Fenris moaned, low and deep. Bright sparks began to swirl around his body.
“No,” I cried through the gag.
Fenris’s great, pale eyes met mine. “Sol,” he rumbled. “I put...your wreath...on the graves.”
His eyes closed, and his body disappeared in a cloud of gold. The sparks vanished slowly, floating upward like the smoke and ashes of the pyre as I gasped for breath in the darkness. Without Fenris’s great, black form, this strange canyon seemed utterly deserted. In the dim shadows, I couldn’t even see his body.
I tried to call his name, but the wet fabric in my mouth muffled my scream. Panic rose in the back of my throat, making it hard to breathe. My arms felt like they’d been turned to stone. I thrashed against the stake tied behind my back until my wrists sang with pain. The stark canyon walls wavered as hot tears flooded my vision.
With a dry crack, the rope binding my hands finally gave way. I pulled the gag from my mouth and scrambled to my feet. My head spun as I blinked in the moonlight. The wall of Nøkkyn’s castle loomed before me, its great, rusty spikes scraping the stars. Thick, greasy smoke poured into the sky from the other side of the wall, mingled with screaming. The clash of metal against metal reverberated through the night.
What I’d first taken for a canyon, I now saw, was a hodgepodge of stone and wooden buildings pressing against the castle walls. Torchlight flickered through the narrow spaces between the buildings. The air stank of rot and stagnant water. My mouth went dry. How long would it take Nøkkyn’s soldiers to find us here? Not long, I suspected.
Shivering, I staggered forward and scanned the ground for Fenris. The moonlight cast harsh shadows over the cobblestones, making piles of broken barrel staves and mouldering trash look like broken, naked bodies. I finally found Fenris hunched in the darkness against Nøkkyn’s wall. His breathing was shallow and uneven.
“Fenris?” I whispered.
He did not respond. I pressed my hand to his cheek; his skin was damp and cool. In the pale light, the blood smeared across his naked body was almost black. There were three deep gouges across his abdomen, and dozens of smaller scrapes and cuts across his arms and legs. His left ankle twisted in a way that made my stomach churn; blisters were already forming across his soot-smeared left thigh.
I pressed my forehead against his and whispered his name. There was no response. I grabbed his shoulders and tried to pull him upright. His head lolled backward, and his long, auburn curls trailed in the muck.
Stars! There was no way I could carry him. But if the guards found me here, with him, we could both end up tied to a stake in the middle of a funeral pyre. Or locked together in the sea cell of the dungeon, watching as the ocean crept closer and closer to the iron grate in the ceiling.
A sob slipped past my lips. By the Nine Realms, to have come this close! I sank onto the ground next to him, my arms wrapped around his chest.
Something hard bit into my thigh. I turned and ran my fingers over the greasy stones, expecting to find a rock. Nothing. I pressed my palm to my thigh, and my heart leapt into my throat. There, pressed against my hip and almost buried by the heavy, charred folds of my skirt, was the little bottle Brunhild had given me as I lay in chains in Nøkkyn’s treasure room. The bottle of mead Fenris paid her to slip into my fingers.
It just cures war injuries, Fenris had said, the first time I’d seen the beautiful meadow and tiny cave where he lived. When he’d shared the mead of the Æsir with me, and it had healed the split lip and black eye Nøkkyn gave me. I remembered the little swirl of light around the cut on his abdomen, how the skin had closed as though Nøkkyn’s blade had never marred his skin.
But those were minor injuries. One little cut, a few scrapes. I glanced down at Fenris’s beautiful, beaten body, and my throat tightened as if I still wore the metal collar around my neck.
With trembling hands, I found the hidden seam where Brunhild had sewn the bottle into my bustle. I pressed my fingers against Brunhild’s hasty stitches. With a gentle rip, the thread gave way. My vision blurred, and my smoke-scorched throat ached from the effort of pulling air into my lungs. The bottle fell into my palm. It seemed tiny, hardly big enough to hold more than a swallow of the Æsir’s magical mead. I bit my lip as I focused on unscrewing the delicate cap.
