Dark, Devastating & Delicious!: The Marriage Medallion / Between Duty and Desire / Driven to Distraction

The handsome woman frowned. “You are angry?”

“Uh, yeah. You could say that. There I was, walking in the woods, minding my own business. And I come upon what is about to be a rape. I step in, stop the rape—and get kidnapped for my trouble.” She touched her cheek. “Plus, Grid backhanded me for asking questions about what, exactly, was happening. And no, I don’t have to relieve myself and we stopped to drink at a spring not far back down the trail.”

The woman gestured at her pallet, which was big enough for more than one. “Please. Will you sit? I apologize for the… zealousness of my women. I requested that they bring you to me. They only did what I asked of them.”

“So you’re saying you’re the one to blame?”

The woman smiled, the fine lines around her eyes etching deeper. “Yes. I am Ragnild, leader of this camp. And I am to blame for everything. Now. Will you sit?”

Brit blew out a breath. “I suppose.” She circled the low fire and dropped to the furs with a tiny groan. She really wasn’t used to riding without a saddle. Everything was going to be way sore by tomorrow. But back to business. “Okay, Ragnild. What is going on?”

The woman put up a hand. “Please. Be still now. Look me squarely in the eye.”

Brit stifled a second groan—one that had nothing to do with her physical discomfort. She wanted answers, damn it. And she deserved them.

But something in the leader calmed her. Made her willing to just sit there—for a moment, anyway—and stare straight into Ragnild’s hazel eyes.

“Yes,” said Ragnild, after a long, strangely peaceful span of time. “It is as my dreams have foretold. You will be a great queen, the first in our nation’s history to rule with her king.”

Chapter Seven

Brit opened her mouth to argue—but decided against it. What Ragnild predicted would happen or it wouldn’t. And the future wasn’t the issue right now.

Now she had questions. Lots of them. “Rinda called me her cousin…”

“Because you are. As I am her mother.”

“But how are we related?”

“Your mother had a brother named Brian. Have you been told of him?”

Brit made a face. “More than I wanted to know, to be honest.” Her mother had finally told Liv, only weeks ago, why she had left their father, why she had split their family in two—baby triplet daughters to Ingrid, sons to Osrik. Brian Freyasdahl, a real piece of work, as it turned out, had been at the center of the problem. She frowned. “You’re saying that my rotten uncle Brian was Rinda’s father?”

Ragnild sighed.

Brit understood. “You’re the one, aren’t you? The one who killed him, the one who cut off his head and his—”

Ragnild waved a hand. “It was long ago.”

“But then… he must have raped you, right?”

“He did. And for that I did what any kvina soldar will do to a man who dares to take what it is a woman’s sacred choice to give. A few months later I realized that I would have his child.”

She thought of Rinda, with her bold attitude and her naughty smile. “That makes your daughter illegitimate.”

Ragnild nodded. “Fitz,” she said softly, with distaste. In Gullandria, a bastard child was called a fitz and was considered the lowest of the low. “Among us, among the warrior women, there is no judgment on the child for being born outside of a marriage. No kvina soldar can marry and remain with us, anyway. Sometimes, for whatever reason—the dishonor of rape, the lusts of the flesh, the true call of love—we find ourselves with child. When that happens, should we choose to have the child, we love that child and bring her or him up strong and capable and proud, as much as we can.” She smoothed the soft white leather of her robe. “With girl children, it usually works well, since they most often choose to stay with us. The life of the boys is more difficult. They are sent away at the age of eight and they suffer at the cruelty of the outside world.”

Brit was thinking of her brother-in-law, the king’s warrior, Hauk Wyborn. Her father had recently legitimized Hauk, but before that Hauk’s last name had been FitzWyborn. “My brother-in-law’s mother was a kvina soldar.”

Ragnild smiled softly. “Valda Booth. I knew her. She was a great warrior.”

And really, there were more important things to be talking about than the plight of the fitz in Gullandrian society and what a dirty rat her creepy long-dead uncle had been. “What do you know of my brother, Valbrand?”

If the abrupt change of subject bothered Ragnild, she didn’t show it. “They say he died at sea.”

“Do you believe that?”

