by Marie Hall
Grabbing her wrists, locking her hand in place, he kissed her palm and felt a surge of pride when she trembled.
“I am a king, there are duties to perform.”
“No, there aren’t.” She shook her head. “Not today. I will talk to Sirenade and let her know that you feel unwell.”
He frowned. “I am well, Nimue.”
She gave him a look that brooked no arguments. This small legger, with a queenly demeanor. If she could handle a lot of scurvy pirates, it was no wonder she was far from impressed by the power he wielded.
Except when he was around her, he did not feel so powerful.
“I will do for you as you did for me yesterday.”
Frowning as he tried to understand her words, his eyes suddenly widened as it dawned on him what she meant. “Nim, if you are seen—”
“I care not.” She shrugged, planting a finger across his lips and stilling his words. “We will know the truth of it. If there was one thing my father taught me, it was that a crew is only as strong as their leader.”
“Wise man, your father,” he murmured against her flesh.
Blue eyes turned liquid, and for a moment, for the first time ever in his existence, Sircco envied the life of a pirate. He envied their ability to take whatever they wanted, damn the consequences.
If he’d been Hook, he’d have plundered her by now.
But Nimue did not deserve a mere tussle in the sheets. She deserved so much more.
Giving him a crooked smile, she grabbed his hand and yanked him out of the room. “Now come, beluga, before you drop dead of exhaustion on me.”
He could break her hold if he’d really wanted to. Her strength was nothing to his. But there were chains stronger than metal in this world, and she had them wrapped around his soul.
Keeping to her side, he crooked a brow when Cook came from around the corner. Her jaw dropped when she looked first at Nimue, who was still scantily clad and hanging onto his wrist with a viselike grip.
“Cook.” Nimue dipped her head regally then, lifting her nose in the air, walked past the servant without so much as a flinch or a flicker.
She never relaxed her grip, even when they turned down several more halls. And as if the walls had ears, suddenly, bodies were popping out of doors, jaws hanging wide and tails flicking in agitation as she continued her slow, but inexorable trail to his sleeping chambers.
Chuckling when they began their ascent up the steps, he leaned in to whisper, “They’re watching us, little pirate.”
She glanced over her shoulder at the ever-thickening crowd of mermaids. A familiar bronze-eyed gaze was among them.
His sister’s hair was in tight coils, but her eyes sparkled with amusement. The wench knew and approved. Good to know.
“I don’t care.” She climbed the stairs two at a time before calling over her shoulder, “The king needs his rest. You may all go now.”
She hadn’t shouted the words, but they’d carried weight all the same. All but Sirenade slowly drifted off, chattering among themselves. In an hour, the very city would be abuzz with the news that their king had taken up with a legger.
The prospect not nearly as worrying as he’d once feared it would be. They weren’t sleeping together. But he doubted that any of them would believe him anyway.
“You will tarnish your reputation, Nimue.” He said it one last time, and not because he was concerned for it, but to be honest. Concern for her reputation mattered not in the least bit at this moment.
If she’d done this with another legger, then yes, he’d have cared. But she was ruining it with him. His perverse need to hear her tell him once more that she didn’t care made him keep on.
Twirling on him the moment they crested the landing, she gave his chest a hard tap with her free fist. “Beluga, you let me worry about my soiled reputation. I have to meet my great-mother soon, and I’d like to see you safely settled in before I do.”
And because she no longer cared, Sircco did what he’d wanted to do since the moment she knocked at his door. Tipping her chin up, he kissed her.
It was not a chaste one, either.
Warm and languid in a way she hadn’t been for him during the night, she melted into his embrace, and he knew in his heart that something had irrevocably changed between them.
*
Nimue straddled his body. Unlike a fish, she couldn’t float in these waters.
He shifted, causing her center to flare up with an exquisite sensation of desire. Grunting, because this what not at all what she’d intended when she’d offered to return the favor, she swatted his ass.
Growling, he tried to sit up, but she shoved him back down.
