a sailor’s wife.” He lunged up to steal a quick kiss from her. “Why leviathans? We aren’t anywhere near the sea.”
She shrugged. “Maybe that’s why. We’re too far away for it to be any more than a bad dream.” She lifted her head, tilting it toward the door to listen. “I think Zaras is up and about.” A rumble of laughter escaped him at her cringing look. She thwapped him lightly on the shoulder. “Shhh. I think we may have kept her up.”
“Unless the woman was listening at the door, I doubt it.” Their vigorous bedplay had elicited more than a few loud exclamations, all smothered by either a hand, a pillow, or the smooth expanse of a neck. “Besides, imagine how confused she’d be if she heard you call out for Bron or I for Disa.” He grimaced. “I can’t believe you introduced me with the name of one of the arseholes who bullied me when were children.”
“He stopped doing it after you sent him home with a black eye and a bloody nose.”
“I gave him the black eye. You gave him the bloody nose.”
“Bullying arsehole deserved it,” she said. Sadness settled over her features. “When I last saw him, he was married, running his father’s loom shop, and the father of two children. All died in the Kefian attack on Panrin.”
He gathered her close, rolling them to their sides. “When I heard about Panrin, I suffered the terror of the damned, wondering about your fate and that of your family.” When he was finally allowed to leave his stationed post, he’d almost run three horses into the ground to reach Panrin. Passing the burned and gutted ruin of Burnpool had ratcheted his fear into pure terror. His first sight of what was left of Panrin brought him to his knees. He had shouted Hazarin’s name, then Disaris’s, then her sister’s and her parents’ until he was made mute and tasted blood in the back of his throat. The only thing that kept him from falling into complete despair was finding Hazarin’s grave as well as those of Reylan and Gheza but none for Disaris or Luda. He’d grieved for the beloved dead but held onto a thread of hope that the two sisters had escaped the carnage and were alive somewhere in the Daesin kingdom, and he had a lifetime to search for them. Those grim memories served to make him clutch her more tightly until she wheezed his name. He loosened his grip with a short apology.
