“This is a cell phone. These are just portraits of my family. Their souls are not inside the cell phone.”
The wondrous celfone!
He moved his finger and the picture in the celfone changed. Tall men who looked like Darius and women who looked like the woman in the mirror appeared. “These are my brothers and their wives. I assure you that my sisters-in-law are dear to me – but only as sisters.”
He moved his finger again. “Is this the woman you saw?” He showed her a big-bellied woman with long yellow hair. “This is my brother Ruprecht’s wife Anya. As you can see, she is going to have a baby soon.”
“Like me.”
“Yes. Our children will have cousins more or less their age. Is that not a fine thing?”
It was hard to let go of her jealousy and suspicions. Was he lying as Snorre and his brothers had lied to her father and uncles about their wives? “Why were you embracing your brother’s wife?”
“Not for the reasons I embrace you, sweetheart. And we were not alone. Did the mirror not show you my nephews too?”
“No. I broke it,” she confessed. “When I saw you kissing that woman. And I cannot mend it. Do not be angry.”
“Did you? It is no matter. Truly. Don’t cry. You shall have another, better one. And the only woman I have or want is you.”
“Truly?”
“On my honor. Freya of the long hair, will you marry me and let us be happy together?”
“Have you fulfilled all that has been asked of you?”
“Yup. Your brothers have a ship that needs no rowing. They have the wergild for your relatives and your father’s armbands. Ravensblade is mended. And in exchange, I get to ask you to marry me.”
“Why do you wish to?”
He hid his cell phone. “Because you have bewitched me. My thoughts are of you alone. You are my fated mate and the mother of my children. How could I not want to marry you?”
Was bewitching the same as loving? She sighed.
“Why are you sad, Freya?” he whispered. “Have I not come back to you?”
She still wondered why. “Did you bring tech-nol-o-gy?” she asked hopefully.
“I did. And other things too. Would you like to see?”
“In those chests?”
“And on the ship.”
He turned the key on the first chest and let her pull out a leather-bound book. “Is it a book of spells?” she asked.
He coughed. “Norse sagas. The stories of Beowulf and Eric the Red and Gudrid the Far-Traveler.”
“And of Snorre the Thief?”
“Well, no. That is not a well-known tale. But there are many others.”
She opened the book and gasped at its beauty. “Who painted this?”
“It’s a reproduction of the original,” he explained.
“I don’t understand.”
“It’s more magic,” he said. “But the magic was in only its creation. It doesn’t do anything but bring pleasure to the reader.”
She turned the pages carefully. “I have not held a book since the pirates burned our homestead. Thank you, Darius, for this precious gift.”
“And for your hair, my darling, I have brought you jewels.” He opened the second chest which was considerably larger.
There, sparkling in a tangle, were gold chains, bracelets and many other objects. “Dang,” he said. “I should have told Valdar not to shake it. Everything is in a muddle.” He fished among the bright things and pulled out two small curved combs. “These are to put in your hair after I have combed it.”
“Are you going to comb it?” Whatever for?
“I am indeed. I have dreamed of doing so for many months. And when your hair is down around your shoulders, falling over your naked breasts, I am going to please you in as many ways as I can.”
“How many ways are there?” The man put his thing in the woman’s cunt, and left his seed behind. What else could there be? Oh, yes, there was that one where he kissed her cunt. She had liked that, although she knew it was not a sport she should enjoy.
But her dragon was smiling and his eyes were twinkling. “Many, many ways, Freya. Let us be married, that I may lie in your bed all night.”
Had she not already agreed? She supposed she had not said the words. “Yes,” she said. “I will marry you, Darius Einerson.”
“I hope I will make you as happy as you have made me,” he told her, giving her a long and passionate kiss. Even if he did not love her, she had kisses of all kinds to look forward to.
Her bump kicked him. He laughed and patted it. “Not long now,” he said to her belly. “But let us see what else I have brought for your mother.”
He pulled a king’s ransom of gold out of that chest. He slid bracelets on her wrists and draped necklaces over her head. He showed her a ring but he would not let her try it on. “It is for our wedding day.” He put it in his pocket.
At the bottom of the chest was a shiny black tile. “What is that?” she asked.
“You wanted technology,” he said. “I brought you some. It’s a tablet.”
“To write on?”
“Not exactly.” He pressed the shining surface and bright colors popped up.
She backed away. “What does it do?”
“I’ll show you.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Three days later,
Darius~
He slid the ring he had brought over Freya’s knuckle. It was a tight fit. Her hands were swollen. The babies were making life hard for her. He raised her hand to his mouth and kissed those swollen knuckles. Valdar and Brand had jointly given Freya into his keeping.
He had vowed to keep her until they were separated by death and to have no other wife but her. She was to have her own house. And her brothers were always to be welcome within it.
As a ceremony, it seemed a little businesslike and rather short on sentiment. And rather long on his relations with her brothers. Not that it mattered. This wedding scarcely had legal force in Iceland or Sweden. They could repeat their vows when he took her to visit his family.
