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Since the previous night, she thought, very pleased. The evening had been warm, the stars had filled the heavens, slanting light down through the oak branches. He’d led her into that ancient oak forest after they’d eaten roasted rabbit by the camp fire. There they’d caressed each other until Hastings had gasped, “Please, Severin, come to me else I’ll expire.”
But he hadn’t. When finally she had cried out, he gently reached his hand up and closed it over her mouth. When she had eased a bit he’d come into her and found his own pleasure.
“Aye,” she said now, still studying her fingernails. “A very long time. I have felt neglected. I have felt like a cow left overlong in the pasture.”
“Now you want me to milk you? Your jest went a bit awry, Hastings.”
She grinned at him. He patted her cheek with his hand, leaned down, and kissed her. He was whistling when he began to unweave his cross garters. He was jesting with a woman. Nay, not just a woman. He was jesting with his wife. He had wanted to strangle her not that long ago. He had been strongly tempted to beat her. When he’d left Oxborough to visit his other holdings, he hadn’t ever wanted to see the witch again. Then the miracle. The epiphany. He remembered when he had forced her. Nay, not really forced her, for he had used the cream, but still, she hadn’t wanted him. She had hated him.
She no longer hated him. Why? he wondered. Now she smiled at him, welcomed him, and many times treated him as though he was the king. It made him feel very good.
He knew he should keep his mouth shut, should not question what God had wrought, but he didn’t. He waited until she was on her back and he was balanced on one elbow over her. He was looking down at her breasts. Not ordinary breasts at all. They were full and white and so very soft. He was lightly rubbing his finger over that soft flesh of hers. “Why did you change toward me? You hated me. You said I was an animal. You wished I would disappear from your life.”
She became utterly still.
“Hastings?”
“Will you push and push until you batter me down?”
“Nay, I am your husband. There should never be any need near for me to push you. It will be your joy to always tell me what it is I wish to know.”
“Very well. I can see that you will be Edgar the
wolfhound with a beef bone. Dame Agnes and Alice told me to. Dame Agnes said that I had not enough experience in a woman’s ways to deal well with you. They told how this dealing worked with men. And since you are a man, they decided it would work with you as well. A smile and a kiss, and a show of interest in you, Severin, that is what they told me to do. I don’t think Dame Agnes believed I would succeed though. I believe she thought I would bite you rather than kiss you. But I did kiss you and it was very nice. I believe I tasted your surprise.”
He said in the most satisfied voice she had ever heard, “You bent utterly to me. You accepted me as your lord and your master.”
“I do not think it wise of you to draw such a drastic conclusion.”
“Why? It is what resulted. They told you to give over to me, to stop setting yourself up against me. They told you to enjoy my man’s body.”
“Aye, they did say that. Alice told me that all the men knew you were not a pig with women, that you were gentle and kind and enjoyed a woman’s pleasure. I did not believe that, for at that time I knew nothing of this pleasure they spoke about. But Alice was very certain. She said that if I wished it, she would bed you and discover for certain that it was true. I thanked her for offering herself as a sacrifice, but that I would try it myself. She said that I just might learn some very interesting things if I just allowed you to come to me without anger, if I just relaxed and didn’t tighten myself when you came near.”
“Dame Agnes and Alice told you all this? Which of my men did they speak to?”
“Alice never draws a conclusion without copious evidence, particularly, I think, if it concerns something men do or don’t do. I would imagine it was a good many of your men. I do know she asked Gwent after your return. She said he would never lie, at least to her.”
Severin fell over onto his back. He didn’t know whether to feel like an ass or a man blessed. He had gained, not lost. He was satisfied with his wife, not in misery. She no longer lay beneath him like a dead log. She enjoyed him thoroughly, he knew it if he knew anything at all. “This is all very interesting. But heed me, Hastings, I treat you now the way I would have always treated you if you hadn’t been such a—” He paused, which was fortunate because Hastings was above him now, and she was breathing fast and hard. “Aye, Severin? You wish to say more?”
He stilled. It was dark in the bedchamber. She couldn’t see the wickedness on his face. “Aye, perhaps. Does ‘shrew’ fit your mouth? Or prefer you ‘fishwife’ or ‘ harridan’?”
“You are saying that it was all my fault, this rift between us?”
“Naturally it was all your fault. You’re proud, Hastings, and stubborn as a stoat. I am a man of peace. I am reasonable in all my dealings, with both men and women. I wanted no battle with you, but you fought me for no reason that I can remember.”
It was too much. She slammed her fist into his belly. He wasn’t prepared for it and thus she did make him start at the jab of pain. He moaned, grabbed her, and pulled her down onto her stomach. He swung his legs over her and kept his hand on her neck to keep her down. He realized in an instant of time that his belly didn’t hurt all that much at all. He realized in the instant just beyond that one that he was astride her white buttocks and both of them were naked. He eased his hand from her neck, down her back, until he held her in place with his hand pressing at her waist. He looked at her squirming beneath him and wanted to be inside her, then, no more words, no more fists to his belly. He was breathing hard. He jerked her onto her knees, ready to thrust into her, then he stopped. No, he couldn’t. She wasn’t ready for him. He would hurt her. She would call him an animal again. He would muck up the miracle.
He touched her soft flesh with his finger and was so grateful he nearly wept. She was ready for him. He slid his finger into her and to his utter, besotted surprise, she moaned. He was trembling with this response from her, so unexpected was it. “Hastings, what is this? How can you want me when I have not kissed you or fondled you?”
Her head was buried in her arms. She was embarrassed, but not so embarrassed that she wanted him to stop.
“Come into me, Severin. Now. Please.”
It took no more than that, just those few simple words and he was above her, pushing into her, feeling her pull him deeper, feeling her delight in him and what he was doing. It was too much. He did try. He thought he’d die. He only yelled once, surely not such a loud yell, but it was a yell, and his lady mother jerked upright on her narrow cot and said, “By the Devil’s cloven foot, are we under attack? Where is my husband? Where are my sons?”
Severin was throbbing deep inside her, his seed still spilling into her. He tried desperately to get a hold on himself, but he could barely breathe, much less talk.
Hastings said, her voice surprisingly even, “My lady, we are not under attack. It was simply your son, held for a brief moment in a dream. He will be all right shortly. He usually is.”
