Janine Ashbless's Blog, page 34
September 1, 2017
Well, it's a Friday...
In The Moonlight by Albert von Keller (1844–1920)Albert von Keller was a society artist who mostly did pretty dull dinner-party portraits, but seems to have a thing for, um, BDSM paintings of tortured young women.
The MartyrAll very improving of course ... if it wasn't good Christian virgins it was witches getting their comeuppance:
Witches' Sleep - 1888There now. I hope you're feeling improved and chastened!
August 30, 2017
"Damn, Janine, you rock!"
Fellow myth-smutter Samantha MacLeod is a past master at bringing a warm glow to my, ahem, heart ... And here she is with a fabulous review of The Sexy Librarian's Dirty 30 (vol.2) !
"I was, of course, immediately drawn to Janine Ashbless's Sweet Hel Below, which manages to tell a wildly creative and surprisingly touching love story between Norse gods, as well as transform an entire realm, in just a few pages. My own love story between Odin’s son Baldr and Loki’s daughter Hel, Death and Beauty, took 150 pages… so damn, Janine, you rock!"
You can read her whole review HERE.
And you can buy the book at Amazon US :: Amazon UK because it it totally brilliant
August 28, 2017
Blue Monday: Jo Henny Wolf guests
Every Monday I post a wicked excerpt for your entertainment!
Today's guest is Jo Henny Wolf, whose short story The Black Orchid appears in the Sinful Pleasures anthology, alongside my own contribution.
“But…” Donn’s thoughts were hazy, but he knew that he couldn’t wait six months. “I need the black orchid now.” No, dumbass, you need to find a killer. Somehow, in his mind, both things had become one, circling endlessly around each other.
Poppy didn’t give him room to think. Instead, she dropped her hand to the buckle of his belt, tapping her nails against it. Donn had no time to process this, for she slid her other hand from his arm up to his neck, dragging her nails over his scalp as she raked through his hair. Her lips moved against his ear. Donn was helpless to stop his hips from bucking. “Maybe we should play a game. If you win, you get a black orchid.”
“And if I lose?” Fuck, he was hoarse. He couldn’t concentrate with her fingers sliding through his hair and slipping around his throat.
“Oh, I’ll think of something, don’t worry about that.”
Donn’s answer came too quick and without thinking. “Okay, let’s play.”
“Perfect.” Poppy reached for something out of a tin on her potting table and showed it to him. It was a piece of soft paper string used to bind up flower stems. Not all that impressive, he thought. Then his brain was flushed out the drain as she clasped his wrists and brought his hands behind his back. “I’m going to tie your thumbs together, and you won’t break that tie if you don’t want to lose the game, okay?” Her fingers were hot as she encircled his thumbs in her grip, and Donn’s throat went dry. He would be at her mercy, completely helpless without his hands. This meant offering himself for the taking, and he wasn’t entirely sure that the nature of her taking was benign.
“Okay,” he rasped. A paper string wasn’t that hard to break. At least he hoped so, but when Poppy had tied his thumbs together, he tested the hold of this binding nevertheless. It was loose enough so he could slip out, but that also meant he had to take extra care not to lose it accidentally. Poppy turned him around.
“Did you know that mantises are cannibals?” she asked, looking him up and down as if she contemplated eating him. He nodded, feebly. Poppy continued, “The females eat the males when they don’t get away fast enough after mating. But they’re still ready to risk their lives for a fuck. Interesting, don’t you think?” She traced the bulge of his straining cock with the tip of her finger, and Donn opened his mouth. No sound came out. She tilted her head, an amused smile crooking her lips. Her eyes were as green as the filtered light inside her glass house.
“Your mouth is pretty useless, isn’t it? We should give it something to do.”
He clapped his mouth shut. Poppy’s grin became devious. She stepped so close he could feel her heat burn through his clothes, so close that he could see her skin shimmer. He thought she wanted to kiss him, but she bent sideways and picked something else up from the table.
“Open up…” She twirled a black orchid blossom between her fingertips. Donn hesitated. “Don’t worry, they’re not poisonous,” she said, tipping the flower to her own lips.
“Do you want me to eat it?”
“Of course not. I want you to open up and hold it in your mouth while I do… other things. And don’t you drop it, or it’s game over.”
Donn flexed his hands behind his back. His pants were growing tighter. He would be so vulnerable like that, but his blood simmered, pulsing in his groin, whispering to him to give in and let go.
