Lucia novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: Seven Nights

The priest overrules the foreign prince and they are wed; in the tower room she tells Tobin her dream and takes him to bed; at dawn a rider says raiders have killed three at Greywatch.

The priest looked at the prince over the top of his spectacles.

"This is a chapel of Altavere, Highness," he said. "A foreign prince has no voice in it."

"I object," Corradin said again, flatly.

"Noted," said the priest. "Overruled."

He turned back to us.

"Do you, Lucia Aurelan, take this man?"

"I do," I said.

"Do you, Tobin Garrick, take this woman?"

"Yes," Tobin said. "Gladly."

The prince stood up and walked out without another word.

The door banged behind him, and Pia let out a long, shaking breath that turned into a giggle.

The priest tied our wrists with a strip of white linen.

When he said we were husband and wife, Tobin looked down at me, and I realized I had stopped breathing.

"Well," he said quietly. "Hello, wife."

"Hello, husband."

"You have a bad habit of acting first."

"I have a good habit of acting first," I said. "You'll see."

His thumb moved once across the knot at my wrist.

The tower room was the only one my father had left unlocked for us.

It had a big bed, a fire already burning, and a window that looked north over the dark hills.

Pia fussed with the sheets and then fled, shutting the door behind her with great ceremony.

Tobin stood in the middle of the floor with his coat still on and his big hands hanging.

"I'm not going to rush you," he said.

"I know."

"I mean it. Seven nights is a long time. We can talk first. We can sleep. I'll sleep on the floor."

"Sit down, Tobin."

He sat on the edge of the bed.

I took off my riding coat and sat beside him, close enough that our knees touched.

"I want to tell you what I saw," I said. "The dream."

"Every woman in my mother's line gets one the night before she turns twenty-four."

"It shows what happens if you do nothing."

I told him all of it.

He listened without moving, and I left out nothing, not even the stone.

When I said the prince's name, my voice broke on it, and Tobin's hand closed over mine.

"That's why you picked me," he said.

"I picked you because you looked at the girl with the cart wheel."

"Lucia."

"You looked up," I said. "He never did. That's all I wanted."

He stared at me for a long moment, his hazel eyes very bright.

"I'll look up every day," he said roughly. "I'll look up so much it'll annoy you."

I laughed, and then I was kissing him.

I do not remember deciding to.

His mouth was warm, and he made a low sound.

Then his hand was in my braid and he was kissing me back, slow and deep and hungry.

"You said not to rush," I murmured against his lips.

"I'm bad at following my own advice."

"Good."

I pushed his coat off his shoulders.

He let me, and then he stood and pulled me up with him.

The heat of his chest through his shirt made my knees weak.

He undid the laces of my gown one at a time, his rough fingers careful, while I tore at the buttons on his shirt.

"You're beautiful," he said when the gown dropped.

"You're wearing too much."

He laughed against my throat and got rid of the shirt, and the sight of him stopped my hands.

He was broad and scarred, with a thick pale line across his ribs and shoulders.

I put my palms flat on his chest and felt his heart slamming.

"You're shaking," I said.

"So are you."

"I've never done this."

His whole face softened.

"Then I'll go slow," he said.

"Don't you dare."

He groaned, and picked me up as though I weighed nothing, and put me on the bed.

He knelt over me and kissed his way down my neck and my collarbone.

He took his time with my breasts, until I was arching under his mouth and begging.

"Tobin," I gasped. "Please."

"Say what you want."

"I want you inside me. I want to feel you. I want it now."

"Greedy," he said, and his voice cracked.

He slid a hand between my thighs and found me wet, and swore under his breath.

He stroked me with two fingers, slow, circling my clit until my hips moved on their own and I was gripping the sheets.

"Look at me," he said.

I looked.

His eyes were dark and fixed on my face, and I came apart under his hand with a cry I could not stop.

He kissed me through it, and then I was pulling at his belt, tugging his breeches down, wrapping my fingers around his cock.

He was thick and hot and hard, and he shuddered all over at my touch.

"Lucia," he said, strangled.

"Now."

He settled between my legs and pushed in an inch at a time, watching my face.

It stung, and then it did not, and then the fullness of him made me gasp and clutch his shoulders.

"More," I said. "Don't stop."

He moved.

Slow at first, deep, his forehead against mine, his breath ragged.

Then I wrapped my legs around his hips and told him to fuck me properly, and the last of his control snapped.

He drove into me harder, each thrust hitting somewhere deep that made me cry out his name.

The bed shook against the wall.

The fire popped.

I raked my nails down his back and heard him groan into my neck.

"Mine," he said hoarsely. "You chose me. You're mine."

"Yours," I panted. "Yours. Don't stop, Tobin, don't stop, I'm going to-"

I broke again, harder, clenching around him, and he followed with a roar, spilling hot inside me while his whole body shook.

We lay tangled and soaked in sweat.

He kissed my hair, my forehead, my closed eyes.

"Hello, wife," he said, and I could hear the grin.

"Seven nights," I mumbled. "I think we only need one."

He laughed so hard the bed shook.

I woke to pounding on the door.

The sky outside the window was grey, and Tobin was already on his feet, pulling on his breeches.

A rider stood in the passage, mud to his thighs, still gasping.

"Captain," the man said. "Raiders hit Greywatch in the night. Three of ours are dead."

Tobin went white.

"Saddle my horse," he said.

"I'm coming," I said, from the bed.

He turned and stared at me.

"Lucia."

"A wife follows her husband," I said, and reached for my boots.

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