Vanquishing the Viking (Curvy for Keeps Book 7) Read online

  He faces the wall and I cannot see his eyes nor his nose or mouth. He does not see me, and I wonder if I imagined my name on the night wind that has started to blow out of the north. But then my name sounds again, and I frown and then blink when I realize the man calls my name to himself!

  “Wendra, are you watching?” he mutters as he hangs from his ax-handle and digs his boot-toes into the thin ornamental ledge that circles the stone facade. “Do you see me, Wendra?” he says again like he speaks to the stone.

  “I see you, Wolruff,” I whisper down to him. I know it cannot be him, that when he looks up and I see his eyes it will not be him. But for this one moment the fantasy is so real I almost believe it, and my hand goes to my neck and I shiver when I feel that scar from a year ago.

  Now the man stops and turns his head left and then right. Slowly he turns his head upwards, and I stare down into eyes green like the ocean, a face scarred like a canyon, a beard rough like a stormy sea. We gaze upon each other like neither of us can believe it is real. It is a trick of the smoke. An illusion of the night. A mirage of the mind.

  “Wendra?” he says, his face twisting into a frown, his eyelids opening and closing quickly and many times.

  “Wolruff?” I say, cocking my head and wondering if we both died in that shipwreck and this is how heaven works, how the afterlife plays out what was unfinished in the world of the flesh.

  Now the smoke rises from below Wolruff and from behind me, and suddenly I am taken back to that moment when the mast cracked and broke his back, when the angry seas swept him one way and blew me the other, when it seemed like fate conspired not to bring us together but to split us apart, not as a test but simply as torment. Could the gods be so cruel as to bring us together again for one last look before ripping us apart—this time forever?

  As if in reply, there is a sound from where his axhead holds the stone, and I look and then gasp when I see the blade move like it is coming loose!

  “Wolruff!” I shout, reaching my arm out even though should he take it I would be pulled to my death along with him. “The ax . . . it comes loose!”

  Wolruff follows my gaze and his eyes widen when he sees his blade pulling loose. He glances at my outstretched arm and snorts like it is a joke. But I hold my arm steady and look into his eyes. The ax-blade is almost out, and if it gives way he dies. Of course, if he lets go of the ax and takes my arm we both die. I cannot hold his weight. It would be absurd. Beyond reason. Impossible.

  “But us being here is absurd,” I whisper down to him, my thoughts becoming words like how a river flows to the sea. “Us being here is beyond reason. Us being here is impossible. Still we are here, though. Still we are alive and in this moment, looking into one another’s eyes, faced with a choice that only a fool would make. So take my hand, you foolish, wonderful Viking. Let us answer the call. Let us challenge the gods that test us. Let us meet the eye of the goddesses who watch us. Take my hand, Wolruff. Take my hand.”

  And as I say it, the ax-head pulls out from the wall and everything stops.

  Everything stops like the gods and goddesses are holding their breath, watching with both delight and dread, waiting to see what their human puppets will do. After all, this is how the gods and goddesses amuse themselves, is it not? They poke and prod, push and pull, tease and torment.

  “But in the end they are not in control,” I whisper as I see the light in Wolruff’s eyes, like he just saw the same secret I did, that the gods love the game because they do not control it. We control it even though it seems absurd, impossible, beyond reason.

  And that’s the point.

  That’s the test.

  Because the only way it works is if we both make the choice.

  I must choose to risk my life and hold my arm out . . .

  And he must choose to take it.

  We both have to give up ourselves before we can have each other.

  Because that’s what it takes to seize your forever, claim your fate, vanquish your Viking.

  So as we smile in the stillness of the moment, as the world starts to spin again, as our past and future merge into one point of infinite power, Wolruff lets go of the falling ax, reaches his big paw out, and takes my hand.

  10

  WOLRUFF

  I take her hand and launch myself up toward the open window, gliding as if on the wings of the divine dove who brought word of new land after the great flood. My body feels lighter than a single feather on that dove, and my heavy boots tap soft and nimble against the stone. It is impossible but it is real and I believe it. I know I am pulled up by not the strength of our bodies but the power in our hearts. The power of our choice.

