Light the Way
Pairing: Ormund Hightower x f!reader
Summary: Ormund prays in the Starry Sept as is expected of a Hightower lord. What he doesn't expect is to fall for a lady who is about to become a septa. He endeavors to change her mind and make her his by any means necessary. Warnings: SMUT 18+ p in v, unprotected sex, obsessive behavior, yearning, possessiveness, power imbalance, corruption kink, dubcon if you squint, manipulation, Ormund's pov.
The odor of smoke and wax clung to the air of the Starry Sept, a familiar perfume that Ormund Hightower had known since boyhood. It was not an unpleasant scent, precisely. Merely overwhelming, a constant assault on senses that had always been sharper than he might have wished. Frankincense, myrrh, the slow drip of tallow candles, the faint mustiness of ancient stone. It all mingled together into a haze that made his nose twitch and his head ache if he lingered too long.
He did not linger today. His visits to the sept were swift, dutiful, a perfunctory acknowledgment of the piety expected of a Hightower lord. The blood of Oldtown ran deep in his veins, and Oldtown was a city of the Faith. The Starry Sept had been the seat of the High Septon himself before the Targaryens came with their dragons and their queer customs, and even now, with the Faith’s center moved to King’s Landing, the sept in Oldtown remained a place of profound sanctity. Ormund came, he knelt, he prayed, he left. It was the proper order of things.
This particular afternoon found him in one of the smaller side chapels, a quieter space dedicated to the Crone. The high windows let in slanted shafts of golden light, dust motes dancing lazily in the beams. Rows of prayer candles flickered on iron stands, their flames shivering each time the great doors somewhere in the sept opened and closed. Ormund knelt on a cushioned prie-dieu, head bowed, hands clasped before him. His lips moved in silent recitation of the familiar words, though his mind wandered. It often did. Matters of trade, of governance, of the constant thrum of politics, these things occupied him more than the mysteries of the divine. Still, he kept up the appearance. For his house. For his people.
A sudden thud shattered the quiet. Then a gasp, high and startled.
Ormund’s head lifted. His prayer forgotten, he turned his gaze toward the sound, toward the small alcove near the side of the chapel where a stand of votive candles burned before a statue of the Crone herself. A woman stood there, no, a girl, or something between the two, clutching her elbow with one hand while a small leather-bound prayer book lay splayed open on the stone floor at her feet. A candle on the stand beside her had been knocked askew, its flame guttering dangerously close to the edge before steadying. She must have caught her elbow against it, the shock causing her to drop the book.
She was a septa in training, Ormund saw, or near enough to one. She wore a plain gray dress of coarse wool, high-necked and long-sleeved, the sort of garment meant to obscure the body, to render its wearer sexless and humble before the gods. Her head was bare, however, no wimple, no veil, just a simple braid of hair wound around her crown. A novice, then. Not yet sworn.
The dress was plain. The dress was meant to be plain. But the way it sat on her was anything but.
Ormund’s gaze lingered, and he knew he should look away. He knew it with the same certainty that he knew the words of every prayer his septons had drilled into him as a child. He was a Hightower. He was a lord. He was kneeling in a sept, for the love of the Seven, and his thoughts should have been on higher things. But the gray wool fit her firmly, snugly, cupping the swell of her breasts in a way that suggested the dress had not been sewn for her measurements. Perhaps she had grown since receiving it, filled out in ways the Faith had not anticipated. Perhaps it was a hand-me-down from a slimmer novice. Whatever the cause, the fabric pulled just slightly across her chest, outlining the soft shape of her with a clarity that made Ormund’s mouth go dry. And lower, at her hips, the dress sat tightly, hugging the gentle curve of her waist and the flare of her hips with an almost indecent precision.
She bent to retrieve her prayer book.
The fabric strained across her backside.
Ormund forgot to breathe.
There was nothing immodest about the dress. It covered her from throat to shoes, revealed not a sliver of skin beyond her hands and her face. Yet, somehow, that made it worse. More scandalous. A lady at court might wear a gown cut low, might flaunt her bosom and her shoulders, might laugh and flirt and play the games of seduction with all the practiced art of her station. Ormund had seen such displays a hundred times and thought little of them, save perhaps a vague distaste for the frivolity of it all. But this, this accidental sensuality, this unintentional provocation, a pious woman in a sept, clothed in the drab wool of the Faith, her body made all the more apparent by the very garment meant to hide it, sent a bolt of heat through him that had no place in a holy sanctuary.
