by B N Miles
"Oh look, Delcan's staring right at you." Drina chirped. She wiggled her fingers at the blonde flirtatiously and sure enough, Delcan went from glaring at Sam, to glaring at Drina, to glaring right back at Sam with the fury of a million suns.
Yeah, that wasn't a good sign.
6
The rest of Sam’s day passed by in a blur. From the time he walked out of the arena until after dinner, his veins sung with adrenaline and his stomach filled with hot air. It wasn't that he hadn't been in a fight before, he'd been in plenty of those. He got into scraps as a child when some of the other kids would try and nab his rations. When he was an adolescent, he ran into plenty of ne'er-do-wells and beggars who thought him an easy target. By the time he was a man, he stopped counting.
Sam had been in plenty of fights, but they were never with a noble. They were never with somebody who was formally trained, well-fed, and versed in actual dueling. He never expected to win, but he did, and he might have regretted goading Delcan had the other man not said such vulgar, disgusting things about Sam's crew after the fact.
Every time he thought about Delcan’s words, his whole body would tense up and all he wanted to do was fight again. He noticed his classmates looking at him throughout the day and if he could have, he would have spent the rest of the day in his room.
It wasn't the new consideration in their eyes, the way they looked at him as if he were something impressive. He liked that part. It felt amazing to be looked at as something more, something that mattered. The part he didn't like, the part that made him want to duck his head, was the expectation that he was going to do something impressive again.
It was like an anchor being tied to his foot, one he had to pull along for the rest of his attendance at the Academy. It was unreasonable to believe it, he knew that on a logical level, but the respect he saw in the eyes of the people who were far more able than he was felt like a responsibility. It felt like back home, when his crew was eyeing a job, then eyeing him because he would come up with a plan for it. A plan that was solid, thorough, and would ensure their survival yet again.
The thing that kept him from screwing up, the thing that drove him to sleepless nights and bloody knuckles, the thing that made his execution damn near flawless—it wasn't skill. It wasn't talent. It was a blatant fear of disappointing people, because in his world, letting people down meant letting them die.
And now, everybody expected him to do what he did with Delcan again. And again. It was fine when it was his crew expecting big things—that came with the territory of being the head of the crew. The difference here was this wasn't a crew of four. This was a crew of forty-nine. Forty-nine people that would die if he didn't live up to their expectations.
No.
No, they wouldn't die. He had to keep reminding himself that. He had to lay on his bed and stare at the grey stone ceiling for two hours just to pinpoint why he wanted to simultaneously brawl and flee all day, then he had to stare at the ceiling for another hour to consciously remind himself again and again that nobody would die if he lost another fight, that he was being illogical.
But that's the funny thing about emotions, he guessed. Trauma.
When one grows up relying on the power of the mind, one forgets to practice the power of emotion. And when an unwelcome emotion creeps up, bares its teeth, forces its will upon the thinkers, the thinkers have no idea how to tame it. Their usual tools—logic, pragmatism, reason, realism—turn into dust.
Maybe it's the same for the feelers. When forced to use the power of the mind, the ideas and problems and routes required to untangle them overcome their hearts and they dissolve into a mess just like him.
There were people who could master both worlds, but they were called wisemen, and Sam was far from such a lofty moniker.
Nobody will die if you lose the next fight.
He mouthed his new mantra again. He'd felt better than he had an hour past, but he still saw blood behind his eyelids when he tried to sleep. If he didn't force himself into oblivion soon, he'd get no rest for the day tomorrow, and his fear of losing the next battle would become a self-fulfilled prophecy.
Fletch muttered something and grunted in his sleep, flopping onto his stomach. He smacked his lips and his jaw hinged wide open, ungentlemanly snores grinding in and out of his throat.
Great.
Sam folded the pillow beneath him to block the noise from his ears. He’d never been good at concentrating with noise. He'll need to get over that sooner or later.
