ElyriasEcstasy

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ElyriasEcstasy Page 15

by Amber Jayne


  Rune nodded. With some semblance of gentleness, he said, “Go stand in the hall. Your pheromones are distracting me.” He had stopped himself from saying the words “fear sweat”. Though his senses were only at their peak in connection with Urna, they functioned at a heightened level even now.

  He waited until he heard the door close at his back, distinctly lacking the normal click and beep that would let him know he had been locked inside. He glanced over his shoulder, making sure no eyes were peering through the hole in the wall at him. The Guard’s slightly labored breathing told him the man was leaning against the opposite wall.

  Rune stepped up to the wall nearest to him and pressed his palm flat against it. Urna had never told him why he did this to his walls and Rune had never pressed him. Perhaps he hadn’t cared. Urna was eccentric. Let him doodle if he liked.

  Now, however, Rune examined with purpose.

  He ran the thin, smooth skin of his fingertips, free of the calluses one developed when regularly handling weaponry, over the surface of the wall and felt the raised medium Urna had used to scrawl six words there. They read: This is the way to… The last word was obscured, as if it had been frantically rubbed out with the heel of a palm. Rune’s keen eyes made out something of the original writing, but it was unclear. It could have been fight, or maybe light.

  He moved along the wall, breathing deeply. It wasn’t hard to imagine his Weapon writing these nonsensical things, in fact, it was quite easy. But could this writing be indicative of something more than harmless eccentricity? Of all the things he’d fancied Urna to be—partner, rival, lover—he’d never once suspected that he might actually be unstable. Such mental deterioration wouldn’t be allowed, surely. It would have been wiped out by drugs, or by other Lux programming tactics.

  They had means, Rune had heard, but thankfully he himself had never been subjected to them.

  Rune continued to move slowly along the wall. His nostrils flared and filled with a bitter, acrid smell, almost indiscernible. His tongue salivated with sense memory. The taste of blood in his mouth. He dropped to his knees.

  There was a sequence of drawings directly in front of him. Symbols he didn’t recognize, which meant that Urna should not know them either. They had received the same military education. Only Urna was always reading those old pointless texts, those scraps he’d gotten hold of somehow. Probably he’d memorized the characters without knowing their meaning, if they had meaning, and copied them here because he thought them pretty.

  “Urna!”

  The Passengers were closing in on the roadway. Not near enough that the two of them were in immediate danger—yet—but close enough that Urna could surely hear them too, with his ears that were far inferior to Rune’s.

  Worse, though, than this closing threat, was the sickness. This was the first time Rune had truly had his boots on the ground out here. Normally he stayed up high, out of range, and directed Urna. That was why they raided old cities, because they provided an abundance of tall structures.

  Bile rose in Rune’s throat and he knew then that they were too far out. Not just flirting with going beyond the range of the wings’ ability to fly them back without running out of fuel, but they were too far under the Ship. He was seized with the grim certainty that they shouldn’t have come such a distance. “Urna!” There was little point in keeping quiet now.

  “Wait.” He heard Urna, nearly breathless now. He was on his knees, digging through some pile of rubbish on the crumbled roadbed. What the hell was he doing? “Wait…” But Rune could wait no longer. He pushed himself forward again, toward that voice. That single point of familiarity in this wasteland. Rune closed his fingers around his sidearm as he went, blind and avoiding obstacles by instinct, but it wasn’t as easy as it should have been. “I’ve got it!” Urna called out in triumph, but Rune didn’t think he was talking to him.

  Distracted, Rune overcompensated for a drop in the level of the ground and tripped, falling to his knees. Instead of coming down hard, what he made contact with was startlingly soft and wet. And it reeked. Panicking, he released the blindfold from his face with a series of sharp tugs, not as practiced in its quick removal as he would one day be.

  He’d stumbled into what appeared to be a small patch of dense moss, copious and rank. Under the Shiplight it appeared red. Before he could stop himself he reached down to touch the stuff with his fingertips. He withdrew his hand immediately. His fingers stung. Something told him that this wasn’t part of the normal pervasive decay. He and Urna had never been this far out. No team had. Was there more of this red moss the deeper one went into the Unsafe?

