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the-common-cowgirl · 10 months

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The Lost Children -

Part 4

Summary: The group embarked on their mission only to be spotted by two of Brida’s scouts as they crossed into Mercia. A chase ensues and you are injured. Osferth cares for your injury and you both let pent up feelings free. Only, Osferth comes to his senses.

Rating: Mature

Warnings: Mentions of Animal Death, Blood, Injury, Fluff, Angst, Kissing, period typical slut shaming, religious guilt, mentions of arousal, heavy petting.

Word Count: 3.5K

“Don’t put that thing near me or I’ll bite it off, so help me G-“

You were cut off with Finan shoving a cloth into your mouth, gagging you.

“You need to be quiet when we mend your leg, girl.” Finan exclaimed with a hushed, hurried tone in the low bank you were in.

Of course you knew you needed to be quiet. Two of Brida’s scouts had spotted the group as you made your way into Mercia. This resulted in a small chase. Your old, bay horse tripped on a tree root in the chase, causing you to go flying from the horse and hurt your leg. The Dane scouts would have caught up to you lying on the ground and captured you if Osferth had not spun his horse around and lifted you into his saddle, successfully escaping the nearing scouts.

And now, you were in a low bank, with a cloth wrapped tightly around your head and through your teeth with Eadith hiking your skirt up so high that Osferth and Sihtric excused themselves for your modesty. Uhtred of course was busy keeping an eye out for the scouts if they should find the group.

A sharp stick was stuck under the skin of your thigh, poking the muscle. Enough so that when Eadith tried to pull it out, you kicked at her with your free leg, missing her by an inch. She must’ve been used to her patients retaliating, you thought between the surges of pain.

“Finan, grab her other leg,” Eadith ordered. As soon as he had hold of your other ankle, Eadith pulled with enough force that had you reeling in pain. Your hands flew on their own to push her off of you; this time you didn’t miss and she landed on her bottom in mud, painting the arse of her dress brown .

Clearly frustrated, “Go get someone to hold her hands too,” she barked at Finan who obeyed without hesitation, quickly jogging to where the men were. In little time, he came back with Osferth who had his eyes downcast, trying not to look at your exposed legs that neither Eadith or Finan seemed to give a second thought about. “Sit behind her and hold her arms tight.”

Osferth began to object behind you but Eadith shut him down immediately, “She is loosing a great deal of blood and she somehow has enough energy to keep fighting us.” Eadith’s lack of patience had Osferth obeying her order without objections this time. You felt Osferth move behind you to sit and he gently brought your hands behind your back as a cool sweat started to form on your brow and your gaze started to go hazy.

His soft grip felt comforting around your wrists but as Eadith tried again to pull the stick, your hands flew free of his hold and you tried to shove her again, this time, Osferth’s forearm reached around your front and pulled you flush against him. “Sorry,” he muttered - you were unsure if he was speaking to you or Eadith for lacking at his task.

Eadith had grown frustrated. “I cannot try many more times before the stick is too slick with blood to pull! Osferth, hold her tightly. Do not let her go. Same for you Finan.” Then her eyes turned on you, “For Heavens sake girl, stop resisting help.”

Your vision was darkening and you felt a strong hold on your wrists behind you, painfully so. It distracted you momentarily from the pain of the stick wedged into your thigh being ripped from your body. Every touch felt delayed or distant and you were vaguely aware of a muffled scream then it being cut short by a hand over your mouth. You head spun as the world tumbled forward and the last thing you heard was Osferth saying, “It’s okay. It’s okay. I’ve got you.”

The world went black.

Your eyes felt heavy and a dull ache throbbed in your head as you were jolted awake. Slowly opening your eyes, you were met by a dimmed sky. Slowly realizing you were in the back of a covered wagon laying in the softest bed of furs you had ever slept on. Lifting your head took great effort due to the absence of your energy but when you did, you saw the back of Osferth’s head. As if he knew you were awake, he looked back at you and a smile broke across his face. He pulled the horse up to a halt and shouted for the group to do the same as he moved from the seat to the back of the wagon where you lay.

“How are you feeling?” He asked and took your hand, absentmindedly feeling for a stronger pulse but the action had your heart fluttering just a bit at how concerned he was for you.

