Chapter 20
SHAW
The sight of Rasha under the ice, sinking with the weight of her dress and the chains, rattles me awake. Reaching under the blankets, I find the curve of her hip and grip her warm skin.
She’s safe.
A moan slips from her lips, driving all my blood into my cock. I’ll never admit it out loud, but laying here with her in the security of my arms is my vice. For once the morning sky is bright and blue, drenched in sunlight and the clarity of a new day.
My thick length sits against her ass, and she sleepily grinds into me. Arching her back in the layers of blankets, she gives me space to slip my arm underneath her shoulders to bring her closer.
“You are naked,” she murmurs, trying to move to see me, but I keep her spine flush to my chest.
“We were about to freeze to death,” I reply.
“Thank you for coming for me. I was ready to die, Shaw.”
Shushing her admission, I can’t think about losing her today when we are finally ourselves and alone.
“Do you want to get dressed?” I painfully ask, knowing if she gets up, I’ll be content with how far we’ve come.
“No, this is nice.” She squirms against me. I can feel her smile in the crook of my arm.
“Rasha,” I growl, and she uses more strength to push away and lie on her back. Her body takes my breath away. While I try to regain my patience, she traces each dip and groove of my torso, moving lower beneath the blankets. I want to tell her to stop, but I groan instead.
Taking her hand before she touches my cock, I kiss her bruised knuckles, and she catches me staring at her exposed breasts. She covers herself with her other arm and starts to pull the blanket up, but I stop her.
“You must have me mistaken for a man who isn’t dying to etch the curves of your body into my eternal memory.
” It’s my turn to touch her alabaster skin as her breath becomes erratic.
I mold my hand to her breast, watching her fight the urge to close her eyes.
“Where did all that bravery go?” I ask. She leans up, and I give in, just a little, letting her pull me into our first real, unbound kiss.
“There you are. I thought you grew shy.”
She kisses me harder, and I love it. Goading her into showing me what she wants, I feel her drag her nails down my back and can’t help it when my hand finds her soaking wet cunt.
“Shaw.” My name out of her mouth warrants a pause. She lays back again, skin to skin, and reaches over. I don’t have it in me to stop her hand from encircling my throbbing cock.
“You’ll stay a virgin this morning unless you tie me up and use me, which I’m not against,” I say, and her face breaks into a blushing smile.
Stroking up and down my shaft, she asks, “Where is the fun in that for you?” Her inexperience makes me take a levelheaded breath.
I want to show her how this is supposed to be.
Sitting up, I take her arms and gently hold her wrists to either side of her head and trail my lips against her neck.
The feeling of her body underneath me is enough to make me lose control.
“Seeing you come is what I want. And you might want to hold on to that virtue now that you have the bow.” Holding myself above her, I memorize the swell of her breasts.
“I meant what I said before. That I’d give myself to you.” She fights my grip, leaning up to nip my lower lip.
“Let me give you this, please. I love your stubbornness, but I need to touch you,” I plead.
She doesn’t move when I release her wrists this time.
Stroking up and down her soft legs, I guide her thighs apart till I can see all of her.
Rasha stays quiet, intently watching as I run my knuckles through the outer edges of her cunt.
“Do you touch yourself?” I ask. She hums a yes, which piques my curiosity.
“When did you last?” At that question, her piercing blue eyes widen, and I push two fingers inside her; I can guess when.
Her cunt flutters around the new intrusion, and I push further, feeling how beautifully wet she becomes with every stroke.
“After the bath in the forge,” she admits. Her mouth stays open, and I withdraw my fingers, dragging them over her chin.
“Did you think about my cock?” I ask. Feeling the absence of my hand, she reaches between her legs and touches herself. I put my fingers in her mouth, and her tongue swirls over the calloused pads of my fingertips. My cock pulses a drop of pre-come on her leg.
“Fuck, Rasha, tell me what you thought of.” I work my fingers back inside her as she bows her legs wider, as if I need the encouragement
“Riding you,” she says, and I slip a third finger in. Instantly, her body turns rigid, and she squeezes her eyes shut. “Too much.”
I watch the tension in her face ease as I pull out, giving her a reprieve. Circling her drenched clit, I wait for her to want more. With one finger, I stretch and stroke until she bites her lower lip, and I feel her muscles relax enough for me to use a second finger again.
The moans slipping from her mouth make me want to drive my cock deep against her throat. I grip her ass, holding her in place, while my coated fingers stretch her in ways no one ever has. I want to lose myself in her until no part of her body is untouched.
“Look at me,” I whisper, and she strains her head the other way, caught in what I hope is the cusp of an orgasm.
“Rasha, please.” I press my whole body against hers and keep two fingers buried inside with my thumb pressed into her perfect clit.
“Look at me,” I whisper, and she slowly turns, her mouth parted as heavy breaths cave in her chest. “Look at how you make me come without touching me.” I can’t keep it together, grinding my own sensitive tip into her leg.
