Ægir's Wife Ch. 04

His charm, a length of rope with his birthstone in the middle, would dangle at the very spot his knot had that night. A couple of inches to the left dangled a dagger with Mikael's birthstone at the hilt of handle. He had swallowed his anger at his middle brother's brash use of the damned thing to mark her breast long enough to order the charm anyway. For Bjorn, it had been a flogger also with his birthstone in the handle. There was even a music note with Monika's.

He sighed as he rubbed the intricate white gold links between his fingers. He hoped with his whole heart that he would be ordering another link within the year. For their child.

He smiled as he placed the necklace in the pocket of his coat. It was absolutely perfect, just like she was. He just prayed that they would have many years of adding new charms before any were lost. His mother's was almost bare these days, only her son's and Olaf's remained.

He remembered her face each time she had pressed a charm into the stiff, cold hands of her husbands. Of course, he had not even been born when she had done the same to his own father. He swallowed at the pain and fear that always accompanied that thought. But today was not about those ancient hurts. No, it was about love. Valentine's Day. There could be no more perfect day for her collaring.

Maybe he should have consulted his brothers first, but then too Bjorn had not consulted him before messing in her mind with that orgasm control and conditioning shit. And Mikael had certainly not consulted them before putting his mark on the flawless alabaster skin of her breast. Besides he seriously doubted either would object to this...his mark upon their wife.

No, it was not the collar that had his stomach in knots and his chest so tight that he was not certain how he was even able to breathe. It was those words. "Æ ælske dæ." They had just slipped out that first time. And never once in their nights together this past few days had she mentioned them. Whether it was because like him, she was not ready to face such complexities or because she had forgotten them, he had not. He could not.

Honestly, they were a complication he had never expected to face. 'Love' just was not something that was necessary in his life. Or so he had thought until... Well, he was still not sure exactly when he has fallen in love with his wife.

From the moment, she had responded so openly, honestly and innocently to that first challenge, he had felt an excitement that no other sub had ever elicited in him. And from the moment he had seen her, touched her, listened to her laughter, it had only intensified. Claiming her that first time had certainly shaken him as no other sexual experience ever had.

No matter how fucking hard he had fought it. Fighting loving this woman was like trying to hold your breath. You could only do it for so long until the burning pain in your lungs forced you to gasp and draw huge lungs full of fresh air into them. And that was what she was...fresh air...for all of them.

No, she deserved to hear those words. To know how he felt about her. He may never be fully counted among the toffelhjälten. He might never be the besotted lover like his baby brother. Or even the funny man that Mikael was with her. He was certain that those words would be rare and never come easy for him. But he would not wait for his death bed...or hers...to say them either.

Now he just had to find the courage to deliver the speech that he had been practicing for days, since the moment he had ordered her collar...and paid a small fortune to make certain it arrived in time for this day. He smiled as he realized there was a skip in his step as he covered the short distance between the boat and the Holding.

As he climbed the stairs, he actually found himself humming the tune of a ridiculously sappy love song that had been translated from Norwegian into English. Though the hair color in the song was all wrong for her, the rest certainly fit. He had never felt so connected to her...to his family...to the Holding. For the first time, he truly felt alive without being at sea and battling Njord.

He was so caught up in excitement that he threw open the door to her room without knocking. He stopped in the doorway. His heart stopped beating. Air froze in his lungs, "I promise you by the end of the week. You will have my reply about the job by then."

Sven tried to swallow the foul taste that bubbled up in his throat. He tried to quiet the raging storm that howled through his mind. He tried to still the trembling in his hands that hung limply at his side. None of them seemed capable of responding to his brain. What little was left of the damned thing.

Job? What job? She had not asked any of them permission to take a job here. No, according to his mother, they could not get her into town after that first bad experience with their blasted 'cousins.' The men had been their bane of existence their whole lives. So it did not make sense that she was talking about a job in the village and it was certainly too far to commute to the city.

Which meant? Well, it damned well sounded like she was planning to go back there. To pick up her career and old life just like Greta had when she abandoned Mikael and Monika. He shook his head as the pain cleared enough to be replaced by anger. She had just been using them all along. Some warped holiday to explore her kinky side. That was all they had ever been to her.

He was across the room before he knew it. His hand gripped hers so tightly that she dropped the phone to the ground. He did not even think as his booted foot crushed it into the hard wood floor shattering the screen, even though he could still hear some voice on the other end, calling out to her. "Kirsty, Kirsty! Are you all right, honey?"

"MY wife will be fine. But she is not taking whatever job you are discussing. Her place is here...with us," he did not wait for a reply or give the woman a chance to phone back as he lifted his foot again and crushed the phone beneath his heel completely. He fought back the need to crush her too as he battled for the control that had been his way of life...until she came and screwed everything up.

