Stavanger Bay she brought the sugar and the mint

We could fade here and have another? :o I can start one if you wanna?

The grooming soon turned to nibbling, and the difference in sensation aroused a dangerous urge to turn around and respond in kind. Szymon quelled it, a rumbling groan of a growl falling like water from his jaws — but he was disappointed, perhaps unreasonably so, when she stopped herself with one last teasing bite. “Can I help you with anything?” came her innocuous question, and he hummed, low in his throat. Yeah, he thought with a teasing playfulness he found impossible to express verbally, keep biting my shoulder. The lowest ranking male of his natal pack, he had never experienced the attention of a female — or of any creature, really — in quite the way Doe tended to him now. Selfishly, he wished she was not the Witch Doctor, responsible for the spiritual, mental, and physical health of every wolf loyal to Skellige — absurdly, he wished she would never have the need to tend any wolf’s wounds but his own — and he drew a deep breath as he paused, registering that thought.

It was not, he knew, an appropriate or acceptable thought to have.

But Doe was his — wasn’t she? The Sea had delivered her quite literally to him, even if she had met Skellige first. Searching his memories, Szymon could find no indication that Skellige wanted to keep the little shale-and-sand female for himself — but if, at any point, his brother decided that she could not belong to Szymon lest she belong less to the pack because of it…

No. No. There were reasons. The Sea had given Doe back when She could very easily have kept the Witch Doctor for Herself; and Szymon had been there to fortify her with an offering of food. His weak and fluttering tongue could pronounce only one word without fail and it was her name. And they shared a skill set, although Szymon had yet to prove himself in the Teekon Wilds. He was accustomed to serving the Witch Doctors of Warsaw — accustomed to the gathering of materials and herbs that would heal the body and mind — and he was an expert angler, as good as Jagoda, he often thought. Surely all of this meant that Doe belonged to him more than she belonged to any other wolf; and although Szymon was willing to share her — begrudingly — with Skellige’s wolves, it ought to be Szymon she came home to and trusted to share her burdens. Without quite realizing it, he had already devoted himself to her in so many ways.

It wasn’t easy to be selfish. Growing up as he had, Szymon had had so many things taken from him — and over time, he had perhaps allowed it to happen simply out of habit. Things didn’t belong to Szymon Cairn. Not normally, anyway. Though he wanted to spend the rest of the day simply reveling in the feel of Doe’s body against his, he needed time and space to untangle at least some of these thoughts and feelings — and so, very gently, he rubbed his cheek against hers, figuring that if they were already physically touching, this didn’t count as overstepping his boundaries. His golden eyes caught hers, then flicked back toward the territory with as much wordless eloquence as he could muster. A reluctant whine spilled from his jaws as he pressed the tip of his nose to the juncture of her chin and throat — he didn’t want to leave — but he shifted away from her, giving her time to do the same so that she would not topple into the dust, and stretched his forelegs with the obvious intention of rising.

I have to go; I have to train. I have to earn the right to touch you — to keep you. He thought so many things at her, knowing she couldn’t hear them, but the growl that hummed quietly, scraping the lowest note in his bass register, was a promise that no matter how far he strayed, she was his compass now.