“Annh!”
With Marrok filling me deeper and deeper with every thrust my own frenzy swept over me. Matching Marrok rhythm-to-rhythm, motion-to-motion, I echoed in Lyn below what he was doing in me above.
Arching against me, Lyn wrapped her legs around us both. At her touch, Marrok growled into my ear and doubled his speed. I was as ready as he.
He flattened over me, hips shaking, his staff deep within jerking in ecstasy.
His.
Mine.
I thrust that final ecstasy into Lyn and she responded with a cry both wild and raw. She clenched around me, draining me just as I clenched around Marrok, drawing into me all that he had to give.
Then we kissed—whose lips on whose I didn’t know.
We rode till Vespers, passing from forest to farmland until the road opened out onto the hold of whatever lord ruled these lands. His castle was a functional one—small and lean and well-fortified. Home of a landed noble if not a wealthy one. Pennants of blue fluttered along its bare walls.
A spreading elm guarded its doors. A shield as blue as midnight hung from one of the low branches, and beside the shield a matching horn. I smiled. I’d almost forgotten what it meant to be a champion.
Dismounting, I blew three great blasts upon the horn before either Marrok or Lyn could dissuade me.
“You know what you’ve just done,” Lyn admonished.
“I called upon the lord of these lands,” I said. “Lodging or challenge will be ours now.”
“If you’re a monk upon the road it would be lodging. But you two… Why do men love to fight so?”
“Not love, duty,” I pointed out.
“If you set yourself to master other men,” Marrok added, “you have to prove to be their master.”
Lyn frowned. “There’s only one man I wish to see mastered right now, and I need at least one of you alive to do it. Don’t forget your duty to me. To Nessie.”
“Never,” I swore. But duty in this time of Arthur was a complicated thing. I rummaged through our packs for my golden helm.
When the great doors rolled out, it was clear my challenge would be answered. Trailed by a half-score knights and squires, the lord of the castle came, his steel-blue helm in one hand and a sapphire-hilted sword in the other. The scales of his armor glinted with a hint of the blue of the forge, perfect complement to the blued-leather hauberk on which they hung. The young man following him most closely carried his shield, twin to the indigo one that hung like a proclamation in the elm.
“What business have you here?” The lord’s voice was strong, though he’d likely seen a quarter century in the lists. Mid-forties, perhaps, nearing fifty, gray already salting in his beard. That he still met each challenger himself was surprising yet commendable.
“These men travel in my name,” Lyn said, speaking before either Marrok or I could. “We’re on a desperate quest, one that brought us, inadvertently, to your door.”
Inadvertently? I scowled, but held my tongue. Rank here was as complicated as duty, but Lyn held it above Marrok who, knight that he was, held it above me, fourth son of a petty king.
“I saw your coming, my Lady, and theirs. I cannot let you pass without challenge.”
“Saw?” Lyn asked.
“I know your quest. I’ve been waiting for you.”
“A righteous man who knew why we ride would offer us food and lodging and help us on our way.”
“A righteous man would,” the lord-knight agreed, weariness and regret heavy in his tone. “But I’ve not been righteous for a long, long time. Send me your champion. Let’s get this done.”
Marrok and Lyn both slid from their horses as I settled my helm in place. Exasperation sharp in Lyn’s eyes, she drew on my left gauntlet and Marrok my right. He shoved my shield into my hand and strapped it on. Lyn handed me my sword. Reluctant squires both, but efficient ones.
“Get it done quickly,” Lyn whispered, “and without hurt. If he truly knows who we are, I want to know how.”
“Your kitchen knave will do his best.” I bowed, half-mockingly, glad for the helm between my cheek and her hand by the glare she stabbed my way. I grinned back.
“Not too quickly,” Marrok said, and by the wist in his voice I knew he envied that it was me not him to face the lord-knight.
In all honesty, for whatever reason I wore the armor, it felt right to be readying for the fight. There were few things my body seemed born to. Pleasuring the two who stood behind me now was one of them. Swinging a sword was another.