“Shouldn’t I believe it?”

“I don’t. I think someone tried to kill him. And I know in my heart that that someone failed.”

“The heart is often wiser than the mind.”

“So you’re saying you think I’m right?”

“I am saying that you must do… what you must do.”

“You know, you’re like a lot of people in Gullandria. Big dreams of what the future will be, not very helpful in the here and now.”

Ragnild chuckled. “I fear you speak the truth.”

Brit sent her cousin’s mother a sideways look. “What about the Dark Raider? Heard any stories about him showing up in the Vildelund lately?”

Ragnild nodded. “Rumor has it he rides among us again—that he rescued an old man from thieves, that he dealt with a group of renegades who were terrorizing one of the nearby Mystic communities.”

Okay, great. Ragnild had heard the same stories as Sif. A confirmation. But nothing new. “Another question.”

“Ask.”

“When am I allowed to go back to the village where I came from?”

“Will tomorrow be acceptable? You’ll stay with us tonight, share a meal, get to know your cousin a little. Rinda and Grid will take you back in the morning.”

“So… this is it, then? You had me abducted so you could look in my eyes and reassure yourself that your dreams will come true?”

Ragnild laughed full out. It was a strong, rich sound. “I fear you have it exactly right—to look in the eyes of our future queen, to forge, you might say, the beginnings of a bond between us, for the sake of the future of my women. And to meet my daughter’s blood cousin. I find I am well satisfied, on all counts.”

Brit grumbled, “Rinda took my SIG 220, you know. I’m really fond of that gun.”

“I’ll have it returned to you immediately.”

“Good. But getting my pistol back isn’t the only problem. There are people who have to be seriously freaked by now, worrying about me.”

“You’ll return to them tomorrow, none the worse for wear.”

Brit got a tour of the village and a lesson in the practice of the dragon dials.

The dragon dials was an exercise system developed in the seventeenth century by the kvina soldars. It was a specific sequence of slow, controlled movements that the warrior women believed promoted strength, calmness, discipline and mental clarity.

After the exercise session, Brit shared a meal in Ragnild’s tent with the camp leader, Rinda, Grid and several other women. They had reindeer stew. Brit found it tasty, if a little tough. After the meal, Rinda invited Brit to the hot springs not far from camp.

Brit went gratefully, looking forward to soothing the aches and pains from a long day on the trail. Rinda brought a fresh dressing along for Brit’s shoulder wound and changed it for her once they’d had a long soak.

Really, Brit was feeling pretty good about everything as she and Rinda strolled back to camp. Tomorrow she’d return to Asta’s place.

And the day after tomorrow, she was heading out again. For Drakveden Fjord. It was time to have a look at what was left of the Skyhawk, to see if she could find a clue as to who had sabotaged her plane.

They heard the commotion as they came out of the trees and into the clearing where the circle of tents stood. Something was going on in the center of the circle.

Rinda grinned. “Looks to me like they’ve caught a man.”

Brit walked faster—and stopped dead when she saw.

They certainly had caught a man. And that man was Eric. He was tied to the big stake in the center of the circle. The children of the camp darted around him, taunting him, and now and then striking him with stones and sticks.

Brit took off at a run. “Hey, stop that!” She hit the center of the circle yelling, making shooing motions with her hands. “Cut that out, you little brats. Go on, go on. Get away from him!”

The children backed off, though a couple made grotesque faces and stuck out their tongues.

Brit turned to Eric. “Are you all right?”

“Most assuredly,” he replied. His expression was subdued. She couldn’t read his eyes. “Especially now that my champion is here.”

She grunted. “Oh, yeah, right.”

About then, Ragnild emerged from her tent. “There you are. We’ve been awaiting you. This man has said your name in hopes that you might claim him.”

“This man is… my friend. He’s only here to rescue me. Untie him. Now.”

Ragnild was shaking her head. “I regret that I can’t do that—at least, not yet.”

“Why the hell not?”

“This man strode boldly into the center of our camp. No man is allowed such a liberty. And he can’t even plead ignorance. I know him. He is the son of the grand counselor, born of Mystic stock. He knows our ways.”

