Page 17 of The Satyr's Wood

Her head still laying against his arm, she nodded before pushing herself up. He was on his feet immediately, his hands outstretched in an offer to help her stand which she gladly accepted. Together, they picked up the gifts he’d given her that had remained strewn across the floor during their conversationand stacked them neatly in one corner. She looked at the untidy heap and acknowledged that she would have to make another basket for that and perhaps even see about constructing some crude shelves with Barbasa’s help. Making a mental note to discuss it with him further, she hurried after him to help him put away what remained in the bag. There was the pressed oil to fuel the lanterns and cook with that he explained was harvested from olive groves and had come up from along southern routes, as well as the honey, various powders and spices for cooking, and lard, among many other food staples that she had stared at it all in wonder.

There was so much there it fed that small spark of hope that he wanted to keep her there forever. Although he had refrained of speaking of a true commitment, she understood the depth of his emotions and was touched. So what if he was a bit damaged by everything that happened to him. Everyone in the world was. And if he could not promise her his undying love yet, she sensed it lurking beneath the surface. It was enough. A smile pulled at her lips as she looked around their well-stocked kitchen. In a small way he demonstrated that everything there was now hers as well.

That was definitely on the right track and one step closer to their happily ever after.

Chapter 12

Wrapping her arms tightly around her chest in attempt to warm herself, Tiffany waded deeper into the river. The autumn weather had changed brutally fast from the last flush of late summer when she had her first bath. The river here seemed colder as if it ran down from the mountains and was becoming increasingly icier as autumn began to settle deeper into the forest. The trees were now all painted in burning hues of red, orange, and gold as fat berries ripened in the last harvests. She had taken to drying the excess of what she found that they didn’t eat and storing them in baskets for the winter.

Barbasa was right—his forest provided more than plenty for them. There was no shortage of berries and nuts in his woods, and the game was plentiful to the point to where they built a smoke house and began to smoke and store that as well. Even now, as she slid the soapy washcloth over her breasts with one hand, she was eyeing a bush a little further down the embankment heavily laden with blackberries. She had vague memories of her grandmother chiding her to not eat blackberries after Michaelmas and leave them to the fair folk but as Tiffany lacked a reliable calendar and considering that she was living with a satyr, she considered it fair game.

She applied more soap to the washcloth and continued to briskly rub it across her body as she considered logistics. It was a pretty steep part of the embankment so it would be best if she could complete as much as possible in one trip so that she wasn’t disturbing it too much. She had a particularly large basket that she recently finished that should be able to carry quite a few berries back to the cabin without having to make multiple trips. It was a good thing that she had the foresight to make the larger basket even if had been just on a whim to challenge her skills.It wasn’t an attractive basket by any means but as ugly and lopsided as it was, it had a purpose in berry transportation now.

She smirked triumphantly at the bush and proceeded to lather more of her body as a rough chuckle rose up from behind her. She turned toward the sound, a flirtatious smile tugging at her lips as she faced the satyr standing at the edge of the water. His eyes had a faint sheen of gold to them as he watched her, his smile full of wicked intentions that made her pussy heat with the rapid quickening of her desire. Or perhaps it was the long, thick length of his cock bobbing from its sheath, his creamy precum pearling the tip to slip down the head and drip from its prominent tip. His broad hand circled his cock and gave it a pump and hard squeeze as she watched. She was so focused on the motion of his hand there that she forgot to breathe for a moment until the burning of her lungs forced her to take a panted breath, drawing another rumble of amusement from the male.

“See something you like, little one?” he growled. “Now I must wonder if it is the fat head purpled head of my cock, or those fat purple berries that is making you look so hungry—like a kitten starved and ready to lap the sweetest cream.”

Holy fuck. Yes. That was what she wanted to say. Instead, her mouth gaped open and closed silently and she jerked her head in a quick nod. Yes, to all of it.

“I quite agree,” he mused as he gave his cock another leisurely stroke. “You also look good enough to eat. I think feasting between your thighs may be just as satisfying as any offering of fruit. Or maybe if I suck a blackberry into my mouth before sucking at your clit, I can enjoy the best of both flavors. What do you think?”

What did she think? Was she still capable of thinking or was her brain melting from the heat crawling up from her sex? The jury seemed to be on permanent post-ravening hiatus becauseshe had no idea. All she could imagine was the firm press of his lips around her clit and the heat of his mouth as he sucked it into his mouth against the pebbled texture of the blackberry on his tongue. Holy dutch oven in hell.

“Yes,” she rasped as she somehow managed to find her voice again. “Please.”

His lips curled roguishly, and he nodded, but instead of heading toward the bush, he stepped forward so that the water splashed around his hooves as he began to wade toward her. Tiffany lurched back nervously and fumbled with the soap so that it dropped against her breasts and hung there in its woven soap bag, leaving a sudsy smear across her nipples, drawing his gaze to the perky, pink buds tightening for his pleasure. His grin widened in response, but he never changed his pace, neither going slower nor speeding up as he made his way toward her, the hot look in his eyes turning to molten honey.

He lifted his hands so that his clawed fingertips lightly scored a path through the soap on her breasts as a soft groan rumbled from deep within his chest. His thumbs brushed over the tips of her nipples so lightly that she came up onto her toes, arching into his touch. She didn’t recall her breasts being so sensitive, but it was like he had secret access to some mysterious hot button that he could turn on at whim that left her shaken with every graze of his fingers as he petted her. His eyes glowed down at her as he palmed her breasts, massaging and stroking them with his long fingers. His claws scraped so gently that there wasn’t even a sting. Rather it was a whisper of sensation that shot to her clit and tightened in hot center of her core.

