A Wife for the Highlander

The next six weeks were the happiest of times. The warm summer days were no match for the heat of their nights as they gardened vigorously. Her maidens commented on how after marrying Keane, Fianna seemed to glow in a way she never had before. Even Keane noticed and commented that she seemed more vibrant and alive than he'd ever seen her.

She'd always had irregular bleeds, part of the curse of being barren she assumed, but one morning, after a particularly energetic session of gardening the night before, she tumbled from his bed to heave into a chamber pot. Her sickness caused him to stir in his sleep, but didn't awaken him, and as her stomach settled, she felt a glimmer of hope.

The second time she awoke sick, four days later, he'd woken with her. He held her and murmured his concerns as she spilled the contents of her stomach into the pot. She said nothing of her previous sickness and claimed the goose pie from the night before hadn't set well with her after such a thorough, and prolonged, tilling of her garden.

"Keane," she asked three weeks later. She'd been sick several more times and Keane was becoming increasingly concerned. She could no longer keep her secret, and having not bled since before he'd taken her hand, she was almost certain now of the cause of her morning sickness. "May we go back to the glen where you took my hand?"

"Of course."

"Can we do it today?"

"If you'd like."

Knowing he'd agree, but wanting him to think he'd had a choice, she'd already ordered the cooks to prepare a meal for their travel. The last time they'd made the journey, she'd prepared their meal herself, but she'd stopped working in the kitchen because the smells of cooking sometimes made her nauseous.

Little more than three hours later, they were sitting beside the same babbling brook, and after their meal of roasted lamb and cabbage, they walked in the same meadow. When he stopped to kiss her in, likely, the same place he'd taken her hand, she'd accepted his kiss, but then began loosening the ties of her tunic. Smiling and taking her hint, knowing she enjoyed him undressing her, he slowly disrobed her before he removed his own garments.

They settled, disappearing into the tall, slowly swaying wildflowers that covered the meadow. As always, he heaped pleasure on her with lips and fingers, kissing her from lips to mound. Keane was an adventuresome lover, a man that took little notice of the teachings of the church when pleasuring his wife, but even he wouldn't go so far as to use his mouth on her garden, the most grievous of sins between husband and wife. When she thought she could stand the caress of his lips and the touch of his fingers no more, he knew, he always knew, and slid his sword into her sheath.

Her back arched as she moaned in pleasure, his staff filling her to perfection. Tasting her lips, he thrust into her slowly, building her pleasure higher with each deep thrust. As the hard ground began to hurt her back, he again knew, and pulled himself from her. When they were joining, it was as if he could read her thoughts, always providing her with what she wanted at the perfect moment to insure her peak pleasure.

He tumbled from between her thighs and hoisted her to her hands and knees as she turned away from him. When he first began taking her from behind, she'd objected, the church teaching the position was akin to rutting animals and a sin, but he'd brushed her concerns aside, just as he had when he'd first wanted to disrobe her, and then when he'd first taken her as they lay on their sides. If rutting like animals was a sin, God would simply have to forgive her, for she could deny him nothing.

He slid his shaft deep and began to till her garden with vigor, their soft gasps and groans telling of their efforts, and their pleasures. After long minutes of tilling, he lifted her from her hands to balance her on her knees as he teased her breasts with his big, strong, but gentle hands while caressing her neck with his lips. She moaned, awash in the pleasures of husband and wife as he thrust into her with a steady, pleasurable, beat. When she was with Boadhagh, they always sprinted to the finish, and if she didn't finish soon after him, she was sometimes left wanting, but not with Keane. He took her slowly, drawing out her pleasure until she was very nearly mad with her need for him to finish her in a frenzy of passion... something he often did more than once before he succumbed to his own rush. No matter who experienced the quickening first, he always, always, made sure she was weak and well satisfied before their gardening was finished.

She could sense her rush taking her, and she wrenched herself from his embrace, dropped to her hands again, and then pushed back into him, wanting to feel his rod deep inside her. With her hard backward push and a long, loud, stuttering groan, she quickened, her rapture causing her to lunge away from his shaft before collapsing to her stomach, the crushed grass and flowers cool against her flaming skin.

He hadn't quickened, and she expected him to throw himself across her back and pin her to the soil as he made her his a second time, but he didn't. Instead, he tumbled to the ground beside her on his back before taking her arm and pulling her toward him.