“Stop fidgeting and let me do my work. Or so help me...” she gritted out. The “so help me” was far from a threat to gut him and was rather a threat to strip herself down, rub oils upon his back, and writhe upon him.
A very odd fantasy to be sure, but one she felt all the same.
“You didn’t need to slap me to get that point across, barracuda.”
Hissing, she manipulated her fingers in a much firmer grip, digging into his muscles hard.
He groaned, but the sound wasn’t one of pain, and this time, when he shifted and rubbed up against her, she didn’t swat at him, but wiggled just a little. If he would only just move to the left...
“Nimue, by the Gods,” he moaned, “please do not move.”
Holding herself perfectly still, she relaxed her grip.
How come he wasn’t falling asleep as she had yesterday? If anything, each touch seemed to make him more agitated.
“Should I get off you?”
He groaned even louder, burying his face into his pillow.
His room was even more of a wonder than hers as. His bed built of solid wood had carvings of mermaids and the sea etched upon the posters. The mattress was a firm, yet squishy lump so sensuous that when she’d set her knee down on it to give her the leverage to straddle him, she’d almost not wanted to move.
He had thick rugs on the floor and heavy crystal chandeliers hanging from the ceiling. A miniature garden of kelp and sea weed waved in the gentle current. Mixed in among them were upside-down bell-shaped flowers that sprinkled a fine gold powder everywhere.
In short, she was in love.
With the man or the room more, that one was a toss-up. Her pirate’s heart had beat a crescendo when she’d spotted the chest in the corner full to bursting with galleons and jewels.
“No,” he mumbled.
And just as she was about to begin massaging him again, he rolled over, and she couldn’t help but glance down at his tail.
She’d seen a man’s penis engorged for sex once. It’d been long, veiny, and quite purple. It’d reminded her of a one-eyed snake, and she’d been fascinated but wary of looking at them ever since.
But Sircco had nothing but smooth tail.
She frowned.
“What?” He knuckled her cheek.
How exactly did one go about saying that she was disappointed because he’d not risen for her? Wasn’t that what males did when they reciprocated feelings of sexual interest?
Not that she had any intention of having sex with him. She was still very firmly in the camp that entangling herself with him in that way was a bad idea. Still, even feeling that way couldn’t prevent her vanity from being wounded.
“Nothing,” she grumped. “Why have you turned, Sircco? I thought you wished me to massage you.”
Blowing out an aggrieved breath, he said, “I cannot relax with your legs spread upon me so.”
Hurt, because she’d thought he’d gotten past that quirk, she made to get off him, but his hands clamped down onto her waist, and he glared at her.
“Where do you think you’re going,” he snapped, and the waters between them began to churn.
Slapping at his indomitable hold, she growled, “If you do not like my legs, beluga—”
“By Calypso’s teat,” he swore. Then cupping a hand behind her n
eck, he forced her down on him, so that she had to either brace her hands on his chest or risk falling right on top of him. “I do want you. All of you, you silly, lovely pirate. I love your legs!”
The way he said it, almost defiantly, made her freeze. Did he mean it? “You do?” She damned the quiver in her voice as weakness.
“Aye.” His stormy eyes grew thick with lightning. But the water between them was calm and cool.
His fingers stroked through her hair gently, disturbing a sleepy Jian, who snapped at his king before swimming off his comfortable nest for the relative safety on the other side of the room.
“They are soft and feel... good. Especially when they clamp down on me as yours now are.”
He bucked his hips a little, and now it was her turn to groan as his slick scales rubbed between her thighs.
“Why are you not hard then?” she asked, then snapped her mouth shut as words she’d had no intention of speaking poured out.
“Hard?” He kissed her brow, but it was hard, impatient, and full of surly fire. It made her melt. “I am so hard that I feel as though I might break. I am in pain day and night, Nimue. I desire your body. Desire to feel you stroke me. To hold me.”
