Her fingers, fisted lightly in my shirt, curl tighter. Heat blooms in the air between us, bright and unmistakable.
Her scent shifts—desire threaded through fatigue.
Ah.
Interesting.
“You like it when I say that, Oona?” I murmur against the shell of her ear. “You crave my punishment?”
She leans back enough to look at me, cheeks flushed, eyes dark and wide.
“That depends,” she manages, chin tilting in that stubborn way I’m beginning to know too well. “What did you have in mind?”
My control frays.
For a moment, I nearly turn us around and fly all the way back to The Barrow just to have her in our bed, in our stone chamber, beneath the roof of my castle—my home.
But the Marches are still raw from the quake. I won’t stray far, not yet.
So I make this place enough.
I call to the earth, and it answers.
Stone softens underfoot, rising and reshaping, forming a broad, low platform lined with thick moss and springy turf.
Vines uncoil from the wall at my silent command, threading overhead to weave a living canopy that filters the light into soft green-gold.
Alina watches all of it with parted lips, breath catching as the bed takes shape beneath us.
“Dagan,” she whispers, reaching to touch the moss, then me.
“Careful,” I say, catching her hand, bringing her knuckles to my mouth. “I did say there would be discipline.”
Her pulse stutters against my lips.
I lower her gently onto the earthen bed, the living ground molding to cradle her. Her hair fans out around her like a dark halo against the green.
Gods, she is beautiful.
Mine.
I let a single vine curl, slow and gentle, around her wrist—more a caress than a restraint—anchoring her arm above her head.
Another follows at her other wrist, holding her in place with the lightest of pressure.
Two more have her ankles, and on my command, they will gently pry her sweet thighs apart.
I can’t wait.
Her breath shivers.
“Dagan,” she says again, and this time my name is a plea.
I drink it in.
“Please, I want to touch you,” she begs.
Dear gods, my control is hanging by a silk thread.
