The Heir Apparent - a historical why choose, rh, poly, MMF, spicy romance ✅

Chapter Fourteen

Riven

"You do not need to go easy on me," Anevay grumbled, glaring at me from several feet away.

"Yes, lady, I do," I said, shaking my head, trying not to notice the way her breasts were heaving with her labored breath.

She had insisted that it would be impossible to learn the movements wearing her corset or one of her ornate gowns.

She wore a simple pale yellow gown that just barely brushed the floor, allowing for easy footwork.

The problem was that without her corset, her breasts moved freely beneath the material. And the cold in the training room had her nipples pebbling up to press against the thin material.

It was distracting at best.

At worst, it was making my cock hard in my trousers.

An experienced woman would have noticed.

Innocent Anevay, however, was oblivious.

So, yes, I was going easy on her. A small part of that was because my cock was making it hard to move around properly.

The other part, well, I felt as though that was obvious.

"I am not weak. Despite appearances," she said, waving a hand down at her tiny body.

Admittedly, she had been doing quite well. For her sex. And her small size.

I had never met a woman who would have even tried to charge on as much as she had.

"No, lady, you are not weak," I agreed. "But you are at a disadvantage."

"How?"

"Because, Anevay, I have killed more men than you have ever met," I told her, watching as surprise had those sweet lips of hers pouting.

"But you are so young."

"I am not that young. And I have been a warrior since I was ten-and-five."

"Ten-and-five," she repeated, looking horrified. "That is too young."

"That is common. For the children of other warriors, anyway."

"Did you not want another future for yourself?"

"No. It is a great honor to defend this kingdom. But with that honor comes endless hours of training, practice, and putting all that training and practice into practical use on actual battlefields. I must go easy on you. I do not want to hurt you."

"But how shall I learn to protect myself from actual harm if I am not trained properly?"

"You will not need to defend yourself. Not so long as I am alive."

"I do not wish to speak ill of the dead, Riven, but I believe the former king also had a guard who made the same vow. But there may well come a day when you will be put to that test, and fail. What then? I believe we both know the fate of women in war is perhaps worse than that of men."

The young girl who had shown up to the castle just two weeks before would never have known about the fates of women caught in men's wars.

Her education had been extensive and that ass Tolliver had not spared her sensibilities.

She could easily learn about war without learning about women being ravaged.

"Please," she begged, picking up her newly forged sword, which was built with a shorter blade for her smaller stature. It was still heavy, and she struggled to swing it with speed and accuracy.