He should not be having these thoughts. Not here. Not now. Not ever.
She straightened, book clutched to her chest, and her eyes met his.
Her expression was doe-like, startled and timid. Ormund realized with a jolt that she had caught him staring. Of course she had. He had not been subtle. He had been gaping like a boy who had never seen a woman before, in a sept no less, before the Crone’s own altar.
“Forgive me, my lord,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper, trembling. She dipped into a clumsy curtsy, still clutching the book. “I am so very clumsy. I did not mean to disturb your prayers.”
Her words shook him from his stupor. Ormund rose from his kneeling position, his legs carrying him toward her almost against his will. He felt as though he were watching himself from a great distance, a marionette pulled by strings he could not see. His footsteps echoed on the stone floor, too loud in the hush of the chapel.
“There is nothing to forgive,” he heard himself say. His own voice sounded strange to his ears, rougher than usual. “A candle can be righted. A book can be picked up. No harm has been done.”
She blinked up at him as he drew closer. The movement exposed the long line of her throat, and Ormund’s eyes traced it before he could stop himself.
“You are kind to say so,” she murmured, her eyes dropping to the floor. Shy, he thought. It was endearing. “I should not have been so careless.”
“I have not seen you here before,” Ormund said, ignoring her self-deprecation. He clasped his hands behind his back, a posture that felt both formal and strangely nervous. “I am a frequent visitor to the Starry Sept, and yet your face is unfamiliar. Are you newly come to the Faith?”
She hesitated, her fingers tightening on the spine of her prayer book. “I have been studying with the septas for some months now, my lord. I keep mostly to the septry gardens and the scriptorium. I...I do not often attend the public prayers. I am still learning the proper observances.”
“Then you are a novice still,” Ormund said.
“Yes, my lord. I have not yet taken my vows.”
Something in his chest eased at that. He did not examine the feeling too closely. “And what is your name, girl? And your house? You have the look of noble blood, if I am not mistaken.”
She looked startled that he would ask, that he would care. “I am...my name is...” She swallowed before giving her name, and the motion drew his eyes to her throat again. “I am of House Bulwer of Blackcrown, my lord. Sworn to your own house. Our lands lie on the northern coast of Whispering Sound.”
Ormund nodded slowly. He knew the name. They were loyal bannermen, decent and respectable. The lady he recalled as a quiet, unassuming woman who paid his taxes on time and rarely came to court. A widow, if memory served. Or was she? Ormund could not recall a Lord Bulwer. He would have to look into it.
“You are far from home,” he observed.
“Not so far,” she said, and for the first time, a ghost of a smile touched her lips. It transformed her face, softening the anxious lines around her eyes, making her look younger. Sweeter. “I have known the city all my life.”
“Then why have I not seen you?” The question came out more intently than he intended, and he saw her flinch back, the smile vanishing. He tempered his tone. “Forgive me. I only meant...a lady of a noble house, even a minor one, would usually be presented at court. At the Hightower. I host gatherings. Feasts. Surely your father would have brought you.”
Now she looked embarrassed. She ducked her head, and a few strands of hair escaped her braid to curl against her temple. “My mother is not...she is not a wealthy woman, my lord. My father died when I was young, and there was no one to arrange.. that is, I have no dowry of note to speak of. Only a small parcel of land that will pass to my cousins, for I am my father’s only child, and a daughter cannot inherit.” She spoke quickly, as if eager to get the words out and be done with them. “I did not wish to be a burden to her. I thought...I thought it better to remove myself from the world and dedicate my life to the Seven. The Faith will take me as I am. It does not require gold.”
Ormund stared at her.
An only child. No dowry. A burden. So she had chosen the septa’s robes, the gray wool, the cold cell and the silent prayers, because she believed she had no other path. Because no lord had come seeking her hand, and she had not wished to be a weight around her mother’s neck. A lump formed in Ormund’s throat, and he did not know if it was pity or something else.
