Chapter Nine
G uinevere was quiet and somber as the wedding guests toasted to our wedding, clinking overflowing cups of mead together as lively music filled Leodegrance’s great hall.
Her demeanor was a far cry from the fiery woman who had challenged me in the forest and it seemed I was not the only one who had noticed it.
Bedivere stood behind us guarding his new queen just as I had asked, and every glance I shot back at him showed that he also noticed the shift in the omega’s mood.
As the group of musicians wound down the jaunty tune they were playing, I turned to her with a frown. “Are you well, my queen?”
Guinevere jumped at the new title, her light brown eyes widening with surprise as she pursed her full pink lips as if she was trying to measure out the words she wanted to say.
But instead of shooting back some quip that would make my lips turn up into a wry grin, she just shrugged her slender shoulders and fiddled with one of the curls that seemed to float around her head like a cloud of dark silk. “Are you? You’ve just married a stranger after all.”
The sweet scent of honeysuckle that wafted off of the omega soured slightly with her glum words.
“I was always destined to marry a stranger, Guinevere,” I told her softly as Gawain took center stage, grinning at the teasing from the other knights as he held up his prized lute and began a much sweeter song now.
The people who had been up and dancing about the center of the hall seemed to calm now, returning to their seats to listen with awe as Gawain showed off his true talent.
The lad was good with a sword—I had trained him myself—but when his fingers plucked at the string of his prized possession, every other thought seemed to fade away and every soul in whatever room he was in watched with enthralled interest.
“He’s good,” Gwen gasped next to me, changing the topic of discussion as her eyes remained fixed on the man in front of us and her expression changed into something lighter—softer even.
I lifted up my goblet, taking a sip of the too-sweet mead as I watched her profile, my eyes taking in the slender curve of her jaw and her little nose.
Before, when we had spoken, I had not taken the chance to survey my soon-to-be bride and now I used her distraction to take in my fill of her.
She was beautiful in a way that differed from the women in my time. While the women of my time were of gentler stock, everything about Guinevere seemed sturdy and strong. She was also taller than many of the other maidens standing nearly a head taller than her maids despite her omega nature.
Her skin was also a different shade than many of the other women—a light shade of brown as if she had been personally kissed by the sun itself.
Feeling the heaviness of my gaze, Guinevere’s eyes were drawn away from Gawain’s performance and back to me once more.
We stared at each other, neither one ready to be the first to break the tension and I realized she was unlike anything I had ever laid my eyes on. Something deep inside of me was pleased and satisfied that she would be my queen and my mate.
Mine , it growled as if anyone would dare to take her away from me.
Then Bedivere’s head was leaning in between us and for just a split second I wanted to grab him and shove him out of the way for moving in between myself and the woman who was my bride.
But even as the instinctual urge to possess my omega filled me it seemed to evaporate as quickly as it had come as soon as my eyes met Bedivere’s much calmer gaze.
“What?” Even still, my words came out sharp as I sat up straight and worked to calm myself down before repeating my question again in a much softer tone than before. “What is it?”
“It grows late, your majesty,” he murmured, seeming unfazed by my outburst, “and there is talk of escorting you and your bride to the bridal chambers.”
In the craze of preparations I had nearly forgotten all about the most important part of the wedding, what would seal Guinevere and me together as husband and wife—as alpha and omega.
The consummation.
When I found Guinevere standing alone in that corridor the night of her arrival I had told her she would be my wife in all ways and I had meant it—but now my mouth seemed to become sticky as if I had poured an entire jar of molasses into it.
Bedivere waited for me to speak, his eyes seeming to understand as he gave me time to come to my own conclusions about how I felt about the situation at hand.
He had been one of my strongest allies on the battlefield, that much was true, but his time as my advisor had been even more helpful as I took steps to become a king without Merlin’s counsel after his disappearance.
I could rely on the older alpha to be honest with me—just as he had been when he didn’t immediately reject Merlin’s portent and instead offered wisdom outside of natural reaction as Lancelot, Gawain, and myself had been prone to.
“What do you wish for me to do, your majesty?”
Leaning forward slightly, I found Gwen’s eyes still on me, though they were rounded now as she realized what Bedivere’s words meant for us.