  That was when he remembered the pistol in his other hand. In that same mad instant he swung the firearm, meaning to get Urna’s total attention. Rune had landed too far behind him and the Weapon was still several yards ahead. He hadn’t listened to Rune’s warning and now the Shadowflash had to make his point clear. He was, after all, charged with his Weapon’s safety.

  He pulled the trigger. It was only the second time he’d fired the sidearm in the Unsafe. The first had been on a rooftop, when he had jumped at a shadow.

  The discharge of the pistol was loud. He hadn’t aimed well. The sickness—the result of fear, obviously—had him off his balance. He heard the spang of metal against metal, heard also Urna’s yelp of surprise. But he smelled no blood. He detected no impact of bullet against flesh. His warning shot hadn’t resulted in tragedy.

  He was retching when Urna made it back to him. The Weapon was running and he almost passed Rune up, skidding to a stop. “Trying to get my attention?” Urna demanded. But there was a mad glee in his voice. Then, closing his hands around Rune’s shoulders, he heaved him up. “Come on.” The Weapon paused, unholstered his own gun and fired it. An unnervingly short distance away, a Passenger let out a strangled cry. “Got my one more,” Urna said.

  Rune’s engine had cut out on landing. He had to fire up his wings again. Urna did the same. They lifted off before the Passengers could reach them. The whole way back Rune felt as if something was pulling at his stomach. He’d thought it simply fear before, but he wondered now if it wasn’t something to do with that red moss. His fingers still hurt, as though they had been scrubbed with some strong chemical, but the hurt was fading.

  When they were back inside the Safe, then within the Lux city’s limits, bathed in the fast approaching light of the Citadel, Rune chanced a look at Urna.

  Urna at his left was flying with one hand held close to his chest, clutching something there that he didn’t want to lose. It was a rectangle of metal. Bronze. It bore an inscription that Rune couldn’t make out. More prominently, it was marked by the scorched pucker of a bullet hole. Urna had picked this ancient, tarnished artifact off the ground, held it triumphantly aloft—and Rune had inadvertently shot it out of his hand. He could have killed his partner. Easily. This would not figure into the report he would later make.

  It was his blood. Rune saw it now.

  The dried brown that formed this particular series of symbols was Urna’s blood. The lingering smell was suddenly familiar, almost personal. It flaked away beneath his fingers and he jerked his hand back, preserving the symbol he had gingerly touched.

  A kind of corkscrew shape.

  He stepped back, sat on the bed, on the overturned mattress. After a moment he noticed the small slit in the material. Perhaps those who had searched this room so violently had missed it.

  Working his fingers inside, he pulled out, one by one, a shell, a stone, a coin. All from the Unsafe, he was quite sure. And finally, digging deeper, he came upon the bronze item. It looked like a plaque, an ancient testimonial of some sort, though to whom he couldn’t say. It was too corroded. Perhaps it had decorated the base of a statue once. Now it was junk.

  But Urna had risked their lives to retrieve it on that long ago night. He had acted impulsively, indulging a whim. Undisciplined. A daredevil. They had never again gone so deep into the Unsafe. Rune had never seen further evidence o
f the red moss, but he had never forgotten it.

  Rune’s fingers inevitably touched the hole that marred the plaque. He might have killed Urna that night. He might well have.

  * * * * *

  Gator was a big guy and he tended to loom. His features were definitely of the rugged variety, though Arvra had never thought him unattractive. Actually, she hadn’t thought much at all about his physical characteristics, other than that he was large and strong and thereby a good candidate to go on a raid into the Unsafe, where sticky situations were bound to arise and having an ox on your side was just good planning.

  But now, all of a sudden, she found herself considering the older male in a new light. He had led her several streets over, to his own dwelling. It was no more sturdy than hers, but he had taken evident pains to brighten up its interior. Cheery paint covered the walls. A number of sculptures decorated the scene—all done in stone, since nobody would waste precious wood creating art, and rocks you could just dig out of the ground. The pieces were fanciful, strange but pleasing shapes.

