Page 5 of The Orc's Stolen Bride

The language barrier made her second guess that assumption. Forcing herself to think logically, or at least as logically as this totally unreal situation allowed, she decided that somehow she had been transported to another part of the globe by something - telekinesis, transporter beam, something. The how didn’t matter right now. What mattered was getting home. In order to do that, she needed to be able to communicate. If they refused to speak English, maybe she could get them to teach her whatever they were speaking.

“OK, let’s start at the beginning. I’m Kari.”

He was watching her closely, although he seemed more focused on her mouth than on her words.

“Kari,” she repeated, pointing at herself.

His teeth flashed white in the moonlight in a surprisingly attractive grin, but his tusks flashed as well and a shiver ran down her spine. How could they look so real?

“Kar-ii,” he said softly and smiled again. He pointed at himself. “Wulf.”

That was clear enough. She peered around him to find that the other two men were still standing there. Their faces were unreadable but something about their body language suggested that they were as dazed as she was. Wulf seemed to be the only one taking this in stride. She gestured at the two men inquisitively. This time she was sure he growled as he stepped between them.

“Really. They can’t even tell me their names?” When she stepped to the side again, he immediately followed her. She stopped and put her hands on her hips. “Now you’re just being childish.”

She pointed at herself again. “Kari.” She pointed at him, “Wulf.”

Then she pointed behind him and raised her eyebrows in what she hoped was a universal gesture. He scowled in what she interpreted as the equally universal male frustration with stubborn women. Moving so quickly she gasped, he tucked her against his side and slightly behind him as he turned to face the other men.

The slightly smaller of the two stepped forward, a broad grin on his face and she immediately spotted his resemblance to Wulf, although his features were leaner and more regular.

“He’s your brother? And you’re acting like I’m your prized toy?”

She elbowed him, with about as much effect as elbowing a brick wall, and he simply pulled her closer against his body with another muttered noise.

“Lothar,” said the man and swept her what could only be called a bow.

She had to give them credit for staying in character, no matter how annoying. The man followed the bow with a charming grin and a completely unintelligible but obviously well meant speech. Wulf barked out a sharp reply. Completely unfazed, Lothar swept another bow and stepped back. As he did, he pushed the second man forward, although she immediately decided that his reluctant step toward her was by choice rather than the other man’s shove. The man was huge, even bigger than Wulf, with a scar that swept from down one side of his face from his hairline to his chin. The scar bisected his left eye and it was noticeably darker than the right eye.

“Egon,” he said in a low deep rumble, his grim expression unrelenting. She noticed that he turned slightly to keep his scarred side away from her. She didn’t see any likeness to the other two but there was still something about the three of them that suggested family

“Hi,” she said cheerily and gave him a big grin. A fleeting expression of surprise disturbed the carved stone of his features before he stepped back again.

Wulf started talking to his brothers and his voice, while not as deep as Egon’s, rumbled pleasantly though her body where it was pressed up against him. Reminded of her position, she started to pull away but this time he simply ignored her. As she suspected, she couldn’t pry herself out from under his arm unless he chose to let her go. Before she could start protesting, Lothar threw another garment in their direction. Wulf plucked it out of the air and knelt at her feet in one smooth motion. He'd placed himself between her and his brothers again, even though she felt no sense of danger from either man, despite their overwhelming size and barbaric appearance.

Startled by his sudden movement, she placed a hand on his broad shoulder to keep her balance and was instantly distracted by the feel of his skin. His muscles tensed beneath her hand and she thought she heard him catch his breath before he gestured to her foot. Blushing, she realized that he was holding open a pair of trousers and waiting for her to step into them. Balancing herself with her hand, she placed each foot into a leg opening. Just as she started to reach for the waistband, he began to pull them up her legs. Somewhere in her mind she realized she should be protesting but the warm rough fingers dragging the material slowly up her cold bare legs felt amazing. The tremor in her stomach returned and she felt the peaks of her breasts tightening against the coarse material of her shirt.

What the hell was wrong with me? Her world had been completely upended and she was having a ridiculously inappropriate reaction to a complete stranger.

