Secret Song (Medieval Song 4)

“Hello,” she said, and stretched. “Oh, dear, is it late? Have I slept long?”

“Long enough. How do you feel?”

She consulted her stomach and smiled. “Fine. Alice’s bread boasts better results than the queen’s herbs. Shall I rise now and see to your evening meal?”

“Nay, it’s still early. You will remain here with me for a while. I’ve been watching you, Daria. I’m glad you’re awake. I want to take you now.”

The chamber was filled with sunlight, the high winds of the previous night had mellowed into a gentle breeze fit for a hot summer day. He wanted her now? When he’d spoken of the field of flowers, she’d felt the beauty of what he’d said, but not the embarrassment of it. “But it’s very bright, Roland. There is a lot of light.”

“I know. Now, let me assist you with your gown. I want to look at my wife.”

Her hair was loose and tumbled from her rest. He wrapped a thick tress around his wrist, slowly but inexorably drawing her face closer to his. “Look up at me, Daria.”

She did, and he watched, fascinated, as her tongue lightly touched her lower lip. “You don’t even realize that you make me want you, do you? Just looking at your pink tongue, and I’m harder than a stone.” He laughed suddenly, released her hair, and began to undo the lace fastening down the front of her gown.

18

Even as he pulled and tugged at her clothes, his movements becoming more jerky, more clumsy as his need grew, Daria was thinking: And what of Gwyn? Am I simply to forget that he broke faith with me? And if I bedded with another man, what would he say? Would he even care? She shook her head at the unfairness of it, then felt the warm summer air on her bare flesh and looked up at him.

He was staring at her breasts.

“Am I as nice as Gwyn? Do I please you as much?”

Roland had forgotten Gwyn. He’d used her unthinkingly and he’d been left feeling he’d been very wrong, that he’d broken faith with his own honor. And, truth be told, he’d had no thought for Gwyn, for his wife had filled his mind even as he’d found his release. It was no excuse, he knew that, accepted it. Her unexpected words caught him off-guard and dug at his guilt, and made him angry at himself for feeling guilt. He was thinking her breasts more beautiful than any woman’s he’d yet seen. His fingers itched to stroke the soft underflesh, to move gently over her nipples she shuddered. He felt as though she’d doused him with freezing water.

“Not really,” he said, and drew back, now looking at her face. “Gwyn’s breasts are much fuller, her nipples a darker plum color and soft as velvet. Her breasts quivered, as if apart from her, when I caressed them, and they filled my open hands to overflowing.”

She was unable to keep the pain his words brought her from showing on her face, but she had asked him. What had she expected? That he would tell her she was the most exquisite creature imaginable and that Gwyn was nothing? She tried to cover herself then but he grabbed her wrists and pulled them down.

“Enough of this damned nonsense. Listen to me, Daria. You’re my wife. I choose to look at you. Don’t throw the other in my face again. It happened; it’s over with. Now, I don’t want you ever to cover yourself in front of me unless I tell you it is all right.”

“Will this other happen again, Roland? And again?”

He shook his head again, saying nothing.

Her breasts were heaving and she saw that he was staring at them again, still holding her wrists in front of her. Her gown was bunched at her waist. Suddenly he pushed her onto her back and came down beside her. He lowered his head and brushed his cheek against the underside of her breast, back and forth, slowly moving upward until his tongue touched her nipple and she felt a shock of such intense excitement plunged through her that she gasped aloud with the strength of it. And she felt humiliated because she’d gasped. His tongue played over her flesh and the feelings built, becoming more insistent, more urgent.

“Please, Roland.”

His splayed fingers slipped beneath her bunched gown and rested on her belly. He raised his head and looked into her face. “On your back, your belly is still flat. I can believe there isn’t a babe in your womb.”

She thought she saw a shaft of pain in his dark eyes, but he lowered his head again quickly to her breast and suckled her until she was shaking.

His fingers found her, and once again he raised his head to look down into her dazed eyes.

“Do you like that, Daria? My fingers on you? Do you know how you feel to me?”

His voice followed the cadence of his fingers: deep, caressing, rhythmic. She opened her mouth and moaned. He leaned down and kissed her, and his tongue eased into her mouth and she burst into her climax at that instant. She cried out and he took her cries deep within himself. So much passion in her, he thought, dazed and triumphant with the evidence of it. He was hurting now, his body trembling with the force of his lust. He left her, unable to wait longer. She lay there, her legs sprawled, her gown in a tangle about her hips, and her eyes were bewildered and lost. Lost until he came over her, lifted her legs, and drove into her.

He thrust his tongue into her open mouth as his sex plunged more deeply inside her.

He felt the rippling pleasure as her fingers now dug into his back, and his pleasure built and built as she lurched and bucked frantically beneath him. He cried out into her mouth, his breath warm, so deep he touched her womb, and he found release so profound, so overwhelming, that it touched the deepest part of him.

He kept kissing her even though he felt drugged with exhaustion. He needed to kiss her, craved to kiss her; he craved the taste and texture of her mouth. And she drew him to her, and he wasn’t in any mood to fight it now. And he continued to kiss her, nibbling at her lower lip, touching his tongue to hers, feeling her delight when she initiated the touching.

Finally, sated, his body still sealed to hers, he knew he must regain control, control of himself, control of her. He raised his head and said, “There will be no more talk about Gwyn. There will be no more talk about any women before Gwyn. Why should I seek out another woman when I have you? And you, Daria, are so passionate that I wonder how you remained a virgin for as long as you did. Of course, I really do not know about your virginity, do I?”

Shock made her reel, but she recovered herself quickly. “You were there when the Earl of Clare made me lie on my back, when he made me hold still and he thrust his finger into me. You were there and you know I was a virgin, yet you wish to wound me. I hate you, Roland.”