What a sweet girl.
The thought rose unbidden, and he let it come. She was sweet. He could see it in every line of her, in the way she held her prayer book like a shield, in the way she could not meet his eyes for more than a moment. Polite, kind, gentle. Studious, she had mentioned the scriptorium, and he could imagine her there, bent over illuminated manuscripts, her brow furrowed in concentration. Pious, truly pious, unlike the flock of young ladies who fluttered around the Hightower’s halls, who giggled and whispered gossip and played at virtue while their eyes roamed over every eligible lord in the room. He knew their type well. He had been avoiding them for years, much to his advisors’ consternation. A lord of thirty ought to be wed, they told him. A lord of thirty ought to have an heir.
He had never felt the lack of a wife before. He felt it now. It crashed over him like a wave, sudden and staggering, leaving him hollowed out. He had waited too long. He had been too choosy, too indifferent, too absorbed in the duties of his station. And now here, kneeling before the Crone’s altar, was a woman who should have been his. A perfect bride, wasted on the gods. She was ready to give up a man’s touch forever, to live and die a virgin, without ever experiencing a taste of what life could offer. What he could offer.
But why should she?
Ormund’s jaw tightened. Who was he to question the will of the Seven? He was a Hightower, sworn to the Faith, a defender of the holy septs. And yet, in that moment, he felt a surge of betrayal. Jealousy. The gods had no right. No right to take her from him.
A woman like this, gentle, modest, good, she was meant to be a wife, a mother, the lady of a noble house. His house. What right had the Seven to claim her, when they had countless septas already, countless women who had chosen the cloth freely and without regret? She would not be choosing freely. He could see it in the way her shoulders curved inward, in the way her smile had faded when she spoke of her reasons. This was not her first choice. This was surrender.
He thought of her dreams, the dreams she must have had as a girl. Finery. A noble lifestyle. A strong husband to protect and provide for her. Children to fill her arms. Had she dreamed of those things? Of course she had. Every girl did. And she had let them go, one by one, because she believed they were beyond her reach. She had resigned herself to a life of gray wool and cold stone, and she called it piety.
It was not piety. It was waste.
Ormund looked at her, this shy, timid creature with her ill-fitting dress, and he felt something calcify in his chest. She was not a septa yet. She had not taken her vows. She was still a woman, still a maiden, still reachable. There was still time.
“My lord?” Her voice was uncertain. He realized he had been silent for too long, staring at her with an intensity that must have been unsettling. She shifted her weight, clutching her prayer book tighter. “Are you well?”
“Quite well,” Ormund answered. His voice was calm, measured, betraying none of the tumult inside him. He forced his expression to gentle. He could see her relax, just slightly, at the change. “I was only thinking that the Faith’s gain is the world’s loss, my lady. You speak of being a burden, but I see no burden. I see a woman of grace and humility, qualities that are all too rare.”
Her eyes widened. “My lord is too kind,” she whispered. “I am nothing so remarkable.”
“I disagree.” He let the words hang in the air between them, heavy with meaning. Then, before she could protest, he inclined his head in a slight bow. “I have taken enough of your time, Lady Bulwer. I hope we shall meet again. I come to the sept often.”
She curtsied again, still flustered. “I...yes, my lord. I am often here. In the afternoons. When the light is best for reading.”
“Then I shall look for you,” Ormund promised.
He left the chapel with his heart beating harder than it should, the scent of smoke and wax clinging to his clothes. He did not look back. But he felt her eyes on him as he walked away.
He came back the next day.
The Starry Sept was quiet in the afternoon, the vast stone halls echoing with the soft shuffle of sandaled feet and the distant murmur of chanted prayers. Ormund found her in the same side chapel, kneeling before the same altar, the Crone’s wise stone eyes gazing down at her with dispassionate benevolence. She was not reading this time; her hands were clasped, her head bowed, her lips moving in silent supplication. The gray dress was the same one she had worn the day before. It still fit her the same way. Ormund took a moment, standing in the shadow of the doorway, to simply look at her.
Ormund wanted to wrap her in silk and velvet. He wanted to see her adorned in Hightower green and gold. He wanted to put pearls around her throat and rings on her fingers and watch her eyes go wide with wonder. He wanted to give her everything she had resigned herself to living without.
