Saved by the Dark Knight
By Layla Skylar
Smashwords Edition
Copyright 2011 Layla Skylar
Smashwords Edition License Notes:
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
Saved by the Dark Knight
Katrina watched her mare Rosie grazing the meadow as she meandered along the bank of a stream, deep in thought. Her wedding was a mere month away now; time was a fickle trickster, slipping away from her. Soon she’d have no choice but to go to the bed of Lord Rolf a virgin, and she couldn’t stand the thought. He was nearing thirty years older than her, and had packed off his last two wives to convents when they proved too meek in the bedroom. Katrina didn’t think she’d be meek. She was more likely to scratch his eyes out when he laid a hand on her.
Her father had good reason to arrange the marriage. It was their family’s best hope of keeping their land, and thus the peasants’ best hope of not being subjected to the direct rule of Lord Rolf. For that reason, she hadn’t rebelled against her father’s wishes. But she couldn’t believe what she was being asked to do. Lord Rolf was so old, and to imagine her first experience of lovemaking with a decrepit old tyrant just didn’t do it for her. Yet what choice did she have?
Katrina stopped walking for a moment and watched the flow of the stream, gurgling over the rocks steady in its bed. She sank to sit on a rock there by the water’s edge, looking back over her shoulder to see Rosie grazing nearby. She wouldn’t cry; that’s what she would not do. It wasn’t like she was fourteen, some silly girl bent on a perfect wedding night. She’d seen enough women get married to understand that the ceremony was for the woman, the wedding night was for the man. Yet she also knew that women could find joy in the bedroom, and the bedding. She’d witnessed that in stolen moments in the castle as she skulked about avoiding the womanly work her mother had set her to.
One time she saw the maid enjoying herself with the stable boy, quite handily. They’d both made so many noises of pleasure that Katrina had almost lost her wits and joined in. They’d made her feel things she hadn’t understood at the time. But she’d thought on it a lot since, like when they went to the king’s court and watched the jousting, the knights on their fine horses, so shiny and utterly masculine. They’d pounded each other into dust on the jousting field. Katrina had wondered then, as she wondered now, what it would be like to spread her thighs and let a man like that pound into her body, consuming her with his heat, his form, his lust.
The idea made her tingle between her thighs, that spot at her core, that place where a man would enter her. She grew wet and hot and achy. She didn’t want the old man, Lord Rolf, to be the one to enter her. She knew he would be, but did it have to be him for her first time?
She’d already been subjected to her virginity test, and Lord Rolf’s old maid had confirmed she was entering her marriage in pristine virginal condition. Now, in another month that wouldn’t be the case. She’d be the mistress of Castle Cavenaught, and share Lord Rolf’s bed every night.
Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. Maybe he’d be a really good lover and make up for his age and looks. She could only hope, because there was a need in her that demanded to be satisfied, ever since she’d seen those knights on the jousting field last summer.
Katrina rose and kept walking, the stream’s continual movement calling her to the same. The late spring afternoon was warm and lush, and the foliage grew thick along the meandering path.
Suddenly, Katrina thought she heard a noise. When she stopped to listen, a soft moan drew her attention to the thicket in front of her. She saw Rosie prick her ears; the horse had been following her at a distance, grazing in the grassy meadow near Katrina’s route. There was definitely someone in there, and Katrina quelled the urge to run. She could leap on Rosie’s bare back in an instant and ride her trusted mare to home and safety. Yet safety wasn’t exactly what Katrina was after at the moment.
Those moans gave her a fair idea of what was going on in the bushes, but she still had wild fantasies about what she’d find if she took a peek. Did she dare?
She crept forward, her feet moving seemingly of their own volition, without orders from her. She knew she shouldn’t be doing this; it was far from the safest, most rational idea. She just couldn’t help herself. She was drawn to find out more about this unexpected treat in her otherwise dull life, which had become ever drearier as she dreaded the bed of a man nearly as old as her grandfather.
Katrina finally came to a spot where she could see through the branches to find a dark-haired man seated on the ground, leaning against a towering rock. His trews were open and his hand pumped at his lap. His head was thrown back and he moaned again, softly, as his hand slowed and the head of his penis showed above his fist, its large mushroom-top glistening. Katrina gasped, then clamped her mouth firmly shut as his dark eyes flew open and pinned her where she stood.
He grimaced, and she understood he didn’t want to stop; she was disturbing him.
She cleared her throat, but her voice still squeaked when she said, “Don’t stop on my account. Can I watch?” She blushed at the audacity of her question, and he took her in, looking at her from toes to tossed brunette curls.
“This is inappropriate. I do not take advantage of young ladies, despite what you may have heard of me.” Katrina realized then who she was speaking to; the Dark Knight of Lightloss – a legendary warrior who they said had a heart of ice and a will hard enough to match it. But Katrina had seen him fight last year, and she’d seen fire, not ice. He fought with passion, not the cold calculation that ice brought to mind. Even without his armor on, he made an impression. Rock solid strength and an indomitable will, not to mention, he was incredibly pleasing to the eye. His features were near perfect, despite his scowl, and his body had to be unmatched, even among knights.
