But perhaps he had eased his own—and she did not know how to ease hers. A man had a shaft to grip and stroke. Sarus had Ardyl to lick her. Yvenne had nothing but hot cuntflesh and slippery fingers and a spot that she could not bear to touch, so sensitive it was. The merest brush of her fingertips against that spot made her want to scream. The only relief she found was also agony, for there was pleasure in pressing the heel of her hand hard against her mound—against that spot—but the pressure only increased the need.
Muscles quivering with tension, she looked up again as Sarus’s sharp scream sounded—and was quickly muffled by Kelir’s lips on hers. The maid’s body was bowed in a taut line, her hips thrashing as her frantic hands pulled at Ardyl’s braids, as if to drag the warrior’s face from between her thighs.
After an endless moment, the maid’s body drooped and a grinning Ardyl lifted her head. There was a murmur, and then Kelir broke the kiss and his reply carried to Yvenne’s bed.
“You got one from her,” he said with a recognizable note of challenge in his tone. “I’ll get two, and see her twice as wet.”
So that was their competition—seeing who could make the barmaid spend the greatest number of times. Though it seemed a joint effort now, as Ardyl cupped Sarus’s face and kissed her, slowly drawing the woman over onto her knees. His body shadowed, Kelir rose behind her rounded buttocks. Yvenne closed her eyes as there was another sharp cry of pleasure, and Kelir’s deeper groan, then sounds that Yvenne had heard before in the tower but they were nothing the same, for then Yvenne had trembled with anger and fear and now she shook with desire, her breath shuddering through clenched teeth, her skin afire.
Forever did it seem to last.
Twice was there a lull before another start, with more whispers and hushed laughter and soft cries. Finally all fell quiet on that side of the curtain, as if each had found their release—and never had Yvenne envied three people more, because her body did not find the same ease. Never had she felt so hot, yet she shivered uncontrollably.
At another murmur, her eyes slitted open. Kelir and Ardyl had Sarus’s unclothed body tucked between theirs, and the prostrate barmaid already seemed asleep. Kelir’s smile was a glint in the firelight as he bent his head to the other warrior’s, and despite their rivalry, Yvenne could not mistake the easy affection in their kiss. Both looked utterly pleased, content.
And Yvenne was dying. How she wished to be lying as spent as the barmaid, but Ardyl and Kelir had pleased her with tongue and cock and Yvenne could do neither to herself. She could only clamp her hands between her thighs and pray to Mother Temra for mercy.
Outside the eternal comfort of her arms, that goddess did not often grant it. Nor did she this night.
Instead the goddess sent Maddek to the chamber door, and that was not mercy. At the slide of the latch, her body’s yearning increased tenfold, her need weighing upon her so heavily that she seemed incapable of breathing, of moving. In her cloak, she lay upon the bed in a tight ball, facing the curtain with her hands buried between her clenched thighs. Now he would come and wake her. She would take his cock into her mouth and make him spill his seed and then he would lie beside her, as spent as the three who lay entangled on the opposite side of the chamber.
Except she could not truly imagine Maddek so content. Nor could she imagine that easing his need would also ease hers.
And that was not what he did, anyway.
For a long span of breaths he seemed not to move at all. Perhaps letting his eyes adjust to the darkness. Perhaps studying the layout of the chamber.
So quietly did he walk, only the slightest ripple through the curtain as he passed it told Yvenne that he’d finally made his way toward the master bed. Yet he still did not come to her. Instead there was the faint click of ivory as he lay his sheathed sword across the rim of the tub. Then the muffled thunk of his wide leather belt falling to the floor. A soft splash came next, followed by the sloshing of water, and the rainlike pattering of drops against tin.
And Yvenne had not truly known longing until she finally looked at him. The fire smoldered, the soft glow barely touching Maddek’s skin as he dunked his red linens into the tub and began to wash, drawing the cloth across the broad planes of his body. Thick muscles were but shadows limned by orange light, and of all the wondrous things she had seen since leaving her tower, none had stolen her breath and filled her with hope as did the sight of Maddek, bare and at ease. Here was the king he would be, not ruled by anger and grief, but strong and calm, and with a faint smile touching his lips when Bone trotted over to investigate his nakedness. Maddek scratched behind the wolf’s ears before sending him to lie down again.
Not once had she seen him glance in her direction. Yet as he moved silently toward the hearth to hang up his red linens, she realized her presence must not be far from his thoughts. At the first shadowed glimpse of his arousal, the fierce ache within her seemed to hollow out, as if her body prepared to receive him. To be filled by him.
That could not be tonight. Thighs trembling with tension, she squeezed them tighter. Still a quarter turn remained until her moon night. Then she would take him eagerly and pray he could soothe this burning need inside her.
Her heart tripped to a halt as the bed creaked and sagged beneath his great weight. Unprepared, she might have rolled toward him, but he was already close behind her curled form, lying on his side with his broad chest pressed to her back.
“This chamber is overhot, yet you are wrapped in your cloak.” His voice was low and gruff against her ear, his warm breath laden with mead. “Are you cold?”
Burning. Yet he must wonder if she felt dark magics.
“I have no nightclothes to cover me,” she explained softly, keeping her voice so quiet that the others in the chamber might hear the sound but would not make out the words spoken.
“Nor do I.”
No need to tell her. Never had Yvenne been so aware of anything as she was his nakedness behind her—and of hers within the cloak. An involuntary shiver racked her muscles and she could not stop from drawing tighter, her fingers wedged between her thighs, knees all but touching her chest.
Still he did not roll her over and urge her mouth down to his erection, though she would have eagerly gone, had she been able to uncurl her body.
Instead he told her in the same quiet manner, “I spoke with the Gogeans. Their situation is as you claimed.”
Of course it was.
But that seemed not a proper reply. And now she wondered if his talk with the Gogeans was why he did not ask to use her mouth. Mead might relax tongues, but an abundance of mead could relax the body, too. “Are you drunk?”
Amusement shook through him. “I am. In the morning my skull will feel as if a blacksmith uses it for an anvil.”
Oh.
When silence was her only response, he shifted behind her, coming up onto his elbow as if to look down at her face. She could not see him at all except as a shadow looming above her.