With a groan, she went to him with a smile. She'd been so deep in her rush that she'd hadn't felt him seed her garden. She tried to snuggle into the crook of his arm, but he continued tugging, steering her onto his chest. A wave of fear washed over her. A wife on top of her husband in the dominate position? Only having his rod in her mouth, or his tongue in her garden, was more sinful!

"Keane, no," she whispered as she tried to pull back. "It's forbidden!"

"By who? The church?" he growled, his face firm.

"By nature! Women are not to usurp the role of men!"

Handling her easily, he pulled her over his chest. "I'm yours to command," rumbled as he continued to adjust her position,"and you're not usurping my role by mounting me if I wish it. We are one, dear Fianna, two halves of the whole." He held her gaze for a moment. "Does it matter to a pear which half is on top?"

She held his gaze for a long moment and then smiled. He always knew what to say to put her at ease. They were as one, and he was right. A whole pear was just as sweet no matter how it was placed in the bowl. Taking his lips, she rose slightly. His kiss became even more impassioned as he gripped his staff and held it erect as she settled over it.

Her moan was long and loud, his rod caressing her in ways she'd never experienced before. She began rocking, his shaft rock hard as it plunged into her most secret place. She rode him for a long moment as they softly cried out their pleasure. With a growl, he pulled her down, crushing her breasts into his muscled chest before encircling her in a rib creaking embrace, but she wanted to be held tighter still. Placing one hand on the back of her head as if to protect her, he drew he legs up and began thrusting into her, taking her with greater fury than any man ever had, and she welcomed it.

Their quiet cries became loud wails as he took her, making his love for her manifest in both deed and voice. She called out her rapture, her quickening refusing to be silenced as she jerked and twisted, her rush forcing her into motion. Beneath her, Keane bellowed in the guttural roar of a man in battle, planting his seed while still tilling her garden with savage abandon.

Finally, his roar of effort, lust, and pleasure cut off as his madly thrusting hips drove his staff deep with a final plunge. He strained beneath her, his face twisted in pain and pleasure, until with an explosive gasp, he relaxed and his hips fell back to the earth. She clung to him, panting as if after hard labors, too feeble to move. Never had a quickening left her so weak and drained.

She lay still for a long moment, his rod still in her womb, his fingers caressing her back with slow, feathery touches before she slid into the crook of his arm, the sun warming her flesh as his love warmed her heart. In their love making he'd elevated her, placing her in control over him, a sin in the eyes of the church, but she didn't care. She'd been a soiled woman, a woman he thought couldn't bear him children, but he'd taken her hand anyway and accepted her as she was. Boadhagh would have never accepted her control over him, but Keane had not only not cared, he'd placed her there himself in a silent reminder that he'd given himself fully to her, just as she'd given herself to him. She'd never been as happy as she was at this moment, and everything that had been broken about her, he'd made right.

"Keane?" she murmured.

"Yes, my love," he rumbled, his voice slow and thick.

"Are you happy?"

He heaved a huge sigh. "Utterly. I have never been as happy as I am at this very moment, and yet, each day, I'm happier still."

She smiled that his words mirrored her thoughts. "Are you worried about not having an heir?"

"There's plenty of time. When the time is right, I'll allow you to choose another for me."

Her smile spread, her bubbling excitement increasing with every word they spoke, and she struggled to contain a giggle. "Then I shall choose a woman with the face of a pig!"

He chuckled. "Compared to you, my love, all women have the face of a pig."

She drew a pattern on his chest with her finger. "And you wouldn't mind? You wouldn't mind if I chose an ugly woman for you to plant your seed in?"

He sighed again, but this one seemed slightly melancholy. "No. It's simply a task that must be performed."

"And if I don't wish you to plant your seed in another?" she asked, straining with all her might to not smile.

He frowned slightly and then twisted his head to look at her. "Then... I suppose I won't. Will you deny me an heir?" he asked.

"No," she said softly, losing her battle with her smile.

"But then how...?"

She rose, her smile playing broadly across her face as she kissed him gently on the lips. She pulled back from the kiss, enjoying his look of confusion. This was certainly going to set the hens to clucking and dispel any notion that Keane MacNobaill couldn't perform all the duties of a husband. What Boadhagh hadn't been able to do in five years, Keane had done in less than five weeks.

"I'm with child," she said softly before kissing him once more.