The cacophony of screaming behind the castle wall had abated somewhat, replaced by the clang of metal and the rumble of heavy footsteps. The panic must be fading, I realized. Someone had taken control of the crowd. Someone was directing Nøkkyn’s soldiers and guards. I tried to push away the dark bloom of fear rising in my chest. The tiny bottle’s cap fell from my fingers and clattered across the stones.
“Fenris?” I whispered. “Fenris, my love. Open your mouth.”
I wrapped my arm around his neck and kissed him, forcing his head backward. His lips cracked, and I brought the small bottle to his mouth. Holding my breath, I poured the thin stream of golden liquid between Fenris’s teeth. The delicate scent of sweet honey rose in the air, weaving between the smoke and rot and blood, making me think of Týr and Fenris, of making love on the grass beneath the towering pines of the Ironwood.
I watched Fenris’s pale face for any signs of healing, for a flurry of golden sparks or a flicker of life in his pale eyes. There was nothing. His body remained cool and motionless in my arms, and his eyes stared vacantly at the indifferent, swollen moon low against the iron spikes of Nøkkyn’s wall. In the distance, someone began barking orders.
I choked back a sob and let my head drop to his shoulder. My eyelids stung, and I pressed them together, trying to lose myself in the warm, wild scent of Fenris’s body, trying to remember what it was like to love him, and to be loved by him. I thought of his smile, his hands along my waist, and the sound of his voice as he called my name. My arms tightened around his chest, as if I could force his soul to stay in his body just a little longer.
There was no point in trying to hide. If the soldiers found us here, so be it.
I’d go no further without my husband.
THE MONSTER AND THE PRISONER: CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“Sol?”
My heart stuttered against my breastbone. Was that his voice? Or had I just imagined it in my desperate attempts to cling to him before we were both discovered? I raised my smoke-blurred eyes slowly, half afraid of what I would find.
Fenris’s pale eyes gleamed in the darkness. He smiled at me.
“Oh, stars!” I gasped.
“Clever,” he whispered. “The mead.”
I wiped the tears from my eyes. “Are—are you . . . ?”
He flexed his arms and winced. “I’ll survive. Sometimes it takes . . . a little longer.”
I tried to respond, but my words were swallowed by sobs. Fenris wrapped his arms around me, pulling me close, and I thought I’d never felt anything as wonderful as his strong body next to mine.
Fenris stiffened in my arms. “Someone’s coming,” he whispered.
Panic poured through me like boiling water. I shook my head, as if I could deny everything that had just happened.
“No!” I moaned. “They can’t find us! They’ll recognize me, and then they’ll know who you are.”
“Can you stand?” he asked.
Nodding, I forced myself to my feet. My head spun and my legs wobbled, but I stayed upright. “I’ll not leave you,” I whispered.
Fenris frowned, but he held out his hand. “Help me up. I have an idea.”
I pulled him to his feet, then staggered under his weight.
“Against the wall,” he whispered. “Quickly!”
We spun so my back pressed into the cold stones of Nøkkyn’s wall. Fenris grabbed my dress and shoved it up, exposing my thighs to the cool night air.
“Spread your legs,” he hissed in my ear.
“Now?” I stammered.
“Trust me.”
I did as he said, wrapping my legs around the familiar bulk of my husband’s body. He pulled my skirts up and around my waist, then presse
d his face to mine. Our lips met for a long, slow kiss. His tongue danced inside me, still tasting of honeyed mead. My hands pressed into his back, his shoulders, feeling his heat and strength. I sank my fingers into his hair as though I could pull that strength into me. Despite myself, the hot coil of arousal tightened in my abdomen.
Torchlight flared in my peripheral vision. The sound of clanging boots filled the street, and several voices barked commands. I stiffened against Fenris’s body.
“Look away,” he whispered.
I hid my face with my hands, as if I were ashamed of being caught. Beneath my fingers, the torchlight made shadows jump and dance across the folds of my skirt and the muck-smeared stones of the street. Feet scuffled in the alleyway behind Fenris; I didn’t dare lift my eyes to see who was there.
“Lucky bastard!” someone announced.
Hard laughter followed this observation.