Surrendering, he opened his mouth and allowed Poppy to gently push the blossom between his lips. It tickled his palate, his tongue, filling his whole mouth with its petals. Donn forced himself not to bite down against the fuzzy sensation. The blossom would offer no resistance if he did. It was solely his responsibility not to break it, his responsibility to keep his mouth open no matter what Poppy did to him. Saliva gathered behind his teeth, and he curled his lip inwards to keep from drooling. The scent of the flower filled every hollow of his skull as he inhaled, and on his tongue, the petals were as velvety soft as a woman’s sex.
All of a sudden, the odd familiarity of the scent made sense, and it hit him like a hammer. It smelled of sex. Of cunt. Its taste filled him to the brim and overwhelmed his senses, rushing through his veins and straight down to his prick. Moaning, he thrust his head back, grabbing the edge of the potting table to keep on his feet as his knees threatened to buckle. He made the most ridiculous sound when Poppy Baines cupped his cock through his pants and squeezed.
“Think of that flower,” she warned him. Had it not been for that, he would have swallowed the blasted orchid the very next moment, when Poppy undid first his belt, then his pants, and worked his cock free of its prison. “Nice.”
She stepped back, examining him like the specimen of a rare plant. Something in her eyes had him on edge, and Donn prepared to be taunted for being so easy. His cock didn’t care about his humiliation though, jutting out recklessly. Wobbly, he spread his feet apart to keep his pants from slipping down and pooling around his ankles.
Poppy shrugged out of her cardigan and dropped it to the floor between them, and Donn stopped breathing when she sank to her knees. Fucking hell. He looked down at her, dripping drool from his mouth and almost losing the flower. She was rigging the game, and not playing by the rules at all… not that they had specified any rules beyond don’t drop the flower. It had seemed simple enough a moment ago, yet when Poppy parted her lips and breathed onto his cock, then dragged her tongue across the tip, wetting it, it turned into an impossible challenge.
The only thing harder than holding still was his cock. Tension coiled between his pelvic bones, drawing every bit of his conscious mind down into the roiling vortex of need smouldering there. He wanted Poppy’s soft, red lips around his shaft, and he longed to push deep into her throat, like she was an orchid and her mouth the vessel to receive his seed.
Buy Sinful Pleasures at:
Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Kobo
Google Play
iTunes
Support your small publisher and buy the paperback direct
Jo Henny Wolf lives with her husband and two daughters in the idyllic Rhine Valley in one of the warmest places of Germany. She spent her childhood roaming the woods of the Black Forest, steeped deeply in myth and folklore and ingrained superstition, where her love for fairytales was nurtured and cemented.
She holds a B.A. in German Language and Literature as well as Scandinavian Language and Literature. Tracing intertextual influences is like a treasure hunt and a fascinating puzzle to her, but it's not as fulfilling as writing her own stories, accompanying her heroines and heroes through adventures full of magic, love and melancholy, and lots of steamy sex. She writes Romance novels as J. H. Wolf.
Website | Twitter | Facebook
Today's guest is Jo Henny Wolf, whose short story The Black Orchid appears in the Sinful Pleasures anthology, alongside my own contribution.
“But…” Donn’s thoughts were hazy, but he knew that he couldn’t wait six months. “I need the black orchid now.” No, dumbass, you need to find a killer. Somehow, in his mind, both things had become one, circling endlessly around each other.
Poppy didn’t give him room to think. Instead, she dropped her hand to the buckle of his belt, tapping her nails against it. Donn had no time to process this, for she slid her other hand from his arm up to his neck, dragging her nails over his scalp as she raked through his hair. Her lips moved against his ear. Donn was helpless to stop his hips from bucking. “Maybe we should play a game. If you win, you get a black orchid.”
“And if I lose?” Fuck, he was hoarse. He couldn’t concentrate with her fingers sliding through his hair and slipping around his throat.
“Oh, I’ll think of something, don’t worry about that.”
Donn’s answer came too quick and without thinking. “Okay, let’s play.”
“Perfect.” Poppy reached for something out of a tin on her potting table and showed it to him. It was a piece of soft paper string used to bind up flower stems. Not all that impressive, he thought. Then his brain was flushed out the drain as she clasped his wrists and brought his hands behind his back. “I’m going to tie your thumbs together, and you won’t break that tie if you don’t want to lose the game, okay?” Her fingers were hot as she encircled his thumbs in her grip, and Donn’s throat went dry. He would be at her mercy, completely helpless without his hands. This meant offering himself for the taking, and he wasn’t entirely sure that the nature of her taking was benign.
