Lord Tristram’s Love Match: Her Stern Husband Book Three

by R. R. Vane

  She heaved a heartfelt sigh, but obeyed his command, because it was true she now lived on his sufferance.

  He hoisted her skirts to look upon her and Judith blushed scarlet as he did so. She knew her bottom was still striped with pink, but as evening had neared, it had begun to smart less fiercely than it had this morning after his ministrations. She sighed again, fully knowing that this blissful state wouldn’t last long because her now stern husband meant to chastise her, just as he’d promised.

  “Still sore, wife?” he asked in a soft voice, as he was sliding his calloused palm over the skin of her bare bottom and thighs.

  “Why are you asking me this? Do you care?” she countered, knowing whatever she uttered, he would still spank her.

  He laughed cruelly, saying, as if he’d guessed her very thoughts, “To be sure, for these words, I’ll spank you even harder.”

  Judith gnashed her teeth, to prevent the retort which sprang on her tongue.

  “What? No further words of defiance?” Tristram asked, brushing his fingers tantalizingly over her buttocks.

  Judith supposed what she did next would not lighten her punishment, but she just couldn’t help herself. She cursed, foully, because Tristram’s fingers kindled a shameful, powerful sensation inside her quim, even if he’d not even touched her there.

  “Ah,” Tristram said in full, grim satisfaction, and he proceeded to spank her soundly with his hand, soon putting a fire in her behind which first matched, and then even surpassed the one she’d felt this morning.

  The spanking left her weak-kneed and crying, but that powerful, shameful feeling inside her quim became even more maddening. When Tristram finally let her off his lap, Judith rubbed her bottom frantically, although, in truth, it was not only her bottom she wanted to rub. She desperately wanted to touch herself between her legs, to ease the shameful, powerful fire her husband’s spanking had kindled there.

  As before, Tristram sat watching her with avid dark eyes which looked both hard and warm.

  “Be thankful I spared you the belt,” he said lazily.

  Judith couldn’t help but glare at him, feeling the insane urge of both strangling him and of begging him to thrust inside her and give her release.

  Tristram cocked a dark eyebrow.

  “Yet I see you’re not thankful for it.”

  His eyes seemed to be searching around the room, and Judith prayed fervently he wasn’t looking for that accursed belt.

  “I-I’m thankful for it, husband,” she muttered reluctantly, through gritted teeth.

  “Oh, are you?” Tristram asked making his voice a silky caress, and Judith knew she could no longer keep the rein of her temper.

  “You love this – tormenting me!” she spat.

  “Yes,” Tristram said tersely, but Judith now perceived the odd, strained note in his voice she had heard before when he’d confirmed he’d kept her on for revenge.

  It was however with relief that she saw he hadn’t fetched the belt. Instead he ordered her to lie on her elbows and knees in their bed, and he knelt behind her. Judith began to wonder frantically if he had more punishment in store for her, but she gasped in sheer mortification as she swiftly understood he’d bent his head to unashamedly lick her sex in that undignified position, with her bottom thrust towards him.

  “So very wet already – gushing,” he muttered, and his voice no longer sounded hard, but warm, just like the voice of the Tristram whom she recalled from their first days of marriage.

  Judith simply moaned when his tongue thrust inside her. It was a humiliating position and what he was doing was certainly sinful. Yet Judith decided she’d already received chastisement for her sins. And soon her husband’s sinful tongue began to lick not only her quim, but also her poor chastened bottom. She’d nearly already climaxed with the sheer pleasure of what he’d done, when he finally deigned to grab her hips and rub his engorged cock against her bottom and sex.

  “I should have spanked you on our wedding night, wife,” he said softly, when she thought she would start begging him to claim her. “It would not only have taught you to mind me, it would have made your quim gush for me. Just as it’s gushing now.”

