Chapter 14

Marvik

C oming down from the best sex of my life, my wits are scattered to the wind. It takes me a moment to realize the female beneath me has gone stiff and the sound she’s been making, her sibilance as she called it, has stopped.

“What’s wrong?” I ask, looking up to see Dura’s face is a guarded mask. A far cry from the writhing, sensitive lover I held in my arms just a moment ago.

“Nothing is wrong,” she lies. “I just need to bathe again. We made a mess.”

I can see that, my cum liberally painted on her stomach and ribs. It’s sticking to me as well, where our bodies are touching after I collapsed with my release. I barely pulled out in time, preventing a baby. Our relationship is still too new for such things and, as far I know, Dura doesn’t have a contraceptive charm. But this is not just dismay over needing to bathe in cooled bathwater. This is something else. Wariness and distrust.

Dura pulls apart from me. I sit up to let her leave, and she walks over to the tub without so much as looking at me. She steps into it and crouches down, scooping water over her belly, removing the traces of me from her body. The sight makes me grow irrationally irritated.

“What’s wrong?” I ask again. “What is going on? Did I hurt you? Did you not enjoy it?” That can’t be it. I felt her squeezing like a vise down on my manhood while she came. It almost made me come inside her, despite my best intentions. I was careful and considerate, going slowly and working to prepare her, in light of her virginity. I was as good as I possibly could have been. But what if I’m wrong? What if I did something she didn’t like? My pride doesn’t want to admit it, but it is possible. I consider myself a practiced lover, but being with her made me wild, forgetting all my technique. And something about her made my words go foul as we were together, a need to tease and shock. Maybe she didn’t like it and would have preferred more finesse.

Dura doesn’t answer any of my questions. Instead, she asks, “Yesterday, you had a plan to get away from me, didn’t you? What was it?”

I go still. She picked up on that? She knew something was coming and didn’t say anything? But of course. At the pond I was too obvious, acted too agreeable. She isn’t stupid; in fact, she is clever and discerning. I should have expected this.

I consider lying, telling her she is wrong. Defend myself. Distract her from her suspicions and lack of trust. It is what my father would want me to do. Which means it is the wrong thing to do. If I lie, it will mean her distrust in me is warranted. And somehow, I think she would be able to tell.

“I was going to wait until you were visible again and then turn you into the orcs. Tell them you were a deserter and then slip away while they arrested you,” I admit, wincing as the words are said aloud. This is definitely not what I wanted to be talking about in the aftermath of our lovemaking.

Lovemaking? Since when do I refer to fucking like that? But it is true that what we just did was more than fucking, deeper in meaning than I am perhaps ready to admit. But I don’t love Dura. Do I? I can’t. Just yesterday, she was my jailer, my enemy. We are still adversarial, as is shown by this conversation. But I think I do . . . care about her. Want her. Respect her. But love her? No. Not yet. Not yet?

Dura stands up from the tub, turning around, her skin wet and clean. She is a vision in the firelight, the glow from the fireplace reflecting off her shining limbs. My unruly cock stirs again, looking at her, but I try to think of something else, something unarousing. Now is not the time .

“So, you were going to betray me,” she says evenly, her face neutral. It is impossible to tell what she is thinking. “Even after I told you what would happen to me if the other orcs found me. Even after we fought together against the wolf.”

“I was desperate,” I argue. “I told you about my sister. And you said they would strip your titles, which you have already lost, and then just banish you, but with a knife. It was the only way I could think of to stop you from stopping me while not hurting you. You would have survived.”

“No,” she returns softly, “I wouldn’t have. It is banishment in name only. No one can survive in the desert sands of the Killikar. The knife is so that the deserter can take the coward’s death rather than face the unforgiving desert. But I suppose you didn’t know that.”

I am horrified. I didn’t know that. I thought, well, that the punishment in Orik isn’t as bad as the one in Adrik and that she would have been fine. Still alone in the wilderness, but fine.

Dura finds her tunic that I carelessly threw on the floor and puts it on. “I appreciate you telling me the truth,” she says, still unreadable. “But I think tomorrow we should go our separate ways.”

I feel panicky in a way that doesn’t really make sense. I should be glad to get away from her and back to my own life. If she releases me from my life debt, then my honor should be satisfied. Truth be told, it should have been satisfied when I saved her from the werewolf’s jaws. But I feel like this is wrong, like I am supposed to stay with her.

“You can’t just decide that!” I exclaim, standing up. Her eyes flick to my naked body and then away, like she can’t quite look at me.

“Yes, I can,” she replies, still in that even tone of voice. Usually that is my trick, to stay completely calm while the other person loses their temper. I can see now how maddening it is. But I can’t let her win.

