#touch starved dunk

[x-strwbrry]

Ser Duncan the Tall x Female! farmer’s daughter ♡ Bound by Oaths, Forced Proximity (Travel/Road Trip), Devotional Submission, Voyeuristic Awakening, Size Difference, First-Time Intimacy

Warnings: Explicit sexual content, heavy over-stimulation and premature climax, dirty talk, crying/begging, mild breath play (mouth covered), tearing of clothing, and themes of an impending forced marriage.

Synopsis: I am your sword and your shield. From this day, until my last day.

Sent on a four-day journey into the heart of the Riverlands to treat a rotted harvest, you are trapped on a muddy track with the one man you cannot afford to look at. Ser Duncan the Tall is a monument of knightly discipline, but when he drops to his knees in a torrential downpour, the fragile walls between you begin to wash away. As the isolation of the road closes in, his restraint starts to fray. Trapped between the expectations of your future marriage and the terrifying heat of his presence, you are about to discover what happens when a righteous knight is pushed past his limit, and just how ruinous his devotion can truly be.

Words Count: 15.3k

Read part one here. 

Part Two

The forest stretched endlessly, towering oaks and whispering pines forming a verdant cathedral. Sunlight filtered through the canopy, dappling the mossy ground in shifting patterns of gold and shadow. The air carried the earthy musk of leaves and the sweet perfume of wildflowers.

Peace should have lived here.

Instead, there was torture.

Every hoofbeat on the earth, every creak of leather, every rustle of fabric made you hyperaware of the man riding beside you. Ser Duncan. His presence pressed down, a gravitational pull that distorted the air. You felt the sheer breadth of his shoulders, the way his thighs flexed as he guided his horse, the rumble of his voice when he spoke.

You couldn't look at him. Not after last night.

The memory burned behind your eyelids. You saw it in the way the light caught the stubble on his jaw, in the column of his throat as he swallowed. His breathing haunted you, those broken, pleading words surfacing every time he shifted in his saddle.

Your hands tightened on the reins, knuckles turning white. Your mare flicked her ears back, sensing your tension. You forced a deep breath, trying to focus on the mission, on the task at hand.

Your father had sent you to check a remote sheep pasture, a half-day's ride into the woods. He had insisted Ser Duncan accompany you, citing increased bandit activity.

It felt like punishment.

"We'll stop here. Let them drink. The stream's just ahead."

Your throat tightened, preventing words. You could only nod as he guided his horse from the path. His mare's coat gleamed like polished copper in the sunlight. You'd always admired her from afar.

"Is that Thunder?" The question tumbled out, clumsy in the silence.

He gave a slight shake of his head. "No." His hand stroked the mare's neck, a gentle touch against her hide. "This is Chestnut. I only ride Thunder for battle. He's... eager. Chestnut is better suited for the road."

He dismounted in one long motion, boots sinking into the earth. You watched his tunic pull taut across his shoulders as he worked to loosen the girth. Heat prickled the back of your neck.

Your legs trembled as you swung down from your saddle. You approached his mare slowly, palm extended. Chestnut turned her intelligent head, nostrils flaring to catch your scent. Her muzzle was velvet against your fingers, an anchor in the swirling chaos of your thoughts.

"She's beautiful. You've trained her well."

You kept your focus on the horse.

"She's a good girl," his voice was rougher than usual. "Smart. Strong."

"The other one... Thunder. What is he like?"

You glanced at him from under your lashes.

"Fast. Fearless. He doesn't like to stand still. In a fight... there's no one better." A ghost of a smile touched his mouth, gone as quick as it came. "But he's a lot of work."

You nodded, understanding the space between the words. A warhorse. A living weapon. Not a companion for a quiet ride. The two animals felt like two halves of the same man.

You led Chestnut toward the stream, hooves sinking into the muddy bank with soft sucking sounds. Duncan followed. Heat from his body bled into the forest air, warming the space around you.

He helped with the tack, his movements efficient but clumsy. His arm brushed yours reaching for your cinch. He froze, hand hovering in the space between you.

"Sorry." A low grumble. He didn't turn his head.

"It's... fine."

You focused on your own buckles, fingers stuck on the leather straps.

You finished with the saddle and turned. He was staring. His eyes were intense, the blue so deep it was almost violet. He looked away fast, jaw clenching.

He stepped back. Then again. A careful distance.

"This place," he said, gaze fixed on the mossy rocks by the stream. "It's good. Quiet."

You looked around. The clearing opened up before you. Sunbeams pierced the canopy, lighting a space carpeted in wildflowers.

"Yes. It is."

He stood there, back to you, tension in his shoulders visible.

Then he turned.

And did something that stopped your heart.

His knee hit the damp earth with a soft thud.

The forest floor tilted. The world spun. He knelt there, a giant reduced to supplication, head bowed, one massive fist resting on his thigh. That dark, unruly hair was now bowed before you.

"Ser Duncan?" The name scraped your throat. "What are you doing?"

His gaze remained fixed on the ground. The voice that emerged was low and rough, a vibration that traveled up from the soles of your boots and settled deep in your belly.

"I would take my oath. Here. Now. As your sworn shield, my lady."

The words hung suspended in the sun-dappled air. You stared at his knuckles, white against the fabric of his thigh. Your mind went blank, then scrambled to make sense of this.

"My... what?" You stumbled back, a twig snapping under your heel. "You already serve my father."

"I serve your father," he corrected, still not lifting his head. "This is different. I would serve you. Only you. It would be... an honor."

Your breath caught. This was madness. You were a farmer's daughter, your hands calloused from work, not a lady in a keep. What need did you have for a sworn shield?

"Ser Duncan… I don't understand. Why here? Why now?"

You thought he was trying to rebuild that wall between you, stone by painful stone. Instead, he was tearing it all down.

"I've said what I'll do." His voice was firm, but the strain beneath it was a frayed rope. "I need to say the words. I need... I need to say them right."

A fat drop of rain splattered on the back of your hand. Then another. Within seconds, a soft patter turned into a deafening roar as the sky changed from blue to churning grey. Rain hammered down, turning the clearing into a glistening mess.

"Get up!" you shouted over the downpour, the rain soaking through your dress, clinging to your skin. "You'll catch your death! This is insanity!"

He didn't move. His head remained bowed, water streaming down his face, tracing the lines of his jaw, carving paths through the dirt on his cheeks. He looked like a statue being worn away by the elements, a man of stone and earth and rain.

"Please, Ser Duncan!" you begged, your voice breaking.

The image from the night before flashed in your mind—his face contorted in pleasure, his body moving in that desperate, lonely rhythm. The shame of watching him, the heat of your own response, it all mixed with the dizzying sight of him kneeling before you now. Your cheeks burned with a fire that had nothing to do with the storm.

A pulse started between your legs, a heavy, insistent throb.

He drew a shuddering breath, the rain plastering his hair to his skull.

"I vow," he began, his voice a resonant boom that somehow cut through the thunder. "I vow on my sword, on my honor, on my life..."

He hesitated, struggling for the words. You had never heard him stumble like this.

"To be your shield in darkness and in light… To protect you from all harm, from steel and from slander, from the blade of an enemy and the whisper of a liar. To defend your name as I would my own. To ob—… To obey your commands, save those that would bring dishonor to either of us."

His eyes lifted, catching yours through the torrential rain. They blazed, wild.

"To be faithful to you," he continued, his voice gathering strength. "To keep your secrets as my own, to guard your person as the most precious treasure in the Seven Kingdoms. To stand between you and all that would harm you, and to lay down my life before yours is touched."

He reached behind him, drawing his longsword in one fluid motion. The steel gleamed in the grey light. He reversed it, offering the hilt to you, the point resting in the mud at his feet.

"My lady." The title emerged raw, agonized. "I am your sword and your shield. From this day, until my last day."

The wind raged around you, whipping your hair across your face, the rain soaking you to the bone. Yet in that circle, in the mud, with a knight's sword at your feet, only the two of you existed.

His oath was insane, unexpected, and utterly, terrifyingly sincere.

Your gaze traveled from the sword to his face. His expression was stripped of all his usual restraint. He was giving you everything. His strength. His loyalty. His life.

Your hand moved of its own volition, reaching out. Fingers closed around the wet hilt of his sword. The leather felt alive in your palm, humming with his oath.

"Ser Duncan." Your voice barely rose above a whisper, but he heard it. "I... I accept your oath."

A shudder wracked his entire body. His eyes closed for a brief second, a look of profound, almost pained relief washing over his features. When they opened again, the fire remained, now tempered with something new.

"Rise, Ser Duncan."

He unfolded himself from the mud, a fluid motion that defied his size. Water sheeted from his shoulders, darkening his tunic.

The space between you crackled.

Your mind raced. He doesn't hate me. He doesn't see me as a burden. He... wants this. He wants to serve me.

"Come." Your voice found a sliver of command as you turned, leading the way toward a denser copse of trees at the clearing's edge. The rain softened to a misty drizzle beneath their branches. He followed, a silent, steadfast shadow. His presence no longer created tension; it offered comfort, a solid wall at your back.

Under the thick canopy, the storm's fury became a whispering hiss. You turned to face him, his sword still clutched in your hand. He stood before you, rain dripping from his hair, the tip of his nose, his eyes fixed on you with unwavering intensity.

