Chapter Sixty-Two Howard
CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO
Howard
Howard cannot remember the last time she said “no”. She has acted “no” in myriad ways. She has spoken it with her body, with her eyes. But has she ever said it? She thinks not. It is a word of power.
The night before they make their final journey to High Hall, Howard finds herself wandering from room to room, staircase to staircase of the lodge where they are staying. She does not want to sleep. She wants to chase power. She needs to know she is capable before she sees Henry again.
Florin’s room is at the very top of the lodge, beneath the eaves. When she knocks upon his door and he opens it, she can understand why he chose the space. It is a burrow, a cosy nook. It is safe. As far from the endless fury of the ocean, or a dowager queen, as can be.
“Katheryn?” he says, rubbing his eyes. “What is the matter?”
“We are not in love,” she says, forcing the words out before she loses her nerve.
He stills. “No. We are not.”
“But I find you attractive. And I feel safe around you.”
The unspoken question hangs between them, until he steps back to allow her in. Florin closes the door softly, and softly he comes to her. Softly he traces her bare arm.
“You are safe, Katheryn. And I am safe with you.”
“You are,” she says.
She steps into his arms and cups his face. “Is this all right?” she asks.
“Yes.” He leans towards her so that she can see his eyelashes.
He pauses until she nods, and then his lips are against hers.
He matches her but never escalates. He is waiting for me, she thinks, and a thrill runs through her.
It might be lust, it might be the power of the goddess.
She slips her tongue into his mouth and feels his hesitation.
Although he says nothing to stop her, she recognises that tension. She pulls away.
“I am sorry. You are safe,” she says.
Florin’s eyes are wide. “I am sorry,” he says. “I …”
“I know.”
She moves away, ready to slip out of the room if he needs her to.
“Don’t go, please,” he says.
“I won’t unless you want me to.”
“Tell me what to do to please you,” he says.
This is what Voda Kelaverinn meant, all those moons ago.
Despite the lovers she took before she married, despite Henry’s experience and Culpepper’s confidence, no one has ever asked her that.
They assumed things of her body, and she forced it to bend according to their pleasures. To bend until it cracked.
She laughs giddily. “I do not know,” she says.
He understands sooner than most would. He smiles ruefully. “I do not know either.”
They hold hands. Everything about the night is soft: the darkness, their skin, the pulsating power that is building between them.
“Tell me no, and I shall tell you no,” she says.
She kisses him again. It is the slowest, gentlest kiss she has ever experienced, and she feels as though she is melting into him.
She wraps her arms around his neck, pulling him closer, wanting to share his warmth, his spirit.
She thinks: I have never kissed a boy my own age before.
They kiss their way to the bed and sink onto it as one, cradling each other, neither one on top.
Usually, this would be the moment when her lovers would grow rougher.
They would cover her, smother her, own her.
She always thought it was a sign of their love, but Florin’s tenderness is more potent.
The way his hands stroke her whole body, not merely groping her breasts or buttocks, or pulling at her hair.
She does not doubt his desire even though it is measured.
She has never been the one to instigate, but now she unbuttons his doublet and tugs at the shirt beneath so that she can feel his chest.
“Undress me,” she says, relishing the command in her voice.
She turns round, closing her eyes as his fingers go back and forth, loosening the strings.
She steps out of her gown, dressed now only in her shift, and kisses him again.
He sighs against her mouth, moaning as her hand dives inside his hose and takes hold of his manhood.
Something is wrong.
Her hand moves mechanically, as she was taught by her first lover when she was twelve. But in her head, all has gone still and silent.
“Howard, stop,” Florin says. He pulls her hand out of his hose, then cocoons her in his arms. “Stop.”
Feeling floods back, and with feeling, the shaking.
She doesn’t understand it. The last time she had this sensation was when Henry was on top of her, and she coped with it.
She tries to take Florin in hand again. He will be angry with her if she stops.
He will think her a prude, a temptress. She was the one who undressed him. How can she be so indecisive?
“You are safe, Howard,” he whispers. “You are safe. You are safe.”
She says, her voice very thin, “I’m sorry. I don’t know … I just can’t.”
“Let us simply hold each other, if that is what you would prefer.”
He pulls the blanket from the mattress and wraps it around her trembling shoulders. He kneels in front of her.
“You do not owe me anything, Katheryn, just as I owe you nothing but my respect. You can make all the promises in the world, but some promises must be broken.”
Howard frowns. “It’s not that I don’t desire you. I do. I want to …” Warmth creeps up her neck. “I want to feel you inside me. But …”
“It is all right,” he says again, smiling up at her. “We are safe together. You taught me that.”
She holds up a hand, and Florin presses his palm against hers.
“Tell me again,” she says.
“You are safe. You are safe. You are safe.”
She kisses him again, shrugging the blanket from her shoulders so that he almost topples backwards. She straddles him as he kneels on the floor, tangling her hands in his lovely curls.
“Keep saying it,” she whispers.
“You are safe, my queen.”
Their words are not poetry, full of shifting meanings and hidden mires. Their language is solid; firm, open ground like the hills of Plythe. She guides his hand to her breast, where his finger flicks across a nipple. Pleasure shoots through her, from breast to belly to groin.
“You are safe too,” she says, running her hands over his chest.
“You are safe,” he says, as she moves his hand down to dive beneath her shift. She does not want him to stop, but she must test him one last time. She must have one final proof that this night will not crack her further.
“No,” she says, and he stops, his hand darting back immediately.
She moves his hose so she can see his hardness, and this time she locks eyes with him as she grasps him.
“You are safe,” he says.
“And you are safe,” she replies. They press their foreheads together as she guides him inside her.
They stay still like that for a while, simply feeling the closeness of the other.
As they begin to move, Howard marvels, light-headed.
She never thought she could be aroused by a man who could control himself with her, but she has never been more aroused.
This, she thinks, as she lets thought fly away, is true coupling.
The night is full of the words of power.
No and yes are handed back and forth between them like a needle, passing a thread through their wounds.