Hers to Claim (Verdantia Book 4)

by Patricia A. Knight

  She could only produce garbled words.

  “Fine. When you regain your voice, ask. Until then, why are you dressed in rags? Didn’t Maddie show you the dresses? I’ll have words with that girl.”

  Adonia frowned at the vehemence in Hel’s voice. “No. She did tell me. Don’t blame—”

  “Ah. So my first question stands. Why are you dressed in rags?”

  Defensive indignation straightened Adonia’s spine. “These are perfectly good clothes.” She winced inside as she stroked the drab tunic with its mismatched buttons and frayed cuffs and hem. At its finest moment, she’d thought it an ugly, utilitarian garment.

  “Do you dislike my choices?”

  “No! It’s just…” Her voice faltered. “They are dresses for the highborn and I’m a…”

  “Enough! Healer, do you intend to defy me—flout my commands?”

  Defy him? How could he think such a thing?

  “Nia.” His growl demanded an answer.

  “I would never—”

  “Then, why did you disobey me? I specifically told you—twice. You are forbidden to disparage or demean yourself.”

  “I hardly think wearing—” As before with the hat, one moment she was one place and the next moment another. One moment she stood, and the next she flopped, head down, over Hel’s shoulder as he strode in ground-eating strides down the corridor to her rooms. “By the Mother! Will you let me finish a sentence?” They passed a wide-eyed Sara plastered to the wall as Hel forged by.

  “Prince DeHelios! Put me down!”

  “Silence! You will learn your value, Nia. You will learn not to belittle yourself.”

  Hel strong-armed the door to her sitting room and crossed in four strides. He stopped before an armless chair and dumped her on her feet before spinning to sit in the chair. He jerked her, facedown, across his left leg. In mere seconds, he had her tunic halfway up her torso, trapping her arms and hands over her head, baring her from the breasts down. One of his massive hands held her easily confined while his other stripped her pants down to bare her buttocks and upper thighs. His right leg trapped her bare ass against his left, effectively immobilizing her. It was only then it occurred to her to struggle.

  “What are you doing?” she cried into the cloth now muffling her head.

  Swack!

  His hand descended on her right buttock cheek in a stinging slap.

  “Ow! Stop it! That hurts!”

  Swack, swack, swack!

  Rapid slaps hit each cheek, growing heavier each time. Left, right, left. Brief explosions of pain jerked her in time to his spanks.

  “Hel, stop! Please, stop!” He must be able to hear her.

  “You. Will. Not.” Swack! “Denigrate.” Swack! “Yourself.” Swack!

  “Ooohhh!” Adonia couldn’t control the writhing of her hips. Hel merely hooked her thighs and clamped down harder with his right leg.

  “You. Will. Not!” Swack! “Say it, Nia. Say it.”

  “Wha..?”

  Swack! Swack! Swack!

  Fire radiated down her buttocks with every slap of his open hand.

  Swack! Swack! Swack!

  “I won’t. I won’t!” she yelped into her tunic.

  “You won’t what?”

  Swack! Swack! Swack!

  “Denigrate…denigrate…myself,” she sobbed. Mortification jousted with the fire burning in her hind end. Mortification won the day, and her emotional turmoil buried the stinging pain. “Stop, Hel, please, stop.”

  His hand gentled, and his palm lay open on her right buttock cheek. The flesh underneath it burned. At his slightest movement, hot sensation streaked to a most unexpected place—her clit. To her chagrin, the little bud throbbed in time with the pulse of heat in her buttocks. The slickness she felt between her legs stunned and confused her. Hel slowly moved his hand in a light circle on her abused bottom. She moaned in accompaniment to the provocative touch. His fingers tickled at the seam of her inner thighs and the right leg that held her motionless loosened to allow her movement.

  “Open your legs,” he commanded.

  “Wh…”

  Swack!

  With a yelp, she spread them as far as the hobble of her trousers would allow.

  His long fingers traced down the seam of her buttocks and delved between her widespread legs. “You’re wet,” he murmured, and his index finger pressed into her slickness and spread it toward her pulsing clit with a swirling caress.

