15. Isolde
ISOLDE
"Good evening."
The gruff sound of Draven's voice draws me away from the lavender seedlings I've been coaxing into the soil beside my temporary lodgings. I shift on my knees to look up at him, dirt-stained hands still cradling the delicate roots of the plant I was positioning.
He stands at the edge of my makeshift garden, that familiar stillness radiating from his broad frame.
The late afternoon sun catches the green undertones in his skin, casting shadows that make his golden-brown eyes seem deeper than usual.
Blood stains darken his leather vest—fresh kills, by the look of it.
"Hi." The word comes out simple, but my mind churns with everything I overheard today. Vaelis's melodic voice floating through Alma's shop window, discussing natural matches and inevitable partnerships with the kind of certainty that makes my chest tighten.
His gaze sharpens, those predator's eyes reading something in my expression that I thought I'd hidden better.
"What's wrong?"
I turn back to the lavender, pressing my palms into the cool earth around its base. The familiar scent rises from the disturbed soil—clean and sharp, like the mountain air back home. Nothing like the suffocating weight of village expectations.
"Nothing."
But my hands shake slightly as I reach for the next seedling, and the lie tastes bitter on my tongue. I focus on the delicate work of transplanting, measuring the spacing between plants with more precision than necessary.
Draven's boots crunch against the dry grass as he steps closer. The sound makes my shoulders tense despite myself.
"I can tell you're upset about something."
The certainty in his voice breaks through my careful composure. I sigh, abandoning the pretense of calm as I settle the transplanted lavender into its fresh hole. The purple-green stems look fragile against the dark soil, like they might not survive the transition.
"There was some sort of lunch party at the tailor's shop today." I pat dirt around the base of the plant, perhaps more roughly than necessary. "I wasn't invited."
The silence lingers between us, heavy with implications I don't want to examine. When he finally speaks, his voice carries an edge I haven't heard before.
"I was invited. Didn't go."
Relief floods through me so suddenly it leaves me dizzy.
At least he wasn't hidden away in Alma's pristine shop, nodding along while the village elite discussed his future like he was a prize to be claimed.
At least he wasn't there to hear Vaelis's confident assumptions about their inevitable pairing.
But the relief sours quickly, replaced by a familiar bitterness that tastes like every small-town rejection I've ever swallowed.
"At least you got an invitation." The words come out sharper than I intended as I roughly pat the dirt around the lavender stems. "Everyone seems intent on keeping me firmly on the outside of things."
My hands move automatically, preparing the next hole with mechanical precision. The earth gives way easily under my trowel, but my chest feels tight with disappointment I thought I'd outgrown.
"I thought that maybe..." I trail off, then force myself to continue. "Maybe the town would welcome me back with open arms. But they obviously don't care."
The sound of movement beside me makes me glance up. Draven drops to his knees in the dirt, his large hands reaching for another seedling without being asked. The casual way he joins me in the work sends warmth through my chest—no hesitation, no awkwardness about getting soil under his nails.
His fingers work the earth with surprising gentleness for someone whose hands are built for violence. The blood on his vest speaks to his afternoon's work, but here, kneeling beside me in my makeshift garden, he handles the delicate lavender roots like they might break.
"I care."
The words fall between us, simple and devastating. My hands still around the plant I was positioning, dirt crumbling between my fingers as I process what he just said.
"You... what?"
He doesn't look at me, focusing instead on creating the perfect depression in the soil for the next transplant. But his jaw tightens, and I catch the way his shoulders tense like he's preparing for battle.
"Ever since you arrived, I've been..." He pauses, searching for words with the same careful precision he uses to track prey through the forest. "Making up reasons. To be where you are. To spend time with you."
My heart hammers against my ribs so hard I'm certain he can hear it. The careful walls I've built around my feelings for him start to crumble like poorly mixed mortar.
"I don't understand."
His hands pause in their work, and he meets my gaze. Those golden-brown eyes hold something raw and uncertain—an expression I've never seen on his controlled features.
"Being around you is like..." He struggles with the explanation, frustration flickering across his face. "Like being chosen by sunlight. I can't explain it properly, but I'm drawn to you. And I care."
The confession hangs in the air, vulnerable and honest in a way that makes my chest ache. His admission strips away every doubt I've been carrying about whether this pull between us exists only in my imagination.
As he speaks, his hands move to cover mine where they rest against the soil around our latest transplant. The contrast between his scarred, calloused palms and my smaller fingers should feel stark, but instead it feels perfect—like two pieces finding their proper fit.
The warmth of his touch travels up my arms and settles somewhere deep in my chest. When I look up and find him watching me with that same vulnerable intensity, something inside me snaps.
I lean forward and kiss him.
The contact sends electricity through every nerve ending. His lips are warm and firm against mine, and for a heartbeat he freezes—surprise radiating through his entire frame. Then his hands tighten over mine, and he kisses me back with a hunger that steals my breath.
The taste of him floods my senses—salt and earth and something wild that speaks to the untamed parts of myself I keep carefully hidden. His tusks graze my lower lip as he tilts his head, deepening the kiss until I'm dizzy with want.
I pull back just enough to breathe, our foreheads touching as we share the same air. His eyes have gone dark, pupils dilated with desire that mirrors the heat pooling low in my belly.
