The Omens of a Crow [COMPLETE] (Watty 2018 Award-Winner)

Chapter 8

She came to him just as his eyes were drifting to a close, like the apparition of a dream appearing before its time. She hesitated above him, pale and cold as a waning moon. Krow raised himself up on an elbow, but she forestalled his speech with a finger on his lips.

"It has been long," she whispered. Her voice was hollow, but ached with a sense of loss, as if she wanted – needed – to find something that no longer existed. "I am winter who has forgotten the warmth and color of spring." She lowered herself onto his chest and kissed him. Indeed, her lips were chill and strange, but they yearned to remember and he shuddered with delight at their touch. He forced himself to break the bond, and she spoke again with frantic insistence. "I want this, Krow." Her words were light and fast, breathless and desperate. "I'm in a tower, all alone but for the howling of wolves and breaking of timbers as they batter down the door." Her lips ran across his cheek. "Please, I've been strong for so long. I don't want to be alone before they carry me away."

Strange words and quick thoughts. Krow did not understand. Not completely. But the hands that slid over his chest were comprehension enough. Her lips found his again, and he responded, wrapping his arms around her and drawing her nightgown above her head. She broke contact long enough to extract herself from the thin folds, then came back to him hard. They crushed their lips together in hurried, successive bursts. She lifted up, body arching sinuously in the dim light, breasts heaving in her urgency. She gasped as she lowered herself. A sigh of pleasure rose in his throat, and he bit lightly on her pale shoulder to cover the moan.

They struggled amidst the twisted sheets. No rhythm or design. Just writhing movement and sweat and breath. She cried out and he felt her shuddering against him as a sharp pain tore at his back. He did not stop, and she responded, gripping his shoulders to help him move. Neither of them slowed until the last of their ardor was spent, and they collapsed in a tangled, panting heap.

They lay for a long time without speaking, listening only to their uncontrolled breaths. Her body was hot on his, still slick from exertion. He ran his palm up her thigh. She trembled at his touch. As his hand moved up her waist she slid over him again, but only laid her head on his shoulder and touched him, moving gentle fingers over his chest.

"My husband was killed ten years ago in the Hundred Days' War," she spoke in the darkness. Her voice was quiet, nearly whispered, as if she feared to break the spell of their lovemaking with speech. "I was young and in love, though I knew him not. I could hardly believe that my father had made a match with Ser Geoffrey Tantervale. Little more than a hedge knight, true, but a man of martial renown and greatly respected throughout all of Brython." She fell silent, and Krow moved his hand comfortingly across her shoulders. When she spoke again, her voice was dull and lifeless. "He was here three months when the war broke out. Three months. A girl of fifteen watched him ride away, but a woman much older never saw him return."

"Why?" Krow asked, breathing in the scent of lilac that drifted from her chestnut locks. "Why did you never remarry?"

"My father was unfit to handle such affairs, and I had become the head of House Selbourne to all intents and purposes. I had not the time to chase after another fantasy."

"Young and beautiful," he murmured into her hair. "They would come to you regardless, I think."

"Yet they have not," she said. "In truth, I fear the larger houses have cut us off from the world in more ways than just the physical. Lord Went, Lord Lackley, Creemont – they'd not risk another Tantervale who might interfere with their designs for these lands."

"The king would allow the destruction of one of his houses?"

"Oh, Krow," she laughed softly. "My poor, naïve healer. You've no notion of the politics of the nobility, and that brings me joy."

Krow mulled over this, fighting a struggle inside himself. He knew which side was winning. "I–,"

"Hush, now," she said. "Stay with me tonight as a lover, Krow, and as a healer. It is my hope you will remain the latter forever. There are no more Tantervales in the world. Not for me. My faith in them has gone, and so they've all died."

He could find nothing to say, so he held her to him. She answered by nuzzling his neck, touching him delicately with soft lips. He wrapped her up in his arms and rolled above her. She lay beneath him, beautiful and willing in her nakedness.

"Krow," she begged as he began to love her again. "If I commanded you to leave Bliss in the morning, would you do it?"

He did not answer, but it didn't matter. Her sighs would have smothered his words in any case.