by Alana Serra
When she finally reached his face, she was surprised by what she found there. She’d never seen one of the Raknari before. Few in her village ever had, and the illustrations that accompanied the stories were none too kind. They painted them as trollish creatures, more akin to mountain ogres or hobgoblins than what she saw before her.
Strong, square jaw. Sharp cheekbones. Slender, pointed ears. Elegant, snow-white lashes. Piercing, ice blue eyes. And long hair that looked like spun moonlight, gathered into a braid that hung against his back. There was something regal about him, and she knew instantly he was Kiova’s Chosen—the Storm Lord of the Frozen Peak.
He was at once beautiful and dangerous, sparking something inside of her that surprised Imara even more than the sight of him. She felt a sudden ache in her fingers, in her body, to touch and be touched in return. To determine the nature of those runes with fingers and tongue. It was a sudden, carnal need, like the burning of some primal fire, and it very nearly carried her toward him.
But reality swept back in as he spoke. His voice had a richness to it, like the rough embrace of a bitterly cold wind, but his words were what truly made her feel winter’s bite.
“I see you’ve put up a temple to a false god since my people were here last.” His gaze fell upon the tallest building in the village. “Yet you remember the Tempests in your time of need. How convenient.”
“I would gladly build a shrine to Kiova if it will appease her, my Lord,” her father said, Imara’s gaze snapping to him.
Was he truly going to grovel? Now, when his people needed him to be strong?
“You deal with me first,” the Storm Lord said, his eyes flashing with a pale light, the runes on his body changing to that same color.
Icy wind howled around the village, pulling snow into a vortex that closed ever inward. She could feel the chill of it even through her clothes. Inside, her anger burned hot enough to fight against it.
“You already have the advantage,” she bit out. “Would you like to unlace your trousers and wave your cock around, or shall we get on with it?”
The Storm Lord’s eyes widened in surprise, and for a brief moment Imara thought she was going to be killed on the spot. Or perhaps worse than that. The way he looked at her now, a slow smirk curving his lips, she thought he might treat her as her family intended him to treat her sister.
A shameful frisson of excitement warmed her belly. She squared her jaw, lifting her chin in defiance.
“Imara!”
Whatever foolishness she’d been feeling, her mother’s voice doused it, though her anger remained.
“My daughter does speak the truth,” her father admitted. “We are at a disadvantage. You would be within your rights to ask anything of us, but I hope you will honor the old ways.”
There was laughter from beyond the Storm Lord, and for the first time, Imara noticed the others. Four of them, spread out behind him on their great cats. All were pale, with that thin sheen of icy blue covering their skin like armor, yet none of the others were covered in runes.
Their leader held up a hand and they quieted instantly. As did the storm that raged around the village.
“Understand I do this because Kiova wills it. I will pact with you, Chieftain, but what happens to your village once that pact is fulfilled is not my concern.”
“But you will pact with us.”
The Storm Lord nodded and Imara’s stomach twisted. They were going to talk terms, and that meant…
“Then I offer the greatest honors I can give you. Half of my own gold, as well as an heirloom that has been passed down from chieftain to chieftain for centuries.”
Her father began to remove the amulet around his neck—the one he’d let no other soul touch, and was never seen without—but the Storm Lord waved a dismissive hand.
“Useless. Your currency is meaningless to me, and I have no need of your mundane trinkets.”
The chieftain blanched, a pained expression coming over him. “A quarter of our yield shall be forfeit to you, once our crops produce and our hunters can find game again. We—”
“A yield you will only be able to achieve with my help. I should claim more of it.”
“And leave our people starving?” Imara snarled, unable to stop herself. “Why bother pacting with us at all if that’s your goal?”
Again the Storm Lord’s icy gaze settled on her, and again she felt a tingle dance along her spine.
“Imara, please,” she could hear the tears in her mother’s voice, felt her desperate hands attempting to pull her close as though she were a child again. “Don’t make this even harder than it is.”
She wanted to rage, to snap back that it wouldn’t have to be so hard if Father wasn’t agreeing to the unthinkable. But as she looked over at him, she saw he’d grown sallow. He looked ill, weak, and so unlike the man she knew that Imara was struck dumb.
He hadn’t intended on offering a payment in flesh. He’d honestly hoped to avoid it. She could see it in his eyes, in the sheer desperation that settled over him like a thick cloud.
But he stood taller, straighter, firming his resolve. Imara knew exactly what was coming.
“Then I offer something which is priceless to me. Something I do not give you lightly, Storm Lord.”
“I’m listening.”
“My youngest daughter. She is even-tempered, kind, and gracious. She will keep a good home and do as you bid.”
Bile rose in Imara’s throat. Keep a good home. Do as he bade. True, she and Elora had both been taught from a young age that such a role was possible and respected, but to be forced into it on behalf of someone who would not even see her as an equal partner? Bad enough she’d have to spread her legs and welcome him into her body, but now she was expected to be his housekeeper, as well?
As distant as he could be, she’d always loved her father. In this moment, Imara hated him with an unbridled fury that burned away every rational thought she might have had. All she could see was sweet Elora degraded, humiliated, forced to endure day after day until she finally broke.
