Chapter 24
When Raye awoke, she was still in bed in the dark with Gaelfr, tucked close against his warm, slightly sweaty skin. But once she shifted upwards, he shifted too, his hand curving over her arse.
“Is it morning?” she asked, husky, to which Gaelfr murmured his assent, and his other hand slid down too, nudging her up closer. And Raye should have argued that, rather than easing up over on top of him, grinding up against the thick, thrilling hardness lying on his belly.
Damn, it felt good, even with that thin layer of her sleeping shift between them, and Gaelfr’s warm hands slipped to her hips, drawing the fabric up.
As if he wanted this to keep going, as if he would do that, with her — and Raye quivered all over at the feel of that warm silken ridge spasming, flexing up against her bare skin.
And all she had to do was slide further up it, feel that slick, rounded crown nudging just where she wanted it, oh gods —
“Ach,” Gaelfr hissed, his hands suddenly gripping her hips, yanking her upwards, away. “No, woman.”
A sharp, convulsive hurt stabbed through Raye’s chest — of course he didn’t want to, what had she been thinking — and she squeezed her eyes shut, drew in deep breaths. While Gaelfr’s grip softened on her hips, and his groan scraped through the darkness.
“It is only the bond again, I ken,” he said, hoarse. “We do not wish for a son of my loins next, ach?”
Right. The bond. And his son. And of course Raye would never want such a thing with Gaelfr, never, ever. And he would never want that, either. Right?
“And we ought to wait for Kalfr, in this,” Gaelfr added, a little rushed. “Tasting and touching each other without him is one thing, you ken, but ploughing is yet another.”
It took Raye a moment to follow that — Gaelfr didn’t mean he wanted to do that with her, did he? Let alone that Kalfr would want to witness such a thing? Or participate in it?
But even the thought churned up more dizzying hunger, enough that Raye’s tongue brushed her lips. And maybe Gaelfr had seen that, and his warm hand settled against her head, sinking easy and possessive into her hair. Guiding her downwards, toward —
“Mama!” cut in a high-pitched voice, dousing Raye with sudden, ice-cold panic. “Are you awake?”
Svein. Raye flinched and leapt out of the bed, dragging her sleeping shift down over her hips again.
While behind her, Gaelfr lit the lamp, flooding the room with sudden dizzying light.
And revealing that the door was still shut, at least, but now something banged on it, loud enough to make her jump.
“Mama!” came Svein’s voice again, far too close. “I can smell you awake in there!”
Raye shot an alarmed look over her shoulder toward Gaelfr, who was watching from the bed with unmistakable amusement, his head propped on his hand, the fur pulled up over his chest. And that was probably as much as she could hope for, at the moment, so she hauled in a breath, and went and drew the door open.
“Mama!” Svein joyously yelped, lurching forward to hurl his arms around her. “You’ve been sleeping forever!”
Raye gladly hugged him back, even as her eyes snapped up, toward the darkness of the alcove beyond him. Toward — Kalfr.
She could scarcely see him in the shadows, but she could feel his disapproval, even that same stark, sickening hatred from the day before.
Because she’d abandoned her own room to sleep in here with Gaelfr, and Gaelfr was still just lying there in bed behind her, all but shouting about what they’d almost just done.
But when Raye shot a chagrined glance back toward Gaelfr, he was eyeing Kalfr too, and he raised a hand in silent greeting, and flashed him a warm, sheepish grin.
As if — right. He wanted to… take good care with Kalfr, he’d said.
He wanted to tend Kalfr. To earn his trust again.
And Raye had agreed to all that, too. To keep her vow to him. To atone.
So she squared her shoulders, and attempted a smile toward Kalfr’s inscrutable face, before dropping her attention back to Svein. “Er, have you been awake long, then, love?” she asked. “And has Papa Kalfr been awake with you all this time, too?”
“Yes, we’ve been having so much fun!” Svein replied. “We climbed to another higher tree house, and explored all the tunnels, and the garden! But now we’ve started making breakfast, and you’ll want to come eat the food we picked from the garden just for you, don’t you?”
Right. Breakfast. Raye nodded, and attempted another smile up at Kalfr’s shadowed face. “That’s so thoughtful of you both,” she replied. “And yes, of course we’d love to, wouldn’t we, Gaelfr?”
She darted a searching look over her shoulder toward him, but he was already smiling fondly toward Svein, and nodding. “Ach, son,” he said. “Only grant us a moment to ready ourselves, and we shall come.”
