“Best to take it one day at a time,” Airi said to Sarda, offering her some wine from her leather flask. She’d been saving it for some sort of special occasion, but the girl needed more than water to fortify her. The wine would help build up her strength…provided she didn’t drink too much.
“How’d you come to be out here in the woods in the middle of nowhere?”
“Same as you, I reckon. Just traveling.”
“It’s getting cold soon and you’re going hungry. Don’t you think its best you found a place to hole up for the winter? Make a little coin.”
“I’m going to…as soon as I find a place big enough where people are looking for hired help. I was told there was a village down the road a ways back, but it was abandoned. Someone’s idea of a joke to send me all this way for nothing.”
Airi grimaced. It was a cruel thing to do. Poor kid. She needed a break.
“Well…you could travel with us to the next—”
“It ain’t your place to say who travels with us!” Kilon belched out in sudden anger. He made as if he were going to get to his feet and smack Airi for her insolence. Sarda cringed and scurried back away from him. Airi stood up and went toe to toe with the bastard.
“I realize that,” she hissed. “If you’d let me finish my sentence I was going to say we just have to ask our leader if it is all right. Now sit down and shut up!”
Kilon backhanded her. Hard. She went flying back and slammed into a tree. Kyno was on his feet in an instant, his body blocking Kilon from following up on the strike. He grabbed Kilon by the front of his shirt and gave him a rattling shake.
“Don’t you touch her again! You’ll answer to me, Kilon! I’ll pop your head like an overripe grape!”
There was really no way any sane man would argue with that terrible voice and that overwhelming, gigantic presence, but Kilon, apparently, was not a sane man. As Airi picked herself up from where she had fallen, wiping a hand across her bloodied mouth, she heard him say, “Then you teach that fucking cunt not to mouth off to me or I’ll smack her again and I don’t care what you think you can do to me!”
Fury blinded Airi. She lunged forward, reaching to claw out the bastard’s eyes. She was jerked back just before she reached him, slamming backward into a thick, hard trunk of a body. Strong hands held her around her upper arms.
“All right, what the hell is going on here?” Maxum demanded. “I leave for a few hours and suddenly everyone’s at each other’s throats?”
“Suddenly?” Airi spat. “That man is an evil little serpent spitting poison into this group every moment of every day. Are you really so blind you can’t see it?”
“All I see is my group acting like a bunch of unruly children and it is going to stop now!” His voice was just as terrible as Kyno’s had been. Kyno dropped Kilon and he got his feet under him. He turned hate-filled eyes onto Airi.
“You just keep that little whore away from me. It’s your group, you say you want her—although we all know it’s your cock that wants her—so what you say goes. But I’m warning you, she mouths off to me again and I’ll rip her tongue out!”
“If you touch her I’ll—” Maxum began.
“I’ll plunge a dagger in that black heart of yours so fast you’ll be dead before you touch me! You get one free shot and that was just it. It’ll never happen again,” she spat back at Kilon.
“One free shot?” Maxum asked. He quickly turned her around in his hands and got an eyeful of the blood running out of her nose and from between her lips. She’d been hit so hard it was a wonder she hadn’t lost any teeth. As it was her teeth had cut the inside of her lip and it was beginning to swell painfully. “He hit you?”
“Well he didn’t sing me a lullaby,” she said churlishly.
Maxum suddenly let go of her, pushed past her, and with two steps and a powerful drawback of his fist, punched Kilon in the face. Kilon went down and the other men quickly jumped in to keep Maxum from doing further damage. But apparently Maxum was done because he stepped back from the man.
“That’s what’ll happen if anyone raises a fist to anyone in this group! They’ll get it mirrored back on them from me!”
Kilon was just about unconscious so he didn’t have a reply. Maxum turned back to her, taking her arm almost gently into his hand, then he called Doisy over.
“Can you heal her for me?” he asked.
“Of course.”
Maxum grimaced. “When you’re done you can do Kilon too.”
Doisy nodded. He didn’t express any kind of resentment or partiality to the situation and Airi realized she felt a little hurt by that. She would have thought she’d at least earned a little friendship with Doisy. A little loyalty. But she should know better than to depend on anyone but herself.
“Now, does anyone want to tell me what started this?”
“I-I did,” Sarda stammered.
“No, you didn’t,” Airi said firmly. “This was my fault. He got under my skin and I provoked him.”
“Provoked him how?”
“Does it matter?” she asked, her tone surly.
“It does. It’ll tell me whether or not I should fine you for your behavior.”
“Fine me? Fine me? He’s the one who hit me! He’s the one who is always being so nasty it makes everyone’s stomachs go sour!”
“I’m not arguing with you about whether or not he’ll win any personality contests. I want to know what you did to start him up. And then I want you to tell me who in the eight hells she is,” he said, nodding to Sarda.
Sulkily, Airi told him word for word what had happened and how Sarda had happened upon them.
“This is my group. I will decide who stays or who goes for that matter. I’m going to get tired of you trying to manipulate things to your liking if you aren’t careful.”
