by Aaron Crash
He grinned. “Such a tell wouldn’t help me at a gambling table. I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to control that.” His eyes went to her ravished body, the sweat on her tits, down her belly, to the tangle of hair between her legs.
“I like you looking.” She touched her sodden sex, giving him a show. “You have me going. I’ve always fantasized about a scholar taking me on my desk. How long will it take for you to fuck me again?”
“Watching you touch yourself? I’m ready now.” Ymir swept the papers off the desk. “Get up here, woman. I don’t have all night.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
YMIR STOOD ON THE BEACH, naked, with the sand between his toes. The morning sky was free of clouds. His uht was a bit sore because after three times with Siteev Ckins, Lillee had needed to be serviced. He’d done his duty and made the elf girl scream.
Lillee stood with him on the beach. Her essess was back in place, her only adornment. Her platinum hair was tied in a series of braids and leather thongs, which hung down her back. She looked wild with the leather on her naked skin, wild and free.
Without work study, they had plenty of time to visit the beach before breakfast.
He sniffed. The salty air still smelled of the rains from last night. The sun, however, kept him comfortably warm. For it being autumn, Grandfather Sun burned hot on his wife, Grandmother World. Only one moon was in the sky, the Shieldmaiden, a full orb nearly as big as the sun herself. She’d wane a bit in the coming weeks even as the Axman thickened until both would rule the night sky.
The waves crashed and rolled. Where did those waves come from? Did the merfolk make them? Or maybe the waves came from Ethra, the mysterious continent to the west across the Weeping Sea. He hadn’t known it even existed before coming to Old Ironbound. He still had so much to learn.
Maybe the troubled lives of all the people of the world caused the ocean waves. Every crash of the sea onto the beach was a cry of pain. The storms swept through the ocean like misfortune swept through the lives of so many, including him.
He frowned at those thoughts. He was thinking like a fucking poet. He should be peaceful. He had two women in lust with him. And he had friends: Lillee, Jenny, Gharam Ssornap, and Toriah Welldeep. On top of that, once they made the Black Ice Ring, it could help him control his magic. Or he could be done with all this nonsense.
Still, the wound in his heart bled. He wanted to go home. That was impossible.
I truly am a Lonely Man now, he thought, as lost as the thing he’d killed in the Crack. I curse you. I curse you forever. Let the sleeper wake from the dream! it had said.
Siteev said that the sleeper waking was from some old book or story. He’d done a little research in the Librarium but hadn’t found anything. It wasn’t very specific.
As for curses? There were many. He was beginning to look at his curse in a different way. If he could use the magic, he might return to the tundra and conquer the clans until they were forced to accept him. He would rule with an iron fist. People might whisper about him, but they wouldn’t talk out loud.
Or he could find other lands to conquer. The world was a big place.
Lillee disrupted his thoughts. “It’s going to be cold.”
“Not as cold as what I’m used to.” He ran through the incoming surf and sprang over one wave and dove into another. The water was frigid at first, but as he swam it grew tolerable. Would this happen to him at Old Ironbound? Would he grow accustomed to the strange place?
It was already happening. He’d found comfort in moments of quiet study in the Librarium, and in the nights of wild passion. He looked forward to eating in the feasting hall with Lillee and Jenny. The Josentown princess was spending less and less time with her catty cohort. One girl, Nelly, didn’t like that at all. She couldn’t keep her troubled stares off Jenny.
Nelly wasn’t just another friend. She was also one of Jenny’s lovers. The swamp woman admitted as much, and Ymir would like to see that. No, better, would be for Jenny to join him and Lillee at nights. That would be risky for her, because one slip and she’d be ruined. She’d be as much of an outcast as Ymir if she went against the customs of her people. That would never happen, though, because Jenny couldn’t answer two out of the three questions honestly.
He bobbed up. The unseen hands of the current tried to take him out farther, and he fought the pull, a nice thrill and a battle he could win. His eyes would be blue. He was understanding his pupil oddity more. Most of the time, his eyes were a muddy brown. Lust turned them green. Anger shifted them to blue.