  So he’d already perceived her shameful, twisted enjoyment of what he’d done. Judith’s cheeks began to burn even more deeply, but soon she had occasion to focus on a different kind of fire. She nearly climaxed as soon as he plunged swiftly inside her from behind. He thrust hard, going in and out of her, as his front was making slapping contact with her freshly spanked rear. A fierce pleasure in her sex, and a fierce burn in her bottom. Judith soon forgot herself entirely, and she forgot to feel ashamed. She climaxed, but he didn’t seem to care, still thrusting inside her with a vengeance, and, after a while, Judith’s body melted again into a frenzy of pleasure, just as he shouted his own release, spilling his hot seed inside her.

  They both collapsed, spent, but Judith could only lie on her belly, because her spanked bottom still tingled fiercely.

  “I know now how I erred when we were newly married. I should have treated you harshly from the start. I was too gentle,” Tristram said in a savage voice.

  And suddenly Judith had the urge to weep at his words. She breathed in deep, trying to contain her anguish.

  “What? Is there nothing you wish to tell me now, wife?” he tossed, as he was wiping his cock with the bed sheet.

  “What is it that you wish me to tell you?” Judith asked wearily, as she rose to clean herself.

  She supposed he would spank her anew for her defiance, but she was too spent and now past caring. What had gone on had shaken her too deeply. And his words – the bitterness with which he’d spoken them… They hadn’t sounded like the words of a man set on cold revenge for his hurt pride. They’d sounded like the words of a man who’d been deeply hurt. But how could this be? Tristram had never had genuine regard for her. She had been just his plaything.

  “I wish…” Tristram’s voice was just an angry whisper, and he suddenly fell silent.

  Judith felt too spent and weary to ask him what he’d meant. When she came back to bed she just lay on her belly, in sheer exhaustion, not caring if her husband might have further punishment in store for her. Hazily, when she was dozing off, she felt a blanket coming to cover her, and, in the nearing slumber, she nearly smiled as she spoke the name of the man she’d in truth, never stopped loving madly, not even when she’d tried to deceive herself.

  “Tristram,” she whispered just before she was fast asleep.

  Chapter 7

  Tristram frowned upon hearing Judith’s lovely voice call his name, knowing full well it was the first time she’d spoken it since he’d stormed into her castle. And he strived to harden his heart against her, because she’d brought him nothing but anguish and grief, and she didn’t care for him. Yet he failed. Because he recalled those nights they’d shared in the first days of their marriage, when there’d been no heated caresses between them but only talk. And he recalled he’d loved talking to her, not only because he would never have enough of hearing her voice, but because, once she’d let go of her shyness, Judith had shown him she really had a way with words.

  Four years ago, 1170

  Tristram had refrained from touching his wife in those first nights they’d spent together, because he’d thought to give her time to get accustomed to him, without pressing. He had also discovered he enjoyed the tantalizing feeling of having her within reach without being able to touch her. It was courtship. And he had become aware they perhaps both needed to enjoy this chaste courtship until they moved on to heated caresses. They had plenty of time, and a life ahead together. Once Judith became more at ease in his presence, he reasoned she would ask for his ardent touch herself, and there really was nothing to be gained by rushing things unduly.

  “Why is it you never speak English to me?” he asked her lazily one night, as they were lying chastely in their bed together. “In truth, I’m more accustomed to speaking English than Norman, and I know you are n
ot Norman, but Occitan from your mother’s side, just like our queen. However, your father is English.”

  Judith had laughed, that rich, melodious laughter he’d come to love.

  “Fine. I shall speak English to you then,” she said, and her voice was teasing.

  Then she did speak to him in a language he barely recognized. It certainly sounded like English, but he was able to understand only some words of it.

  “What kind of English is this?” he muttered in puzzlement.

  “My English,” she said in a voice full of laughter. “The English of the North. It’s different from yours. Didn’t you know?”

  Tristram had never travelled North, but he recalled people said Northerners’ speech was rough and different from that of the South or Midlands. To him, Judith’s English didn’t sound rough at all though, but strangely musical in its own way.

