Mists of Velvet

by Sophie Renwick

  “Cailleach has granted your goddess the rite of a Shrouding.”

  “I know. I’m just going.” Rhys couldn’t hide his smile.

  “When a Sidhe warrior takes a mate, there is a ritual that must be completed.” Bran handed him the strip of cloth. “Your hand must be bound to hers.”

  “A Sidhe?” he asked, swallowing hard.

  “Yes. A Sidhe. Even dilute ones.”

  Rhys smiled at Bran’s grin. “Any special words that need to be said?”

  Bran shook his head. “Only the ones in your heart.”

  With a nod, Rhys opened the door, the white cloth fisted tightly in his hand as he searched for his goddess.

  She was easy to find. In the garden, beneath a gathering of oak trees, was a circle of white-robed women. At the head of them was Cailleach. When she saw him, she raised her hands, and the glimmering cloud that hovered around them lowered, fell, and disappeared.

  “Rhys MacDonald, descendant of Daegan, you are to be given this night to the goddess Bronwnn.”

  He was nervous. Bronwnn wanted this ceremony so much. He didn’t want to mess it up. He wanted it to be beautiful for her. In the same way every bride wanted the gown and the flowers and the devoted, handsome groom, every goddess, he supposed, wanted this.

  “Thank you,” he murmured, not knowing what else to say.

  Cailleach’s eyes flashed, this time not with anger, but amusement. “Is it your intention to take this goddess as your mate?”

  “It is.” He said it with deep conviction.

  “Then your union is to be consecrated this night. Here, beneath the ancient oak of the Sidhe and the golden veil, which represents the power of the goddess.”

  Then Cailleach and the others departed, moving outward from the circle and revealing a woman covered in a glistening silver shroud that hugged the outline of her body. She was on a low bed of sorts, which was draped in silver and white satin and littered with pillows.

  Rhys took a step, and then another, letting instinct guide him. He walked all around the bed, studying her still form. Up close, he saw how transparent and gossamer the cloth was, clearly showing her nakedness beneath. Reaching out, Rhys stroked one full breast with his hand. The nipple rose and pressed against the gossamer cloth.

  His own body responded to the sight. She was gorgeous, like a pagan princess from a fairy tale, just waiting there for him to take her.

  Unable to stop touching her, he slipped his palm lower, down her belly, where it lingered over her navel. He thought of her pregnant, rounded, and he wondered if it was too soon for her to be carrying his child.

  Soon, he told himself. Perhaps it would happen tonight.

  His palm left her belly and descended slowly to her thighs, then to the junction of her sex. She had been shaved, her sex now smooth and white. Kneading her with the heel of his palm, he listened for her intake of air, but she lay perfectly still, serene beneath the cloak.

  He guessed he was supposed to pull it off, but he wanted to savor this moment; to do it his way.

  Stepping to the bottom of the bed, he lifted the shroud, just enough so that he could come to her from beneath it. That was when he saw the markings on her body. On her shaved mons was a crescent moon, the symbol of the goddess. Around her navel was an infinity knot, and between her breasts was a painted triscale. In her hand was an athame, with a large moonstone gem on its hilt.

  “Mo bandia,” he whispered as he kissed his way up her thigh and over to her slick sex. “I have come to claim what is mine.”

  She stirred, spreading her thighs. Her hand left the athame, only to join her other hand as it skimmed down the curves of her pale body. “I am yours, Rhys MacDonald.”

  With a swipe of his tongue, he parted her folds, tasted her, teased her. Then he eased his way up her body, the gossamer veil covering them both. When he was fully on top of her, his arms on either side of her shoulders and his gaze locked with hers, he lowered his head and kissed her, his tongue slipping effortlessly into her mouth.

  Bronwnn allowed her hands to rove over his shoulders, which felt as unyielding as rock and as contoured as a sculpture. Sliding her hands down, she ran her palms over his chest. Then she fingered his nipples and felt them grow taut and erect.

  Tilting her head back, she looked up into his face and saw that he watched her with unblinking eyes, his body rising up for hers, his back covered in the silver shroud that cocooned them. He was the most beautiful man in the world to her.

  “Tell me what to do. I want to make this perfect for you.”

  “It already is, Rhys.”

  He smiled into her eyes, then lowered his face to her neck, nuzzling the sensitive patch of skin beneath her ear. “No, not yet. Not until I hear you cry out and come so hard around me.”

  Her body shuddered. She knew he felt it, because his cock was pressing into the smooth, hairless skin of her sex.