She couldn’t let that happen. She wouldn’t.
Hands balled into tight fists, chin raised high, Imara took a step forward. Away from her parents and her sister. Toward the hell that awaited her. Toward the future she’d decided for herself in a fraction of a second.
“I’ll serve your pact, Storm Lord, but I’m not going to clean up after you.”
“Imara, stand down,” came her father’s booming voice, drowning out her mother’s tearful plea and the shocked murmurs of the crowd.
Elora was the only other person she heard clearly. “Immy, no.”
Her sister rushed toward her, clinging to her like she did when she was much younger. Her eyes were wide and watery, stricken with so much fear that it nearly paralyzed Imara.
“You can’t do this,” she cried. “This isn’t your choice to make.”
“They need you here, El. You’ll make the better leader. Everyone knows it,” Imara whispered, tilting her head down to touch her forehead to her sister’s.
Her sister looked up at her, looked through her, and Imara did her best to make her understand. She held her tight, gripped her furs so hard that her fingers hurt. She relied on and even exploited the fact that her sister had a mind for the greater good in a way Imara never would.
And slowly, she saw that aching, miserable acceptance settle into her fair features.
“I thought you said self-sacrifice was unattractive,” she whispered, fighting back tears.
It won’t matter where I’m going.
Imara kept the thought to herself and just squeezed her sister tighter. “I love you, El. Don’t ever forget that. I—”
A heavy thud hit the hard-packed earth behind her, and Imara knew without looking that her new captor loomed. As he came closer, her agitation grew, until she whirled on him like a mother wolf protecting her cub.
“Could you give us a moment?”
“This is not the ‘even-tempered,
kind, and gracious’ one,” he noted, the slightest hint of amusement cracking his severe countenance.
“No, my Lord. This is a misunderstanding, and we will—”
“I will take her.”
Those intensely cold eyes bored into hers, cutting so deep that Imara could scarcely breathe. If she’d been hoping for some other way out of this, that her father might perhaps grow a spine and shield both of them, she wasn’t going to be granted it.
With those four words, her fate was sealed. From this day forth, she belonged to the Storm Lord.
Chapter 3
As Rheor looked down at the tiny, fragile creature who’d offered herself to him with little hesitation, he was keenly aware of just how easy it would be to break her.
She was much smaller than him, the top of her head only reaching the middle of his chest. She was much too thin, to the point where he suspected the furs she wore were her only protection against the cold, and the only thing slightly bulking out her form. There was a bow slung over her back—something of mundane make, without a trace of magical energy about it. Easy to snap in half like a frozen twig. A skinning knife was tucked into her belt, but that, too, was dull and lifeless.
She would be utterly defenseless. Oh, she would fight. One look at her defiant green eyes was enough to tell him that much. Hair like flame from the Molten Peak, skin flushed with pink, he knew she would fight him like a feral Machai cub.
She might even be worth the trouble. There were some curves to her, slight as they may be. And while she was small, her spirit would likely make her an eager partner in his bed, once he had her at his mercy. She would never simply lie back and let him rut without any response whatsoever, as some women did. Those blunted little claws of hers would rake at his back, her straight, unimpressive teeth would clamp down on his flesh, and she would rise to meet every thrust as he drove into her.
His cock twitched beneath his leathers, a rush of heat flooding his body and speeding southward. Some primal part of him was tempted to have her now; to assert his claim before these humans and his fellow Raknari. But that was the old way. The way of brutish instinct, with little care for the consequences or the image of how a leader should conduct himself. Perhaps if he were a common-born Raknari with only the barest handle over Kiova’s bitter cold. But were he only that, the humans would not have agreed to pay him in the flesh of one of their females.
He looked past the flame-haired woman, toward a man with graying blond hair. There was pain in his eyes—the pain of loss—and it struck Rheor harder than it had any right to. His jaw squared and he steeled himself. He didn’t need to feel a kinship with this man. They had nothing in common. Humans were weak, pathetic creatures who took from the land and never gave back. They’d abandoned the Tempests, and now they expected Kiova to provide for them.
She would, though, in her way. Acting through Rheor, she would bless this waste of good farmland and permit these humans to live another season. And in return, Rheor could only hope she would end her torment and cease tightening her icy fingers around his neck.
For that was the real reason he’d responded to the chieftain’s summons. He had no interest in gold, jewels, or crop yields. The price of a whore had been a luxury suggested to him by his men. A way to warm a bed that had long since been empty, and nothing more. While something seemed to draw him to this woman in particular, she still wasn’t reason enough to make such a ridiculous, one-sided pact.
In truth, his one and only hope was to regain Kiova’s favor.
Rheor was uncertain how he’d lost it, though he had a strong guess. For years now his powers had slowly grown beyond his control. Using them left him exhausted, and on the few occasions when he allowed his emotions to get the best of him, it seemed all four of the Tempests had a hand in the storm that followed. There was every chance he’d caused the endless winter that hung over Kiova’s domain, and while he had no care for the encroaching humans—they were little more than chattel in the grand scheme of things—the delay of spring meant the land could never rest and the other Tempests would never be given their due.