There was a sudden knock at the door and Sam gave up completely on both sleeping and calming his ridiculous psyche. He let out a long, defeated sigh and tossed his blanket off.
He wrenched the door open and leaned on the frame, his eyebrows shooting up and his rolling brain stilling when he realized who he was looking at. It didn't occur to him that it would be Mattie until he opened the door, mostly because he'd been thinking that somebody better be dying considering the hour.
"Everything okay?" He rubbed his eyes until they adjusted to the dim candlelit hallway.
Mattie looked wide awake, and she wasn't even in her sleeping gown. Was she out doing something?
Sam glanced at her outfit. He'd never seen those trousers before, fine and deep green. Her shirt was uncharacteristically tight and thin compared to the billowing tops she preferred. She couldn't have been out hunting in such flimsy clothes. A strong wind could rip that shirt right off.
When the thought occurred to him, his eyes snapped to her chest briefly before he had time to feel like a lecherous asshole and sure enough, he could see the detailed outline of two pert breasts.
His eyes snap to hers. How long had he been staring at her chest like an idiot?
Mattie smirked at him, then she folded her arms behind her back and cocked her head.
Sam swallowed the excess saliva gathered in his mouth.
"Nothing's wrong. I just couldn't sleep and I figured you couldn't either. Wanna come keep me company?"
Yes. Yes, he did.
"Uh, yeah, let me just—"
"Don't bother, I've seen you in less." Mattie waved dismissively at his bare chest and without waiting, turned and sauntered away. She didn't look back over her shoulder.
This was the Mattie he expected after their little tryst. He didn't wonder why she was suddenly coming out now, he was too busy following her. Maybe that made him look too eager. Women found that unattractive.
Sam was halfway down the hall when he slowed his walk. He shouldn't let her think that he was some drooling mutt, so he shouldn't act like one . . . but he was already halfway to the end of the hall and he didn't want her to think he was so uninterested in keeping her company that he took his sweet time.
Damn the spirits, why did this have to be so complicated?
Sam collected himself, pushed his messy hair from his face, and kept walking. Mattie made it to the end of the hall, where a small alcove was situated underneath a bay window. The moon wasn't full tonight, but it was bright enough to bathe her in blue-white light. When she turned to look at him, her shoulder dipped ever so slightly, and his mouth went dry because he could see right through her flimsy shirt.
She sat down, an inviting smile on her lips.
His eyes moved when she pulled her braid over her shoulder and twisted the end with her finger. He'd been staring and she'd been watching him. By every element in the world, he probably looked as young and clumsy as he felt. He'd been at least slightly less of a dog when he had his first woman, and he'd been fourteen.
Sam swallowed again and closed the distance, his eyes on the window, staring at the black outline forest and the churning sea beyond. Quite obviously a strategic placement. An attack at sea would be far more detrimental than a land attack, so they set the least valuable people in the school closest to it. He bet Mode and the other instructors were cozied in the heart of the main building like kings in a castle.
Mattie scooted over and he sat beside her. She curled on the cushion seating, her b
ack pressed to the wall. Both of his feet were on the ground, his hands on his knees, and his eyes frozen forward. He stared so hard at the other end of the hall that his vision tricked the shadows to move like there was somebody afoot.
"You've barely spoken all day," Mattie said.
"I hadn't noticed, sorry."
Her legs suddenly slipped into his lap and he stiffened for a moment before relaxing. She rested her feet on him all the time, everything was normal, he needed to calm down.
But even though he wasn't looking at her, he could see her smirking at him in his mind's eye. No woman would ever wear something so scandalous outside of her own bedchamber and yet she was, bold as could be. What did that mean? Did she know that she was tantalizing, or was she unaware of how she looked to him at any given moment, never mind nearly naked?
Stupid. Of course she knew, Mattie wasn't an idiot.
"Distracted?"
"Hm. Yeah."
"You seem distracted now."
