It wouldn't take much work to get her to consent to a night of sport.
But while his cock thought that sounded like a fine idea, the rest of him had more elaborate plans for the delicious little brunette, plans that, given the time of year, should bear fruit as Lady Sun rose on the Equinox. He would be patient, even if it killed him. Flirt and tease and banter, but for the moment, no more.
Her layered coats were loose for comfort while traveling, not the body-skimming cut that women wore in the larger cities of the Empire, but the soft fabric draped nicely, suggesting curves to die for, and like many young women, she unbuttoned the top buttons of her coats and pulled open the neckline of her under-robe a bit, encouraging the eye to stray toward her cleavage. Having seen that much, he was willing to bet her bottom was firm, pert, rounded, the kind of ass that cried out for gripping, caressing and spanking.
Perfect for the Equinox rites.
Patience. He ought to wait until the Equinox, when her yielding and their mutual pleasure would be a gift to the Lord and Lady as well as to himself. Waiting would make the pleasure that much more keen on the Equinox, bringing them both luck for the rest of the year.
But that didn't mean they couldn't both have a bit of fun in the meantime. Flirting, teasing, and perhaps more than that, to keep them both sane until the Equinox.
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* * *
Chapter Two
As the party headed south, the air grew warmer and drifts of early flowers appeared among the new grasses. Miryea checked out the flowers and new growth with interest as they walked, looking for useful medicinals.
The caravan-master had warned them to stick close together now that they were in the wilder territory of Thelana and skirting near the Kulchu border. His insistence had seemed reasonable enough at first, but after the fifth repetition of the warning, Velari started laughing. “He sounds like someone's old auntie! 'Oh, be careful out there. Don't go to the market alone, child!'” She made her voice quaver like an old woman's.
Shiran, who was still hanging around Velari, laughed too and said, “All that bleating makes me want to go for a walk in the forest. Sorania defeated the Kulchu back in our grandparents’ heyday. I'm not that worried about a few outlaws, Kulchu or Thelanese. It's not like slavers are a real problem anymore."
“My grandmother said...” Miryea started to repeat some of the information her grandmother heard from younger friends who were still active in the Imperial service—information that wasn't widely circulated outside official circles because, as her grandmother put it, some damn fools in the government decided that people might panic like sheep if they knew trouble was brewing again on the border of Kulchu. Better to focus their attention on the Emperor's recent victories against Darthan to the east.
“My grandmother says ... ” Velari mocked. “Come on, Miryea. We're adults. I know your grandmother's no timid old farm woman, but she's also your grandmother. She's going to make everything sound scarier so you'll be cautious. And I think the caravan-master is doing the same thing. He doesn't want to deal with stragglers, so he's bleating like a goat about bandits and slavers."
“But...” She wanted to argue but decided it wasn't worth the effort. And maybe Velari had a point. They weren't that near the Kulchu border—everyone knew the landscape became more and more arid the closer you got to Kulchu but the trees were still those of a moist climate here, the grass still lush—and the caravan-master did sound annoyingly goat-like.
All that was still going through her mind when she saw the patch of bonestrength among the trees by the side of the road. Bonestrength was rare in much of the Empire and could only be harvested for a few weeks in the early spring. Being able to bring some with her to Poldar would be a coup—a valuable addition to her own small medical kit and a wonderful gift for the physician to whom she was apprenticing.
It might impress him enough that he'd be kind to her, let her work with herbs and mix drugs and not push her to try too many challenges right away.
Or he might decide that if she could identify such rare herbs, she must be ready to, oh, do complicated surgery.
Who knew? That might be the best thing for her. Either she'd get over her doubts or she'd know right away she needed to find a different line of work.
Either way, she needed those herbs. And since the group had stopped for the evening, she didn't need to worry about them getting too far ahead. That would appease the caravan-master.
For a second, she thought about grabbing Velari or Shiran or one of his friends.
Then she imagined their mocking and went by herself.
It wasn't as if she were going far, she reasoned. They'd be able to hear if she called out. And she had her staff with her.
The thick patch of bonestrength proved more distracting, though, than she'd imagined. So engrossed was she in giving thanks to the season's lady and cutting the herbs with proper reverence that she didn't hear footsteps, didn't heed crackling twigs.
Didn't hear a thing until Adimir had grabbed her, both of her small wrists held captive by one big hand. Even if her little bronze harvesting knife would have been any use in a fight—and it wasn't, not with its small, curved blade designed for the ritual cutting of herbs and nothing else—his grip was much too strong for her to squirm away.
She opened her mouth to scream. His free hand clapped down over it. “I'm not going to hurt you, little rabbit,” he stage-whispered. “I'm trying to protect you from yourself. It's getting toward nightfall; you're alone in a forest full of wild animals and potentially wilder humans. A townswoman, I take it.” She shook herself free of the silencing hand.
“I do know how to use that staff."
He nodded. “I've seen you drilling. You've been well-trained."
“My grandmother was an Imperial Army officer. She taught me.” It occurred to her to wonder when he'd seen her. Hadn't he just joined them that day?