She was not chaste. She had told me as much that night. In many ways it would make this much easier.
“You may gather the men,” I finally told him and watched as he gave me a resolute nod before slipping away.
“What’s happening?” She asked her head whipping around to follow Bedivere’s imposing figure as he whispered something to her father who nodded and clapped his hands together loud enough to cut through the music and bring silence to the great hall.
“It is time for the bride and her groom to retire for the evening!”
A roar of approval came from the gathered crowd before the sound of the scrape of bench seats scraping on the stone floor filled the room.
I stood, offering a hand to her. “It is time for the consummation, bride.”
The color in Guinevere’s cheeks faded slightly, making the rouging that her maids had given her stand out starkly against her skin.
“Is it that time already?” she asked, eyeing my hand suspiciously for a moment before her shoulders dropped and she slid her hand into mind.
I expected her honeysuckle perfume to sour with the impending doom of the situation, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that it was sweet as it flowed up to my nose.
Was that anticipation I could smell? I couldn’t be sure as bedding an omega was not an accomplishment I could boast about.
There was too much risk of bonding with someone who was not meant to be my queen so I had made it a rule to avoid omegas almost entirely when I could.
Many had pushed me to court a queen long before Guinevere’s appearance during the feast half a fortnight ago, but something deep within me had kept me from actively pursuing anyone.
Now it all seemed to make sense. I almost wondered if Merlin had cast a spell on me before fleeing in the middle of the night all those years ago to make sure that when he finally brought my bride through the threads of time that I would not be married.
“Do we have to, ah, consummate?” Guinevere asked me quietly as we led the jeering onlookers through the halls of the castle in the direction of the suite where the deed would be done.
I glanced down at her, frowning. “We do. Our marriage will not be a true marriage unless consummation occurs.”
Guinevere’s shoulders stiffened slightly.
“I just never thought I would…” she trailed off before gesticulating in the direction of the suite. “Get married .”
She said the word as if it was a dirty thing.
“Why?” I asked, surprised by her tone. “Is it not natural for one to marry eventually?”
Guinevere shook her head. “In my time some never do it.”
“Even omegas?”
She paused. “No, most of us find packs or an alpha,” she said with a sigh.
I paused my questioning as we came up to the double doors that led into the bedchambers and would eventually lead to the final part of the night.
Behind us, Leodegrance had gathered the crowd around him. “We wish this happy couple a long and prosperous life full of many fat babes!”
The crowd shouted and laughed their approval as I gently tugged on the ring of the door and pulled it open.
It was much quieter on the other side of the thick wood as I rounded on Guinevere who had gone mute upon hearing the cheers of the crowd.
“Why did you never find an alpha?” I asked softly, curiosity winning out over the instinctual urge to make sure every person out in that hallway knew Guinevere was my omega chosen for me in the same way I had been chosen to pull Excalibur from the stone all those years ago.
Guinevere shrugged, her eyes glued to me rather than whatever lay behind me. “Never felt the need to. My mom always taught me to be independent—to not rely on anyone the same way she never relied on anyone.”
“And was she an omega?”
Guinevere huffed a laugh. “No. She was a beta—one of the very few differences between her and the Queen Adelaide of this time. She was always surprised that I came out the way I did. Our entire family was full of betas, so she always just assumed my omega designation came from my donor.”
The term was odd and she must have seen the confusion on my face because she hurried to explain.
“A donor is someone who donates their, um , sperm to someone so that they can have a baby without having to get married.”
I had a feeling I was going to regret my next question, but I could not help but ask. “What is ‘sperm?’”
The word was even odder than the first one and judging by the flush in Guinevere’s face told me nearly everything that I needed to know.
“I don’t quite know the preferred term for it in this time, but it’s a man’s…” she pointed to my waist, avoiding my gaze as I followed her finger.
“ Seed ?” I asked incredulously with a scoff. “Men donate their seed to a woman who is not their wife?”
The very notion of it was almost vile to me. “How does a man have heirs to give his treasures to if his children can run about at random in such a way?”
“Not every man needs an heir, Arthur,” Guinevere told me dryly, crossing her arms over her chest.
“Why would your mother ever do that? How did she protect herself without a husband?”
