Chapter 23 #3
Her hand found his. Their fingers entwined.
Their bodies gathered together. They surged against each other, waves crashing against a welcoming shore, until pleasure exploded between them.
They cried each other’s names as kisses muffled their words.
Only then did Cuchulainn close his eyes and roll onto his back, taking her with him.
He wrapped her in his arms. She curled against him.
Her hand went to his temple, where she rubbed soft circles, expanding them so that her fingers sank into his hair and she massaged his scalp.
Scáthach knew the instant he slept. His relaxation was deep and complete. That night she didn’t stay awake and watch him. That night she fell into a deep, delicious sleep with her hand still buried in his hair and her body fitted perfectly against him.
* * *
Thirst woke Scáthach. Moving slowly and carefully, she disentangled herself from Cuchulainn’s arms and legs.
They were lying on his cloak and, though they’d been using hers as a blanket, sometime in the night they’d kicked it off so that it pooled at their feet.
Scáthach wrapped the cloak around her and hurried through the fog bank to relieve herself.
Outside of their cocoon of fog it appeared to be the middle of a dark, frigid night.
She returned to their secluded spot, where she brought a waterskin as well as the skin of mead with her to the fireside.
There she sat, facing the roaring fire, drinking deeply from the waterskin and then, thirst sated, sipping the mead.
“You look impossibly beautiful sitting there silhouetted by the fire with your hair wild and free and that cloak slipping off your bare shoulders.” Cuchulainn’s voice was low and intimate as it drifted to her.
She looked over her shoulder and smiled. “I didn’t mean to wake you.” She opened one end of her cloak. “Join me?”
With endearingly boyish enthusiasm, he stood, stretched, shook back his own mane of hair, and then sat beside her, snuggling close so that her cloak could be wrapped around him, too.
She offered him the mead, and he drank thirstily. Scáthach studied him, seeing only the handsome young warrior who had worked his way into her heart. “Are you well, Sentanta?”
He leaned into her. “Yes. Very well. You?”
“I have been thoroughly loved this night, which means I am excellent.”
He tilted his head so that he could meet her gaze. “No one except you calls me Sentanta. I’ve been meaning to ask, why do you?”
“Because Cuchulainn is a construct formed by the expectations of others. Sentanta is you.” She pressed her hand against his bare chest, and he covered it with his as she continued.
“Sentanta is the fisherman warrior who only wishes for a place to call home and a family who loves him. Cuchulainn struggles to fulfill his father’s desires and live up to the hero worship of Ulster’s warriors.
Sentanta knows that he is enough without worrying about the opinions of others. ”
“You’re so wise,” he said softly.
“I had wise teachers,” she replied.
He grinned. “Your nursemaid sea monsters?”
She mirrored his grin. “Well, yes. But in addition, I had a mother filled with wisdom she shared with me rather than hoarded. And I cannot fail to mention that I have a very wise daughter whose viewpoint I value and a savvy, opinionated second-in-command.”
He nodded. “That’s an excellent way to describe Tabiti.”
Scáthach met his gaze. “I also had a father who taught me that sometimes love isn’t enough to keep someone with you. I learned early not to take anyone who touches my life for granted.”
He held out his hand and she took it. “I don’t know how long you and I will have together, but I want you to know, were the choice mine, I would never leave your side.”
She lifted their joined hands and kissed his. “While we’re in the Underworld, let’s only consider the here and now. The future will take care of itself when we return to the mortal realm.”
“But for now it’s just us? Together?” he asked.
She touched his cheek. “For now it is just us. Together.” Their lips met, gently at first, and then the kiss deepened.
The cloak slid from their shoulders as Cuchulainn stood, lifting her in his arms as if she weighed nothing.
He carried her to their bed of fur, adding her cloak to his before he put her down.
As he stood over her, Scáthach got to her knees.
She captured his gaze as her hands moved up his strong calves and thighs to his cock, which was already hardening.
Still meeting his gaze, she stroked his length.