  The choice to listen.

  The choice to trust.

  The choice to believe.

  Now I am at the window and I hurl myself through the opening as reality comes smashing into us like a hail-wind. She screams as my body slams into hers, and I grab her and pull her close as we crash into the room.

  My body cushions hers as we land on a low table, shattering the wood like an old tree. The splinters drive deep into my back, reminding me that we are returned to the realm of the flesh, the world of blood and bone. I pull her close and cradle her head. We pant and stare. No words can be spoken because what happened cannot be spoken of in words.

  Outside the door the stairs burn. Outside the building the battle rages. But here it is just the two of us. We burn with a different sort of flame. We fight a different sort of battle. A battle that is not won yet.

  Not until I claim my queen. Plunder my prize. Seize my siren.

  I stroke her cheek with my thumb and look upon her beauty like I have never seen it before even though it was all I saw in my dreams the past year. She parts her lips as if to speak but says not a word. This is not a time for words. It is not a time for thought. I cannot hesitate. Twice before the gods denied me because I turned away. This time I do not turn. I do not flinch. I do not stand down.

  “You are mine, Wendra,” I whisper, cupping her cheek and running my thumb over the smooth bump of her scar. “I knew it when I first saw you. I knew it when we faced each other in the food hall. I knew it when we stood before the King. I knew it when my blade touched your sweet skin. I knew it when the stormwinds broke my back. I knew it when I took your hand and our love pulled me in.”

  Wendra blinks away tears and her lips tremble and her body shivers as it presses down on mine. “You seem to know a lot for an ax-wielding Viking,” she says. “What else do you know?”

  “This. I know this,” I growl, leaning close and running my nose delicately along her cheek, sniffing her like a beast of prey. The blood rushes to my head and my heart and loins all at once, and I shudder as a power greater than I have known burns through me. My lips touch her cheek lightly as my hand tightens around the back of her neck. She shudders and I move closer to her lips. She smells like the sea after a storm, fresh and vibrant, churning with energy, roiling with joy. My cock throbs and my heart pounds, and I swear I feel the gods and goddesses watching us in muted silence as they wait. My mouth twists in a smile when I decide that the gods are no longer in control. Our choice to believe the unbelievable and accept the impossible has made us divine. We have fought and we have won. Do what you will, gods.

  As if in answer comes a great crash outside the door. I know the stairs have collapsed, leaving a fiery pit outside the front door, like the gods have opened up a portal to the Underworld. Now they laugh and congratulate each other and sit back on their ephemeral thrones with self-satisfied smile. But Wendra and I smile back at them. We smile because now we know how fate plays the game. We smile because now we know how to play it too.

  And so, trapped in our tower with no way out, I look up into her eyes and bring my lips to hers.

  And I kiss her.

  By the gods and goddesses, I kiss her.

  11
<
br />   WENDRA

  He kisses me with the power of the tide, slow but with hidden strength that sends ripples through my body. I heard the stairs crash down outside, and I know we have no way out. Somehow it matters not, though. Somehow I am ready to believe in anything now. Ready to believe in that old ritual of my people, that fate is like the tide, destiny like the current, that two fated souls will be brought together again and again like the waves to the shore.

  And so I put all thoughts of escape out of my mind and kiss him back. I give myself to the moment and to forever, and as the kiss lights me up like a starburst, I see in my mind’s eye that one moment and forever are the same thing, that time and space are like the sea and the sky, that love is like the horizon-line between the two, that magical threshold where sea and sky merge, time and space dissolve, a single moment becomes forever.

  Wolruff grips the back of my head and kisses me harder. His beard is rough against my skin, his fingers knotted tight in my hair. My sex burns for him beneath my skirts, and I part my legs and straddle him, gasping when I feel the swell of his manhood big as a mountain.

