A New View, ch. 3
Late night. The Elvheim Hall.
The wind howled against the high windows of the old concert hall, rattling its glass panes like ghosts desperate to get in. Lucy pulled her coat tighter around her, her breath fogging in the air. She could see her own fingertips trembling.
Michael was already setting up heaters, moving with quiet efficiency. The kind of silence that felt full. Weighted. His focus was almost palpable in the air.
“Cold?” he asked, without looking up.Â
“I have actually lost the feeling in my soul,” she replied dryly, attempting a joke. Her voice cracked slightly, exposing the fight she’d had with Adam before she left.Â
Michael looked up then. Eyes soft. Reading her like always. But instead of pressing, he gestured toward the little setup he’d made in the corner—a folding chair, a thermos, and a paper bag of chocolate chip cookies. The cheap kind.
“Sit. Tea. These help.”
She obeyed. Their fingers brushed as she took the mug. She tried not to flinch at the warmth, or the quiet brush of skin. Michael sat beside her, unspeaking. The silence was companionable this time. Strange. Holy, almost.
After a while, he said softly, “I had an idea for tonight’s shoot.”
Lucy looked up. He was staring at the vast wooden table in the center of the room—its grain rough, dark, impossibly old. “I want to try something different. Less staged. More… primal.”
She raised an eyebrow. “How primal are we talking?”
He reached into his coat and pulled out his phone. After a few swipes, a low, throbbing synth melody filled the empty hall. It was eerie and wild and bone-deep, something between a lullaby and a battle cry.
“This,” he said simply. “It’s called Mylardatter. Danish band. Not very well known.”
She took a sip of tea, the mug warm against her lips. “Do you listen to a lot of niche Viking music in your spare time?” He smiled, but not the kind that would reach his eyes.
“A friend introduced me to it. A long time ago.” He didn’t elaborate. She didn’t ask.Â
“The idea is that you’re being offered. To a king. Not as a prize, or a slave—but as something holy. Wild. Something dangerous enough to kneel for.”
Lucy blinked.
Michael stood, walking slowly around the table, gesturing with his hands like he was already seeing the image. “Your arms will be stretched out along the planks. Back arched. Knees parted. Your backside raised—yes, it’s provocative. But not vulgar. Think feline. Think untamed. And your face…” He looked at her then, eyes searching. “Your eyes have to be wild. The king wouldn’t want a mindless servant. He’d want something that could ruin him.”
A long silence passed between them.
Then he softened. “What do you think?”Â
She was already in. She knew it. Somewhere deep in her bones, she was already crawling onto that table. But he didn't see it - and the seconds of waiting were driving him crazy. The vision was one he had had for years, but none of his clients had fit the rawness that the motif required. He wanted HER in the photo, but was at the same time terrified that she’d run for the hills at the idea. “Do you feel like trying? Just with your clothes on. This place is freezing.”
His eyes lit up for the tiniest of seconds as she replied - a soft, but certain nod.Â
And when he reached for her hand to help her onto the table, there was something different about the way he touched her. Slower. Reverent.
He stepped away to grab a camera from his bag. Fiddled with the lens, turned to say something— and froze in place. She was already in position.
Perched atop the massive wooden table, as if she belonged to another time. Cargo pants, frizzed curls, and all modern attire failing to conceal her true inner self. Her arms were stretched forward, back bowed just enough to make her waist dip, hips raised instinctively. She wasn’t even trying. Her breath misted in the cold air, hair wild around her flushed cheeks.Â
But it was her eyes that stopped him.
Feral. Alive. Glinting with something ancient and dangerous and beautifully hers.
It took him three full seconds to remember he was supposed to breathe. Then he cleared his throat. Professional mask snapping back into place, barely.
“This is almost perfect, Miss Owen,” he said, stepping into position with the camera. “We’ll only need a few adjustments, I think—”
But his voice was different now. Lower. Rougher. Worshipful.
________________________________
The first thing Michael noticed was the color.
Not the shape of her, though - Gods - it was impossible not to notice that too. How the thin cinnamon bodysuit clung to her hips, curved into the hollow of her back, stretched across her chest like fire stitched into fabric—but it was the color that stopped him.
Spicy cinnamon. Burnt rust. Like autumn come to life and set alight.
It matched the furs in his arms almost too perfectly. As if she’d known. As if some part of her was beginning to sync with the vision before he had even shared it. Â
She climbed up onto the table in silence. No laughter this time. No playful jabs. Just the sound of her breath, shallow and uneven. Her hands trembled slightly as she lowered herself onto all fours.
“Cold?” he asked quietly, already knowing the answer. She nodded. Michael swallowed hard, feeling something cold and hot twist inside his chest. A different kind of tremble ran through her then—not from temperature. From nerves. From vulnerability. He could see that she was light years away from being the Mylardatter - all thanks to her boyfriend. A feeling rose inside him, slithering through his visions and ideas for the picture, through his professionalism.
I had the perfect motif, you absolute idiot of a man.
And she’s here, and she’s worried what you might think.
He didn’t say it, or even show it. But it rang through his mind like thunder.
Instead, he moved. Swift, professional. Draping the first piece of fur over her lower back with the same care he might offer a sacred relic. Then another, brushing down one shoulder. Then another, fanned out across her thighs. He smoothed and tucked and adjusted, layering warmth where he could, but never rushing it. With each touch of fur, each careful arrangement along the slopes and hollows of her body, Lucy stilled. Her tremble slowed.
