Mastered By the Viking King by Lily Harlem

Chapter 4

Njal held the hand of his new bride and supped on a horn of mead. Finally a sliver of contentment came over him. He was grateful for it. The twisting in his guts—green, bitter, and sharp—had faded just a little.

Tove, she was a pretty little thing. She was too bony, he’d admit that—and she could do with finer clothes on her back—but with her he’d have hot, naked, sweaty fun on the long, dark days and nights of winter.

Two loaded plates of food were set on their laps. Bread, meat, dried fish, nuts, and pickled berries.

Tove’s eyes went wide as she stared at it, her free hand hovering.

“Eat,” he said. “And enjoy knowing you will never be hungry again. No queen of mine will want for food.” He released her hand and banged his chest. “I am a fine hunter, and a king of many hunters. Food will always be on our table.”

She nodded, then the tip of her small pink tongue poked out and she licked her lips.

His jaw clenched. He’d never been drawn to such a delicate-looking female, but he couldn’t deny the attraction. It was wrapped up in protectiveness, too. She’d clearly had a hard life up until this point. But he’d change that.

He’d make her happy and keep her satisfied.

Grasping a hunk of meat, Njal chewed on it, turning his attention to the revelry in the Great Hall. There was lots of eating and drinking going on, as well as music and laughter. The wind whipped over the roof, rattling the huge doors but the festivities continued. Even the first snows of the winter couldn’t dampen the rejoicing brought by a new queen on the throne.

When the food had been eaten and the music had stopped, Njal stood.

“It is time for everyone to leave. I wish to be alone with my royal bride.”

Vikings and their wives and maidens turned weary heads to look at him. A few yawned, others rose and stretched.

“Now!” he shouted.

There was a sudden rustle of movement, scraping of chairs, and the banging of boots. The doors were flung open. A swirl of snow-strewn wind rushed in, and the fires flickered in protest.

He set his hands on his hips and watched as townsfolk gathered their belongings and pulled on furs. The night was brutally cold; it would be that way for months to come. Fortunately, they’d had a good season fishing and hunting, and the crops had grown well.

Halfdan, his closest advisor, was last to leave. He turned, nodded at Njal, then pulled the doors shut behind him.

Njal drained the last of the mead from his horn. His belly was full, his blood warm, and now he wanted to devote his attention to the new woman at his side.

She needed to understand how it would be from this point on. He couldn’t risk it being any other way.

In return for her obedience and loyalty, he’d ensure every aspect of her life was taken care of, from food to treasure, pleasure and satisfaction.

And he’d have to start as he meant to go on. With a firm hand.

* * *

Tove set her plate aside and stared at her new husband’s broad shoulders. Even without the fur draped over them, they were as wide as a doorway. His sheer size sent a shiver of trepidation through her. She couldn’t imagine his strength, or how fast he could run, and she was sure the skill with which he’d fight and hunt would take her breath away.

He was like no other she’d ever met. Her father had been a shy man, and strong, but not tall. Arne, well, yes, perhaps he was like him—a bigger, more powerful version with even more fire in his eyes.

King Njal slowly turned to face her. His eyebrows lowered, his mouth stern.

Her shiver turned into a full-blown body tremble. What did he want? To see her naked? Sex? Was he going to beat her the way some Vikings did their wives? Spank her the way Arne had Gert?

“We are alone for the first time, wife,” he said, pushing up the sleeves of his tunic and exposing thick forearms roped with muscle and tendon.

“Aye, my king.”

“No.” He shook his head. “You will call me Sire, or Njal, for although I am your king, I am also your husband.”

She swallowed and clenched her fists. “Njal.”

He sat, his knees apart, his concentration still fixed on her. “Do you have anything to say?”

Tove thought for a moment. “Why did you not choose Princess Hilda? She is very beautiful.”

“As are you.”

Tove released a sharp little giggle.

“What? You think you are not?”

“I am…”—she plucked at her threadbare tunic, which had seen better days—“not a princess.”

“A princess does not make a woman a good woman, and neither do clothes. Tell me, Tove—are you a good woman?”

She raised her gaze and looked at him, drawing in a deep breath. “I believe my parents taught me right. Aye.”

“I guess we will soon find out.” He paused. “You have heard about the last queen?”