“Manipulate?” She stared at him aghast. “I wasn’t trying to manipulate anything! I just wanted to suggest—”
“Just like you keep suggesting I get rid of him?” He jerked his head to Kilon.
Suddenly she could see it from his perspective. But damn it all, she hadn’t meant to be manipulative. When she bit her battered lip, he softened toward her. “To be fair I don’t think you are doing it with great machinations in mind. Just…be careful, all right?”
She nodded. “All right.” But after only a beat she said. “So can Sarda stay?”
He laughed incredulously. “You are unbelievable!”
“Just until we reach another town. Just to keep her safe until then. Please?”
Maxum sighed, shaking his head and a smile twitching at the corners of his mouth. “Only to the next town. And I swear, if anything goes wrong I’m going to take it out of your hide.”
“All right. But it won’t!”
“It better not.”
Airi smiled happily and let Doisy tend to her nose and mouth.
Airi woke the next morning to the sound of the river flowing nearby. Everyone else was still asleep and dawn had barely broken. She went to her saddle and grabbed her bag off it. She carried it down to the stream and looked for a secluded spot. She found a small copse of trees circling the edge of the water, creating a concealing inlet where the current was not running so fast. She stripped out of her clothes and, grabbing a bar of scented soap from her bag, she slipped into the icy cold water. Her teeth were clattering at first until she grew used to it. Then she began to briskly scrub at herself with the soap. It was a woman’s fragrance, this soap one of the few things she spoiled herself with when she could afford to. She had bought a new bar in Calandria and she smelled deeply of it quite a few times as she took her bath. Then she unplaited her braids and scrubbed it through her hair.
“You’re elven!”
Airi gasped at the deep voiced words of surprise and out of habit she covered her ears before she thought to cover her naked body. She dropped down in the water so it was up to her neck.
“No sense hiding it now,” Maxum drawled as he came to the water’s edge.<
br />
He was right. She dropped her hands from her gracefully pointed ears and lifted her chin.
“Are you going to tell the others?” she asked.
“It’s none of their business if you don’t want it to be.”
“I don’t.”
“Why are you hiding it?”
“I would think that would be obvious.”
“Well, I know elves have a bad reputation for being elitists and cold natured, and they are considered to be cruel to those not of their race. Their prejudice runs deep and therefore the other races do not trust them, but that doesn’t mean you are like that.”
“We already know I’m untrustworthy,” she said.
“But you’re not a snob. An elf wouldn’t be caught dead with a band of misfits like mine.”
“Well, I’m not all elf.”
“A halfbreed? That explains why you’re so short. But halfbreeds are as rare as genten diamonds. Elves simply do not breed outside of their race. Was it like our orcish friend? Were you the product of—”
“No. Not as my mother told it. She said she loved him…and that he loved her. But he died when I was two. I don’t remember him at all. It was hard for my mother, raising an elven child. I’ve been hiding my ears since my hair was long enough to cover it. I don’t know why I still do it. I just…I have enough against me to start with. It’s easier if people don’t know.”
“All right. I can respect that,” he said, and she could see by his expression that he did understand. And that he didn’t care if she was elven, orcish, or kataanese. It gave her a sense of relief…and a strange sense of belonging.
She shook the feeling away. She didn’t belong anywhere. She had based her entire life on that concept. She didn’t belong and she didn’t want to belong. Belonging meant trusting others with parts of yourself, making yourself vulnerable in emotional ways. She was not the sort to do that and she wasn’t going to start now. Especially not with someone as untrustworthy as Maxum…or his men.
That was unfair, she realized. There was nothing inherently untrustworthy about Doisy and Dru or even Kyno. They had done nothing to earn her mistrust except they were people. People were undependable. Life had taught her that hard lesson and she shouldn’t forget it. Maxum’s men may not have betrayed her yet but life had taught her that it was only a matter of time.
Everyone always let her down.
Always.
“All right, now that we have that out of the way, would you mind leaving so I can get out? The water is very cold.”
“Get out? I was just thinking about getting in.” He sat down on the bank and removed his boots. Then he stripped off his vest and then his shirt.
“Don’t you dare!” she squeaked as he stood up, all gloriously bare-chested and began to untie the fastenings of his pants. Despite her distress, she couldn’t help but stare at the golden play of muscle beneath skin as he moved. The light dusting of hair on his chest faded as it went down and then darkened below his navel in an arrowing line that led straight to where his hands were loosening his pants. Suddenly she badly wanted to see what he was threatening to show her…so she didn’t put up much of a fight as his pants were skimmed down his legs, leaving him magnificently naked before her. Something in the core of her went warm, battling the cold of the river, making her shiver at the contrast.
He walked boldly forward and into the water, giving her an all too brief look at all he had to offer…but brief was more than enough. He had been fully aroused, hard as can be and jutting proudly forth from his body. He gasped when he hit the water and she smiled. That ought to cool his ardor some, she thought. But then she realized he was coming toward her. And that he was naked and so was she!
