“You really need to comb your hair, Aaric,” she whispers.
Chuckling, I lift my head to look up into her bright green gaze. She’s smiling down at me, her eyes dancing as she watches me. We have a moment of complete silence as we just watch one another.
“So, your tattoos glow and for whatever reason when that happens, it makes me extra horny. Honestly, that doesn’t surprise me, everything about you makes me extra excited.”
My brows furrow together as I try to make sense of the words that she speaks. Wrapping my fingers around her hips, I tug her closer to me. She falls forward slightly, her bare breasts pressing against my chest, her mouth touching the side of my neck.
“Your tattoos are sexy. That’s what they call them where I’m from, tattoos.”
“And these tattoos, are they talisman where you come from, as well?”
She hums, lifting her head again so that she can look into my eyes. “No, well maybe some are. Most people just get them to commemorate things, maybe because they really just like the design, or item.”
“Interesting,” I grunt.
She hums, shifting forward, her mouth touching my own just for a brief moment. “Yeah.”
“You do not have any of these,” I point out.
Shaking her head, she watches me, her gaze flicking to my head. She reaches up, shifting my hair to the side to expose the markings on the side of my scalp. I shave the hair there so that it’s exposed to honor the gods, especially when I am in war.
“I don’t,” she agrees. “I haven’t ever found anything that I want to put on my body permanently,” she says with a shrug.
I hum, massaging her hips with my fingers. “Something to honor the goddess, Itla, after you have safely delivered our son into this world,” I suggest.
“Maybe,” she sighs.
She turns her head to the side, watching the waves of the water come in and out as the sun makes its final descent into evening. The water doesn’t interest me as much as it usually does, right now Liv has all of my attention.
“Sváss?” I call out after long moments of silence.
She turns to look back at me, her green eyes filled with wetness. Instead of asking her anything further, I wait for her to speak. It takes longer than I anticipate, but eventually she does begin to talk.
“I should want to go home, still.”
“But?”
“I don’t want to leave anymore. What is wrong with me? Just hours ago, you were crueler than any man I have ever met,” she says, her voice breaking as the wetness begins to fall down her cheeks. “Now, I can’t imagine being anywhere else but right here in your arms.”
There’s a moment of silence, she watches me, waiting for me to answer her. All I can say is what I truly believe.
“The gods have fated us to one another, Liv. It is not up to us to question their intentions. All we can do is hopefully walk the path that they have created for us.”
She wrinkles her nose, shaking her head once. “That sounds an awful lot like Christianity,” she mutters.
“This is bad?”
She shakes her head. “No, but it leaves a lot in the hands of fate, of something you can’t see or control.”
I hum, touching my mouth to hers, then kiss each of her cheeks where the wetness fell just seconds ago and has thankfully dried up.
“Sometimes you must just close your eyes and follow the path of the unknown, sváss. Sometimes the rewards are greater than you could have ever imagined.”
“Sometimes they can lead to your demise,” she whispers.
“Yes, that is true.”
We don’t say anything else. We watch the waves until the sun completely vanishes. Once dark settles on the land, only then do we stand and gather our things.
I slip Liv’s undergarment dress back on her naked body, then wrap the fur around her shoulders before I pull my own hides on and shove my feet into my boots.
Together we walk back to the húsgørd, hand-in-hand. The entire time, I think that this can work between us. Aside from her age, I like everything about her and maybe her age isn’t as big of an issue.
The gods will provide me with heirs. If not by Liv, then they will guide me to the woman who is meant to carry them into this world safely.
LIV
Aaric and I slip back into the big house, apparently named a húsgørd. He explains to me that it is the name of the king’s large home, which naturally, is his home because he is the king. It’s odd to me that it seems to be constantly full of people.
There is not a moment where someone isn’t walking around the large room in the center. No meals are taken alone with just him and his family, or he and I. Maybe it’s solely because he’s the king and his people wish to always be around him, especially his closest men?
“Aaric?” I call out once we have rinsed off the sand and dirt in the small tub that he had some boys bring in.
I still haven’t discussed his use of slaves and the way that I feel about them with him. He knows how I feel, but he doesn’t know that this is something I would really like to change about their practices.
“Já, Liv?”
I’m wearing a clean see-through undergarment dress, tucked in beneath the furs in the bed. I watch as he feeds the fire, stoking it and staring at the flames as he waits for me to ask what it is I’m about to ask him.
“When you go on this raid, what will happen to me? Where will I be? You cannot mean to take me on the actual raiding.”
He turns to look back at me from over his shoulder. His lips twitch into a grin. “You’ll be at the camp, guarded by Hagen.”
“With that woman, no doubt,” I grunt.
“Isolda?” he asks, but I can hear the laugh in his voice.
Slowly, he turns to face me. My eyes take in all of his markings, his talisman to his gods. They’re sexy as shit. I’m kind of glad that we’re here in his world, if he were in the city, I couldn’t beat the bitches off of him even if I tried.
“Yes, her,” I grind out.
“Why do you care where she is?” he asks.
Slowly, he crawls onto the furs and even slower he makes his way toward me, like a panther. When he reaches me, he doesn’t stop, I lean back, as he practically forces my head onto the pillow.
He’s smiling down at me, his eyes dancing as they watch my own, his lips twitching into a cocky smirk that I love to hate so damn much.
Lifting my hand, I wrap my fingers around the side of his throat. He has marks that my nails made earlier and I know that I should feel bad, but I don’t. The fact that he wears them, it does something to my insides.
“I don’t care,” I note, the words are a blatant lie.
He sees it for what it is, judging by the smirk that grows into a full-fledged smile. He shakes his head once, his lips touching mine, but he doesn’t deepen the kiss. Instead, his tongue slides across the seam of my lips.
“You do, fagr,” he mutters against my mouth.
“She wants you,” I warn.
He hums, moving his mouth down to my neck. He tastes my throat, his teeth skimming my flesh as his hand reaches for the top of the furs and tugs them down. We just had sex, what feels like minutes ago.
“Perhaps. She has had me, Liv. It is no surprise that she may have liked what she had and wants more, why do you care?”