Crimson and Steel (7 page)

Marcus stretched out on the broad bed and gathered her in his arms. Kell rested her head in the middle of his chest and tangled her legs with his. Sleepy and sated, she held his hand and nuzzled his flesh, kissing his nipple now and again. An owl called from a nearby tree, and her eyelids began to feel leaden.

“Lord,” she whispered, “Lord, when we lay together before…”

“Hmm?” He moaned, idly drawing on her the small of her back with his fingertip.

“When we lay together before you said something just as Lucian called you away.”

“I did?”

“Yes…about a girl. I asked you why you had chosen me at the auction before seeing any other girls. You said that I ‘looked like she did.’ Who was she?”

“Oh.” His hand stilled. Kell stiffened for fear of having upset her new master. “Rest easy,” he soothed, running his palm down her side. Kell shivered as his calloused palms scraped against her skin. “When I was a young man, younger than you are now, I was an officer like Lucian. But I didn’t assist a praetor with the minutia of day-to-day camp life. I was a cavalry officer. I served in Germania, at a fort on the Rhine. The 30th Legion
Ulpia Victrix
.”

Kell turned her head to look at her master. She rested her chin on folded hands, watching his lips and eyes as he spoke. The candle was nearly out and the flame flickered wildly, casting shadows across his face as he reminisced. She reached out and touched his hair where it grayed at the temples as he continued.

“I led patrols across the river to gather reconnaissance about the barbarian’s movements. We often clashed with wild tribesmen in enemy territory and raced back to the safety of the fort with our tails between our legs. One summer they revolted en masse. That was my first taste of real war. And that is where I met my wife. I took her as a captive and made her my slave. I fell in love with her. In my youth I made her my everything. She was my life, aside from my obligations to the army. I married her, gave her her freedom. And then she died giving birth. Along with the child—a son.”

“Lord, I am sorry,” she said, laying her cheek back on his chest. “I should not have asked you to tell.” Tears welled in Kell’s eyes and fell on his breast.

“No, no. I have not uttered these words in a long while, and it feels good to share them.” He caressed her back and let out a warm chuckle. “Do not let an old hurt of mine trouble you. It is long past.”

“Not long enough to keep you from buying one who reminds you of her,” she uttered murmured most delicately.

“True,” he replied gently after a pause.

“Is she the girl on the wall?” She looked up to him with tear-dappled eyes.

He nodded. “You have seen the fresco?”

“Yes. She was beautiful. She looked very happy. Did you paint it?”

“I did.”

“I want to make you as happy as she did, Lord,” she said faintly, barely audible over the breeze.

“And I you.” He kissed the top of her head.

Kell snuggled down into his chest and pressed her rose petal lips to his hand. “Good night, Lord.”

As she slipped into slumber she vowed to make as indelible an impression on her new master as his first love had imprinted on his heart.

Chapter Eight

Asmin stirred as a shaft of sunlight lay across her eyes. Her lashes fluttered open. A crack between the deer hide and the cave opening allowed this beam to strike her perfectly across the face and rouse her from slumber. She was not upset by this, as she had desired to rise early. She was not finished showing her appreciation to Ulf.

The barbarian still held her as they nestled together on their sides, his fingers laced together over her belly. Asmin wriggled her rear against his groin and found his prick had also awakened. She smiled slyly to herself and gingerly rolled over in his arms to face him. Looking upon him as he slept she smiled, then pressed slightly, and he rolled the rest of the way onto his back. Very gently she lifted the fur blankets to reveal his nude form. Already she had become aroused. No civilized men looked like this. No muscular man she had ever seen had thighs nearly as big around as their waist. From his shoulders to his hips he was a granite V, and his powerful legs allowed him to carry that weight as slyly as a panther. Ulf’s cock twitched in his sleep, pink and half-erect. She quietly crawled down and positioned herself between his legs.