She suddenly began to swim away, trying to force her cold body to work, but in the end she was trapped because outside of their little cove the water ran fast and white and it was too dangerous for her to swim out into it. He caught her easily, dragging her body up against his, his warmth so penetrating and so inviting as it came close…connected…contacted. She had been wrong about the cold of the water affecting his arousal. He was still fully, dangerously erect. He drew her up to him, her breasts flattening to his chest, his erection nestling against her belly. Heat bloomed across her face and her body. She went stiff in his hold.
“Let go of me!”
“No. Is it true what they say about elves? That beneath that cold exterior they run incredibly hot?”
“I wouldn’t know. I’m only half elf and I was never raised around elves. In fact, my mother seemed to think that if an elf saw me he would feel honor bound to eradicate me, since I’m an impurity to the species. It’s another reason why I hide. Just in case it’s true.”
“Any elf that tried to eradicate you would find himself in the fight of his life.”
“So will you if you don’t let me go!”
Only, the warmth of his body was so inviting in the cold water and she found herself snuggling up into him. He noticed with a grin.
“I don’t think that’s what you really want. In fact, I’m thinking you are way out of touch with what you really want.”
“You have no idea what I want,” she said. “You only know what you want. It’s always about what you want.”
“I’m not going to lie and say I don’t want you because I’ve made that abundantly clear.” He reached to take her hand, brought it below the water and between their bodies where he slowly curled her fingers around his erection. “Clear, yes?”
“Yes,” she whispered as she willed herself not to stroke him, or hold him or shape him. To feel every inch of him.
Clearly her willpower needed a lot of work because before she knew it she was doing exactly all of those things. He sucked in a breath as she molded him to her palm and drew her touch from the base of his staff all the way to the tip. He was so hard and so hot…even in the cold of the river. And as she touched him…as she learned him…she felt an answering heat blooming between her thighs.
Her opposite hand still held her soap and in spite of herself and her internal berating, she touched the soap to his chest and drew a soft circle with it. Before long she had worked up a lather and was dipping the soap beneath the water, washing his taut abdominal muscles. He took a sniff and grimaced.
“Sweetflower. I’m going to smell of sweetflower.”
“I could always stop,” she offered, hoping he didn’t accept. She had plans for her soap.
“Not on your life. Having Airianne the elf give me a bath? I wouldn’t trade that for anything in this world.”
“Shut up before you ruin it,” she said with a frown. Then she opened the hand she still held around him and the soap skimmed down the long length of him. She worked the soap into an earnest lather against him, slicking her touch as she stroked and stroked and stroked him. He groaned deeply and she could see a muscle ticking in his jaw.
She suddenly felt a great sense of power in that moment. It was a feeling quite unlike anything she’d ever experienced before. She had the power to give him pleasure…and it was working. He was aroused…because of her. He was moaning with pleasure…because of her. He could be brought to climax just like this…because of her. The potency of that kind of power was heady and being who she was, she wanted to test the bounds of it. The hand with the soap in it went down to slowly wash around his sac, her hand toying with the malleable flesh, and all the while her opposite hand stroked and stroked and stroked until he swore softly and reached to tangle a hand in her wet hair. Gripping it tightly he made sure her eyes met his.
“Do not make me come,” he demanded of her.
“Why not?” she asked, her voice rough with unused passion.
“Because I want to be inside of you when I do.”
“That isn’t going to happen,” she said, her soft tone anything but convincing. He laughed, groaned deeply and laughed again. It was as though he was having a hard time controlling what emotions he wished to show. His eyes were on fire, burning like a cadium tree burn
ed, with a wild green fire. Something in the wood made it burn green, just as something in her touch made him burn for her.
“I don’t believe you,” he said almost tauntingly. “I think you want me just as much as I want you.”
Then, to prove his point, he slid his fingers boldly between her legs, immediately feeling the viscous difference between the wet of the river and the wet of her welcoming body. He gave her a sly smile.
“There now see, let there be truth between us.”
“All right,” she said breathily, “so it’s true I want you. I am a woman and you are a man. You aren’t all that hard to look at and it’s been a while since I’ve lain with a man.” About ten full turnings, she added to herself. “It makes sense that I might want something…just something.”
“You want to fuck. Fornicate. Have sex. Lay with. Tumble. With me. No other man will do. Admit it.”
“I’ll admit no such thing. You’re merely a convenience.” She lifted her chin stubbornly. “Plenty of other men would do.”
“Dru?” he asked. “Kyno? They’re right within reach. What about Doisy? He’s always up for a turn with the ladies.” But even as he said it, a vicious stab of jealousy tore through Maxum. He didn’t want her to say just any man would do. He wanted her to say only he would do.
He slowly, steadily worked his finger inside the tight sheath of her body, seating his palm against her clitoris where he began to rub her insistently.
At her stubborn silence he said. “Tell me who you want. Tell me I’m not just a warm body.” He withdrew from inside her body and she cried out softly in instant regret. She grabbed his arm. He drew his finger lazily around her clit, warming her up, making her moan. “Yes? What is it?” he asked her.
“Please!”
He worked quicker, in tighter circles and she began to tremble in his arms. Her mouth dropped open slightly, her breath came in soft pants and her eyes slid closed. She was falling into the sensations he was creating.
And then he stopped and drew his hand away, leaving her with only the icy cold water against her flesh.