He stretched out his long legs parallel to the bed and with his elbow on the mattress, his hand holding Chas’, he thought back to the man he had dispatched with such fierceness it frightened even him. He had been like one of the berserkers of old—slashing and thrusting with a steely purpose that carved limbs from his opponent in a frenzy of death-wielding that left body parts cluttering the floor.

  Vaguely he remembered seeing the horror on the faces of Patrick Murphy and his fellow guards as Ruan carved Chas’ attacker into nothing more than sections of singed meat. Repeatedly he had sliced at the body, cleaving head from torso, leg from trunk, arm from chest then scattering the pieces like confetti at a wedding. So furious, so enraged had his attack been, it had taken Patrick and two of his men to subdue their maddened prince, bringing him down to the floor like a stag to ground. Though he bellowed his rage, threatened bodily harm and eternal imprisonment, they had managed to bring him back to some degree of sanity.

  Rushing to the bed, finding Chas comatose and laboring for breath, Ruan had thrown back his head and bellowed like his ancestors of old. He had not even felt the hilt of Patrick’s sword crashing against his skull to render him unconscious.

  Ruan had learned that Patrick had taken charge, sending for a dochtúir to treat Chas. It had been Patrick who had arranged the ship back to Sciath, taking a wild chance that the longer route would not be the death of the young woman. Patrick, it was, who had insisted the dochtúir administer a sleeping draught to the young prince to keep him out during the journey.

  And it was Patrick, himself, who even now stood guard outside Chas’ door to make sure no harm befell the woman his prince had claimed as his own.

  As day broke over Sciath on the ninth day of Chastain Neff’s convalescence, lightning flared in the distance and the ominous rumble of thunder shook the stone walls. A light mist of rain was already scratching at the windows, asking to be allowed in. It was the bright flash of a nearby lightning strike that woke Ruan.

  He sat up in the chair, every muscle in his body aching from the cramped position in which he’d been reclining. He ran a hand over his whiskered chin and winced at his own body odor. He hated being unkempt—though he rather liked the scratchiness of the beard he’d never been allowed to grow. Turning his eyes to Chas, he saw that she was still sleeping and he sighed. Patting her hand, he drew in a long breath, exhaled slowly and then released her hand to stand. He put his hands to the small of his back and stretched backwards, feeling the muscles protest. He sighed again and walked to the window where lightning was now streaking across the heavens with increasing rapidity. Thunder boomed in answer to the loud crack of the lightning as he pushed aside the heavy drapes with the back of his hand.

  The day was dreary and gray as befitted a wild storm—not untypical of Gaelach at this time of year. The fields—or so it was said—had forty shades of greenness because of these seasonal rains. Despite the fact that lethal storms roared along the coastline, the Gaelachuans loved their rain and reveled in the wild tempests that could turn so quickly to claim a life.

  Reaching up to push the draperies back from the window so he could get a better view of the thunderstorm, Ruan cracked the window just enough to feel the delicious coolness of the rain against his face. He closed his eyes, breathing in the scent of spent ozone and the dusty smell of rain-washed fertile land.

  He hung his head, the flash of the turbulent storm lighting him in relief from mussed dark hair to the soiled shirt he wore hanging loose from his britches. His bare feet were turning cold for he was standing in a small puddle of rainwater that was dripping from the windowsill, but he didn’t care. There could be nothing colder than his heart as he strove not to think of losing Chastain.

  She was meant to be his, he thought as rain fell on his hair and dripped from an errant lock that had fallen over his forehead. He braced his hands to either side of the window and barely acknowledged the moisture soaking him.

  “In another life,” the mystic had told him, “you were gods to your people. Where you went, your lady followed, even into the Abyss of Hell, Itself, she tracked you. A child—your child—grew in her belly and she wished for you to see its birth.”