His breath caught on a moan. His eyes began to close.
She leaned forward and licked the tip of him. But she paused then, asking, “May I?”
Eyes still closed, he nodded. “Yes.”
She took him fully into her mouth then, swallowing his thickening length. Her hand followed her mouth, working his shaft—and Cuchulainn’s body froze. His eyes opened, and with a gasp, he suddenly lurched back several steps, almost stumbling into the fire.
“I-I can’t!” he exclaimed.
Scáthach stood and went to him. She wanted to wrap him in her arms, but the wild, frightened look in his glassy eyes told her that would not be helpful. Instead she took his hand, twining their fingers together as his breath came in short, panicked gasps, and he stared past her.
“Sentanta, look at me.”
He blinked several times and then turned his gaze to her.
“I’m sorry!” he blurted. “I want you! I want your mouth on me. I’m—I’m so frustrated and angry at myself while also being filled with rage at Aife.
She did this to me—to us.” He shook his head.
“I don’t want to be like this. I don’t want to remember her mouth on me when it’s your mouth.
I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to defeat this. ”
“Sssh,” she soothed. “There’s nothing to defeat. Just something to overcome. I have an idea. Will you try it with me?”
“I’ll try anything you want. I—I just don’t know if I’ll be successful,” he said miserably.
“Oh, love,” she told him. “It isn’t about you overcoming and succeeding. It’s about us.”
“Us,” he repeated, clutching her hand. “Yes. Us.”
She nodded. “That’s right. You’re not in this alone. And there is no rush. In this realm time is much more fluid.” She kissed his lips very gently. “We can make this night last weeks, even months.”
“But the sea monster Curruid—” he began.
She pressed her finger to his lips. “Is dead and will remain dead. He isn’t going anywhere. Here we have time and solitude.”
He gazed at her and then cupped her face between his hands. “Did you call me your love?”
She smiled. “Yes.”
His face blazed with joy. “I am the man whom Scáthach, the mighty Queen of Shadow, loves!” he shouted into the seemingly endless night. “I can do anything!”
“Exactly,” she said. “You trust me?”
“With my mind, body, and spirit, which is exactly how I love you,” he said. “With all of me.”
She took his hand again and led him back to their bed.
Scáthach faced him and, holding his gaze, went to her knees before him.
When her hands lifted to his legs, she could feel the iron-like tension in his body.
She drew lazy circles over the sensitive skin of his muscular thighs before she reached up and caught both of his hands, which she guided to her head.
Scáthach held his gaze. “When Aife used you, she was in control. Tonight you are in control. Completely. If you don’t find pleasure in this, I stop.
If you do, it will be because you want to continue.
You set the pace. Show me what pleases you and if this doesn’t please you, then we will try something new. ”
He nodded a little sharply, but when Scáthach made no move to take his cock in her hands or her mouth, Cuchulainn began to relax. His fingers moved in the thickness of her hair, caressing her scalp much as she had his. Her eyes closed and she sighed in pleasure.
“I love your hair,” he said, continuing to work his fingers through it.
She opened her eyes as he brought her head toward him. He guided her to his cock, which had grown hard again.
“May I touch you?” she asked in a sultry whisper.
“Yes.”
She took him in her hands, stroking him until he arched toward her. She did not move nearer, though, until he guided her mouth to him.
“May I take you into my mouth?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“Show me. Guide me. I will only do as you wish. Remember, my Sentanta, you are in control.”
“I’ll remember.” His eyes remained open—his gaze on her lips as she licked the head of his cock, teasingly, until he put enough pressure on her head that she drew him into her mouth. His body trembled as, with small pushes and pulls, he showed her his rhythm.
He had to stop twice. She said nothing, only smiled up at him and waited as he collected himself, until finally he was able to immerse himself completely in her touch, her mouth, and his pleasure.
He shouted with his climax and then dropped to his knees beside her, where he wrapped her in his arms and held her close while his breath steadied.
“Are you well?” he murmured against her hair.