Total pages in book: 208
Estimated words: 209645 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1048(@200wpm)___ 839(@250wpm)___ 699(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 209645 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1048(@200wpm)___ 839(@250wpm)___ 699(@300wpm)
“What have the elves told you?” Aramus demanded.
Frey sighed before he replied, “The power the united will wield does not come from the union of nations. Or the union of flesh. It comes from love.”
Love?
I tipped my head back to look at my husband just as he tipped his down to look at me.
Mars and Silence, I could see that happening.
Aramus and me, it was definitely happening.
Cassius and Elena and True and Farah?
“Shite,” Aramus spoke my thoughts out loud.
Shite, indeed.
“Well, this is lovely. Just, er, well…lovely,” I blathered as I walked into the captain’s cabin aboard The Finnie, my husband following me.
We had all taken a meal together on the beach, Aramus and his men briefing Frey and his men about all the goings-on, Frey and his men sharing news from across the Green Sea, the women listening intently.
My husband had then asked if we might ride with them up the coast, turning east from the Triton Sea along the north coast of Wodell, through the Seil Sea, into the River Fae, which would lead us inland and right to Notting Thicket.
Frey had immediately agreed.
However, Finnie and Maddie had begged for some time with their feet on land to have the opportunity to relax, “sunbathe” and “maybe find something we can make into a Frisbee.”
I found both these women quite odd, though engaging.
What was odder was that their men did not seem odd.
I’d met people from The Northlands.
These men acted like that.
The women did not.
At least, not exactly.
The way they spoke was often very strange and on occasion they said things that mystified me.
I saw my husband casting curious glances their way as well, but like me, he said naught.
Though considering sailing to Notting Thicket would take half the time as riding, he agreed to a delay in leaving, but requested, “Time aboard your ship for my wife and I. We have not had much privacy since leaving Fire City.”
I found the wide grins the women gave me and knowing smiles the men gave Aramus vaguely embarrassing. However, I was so tuned for Frey’s response, I did not pay that feeling much attention.
“Of course,” Frey agreed. “We’ll change cabin for tent. Do you have accommodation for Maddie and Apollo?”
“If we don’t, we’ll make it,” Aramus answered.
I was instantly relieved, thrilled, ecstatic.
And then I was petrified.
It would happen…tonight.
I would become my husband’s wife…tonight.
My husband would be my true husband…
Tonight.
He had experience that could not be construed as “not much.”
I had the fumblings of youth and then some other fumblings that were just…not much.
I was no longer virgin, but although I had felt desire, and excitement (most of this happening with what I’d done with Aramus), beyond that…well…
That was it.
Not much.
What if that was about me, and not as I had thought, that it was about my partner?
What if Aramus enjoyed my touch and kisses, but when things became more ardent, he did not enjoy what I did not know how to do?
What if it was I who was fumbling?
I hid my anxiety as best I could as Finnie demanded to row back to the ship to retrieve some things and “make the cabin presentable,” upon which a heated discussion that could easily be termed an argument broke out about how Frey would row her, how Finnie was quite capable of rowing herself, thank you, and how Frey knew that but he did not care, etcetera.
“They do this a lot,” Maddie muttered after leaning toward me. “Married for decades, Frey will not get it into his head that ‘me, Tarzan, you Jane’ thing doesn’t work with Finnie.”
“Tarzan and Jane?” I asked.
“You know, he’s all alpha man looking after his woman and she’s all for alpha in bed, but the rest, not so much.”
“Alpha man?” I inquired.
“Do you have wolves in this land?” she queried.
“The mainland does, but…” What she was saying dawned on me and I smiled. “Alpha. I see. Clever.”
“My husband commands the wolves,” she shared.
Apollo commanded wolves?
She turned to Apollo. “Do you think that will work here, honey?”
“Regrettably, my poppy, I have the feeling we shall see,” he answered heavily.
She turned again to me, now curiously not concerned in the slightest that her husband might have to command wolves due to our circumstances which might be dire. “He might not command dragons and elves, but he’s still badass.”
Badass?
Maddie studied my face then asked, “Have you heard of Minerva?”
I reared back. “The malevolent she-god of Hawkvale who was vanquished some years ago?”
She smiled. “Yes. Her. Well me and Finnie vanquished her. With Circe and Cora, who are on their way with Lahn and Tor, and a little more help from friends.”
I stared at her, mouth agape.
“We’re pretty badass too,” she shared.
“You’re witches?” I whispered.
“Well, I wouldn’t call myself a witch. But if the shoe fits…” She shrugged.
I had heard tales of these powerful witches who had vanquished the she-god Minerva and her triumvirate of evil-doers.