She reaches down to squeeze my shaft with her trembling hand, and I bite her shoulder.
“Promise it will be you.” She suddenly twists to face me, rocking herself into my palm, taking my fingers deeper.
“Come and I promise I’ll mold your virgin cunt to my cock.
” Inhaling the sweet smell of her come dripping down my wrist, I watch an orgasm shake through her as my name falls in repetitive moans at the end of each pant.
I bring her on top of my body and pull the blankets around us, gently stroking her ribs.
I want to tell her that it’s been a very long time since I’ve touched a woman—that I am equally as nervous to fall for her—but is that what she wants to hear?
Or should I tell her the truth about the unfinished chain and let her hate me.
Shattering her comfort seems cruel, so I kiss the top of her head and let her trace her fingers over the broken bits of my tattoo, wondering if she will get the chance to see my body as it once was.
“Shaw?” She breaks the silence. Snow birds chase away an eagle soaring overhead. All the creatures are relishing in the dawn of a new day. “Your ancestors made the tomb for the bow?”
“Something like that. Do you want to tell me what happened down there?”
Rasha moves away, wrapping herself in a blanket, and brings the quiver into her lap.
“I was ready to die, but Aslaug brought me this.” She pulls the bow out and tips the quiver over so the amulet falls into her lap. Laying the bow over her crossed legs, she holds up the amulet and waits with patient eyes for me to explain.
“The amulet protected you and opened the path to the edge, which is like a pocket between the Vanheim where things are sometimes stored.” I take the small oval piece out of her hands and hold it up to the sunlight, slowly turning it to move the coagulated blood around.
“That’s your blood or mine?” she asks.
“Ours,” I answer truthfully.
“How did you get my blood, Shaw?”
I hand it back to her and start opening bags to find clothes. The sun is strong, but it is still well below freezing, and I can’t think clearly if she’s naked.
“I carved it from the ice. You left an offering, and it didn’t need to go to waste.”
“You didn’t tell me,” she said, plainly letting her aggravation infiltrate her words. “I didn’t need to make a spectacle of myself. You could have said at any point that you had the key to getting the bow. That you knew about pockets between the Immortal and Mortal Realm.”
“Rasha,” I sigh and hand her my shirt.
Letting the blankets fall, she keeps talking. “I am not a child. I don’t want to be consoled. I needed the truth. I left all those women behind.”
“It wouldn’t have worked if you knew the truth.
We won’t leave them behind. The clan thinks you’re dead, which gives you time to learn how to wield the bow.
I don’t know if it will work the way I think it will,” I tell her, and she huffs a glare my way for good reason as she puts my shirt over her perfect body.
“You asked me to trust you, and I almost died.” She slips on pants that are far too big for her.
“I have tried to find the bow for many years to no avail. You” —I put my own tunic on and turn to face her— “you’ve been so determined, and it hit me when we did our runes at the divination feast.”
“What?” She looks down at the ancient bow. Her fingers are bruised from fighting with the men, but she glides over the carvings and marvels at the intricacy of the details all the same.
“That I have been carrying the empty amulet and the broken chain, not for myself to find the bow, but for you. And the gods wouldn’t have accepted you if you had previous knowledge. It would have clouded your judgment.”
“So where do we go from here?” Her anger is written all over her face.
I broke her away from everyone and let her get hurt in the process, but I didn’t want to chance that I’d be left here for eternity.
I need the bow to make amends with my family just as much as she needs it to save her clan.
If I tell her that, I run the risk of her leaving me.
“We go to my cabin in the Sacred Forest and make a plan to cut Harald’s men off before Spring, when they will be able to reach the mountain pass. We will find the herd with my map and lead them to the other side, where they will be safe.”
“Are you asking or telling me?”
My shoulders fall, and I fear the desperate lust we felt an hour ago is shrinking in the cold, like a dying fire in the forest. When I approach her, she doesn’t move away, so I cautiously take my coat from the bed of the sled and wrap it around her shoulders, fastening it tight, which brings us closer.
“I am asking you,” I say, and she swallows, loosening her tightly clenched jaw.
“We will need to stop at my village and warn them,” she adds, wrapping her hands around my forearms.
“Alright. After we see how the bow works. Now, you can stay back here if you want to rest, or you can sit up front with me. I can’t answer the thousands of questions swimming behind those beautiful eyes all at once. Is that fair?”
Watching her suck her pink bottom lip into her mouth, I almost say fuck it and tell her everything, but Aslaug jumps into the bed of the sled with a fuzzy, white rabbit between her strong jaws. Rasha moves away from me to scratch Aslaug’s head and take the rabbit from her.
“Fair for now. We should cook this before we go so we aren’t hungry and grumpy the rest of the day,” she says, climbing down from the sled.