She nodded.

“She betrayed me with a wanderer, believing him to be a god who passed through Halsgrof.”

Tove said nothing.

“She brought him into our house, fed him, bathed him.” He tapped the fingers of his right hand on his thigh. “And when I told her not to believe his lies, she disobeyed me, and took him into her bed.”

Tove’s heart was thudding, the irritation and disappointment clear in Njal’s voice. She hoped in the name of Thor, Odin, and Freya that she never inflicted such shame on her new husband.

“I will not be disobeyed, Tove.” He stopped tapping his fingers and studied her. “I will not stand for it.”

“I will not… disobey you, Sire.”

“I hope I can believe you.”

“You can.”

He frowned. “Get over my lap.”

Confusion swam in her mind. Had she heard him right?

“What?”

“You heard me. You might be thin and with the voice of a mouse but your ears work.” He smacked his palm upon his thigh. “Get over my lap.”

Tove’s stomach clenched. Her knees felt too weak to hold her.

“Now!” His voice was a bear’s roar.

She whimpered and stood.

What was he going to do to her?

“Over…”—he clasped her wrist and pulled her close—“…you go.”

“Oh!” The breath was pushed from her lungs as her breasts were flattened upon Njal’s rock-hard thighs, her crown rattling to the floor.

“You need to know,” he said, trapping her in place with his thick arm over her shoulders, “what will happen if you disobey me.”

“I won’t disobey you, Sire. I promise.” She scrabbled for something to hold on to, and found his leg. She clutched at his soft leather pants and tried to push up. “Please.”

“Keep still.” He pulled her closer against his body.

She kicked up her heels, trying to gain purchase to right herself. Over his knee she was so vulnerable and at his mercy.

“Stop that.” He batted at her calves. “Do not raise your feet.”

She gasped. “But—”

“I intend for you, my second queen, to know your place from day one.” He dragged at her tunic, rucking it from her ankles and up to her thighs.

Cool air washed over her skin. She was in the same vulnerable position Gert had been with her husband. Her head spun, blood rushing in her ears. She tried to think straight. Did the king want to have sex with her like this? She didn’t think so, but never having taken a cock she wasn’t sure of the details.

“You will eat like a queen,” he said, rubbing his wide hand up her right thigh to her bare ass. “And fill out this sweet behind. I’d prefer it a bit rounder.”

Unlike Gert, Tove kept very still, and stared unseeing at where she gripped his pants. He was stroking her buttocks—which were bare because she couldn’t afford undergarments—caressing the cleft, the under-creases. His fingers slipping through her flesh, over her flesh.

He treated her like his property, as if her ass was his.

I am his!

A strange warmth slid from his touch up to her belly. It was like nothing she’d ever felt before, honeyed and golden, spreading to her chest.

She belonged to someone. And not just anyone.

She belonged to the king.

King Njal—the biggest, richest, mightiest king in all the land.

How lucky she was.

Slap!

“Ouch!” She jerked and pitched forward. He landed a hard spank right across her buttocks. It stung like a hornet.

“This,” he said, “is what I should have done to my last queen.”

Slap. Slap. Slap.

“Oh!” She wriggled to get free.

But he held her securely.

Her bottom was heating as if real flames had licked over her delicate flesh.

“I should have spanked her round behind the moment she stepped out of line.”

“But I haven’t stepped out of line!” Tove gasped, her eyes misting.

“This will ensure you don’t.”

He spanked her again, several swift swipes of his hand that made her buttocks clench and heat grow between her legs.

He paused, and once again caressed her now sore ass.

“Please, no more.” She curled her toes in her boots. “Sire.”

“I will decide when this stops.”

“But… but…”

“What?”

“I am not your first queen, so why should I…” She paused, wondering if her words would make things worse.

“Go on.”

She gulped. “Why should I pay for her wrongs?”

He was quiet for a moment. “You are not. I am simply starting as I mean to go on—and that is by keeping my wife in line.”

“I will stay in line without… ouch!”

He’d resumed the spanking. Her poor bottom sizzled as he layered up the heat and pain. She gave into the sobs building in her chest, tears squeezing free from her eyes.

Over and over, his huge hand slapped down. The sound of flesh on flesh cracked around the Great Hall. Tove’s ears sang with it, and her skin prickled all over. All she could do was hang there and take it.

