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“No. Just my name,” he said, interrupting her.
“Ravik,” Grace said softly.
His brow creased, and he pressed her hand against his cheek with an almost pained sigh. I wasn’t sure what I was witnessing, and why the Magnar would allow me to see this. Grace stared at him, stunned at first. Then her lips parted as if sudden understanding dawned on her. She raised her other hand to his cheek, cupping his face. He opened his eyes, their gazes locked in a silent communication. It made me uneasy. Yet, my gut told me this needed to play out.
Grace combed her fingers through his long hair. He closed his eyes again and exhaled a shuddering breath when she whispered his name in his ear. Wrapping his arms around her, he held her in a tight embrace. She kissed his cheek. My fingers dug into the chair until I felt the material begin to tear. The look he gave her was tender. Magnar Ravik handled her with more care than I could have hoped for. But her reaction baffled me. Scared me. Releasing his embrace, he brushed her hair aside then gently kissed her lips.
“Thank you for your warm hospitality, little Grace. Both the Magnar and the man will not forget. You may go. Your consort and I have much to discuss and little time to do so.”
Grace got off his lap and kneeled before him. The weight crushing my shoulders and constricting my lungs lifted. After Ravik caressed the top of her head, she rose to her feet and glanced at me. I smiled and we both watched her leave.
The Magnar’s tender expression evaporated the minute Grace faded from view.
“For such a smart man, you’re quite an idiot.” His voice was icy.
“Magnar—”
“Don’t Magnar me,” he snapped. “Why the fuck would you let me or any other man touch your woman?”
That threw me. “It is tradition. You are the Magnar. Doing otherwise would have been—”
“The right thing to do,” he said, interrupting me. “It isn’t tradition, it’s Braxian garbage. I guess you’re as big a fool as the rest of them.”
I sagged in my chair, dumbstruck. His words dripped with treason. Was that why he left his guards with William? Was he baiting me to speak up against Braxia only to have me jailed? I opened my mouth. Closed it. Opened it again.
“What if I decided to fuck her?”
My teeth clenched. “You’re a fully mature Braxian. You’d never fit without killing her.”
“Your father sired you, and your mother lived to tell the tale.” His eyes were hard, unflinching. “Nothing a bit of patience and plenty of Denax wouldn’t take care of.”
My blood ran cold. Ravik wasn’t that much bigger than my father. Denax was an extremely effective lubricant and dilator. I used it on Grace the night I almost took her ass. I had only intended to give her enough to prevent tearing or significant harm. With proper time and preparation, she could have enjoyed it.
Ravik smiled at my expression. Magnar or not, I wouldn’t let him fuck Grace. Though from his earlier comment, it didn’t sound like he planned to.
“Let me tell you a tale, young Anton,” Ravik said, leaning back in his seat. The couch creaked under his massive weight.
I nodded, grateful for the conversation to steer away from fucking Grace.
“Thirty-three years ago, for my twelfth birthday, my father gave me a human slave. She was a beautiful wisp of a girl, a fourteen-year-old named Lissy. I became sexually active a few months prior, and Father considered it a rite of passage to deflower a human female.”
It was more than a rite of passage. Virgins were hard to come by. Beautiful human virgins even harder. Wealthy clans paid high prices to get willing young females for their sons to bed. It became a sign of status. Between the ages of eleven and fourteen, a Braxian male’s girth was still small enough for a human woman to handle with reasonable ease. By fifteen, coupling with a human usually resulted in serious tearing without Denax. However, frequent and excessive use of the dilator endangered the woman’s health.
“Within a year, I committed the unforgivable. Not content to fall in love with a slave, I also impregnated her with a male.” He snorted at my stunned expression. “But that wasn’t the worst part. I allowed my son to live and kept him a secret for fifteen months. Can you guess what happened next?”
“Your father discovered his existence.”
“Yes.”
I couldn’t imagine what that must have been like. Magnar Sigmer had been a zealot and a bigot. For his own son to taint their bloodline, with a slave no less…
“A human snitched on us. The Narinda colony’s ambassador came to discuss possible trade agreements.” His lips stretched in a sneer. His hatred for the human still burned bright. “He knew Braxian protocols. When Lissy refused him, he complained to my father who had guards escort him to her quarters. If she refused him again, they would hold her down for him and then punish her. Apparently, she was breastfeeding our son when they barged in.”
I shifted in my seat, imagining the young girl watching in horror as the guards dragged her child away. By then, she would have been sixteen or seventeen.
“When I returned early from the training camp, I naively thought my father summoned me as a reward for the distinctions I earned during combat training.” Ravik emitted a sad chuckle. “The guards said he awaited me in the courtyard. When I saw over a dozen juveniles from elder clans gathered there, I thought they came to celebrate me.”
I knew where this tale headed. Yet, I listened with morbid fascination.
