out?"
"I hardly know," Shanya replied. "I hadn't planned on leaving, after all. If I had, I would have worn clothing better suited to travel." She picked distastefully at her soiled linen shift, donned once again after her shower. "And I would have brought a brush. May I borrow yours?" Kell nodded and handed it over. Shanya began brushing her long, still-wet hair. "What do you suggest? Is there anything in particular an unskilled female can do in this strange world I've entered?"
Kell winced, picturing some of the unsavory jobs desperate women turned to in some cities. "Perhaps Maisie needs some help around the inn. If nothing else, she could teach you how to live out in the real world, with no 'dents and no man to protect or smother you. Perhaps Scholastica? You'd be safe there."
"Safe? How many dangers are there out here?"
"Countless." Kell surveyed her work with a critical eye, then racked her armor and capped her light, satisfied. "Life is dangerous out here, Shanya, and don't ever forget it. There are unscrupulous people in the world that would do very unpleasant things to you. But that's not a good thought to take to bed, and I'm tired. That willowbark tea Maisie made for us is doing me a world of good. Is it helping you any?"
Kell waited a moment to let her eyes adjust to the darkness, then moved to the bed. She found the edge of the coverlet, yanked it aside, and stretched out with a sigh.
"Yes, it is," Shanya said. Fabric rustled, hit the floor with a soft plop. Kell's heart missed a beat and she deliberately turned on her side, facing the wall.
She heard Shanya slip into the bed, but no sound of fabric sliding against the bed linens. Then she felt Shanya press up against her back, long and warm and naked.
"Hold me?"
"What—" Kell's voice squeaked, and she cleared her throat. Her heart pounded at least twice as fast as normal. "Shanya, what are you doing? Go to sleep, little girl."
The last two words were addressed more to Kell's own conscience than to Shanya.
"I'm not very interested in sleep. Are you? You can't try to pretend you're not interested in me. I can feel your heart pounding, and your breath racing."
Kell clenched her fist in the sheet, tense all over. Damn the girl, of course Kell was interested in her! But she also knew how shameful acting on that interest would be. "Yes, and I can feel you trembling with fear. Go to sleep, Shanya. I don't expect you to do me any favors in return for standing up for your rights. And I certainly don't want to take advantage of an innocent."
Shanya laughed, a surprisingly bitter sound. "Innocent? Yes, I am indeed innocent of the crime they condemned me for. But I want to know what it is to have congress with a woman, someone who is soft and gentle, not like one of those brutish men." Her soft voice quivered with emotion. "Don't you understand? They were going to burn me, let me die screaming in agony, without ever knowing if what I was dying for was worth it. I've never even been kissed, let alone loved. Why deny me this knowledge?"
"Because you're so young," Kell cried out from the bottom of her heart. "You're beautiful, believe me, but you're so young, so innocent. How do I know you even really want me, when I'm sure you're too innocent to know what true desire really is? And, and, you're under my protection, for First's sake. It would be wrong, terribly wrong, of me to seduce you."
Shanya giggled. "But you're not trying to seduce me. You're laying there tense as a board and letting me make a complete fool of myself." Then her voice became serious and she snuggled closer, resting a tentative hand on Kell's breast through the thin fabric of her sleep shirt. "Kell, I like you, and I admire you. I want to be with you because I trust you, not because I'm some brainless ninny with a case of hero-worship. I don't think I'm in love with you, I don't expect you to take me under your wing. I just want to know what it is to hold a woman in my arms in love. I could be tied to a horse right now, hauled over the border into the Province like so much grain, and staked up in the middle of a twenty foot circle of wood to watch my father drop a lit torch on the pile with a smile. You saved me from that fate. Don't you think it worth saving me from ignorance, as well?"
"You're thinking clearly," Kell said, wondering. "You really mean it. You're young, yes, but you just gave me a clear, mature argument that makes me feel so much better. . ."
Kell sighed, feeling the conflict within drain from her muscles. She turned within the circle of Shanya's arms and touched the uppermost right arm gently. "You're not in too much pain?"
"Kell, I feel no pain at all right now," Shanya whispered. "All I feel is tingly all over. Are you going to show me what to do with this feeling?"
Kell traced her fingers up the bruised arm very lightly, up the graceful neck, and found the girl's jawbone, stroking it with her thumb. "Yes," she said simply, then captured Shanya's lips with her own.
* * * *
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the Evil Kitten Project
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