And then he stopped.

She was breathing hard. Her face was damp with tears, and her hair messy, sticking to her brow and cheeks.

“I have turned your rump bright red,” he said. “And it will pain you to sit.” He rubbed her right buttock and hip, then traced the line between her ass and thigh. “And when it pains you, remember that as your king, husband, and master I will take you over my knee whenever I deem it necessary.”

“Aye. I understand.” She sniffed.

“Mmm…” He slipped his finger to the point her slender thighs touched. “You really were hiding a particularly pretty bottom beneath that old tunic. I do believe we will have fun together.”

She was about to reply when his finger journeyed upward to the damp lips between her legs.

She sucked in a breath and froze. To feel him there, when she was flushed and sweaty… oh, what must he think of her?

Still, her mind swam and her heart thudded. He probed higher, slipping between her folds of flesh.

“Oh, Njal!” she gasped, raising her head, her neck arching. “I—”

“Shh… you are drenched, my sweet queen. I wish to feel your wetness.”

She bit her bottom lip and stared at one of the Great Hall’s fires, its flames dancing, casting fluttering shadows upon the wall.

She was fluttering, too, her cunny quivering as her new husband touched her in a place no one had before. The urges rushing through her body were a confused maelstrom of contradictions. She wanted to escape, free herself of his hold, but at the same time, a strange need, a craving to stay and be touched held her hostage.

His breathing was ragged.

Her ass tingled.

Then he slipped his finger into her entrance.

“Oh… in the name of Freya!” she gasped.

“Your cunny is tight,” he said in a hushed voice. “Very tight.”

“I… I…”

The broad tip of his finger was cool and hard, determined as it sank deeper. Then it came to a barrier, a part of her that didn’t want him to push any deeper.

She held her breath and mashed her lips together.

“Oh… well… Queen Tove… now I understand.” He chuckled. “Why, you really were the perfect choice. A maiden who has naught taken a man’s cock. Tell me that’s true.”

“Aye… it’s true.”

“So, I will be your first.”

“Aye, Sire.”

He stayed deep, his finger moving a little, stimulating the soft walls of her sex.

She moaned, not understanding why the dense pressure was drawing such a noise from her chest.

On and on he gave her his finger, not hard, but gently.

“My Tove,” he said. “You will become very used to me claiming your body. Your breasts, your mouth, your cunny, and your ass. It is all mine to do with as I wish.”

She gasped. A tumble of images of him using her rolled through her mind.

“I will put my fingers, my tongue, and my cock on you and in you. My cock will love your pretty mouth and demand you take it frequently. My cock will also love your tight cunny and will stretch it, fill it, possess it.”

“Njal,” she gasped, her toes curling and her hips rocking. His finger was wicked. It had cast a spell on her.

“And your ass,” he went on. “Aye, I’ll stake my claim deep in there too by taking your asshole with my cock.”

“What! I…” His cock? In her asshole? He must be mistaken. She wouldn’t survive that, surely.

“And if you think I do not speak the truth about that, you are wrong.” He circled his finger, spreading the sweet arousal gathering in her cunny. “I will sink deep into your ass, when it is rounder, when you have become accustomed to my needs and my size. But do not think, my queen, that resisting me there will be of benefit. I will have all of your body. Every hole. Say it. Say I will have all of you.”

“Sire… oh…”

He withdrew, leaving her missing him there, her cunny clenching around nothing.

“Say it.”

“Aye, you can have all of me, you will have all of me.” The words tumbled from her mouth. “I am yours, my king, my husband.”

“That pleases me to hear.” He spanked her bottom again. “Very. Much.” He punctuated each word with a slap.

She lurched forward, the smacks shocking her.

Spank. Spank.

She squeezed her eyes closed and held in the cries that threatened to erupt from her throat. His treatment of her was unfair, but she was powerless to stop it. Completely and utterly at her new husband’s mercy, she had no choice but to take his palm, tolerate the wild heat boiling her rear. The pain came, more and more, again and again, his wide palm spreading the humiliation and the torment.

Suddenly he dragged her tunic over her rump and hauled her up onto his knee.

“Ah… oh, it hurts!” The rough fabric abraded her punished buttocks.

