Very well. “I am,” she whispered.
He left the bed, and her body felt all but boneless as she rolled onto her back. Her cloak fell open in front and was still bunched behind her waist, and the effort to right it seemed to steal all that remained of her strength. From the foot of the bed, the splash of water told her he washed, and she was lazily thinking of doing the same when he returned with a swath of dampened rabbit fur. He lay close beside her, elbow braced and head resting upon his hand as he looked down at her face. Though he could not possibly see through the dark, her cheeks blazed with heat as she quickly washed his seed from between her thighs.
Despite his release, his arousal had not completely subsided. She could feel his heavy length against her leg, could feel the heat of him even through her cloak.
On a whisper she asked him, “Do you still wish me to ease your need with my mouth?”
His low chuckle answered her before he said, “Perhaps tomorrow. Tonight I am well spent.”
“As am I.” Which filled Yvenne’s heart as she had never imagined. As raw and rough as Maddek was, she had not been mistaken in her choice of husband. “I was told that you would see to my pleasure, but I knew not—”
Her words were lost on a strangled breath as hard fingers seized her tongue. Pain tore through her mouth and even before her mind realized what was happening—Maddek is tearing out my tongue—her hands flew to his wrists and desperately tried to stop him. She had not been able to stop him before, had not moved that mountain, and so it was not her hands that halted him now.
His fingers stopped just beyond her teeth, the tip of her tongue in a viselike grip. A sobbing breath burst past her open lips. She tried to shake her head, to beg, but the movement seemed to rip at the sides of her tongue, and the only noise she could make was a strangled plea.
“Again you speak sly words.” Though it was only a murmur, anger hardened his voice like stone. “Again you speak of my mother.”
She could not answer, only attempt to shake her head again. Her eyes watered from the agony of it, but the agony within her was sharper, deeper. She could taste herself upon his fingers, the fingers he had said would not hurt her.
The fingers she had trusted to touch her.
“You will not receive another warning. Do you understand this?”
She’d understood it before. But there was no answer except to nod. He released her tongue and she would have told him then, but her throat was thick with tears and a queen did not cry when there was someone to see. Perhaps he would not see her tears in the dark, but if she spoke he would hear them.
And she could not bear that.
In misery, she turned onto her side, facing away from him, but his next words followed and slipped into her back like a sharpened blade.
“Queen or not, you are but a vessel through which I will take my vengeance. I will plant my seed within you—but if you wish for more, if you wish to be loved, you had best look elsewhere. For I can never open my heart to a woman who took part in the murder of my parents.”
That had to be denied, even if it exposed the tears that burned in her throat and her eyes. “I did not,” she whispered thickly.
“Perhaps not. But I cannot ever know if it is true. You admit you are treacherous and your sly tongue cannot be trusted. Your sighs and your longing say that you want more than a bedding, but if it is love you seek, look to our children. Look to my people and yours, as you are so adept at securing their loyalty. But do not look to me.”
Never had her heart felt so heavy. The weight of it held back even the tears. Bleakly she replied, “I hear you, warrior.”
He made no response as she rose from the bed. Perhaps thinking that she intended to wash more—as if the wound he’d delivered truly bled. Not until she reached the hearth did he ask quietly, “Where do you go?”
Where she was safe. “I will return to your bed upon my moon night. I am only a vessel, so you have no use for me there until then, and I have no wish to lie beside you.”
But the wolves would welcome her. With a soft whine, Bone licked her face, and she curled up against him, with Steel a comforting warmth at her back.
Maddek said not another word.
And it mattered not if the wolves felt her crying silently against them. It mattered not if her tears soaked into their fur.
For Maddek was truly a great warrior, finding vulnerabilities Yvenne had not known she possessed. He could even make weapons of her sighs, transform her longing into a blade, and use them to slice through her heart.
A great warrior indeed.
CHAPTER 16
MADDEK
Early did Maddek rise, for that night sleep had not found him. With head pounding, he’d lain upon his cold bed until the gray light of dawn revealed Yvenne’s slight form curled up between the two wolves in front of the hearth.
Heavily she slept. Even when he finished dressing and crouched beside her, she did not stir. Her hood was up but failed to conceal her thin face or the reddened skin around her eyes. Her fingers were tangled in Bone’s thick fur.
The wolves lifted their heads but he quietly bade them to stay—then gave the same command to Kelir when that warrior disentangled himself from the barmaid. With Ardyl and Danoh at his back, Maddek made his way downstairs, where the travelers and soldiers who had not found rooms were sprawled sleeping over tables and benches.
He looked to Danoh. “See that Yvenne’s meal is taken to our chambers.” So that she would not have to shove aside a soldier’s feet before eating.
With a nod, Danoh went in search of the innkeeper. In silence Ardyl accompanied him to the blacksmith’s. If it had been Danoh walking beside him, Maddek would not have wondered at how quiet she remained. But Ardyl’s silence was censure, just as his warriors had treated his bride to similar censure the previous eve.
Ardyl’s disapproval now was likely in response to his bride’s decision to sleep on the floor. His warriors might have heard Yvenne’s pleasure, but they could not have heard what prompted her to leave their bed. No doubt they believed she punished Maddek for some insult.
That misconception would not be dispelled by him. Better they believed he deserved her punishment than reveal how she had spoken with a sly tongue—or that he had failed to fulfill his vow.
The last made shame fester within his chest. Only because she had not directly spoken of his mother had he spared her. But he had warned her against speaking with a sly tongue earlier that eve . . . and still gave her another warning rather than follow through.
But if she had spoken directly, Maddek knew not whether he’d have ripped out her tongue—or if he would have become an oathbreaker, the most reviled of all Parsathean warriors.
Never had he imagined his honor would be brought so low.