Simon's Lady (17 page)

“To bore you with them, yes,” he said. His hands left her hips and came to meet hers on his shoulders. He slid his fingers between hers. The cool appraisal in her beautiful eyes inspired him mightily. She had not misunderstood.

She drew a deep breath. “Why should I wish for you to bore me with the technicalities of tournament regulations?” she asked. Her voice was low and lilting and completely clear of its earlier obstruction.

“If you are not quite ready—” he drew her toward him and licked her lips, once, lightly “—for this.” He kissed her.

When he finished, her face was flushed, and not, he was pleased to note, with embarrassment. “Well, now,” she said. “We’ve agreed that it’s time, and that’s that.” She gave him a slight push, causing him to teeter, and thereby disengaged her fingers from his. Without waiting to see whether he lost his footing, she turned smartly and gracefully on the steps and began to mount them again. The swish of her hips just then was especially appealing.

His smile was very broad as he followed her up the stairs. It had not faded when they arrived at the door to his chamber, where the page was standing ready to bow them into the room. He dismissed the lad, and after Gwyneth preceded him into the chamber, he shut the door behind him with a great deal of anticipation. He was satisfied by what he saw around him.

He had ordered that a low fire be lit to take the damp and any chill from the room. He walked toward it to stir the embers. On the floor next to the hearth was the tray he had requested, on which sat two goblets of wine, a silver ewer and a bowl of fruit. The shutters of the high window to the exterior were half-closed, filtering the pastel glow of the dying day. Below the window, filling half the room, was the large bed, the covers of which had been turned down invitingly. The bed would serve the purpose, of course, but he was thinking that clean, crisp sheets were a poor second to the pleasures to be found on a riverbank.

He turned his back to the warm coals and saw Gwyneth standing in the center of the room. He reached out his hands, beckoning to her. She came forward obediently, her features composed, her eyes upon him, unwavering. The veil held by the circlet on her head fluttered gently as she walked, creating the effect of a gossamer halo or a transparent butterfly wing.

“You’ll be warmer here when you undress,” he said.

Her voice was low when she replied, “I’m not cold.”

“All the better then.”

When she was next to him, he dropped his hands to unclasp his belt. He let it fall to the floor, and his sword clattered beside it. His desire for her was flowing easily throughout his body. It was strong, but he was in control of it. Even so, he saw no need to wait for his satisfaction, and he intended to make full use of the long night ahead of them.

He pulled his tunic over his head and let it fall atop his belt. His shirt came off next and was added to the drift of clothing. He deftly undid his cross-garters and every other clasp that held him together. Shoes and chausses were cast aside, and he was naked before her, ready and rigid with husbandly intention.

He saw that Gwyneth had made no progress with her clothing beyond moving her right hand to the wrist of her left, where she was pulling at ties, rather ineffectually, it seemed to him. He made an impatient noise deep in his throat and moved toward her. He raised his hands to help with the absurd complexities of feminine apparel, but before he touched her, she looked up, and he saw deep in her violet eyes a start of surprise and another, darker emotion. Her eyes lowered quickly. When his hands came down on her shoulders, she flinched.

It was an involuntary reaction on her part, he knew. And it was so minimal that he might have missed it, except that he was too well experienced in the precise moment of hand -to-hand contact on the field where the world came into the sharp focus of kill or be killed. He was also well experienced in adjusting strategies to varying goals, understood vulnerability as only a strong man could and distinguished sharply between harm and pleasure. He raised her chin. Her lashes fluttered up. He was not entirely surprised, but was truly impressed by the look of stout defiance deep in her violet eyes. He saw now that she was afraid of him but had so masked her fear that even he, who could smell the faintest whiff of it, had not sensed it.

The situation was plain. It was equally plain what he was going to do about it. He knew how to preserve her dignity, and he wanted to rouse her desire. He did not say bluntly, “You have no need to fear me.” He did not say pityingly, “You’ve been abused.” He did not say chivalrously, “If Canute of Northumbria were not already dead, I would kill him.”