“Heavy,” you replied as your head unceremoniously fell back into the soft furs. His thumb now brushed against your wrist gingerly. “Where did you get a wagon?”

“Sold your horse for meat to a nearby village to get the wagon.” Your eyebrows furrowed together in sadness as you looked at him. He gave a sorrowful look, “I’m sorry. I thought you didn’t care for the beast.”

“He was a good mount, he didn’t deserve death.” You were surprised at how your heart betrayed you and began to mourn for the old, ugly gelding.

“He was worse off than you after the fall. He welcomed death like an old friend after the pain he was in.” Osferth’s words made you feel better, knowing the bay was given a merciful death.

“He broke his leg?”

“Aye, lady.”

“Osferth, if I ever hurt myself so badly, make sure you give me a merciful death as well.” Your words were soft and true, he knew you weren’t speaking with sarcasm or anger like your normally did. You seemed too weak for that.

Your eyes were growing heavy again as you felt the wagon rock a little and Eadith’s voice, “She awoke?” Your eyes now closed but you knew Osferth nodded.

“She’ll make it then. She’s past the worst of it.” Eadith reassured him.

Sleep was beginning to embrace you again, despite its return, you were keenly aware of Osferth’s soothing thumb over your pulse.

“What about her fever,” he asked, quietly as if not to stir you.

Eadith was silent for a while before she answered him. “You’re a man of God, Osferth, pray.”

When you awoke again, the air was cool and there was no light but a flickering fire some distance away. You realized you had woken to the wagon shaking, someone was climbing in but you were too tired to care.

Your eyes found Osferth’s and he looked startled that you were awake but the shock soon faded as a smile spread across his face. You returned a weak smirk and you could almost see his heart flip.

“I - uh- brought you some stew.” He moved with a bowl and sat with his legs crossed beside your head. Setting the bowl down on the even wooden surface of the wagon that did not make up your soft bedding, he moved to help you prop yourself up. As you did so, your leg throbbed with a dull, burning pain and your head pounded. You could hear the group at the fire some distance away but could not see them due to the privacy the covered wagon offered.

Osferth smiled and grabbed the bowl., dipping the wooden spoon into the stew and gently blowing on it to make sure it wouldn’t burn you. The action was tender, sweet, foreign. You offered him a weak smile and he brought the spoon to you lips. As you slowly sipped the stew, you grew uncomfortable at the action of someone else feeding you, making you nearly lose your appetite. Once the first spoonful was gone and Osferth went in for a second scoop, you stopped him.

“I think I can feed myself,” you said trying to hide your discomfort.

Osferth furrowed his brows, “Are you sure? I can-“

“Yes,” you cut him off, “I’m certain of it.” You said with a little too much finality to be pleasant.

Osferth dropped his smirk a little and offered the bowl and spoon to your weakened hands. Feeding yourself took a bit more care as you were greatly reduced in strength, but you felt more comfortable this way.

Once you finished, you felt incredibly full and offered the bowl and utensil back to Osferth. “Did you like it?” He asked with a proud expression on his face.

You nodded, “Yes.” You willed yourself to be pleasant despite feeling as though you might vomit from how uncomfortably full your stomach felt.

“I made it.” He admitted with a smile, “I used to make it back in the monastery and the brothers devoured it.”

“Back in the nunnery, I was barred from the kitchens.” You admitted to him with a laugh as your stomach was easing down. You were grateful to share a similarity in your upbringing that wasn’t a sour memory.

Osferth laughed, “But why?”

“The sisters believed I was a cook of the devil for everything I cooked, somehow burned.” You laughed at the memory and Osferth laughed with you. It was a warming feeling; to feel humor again.

“So what were your chores at the nunnery?” He kept his bright eyes on you joyfully, simply happy that you were happy.

You huffed a short laugh through your nose, “To stay out of the way.” You both giggled at that. Once you recollected yourself, “Or gathering. I’m quite a good gatherer,” you admitted with pride.

Osferth raised his brows, “Oh really? Did you acquire that skill whilst doing your first chore?”

You tilted your head at his joke and eyed him in disbelief, “Did Osferth make a jest?” You both laughed. Once the laughing died down, you two just stared at each other in bliss, happy to be in the other’s company.

