The Clinic

by Cate Culpepper

  “Of course.” Shann nodded. “It’s mother’s milk to Jess. Go tell her.”

  Brenna nodded and limped toward the riverbed, still trembling a little from her abrupt awakening.

  “Brenna?” Shann looked after her, folding the army blanket neatly. “What’s this about horses, and a fire?”

  Brenna groaned. “I still talk in my sleep, don’t I? Sam used to tease me about it.” She sighed. “Just a dream, Shann. I’ve had it for weeks. Well, first it was just me and this horse, running from something. Then it was my horse fighting another horse. This time it was me and my horse, and many other horses, and a forest fire…” She ran out of steam and waved vaguely at Shann. “Never mind me. I’m still asleep. I’m talking out of my head. Be back soon.”

  Brenna didn’t feel Shann’s suddenly intent gaze on her as she made her way down the rise of the riverbank.

  Shann felt a warm arm slide around her waist, and Kyla rested her head on her shoulder, yawning.

  “Everything okay?”

  “Good morning, little sister. Yes, we’re doing well. Jess is stronger.” Shann put her arm around Kyla, still looking after Brenna with a bemused expression. “I’m about to cook breakfast. Want to help?”

  “Sure.” Kyla eyed her queen curiously, then followed her fixed gaze. “What, lady? Is something up with Brenna?”

  “Possibly,” Shann murmured. “I’m beginning to think we might have a seer among us at last.” She pressed Kyla’s shoulders. “Now, adanin, while we brew coffee, a few thoughts about the joyous, sacred, and profoundly serious bond of marriage…”

  *

  True to her word, Jess hadn’t gone far. She’d found a wide ledge to rest on, topping a bluff just yards west of the riverbed.

  Brenna first saw Jess’s squared shoulders and erect posture, as she sat on an army blanket spread on the grass. She was looking out over a dizzying vista of treetops below her.

  After months of confinement, Jess was enjoying the view. Her eyes swept the green expanses slowly, with restful pleasure. “Morning, Bren.”

  “Yeah,” Brenna replied pleasantly. “How about you move, maybe six feet back from that ledge?”

  Jess turned her head stiffly and regarded Brenna, who waited on the patch of grass between the riverbed and the bluff. She smiled and lifted herself on her heels and hands to inch painfully off the blanket and away from the ledge.

  “Sorry.” Brenna winced and folded her arms against the early morning chill. “But you’re still weak enough to pitch headfirst off that thing, and I hate heights enough to just let you drop.”

  Jess eased herself carefully onto the grass as Brenna knelt beside her. “Better?”

  “Thanks.” Brenna sat back on her heels and studied her face. “Well, your powers of recuperation continue to amaze me, Jesstin, but you still look like a train wreck. How many shades of bruise are you capable of?”

  Jess smiled ruefully and allowed Brenna’s cursory examination of her visible ills, touching her neck to gauge fever, taking her pulse, turning her head gently to check her pupils.

  “You’re cool enough, for now, and I don’t think those ribs will trouble you too much if we keep you wrapped.”

  “How do you plan to escape through a mountain pass with a fear of heights, Brenna?”

  “I didn’t say I was afraid of heights. I said I hated them.” Brenna frowned at the tender swelling beneath Jess’s eye. “I just won’t look down until we reach Tristaine.”

  Jess raised an eyebrow carefully.

  Brenna hesitated, then brushed a faint line down the side of Jess’s angular face, tracing the path of a recent tear. Jess’s eyes shifted, but Brenna kept her hand lightly on her cheek. “Just nerves, Jesstin?”

  Jess rested her face briefly in Brenna’s palm. “Missing home.”

  “I know you do.” Brenna gentled her voice. “It must be terrible for Cam and Kyla, too, to have to wait.”

  “Kyla was right last night.” Jess lifted Brenna’s hand from her face and cradled it in her own. “Tristaine’s council will be divided without our voices. There are those in our village who still believe negotiating with the City is possible.”

  “How can they?” An image of the fighting stallions flashed through Brenna’s mind, and she shook it off. “After everything that’s happened, after Dyan, and Lauren—”

  “They’re a very small faction.” Jess turned her troubled gaze to the valley below. “And our elders, the older women, are all solidly behind Shann. They’ll keep the others in line. I know they will. Tristaine was dearly won, lass. We can’t lose it now.”

  Jess skipped a pebble over a ledge yards away.

  Brenna didn’t hear it strike anything as it began its free fall.

  They sat for a while in comfortable silence, the morning mountain breeze chilling them pleasantly.

  “I’ve never had a community, a home like yours,” Brenna said, finally. She felt the smooth swell of Jess’s muscular arm, warm against her own.

  “It’s something I want to give you.” Jess stroked the top of Brenna’s bent head. “Someday I hope to make you my adonai, Brenna. My wife. I want to build you a cabin in our village, a home to grow old in together, safe among friends.” Jess lowered her rich voice. “For now, if you’ll let me, I’ll be home to you, wherever we are.”

  Brenna shuddered with a familiar, delicious weakness that crept up her spine as Jess’s warm breath touched her hair. “I’ve never had that either, that kind of love.” Her eyes rose, and there was a note of pleading in them. “It scares me a little, Jess.”