He stepped forward, his boots echoing on the stone.
She looked up at the sound, and again, that flicker of surprise crossed her face. “Lord Hightower,” she said, and made to rise, to curtsy, but he waved her back down.
“Please, do not stand on ceremony. We are in the sept, after all. All are equal before the gods.” He moved to the prie-dieu beside hers and lowered himself to his knees, folding his hands in a mirror of her posture. “I hope I am not intruding on your prayers.”
“No, my lord. I had just finished.” She glanced at him sidelong, eyes questioning. “You said you came here often. I did not think...that is, I did not expect to see you again so soon.”
“Did you not?” Ormund allowed a hint of a smile to touch his lips. “I told you I would look for you. I am a man of my word.”
She ducked her head to hide her smile. The gesture was so artless, so genuinely shy, that Ormund felt a pang of tenderness in his chest. He had known women who could blush on command, who used their modesty as a weapon, a lure. This girl was not one of them. Her embarrassment was real, and it was achingly endearing.
“Tell me more of yourself,” he said, keeping his voice low and gentle. “You said you spend time in the scriptorium. Do you enjoy your studies?”
She hesitated, as if unsure whether he truly wanted to know or was merely being polite. Then, slowly, she began to speak. Her voice grew more animated as she talked about the manuscripts she had been copying, the histories of the Faith. She had a scholar’s mind, Ormund realized. She spoke of illuminated texts with genuine enthusiasm, of the painstaking work of grinding pigments and applying gold leaf. She was, as he had guessed, studious and intelligent, far more intelligent than she gave herself credit for.
He asked her questions. He listened to her answers. He watched the tension slowly drain from her shoulders as she forgot, for a moment, to be afraid of him.
It became a ritual. Every afternoon, Ormund found an excuse to visit the Starry Sept. His duties could wait, he told himself. A lord’s work was never done, but an hour of prayer was never wasted. He told no one where he was going, slipping away from the Hightower with only a single guard, who waited outside the sept’s grand entrance. He did not want to draw attention. Not yet.
Each day, he found her in the same chapel. Each day, he knelt beside her and spoke with her, learned about her. He learned that she loved the smell of rain, that she had a sweet tooth and missed the honeycakes the cook at her father’s keep used to make, that she was secretly terrified of the septa who oversaw the novices, a stern old woman with a cane she was not afraid to use.
She relaxed around him, day by day. She stopped flinching when he approached. She started smiling when she saw him: small, shy smiles at first, then broader ones, her eyes crinkling at the corners. She laughed at his dry jokes, her hand flying to her mouth to stifle the sound, as if laughter were forbidden in the sept. Ormund wanted to tell her that the gods would not begrudge her joy, but he did not, because the sound of her laugh was a gift and he did not want her to stop.
He was falling. He knew it. He did not try to stop it.
She was everything he had never known he wanted. Gentle where other ladies were sharp, sincere where they were calculating, truly devout where they were merely performative. She did not flirt. She did not scheme. She did not look at him and see a title, a castle, a political advantage. She looked at him and saw a man, and that man, she seemed to think, was being kind to her out of some noble impulse of charity.
She had no idea.
The more he learned of her, the more convinced he became. She ought to be his. Not the gods’. His. She would fulfill her duty to the Seven by being a good wife, by raising her children in the Light, by tending to the smallfolk on Hightower lands. She did not need to rot away in a septry cell, forgotten by the world. She did not need to die a virgin, untouched and unloved.
The thought of her untouched made something dark twist in his belly. It was not right. A woman like her, sweet, warm, made for tenderness and affection, she deserved to know what it was to be held, to be cherished, to be loved. She deserved a husband who would worship her, who would give her everything she had denied herself. She deserved him.
The idea crystallized in his mind, and once it had taken root, it would not be dislodged. He would wed her. He would make her Lady Hightower. Her lack of dowry meant nothing to him; his coffers were full, his lands prosperous. Her mother would be ecstatic, a daughter who had resigned herself to the Faith, suddenly elevated to the highest rank in Oldtown. It was a fairy tale, a miracle. It was meant to be.
