Okay, okay, okay, it appeared I was getting married.
Shit.
To a man known as “The Dragon”.
Shit!
Try, at least, to be happy, that girl had said to me.
I didn’t think that boded well.
Enjoy The Drakkar. I think you will and more, I think he will enjoy you, the lady who could jump from a two story building had said.
That didn’t bode much better, as in, at all.
I clutched my father’s arm as we walked down an aisle that seemed to be as long as a football field (but wasn’t but it was still freaking long) and I wished that I could concentrate on being with my Dad for the first time in fifteen years but I couldn’t. There was a sea of people all standing, all smiling at me or watching me with interest in their eyes and happiness on their faces.
I took them in as the music washed over me and my father marched me quickly forward.
Crap, I was getting… freaking… married.
Okay, Finnie, I said to myself, sucking in breath, take stock.
Dad was at my side, he was alive and except for the somewhat strange outfit he was wearing (dark brown leather shorts, very high, dark brown leather boots, a thick but gorgeous dark red turtleneck sweater, a leather band at a slant around his chest crusted with gold inlaid with rubies, a fur cloak attached to the band that hung on a slant on his back and a big, gold crown with rubies and diamonds, much like Mom’s but masculine, on his head) was walking me down an aisle.
I never expected to have that, my Dad walking me down the aisle, not since I was fifteen and their plane went down. If I ever settled on a guy, I knew there would be no Dad walking me down an aisle.
So, okay, this was good or, not really since I had no clue who I was marrying but I decided to take it as such.
I looked to the front of the church that was coming ever closer and saw no cross or other church-like thing of my world but instead six enormous statues that looked carved out of ivory marble positioned to form a curve at the front. There were three men statues and three women starting with a man with legs planted, hands on hips; the next was a woman looking down at her belly where both her hands were resting; the next was a man who had one arm straight out, his legs separated, knees slightly bent, his other arm lifted, hand looking at the ready to pull what looked like a sword from his back; the next, another woman, this one had one arm dangling in front of her, her hand loosely opened at her pubis, her other arm lifted and resting on the side of her neck, a weird smile playing at her lips on her slightly downturned face; the next, a man with legs planted, arms crossed; and the last, a woman standing with her hands loosely cupped together, fingertips touching each other, head slightly bowed, lips to her hands.
Weird.
In front of this display stood a man wearing white robes with a long, wide satin band around his neck and dangling down his front bearing stripes starting with dark blue then light blue, red, deep violet, gold then bright green.
Okay, interesting. It seemed in this world they had more than one god. It was going to be cool learning more about that.
I sucked in breath to say something to my Dad, anything, and to get him to say something in return then it caught in my throat as a man moved to stand in front of and to the side of the man in white robes then that man looked down the aisle at me.
My step faltered when I took in all that was him and there was a lot that was him to take in.
“Sjofn,” Dad growled, his hand over mine in the crook of his arm tensing. He felt my step falter and he thought I was going to bolt. With effort, I pulled my shit together and kept walking.
But I was thinking, oh no.
And that would be a big, oh no, no, no, no.
No.
Was that…? Was he…?
Oh shit. He was. He had to be. He was standing at the front of the church.
It was The Dragon.
It was my groom.
And I got his name. I totally got it with the way he was glowering at me like he most assuredly did not like me, he also did not want to be there and further, what he did want to be doing was slaughtering entire villages either with weapons or, perhaps, breathing fire at them and setting them alight.
He was massive. I was five six. He had to be six three or six four. His hair was very dark, very thick with bit of wave and it curled around the turtleneck of his sweater that was a dark brown so dark it was nearly black. He did not wear weird leather shorts but wool breeches that fit him snug and did not come near to hiding the power of his massive, muscular thighs. The same could be said for his sweater which did not hide the breadth and brawn of his shoulders. He had on boots that went to just below his knees and I saw that he didn’t bother shining them for his nuptials. They were smudged and even had dirt and mud on them. There was a leather band slanting across his chest, under his ribs at one side, over his shoulder at the other but there were no gold, rubies or anything on his. I saw the fall of a cloak, this one not a lustrous fur pelt like Dad’s but a simple hide.
I could also see the hilt of a sword over his shoulder behind where the band was and knives on either side of a leather belt at his waist.
His features were tan, sharp, strong and prominent. Heavy brow, jutting square jaw, carved cheekbones, full lips with tons of ridges in them. If his look wasn’t so dark and extremely pissed off, he’d be hot.
He was not.
He was freaking scary. The bulk of him, the intensity of angry energy he exuded which I could feel pressing against my skin, the murderous look in his eyes.
Scary.
No, terrifying from top-to-toe.
And this was saying something, coming from me, Seoafin Wilde, a woman who did not get scared easily.
But no matter how frightening he was, I could not tear my gaze from him so as we cleared the front of the church, I didn’t.
And I saw his eyes were a weird shade of light olive green, not green or brown or hazel but light olive green surrounded by a mass of dark, curling lashes.
As I got closer and then we stopped a few feet from him, I noticed instantly he dwarfed me not only in height but in build. He was two of me, at least.
Oh God.
This was not good.