  Old legends, Ruan thought as he opened his eyes and lifted his head. The mystic had spun images of legends so ancient they had become all but lost except in the mist-filled minds of the Ancients. He had regaled his prince with tales spun from strange fabric, from lands with Araibis names that rolled from the tongue like clattering pebbles down a mountainside.

  “She will always be yours and you will always be hers. Your lives will always be intertwined and from one generation to the next, she will guard you as diligently as you will love her.”

  Ruan felt a hand upon his shoulder and his heart soared. There was no need for him to look around to know it was his lady’s light touch that had asked for his attention. He reached his right hand across his chest to lay it atop hers and squeezed gently.

  “How is your wrist, milord?” she asked, and he could hear the weakness in her sweet voice.

  “It throbs a bit with this rain but otherwise it is fine,” he replied, reveling in being able to speak to her again and knowing everything would be fine from then on. “My tailbone is sore, though.”

  He turned to her, his eyes traveling over her pale features, skipping past the pain in her pretty green eyes for he was the cause of that and it hurt him deeply. There were light splashes of color to her cheeks but that was good, he thought. No fever brightened her pretty flesh. He put the back of his fingers against her face.

  “How do you feel, milady?” he asked quietly.

  “Sore but well enough, milord,” she replied, turning her face so she could kiss his hand.

  Gently—and with infinite care—he put his arms around her and brought her to him. His heart was thundering in his chest to match the cadence of the turbulent storm outside.

  “Had I lost you…” he began only to feel tears closing his throat.

  “I am here, beloved,” she replied. “Where I was meant to be.”

  He dipped his knees and swung her up into his arms to carry her to the bed. Putting a knee to the mattress, he lay her down gently atop the covers then stretched out beside her.

  Outside the storm grew louder and rain lashed against the windows. The room had grown hot and stuffy so he sat up just long enough to peel the shirt over his head and toss it to the floor. He lay back down and for a long time he simply held her, feeling her fragile body pressed close to his. There was iron strength in this woman, but she was his to protect—to keep safe, warm and content. To rock their bantlings in her slender arms.

  “Ruan?” Chas asked softly.

  “Aye.”

  “I feel I am in need of a good fucking.”

  The prince lifted his head and stared down at his lady. He narrowed his eyes. “I thought you didn’t like that word.”

  Chas shrugged. “I don’t,” she said, “but sometimes it’s what a woman needs.”

  He looked at her for a long moment. “Are you well enough for such cavorting, milady?”

  “I am.” She ran her finger from his bare hairy chest down to his navel, circled the deep indention with a fingertip and then slipped her hand under the waistband of his britches to thread her fingers through the crisp, wiry curls above his shaft.

  Ruan shuddered as her fingers wrapped around him.

  “Fucking, eh?” he queried, and glanced down to where his soldier was moving from parade rest to attention.

  “A good fucking is what I believe I said,” Chas stressed. “In the manner of a corsair of old.”

  Ruan’s left eyebrow shot up. “A corsair?”

  “Aye,” Chas answered with a sigh. “A bold and brazen corsair who has captured me and taken me aboard his ship. There to be ravished and ravaged and masterfully satiated.”

  “I’m not so sure ravishing and ravaging are such a good idea, wench,” he said.

  “Well, if you don’t feel up to the challenge…”

  He reared up and pushed her flat on her back, trapping her hand over his rising staff. “Be careful with your taunts, lass,” he warned.

  Chas pretended to shudder. “Oh, please, Captain!” she gasped. “I am but an untried maiden. I have never known a man. Please, I am saving myself for my betrothed, Lord Rufus.”

  “Rufus?” Ruan asked with a snort. “Some lover that fool would make.”

  Chas pushed weakly at the broad chest above her with one hand while the other closed around the prince’s hard cock. “Please do not rape me, Captain. Please!”

  Ruan’s lips twitched. “Ah, but there is rape and then there is rape, wench,” he said in a gruff voice. “Before all is said and done, I will have you begging for quarter!”