  “Oh, just keep talking! I have a keen ear and I think I’ll soon be able to follow more of what you say,” he urged, smiling in the dark.

  “Oh really? Would you be able to follow a story in verse if I tell you one?” Judith asked in Norman, but then reverted to Northern English to tell him the tale of the owl and the nightingale.

  Tristram could not follow everything she was saying. He nevertheless soon became absorbed in the versed tale, where a grim owl perched on a bough argued with a vain nightingale. Some words of it sounded strange and he had trouble keeping up with the rhythm of her speech, but he made himself listen closely. He’d never heard the tale before, but he soon came to understand that most of its intricate verses were due to Judith’s own cleverness. Judith may be shy, but now she was quite at ease in his company and she could revel in her passion for words. He found himself loving her English verse just as much as he loved her Occitan songs, even if it was still somewhat hard for him to follow what she was saying.

  “So who did you like best, the owl or the nightingale?” Judith asked in Norman with a smile in her voice when she was done with her tale.

  “I liked best the wren which comes to make peace between these two birds,” Tristram countered with a smile of his own.

  “The wren is wise,” Judith conceded. “Yet whom would you choose as the victor of the debate, the useful owl or the beautiful nightingale?”

  “Is there a choice? Both have their uses!” Tristram retorted, knowing Judith was not really asking him a question, but only liked to engage him in a debate not unlike the one in the tale she’d just told him.

  She was quite clever, he’d come to see, even cleverer than he’d thought at first, but modest about her own wit and very seldom displaying it in front of others. And her gift for words far surpassed his own. She was already a troubadour, able to weave songs more wondrous than Queen Eleanor’s most lauded poets. He’d once attempted to tell her she should bring her lute to Court and entertain more people with her songs, yet she was still shy in other people’s presence, and Tristram had not pressed. For now Judith seemed happy not to share her songs with many people, and he had come to understand that making them was far more valuable to her than sharing them with others. It was wondrous and strange that a woman so quiet in other people’s presence had such a way with words when there was just the two of them. And he felt the most fortunate of men, this woman was now his wife.

  Soon they began to play a game of rhymes in Norman, and in this language Tristram could hold his own against Judith, although he had to admit she was still better than him at it. When they were done, he thought of bestowing a kiss upon her lips, but he felt strangely shy himself of it. Was it as his mother had told him? That he was already coming to love Judith? Or was it that he’d indeed fallen in love with her just the first time he’d chanced to hear her mermaid-like voice?

  “Tell me of Redmore,” he soon urged her, because he would never have enough of hearing her warm voice, and she loved best to talk of her childhood home.

  Soon Judith’s compelling voice began to tell him of Redmore.

  “Some people may find it stark, and the warmth of the South is not to be found there. The hills are green in spring, but russet in autumn. The cliffs are further ahead and they are treacherous at times. It’s often windy, but this is how I like it – the wind ruffling my hair when it’s unbound. And in summer, the heather moorland is a wonder to behold – all purple, but there’s dark blue bilberries mingling within. I do not think such colours are to be found in many places in this world, although to Mother they seem dreary – she misses her warm home in Aquitaine, where colours are bright and the sky is always azure.”

  Tristram had already learnt Judith was very fond of her mother, and she worried over the lady’s frail health. And soon Judith would go back home to see to the ailing Lady Fenice. Tristram thought upon this with regret because he would have loved to keep his new bride by his side in London, yet he understood she was impatient to know her mother was well. He hadn’t had the heart to tell her nay when she’d told him she needed to go back to Redmore so soon after their marriage. They’d spent but two brief weeks together, and Tristram supposed it would have been better to already share their bodies as they would be parted for some months.