"You're soaked," you said softly.

"So are you, my lady." A small smile touched his lips.

You had no idea what you'd agreed to, what you'd just unleashed. But for the first time in a long while, you didn't feel afraid.

The ride back was silent.

The rain had stopped as quickly as it began, leaving the forest smelling of wet earth. The storm that had broken between you and Ser Duncan in that clearing remained, making the act of sitting astride a horse feel charged with unspoken meaning.

You led the way, your mare's hooves squelching in the muddy track. You could feel him behind you—no need to look.

My shield. The words echoed in your head, a surreal, impossible refrain. He had sworn himself to you. Not to your father's house, not to the farm, but to you. A gesture so profound, so completely outside the bounds of your life, that you didn't know how to process it.

You faced forward, gripping your reins so tightly your knuckles ached.

As you neared the stables, the air cooled. A shiver ran through you. Your dress clung to your skin, the breeze carrying a chill that sank deep into your bones.

You dismounted too quickly, boots sinking into the mud-churned ground. Before your fingers could close around your mare's reins, a heavy weight settled over your shoulders.

His cloak.

It carried his scent—wet wool, the earthy smell of forest. Huge on you, it engulfed you like a warm tent, the hem brushing your boot tops. His body heat still clung to the fabric, a searing contrast to the cold air.

You looked up, a sharp retort ready on your lips. He was already dismounting, avoiding your gaze as he focused on securing the horses.

"You're cold." The words weren't a question but a statement, delivered in that low, gravelly voice that left no room for argument. "It's not safe to catch a chill, my lady."

The title hit you again.

"I'm not a lady," you insisted, voice sharper than intended. You pulled the cloak tighter, an attempt to ward off the dizzying sensation of his nearness. "I'm a farmer's daughter. I work the fields. And I've been cold before."

He finished with the reins and turned to face you fully. He was close. Too close. You had to tilt your head back to meet his eyes.

He looked down at you, and for a moment, you thought he might argue. Instead, a slow, deep red crept up from the collar of his tunic, staining the skin of his throat and the tips of his ears. 

He was blushing. 

The realization was so disarming, so at odds with his imposing presence, that it stole your breath.

"I don't care about your title. I care that the hands that work the land are honest."

The words were so simple, they bypassed all your defenses. You stared at him, completely at a loss. This was the man who had spoken of killing, who carried the weight of a prince's death on his shoulders. And here he was, blushing like a boy because he'd given you his cloak. The contradiction was maddening.

You tried to form a response, something clever and cutting to re-establish the distance between you. 

But all you could think of was the image of him on his knees in the mud, swearing his life to you. All you could feel was the heat of his gaze and the weight of the cloak that smelled of him.

You wanted to reach out and touch him. To see if his skin was as hot as you remembered, as it had been in your fantasies.

"I... thank you for the cloak," you managed, your voice a breathless whisper. It was a pathetic surrender, but it was all you had.

He gave a curt, almost jerky nod. "I'll see you to your door."

He fell into step beside you, his long strides easily matching your pace. The short walk from the stables to the kitchen door felt like it lasted a lifetime. Every step was a battle against the urge to turn to him, to say something, to do something. His presence was a pull that made your skin feel too tight.

At the door, he stopped. He didn't try to open it for you, a small mercy you were grateful for. He simply stood there, a silent, watchful guardian.

"Goodnight, my lady."

"Goodnight, Ser Duncan."

His cloak stayed with you.

You couldn't bring yourself to return it. Didn't even try. It dominated the bedchamber, a shadow draped over the chair that seemed to pulse with his presence.

When the house settled into heavy silence, restraint snapped. You threw the bolt on the door—a sharp clack of finality—and crossed the room. The wool remained damp, heavy with the day's rain and the lingering heat of his body. You hauled it to the bed, your heart hammering a frantic rhythm against your ribs.

You collapsed onto the mattress, gathering the fabric into your lap in a desperate heap. Burying your face in the folds, you inhaled. The scent assaulted your senses: rain-soaked forest, woodsmoke, the salt of his skin. Undeniably, intoxicatingly him. You clutched the wool to your chest, trying to force it into the hollow ache inside you, the scratchy texture a welcome irritation against your flushed skin.

You were splitting in two. Your mind warred with itself. The noble knight offering his sword clashed with the raw, primal image of his fist wrapped around his cock—the desperate, guttural sounds he'd made. Ser Duncan was a mystery, and that mystery was burning you alive.

A soft knock shattered the air.

You lurched upright, clutching the cloak to your breasts like a stolen treasure. "Yes?"

"Your bath is ready, my lady," the maid's voice drifted through the thick wood. "I've drawn it hot."

You ignored her, your gaze fixed on the door as her footsteps faded. The bolt was already thrown, the room sealed. Alone again with his scent, the humid air felt thick enough to breathe, the heavy cloak still anchored in your grip. You didn't drop it. Instead, you brought the coarse wool to your bare skin.

The friction was a shock. It scraped over your nipples, making them ache and pebble instantly. A jagged gasp escaped you, imagining those weren't fibers, but his calloused palms. You rubbed the heavy fabric over your stomach and down the curve of your thighs, the rough texture intentional and punishing.

You were wet, soaking, aching. As you ground the cloak against yourself, you felt the dark wool grow damp with your own slickness. The thought was a thrill of pure depravity. You were marking his property. Staining his cloak with the evidence of how much you wanted him. Let him find it, you thought, a feverish light behind your eyes. Let him inhale and know exactly what he does to me.

"Ohhh, Ser Duncan," you whimpered, the name a prayer and a filthy confession.

You dropped to the cold stone floor, too impatient for the tub. You spread your legs, the cloak bunched beneath you and over you, and guided your hand into the heat. You were swollen, your folds dripping. Two fingers drove inside, stretching yourself, while the heel of your hand ground against your clit with frantic, messy pressure.

Your eyes closed and you saw him. You saw him on his knees, his mouth open, begging for you in the dark.

"I'd be so good for you," you whispered, throwing his own words back at the empty room. "I'd let you... I'd want you to..."

The pace quickened, your hips bucking off the floor. You weren't just touching yourself; you were trying to find him through the friction. Ragged, ugly sobs tore from your throat as the coil tightened. When the orgasm hit, it was a convulsion that ripped a broken cry from your lips. Your internal muscles clamped down hard on your fingers, waves of heat crashing through you until your limbs went limp.

Silence returned, thick and suffocating. You lay sprawled on the cold stone, the heavy wool draped over your trembling body like a shroud.

Shame followed immediately, an icy contrast to the heat. Your eyes dropped to the dark, wet patch on the cloak where you had pressed it between your legs. It was a desecration. You had taken his honor and made it a tool for your lust.

On unsteady legs, you rose and climbed into the steaming bath. You dragged the cloak in with you, submerged it, and began to scrub. The harsh lye soap turned your knuckles white as you worked, desperate to wash away the scent of your own climax.

But as the lavender suds swallowed the smell of him, you knew it was a lie.

The line was gone. You were standing on the edge of a cliff, and you had just taken the first, dizzying step into the abyss.

Grey muted the world outside your window. A miserable, needling rain had fallen since dawn, turning the track to a river of thick, grabbing mud. This was the sort of day that kept even the livestock huddled under thatch, but inside the solar, the atmosphere was far from restful.

Your father sat at the heavy oak table, a broken wax seal at his elbow and a deep furrow between his brows. Your mother bustled between the sideboard and the door, directing the kitchen girls with sharp, hushed commands that did little to mask her anxiety.

"Sit." Your father's voice lacked its usual warmth as you crossed the threshold. "We have a matter to settle."

The knot in your stomach tightened as you took your seat. The trencher of salt pork and cold eggs on your plate remained untouched.

"Your mother and I must take ship for Gulltown." He tapped the parchment before him. "A cog carrying our late-harvest grain was driven into the rocks off the Fingers. The merchant disputes the charter, and the masters of the port threaten to seize the rest of the cargo. It's a mess of Braavosi contracts, and I must see to it myself."

Gulltown. A week down the high road, at least, then the treacherous passage through the mountains. "How long?" Your voice came out smaller than intended.

"A moon. Perhaps longer." He rubbed his temples, where silver showed thick in his beard. "The bailiff will handle the threshing here, but I need you on the accounts. You know the ledgers better than he does."

That was familiar ground; you had managed the estate during his shorter absences. But your mother stepped forward then, her silk skirts rustling like dry leaves. She laid a second letter on the table—this one sealed with plain, uncrewed wax.

"There is more." Her voice was soft. "A rider arrived from the Riverlands while you slept. From my cousin, Ser Elmar Beck."

You broke the wax with a thumbnail and smoothed the parchment. The ink was cheap, the hand hurried and cramped.

"A blight," you murmured, reading the stark lines. "A grey mold on the winter wheat along the Blue Fork. He says it creeps across the fields like a mist, rotting the stalk before the ear can swell." You looked up, your fingers tensing against the paper. "Elmar is a knight, not a farmer. Why write to us?"

"Because Elmar and I broke our first lances together at Riverrun," your father said heavily. "He knows I have an eye for the soil, and he knows our valley has never starved. He is desperate. If the wheat fails, his smallfolk will eat dirt by first snowfall, and the Tullys will still demand their tax." He leaned forward, his gaze boring into yours. "I cannot go to the Trident and Gulltown at once."

