Chapter 26
Chapter Twenty-Six
Ormr thought he must have struck his head harder than he’d assumed.
He was sitting on a makeshift rock bed in a cave being tied up by the Scotswoman.
Being expertly tied up. As he twisted, testing them, he felt the knots tighten.
She was not a young maiden with no worldly experience; she was a seasoned woman dabbling in a maiden’s fantasy.
Her eyes told him that the ocean swam through her veins.
It bled into her eyes, making them change like the ocean tides.
A mortal goddess, nae Volva herself, as his people called such a powerful witch, had come to him in his time of great need.
Once his strength returned, he would show her who she was.
“These are tight, Scotswoman.”
She gave him a wicked grin that held a spark of mischief. “Doubting yourself now, Viking?”
“That…I am.”
Holding his wrists in her hands, she gave him a sly smirk before a rich, throaty laugh bubbled out of her.
The melodious sound filled the cave. Ormr felt as if he’d struck his head again, only this time he was in Valhalla, and the riches that were awaiting there were this woman and her laugh.
He would find a way to make her do it again.
She tightened the last rope that bound his hands to his ankles and stood. She patted his hands and said, “Now, then, I will be back.” Halfway to the door, she turned back to him. “Roll after me, and I’ll push you into the water and watch ye drown.”
He scoffed, feeling petulant at being tied.
She read his face and replied with a soft smile. “Oh, yer all right.” She walked back to him, and bending low, her hair in its tight plait swinging forward, she put a gentle breath of a kiss to his cheek.
Without a thought, he followed his desire.
She made to leave and found that her dress was caught in his fingers. Wrists bound, he held on tight and watched her face as emotions crossed her features as surely as they did his. She had kissed him, and with the music of her laugh still filling his ears, he wanted another one.
Instead of slapping his hands aside, her gaze kept steady on his. “Oh, you liked that, did ye?”
He didn’t want to beg, but… “More.”
Dress still caught, she slid in next to him, her blue ocean eyes demanding: “More of what?”
He had punished women who teased him, testing his restraint and desire.
They thought that because he chose to bed them, they held sway over him, but at that moment, it didn’t feel as if she were keeping herself from him but rather making him state aloud what he wanted, and if he could do that then, she would give him what he’d asked for.
“Kiss me.”
“Why?”
“You feel it too.” He objected to having to explain himself. Doing so felt too revealing.
“Maybe I need to measure your thoughts against my own. I need to hear it from your lips, my formidable enemy-friend.”
“I desire you.”
She studied his eyes and mouth as if searching for some part of him that would tell her a different story.
Satisfied that his words were not a lie, she gently kissed him.
“Yes,” she murmured against his lips, her eyes a crystalline blue he’d only seen in small purses of the most precious jewels in the vast cities of Persia.
“It is the same,” she confirmed. He released her captured dress as she pushed his tied arms up and slipped under them, going astride his lap.
Ormr’s chest tightened at her response; he was indeed in Valhalla.
First, her laugh sent bells chiming up his spine, but now she was confessing to feeling as he did?
He had died. Or he was in a bitter death haze, and she was a wild seal who had discovered his body, and it all was a fever dream.
He’d thought she was his Volva, but really, she was really what the Scots called a selkie.
It was the only explanation for the feelings that were so new and violent that he felt as if he were drowning while holding her tight in his arms against his chest. Her touch, her weight on his lap, was electrifying.
He wasn’t at the bow of his ship or in war but in a quiet cave with a woman loving on him.
The feeling was the same, only with her, there was also warmth in his groin.
Her warm, soft lips and rounded hips filled something deep inside of him that he hadn’t known he was missing.
He wanted to eat her, crush her, and breathe her into his lungs until she was of one body with him.
His affection was startlingly necessary.
And with the bone ache of his desire for this Scotswoman, a peaceful silence rushed in.
He had felt no other equivalent except free-falling in deep water. Then, as now, his mind let go.
“What is this that you are doing to me?”
She breathed him. Her nose traced his jaw beneath his beard. Her lips found his. “I was going to ask you the same. What kind of magic have you placed upon me? What is this thing you hold that calls to me, Ormr?”
