Dark Court: The Final Hour

by Camille Oster

  Demanding lips returned to her, robbing her of thought again. With his arms around her, he lifted her up to him, turned her around toward the table. If someone walked in, they would get quite a sight.

  Without meaning to, her hands sought him, sought the warm skin around his waist, snuck under his shirt as he shifted closer, finding where he wanted to be between her thighs. His firm manhood pressed to her.

  How did she keep on finding herself here? Because she wanted him, always had. Because he made her feel things no one else could. And relinquishing to him felt so wonderful.

  His hands drew up her skirt, stroking along her thighs. She loved hearing him breathe so hard, she loved how his hands shook. She loved how much he wanted her.

  With a few tugs and her cooperation, he lifted her shirt over her head, his hands stroking down her shoulder and over the soft mound of her breast, down to her hips, where he tugged her forward toward him. It was no secret what his intention was. The heat in her had built to a pervasive ache, one she couldn’t pull back from.

  “You have always been my weakness,” she panted.

  “Let me be your strength.”

  “I am strong,” she defended, both tensing and relaxing as his fingers slowly ran from her throat down between her breasts and lower, and his eyes followed.

  “Then be strong enough to let me in.” His fingers sought into her wetness and the nub that made her pleasure surge. “I love you, and though you won’t entirely admit it, you love me too.”

  The pleasure was too intense to talk, and Ashra was relieved because she wasn’t entirely ready to leave all the cards on the table just yet. He still had some things to prove to her.

  Intimacy was obviously not a problem. With mere touches, he left her a puddle of aching need. Unbelting, he freed himself and pushed into her. Ashra’s breath was stolen away. Lightening heat filled her and she gasped. She didn’t even want him to move, just be there with her—inside her.

  Deep, powerful pulses of pleasure rushed through her, starting around him inside her and radiating out to very part of her. Then he moved, and she gasped as the sharp thrust stole her very consciousness. He repeated and the exquisite tension built higher, impossible to bear and impossible to escape. He claimed the very center of her and she let him. Like this, it felt as though everything that had passed meant nothing. All she needed was him being a part of her. Tension cresting, her arms held him to her as unbridled pleasure submerged her in a sea of sensation, holding her at a knifepoint between stillness and a storm.

  Arms held her and the deep groans of his release reverberated through her ears. Finally leaving a sated languishness she couldn’t deny that she wanted to hold onto as long as possible. He lay on her, his weight pressing her down, his breath sharp and labored at the crook of her neck.

  They stayed like that until their breaths calmed, then he raised himself on his elbows and trapped her beneath him. “Can you blame me for not letting you go?”

  It was hard to argue something that at that very moment felt as natural as breathing.

  He kissed her, tenderly and gently. It was so lovely when they were like this, calm and intimate. Thinking back, she remembered how awkward it had felt to him in the beginning, how unsure and hesitant he had been at this untamed bond was between them, but not now. He knew what he wanted—this was what he wanted.

  If it wasn’t for him holding her, she would get cold soon, but neither of them was rushing to end this intimacy. She almost wished they were in bed so she could just lie in his arms.

  “Some things we do right,” he said.

  “It’s just everything else we get wrong.”

  “Not everything. It would help immensely if you try not to destroy me and burn everything I have to the ground. I wasn’t going to be another Raufasger. You could have had some faith in me.”

  Put that way, it was hard to express that it hadn’t fundamentally been personal. Well, to some degree it had been. “It was perpetuating a fundamentally unjust system.”

  “So now we start with nothing.”

  “Is that so bad?” she asked. “What is it exactly that you miss?”

  “Nothing, but for the record, is there anything about my current activities you object to? I’d like to know before you burn my establishment to the ground.”

  Putting her arms around his neck, she smiled. “Nope.”

  “Are you sure? Because, you know, I have my propensities to leverage the things around me to my own benefit.”

  “Do your worst—within limits.”

  “And what are those limits?”

  “Use the system for all you can get, just please don’t undermine it.”

  “Fine. Deal. I won’t overthrow your council.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I won’t take any responsibility if it falls apart on its own, but I won’t undermine it, or in any way hurry that process along.”

  “My council will work.”

  “It is not in people’s nature to cooperate.”

  “You spent too long at court. You don’t have any faith in people’s better nature.”

  “People don’t have better natures.”

  “We can insist on it. We can insist on creating the world we wish Charis to grow up in. And Tabain.”