“And taught you well, I'm sure. But it's not in your hand now. And you don't have a warrior's instincts—you weren't paying attention to potential danger. No shame in that. You're not a soldier. You're a healer, focusing on your work."
“I'm not a physician yet. Just an apprentice.” And that may be all I'll ever be.
He pulled her closer to him. “Who's going to keep you safe from a wicked barbarian Kulchu if you go wandering off in the forest like this?"
She felt a flash of terror, then saw his smiling face, felt his free hand caress down her spine to cup her bottom. She smelled the heat of his body, slightly sweaty, yet clean, and very male, almost drowning out the earthy, green smells of spring and the bitter, sharp scent of bonestrength. She could practically taste his skin, the salt and musk of it. The only thing in real danger, she reasoned, was her common sense—and that was already a lost cause. Adimir might be imperious, arrogant, condescending—but he was also the most handsome man she'd ever seen, pure walking sex, and if he wanted to kiss her, she wasn't going to resist.
In fact, she closed her eyes, raised her face, anticipating his lips on hers.
The kiss was all she could have imagined and more. Hot, yet sweet and mouthwatering, like the chili-laced tamarind candy she bought whenever she found it in the marketplace.
She'd been kissed before—before now, she'd have said she'd been kissed fairly competently and thoroughly—but this was beyond anything she'd ever experienced. It shot through her body, pulsing in her nipples, waking butterflies in her belly. Lighting a fire between her legs.
She couldn't wait to find out what happened next. Would he kiss her until she was melting like butter over the fire, or would he move more quickly, reaching for her aching breasts, her moist, heavy sex? Either would have its merits, although she hoped he didn't move too fast, leaving her trailing behind him.
What he did next, though, was nothing she could have anticipated.
He pulled his hand back and smacked her ass.
The force of the blow would have made her stagger except for h
is firm grip on her wrists. She squeaked, more from surprise than pain, tried to squirm away. Shocked, and drunk on sensation from the kiss, she was slow to react, her body sending mixed signals to her brain—was this pain or pleasure?
The second thwack made her knees buckle, and the third was just as forceful. By the third, though, she'd found her voice, if not the coordination to fight back effectively in any other way, and exclaimed, “Stop it!"
“That should teach you to be more sensible,” he snarled, giving her one last thwack, as if carried by momentum.
Like the spankings her grandmother had administered when she was much younger, these smacks were more loud and startling than painful.
But being spanked by a handsome beast of half-Kulchu male was a very different experience.
These swats left more than her bottom throbbing.
Her breasts, her sex, and everything in between, already sparked to life by the kiss, tingled with excitement. Her ass throbbed rhythmically, but it was far more pleasurable than painful. The rhythm of sex, in fact. She felt herself swelling, moistening.
Lady, she'd have to change her salvar at this rate! And it wasn't even as though he'd been roughhousing with her in a flirtatious way, reverting to that stage of life where boys tormented girls to show their interest. No, the arrogant fool was acting like he was her father and she was a child who needed discipline. He'd even called her “little rabbit,” like her own father had.
And still she wanted him, even though he was treating her like a child. Was she insane?
Maybe, and certainly her self-respect wouldn't thank her later, but for the moment, all she could think about was impressing upon him that she was no little girl to be teased and scolded and spanked, but a grown woman.
A woman with needs that he'd awakened.
A woman who'd show him what she was made of.
With a barely suppressed moan, she pressed herself against Adimir, moving like a cat in heat so he'd feel her curves, know that he hadn't been dealing with a child. Then, she figured, once he started to show interest, she'd spurn him, salvage her pride, and make it clear that if he wanted her, he'd have to court her properly, not kiss her and smack her as if he couldn't decide what he wanted.
Except that he was already showing interest, in the form of a hard cock jutting proudly against her.
A large cock hard and eager enough to let her know that the kiss had excited him as much as it had her, and that he hadn't been thinking “fatherly” when he'd spanked her, any more than she'd been thinking “daughterly."
Temptation overwhelmed her. She rubbed against the erection, wishing their clothing wasn't in the way, wishing she could ride that hardness. Wishing she could caress him through the heavy fabric of his salvar, run her hands across his broad chest, tweak and tease at his crinkled, dark-brown nipples.
But he still had her wrists in a grasp of iron. “Let me go,” she whispered urgently. “I want to..."
“To what, little rabbit?” Laughter bubbled in his voice, laughter and something else, a vein of desire dark and sweet as the red wine of Koromel. “Slap my face? Run away? Swat my ass until it glows? I bet you're furious, and I can't really blame you."
The thought brought her up short.
If even Adimir was admitting she might have a right to be angry, why was she lusting after him, longing to feel his hands on her, to feel his weight on top of her, feel him thrusting inside her? Even to feel a few more of those strangely tantalizing smacks on her butt?
If even he admitted he'd been out of line, then the anger that warred with her attraction was justified, and anything else she felt was instinct, an animal response to being touched by this delicious lout of a man. Something inside her recognized he'd be a good mate in a primal sense, one who would make strong, handsome babies. Kind of like a female cat, in springtime heat, cozying up to the big tom she'd driven away all winter.
Humiliating how this was completely bypassing her head, her heart, or any part of her that should be making decisions.
