CHAPTER ELEVEN
Vrogul
I remembermy father had spoken of the Mating Heat; half-reverence, half-jocular lewdness. He’d said that it had lasted four days with my mother, before hisKteercould allow him to think of aught but pleasuring her, and that they would’ve starved to death had their neighbors not brought food and water to keep up their strength.
Not exactly the kind of thing a young male needs to hear about his parents.
But I’d been forewarned, and since I’d hoped for exactly this outcome, I’d packed food and ale and even some dried meat.
And ‘twas a good thing.
Because I lost count of the number of times I made love to Rowena after allowing her to rest from that first time. I spread her out on my plaid and worshipped her body,making her scream my name again and again. I lapped my own spend from her swollen cunny, the spicy-sweet scent mixing with her desire, driving me mad.
I fooked her from beneath, from the top, from behind. We both loved it when she braced her palms against the rock and I thrust into her weeping cunny from behind, her breasts hanging down, allowing me to tug and tease them.
Gods below, my Mate was so responsive to me, and I could ask for naught more.
We fell asleep that night wrapped around each other, the spare plaid keeping us warm, and I woke her thrice in the darkness with another climax. The next day, we barely left our little haven there on the edge of forever, the sea stretching out before us. I made her come again and again on my cock, loving the unabashed way she screamed my name to the wind.
She didn’t call meMate…but she didn’t have to.
Just the fact that she’d accepted my claiming was enough for myKteer.
Still, as the sun set on our second day, I could feel myself becoming…anxious. As if something was missing. ‘Twas as if, while myKteerand cock were becoming more sated, my heart and mind were not.
Something was missing.
Not physically; we were both sore from the claiming. But there was more, I was certain of it.
That night, she fell asleep in my arms, exhausted.
“I love ye,” I whispered against the top of her head, and she did naught but snuggle sleepily closer.
She was mine.
But was I hers?
I woke her before dawn with my tongue between her legs, and as she screamed her climax, I moved up to plunge my cock into her weeping cunny. The second orgasm overtook the first, and she bucked wildly beneath me when I spilled into her for the last time.
‘Twas everything I’d ever prayed for, but now I had to leave her. Leave my people, leave Islay…for our future.
We kissed often on our way to the hot springs where I washed her gently as the sunrise lightened the eastern sky. I wish I could have allowed her to rest there, but I needed to be on my way. Maardok would be loading the ore onto our birlinns today, and we would go to meet Callor.
And break our oath to him.
So, I bundled up my Mate, drying her and her hair. I helped her fashion a long braid and pull on her rumpled, sex-scented gown once more, and told myself she could sleep after I was gone.
But the closer we got to the village, the more certain I was that something was wrong.
In fact, by the time we reached the rise overlooking the village, I was half-running, pulling Rowena—who had to hold her sword over her back to keep it from rattling—along. Sounds of metal meeting metal drifted in the wind, as did cries which set myKteeron edge.
I ran faster.
We crested the hill, and I skidded to a stop, my worst fears confirmed.
I didn’t need to go to Callor.
He’d come to me.