Wasn’t the river cold just moments ago? Why did it feel like a sauna lapping against her skin?

“So beautifully responsive,” he rumbled thickly. “It is like the gods designed you for me, crafting your body with such exquisite care that it is as familiar to me as my own, and a thousandtimes more precious.” He pinched her nipple gently and purred as a hotter streak of heat washed through her. “Look how it rises eagerly to my touch. It is like it recognizes me and calls to me with a sweetness that rivals the deadly songs of the sirens.”

He gave her breasts one last gentle squeeze before they dropped lower, tracing a path down to her belly in small, circling strokes as he spread the soap lower and lower yet to the top of her curls exposed by the thigh-high water. Tiffany shivered at his touch, her eyes fluttering closed as she leaned into it. She felt his head bend so that his lips and breath grazed her cheek, and she trembled as her need quaked through her, demanding its release.

“I can smell your need,” he rasped. “It is thick and sweet in my nose like the most decadent wine sipped from the cup of cups among the gods. It begs for me to sip at it and for my tongue to wash away every dewy drip of its essence. Your aim here was to clean yourself, then I am obliged to help.”

His fingers dipped lower over her vulva before suddenly parting her labia to slip within the heat between them. Her knees grew weak, and she shivered, her inner walls of her pussy clenching rapturously as his fingers passed back forth against the sides of her clit. Heat flooded through her as her thighs trembled in their struggle to keep her upright as she rocked instinctively against his hand, bathing his fingers in her musk—marking him like a she-beast claiming her mate. It was a wild thought, completely out of left field, but she embraced it whole heartedly as she moaned when his mouth slid over hers, his tongue plunging between her lips in a drugging kiss as his fingers danced between her thighs, drawing the pinnacle of her ecstasy higher and higher until her entire body clenched with a cry and her slick bathed his hand.

Barbasa grunted deeply and dragged his mouth from hers as his cock jerking against her belly with a hot smear of seed. Hisgold gaze pierced her with its heat as he brought his hand to his mouth and ran his long, rough tongue along it from the base of his palm to his fingers tips as if to savor her flavor. A pleased purr rattled from him as he met her eyes and grinned deviantly as his hands trailed back to her rump and lifted effortlessly against him. Tiffany’s arms instinctively wrapped around his neck, latching on to him as he lifted her higher from the water and proceeded to walk forward.

Turning her head to glimpse his destination, it wasn’t until they were practically upon it that she saw the large flat stone barely breaking the surface of the water. Although it bore a greenish tinge that helped disguise its presence, it was noticeably as a large as small dining room table and the river water flowed in tiny streams over it as it must have done for ages because the entire surface was worn perfectly smooth—which she discovered in the next breath as Barbasa lowered her ass onto it.

Her arms dropped from his neck as he slowly straightened but she still gripped his forearms as she gave him a questioning look when he took a step back from her. Was he planning to leave her there on that rock? Why bother even carrying her there? But then he tipped his head to the left and she followed the motion until her gaze fell upon the dark berries hanging just a couple feet away.

“Did you forget?” he purred. “I think I deserve my feast now.”

Giving her one last heated look, he stepped over to the bush and plucked the largest, fattest berry she had ever seen. He turned it slowly between his fingers as if inspecting it before carrying it over to her.

“Open your mouth, little one.”

Her brows pinched together faintly in confusion, but she did as he instructed only for him to rub the surface of the pebbly berry lightly back and forth over her tongue as if it was thebulbous head of his cock. Juice dribbled over her tongue and into her mouth and she swallowed reflexively as a low chuckle escaped the male. Ever so slowly he withdrew the berry from her mouth before bringing it to his own lips and sucking it slowly into his own mouth. He did so with a growl that made her pussy clench with renewed interest as he pressed her back so that she lay flattened against the stone so that the little streams of water washing over the stone teased her flesh, heightening every sensation.

Then he was dropping, lowering into a crouch between her thighs. He spread them wider. She watched his dark head lower, his horns arching toward the sun like hands raised in prayer but at the first touch of his tongue she was the one who wished to shout to the gods with her pleasure.

His tongue found her folds first, dragging over them and teasing them as it dipped slightly between them before withdrawing in little flicks as he teased her sex mercilessly, after dragging upward to do the same to the sensitive nub peaking at the top of her entrance. He did this until she was on edge, her fingers clinging to the slick rock before it finally voyaged up to her clit and withdrew so that only the hot brush of his lips remained. Eyes widening, she panted with the realization of exactly what he had intended to do—after all, hadn’t he told her in exact detail?

The heat of his mouth closed around her clit, dragging it in. He groaned and slurped deep with a tug that she felt to her soul as the tender surface of her clit brushed the slightly mush nubs of the fruit. It rubbed against them with every sucking tug upon it as he moaned and growled rapturously as if feasting upon the finest dessert. Her pleasure tightened through her, circling higher, spinning and winding through her, drawing on every nerve ending and lighting them ablaze when, all of a sudden, she came all at once. A screech tore from her throat that sent thebirds from the trees with a flurry of wings as hot, electric ecstasy shot through her and consumed her entirely.

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