It’s too much. My cock swells as I rock it within her tightening sex. It pulses and then I roar as the power of my release shoots down my back and thighs, and my seed jettisons into her until I have nothing left to offer to my mate.
Spent, we lay together, belly-to-belly. Kate is on my chest and I close my eyes and enjoy the feeling of her breath moving through her body, even though we’re both slick with sweat, her juices, and my seed. Dirt clings to that concoction but I can’t be bothered to care. The last lights of the pixies drift away from the pond. The new families have retired, and those males left wanting are returning to their hives to try again next year.
Kate’s finger traces unfamiliar patterns along my skin, and I suspect she’s also watching the last fading flickers of the pixie dance.
“So, what happens now?”
“Now we get up, if we manage to find our legs—it seems I cannot feel mine and am not so certain they are still attached—and we return to our den to bathe. Within the next few days, I will attend Bafulk’s hashavan. I will likely get notice of it within the next several days. Then, at the very next full moon here in about a week, we will be joined properly in a mating ceremony that my mother has been dreaming of for me since I was born,” I say with a small laugh.
Kate burrows her face into my shoulder and groans.
“Okay, so I just have to survive whatever overdone thing your mother has imagined for us, and then we’re free.”
I nod, amused by the eagerness in her voice. I understand the feeling. I’m more than ready to finally be settled with my family with no more expectations or ceremonies. I drag my fingers across her skin as I speak. “Yes, for the most part. After our ceremony, we will be taking up our post among the orcs. We will be there for most of the year, but Mother will see to it that our den and territory are maintained.”
Lifting her head, Kate smiles down at me. “I like this plan. You and me, Boukie and Cavekji doing what we’re meant to do and being a family together. It’s good.”
I tickle her ribs to feel her squirm on top of me.
“Have you decided what you want to do now? Where your heart is?”
Kate pauses and licks her lips.
“I did have a thought, now that you mention it.”
“And what is that, my love?”
A bright red flush steals over her face. “I’d like to study healing, if that’s possible. Being with the females in the Warue territory... I felt really helpless, Cavek. I wanted to help them but couldn’t do anything.”
“You helped keep those kits alive.”
She nods. “I did, because I was nursing Cavekji and produce an abundance. But I never want to feel that way again. I want to help people and be able to tend to any hurts my children suffer as they grow.” She chews at her lip. “Do you think it’s possible for a human to learn healing magic?”
I grin and kiss her soundly. “Don’t be silly. Of course it is possible. Most of healing is relying on the spirits of the various herbs and your relationship with them. Hands-on energy manipulation, the kind that encourages a body to repair quicker, is something that all living beings can learn how to do. If this is what you feel your path is, I will proudly support it.”
She shrieks with joy and presses against me, kissing me with renewed vigor. She’s pouring all her love into me. I can feel it slide into me and that emptiness that I had never known I had inside before my Kate. Her hands begin to wander and this time she’s the aggressor, and I love it. I arch my hips beneath her exploring hands and whisper out encouraging words.
We make love two more times at the lotus pond. Hard and fast, slow and sweet. We explore each other and revel in the way our bodies join, making us a singular whole being if only for a short time.
KATE
When we’re done making love, the flowers have closed their luminous buds and only the softest glow of the vines remains to light our way home. I look up at my mate as he draws me into our den and allow peace and happiness to flow freely within me.
Cavek is my wellspring of love that I thought I would never have. And our love is the foundation upon which I can, for the first time, build our future with complete trust. I kiss him, committed heart and soul.
Epilogue
Two months later
Kate
We’re settled in at our new home among the orcs. It’s a charming little cottage in the heart of the village. Boukie loves it already. She misses Bafulk but is making new friends easily among the children in the village.
For our part, Cavek and I have been enjoying so much quality time together. He still has duties that take him out of our home, just as I do with my training as a healer, and there are obligations we fulfill as a couple, but it’s a slow-paced life for the most part. The visits from dignitaries from other orc clans are probably among the more exciting things that happen around here.
