by Ann Gimpel
“Then tell her I’m asleep or something.”
“She’ll know you’re not.”
“You think?” Rowan grimaced. “Usually, I’d tell her to fuck off. But I don’t have the energy to fight with her.”
I bent and kissed the top of Rowan’s head. Mort growled a warning. I understood. Rowan had been gone far too much for his taste, and he wanted her all to himself. So did I. “You and me both, mate,” I murmured and walked from the room.
I felt for Ro, but she had to buck up. There are no accidents. Fate had sculpted her, made her resilient. She’d find her way. I’d planned to use these few minutes to organize my thoughts, but it would be best to see why Dewi was here.
I had my own ideas about that topic, but I wasn’t going to make the mistake of inserting my expectations. The corridor flashed by, and the door swooshed shut behind me. Dewi stood a few meters away, scaled forelegs crossed over her ruby chest.
“Where’s Runa?” she asked.
“Rowan”—I stressed the name she preferred—“has had quite a day. She’s resting.”
“Pfft. She doesn’t wish to talk with me.”
I walked closer. “Why would she? You ignored her through a miserable childhood. You and all the rest of your kinsmen. Now that she’s pregnant, you want to imprison her.”
“I do not.” The dragon shot fire skyward.
“Well, it’s how she’s interpreting it.” I inhaled sharply, nostrils flaring. “Fire Mountain may be your home, but it’s not hers. How long will the pregnancy last? Will the baby be more dragon than human?”
Dewi regarding me through whirling eyes shading through the green spectrum. “Finally. Ye’re asking smart questions. The pregnancy could be verra brief. And ’twould surprise me if the babe wasn’t more dragon than human.”
I digested the information. “How is that possible? Rowan and I are both half dragon, and our human forms are fairly entrenched.”
Dewi uncoiled her forelegs and shrugged. “Aye, the child is half dragon, but not just any dragons. Nidhogg and Cadir.”
“I can see where Nidhogg might add something special, but Cadir?”
“He wasn’t always what ye saw.” Her voice softened. “Once he showed great promise. Unfortunately, ’twasn’t tempered by great wisdom. Magic can be a curse, even for dragonkind. Some were jealous of his ability; he had few associates. In the end, his isolation led to bitterness and—”
“Made him ripe for Loki’s plucking,” I finished her thought.
“Aye, something like that.” Smoke puffed around the edges of her jaws.
“This still isn’t adding up,” I told her. “Nidhogg is my”—I stumbled over the word father and tried again—“male parent, and I haven’t come close to sprouting wings since Hel yanked away the glamour.”
“The situations are not the same.” She shook a talon my way. “This baby already knows precisely what—and who—he is. You languished through centuries afore ye discovered your birthright.”
The word languished annoyed me, but I pushed it aside. Something she’d said banged around in my head. “What do you mean by very brief.”
“Och, the pregnancy. It might only last a few weeks.”
“How is that possible? I thought your eggs incubated for over two years.”
“Eggs, aye. But this baby is within Rowan’s body.”
“Help me out here,” I said. “I’m not seeing the difference.”
“Although we bathe our eggs in our power, ’tis far more intense within a body than we could ever manage in our nests. Also, the energy is different in the Nine Worlds than on Fire Mountain.”
I felt Ro’s magic before I saw her walk to my side. She inclined her head to Dewi. “Apologies. I was being a brat.”
“Accepted, but there is more to this.” Dewi lowered her head until it was nearly eye level with us.
“Figured you’d know,” Rowan said. “The child is, um, talking.”
“Of course, he is.” Dewi sounded pleased.
“He told me you were part of his dragon ancestry, and he wished to greet you properly.”
“And I shall greet him as I have every dragon who was ever hatched.” Dewi scrunched lower and splayed a taloned foreleg over Rowan’s belly. Where it had been flat when I’d left her room, it had developed a definite curvature. The dragon puffed steam until it billowed around us.
“You just made him very happy,” Rowan said.
“He has done the same for me.” Dewi straightened. “I shall leave you to rest and eat, but be quick. We leave verra soon.”