The silence in the room grew heavy, thick with the smell of damp wool and woodsmoke.

"You want me to go," you said. It wasn't a question.

"It is a four-day ride to Beck's Ford," your mother interjected quickly, a little too smoothly. "You have the head for it. You will look at the ears, check the drainage by the river, and tell Elmar how we saved our crops three summers ago. A simple matter of counsel."

A simple matter. Four days out. A night at a lord's hall. Four days back. Through lands still raw from the last skirmishes between petty lords.

"I cannot ride the Riverlands alone, Mother."

"You won't be alone," your father said. His eyes shifted toward the open archway behind you.

You didn't need to turn. You knew the rhythm of that stride before you heard the dull thud of heavy boots on the flags. A sudden shift in the room's air told you he was there—the scent of rain, oiled leather, and horse-sweat cutting through the stale grease of the kitchen.

"Ser Duncan," your father called.

Duncan stepped into the solar. He was a big man, broad-shouldered and thick-necked, and his presence immediately made the low-ceilinged room feel claustrophobically small. His eyes found yours first before he bowed stiffly to your parents.

"My lord. My lady."

"You are to take three horses from the stable and accompany my daughter to the Blue Fork," your father commanded. "Ser Elmar has a rot in his fields. She has the knowledge to fix it; you have the steel to ensure she lives to come home."

Duncan didn't blink, but you caught the subtle, telltale hardening of his jaw, the way his large hand tightened around the pommel of his dagger.

"To the Riverlands, my lord? The roads near the Red Fork have been lawless since the spring rains."

"Which is why she goes with an anointed knight," your father snapped, leaving no room for dissent.

Duncan looked at you then. Truly looked. His eyes scanned your face, lingering for a fraction of a second on the hollow of your throat, where your pulse beat too fast against your collar. There was an intensity in his stare that made your skin prickle with a heat that had nothing to do with the hearth.

This was madness. To be trapped on a muddy track with him for days, weeks after the whispered words in the godswood, after the oath he had sworn that felt more like a threat to your virtue than a promise of protection.

"The rains will make the travel slow, Father," you said, your voice tight, almost brittle. "Perhaps it is better if we wait. Or send a courier with a treatise."

"A courier cannot smell the soil," your father said with finality. "You leave at first light. Duncan, see to the cloaks and the pack mules."

"Yes, my lord."

Duncan bowed again, a brief, efficient movement of iron and muscle. As he turned to leave, the space between you vanished for a heartbeat. His heavy leather sleeve brushed against the wool of yours. It was a careless, accidental contact, but it sent a sharp jolt straight through your core. For a second, his shadow completely blocked the grey light from the window, wrapping you in his heat.

He didn't look back as he strode out, but you saw the rigid line of his back, the tension in the corded muscles of his neck.

You stared down at your plate. The grease on the cold eggs had congealed into a white film. Your parents had just handed you over to the one man who made you forget your duty, your name, and your honor—and as the rain continued to lash against the glass, you knew the Riverlands would be the end of you both.

The morning you left was a study in bruised iron and wet wool. The rain had ceased by dawn, leaving the world glistening and the air thick with the scent of sodden earth. In the stableyard, the horses' breath misted in the chill. Ser Duncan's mare, Chestnut, pawed impatiently at the cobbles, her bronze coat gleaming like a polished kettle, while your own grey stood placid—a quiet beast meant for a lady, not a march through the mud.

You were cinching the girth, the damp leather creaking under your pulling hands, when the light failed.

A shadow fell over you, broad and sudden, blocking out the pale eastern sky. You didn't need to look up. You could feel the heat radiating from him, a physical presence that made the hairs on your arms stand up. You tried to focus on the buckle, to force your hands into steady, methodical movements, but your mind was already betraying you, mapping the sheer width of him behind you, the scent of well-water and oiled leather that followed him like a herald.

When you reached for the heavy riding saddle, your fingers strained against the damp hide. A large, calloused hand clamped over yours on the pommel.

"I have it," Duncan rumbled. His voice was too low, too deep for the morning stillness, a gravelly sound that vibrated straight through your ribs.

You didn't pull away. You froze, your knuckles trapped beneath the rough skin of his palm. His thumb brushed the side of your wrist, slow and deliberate, before he took the weight from you. His tunic strained across his back as he hoisted the saddle onto the mare with an easy, fluid grace.

"Thank you," you muttered to the horse's mane, your heart hammering against your ribs.

"The road to Beck's Ford will be unkind," he said, adjusting your stirrup leathers. "We must make our miles before the clouds return."

"Then let us find the high road, Ser," you replied, your tone clipping the air like shears to hide the tremor in your breath.

By midday, the silence between you had grown teeth.

The track along the Red Fork was a ribbon of deep, sucking mire, flanked by dense willow-choke that seemed to press the humidity down upon your shoulders. You rode ahead, trying desperately to mind your own business, to look at the scenery, to be the lady your father expected. An impossible, maddening task. Every jingle of his mail, every shift of his great weight in the leather behind you, drew your mind straight back to him. You were helplessly hyper-aware of him.

Worse, he rode so close that Chestnut's hot, rhythmic breath practically blew down your neck, puffing against the damp skin just beneath your hair. It sent a relentless, rhythmic prickle of heat straight down your spine.

You pulled your mare up so sharply the beast slid in the silt. Whirling in the saddle, your face flushed.

"You don't have to ride in my pocket, Ser Duncan. Your horse is breathing down my neck."

Duncan reined in, his bronze mare coming abreast of yours. He looked down at you from his height, his expression a mask of pure, unblinking knightly discipline. "The ditches are deep, my lady. The Riverlands are full of broken men after the harvest. It is safer this way."

"I am perfectly capable of staying out of a ditch," you snapped, knuckles white on the reins. "And I am capable of seeing danger before it arrives. Fall back. It is... distracting."

"Distracting?" Duncan's blue eyes darkened, turning the color of the river before a storm. He leaned slightly forward in his saddle, his shadow enveloping you once more. "A protector should be a comfort, not a distraction. Unless it isn't the safety of the road that is troubling you."

The implication made your breath catch. Lifting your chin, you fought to claw back your dignity. "What else would trouble me, Ser? I merely find your methods overbearing. You look at me like I am a problem you have to solve from a distance, yet you crowd me until I cannot breathe."

Duncan's jaw tightened, a muscle twitching beneath his stubble. The rigid professionalism he'd clung to all morning finally frayed.

"What do you want from me?" he demanded, his voice rising thick with frustration. "Should I stop being careful? Stop treating you like a lady? Do you want me to treat you like one of my squires? Swear at you? Spit on the ground?"

As if to prove the point, he turned his head and spat aggressively into the thick mud between your horses.

The wet thwack of spit hitting mire shattered the suffocating tension. So utterly un-knightly, so raw and ridiculous in the middle of his protective stance, that a startled laugh bubbled up before you could stop it.

You covered your mouth, but the sound escaped, clear and bright. Hearing you, the hard lines of Duncan's face crumbled. He looked down at the mud, then back at you, and a dark flush crept rapidly up his thick neck, staining his cheeks crimson.

A rough chuckle rumbled from his chest, and within seconds, you were both laughing. It was a frantic release of all the pressure building since leaving your home.

"Gods," Duncan muttered, running a thick hand over his face, his ears burning red. "Forgive me, my lady. That was... I am a fool. A bloody barbarian."

"A very dignified knight," you gasped, wiping a tear from your eye, your smile lingering as your heart hammered against your collarbone.

"The singers definitely leave that part out," he said, his voice softening. His blue eyes found yours again, anger replaced by a gaze so heavy it felt like a touch. His leather-gloved hand hovered before his thumb brushed a stray hair from your cheek. The contact sent heat through your skin. "Come. Let us find a place to make camp before the sky turns black again. And I promise... I will let Chestnut breathe the open air."

You turned your horse back onto the track, your body thrumming with restless heat. He fell into place just behind your shoulder—not quite as close, but close enough to feel the weight of his gaze. 

The fire crackled, spitting orange sparks into the purple twilight. Woodsmoke and crisping pork fat hung heavy in the small clearing, trapped beneath the low canopy of willows. You sat cross-legged on your bedroll, a dented tin plate balanced on your knees, mechanically moving food with a horn spoon. Your appetite had vanished with the sun, replaced by a humming alertness that made every rustle in the brush sound like a drumbeat.

Duncan crouched three paces away, hunched over the small blaze like a shadow carved gargoyle. He'd shed his mail and heavy leather jerkin, wearing only a loose linen tunic with sleeves rolled past his elbows. Thick, corded forearms emerged, mapped with pale jagged briar-scars and old iron-nicks. Each time he stirred the coals with a green ash wood stick, muscles shifted beneath the thin cloth, broad and deliberate.

A maddeningly intimate view. You kept eyes fixed on your plate, trying to force yourself to eat, but your gaze kept sliding back to his bare wrists, to the dark hair curling at his unlaced throat.

"You're good at this," you said, voice thin against evening's vast silence. Your spoon gestured vaguely toward the trencher. "The food. Most men-at-arms I've known burn the outside and leave the center raw."