Brit turned to Eric. A trickle of blood slid down his neck where some cruel child had struck him. “What is she talking about?”

Instead of an answer, she got one lifted sable eyebrow.

Argh. What was up with him? He could help her out a little here. She faced her aunt again. “I’m afraid I’m confused. Why is he tied up? What did he do?”

Ragnild was frowning. “I have explained that. He belongs to no woman here, yet he dared to walk boldly among us. Such behavior cannot be allowed.”

Rinda stepped forward. She was grinning that naughty grin of hers. “You have to claim him.” She tipped her head to the side and looked Eric up and down. “Hmm.” She licked her split lip. “Perhaps I shall claim him—that is, cousin, should you reject him first.”

“What is this? Claim him? How do I do that?”

“You say, ‘I will claim this man.”’

“Okay. And then?”

“Then we untie him. You take him to your tent—Grid and I shall be pleased to have you borrow ours.”

“Okay. I take him to my tent…”

“And then—” Rinda’s grin widened “—you have your way with him.”

“My way?”

Rinda laughed. “You do take my meaning. I see it in your eyes.”

Brit sighed. “And after I have my way with him?”

“Then you may keep him for as many as seven nights, though I suppose, in your case, it would only be the one night, as tomorrow you are leaving us. If you are pleased with his performance, it is the custom that you let him go.” Rinda’s grin got wider. “If he doesn’t please you, you can offer him to another of us. Or simply kill him for being useless as a lover.”

Bizarre. “And what if I don’t claim him?”

“Well then, if no one else wants him, we’ll kill him right now.”

“You’re not serious.”

No one said anything. Ragnild looked determined. Rinda continued to look way too amused. The bloodthirsty children watched with wide, eager eyes. And Eric simply waited, his angular face a patient mask. As if it made no difference to him whether she took him or the warrior women stabbed him in the heart.

Finally Ragnild asked somberly, “Cousin to my only daughter, will you claim this man?”

The choices were severely limited. “Okay, all right. I claim this man.”

Chapter Eight

“What are you, nuts?” Brit demanded. “I really think they might have killed you.” They were alone in the tent Grid and Rinda had given them for their supposed night of sexual delights.

Eric stood over the low central fire, warming his hands. Firelight glinted off his clubbed-back hair, bringing out bronze gleams in the ash-brown strands. “No harm is done, for you have saved me.”

Was he smiling? Brit swore, a very bad swear word. “You have blood on your neck.”

“And you have a new bruise on your cheek.”

Lightly she touched the swollen spot where Grid’s knuckles had struck. “I spoke when not spoken to.”

“A good thing you don’t receive a blow every time you do that.”

“Chuckle, chuckle.”

He took a handkerchief from the pocket of his shearling coat and wiped until only a faint smear remained. “Better?” He stuck the cloth back in his pocket.

“Not particularly. How can you stand there and grin? That was stupid, what you did. Those women out there take their beliefs seriously.”

“I had complete faith in you.”

“What if I wasn’t here, what if I hadn’t come back to the camp, for some reason? What if I had refused to claim you?”

“But you were here. You did come back… and you have claimed me.” That haunting deep-set gaze was on her.

She felt her skin grow warmer, felt the hungry shiver sliding through her. “Stop that.”

“Stop what?”

“You know what. That… look. You give me that look and I get all…” She let the sentence die unfinished, since she was getting herself deeper in trouble with every word.

He showed no mercy. “You get ‘all’ what?”

“Just… don’t, okay?”

“Don’t…?”

She flung out both hands. “Don’t give me the bedroom eyes. Don’t get… ideas.”

“Bedroom eyes? You Americans. Such amusing figures of speech.” He took something from another pocket, then shrugged out of the coat and tossed it on the pallet that lay against the side of the tent, to his left. His leather shirt was the same one he’d been wearing that morning. It had lacings at the neck. She could see a slice of firm, smooth chest.

And a few links of silver chain, shining. “I see you found your medallion.”

“Would you like it back now?”

“Uh. No, I would not.”

He circled the fire and came toward her. She debated: shrink back or stand proud?

As usual, before she made a choice, there he was. Right in front of her, mesmerizing eyes and broad shoulders filling the world. “Give me your hand.”