  He groans as my wet undergarments press against his peak, and with a grunt his rips my tunic open. My breasts spill over my bodice, and he snaps the straps like threads and grasps my globes tight and hard. He squeezes and I arch my head back and scream, and then Wolruff’s face is between my breasts and he licks me and bites me and rubs his beard all over my nipples until they rise red and hard like peaks. He sucks each nipple, taking his time with each, his big hands sliding under my skirts and grasping my thick thighs firmly. He moves me over his manhood, and I ride him as my throat tightens from an ecstasy that takes me beyond myself. My small-clothes are wet and warm, and I drip down my inner thighs as Wolruff devours my nipples and bucks his powerful hips up into me.

  “By the goddess herself,” I mutter as my ecstasy swells and rises and then overflows in a climax that makes my eyes roll up and my head go limp. My shoulders hunch and I convulse like a witch at the stake as the passion burns from the secret place that is hot like fire, wet like the rain. “What do you do to me, Wolruff?”

  Wolruff responds by tearing off the shreds of my tunic and bodice, and then he sits up and lifts me by the waist like I am but a doll. He holds me firm and stands me up, and I look down with glazed eyes as the Viking presses his face against the front of my skirts and breathes deep of my feminine.

  He groans and shudders as my scent invades him, and I see his manhood rise like a sea-serpent beneath his leather battle-dress. With one hand he pulls open his thick belt. Then he goes up on his knees and takes off his garment.

  Wolruff is long as the night, thick as a log, heavy and hard and magnificent. His shaft gleams like sunfire, the head shines like a blood-moon, his clean oil oozes like sap from a swollen tree. I feel my cunt tighten and release its own wetness. Wolruff groans again like he smells my cunt opening for him, and he reaches up and grasps my skirts at the waist and pulls them off me so swift my hair blows back.

  I blush as the breeze from the open window blows cool against my wet thighs, but I do not think I can stay cool long. Sure enough, when Wolruff rips my small-clothes off my hips and buries his beard in my bush, the heat consumes me and I collapse onto his broad shoulders as his thick tongue snakes up my cunt and brings forth another peak that bursts like a fruit opening up in spring.

  My juices pour onto his face as I scream and thrash and grab his hair just to stop myself from falling over. Wolruff grasps my buttocks and spreads them as he licks me, and when I feel his thick fingers against my dark rear hole, I gurgle and gasp and climax again like a goddess-whore, anointing the Viking with my womanly waters.

  “You are a goddess,” he mutters from my muff, and I shudder and smile and start to speak but stop when he taps my forbidden rear hole and then pushes a finger inside my behind. I buck forward into his face, forcing his tongue higher up my cunt. I am penetrated from front and behind, plugged good and tight with his thick tongue and fat finger. He moves his face back and forth, and I spurt again as my climax almost chokes me.

  Now Wolruff pulls away, panting for air. His lips glisten with my juices, his beard is savage and matted, his green eyes wild like a wolf’s, his mouth broad in a grin. He wipes his mouth and then rises to his feet, his hand fisting his shaft as he stares me up and down. I stand naked like a newborn, but I am without shame and without doubt. I am his and he is mine.

  “I will take you now, Wendra,” he says softly but with a stern authority that makes my sex clench like it has a mind of its own. I nod and he steps forth and kisses my lips. His standing cock presses firm against my mound, and I reach down with trembling hands and caress him from below.

  His big body tightens and his green eyes roll up at my touch. I stroke his shaft tenderly, with long, careful strokes that give me as much pleasure as it does him. Then I reach below and hold his warm balls. They are heavy like sandbags on my palm, and I massage them and close my eyes and smile. He is full of seed and I feel my sex sigh, feel my womb whimper, feel the woman in me yearn for the man in him. In this moment I understand why the gods and goddesses play these games with their human puppets, and I know that right now they envy us, yearn for the filth of the flesh, the beauty of the blood.

  The blood throbs my nether lips as Wolruff guides himself to my opening. My dark curls bristle as his head pushes through my forest, and when I feel my slit spread by his entry, opened by his advance, filled by his girth, the tears roll from my eyes like raindrops from the clouds.