“Okay,” he rasped. A paper string wasn’t that hard to break. At least he hoped so, but when Poppy had tied his thumbs together, he tested the hold of this binding nevertheless. It was loose enough so he could slip out, but that also meant he had to take extra care not to lose it accidentally. Poppy turned him around.
“Did you know that mantises are cannibals?” she asked, looking him up and down as if she contemplated eating him. He nodded, feebly. Poppy continued, “The females eat the males when they don’t get away fast enough after mating. But they’re still ready to risk their lives for a fuck. Interesting, don’t you think?” She traced the bulge of his straining cock with the tip of her finger, and Donn opened his mouth. No sound came out. She tilted her head, an amused smile crooking her lips. Her eyes were as green as the filtered light inside her glass house.
“Your mouth is pretty useless, isn’t it? We should give it something to do.”
He clapped his mouth shut. Poppy’s grin became devious. She stepped so close he could feel her heat burn through his clothes, so close that he could see her skin shimmer. He thought she wanted to kiss him, but she bent sideways and picked something else up from the table.
“Open up…” She twirled a black orchid blossom between her fingertips. Donn hesitated. “Don’t worry, they’re not poisonous,” she said, tipping the flower to her own lips.
“Do you want me to eat it?”
“Of course not. I want you to open up and hold it in your mouth while I do… other things. And don’t you drop it, or it’s game over.”
Donn flexed his hands behind his back. His pants were growing tighter. He would be so vulnerable like that, but his blood simmered, pulsing in his groin, whispering to him to give in and let go.
Surrendering, he opened his mouth and allowed Poppy to gently push the blossom between his lips. It tickled his palate, his tongue, filling his whole mouth with its petals. Donn forced himself not to bite down against the fuzzy sensation. The blossom would offer no resistance if he did. It was solely his responsibility not to break it, his responsibility to keep his mouth open no matter what Poppy did to him. Saliva gathered behind his teeth, and he curled his lip inwards to keep from drooling. The scent of the flower filled every hollow of his skull as he inhaled, and on his tongue, the petals were as velvety soft as a woman’s sex.
All of a sudden, the odd familiarity of the scent made sense, and it hit him like a hammer. It smelled of sex. Of cunt. Its taste filled him to the brim and overwhelmed his senses, rushing through his veins and straight down to his prick. Moaning, he thrust his head back, grabbing the edge of the potting table to keep on his feet as his knees threatened to buckle. He made the most ridiculous sound when Poppy Baines cupped his cock through his pants and squeezed.
“Think of that flower,” she warned him. Had it not been for that, he would have swallowed the blasted orchid the very next moment, when Poppy undid first his belt, then his pants, and worked his cock free of its prison. “Nice.”
She stepped back, examining him like the specimen of a rare plant. Something in her eyes had him on edge, and Donn prepared to be taunted for being so easy. His cock didn’t care about his humiliation though, jutting out recklessly. Wobbly, he spread his feet apart to keep his pants from slipping down and pooling around his ankles.
Poppy shrugged out of her cardigan and dropped it to the floor between them, and Donn stopped breathing when she sank to her knees. Fucking hell. He looked down at her, dripping drool from his mouth and almost losing the flower. She was rigging the game, and not playing by the rules at all… not that they had specified any rules beyond don’t drop the flower. It had seemed simple enough a moment ago, yet when Poppy parted her lips and breathed onto his cock, then dragged her tongue across the tip, wetting it, it turned into an impossible challenge.
The only thing harder than holding still was his cock. Tension coiled between his pelvic bones, drawing every bit of his conscious mind down into the roiling vortex of need smouldering there. He wanted Poppy’s soft, red lips around his shaft, and he longed to push deep into her throat, like she was an orchid and her mouth the vessel to receive his seed.
Buy Sinful Pleasures at:
Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Kobo
Google Play
iTunes
Support your small publisher and buy the paperback direct
Jo Henny Wolf lives with her husband and two daughters in the idyllic Rhine Valley in one of the warmest places of Germany. She spent her childhood roaming the woods of the Black Forest, steeped deeply in myth and folklore and ingrained superstition, where her love for fairytales was nurtured and cemented.She holds a B.A. in German Language and Literature as well as Scandinavian Language and Literature. Tracing intertextual influences is like a treasure hunt and a fascinating puzzle to her, but it's not as fulfilling as writing her own stories, accompanying her heroines and heroes through adventures full of magic, love and melancholy, and lots of steamy sex. She writes Romance novels as J. H. Wolf.
