Page 40 of Golden Queen (Idrigard #1)

I was on the point of asking him if he trained with a sword very often, my mind wandering to the idea of him, powerful and fierce, in the heat of some battle, blood splattered across his face, but then he undid the clasp of his breeches, and I felt the air sucked out of me.

I reached for him without thinking. I felt the rigid, smooth flesh beneath my fingers. He groaned, covering my hand with his, but he did not push me away. "I want to know how to please you...the way you please me,” I said.

"Trust me, Sera. You please me already."

"I want..." The words trailed away as he guided my hand down the length of him, and I heard his breath hiss. He pushed forward, forcing me back onto the bed.

"What, Sera? What do you want?" His voice was low, almost menacing. It sent a thrill through me as he forced my legs apart and shifted my hips so that he was just against me, the solid head of his cock, lightly parting my flesh.

"To be the best at it," I admitted. I finally felt my face burn with embarrassment.

He didn’t laugh, though I could see the muscle ticking in his jaw as he fought valiantly to contain it.

Instead, he shook his head ruefully. "I am currently trying to calculate the chances of whether I will burn this bed, maybe the entire castle down, when I lose myself in how fucking good it feels to be inside you.

I don't think you have anything to worry about. "

My eyes widened in surprise, both at his words and at the way the admission stoked some primal female satisfaction deep inside me. I was sure he was exaggerating. There were, after all, Alumbrian witches in Nightfall. The pleasure they were capable of giving was legendary.

It didn't matter though, not in that moment. In that moment, under his dark gaze, I felt like some goddess of lust and power.

He pushed inside me, slowly, joining our lips again.

I felt him groan against my mouth, his breath rushing out, the way he seemed to shudder, and I knew he liked it.

It fanned the flames of that primal satisfaction to a wildfire and had me sliding my arms around him, pulling him to me as I lifted my hips.

He filled me with a single push, striking against the deep, aching heart of me, making me cry out in what sounded like desperation.

He stilled, his breaths coming more rapidly, his eyes never leaving mine.

I squirmed, on the edge of release already just from the feeling of him inside me, that alien fullness already beginning to feel somehow intrinsic to me.

He did laugh then, hands sliding down to my hips to hold me in place. "Be still, you wicked thing. I am trying to maintain some control and not shame myself."

I was sure he was exaggerating again, saying those things because he could already recognize how good it made me feel to hear them. But then the hand on my hip trembled, and I stilled, feeling the breath spool out of me as I met his eyes.

They were darker, filled with shadows, but somehow more alive. I was enthralled, mesmerized by them as he began to move.

Once again, it was ecstasy and greed as he filled me. My body was somehow both sated and wanting all at once as he pushed into me and slid out with increasing speed. I could not take my eyes from his as he moved in me.

He covered my cry with his mouth as I reached release and only a heartbeat later, his arms were around me, his hands wreathed in golden fire as he lifted me up and away from the flammable bed covers as he spilled himself in me.

That sunshine, perfect peace, and magic flooded me until I could no longer tell what was my body's pure, rapturous satisfaction, and what was his magic sending waves of corresponding bliss through me.

He angled us down to the bed and pulled himself free as he tucked me into the space under his arm. We both lay, nearly panting with my head pillowed on his chest and his arm tight around me as though he liked the feeling of me at his side.

I turned, lifting myself on an elbow to look at him. "I never thanked you for fighting with my people."

"You never needed to," he said, looking down at me, a faint smile seemingly stuck on his face.

"Thank you," I said anyway.

He nodded, looking away toward the canopy of the bed.

"And..." I trailed off, unsure again.

He looked at me, raising a single dark brow. "Yes, Sera?"

"Will you take me to meet your dragon?" I knew it might be asking a lot of him. Dragons were not pets to show off to people.

"I was already planning to," he said, smile spreading.

I laid my head back down on his chest, running my hand across his skin as I listened to his heartbeat, so strong under my ear.

I woke some time later to find that he had covered us. I had shifted onto my side, and he was wrapped around me, his arm stretched out across the bed under my head, the other around my waist.

I didn't understand what woke me at first, but then I felt his hand jerk. I could see the faint glow of fire licking up from his open palm laid on the bed and more from the one against my skin.

He jerked again, and I realized he was dreaming. The fire flared to life.

I grabbed his hand, pulling it up and away from the sheets, cradling it against my chest where it couldn't burn the bedclothes.

I felt him wake, and with consciousness, the fire died away. His arms tightened around me as he settled back into deep, even breathing.

I wondered, as I began to fall asleep again with his big hand clasped tightly against my chest, if that was the reason he did not sleep—the fear of losing control and burning the whole place down in his dreams.