  It had been some months since she’d last been inside here, she realized, gazing about and nodding.

  “Like what I’ve done?” Gator asked, again with that hint of bashfulness.

  “I like it.” Arvra smiled. She felt herself loosening from the long journey home. She had some idea that Gator was trying to make romantic overtures to her, and she had been silently considering them on the walk over here. She eyed him. “You said something about a bath?”

  He copied her smile then redoubled it into a grin that stretched his stubbly face. He clomped past her to open a door at the far end of the brightly painted room. “In here.”

  She went to the door. There she stopped and actually gasped aloud. “Wow! Where the hell did you get that?”

  It was apparently the reaction he’d been hoping for. He laughed heartily, then crowed, “I made it.”

  “Made? That? You?”

  “What, you think I’m only good for going under-Ship to plunder and pillage?”

  Arvra had to look up to fix him with a wry stare. “No, Gator. I don’t think that.” She put just enough flirtatious lilt into her voice to bring a slight blush to his cheeks.

  He laughed again.

  She entered the smaller chamber, which was quite dominated by the huge slab of a stone bathtub. Plainly it had been chiseled by hand, but the loving detail and craftsmanship was obvious. Its sides were like the walls of a miniature fortress, with amazing crenellations carved into the brim. It was large enough to easily accommodate Gator himself. The whole thing rested atop a rectangular base of thick white stone.

  “It’s two parts, actually,” he pointed out, while she was still goggling in wonder at the marvelous monstrosity. “The base is one piece. I made a deal with this old gal whose house’s foundation is made of the kind of stone I wanted. She let me go in and chip it out. Took a bit of work. Then the tub itself.” He slapped the stout side. “That took a long, long while. I worked from a single solid mass, but since I knew exactly what I wanted out of it, it was just a matter of time.”

  Arvra looked up at him again, still stunned. “A bit of work. A matter of time. You really know how to understate things, don’t you?”

  He shrugged but was plainly quite pleased. “I had a buddy getting the water ready for it all day.”

  The deep, luxurious tub was fairly filled with water—a great quantity of it, water that was steaming. She noticed now that a hunk of actual soap rested in a niche sculpted onto the rim. There had to be weeks’ worth of rationed water here.

  And he was offering this to her. She was touched. Again a tear appeared and slid down her cheek. It was followed by another, then Gator came to her and held her against his broad chest and she let several convulsive sobs escape her. She wasn’t a crier. Not usually. But last night had been arduous, no matter how satisfactorily she’d passed the time in that cell with that woman Lavinia. Then coming home, seeing Frank…

  After a quick moment she had herself back under control. Gator smiled down at her.

  “I’m going to get in that water now,” she said.

  He nodded, letting her go. “Okay. I’ll—” And he was turning toward the door.

  “You don’t have to go.” With that, she started shedding her clothing. Gator’s dark eyes slowly widened. A few seconds later, standing naked, she let him take a good long look, even turning about so he could view all of her. It occurred to her, belatedly, that this might be all he was after, just this opportunity to take a full look at her unclothed body. She didn’t begrudge him the favor. Hell, she probably would’ve done that for him if he’d asked nicely. But all this—hot water, soap, the extravagance of a real bath. She had been expecting something more along the lines of a bucket and sponge, which was what most people in this town thought a bath was.

  She was not self-conscious about her scars around him. Gator already knew about them, the marks on her upper left arm and across her abdomen.

  Finally she stepped up onto the white supporting slab, gazed down into the filled tub, then lifted a leg over the side and slid herself wholly down into that luscious, hot water.

  She came up spluttering happily. Her multicolored hair was now plastered about her skull. The chill left her body immediately. She reached for the soap. It released a wondrous floral scent when she dipped it into the water and started lathering herself. Her slick hands moved over her breasts, nipples growing hard. She peered through the veiling steam, expecting that Gator was still watching her—wanting him to see her now.