Asmin smiled wickedly as she leaned in and kissed his cock, right at the junction of the shaft and balls. His prick lurched and bobbed to lie on his chiseled belly. Asmin pressed her nose to the underside of his stiffening shaft and licked its entire length, pausing to swirl her tongue on the head. She mewled with satisfaction and did this again, this time sucking the cap gently into her bee-stung lips and tasting the dab of fluid that had leaked out of the slit. Asmin again went to the base of his now fully erect cock and drew one of his balls into her mouth, pursing them so she could gently nurse on his sac.

Ulf had roused and was sitting on his elbows, entranced at the show she was performing for his benefit. She reached up and gripped his cock as she locked gazes with him and stroked his shaft, letting the soft skin roll up and down over the head as she purred against the tender jewel she held in her lips. She licked and sucked the other ball and exhaled hotly through her nostrils as she tugged firmly on his prick, causing more liquid to seep from the head. This she smeared around with her thumb, and he jerked his hips.

Asmin moved from his balls to the head of his cock. Gripping his shaft firmly in her left hand and supporting his balls in her right, she knelt over his throbbing need and dragged her swollen lips over the glistening head. She circled his dick with her soft mouth, flicking at it with her little, pink tongue now and again to illicit a twitch of his leg.

With a wicked smile she exhaled gently on his now very purple cock and lightly rubbed the flat part of the head with the soft pads of two fingers, all the while looking in his eyes and wondering if he would allow her to continue her teasing. Circling this most sensitive area with her fingertips, she slowed her movement until her digits were hardly moving at all, squeezing his shaft with alternating pressure. Ulf’s eyes looked as though he were about to burst from the tension. She then grinned broadly and engulfed his cock with her mouth.

She began slowly, moving her head up and down as she pursed her lips. Hollowing out her cheeks, she inhaled through her nose when necessary, continuing to cup and playfully tug at his sac. Occasionally she would relent to take a deep breath and to lick at his prick.

“Good morning,” she said happily between laps.

Ulf smiled back languidly, tangling his fingers in her long hair.

Asmin took his cock in her hand and tugged it as she leaned up to steal a long, lingering kiss from her host. She then nestled back between his well-formed thighs and continued to lavish attention on his prick. Bobbing her head more briskly, she began stroking his shaft and palming his balls. Her fine hair draped over his legs, and he moaned, obviously enjoying the sensations. She again paused for a moment to tease the sensitive ridge on the head of his cock with her breath and the pads of her fingertips until his pleading gaze begged for mercy. Her eyes full of mischief, she then plunged his cock into the back of her throat.

The she could feel that Ulf was close. His balls were rising tight to his shaft, and his hips were bucking up from the furs. She screwed her lips up and down in a circular gyration, slowing down with each tortuous circuit. A humming thrum began to emanate from her throat, and she pressed into the area behind his dangling balls to massage a hidden gland known by all pleasure slaves.

Ulf gripped the sides of her head and stiffened. A fount of seed erupted in her mouth, and she struggled to swallow all that he offered, even as she coaxed as much as she could from his pulsing body. Her fingers probed deeply to stimulate his orgasm, and her tongue swirled around his throbbing cock. His cum filled her mouth, invading every part, jetting between her teeth and behind her lips, and trickled down her chin.

Asmin sat up on her knees and was pulled gruffly into Ulf’s embrace. The barbarian ravished her lips with a searching kiss, and she complied eagerly, tangling her tongue with his as she was pressed onto her back. He pecked at her face and tugged on her earlobe with his teeth before nibbling a trail down the elegant tendon on the side of her neck. Crawling down her body, he paused to lavish her breasts with well-deserved attention, yet he grudgingly relented and moved on to his ultimate goal.

Ulf muscled his shoulders between her thighs, forcing them wide. He kissed the tender flesh of her calves and nibbled on the bit of tendon that was displayed as her legs were spread to their limit. He then rolled her to her side. He aligned his face with the intimate petals of her sex so that it would be as though he were making love to her mouth. Holding her open, he dipped in his mouth, pressed his nose against her mound, and rubbed his stubbly chin against her pussy. He closed his lips on her pussy and slipped his seeking, pink tongue into her molten core, searching out her deepest and most flavorful places.