Hearing his name properly roll off her tongue sent a shiver down his spine; he knew then that this Scotswoman was destined to be his. He cradled her closer and rubbed the apex of her spread thighs over his firm arousal.
Orabilia groaned in pleasure before gripping the hair at his temples to make him stop. “None of that.”
Her eyes blazed blue, and within them, he saw the ferocity with which she could love someone and also hate them.
“What is it that makes you command me to stop, Scotswoman? I crave you; you crave me; there is nothing but time before us this day.”
She shook her head as if he wouldn’t understand and rested her forehead on his shoulder.
“We— I have gone too far. What is this that we are doing? My father has promised me to another. I should not have started this. It is impossible.”
Ormr felt her soft breasts in the fine linen cloth of her dress pressed against his chest. He longed to undo it all.
To slide his hand under her hem and check to see if her body was ready for him, slick and slippery like an ocean stone.
But he also held fear. She was talented with her sword, yes, but it was more than promised death that stilled him; if she rejected him because he’d gone too fast, he’d curse himself, and for that, he slowed.
Patience, his grandmother had always warned him; it was patience that got the fish, the gold, the power.
This time, patience would see to it that he’d get this woman, betrothed or not.
“Break the betrothal. I will give you a life of luxury.”
Her smile was soft with joy, but her gaze was tinged with pity. “If only it were that easy.”
“It is.”
“I am Lady Orabilia, daughter of Chief Laoch of the MacLaoch clan.”
Ormr’s guts twisted. Of all the women… Of all the powerful, beautiful creatures he’d ever held, why…
Why did the one he desired so much have to be that man’s daughter?
He was no longer in Valhalla. It was real.
He was far from death, and she now held the barbed story of life’s truths to his heart: torment.
She continued, “I can see in your face that you know who my father is.”
“I know of him.”
“Then you know this can never happen.” She kissed his lips, and it felt like goodbye.
He gripped her tight. “Do you know who I am?”
“Ormr.”
“Ormr Minorisson, brother of Harald Minorisson, court-appointed jester to King Hakkon of Norway. My brother is the mouth, and I am his fist.”
“Oh.” He felt her pull away at the name of his king. “You are… I must go.”
He watched dread cross her features as she swallowed and tried to slip from his arms. He held tight.
“Understand, Orabilia—”
She murmured, “What have I done?”
“I can take you from this place.”
“I don’t want to leave!” She leveled her fiery gaze onto his. “We have been fools.”
“We have.”
“The people you have killed in his name…” She breathed firm breath. “I must go now.”
“Why? You always knew who I was. I am a Viking, woman. And yet, you have come this far. There is no hiding what I am.” He gestured to his blond hair, towering body, necklace and cuffs. “And now, I know who you are. What is different about this reality now that we have names?”
“Sunlight has shown starkly on my betrayal, and I cannot have it. I have betrayed my country, my people, by being with you, having the thoughts I’ve had…”
He nodded. “So have I. You are a fine ransom. Maybe the best I’ve ever come across. I should tie you up, pull my ship from the depths, and take you home.”
She gritted her teeth at his idea.
“But all I can fathom is doing none of it. I want to see you at the prow. I want to see the sail snap in the wind and your onyx hair ride along with it. I want this…” He removed his arms from around her to grasp her hand and held it still while he put his finger to hers.
“What are ye… Oh.” Orabilia shivered.
Golden light arced out of his finger and touched hers. Can you feel the hum within?
“Yer lips dinnae move.”
Because you are a woman who can speak to me on the wind. We are beyond what others see us as. Instead, we are connected because we are the few who are gifted.
“I hear ye. But I… How?”
“You are what my grandmother calls Volva. I see you and will heed your words. But I understand now that you have not been taught the way. Stay, Orabilia, and let our bodies talk while our minds rest.”
“I’d rather my mind talk before my body does. Who is your brother to the king? You say jester, and I can hear the sarcasm in your words.”
“My brother controls the politicking on our lands, but I command the men. And it is I who command fealty. I have planted the fertile seeds to continue his lineage, and while he reports to the throne, it is my command that the people follow.”
“If it is politicking that your brother is good at, then it is fortunate that you have him because the only way you can have me is if you play a very fine politicking game.”