One of Guinevere’s dark brows rose. “She never wanted a husband—or a wife for that matter, and as for protecting herself? She owned a gun.”
“Gun?”
“It’s a weapon that shoots lead projectiles at someone’s enemy,” she explained, pointing two fingers at me with her thumb in the air.
I examined the digits as her thumb twitched and she made a noise that sounded like a rough exhalation of air before dropping her hand. “Would that not just be a bow and arrow?”
She shook her head. “No, these go much, much faster. They can tear through flesh in a blink and some of them can shoot multiple projectiles one after another.”
Her explanation only revealed more questions for me to ask, but the queries died on my lips as her brows drew together and she frowned.
“What is it?” I asked, suddenly afraid something was wrong with her.
“It’s nothing,” Guinevere said with a shake of her head. “I’m just surprised I can tell you about guns in the first place. Apparently the gods don’t see that as important enough to knock the wind out of me over.”
Guinevere ran her hands down the front of the pale dress she was wearing before tilting around my bulk and changing the subject. “Wow, medieval nests are so different from what I’m used to!”
She was forcing a note of false-brightness into her voice as she moved around me and practically danced out of my reach as she approached the nest.
“Is it so different?” I asked, staring at the empty structure. It was made out of woven straw, like a massive flat basket with a cushion placed in the center. Unlike regular beds which were rectangular, this one was built in a circle. On the floor next to it were piles of furs and extra cushions.
I had only ever seen one other nest and that had been my foster-mother, Lady Anne’s. Kay and I had received the scolding of a lifetime from Sir Ector that day for daring to go into their private quarters—the old alpha had explained that an omega’s nest was sacred and that only the omega and her alpha should ever lay their eyes on it.
Now I was staring at the empty one in front of me and I was not sure what the fuss had been about.
“Yes,” Guinevere told me simply as she drew her fingers along the textured sides before gesturing to the pile on the floor. “For one we use soft blankets and pillows—almost no one uses furs anymore.”
“It should not be on the floor,” I told her gruffly, suddenly irritated at Leodegrance’s servants for daring to place something my omega would lie upon on the cold floor. I was about to turn around and bark orders at the people who were undoubtedly still waiting outside when Guinevere’s soft giggle stopped me.
“You don’t know much about omegas do you, Arthur?”
Her question made me pause. I had never had much interest in the fairer designation prior to my sudden marriage to the woman in front of me—so all I knew was what had been told to me by Sir Ector when he was instructing us on proper alpha behavior.
Sex, or at least the act of it, was not spoken about in plain terms. My men, while bawdy in their exploits with the women around them, had quickly learned to mind their tongue around me.
“I know that my knot is supposed to go in your cunt, is that not sufficient?”
I had been trying to get a rise out of the omega—to distract her from her anxiety about our wedding night—but the sudden flush of her scent nearly drew me over the edge as she frowned up at me.
“It is not ‘sufficient ,’ isn’t there a tender bone in your body?” she asked as she turned her back to me and surveyed the nest. Then she reached back and gave me a little shove in the direction of the chair that had been shoved into the corner of the room.
Her brown eyes found mine and I saw a flash of something mischievous in them. “Watch me carefully, alpha, or I’m liable not to let you into my nest at all tonight. Consummation or not.”
Her words held a surprising weight to them and I found myself settling down into the chair with a dull thud as she completely ignored my presence in favor of the furs on the ground.
She picked one up and held it up to her nose, giving it a surreptitious sniff. It seemed to pass her inspection and she dumped it into the nest haphazardly before picking up the next one.
The next few minutes were just her picking up another fur or linen and smelling it before either putting it in the nest or chucking it over her shoulder.
“Why do you get rid of some of them?” I asked after she was nearly done with the pile.
Guinevere turned to look over her shoulder at me and I was surprised to find her pupils blown as she let out an exasperated sigh.
“You all really need some sex ed,” she muttered under her breath before answering my question. “Omegas don’t like the scents of anything in their nest but their own and their alphas. Some of these were touched too much by whoever set them in here and they smell wrong.”
I was not going to ask what sex ed was as there were apparently many things about the future that I was not and would never be able to understand. “So now what do you do, little queen?”
The endearment rolled easily off my tongue and Guinevere seemed to like it because I watched a shiver roll down her spine as she squared her shoulders and got back to work, talking as she began to arrange the furs.