Soon, he promised himself, they would go to his family’s island and fulfill his vow to the Eldest, and show her what a proper Swedish wedding was like. Inject a little romance into this marriage. In the meantime, this Viking ritual had made her his wife and hopefully shown Freya that he loved her.
“And now we feast,” declared Brand.
He hadn’t even kissed the bride. “One moment, brothers,” he said. “Who makes the feast?”
“It is all prepared,” Valdar said in surprise.
No wonder Freya looked exhausted. Darius bit his tongue. “Then let us celebrate our marriage.” He offered her his arm. “When do we get to be alone?” he whispered in her ear.
She blushed. “After the feasting, comes the bedding,” she whispered back.
“I am looking forward to seeing that pink room again,” he said.
She primmed her lips, but her cheeks stayed flushed.
“Will there be dancing?” he asked as they went back indoors.
“Of course. There is always dancing,” said Brand.
And there was. Hours and hours of dancing and lewd jokes. Designed, he realized too late, to wear him out and prevent him from performing in bed. Viking humor. Welcome to the Dark Ages. But finally Brand and Valdar went away and left Freya to lead him upstairs to her room.
It was as simple and unadorned as a nun’s cell. Just a plain whitewashed room with a white bed and a row of hooks on the wall. A space for sleeping, not for pleasure. The chest he had given her at daybreak sat at the end of the bed.
“Tired?” he asked.
“A little.”
“You work too hard.”
“A man may work from sun to sun, but a woman’s work is never done.” She rubbed her bump. “But I never used to get so tired.”
“It’s the babies.” And the complete lack of labor-saving devices. But he didn’t think she would grasp the concept.
“Do you
really want the pink place?” she asked wearily.
“It was lovely.” He looked at her drawn features, really looked. “But what do you want?”
“I want to sleep.”
On their wedding night? He didn’t think so. But she was the one who was sleeping for three or four. “All right. We’ll go to sleep, if that’s what you want. But first I have a present for you.”
“I am too tired even for more tech-nol-o-gy.”
“You won’t have to do anything,” he promised. He had asked his brother what his pregnant wife wanted most.
“Sleep,” Ruprecht had informed him.
“I was thinking more of a wedding present.”
“Shea butter.”
“Shea butter?”
“You rub it onto her skin,” Ruprecht grinned. “I promise she will love it.”
He took out the plastic tub of Shea butter and showed it to Freya. She was intrigued by the plastic and the label.
“What is it?”
What explanation could he give that she would understand? “It is a perfumed oil for your skin,” he explained, unscrewing the lid.
“How did you do that?” She took the tub from him.
Of course. She had never seen a screw-top lid. Eventually she tired of putting the lid on and removing it. “It smells like flowers,” she said.
“Roses.”
She looked at the picture on the label. “I don’t think they grow around here.”
“They like a warmer climate.” He took a dab and rubbed it into the back of her age-spotted hand then brought it to his lips to kiss and smell. “Now you smell like a rose.”
“It’s a good smell,” she agreed. “And my hand does feel softer. Is it magic?”
“No.” He reached for the pins in her hair. She was wearing his mother’s diamond-tipped ones to hold up her intricately braided bun. “I am going to comb out your hair, if you can stay awake so long, and then I am going to rub that rose oil all over your body.”
She looked resigned, but she nodded wearily.
“Sit on the trunk,” he said closing the lid after he had taken out the gift that Anya had suggested. It was still wrapped in tissue paper as it had come from the lingerie store. He put it on Freya’s bump. “This is for afterward,” he told her.
“What is it? Is it cloth?”
“The outside is a type of paper.”
“Paper?”
Right. The Norse had not had paper, just parchment. “I’ll explain when you are less tired.” He began to release her braids. Her hair fell in ripples down her back. He found her comb and drew it carefully through her hair.
“Does that please you, Freya?”
“It does, Darius Einerson. Is this what men do in your country?”
“Some of them, I suppose. I have never combed any woman’s hair before.” Never wanted to. But Freya’s hair was so thick and silky and twined around his hands as if it had a life of his own, that it had formed part of his fantasies for months.
“Tell me,” he asked, “Was your hair red when you were younger?”
She jumped. “Yes.” Her voice was a croak.
Maybe that explained why he sometimes dreamed of her so. “Perhaps,” he said, “Our children will have red hair.”
“Would that please you, husband?”
“Very much. But it will be enough if they are healthy babies.”
Her eyes were closed by the time he had had enough of smoothing her lovely hair. He pulled her unresisting to her feet and led her to the bed and made her sit. He untied her leather shoes and reached up under her skirts for her stockings.
She had chosen to wear her plain homespun for her wedding rather than the stockings he had bought for her in Sweden. Perhaps she had not known what they were for. His gifts were all so new to her. Each one requiring an explanation. He began to rub the Shea butter into her feet.
“That tickles. What are you doing?”
“I told you, Freya. I am going to rub this stuff all over your skin. Until you smell like a rose everywhere.”
“Oh.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Freya~
Darius had not lied when he said she would have to do nothing. But it was very strange to have him wait on her like this. Long ago her mother had had maidservants who combed her hair and dressed it. But she did not think Mama had ever had them rub her feet and legs like this.