His chin remained tucked near his collarbone as he nudged a stray coal back into the hearth. "It's just salt meat and wild garlic. Fire does the work if you don't rush it."

"Still. Better than hardbread and cold water." You leaned back slightly, trying to adopt a casual posture you didn't feel. "It's nice to be looked after for a turn. At home, if the bailiff or maids see me idle for more than a minute, they find a ledger needing balancing or a wool-sack needing weighing."

Duncan finally raised his head. Firelight caught his eyes, turning dark blue into something warm and bright, like polished amber. "Your father told me you have the head of a master-builder. Said you could calculate the yield of a ten-acre plot before the seed was even out of the sack."

"He exaggerates," you said, a small smile tugging at your lips despite the prickle on your throat from his intense stare. "He simply prefers the countinghouse to the fields, so he let me take the mud on my boots instead."

"Nothing wrong with mud," Duncan rumbled softly, gaze dropping to the stick in his large hands. He began peeling a strip of bark away with his thumbnail. "It's honest. Better than the grease in the city."

Silence settled again, but the sharp edge from the road had softened into something heavier, like humidity before a summer storm. You watched his thick fingers work the wood, obsessed with the sheer scale of his hands. They were the hands of a killer, big enough to crush a man's windpipe, yet you'd seen him handle your mare's delicate leather tack with heartbreaking gentleness.

"Tell me," you started, words slipping out before you could weigh them. "Tell me about King's Landing. You said you grew up in Flea Bottom. The septons always speak of it as a pit of sin and thieves, but... I've only ever known the valley."

Duncan's thumb stopped against the bark. He looked caught off guard, heavy brows drawing together as if trying to see through fog. "The septons aren't wrong," he said after a long moment. "It's a foul place. When the wind blows from the south, the stench of fish-markets and tanners' vats stays in your teeth for days. It's narrow, too. The hovels lean out so far over the alleys that you can't see the sky unless you're standing in the middle of the street."

He glanced down at his massive frame, a faint, humorless smile touching his mouth. "I was a lanky lad then. All ribs and long shins. Spent half my youth with a knot on my forehead from cracking it against low door-beams."

The image of a young, clumsy Duncan surviving by his wits in the capital's squalor struck something raw in your chest. "How did you find your way out?"

"Ser Arlan found me." He tossed the peeled stick into the flames, watching the fresh wood catch. "Eleven, maybe twelve. Trying to take a loaf of barley bread off a baker's cart near the Iron Gate. The baker's boys had me cornered with clubs. Arlan rode past on his old gelding. Dented breastplate, shield with the paint half-flaked off, but to me, he looked like the dragonknight himself. He bought the loaf, paid the baker for the trouble, told me he needed a boy to fetch his water and brush his horse."

"Sounds like a good man," you murmured.

"He was the only man." His voice dropped into a low, gravelly register that seemed to vibrate in the ground beneath your blanket. "Taught me how to hold a shield. How to stand straight. He told me a true knight doesn't need a golden spur or a high name—just an honest heart and the will to defend those who can't do it themselves." He looked up, blue eyes boring straight into yours across the small space. "He gave me everything I am.”

The unvarnished grief in his face made your throat tighten. He wasn't boasting; he was laying his soul bare in the dirt of a riverbank because you had asked. You wanted to move closer, to bridge the small patch of grass between your bedrolls and touch the corded muscle of his shoulder, just to tell him he was enough. The desire felt like a physical ache between your ribs.

To break the weight of it, you forced a lighter note into your voice. "And after? When you took his coin and went into the world? Any grand tourneys? Highborn ladies giving you their favors?"

Duncan blinked, the melancholy vanishing from his face, replaced instantly by that deep, dark crimson flush you had seen on the road. It crept up from his collar, staining his ears. He rubbed the back of his neck, suddenly looking very much like the stableboy he had once been.

"No." He cleared his throat, looking everywhere but at you. "No ladies. Mostly just rainy roads and old taverns where the ale tasted like horse-piss. The only women who ever looked twice at me were tavern wenches trying to see if I had any silver left in my pouch after a night's lodging."

You let out a genuine laugh, the tension breaking just enough for you to breathe. "So no broken hearts left from Oldtown to the Wall?"

"None." His voice steadied, embarrassment fading. He stopped looking at the fire. He looked at you. His eyes traveled slowly from your hair, down to the curve of your collarbone where your tunic was unfastened against the fire's heat, then lingered on your lips. "I've never had much use for fair words or courtly games, my lady. A man like me... we don't get the things the bards sing about."

The air thickened instantly, suffocating. The fire's crackle faded to a distant murmur. You watched the steady rise and fall of his chest, the pulse leaping in the hollow of his thick throat. Though he remained still, his presence pressed against your skin.

You should look away. Should speak of the hour, the harvest, your father's ledgers. But you were paralyzed, caught by the dark hunger smoldering in his eyes. He wanted to cross the space between you, evident in the way his knuckles whitened around the ash stick, his whole body coiled tight beneath the linen shirt.

Duncan swallowed, the sound sharp in the quiet clearing. He rose abruptly, his massive frame blotting out the firelight and plunging you into shadow.

"The wind is shifting." His voice was rough, uneven, like iron dragging over stone. "I should... I need to double-hobble the grey. She's restless near the water."

He turned before you could answer, long strides carrying him quickly from the fire's circle into the dense darkness of the willow-choke.

You exhaled a long breath as you set your untouched plate on the grass. The shiver that ran through you had nothing to do with the night's chill. You pulled your woolen cloak tighter around your shoulders and lay back on your bedroll, staring up through the leaves at the cold, indifferent stars.

He was out there in the dark. A silent guardian who could kill a man with his bare hands. While you remained trapped in the small circle of light he had built. 

Heat first. A solid wall of it pressed against your spine.

You lay on your side, curled against the morning chill, your back flush against something far more solid than your bedroll. Your eyes snapped open. You froze.

Enveloped.

The scent of woodsmoke, leather, his skin filled your senses.

Ser Duncan.

You lay completely against him. The hard plane of his chest rose and fell against your shoulder blades, a slow rhythm that contrasted with your frantic breathing. One massive arm draped over your waist, anchoring you. His other hand rested beneath your head.

You were using his hand as a pillow. Your cheek nestled into his calloused palm, his long fingers curled against your jawline, holding you close even in sleep. An intimate touch, while he remained asleep.

Every instinct screamed to move, pull away, feign sleep. Create distance before he woke. But you couldn't. His warmth seeped through your wool shift, lulling your body into liquid surrender.

He shifted behind you. A deep, unconscious movement. His body pressed closer, long thighs bracketing yours, chest molding to your back. A sleepy huff of air rumbled in his chest, puffing warm against your bare neck. A fierce shiver of need shot down your spine.

Gods, he was hard.

Through the thin layers of your clothes, you felt the solid length of him—hot, thick, pressed right against the soft swell of your hips. This wasn't the frantic tension from the woods. This was slow, heavy morning arousal, a potent proof of his body's silent desire, nestled perfectly against you.

A tiny whimper caught in your throat. You clamped your teeth together, praying to the Old Gods he hadn't heard. Duncan remained asleep, his breathing deep and regular. His hand beneath your cheek twitched, rough thumb brushing across your cheekbone in a slow, instinctive caress that made your toes curl beneath your blanket.

Your blood was humming, a furnace of heat pooling between your thighs. A persistent, throbbing ache made you want to lose all sense of propriety. You wanted to press back against the hard ridge of him, to grind your hips into that solid heat until the friction drove you completely mad. You wanted that massive hand to move, to leave your jaw, to slide down your neck and cup the aching weight of your breast.

You squeezed your eyes shut, fighting your own anatomy with everything you had. It was wrong. He was your sworn shield, asleep and unaware, and you were taking advantage of his proximity.

But the line between passive and active shattered when his hips gave a small, primitive thrust against you. A subtle, sleepy hitch of his weight, pressing him so firmly into your softness that you had to bite your lip to keep from moaning aloud.

This had to stop. Now.

With a herculean effort of will, you forced yourself to roll away, breaking the contact and slipping out from under his heavy arm. The sudden invasion of damp morning air where his heat had just been felt like a physical blow. You curled inward, your back now facing him, your heart knocking against your ribs.

You lay perfectly still, feigning sleep though your skin vibrated and breath came shallow. Behind you, he stirred, a confused, gravelly grunt as the loss of your warmth woke him. The wool of the bedrolls rustled loudly as he shifted, then the camp went entirely still.

You kept your shoulders steady, pretending to be lost in deep slumber, but you felt the immense weight of his gaze on your back. The silence stretched, thick with the unsaid, heavy with the realization of what had just happened in the dark.

Then you heard him rise. His footsteps were soft, heavy thuds in the damp grass as he moved away from your bedroll. A moment later, the faint, steady trickle of the stream signaled he was washing the sleep and the heat from his face.

Only then did you let out a ragged breath. You rolled onto your back, staring blankly up at the grey sky through heavy willow leaves. Your body still thrummed, the ache between your legs an insistent, mocking reminder of how close you had been to the flame. You had nearly been burned completely, and the most treacherous part of you wished you had let it happen.

That day's ride carried a different weight. The morning's sharp defensiveness had dissolved, replaced by a charged silence that needed no words to fill the miles. The dawn's intimacy had forged a wordless understanding between you—a quiet, dangerous truce.