Fighting the reaction, she met his eyes and couldn’t decide whether it made it better or worse that she could read the same desire in his face. Helplessly, her eyes drifted lower. Her breath caught as she spied the evidence of his reaction, his cock straining against the thick leather - his extremely large cock. As he slid his hands underneath her shirt to pull the pants over the curve of her hips, he grew impossibly larger. Biting her lip, she forced her eyes closed to avoid staring at him. Closing her eyes only made the feeling more intense as he worked the fabric higher. Under other circumstances she would have been embarrassed at the tight fit but the feel of his fingers cupping her ass on the way up completely distracted her.

Pants finally in place, his fingers lingered for a moment at her waist before pulling reluctantly away. Deciding it was safe to open her eyes, she made the mistake of looking down. He'd bent down to roll up the way too long legs. The position placed his head in front of her pussy. As she watched in startled amazement, he inhaled deeply and growled again. His hot breath washed through the cloth and over her damp lips and she could feel the vibration in her core. She almost came on the spot.

After a tense moment, he resumed rolling up her pants legs. He spoke over his shoulder and another article came flying through the air. Again, he caught it without even looking. How did he do that? She had difficulty catching a ball thrown directly at her face, as proven by her experiences in high school gym class. The flying object turned out to be socks and he gently smoothed one over each foot and up her legs, his warm fingers caressing her skin. Once the socks were on, he stood so suddenly that she went up on tiptoes as her hand on his shoulder pulled her up with him. The position left her close against him, close enough to feel the warmth of his body along her front, and the iron ridge pressing against her belly. Her mouth parted in shock and his eyes immediately dropped to her lips.

Helplessly, she watched as his head started to descend, her stomach churning with excitement. For a suspended moment in time, as his head dipped down, she wanted him to kiss her more than she had ever wanted anything else in her life. His lips were a brush away when his body jolted. His eyes flashed black and he whipped around with a snarl. The tension broken, Kari stepped back and saw Lothar attempting to hide a smile, his hands raised in apology. Apparently the bundle on the ground on Wulf’s feet had been the latest aerial missile, but this time he'd been too distracted to make the catch. Flattered by his focus on her and unnerved by the almost kiss, she retreated another pace.

He shook his head, as if he too were shaking off the impact of their closeness, and picked up the latest garment. It turned out to be a fur vest, open down the middle. He started to place it over her shoulders but she smiled brightly and took it from his hands instead, keeping a cautious, and probably futile, distance. She wasn’t a doll to be dressed and he needed to learn that now. The vest was heavy and came to her knees but it was amazingly warm. When he attempted to close the distance she had created, she skittered away. Ignoring his frustration, she started gesturing to her new clothes and raising her eyebrows, trying to communicate that she wanted to learn their names in his language. Wulf merely stared at her but she heard Lothar laugh and call something to him.

Shaking his head, Wulf nonetheless taught her the words for socks, shirt, pants, and vest before turning back to his brothers and engaging in what sounded suspiciously like an argument.. Standing there, idly stroking the warm fur of her vest, she tried to memorize the words she had just learned. Something kept nudging at her consciousness and she stopped repeating the words to herself long enough to try and decide what was bothering her. Her attention focused on the fur beneath her fingers. The silky pelt had a mottled pattern in soft shades of … purple?

Kari knew with a sudden devastating certainty that no animal on earth had ever produced a coat like that. The coarse weave of the shirt and pants and the chunky nature of the obviously homemade socks took on a whole new significance. Wulf and his brothers weren’t medieval reenactors; these were the clothes they wore every day. She raised her eyes to the quiet lake and the towering mountains and couldn't find anything remotely resembling the world she knew. Her body started to shake as the realization finally swept over her - she wasn’t on Earth any more. The stars above her started to spin in an oddly hypnotic fashion. She heard Wulf call her name and then everything went black.

CHAPTER FOUR

Wulf made it to Kari just in time to catch her body as it fell. Surely she wouldn’t be taken from him so soon. Frenziedly, he pressed his finger to her throat, sighing in relief as her pulse beat strong and steady beneath his fingers. The journey from the land of the Gods had obviously been too much for her. She felt so fragile and delicate in his arms as he held her close, vowing to do everything in his power to make this transition easier for her. Of course, if would have helped if Wold had blessed him with a knowledge of her language as well but they could overcome that.

“What happened?” Lothar asked.

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