  Slowly Wolruff enters me, penetrating my virgin hole with care but no hesitation. Gently he pushes me back until I am firm against the cool stone wall, and then he firmly completes the entry and flexes inside me. He holds himself there and looks upon my face. He kisses my lips, kisses me again. He slides his hands down along my curves, over my hips, around to my rump. Then suddenly he grasps my buttocks and raises me up high.

  I wrap my legs around him and he brings me down onto his erect manhood, driving it so deep up I feel it in my throat. I am open wide like the breached hull of a ship, and he raises me effortlessly and brings me back down while pumping upwards.

  At first the force almost breaks me, and I scream and dig my nails into his broad back as the best sort of pain rips through me. But the pleasure that follows makes me lick my lips and brace for more, and when more comes I take it like a goddess.

  Wolruff pumps harder now, bending his knees and bouncing me on his cock like I am a little girl. But I am no girl. I am a woman, and I lean my head back and moan without shame, howl without hesitation, scream without stopping. The Viking roars as his cock pounds into me. It gets bigger with each stroke, harder with each thrust, and soon my inner walls are stretched so wide I have to open my mouth in sympathy.

  Wolruff rams me harder now, raising me and slamming me back onto his cockhead. My teeth rattle and my vision blurs, my ears ring and my body hums. My climax comes and goes like the surf crashing against the rocks, and when I feel Wolruff’s heavy balls slap against my wet undersides, I sink my nails into his back and my heels into his waist and my teeth into his shoulder as I prepare to be claimed with his savage seed, pillaged by his invading heat, plundered by his raging horde.

  He slams me against the wall and holds my scarred neck, pumping hard into me and then holding firm and flexing. His eyes go wide and then roll up and show me their whites. I gasp as time slows down, like the moment before a tidal wave crashes. The roar of his climax starts low in his throat, like a deep ocean swell that cannot be heard or seen but can be felt in your bones.

  And I feel it not just in my bones but in my heart and my head and my fingers and my toes. I feel it everywhere, like I’ve felt it forever, and when it comes I am ready for it.

  At least I thought I was ready.

  12

  WOLRUFF

  Nothing in my life has readied me for the grip of pleasure so raw as
this. Wendra’s cunt is warm like a cradle, soft like a blanket, wet like a bath. Entering her was sublime, an experience better than pillaging and plundering, sailing into uncharted waters, leading men into battle and out in victory.

  With each thrust I sink deeper into her soul, let her deeper into my heart, claim her more completely than seems possible. If the gods still watch then they are muted and mystified, silenced and stupefied. I grin and lick her lip as my hips pound up into her, and when I feel my balls tighten in preparation to flood her, I pant and pump and ram hard and deep. When it comes I know it will destroy both of us, and I feel the roar of my climax building deep in my gut, ascending steadily from silence into sound.

  The roar comes with an agony so beautiful I am almost broken, and I erupt in slow motion, my balls seizing up and delivering a volcanic load that makes her rise with its force. She screams and her nails rip the skin on my back, her sex pours down my shaft, her eyes roll back in her head as she flails and thrashes in my grip. My buttocks flex and hold deep inside as I shudder my way through a climax that is a lifetime in the making, an explosion with enough power to create a million new worlds, destroy a million old ones.

  The roar continues with the fury of a lion, and the walls tremble as our bodies seize up. I feel her climax rip through her like windblown rain, and I shoot more of my seed into her depths, pumping and squeezing and pumping again until she overflows down my shaft and balls, our combined juices dripping heavy onto the stone floor.

  I pant and drool against her neck, and my cock throbs inside her. I am still hard and big inside her, my arousal still fierce like a storm-front.

  “I want you again,” I growl against her skin. My cock throbs inside her as she nods like she is not certain what I mean and does not care to be certain. I smile and pull out, holding her until her feet find the floor. She sways and swoons, and I catch her just before she falls. She smiles like an angel, giggles like a girl. Then she whispers like a woman.