Duncan kept his horse at a distance, yet you felt the constant weight of his gaze. When you glanced over, you'd catch his eyes lingering on your profile, tracing the line of your neck, or dropping to your hands where your knuckles whitened on the reins. This steady awareness made your skin prickle beneath your woolen cloak.

Late afternoon brought an inn into view at the crossroads. The River-Runnan, its weathered sign proclaimed—a three-story structure of river-stone and dark timber that looked as weary as the travelers approaching. It marked the last outpost of civilization before the track deteriorated into the isolated flats leading to your cousin's holdfast.

As you guided the horses into the stable yard, something unexpected occurred. Your grey mare, Rose, nickered softly. Duncan's bronze chestnut answered with a low, vibrating whinny. They stretched their muzzles across the space between them, sharing warm breath in an unmistakable greeting.

You and Duncan exchanged a look over the horses' heads.

"Well," he said, a rare smile touching his mouth. "Seems they've more sense than their masters. Made peace."

"It appears so," you agreed, your own smile breaking through your careful reserve. "I suppose we're stuck with each other's company a while longer."

He dismounted with the creak of leather, moving to stroke his mare's neck. "I think Chestnut likes you better than me, truth be told. She's been eyeing your oats all morning."

"She simply has excellent taste, Ser," you retorted as you slid from your saddle. Your legs were stiff, and for a moment, your balance faltered. Duncan was there instantly, his large hand cupping your elbow. His palm burned through your sleeve, his touch firm and steady before he seemed to remember himself and drew back. "She recognizes a woman of quality."

A low chuckle rumbled in his chest, making something in your belly flip. "Of course. My error, my lady."

Inside the common room's smoky warmth, you secured two chambers, telling yourself it was the only proper arrangement. But when the innkeeper handed over the iron keys, your fingers brushed Duncan's as you passed him his. A spark jumped between your skin that had nothing to do with propriety.

"Supper is in an hour," you said, your voice dropping into that breathless register you despised.

Duncan looked down at the heavy key in his palm, then up at you, his blue eyes dark and unblinking. "I will be waiting."

You practically fled up the creaking stairs, shutting your chamber door and leaning your weight against the thick timber. You needed the solitude to douse the sudden, wild heat that flared to life whenever he stood within arm's reach.

The hour passed in a blur of cold basin-water and the frantic smoothing of your travel-stained skirts. When you finally descended to the common room, the space was bustling with grain-traders and drovers, the air thick with the smell of roasting mutton, ale, and damp wool.

Duncan was already there. He had changed into a clean, dark linen tunic, and his hair was still damp from washing, curling tightly at the nape of his neck. He looked massive against the low ceilings, rugged and entirely unpolished in a way that made your throat go dry. He rose the moment you approached, a gesture of old-world chivalry that felt absurdly intimate in a room full of shouting teamsters.

"My lady," he murmured.

You rolled your eyes to hide the flush creeping up your neck, though you could not stop the smile. "We are at a crossroads inn, Duncan. Do not start that again."

The ghost of a smile touched his mouth. "As you wish."

He led you to a small, scarred table tucked into the shadows of the corner hearth. For a time, you ate the hearty mutton stew and crusty black bread in a comfortable, easy silence. The tension had not vanished; it had simply evolved. It was no longer the sharp, defensive pain of the previous day. It was anticipatory, a live wire humming in the dark.

"You handled the grey well through the mire today," he said, breaking the quiet as he broke a piece of bread. "She is a sweet thing, but she has a stubborn streak when the mud gets up to her hocks."

"So does her rider," you said, meeting his gaze over the rim of your ale-cup. "We are well-matched in our vices."

The look he gave you then was completely different from his usual guarded stares. It was slow, heavy, and reached his eyes, turning the blue to a deep, dark sapphire. "That you are. I have noticed you do not take to the rein easily."

"And you do, Ser Knight?"

"Only when the hand holding it is one I trust," he said softly.

The words landed between you like a weight. The conversation flowed more dangerously after that, masked behind mundane talk of harvest prices and the ridiculous cost of salt in King's Landing. It felt like a conspiracy, two people building a fragile bridge across a chasm, piece by agonizing piece.

But the night demanded an end. When you stood together at the foot of the stairs, the awkwardness returned, cold and sudden.

"Goodnight, Ser Duncan," you whispered.

He gave a short, efficient bow of his broad shoulders. "Sleep well, my lady. I am just across the timber if there is a noise."

You climbed the steps, feeling the physical weight of his eyes tracking the movement of your hips until you cleared the landing. You did not dare look back.

Your chamber door closed with a decisive click. The room was small, containing nothing but a narrow rope bed and a single window looking out over the black stable yard. You lit a tallow candle, watching the flame dance against the rough stone.

You were exhausted, but your blood was thrumming with a restless, agonizing energy. You paced the floorboards, your skin still singing from the morning when you had woken up molded against his chest, feeling the heavy, thick length of his arousal pressed into your hips. He was becoming more than a complication. He was becoming a necessity.

The next dawn broke bright and clear, the road drying into an easy, hard-packed track. The light-heartedness that followed was entirely new. Duncan actually made you laugh, a real, unburdened sound that echoed across the rolling hills as he recounted a ridiculous tale of Ser Arlan attempting to joust a drunken septon in the Reach.

By late afternoon, Beck's Ford's grey stone walls rose from the river-mists. Your relative, Ser Elmar Beck, proved a frantic, thin man whose relief at your arrival bordered on pathetic. He fussed over you instantly, shouting for servants, offering hot baths and a feast you had no desire to endure. Declining the pageantry, you insisted on a simple trencher and a quiet corner room near the granary.

After a brief, professional tour of the blighted fields where your focus finally returned, allowing you to map out a clear trenching strategy to save the winter wheat, Elmar's bailiff showed you to your quarters.

The room was modest but secluded, boasting a large, iron-latched window overlooking a breathtaking view of the Red Fork winding like a silver ribbon through the dark valley below. As you stood there watching twilight swallow the Riverlands, you heard the heavy, familiar boot-heels settle directly outside your door. He was there. Your shield. The keep's smallness only meant the walls between you were growing thinner.

He stood in the hallway, his immense frame seeming to fill the narrow space. Washed and changed too, his dark hair remained damp. He looked... good. Relaxed.

"Ser Elmar requests our presence at dinner." His massive frame nearly filled the narrow stone corridor. "I came to escort you."

"Of course." You stepped out into the hall, closing the heavy oak door behind you. "Though I am not sure if I am ready for more conversation."

He fell into step beside you as you walked toward the great hall, the steady thud of his boots a comforting rhythm. "Just stick with me." His voice dropped into a low, conspiratorial murmur. "I will protect you from the boring parts."

Looking up at him, a genuine smile fractured your reserve. "Is that part of your oath, Ser Duncan? Shielding me from tedious conversation?"

He looked down at you, his blue eyes entirely serious in the torchlight. "It is the most important part."

The warmth spreading through your chest at his words had nothing to do with the damp evening air. You walked into the great hall together, shoulders almost touching, a silent understanding passing between you. The journey had changed things. It had broken down the rigid walls of status and forced a new kind of honesty. You were no longer just a farmer's daughter and he no longer just a hedge knight. You were something else, something just beginning whose shape you could not yet name. For now, there was a blight to discuss, and a dinner to get through.

The dinner in Elmar’s hall was a simple, rustic affair, a welcome change from the stuffy, formal meals you had endured in the past. The long table was made of rough-hewn oak, and the candles were of cheap tallow, casting a warm, flickering light over the faces of the small household.

Ser Elmar Beck was a man shaped by his land, his face weathered and his hands calloused, much like your own father's. His wife, Lady Anya, was a quiet, round-cheeked woman with a kind smile and eyes that held a deep, lingering weariness. You noticed the way she held her hand protectively over her stomach, a gesture so subtle it was almost imperceptible. But you had seen it before in the women of your valley. You knew the signs.

The conversation was pleasant, revolving around the harvest, the local gossip of the Riverlands, and the peculiarities of the weather. Ser Duncan sat beside you, a solid, quiet presence. He ate with a focused intensity, but you could feel his attention, a subtle awareness that remained both comforting and distracting.

When the meal wound down, Elmar turned to you, his expression earnest. "My lady, I cannot thank you enough for making this journey. The sight of you on our threshold was a beacon of hope."

You inclined your head. "It was my duty, Ser Elmar. My father has always believed that knowledge of the land is meant to be shared."

He nodded, his gaze thoughtful. "Your father is a wise man, and you have his eye, it seems. What you told me this afternoon about the water mold and the need to trench the eastern field makes perfect sense. I have been fighting this blight with prayers and copper sulphate, but I never thought to look at the water itself."

"It is a common mistake," you said. "The water looks clean, so we assume it is. But sometimes the danger is what we cannot see."

He leaned back in his chair, a look of profound respect on his face. "You have a true understanding. It is a rare thing, especially in someone so young."

You glanced at Ser Duncan. He was watching you, his expression unreadable, but there was a flicker of quiet pride in his eyes that made your chest feel tight.

Lady Anya chose that moment to speak up, her voice soft. "My husband speaks truly. We are grateful." She paused, her hand resting on her stomach again. "And we will be more in need of such wisdom in the coming moons."