With her heart beating so fast that she thought she might vomit, she glanced down at his tail, which was still only a tail.
Sircco closed his eyes, releasing his grip on her and tossing his arms out to either side. “I want to remain a gentleman with you, Nimue. I do.”
“Where is it?” she asked softly.
His eyes snapped open, and she’d never seen them storm the way they were now. Licking his lips, he said, “There is a hidden slit. But I look nothing like you, and I do not wish to terrify you, my little pirate.”
Scared now what he could possibly mean she imagined all sorts of diabolical things—a penis with spines on it or perhaps full of poison sacks.
Thinking about it caused her to touch the scar where the hag had cut her months ago.
“I... I...”
Why was she doing this to herself? To him? She had no intention of lying with him. Doing so would only make everything messy and complicated when she had to leave.
A deep sigh caused his chest to rise, and her along with it, causing her to squirm again and eliciting a moan from him.
“This will not work,” he muttered angrily.
“What!” she screeched, shoving herself up his body so that she once more sat on him instead of sprawling on him.
It was one thing for her to think it and quite another for him to speak it.
“You don’t get to decide that, beluga. I do. And I say... no?”
She sniffed. Why had that been so difficult to get out, and why had it sounded more like a question? And why, in Calypso’s name, had it come out like a mouse’s squeak?
“I can make legs, Nimue.” He looked at her.
“You can do what?” She frowned. “Can all of you do that?”
“No, only my sister and I, but we do not care to keep the form long. It is unnatural.”
She slapped his chest. “There is nothing unnatural in this room but you, you big insufferable whale!”
“Gods Above and Under. That is not what I meant, hagfish.”
Eyes wide, she gasped, ready to drive her dirk through his tongue. “You would dare call me that. I loathe you, male.”
Not true. But whatever.
Grabbing her wrists, he shook them gently. “I wasn’t speaking of you, Nimue. But me. The form feels itchy to me. I cannot wear it long, but if it would help you... help us. I would do it.”
Sex.
She froze.
No sex.
Yes sex.
Good.
Bad.
So bad.
She whimpered, nibbling on her bottom lip so hard that it ached. Her nipples were pointed, painful things, thrusting against the thin silk of her robe and throbbing each time they rubbed against it.
Sircco released her. “I will not force you.”
Whimpering again, she fought an internal war with herself. “I want sex with you, male,” she finally admitted, and her insides skittered when he groaned. “But I am leaving soon.”
The hands he’d been raising to her sides dropped with a thunk to the mattress.
Nimue had pushed things between them too far. It took a Herculean effort to get off him, and when she did, she had to fight the need to rub her hand between her thighs to satisfy the need.
“My great-mother awaits me,” she mumbled regretfully.
He still wouldn’t talk, but he nodded.
Angry, frustrated, and feeling violent all of a sudden, she stomped her foot. “Why do you have to be so perfect? Leggers and fish do not mate, Sircco! We do not mate!” Then twirling on her heel, she raced for the door.
But she stopped and changed direction, heading not for the bed, but the chest. Looking at him the entire time, she retrieved a handful of gold and jewels, fisted it tightly, and gave him a haughty stare, because that’s what pirate’s did.
Chapter 13
Sircco wanted to both laugh and roar. He’d never felt such a violent need before in his life. He’d forced himself to remain on his bed, not blinking or moving until her dainty heel disappeared behind the slamming of his chamber door.
Once he was sure she was gone, he sailed from his bed and glowered, wanting nothing more than to rip the door off its hinges, find her, drag her back here, and demand that she love him back.
He blinked, startled by the thought.
Love.
He felt it.
He palmed his chest. The violence, the urgency, the softness, the need... what the poems said, he felt it all—for a legger.
His legger.
“Bloody damn, barracuda,” he snarled, but all the fire was gone now as he dropped back onto his bed.
Talia had told him once that she couldn’t help how she felt, but that if she could have, she’d have given her heart and soul to him.