“As it should.” He cupped her cheeks and stared into her eyes. “Do you swear your loyalty to me in and out of our bedchamber?”

“Aye.” Her breasts were rising and falling, pressing on her tunic. Her nipples were hard and tight. “I do.”

“And your obedience and devotion.” His eyes were so dark, like the deepest, blackest section of a fjord on a winter’s night.

She nodded. “Aye. I do.”

“Good.”

“And Njal.” She paused. “Can I ask you something?”

“Aye, my queen.” He touched the tip of his nose to hers.

She could smell his breath, sweet with mead. Her heart did a little flip. The Great Hall seemed to fade away, leaving only Njal.

He filled her vision, consumed her thoughts.

“Speak,” he said softly.

“You won’t…”

“What?”

Her mouth was dry. “You won’t spank me again if I ask you… this?”

He raised his thick eyebrows. “I can’t promise that. If it displeases me, you’ll feel the weight of my hand on your rear.”

She trembled.

“But you might as well say it now.” His fingers weaved into her hair, holding her steady and close.

“My father… and mother, they loved each other very much, do you think you could ever…”

“What, my queen? Could I ever what?”

She’d just have to say it. “Love me?” The words barely came out as a whisper. “Could you ever love me?”

His nostrils flared. “Love you.” His voice was gruff. He pulled back a little. “Is that what you want? Love?”

“Aye.”

“Not just food and shelter?”

“No,” she said quickly. “I believe in happiness and love. I want that.”

His mouth stretched into a smile. “Why, I do believe you have a real voice inside that pretty little head of yours.”

“I’m sorry, have I displeased you?” She wasn’t sure. He was smiling, but he’d chosen her because she was quiet.

“No, I like that you know what you want, Tove.” His face drew closer again. He slid his right hand down the column of her neck and cupped her left breast.

She gasped, his big palm a heavy weight upon her.

“And in answer to your question,” he went on. “I, too, want love—but you will have to earn it.”

“I did nothing to earn that spanking.”

He frowned, his brow creasing, eyes narrowing to thin slits.

She tensed. She’d pushed him too far. Spoken without thinking.

“It is true, a spanking would usually be a punishment, earned from a misdeed. That one was to demonstrate what will happen should you step out of line.”

“You could have just told me you’d redden my ass if I was disobedient.”

“Where would the pleasure in that have been?” The right side of his mouth tipped into a sexy, roguish grin.

Irritation poked at her. “So, can I ask for something, to weigh up the balance?”

“You wish to make a deal with me? The king?”

“I wish to make a deal with my husband.”

She nodded at the crown on the floor.

He stooped and retrieved it, passing it to her.

She placed it on her head. “If anyone can make a deal with the king, surely it is the queen.”

Oh, Tove, why are you speaking this way? You’ll be thrashed before morn.

His face softened. “That is true.” He released her and sat back, folding his arms.

She remained perched on his lap with her fingers knotted. She kept her chin raised, partly to ensure the security of the crown, partly because she felt he’d respect her more if she didn’t cower.

“So, ask for this… thing,” he said. “And I will decide if I wish to give it.”

“Food.”

“You have just eaten, but yes… I can call for more.”

“No, not for me. My mother, she is starving and freezing. Living in Cativad, she has barely enough to survive the winter.”

“Winter is here.”

“Only just—the pass is still open. Please.” She clasped her hands to her chest. She hated to beg, but the life of her mother was worth it. “Can you send grain? A few chickens, dried fish? It will be the difference between life and death for her. Since my father died, and—”

He pressed his finger to her lips. “Shh.” He pulled in a deep breath. “Of course, we will send food to the queen’s mother.”

“Thank you.” A tide of relief washed through her.

“And firewood? Does she require that?”

“Yes. She does. I tried to chop but my father’s axe, it is so heavy and—”

“Sh, I can tell you are a good daughter.”

“I try to be.”

He clasped her around the waist, then stood, placing her on her feet beside the throne. “I must send a Viking now, this night. It may be too late if we wait until the ‘morrow.”

“Thank you.”

“Do not thank me, Tove. It is not your thanks I require.”

“But…”

“Behave as a queen should. That is what I ask of you. That is your duty to me and your people now.”