Chapter One
Kadlin woke with a start. The first soft rays of morning light were creeping into the room, and Bjorn was beside her, thrashing and crying out in his sleep. The nightmares were growing more frequent. They’d had to move young Hjortr to the front of the house with the others. He was sharing a pallet with Agata and Finnr’s son, Bassi. The boys were only three months apart in age and seemed happy with the arrangement, but Kadlin wished her little family could be in the same room. Bjorn’s terrors kept the child up at night, and once the big Viking had begun to walk in his sleep, it wasn’t safe to have the four-year-old in their chamber.
Bjorn was striking out at some unseen tormentor, and Kadlin leapt from the pallet a moment before his arm crashed down where her head had lain. She watched his handsome face contort and tried to make out the muddled words that spewed out of him. When his movements slowed, she knelt beside him on the furs and whispered his name, but he didn’t respond. She repeated herself more loudly, then reached out and brushed the copper-colored braids from his forehead. His eyes flew open, and he grabbed her wrist then flipped her onto her back, pinning her beneath his big body. He balled his other hand into a fist and drew it back as if to strike.
“Bjorn, stop! It’s me!” she cried.
He seemed to stare right through her, and Kadlin knew he was not yet awake. “Husband, please,” she whimpered. His green eyes were wide with horror, and she watched as he seemed to come slowly to his senses. He loosened his grip on her wrist and looked down at her, then glanced at his fisted hand as if it belonged to another man’s body.
Opening his fingers, he reached out to touch her face, and Kadlin couldn’t stop herself from cringing. Regret crashed over her when she saw the pain her reaction had caused him. He flopped onto his back and slung his thick forearm across his eyes, but Kadlin pulled it away and covered his face with kisses, only to find his cheeks and forehead slick with sweat.
She poured mead from a pitcher on the small side table and offered him a drink before quenching her own thirst. “Hush, Bjorn. All is well now.”
“I could have—“
Kadlin set down the cup then cradled his face. “But you didn’t. Won’t you please tell me what torments your dreams so?”
He shook his head, and the beads in his long braids clattered. “Always the same. There is a mirror, and I see myself in it, but it is not truly me. I feel something lurking behind me, and I know I am in danger, but I cannot defend myself. And then all is black.” Wrapping his arms around her naked body, he crushed her to his bare chest. “I am so sorry, my love.”
Kadlin could feel his heartbeat thundering beneath her cheek. The same dream had been haunting him for months, and his reaction to it had grown ever more frightening. She couldn’t imagine what horror could cause her powerful man such worry, and she longed to find an answer to this omen and ease his suffering. Gods, please guide me. I love him so.
When she kissed the giant’s pounding chest, he released his grip and began stroking her back. She moved her mouth over his taut skin and felt his nipple pucker under her lips. He traced the rise of her backside then kneaded the flesh. Straddling his muscular thigh, she ground against him, and he moved his hand lower until his fingertips grazed the wet divide of her nether lips. When she pressed against his touch, trying to force him to probe inside, she felt his rod grow and stiffen against her hip.
“Always so impatient, my little imp,” he growled in her ear.
A shiver ran over Kadlin’s body at the sound of her pet name. When he called her “imp”, their play always left her weak and spent. Her mind wandered back to the first time he’d taken her this way. He’d lashed her to the trunk of a willow tree and delivered to her such exquisite pleasure and pain that she’d had to
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