He’d never been able to understand how she could find one of them so alluring, so intriguing that she would willingly give up her life in Seren for Hook. And now he only wished she were here so that he could tell her thank you, because without her sacrifice, there would be no Nimue.
Nimue. Lady of the Lake. It was what her name meant.
A legger with the soul of a fish. His lips twitched. He knew what the humans called his kind. He’d never much enjoyed the moniker, you could not eat folk the way you could eat fish, but perhaps they also did not care to be called leggers.
Squeezing his eyes shut, he recalled the way she’d felt on him. Without her legs, he could not have felt her touch on both sides of him, like a band around him. A maiden would have had to place herself on one side or another, but Nimue had been wrapped all around him.
Her arms, her legs, and her warm center had rubbed so close to his painfully thick penis that he’d been forced to think of hagfish—ergo the reason for calling her as he had—whenever she did it. he slimy, repulsive creatures were nothing at all like his ivory-skinned, rosy-lipped human.
Grunting, he slipped his hand down, grabbing hold of himself. He wanted it to be her doing this to him. He was a king—he should not need to service himself, but if he didn’t, Goddess help whatever poor creature crossed paths with him this day.
He made quick work of it. All he needed to do was think of her tongue in his mouth and how soft, wet, and minty she’d tasted, and he released in a powerful thrust of hips and tail.
Flicking his wrist, he cleaned up the mess and briefly considered going downstairs to join Sirenade in the study, but he had no interest in seeing her coy smiles and knowing eyes. Lying back down, he sighed. He would close his eyes for a moment, just long enough to give the rabble below time enough to get immersed in other tasks besides gossip.
Five minutes later, he slept.
*
“I hate him!” Nimue yanked at a kelp frond so forcefully that hundreds of baby snails showered down by her feet.
&n
bsp; “Nimue!” Her great-mother scolded. “They’ve only just been birthed, my dear. Do have a care. And you most certainly do not.”
Remembering that it would be a bad thing to snarl her teeth at her grandmother, whom she loved dearly, she dropped to her knees and picked up the little babies with gentle fingers.
She felt bad for hurting them. They were so cute, unlike that insufferable... “Beluga!” she snapped again.
“Nimue, honestly. Tut, tut.” Maiven smacked at her hands. “Release my snails at once. If you crush a shell, I will crush you. Now, come, let us eat some sea weed cakes, have a nice mug of herbal tea, and talk this through, shall we?”
Rolling her shoulders and realizing that if she stayed out here another moment, not a single snail would survive her wrath, she gave her grandmother an unenthusiastic nod. “Aye. Fine.”
They were settled around Maiven’s cozy table minutes later and nibbling on sweet cake.
“I am sorry,” she mumbled after eating her second slice. “I don’t know what’s come over me. I’m frustrated and itchy everywhere, and I cannot stand it.”
Before coming to Maiven’s, she’d serviced herself not once, but twice. And neither time had helped. They’d only made it worse. That blasted fish and all his talk of sex.
“Perhaps you could start with why you are frustrated and how my king comes to play into this scenario?” Maiven asked coolly, sipping on her tea.
“He propositioned me.”
Smiling, Maiven’s eyes twinkled, and Nimue growled, “You knew!”
Snorting, her great-mother nodded. “I may have heard the chatter. But as I was told it, you were the one dragging him behind, dressed scandalously with all of your legs on display for the world to see.”
“That is not at all how it was.” Okay, so maybe the robe had covered nothing, and perhaps she had been the one doing the dragging, but... “He came willingly.”
Wait? What?
Shaking her head, she tried again. “Rather, he didn’t try very hard to get away. Gods and damnation,” she snapped, because she hadn’t meant to put it that way, either. “I didn’t beat him over a stick to come, great-mother!”
Patting her hand and tutting gently, Maiven’s smile never wavered as she said, “My dear, he is a fine and handsome merman. There is no shame in falling under his spell. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with dalliances. I was known to have them often in my youth.”