It was a liability...as damning as a smile during a game of Seven Devils. He swam back to Lillee, who stood in the water, soaping herself. This was so much more satisfying than standing in the murk of the communal shower room under water only a tad warmer.
They’d borrowed Jenny’s pristine shower a few times in her sumptuous apartment. If Jenny joined them, and turned her back on her people, they would move up there and live together. It would feel so natural, a real family to replace the clan he’d lost.
No, he thought. His clan could never be replaced. He’d have to bear the homesickness, and if it never went away? He’d endure. Clansmen endured. It was how they could survive in a place that killed anything weak.
He kissed Lillee, washed himself, and walked up onto the sand to dry in the warm sun.
She joined him. “I know about you and Professor Ckins.”
“Impossible.” There was simply no way the elf girl could know.
Lillee smiled and touched his back. “I had a Flow dream last night. I saw you and her, on the AngelTeeth Islands, near the lighthouse, and you were celebrating. Tell me I’m wrong.”
“Fucking magic,” he spat.
A bit of Grandmother Rabbit’s wisdom came to him. Trust is a spider’s web. It is easily broken and impossible to repair. Can you tell a spider where to spin her web? Once the trust between people is broken, only fate can fix it.
Ymir would tell the elf the truth. “You said that I was free to celebrate sex with whoever I wanted. According to that agreement, I did not disrespect you, and I didn’t disrespect myself. Siteev hasn’t been drinking the sanctum sap tea, and she is a bit old to have children.”
“Not so old.” Lillee patted his back. “She didn’t want anyone to know. I understand that. I am not accusing you of anything.”
He pulled her close. Her body was slick with water and smelled good from the soap. She was slight compared to him, but muscled, with strong bones underneath her soft skin. “I love you, Lillee. You’re my best friend.”
She curled into his arms. A sob shook her.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
She whispered. “I didn’t think I would find love or friends ever again. I had steeled myself for a lonely life. Who would want a Sullied Ohlyrran princess?”
“This clansman.” He squeezed her.
“I love you too,” Lillee said. “I know you will have other women. When I’m freed from my essess, I find it exciting. Wearing the cuff, I get uncertain. Without lust, my emotions lean toward jealousy. However, my logical mind trusts you.”
“Then let’s stick with your logical mind.”
She moved back and held both his hands. “Did you ask her what aszeculum meant? I’m assuming you weren’t so caught up in your passion that you didn’t ask.”
He laughed. “No, I asked her. She insisted it was sky, though she wasn’t certain. She was going to check.”
“Did she know about the Akkiric Rings?”
“If she did, she didn’t let on. I don’t think she was the one who left the parchment in my cell.” He paused, recalling the conversation. “She did mention something about the Age of Isolation being a good thing. I don’t think she likes the idea of the Fallen Fruit people mixing. I could be wrong.”
“Fallen Fruit?” Lillee grinned. “It’s quaint. There are many who believe in keeping the various people separate. The guilds, however, are always trying to bring us together. The Knowing Gui
ld believes that knowledge and engineering should be shared for the good of all. The Undergem Guild knows that more trade and closer relations will mean more profits. As for the Painted Pen Guild, art is best when it’s shared. Professor Ckins’s views probably don’t have anything to do with our quest.”
“Quest?” It was his turn to smile. “That sounds grand. The Quest for the Akkiric Rings.”
“The Black Ice Ring first.” Lillee nodded. “It might help you control your power more. Last night, I barely grabbed you before you fell.”
That made him growl. “Fucking magic. If I slept outside, I might already be dancing with the three moons. Or the fall from the heavens would kill me.” He stopped to consider her words. “The two moons won’t be right until the night after First Exam. Before that, we need to translate that word. And we need to figure out a way into the Flow Tower and the Sunfire Tower.” He thought of the key ring in Gharam’s apartment. It would definitely have a key to every lock at the Sunfire College—the Gruul man was the Studia Dux there. Ymir didn’t like the idea of stealing from his friend, though he might not have a choice.