  “Yes, the Greve brat. I suppose he will make a decent big brother to Charis, and to this one,” Roisen said, settling his hand on her stomach. “A boy, perhaps. Or a girl. But girls can be so vicious,” he smiled.

  He stepped away and Ashra felt the cool air in his absence. Quickly, she pulled on her shirt and righted her skirt.

  Mug in hand, he took a sip and then put it down again with a grimace. Seems it had gone cold. Moving back to her, he stroked the palm of his hand down the side of her head. “They will grow up well. Heaven help anyone who gets in their way. No one would dare,” he said with a chuckle. “And it’s not even me they have to worry about. You should see their mother.”

  Chapter 36

  ROISEN WOKE EARLY in the morning and threw open the windows, letting the cold air flood into the room. Ashra was still sleeping, wrapped warmly in ample blankets.

  The street below was quiet, the town barely awake. There was much to do that day. Roisen still had to build his empire, and he relished it. He enjoyed having the Naufren over the coals—financially speaking. He showed no mercy to anyone else either.

  There was something to be said for having full freedom from a liege. There literally was nothing to stop him, nothing he needed to guard against. The council was too busy working out its inner workings and setting up production on the now state lands to worry about him, and technically he was playing within the rules—using them for all he could. The council covered basic food distribution to everyone, but anything else was fair game. Raufasger had rooted out and destroyed any level of skill, and the Naufren were still too caught up in the old ways, unwilling to recognize that they had little meaning in this world.

  The only thing he had to guard against was Bryce dragging Ashra into things she shouldn’t be in. The council needed to stand on its own two feet and she was too much of a soft touch when he came knocking with some problem he wanted her to fix for him. People like Bryce would take as much time as one was willing to give them. Unfortunately, Ashra wouldn’t allow Roisen to chase the cur away.

  Turning back, Roisen watched the sleeping form of his woman in the bed and after a moment walked over and stroked a curl from her face. “I’m going to work,” he said and she mumbled. Charis had kept her up with a slight fever during the night. Kissing her, he pulled the blanket up tightly aroundher and walked out of the room to the children’s room.

  Tabain was still fast asleep. He was a cute kid, but Charis was awake, looking at him when he appeared over the crib. Rosy cheeks showed the aftermath of the fever, but she looked alert and even smiled at him and kicked her feet under the blanket. “You wore your mother out—and yet so criminally adorable,” he said, picking up the tyke and settling her on his arm
where she seemed to fit perfectly. “You’re right as rain, though, aren’t you? Hungry?”

  The girl fussed a bit and looked over at the door.

  “Ordering me around already, huh?” Roisen said and walked her downstairs, where a pot of applesauce drew her attention. “You are hungry.”

  The kitchen was still warm from the stove and he shoved in some wood to build the fire again. Sitting down, he placed Charis on the table, where she sat as he fed her with the tiny spoon. Intermittently he had some bread and cheese himself.

  Their life here was so simple, but he had never felt so satisfied. Charis couldn’t care less if the spoon she ate from was clay instead of silver. Once shut in here, in this simple house, the rest of the world didn’t exist, except for fucking Bryce who turned up like a bad smell. For some reason, Ashra seemed to value the friendship, and Roisen struggled to deny her anything she wanted, even if he found the man trying.

  “Today Papa is going to make one of his enemies cry,” Roisen said with a grin as he spooned another portion of applesauce into Charis’ mouth. Lukas Brieton was trying to sell his forestry harvest. Brieton wanted to buy land and needed the money. Well, he was going to pay dearly for it. “Poor man will lose his shirt in the process.” But it was interesting, although hardly surprising, to see that the Naufren were starting to turn on each other. It was bound to happen. They had never done anything but.

  Bryce, even being as soul-destroyingly annoying as he was, did have a penchant for making people cooperate, and it did move mountains. With some stop-gap measures, for which Roisen at times supplemented at a decent benefit to himself, hunger was abating across the land. Once the state land harvest was fully productive, there would be enough food for everyone.

  With hunger gone, creativity improved, focus turned to building and Tondoke was expanding. Roisen had bought his first property close to the center of the city. Eventually he would build their new house there, but there was a comfort here in this small, non-descript lodging that he was reticent at letting go of.

  Ashra hadn’t agreed to marry yet and he was not going to suggest any substantial changes until she did. Perhaps when she started showing and people starting asking questions, she would look more favorably on it. The absence of a ring on her finger was an itch Roisen had to stop himself from scratching—which perhaps was the point of her not relinquishing yet. She was testing his resolve and his patience.

