die.
There. Decision made. Kama would live.
But could she?
Kama worked at it really hard, waking one bit of her body at a time, with a deep inner strength she'd never suspected in herself. Her finger moved, then her whole hand. When she got her arm to move, it was a grandly triumphal moment.
Slowly, one piece after another, Kama commanded her body to move. Weak. So weak! Her body trembled. But she got it going, got herself mostly upright, although she staggered and nearly fell just trying to gain her feet. But she did it. She pushed her way through the fog and the pain, and made it to the steps.
One at a time. Just like movement itself, if she took the staircase one step at a time, it felt almost possible that she might reach the door up at the top of the horrible stairs.
The door ahead concealed magic, and mystery, and her future. Up. Pause, gasp for breath, which felt like sweet nectar in her starved lungs. Up. Pause.
She tipped forward, felt pain. Her knees hurt. She crawled.
That worked better. Four legs are more stable than two, after all, and she made it all the way up the stairs, then dragged herself up by the door handle. She stared at it for a long moment while she panted, wondering if she remembered how to work it, then depressed the thumb catch and pushed.
The magical realm rose up to greet her, as Kama fell across the threshold and landed on her face.
She heard a startled cry, then someone rushed to her aid.
"Mistress Banchek sent me," she whispered, through her painfully dry throat. "Mistress Banchek. . . she paid. . . "
"Hush now, don't try to talk," a concerned voice said. Then a shout. "Hey! Hey, someone, help! Get Liesel out here, now!"
Running footsteps, voices. Female voices. Hands. Kama suddenly felt embarrassed at her filthy state. She helped the hands, managing to stand up.
"Are you Kama?" a powerful voice asked her, rich and deep and resonant with the wisdom of the ages.
"Yes."
"You should have come sooner, much sooner. Liesel will help you now."
Then warm green hands touched her temples, and a soothing presence eased into her soul. Kama would have cried at the gentle, caring touch, if she had any tears left. But they'd all run dry, days ago, and left her an empty husk.
She heard someone call for water, lots of water, then she felt a cup pressed to her lips. It tipped up, and water went into her mouth. She swallowed, and it was wonderful.
The water didn't make it very far down. Her mouth and throat were so dessicated she imagined the life-giving liquid absorbed completely by the time it reached her collarbones. The glowing green hands allowed her only one sip at a time, with a horribly long time between sips, but Kama could feel the life spreading through her.
"You're going to be alright, sweetie," Liesel said, holding her close. "It's been hard, I know, but we'll get you through, okay? Now, can you give me some help here?"
Kama nodded. Her eyes worked better. The grey fog receded a bit, chased back by the water. She could see Liesel now, a small woman with fiercely curly dark hair. "What?"
"I need you to stand. Can you do that for me?"
Kama tried. She didn't want to let that kind, caring voice down. So she moved, and felt the water enter into her joints, providing lubrication and allowing movement. She clambered awkwardly to her feet, leaning heavily on the shorter Healer.
"Good! Now, come with me. Come on, take a step, now, and follow it with another. . . "
Liesel cajoled Kama down the hallway to a room. Kama got a confused impression of a cross between comfort and austerity, then Liesel guided her to a chair, and Kama sat upright, like a real human being worthy of using furniture.
"Sorry to be so much trouble," she said carefully.
"No trouble, none at all," Liesel replied cheerfully. "These ladies are entirely too healthy. I never get to do anything this interesting. Now, you've mistreated yourself awfully, but I think most of what you need is food, drink, and rest. There's not much even the most powerful Healer, which I'm not, can do for dehydration and starvation, except ensure that you don't vomit everything we give you right back up."
Kama quirked her mouth corner upwards. It wasn't a smile, she might not be capable of smiling ever again, but it conveyed a bit of wry emotion. "Good. I hate to vomit."
Liesel chuckled. "I'm sure you do. Now look here, Fasha's brought you a nice cup of broth. Can you drink it without my help?"
"I'll try."
Kama took the offered cup. It smelled divine, and she felt hungry for the first time since Lorra left her. She tried a sip, and her body was startled, because she hadn't given it anything to eat in days. But she felt her guts consider the offering, approve it, then ask for more.