Website | Twitter | Facebook
August 27, 2017
Uprising
I was completely blown away by Muse's performance at the Leeds Festival!
Shit - does that mean I'm into Prog Rock now?!
August 25, 2017
August 23, 2017
COVER REVEAL: The Prison of the Angels
Aargh, I'm so nervous! I hope you like it!
Here it is - the cover for The Prison of the Angels - which is officially due to be published by Sinful Press on
1st December 2017!
Here's the wraparound:
And the blurb:
I thought I was a good girl. I thought that no matter what others did for my sake, I could stay innocent. I thought that as long as I acted out of love, I’d be blameless.
I was wrong, wasn’t I?
Milja Petak’s world has fallen apart.
Her lover, the fallen angel Azazel, has cast her aside in rage and disgust. The other contender for her heart, the Catholic priest Egan Kansky, was surrendered back into the hands of the shadowy Vatican organization, Vidimus, after sustaining life-threatening injuries.
She has killed and she has betrayed. She is alone, homeless, and at the end of her tether - torn apart by guilt and the love she has lost. But neither Heaven nor its terrifying representatives on Earth have finished with Milja. Both of her lovers need her in order to further their very different plans, and both passionately need her, though they may try to deny it.
Milja is once again forced into a series of choices as she uncovers the secrets Heaven has been guarding for centuries. But this time it is not just her heart at stake, or even the fate of a fallen angel.
This time, the choices she make will change everything.
This time it’s the End of the World.
August 21, 2017
Blue Monday
Every Monday I post a naughty excerpt for your entertainment!
The Sinful Pleasures anthology was launched yesterday, so here's a bit from my story, The Pier by Night, a tale very much about the terrible weight of temptation. Old friends Maz and James are hanging out together in Brighton as their respective spouses attend a conference...
“What do you want to do now?” James asked, as they came level with another set of concrete stairs leading back up to the promenade. The question was lightly posed, but it seemed to carry an unconscionable weight. Maz looked sideways at him, rearranging the tickling strands of her hair back from her face one more time. Her body knew exactly what it wanted to do. Her body seemed to belong to some other person – someone with no memory, no ties, no guilt. Somebody who had lived all her life here, in the sun, on the beach, far away from any home or husband.
How easy it would be to do something irrevocable. Something that would tear down their carefully ordered world.
“Do you think they’ve got an aquarium?” she heard herself ask. “I like them.”
“It’s a seaside town. Of course they’ve got an aquarium.”
They did.
#Indoors, it was surprisingly quiet and empty. The sun must be keeping everyone else outside. After the blaring pop music of the pier and the excited children on the beach, the dimly-lit faux-rock tunnels, with their windows onto pellucid underwater landscapes, seemed like another planet.
Maz and James took their time. She hadn’t been kidding about how much she enjoyed displays like these. The glowing pools drew her, and the fact that James was beside her only heightened the sense of dreamlike intensity. He would touch her occasionally – a hand on the small of her back, a finger brushing her wrist, the gentlest of clasps upon her upper arm as he pointed out a delicate seahorse among the reed grass. There was a quiet intimacy to it that made her shiver and blush and lose focus.
She could feel her whole body thrumming, as if she were lambent with arousal.
She enjoyed every moment, from the starfish in the touch-and-feel pools to the huge Japanese spider crabs from the bottom of the Pacific, their span of spindly legs metres across, that lurked in ultraviolet darkness. But her favourite was the jellyfish display. This room was dimly lit with glows of red and blue, the tanks bare except for their denizens pulsing delicately as they rose and fell, like phosphorescent thistledown, in the gin-clear water. No other tourists were around. She came to halt in front of one tank, fascinated by their utterly alien beauty, their slow dance emptying her mind like a meditation.
She felt James come up and stand behind her. He put his right hand on her waist, then the left found its place over her other hip. He stood quietly, so close that she could feel his body warmth on her back. They were in perfect symmetry.
Her mind was empty, and her body felt like it was shining in the dark.
Without a word, she covered his right hand with her own, and slid it up to cup her breast.