  The torches that had been lit around them filtered softly beneath the transparent blanket, making it intimate and erotic beneath the shroud. Normally, the covering was to be removed, revealing her body for his inspection and pleasure. But Rhys had made the ancient ritual his, and she felt it was perfect for them.

  “I want you so much, Bronwnn. I want to savor you, to kiss and lick every inch of you.”

  Her womb clenched, and the muscles of her core tightened in yearning. Bronwnn felt his wide palm slide up her calf, then her thigh, nearly engulfing her flesh in his hand. He caressed her to her hip, running his hand appreciatively up and down the rounded contour.

  He reached up, above her head, and she saw the white cloth of the Sidhe fating. He wrapped their hands loosely together and gripped her fingers with his.

  “Bound now, you are to me.”

  “Yes, my love.”

  Sliding his unbound hand beneath her neck, he raised himself slightly above her. He was so beautiful—so strong—looming over her.

  Reaching for his hand, she placed it on top of her breast. But before he could take her nipple between his thumb and finger, she reached for his head, bringing him to her so that she could offer her breast to his mouth. “Suck me,” she whispered into his hair.

  She arched like one of Rhys’ taut bows when he curled his tongue around her peaked nipple. Her fingers gripped his hair, and her head was thrown back by the time his hand was kneading her and his mouth was tugging at her nipple.

  She moaned, the sound erotic in the silvery light. Rhys responded by freeing her breast and claiming the other one. This time he bit down gently on the nipple. Her hand flew to her belly, her body tightening. His palm followed hers, down below her rib cage, to the crescent moon that had been placed on her mons.

  “I want to give you my baby,” he whispered. “I want to feel this skin stretched with life.”

  “Yes,” she moaned. She wanted that. The instinctive need to conceive welled up inside her, and she knew that this night, she would take Rhys’ seed inside her and create their child.

  She gasped as he nuzzled his mouth against her nipple, making it harder and making it strain against his lips before he kissed his way from her breast to the soft, scented valley between, only to capture her other waiting nipple between his lips.

  On a hiss she arched into his mouth, and he covered her hand more forcefully. She imagined him taking her when she was full and heavy with their child. She knew he shared her thought when his movements became more intense, more aggressive, and possessive.

  Rhys slid down her length, his tongue burning a path down her midriff to her belly, and she rubbed her thighs together, feeling the slickness pooling between them.

  His beautiful hand gripped her bottom; then he lowered his mouth and lapped at her. The way his tongue slowly slid up the length of her made her ache to hold him there.

  But soon she was restless. He was going too slow, and she was rubbing against him, struggling to find the right rhythm, the right pressure that would make her shatter.

  And then, just when he moved his to
ngue against the spot that ached, she moaned and felt two of his fingers sink deep inside her, drawing out her arousal and then sinking inside again. She groaned, emitting a deep sound of need and release; then he set his tongue to her clitoris and pressed against it, feeling it throb. She needed to touch him, to feel her hand stroking up and down the long, thick length. As she grasped his cock, he moved his tongue in a furiously fast rhythm that had her nearly convulsing and crying out his name.

  “Faster,” he moaned.

  Rhys could barely breathe as he watched her work his cock with her hand. A drop of pearl-colored fluid leaked out the slit of his sex and onto her fingertip.

  He knew he wouldn’t last. He knew he’d ruin this ritual if he came in her palm.

  Slowing things down, he moved to the side. Their hands were still bound, but he still had one free hand to play with her. But she was intent on something else—the athame that lay at her side.

  Picking it up, she gave it to him. “I am to shed blood for you tonight.”

  “What?”

  She smiled and kissed away his frown. “Normally, it is my virgin’s blood, but you have already claimed that.”

  “Yes, I did,” he said with a possessive growl.

  “But our blood must mix tonight.”

  Taking the athame, she poked the tip into her thumb, drawing out a drop of blood. Then she poked his finger, allowing his blood to drop onto the blade and mix with hers.

  “Hold the handle with me.”

  Wrapping his free hand around hers, as well as the hilt of the athame, he watched their blood mix and run together down the blade.

  “Now we must plunge the blade into the earth, consecrating our union.”

  Together, they leaned a bit to the left. The bed was not high off the ground, and the tip of the blade easily pierced the earth. Bronwnn’s fingers clutched his, both on the athame and beneath the white binding that clasped their hands together. He could feel her pulse, a steady thump against his wrist. Above them, the shroud glimmered more brightly, casting little shadows on her body that reminded Rhys of starlight.