"Isolde." My name on his lips sounds like a prayer and a promise wrapped together.
Then his mouth finds mine again, more demanding this time, and I lose myself completely.
His hands leave mine, sliding up my arms with a possessiveness that nearly makes my breath catch. The rough calluses on his palms scrape against my skin as he pushes my shoulders back, guiding me down into the soft earth and crushed lavender.
My back hits the ground, and the scent of disturbed soil and bruised herbs rises around us. He follows me down, his weight settling over me, solid and real. One large hand fists in the fabric of my skirt, gathering the practical linen until cool evening air hits my thighs.
“Draven.” His name comes out as half-protest, half-plea.
“You said I should choose something for myself.” His voice is a low growl against my throat, his tusks scraping the sensitive skin there. “I choose this. I choose you.”
The words unravel me. My hands find his shoulders, digging into the hard muscle beneath his leather vest. I can feel the scars there—ridged stories of violence and survival—as I arch against him.
He yanks my skirts higher, baring me completely to the open air. His fingers slide between my thighs, finding me already wet and ready. A rough sound escapes him—approval mixed with hunger.
“Look at you,” he murmurs, his golden eyes dark with intent. “So ready for me.”
Then he’s freeing himself from his trousers, and my breath stutters. He’s thick and heavy, the broad head already glistening. He notches himself at my entrance, and the stretch is immediate, breathtaking.
“Isolde.” My name is a warning and a promise.
He pushes inside.
The fullness steals my voice. My nails bite into his shoulders as he sinks deeper, stretching me open in a way that borders on pain before tipping into perfect, shocking pleasure.
He bottoms out, his hips flush against mine, and we both go still for a heartbeat—both of us adjusting to the reality of this connection.
Then he moves.
The first thrust is controlled, testing.
The second loses some restraint. By the third, he’s fucking me in earnest, his hips driving into mine with a rhythm that speaks of hunger barely leashed.
The dirt grinds into my back through my dress, the crushed lavender releases its perfume beneath us, and all I can do is hold on.
His hands grip my hips, his fingers digging into my flesh hard enough to leave marks. The size of him, the sheer strength in his grasp—it makes me feel delicate in a way I’ve never experienced. Not fragile, but cherished in my surrender.
“That’s it,” he growls, his pace turning relentless. “Take me.”
I do. I take every inch, every driving thrust, meeting him with a hunger that matches his own. My legs wrap around his waist, pulling him deeper, and the sound he makes is pure animal satisfaction.
His mouth finds mine again, messy and desperate. Our teeth clash, his tusks careful even in his frenzy. I taste salt and wildness, and something inside me cracks open.
“Draven, I—”
He swallows my words with another kiss, his hips pounding into me now, the slap of skin on skin loud in the quiet evening. I’m so close, pleasure coiling tight in my belly, and he knows it. One hand slides between us, his thumb finding that sensitive bundle of nerves, and the world shatters.
The world shatters into light and sensation as I come, my back arching off the dirt. He swallows my cry with his mouth, his hips never slowing, fucking me through the convulsing waves of my pleasure until I’m oversensitive and trembling.
“Look at that,” he growls, his voice ragged against my ear. “My quiet beekeeper, coming apart in the dirt like a common thing.”
The words should sting. Instead, they fuel the fire. My nails scrape down his back, finding the scars beneath his vest.
“Your common thing,” I gasp, the defiance clear in my voice.
A sharp, approving grin flashes across his face. He shifts, hooking one of my legs over his shoulder, the new angle breathtaking. He drives into me, deeper, and I cry out.
“That’s it. Sing for me.” His praise is a dark, rough thing.
“They think you’re so delicate. That pretty honey-seller with her soft hands.
” He brings one of my hands to his mouth, bites the pad of my thumb—not hard, but enough to make me gasp.
“But you take me like you were made for it. Greedy for it.”
He’s right. I am greedy. I meet every thrust, my hips rising to meet his, the filthy sound of our joining mixing with our ragged breaths. The degradation is woven into the praise, and I can’t separate them. They are the same truth.
“They’d faint,” he snarls, his pace becoming punishing. “Alma with her perfect silks. Vaelis with her calculated smiles. If they could see you now. Soil in your hair. My marks on your skin. Begging for it.”
“I’m not begging,” I pant, even as my body is doing exactly that, climbing again toward a blinding peak.
“Aren’t you?” He slows, withdrawing almost completely, and the loss is a physical pain. “Tell me.”
The command hangs in the lavender-scented air. I am exposed, pinned, utterly at his mercy. And I have never felt more powerful.
“Fuck me, Draven.” The words are raw, stripped of pretense. “Please.”
The ‘please’ does it. A victorious sound rips from his chest. He slams back into me, one hand fisting in my hair, tilting my head back to expose my throat. “My good girl. My perfect, filthy girl. Take it. Take all of me.”
And I do.
I come with a broken cry against his mouth, my body clamping around him in rhythmic pulses that make him groan. He follows me over the edge, his thrusts turning ragged as he spills deep inside me, his forehead dropping to my shoulder with a shudder that rocks through both of us.
For a long moment, there’s only the sound of our ragged breathing and the distant chatter of evening birds.
He rolls onto his back, taking me with him and making sure I'm resting safely on his body instead of on the ground. And then he says something I never thought he would.
"You're my queen, Isolde."