The gathering of clans a few weeks ago ranked higher on the exciting scale than I really wanted to experience. Among one of the visiting clans, someone accidentally let loose a small pack of griffin hatchlings that he was transporting to the mountains to set free. Each about the size of a pit bull, they caused quite a bit of damage before the one responsible for their care rounded them up.
I started feeling sick within days of the last of the clans departing. I chalked it up to overexcitement and a bit of indigestion. But when I wasn’t better after a few days, Cavek insisted that we go see the healer. Now that Cavek and I are seated in the healer’s cottage, I’m certain it’s something else.
The healer, Vashma, settles across from us, her heavy robes spilling around her. The entire sight is quite serene. I could appreciate it more if my heart wasn’t trying to jump out of my throat.
“I doubt that you need me to tell you this, Kate, but from what I can tell you are in your early stages of pregnancy.”
I can’t even enjoy Cavek’s look of shock.
“The High Sun Festival?” my mate in a small voice.
Vashma raises her brows and snorts.
“Pixie dust, of course. No wonder you’re expecting. You have done this before, Kate, so you know to take it easy but don’t worry about keeping to your regular routine. And congratulations, you two,” she beams with pleasure. It’s not often she consults on a pregnancy and she always enjoys giving the news.
Cavek swallows and a hint of panic comes over his features. With Cavekji still very much a baby and entering into his evil toddler period, neither one of us is prepared for another baby so close in age.
“Well, this is a bit unexpected,” he manages to say.
I snort and pat my mate on the shoulder.
“Just you wait. You get to be there for it all this time. The mood swings, the hormones, and sleepless nights with a newborn,” I chuckle with glee as he noticeably pales.
Oh, yes. He’s in for a good time.
SEVEN YEARS LATER
Cavek
Our youngest, Bisak, giggles at me as he scrambles out of the tub and attempts to get away. He loves these games too much. At three years old, he’s a tiny terror. Whenever we go back to the Middling Way, Serus keeps trying to hand him blunt weapons, such as staves and clubs, which I promptly have to take away before Kate sees. Trolls don’t count these as proper weapons, but Kate doesn’t agree. And after watching Bisak nearly clobber his brother with the last club, I’m starting to agree with her.
I loop an arm around the wriggling trollbie as he attempts to squirm out of my hold, his body still slick with soap and water. It’s like holding onto a fish. With immense effort, I finally pull his sleeping tunic on him and set him on the floor so that I can stretch out my back. I only blink and my trollbie is back in the tub, this time fully clothed.
I growl at Bisak, and he responds with a cheerful grin so like his uncle it gives me pause and a touch of homesickness. I rub my hands over my face and scowl at my offspring.
“Look at this mess, Bisak. Now I have to get you back out and dry you again.”
“Up. Up
. Love you, Daddy,” he chirps, his arms coming up in a show of cooperation.
With a muttered oath, I sweep him back up out of the water, strip off the soggy tunic, dry him for the second time, and pull a fresh one back over his head.
Hours later when both Kate and I are sitting in exhaustion by the fire, and our children are tucked in bed, I look over at her and rub my hand lovingly over hers. She’s never looked more beautiful and precious to me. I doubt that even time will change that.
“I love you, mate. More than anything,” I murmur.
She opens one eye and smiles at me. “I love you too, Cavek.”
“Please don’t take this the wrong way, but I think I have reached my limit for offspring.”
She closes her eyes and groans.
“Thank the gods. You and me both.”
Ten years later
Kate
Sammi and I share conspiring smiles as we watch our children flirt. Cavekji is courting with her second born, another daughter named Amvola. Ferona stands nearby making rude noises at them and laughing uproariously over it while her sister blushes angrily. My son is slow to anger. If not for the cheerful shade of mint green to his complexion, his disposition is so mellow that people often tell me that he doesn’t seem like a troll, even a half-troll. Instead of taking offense at Ferona’s antics, he rolls his eyes at his best friend and pulls Amvola to her feet so that they can find a more private place.