But he could not simply declare his intentions. Not yet. She was too skittish, too convinced of her own unworthiness. If he confessed his feelings too soon, she would flee. She would think she was dreaming. She would think he was mocking her. He had to be patient. He had to be careful. He had to make her see that she was not a burden, that she was desirable, that she was worthy of love.
So he waited. He visited. He befriended her, day by day, until she trusted him implicitly, until she looked forward to his visits, until the sound of his footsteps in the chapel made her turn with a smile already blooming on her lips.
Then, when he judged the moment right, he made his move.
It was late afternoon, and the light through the chapel windows was the color of honey. She was sitting on a stone bench near the candles, her prayer book open in her lap, though she was not reading it. She was looking at him instead, a soft, dreamy expression on her face that made his chest ache. They had been talking of small things: the weather, a new shipment of incense that had arrived, the septa with the cane who had been unusually severe that morning. The conversation had lapsed into a comfortable silence, the kind that only existed between people who knew each other well.
Ormund turned to face her fully, his heart beating a steady, determined rhythm in his chest. “I have been thinking,” he said, “about your choice to join the Faith.”
Her expression flickered, the dreaminess replaced by something guarded. “My lord?”
“I do not mean to pry,” he said, holding up a hand. “Forgive me if I overstep. But I have come to know you these past weeks, and I find myself... concerned. You are young. You have a whole life ahead of you. And yet you speak of taking vows that will bind you forever, that will cloister you away from the world.” He paused, letting his words sink in. “Surely you feel as though you are missing out. Surely you are at least curious about what you are leaving behind.”
She looked down at her lap, her fingers tightening on the leather cover of her prayer book. “I have made my peace with it,” she muttered. “It is not as if I had many other options.”
“But if you did,” Ormund pressed, leaning closer. “If a path opened before you, a different path, one that led to marriage, to a household of your own, would you take it?”
She was silent for a long moment. When she spoke, her voice was barely audible. “It is a moot point, my lord. I have no dowry. No prospects. I am not...I am not the sort of woman men fight for.”
“You are wrong,” Ormund said, and the intensity in his voice made her look up sharply. “You are so wrong. But that is not what I asked. I asked if you would take the opportunity, if it were offered.”
She bit her lip, and the gesture sent a bolt of heat through him. “I do not know,” she admitted. “I have never...I do not know if I am suited for marriage. The septas say that it is a sacred duty, but they also speak of the...the temptations of the flesh. The lusts that drive men and women together. I have never felt...” She trailed off. “I have never felt overwhelming desire. The way the septas describe it. So perhaps I am better suited to the cloth after all. I will manage without it.”
The words hung in the air between them, and Ormund felt his patience snap.
She had never felt desire. Of course she hadn’t. She had been sheltered, hidden away first in her father’s modest keep and then in the septry, surrounded by old women in gray wool who told her that the body was a vessel of sin and shame. No one had ever touched her. No one had ever kissed her. No one had ever shown her what passion could be. So she thought that meant she was incapable of it. She thought that meant she was destined for a life of cold sheets and silent prayers.
The possessiveness that had been simmering in his blood for weeks boiled over. He could not let this stand. He could not let her slip away into the Faith’s embrace without ever knowing what she was giving up. He had to show her. He had to make her understand.
“I can help you,” he said.
She blinked, confused. “Help me? How?”
Ormund rose from his knees, he moved to stand before her. She looked up at him, her eyes wide and questioning, her prayer book forgotten in her lap. He reached down and gently took it from her, setting it aside on the bench. Then he took her hands, drawing her to her feet.
“My lord,” she began, a nervous tremor in her voice, “what are you...”
“Hush,” he murmured. He stepped closer, backing her toward the stone wall of the chapel, until her shoulders brushed the cool stone. She was trapped, though she did not seem to realize it yet. Her eyes were fixed on his face, bewildered but not yet afraid. “You said you have never felt desire. I believe you. But I also believe that you are wrong about yourself. You are not incapable of passion. You have simply never had anyone awaken it in you.”
“I don’t understand,” she whispered.
“Let me show you,” Ormund said. And then, before she could protest, before she could pull away, he lifted his hands and cupped her face.