“I put them in the nest until they are perfect,” she told me vaguely as she spread the largest fur of the bunch out to cover the cushion of the nest.
“And how do you know if it’s perfect?”
I heard an annoyed huff. “How do you know if a sword swing, or whatever, is perfect?”
“Instinct and practice,” I answered immediately. It was what set knights apart from regular fighters. The sheer amount of practice it took to take on the mantle of a knight was not for the weak, but there was a certain amount of natural talent also required to be a true warrior.
“Same thing with nests,” she said, twisting some of the linens and tucking it along the edges of the nest. “When I first awakened as an omega it drove my mom nuts when I would steal all of the blankets in the house and make my blanket forts to hide in.”
“How old were you when you became an omega?” I asked curiously, my eyes on her slender frame as she lifted a dainty foot and stepped inside of the nest and dropped to her knees to continue her work, her dark curls spilling over one shoulder in a delicate waterfall.
The motion sent her sweet scent wafting towards me and I had to push down on the desire to join her in the nest whether it was done or not.
“Twenty-one,” she told me, her words a bit sheepish.
I was surprised by that. “So late?”
Guinevere shot me a dry look. “You sound like every man I’ve ever spoken to about it. I was a late-bloomer. When did you become an alpha?”
“Ten and five, a season before I drew Excalibur from the sword.”
“Truly like the damn fairytale,” was all Guinevere muttered with a shake of her head before she sat back on her heels and surveyed her work. “It’s no blanket fort, but it’ll do for…”
She trailed off as if suddenly remembering the purpose for the nest.
I was already standing and crossing the room. “I told you that night, Guinevere, that our marriage would be a true one regardless of past, present, or whatever future lies before us and I meant it.”
“I know,” Guinevere told me with a frustrated sigh as she avoided my gaze, her eyes on the large window that framed one of the stone walls, showing the now-starry sky outside. “I just thought I would have more time to, I don’t know, come to terms with it all?”
“Is it because you fear me?” I asked, hoping that was not the reason for the omega’s reticence.
Guinevere shook her head.
“Then is it because I am ugly?”
This time her head shake was accompanied by a snort of derision. “You and I both know you are not ugly, Arthur. I just don’t know you that well. How often do you jump into bed with a stranger?”
I did not tell her that most of my bed partners were strangers who I had no interest in learning the name of. I was not well-versed in the mind of women, but even I knew that was dangerous territory to step into. “Have you known every partner you have made love to? That every man who crawled between your thighs was a lover?”
Even the visual of it sent a strange envious streak through me and I had to push it from my mind.
But my words made her pause. “No… not really.”
I reached for her, cupping her face in my hands as the urge to comfort her filled me. “Then think of this as nothing different.”
“But I wasn’t marrying those guys.” Brown eyes rolled as if I did not understand the situation at all. “I did marry you.”
Something about the way she said it was so satisfying to me that I nearly dipped my head and gave her a premature kiss.
The wedding earlier had not required more than a chaste peck on the cheek—any more than that would have sent the tongues of the audience wagging.
Now, however, I wondered how those delicate pink lips would taste under my own. I wagered they were sweet, like the thick floral scent surrounding the omega in front of me.
Guinevere’s eyes shifted down to where my hands were touching the soft skin of her cheeks and hesitantly she reached up to cover my fingers with her own.
“I will take care of you, little queen,” I promised. “The moment you became my wife I vowed with my life that I would protect and cherish you regardless of your origins. Getting to know each other the way you wish will take time, but we must come together so as not to anger the gods.”
“These gods could use some frustration,” Guinevere muttered petulantly, still she finally nodded in surrender. “Okay, I’ll do it. Just… be gentle? I’ve never done this outside of my heat so my memory is a little bit fuzzy.”
Surprise filled me at her words. I would need for her to explain them to me better later on, but for now the beast that always seemed to creep in the back of my head was digging its claws into my good sense and if I wasn’t buried in between this omega—my omega’s thighs soon I feared I would lose myself completely.
“I will make the very stars blur in the heavens,” I told her roughly, “and the gods will hear your cries and know you are home.”
Then I dropped my mouth to hers and was lost to the sensation of it.