  Bronwnn’s eyes lit with wonder as she looked up at the veil that draped over them. “Our union has been accepted.”

  “I love you,” he blurted out. It wasn’t very mystical, or original, but it was all he could say.

  “My mate,” she whispered as she wrapped her thighs around his hips, guiding his cock into her slick, hot core. “My mortal. Come. Claim your goddess.”

  Never allowing their gazes to break, Rhys lowered himself on top of her so that her breasts scraped his chest and their eyes were locked together; then he sank himself deeply inside her, reverently, slowly.

  “Take me. All of me.”

  He knew she could. He was so deep inside her, he felt her pulsating around him. And when he began to enter and withdraw, he heard each gasp she made with his measured strokes.

  Bronwnn placed her free hand, palm up, against Rhys’, and they stayed like that, palm to palm, bound hand to bound hand, for long seconds before he entwined his fingers through hers and brought their joined hands back behind her head as he thrust deeply into her, claiming her fully.

  Bronwnn had never known this euphoria before—this oneness of mind, body, and spirit. As they looked into each other’s eyes, as his hand gripped hers tightly and his body slid along hers, Bronwnn knew she would never, ever feel this connection with anyone else.

  “Don’t close your eyes. I want you looking into mine as you come,” he rasped.

  And then he stabbed her deeply, and she fought to keep her eyes open as she trembled beneath him. She was shaking and shattering in his arms, and he thrust up into her once more, his fingers pressing against her.

  “Take me,” he said, thrusting up hard against her. “Claim me.”

  She did. Lifting her hips to meet his, she thrust back, joining with him. With her teeth, she nipped at his throat, and he groaned, pouring his seed deep inside her.

  “Mo bandia,” he breathed against her. The binding had come loose around their hands and slipped to the ground, allowing Rhys to pull her into his arms. They were still covered by the shroud, and Bronwnn thought it the most intimate, beautiful moment she would ever experience.

  “My mortal,” she whispered back. She felt him, so deep inside her, swimming in her blood.

  “I can feel you,” he said, his heart beating heavy against her breasts. “Inside me. I can hear your heart. Your breath—your desire.”

  He lifted himself off her and gazed down upon her naked body. “I can hear your body crying for more.”

  “I am the goddess of sexuality. Insatiable, you called me.”

  “I did.” With a heated look, he tore the shroud from them, exposing their nakedness to the trees and the moon and the sky above. Lifting her up, he cupped her bottom and helped her to wrap her legs around his waist.

  “Now, I’ll have you as a Sidhe takes his mate.”

  Gooseflesh erupted along her skin at the possessiveness in his voice. His entry was swift and hard, and she felt him deeper inside her than ever before.

  “Mine,” he said as she took a handful of her hair and brushed it back over her shoulder so he could see her face as he thrust up into her again. “And you were worth fighting for.”

  She smiled, opened her arms, and wrapped them around him, allowing him to set the pace, to love her beneath the moon and stars and the velvet mists of Annwyn.

  EPILOGUE

  From the window, Keir watched the Shrouding. He should not be here, sucking the emotions from Rhys. But he was weak, and lonely. He needed her—Rowan.

  He watched as Rhys tore the shroud from Bronwnn’s body. He saw the way he lifted her up and sank her down onto his cock.

  He had never taken Rowan that way, but his body ached to do so.

  Closing his eyes, he imagined it, the feel of her body sliding down on his. He imagined what her breasts would look like; how they would sway as he took her hard.

  He thought of the satin, covered in her blood. He thought of the black square that held their mixed sexual essences and of the night he had made love to her and claimed her as his mate.

  His body cried for her, and so, too, did his soul. There was a way, he believed—a way to find her once again.

  And then, he turned from the window, unable to watch Rhys with his mate any longer. He stepped out of the shadows and into the light. A butterfly, with white wings edged in blue, fluttered before him; he reached for it, letting it still on his finger.

  Yes. There was a way. Magick had two sides. And if one side would not accept his request, then perhaps the other would.

  Cliodna, his little wren, flew to him, singing sadly in his ear. She felt his sorrow, and he petted her wings as she settled on his shoulder.

  Tonight, he would open that box. He would set the white strip on his thighs and divine his mate back to him. And he would use any means necessary.

  Books by Sophie Renwick

  Mists of Velvet

  Velvet Haven

  Hot in Here