Svein beamed back at him, and trotted out toward Kalfr, who guided him away again. And though Kalfr didn’t look back, Raye could still almost feel his lingering unhappiness, or even his hatred, and she dragged in deep, steadying breaths. She could do this. She could try to atone. For Svein.
“Should get ready, then,” she mumbled, as she lurched toward the nearby washbasin, and quickly scrubbed her hands and face before heading for the shelf of clothing. “What do you want, trousers?”
Gaelfr grunted his assent, so Raye sifted through his overlarge trousers, picked out the finest-feeling pair, and tossed them over toward him.
Next she dug through her own patched, shabby dresses, too — not counting the bloodstained one, she was down to three — and pulled on the least terrible option.
It still looked stained and tattered and unkempt, although — Raye frowned down at it for an instant too long — it didn’t look quite as baggy on her as it had before, did it?
And when she spread a cautious hand against her ribs, they felt a little less prominent than before, too.
“Ach, you look a mite less starved, woman,” Gaelfr said gruffly from the washbasin, and when Raye glanced up, he’d taken his hair out of its usual half-knot, and was impatiently running a wooden comb through its thick, glossy length.
“Though I yet owe you a new frock, do I not? I shall find a way to do this, mayhap” — he smirked — “once we have further fattened you.”
Raye scoffed and rolled her eyes, but she couldn’t muster the will to argue, either. Especially once Gaelfr stuck the comb between his teeth and drew the top half of his hair back, deftly winding it up into a neat knot again.
“Do you wish for this?” he asked once he’d finished, thrusting the comb out toward her — surely due to her blatant staring, damn it. And too late, Raye shook her head, and ran a hand through her own messy, tangled hair. “No, thank you,” she said, too stiffly. “I don’t usually use combs, it’s too —”
She tugged her fingers at a painful knot, while Gaelfr harrumphed, and jabbed his claw toward the bed. “Come, then,” he said flatly. “Sit.”
Raye instantly obeyed, as though compelled, and then quivered all over at the feel of Gaelfr’s hands, stroking deft and proprietary at her head, drawing her messy hair back over her shoulders.
As if he had every right to touch her, to gently scrape his claws at her scalp, to card his fingers through her thick curls.
Raye couldn’t remember the last time someone had touched her hair like this — since her mother, perhaps — and she couldn’t deny her slow, shaky exhale, or the way her head tilted back into his touch.
Because gods, it felt good. The gentle tugs against her scalp, the soft scratches of his claws, the feel of his fingers carefully working through one tangle, and another.
Firing sparkling shocks of pleasure down her neck, her shoulders, prickling at the small of her back, heating in her belly…
“I will braid it, like Svein’s,” came his voice behind her. “To keep it safe from tangling thus again.”
It wasn’t a question, but rather a decision, an announcement — Gaelfr was unilaterally deciding how Raye would wear her hair, without even asking her — but in the strange, hazy pleasure, she found she didn’t quite care.
In this moment, he could do whatever the hell he wanted, and she would only sit there, and revel in it.
The braiding felt lovely too, light rhythmic tugs slowly working all the way down her scalp, and Raye felt genuinely disappointed once Gaelfr finished, and tied it off with what appeared to be another green ribbon from his trousers, just like the one he’d given Svein.
“There,” he said, with a pat to her head. “Better, ach?”
Raye couldn’t help a grateful glance up over her shoulder, and perhaps a too-appreciative smile, too. “Yes, much,” she murmured. “Thank you, Gael.”
Gaelfr’s eyes stilled, because — damn it — that was Kalfr’s name for him. But even as Raye opened her mouth to apologize, or perhaps to take it back, he dismissed it with a wave of his hand. “Naught to it,” he said. “Now come.”
Raye nodded, not quite meeting his eyes, and silently followed him out into the larger open room, and toward the narrow staircase.
And when Gaelfr’s hand brushed against her back, nudging her up the stairs, she desperately fought to ignore that touch, to focus her dazed, scrambled thoughts. She was doing this for Svein…
When they emerged from the fireplace into the house’s bright, sunlit main room, Kalfr and Svein were both working together over the fire, while the delicious smell of frying meat and mushrooms wafted through the air.
And though Svein excitedly pranced over to greet them, Kalfr only spared a brief glance over his shoulder, his eyes narrowing on Raye’s braided hair, and especially on that new green ribbon Gaelfr had given her.