“For where?” I asked.
“To clear the space beneath the Nine Worlds.”
I winced, not wanting to annoy the dragon, but I had to ask, “Does Odin know?”
“Why should he?”
I planted my feet shoulder-width apart. “Because you’re allies now. All that Norse-Celtic rivalry has to be laid aside. What if Odin set some kind of snares? When we left Valhalla, he was on his way to take a look at the problems we saw. Worse, what if he’s still there and your magic clashes with his?”
The steam turned to ash. “I see the problem,” Dewi rumbled. “We shall make adjustments. Meanwhile”—her jaws lolled into a smile—“Zelli and Quade will be by to get you in a couple of hours. Be ready.”
Before Rowan or I could lodge a protest, request a bit more time, magic boiled around the dragon, and she vanished.
The cat was still curled around Rowan’s neck. “I owe you an apology too,” she said to me. “I felt overwhelmed, but it’s a shitty excuse.”
“It’s all right.”
“No. It isn’t. I’ve elevated pushing people away into an art form. It’s long past time I got over it. Speaking of time, we don’t have much. Feel like cleaning up?” She lifted Mort down despite his staunch protests and told him to go back inside. Of course, he ignored her and stalked around meowing like a mad thing.
The corners of my mouth twitched. “We don’t have a very good track record with baths.”
She chuckled, and the sound warmed me. “We’re so new, being naked together should lead to…other things. If it didn’t, I’d worry about us.”
“Aha! You just admitted it.”
“Admitted what?” Rowan glanced my way.
“You want to see me naked,” I teased.
“I do. Would you prefer the pool or the cisterns in the cave?”
“Surprise me.” My body’s response to her suggestion was so immediate it astonished me. It ran far deeper than her beauty and her allure. Deep, primitive, savage, the most profound parts of me screamed she was mine. I wrapped my arms around her and fell into the power she wove around us. Hers and yet more. I felt her dragon nature more acutely than before as the stark flanks of Ben Nevis fell away replaced by a circle of standing stones and a glowing turquoise pool.
I’d been here before. It was a secret place not quite belonging to Midgard. Still part of the Nine Worlds, but removed by a few degrees. I still held Rowan in my arms. She fit against my body as if she’d been molded just for me. Angling my head, I crushed my mouth down on hers.
More than wanting her, I had to have her. She opened her mouth to mine and wove her hands into my hair as she held my head. Her nipples turned to peaks against my chest, and the press of her belly cradled my more-than-erect cock. Maybe someday we’d get around to elaborate foreplay, but it wouldn’t be now. Urgency beat a path through me, all mixed up with heat and need and loving the woman in my arms.
She moaned and writhed as we kissed, mouths glued together, tongues sparring. She bit my lower lip. I bit back. My hands worked their way down her back, but I wasn’t satisfied kneading the tight, high globes of her ass. Rucking up her skirt, I dipped a hand between her legs, seared by the heat of her.
She muffled a shriek and ground herself against my questing fingers, all fervor and magic and slick neediness. I teased and rubbed and plumbed her with fingers while pressing my palm against her vulva. I knew she was close, so I added a b
it of magic, and she dissolved around me. Holding her, watching color paint her breasts and face as she came humbled me and made me feel a million meters tall.
“I promised you a hundred of those,” I rasped.
“We have a few more to go,” she managed, despite struggling to get her breath back.
“I’m taking that as an open invitation.”
She placed a hand over mine and pressed herself into me. “It’s more than an invitation. I’m yours. Prickles, bitchy moods, and all.” Her mouth sought mine, and our kiss took off where the last one had left off.
My cock was so ready, keeping a noose around its randiness was out of the question. It had slipped its bonds; any illusions I had about who was in charge were pipe dreams. It pressed against the front of my trousers that had become uncomfortably snug.
I tore my mouth from hers, hating to let go for even long enough to divest ourselves of our clothes. I was breathing so hard, my words came out garbled. “Propose a contest. Who can undress faster?”