Her skin was soft. So soft. His thumbs traced the line of her cheekbones, the curve of her jaw. She trembled under his touch, her breath catching in her throat. Her eyes, those beautiful eyes, were filled with confusion and the first stirrings of alarm.
“My lord,” she said again, but her voice was weaker now, less certain.
“Trust me,” Ormund breathed. He leaned in, pressing his nose to the curve of her throat, just below her ear. He inhaled deeply. The scent of her flooded his senses: clean skin, a hint of soap, something sweet that he could not name. No perfume. She would not wear perfume in the sept. It was just her, just the natural scent of her skin, and it was intoxicating.
His hands slid from her face to her shoulders, tracing the line of her collarbone through the rough wool of her dress. He felt her shiver. Her hands came up, pressing against his chest.
“You are beautiful,” he murmured against her skin. “Do you know that? You are so beautiful, and you have denied yourself for so long. But you do not have to deny yourself any longer. Let me show you what you have been missing.”
Her breath hitched. “Ormund, I...we should not...”
“Why not?” He lifted his head to look at her. “We are in the sept. We are before the gods themselves. If this were wrong, would they not strike us down? But they will not. Because there is no sin in love. There is no sin in what I feel for you.”
She stared at him, her lips parted, her protests dying on her tongue. He could see the war in her eyes, the years of teaching, of modesty, of fear, clashing with something new, something she had never felt before. He would win. He would make her feel it and then she would be his.
He kissed her.
Her lips were soft and warm and utterly still beneath his at first, frozen with shock. But Ormund was patient. He moved his mouth gently, coaxingly, one hand sliding to the back of her head to cradle it. He angled her face and deepened the kiss by slow degrees, letting her acclimate to the sensation. His thumb stroked the nape of her neck in soothing circles.
Slowly, hesitantly, she responded.
It was barely there, a slight movement of her lips against his, a tiny sound from the back of her throat. But it was enough. Triumph surged through him. She was not immune.
He pulled back just enough to look at her. Her eyes were glassy, her breath coming in short, shallow gasps. “There,” he whispered. “That is desire. Do you feel it?”
“I...” She swallowed hard. “I do not know.”
“Then let me teach you more.”
His hands dropped to her body. He traced her form, his palms skating over the curves that the gray wool did such a poor job of hiding. Her waist, her hips, the swell of her breasts. She gasped when his thumbs brushed the undersides, her back arching involuntarily. The wool was coarse beneath his fingers, but the warmth of her body bled through it, he could feel the way she trembled.
“You are so responsive,” he murmured, his voice thick with want. “So perfect. You see? Your body knows what it wants, even if your mind does not.”
“We cannot,” she breathed, but she did not push him away. Her hands were still on his chest, but they were clutching at the fabric of his doublet now, clinging rather than resisting. “Someone will see...”
“No one will see,” Ormund assured her. He glanced toward the chapel entrance, deserted, as it always was at this hour. “It is only us. Only us and the gods. And the gods want this. They want you to be mine.”
His hand found the hem of her dress and began to lift it, slowly, inch by inch. The wool bunched under his fingers, and cool air kissed the bare skin of her calves. She made a small, strangled noise, her eyes going wide.
“What are you doing?”
“Showing you,” he said. “Showing you what you would be giving up. Showing you what I can give you.” His other arm wrapped around her waist, pulling her flush against him. She could feel the hardness of his body, the evidence of his own desire pressing against her hip. Her breath caught.
“I will make you feel things you have never imagined,” he promised, his lips brushing her ear. “And when I am done, you will understand. You will want me as I want you. And I will wed you. I will make you Lady Hightower. You will never wear gray wool again. I will dress you in silk and velvet and cover you in jewels, and every night I will take you to my bed and show you pleasure until you forget your own name.”
Tears glimmered in her eyes: overwhelm, confusion, the first stirrings of a pleasure she did not yet understand. “Ormund...”
“Shh. Let me.”
His hand found the apex of her thighs, and she jerked, a sharp gasp escaping her lips. He held her steady, his arm a band of iron around her waist. He was gentle, so gentle, as he began to touch her. His fingers traced the shape of her through the thin linen of her smallclothes, feeling the heat that was already building there. She was innocent, untouched, but her body was responding to him. He could feel the dampness beginning to seep through the fabric.