Her words weren't what made his attention snap to her, it was her tone. It sounded like something . . . hidden. Like smoke. Like shadow. Like sex.
What was she doing? Did Drina put her up to this?
Sam kept his eyes on Mattie's and angled his body to face her, his hands gripping her delicate calves on instinct. He should say something about . . . them. Ask her about it. She was obviously playing some game with him at this point, he just wasn't sure how to respond to it. Mattie surely wasn't joking around like Drina, that would be wildly unlike her. She wasn't manipulating him; she was his best friend. She wasn't just doing this at her convenience, or was she? And if he followed along, if he played her game, would it mean the same thing to her as it would to him?
Instead of asking her any of that, instead of saying anything of import, he forced a smile and said, "I'm not. I'm here now. Just tired, but I'm listening. What's on your mind?"
More fear. His cowardice was rearing its ugly head today more than it had ever done in the past. Fear of losing people. Fear of pain. He'd had plenty of both, it shouldn't cut so deeply now. He should be able to face Mattie with the full knowledge that it could lead to hurt, and yet dive in despite it. But he didn't. He wasn't.
Her lips pulled sideways and her expression sharpened. He didn't know what to make of it.
"A lot, actually." She said it casually, bending her knees and sliding closer to him until he was gripping her thighs instead of her calves and it didn't feel so casual.
"You really embarrassed Delcan today, you know. I'm worried about him."
Why was she still smiling, then?
"That wasn't my intention, obviously. I couldn't just let him flay me without putting up a fight, either. People catch a scent of weakness and, well, you know what happens."
Mattie was still twisting the tail of her auburn braid around her finger. She brought it close to her face and brushed it absently across her jaw, her eyes boring into him like they were talking about how they were going to ravish each other rather than a fighting class.
"I know. Still, he's not going to forget it soon. Didn't you notice the way he was staring you down all day? Did you not notice the way his entire crew stared at you all day? He's going to try and pull one over on you, and your odds aren't looking good at six to three. We need to recruit three more people, or better yet, four."
Of course he noticed Delcan and his people throughout the day, he was just trying to avoid thinking about it. One stress at a time was enough, and talking about it now was making his stomach jump, so Sam barreled through the topic and spun it around to point at Mattie. He'd think about recruiting more later, but right now, he just wanted to stop talking about it.
"I wouldn't have done it if it weren't for you volunteering me. What was that about anyway?"
"Oh, that." Mattie's smirk finally cleared, this time for a grin. "Because I knew you could do it. Drina bet me you couldn't."
That girl has a serious gambling problem. Any thought of Drina melted as soon as it appeared because, well, Mattie hadn't said something so kind to him before. She didn't outright say, 'I knew you could do it, because I believe in you,' but she didn't have to. It was beneath her words, in the richness and warmth of her tone. Mattie believed in him so much that she'd put him into a position even he didn't think he could beat. But he did, and she knew he would.
Souls weren't real, not like the Oldmons in the temples said. At least, he never thought so. After all, if souls were real, then The Great Spirits were real, and if the great spirits were real, then vile people and wicked actions would not exist. Sam would not have to grit his teeth and ignore mud-covered children hobbling through the streets with empty bellies and festering wounds, asking him for food and money he didn't have.
And yet, his soul soared. It rose in his sternum, filled his chest, crowded his lungs, and billowed from his lips to sail up, up, up into the air. His whole body was made of weightless feathers.
"So, what did you get for winning?" He grinned, grasping this moment in time and preserving it like a stone in his memory. He didn't have many memories he wanted to hold onto forever, but this was one.
Mattie's expressions kept changing wildly. One moment, she was smirking like she was up to something wicked, then she was grinning her familiar, sweet grin, then she was smirking again.
She crooked her finger at him.
He didn't even have to think about it when he leaned in.
Her hand glided to his shoulder and she pulled him closer, her mouth near enough that he could feel the energy shooting from her lips to the shell of his ear.
"She had to let me borrow her shirt," Mattie whispered.
