Before the Battle

Family Name 4/17

The morning came.

However, because of the overcast sky and the constant snowfall, the room was still rather dark.

I was lying on the bed, looking through the window at the clouds drifting across the sky and the white flakes sticking to the window frame. I was pleasantly tired, content and happy, my eyes were closing.

I could feel Shira's hand gently caressing my thigh, and if my exhausted body could respond to his touch again, it would. But after the wild night we'd spent making up for the lack of intimacy of the past few days, it was too soon for that.

"Did you get that from me?"

Shira's worried voice snapped me out of half-sleep. I opened my eyes to see his palm running over the bruise on my side.

He sat up, the focused gaze of those blue-grey eyes beginning to study every detail of my body, his expression growing darker by the second.

Yes, I had a few bruises, on my wrists, my arms, my hips and there were a few purple marks on my neck and chest, maybe even a scratch or two.

"Shira, please don't make a big deal out of this," I asked him, not wanting to ruin this perfect moment.

I ran my finger over his shoulder, where a bright red tooth mark was glowing, and smiled, "You didn't seem to come out of it unscathed either."

He wasn't appeased by my words, his lips pressed into a tight line, his expression stone-cold, unreadable.

"I hurt you," he finally said.

I didn't understand why he was making such a fuss. Maybe we'd gotten a bit carried away, but... My mouth widened in a satisfied smile as I remembered some particularly memorable scenes from the night before. I wouldn't change a minute of it.

"Hurt? You mean this?" I showed him the barely visible bruise on my wrist. "It's nothing. And... I'm not that much weaker than you, so if I..."

"I didn't mean you were."

"Good, because you're acting like I'm a porcelain doll.If I didn't want you to hold me, I wouldn't let you. If I didn't want to submit to you, I wouldn't. It was my choice too, do you understand?"

The corners of Shira's lips curved into a small smile and he nodded. "I understand."

"Or did you get the feeling I didn't want to?"

"No, I didn't get the feeling you didn't want it," he repeated slowly, his frown disappearing to be replaced by a smile. "In fact, you were quite vocal about how much you wanted it. It's a good thing there isn't another living soul for miles around."

Heat rushed to my face and I looked away, embarrassed.

Shira leaned in, his fingers touching my flushed cheeks. "You didn't blush last night."

He was right. But there was a difference between saying and doing something in the heat of passion and with a clear head.

"Actually, I would have expected you to have stopped blushing a long time ago," he added, his fingers still running over my cheeks.

Even I didn't think anything could embarrass me after all we'd done together over the months. And that Shira was very inventive when it came to sex activities.

Still, he managed to throw me off with some of his innuendoes. Him or Maya. Especially the young doctor, who shamelessly enjoyed seeing how embarrassed I was when she made a lewd remark.

My mother's strict upbringing certainly had something to do with it. As the widow of a famous Imperial Army officer, she did everything she could to bring up her two children in the exact spirit of palace tradition and etiquette.