  Reaching down to drag her hand from between their bodies, Ruan spread her arms wide, pinning them down to either side of her head. He swooped down and claimed her lips roughly, thrusting his tongue deep inside the sweet cavern of her mouth.

  Chas wriggled beneath him, making sure her thigh rubbed against his rock-hard erection. When his lips slid from her to shower hot kisses down her throat, she turned her head away.

  “Woe is me!” she cried. “Oh, woe is me! I am being violated!”

  Ruan threw back his head and gave an eerie rendition of a villain’s evil laugh before sliding his body down hers until he could press his mouth over the peak of one dusky nipple hidden behind the soft lawn of her nightgown. Sucking on the erect nubbin through the fabric, he gently closed his teeth around the protrusion.

  Chas bucked beneath him, pressing her breast closer to his mouth. The sensation of wet fabric and the pressure of his teeth were sending shivers through her body. As his tongue flicked out to stab at the tender peak, she could not keep the groan of delight from escaping.

  Ruan let go of her arms and sat up, straddling her. He put his hands to the bodice of her gown and ripped the fabric from neckline to waist, freeing her lush breasts.

  “Oh!” Chas cried out and put her hands to his broad shoulders in an attempt to push him away. “Unhand me, you monster!”

  Ruan moved off her just long enough to rend the gown all the way to the hem then jerked it out from beneath her.

  Chas lay there with her eyes hot and filled with hunger as her lover tore the gown into strips. She put out her tongue to wet her lips, and as she did, she heard Ruan’s low growl, for his gaze was locked on her mouth.

  First, the right wrist was looped with a strip of torn gown. Stretching his lady’s arm to the top of the bed, he tied the strip to the headboard.

  “No, no!” Chas protested, weakly hitting him on his right biceps with her balled fist, but he captured her hand and before she could utter another denial had tied her left wrist to the headboard.

  Feebly she kicked out at him as he made quick work of her ankles. She thrashed her head back and forth on the pillow, moaning and pretending to sob.

  “Rufus, eh?” Ruan snarled as his hands went to the buttons of his fly.

  “He will avenge me!” Chas pronounced.

  “How, when the fop has no knowledge of which end of a blade to wield?” her ravager inquired with an evil smirk.

  Peeling the britches from his hips, he stepped out of them, presenting the bold thrust of his erection to the wide eyes of his lady. “Now this is a sword, wench!” he bragged.

  Slowly—very slowly—he put his knee on the bed and threw a leg over Chas’ hips. He sat down gently—his cock stretched out along her lower belly and oozed a bead of love juice upon her flesh.

  Chas shut her eyes and turned her head away. She struggled against the bonds holding her wrists, writhing sensually upon the tousled sheets.

  Ruan leaned forward to put his hands on her breasts and began to knead them firmly. He ran his thumbs over the straining peaks then flicked the nails of his index fingers over the pebbled surfaces before lightly pinching the sensitive nubs, rolling them between his thumbs and fingers.

  “No, please!” Chas begged.

  “One more word out of you, wench, and I’ll throw you to my men when I am finished with you,” Ruan warned in a gruff voice. He sat up. “They want you as it is!”

  Chas drew her lower lip between her teeth and shivered.

  His hands spread over her rib cage and down until one hand—the heel just touching her pubic hair—was pressing firmly on her belly, one finger dipping into her navel. He smiled at Chas’ moan and pressed a bit harder. As he did, he lowered his free hand to the spread V of her thighs and—turning his hand palm upward—slipped his index and middle fingers deep into her cunt. His thumb grazed her clitoris and when she cried out, he grinned mercilessly.

  “I’ll make you forget Lord Rufus No-nuts,” he swore and moved his fingers in and out of her with a sure stroke.

  “Lord who?” she asked with a giggle.

  “Shush or I’ll turn you over to my crew, wench!”

  His fingers were easing in and out of her with a rhythm that had Chas squirming. She wriggled her hips, and her heels were digging into the mattress as she sought to elevate her lower body to the luscious torment he wrought.

