Tamer of Horses

by Amalia Carosella

  Antiope had not shown her this much, he could tell, for her eyes widened further with each stroke of his fingers.

  “Please,” she breathed.

  Pirithous lowered his head, letting his mouth follow where his hands had led, and soon after, she had no need to beg.

  Hippodamia slept upon her stomach, her body sated at last, but Pirithous could not keep from touching her still, trailing his fingers down the length of her spine, reveling in the softness of her skin. Her dark hair had fallen from its pin long ago, tickling his stomach and thighs while she brought him to release a second time. He had loved the feel of it wound through his fingers, and the feather touch of it upon his skin. Now, it spilled across her back and shoulder to the linens, almost black in the dim, flickering light of the dying fire.

  He followed the curve of her backside, cupping one plump cheek in his palm, and wondered what other lessons Antiope had given her in pleasuring a man. And had Hippodamia asked it of her? Theseus’s laughter echoed in his ears, and Pirithous smiled. Antiope would have told him all, as was her habit, and no doubt Theseus would have done the same. By now they had both laughed themselves to sleep twice over at Pirithous’s expense.

  Not that he could blame them for it, but would it not have been kinder to warn him of Hippodamia’s intent? He might have taken himself in hand if he had only known, though perhaps it was just as well that he hadn’t. He leaned down to kiss Hippodamia’s brow, furrowed slightly even in sleep. He should not have let her use her mouth the second time, nor would he permit her to do so again on the morrow, for she would need time to heal where her teeth had marked the soft flesh inside. And there were other things she could do, if she wished to pleasure him. Other things they might do together without risking the fruit of their marriage.

  He let his fingers dip between her legs, finding the heat of her womanhood, still slick, and brought his hand back up slowly, teasing her until she stirred in her sleep. Aphrodite was cruel to him, for he was hardening again just at the thought of taking her. Still five days, yet, until the solstice, and now that he had tasted her, he could think of nothing else but her body, opened to his, hot and wet and ready.

  One dark eye opened, and Hippodamia’s fingers brushed over his manhood.

  “Antiope was right,” she murmured.

  “Too often,” he agreed, kissing her half-closed eyelids. “Though I dare not guess what she told you.”

  She smiled lazily, dragging her fingertips up with the barest of caresses. Just enough to make him stiffen even further and cause his blood to burn for more. “She said you did not sleep as long as you had a willing woman in your bed. That you never tired of pleasure.”

  “But did she tell you of the pleasure you’d receive in return?”

  She rolled to her side, and he let his hand slide to the curve of her waist, then up, her skin soft and smooth as silk beneath his fingertips. A drag of his thumb over the point of her breast and her nipple tightened, more awake than its mistress, who still looked at him with drowsy eyes slowly darkening with desire.

  “She said I would forgive you before the night was through, as you would me, but little else.”

  “More fool, me,” he murmured. By rights, her coming to him should have meant forgiveness already given, not this game of seduction. But he had put her into Antiope’s care, and he should have realized it could not be so simple with the Amazon queen advising her.

  And he would not ask. He would not ask if she had forgiven him, after all. In fact, he was feeling rather unforgiving himself, though some part of him knew he should not blame her. A part he chose, in that moment, to ignore.

  Pirithous turned away, rising from the bed, though his body ached with the loss of her touch, the warmth of her hand, the temptation of her mouth.

  “My lord?” she called softly, and he knew without looking her forehead would be furrowed just so, for her confusion lapped at his heels.

  “Go back to sleep, Princess.”

  And then he left her.

  But for the first time in months, he spent the rest of his night alone.

  “She came to you willingly and you left her?” Theseus said, laughter in his voice. “Surely you are not so great a fool as that!”

  Theseus was not as difficult as some men to rouse in the morning, though Antiope had not bothered to hide her irritation when Pirithous had pounded on their door. No doubt they had been up late the night before, for there was no question that Antiope kept him well satisfied, and for all the teasing they gave him for the little sleep he took, they did not live on much more. Antiope was a daughter of Ares, after all, and as a son of Poseidon, Theseus was as hot-blooded as Pirithous himself, if not quite so intent upon a variety of partners.

  When Theseus had opened the door, he had been stark naked, and at the sight of Pirithous he only grinned. Pirithous had waited impatiently while he returned to the bedside where Antiope lay only half-covered by the linens, kissed his wife goodbye, and dressed in the first rumpled tunic he found. They had retreated to Pirithous’s rooms thereafter, with a tray of bread, cold meats, and wine.

  Pirithous wasted no time in pouring his own cup, unmixed, but Theseus had refused, drinking minted water instead.

  “She came to me because she wanted my forgiveness, not because she wanted me.”

  Theseus snorted, breaking a piece of bread from the loaf. “If you refused to sleep with the women who wanted something from you in exchange, you’d have to give up every girl you keep in the palace, and never accept another village girl into your bed. Of course she wanted your forgiveness! And how else would she have gotten it, when you said yourself you had no desire to hear anything she might say? When you left her to her own devices for more than a day without so much as a word?”

  “She’d said enough to make her feelings clear, Theseus. And I do not think for a moment she would have come upon this scheme without the influence of your wife.”

