Townsend, Lindsay - The Snow Bride (BookStrand Publishing Romance)

by Lindsay Townsend

“Hedda took particular care with a set of richly fashioned and dyed clothes that were very long in the legs and arms.”

  “Belonging to a tall, thin man.”

  “Exactly, and she kept them separate from the other clothes. She had a set that was just dry and those she put in a pack to take out. She would not let me go with her, she wept when I tried to do so, but I marked the direction she went and how long it was before she stumbled back into the washhouse. She had another set of similar clothes with her then, of the same kind, and she instantly set to washing those, as if she must make them ready for tomorrow. I asked her, as best I could, and she pointed at the sun, then at the sky where the noonday sun is.”

  “Each noon, eh? And on foot, through snow, there and back in under a day? Not so long or so far.”

  “No, less than an hour, I think, unless I rushed my prayers.”

  “She went alone? No escort?”

  “No.”

  “And you heard no wolves howling?”

  “No.”

  “Excellent! Close and secure and safe from wolf packs, it should be easy to find—I marvel I have not spotted the place already, during the hunt, or seen clearer tracks. Denzil must have drawn us away from that part. I wonder why.”

  Still with his eyes tightly shut, Magnus cracked his fingers and licked his lips, and again she thought how glorious he was, like a battle-scarred angel.

  “She returned with mistletoe berries,” Elfrida went on, saving the best news until last. “To decorate the Christmas feasting, she said.”

  “The mistletoe woods,” Magnus breathed, understanding everything, and now he opened his eyes. “That is enough. We can follow her tracks at daylight.”

  “Or follow her.” We, he said, not Mark or other of his men. We!

  “Indeed. Well done!”

  Her breathed hitched as he looked at her, pride and feeling shining in his eyes. “Should I ask for a reward?” she asked, “Or should I claim it?” She reared up in his arms and seized possession of his lowering mouth.

  His apple-sweet breath filled her as his lips fondled hers and their tongues touched and embraced. His eyes, brighter than candles, remained fixed on hers, only on her. Her loins quivered and tightened in response.

  “Little witch.” Each place he caressed tingled and yielded as if her body itself was singing, ringing like a church bell. She clawed at his tunic, longing to see him, taste him, touch him.

  “Easy there, dove eyes, we have all of tonight.” He snared her hands in his own, pulling her wrists above her head so she arched like a wave. “Tonight, you take my magic.” He kissed her navel through the cloth of her gown, and she shuddered. “Tonight your witchcraft sleeps in my arms. You will be seduced and beguiled, Elfrida, and sob and say my name.” He laid her down on the mass of cloaks and gently nipped her throat.

  “Magnus.” Dazed with desire, she tried to reach for him with her body and crush her breasts against his great chest, but fast as a striking wolf he rolled her onto her front, pinning her easily to the platform with his long legs.

  His beard tickled her ear as he leaned closer still. “Did I not say I take you tonight, my naughty elf?”

  “Yes,” she whispered, astonished at her own wantonness. She wanted this, she realized, moaning softly and lifting her hips to meet his gently sweeping fingers, running up the backs of her thighs.

  He rested his hand on her bottom. “Yes, sir?”

  “Yes, sir,” she repeated, her obedience acting as a sweet goad deep within her. She, who had never had a man before Magnus, who had been proud to call no man master, now ached to say the word.

  Above her, she heard Magnus suck in a long breath, as though startled, but when he spoke he was as steady as ever.

  “Should I chastise you for that lapse?” He drummed his fingers very lightly on the curves of her behind, and stars seemed to explode in her eyes. “’Tis a sweet temptation.”

  “Yes.” The word escaped before she even knew she would speak. “Sir,” she added hastily.

  * * * *

  He had only ever dreamed of this, Magnus thought, as he lifted and eased her over his lap, fulfilling and fueling a secret desire and loving mastery never acted upon. Since his battle scars, he had never presumed any woman would desire such tough yet tender play from him.

  Why had he even begun it with Elfrida? Because she looked so appealing, and he had wanted to make her smile, to tease her a little, to have her scold him a little. She was so vivid in her fury.

