Kalfr huffed a sound that might have been a laugh, or a groan. “She smiled, and petted me, and behaved as though she had always known of you,” he replied. “But I could taste her shock, and her pain, and the jealous bitter rancour of her rage. For it seems” — his shoulders sagged beneath Gaelfr’s grip — “I had somehow earned her trust and her longing, amidst all this. And then… I betrayed her. I hurt her. And thus, I gained a lifelong enemy, not only for me, but… for you. ForSvein.”
For them. For Svein. Raye’s hand tightened on Kalfr’s knuckles, her eyes snapping up to Gaelfr. To where he had both hands on Kalfr’s shoulders now, caressing him, even as his jaw spasmed, and his eyes flashed with blazing fury.
“And then?” he asked. “Tell us,ástin mín.”
Kalfr sighed, his shoulders rising and falling under Gaelfr’s hands. “Our kin finally found another way to stop the attack, without launching us into yet more war,” he said wearily. “And once the farce was done, and Sybil learnt she would not have the pleasure of watching me die a slow death upon her poison, she swore she would yet wreak vengeance upon me. She swore she would destroy me. She swore she would track my scent, and then she went and —”
His chest heaved, and he snatched his hands away from Raye’s, and covered his face. As if he was about to weep, and Raye couldn’t stand to see him weep, not again. Not now, not after all this, she wanted him to be at peace, at pleasure…
Her panicked eyes darted up to Gaelfr’s, and he looked just as unsettled as she felt. His hands tightened against Kalfr’s heaving shoulders, his mouth thin and bitter and furious. And his own shoulders rose and fell as his eyes flicked down to Kalfr, and back up to Raye. Holding her gaze with something like consideration, or like… a challenge.
“Myástvinurneeds tending, woman,” he said, curt and decisive. “So you will now kneel before him, and cover this foul woman’s scent with your own.”
26
Raye stared at Gaelfr, while her mouth fell open, and her heart skipped a beat. She would what? What?Now?
But Gaelfr’s eyes were hard and flinty on hers, his hand now caressing slow and possessive around the front of Kalfr’s spasming throat. “You heard me, woman,” he said. “Kneel, and tend him.”
Raye’s heartbeat kicked up, thundering in her ears, and she shot an alarmed glance across the table toward Kalfr. But his face was still hidden behind his hands, though surely he’d heard what Gaelfr had just said… right? Surely he could say no? Surely he would?
But Kalfr didn’t move, didn’t look at her, and Raye’s thoughts flailed back to that bond again. Because to all appearances, Kalfr was still affected by their bond, too. And he hadn’t even had Gaelfr to tend him, like she had. And he hadn’t resisted the touch of her hand just now, either, as if…
“You both need this, woman,” Gaelfr’s firm voice continued, his brows rising. “And you have not already forgotten your vow to him, have you? Or how you told me, just last eve, how you yet long for him?”
Gods damn him. Raye’s face burned, and if Kalfr hadn’t still been sitting there, she might have argued that point, or at least snapped back some kind of retort. But Kalfr wasn’t moving, still just sitting there with his hands over his face, his grief so palpable that she wanted to weep, too.
“But what about,” Raye finally croaked, “what about Svein?”
Her eyes darted toward that nearby closed door, where Svein was liable to burst out at any moment, but Gaelfr’s expression cleared, his head shaking. “I can scent he has fallen asleep,” he replied. “For he was up before dawn, was he not? I shall warn you, if he awakens.”
Well. Raye’s mouth opened and closed, and she again glanced back at Kalfr. At his long fingers still hiding his face, at the way Gaelfr’s hand stroked downwards over his collarbones, his chest. Showing her, maybe, that he had Kalfr’s permission for this. That Kalfr…wantedthis.
Gaelfr’s brows rose higher, and his other hand pointed purposefully toward the floor. The floor, beneath the table, between Kalfr’s thighs, and he meant it, they really meant it…
“And you… you’ll tell me?” Raye breathed, searching Gaelfr’s eyes, wiping her sweaty hands on her dress. “If he wants me to stop?”
Gaelfr glanced down at Kalfr, drumming his claws lightly against his skin, as if passing along the question. And if Raye wasn’t mistaken, that might have been an infinitesimal nod of Kalfr’s head in return. Saying… yes.Yes.
Raye’s stomach swooped, her heart kicking and flailing, but she nodded back. Because yes, she wanted to do this. She would do her best to make amends to Kalfr. Even if it was… this. Tending him,servicinghim, under his damned kitchen table.
She grimaced as she shoved her bench backwards, and awkwardly ducked down beneath the table’s solid wood top. The light was dim, the space small, the floor hard and unforgivingbeneath her knees. And when she blinked forward, she twitched at the sudden, incongruous sight of Kalfr’s long legs, slightly spread apart, and still covered in sturdy black trousers.
She couldn’t see anything else above Kalfr’s waist, let alone his face, or Gaelfr still standing there behind him. It was just her and his legs, good gods, and what was she supposed to do now? Was she allowed to touch him, to pull down his trousers, what if he — what if he —
But then something shifted above, settling down on the bench beside Kalfr. Gaelfr. And now that was… Gaelfr’s hand. Gaelfr’s large, familiar hand, easing into view before Raye’s blinking eyes, aiming for the string at the top of Kalfr’s trousers. And with a deft, familiar tug, Gaelfr’s hand loosened the trousers, and then slipped smooth and easy down inside.
Raye’s mouth went dry, her eyes frozen on the sight. On the ease of Gaelfr’s hand, already gently squeezing and caressing beneath Kalfr’s trousers, as if in a silent, secret greeting. A greeting Kalfr was clearly responding to, his trousers swelling out fuller beneath Gaelfr’s touch, a tantalizing scent now furling through the air.
“Good,” came Gaelfr’s murmur, almost too quiet to hear, but it still fired something hot and strange into Raye’s belly. “This is better, is it not?”
She couldn’t hear Kalfr’s reply, but Gaelfr’s hand gave him an approving pat. And then, with another familiar movement, Gaelfr reached down further, and drew Kalfr’s hard cock all the way out of his trousers.
Raye’s throat spasmed, her memories skipping and blurring backwards, because oh, gods, it looked just the same. Just the same as it had all these years ago, and in all her dreams, too. Long, smooth, and impossibly graceful, just like he was. With a deep grey shaft, a silken sliding hood, and a rounded hidden cleft so richly shaded it was almost pure, gleaming black. And fromwithin that cleft, a small, glossy bead of white was growing, and the sight of that, thesmellof it, ohfuck…
Raye’s gasp escaped before she could bite it back, and from above the table, Gaelfr let out a low laugh. “Taste myástvinur, woman,” came his taunting order, complete with a slow, possessive stroke of his audacious fingers all the way up that long, silken shaft, and back down again. “Tend him for me. Deep, and sweet, andthorough.”
Gods damn him. There was no refusing, not with the way Gaelfr’s hand was already guiding Kalfr’s gleaming crown downwards, directly toward Raye under the table. Making her lashes flutter, her mouth water, and she needed this, she needed it so damned much…