I bowed my respect to the Blue Knight—to his age, his experience, his station. I had no doubt he would acquit himself well.
We circled one another and feinted once or twice, assessing the other’s mettle, his stance, how he held his blade. This part of the dance where we made our introductions was a particular favorite of mine. Not that I would draw it out beyond its usefulness, but duels were often decided in these few moments before blades ever touched. Weakness and strengths could often be read in these moments. Fear and confidence became readily apparent.
The Blue Knight moved with a fluid grace that belied his age. He held his blade with the easy confidence that came from experience. There was no rush nor hurry to his steps. No hesitation in his manner. He expected to win. Not arrogantly as was the wont of some who compensated with great brutes of weapons with which to power down their foes. Just purposely, matter-of-factly, secure in the outcomes of all the battles that had come before.
I felt a moment of sadness, of regret. Arrogant whoresons were the easy ones to best. The simple, stouthearted men who fought for love and duty… Their losses pained my soul.
But what had begun would not be un-begun. This Blue Knight would fight well. I would learn from him, spar with him, and enjoy the dance with him while it lasted.
Patiently, he awaited me. In ceding the lead to me, did he know he’d already ceded victory?
When I lunged forward the circle of spectators faded from thought. There were only two of us now in the world. My eyes and breath were for him alone. Every move I made I made for him. His sword slithered across the top of my shield. I drove the hilt of my blade into his. We thrust, fell apart, then thrust again.
The sun’s slanting rays caught my golden shield in a blinding blaze, swallowing the midnight blue of him in shadow. I waited till the moment passed, till the sun’s reflected glory no longer bathed my golden body—scales and helm—in light too bright to look upon. Waited until the Blue Knight could see again, until he crashed against me, beating at my shield, desperate now to find me, touch me, blood me.
I met his eyes across the distance, heard his panting need between his impatient strokes.
“Now!” The cry came to my ears from a distance. Was it my lady’s plea or a command?
Whichever, I obliged.
My sword snaked out in a wraparound blow that took the Blue Knight from behind, half-stunning him. I fumbled for a moment at the laces to his helm then stripped it from him. There was no terror in his wide eyes, only death.
“Do it.”
I stepped in close then, back-to-front, my steeled cheek resting on his bearded one. Then I drew my arm across his throat and clenched him to me in a suffocating embrace. He jerked in my arms, once, twice, and on the third time I lowered him to the ground, surrendering him there in victory.
The Blue Knight’s men crowded to his side. Lyn and Marrok appeared at my shoulders, watching the Blue Knight with expectant eyes.
He coughed, drew in a breath that rasped from throat to chest, and opened his eyes.
Only then did Lyn’s hands slip along my shield arm to unbuckle the strap between elbow and wrist, while Marrok worked the helm from my head.
The Blue Knight’s men helped him sit.
“Wh—” He cleared his throat and tried again. “Who are you?”
Lyn’s face fell. “You don’t know? But you said you saw our coming!”
“I know you’re sister to the captive the Red Knight holds. And
I know these men are your champions. But I don’t know who you are.”
“My sister! What do you know about her?”
The knight shook his head. “That she’s held, nothing more.”
Marrok stooped beside him, intimidating enough that the Blue Knight’s men shifted away from him. “How do you know?”
“The Red Knight—Ironside—is my brother.”
Beside me, Lyn went very still. Darkness gathered in her eyes and Marrok’s.
“He is not his brother,” I reminded them. “Let him speak.”
“What is there to say?” he asked. “My brother and I have held little love for one another for many years. Two nights ago his mistress came to me in a dream, said you’d be hunting the sister they held. That I was to challenge you when you came.”
“If you bear them no love,” Marrok asked, “why did you challenge?”
“He was compelled,” Lyn said. “He had no choice.” She let out her anger at the Blue Knight in a long and shuddering sigh.