  I am in deep love indeed when I cannot wait for my wench to upbraid me.

  And, witch as she was, unexpected as ever, Elfrida had surprised him.

  He sat up, one leg curled and bent at the knee, the other straight out with Elfrida sprawled across it, swiftly breathing and tense, her whole slim frame expectant and submissive, stoking his own desire harder still.

  You too, eh, my dainty witch? And neither of us admitting before now. Admitting for him, he amended quickly, but knowing and learning for Elfrida. How could it be otherwise when she was a novice in the arts and coils of love?

  Sex magic, he thought, and smiled.

  “Comfortable?” he asked, making sure her head and upper body were pillowed on the cloaks.

  “I am,” she answered softly, wriggling a little to hide her face behind her arms, still shy of him—adorably shy, he thought, pierced by her trust.

  Remember that always, Magnus, and go steady. Be her gentle knight. Do not rush her.

  “Ready?” he murmured, combing his fingers through her long, soft flames of hair. Trust would mean relaxation and greater release for her.

  She nodded, only a tiny movement, but he felt her tummy shift against his thigh. “Sir.”

  Her acceptance and shy, blushing desire almost made him lose control. For several wild, heart-hammering moments he imagined tumbling her onto her back and having her, plunge in, dive in, ride on.

  But his own wounds had taught him in a harsh school of patience. Some pleasure was almost pain, but true pain was only pain, and he would never tear, never harm, never ram.

  “I love you, Elfrida,” he said and began.

  Love you, sir, she thought, too light-headed by then to speak. Hung across his knee, awaiting his sweetly punishing hand, she had lost all speech, including her own dialect. She could do nothing but luxuriate in her own vulnerability, secure that her ugly-handsome, loving knight would never hurt her.

  She had spoken of sex magic, but all charms and magic were beyond her. I never knew, she thought again, while the deepest part of her was calm. Magnus loved her, and he said he did, and she knew he did.

  He would fight for me. I have no need to ask. I am as womanly as any, and a witch besides.

  She was proud of herself and of her masterful knight, who had traveled to Jerusalem and who feared nothing, who could whistle any tune and who was kind. A man-angel in demon dress, her beast knight and snow knight.

  Trusting and beloved, she did not know if she had slept a moment or if time itself had slowed down for her.

  Her skirts were slowly lifted, and a delicious slither of cool air played upon her thighs. “You are a secret dream made real.” He pooled her skirts about her waist.

  “And you for me,” Elfrida whispered, closing her eyes, longing for his touch.

  “This is between us, is it not, and just us?”

  “Who else?” She yelped as Magnus pinched her thigh, very lightly.

  “Is it wise for you to dispute thus, when you are where you are and I am where I am?”

  “But you asked...sir.”

  She rolled slightly as Magnus chuckled. “I see we understand each other very well, little witch, and have no fear—you may argue as much as you please in any place and company save when we are in our bed.”

  “And then?” Elfrida goaded, “and here, now?”

  He fondled her behind, stroking softly between her legs. One long, slow caress and she whimpered, helplessly gripping the pillow of cloaks as a lightning jolt of pleasu
re erupted through her.

  “The first release of many.” Magnus kissed the back of her neck and flicked her earlobe with his tongue. “You are pink and rose and will be warmer yet.”

  She quivered, arching her back, thrusting her bottom higher into his cupped fingers. He feathered his hand across her behind, kissed her up and down her spine and purred a growling praise into her ear.

  “Such a perfect, round, pattable, spankable rump.”

  For you, all for you. She did not know she had spoken aloud until his roving fingers streaked down, cupping her intimate places. “Lovely Elfrida. Gorgeous, red-haired, amber-eyed, sweet-thighed, clever, caring, round-assed girl. But first, before I spank you...”

  He stroked and patted and caressed as he praised more, a mingle of old speech and his own. Hung over his knee, writhing and squirming, her loins tingling and on fire, her need and desire built and sharpened and then almost, almost exploded again.

  She gasped, hearing herself pleading and not caring, wanting only more and more of sir, of Magnus, of him.