His hands were strong but soft. They moved up and down her legs gently soothing their weariness and stirring longings she had thought she was too tired to feel. She remembered that pregnant women had always had two complaints about their husbands.
Either the men wanted to poke their things into their cunts too often, or they wanted to poke their things into the cunts of their bed-slaves instead. No one had said that they liked fucking when they were great with child. Was she wicked to feel like this?
Darius tossed her skirts above her knees and began to massage them with the rose oil. “I think we have to take your dress off,” he said. “So I can get to your thighs.”
She waved her hand and her dress and apron vanished, leaving her in her shift. He pulled on the edge of that garment. “Hmm,” he said thoughtfully. He rubbed the creamy stuff into her upper legs, flirted with the hair that grew over her cunt, and then stood before she could properly enjoy his caresses.
She clutched her paper so it would not fall.
“I think it is time for you to open your present,” he said.
“Open it?”
He turned the paper over. “See this little shiny spot?” He was pointing to a silver circle. “It peels off.”
It did. The paper fell away from her clutching hands and revealed pale blue cloth. Darius whisked the paper away as if it were unimportant and lifted the cloth. “It’s a nightgown,” he said.
A dress just for sleeping in? Whoever heard of such a thing? “Is this the custom of your people?” she asked. She had liked lying naked in his arms. Looked forward to it.
“I thought you would like to have silk next to your skin,” he said.
She remembered the traders coming home with silk. “It is very slippery,” she said rubbing it between her fingers and thumb. But it didn’t seem very warm.
He chuckled and pulled her to her feet. “I’m going to take your shift off.” He undid the ties at the neck and pulled it over her head. Her hair fluttered every which way. He carefully smoothed it down and arranged it over her breasts. “Beautiful,” he said before he flicked it back over her shoulders.
What was beautiful? Her hair? Her breasts? They were as swollen as an unmilked cow’s. He reached for the rose oil and smeared it gently over her breasts, barely touching the stiff nipples. “Are they tender?” he asked.
“A little.”
“I’ll be careful.” He stroked all around her nipples until she didn’t care about the ache. Lightning flashed to her cunt and her womb began to clench. The babies responded by leaping like fish in the spring.
She didn’t want him to stop touching her breasts, but he took his hands away and began to knead her shoulders and arms. And then he rubbed her belly where the skin was stretched so tight she sometimes wondered if it would split. His sweet-smelling ointment eased the itchiness.
“I can see our babies moving,” he said happily. His hands roved behind and kneaded her bottom. He took the blue silk from her hands and shook it out. It collapsed to nothing. He threw it over her head. It was like wearing thistledown.
“It’s so light,” she said stroking it wonderingly. “But not very warm.”
He used the cloth to tease her nipples. “Yes,” he said. “But it is still summer. Besides, I will keep you warm. Do you like that?”
She did.
“Do you still wish to go to sleep?” he asked.
“No.” His rose oil had made her hungry for more caresses and more bed-sport.
“Good.” He wrenched back the blankets and put her down on the sheet. “Because I want nothing more than to make love to
my wife.”
She forgot that she was swollen and ungainly as he began to kiss her where he had smoothed her skin with the rose oil. His hot lips and licking made every muscle clench with eagerness. She clutched his hair as his lips roved over her belly and thighs. Love for her thoughtful husband rose in her heart. Would he ever love her in return?
“May I kiss your,” he paused and chuckled, “Cunt?”
“What is so funny about my cunt?” she asked crossly.
“Cunt is a rude word nowadays.”
“What would you call it?”
“Your pussy.” He stroked the fluff between her legs. “Open up, darling.”
She clenched her thighs together. “You think I smell like a cat?” She felt indignant. She had bathed and taken a sauna before their wedding.
“Not at all. Although you are as soft as a kitten.” His hands lifted the nightgown and played in her nether hair. “I didn’t mean to offend you, sweetheart.”
She let her legs relax. He kissed her softly and then more strongly, licking and lapping as if it was he who was the cat. She gave herself up to the sensations spilling through her body. Ripples spread from her cunt all through her body. Her womb convulsed. It was like riding ocean waves during a storm. Except that she was safe with Darius’ strong body straddling hers.
“That’s it,” he crooned in her ear. His fingers were busy tugging and stroking her cunt. “Sing for me, Freya.”
Her brothers doubtless heard her shriek of pleasure. Darius rolled her so her back was to his front. His Dik poked her bottom. He kissed her neck through her hair. He was lying on it so she wished it into two plaits. Darius laughed softly against her bare neck, and pulled the nightgown off her.
“Why did you bother putting it on, if you were only going to take it off again?” she asked.
“For the pleasure of seeing your body through the silk. I had hoped you would enjoy the feel of it.”
“It was pleasant enough. But I am used to sleeping without clothes.” She wriggled her bottom against his Dik. He did not seem as eager as she expected her husband to be. “Don’t you want to fuck me?” she asked.
He was laughing again. “Of course. Are you ready to have my dick in your, er, cunt?”
Dragon Bewitched Page 11
