Wheeling Gull Isle the beatings will continue until morale improves

He was nothing if not a stubborn creature. It would perhaps be his undoing, but he held fast. She questioned him, her demeanor gentled for the moment, and he answered without the usual cold edge to his words. "I want ye for a wife," he replied, a softly spoken and genuine statement. "I do not want to hurt or kill ye." His gaze flicked upwards, but only to touch her face, and not meet her eyes.

She prodded him, but he did not need to be forced. He knew what she sought (or thought he did) and rolled into the highest level of submission - with his white belly and throat exposed to her, his tail tucked between his legs and his forepaws drawn above his chest. He was at her mercy.

"Reign beside me," suggested the Captain. "Co-Captain. Not the Captain's wife — an equal partner." Such a thing had never occurred before, but then he had never met such a lass as her. "We'd be unstoppable, ye and I."