The unspoken announcement hung warmly in the air. You gave her a congratulatory smile. "My lady, that is wonderful news."

She smiled back, though it was tinged with anxiety. "We are hopeful. But my husband is not as young as he once was. The management of the fields and the health of the crops is a heavy burden when one is otherwise occupied."

Elmar sighed, placing his hand over his wife's. "My lady is too kind. The truth is, I am a soldier, not a farmer. I know how to hold a line, not how to read the soil. I have been doing a poor job of it, as this blight proves."

An idea began to form in your mind, bold and unexpected. You glanced at Duncan again, drawing strength from his steady presence before you spoke. "What if you had someone to manage it for you? Not a standard steward, but a master of fields. Someone with the knowledge to guide your men and oversee the health of the land."

You took a breath, the words rushing out with growing conviction. "I could write to my father. He knows of those who have studied the old ways, who understand the balance of water and soil. They could come here, assess the lands, and train your people. In the long run, a healthy harvest is worth more than any hoarded coin."

Elmar stared at you, his mouth slightly agape, while Anya’s eyes lit up with a fragile hope. "You would do that for us?" the knight asked, his voice hushed. "You would find us such a person?"

"I know of one in particular near the Trident," you said. "Her mind is sharper than any sword. She might be persuaded to take on an apprentice here and pass on her knowledge. My father believes the realm is built on its fields, not its castles. Helping you keeps the Riverlands fed. It is not a favor, Ser Elmar. It is good sense."

The silence that followed was thick with possibility. Ser Duncan shifted beside you. You did not look at him, but you could feel the physical weight of his gaze on the side of your face. It was a look of quiet astonishment. You had taken control of the room, not with a high title, but with knowledge and sheer conviction.

Elmar finally spoke, his voice thick with emotion. "I am speechless, my lady. If you can arrange this, you will have saved not just our crops, but our home." He stood up, a formal gesture of profound gratitude. You rose as well, feeling Lady Anya's eyes on you.

"Consider it done, ser," you said, your voice steady. "I will send the raven at first light."

As you turned to leave the hall, Ser Duncan fell into step beside you. You walked in silence down the stone corridor, the weight of the evening settling over you. When you reached the door to your chamber, you turned to face him.

He was looking at you in a way he never had before. It was no longer the guarded, hungry look from the road, or the respectful, distant mask of a protector. It was open, raw, and full of an emotion so powerful it made your breath catch.

"Is that it?" he asked, his voice low, almost a whisper. "Is this what you do? Ride into a lord's keep and fix everything?"

You couldn't help but smile, a little breathlessly. "Only the broken things."

He shook his head slowly, his blue eyes never leaving yours.

The air between you felt charged, entirely alive. He was so close, the heat from his bare forearms a tangible force in the chilly corridor. You thought of the morning in the camp, his body curled tightly around yours, your cheek nestled in his palm.

"I think," you said softly, "that we are all a little broken, Ser Duncan. Some of us are just better at hiding it."

For a moment, you thought he might finally breach the distance. His hand twitched at his side, a small, involuntary movement of his fingers. But he stopped himself, his knuckles tightening as he forced his rigid restraint back into place, brick by brick. You felt your body trembling.

But this time, you were not trembling with frustration or anxiety. You were trembling with a burgeoning sense of your own power. He saw you now. Truly saw you. Not as a responsibility, not as a farmer's daughter, but as a woman of intelligence and strength.

The morning sun filtered through the small window of Ser Elmar's study, illuminating the dust motes dancing in the air. You sat at a heavy oak desk, a piece of parchment spread before you, a quill in your hand. You had just finished your detailed report on the blight, outlining the causes, the recommended treatments, and the long-term strategies for drainage and crop rotation. It was thorough, precise, and, you hoped, helpful.

A soft knock at the door broke your concentration. "Enter."

Ser Elmar came in, his face looking less weary than it had the day before. "My lady. I hope I am not disturbing you."

"Not at all, ser. I was just finishing my report."

He approached the desk, peering at the neat lines of your script. "Extraordinary. Truly. You have a gift for this."

You felt a flush of pride. "It is simply a matter of observation, ser."

He smiled, a genuine crinkling of the eyes. "A rare and valuable skill." He hesitated, his expression turning hopeful. "Which is why I was hoping to impose on you once more."

You looked up, curious. "Impose?"

"We have a midwife arriving from a neighboring holdfast. She is a wise woman, and I would be grateful if you would be here to consult with her when she arrives. She will have questions about the land, the water... things you understand far better than I."

It was a reasonable request. But it meant another day. Another day here, away from the farm, away from the journey back with Ser Duncan. A small, treacherous part of you leapt at the prospect.

"I would be honored to assist, ser," you heard yourself say. "The midwife should be here by midday?"

He nodded. "So she said. I will send for you when she arrives. Thank you, again. You are a godsend."

He gave you a final, grateful nod and left the study. You were alone again, the silence of the room pressing in. You stood up, moving to the window that overlooked the inner courtyard. The sun was high, the day warm. You watched the bustle of the holdfast below.

And then you saw them.

A young maid, with auburn hair escaping her cap, was carrying a basket of linens. She was hurrying, her head down, and she nearly collided with a young man coming out of the stables. He was a woodcutter, by the look of his strong arms and the axe slung over his shoulder. His hair was the color of sand, and he had a broad, open face.

They stopped, inches apart. The maid's basket tilted, and a stack of clean rags tumbled to the cobblestones.

"Oh, forgive me, my lady! I wasn't looking!" the maid squeaked, her face turning scarlet. She immediately dropped to her knees, scrabbling to pick up the fallen laundry.

The young woodcutter laughed, a warm, easy sound. He crouched down to help her, his large hands gently gathering the clean cloths. "No harm done, Alia," he said, his voice low and kind. Their hands brushed over a piece of linen, and the contact seemed to jolt them both. They froze for a second, their eyes meeting.

It was a small, fleeting moment, but it was charged with a sweet, undeniable chemistry. You recognized it instantly. The awkwardness, the sudden awareness, the blush that wasn't just from embarrassment. It was the language of young, burgeoning affection.

But it was happening in the open. And you weren't the only one watching.

Ser Elmar had emerged from the main keep, his face already set in a frown of disapproval. "What is this?" he barked, his voice sharp. "Alia! You clumsy girl! Those are the linens for the birthing room! Get them washed again, at once!"

The maid's face crumpled, the blush of happiness replaced by one of mortification. "Yes, ser. Forgive me." She snatched the rest of the rags from the woodcutter's hands and fled, her head bowed.

The young man stood up slowly, his easy smile gone, replaced by a look of sullen anger. He shot a glare at the knight's retreating back before he, too, turned and stalked off toward the woods, his shoulders hunched.

You couldn't stand it. You had seen that look before, the quiet frustration of a life where small moments of joy were punishable offenses. You turned from the window, your heart thumping in your chest. You knew what you had to do.

You found Ser Elmar in the great hall, overseeing the delivery of some stores. You approached him, keeping your voice calm and respectful. "Ser Elmar, a moment."

He turned, his expression impatient. "Yes, my lady?"

"The maid, Alia," you began. "It was an accident. The woodcutter was helping her. There was no harm done."

His frown deepened. "She is careless. In my household, we do not tolerate carelessness. It leads to bigger problems."

"Or," you said, choosing your words carefully, "it leads to young people learning. She was flustered, yes. But he was kind to her. He helped her. That is not a problem, ser. That is a good thing."

He looked at you, startled by your gentle but firm rebuttal. "My lady, I appreciate your perspective. But the order of a keep must be maintained."

"And a happy household is an orderly one," you countered. "A scolding for a simple accident will only breed resentment. The girl is clearly a hard worker. Her only crime was a moment's distraction." You met his gaze, letting your own experience lend weight to your words. "Sometimes, ser, the soil is more fertile when you let a few wildflowers grow."

He blinked at you, the metaphor clearly not one he was accustomed to. But he was a fair man. He sighed, his shoulders slumping slightly. "Perhaps you are right. I will... I will go easier on her."

"Thank you, ser." You gave him a small, respectful nod and walked away, your heart still pounding. You had done it. You had spoken up.

As you turned the corner, you almost walked straight into a solid wall of a man. You looked up, and up, into the familiar, stormy blue eyes of Ser Duncan.

He was standing in the shadows of the corridor, his arms crossed over his massive chest. He had seen the whole thing. From the look on his face, you couldn't tell if he was impressed or exasperated.

"You just can't help yourself, can you?" he rumbled, his voice a low, deep vibration that you felt in your bones.

"Help what?" you asked, feigning innocence, but you couldn't keep the smile from your lips.

He shook his head slowly, a ghost of a smile playing on his own mouth. "Fixing things. People. Problems. Everything."

You looked away, feeling suddenly warm under his gaze. "They needed fixing."

"So you do it," he said, his voice soft. "No matter the cost."

There was no judgment in his tone. Only a quiet, profound understanding. He saw it, the core of you. The need to make things right, to mend what was broken, whether it was a blighted field or a young girl's wounded pride.

It was a moment of pure, unspoken connection. A crack in the armor you both wore. You stood there, in the dim light of the corridor, and you felt a shift. The air was thick with it.