Then, a wave of realization washed over Osferth abruptly, and he shifted in sitting position. “Uh I forgot, I need to,” he stammered, suddenly uncomfortable, “Eadith is-“ he began, “Lady Eadith is busy. She asked me to,” he tripped over his words. “Lady Eadith asked me to clean your wound tonight.”

You gave a short chuckle at the reason for his sudden change in demeanor. “What must you do to it?” You asked, trying to sound like Osferth hiking up your skirt did not excite you.

Osferth began to blush. “Clean the would with a wetted rag and pour this over it,” he produced a small bottle of what you assumed was strong ale from a pouch that hung on his hip.

You nodded and reached for the hem of your now patched skirt. Osferth’s hand came to yours mid-grasp. “Wait, I’ll do it. I have to go get the rag wet in the river below.”

You nodded and Osferth left quickly. Your heart beat wildly at what was about to happen. You didn’t care about the prospect of pain from cleaning, just the mere thought that Osferth was going to see you immodestly had a light sweat breaking out over your body.

When he returned, you were still propped up, nervously biting your nail. Osferth settled next to your leg without a word, water droplets running between his slender fingers and down the bony knuckles of his hand. “May I?” He asked, bringing you from your trance.

“Yes,” you replied, not knowing what you agreed to let him do but knowing you’d most likely let Osferth do anything to you he so desired. You could almost hear the nuns that raised you calling you a harlot but you didn’t care in the wake of Osferth’s light touch at your ankle.

Osferth grasped the hem of your skirt and lifted your dress, keeping a hand on your other covered leg to protect your modesty and only reveal to him what he needed to see in order to clean your wound, nothing else. He rested the raised skirt on the bone of your hip and just below your undergarments. You kept his gaze trained on your wound; definitely not on your long, slender legs you were, for some reason, bending at the knee ever-so-slightly.

The wet rag moved against your wound and you sucking in a sharp breath. Osferth looked at you in terror, horrified that he hurt you more.

When the stinging subsided, you let out an uncomfortable, strained laugh, “Have you been doing this when I’ve been asleep? Not used to me being in pain?”

He shook his head, running the rag along your wound again gently, “No, Lady Eadith has been tending to you. This was the first time I was asked.” He moved the rag against you again, causing you to tense once more.

You let your head fall back, not wanting to look at the swollen pink wound anymore that you knew was infected from the discolored ooze Osferth was wiping away.

“That should do it,” Osferth announced to himself after some time of the cold rag gently caressing your wound. You heard the bottle uncork and prepared yourself for the worst of it. You remembered helping tend to wounds in the nunnery, when the alcohol was poured over the infected wounds, the girls would scream.

I will not scream, you told yourself, I am stronger than they were.

“This might hurt,” Osferth warned. Suddenly, the cold of the liquid touched your wound and you began to let out a squeal that had Osferth putting his hand over your mouth to silence you.

When it was over and the stinging subsided, he released his hand. “I’m sorry,” he apologized softly, “We are in Dane Land. We need to be quiet.”

You scoffed, “Tell the ones around the fire that.” You could still hear some of them talking even at this distance away. You pulled yourself back up to sit against the wagon sideboards.

Osferth bristled at your returning unpleasant attitude but did not say anything. He turned to set the bottle of strong ale at the front of the wagon. When his face found yours again briefly, then his cheeks turned the color of roses and he would not meet your eye, looking down to his hands.

Suddenly you realized your skirt was still hiked up to fully expose your injured leg and the tiniest glider at your undergarment. You began to chuckle at Osferth’s discomfort.

“Have you never seen a naked woman before Osferth?” You pulled your skirt down to cover yourself and he finally met your eye.

“What sins I have committed do not matter for it’s your innocence I am trying to protect.” He looked down to his hands again, they were clasped together.

Now he made you blush and you were glad he was not looking at you to see it. You liked the feeling his words gave you deep in your stomach, so you chased this feeling. “Who is to say I am innocent?” You smirked playfully.

Osferth slowly raised his brilliant blue eyes to connect with yours, eyeing you almost like a predator to find your jest hidden within your face but you were rather good at composing your lies. “Have you been with a man?” His voice was deeper, quieter, softer. You watched his tongue dance behind his teeth as he waited for your response.