“Stars!” Fenris barked, twisting his torso away from me. His voice was sharp enough to make me jump. “Can’t a man get a minute of privacy here?”
The torchlight shifted, casting longer shadows over our bodies. There was more laughter, then a dry cough.
“Think he’d trade places?” a voice asked.
“Not bloody likely. Handsome fucker like that probably has to beat ‘em off with a stick.”
“He could beat me off anytime,” someone added, with an exaggerated sigh.
Another round of laughter greeted this observation.
“That’s enough,” grunted a heavy male voice. “Let’s move out. There’s nothing to find here.”
Another shuffle of boots and bodies echoed through the stone and wood canyon. A torch swung. The flicker of its orange light faded from the bottom of my dress.
“You enjoy your evening now,” the heavy voice grumbled.
More coarse laughter. Metal hissed and clanged. The shadows across my dress deepened as the clatter receded. Only after the torchlight had vanished did I dare breathe again.
Fenris twined his fingers through mine and pulled my hand away from my face. His eyes flashed in the moonlight.
“Sol,” he whispered. His voice was so soft I had to strain to hear him. “Did they hurt you?”
I swallowed. My throat was raw and sore from the smoke, and my wrists still burned from pulling against the ropes. Once the sun rose, I’d probably find dozens of scrapes and bruises along my body, some from Fenris’s teeth as he pulled me from my funeral pyre. I leaned close to him, pressing my lips to his ear.
“No,” I whispered.
His hands dropped to cup my stomach, and he trembled. “The baby? Is...is the baby . . .?”
“Just fine,” I said, my voice low and soft.
“Thank the stars,” he sighed. “I swear, I thought I’d lost you both.”
Both. Something bright and buoyant rose in my chest at his words. Yes, we had survived, both me and the child I carried in my womb. For the first time since we’d left our cave in the Ironwood, I felt like laughing.
“Fenris,” I whispered, sinking my fingers into the curls of his hair. “I—”
His lips pressed to mine before I could finish my thought. A moment later, another flood of torchlight filled the street. I pressed my eyes closed and tried to lose myself in Fenris’s kiss.
“Nothing,” someone barked, and the torchlight ebbed. “Just some couple fucking.”
“That I’d like to see,” another voice said.
The torchlight surged and wavered across my eyelids. A fresh round of laughter echoed off the stone walls surrounding us.
“Move out!” Someone yelled. “Keep searching!”
Their boots thudded down the street, leaving us alone in the moonlight. Fenris glanced down the street.
“They may keep coming,” he whispered.
“Let them,” I replied, unable to stop my smile. “I can do this all night.”
His body sank against mine, pressing me to the cold stone of Nøkkyn’s wall. Grit and rough stones bit into my shoulders through the thin fabric of the dress, but the heat of Fenris’s body surged through me, making me feel stronger and more alive than I’d felt since the night I was dropped into the sea cell. I pulled Fenris to me, embracing him with my arms and legs, my lips and tongue. I kissed him with everything I had, all the passion and fire I’d felt while I watched Nøkkyn with his whores, all the wild, surging gratitude I’d felt when I realized Fenris had saved me from that fate. I kissed him like I’d never expected to kiss him again, like he’d given me another life, a beautiful second life far better than even my dreams could have foretold.
As we embraced, the night fell away. The stench of rotten vegetables and greasy smoke, the flare of torchlight as soldiers clattered past the narrow street, the occasional shout or clang of metal from the other side of the wall, all vanished as Fenris embraced me, his mouth and tongue claiming me, the hard length of his body pressing me into the stones. His arousal throbbed between my legs like the pulsing urgency of life itself.
I closed my eyes, and we were back along the shores of the Lucky River, where Fenris held me against the moss-covered granite boulder. We were back in our cave, so desperate for each other that we couldn’t even bear to lie down, we had to take our pleasure standing, against the rocks. Against a tree. Against a wall.
I ran my leg up Fenris’s back, pulling his naked thighs to mine. He gasped a breath as his cock brushed the wet folds of my sex.
“Here?” he whispered. “Now?”
I pulled my skirt even higher, offering myself to him.