"I should see to my own duties," he said, his voice a little rougher than before.

"And I should prepare for the midwife," you replied.

He didn't move. Neither did you.

Finally, he pushed away from the wall, his movements slow, deliberate. "Be careful, my lady."

You didn't know if he was warning you about the midwife, or about something else entirely. Something about him, and you, and the dangerous path you were walking together.

You just nodded. "Always, Ser Duncan."

He watched you for a second longer, his eyes dark with something you couldn't quite name. Then he turned and walked away, leaving you alone in the corridor, your heart beating a wild, hopeful rhythm.

The day stretched before you, another day in this holdfast. But you knew it wouldn't be like the others. Something had changed. You had intervened, and he had seen you do it. And in doing so, you had shown him another piece of yourself.

The afternoon sun was warm on your skin as you slipped away from the keep.

Ser Duncan was occupied with the men, inspecting the perimeter of the lands. It was the perfect opportunity.

The lake. You needed to see it again, up close. You needed to feel the cool water on your skin, to wash away the dust of the road and the tension of the past few days. More than that, you wanted to be alone. Truly alone, with no guards, no duties, no watchful blue eyes following your every move.

You followed a narrow path through the woods, the air growing cooler and more scented with pine and damp earth. The sounds of the holdfast faded behind you, replaced by the chirping of birds and the rustle of leaves. It was a small, forbidden freedom, and it made you feel giddy and bold.

You could see the glint of the lake through the trees ahead. You picked up your pace, your mind already on the feel of the water, the sensation of being unburdened, even for a little while. You had even brought a small cake of soap, a decadent, unnecessary luxury for a simple bath.

As you rounded a large oak tree, a sound stopped you dead in your tracks. A sound that was not made by birds or leaves.

It was a gasp. A soft, high-pitched moan.

You froze, your heart leaping into your throat. You peered around the thick trunk of the tree, your curiosity warring with your sense of propriety.

And then you saw them.

The woodcutter and the maid.

They were barely thirty feet away, hidden in a small, sun-dappled pocket of the clearing. Oblivious to the world, they were utterly consumed by each other. Her back was pinned flat against the rough, flaking bark of a pine, her heavy kirtle hitched all the way to her waist, her bare legs wrapped tightly around his lean hips. His tunic had been discarded in the grass, his trousers shoved down just far enough to free himself.

They were fucking.

It was nothing like the sweet, fumbling innocence you had glimpsed in the cobblestone courtyard. This was raw, urgent, and primal. He was driving into her with a steady, punishingly powerful rhythm, his thick hand clamped brutally over her mouth to stifle her cries. Her eyes were squeezed shut, her face a flushed mask of ecstatic pleasure, her fingers clawing desperately at his bare shoulders.

You should have turned away. Every lesson of your upbringing demanded you leave them to their privacy. Yet you remained rooted to the spot, your eyes wide, your own body reacting with a sudden, terrifying intensity. You watched the hard flex of the young man’s flanks, the slick sheen of sweat coating his spine, the way her hips violently arched off the tree to meet every blunt, heavy thrust. The sounds filling the quiet woods—the wet, rhythmic slap of skin against skin, her muffled whimpers, his low, guttural groans—were the most obscene and intoxicating things you had ever heard.

This was what it was truly like. This was what happened in the deep shadows, entirely free from the suffocating, watchful eyes of lords and septons. This was the kind of desire that could not be governed, that refused to be denied.

Instantly, you thought of Ser Duncan. You thought of his massive, powerful frame, of the thick, heavy length of him you had felt pressed against your ass in the gray light of dawn. You imagined him here, in this very clearing, holding you. Pinned against the bark. His large hand bruising your lips to keep you quiet. His immense body moving inside you with that same desperate, unrestrained ferocity.

A heavy rush of liquid heat flooded your core, so intense it made your knees sway. You instinctively pressed your thighs together, a helpless, aching attempt to ease the sudden, sharp throbbing between your legs.

You could not bear it a second longer. Your breath was coming in ragged, shallow pants, your entire skin on fire. You turned blindly to slip away before they could discover you.

But as you whirled around, your back collided with a solid, immovable wall of flesh. Before a gasp could leave your throat, a large, calloused hand clamped firmly over your mouth, cutting off your cry of surprise. An arm like an iron band wrapped around your waist, hoisting you backward and pinning you flush against a chest as hard and unyielding as the pine tree.

You froze, your heart hammering against your ribs like a trapped bird. You knew exactly who it was before he even breathed. The scent of old leather, woodsmoke, and pure, raw male musk was unmistakable.

"What in the Seven Kingdoms do you think you are doing?" Duncan's voice was a low, furious growl, vibrating directly against the shell of your ear. He held you completely captive, his large body a cage of suffocating heat and corded muscle.

You tried to speak against his palm, to offer some breathless explanation, but his grip remained unyielding. You shook your head, your eyes wide with panic and a potent, confusing surge of arousal.

He was angry. You could feel the rigid tension vibrating through his entire frame, the iron tightness of his biceps. "You snuck off," he hissed, his hot breath scalding the sensitive skin of your neck. "Without a single word. Into the woods alone. Do you have any idea what could have happened to you?"

You wanted to twist around, to tell him you were perfectly fine, but his low rebuke was suddenly drowned out by a sharp shift in the clearing. The maid's muffled cries had grown more frantic, her whimpers rising in pitch as the woodcutter’s thrusts became fast and erratic. They were close.

Duncan heard it too. Every muscle in his massive body went utterly rigid behind you. Slowly, deliberately, the hand around your waist shifted, turning you slightly so that you were both forced to look back into the clearing.

You watched, transfixed, your skin a live wire of sensation. Ser Duncan's hand was still pressed over your lips, his chest rising and falling rapidly against your shoulder blades.

"Gods, yes," the maid panted, her voice cracking, completely breathless. "Please... fuck me harder. Please, just like that... don't stop. I am so close..."

"You feel so good," the woodcutter groaned, his voice strained and thick with lust. "So tight and wet... fuck, Alia... I am going to spend inside you..."

The crude, direct words sent a jolt of pure, undiluted electricity straight to your core. Behind you, Duncan’s breathing hitched violently. His chest was heaving now, his breath coming faster and hotter against your hair. The heavy hand over your mouth loosened slightly, his fingers trembling, but he did not remove it. He was a furnace at your back, his rising heat seeping through your clothes, melting into your own.

The lovers were entirely lost to their climax. Suddenly, the maid unwrapped her legs from his waist, sliding down the trunk of the pine until she was on her knees in the moss before him. She grabbed his hips with shameless eagerness, pulling him forward and taking him into her mouth with a desperate, low moan.

The woodcutter threw his head back against the sky, his large hands fisting blindly in her auburn hair. "Fuck, yes... just like that... oh, gods..."

Duncan made a strangled, guttural sound in his throat—a low noise of pure shock and answering arousal that vibrated through your spine and pooled heavily between your thighs. His arm tightened reflexively around your waist, a possessive, crushing gesture. He seemed to suddenly remember where he was, remember that he was holding you, forcing you to bear witness to something so raw. His hand began to lift away from your face, intending to shield your eyes.

But you stopped him.

You reached up, your fingers wrapping around his thick, scarred wrist, holding his hand firmly in place over your mouth. You did not want him to let go. You did not want to be shielded from the filth of it. You wanted to see. You wanted him to feel you watching it.

He froze. You could feel his utter disbelief, his shock, radiating from his skin in waves. But he did not pull away. He let you hold his wrist, his massive frame trembling slightly against yours as the final, desperate sounds of the clearing echoed through the trees. Together, you watched the young woodcutter’s face contort with pleasure as he spilled himself, watched the maid slide down into the grass beside him, both of them laughing breathlessly, slick with sweat and satisfaction.

Slowly, carefully, Ser Duncan turned you around in his arms. He removed his hand from your mouth, but he did not release your waist. He stared down at you, his eyes dark, the pupils completely blown out with a raw, hungry need that mirrored your own.

"You wanted to see that," he stated. His voice was a low, rough rasp, thick with the gravel of his own suppressed lust. It was not a question.

You did not deny it. Your lips parted, your breathing still ragged as you looked up into his stormy features.

Duncan took a deep, shuddering breath, his jaw clenching as he forced the wall of his rigid restraint back into place. 

"Next time you get an itch for adventure, you tell me," he growled, his voice a low, threatening rumble as he kept his grip tight on your waist, refusing to let you step back. "You do not just disappear into the gods-damned woods."

You lifted your chin, a spark of pure defiance flaring through your arousal. "And what if I do not want to tell you? What if I want to be alone?"

"You do not want to be alone," he bit out, his voice low, fierce, and entirely uncovered. He leaned down, his face inches from yours, his massive bulk blotting out the sun. "You just want to see what happens when you push. You want to see if I will follow you."

The truth of it, the sheer weight of him seeing through your armor so easily, was both infuriating and intoxicating.

"Maybe I do," you retorted, your breath hot against his chin.

His eyes flashed. His jaw clenched so hard the muscle leaped, and his gaze dropped starkly to your mouth. Your lips parted in response, your body aching for him to finally rip the dress from your shoulders and pin you to the nearest trunk just as the woodcutter had done.