  Oh…that feels good. Soft passes over those nerves sent a different kind of heat coursing through her. She arched her back and opened her legs further. “Mmm, please.” She didn’t care what it revealed about her. The hand teasing her flesh disappeared. Goddess, what had she expected? She slumped across his knee in resignation.

  The arm that had held her torso and shoulders trapped released her. “Kneel up.”

  Hel pulled her tunic back to cover her breasts and abdomen, and she cast a wary glance toward him. The sensual heat in his eyes and the carnal gratification in his twisted grin caught her by surprise. “Now that we know what spanking does to you, sweet Nia, you can be sure I will do this more often.” His grin disappeared. “I warned you I would punish you. Now, go to that closet and select garments befitting your station.”

  As she rose, Hel completed the baring of her lower body, stripping her underwear and her trousers from her legs as she balanced on one foot and then the next.

  “My underpants, please?” Adonia held out her hand then dropped it at the look on his face. “I need them,” she pleaded softly. “I only have two pair.”

  “No.”

  “No?”

  “No panties under your dresses and no trousers unless you are sitting a horse.”

  She blinked. Huh.

  “Now do as I instructed. Pick a gown from the closet and put it on. I will wait.” He sprawled like a great, indolent cat in the armless chair and examined her through lazy eyes.

  At least he doesn’t seem angry any more. She gingerly pulled her tunic over her smarting derriere and padded into her bedroom, the womanly flesh between her legs almost as hot as her ass. A faltering smile played at the edges of her mouth. I’m not certain I’d call that punishment. She wondered what that said about her.

  ~~~

  Hel watched Adonia gingerly cross the room to her closet, the hem of her threadbare top flirting with her cherry-red buttock cheeks. He adjusted his pants, loosening the fabric trapping his semi-engorged cock. These unplanned minutes with Nia had proved stimulating. His smile broadened—for each of them. A flare of satisfaction eclipsed the gnawing frustration and flash-fire anger that had plagued Hel all day. Cathartic, but I shouldn’t have lost my temper with her. She is not the source of my aggravation. Sweet Nia. How little she knows of herself. He relaxed further into the chair and closed his eyes. His day had started early and promised to finish late.

  Earlier that day, when the earliest rays of daylight speared between the craggy peaks surrounding Nyth Uchel, he had joined Bernard and a work crew at Torre Bianca. Methodically, the workers had examined Torre Bianca’s exterior to the extent hastily constructed scaffolding allowed. Hel had left them to their work and searched the first two interior levels of the tower. The sun stood high overhead, well after mid-day, before he paused. Spills of light reflected off the vast interior of diaman crystal slabs and revealed only smooth, unblemished surfaces. Hel wondered if the men outside had fared better.

  “What have you found, Bernard?” Hel walked out of the tower, dusted his hands on his pants and squinted into the bright mid-day sun. The radiance did little to remove the frozen bite of the air.

  “Nothing, my lord. The workers have scoured the base of the tower since dawn. We’ve found nothing.”

  “Extend the scaffolding higher and keep looking.” Choking back his frustration, he walked back inside. His eyes lifted to the soaring interior staircase of ornate worked iron and the mechanical lifts that stood on either side. Searching this will take weeks.

&nb
sp; “I cannot fasten the gown. Will you please help me?”

  Adonia’s voice roused Hel from his reverie, and he straightened in the chair. Nia looked over her shoulder at him, offering her back. Standing, he moved into her and began to close the series of hooks on the long-sleeved, rose-colored gown. He had chosen the gown for its warmth and simplicity. In his eyes, cleanly tailored lines best suited Adonia’s elegance. As his fingers closed the last fastening, he rested his hand on her waist and simply stood enjoying the warm, toned flesh under his palm.

  “All of the gowns are like this.” Nia turned in his hold and stepped back with a questioning expression. “I cannot manage any of them on my own.”

  “I’ll help you with them.” Hel enjoyed the uncertainty crossing her face.

  “How? I can’t…”

  “It won’t be a problem, Nia. You’ll be sleeping with me from now on. My room adjoins yours.”

  He supposed it wasn’t nice to laugh at her but the dumbstruck expression on her face was comical.

  “With you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Every night?”