She took a deep breath, trying to let the cool spring air that filled her lungs cool the fire in her blood as well. “Slapping was on the list,” she snapped, putting all the indignation she knew she ought to feel into her voice, along with the bit she actually did feel. “How dare you...” She quivered in his firm grasp, half from lust, half from anger directed at least as much at herself as at Adimir.
“Same reason you dared to rub up instead of kneeing me in the ballocks,” he said. “We want each other. The Lord of Grain and Lady Sun are drawing us together as the seasons change. Makes us daring—crazy, even. Like this."
He released her wrists. A dozen impulses flashed through her mind: fleeing; slapping Adimir's too-handsome, too-smug face; smacking his ass and seeing how he liked it; climbing his glorious body like a tree.
What happened instead was that he pulled her close, cupped her stinging bottom with one big hand, and kissed her again, even more thoroughly than before.
It was a rough kiss, deep and hard and intense, opening her mouth and taking control of it. Thrusting with his tongue as he must want to do with his cock in her pussy. Kneading her tender ass as he kissed her, causing either pleasurable pain or painful pleasure. Each squeeze seemed to move her pussy lips together, letting her know exactly how wet and sensitized she was.
His free hand snaked into the neckline of her coats, slid down to feel the weight of her breast, toyed with a nipple. She cried out into his mouth as a bolt of pleasure shot through her.
Her knife dropped from fingers much more interested in touching him than keeping track of it.
Rolling her hips, she stretched on tiptoe to work herself against his hardness.
I'm a fool, she told herself, but she really didn't care. Not now.
And when Adimir broke off the kiss and unbuttoned her coats—first the silk and wool outer one, then the light wool inner layer—and pushed aside the linen inner robe, she cared even less. A hot mouth suckled her nipples, first one, then the other, drawing them to peaks that felt as explosive as a volcano. A hand infiltrated the waistband of her salvar, reaching down to part her slick lips.
Adimir raised his head. “You're like a river,” he said, “or the spring rains flooding the land. Amazing."
She wanted to say something, to do something, but pleasure paralyzed her. She managed to run her hands over the broad expanses of his chest, toying at his nipples, but as his fingers worked on her, teasing her slick, hard clit, setting her on fire, she lost the coordination to do much else.
Fire gathered between her legs, shot out like lightning. She bucked, threw her head back, and howled some incoherent noise of pleasure as she came on Adimir's hand.
Barely able to focus, but wanting more, needing more, she reached for him, felt his hard cock throb under her touch for a mere second before he grabbed her wrist and moved it.
“Not now,” he muttered through clenched teeth. “Much as I'd like to feel your sweet mouth on me, or to fuck your little pussy, we wait for the Equinox, for the rites of spring."
“Please...” Lord and Lady, was she actually begging him for sex? Granted, he had the mouth of an incubus and the hands of the Lord of Grain himself, but there was such a thing as dignity, and she'd thrown hers to the eight directions.
“Don't fret, little rabbit. You're mine. We both know it. And on the night of the Equinox, I'll claim you before the Lady and Lord.” He patted her bottom in a proprietary way.
His tone cut through the lust-fog in her brain. “Yours? Yours?” Miryea tried to control her voice, but she felt herself shrieking anyway. “We play together a bit and suddenly I'm yours? Like your sword, your horse ... your boots? I don't think so!"
Some traitor parts of her, and not just the obvious ones he'd caressed with such skill, insisted that, if not exactly his, she felt connected to him now. Bonded, if only out of a craving to finish what they'd so promisingly started.
But indignation and some vestige of her grandmother's training (wh
ich had taken a holiday under the onslaught of desire) made her yank herself away from that so-tempting touch. “You're impossible!” she exclaimed. “And distracting. I need to gather these herbs and get back before Velari worries about me."
Fastening her coat buttons with shaky fingers, Miryea moved to the next patch of bonestrength.
After she caught herself hacking away viciously at the stems, though, she made herself stop, breathe deeply, and compose her thoughts before continuing. The latest thinking, coming out of the university at Poldar, was that the harvester's emotional state did not really affect the properties of the plants, at least as long as you remembered to thank the Lord and Lady properly. But harvesting bonestrength while fantasizing about sticking a knife into Adimir couldn't possibly be good either for the medicine or the state of her spirit—especially when the image of cutting his salvar off was just as compelling.
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* * *
Chapter Three
“Run away, little rabbit,” Adimir murmured. “On the Equinox, you'll admit you're mine."
On the Equinox. Only two nights, but he might just explode with frustration before then, or ruin it all by acting like a lovesick boy and pressing so hard that his little rabbit ran for real.
And exactly what—if anything—had he been thinking when he'd said and done some of those things? A quick kiss, an equally quick smack on the ass, and sending her on her way, bewildered but intrigued, that was all he'd intended. But Miryea's scent of sun and herbs and youth, the silken texture of her skin, the mixture of heat and innocence—that captivating stage of a woman's life when you no longer have to act as a teacher in the ways of the flesh, but still could surprise her with her own responses—had addled his wits.
It had taken all his will not to speak of love, of marriage, of forever. And as it was, he'd spoken as possessively as a future husband might.
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