I still can’t believe that Cavekji is formally courting my best friend’s daughter. That’s the dream of nearly every best friend, that their children might marry—or mate in this case.
Not that we’re likely to get lucky again. Aside from her oldest two daughters, Sammi has a wild brood of boys. She and Orgath have been busy populating his clan almost single-handedly, whereas Cavek and I only had two more children after Cavekji and have taken a potion to null our fertility for many years so we can enjoy each other. Now that they’re nearly all out of the den, I’m looking forward to some real alone time.
My tart-mouthed little apple-green daughter Melia sits a short distance away with a book. She wrinkles her nose at the whole thing. She’s insisted quite firmly that she’s not interested in finding a mate, although I’ve caught her casting looks of interest when Ferona’s mate-to-be visits with his kin from a neighboring orc clan. At sixteen, she’s still young and I, frankly, am not in that huge of a hurry for her to grow up. Cavek blames her mischievous nature on pixie magic from the night of her conception. I give her a pointed look to not torment her brother. She grins and concedes with a nod. Foiled again.
To my surprise, Boukie arrived this morning from the mountains where she lives with her mate, an ancient dragon with the most sarcastic temperament I’ve ever encountered. I thought dragons would be wise, not wise-asses, but I like him. Orgath and Cavek do as well. In the far field beyond the keep, they are sparring. The males insist they aren’t too old for such things, although Sammi and I often exchange dubious looks over the matter.
Sundays have become a sort of unofficial family day, to the point that they’ve taken over the Sunday dinner traditions we had back home in Ov’Ge.
At my side, Sammi stands up from her seat and taunts her boys at the top of her lungs. Bisak, now thirteen, scampers around the older boys like an excited puppy. Just behind him, one of Stitch’s pups from last season’s litter races after him, its tail wagging. Sammi’s teasing hits home. In response, all the boys—even Bisak—bellow and throw themselves into trying to conquer “the enemy” also known as their fathers.
Sammi raises her glass to me in a lighthearted toast.
“To us.”
“To love,” I rejoin.
“To family,” Boukie says as she watches the boys. “The odd group that we are.”
I laugh and agree that I can drink to that. Nearby, Cavek waves to me and I blow him a kiss.
Tonight, I mouth to my mate. He winks at me, and the boyish grin that spreads across his handsome face sets my heart racing.
Even after all these years, it takes so little effort on his part. His hair has faded into the palest purple hue and the grooves on his face from his time with the werewolves have deepened some, but not as much as the laughter lines around his mouth and eyes from our years of happiness together. I have no shortage of gray hairs myself and a few modest wrinkles, but Cavek makes me feel cherished like I’m still the most beautiful woman for him.
I smile and sip my drink, counting the hours until I will get my mate alone again.
Author’s Note
I hope you enjoyed Kate and Cavek’s story. When I wrote the Orc Wife, I knew immediately that I wanted to go back and tell their story, just because they are such a fun couple and quite different from Sammi and Orgath. It of course presented a few unique challenges, one of which was how to tell their story without literally rehashing the entire third of the Orc Wife. While writing this I really began to love the characters, especially Boukie.
Of course, everyone always wants to know what characters are getting stories so I will go on record to say at this point the characters that have made an appearance that are definitely getting slotted for stories are Bodi (with a reappearance of his brother Farli and Jason), Serus later this fall in the Troll King, and Boukie with her Dragon this winter. I also have the Accidental Werewolf’s Mate, Unicorn’s Mare and the Pixie Queen that will be coming out this year. A lot is on its way for the Monstery Yours series!
The next book coming out is The Accidental Werewolf’s Mate. A drunken encounter between a human woman and an Evarue werewolf inadvertently leads to an unintentional mating bite and now they have to see just how they are going to make the whole mate thing work.
As always you can follow me (SJ Sanders) on Facebook and join my group Mate Index Sweethearts. Also, if you are looking for merchandise, check out my shop https://www.zazzle.com/store/sexybeastdesigns
S.J. Sanders
The Troll Bride Page 18