“Damn,” Ymir cursed. “We could gather the ice before. Too bad ice has a way of melting.” He furrowed his brow. “If we were better at Flow magic, this wouldn’t be a problem. You know, Siteev might help us. Though she is a Moons professor, she has experience with the other magics. She made her coral golem.”
She stepped up to him and kissed him. “Listen to you...the barbarian talking about magic so easily.”
He expected to feel the icy fingers on his spine, or fall into a vision, or even float off the sand. Instead, something even better happened. The homesickness he’d been feeling left him. His heart was full for a moment. He knew it wouldn’t last, that he’d feel the call of the tundra again. For now, for that brief moment, smelling the ocean, smelling Lillee, he was at peace. They were on a quest, and he wouldn’t fail.
He and Lillee dressed, but instead of putting on Gharam Ssornap’s boots, he slung them over his shoulder on a leather thong. He slid on his satchel so the front strap crossed his chest. “You go on, Lillee. I will meet you in the feasting hall. There is something I want to try now that we have a little time. By the Axman’s beard, I don’t miss our work study program.”
“What if Daris and Odd don’t do a good job?” she asked.
“Then Gurla will give them a good tongue lashing.” He expected her to joke about sex, but she had her cuff in place.
He padded across the sand, gazed up at the smooth rocks of the cliff, and knew he couldn’t start his climb there. He used the rings to get up to the grate—so far, no one had repaired the lock. Once he got to where the sea cells had been built out of stones, he saw a path upward. Fingers in cracks, feet on protruding stones, he crawled up the side of the cells until he reached the wooden sides of the second-level apartments. That would be more difficult. Turning, he stared down at the worried face of the elf.
She gave him a wave, and he waved back. He inched along a ledge until he found a metal downspout. The builder had used Form magic to fix the slender spout to the wood. That would make scrambling up the second-level apartments easy. Hauling himself up the spout, he climbed higher, to dizzying heights, until he reached the top-level rooms for the richest students.
The spout disappeared into a mixture of boards, bricks, and stones. The windows provided him ledges to move horizontally. He smelled kaif brewing in one of the apartments. Someone was smoking kharo in another.
Most of the windows had their curtains drawn closed, so he couldn’t see inside. One room had the curtains open, and inside, the room was a messy place of scattered clothes. Someone slept, curled up in their blankets, on a nice big bed.
Another stone wall allowed him to climb to the rooftops of the top-level apartments. He stood on the tile roofs near chimneys leaking smoke. To burn wood on such a warm day was luxury indeed. He was sweating lightly from the exertion. His muscles ached comfortably. He’d not be taking the stairs so often now. Climbing had him awake and feeling alive.
He turned to see the grand citadel dwarfing the Flow Tower to his left and the Moons Tower to his right. The tiled roof of the feasting hall lay above the steaming windows. Inside, scholars would be eating breakfast.
Ymir’s stomach grumbled, and he patted it. “Soon, you’ll have as much as you can eat.”
He shifted to see the white waves rolling across the blue water. On such a clear morning, the lighthouse, StormLight, on the AngelTeeth Islands didn’t seem to be glowing. He had to laugh at the idea of Lillee dreaming of him and Siteev Ckins together out on that shit-splattered rock.
The elf girl had accepted him and his celebrations. That was good.
Seeing the blue sky, moonless for a time, made him think of the Axman, who had hewed his fate into the world with his mighty ax. The Axman didn’t care much for the prayers of mortals; he had smote life itself to give the clans breath. That gift was enough, and the ways of the Axman were not the ways of men. The Shieldmaiden was kinder, yet she too had little patience for whining. At times, however, she did raise her shield to protect her children from the more capricious whims of fate.
Which way did Ymir’s path lie?
The heavens weren’t about to answer. Ymir didn’t need them to. He would know, when the time came, where his destiny lay. He’d walk the path when he was shown the path. Until then, prayers and ruminating were a waste of time.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
JENNYBELLE JOSEN STOOD in the feasting hall with her tin tray loaded with her breakfast: eggs, bacon, and some slices of apple. A big cup of steaming kaif, mellowed with milk and sweetened with beet sprinkles, was balanced on her tray. She’d been about to sit when something in the window caught her eye—Ymir standing on the rooftops of the southern Flow apartments. He faced the sea. How had he gotten up there?