Your lungs stopped working for what felt like a lifetime before you could collect yourself. Something about his aura, the way he asked you had you in a trance, you couldn’t lie now even if you wanted to. “No,” you breathed out, “I grew up in a nunnery. There wasn’t a chance.”

Osferth returned his vision to his hands once more, as he fiddled with a loose thread on his clothes. He seemed to be deep in thought. You wondered what he was thinking about in this moment. You longed to get inside his mind and pick it, to know if he imagined you under him. The mere thought of such an act gave way to an uncomfortable want at the apex of your thighs and you decided to do as you always did: not hold back.

“What are you thinking about?”

He met your eyes, and again, he had a deep look of desire in his blue eyes. He took in a quick breath. “I do not wish to tell you what I was - am thinking.” He looked down again, “I should repent.”

“You were thinking of me?” Your voice was soft like a gentle breeze through a field of wildflowers on a warm summer morning. Osferth considered in that moment you might be a living, breathing, walking siren for how you could sound so sweet when he knew you were anything but.

He met your eyes and nodded. “Tis not right,” he breathed, “Not fair to you.” Somehow he was closer to you than before. Who was leaning in? Neither of you could tell.

“I don’t care what’s right or wrong,” you whispered, running your hand up his leather armor and grasping the top of it, gently pulling him toward you, though, there was no resistance. “I want you,” was the last thing you said before your lips crashed on his.

He resisted at first, like the God-fearing monk he was taught to be, like the friend of Uhtred he was, like the caretaker he vowed to be to you, but as all pleasures of the flesh he had partaken in before, he decided he would repent afterward in order to taste salvation on the lips of a devil first.

You had never kissed anyone but you had seen it done between Eadith and Finan and the couples in Winchester. You had practiced on your pillow, and you wanted him, desperately. To say your first kiss was good was an understatement. With your novice lips working with Osferth’s expert lips, you felt like you may have met your God.

He pulled away from you but barely, enough to feel his heavy breath against your own. His eyes were heavy, his mouth hanging agape. “I’ve wanted you for so long,” he admitted.

“I’ve wanted you too,” you blushed, closing the small gap between your hungry mouths again and kissing Osferth with the fever of a rabid dog. He returned the want, the need tenfold and gently, but greedily, placed a large hand on your stomach, another around the bottom of your back and slid you down into a laying position.

He now hovered atop of your body, his large frame covering your own like a cloak of protection. Kneeling beside your body, one of his hands found purchase at the base of your head in your tender hairs and cradled you so that your head was tipped back and neck exposed. Slowly, he worked down your jaw to your neck, kissing and licking against your pulse.

An unfamiliar feeling of tight heat was building in your core and you moved your legs to gather friction against the mounting pressure at the apex of your thighs. When you did so, pain from your wound shot through your body and you let out a small whimper. It was enough for Osferth to stop his pursuit in the taste of your pulse.

He pulled back and you tried to grab his armor, pulling him back but he grasped your hands and shoved them away. “I’m sorry,” he stammered, “This is not right.”

Frustration bubbled up in your throat at his denial, “This is the only thing that’s ever felt right in my life!” You whined, sitting up, angry tears threatening to spill. You sat facing Osferth, propped against the sideboards of the wagon.

Osferth shook his head, “Not everything is about you.” Anger was hidden in his quick words.

You narrowed your eyes, “How could this not be about me? This would have been my first time if you would not have stopped.”

Osferth met your eyes defiantly, “Exactly. I cannot take your innocence! I am not your husband, I am not important enough in your life to do so.”

You rolled your eyes, “If I ask you to take me, then you are.”

He shook his head, jaw clenched hard, “No. That should be reserved for someone more special than me” He met your eye and for the first time in your time knowing him, you saw anger in his eyes, “Do not tempt me again. I will not forgive you if you cause me to sin in such a great way.”

With that, he stood and left angrily, the wagon rocking as he hopped out and away from you, leaving you along in the covered wagon, feeling denied, filthy and shamed.

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#fanfic #the last kingdom #the lost children #osferth #osferth fluff #osferth smut #osferth x reader #eadith #Finan #smut #female reader

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