The man in white robes said something I didn’t understand not because I was freaking out but because it was in a weird language and the man known as The Dragon tore his furious, brown-green gaze from me and looked at him then he lifted a fist.
My torso swayed back as the massive thing sliced through the air.
Dad clutched me tighter then forced me forward so I was standing beside The Dragon as he pried my fingers from his elbow and lifted my hand, curling my frozen fingers over The Dragon’s fist and holding them there.
God, my fingers got nowhere near covering his mighty fist.
The music stopped.
Oh shit.
The man in robes said something and my Dad replied with a loud, authoritative, “Yes!” his fingers squeezed mine then he was gone.
Gone!
Just like that.
Oh shit!
Without any ado, the man in robes tipped his head to the ceiling and started babbling in a foreign language that was nothing like anything I’d ever heard before. And I’d heard a lot of foreign tongues and knew my way around a few of them.
Crap.
This went on for awhile as I stood next to my scary giant groom. Then it went on for another while.
Then it went on.
All the time it went on, I stood with my hand on The Dragon’s fist and, well… that was that.
Strange.
So strange and it went on for so long, I started to relax. Then I tensed when the robed guy turned abruptly and moved to stand in front the statue of the dude with his hands on his hips. The robed guy lifted his arms to the statue and started droning again.
Then he droned more. Then more. Then some more.
About fifteen minutes later, he moved to the statue of the woman with her hands
on her belly and started droning again.
Hells bells, if he prayed to all of them for fifteen minutes, we’d be standing there, hands raised, for over an hour.
The packed church was silent behind us and the robed guy seemed like he was in trance of ecstasy, chatting it up in prayer with the lady statue so I figured maybe I should take that moment to get to know the scary guy whose hand I was kind of holding and who would be (maybe if this wedding didn’t last a decade) my husband for a year.
Shit.
I peeked at him out of the corner of my eye.
Okay, slightly less scary. He didn’t look pissed anymore. His eyes were aimed at the robed guy and he looked bored out of his skull.
I could dig that. I was getting bored too. Maybe I could work with this.
So I pulled my shit together and shuffled my body a little closer to his.
I stopped when his head tipped down, his green-brown eyes captured mine and they went from bored to mildly annoyed which was still super-freaking-scary.
I stared up at him.
But what could I do? Really, I had no choice.
So I whispered, “Uh… hi.”
His dark brows snapped together.
Yep, that was super-freaking-scary too.
Oh hell.
I plowed on, still whispering. “Uh… do we have to stand with our hands like this?”
His expression didn’t change and he made no reply.
“I mean,” I went on, tipping my head to robed guy, “he’s kinda into what he’s doing so I think he wouldn’t notice if we took a break.”
No answer but his eyes didn’t leave mine.
I kept going. “He’s so into it, we could probably go sit down or even,” I tried to joke and smiled up at him, “go out, get a beer and come back and he’d still be at it.”
His eyes narrowed on my mouth.
Definitely super-freaking-scary.
I stopped smiling and stopped speaking and his eyes snapped back to mine. I wanted to look away but for some reason, I couldn’t. Maybe it was because, really, upon closer inspection, he could be seriously hot if he didn’t look like he wanted to break me in two.
Then I really wanted to look away when his eyes started roaming, my face, my hair, my crown and then they drifted down where they took their time examining my ample cleavage.
Ho boy.
In the middle of this, for some reason, his jaw got hard (or, harder), his angry scowl returned, his eyes came back to mine for a slash before they turned back to the robed guy.
Well, that didn’t work.
The robed guy moved to the next statue and started jabbering at it.
I tried to figure out my next move but there wasn’t one. I was apparently a princess at my wedding to a man known as The Dragon, both my parents didn’t seem to like me much, I was standing in front of a huge church with a shitload of people in it and I was getting married in the longest, most boring ceremony in the history of time.
Not a single bit of that was good, even the princess part.
Okay, that wasn’t true. The princess part was good. So were my crown and my kickass clothes, not to mention my boots and underwear.
And I kinda liked the sleigh and wished I’d had a moment to enjoy the ride because I was guessing it would have been fun.
I held onto those thoughts as I kept my hand curled around his fist and then the robed guy moved onto the next statue.
Then, ever game (this was my adventure and I had to make the most of it, as I always did because that was what my parents taught me to do), I pulled in a breath and braved another step closer to my scary groom. I got so close, our arms brushed and his chin dipped back down so he could scowl at me.
“Hi,” I whispered, “me again. Your future wife?” I made a lame attempt at a joke.
He did not laugh. He did not even smile. He continued to scowl but said no words.
Maybe he didn’t have a sense of humor. Maybe he actually had no emotions at all except being bored and pissed.
“Uh…” I persevered, “what are those statues made of? That looks like marble. I’ve never seen anything like it. It’s gorgeous.”
His head tipped slightly to the side but his eyes went alert.
Uh-oh!
Stupid!
Sjofn would totally know what those statues were made of and likely have seen them countless times before (unless, of course, she wasn’t religious).
Shit!