  “And if Antiope encouraged her to spread her legs, knowing it would soften you, what of it?” He shrugged, unrepentant. “I cannot see how it hurt you in the slightest, unless she revealed some strange deformity once she undressed, but Antiope assured me she was quite comely. Breasts like ripened pomegranates and skin as sweet as honey. Or did she taste like fish instead of ambrosia? Antiope confessed she had wished for a taste, but Hippodamia was too uncertain.”

  His eyes burned at the thought of Antiope between Hippodamia’s smooth thighs, bringing her to release before he had ever known her body. “Amazon or not, there is only so much I will tolerate from your wife, Theseus. Hippodamia is mine!”

  Theseus laughed. “If Hippodamia wishes to take a lover from among her women, you’ll have no say in the matter, my friend. Were she to choose Antiope, you might at least know she is not refusing your bed for her own pleasure while we are in Athens.”

  “And Antiope? Has she taken some other lover?”

  “Antiope believes the women of Athens beneath her notice, and I will not deny it makes things easier. But when Antiope lived among her people, she had lovers, and though I have given her all that is within my power to give, she misses the companionship she shared with those women. I can hardly blame her for it.”

  “Hippodamia will have no need to look to a woman for her pleasure once I bring her to my bed. As I proved to her last night.” Twice over, and happily, until he had understood her reasoning. But if she thought for a moment he would let her go to Antiope for her needs—better if it had been a maid or a serving girl than Antiope, of all women. To have Theseus’s wife smirk at him at his own table, knowing him cast aside so easily! No. If Hippodamia wished to take a lover, he would give her the use of any of his palace women, but Antiope had already done enough harm without giving his bride a taste for what he could not provide.

  “Gods be praised!” Theseus said. “For a moment, I feared you had left her unsatisfied as well as insulted. You’ll be lucky if she ever offers herself again, after this. Did it never occur to you that she simply kn
ows no better? Living on that mountain among centaurs, and then you place her in Antiope’s care. What else did you expect?”

  “I suppose I expected your wife to mind herself and her manners,” he grumbled, downing what was left in his wine cup. “And I trusted you to keep her from overstepping, besides.”

  “You wanted a queen strong enough to take Dia’s place. Whether you want to see it or not, your mother had much more in common with the Amazons than she did the daughters of any of your assembly or mine. Unless you mean to entrust your kingdom to Dia’s steward—and he is as like to cheat you as any other, king or not—you had better not have intended to cow Hippodamia into some meek, simpering thing. Better if she were more Amazon than less, and Antiope will see her made competent, at least.”

  “Competent in the arts of womanly manipulation, to be sure,” he growled, tossing his wine cup against the wall. The pottery shattered, but he did not care. “And what good will it do me if my people believe me too weak even to govern my wife? I must have her respect and theirs, Theseus. You are king of Athens. You know what it takes to rule.”

  “And my wife, cousin, is an Amazon. Do you truly think my people did not question me when I took her to my bed? You think they did not whisper that King Theseus had been bespelled, that they did not say I was unfit for the crown, made weak by a wife who would surely seek to conquer me? Hippodamia is no fool. If your people do not embrace her, the peace Dia sought will not last no matter how many sons she gives you. She will not risk her people, and she cannot serve them by costing you the kingship!”

  “And I am to ignore the rest? To pretend she does not seek to wrap me around her fingers and distract me with the pleasure her body might offer?”

  “You stubborn ox.” Theseus leaned forward, his eyes the flat blue-gray of a hurricane on the sea and all humor gone from his expression. “What she offered you last night was a gift! A peace offering by which you might begin again without strife. By all rights, you should be with her now, feeding her honeyed figs and dates between kisses and imagining the kingdom you might build together. And do not tell me you cannot match her, art for art, pleasure for pleasure, when it is Zeus’s blood flowing in your veins.”

  “And when I cannot think straight for the want of her? What then, Theseus? When my people no longer trust me because I have spent all my days in her bed instead of seeing to my horses?”

  Theseus snorted, pushing his plate away and rising to his feet. “It is a blessing to care for your wife, Pirithous, not a curse. Son of Zeus or not, you will find the balance if you would only stop fighting against the bond you might share, and your people will think no less of you for it. Provided, of course, that Hippodamia will forgive you at all. I am not certain I would, were I her.”

  And then he left, brushing past the steward on his way through the door. Pirithous cursed, and the steward cleared his throat, dithering just outside. His gaze darted from Pirithous to the shattered remains of the cup upon the floor.

  “Regarding the bridles, my lord, you promised the smith you would send him the gold and silver this morning.”

  He drank the last of the mint water from Theseus’s cup and filled it with what was left of his wine. The steward, of course, could not move the heavy marble which served to keep the finest of his prizes and treasures safe in their storeroom, but he had not the time now to see to it. Theseus so rarely lost his temper that he did not dare ignore his friend’s words, and Hippodamia would even now be in her bath.

  “Take the plates and platters from the table. It will be enough for him to begin his work, and I will send the rest later.”