  “Yes.”

  Her arms wrapped her waist, and her gaze dropped to the floor. “We’ll have sex?”

  Hel nodded. “Yes.”

  “Every night?”

  “Yes.” He wondered how far down her neck the flush went. “And it will please me to serve as your maid, my lady.”

  Her eyes rose to his. The vulnerability filling them brought a pang to his heart. “It will please you to attend me?”

  “Nia.” He shook his head and pulled her into his arms. She went unresisting, her hands and arms gathered in front of her. “Everything about you pleases me.”

  She strained her neck back and stared at him dubiously. “You didn’t feel so ten minutes ago.”

  He stifled a smile and raised a hand to caress her cheek. “Hmm. You are everything I have prayed for.” The expression on her upraised face softened. “A healer, and once trained, a powerful magistra.”

  Her yielding body stiffened. She straightened out of his arms and turned away. Her shoulders sagged. “Of course.”

  He watched her withdraw into herself and an unfamiliar sense of inadequacy shot through him. I’ve disappointed her somehow. What am I missing? He set his personal thoughts aside with a sense of frustration. More pressing matters demanded his attention. “I have much to teach you. It is time to start your lessons in the Great and Lesser Rites. We’ll spend our afternoons and evenings together, as much as your sickroom and my search for A’rken’s engraved words will allow.”

  “Yes…I understand a magistra is needed. I’ll do what I can.” Her gaze flicked up to his and she faced him, chin held high. “I need your assistance with the healing magicks.”

  His eyebrow crept up. “What do you need from me?”

  She cleared her throat, and her hands clasped and unclasped. “Energized diaman crystals—to begin. Later, perhaps your guidance in managing the energies.”

  He nodded, and amusement at her attempt to be assertive brought a slight smile to his lips. “Gladly. Do you want to start now?”

  Her eyes flew open then she dropped her gaze to the floor. “Ah, yes. Yes, I’d like to start…ah, now.

  He chuckled deep in his chest. Her shy, artless acquiescence disarmed him—every time. “Then come with me to the storerooms. We need crystals.”

  She followed him through the door and waited as he closed it. “Down that hallway, turn left, second door on the right.” He motioned with his arm. “After you, Healer.”

  Her spine straightened, and Nia did an excellent imitation of a soldier marching to a firing squad. Hel prowled behind and feasted on the swing of her slender form. An eagerness rose in him to feel that lithe body beneath him, those slender thighs wrapping his waist. It wasn’t the only thing that rose, and he found himself adjusting his trousers again. Patience, DeHelios, patience. You’ll have her soon.

  Chapter Twelve

  Hel smiled inwardly at the wonder in Nia’s eyes as she examined the Chambre Cristalle.

  “It’s warm in here. I had thought it would be as frozen as the rest of the city,” Nia said.

  “Torre Bianca has a unique heating system. I’ll show it to you after we have done what we came to do.”

  She jerked her head in acknowledgement and slipped off her mynx coat. She laid it by three tall woven baskets containing diaman crystal that rested against the dais. Rather than exhaust her with a physical climb, Hel had chosen to take one of the mechanical lifts and had transferred the baskets from the lift to the chamber while Nia moved slowly about the expansive room, her eyes busy absorbing the Chambre Cristalle as if sheer intensity of gaze would force the chamber’s secrets from its walls. Nia stopped, seemingly arrested by the sight out one of the floor-to-ceiling windows. “Incredible. It’s as if I’m a goddess surveying her world.”

  He moved to stand beside her. “Yes, these views have always inspired me.” In the afternoon light, snow glistened off a vast panorama of jagged crags and peaks. Beneath, plumy falls of white water plunged hundreds of feet, the final terminus hidden from view. Enormous black forests of hundreds-of-years-old trees draped foothills as far as the eye could see. He frowned. The vista revealed a land locked in ice.

  Hel wondered how the Chambre Cristalle appeared to Adonia as she saw it for the first time. Memories of his first glimpse of the room flooded back with sweet nostalgia. “I remember when I first climbed that spiral staircase to the upper-most level of Torre Bianca and walked into this chamber with my father. I was sixteen and just coming into full manhood. I stood where you stand now and marveled.” Hel gestured with his arm. “My father stood in that doorway. ‘This is the Chambre Cristalle,’ he said. ‘Your mother and I work the Great Rite here. When you are sufficiently schooled, you, your brother and the magistrae chosen for you will assist us.’”