Rowan laughed. “You’re on.” She whipped her top over her head and unfastened her skirt and stepped out of it. All that remained were her boots.
I’d meant to undress, but I was starstruck staring at her. Her breasts were full, belly rounded. It lent her a Madonna appearance and made her all the more desirable. If that were even possible.
She glanced down at herself. “Just kind of happened,” she murmured. “Is it okay? Am I still—”
“More than okay. I can’t get over how incredibly lovely you are.”
Rowan grinned, slow at first, but then it reached her eyes. “Could you get over it long enough to take your clothes off?”
I laughed and stripped out of my vest and shirt before kneeling to deal with my boots. Finally, I got around to my breeches. Freeing my cock was a relief, and it jutted from my body. Meanwhile, Rowan had removed her boots and was bending over the water, presumably warming it. Her ass parted, offering me an alluring view of her sex framed by red curls. In my present condition, cold water would be fine. Nothing could quench the fire roaring through me.
I walked to her and filled my hands with her breasts. They were firmer, not just fuller, and the touch of them delighted me. My cock nudged her opening as I cuddled her breasts and twirled the nipples. “Damn, woman. You have the finest ass.”
“Bath first,” she said. “Both of us stink.”
“I’m putty in your hands.”
She snorted. “You can’t smell us?”
I could, but it didn’t matter to me. We’d come from a battlefield. Our sweat was well-earned. I wrapped an arm around her waist, and we walked into the water.
Chapter Seven, Rowan
The soft blue waters of the pool surrounded me, first my legs, then waist deep, and then my breasts were submerged. All the while, I was intimately aware of Bjorn next to me. The scent of his power, rich with the salt tang of the sea, invaded my nostrils. When he’d stopped dead and just stared at my heavier breasts and no-longer flat belly, I’d been afraid I wasn’t pretty anymore.
Not that I’ve ever been invested in how I look, but I wanted so much to be pleasing to him. Gah. I sound like such a girl, but the approval radiating from him had soaked into my bones, my soul.
He grabbed handfuls of sand from the bottom and scrubbed my back and arms. I mixed magic in with sand—as a stand-in for our lack of soap—and worked on the grime and grit caking his hair and streaking down his face.
A giggle escaped me. “Damn. We’re both hot messes.”
“Fighting is dirty business. Turn around. I’ll get your hair.”
Eventually, we were more or less clean and playing in the water like a couple of kids splashing each other. “It’s easy to believe we can shut out the world when we’re here.” I said.
“Because we can,” he said solemnly. “But someone will find us, even here. Besides, you and I aren’t runaway types.” He tipped my chin up with an index finger. “I love you, Rowan.”
My throat tightened with emotion, and I wrapped my arms around him. His mouth crashed down on mine, and we were back where we’d begun, standing on the shore among the circle of sacred stones. Lust spiraled, developed a will of its own. He scooped me up and carried me out of the water to a thick stand of marsh grass.
His kisses were sweet and hot and urgent. His mouth traveled down my neck and back up to my face, biting as he went. I hung on as he lowered us into the dense, prickly grass. He lay on his back and arranged me so I straddled him. His cock throbbed between us. Hard and thick and beautiful. I longed to worship it, take him into my mouth, but he had other ideas.
Lifting me, he pressed the tip of him against my entrance and thrust fast and sure, only stopping once he hit bottom. A slow, lazy smile etched into his face. “There. That’s perfect. You’re perfect.” He twitched his appendage within me. I tightened around him. We did that for a while. Twitch. Tighten. Twitch. Tighten. Lust thickened until not moving became a contest of wills.
He broke first.
Hands still around my hips, he slid me up his shaft and then back down. He stretched me, touched places so deep and private, emotion rocked me as my body climbed high, surfing the crest of one wave after another. Magic brightened the air around us, turning it liquid with shades of blue and gold. Men had touched my body before, but I’d never let anyone near my essence. I’d kept my soul locked away. Before it had only been for me, but now it was Bjorn’s as well. I should have been frightened of the way I’d opened myself, but it felt right. He felt right.