Moaning and snuggling in deeper, he held her in place as she writhed. He nibbled on her outer lips, and then kissed them, tugging on them and lapping at the nectar they offered him. He drank in all of the honey her pussy offered. Pursing his lips around her clit, he flicked his tongue back and forth and slipped two long fingers into her sheath. He felt her clench around his knuckles, and a spasm rocked her belly. Again and again she throbbed and released her inner juices, tears streaking her face.

Ulf shifted her to her back and held her rear in his hands. He lifted her up from the furs and lapped at her as though he held a slice of melon. His seeking tongue never paused as his gnarled knuckles delved more fully into her pussy. They made a wet, sucking sound as he eased them in and out of her depths, massaging her inner walls. Exhaling through his nostrils, he bathed her clit in warm air as his scratchy chin pressed against her smooth rear. All the while, he stroked her pussy with his calloused digits and urged her to orgasm. Asmin cried out and milked his hand as she struggled to hold still. Ulf stroked and caressed her pussy as she suffered through aftershocks, and only withdrew his attentions when she had stilled.

The pair dozed together that morning, weary again from lovemaking. Ulf cradled her in his arms, and she nestled her head on his shoulder, her lips stealing little pecks on his neck.

“If a man was to own a woman,” he whispered, “he’d be a fool to own any other than you.”

Asmin flushed and hid her face in his hair, smiling. He trailed his fingertips up and down her back, swirling them between her shoulder blades. He wasn’t rich; he had no station. He had no villa in which to dwell. Asmin knew he was not the master she was looking for. His life was the antithesis of serene manorial living. But that had not been her lot. Not in Noricum. That dream was long gone, thanks to Braxus.

What a wicked game the gods play, she ruminated, to enamor the wickedest man in the city with her dance. Now she rested in the arms of the sexiest man she had even seen, let alone bedded. He asked nothing of her and offered her everything he had. He had saved her from certain doom. Yet what would she do? Surely she could not live with him in the wild. Could she? Would he have her in a permanent way? Ishtar, she cursed, chastising herself. She had just met this man, and already she was so smitten with the penniless barbarian, she was considering combining her fortune with his. Asmin snuggled in more securely in his all-encompassing embrace and inhaled his clean, wild scent. Ulf threw his thigh over her possessively and clutched her tight. They dozed for a time.

Raised voices and hooves splashing in the stream roused Ulf.

“Stay here.” Ulf rose. Asmin complied silently, bunching the fur blanket about her nakedness as her eyes grew wide. This place had seemed a wonderland of pleasure for the last day. The outside world had all but disappeared. Now she was certain reality had caught up with her.

Ulf strode out into the midday sun as naked as the day his mother had birthed him. Asmin crept as close to the cave’s entrance as she dared and peered through a crack in the hide cover.

“Name yourselves,” Ulf said loudly as he stopped to strap on his breechclout.

“My name is Javad, outlander,” answered the saffron-clad Persian, “and this is a customer of mine. He is a famous charioteer in yon city, perhaps you know of him, yes? No? Well, we seek a runaway slave.” The crimson-clad ruffian glowered at Ulf from the back of a white mare. Javad rested his round girth on his mule and dabbed the sweat from his swarthy pate with an embroidered cloth. “She is a lovely thing, you would remember her. Have you seen her in your ranging?”

“And what if I have?” Ulf asked back with menace. “Get off of my land. You are not welcome here.”

Javad looked to Braxus, who was rather nonplussed by such a curt reply, and back to Ulf. “Now, listen…I didn’t get your name,” Javad said, hoping to open up negotiations.

Ulf set his jaw to grind his teeth and lowered his brow. His heavily muscled frame shifted on his hips slightly as he balled his fists until his knuckles turned white. He made not a sound.

“Friend, listen,” Javad responded, raising his palms and lightening his tone, “we mean you no insult. I must satisfy my client, you see. After all, you have no doubt cared for the runaway, and that has cost you something, yes? What amount of coin will satisfy you?”

“It cost me nothing. She is here, and she is not leaving with you. I’ve already told you that you are not welcome.” He stared intently at the charioteer.