  He was watching. He was staring rapturously at her, with a heartbreaking longing in those dark eyes. Arvra wondered remotely if he’d always felt this way about her. He’d never given any indication during the times they had worked together. Then again, that was business.

  She even dared to wonder if he had chiseled out this magnificent bathtub with her in mind all along. But that was too conceited a thought, and she shook it off. She continued soaping herself.

  “Gator?”

  He grunted an acknowledgment, still staring.

  “Want to get in with me?” The thought sent a surprisingly powerful thrill through her.

  He could only nod.

  It was her turn to watch him strip. She knew him to be a strong man. She halfway expected a burly, graceless body, ugly with muscle. But he was a well-proportioned specimen, with powerful but not grotesquely swollen pectoral muscles, firm abdominals. He was a bit shy about lowering his trousers, which Arvra found oddly delightful as she continued to ogle him.

  Finally he stood nude. He allowed her the same chance to view him as she’d given him. His legs were solid columns. His ass was as chiseled as this tub she sat in. His cock, thick and dangling, was framed by a tangle of dark pubic curls. Already it was hardening.

  She saw what she took for a birthmark on his right hip. After a second she realized it was a tattoo, one which sort of curled in on itself. It was red and looked like it might be a symbol of some sort, though she didn’t recognize it.

  Arvra shifted as he came up to the tub’s edge and gently dropped a leg into the water, cloudy now with bubbles. The water level rose as he lowered himself fully. As large as the bathtub was, they couldn’t sit in it together without touching. There was a cheerful little scuffle as they settled their legs, Gator’s brawnier ones closing around Arvra’s thinner limbs. They faced each other. She could see his nervousness on his unshaven, rugged features, even now.

  She smiled at him. The heat and luxury made her feel dreamy. She picked up the hunk of soap—this stuff was expensive; where had he gotten it?—and leaning forward, started to lather his broad chest. Her fingers trailed across the nipples capping his pectorals. Gator shivered.

  “You want me to stop?” she asked.

  “No.”

  He reached for her now. He had big hands and he fairly covered her shoulders with them. The fingers tightened and she felt the strength of him communicated through that grip. His thumb ran alon
g her collarbone.

  After a little while, when this seemed to be all he meant to do, Arvra said, “You can touch my tits. I want you to, you know.”

  Black eyes alight, he laid his hands on her breasts. He squeezed, and it was her turn to shudder with pleasure. “I’ve…” he murmured, voice suddenly thick in his throat, “I’ve dreamed about this. I’ve wanted to touch you for so long.”

  Her hand moved downward, onto the muscle-buttressed expanse of his midriff. “How come you didn’t ever say anything? You and me, we’ve known each other a long time.”

  He continued to caress her breasts, catching and releasing her nipples between his fingers. “Well, we were working together. You know, no time for play. I thought it would be inappropriate.” He shrugged. “‘Sides, I didn’t figure you’d ever thought about me that way.”

  She hadn’t, it was true. But there was no need to point out the fact. The blissful liquid warmth worked its way into her, deeper and deeper, unlocking sore muscles and joints. That lengthy bus ride receded to a vague, unimportant memory. She was only here. It was only now.

  Her hand found Gator’s swelling shaft. Her slick fingers closed around it.

  His whole body jerked, violently enough that water slopped over the side. She wondered distantly how long it had been since he’d last gotten laid, decided immediately that it wasn’t any of her damn business.

  She liked how he felt in her hand. His girth was impressive. She could feel the pulse of him. She slid her hand down along the shaft, below the soap-hazed level of the water. Her fingertips toyed with his balls, the fleshy pouches big and lax in the hot water. She traced the seam bisecting his sac then palmed each ball in turn, applying the gentlest pressure.

  He shifted again, this time more deliberately. Arvra sucked in a breath as he reached down into the water, thick blunt fingers grazing across the sensitive inner flesh of her thigh, moving, seeking. She gasped again, more sharply, as she felt the first tentative probing of her cleft.

 

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