Oh. And Ella could almost feel that weight, suddenly, hanging about him, dragging down on his shoulders — and maybe that was why he’d felt so wrong today. He was supposed to be lighthearted Natt, running and laughing and playing, and now he had to be a leader, he had to carry on his father’s traditions, he had to draw truth from his brothers, and speak it for all to hear.
“So what do you have to do tonight, exactly?” Ella asked. “Your brothers just — talk to you? And do you talk to them too?”
“Ach,” Natt replied, with a nod. “As we have, these past days. It is not always an easy thing, to face one’s truth, without some help.”
Oh. Ella felt herself nodding back at him, her hands reaching instinctively to his bare chest, spreading wide against his warmth. “How wise and generous you are, Nattfarr of Clan Grisk,” she said, soft. “You’ll be a spectacular Speaker, I know it. You’ll make this mountain a better place foreveryone.”
There was wetness welling behind her eyes, and she blinked as Natt’s hands came up, and cradled her face soft, gentle, between them. “You honour me, my fair lass,” he murmured. “Now may we leave all this behind, and only have our joy, for today?”
His voice sounded almost pleading, his eyes just the same, and Ella nodded, and swallowed hard, and nodded. Joy, for today. And then…
“Right,” she said, too quickly. “Right. Um. Well” — her eyes were casting about, and had thankfully caught on the sheer wall of the mountain behind them — “are thosestepsin that stone, Natt?”
Natt blinked, his eyes darting up toward it, and then flicking back to her face again. And this time, thank the gods, they finally, truly looked like him again. Warm, amused, alive.
“Ach, they are,” he replied, his voice light. “But I ken such a pretty, pampered lass like you should never be able to climb this wall with me.”
Ella was smiling at him again, blinking back the last of the wetness behind her eyes as she jabbed her finger into his chest. “And Iken,” she said, “you’re wrong, you arrogant Grisk. Not only shall I climb it, but I shall do it so quickly, you shan’t be able to keep up, and will need to concede defeat, on your knees.”
“On my knees?” Natt echoed, with his old familiar grin, sharp-toothed and wicked. “Mayhap I shall allow you to defeat me, to gain this.”
Ella made a face at him, but he was still grinning at her, the warmth and affection bared and true in his sparkling eyes.
And that was enough, in this moment, so Ella kicked off, and ran.
27
Ella spent a breathless, glorious final afternoon together with Natt, full of running and games and laughter.
It began with them climbing up the mountain together, starting with that wall, a deceptively simple-looking obstacle that soon proved both maddening and thoroughly exhausting. But Natt was behind Ella the entire way, peeking up her skirt and making increasingly heated promises — and when they finally reached the top of the cliff, Natt sat her spread-eagled upon it, her legs dangling over the edge. And then he precariously perched himself on the sheer wall before her, and brought her to ecstasy, under the sun, upon the edge of the world.
“You utterhellion,” Ella breathed afterwards, once she’d dragged him up, and was frantically kissing his wet, tangy-tasting mouth. “What if you’d fallen?!”
But he only grinned at her, curling his long, slick tongue against hers with shocking lewdness. “Then you should have forever grieved me,” he said smugly, “and never found such joy again.”
Ella elbowed at him, and also at the nagging, dragging thoughts that had arisen with the words, and thankfully Natt shoved her back onto the earth, his body heavy and sweaty over hers. “And now,” he said, “I must be repaid, for this grave danger I have faced, upon your behalf.”
Ella laughed and protested and shoved at him, but of course he was far too strong. And when he sat upon her chest, and drew out his dripping, sticky hardness, her only recourse was to grasp for it with her trembly fingers, and draw it close between her hungry lips.
It led to Natt hovering low on his elbows and knees over her, blatantly fucking his cock down into her slobbering sucking mouth, and howling his pleasure at the sky. And oh, it was good, it was the rightful Speaker of the Grisk taking his base, unfettered pleasure with his woman, and then flooding her with seed until she choked.
“This pleased me,” Natt murmured, afterwards, as he pulled Ella to her feet, and wiped her face clean again. “Who should have thought that a pretty lass like you should take such joy in having her throat plundered by an orc’s prick? No foul man shall ever please you again, after this.”
He smiled as he spoke, but there was again that odd whispering darkness in it — and Ella shoved it away, and then dragged him close into her arms. “No, he shan’t,” she said firmly. “Now, can we go up further, from here?”
Natt immediately nodded, guiding her in the direction he wanted to go, toward a rocky but manageable-looking ascent. “There is a pool, this way,” he said. “We ought to bathe you there. You are always such a filthy lass.”
Ella loudly protested, but willingly went along anyway, until Natt drew her to a halt before the breathtaking sight of a tall, rushing waterfall, tumbling into a dark, misty pool beneath. And as she watched, the world hitching all around, Natt’s gentle hands carefully undressed her of everything but her earrings, and then drew her in.
The water was shockingly cold, setting Ella’s teeth immediately chattering, but Natt was here, as warm as always, tucking her close against him, rubbing her all over with his big heated hands. But not quite meeting her eyes as he did it, and the nagging heaviness seemed to drag ever deeper in Ella’s stomach. Whispering of Alfred, of wars, of money and her father and her home. Ofsomethingbeing ruined, gone forever, no matter what path she took.
When Natt drew her out of the water again, the cold was all that remained, so strong Ella’s shivering body could scarcely stand. And in a single movement he swept her up, along with her clothes, and tucked her close and safe against his hot chest.
“Next, I must dress you again,” he murmured, into her ear, as he easily leapt up onto a bank of rock, nimbly leaping from one stone to the next. “For my Revel. This shall begin at nightfall.”
The sun was indeed sinking lower in the sky, and Ella nodded as Natt eased her toward what appeared to be a solid wall of stone. But it turned out that there was a tiny crevice just above it, entirely invisible from below, and soon they were back in the Grisk wing, and Natt was carrying Ella into the Grisk storage-room. Where he again stood her between the rows of shelves, while he rummaged around her, holding up item after item against her still-shivery skin.
“These must stay,” he said decisively, flicking a claw at the earring still in her ear. “And these must also.”