  The fist smack landed, stinging, on her left cheek, followed swiftly by one to her right. “Yes!” she cried, as more light, quick, relentless slaps set her bottom and intimate parts and breasts into a throbbing jingle of mindless pleasure.

  “Such a lush and juicy ass.” Magnus still praised her, fondling her bottom, smacking each cheek, each spank a little harder, a little faster than the last. Again, her desire surged, and she begged him—harder, harder.

  “Have me!” she howled, lifting her quivering haunches to his smarting, spanking hands, wanting more and longing for him to drive himself into her.

  At last he turned her, raising her head and mouth to his. He tasted of salt and his own sweet maleness as his lips possessed, conquered, and teased. Rising into his embrace and climbing into his lap, she wrapped her arms around his broad, muscular back and heard his breath stop as their bodies collided. He scooped a big hand into her bodice, cupping one of her breasts and cursed as the smooth, rich fabric tore.

  “Rip it off me,” she whispered, reading that desire in his stark, scarred face.

  “Do not tempt me.” He growled. “Or I will do more.”

  She reared up, taking his mouth again, plunging her tongue between his teeth as she twisted her fingers through his black hair, taunting him. The heaviness of her limbs had been swept away by a sparkling desire, more heady than wine. “Do your worst, sir,” she whispered against his taut throat, rubbing her breasts against his hairy chest.

  A shooting star fleeing across the heavens, could not have been faster. In a dazzling blur of action, Magnus used the speed he had been famed for in the crusades and, gripping both sides of her gown so she would not be scored, rent it top to bottom. As she gasped at his strength, he tugged off his own clothes, allowing all to flutter in a puddle of dull and bright cloth by his feet.

  Still perched on one of his knees, she licked at his naked belly but missed. He had seen her slight movement and anticipated it, swooping his own head low and tonguing her navel, then lower. He caught her hands and held them easily by her wrists with his own, chuckling deep in his throat as she drummed her heels against his legs. It was like striking warm stone.

  “Shameless, you are,” he hissed against her. In a swirl of motion, he raised her off his lap then lowered her onto the wooden platform, kneeling down and keeping her in place by a warm, heavy arm. His left hand was already busy running up her thighs as he blew a loud kiss into her belly. “Here we are, out in a woodshed—”

  “No one comes after nightfall,” she countered, her voice rising as his questing fingers and now his tongue tracked over her shivering body, closer and closer to her hot, molten center.

  Clothes spilled everywhere as he finally entered her, almost knocking over the brazier in his single-minded ardor. His lovemaking wild and rutting, he slammed into her, their flesh smacking together in a blurring, fierce rhythm.

  For both it was intimate and exciting, tender and overwhelming. Magnus roared his pleasure, feeling no longer wounded or ugly. Elfrida knew rapture she had never known before, feeling no longer lonely or feared but cherished and desired.

  Chapter 15

  Cold woke Magnus, and the aching in his limbs. He found his tunic rolled under his head and three cloaks tugged round him. Elfrida was fanning new flames from the brazier and casting anxious glances his way. He smiled, and she broke off her task and hurried over.

  “Will you have some food?” She blushed, as if uncertain or uneasy of his mood. His heart ached in tenderness for her.

  “Yes, please.” He enjoyed being fussed over and tended and watched her closely, for the pleasure of staring. She had put on her blue gown, hiding the ripped side seams by belting it closely.

  “There has been more snow,” she remarked, bringing him a flask and half of the pie. He broke off a piece and offered it back to her, and she smiled. “You look well, Magnus.”

  His missing foot ached like the devil, but he was not about to admit that. “And you, my heart.”

  He patted the place beside him, and she came and settled at once. “We should learn each other’s tongue, do you not think?”

  “For certain, yes. How many languages do you know?”

  The rest of their sparse but delightful breakfast was taken up with snippets of London speech, Greek, Latin, Arabic, and French.

  Elfrida learned the words for mead or wine in all of these and then startled him afresh. “Will you be sick today?”

  “Sick?”

  “So you do not go out hunting.” She touched one of the amulets about her neck—strange how he had not noticed those last night, unless she had removed them all. “It brought little news and not much luck yesterday for you.”

