Chapter Text
No matter how far he wanders, no matter what realm he traverses—he dreams of the Grove. Of green glens and tall sweetgrass soft beneath their bodies. Of Freya’s lithe figure pressed to him, above him, under him; of her sighs and moans against his lips as he spills inside her.
Of her twining vines around his limbs and her clever mouth upon his cock, pulling each endless roil of pleasure from his belly. He should be ashamed of the way he wakes like an adolescent boy, wanton and needing, but instead he feels…hunger.
It is how he knows that he is dreaming, for Freya would never show him such peace.
He wonders why he dreams of her. Was it perhaps a hex from the witch herself; some form of cruel and unusual punishment to have him wake with the memory of her taste on his tongue? The burgeoning ache of his cock beneath his kilt?
The linger of her scent in the periphery of his mind, like a tether unseen. A thread bound around his chest that lures him in each moment he allows himself the luxury of idleness.
What surprises him most is that Freya isn’t always vengeful to him when he goes to her. At times, she is simply…there. Gathering herbs, or fishing. At times, she is in the soft dark of her home, stitching together things he cannot quite know. Other times, she brandishes blade and magic against him, no matter how dearly she pays the price for it.
When he dreams next, he finds her in the quiet of her garden, kneeling among the flowers and herbs, dirt on her hands and cheeks. A basket of sweet-smelling herbs beside her.
As ever, he sits by her in the dirt, places the basket in his lap.
She picks flowers and tubers from the earth, sets them in his hands. Silent, as ever; he brushes off the dirt and lays them in neat rows. Today, though, as she lays her cupped hands over his lap, he grasps her wrist.
She looks at him; Tiger’s Eye in sunlight.
“Why do you come to me each time?” he asks.
Freya looks at him, offering nothing in her face beyond her usual sardonic smile.
“Why?” he presses. He will not release his hold on her.
Her voice is an ethereal sound, like the distant call of a bird through the trees—like the haunting song of a buck at the height of musk. “Are we in your home now, Spartan?”
He grunts. “You know what I mean.”
“Do I?” Her sigh is the soft flutter of wings, the quiet rush of a lapping river. “I’ve never had a dream question itself before. But I suppose I should have expected as much.”
He furrows his brow with discontent and confusion. She pulls her hands away from his grip—he gives it easily—and sets them instead over the plane of his thighs. “Freya—”
“I wondered why I kept dreaming of you,” she murmurs, slipping into his lap with feline precision. The weight of her is familiar, the press of her hands against his chest is one he thinks of in fleeting moments throughout his day. “I should be wringing your neck.” Her touch glides up over the length of his throat, circling his neck. The pressure of her fingers is an ominous weight, but she simply holds there, as if anchoring herself to him.
The basket slips away from his grasp. He fills his hands with her hips and waist, and finds himself discontent with the layers of clothing between them.
She mounts him in the sweet grass and rosemary. The crush of herbs beneath his body, wafting fragrant and rich around him is as heady as the feeling of her nimble hands guiding him inside her.
She takes him with searing heat and rippling wetness; draws him in like a current beneath the waves. Her hands are a collar about his throat still, her hips a merciless roll of sensation that he cannot refuse. He grunts and sighs against her panting mount, slides his hands along the slow curve of her back.
He does not know whose dream they exist within. At this point, he does not care. For they are dressed one moment and the naked the next, and he has better charms to concern himself with. He palms her hips, her waist, her neck, drawing her down as he drags his hungry mouth over the exposed expanse of her breasts.
She is molten flames all over; warm and damp against him, and the taste of salt-sweat and sweetness on his tongue makes him only yearn. He draws her nipple between his teeth and suckles at it until it is stiff and aching, and finds his mind wandering idly to the thought of drawing milk from her breasts. Of her belly round and sweet between them, of her skin aglow with life.
Dreams. This is a dream, and only that. These thoughts are meant only for the quiet of his mind. The solitude of this strange place where they come together.
She gasps and goes taut above him; her fingers tighten and flex over his throat, crushing, crushing—
He wakes to the cold of the cabin and a dwindling flame.
Atreus is crouched by the fireplace, feeding wood into the hearth. Rubbing his hands and blowing them for warmth, reaching for the growing flames.
He sits upright, rises to his feet.
Atreus peers at him over a shoulder curiously. “Did you sleep well, Father?”
“Hrn.” He adjusts his kilt. It smells of sweet grass and rosemary.