  He fell asleep with a suppressed sigh and a smile, telling himself it would be best to let Judith bring herself to ask for his caress. He had come to see she got tense and flustered whenever he attempted to touch her more ardently. And he resolved she might have let go of her shyness in their talk, but that she still needed to lose her maidenly fear of being touched by him. No matter, he told himself before drifting into sleep. He could see only too well Judith was already coming to care for him and soon her fear would melt. Once she was back from Redmore they would become husband and wife in truth.

  Chapter 8

  Judith left her new husband with regret in her heart, knowing a part of her would have liked nothing better than to have him hold her in his arms and make her his true wife. She however resolved he was right in not pressing her and in prolonging their courtship. There was another part of her which was shy and skittish, yet not of him, but rather because she was afraid she would show him from the start how utterly besotted and at his mercy she really was. She fancied this beautiful man far too much, and perchance he would not like her behaving like a lovesick fool, but as a restrained, dignified wife. So perchance it was wiser to prolong their courtship, just as Tristram wanted.

  When Judith came to Redmore to look upon her mother, Lady Fenice looked pale and forlorn, although she tried to smile brightly as she cast her eyes upon her daughter. Yet Judith saw at once that something was amiss.

  “Oh Mother, I missed you so!” she said, kissing her mother’s cheek.

  She suddenly felt guilty for the joyous news she wished to share with her mother. And she felt guilty that Sir Edward had decided upon this match without having the courtesy to ask for his wife’s advice. Judith had tried to speak to her father upon this, but he had been set in arranging a hasty marriage for her, proclaiming he knew what was best for his daughter. Suddenly, Judith’s genuine happiness over her match seemed out of place in her mother’s chambers. Yet, as always, her mother soon inquired after her, and Judith found herself speaking of her new husband, or at least attempting to do so.

  “My lord Tristram… He is…”

  Judith stopped herself with a short, strained laugh. She’d meant to say Lord Tristram de Brunne was simply wondrous, but now, seeing her mother’s keen eyes upon her, she came to understand the word was childish and silly.

  “He is a good, worthy man,” she said instead. “And I can see he means to be a kind, courteous husband to me. In truth I couldn’t be…”

  Again, a silly word came into her head. She’d meant to tell her mother she couldn’t have been happier, but surely, her mother had always warned her not to be shallow about this world and its perils. Happiness was hard to come by, her mother had always told her.

  “You are happy in this match your father made for you,” her mother suddenly told her with a smile, embracing her warmly, a
nd Judith felt relieved and grateful for her words.

  “Aye! I-I know I may be fanciful, but I truly think Lord Tristram and I… that we can have a happy marriage. I just can’t wait for him to meet you! He promised he’d come as soon as he was able to visit. And you’ll see he is indeed a worthy man.”

  “I am certain he is,” her mother nodded with a smile, but Judith could catch a hint of distress in her voice.

  It was natural for her mother to worry on her behalf, and Judith prayed Tristram would get here soon. Once her mother got to know him, she would certainly see what Judith already saw, that her daughter could not have wished for a better husband. So Judith hoped fervently Tristram would come as soon as could be, but the weeks turned into months and still Tristram wouldn’t come. He sent word to her often. At first it was tedious business at King Henry’s court which kept him away.

  “I am certain he will get here eventually,” her mother told her with an encouraging smile whenever she caught Judith glancing despondently through the window instead of focusing on the tapestry she’d been embroidering.

  But Judith caught a note of distress in her mother’s voice, and she felt wary of it. She wrote to Tristram urging him to try to do away with the tedious business which kept him from her. Yet the reply she received was disheartening.

  “Tristram’s mother has fallen ill with a fever,” Judith said in anguish coming upon her mother one evening, after she’d received the letter the messenger had brought her.

  She felt worried for Lady Aelis, Tristram’s mother, who had been most kind and courteous to her upon her marriage to her son.

  “Don’t you think it would be better to seek London in order to aid Lady Aelis in her hour of need?” she said, thinking Tristram and his mother may need her at this time.

  “Has your husband asked for your aid?” her mother inquired.