He came toward her and held out a hand for one of hers.
“Come,” he said. “Pain or not, I believe you will be more comfortable afterward, will you not?”
“Oh.” She allowed him to draw her to her feet. “Yes, I believe I will. I am so sorry. I am nervous. I do not know quite what to . . . do.”
“It would be strange if you did,” he said, “since you have admitted to never having done this before. Lie down while I extinguish the candles.”
He drew the covers farther back on the near side of the bed so that she could lie down, but he turned away before she actually did so. She was thankful for that. She lay down on her back and closed her eyes. Then, against her eyelids, she saw sudden darkness. She could hear him coming around the foot of the bed to the other side. There was a coolness as he drew the covers farther back, and then she felt the mattress beside her depress beneath his weight.
Tomorrow night, she thought, and the next night and the night after that this would be a growingly familiar ritual, without embarrassment or awkwardness. Perhaps it would be something to which she would look forward. She hoped so. There had been those nameless and unladylike yearnings that had often plagued her through the last ten years or so, and she hoped it was this for which she had yearned, that it would live up to her hopes.
It was one of those nights that was almost as bright as twilight. She could see as well as feel that he had turned onto his side and raised himself on one elbow to lean over her. His hand moved flat down her side from her waist to her hips and on down the outside of her leg until he reached even lower and grasped the hem of her nightgown and drew it upward. She had to half lift herself until it was bunched about her waist.
He came on top of her then and she realized in some shock that he had shed his robe and was wearing nothing beneath it. His legs pressed between hers and pushed them wide, and his hands slid beneath her buttocks to lift her and tilt her. Her hands came reflexively to his shoulders, which seemed massive and hard with muscle. She was aware of the hard ridge of what must be a scar curving from the front of his right shoulder over to the back.
And then he was pressed against her and she told herself not to hold her breath but to relax and breathe normally while he came inside her. She waited for the pain and schooled herself not to flinch. But there was only the unfamiliar feeling of being stretched and filled until, after the merest twinge of what threatened to be pain but was not, he came deeper in and she feared there would not be enough room.
He held still in her while his hands slid free and he half raised himself on his elbows. It was only then she realized how heavy he had been on her. She kept her eyes closed and slid her hands partway down his back. The scar extended downward to the edge of his shoulder blade—on the opposite side of his body from his facial scar. That particular cut must have come close to taking off half his face and his arm with half his shoulder as it slashed down across him.
He withdrew almost completely from her and pressed inward again before repeating the action, slowly at first, almost tentatively, as though he was being careful not to give her too much pain, and then with firmer, swifter strokes that had her squeezing her eyes more tightly closed and knowing that nothing in her yearnings had quite matched this.
She lay still beneath him and let it happen. He was her husband and he was making her his wife. Perhaps he was also impregnating her. There was some pain, a growing soreness that she guessed would remain with her for the rest of tonight and probably into tomorrow. But it was a lovely pain. And this was lovely. She was no longer embarrassed or apprehensive.
His weight descended full on her again after a while, and his hands slid beneath her again, and the thrusting of his body was harder and deeper until she felt him releasing his breath against the side of her face on what was almost a sigh, and he held deep and she felt a gushing of heat inside.
It was absurd to feel that this was the happiest day of her life. It was a chill bargain into which they had entered today. What had just happened was merely a part of it. Even in her inexperience she could not convince herself that they had just made love. There had not been any love involved with anything that had taken place today. He had married a breeder for his heir, and she had got a husband and home so that she would not live out her life as a dependent spinster. That was all, according to their bargain.
Oh, but it was the happiest day of her life nonetheless.
After a minute or two, he lifted himself off her and moved to her side. He lowered her nightgown and pulled the bedcovers up over her. She wondered if he would return to his own room now, but he lay down and pulled the covers over himself too.
“Thank you, Chloe,” he said.
She turned her head his way and only just stopped herself from thanking him too.
“I hope it was not too painful for you,” he said.
“No,” she said. “No, it was not.”
“I will try to see to it,” he said, “that you do not regret today.”
“A wedding without guests or any pomp?” she said. “I rather liked our wedding.”
“I meant our marriage,” he said. “I will try to see to it that you do not regret marrying me.”
“I will not,” she assured him. “It is all I have ever wanted, you see—a respectable marriage and a home and a family. I will not regret our marriage.”
She thought of the emptiness of his eyes and hoped she spoke the truth.
“I will try to see to it that you do not regret it either,” she added.