Chapter Seven #3
The fingers pulled out, but before I could feel relieved, I felt something bigger and harder pressing against me.
It was his cock, of course, only for real this time.
He eased the tip inside me, and I shifted and groaned, but pushed back for more.
He whispered something to me in his language that I didn’t understand.
Then he slid in hard and fast and held still, making me feel stuffed and aching, yet strangely excited.
He wasn’t moving, letting me get used to feeling so full.
I reached a hand back over my shoulder to touch his face, wanting to connect with him.
He kissed my fingers and whispered to me.
“It’ll be better from here, a chuisle. Breathe for me. ”
I began to breathe again, and the pain lessened, then morphed into something far sweeter.
He was still making sure I felt the thrusts on my own cock and suddenly a feeling swept over me that was more intense than I’d ever known.
I moaned and cried out, but he knew what to do and gave me what I needed, moving inside me with hard, but careful thrusts, though I still felt every inch of him.
He angled his hips so that the place up inside me was being caressed with each stroke, and I pushed backward into the pleasure/pain.
The sensations were coming too fast for me to process them, and I gave myself over to it completely.
When I thought I couldn’t take much more, I felt a wet explosion deep inside me, and I felt like I’d accomplished something to give that to him.
I collapsed down on the bed, and he rolled off me and lay down beside me, pulling me close to nuzzle me.
He took my hand in his and kissed the back of it.
Then his hand fell onto the back of my head, caressing me, and we both drowsed a little.
The hard length of his body was warm and comforting next to mine, and I drifted gently down to sleep.
The next morning, after we woke, we got dressed, and he took my arm to walk me downstairs. He’d told me that he had arranged a small ceremony with a late breakfast for us afterward, and that all I had to do was follow his lead. He told me not to be scared.
We continued our walk toward the huge double doors at the end of the hall. They were open wide, and the people inside the huge ballroom must have wondered at the stunned—make that poleaxed—expression that had to be on my face at what I saw inside the room.
A huge crowd of beautiful, glittering nobility was watching us carefully.
The handsome and young-looking creatures crowded the hall all the way to the door, though they parted like the Red Sea was supposed to have done for Moses when the king and I began to walk inside the enormous room and past them to go toward the front.
They all looked at me admiringly, and I thought enviously as we passed by them.
I believe by that time that only Fionn’s arm was keeping me on my feet, or I might have collapsed in a heap on the polished marble floor.
We came to a dais, and he gave me a hand to climb the few steps up to stand on it beside him.
With my shaky knees, I needed one. A regal man in long, red robes and wearing a hood stood waiting for us, with two young boys, acolytes, who were standing slightly behind him, swinging bronze bowls on slender chains containing some earthy-smelling incense.
It smelled awful, and I tried to breathe through my mouth.
I realized the man must be one of the pagan priests of Cocidus, a northern god of Briton, and the god of hunting, forests, and war.
When the Fae merged him with the Roman god, Mars, he became Mars Cocidus, a protector of soldiers.
The priest began to speak in a low tone with the boys behind him occasionally chanting something in singsong voices back to him when he paused.
He tied a long cord loosely around our joined hands and spoke a few words.
All of this was in their language, so I didn’t get a word of it.
Afterward, Fionn slipped a heavy gold ring, studded with small jewels, off his own finger and slid it onto mine.
I looked down at it in disbelief. It reached all the way to the joint of my finger.
It was a little loose, so I clasped my hand into a fist to make sure it didn’t fall off.
The whole ceremony lasted perhaps ten minutes, and then the priest held up a Celtic symbol, made of polished metal and attached to a long bar.
I’d seen them before a time or two when I’d traveled in Alba, which was later known as Scotland.
They were a bit like a regular cross, made with knotwork, but these had a circle in the middle, called a “halo” around the center.
When it was held up in front of us, King Fionn leaned forward to lightly kiss it and then stood back for me to do the same.
I didn't know much about this religion of the Faeries, but I could see it was expected of me to kiss it too, so I leaned forward to lightly brush my lips over it.
But the second I touched it with my lips I felt a sizzling burn that startled me so badly I pulled sharply away.
There was an audible hiss from the cross and both the priest and the king noticed it. The priest looked shocked.
Fionn pulled me closer to him and sternly told him, “Never mind. Keep going.”
He nodded, looking uneasy, and said a few more words that didn’t even register on me. I was far too mortified and shocked myself, and my lips were still burning, like I’d tried to press my mouth too close to hot iron. I touched them to make sure there were no blisters.
What was that? Had the priest put some kind of acid on the metal?
But why would he do such a thing? And King Fionn hadn’t been affected by it.
He pulled me around to face the crowded hall, and from behind me, the priest placed something on my head, and I could feel it slide down over my forehead.
I thought it must be a crown. I reached up to touch it wonderingly.
The people in front of us cheered as Fionn held our still-bound hands up in the air between us for all to see.
He leaned over and whispered something so softly in my ear that I had to strain to hear him.
I didn’t understand him anyway, because I suddenly realized he had spoken to me in his own impossible language.
But I thought he was trying to soothe and calm me.
He turned to the crowded hall and said, “I present to you Braden, the atheling son of King Callum of Gorias—and my newly crowned Royal Consort.”
(Aside—dear reader, as I mentioned before, the terms prince and princess were not in use at that time, so long ago.
The old English term atheling was used for any man who was eligible for the kingship.
It roughly translated to throne-worthy, which wasn’t strictly accurate for me, but I went with it anyway.
There was no word at all for Princess as women were not considered to be any such thing as throne-worthy at the time.
A cultural error that was widely in practice at the time all over northern Europe.)
I felt dizzy for a moment, until he squeezed my hand again, the heavy gold ring cutting into my palm a little. It was typical of how I’d felt since I’d been in this realm—pain mixed with joy and wonder.
“Be strong and remember who you are,” he said, speaking softly in my ear. “Hold your head high, a chroi. After all, we’ve just begun.”
We walked out past the guests, stopping every few feet as hands reached out to touch us, and the people all called out happy greetings to us. Though they seemed fascinated by me, they were about interacting with the king, and I could see how popular and well-thought of he was by his subjects.
That he was ambitious and reveled in his position and his power, I had no doubt, though even then I suspected that all kings were much the same.
Fionn led me to a feasting hall, already half filled with people.
The overflow from the hall soon filled up the remaining seats, and we took our places at the head table.
The servants began to bring out masses of food and drink, and I was almost too excited to eat.
It was a day I’d look back on in the days to come and take comfort in.
It was, up until that time, the most exciting day of my life.