“I’m Gareth of Orkney, that’s Sir Marrok of Bromdale, and the Lady Lynette of Castle Savage.”
“Persant of Inde, lord of this small glen.” He glanced from me to his men and back to me again. “What now? I have thirty strong knights. We’re yours to dispose of.”
“I require no men. But my liege Arthur does. Present yourself at Camelot at Martinmas. My gift to him.”
Lyn took my hand. “Thirty knights against Ironside, if we ask them.” Hope glimmered in her eyes.
“And my brother has twice that and more,” Persant said. “We’d be slaughtered in battle. No, champion against champion would be your best course. Except…” Holding me eye-to-eye he struggled to rise. His squire and Marrok helped lift him to his feet.
Whatever he was going to say he seemed to think better of. With a stern shake of his head he turned away.
“Except what?” Lyn cried, grasping at his arm.
Persant looked into the soul-depths of Lyn’s grief and flinched. But he shook his head again. “It’s my brother’s secret, not mine.”
“It’s my Nessie’s life!”
“You’ll find it out soon enough. Know this. He has no chivalry. Don’t think twice—set both your champions upon him at once. And even then, pray.”
“But…he’s just a man.”
“No.” Persant’s voice was quiet. “He isn’t.” He turned to a tall, white-bearded man among those who attended him. “See to our guests, Ranulf. I’ll be in the chapel. I have sins to atone.”
We didn’t see Persant at table that night or before Lyn was led away to the household’s boudoir and Marrok and I were shown to the Blue Knight’s own bed.
“With his gratitude for the mercy you showed him today,” the seneschal said as he closed the door behind him.
I doubted he knew just how much gratitude Marrok and I planned to show each other this night.
Chapter 25
Gareth
We stripped by the light of the brazier, damning propriety that forced Lyn to sleep apart from us but glad enough for the lord’s wide bed.
Would I ever tire of the sight of Marrok naked by firelight? His every muscle rippled for the pleasure of my eyes alone, the deep shadows accentuating the highlit beauty of the knight. My knight. I hungered for him, but without the blinding urgency of nights past. Tonight we could go slowly, could enjoy the whole of one another without the wanton rush toward consummation.
“Shall we make this night last?” I asked as I led him to the bed.
“For as long as you want it to.”
My lips were on his, his hand cupped around my flank, my hand stroking the iron muscles of his thigh when the chamber door creaked open. We froze. Was it the lord-knight needing something from his cell? Perhaps Lyn had found her way here?
When a decidedly feminine form slipped through by the dying firelight, I relaxed. Marrok, though, dropped his hand from me and sat up. When a second lady entered after the first, I elbowed my way up in surprise. I drew the edge of the bed sheet over my hips, but Marrok didn’t make any such move to modesty.
“Who are you?” His tone was cold.
“Gifts,” the one nearest replied. She was young. My age perhaps, or a season or two shy. And her face in firelight as she neared the bed was lovely. As lovely as the second lady’s, for as she neared, I saw they were twinned.
“Who sends gifts such as you?” Marrok demanded, surprising me with the continued hard edge to his voice.
“A grateful father who wishes to thank you for your mercy.”
“And one who wishes to ensure you fight well when you meet with his brother. He sends us here to give you strength.”
“Like Lot who offered up his daughters,” said the first.
“And Lot was a good man, wasn’t he?” said the second. “Just as our father is a good man.”
Bewildered yet, I spoke the first thing that entered my head. “My father is called Lot, named for the man of Scripture.”
The first damosel turned earnest eyes on me. “And is your father not a good man?”
“A good king actually. Just misguided at times.”
“And you think that’s what we are—a misguidance?” asked the first.
“Even if we told you we’d be here even without our father’s blessing?” asked the second.
The first of the damosels stirred the brazier fire back to life, setting the twin beauty of their faces aglow, reflecting the heartfelt worship in their eyes. They turned to each other then, and slowly, deliberately, slipped each other’s nightshifts over their heads.