His fingertips never touched skin. And yet—she felt everything.
His face came close—once, to tuck the fur under her chest. Again, to drape a russet-dyed pelt across the arch of her back. Inches from her. She looked to his eyes, but they only met hers briefly. Still, his focus and his concentration managed to calm her. She didn’t understand it. Not entirely. But she felt herself leaning into the rhythm of his preparation, like it was a song her body remembered. And somewhere in her chest, something shifted. When the last fur fell into place, he stepped back—only for a second—to flip on the massive projectors he’d wheeled into place.
Orange. Red. Gold.
The lights burst to life like sunset through fire. They illuminated her from behind, casting warmth across her shoulders, glowing around the curls of her hair like a crown of flame.
But they also hit him.
And suddenly, Michael wasn’t just a photographer.
He was something ancient. Something regal. Something her body recognized before her mind ever caught up. His posture changed under the light. His face, half in shadow, half glowing with fierce warmth—he looked like a war god. A storm made into flesh. Lucy felt her spine curve deeper. Instinctively. Her shoulder blades pinched together, her backside raising slightly more. Her fingers flexed against the table’s grain. Wild-cat tilt, burning eyes.
Michael caught his breath—literally caught it, one sharp inhale through the nose—and turned it into a cough, a half-step back, anything to keep from giving himself away.
Because this wasn’t Lucy anymore. This was the vision. This was the girl on the altar, the fire offering, the impossible gift to a god-king. This was Mylardatter.
And he had work to do.
Click.
Clickclickclick.
Whir, focus, flash.
He moved like something possessed. Around her, beneath her, beside her. Changing angles, adjusting light. One knee on the table. One elbow on the ground. He barked quiet instructions—“Chin down. Eyes up. Hold—yes, like that.”
Every time she moved, it was like a spell. Every photo he took, a tribute. Every glance between them, a held breath they didn’t dare exhale.
_________________________
The hall fell even more silent as the cameras had stopped their clicking. Only the projectors still buzzed faintly, casting long shadows like echoes of gods long gone. The heater sputtered once, uselessly, and died.Â
Lucy breathed out a shaky breath at the sound of the dying heater. She slowly pushed herself upright, limbs stiff from holding the position too long. Her arms wobbled slightly beneath her as she moved—fur falling from her shoulders, the cinnamon bodysuit clinging to her like second skin, her curls haloed in heat and effort. She was no longer the wildling on the altar. She was just Lucy. And her body was starting to feel everything she’d held back.
The cold. The fatigue. The memory of Adam - his silence. His absence. The argument. The ridiculous need she’d had to make herself seen. A rush of guilt pulsed up from her stomach and into her throat. Her hands trembled. Her legs wavered. And then—his voice.
“Eeeeasy. Easy, Luce. C’mere.”
He was suddenly there, like he always was.
His voice warm, honey-smooth, velvet and steady. His hands were firm as he helped her off the table - or altar - and into something real. He wrapped his woolen coat around her shoulders before she could even blink. It smelled like hope, cigarettes, leather and longing. Real. And her breath caught. She shivered, but not from the cold alone. Michael rubbed her arms slowly, grounding her. A silent ritual - just being. Existing.Â
She leaned into him for the briefest of seconds. He didn’t move. Didn’t speak. Just stayed there—solid, quiet, warm.
Then, without a word, he moved into motion. He packed swiftly. The furs. The camera. The thermos. His movements were clipped, but not rushed. He’d seen that look before—the hollow-eyed ache of someone who’d given too much to a moment that asked everything.
This girl needed aftercare. So he called a cab.
The ride home was silent.
She curled beneath his coat in the backseat, still in her bodysuit, her knees drawn up slightly, legs wrapped in what warmth she could steal. Michael’s arm curled instinctively around her waist. Protective. Careful.
The city - a blur of sodium lights and sleeping streets - passed by them, silently. The only sounds were the hum of tires, the slow exhale of Lucy’s breath, and the steady beat of Michael’s pulse against her side. She didn’t understand why, but it felt like she could fall asleep like this.
Right here. In his arm. Not because she was in love, or reckless.Â
But because it was safe. And no one had made her feel like that in far too long.
Dawn kissed the rooftops as the cab pulled to the curb.
The sky was pink, sleepy, soft at the edges.
Lucy stepped out, still silent, still wearing his coat.
Michael followed. He shouldered his bag. He looked at her like he wasn’t ready to let her go yet. Like she still carried part of the vision inside her.
“Up, and get some rest, Luce,” he said quietly, with a crooked smile that made her knees weak.
She nodded. But something—something had changed. She didn’t feel fragile anymore. Or rather - slightly less fragile than before. There was a pulse beneath her skin now. A fire. A flicker of something raw and steady.
She looked up at him. Met his eyes. And then - she stretched out her arms. Just slightly. Small, shyly. As if they would vanish into the morning if rejected.
He hesitated just a second. Then stepped in, wrapping her in his arms, offering exactly what she needed. Cool professionalism. An artist and his client. She didn’t bury her face in his chest, and he didn’t hold on too long. But at the end—just as he was about to pull away—she slid her fingers up his back.
Her nails just barely scratched the space beneath his shoulder blade. Not enough to hurt - certainly not enough to leave a mark. Michael froze. His breath caught, soundlessly.Â
And there she was again. Not Lucy, the girl in the cab. But her.
Mylardatter.