Gwyn had gone still over him, blinking uncertainly at his face, and he exhaled again, his gaze dropping to where his hands were now skimming up her arms. As if he were bracing himself, finding the words, for whatever this last truth might be.
“I… hunted you,” he said in a rush. “Many moons past, in Dunburg. No to harm you, but to… seek you. Claim you. In the way of the Skai.”
Wait. Joarr had wanted to… seek her?Claimher? Many moons past? In the way of theSkai?
“But,” Gwyn protested, her voice weak. “But you — you were spying on me because of my father. Because you wanted tocompromiseme. To use me against that law.”
Joarr twitched a shrug, his eyes still intent on his hands stroking up and down her arms. “Thiswastruth, after,” he said, quiet. “After I learnt of my true clan. After the Bautul almost break our mountain’s treaty, and I seek way to face this. But before this” — he shrugged again — “I was Skai. And I worked oft in Dunburg, to watch your father and his men. And when a Skai finds a woman he wishes for his own, he… hunts her. This is how Skai take a mate, ach? No goddess, no altar. Only the hunt, and then… the claiming.”
With that, his eyes had darted, brief but far too betraying, toward Gwyn’s house. And now her thoughts were tumbling with it, flooding with memories, with comprehension. Roy had known about Joarr, because Joarr had beenhuntingher in Dunburg. Joarr had…wantedher. He’d…claimedher, like a Skai, on her kitchen table, and he’d said, he’d said…
Now we mate, he’d said that night, with that truth burning in his eyes.I claim, tonight. Mine.
A tremulous little shudder rippled up Gwyn’s back, a gasp escaping her mouth — but then she shook her head, hard. “But — butafter,” she countered, flapping her hand toward this very bench. “Here. You said you only felt guilty. You tried toleaveme. You certainly didnot” — she hauled in air — “suggest in any way that you now considered me yourmate, in the ways of the Skai!”
Joarr’s grimace felt more like a flinch, his shoulders slightly hunching. “But I could not, you ken?” he said, his voice thin. “I — broke my pledge to the Bautul, in this. I was no to make you my mate, I was only to — touseyou. So all this night, and in the days after, I fought against what I had done, ach? I sought new ways. Sought to make walls against you, push you away, make you think I no care. Make sure you no trust me, and thus I no trust you. Find way — any way — to keep my pledge to the Bautul, and keep away this war. Ach?”
Oh. Gwyn’s stomach had plummeted again, her gaze desperately searching his — and he was looking back, his eyes hard, molten, blinking. “I was wrong,” he said, hoarse. “This was wrong. I had made you my mate. And the more I fought to deny this, to push this away, the more it found me, ach?Youfound me. You see me. You see past all my falsehood, into the truth beneath.”
She couldn’t seem to move, let alone speak, and Joarr’s warm hands slid up her arms again, over her shoulders, her neck. Until he was again carefully cupping her face in his fingers, as if she was something fragile, beyond price.
“You seek my truth,” he breathed. “You seek fun with me. Seek to help me. Seek new ways with me. You break all my sight. And you even take me on Bautul altar, and make me your mate in the ways of the Bautul also. And next you help my clan, and seek to bear myson, and I am” — his chest hollowed — “I am undone. Forever under your spell. My witch. Mymate.”
There was still no way to speak, to answer this, and Joarr’s eyes kept holding hers, a single streak of wetness slipping down his harsh cheek. “I am sorry, for all the ways I fought you, and failed you,” he whispered. “I long to face this anew. Long to find new ways with you. If you should see fit to grant this gift to me, after all I have brought upon you.”
Gwyn’s eyes were suddenly leaking wetness too, and she desperately gulped down air, clutching her hands at his stiff shoulders. “You — you did a lot of good things too, Joarr,” she managed. “You showed me fun. Found me friends. Believed in me. Supported me. Helped me find a way to get rid of Roy, and —”
Her voice broke off there, because Joarr had slipped his warm hand over her lips, his head twitching back and forth. “No, my witch,” he breathed, a ghost of a smile on his mouth. “You no give me yet more kindness in this, ach? Ought to cast dark spells. Make cruel demands. Make me suffer.”
But goddess, Gwyn couldn’t, not with the warmth so close, whirling with relief, withhunger. He’d wanted her. He’d come for her. And she was revelling in that truth, and dragging in the hot close scent of his hand over her mouth, perhaps even flicking out her tongue to taste it…
His response was instant, his body gone utterly still — so Gwyn tasted him again. Dragging her tongue slow and meaningful against his palm, and drinking up the sudden answering heat, flashing sharp and beautiful in his watching, blinking eyes.
And in a flick of fluttering movement, his hands dropped to the front of her dress. Undoing the row of buttons with astonishing speed, and then tugging the fabric off her shoulders, and hurling it away into the garden. Leaving Gwyn utterly naked upon his lap, her bared groin spread apart over his. Over where he was already hard, hungry, pulsing up against his trousers…
So this time Gwyn’s hands fluttered down, yanking at the trousers’ waist — and oh, he was kicking them off entirely, too. And now there was nothing left separating them, no lies, no clothes, no secrets. Nothing but skin and hunger, and the hot crackling craving in Joarr’s watching eyes.
“Mine,” he breathed, his voice catching, his hand sliding down Gwyn’s front. Stroking first over her breasts, and then lingering against her belly, fingers spreading wide. And then easing down to caress soft between her thighs, to where she was already swollen, slick, waiting.
He held her eyes as his hand briefly slipped to his own groin, guiding himself up, nudging that familiar, heated hunger against her. Where it wanted to be, where itbelonged. And Gwyn felt it, clutched at it, revelled in it — and then sank down, slow and smooth, driving him deep inside.
His groan was harsh and rasping, tangling with her own breathless moan, and she could feel him swelling even fuller within her, lighting her from the inside out. And she was shuddering all over, clamping and convulsing upon him, needing him there, needing him to stay, to mean this, to prove this…
But already he was nodding, his eyes shimmering on hers, his strong arms gathering her close against his warm, solid chest. And then — surely for the very first time since they’d met — he rocked into her, slow. Gentle. Reverent. No driving, no taking, no conquering. Just — quiet. Sweet. His. Hers.
Oh.Oh. It felt so strange, so tenuous, so… vulnerable. As if this was something he’d never done before, something that was only hers. Something… new. A new feeling, a new way, with this orc’s hungry hard power willingly caught, trapped, in her thrall. In her strength. In her spell.
But he wasn’t fighting it anymore. Only staying, only giving, rocking into her again and again as she gasped, shivered, clung desperately at his shoulders. As his warm hands kept stroking up and down her back, his face buried deep in her neck, his mouth kissing soft and worshipful against her skin.
She… was. His. Hers.
The proof of it was already building, already rising, twisting higher and tighter with every grind of his hips, every swell of his strength inside her. With the scrape of his teeth against her neck, the gentle prick of his claws into her back, his raw, guttural groan as she felt him shudder to stillness, his heat rooted as deep as it could go —
He shouted as he sprayed out, flooding her with his furious truth, his affection, hispledge— and then Gwyn was shouting too, breaking apart around him. The release and the relief screaming out from her pierced core, streaking to every breath of her soul. His. Hers. A new way.
It wheeled again and again, circling and juddering between them, until Gwyn finally collapsed against his chest, her breaths heaving from her lungs. While his heart frantically thundered beneath her ear, his hands still spread wide on her back, his head bowed against hers.
“Mine,” he whispered, so soft she barely heard it — but she twitched a nod, pressed a light little kiss against his skin.