The fragile scaffolding of his chivalry finally collapsed.

With a low, feral curse, Ser Duncan the Tall wrenched himself away, the sudden fracture of contact leaving the air bleeding between you. He stumbled back a pace, shoving a trembling, massive hand over his face as if he could scrub away the raw, predatory hunger etched into his features. A furious, dark crimson flush surged up his thick neck, staining his ears and cheeks a hot, humiliated red.

"W-we turn back," he stammered, the syllables tripping heavily over his swollen lips, his voice a ruined, gravelly rasp. "Right now. You will... you will not leave my side until we are in the valley. Do you mark me?"

You could only stare, your own veins pulsing with a heat so sharp it bordered on agony. You managed a dazed nod, following him as he whirled and cut blindly through the dense brush.

But the suffocating canopy offered no escape. The trail narrowed into a treacherous, green vice, forcing you directly behind his broad, rigid back. The air between you vibrating with the musk of unspent violence and damp earth. Every step felt like a countdown. Suddenly, his boot caught a hidden root. His giant, seven-foot frame lurched backward, directly into your path.

The collision was total. Your face struck the solid wall of his back. Dunk was a furnace, radiating a primitive, heavy heat that soaked instantly through your clothes, melting straight to your bones.

"F-forgive me," he rumbled, a breathless vibration you felt in your own chest. He flinched, his muscles locking as he tried to pull away, desperate to re-establish the distance that kept his honor intact.

You didn't let him.

Driven by a sudden, wicked impulse, your hand shot out, locking around his thick, calloused wrist. "Duncan," you whispered.

He froze. He stood like a monument of trapped muscle beneath your palm, his pulse hammering against your fingertips like a panicked beast. Slowly, painfully, his massive head turned, pinning you over his shoulder. His face was a mask of pure ruin—his blue eyes had darkened into a stormy, dilated black, his jaw clenched so hard the bone jumped beneath his flushed skin.

In one heavy, deliberate movement, he whirled to face you fully. He didn't reclaim his hand; instead, he seized your jaw with a desperation that hovered on the edge of violence, his rough, warm thumb smearing hard across your lips.

"D-don't," he breathed, the word a shattered, pathetic plea.

Instead of pulling away, you parted your teeth. With unashamed deliberation, you drew his thick, scarred thumb fully into your mouth.

Dunk let out a strangled, choked cry as you closed your lips tight around his skin. You sucked on him slowly, deeply, letting the wet, sweltering heat of your mouth envelope him as your tongue swirled around the calloused pad. It was an act of pure, shameless worship—a wet, wicked mimicry of the very coupling you both craved. You looked up through your lashes, holding his blown-out eyes as you pulled his finger deeper against your palate, drawing out a slick, rhythmic friction. In that quiet forest, the dark, deliberate sound of your suction was an intimacy so absolute it felt as though you were already making love, your mouth taking him in just as your body begged to.

A violent convulsion bucked through his entire massive frame. His eyes squeezed shut, his face turning a deeper, bruised shade of red as he trembled against you, utterly unmade by the shameless glide of your mouth.

When you finally let him slip from your lips with a soft, wet pop, he stared down at his glistening skin, his chest heaving in ragged, whistling pants.

"Seven hells," he rasped, his voice thick and thoroughly ruined. "You... you know not what you do to me. You ruin me."

"I know," you whispered, stepping into his space until your breasts pressed against his broad torso. You gripped the front of his tunic, anchoring him to you. "And I want you to ruin me, too. Duncan, listen to me... I have never been with anyone. I have never made love in my life. No man has ever touched me. Not like this. Never."

The confession struck the knight like a physical blow. Dunk’s breath caught, a pathetic, beautiful whimper escaping his throat as his face burned an even deeper, agonizing crimson. The thought of your innocence, contrasted against the raw, filthy display of your desire, utterly destroyed what little remained of his sanity.

"Tell me to s-stop," he begged anyway, one last, desperate prayer for his honor, though his voice cracked and his hands were already fisting blindly in your clothes. "Tell me to walk away, and I swear it on my sword... on my honor. Just... speak it, before I do what cannot be undone."

"Don't," you breathed against his lips. "Don't stop."

With a sound that was almost animal, he devoured the final inch between you. His mouth crashed onto yours with a starved, feral hunger. His lips were scalding, his beard scratching brutally against your skin as he claimed your mouth.

His hand slid to the nape of your neck, fingers fisting into your hair to tilt your head back, bruising you with an intensity that stole the air from your lungs. The kiss was a wet, messy collision of teeth and tongues—a slick, breathless exchange of heat and spit that made your head spin. He tasted of a dark, heavy sweetness that belonged to him alone.

He lunged closer, his arm locking around your waist like a band of iron, lifting you slightly as he crushed your hips against his.

The illusion of his restraint vanished completely. Through the layers of wool and linen, the rigid, monstrous length of his arousal pressed insistently against your abdomen. He was hard as iron, thick and unyielding. Driven by pure, unadulterated need, his hips ground against yours in a slow, desperate rhythm, seeking friction, seeking ruin, letting you feel exactly how much he wanted to stretch you open.

"This is wrong," he gasped against your lips, the words torn and agonizingly slurred, his pride entirely gone. "Gods, this is so wrong... you are so pure, and I... I cannot be this weak... I'll ruin you... I swore an oath..."

"Shut up," you breathed, catching his lower lip between your teeth and biting down just enough to draw a groan. You cupped his burning face, your thumbs wiping away the sweat at his temples. "Don't think about oaths. Take me. Right here. Take what you need."

His entire body convulsed, a shudder of agony and ecstasy. He let out a broken sound as his mouth seized yours again, deeper, more possessive, as his massive hands gripped your hips and anchored you tightly against his hardness. 

The world shrank to the fevered space between your bodies.

Ser Duncan's hands were everywhere at once shaking and clumsy, grabbing at your waist, your hips, the curve of your back. His breath came in ragged, panting bursts against your neck, hot and desperate. The sheer strength of his hands should have been frightening, but it wasn't. It felt like worship.

"Please," you gasped against his mouth, your hands scrabbling at his broad shoulders. "Duncan... please. My dress..."

He made a low, guttural sound of pure frustration and seized the neckline of your kirtle. With a sharp, careless jerk, he yanked the fabric down, tearing the laces. The air hit your bare breasts with a shocking rush of cool, making your nipples pebble instantly. He stared, his blue eyes blown wide and dark, his chest heaving as if he'd been struck.

A strangled, helpless moan escaped his throat, a sound so raw and boyish it made your cunt clench. "I—fuck—I can't," he panted, his gaze glued to your exposed skin. "You're so..." He couldn't even finish the sentence. He just lowered his head and took your nipple into his mouth.

It was not practiced. It was clumsy and eager and utterly perfect. His lips were impossibly hot, wet, and soft as they sealed around your tight bud. He sucked with a greedy, noisy urgency, his tongue flicking clumsily over the sensitive tip, bathing it in warm, slick heat. He left a wet, glistening trail as he moved to your other breast, his breath hot against your damp skin, panting like he'd run for miles.

"Gods," he groaned, the sound vibrating against your flesh. "... I can't... I'm going to..."

"You can," you encouraged, your hands tangling in his thick hair, holding him to you.

"Touch me, Dunk," you begged, your voice a breathless, desperate whisper. You pushed your breasts harder against his face, shamelessly seeking more of that exquisite, clumsy heat. "Put your hands on me. Touch me how you want to, please..."

Your words shattered him. His hands, which had been hovering uselessly at your sides, finally moved. They slid up your sides, rough and warm, to cup the heavy weight of your breasts, his thumbs brushing over your wet, spit-slick nipples. The dual sensation of his hands and his mouth was overwhelming.

He was panting like a man in a fever, his hips jerking uncontrollably against yours. And then, he stiffened. His whole body locked up, a tremor running through his massive frame.

He had come.

Right there, pressed against you, with just the friction of your bodies and the feel of your skin in his mouth, Ser Duncan the Tall had spilled himself in his breeches like a green boy. A deep, guttural moan of shame and release was muffled against your breast, his face buried in your cleavage as he shuddered through it.

You held him, your arms wrapped around his head, stroking his hair as he gasped for breath, his body still quaking with aftershocks. There was no mockery in you, only a fierce, possessive tenderness.

"Ser Duncan," you murmured, kissing the top of his head.

You felt the hot, spreading dampness seeping through his breeches and into your skirts. His cock was still hard, pulsing against you through the soaked fabric, every twitch of it sending a new, weaker gush of his seed soaking his clothes. He was utterly undone.

Slowly, he lifted his head, his face a picture of utter, beautiful humiliation. His eyes were glassy, his lips wet and swollen from your breasts.

"I... I am so sorry," he stammered, his voice cracking. "I didn't mean to... I couldn't..."

You reached down and took his hand, your smaller fingers lacing tightly with his big, calloused ones. You brought his hand to your lips and kissed his knuckles.

"Ser Duncan," you said, your voice trembling with your own rising emotions. "Listen to me. I am to be married. To a man I don't love, for an alliance that means nothing to me. I would rather die a maid than let him touch me." Tears pricked at your eyes, spilling over and running down your cheeks. "Please. I am begging you. Be my first. Ruin me for anyone else. I want you to be the only man who ever knows me like this."