He looked down. Her breasts weren't large, but they were the perfect size for his palms, the little buds of her nipples straining against the thin, gauzy material.
"It's a nice shirt," Sam whispered back, watching her chest rise and fall with every breath. If he put his hand there, would he feel her heart galloping like his?
"I'm glad you think so. It's made of Meera gauze, very rare, you know. You may never see its like again."
Sam held his breath, blood combing through his veins and ploughing into his hips.
"Do you want to touch it?"
He wanted her. She wanted him. All that existed was her breath ghosting the inside of his ear, filling his body up until every desire he had was set to burst. Sam hesitated for a second, only one, for if he waited any longer, that explosion would turn inward and he would be cleaved in two, halved like chopped wood.
His hands were at his sides, then they were on her. One cupped her jaw, the other circled her chest. He moved forward like a whip and pressed her back hard against the stone wall of the alcove, folding and contorting her into the corner and pressing himself into her as if they could become one. He swallowed the soft sounds she made, little squeaks as he brushed and pinched and circled her breast, and he poured all of his want back into her. His tongue met hers in an almost violent clash, their teeth scraping against one another. It was frenzied, uncontrolled, and all Sam could think about was the sight of her naked in his bed, her face full of the same hunger that consumed him.
"Oh!" Mattie gasped against his lips and Sam was vaguely aware of her legs moving, but he didn't pay attention until she was straddling his lap, squeezing his hips with her knees and pressing her center against the too-hard bulge in his pants.
She broke the kiss and latched onto his neck, nipping and sucking at his skin and sending gooseflesh rolling down his arms. His nerves were on fire, every little touch like a stroke to the very essence of his being, every little sway of her hips driving him further into a dark place where words and expectations didn't matter, only taste and touch and mad need.
Mattie swiveled her hips and the material of Sam's pants dragged against him, the pressure in his groin rising like it was being sucked from him and into the woman rubbing herself against his lap.
Sam hissed when she pressed down harder. He didn't realize his eyes were closed until they flew ope
n and locked onto a figure standing right there in the middle of the hall.
Mattie stopped long enough to lean away and look at him. Sam's blood flagged and spread into his body again, like rations given to each appendage.
He could have yelled at Drina right then. Mattie glanced over her shoulder and when she saw who it was, she quickly scrambled off of Sam's lap.
"Oh, please, don't mind me." Drina flicked her wrist as if she walked in on people like this all the time. She probably did.
Any electricity building between Sam and Mattie was quickly snuffed, but the embers still remained. Sam was very aware of Mattie, of her proximity, the heat of her body, and how close his bedroom door was.
"Drina," Mattie huffed, "did you need something?"
"No, but I thought you did." She inspected her neatly shaped nails. "When I woke up and you were gone, I got a little worried considering what Sam did to Delcan today. I figured if somebody had dragged you off, I'd come to the rescue."
Something was off with her. She didn't look at either of them when she spoke. Sam watched her carefully and noted that whenever she was done inspecting her nails, instead of giving them her attention, she only looked at the other hand.
Then it hit him.
She came to sabotage him because of that stupid bet. Damn her. Well, the bet was never a serious one to begin with, so she could forget about playing a game with Sam and Mattie, not when he was so close to figuring out what they were to one another.
"But since you don't actually need me, I'm going back to bed." She flicked her hair over her shoulder and finally looked at them. Her voice was cheerful, but her cheeky grin didn't meet her eyes.
"Next time, Mattie, leave a note so I don't think you're being brutally murdered." With that, she turned on her heel and sashayed away. Sam watched her and took note of her gait. When she was pretending to be interested in people, she walked away slowly, probably so any onlookers could drool after the sway of her heart-shaped backside. When she wasn't pretending anything, she walked a little quicker than Mattie, but not so fast that it was noticeable. Right now, though, she was walking at a brisk clip before she disappeared behind the door of her shared room.