“Stars, yes,” I moaned.
His breath hitched as he grabbed my thighs, pressing our bodies together. He slid inside me as though we’d never been apart, as though our bodies had been created like this, joined together in ecstasy. At first, Fenris was still, his cock deep inside me, his forehead pressed to mine, his chest rising and falling with his panting breaths. His hands tangled in my hair, pulling it tight in his fists.
“I thought—” he gasped, “I thought I’d lost you.”
I tried to answer him, but my lips refused to move. The sea cell filled my mind, the tang of salt and the bitter cold of the ocean. I had expected to die on those algae slicked rocks.
I’d thought I’d lost everything.
My hips rocked against his, taking him deeper into me, as though pleasure could erase the fear, the ache of missing him. The hard coil of need tightened as my ankle curled around the small of his back. I pulled his lips to mine, kissing him so hard I was almost devouring him.
Let the soldiers come. Let them flood this alley with their torches, their voices.
I wasn’t going to stop.
Fenris groaned into my mouth, his pleasure reverberating through my entire body. I thrust against him, grinding my hips into the hard muscles of his stomach, his thighs. More. Stars, I needed more from him. My back arched, driving my shoulder blades into the rough stone wall. Streaks of scarlet and vermillion filled my vision, the flaming sparks from the bonfire where I was supposed to die. And I was burning now, burning under the greasy smoke and ashes of the pyre on the far side of Nøkkyn’s wall.
Fenris met me thrust for thrust, his hard length driving me backward. Pleasure swelled inside me, streaking upward like the flames, singeing every fiber of my body. The walls spun around us; my breath came fast and shallow. I sank my fingers into Fenris’s back, clinging to him as I shook with euphoria.
“Don’t stop!” I cried.
He groaned in response. My hips kicked against his, driven by some deep, primal fire. I was panting and moaning now with sharp animal noises, urging him on. Oh, he felt good, he felt so damned good inside me, I never wanted it to end—
My vision blurred, and the entire world dissolved in an explosion of ecstasy.
When Fenris cried out above me, the hard length of his cock pulsing inside me, I was no longer certain if I was still standing or if the entire world had shifted to lay us both on the ground. My heartbeat thundered in my ears, and my skin buzzed a
lmost painfully against the worn fabric of my dress.
Fenris gulped a breath. His body leaned heavily against mine, and he curled his head against the hollow of my neck. He was shivering, I slowly realized, and his skin was damp with sweat.
“My love?” I whispered.
He murmured incoherently in response. His chest felt heavy against mine. I squirmed against the wall. Fenris shook his head like a man waking from a dream. His stepped back, swayed on his feet, and crashed to the stones.
“Fenris!” I gasped, as loud as I dared.
He blinked up at me. I could have smacked myself across my own stupid face. Stars, didn’t he just say it takes time to recover when the injuries are serious? But did that stop me from thinking with my cunt and fucking him half to death?
“I’m sorry,” I said as I sank to my knees next to him.
Fenris coughed once, soft and low. “No. No, I should be...sorry. Am sorry. I shouldn’t be... weak.”
He tried to smile again. The circles beneath his pale eyes were as dark as bruises. My vision swam, and I blinked furiously to clear the fresh tears.
“I never should have—” I started.
Fenris pressed his finger to my lips. “Hush,” he whispered. “Don’t. Just...Can you help me stand?”
I slipped my arm beneath his shoulder and helped him to his feet. We both staggered under his weight, and I almost slipped on a foul-smelling puddle.
“Stop,” he panted.
He stumbled to the wall and bent over, gasping for breath. As I watched, a cold band of fear tightened around my chest. He was completely naked, of course. Transforming into the wolf would have shredded whatever clothing he had been wearing. And now he was weak as a newborn foal.
And me... The soldiers turned away in the torchlight, when Fenris barked at them. But when the sun rose, who in this city wouldn’t recognize my face? Stars knew I’d been paraded past enough people in Nøkkyn’s damn castle.
Where in the Nine Realms could we go to hide?
THE MONSTER AND THE PRISONER: CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The Complete Fenris Series Page 32