That barbarian was so strange and yet so alluring. She loved how he’d tricked his way out of his work study. Ymir was worthy of the Swamp Coast, yes, but was Arribelle worthy of him? Her sister was a slow, cruel creature, and shouldn't be the Firstborn.
Jenny's dead sister, Karabelle, would've been such a better choice. Kara would have been a good queen, a powerful queen, and she would've needed such a man to help her rule the Josentown Queendom. Such a shame death had laid poor Karabelle low. And it had broken the will of Jenny's mother. To lose both husband and daughter to poison, on a feast day, was too much for her to take.
Auntie Jia took control of everything, including Jenny's life, such as it was. Why wouldn't she? Jia had leapt on her chance to rule, and though she never said as much, it was clear she'd been waiting her entire life to seize such power. It could be Jenny might be put in the same position someday. Maybe she should just wait.
Jenny fell into a little fantasy. Arribelle ill, not poison just a sickness that the Moons mages couldn't heal. Arri was indeed married to Ymir, and the clansman walked through Josentown, beloved by all. Once her sister died, Jenny could take him for a husband. It wasn’t unheard of. Together, they would rule Josentown and all its counties. Maybe that was the way forward. Jenny and Nelly would cast the Lover's Knot, get Ymir to fall in love with Arribelle, and he'd marry her. He might be able to tolerate her violent tempers and foul moods. In her fantasy he could. Then Jenny would wait for her turn, not only to rule, but to find passion with Ymir in their marital bed. Yet, while Jenny had many good qualities, she knew that patience was not one of them. Waiting would kill her as quickly as poison or an assassin's knife.
She shook away the fantasies. She didn't want to ensorcell the clansman. And she had her daring plan, rotting in her gut. But that seemed like more fantasy. She’d not told a single person about that particular idea. Her heart was so torn.
Nelly interrupted her thoughts. “Isn’t that tray getting heavy, Jenny? Come on over and sit down with us.”
Jenny did. Her friend saw she was troubled.
Nelly drew close so they could talk in whispers while they ate. "
You've been so distant, Jenny. What are you and that clansman and his Sullied elf girlfriend planning?"
"Nothing." Jenny was surprised Nelly had noticed anything. Maybe she wasn't as dim as she first appeared.
Nelly nibbled on some bread. "That nothing has you alone at nights. Or are you alone? Are you sampling the clansman behind our backs? You know that's forbidden."
Anger flashed through the swamp princess. "You know I would never do that. Not ever."
"And yet, you are spending so much time with him." Nelly sipped her kaif. "You know, we don't need Ymir to learn magic. All of us agree. He’d be perfect for Josentown. Maybe he wouldn't find your Firstborn sister so interesting, but the Lover's Knot could tie them together. Perhaps he shouldn't pass the First Exam. And perhaps we can make that happen. You have his ear. You could sabotage him. If we get him expelled from the Majestrial, we could just take him home right away."
It was a daring plan, and if Jenny hadn't liked Ymir so much, she might’ve done it. She considered the option seriously, which was shocking. They could find Ymir a place to live in StormCry, and then, during the winter solstice break, they could make the long journey back to the Swamp Coast. Once there, once Ymir saw the moss-heavy trees and the black water of the bogs, he might like it. They could cast the magic to bind him to Arribelle, and this little drama would be over. Jenny would return to Old Ironbound, free from all scheming, her duty done. Auntie Jia would be so very proud.
With Ymir gone and no longer a temptation, Jenny could bring Lillee up from the sea cells, and the two could live together in Jenny's apartment. At night, she'd slip the cuff of the Sullied elf, and the two could make love all night long. Uncuffed, Lillee was a fiery thing, dirty in ways that happily surprised Jenny. The Josentown princess knew she'd be happy for a time, but she also knew she would ache for Ymir. Not for his touch, but for his mere presence. His smiles, his quick mind, his big, muscled body. Even just being near him made her happy.