  Later, after Hippodamia had been given her choice of his treasury. And if she would not accept gold in payment for the insult, he would find some other method of persuasion.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Hippodamia

  Hippodamia lurched upright with a splash, grabbing for her discarded robe. Pirithous caught the fabric before she did and, with a jerk of his chin, sent Antiope’s maid from the room. Her maid, now, she supposed, for Antiope had made her a wedding gift, but she would not have believed the servant of an Amazon could be so easily cowed by a man’s wordless gesture, king or not.

  “Surely we need not keep up a pretense of modesty any longer,” he said, holding the robe just out of reach. Of course he had come dressed only in his kilt, that she might see each ripple of muscle across his chest and shoulders as he moved. “Or at least you did not seem so very shy last night.”

  She crossed her arms over her chest and lifted her chin. “One night of pleasure does not give you the right to impose yourself upon my bath, my lord.”

  He lifted one eyebrow, his gaze traveling from her face to her body, and the water which did not cover her nearly as well as she might have hoped. “But the desire to gain my forgiveness gave you the right to impose yourself upon mine?”

  She flushed, cursing herself even as the warmth spread from her breasts to her cheeks, and another, second blossom of heat followed, between her legs. The things he had done with his mouth—she had not known it was possible to ache so sweetly, and when his fingers had slipped inside her, curling so perfectly, she could do nothing but buck beneath the caress, her vision bleeding white at the edges as wave after wave of pleasure washed through her body.

  “You did not seem to mind.”

  Pirithous dropped the robe on the floor again and stepped over it. She kept her gaze upon his sandaled feet, refusing even the sight of his strong calves and well-muscled thighs. But Pirithous caught her by the chin, lifting her face, and his gray eyes searched hers, impossible to ignore.

  “And was it all you had hoped for, Princess?”

  She shivered, turning her face away before he saw the answer in her eyes. All she had wanted was his forgiveness, the touch of warmth in his eyes when he looked upon her. But he had given more, so much more, then torn it away again before she could even begin to understand. There was no warmth in his eyes now, either. He looked at her as though she were nothing more than a puzzle, some problem to be solved and put away again. And it was obvious she had not satisfied him as he had her, or why else would he have left?

  After the pleasures of his palace women, what could she offer that he had not known already? It had been such a messy, wet business, and she had probably fumbled through the half of it, in his eyes. And even if he had hoped she might repeat her performance, she had only to press her lips together to feel the ache where her teeth had cut into her flesh, just short of drawing blood inside her mouth.

  “I would have my robe, please, if you are so determined to keep me from my bath.”

  He snorted, straightening. “You misunderstand my intentions, Princess.”

  She shook her head, annoyed, and grasped hold of her courage. Perhaps she could not pleasure him the way he wished her to, but she would not shrink beneath his gaze like the maid. That did not mean, of course, she could not dart a look toward her door as she prepared to rise. She would simply stand before him, meet his gaze, and demand her robe—

  His hand closed on her shoulder, holding her gently in place as she tensed. She did meet his eyes then, startled to find him kneeling beside the bath. He plucked the abandoned sponge out of the water, his fingers grazing her thigh and lighting sparks of need inside her. The sponge paused over her knee and he wrung the water from it to trickle down her bent leg.

  “What are you doing?” The words came out rough and broken as he slid his other hand from her shoulder, down her arm, brushing damp strands of hair from her skin as he went.

  “I should think it rather obvious.” The sponge followed a trail of water down her shin. “I certainly would not stop you from bathing, but I found, suddenly, that I could not stand the thought of letting another do you such an intimate service.”

  Above the water, her skin prickled with the cold, gooseflesh rising. He had wanted to come to her, wanted to bathe her himself. But he had left her so easily the night before, going back to his bed and the other women
he kept to provide him with the most intimate service of all. Her throat thickened, her mouth as dry as desert sand.

  “Am I permitted the same privilege, my lord? If I desire that you not be served by another, will you respect my wish?”

  He laughed. “I promise you, Princess, if you ever wish to bathe me, I will not refuse you the honor.”

  She swallowed, ignoring the tremble of her legs as he dragged the sponge up her thigh. “And if I wish to spend the night in your bed in place of another?”

  He brought the sponge up from the water slowly, letting the warm water spill over her shoulder before he met her gaze. “If you wish me to promise I will have no other in my bed but you, I fear you will be disappointed.”

  “Then it is my right to do the same.”

  His eyes flared lightning-white, his jaw tightening, and for a moment she thought he might rise, leaving her alone again. She had asked too much, and stung his pride as well, no doubt. Yet she would not take it back, could not, though she had not realized until now how much it meant to her. Among the centaurs, marriage was a sacred thing, binding for life. A mated male would never betray his wife, and even though Centaurus had told her this marriage to Pirithous would be otherwise, she still longed for more, for better. Hippodamia held his white-eyed stare, and said nothing.

  Pirithous’s nostrils flared with one deep breath and he dropped the sponge into the water again, turning his attention to the work of bathing her instead. “You forget, Princess, you owe me a son. There can be no doubt as to his father.”

  But she had not forgotten her duty, not at all. She lifted her chin, though he was not looking at her face. “After I have given you a son, you can have no such objection. And until then, Antiope spoke of taking lovers from among her women.”