“It was the first cloth brought to me, and the pattern appeared as though by a divine hand. Pomegranates, and your dragons. It pleased me, to think Edward would see it and know we are not entirely biddable as he would compel us to be.” He paused, ridding himself of a rising anger in his voice. “Is a small thing, but I thought it would annoy him, and please you.”

It was enough, to know this of his mind. Her hand found his in the darkness and held it fast. It was enough to know that though neither one of them would have wished for this match, and though they had little trust between them and too much strife and secrets and half-truths, they stood together in a world controlled by Edward.

They lay there in the black of night, hands clasped. After countless minutes, she turned her face to his again and breathed the smell of him. She remembered the swell of muscle in his forearm as it had flexed under her urgent fingers, and felt the warmth spread out from the center of her. All her skin tingled, burning, the tips of her breasts aching. Her fingers tightened around his slightly as she thought of bringing their joined hands to her breast, but the impulse was lost as she felt him reach for her with an eagerness that mirrored her own.

He was everywhere at once. Hands rucking up her shift, tangling in her hair. His mouth hot on her throat as she strained toward him, eager. His body hard against hers, legs tangled as she found the smooth skin of his back, muscle curving, the furrow of his spine that her hands followed down to the swell of his buttocks. His hissing intake of breath as he pulled her hands off him and up, pinned them at her shoulders while he forced her to go slow.

Her breath came hard, her body restlessly moving against his, but he took time to touch her everywhere. His hands and mouth trailed over her, discovering softness and curves that had always hidden beneath armor, that she did not know herself. Hard muscle and sinew melted, everything she had valued in her body forgotten as his mouth found the womanly places and celebrated them until she gasped with pleasure. There at her breast, his tongue tracing the curve, his hand cradling the softness as he took the tip in his mouth and made her cry out with the sensation. He moved lower and found the curve of her waist, his hands moving up and down her sides while his head rested on the softness of her belly. His lips found the slight swell of her hip, his hands gripping the fleshy roundness of her bottom as his face moved lower still.