She heard him sigh under his breath. Then he moved against her, his chest to her back, his face stooped to her hair. And both hands on her breasts, squeezing softly, hefting their slight weight, thumbing her nipples. That friction through her clothes sent burrs of pleasure dancing across her skin, all the way to her core. Ridiculously, she wished she had more tit for him to caress – but it was a fleeting fancy, nothing more than a shadow of her sense of inadequacy. The hands that were supposed to touch Shauna were upon her, now; his body was warm against hers, his breath was shallow and pent against the whorls of her ear. She could feel herself melting under the heat of his regard, the warmth running right through her to escape in a trickle between her thighs. Her whole body softened into one thrilling ache – all except her nipples, which somehow, perversely, were pebbling as he teased them, until he was able to take each point between thumb and finger and roll them with exquisite boldness.
“Hhhhh,” she gasped.
The jellyfish hovered before her blurred vision, like angels falling through an alien heaven.
When he moved one hand around and trailed his fingers down the cleft of her cleavage, her legs nearly gave way beneath her. She relaxed back into his embrace, surrendering. Then he turned her in his arms and pulled her close.
She lost sight of the jellyfish. His shadow engulfed her and his lips moved over hers. Soft and warm, he kissed her. It was almost chaste, at first. Then he broke the seal of her lips with his tongue and their kiss, though gentle and slow still, became something not in the least platonic. Through his clothes, she felt the press of his hardening cock.
Buy Sinful Pleasures at:
Amazon:
iTunes:
Kobo:
Google Play:
Barnes and Noble
The Sinful Pleasures anthology was launched yesterday, so here's a bit from my story, The Pier by Night, a tale very much about the terrible weight of temptation. Old friends Maz and James are hanging out together in Brighton as their respective spouses attend a conference...
“What do you want to do now?” James asked, as they came level with another set of concrete stairs leading back up to the promenade. The question was lightly posed, but it seemed to carry an unconscionable weight. Maz looked sideways at him, rearranging the tickling strands of her hair back from her face one more time. Her body knew exactly what it wanted to do. Her body seemed to belong to some other person – someone with no memory, no ties, no guilt. Somebody who had lived all her life here, in the sun, on the beach, far away from any home or husband.
How easy it would be to do something irrevocable. Something that would tear down their carefully ordered world.
“Do you think they’ve got an aquarium?” she heard herself ask. “I like them.”
“It’s a seaside town. Of course they’ve got an aquarium.”
They did.
#Indoors, it was surprisingly quiet and empty. The sun must be keeping everyone else outside. After the blaring pop music of the pier and the excited children on the beach, the dimly-lit faux-rock tunnels, with their windows onto pellucid underwater landscapes, seemed like another planet.
Maz and James took their time. She hadn’t been kidding about how much she enjoyed displays like these. The glowing pools drew her, and the fact that James was beside her only heightened the sense of dreamlike intensity. He would touch her occasionally – a hand on the small of her back, a finger brushing her wrist, the gentlest of clasps upon her upper arm as he pointed out a delicate seahorse among the reed grass. There was a quiet intimacy to it that made her shiver and blush and lose focus.
She could feel her whole body thrumming, as if she were lambent with arousal.
She enjoyed every moment, from the starfish in the touch-and-feel pools to the huge Japanese spider crabs from the bottom of the Pacific, their span of spindly legs metres across, that lurked in ultraviolet darkness. But her favourite was the jellyfish display. This room was dimly lit with glows of red and blue, the tanks bare except for their denizens pulsing delicately as they rose and fell, like phosphorescent thistledown, in the gin-clear water. No other tourists were around. She came to halt in front of one tank, fascinated by their utterly alien beauty, their slow dance emptying her mind like a meditation.
She felt James come up and stand behind her. He put his right hand on her waist, then the left found its place over her other hip. He stood quietly, so close that she could feel his body warmth on her back. They were in perfect symmetry.
Her mind was empty, and her body felt like it was shining in the dark.
Without a word, she covered his right hand with her own, and slid it up to cup her breast.
She heard him sigh under his breath. Then he moved against her, his chest to her back, his face stooped to her hair. And both hands on her breasts, squeezing softly, hefting their slight weight, thumbing her nipples. That friction through her clothes sent burrs of pleasure dancing across her skin, all the way to her core. Ridiculously, she wished she had more tit for him to caress – but it was a fleeting fancy, nothing more than a shadow of her sense of inadequacy. The hands that were supposed to touch Shauna were upon her, now; his body was warm against hers, his breath was shallow and pent against the whorls of her ear. She could feel herself melting under the heat of his regard, the warmth running right through her to escape in a trickle between her thighs. Her whole body softened into one thrilling ache – all except her nipples, which somehow, perversely, were pebbling as he teased them, until he was able to take each point between thumb and finger and roll them with exquisite boldness.