  “I’ll tie you to the mast and let every man on board suckle your tits,” he said and leaned down to capture a hard nipple between his lips, sucking the sensitive peak into his hot mouth as his stiff cock dragged along her thigh.

  Chas was rapidly losing herself to the delicious pressure inside her cunt. His fingers were plying her as a master musician with his instrument, but she wanted something harder, something longer than those knowledgeable digits sliding in and out of her.

  Ruan sensed his lady’s need and pulled his fingers out of her. “You want me, wench?” he asked in a low, gruff snarl. “You want my stiff cock inside you?”

  “Aye, milord!” Chas panted.

  “Well, you’ll have to wait,” he snapped.

  Chas started to protest, but her lover slid down in the bed, loomed over her and where his fingers had been ravaging, she felt his lips and tongue invading. She groaned as the hot moistness of that little muscle stabbed repeatedly at her clit.

  “Ruan!” she cried.

  He raised his head. “You dare to call another lover while I am fucking you, wench?”

  “Nay,” she said. “It is just that I…”

  “Shut your mouth or I will gag you!” he cautioned. “A woman’s mouth is good for only one thing and we’ll get to that soon enough!”

  A shiver of delight rippled down Chas’ body, and it was all she could do not to make a sound as he continued to suckle her cunt and ply her vagina and ass with stone-hard fingers.

  Ruan knew his lady was nearing a point where he could not control the sensations rippling through her. He snatched his fingers from her and stretched out atop her, settling his cock between her legs.

  “I am going to fuck you, wench!” he chortled.

  He was in her quickly, his throbbing shaft probing deep. His hands were on her hips, lifting her for his hard thrusts into her wetness. Fingers digging lightly into her rump, he brought her to him in lightning jabs that rocked her.

  Chas felt the itch beginning deep inside her and arched her head back, giving herself up to the sensations between her legs. His cock was as hard as tempered steel and her warrior was wielding that delectable weapon with the expertise of a master.

  As her climax shot over her in a rosy heat that made her release a soft scream of fulfillment, she felt him come. Long, hard and copious, the culmination of his lovemaking seemed to jerk inside her forever until he fell limp upon her, his face buried in the crook of her damp neck.

  They lay there panting, trying to calm their heaving chests. The fingers of Ruan’s right hand were on her left arm, gently stroking the underside from elbow to underarm in a lazy figure eight.

  “Will you still turn me over to your crew, Captain Brazen?” she asked gently.

  “Nay, wench,” he denied. “No man will ride you save this corsair.”

  Chas closed her eyes and rested her chin on the back of his head, and sighed.

  * * * * *

  “What do you think of a springtime Joining?” he asked.

  “They are nice. Do you know someone who will be Joined in the spring?” she countered.

  “I thought perhaps you and me.”

  She pushed back from him a little and looked up into his tender eyes. “Well, if it is our Joining of which you speak, I would prefer summer,” she admitted, “upon the Solstice.”

  He nodded. “Sounds like an auspicious time to me.”

  “There are, however, a few minor things that may prevent such a Joining,” she said.

  Ruan frowned. “And those are what, exactly?”

  “No enjoying the honeymoon before the Joining,” she said firmly.

  The prince groaned but he nodded his reluctant agreement. “What else?”

  “The groom has not asked the bride to be his mate. Don’t you think he should?”

  A slow smile dimpled Ruan Cosaint’s handsome face and he released his lady. With manly grace, he went to one knee before her, took her hand in his, kissed it cavalierly and then placed the palm against his heart.

  “Milady Chastain,” he said, his eyes locking with hers. “Would you do me the honor of becoming my bride?”

  “It would be my honor, Milord Ruan.”

  “Good then…”

  Chas placed the palm of her free hand against his cheek. “There is one more condition, one of utmost importance at this precise moment.”

  The frown returned to the prince’s rugged face. “That being what, milady?”

  “You take a long, hot bath,” she said, wrinkling her nose. “You stink!”

 

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