Both those options sounded truly delightful, though Rosa felt herself belatedly frowning up at him, her head tilting. “Mylibrary?”
“Ach,” John said, with a shrug. “You have given up your own library for my gain, and you know more than any other in this mountain how best to take care of one. It is only fitting that you should now have mine.”
Have his. This orc was giving her alibrary, coolly, easily, as if it were nothing. But in staring at him, searching that watchful wary distance on his face, Rosa knew itdidmean something. Itdidmatter. This was a monumental gift, it was John handing over perhaps his greatest treasure, toher. Showing his truth through his actions, as he always had, since the first day they’d met.
Rosa flung herself toward him, her arms clamping around his waist, her face thrust into his warm chest. “Thankyou, John,” she whispered. “No one’s ever given meanythingso lovely.”
John’s arms had closed around her, clutching so tight it stole her breath. “Foolish pet,” he murmured, though the words were thick with emotion. “You shall not be so thankful when you truly see all the work this shall bind you to. Not only this, but also your teaching, and your Aelakesh studies, and your writing. All whilst your tiny body also grows myorcling. And because of all this” — his voice hardened — “you shall forever lose your dream of studying at this university.”
But the warmth was so bright, it felt like Rosa might burst with it, and she drew back to meet his gaze, both hands spreading wide against his chest. “I don’t need to be at a university to learn,” she whispered. “I want to be here, John-Ka, learning withyou. And also” — she twitched a grin at him — “serving you, as your loyal pet.”
Something stuttered, shifted in those eyes, and he wordlessly gripped Rosa’s hand in his, and led her down the corridor. Toward his room, Rosa realized, and once they were inside he again turned to face her, his eyes oddly unreadable in the flickering light.
“I have one more gift for you,” he said, very quiet. “Should you choose to accept it.”
Rosa felt her brows rising, but she nodded, waited — and from beneath the stack of clothes on his nearby shelf, John drew something out. Something smooth, bright, gleaming gold and silver.
It was — a necklace. Or, more accurately, akraga. One of the ones from the Ka-esh forge, like the ones Rosa had seen in the pleasure-den. But far smaller and thinner than those had been, made of delicate shards of gold and silver beaten together. And when Rosa blinked closer, drinking up the utter loveliness of it, she realized it also hadscriptwritten on the inside, all beautiful flowing Aelakesh.
“Can you read it to me?” she whispered, gently tracing her finger against it. Feeling the detail of the etching, the impossible, unreal beauty of the metalwork, crafted with astonishing care and skill. A gift. Forher?!
“Upon it is written, ‘I belong to John, of Clan Ka-esh,’” John said, his voice very quiet. “‘He vows to keep me safe, and fed, and fulfilled, so long as he is able.’”
Oh. Rosa’s wide eyes jolted to John’s face, searching those damned blank, distant eyes — and still reading them, somehow, as easily as if they were written on a page.
Thiswas his vow. This was his promise. This was John admitting, without words, that he’d had this made for her, specifically for her, and hadn’t Gary said one of these tookdays—
Rosa’s throat clamped in on itself, and her fingers traced over that damned telling line, suddenly screaming at her with the bare, violent force of its truth.Ég tilheyri John. I belong to John.
“Once I close this around your neck,” John’s voice said, hoarse, “it shall not again open. It must then be broken off, or melted.”
Rosa’s eyes couldn’t stop blinking, first at the power of those words, and then at his face. His face, so blank, so wary, so —afraid.
“It is a foolish orc custom, I ken,” he said, very quickly, as he abruptly lowered thekragato his side. “Or, rather, a Ka-esh one. A silly wish to fully claim another, and flaunt this to one’s kin. It means naught, I ken, when one can so easily use one’s scent and one’s teeth for marking, and mayhap I shall set it aside, until —”
He was babbling, Rosa realized, with a sudden, jolting affection so heated it seemed to melt her insides — and John was turningawayfrom her, he was hiding it back on his shelf. And after an instant’s shocked speechlessness, Rosa bodily launched herself toward that arm, thatkraga, before it could possibly disappear forever —
“Stop,” she choked at him, her hands scrabbling, her nails actually scratching gouges into his skin. “Don’t youdareput that away, my lord. It ismine!”
Her breath was heaving, her body tingling all over, and against her John had snapped into stillness, his eyes intent on her face, his nostrils flaring, his teeth bared. A low growl burning from his throat, and the thrill of desperate, wonderful fear was so visceral, so powerful, the very stone staggered under Rosa’s feet.
“You are an orc,” she hissed at him. “And you aren’t foolish, your practices aren’t silly, your culture is yours, and you’reyou. And you’re a marvellous deviousreprobate, and Iloveyou, I’ve already told you I’ll be your pet and your mate and the mother of yourchild— so ofcourseI want to wear such a beautiful gift, for the love of thegods, John!”
She was nearly shouting at him, and also truly on the verge of weeping — until it all broke off at once, shattering into stillness, as John’s hands circled close around her throat.
He was still growling, and the gleamingkragawas thrust up onto his arm, freeing both his hands for this. For fully enclosing Rosa’s neck with such purpose, such checked power, such tenderness.
Rosa had fully frozen in place, not moving, not thinking, and John’s head curtly nodded his approval, his growl rumbling lower, almost to a purr.
“Gott,” he breathed. “Then you shall undress for your lord, pet.”
Heat sparkled under Rosa’s skin, streaking to her belly, her groin, her heart — and she wordlessly reached behind her for the dress’ row of buttons. They were small and plentiful, running in a long line down her back, and Rosa’s shivery fingers fumbled against them, her gaze trapped on the deadly hunger charging across her mate’s impatient, imperious eyes.
“Foolish woman,” he sneered, as his hand dropped from her neck to her collarbone — and with a swift, vicious yank, he tore Rosa’sdress. Ripping it straight down the middle, slicing through seams and trim and lace with breathtaking force. Until the dress fell from Rosa’s body onto the floor, leaving her standing there naked, fully exposed, before her lord’s greedy staring eyes.
And he was staring, his hooded eyes sweeping up and down, his tongue slipping out to brush against his lips. His gaze lingering, suddenly, on the slight new swell in her waist, the unmistakable new fullness in her tingly-feeling breasts.
John’s groan was raw, guttural, and in a flare of movement he was here, close against her. His hands roving over her skin, cupping her belly almost whole between them, and then curving against her breasts with soft, astonishing reverence.