“You see?” he breathed. “Your body knows. Your body wants this.”
He teased her through the linen, rubbing slow circles that made her whimper. Her head fell back against the stone wall, her eyes fluttering closed. Her hands, still clutching his doublet, tightened. She was trying not to make a sound, biting her lip so hard he feared she would draw blood.
“Don’t,” he chided gently. “Let me hear you. There is no shame here.”
He pushed the linen aside and touched her bare skin. She cried out, a broken sound that echoed faintly in the stone chamber. He swallowed it with a kiss, his tongue sweeping into her mouth as his fingers explored her most intimate places. She was wet now, slick and hot and so very ready, even if she did not understand it. He massaged her gently, learning the shape of her, finding the places that made her gasp and twitch.
When he found the small, sensitive pearl at the crest of her sex, she nearly buckled. He circled it with his thumb, pressing just hard enough, and she made a sound that was half-sob, half-moan. It was the most beautiful sound he had ever heard.
“That’s it,” he crooned. “That’s it, sweet girl. Feel it. Let it happen.”
He worked her with patient fingers, building her higher and higher. She was shaking now, her whole body trembling, her breath coming in ragged gasps. Her hips began to move of their own accord, rocking against his hand, seeking what she did not yet understand. Ormund understood. He knew exactly what she needed.
He pushed one finger inside her, and she cried out, her inner muscles clenching around him. She was so tight, so impossibly tight. A true maiden, untouched and pure. The thought made him groan, his own arousal straining painfully against his breeches. He added a second finger, stretching her gently, and she whimpered, her nails digging into his chest.
“It’s all right,” he murmured. “It’s all right. I have you.”
He moved his fingers in a slow, steady rhythm, his thumb still circling her pearl. The dual sensation was too much for her. He could see it in her face, the way her brow furrowed, the way her lips parted on a silent cry. She was close. So close.
“Let go,” he commanded softly. “Let go for me.”
Her body convulsed, her inner walls clamping down on his fingers in rhythmic pulses. A high, keening wail tore from her throat, he caught it with his mouth, kissing her deeply as she rode out the waves of her climax. She sobbed against his lips, tears streaming down her cheeks: tears of pleasure, of shock, of a release so profound she had no words for it. He held her through it, one arm still wrapped around her waist, keeping her upright as her legs gave out.
When the tremors finally subsided, she slumped against him, her face buried in his shoulder. She was crying quietly, her body limp and boneless in his arms. Ormund stroked her hair, pressing kisses to her temple, her cheek, the corner of her mouth.
“There,” he whispered. “There, now. Was that not worth feeling? Was that not better than a lifetime of cold prayers?”
She did not answer. She could not. She was too overwhelmed, too undone. But the way she clung to him, the way her fingers twisted in the fabric of his doublet told him everything he needed to know.
He was not done with her yet.
Gently, he eased her back against the wall and reached down to unlace his breeches. Her eyes, still glazed with the aftermath of her pleasure, went wide when she saw what he was doing. A flicker of fear crossed her face, and he soothed it away with a murmured reassurance.
“Shh. Do not be afraid. This is the natural conclusion of what we have begun. I will be gentle. I will make it good for you, I promise.”
“But...but I am not wed,” she whispered, the last vestiges of her pious training clinging to her like a ghost. “This is...this is a sin...”
“There is no sin in love,” Ormund repeated firmly. He hoisted her up, his hands gripping her thighs, wrapping her legs around his waist. The position pressed her back against the wall and opened her to him completely. The head of his cock, slick with his own arousal, nudged against her entrance. She was so wet, so ready. “I will marry you. I swear it. I will go to your mother tonight and ask for your hand. You will be Lady Hightower. This is not a sin. This is a consummation.”
He rubbed himself against her, coating himself in her slickness, and she whimpered, her head falling back. Her hips twitched, an involuntary motion that pressed him closer. She wanted this. Her body wanted this, even if her mind still resisted.
“Tell me you want it,” he urged. “Tell me you want me.”