  Nia turned from the window to face him. Her face softened. “You did not choose your wife?”

  Hel exhaled on a long breath and wondered if Nia would understand the restrictions and obligations placed upon the highborn. “No. Nor did I expect to.”

  He barely heard her whispered, “Did you care for her?”

  As the Mother was his witness, he tried to keep the dislike from his voice when he spoke his dead wife’s name. “Lady Athena fulfilled her duty, as did I.”

  He hadn’t been in the Chambre Cristalle since the death of his wife. Seeking a distraction from the emotions Nia’s uncomfortable question raised, Hel examined the eight-sided room with its tall, arched windows that ran from floor to ceiling. An enormous dais of roughly quarried gray diaman crystal occupied the center of a great circle engraved into the floor. Deeply chiseled rays radiated from the circle to all eight windows. The altar’s top reflected the light off its highly polished surface. All other sides still bore the marks of the stonemason’s chisel. A domed skylight in the center of the circular pitched roof cast a spotlight of sun upon the altar. Through the dust motes dancing in its beams, Hel could see the eyebolts sunk into each corner of the altar. Leather lashings run through the bolts hung loose.

  In this place of austere and imposing beauty, he and Athena had worked the rite that empowered the atmospheric shield and held winter in abeyance. Here, driven to the edge of insanity by sexual arousal, he and his partner melded their spirits with their Great Mother. She’d use their bodies as a conduit for Her staggering power, a living channel to distribute Her vitality for the benefit of all.

  Each time, wielding and channeling the tremendous forces unleashed during the Great Rite had pushed his mental and physical discipline to the point of failure. Each time, he’d found the inner strength to stand triumphant. Through the fiery gauntlet of the Great Rite, She had tempered him into a wielder of Her highest magick—an adamantine son, a paladin-prince steadfast in his service to Her.

  Adonia’s hand on his arm returned his wandering thoughts to her. “You must have been intimate with her daily. I cannot con
ceive of how difficult that was for you,” Adonia said.

  Hel groaned inwardly. It had been difficult in ways he could never explain to Nia, but it had also been a journey of self-discovery. He closed his eyes against the rising memories. The physically brutal battles—the only way Athena could be aroused—had also aroused him. He’d acquired a taste for the carnal high that accompanied sexual dominance even if tempered by an antipathy for the extreme severity Athena had required. When he opened his eyes again, Nia’s worried gaze met his. A half-smile pulled at his mouth. He cupped her jaw and ran his thumb across her lower lip. “Sweet Nia, certain methods for sexual arousal are not gentle, not always born from love. Some women and some men require…different…stimulus to bring them erotic fulfillment. Sometime soon I will show you another chamber on the level below us.” Her eyes widened and he bit back a chuckle. “I will enjoy introducing you to its pleasures.”

  She turned from him and stared sightlessly out the window.

  Hel watched her for a moment. Her consternation amused him, and the dark feelings resurrected by her curiosity faded back into the past. He crossed to the baskets and began placing the crystals into the deeply engraved circle and rays surrounding the central dais. When he’d finished, he leaned back against the altar and let his eyes wander up and down Nia’s slender form—fuel for the carnal fire that had lain banked since A’rken’s cottage. “Nia.”

  With a deep inhale, she turned. “Now?”

  “Now.” He held out his arms. “Come to me.”

  She took halting steps toward him. Fine tremors shook her body. “Now that the time has come to perform a Lesser rite, formally, on a dais—in the Chambre Cristalle—I’m a little bit afraid.”

  He smiled gently, his arms still extended. “Yes, I know. I will deal with your fear. Come here.” He enfolded her into his arms with a soothing murmur and ran his hands in gentle strokes over the bony planes of her back. He didn’t mind her leanness, but it spoke to him of deprivation or disregard for her own wellbeing. He wished he could stuff her with finely prepared meals and opulent desserts and add some softness to her spare body. He waited long moments until her shudders stopped. “Have I told you how brave I think you are?”