“I said I don’t want the medallion.”

“I have something else of yours.”

She should probably take issue with the word else. Then again, better not to belabor a point made far too many times already. She settled for a sneering curl to her lip and a surly, “What?”

He simply waited.

“Oh, all right.” Grudgingly she held out her hand.

He cradled her palm, his hand warm and firm around the back of hers.

The problem was, she did like it. When he touched her. She gloried in the shivery feelings he aroused, though she kept trying to tell herself she shouldn’t, that her obvious response to him only egged him on when it was absolutely paramount that she keep him at a distance.

Carefully, so as not to spill them, he laid a pile of peanut M&Ms in her cupped hand.

She looked down at them and back up at him. He was smiling again. And so was she—now. It was just too rich. “Pretty good, huh?”

“You are a woman of greatest resourcefulness.”

“That I am.”

“Not that I wouldn’t have found you without the bright-colored trail you left for me. I would find you anywhere.”

“Oh, I’ll bet.”

The fire behind him crackled cheerily. Thin gray curls of smoke drifted up through the tent hole above. Outside, faintly, she could hear the sounds of the women of the camp as they prepared to settle in for the night. A woman called for a child and a thin voice answered, “Coming, Mama!” Brit stared at Eric and he stared back at her and they smiled at each other like a couple of fools.

“I was curious,” he said. “I ate one.”

“Did you like it?”

“It was excellent. That smooth outer shell, the silky, melting ball of chocolate, the crunch of the nut within…”

He had it exactly. She confessed, though it was the last thing she ought to be telling him, “I like to suck them. Slowly.”

He whispered, his voice rubbing, velvet soft, along her every nerve, “Show me.”

She made herself frown. “Oh, puh-lease. They’ve been on the ground.”

“So fastidious…”

“That’s me.” She was thinking of that big plate of night crawlers in blood balls she’d lapped up that time on Fear Factor. Fastidious. Oh, yeah. Fershure. At least when she could afford to be.

She noticed that he was bending his head.

And yes, it was true. She was lifting hers.

Their lips met.

Well, what do you know?

She was doing it. Kissing Eric, though she knew she shouldn’t.

Okay, all right. It was a problem she had. Just ask her mother. There was always what she should be doing: college, finishing one of her novels, stuff like that. And the various dangerous activities that tempted her: to learn to fly, to earn a black belt, to explore what was left of the world’s wildernesses, the kinds of places where if you didn’t know what you were doing, you could end up dead.

Oscar Wilde had said it best: “I can resist everything except temptation…”

You go, Oscar!

His mouth to hers… so lightly. Just brushing. And what a mouth it was. Exactly as she’d imagined it, velvety soft as his voice could be.

He spoke between those brushing kisses. “My dreams. At last. Coming true.”

She pulled back. “Don’t get your hopes up. It was only a—”

He silenced her by taking her mouth again. She let him do it.

Only a kiss, she promised herself. It’s only a bone-melting, sweet, tender kiss….

Oh, and it was… all that.

Really, she had to be honest—at least, with herself.

He was… all that.

His lips settled in, covering the whole of her mouth. She heard an eager, needful sound—a sound that came from her own throat. And her mouth was opening—just a little, she promised herself. Only enough to let in the wonderful moist heat of his breath.

But then, what do you know? His tongue came in, too. And she didn’t close her lips against it.

In fact, she slid her own tongue beneath his.

Oh, my, yes.

Their tongues sparred and slid, up and over each other. His retreated.

Hers followed. Into the wet cave beyond those beautiful, tempting, velvet-soft lips.

Chaka-boom, she was going.

Going, going…

Gone.

With a hungry cry, she grabbed for him, wincing a little as her hurt shoulder complained. She slid her eager hands up over his hard chest, his strong shoulders, until she had him around the neck, until her body was pressed to his, her breasts to his chest, her hips just below his. Against her belly she could feel his desire. Heaven, that hard ridge. At the center of herself, she was warming, softening, hollowing out. Melting like the chocolate beneath the outer shell of an M&M, the sweetness spreading…

She opened her hand. The candies rolled down his back and hit the dirt floor with soft plopping sounds.