What he said was, “You have properly forewarned me, my lady, and I’m unarmed, as you see.” He looked down at himself, unashamed of his nakedness and his naked desire. “You’ll understand that I need to check you for knives.”

He liked the shift of emotions in her eyes as she registered his statement, and the color that came to her pale cheeks. He was aware of the rise and fall of her breasts not far from his chest as she took a deep breath. He raised his hands slowly and deliberately to her head and removed the circlet. He turned slightly to toss it atop the pile of his own clothing. The veil followed, billowing softly in its descent.

He touched the braids knotted at her nape. She seemed to relax, and he spread his fingers through the knot, loosening it. Then he partially combed out her braids with his fingers and permitted himself an “Ahh” of satisfaction at the feel of her hair in his hands. He leaned forward and pressed his lips to her neck. He murmured, “No knives here that I can see.”

He raised one of her arms so that he could untie the laces that held together the front and back panels of her bliaut. This over-shift soon fell into a puddle at her feet, and then there was only her kirtle and the laces of one sleeve left to undo. He continued as if searching for hidden weapons. He commented, “Only curves. No sharp points.” He held up her wrist to unlace her sleeve. When the laces were free, he pulled the kirtle over her head, causing her hair to tumble and tangle in disorder down her back. He tossed the gown atop the circlet and veil.

She stood before him in her light shift, the outline of her body visible beneath the transparent cloth. He had become impatient. He thought that undressing her was as much a waste of time as dancing with her. He eyed the neckline and knew that he could strip it from her with the force of one finger.

She must have read the look in his eyes, for she rasped quietly, “Don’t rip it.” She paused and met his eyes. “Please.” Her hands came to the ribbon at her breasts, and she began to fumble with it.

He reined in his impatience. He lifted his hands to hers and pulled the ribbon. As slowly as he was able, he pushed the shift from her shoulders so that it lay with the bliaut at her feet. His eyes swept her naked beauty. His hands did the same. He paused to reconsider his predilection for hips and caressed her breasts at length, marveling in their shape and feel. He bent to kiss their tips. He swirled his tongue over milky pink roses and sucked gently. He had the errant, unworthy, wholly delicious thought that he had been too hasty in denying the need for the bedding ceremony. He would have dearly loved to see the look on Senlis’s face upon beholding Gwyneth’s body. Still, he hardly needed or cared for the approval of a male audience to know the value of what he was holding and touching, kissing and caressing.

He placed her hands on his shoulders, ran his palms from her armpits down her sides to come to rest briefly on her hips then continued over her buttocks. He pressed her to him, groaning in anticipation. He leaned into her farther, traced the backs of her thighs to the tender underside of her knees, then back up and over her spine to her shoulders and across her arms, which were stretched around his neck. His hands held hers, his elbows raised and propped on her shoulders.

He nuzzled both sides of her neck. Then he bent his lips to hers. “So far, I’ve discovered no fearsome weapons concealed on your person,” he said, “but I’ve one last place to look.” The kiss she gave him was almost what he wanted. “Can you guess where?” he asked.

She blushed and shook her head.

He moved against her, nudged her legs apart with his knee. He dropped his arms to her waist to support her. “Afraid to guess, my lady?” he said, frankly taunting.

She gasped, but met him taunt for taunt. “Show me.”

He did. He dropped down on his knees before her. He bent his head to place one cheek, then the other, against her abdomen, and stretched his neck against the fine triangle of curls at the apex of her thighs. Involuntarily the thought,
daughters,
came to him, and he was pleased. He raised his head so that his lips and nose were at her waist. He was intoxicated by the feel of her skin and her scent. The top of his head grazed the full curves of her breasts, then he rose to his feet and moved one hand behind her, boldly splaying it over her buttocks. The other hand he placed delicately, but unhesitatingly, at the front of her thighs. He pushed his fingers between them, gliding them over her, pausing a moment at the opening that existed for him. He found it dry.

