did not make Owain feel better about himself.
‘I’m not a guildsman between a woman’s thighs,’ he grumbled apologetically. ‘I just happen to be a gifted amateur.’
She reached behind him and clutched at his backside. ‘I’d say you were a very gifted amateur,’ she conceded. Pulling him deep into herself she rubbed her hips vigorously up and down until they were both gasping with the choking need for release.
When the thrill of his climax finally struck, Owain knew the release was only coming in defence against the rush of satisfaction that she was enjoying.
The redhead pressed and squeezed at his length with a furious grip from the inner muscles of her sex. Her fingernails raked at his backside as she clutched him in her embrace. Her body convulsed with paroxysms of animalistic satisfaction.
And Owain groaned as the pleasure was wrenched from his body.
His erection throbbed as it pumped his thick seed into her. Each pulse was powerful and driven by a vigorous force. The muscles at the base of his shaft clenched hard and tight with each spasm of his ejaculation. The force of the climax was so powerful it was almost painful.
Spent, Owain and the redhead collapsed together on the hay.
They lay side by side, basking in the aftermath of pure satisfaction that was being expelled from their bodies by exhausted sighs.
Behind them, from the confines of her cage, Drusilla purred with soft approval.
Owain could hear other sounds beyond the walls of the stable where they lay.
He could hear the conversations of those untroubled by the care of dragons, the falseness of circumstantial fealty or the need for vengeance. He could hear the sounds of guards in chain mail marching noisily around the castellum and he figured he was listening to the powerful presence of the castellan’s dark knights.
The castellan’s Order of Dark Knights were the heavily armed protectors of Blackheath. Their presence was imposing and, Owain knew, the dark knights of Blackheath were one of two reasons why High Laird Gethin ap Cadwallon was approaching this mission with diplomacy and tact rather than his usual application of brute force and ignorance. The other reason, Owain believed, had something to do with a mage in the castellan’s employ.
The redhead nuzzled against Owain’s chest. She placed a gentle kiss against his nipple and absently suckled against him. The familiarity was instantaneously warming and comforting. It was also wholly disheartening because she wasn’t Carys.
Even though the sex he had just enjoyed had been superlative, the redhead had not been Carys. The experience had been great for him. It had clearly been good for the redhead. At the back of his mind he suspected what he had just enjoyed would be galling for the man who had placed the ring on the redhead’s finger. But that wasn’t something he would think about. It was enough to acknowledge, even though the experience had been satisfying for the participants, it had not been an experience he was sharing with Carys.
He pulled himself away from the redhead’s kisses.
She didn’t seem to notice that his mood had swung toward impatience.
‘Are all the men in the West Ridings as well-equipped as you?’ she asked.
‘I haven’t lain with all of them,’ he said. ‘Are all the maids in Blackheath as welcoming as you?’
She considered the question and then nodded. ‘Yes, we are. Especially, it seems, once we’ve been able to stroke a dragon.’
He considered pulling on his hosen and trying to find where his sword and tunic had been discarded. A sliver of moonlight glanced against her bare breasts. Despite the suggestion of melancholy he had suffered a moment earlier, the need to experience the woman by his side again struck him with sudden and unexpected force.
‘Would you like to stroke my dragon again?’ he asked coyly.
She reached for his spent shaft. Her fingers slid against the slippery meld of her juices and his own spent climax as she teased him back to erection.
‘I’d rather stroke this until it was ready to fill me again,’ she said earnestly.
And that was all it took.
This time, when he entered her, she seemed to accept the pleasure with less surprise and more satisfaction. This time, when he pushed deep into her sex, she managed to meet his gaze in the darkness and study his face as he rode back and forth.
‘You do know I’m married, don’t you?’
He had tried not to think about the fact that it was her left hand that guided him into her sex. He had tried to stop himself from dwelling on the fact that she had caressed his length with the same hand that bore the leather band on her heart finger.
‘I’d noticed your ring,’ he admitted. ‘But I’d figured it wasn’t troubling you.’
‘My husband is a captain in the Order of the Dark Knights,’ she explained. ‘He spends many months on foreign shores. Currently he’s away leading the Blackheath Cavalry to quell an uprising on the Silver Sands. I know he spends many nights with other women. He knows I spend many nights with other men.’
Owain didn’t know what to say.
He thought it safest to say nothing. Her words weren’t exactly souring his arousal. But they were adding nothing to it either. He figured that as long as she spoke about the arrangement she had with her husband he could prolong both their pleasures.
‘We have a relationship where we try not to embarrass each other,’ she explained. ‘I take visitors to Blackheath between my legs when the mood strikes me. He takes foreign women when the mood strikes him. As long as neither of us does something as embarrassing as being publicly exposed as a swiver, it’s a relationship that we both find convenient and satisfying.’
‘And is there a reason why you’re telling me this?’
‘So that you know there is nothing more between us, just sex.’
He nodded. As he continued to ride in and out of her, he said, ‘Not that I could tell anyone about you, or what we’ve done. I don’t even know your name.’
She gripped him tight with her inner muscles.
He came close to climaxing in response. She giggled as she saw the frown of concentrated consternation that wrinkled his brow.
‘You’ve got no need to know my name either,’ she laughed. ‘I can call you Owain the fucker and you can call me the apprentice to your longsword.’
He laughed at that and found himself gliding into her with increased passion. She wasn’t Carys. But she was pleasurable company and skilled in the art of sex.
This time, when they hurried toward their respective climaxes, he was struck by the stronger focus they each seemed to have on ensuring that the other was properly sated.
His length teetered on the brink of explosion for an age.
She sighed and moaned and clutched at him with brittle ferocity. Her inner muscles convulsed wetly around him as she shivered