  It was her tactful way of alluding to Denzil’s attempt to kill him, Magnus thought, as he finished the pie and yanked on his damp clothes. “Today, pray God, we shall do better,” he said.

  Elfrida nodded, her face solemn. Her amber eyes glittered. “I have a plan for that.”

  She told him, and he laughed then admitted that it might just work.

  We have to do something, Magnus thought. He opened the door to the wood store and stepped out into bright, fresh snow. Every day that passes and Christina is gone, the hunt grows harder. I wish to God I could remember that tall, skinny Denzil, and that the days were not so short.

  Elfrida wished that none of Magnus’s men were going hunting, even if, as Gregory Denzil claimed, the castle needed the meat. Leaving Magnus in the garderobe clutching his belly and pretending to be ill, she waved off the ragged group with their nets and spears, surprised to find herself sending even the flea-ridden Mark her wish for a safe journey. Mark’s devotion to Magnus had warmed her to him. In turn Mark was becoming less ill mannered toward her, always giving her a terse nod in greeting.

  Gregory Denzil had surprised her, too. With Magnus claiming he was sick, she had worried that Denzil might refuse to leave the keep himself and send out only a few men. Instead he seemed as keen to hunt as he had the previous day and took more than half his guards and soldiers with him.

  “You are still here, he thinks I am tied to the garderobe, and his men get restive if they feast too long,” Magnus observed when she climbed the stairs and waited on the garderobe landing until there was no passing page, maid, or squire to overhear their conversation. “What have you done with the three lads?”

  Elfrida guessed he meant Meat, Ale, and Pie. “I left them in the great hall.” She did not add they were playing dice.

  He scowled. “Dice and ale?” he guessed, with a snort. “They are supposed to be your escorts and with you for your safety.”

  She shrugged. “I can heed myself, Magnus. We should get on.”

  He looked her up and down, his eyes lingering on her tightly cinched waist and her careful use of her cloak pins to gather together and secure the torn side seams of her gown. She felt herself blush, conscious of the cloth brushing against her bottom like a hand. “Wh
at now?”

  As if sensing her confusion, he took her hand and kissed it. “Remember our agreement last night?” he asked gently. “We are peers by day and all places—in bed, too, if you will it,” he added, even more softly. “I am no bully, Elfrida.”

  “No, you are not,” she admitted, wishing all the same they could return to last night.

  He smiled and squeezed her fingers. “To business, then. You will need to be more warmly dressed.”

  “I will have my cloak.”

  “We shall both have better. I had a mind we should plot ahead. Yesterday on the hunt, I dropped a bundle into a holly bush outside the castle walls. We shall recover it when we follow the laundress.”

  “If she walks out today at noon.”

  “Why not? You say she has on other noondays.”

  “That is what I guessed, for she seemed most busy and particular and pointed at the sky most clearly. But I could not talk to her. And even if I guessed right, my plan may come to nothing.”

  “Your plan is as good as any. As for the woman, the squires can watch out for her and let us know if she goes out early.”

  “Do you think it will take long?”

  Magnus spread his one good hand. “’Tis in God’s arms. We must pray and hope. For me, I do not think it will be long. To be a guard is a toilsome job and to watch outside in winter, even on a day as bright as this, the worst of all. They will soon grow bored and keep more and more indoors, or out of the weather, at least.”

  “May it be so,” Elfrida muttered, making her words a wish-charm.

  She and Magnus put on their cloaks and returned to the great hall. There, Magnus explained to a disinterested, nose-picking guard with a gaping ulcer on his leg that they would take a stroll in the snowy pleasure garden of the castle.

  The guard yawned his assent and sent three young, beardless soldiers with them who kicked at snowdrifts and pulled ivy and honeysuckle off the snow-covered garden trellis. Soon the three had found a sunlit, windless spot between the stone walls of the keep and its gatehouse, and they watched out from there.

  Magnus winked at Elfrida, but she dared not smirk. So far, she thought, and began the next part of her plan. In plain sight of the youths, she brushed the snow from a frosted turf seat, wide enough for two, and sat down. Magnus settled beside her.