He perceived another problem now, a different one than he ordinarily encountered, for he had never had experience with unwilling or unready women. His own desire was surging and might have, under other circumstances, lost its direction in frustration and found outlet in violence; and if he had not already been attuned to her fear, he might have determined that her coldness was the one flaw in the jewel that was his wife. However, this night he felt protected by the Norns. He had been blessed by the three weird women and felt guided by them and inspired by them.

Again, he knew just what to do. He kissed her sweetly. He lifted her in his arms and carried her to the bed. “I’m reassured that no sharp knives await me,” he said, “but there may be other dangers in store.” He laid her down on her back upon the bed and stretched out next to her on his side. He arranged her legs so that her knees were bent, her feet flat on the bed and near her buttocks, her legs spread a fraction. “I need for you to clarify a story.”

“A story?”

He smiled a little and propped his head in his right hand. With his left, he began to move his fingers lightly from her neck to her breasts to her abdomen. “The other evening, you told me about the god Tyr.”

Her eyes were open, and she looked at him warily. “The one who was supposed to treat his wife well.”

He slanted her a pointed glance. “Exactly.” His fingers stroked her abdomen and moved to the inside of her thighs, up to her knees, one at a time, and back down again. His hand came to rest atop the golden triangle of curls. “You told me the story of how Tyr lost his hand.”

“I did.” Her voice was cautious.

His fingers began to move in small circles. “You told me that the giant wolf, Fenrir—the child of the god Loki and an evil giantess, I believe—seemed harmless at first and was allowed by the gods to wander free. Is that right?”

“That’s right,” she said, curious.

He slipped his fingers between her legs and touched her intimately. Then, before her very wide eyes, he brought his fingers to his lips and wet them with his tongue. He touched her again, this time with very different effect.

“But then Fenrir grew so fierce,” he continued, “that the Norns warned he would cause Odin’s death if something was not done. Now the gods could not pollute the sacred ground of Asgard by simply killing Fenrir, so they had to devise a way to restrain him. Is that right?”

“That’s right,” she said again, somewhat breathless.

“So they decided to play a trick. They asked Fenrir to test the strength of an iron chain they had made. They tied it round him, hoping he would be unable to break it, but he escaped easily. So they tried with ever-stronger chains. Once, twice, three more times, and he broke them all. Then they went to the dwarves for magic. Is that right?”

She moaned an affirmative. She was responding to the delicate movement of his fingers between her thighs. They were sliding and gliding and drawing ripe, rounded desire from deep inside her.

“The dwarves made the gods a magic silken ribbon that was unbreakable, but Fenrir was suspicious by now. When he saw the strange ribbon, he refused to be tied by it. The gods promised to free him if the ribbon proved too strong, but he did not trust them. At last Fenrir agreed to the test if one of the gods would put a hand in his mouth as a sign of good faith while he made the attempt. The gods hesitated, then Tyr put his hand between Fenrir’s teeth.”

He was losing the threads of his own story, and it was taking all of his self-control not to respond now to the liquid desire he was producing between her legs.

He made an effort to continue. “So Fenrir was tied up and soon found that however he strained, the bonds got tighter. The wolf wanted to be released, but the gods refused to free him. So he clamped his jaws shut and bit off Tyr’s hand. Is that right?”

She nodded and managed to breathe the trembling question, “What is the clarification you need?”

He stilled the work of his fingers, then withdrew his hand. “I’ve still got it,” he said with a note of relief and desire, as if he had just removed his hand unscathed from the jaws of the raging and dangerous giant wolf. He parted her legs as he might open a sacred book—not a religious one, but rather a sorcerer’s manual, full of dark secrets and black magic, one he knew he should not open, one he could not resist. He rolled on top of her and settled himself between her legs.

“What I’d really like to know,” he said in a low voice, into her neck, “is whether your story was not something of a trick itself. It occurs to me that Tyr might just as easily have lost his hand between the ravenous legs of his wife as he tried to please her.”

“Tyr’s wife?” she asked.

“Yes, his very beautiful foreign wife,” he answered. “The one who was supposedly weak and peaceful but who was, in truth, most clever, I think.” He pressed his manhood against her opening. “And if that’s the case, I’d like to know what happened to him when he joined, this like, with her.”