“No, sir. It isn’t you who’s taking advantage. My apologies. I’ll leave.”
“Aren’t you the Regent Donovan’s daughter? You came to the joust last year.” He’d put himself away, much to Katrina’s chagrin. She’d hardly gotten a good look at all.
“I liked it. Watching you.” Her face heated to red the moment she registered her statement. “Well, I did.” She dared to smile at him.
He laughed, but then he sobered, quickly. “Aren’t you recently betrothed to Lord Rolf?”
Katrina looked away, but she nodded. “You sure do seem to know a lot about me.”
“I saw you last year. You’re beautiful. And you’re far above my station.” He made to walk past her, beginning to haul his pile of gear over to his hobbled horse, but she touched his arm lightly and then stepped back again.
Katrina wasn’t sure how far she was willing to go, but she did know she couldn’t let the answer to her wish walk out of this thicket without giving her some sort of experience she could take to her blighted bridal bed. “What is station, between a man and a woman?”
“Are you an idiot? It’s everything.”
“That’s not what I mean. Because I’m a noblewoman, yes, letting my husband be the first to bed me is expected as proper. What if I were another woman?”
“If you were an innkeepers daughter, I would woo you all eve to get you in my bed. You don’t do that sort of thing with a Regent’s daughter, or a Lord’s betrothed.”
“What if I swore never to tell, would you go back to what you were doing and let me watch?”
He chuckled. “I don’t know what’s lit your fire, but you have a wish to see a man, is that it?”
“I go to my bridal bed in a month. You know the Lord I’m to wed is old. I want to know a young man, a strong, vibrant, desirable man, before I honor my wedding vows.”
“How much do you want to know?”
“I’m not sure. First, could you show me again what you were doing?”
“Let me ask you a question first, since we’re getting all cozy here. Have you ever done what I was doing?” He shot her a wicked smile, and her skin heated instantly as her heartbeat surged.
“What do you mean?”
“Have you ever touched yourself, young noblewoman?”
“My name is Katrina,” she told him, avoiding answering his question. What her fingers did under her bedclothes was none of his business. She turned as if to walk off, and heard him groan behind her.
He watched her with evident frustration when she turned back toward him. Finally, his icy façade dropped, and he gave her a slow smile that further heated her blood. His hand dropped to the front of his trews, and he tugged at the laces, loosening them so he could expose himself to her.
She drew in a shuddering breath, her lungs, all her muscles really, feeling tight as wound chain. What she wouldn’t give for release. What she wouldn’t give to feel him on her, his hands touching her, laying her open wide and delving inside. What she wouldn’t give for that large mushroom-head she’d gotten a glimpse of to press against her most sensitive places, to rub there, as she’d often rubbed herself, until she felt that surge, that explosion of pleasure. Would it be better with a man? Probably, if it was a man like this.
Her Dark Knight drew his cock out of his pants and rubbed his fingers over the head she’d been thinking of. She gasped again at its size. He wrapped it in his fist and thrust his hips slightly. The movement made her belly drop and her own moisture soak her underclothes. He was beautiful.
Suddenly, she wanted to touch, but she hesitated a second after reaching out. She knew it was crossing a line, and that once she touched she was unlikely to stop herself from enjoying him fully. It turned out she didn’t care. Her virginity wasn’t worth preserving to her – just to her father and Lord Rolf. She was going to take the Dark Knight who had dropped into her lap, and let him save her from a passionless destiny.
His dark eyes held a question as they watched her slightly extended hand. His lips quirked in a sulky, disbelieving half-smile, and suddenly she wanted to shock him more than anything. Wanted to prove she wasn’t some animal waiting to be bred by whoever won her. She had her own needs, her own desires, and for once she would see them fulfilled.
With a confidence she hadn’t known was deep inside, Katrina closed the distance between them and took his hard cock in her hand. She felt his intake of breath, and knew she had shocked him. She shot him her own sassy half-smile and moved her hand along his warm, soft length. What a strange sensation, the skin hot and silky smooth. Her gaze dropped lower, and she examined his exposed manhood with all the interest and fervor of a passionate soul bound up in a virgin’s curiosity.
She ran her fingers along his cock, stretching her grip around the head and sliding her fist over him, as she’d seen him do. He wobbled, like his knees were going to go out from beneath him.
“You like that?” she asked.
He nodded, seemingly not trusting himself to speak. Instead, he placed his hand on the back of her hand, and guided her movements. A moment later he threw back his head with a moan, and stopped her hand. “No more.”
“What do you mean? We’re just getting started. You haven’t shown me hardly anything.”
“I meant no more of that or I’ll spill my seed and be no good to you.”
She brightened. “Really? You liked it that much? I don’t have any experience, so I didn’t think I’d actually please you.”
“It’s your inexperience, and your willingness to learn, that do please me. Now, Katrina, will you allow me to please you?” He asked so formally, but the look in his eyes was pure conquest.
She’d started this, but he would have her now. She knew it, and it thrilled her. She could only nod; she wasn’t sure exactly what he meant.
He stepped forward, and tilted her head up with one hand under her chin, until his lips could claim hers, teasing and retreating playfully, making her want more of him.