“I...I do not know...” Her voice was wrecked, raw.
“You do know.” He pressed forward just slightly, just enough for the tip of him to breach her entrance. She gasped, her inner muscles fluttering around him. “Say it. Say you want me to be your husband.”
“I...” Her eyes met his, teary and drowning in sensation. “I want...I want...”
“Say it.” He pushed in another inch. She cried out, her nails raking down his chest. He was stretching her, filling her in a way she had never been filled before. She was so tight, so hot, so perfect.
“Husband,” she sobbed. “I want you to be my husband.”
The word sent a bolt of pure, primal satisfaction through him. He surged forward, sheathing himself fully inside her. She screamed. He swallowed her cry, kissed her through the pain of her maidenhead breaking, held himself still to let her adjust.
“Good girl,” he praised, his voice rough with strain. “Good girl. You took all of me. You are so perfect.”
She was weeping, but she was also clinging to him, her legs locked around his waist, her body slowly relaxing around the intrusion. He waited until her breathing steadied, until the tension in her shoulders began to ease. Then, slowly, he began to move.
He fucked her with slow, deep strokes, each thrust measured. He wanted her to feel every inch of him, wanted her to understand what she had been denying herself all these years. Her whimpers gradually turned to moans, her cries of pain melting into sounds of pleasure. Her hips began to meet his, awkwardly at first, then with growing confidence. She was learning. She was feeling.
“That’s it,” he grunted. “That’s it, take it. Take all of it. This is what you were made for. This is what I will give you, every night, for the rest of our lives.”
She was panting now, her breath hot against his neck. Her inner walls fluttered around him, tightening in a way that signaled another approaching peak. He quickened his pace, driving into her harder, faster, chasing his own release.
“Tell me how it feels,” he demanded. “Tell me.”
“Good,” she gasped. “It feels...oh, gods, it feels so good...”
The words were his undoing. Hearing her admit it, hearing her lose herself in the pleasure he was giving her. He drove into her one last time, burying himself to the hilt, and spilled his seed deep inside her with a groan. The sensation of it, the warmth flooding her core, pushed her over the edge again, milking him of every last drop.
They stayed tangled together against the stone wall, both of them breathing hard. Ormund pressed his forehead to hers, his eyes closed, his heart pounding. She was still trembling, little aftershocks rippling through her body. He could feel the evidence of what they had done, the mingled fluids trickling down her thighs.
She was ruined. She was his.
“I will go to your mother tonight,” he murmured, pressing a kiss to her damp forehead. “We will be wed by the end of the month. You will never wear gray wool again. I swear it on the Light of the Seven.”
She did not speak. She only nodded, her face still buried in his shoulder. But her arms tightened around his neck, that was answer enough for him.
Ormund held her until she stopped shaking. Then he helped her straighten her dress, tidying her as best he could. She would need to return to the septry, would need to clean herself up before anyone noticed the state she was in. He would send a maester to her with a potion later, something to prevent any consequences until after the wedding. He was not careless.
He watched her walk away on unsteady legs, her prayer book clutched to her chest like a shield. She did not look back at him. But he could see she moved differently, the faint hitch in her step.
That night, he dispatched a raven to House Bulwer, requesting an audience to discuss a matter of great importance. He did not use the word “betrothal” in the letter, but he did not need to. No one would refuse the Lord of the Hightower.
Ormund stood at the window of his solar, looking out over Oldtown. The city was bathed in moonlight, the towers and spires silvered by the glow. Somewhere below, in the septry, his bride-to-be was lying on her narrow cot, perhaps still feeling the ache of him inside her. Perhaps dreaming of silk and velvet. Perhaps dreaming of him.
He smiled, satisfied. The gods had tried to take her from him. But he was a Hightower, and Hightowers did not lose. She was his now, his lady, his wife, the future mother of his children. It was, he reflected, the most pious thing he had ever done.
a/n: Since it was requested to write something for Ormund. The fic was inspired by Rhaenyra looking strangely hot in her septa disguise in season 2. Reblogs, comments and likes are appreciated! <3
a/n: Voluntary donations are accepted on Ko-fi, your support helps me write more: https://ko-fi.com/catbayunthestoryteller <3