He chuckled at that.

She pulled back enough to grant him a mock scowl. “You know we shouldn’t be doing this.”

He laid a finger against her mouth. “No. You have it wrong. We must do this. I must please you. Or you’ll have to kill me.”

She stuck out her tongue and licked that finger of his—it tasted salty and a little bit dusty. Altogether lovely.

Fastidious? Brit Thorson? Not right this minute…

She felt his low groan as it rose from his chest. Delicious. Perfect.

No, she would not marry him, no matter what the fates predicted. But this…

How could she turn away from this?

He brought up his other hand and cradled her face in his warm, cherishing palms. His eyes looked into hers. She was falling. Down and down…

“You have claimed me. You shall have me.”

Oh, well. All right.

But then again…

“I have an idea.” Her voice came out husky, hungry, low.

“Share it.”

“How ’bout we don’t? And just say we did.”

He only shook his head at that, his eyes so deep, his mouth swollen with kissing.

Crazy, she told herself. Way, way insane.

A leather strip held back his hair—another temptation, more of the only thing she couldn’t resist. She took that strip and pulled. It slid away. His hair fell loose around his shoulders. She let the bit of leather drop, down there to the dirt, with the scattered M&Ms. She combed her fingers through the strands—so silky, alive with the warmth of him.

“You don’t need this coat,” he said.

She didn’t argue. She let him push it from her shoulders and toss it to the pallet where his own coat lay.

He gathered her close again, enfolding her in those lean, strong arms. And he kissed her, his tongue pushing in, finding hers waiting. To welcome him.

To play…

He had her sweater by the sides. He raised it, fingers trailing over the bumpy fabric of her thermal shirt, thrilling her with the simple pressure of his touch. The kiss was interrupted as he pulled the sweater over her head. She lifted her arms straight up too fast.

A small cry of pain got away from her.

He tossed the sweater away, his brows drawing together. “Your wound…?”

“No. Nothing. It’s…”

But he was bending close again, pressing his lips to her shirt, right over the bandage that covered the place where the arrow had struck. He blew out a breath. She felt it through the layers of cloth and the bandage. It was lovely. Warm and moist. So tender. So soothing.

So right…

She cradled his head against her shoulder and stroked his hair. “Oh, Eric…”

He pulled back and took her by the arms. And he looked into her eyes, deeply. For an endless span of time.

She shook herself. Really, she had to clarify things a little. “This doesn’t mean—”

“Shh.” His finger sealed her lips again. “Explanations are for strangers. We are not strangers. We never were that.” She put her hands flat against his chest. She had a thousand things to say. But they all kept flying away. His eyes were so deep. They went down and down forever. “I assume nothing. You needn’t fear.”

He did assume. She could see it there. Shining in his spruce-green eyes.

But—right then, did she care?

Uh-uh.

He was holding her. He wanted her, and, oh, she did want him, want his hard body against hers, his strong arms around her. For this night, in her cousin’s tent, in the camp of the kvina soldars.

It was not such an easy thing, this quest of hers. Mostly it seemed she was getting nowhere—except in trouble. And in one sense, he was her adversary, keeping from her what she needed to know.

But in another, deeper way she truly did feel bound to him. Beyond being adversaries, they were also comrades. He would fight at her side if it came to that. He would willingly lay down his life for hers.

And as she looked up at him, she knew she would do the same for him.

It was a bond between them. A powerful one. Wherever this all might lead in the end, it would be an honest thing, to be with him tonight.

She felt the smile of acceptance curve her lips.

In response he whispered her name. “Brit…”

She took the sides of his shirt and gathered the soft leather, sliding it upward, fingers skimming the firm, hot flesh along his ribs, pulling the shirt over his head and tossing it in the corner with the rest of their things.

His smooth bare chest gleamed in the darkness. And there was the medallion….

The sight of it—of the twining serpent, the four mystic animal faces, the cloverleaf cross at the center—took the shivery, sexual moment and twisted it. Ruined it.

She turned her head away.

He caught her chin, guided her back. “Look. Know. It is there for you when you want it. And only then.”

She pushed at his chest—regretfully. But firmly.