“Uh…” I mumbled quickly, “I mean, I should know, of course. And I’ve, uh… seen it before, obviously, I mean, seen those statues before just not um…” Shit! “That marble, uh… anywhere else. But I never thought to ask and um… well, we seem to have time to chat.”
He glared at me. Then he shook his head once and looked back at the robed guy.
Okay, that didn’t work either.
I sighed and I did this heavily.
Then a thought occurred to me. I squeezed my fingers on his fist to get his attention and his head turned and dipped to look at me again.
I fought the fear his scary-assed glower sent slithering through my belly, got up on my toes and leaned in slightly, whispering, “Do you speak my language?”
Again with the brows snapping together and narrowing of eyes so I dropped back down on my feet and leaned away an inch.
Then, his voice came quiet but deep and growling and just as scary as the rest of him, “Have you been at the drink?”
The bad news was, he thought I was tipsy. The good news was, he spoke English.
“No, I… don’t think so,” I answered, still whispering.
“If you do not know then you have and have had too much,” he returned, still growling quiet.
“Well, I don’t feel lightheaded or sick and I’m not swaying or singing, which I do, a lot when I’ve imbibed too much so,” I tried another smile, “evidence is suggesting I’m not shitfaced.”
He aimed his narrow-eyed, knit-browed scowl at my mouth again then it snapped back to my eyes.
Then he growled low, quiet and now ominous, “Shut your mouth…” his neck bent further so his angry face was closer and finished, “future wife.”
He spit out the last word like it tasted foul then straightened and looked at the robed guy again and so did I to see he had fortunately moved onto the next statue.
Hmm. None of that went well. Not any of it. Not even a little bit.
And I was right when I first saw him, he didn’t want to be here at all but, I was getting the impression, especially not with me.
I decided to try again maybe at the reception. Maybe after I had some alcohol and maybe after I got some down him. Maybe he’d loosen up then. Maybe, if I got enough down him, he’d pass out so I could avoid the wedding night, uh… festivities until I could figure out how to avoid the marital consummation on the whole.
In other words, hijack a sleigh and get the fuck out of Dodge.
I stood silent as the robed guy kept talking to statues then finally moved back to stand in front of us then he said a bunch more stuff and at long last, he smiled, put a hand on my shoulder, another one he reached high to put on The Dragon’s shoulder and he nodded up at The Dragon happily.
He dropped his hands and I wondered if that was it or if we would exchange rings or vows and I hoped I didn’t have anything I was supposed to know to say but I didn’t wonder long.
This was because The Dragon turned his fist, it opened and his long fingers engulfed my hand and I realized his big body was turning to me.
I turned to him, tipped my head back to look up and then I felt my stomach drop.
He was smiling, even, beautiful white teeth against tan skin. And his eyes were shining with a light that looked a bizarre and terrifying mixture of wolfish, amused, lethal and heated.
Then he let my hand go and before I knew what was happening, his long, strong arms were wrapped around me, one tight at my waist lifting my feet clean off the floor, hauling me up his body, the fingers of the other driving into my
hair to cup the back of my head.
I let out a surprised cry as my hands automatically went to his shoulders to hold on, I vaguely heard a few excited whoops from the church but then he was forcing my head down, his was slanting and… oh God… oh God! – he was going to kiss me!
Nope, he wasn’t going to. He did.
And no sooner had he crashed my mouth down to his when his mouth opened, his tongue forced my lips open and he kissed me.
Deep, rough, hard, wet and oh so very hungry.
And last, but definitely not least, skillful.
I didn’t know this guy and he scared the living daylights out of me but that did not take one iota away from the fact that the man could freaking kiss.
It was the best kiss I’d ever had. By far.
Wow.
His head jerked back, tearing his mouth from mine and I stared down at him dazed.
I was wrong. He wasn’t scary. He was totally, freaking hot.
I heard but yet didn’t hear the calls, shouts, clapping and whoops as the daze of his kiss slid away from me and I saw I had wrapped my arms around his neck and he was looking up at me, again scary-pissed but now also guarded-pissed.
What?
Then he dropped me so heavily on my feet, I instantly had to brace so my knees wouldn’t buckle. I barely got my legs under control when his hand gripped mine and he was dragging me down the aisle.
Yes, dragging me.
Uh-oh.
I had to run to keep up with his long strides as I heard my father shout from behind me, “Drakkar! What are you doing? Where are you going? The celebration!”
The Dragon didn’t slow, not even a little bit as my father called and people stopped cheering and clapping and started buzzing with surprise but I had to keep up with him or he’d be dragging my prone body behind him rather than my sprinting one.
We made it to the vestibule and he yanked my cloak out of a waiting girl’s hands, another one rushed to me, shoving my gloves at me. I took them reflexively and we were out in the cold.
Then I was up, thrown bodily, yes bodily, into the back of a sleigh. My cloak was tossed at me, landing against my chest and lap.
I blinked at my new husband in shock, my heart hammering, he gathered a bunch of leather straps, thrust them in my hands and I automatically gripped them. Then, as people poured out of the church, he wasted not a second mounting a glossy, huge steed, twirling it around then he leaned to the side, slapping the rump of one of the four horses fixed to my sleigh and shouting, “Yah!”