  “Had enough?” he asked Charis. “Perhaps we should go for a little walk, survey your domain.” Wrapping her in a blanket, he took her out of the house and walked around the main square, watching as the baker was putting out his steaming wares. He nodded guardedly at Roisen as he passed. The people here were still wary of him, but everyone in this village knew the former great enemies of this land were now shacked up in a small house just off the village square. They didn’t pretend to understand, but they didn’t question either.

  “What do you think?” he said, stopping at the lot he had purchased where the remains of a burned house still stood. “This is where our house will be. But we need some way of breaking it to your mother. Maybe we will build it now and give it to her as a wedding present. What do you think? We can’t, after all, have three children in one room when your brother comes, can we? You would bully your poor brothers mercilessly. As you grow, you will want your own room, and so will your older brother. And a backyard to play in, with apple trees to climb. Maybe a stable for horses.”

  The more he thought about it, the more eager he was to build it. It would be the place they would live, at least until he could purchase back the Lorcan estate, but he wasn’t sure Ashra would ever want to live there. It was a mausoleum to the past, but Roisen had some obligations to the family name he couldn’t make himself walk away from, even if he wanted to.

  “We better return before your mother wakes and starts missing you.”

  Taking his time, he walked back to the house and upstairs to where Ashra was still lying in bed. “Look who wanted to come see you.”

  Ashra opened the blanket and let the little bundle in. “Slept in, did you?” she said to Charis who entwined her tiny fingers in Ashra’s hair.

  “She’s been up for a while. I have to go. I’m gonna rip Lukas Brieton’s guts out today—figuratively speaking.”

  “Have fun,” Ashra said and pulled Charis to her and placed a kiss on her head. She smiled at him that way that hit him in the gut, making him waver for a moment. No, it was not the time to get back into bed. That reward would be his tonight, after a good day of slaughter—figuratively speaking.

  The End

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  Other books by Camille Oster

  Rise of Vali – A Norse God Fantasy Romance

  Lily has no understanding why their elderly seer has sent her on a quest north. There is nothing up there but frozen and barren wasteland. There was nothing south but the creatures that savagely extinguished any sign of human life, the creatures constantly trying to reach them in their never-ending hunger, but yet unable to travel into the wintery landscape where her village is forced to make their home out of necessity.

  But north she must go through endless valleys of snow and ice, toward the questionable destiny Mad Hilda had foreseen, to beseech the help from a god frozen in ice since the devastation of Ragnarok. However, resurrecting a god may prove more dangerous than dealing with the creatures Lily seeks to destroy.

  https://www.amazon.com/Rise-Vali-Norse-fantasy-romance-ebook/dp/B073HXRRTR/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&qid=1516939855&sr=8-10&keywords=camille+oster

  Unrequited

  Not everyone deserves love. For some, love comes unwillingly and refuses to stay, leaving devastation in its wake. The Chartrices own the demonic Parisian underworld and they rule with an iron grip, destroying everything that stands in their way. Brothers Castran and Tarquin, and father Adaeus, are ruthless and supremely equipped to force their will, stamping out any dissent with cold efficiency. Some see them as villains, but their rule keeps order.

  But there are some things strength cannot overcome, especially the unbidden emotions that promise more than a life of single-minded determination and isolation. A glimpse of something more, something soft, can undo the coldest of hearts. Still, a villain is a villain, and the fates are cruel.

  Three interlinking stories trace the effects of the most insidious of enemies, love, on a family that allows no weakness.

  https://www.amazon.com/Unrequited-Camille-Oster-ebook/dp/B01ANE6C8G/ref=sr_1_18?ie=UTF8&qid=1516940021&sr=8-18&keywords=camille+oster

  Sequence Effect

  Gwennie Elders doesn't regret for a moment the debt she took on to extend her grandmother's life, but when running into trouble with repayments she had to resort to drastic actions to save her family's business and apartment. It would only be a year of her life and she'd be unconscious throughout--to awaken debt-free and able to resume her life as a baker on the city's ground level, hemmed in by the towers where the wealthy and privileged lived. But there are no easy and options, and although she emerges from her servitude debt-free, her family's business and her means of support fleeted away while she was asleep, forcing her to seek a means to support herself in the coming war.

  https://www.amazon.com/Sequence-Effect-Camille-Oster-ebook/dp/B00JPBBZM2/ref=sr_1_24?ie=UTF8&qid=1516940021&sr=8-24&keywords=camille+oster