She wondered at the concern of all these strangers. Why were they doing this? What worth did all these women, and there seemed to be dozens, find in her useless self?
Whatever the reason, they swarmed over her. They fed her, and stripped off her filthy dress, and washed weeks of grime off her. They wrapped her in a soft robe, fussing over how thin she was, how prominent her ribs. Someone even started to brush out her hair.
"No," she said, reaching up with the new strength granted by the water and the broth. "No. Don't brush it. Just cut it. I don't want my hair anymore."
They protested, all those female voices that belonged to women that saw her as worthy of care. But she insisted, and in the end, someone fetched scissors and cut her hair right off.
Kama's head felt light, about to float away, and not from weakness this time. They brushed out what remained, evened out the ragged cuts, wondered aloud what color her hair would be when clean.
"Blond," she told them, then suddenly the room swayed sickeningly around her and she clutched at the table, turning panicky, wide eyes on Liesel.
"All righty then, there's the signal." Liesel took Kama's hand, glowing again, and suddenly the motion and its attendant nausea ceased. "Everybody out, she's had enough. Now. No argument. I'll let you at her in the morning."
She shooed everyone out, then helped Kama over to the bed. Kama hadn't slept in a bed in what felt like a lifetime. "Lay down," Liesel commanded, then shed her outer robe and the simple outfit beneath it, leaving only her underwear. "I'm staying right here with you. Otherwise, like I said, you'll start vomiting, and will undo everything we just did for you."
Kama didn't argue, although she really wanted to cry at the thought of sleeping with a woman other than Lorrine. But Lorrine was gone, she accepted that now, and she'd decided to live anyway. So she settled into the bed, and the Healer wrapped her in kindness, and did something inside so Kama fell easily and gently into sleep, for the first time since the night before Lorrine ended her world.
Expedition
They stopped three times that day to have sex. Derfek claimed watching her breasts bounce up and down while they rode made him crazy. So they did it in a grove of trees, and they did it under an old stone bridge, and they even did it right out in the open. That was the best time, strangely enough. Lorrine felt wildly excited by the knowledge that at any time, a traveler might come upon them and see her naked body, with Derfek in his magnificence making her pant and cry out with sheer pleasure. The sun felt good on her skin, and the breeze cooled overheated places, and she decided that sex was pretty much the entire reason to be alive. Never mind the bits of gravel in her backside, and the twigs in her hair. The way Derfek made her feel more than made up for such minor inconveniences.
Not to mention her morals felt perfectly okay with having a proper sexual relationship with a man. Sure, some of the more restrictive cultures would sneer at them for not getting married first, but still, one man and one woman. Proper, natural, good.
"There's a town with an inn ahead," Derfek said. "We should reach it before sunset. And after that, we can hit the big trade road to the west, head for the Dargasi lands."
Lorrine felt instant uneasiness clutch at her. "Dargasi lands? Whyever would you want to go there?"
<
br /> He shrugged. "Because it's one place I've never been. You're Dargasi, right?"
"Half. But that won't do you much good, you know. I've never met my mother's people."
Derfek growled. "Damn, woman, you disappoint me. Are you saying you can't get me into the desert?"
"I don't really know," she replied cautiously. She didn't want him angry at her. "Maybe. . . I've never talked to any of my relatives. Not on either side. But there's a chance. Possibly. If blood truly matters as much to the Dargasi as people say it does."
"Oh, it does. Believe me, it does. What good are you to me if. . . never mind. We'll give it a try, okay? Just keep in mind, it's in your best interests to keep me happy."
"Why's that?"
"Because," he grinned at her, "you need my dick."
She laughed, and smiled, and wondered why she needed him so badly. They'd only just met! But she did. Only a day, and she already knew life would never be complete without this man at her side.
They found the inn, and Derfek once more reduced her to a state of quivering pleasure. Where did he find the stamina? And did the man never eat? Life with her true love certainly seemed different from anything she'd ever experienced.
They did actually eat something in the morning, a quick breakfast of soft-boiled eggs and salt pork. Lorrine felt very privately disgusted. She despised soft-boiled eggs, and salt pork, while it satisfied some very deep cravings in her body for salt and fat, still looked like exactly what it was: a big blob of fat. But Derfek loved his