Pale skin made paler by the night was revealed, inch by anticipated inch. I stole a glance at Marrok, who’d gone very still, entranced as much now by their nakedness as by their twinness. His breath was already quickening.
As was the rest of him.
As was I.
Proud of their bodies—and rightly so, as twin roses from a master’s garden made flesh they seemed—they stretched, offering a better, wanton view of their perfect round breasts draped in shadow, the long curve of their waists that disappeared in a mass of nighted curls and mystery.
A whine broke from Marrok’s throat.
One of them circled to my side of the bed, looking over the round of her shoulder at us through a fall of auburn hair, her hips swaying promise as she went.
I felt the sear of her gaze as it followed down our chests, over our jutted hips, and across our still-twined legs.
Her brows arched in momentary surprise. Then, as comprehension dawned, her lips quirked in a small and knowing smile.
I had to send them away. It was the right and courteous thing to do. Only, looking up, the swell from beneath her upturned breast begged a touch, a hand cupped perfectly around it. Swallowing, I hoped that recognizing that Marrok and I lay here in sin—or on the edge of it as we had yet to get seriously started this night—would of itself be message enough because I wasn’t sure I could speak the words of dismissal.
Powerless, I looked to Marrok for support, but his hand already hid the lush curve of the hip beside him.
Decidedly not put off by our sin, my lady—
No! What was I doing thinking of her as mine simply because she stood on the bedside by me less than an arm’s reach away? The damosel next to me eyed our intertwined legs and the half-flaccid staffs that fell at our thighs. I twitched under her gaze, my body betraying the words I still could not utter.
Marrok rolled over, capturing his lady’s other hip and dragging her down to sit on the bed.
Of her own, my lady sat beside me. Temptress that she was, she lifted my hand and guided it to that very swell of breast that nestled as firmly and snugly in my palm as I had imagined it would. A sharp flow of blood raised my staff to half-mast.
It didn’t go unnoticed. In a breathspace my lady’s hand was upon it, confident, sure and experienced. Marrok’s groan told me I was not alone in a temptress’s grasp.
“You’re no innocent,” I breathed at last.
>
She leaned in, her pout of lips almost touching mine. “Who said we were?” Then they were touching and her wise hand on me brushed the underside of my risen flesh from tip to base, a nail tracing the sensitive line between staff and stones.
I moaned.
But no, any further and I would not be able to stop this temptress’s assault.
A gasp and growl from Marrok told me for him it might already be too late—that perhaps he’d already reached the point of no return.
“Lyn!” I cried. A reminder both to him and me.
“Shh.” My lady pressed her unoccupied fingers to my lips. “She’s having her own pleasure now.”
I shook my head. This was not Persant’s doing. This was no offer of a virgin daughter from a grateful father. They were being spelled. Or we were.
One of Nimue’s trials.
I made to rise, and the lady squeezed expertly at the base of my staff arresting my flight as it leapt to hard attention. Then the tip of it was in her mouth, the wet ring of her lips sliding over it, enveloping it with warm breath.
“No. No,” I implored, but how could I move now?
Marrok snarled, tipping his lady face-down on the mattress beside me. He rose over her like a beast, all reason fled from his eyes. The bed shook as he buried himself in her. Then shook again. And again.
My maiden’s mouth and hand maddened me.
I clawed at her hair and at the one breast that hung within reach. Her second hand gripped my stones.
“Lyn!” I cried again. A denial. An apology. A prayer.
Sight of Marrok rising and flattening as he rode to his peak drove me to mine.
Grabbing the lady’s shoulder by his teeth, Marrok raised her up. An arm, snaking around her stomach, pulled her to him as he thrust into her one last time, his great body shaking with effort and release. His eyes limned red with whatever demon rode him.
God’s wounds, I wasn’t even jealous watching him with another. I had eyes and ears only for his animal pleasure, my own body tuned to his. I swear I could feel his release in me moments before my own.
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