"What fucking job, Kirsten?" he screamed as he tightened his hold on her wrist even more. If he had been thinking at all, he might have loosened his grip when he saw her draw back in fear. But he was too far gone then.

Anger, hurt and betrayal were a dangerous cocktail when mixed as they were with newly discovered emotions. Too powerful to be easily overcome. "Answering me, woman. Or I swear I will fucking open that back of yours with the whip," he said as he ripped open her blouse.

"You do and I will fucking kill you," said the cold, steely voice as Mikael spun him around, his fist connecting with Sven's jaw so powerfully that both he and Kirsty fell back against the bed.

Before Sven could say or do anything else, Bjorn was in the room and reached for her, drawing her tightly against his chest. "Me, first," his baby brother declared his intentions as he shoved her behind them both.

But Sven was not to be stopped. Incensed by betrayal and pain that seemed more than he could bear in that moment.

Of course, the toffelhjälten could not see her for the conniving little bitch that she was. Why was he not surprised? It had taken Mikael years to see it in Greta...and it seemed not even that had wizened the man up. Of course, what would Bjorn, the virgin, know of women and their capacity for duplicity?

No, only he knew what they were really like...always looking for some excuse to betray the men who loved them, who gave them everything. He above all others had seen that over and over again. He who had played with dozens of married subs.

Well, if she fucking thought that he was letting his wife off so fucking easily, she would learn. So would the little fools, "Don't you fucking see? She has just been using us. Using us to fulfil her fantasies. Now she is off back to her fucking old life...abandoning us just like..."

"Don't you fucking say her name or I swear it will be the last word you say for months until your jaw heals," Mikael stormed closer to him.

"No, it isn't like that...I swear," she clutched at Bjorn's back.

His baby brother shook his head and pushed her back, "You don't need to say anything else, Kirsty. Wait for us downstairs while we handle this."

Sven shook his head at her acting abilities. How many times had he buried his head between a woman's thighs and tortured her with his tongue as she chatted like nothing was happening on the phone with the husband she was betraying? Not HIS wife. She was not betraying him, them. He would make damned certain that she paid for this.

But one thing was certain...she was not going back. Even if she had killed that silliness and false hope that he had foolishly given into, he was not letting her go. He never would. He did not need to love her to own her.

She might have thought this was some game, a fun holiday, a kinky one. Well, hadn't his own mother tried the same the stupid shit with their fathers? And look how that turned out. No, as that silly saying went...she had made her bed, now she must lie in it. Even if he had to fucking tie her to it every damned time they left this place. His wife would learn her place.

Let the toffelhjälten deal with that too as he came up swinging, connecting with Bjorn's ribs and doubling his baby brother over in the process. So much for the kid's size advantage. "Do not coddle the conniving little cunt," he said as he drove his knee into his stomach.

He spun around and connected a solid blow to Mikael's jaw at the same moment that another landed on the side of his head, leaving his ears ringing and his head spinning. But he was determined to take his toll on them both before going down. "You never fucking learn what they are like do you?" he taunted his brother. The look on Mikael's face told him that his words scored a more powerful blow than even his fists had.

He stepped back then, watching as she ran to Bjorn to comfort him. He had had enough of all of them. "Hear me now...you are not going back there. You belong to me now. You will fucking learn your place."

He stared from Mikael to Bjorn, "And the two of you will fucking grow a set of balls when it comes to her. She is not going to use this family and then just abandon us the way that other bitch did. So stay the fuck out of my way when I need to correct her."

He did not stay to hear what they said as he stormed from the room. Instantly, he was across the small distance and standing on the deck of the only piece of solid ground he had ever known. Her name was Ægir's Captive for a reason. Because the only way to have what you wanted in this world was to fucking take it. She would learn when he took what was his, he fucking kept it too.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out the collar that had cost him over a thousand of her pounds. He drew back his arm and threw it as far as he could into the fjord, the sea that had always been the only thing that was true. The only thing he could count. His true wife and mistress.

He just needed to remind himself of that fact and push the fucking pain that ate at his soul away. The sea. Sons. That was what this was all about. Love had no place in this fucked up world. It was just an illusion for fools like his brothers. He had lived forty years without it. He could live another forty just as easily.

'Really?' 'Can you?' sang the wind as it wiped about him. Ice and snowing bleating his face as they mixed with hot tears that he would deny until the end of his days and this fjord swallowed his body just as it had that meaningless piece of gold and gems. He did not need her. Them. Love. Any of it.

He did not.