Considering how territorial they were and how often they bickered among themselves, the result of such a thing would be disastrous.
And that was not even counting the fact that Rheor could feel himself fading away. It was more prevalent after he used his powers, as if he gave a piece of himself that was never to be returned. But every day that passed seemed to make him weaker in mind, body, and spirit, even as the magic within him raged ever stronger.
So he’d agreed to a pact. He could have simply stopped the winter storms of his own accord, with no recompense, but the chieftain wished to honor tradition, and Rheor was not inclined to give gifts with no expectations attached to them.
“The pact is made,” he announced, giving their chieftain a curt nod. “Take her to an empty residence. That one there,” Rheor chose a hovel at random, pointing it out to his men, “ensure I am not disturbed.”
He heard the sharp intake of breath and looked down at his little human. Her eyes blazed with fire and fury enough to melt all the ice that clung to the Frozen Peak. But there was something else there, too. Something primal that called to him, warming his blood, making his cock throb beneath his breeches. Had she been truly afraid of him, truly resistant, he would have passed her off to someone else to handle what chores a human could manage and that would be the end of that.
But she wanted him. He could see it, sense it, practically feel the spark that lit between them. She might resist him at first, but Rheor knew she would eventually come to his bed willingly, her belly lowered to the mattress, her pert rump up in the air, her cunt pink and wet and welcoming. He would take her in the way all whores were taken, and she would angle her hips back against him and rub desperately at her little bud while he thrust into her. Then he would fill her with his seed, mark her with his icy brand, and have her again when she begged him once more.
“If you will allow me to say farewell to my daughter, my Lord,” the chieftain said, stepping forward.
He would have allowed it, but his new prize—Imara, they’d called her—spoke up first. “Just take me wherever you’re going to take me and let’s get this over with.”
There was a fine tremble in her voice, and Rheor was uncertain if it was fear or anger. His gaze narrowed at the chieftain. Had he harmed her in some way? A man causing harm to a vulnerable woman—a daughter, a younger sibling, a partner—was punishable with a lashing under his rule, and exile if no remorse was shown or if it continued. For a man in power to do such a thing was unthinkable to him, and he considered ending the pact right then and there. He could take the young woman away from this place, give her a life where she would be safe. He could protect her, care for her, and perhaps—
No. The thought came out in a growl in his mind. There was no place for such warmth in his life. He’d allowed it once. He would never make that mistake again.
“Imara… I did what had to be done. You know this. You can’t punish me for doing my duty as chieftain,” the man said, continuing to step forward.
Rheor put himself between the blond man and his flame-haired daughter. He glowered down at the human, meeting his green eyes in an icy glare. To his credit, the chieftain didn’t shrink away. He also wasn’t stupid enough to persist.
“No,” Imara agreed with a bitter laugh, “but I can punish you for not doing your duty as a father.”
Kost and Skaul had jumped down from their mounts and Imara walked toward them, allowing them to lead her to the nearest residence. From the smell of damp straw, it seemed to be a barn of some sort. Rheor watched as two of his trusted warriors checked the interior, then ushered her inside before standing guard in front of the wooden doors.
“The rest can be brought to the foot of the mountain. You will find a cave there that glistens when struck by the midday sun. Store everything inside of it. I will send someone to retrieve the goods within a fortnight.”
“You have
my word, my Lord,” the chieftain said, chasing the pain from his voice. With one of his daughters bartered away and the other clinging to her sobbing mother, the man finally seemed to locate his spine. “Are we to wait a fortnight for you to uphold your end of the bargain, as well? The most vulnerable people in my village may not live that long in this weather.”
Rheor looked around them, at the winds that encroached on the village, held back only by the flimsiest of stone walls. The roofs were damaged from hailstones, the ground was frozen over, the trees had been stripped of leaves and bark alike, and he couldn’t hear anything stirring beyond the walls. While the storm was fairly mild as far as Kiova’s wrath was concerned, the human spoke the truth.
And if he was ever to regain the favor of the goddess, he would need to extend some faith—even to those who didn’t believe.
“I will clear the storm,” he said, and the chieftain’s relief was palpable, “but know that I can bring it back with a snap of my fingers should you fail to uphold your end of the pact.”
“Understood.”
The chieftain’s gaze was steely, and for a brief moment, he gave the impression not of a man who was desperate and groveling, but of a proud leader who resented having to offer his dignity—and his daughter—at the altar of the Tempests. Rheor felt a grudging respect bloom within him, and he inclined his chin briefly.
“Stand away from me,” he told the gathered humans.
None of them dared to defy him. Rheor even sent his beast away, the overgrown kitten giving a mournful call as it stepped away from the clearing. Considering how erratic his powers had been as of late, it was best if he had space in which to work. Space in which to fail, perhaps, though he desperately hoped that wasn’t the case. He cared little if the humans thought him weak. They would be wrong, and proven as such the instant they ever tried to act on that belief.
