His nostrils flared, and he caught the scent of her body. It filled his head with luscious dreams and ravenous desires. He closed his eyes, and every sense shut off the noises and smells of the forest. Nothing existed but her, right in front of him. His arms closed around her and brought her the rest of the way against his body.
She sighed, and her tender flesh set his nerves on fire. He tightened his grip on her to stop her slipping away, but she submitted with good will. She turned up her face to his, but he didn’t kiss her. He sank his fangs into her neck, and she gasped out loud.
He hooked his hands under her armpits and lifted her off her feet. He lifted her higher, and his mouth devoured her neck down to her shoulder. He pushed her dress aside with his nose and bit down hard into her delicate skin. She moaned, and her head lolled to the side.
Ari set her on her feet and sank down onto the ground. He mouthed her shoulder, down to her armpit, and around to her chest. He rubbed his face against her breasts through her dress. Sooss ran her hands through the fur on either side of his head and guided his head back and forth between her breasts. He nibbled first one and then the other. Then he bit them and made her whine. He squeezed his hands around her waist, and her flesh softened in his hands.
She hugged his head against her chest, but he tore himself free and continued down to her stomach. He roved over her round belly with his lips, down to the rough patch of hair between her legs. He massaged her buttocks, harder and harder, until he crushed them. She pushed her hips into his face and rubbed her pubic bone against his mouth.
He ran his hands down her legs and pushed up her dress. Her long legs glowed white and round in the darkness, with the black triangle at the top showing him the way into her mysterious tunnel. He fell on his knees in front of her and dove into the depths of darkness. She tightened her fists into his fur, and her legs opened to receive him. The warm water closed over his head, and the surf crashed in his ears.
Sooss rocked on her feet, and Ari clamped his hands around her thighs to hold her up. Her breath caught in her teeth, and she combed her fingers through his fur. He burrowed into her and drank the heavenly elixir of her deepest flesh. She closed her eyes and lifted her face to the night. Her mouth full open and he heard her moan.
He emerged into the crisp forest air and lifted her dress up over her alabaster belly to her shoulders. He slipped it over her head and it fell to the ground. He whisked her off her feet, and she offered no resistance. He laid her back on the loamy ground and pillowed her head on the moss. The watery light glimmered in her eyes. She gazed up at him with that mysterious intent in her eyes. Her hands followed him in slow movements over her.
Then, with preternatural speed, she dropped him back on the ground and soared above him. Her apparition hovered over his face, and he fixed her shimmering face with his eyes. Just enough light washed through the trees to make out her expression. She pushed his hands down on either side of him and went to work on his clothes.
The warm breeze tickled his fur. She peeled his clothes off, and now she dove down out of his sight to the swollen shaft between his legs. Her mouth closed around him, and he closed his eyes with a groan. His body stiffened. She drove him out of his mind with her mouth and hands and gave him no rest until he could stand it no longer.
He lifted her by the armpits onto his chest, and his fingers twined into the ropes of her hair. His mouth sought hers, and he tortured his throbbing cock against the wiry hair between her legs. The soft petals of her lips sent excruciating pulses down his shaft until he ached for her. Her hips rocked in unison with his. In an instant he would be inside her.
He cradled her shoulders in the crook of his arm and rolled her sideways onto her back again. He smothered her delicate body with his. His fur scored her pearly skin. He let his knees fall between her thighs, and she opened to welcome him in. Her head fell back on the moss. Ari anchored his elbows into the ground to strike. Sooss spread her legs wider, and her perfume made him giddy. He buried his burning brow in her neck and closed his eyes.
Sooss waited, but he didn’t move. She tried to lift his head, but he stayed hidden in her neck. His back and shoulders heaved with his heavy breath. She touched his neck. “Ari?”
His weight sank down on top of her, and he let out a heavy sigh. “It’s no good.”
She frowned. “Is it someone else....someone on land?”
Under cover of her hair, he squeezed his eyes closed tighter to hide from himself.
“Who is she?” Sooss asked.
“There is no one else,” he told her, “not on land or anywhere else.”
“What is it, then?” she asked.
“I....I don’t know,” he murmured.
Sooss lifted his head again, and this time, he complied, but he still couldn’t open his eyes. He didn’t dare look at her. “Tell me about it.”
He groaned, and rolled off of her. He stretched out at her side and covered his eyes with his elbow. “I can’t explain it. I wasn’t thinking about....anything.”
“Something distracted you, though,” she told him. “Something stopped you. What was it?”
He turned his head away. “Nothing.”
She tried to move away, but he caught her around the waist and pulled her against him. “Don’t go.”
She pursed her lips. “This was a mistake. I shouldn’t have come out here with you.”
His eyes popped open. “Don’t say that. I wanted to.”
“You wanted to,” she replied, “but something stopped you. If you won’t tell me what it was, I can’t help you.” She tried again to get up.
“Okay,” he told her. “It is someone on land, but I don’t know why I thought of her. She doesn’t mean anything to me, and there was never anything between us. I just thought of her at the wrong time. I’m sorry. Come here, and we’ll start over. Where were we?”
Sooss shook her head. “We won’t start over. She meant enough to stop you, so she meant something.”
He tried to protest, but she wouldn’t hear it. He sank back on his elbow. “So what now? At least spend the night with me, even if we don’t do anything.”
“What’s the point?” she asked. “I thought you....”
Such a look of despair and desolation contorted his face that her words died on her lips. She folded him in her arms. “All right. We’ll spend the night. Let’s just lie here.”
“But I want to,” he insisted. “I mean it. Nothing means more to me than you do.”
“If you really want to,” she replied, “we can try again in the morning.”