  Jess’s features softened, and she grinned down at Brenna and nudged her with her shoulder. “Well, I know what Shann would say. ‘Jesstin has her quest now, young Blades, and you have yours. Jesstin must bring you home safe, and you must find the spine to love her in the manner she so richly deserves.’” Her brogue lengthened the word “richly,” in a keen echo of Shann’s musical voice. “‘That’s your job now, lass.’”

  Brenna smiled. “Beats the hell out of my last gig, that’s for sure.”

  Jess grinned and started unsnapping her shirt.

  Brenna smiled again. “What are we doing?”

  “Drills. We’re going to give you a spine-strengthening session.”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “I’m going to ravish you before breakfast.”

  “Oh, no, you’re not.”

  Jess nodded and pulled her shirttails out of her pants.

  “Jesstin.” Brenna reached to feel Jess’s forehead, but she ducked her touch deftly.

  “Don’t worry about me, lass. I’m fit enough to take on a wee mite like you.”

  “The last time I heard that,” Brenna pointed out, “my staff laid you flat with one backswing.”

  “Oh, wench of little faith,” Jess reproved, and reached for her.

  Brenna straight-armed her back gently. “Jesstin, you’re telling me you feel well enough to engage in sexual relations at this time?”

  “Sweet Artemis, City girls love to talk.”

  “Just checking,” Brenna said, and surged hard against Jess, who squeaked in surprise as Brenna’s fingers wrapped in her wild hair and her head was pulled down for a heated kiss.

  The two women sank to the rocky ground in full, unabashed lip-lock. Both of them cursed when they landed, Jess because the stony earth hurt her back, Brenna because Jess did, but they did so without ending the kiss. Their tongues entwined and they rolled.

  Brenna’s clothing was half off before she looked up and realized how close to the ledge they were. Glancing down she saw the army blanket tangled around her ankle, and she thrashed upright in Jess’s arms instinctively. Not fighting her, just following a gut-level need to regain control and back away from danger.

  “Wait,” Jess breathed behind her. Her strong arms were wrapped around Brenna’s waist, and she pulled Brenna upright against her so that her bare back pressed into Jess’s open shirt.

  Now they both kneeled in the grass, looking
out over a carpeted expanse of green, silent space. Jess’s arm was clamped beneath Brenna’s exposed breasts, which bobbed against her tanned skin, the pink tips swollen and hard.

  “I can’t protect you from this kind of fear,” Jess whispered, nodding at the dizzying drop beneath them. “And this kind of danger may always be part of your life with us.” She wrapped her long fingers around Brenna’s cool breast and squeezed. “But it will be a clean fear, not the hopelessness of the City. We’ll be free, adanin.” She began kneading both full globes, and her eyes clenched shut as a carnal heat streaked through her.

  Brenna groaned with pleasure, in spite of her racing pulse. The edge of the bluff still felt terribly close, but her tension began to drain from her as Jess’s palm rasped across her stiffening nipples.

  “We’ll be refugees at first, Brenna. Perhaps for a long time.” Jess worked her free hand down beneath the waistband of Brenna’s slacks. “Spread your knees, lass.”

  She skated over Brenna’s soft mound, then moved lower to discover that her thighs were still clenched together.

  Jess slapped Brenna’s sensitive vulva, hard, and Brenna gasped and jerked her thighs apart, feeling the burning rasp of the grass against her kneecaps.

  “But you’re not alone anymore.” The faint echo of a brogue touched Jess’s voice again. “You have sisters now, other adanin. You have me, Bren.” Her fingers swarmed down over Brenna’s damp cleft, probing.

  “Jesstin…” Brenna’s hips bucked as Jess filled her snugly, then impaled her with a grinding twist. Jess began moving inside her with smooth, relentless strokes.

  “I’m a warrior, Brenna,” Jess murmured in her ear, “And I pledge my life to keeping you safe.”

  Brenna moaned as Jess flexed her knuckles gently, stretching her. The rough side of her narrowed hand scrubbed against Brenna’s straining clitoris, sending needles of heat sparking along her shoulder blades.

  “Tell me if you choose a life with us,” Jess panted. “Answer me with your body.”

  Brenna whimpered helplessly, her head fell back against Jess’s shoulder, and then she exploded in shuddering pleasure.

  *

  After they’d calmed down, Jess wrapped the thin blanket around them both, and they watched the sun finish peaking over the eastern rise. Brenna sat in the grass in front of Jess, between her long legs, her back against her chest.

  Brenna was dozing, and Jess smiled down at her, delighted at her soft snoring from her parted lips. She slept like a child in her arms.

  “Hey.” Jess squeezed her gently.

  “Sorry. What? Hey.”

  “Nothing, darlin’. My butt’s falling asleep, though.”

  Brenna awoke in stages, letting the cloud-studded sky fill her vision, as blue as her lover’s eyes. “Good morning, Jesstin.”

  “Morning, adanin. Welcome to the day.”

  They sat for a moment longer, enjoying the view. After awhile, they helped each other up and made their way back up the riverbed, toward the faint, spicy aroma of fresh-brewed Tristainian coffee.

  About the Author

  Cate Culpepper is a 2005 Golden Crown Literary Award winner in the Sci-Fi/Fantasy category. She grew up in southern New Mexico, where she served as the state lesbian for several years. She moved to the Pacifi c Northwest almost twenty years ago, where she now resides with her faithful sidekick, Kirby, Warrior Westie. Cate supervises a transitional housing program for homeless young gay adults. She proudly cites Xena: Warrior Princess as a much-loved inspiration for the strong women portrayed in her original fi ction.