“Hhhhh,” she gasped.
The jellyfish hovered before her blurred vision, like angels falling through an alien heaven.
When he moved one hand around and trailed his fingers down the cleft of her cleavage, her legs nearly gave way beneath her. She relaxed back into his embrace, surrendering. Then he turned her in his arms and pulled her close.
She lost sight of the jellyfish. His shadow engulfed her and his lips moved over hers. Soft and warm, he kissed her. It was almost chaste, at first. Then he broke the seal of her lips with his tongue and their kiss, though gentle and slow still, became something not in the least platonic. Through his clothes, she felt the press of his hardening cock.
Buy Sinful Pleasures at:
Amazon:
iTunes:
Kobo:
Google Play:
Barnes and Noble
August 20, 2017
Sinful Pleasures - out now!
It's out! It's proud! It's TOO DAMN HOT for Amazon!
Because side-buttock may drive you into an erotic frenzyYes, that's the "safe for Amazon" cover, which has been carefully hidden behind its porno search-filter just to make it even harder for you dirty dirty readers to find it.
August 18, 2017
Smut Leeds
I'm all tied up with one thing and another at the moment...
But I managed a lovely day out at Smut in the City: Leeds last weekend!
I went there with Jennifer Denys - here she is being tied up by Zak Jane Kier:
It's research!Zak did a fab "Diceman" workshop on using random factors which gave me a WHOLE new idea for a short story
But I managed a lovely day out at Smut in the City: Leeds last weekend!
I went there with Jennifer Denys - here she is being tied up by Zak Jane Kier:
It's research!Zak did a fab "Diceman" workshop on using random factors which gave me a WHOLE new idea for a short story
August 16, 2017
Out now: Dirty 30 Vol. 2
I'm over the moon! The Sexy Librarian's Dirty 30 Vol. 2 is available on Kindle NOW!
Amazon US
Amazon UK
The Sexy Librarian, Rose Caraway returns with another Library of Erotica, just for you. From Torrid Literature to BDSM, Fairy Tales to Orgies, Clandestine Military Adventures to Bi-Curious Rendezvous, this adventurous, and fantasy-filled collection is here to turn you on. So grab your partner and peruse the card catalog and see which sexy story catches your interest first. This is your very own, hand-held library! Explore this volume of Erotica to your libido's content.
There will be both print and audio versions out in due course, but in the meantime here's the opening of my own Viking story, Sweet Hel Below:
My brother killed me.
He didn’t mean to, of course. He only wanted to join in with all the other laughing, beer-giddy gods as they took it in turns to attack me and watch their weapons bounce off without even making contact. So when Loki sidled up to him, pressed the mistletoe dart into his hand and said “Here, I’ll guide your throw,” blind and trusting Hodur let him. The magical dart, sharp as iron, pierced my left eye and buried itself to the tip in my brain.
That is a story everyone knows. I’m telling a different one here.
They burnt me on a ship-pyre. The black smoke rose up and I blew away as soot. Then rain caught me and washed me down into the leaves of the World Tree, down the silvery bark to its roots, past mortal lands and the realms of fire and ice to the very lowest of the Nine Worlds. To Helheim.
Where else is there for a dead god to go?
I found myself facing a ravine full of raging water and churning sword blades. How wide that gulf stretched it was hard to tell; to my dismay the sight in my left eye had not returned to me. I walked the bank, stumbling sometimes, until I found a bridge with a roof of golden thatch. Guarding it was a blonde and lovely giantess almost twice my height, armed with shield and spear.
“What’s your name, traveler?” She grinned at me, looking me up and down in a way I’m quite familiar with.
“Baldur, Odin’s Son.”
“Baldur the Golden?” Her face fell a little. “I heard the news from Asgard. You may pass.”
I tried a smile. “I don’t have to fight you?”
“I am here to stop people getting out of Helheim,” she answered gently. “Follow the road north and downhill to find the Lady’s hall. But first, kiss me. Dead or not, I would have it said that Modgud was once kissed by Baldur the Beautiful.”
She knelt so that I could kiss her, though I fear my lips felt cold because her own felt so warm to me. I stroked her breasts until she began to sigh, feeling her big nipples rise to the kiss of my cool fingers and the heat thrum beneath her skin. Her heart beat harder. But then, with a sad laugh, she pushed me away.
“No more, alas, Odinsson. The Dead and the Living may not lie together.”
Amazon US
Amazon UK