I take a deep breath and then say in a modulated tone, “If you leave, I will just follow. ”

She shakes her head. “If I want to, I will be able to easily outrun you and you would never find my trace. It would be useless to track me.”

“Why are you doing this? Why right now? I thought we settled this back in Kingsbury.”

“Because I do not want an Ash’ka that doesn’t want me!” she explodes. “One that makes plans to betray me while smiling!”

“That was yesterday!” I snap, stepping toward her, still naked. “Everything has changed. Can’t you see that? Everything!”

“Oh?, now you believe you are my Ash’ka and want to be with me?” Dura asks sarcastically.

“Maybe,” I shoot back. I can tell my words surprise her, her eyes widening. I make my voice calm, reasonable, and continue, “I don’t know yet what we are. Enemies? Strangers? Fated mates? Lovers? I’m unsure, but getting surer. Can’t I stay with you until I am? Until I know for certain what we are?”

Dura stares at me, undecided. Then she says, “You don’t understand what it’s like. To have two intrinsic voices in your head pushing you toward another person. Both my elf and orc side want you. Not just tonight, not just as a lover. As a mate. Forever. Bitten and Claimed and mine. If you stay with me, my feelings will only deepen. They have been deepening, even when I was sure that I hated you as well, even when it seemed like foolishness to bind myself to an enemy. If we were to grow close, if I were to lower my walls and let you in . . . if you still reject me later, after all that, after everything I have lost and suffered . . . I fear it will kill me.”

This is the most vulnerable she has ever been with me. More vulnerable than when we were both naked, and I was inside her. More vulnerable than when she admitted her earrings were from her mother. I do not know what to say. I can’t just lie and say that I want to be her mate. That would be telling her what she wants to hear again and she wouldn’t trust it and it wouldn’t be true besides .

“I am drawn to you,” I admit instead. “I have been since I woke in the cave. Just like you, I have felt myself being pulled toward you in a way that is not wise. More than I even wanted to be. Especially when we were at odds. But we aren’t now and have a chance to start afresh. Can that not be enough for now? Who’s to say that it will not grow into what you want it to be?”

“But what if it doesn’t?” she whispers.

I close the distance between us. I reach out a hand and tentatively cup her cheek. She hesitates for a moment, then leans into the touch. “What if it does?” I whisper back.

She looks up, and I take a chance and kiss her. Experimentally, just a gentle brush of lips. On my second pass, she kisses me back, just as searching as me. Like a training bout or dance, one movement answered by another. As if we are exploring each other, seeing what the other likes, what touches are alright. After about a minute, I bring the kissing to a close and pull back.

“Let’s go to bed, alright? We can talk in the morning. This conversation will be better after some rest.”

She looks at me intently, as if trying to see if there is another hidden meaning in my words. Then Dura finally nods and looks toward the bed.

“You should bathe first as well. We don’t want to dirty the linens.”

She has a point. I am still sweaty from our walk here and from our amorous activities, my belly also sticky with my spend. I grab the towel from the bed and hastily get into the water. It is lukewarm, but nowhere near as cold as the pond was, so it is still pleasant. I scrub swiftly, using the bar of soap on my skin and hair before exiting the tub and digging through my pack for the new clothes I got at the tailor’s. I pull on the new trousers and tunic, leaving the overcoat for later. Then I turn to Dura, who has watched me, an inscrutable look on her face .

“Do you still want to sleep on the side closest to the door?” I offer, trying to be conciliatory. This is an unfamiliar experience for me, dealing with an unhappy lover. Before, when I was with a woman, either we were happy or things ended. I have never tried to hold on to a lover with one foot out the door before.

Dura nods at my question and I walk around the bed to the far side before climbing in. After a long hesitation, she does as well, though she is far from me. How do I fix this? How do I bring back the feelings from before when we let all our walls fall down and dove into each other? That felt as natural as breathing, but this, the aftermath, is stilted and guarded; like one wrong move would cause a war to start between us.

As she lies down, stiff as a tree branch, I slowly slide closer to her. “May I hold you?” I ask, wanting nothing more than to have her in my arms. Which is new to me. I’ve never been one to cuddle after sex, but I find I want it now. Maybe some physical closeness will help heal this rift between us.

There’s another long hesitation before she finally says, “Alright.”

I reach out my hands and pull her close, with her head tucked just under my chin. It is like trying to cuddle a stone, her body is so tense. I can tell when she finally falls asleep because she softens, growing warm and pliable at last.

Tomorrow is another day, I think. We will figure out this thing between us as long as we stay together. With that thought, I fall asleep.

???

In the morning, I bolt upright, my arms empty. Dura is gone. And so are the supplies.