We felt right.
“Darling. Darling, Ro,” he crooned in Old Norse. He was moving faster now, and his cock swelled bigger within me. I waited, hovered at the top of the next wave of sensation, wanting to take him with me. Wanting him to drown in heat and love and lust, right along with me.
I felt the moment when passion took him. The still, quiet spot before semen juddered from him, but when his climax was as inexorable as the tides. Tightening my muscles around his engorged cock, I urged him to spill himself within me, to join me in ecstasy.
We came for a long time, and then we held each other as breath and reason returned. One perhaps slower than the other. I must have smiled because he asked, “What?”
“You’ve bewitched me. Besotted me. I’m done for.”
“Nay, wench. ’Tis you who’ve bewitched me. After all, ye passed as a witch for many a long year.” He was still speaking Norse.
I smiled. He grinned back.
“I’m happy,” I whispered. “So happy, it’s scary.”
He stroked my cheek. “I want you to be happy, darling. Tell me about our son talking with you. What was it like?”
I nodded. Of course, he’d want to know. “Odd. Mystical. Magical. Normal. All wrapped up in one. He has a small voice, a child’s voice. I knew instantly it was him. He didn’t say much, but he knew Dewi was close and was quite insistent about meeting her.”
“Makes sense.”
“Why? I couldn’t figure it out.”
“Dewi was the first dragon ever to hatch. She’s kind of like the grande dame of dragonkind. Our son would recognize her as special, important.”
I thought about it. “Do dragons have archetypal memories?”
“I’m not certain. They—er, we—all share a mind link with Nidhogg. Things have been different for me since Hel removed the cloaking. I’m still sorting it out. What about you? You may not have known about your dragon father, but has your power altered since discovering you’re a Dragon Heir?”
I considered the question. Everyone—as in Nidhogg and Ysien—had intimated gates would open, angels would sing, and I’d suddenly be elevated far above where I’d been. “Hasn’t happened yet,” I murmured. “Frankly, I’m not expecting it to. The biggest alteration in my magic was you.”
“We pack a hell of a punch working together.” Bjorn traced the line of my jaw with a calloused fingertip.
“Even more than that. Words don’t come close to describing what a jo
y it is when your power weaves with mine.” I felt my face warm, but I kept on talking. “It’s silly and schmaltzy, but I believe we could conquer any foe. If you’d been closer when Yggdrasil’s roots grabbed me, escape would have been trivial.”
Vertical lines formed between Bjorn’s blond brows. “At least theoretically, Quade and I were close. Did you try telepathy?”
“Yup. Did that right off the bat, but it ricocheted back at me after our brief exchange about the One Tree’s rotted-out roots.”
The lines deepened, and I could almost taste his worry. “After all my fine talk about protecting you, I made a few assumptions. I didn’t test them, and they weren’t true.”
“What assumptions?” He looked so distraught, I wove my fingers into his hair and smoothed it away from his face.
“We talked once, complained about the lack of air. I figured you were somewhere near me, even though I couldn’t see you.”
“It was a reasonable supposition. Damn it, Bjorn. We can’t know everything.” I buried my face in his shoulder. We’d have to leave soon, and I wasn’t ready to jump on Zelli and head back into the airless void where it was tough to think, let alone launch a campaign to deal with the gray things.
If they were even the problem.
“Your mind is busy,” Bjorn murmured.
I nodded. “Always. Even though Odin believes so, I’m still not convinced those gray tubes were malevolent.”
“One of you is wrong,” Bjorn said bluntly. “I thought I sensed treachery oozing from them, but the environment was so bizarre, I wasn’t certain. Quade was convinced they’re evil, though.”
“Hmph. Interesting. We must make certain we remain together,” I told him. “Which likely means traveling together and not with the dragons.”
“I’ve already thought about that.” He kissed my forehead. “We need to get back, so we have time to eat something, but tell me about our baby. What language did he speak?”
A smile curved my mouth as tenderness for my unborn child ran through me like quicksilver. “The dragon’s tongue.”