That satisfied him, and he relaxed into her embrace. She comforted him against her breast until he fell into a troubled sleep.
Ari woke up in the gray watery dawn with the breeze chilling him. He shivered to his feet and into his clothes. He looked around but found no sign of Sooss, not even a footprint to mark which direction she’d gone. He set off through the forest toward his pool when he remembered the village. She must have gone back there. He wheeled around and retraced his steps from the previous day.
Halfway there, the wind turned again and bit even colder. He’d never noticed the wind being cold before. He walked faster. For the first time since coming to the Aqinas world, he scanned his surroundings for potential threats. His hair bristled on his back, even with no sign of danger nearby.
He spotted light between the trees. The field wasn’t far ahead. He broke into a run, but he hadn’t taken more than two steps when he stopped in his tracks. A white-clad figure blocked his path to the field. He frowned. “What do you want?”
“Where are you running, Ari?” Frieda asked.
“I’m going to the village.” He took a step forward, but he couldn’t get around her. He couldn’t force his way to the field. The light hovered just out of his reach.
“You can’t go to the village, Ari,” she told him.
Ari cocked his head and fixed her with his fierce eyes. “How are you goi
ng to stop me? You said the water gives me everything I want. If I want to go to the village, I will.”
She shook her head. Her chin fell down on her chest. He’d never seen her so wretched. He’d never seen any Aqinas wretched—ever. “What do you think you’re going to do at the village?”
“I’m going to find Sooss,” he replied.
“You won’t find her at the village,” Frieda told him.
His head shot up. “Why not? Have you decided to separate us?”
“I couldn’t separate you if I tried.” Frieda sighed. “Sooss would never let me interfere with anything she wanted to do. You know that as well as I do, Ari. If you could see her at the village, I wouldn’t try to stop you.”
“Then why are you trying to stop me?” he shot back. “Why are you blocking my way?”
“I’m not blocking your way,” she mumbled. “I came here because I care about you.”
He smacked his lips. “I’ve had enough of your riddles. I’m going.” For some reason, though, he couldn’t move.
“You won’t find Sooss at the village,” Frieda repeated.
“Where is she, then?” Ari asked.
Frieda shook her head. With infinite slowness, she raised her eyes to his face. “She’s not in the village.”
“Where is she?” Ari heard his voice rising, but not in anger. The wretched despair on her face made his teeth chatter. He clenched his fists to stop his hands shaking.
Frieda kept shaking her head. To everything he said she shook her head, “She isn’t there.”
He started to ask again where Sooss was, but his parched throat wouldn’t make a sound. He stared at her.
“I’m sorry, Ari,” Frieda told him. “I’m really sorry.”
He swallowed hard. “Where is she?”
A tear trickled down her cheek. “She’s dead.”
Ari opened his mouth. An unstoppable compulsion drove him toward the field, toward the village, toward Sooss. He had to find her. He had to get to her, wherever she was.
Tears streamed down Frieda’s face. “I only wanted to tell you before you went to the village looking for her. She’s not here anymore. She’s gone. You won’t find her.”
He took a step forward, and his need forced him into a run. Frieda put out her arms to him. “Ari....”
He shoved her aside and ran. He ran until his lungs burst. He ran for hours before he broke out into the bright field. The wind blew warm and whispering through the grass, the same way it did yesterday when Sooss brought him here. He whipped the flower heads with his hands. He would destroy them. He would destroy this whole beautiful fairy world.
Frieda’s voice floated out of the trees behind him. “Ari!”
He ignored her and ran on. He tore through the field. Somehow he found breath to call out. “Sooss!”
He turned the corner toward the village and charged to the top of the hill. He raised his voice to the sky. “Sooss! Sooss!” Only the wind answered him, the wind rustling through the golden grass.
He saw the village from the top of the hill, but it wriggled and squirmed with life far below him. He could never get there by running until his heart exploded. It hung before his eyes with the hazy reality of a dream, and that’s all it would ever be. The Aqinas world would never be anything but a dream to him, now that Sooss was gone. She made it real, and now she was gone. She would never walk through the forest with him again. She held him here. He drifted with the water, drifted far away.
He closed his eyes, and when he called again, the strangled cry choked him with unspoken grief. He should have died when Roshin threw him off that cliff. He should never have come here in the first place. Why did he have to come here to meet her, only to have her snatched away? Why couldn’t he give her at least one night of ecstasy before she died? Why did he have to collapse on her at the last moment?
He cast around for some way to destroy himself along with everything else, but everything in this hideous fantasy world was soft and harmless. No one had any use even for a sharp knife with which he could slash his own throat. He hated himself, and Frieda, and all the Aqinas and all the Lycaon and the Felsite and everyone on this horrible planet.
He closed his eyes and ran. He couldn’t stop running. That’s all he knew how to do. He no longer cared where he was going or what happened to him. He only screamed and cried and bellowed until the darkness took him, “Sooss! Sooss!”
End of Book 7
Book 8: Taman
Chapter 1
Taig hugged his knees to his chest and blinked hard. His eyelids weighed a ton. He fought with every ounce of his strength to keep his eyes open. He ached to sleep, but he couldn’t relax his vigilance for an instant.
One group of Outliers guarded him and Reina. Another group surrounded Aimee some distance away. Aimee held Sarai on her lap. He slept with his head pillowed on his mother’s shoulder. Aimee kept her eyes closed, too, but she wasn’t asleep. Every now and again, Taig saw her look around at the Outliers. Then she let her cheek fall on her son’s head. Maybe she dozed for a while, too. Taig wouldn’t blame her if she did. He would even envy her a few stolen moments of sleep.
In all likelihood, though, she probably couldn’t sleep, either. No one could. Reina’s eyes never lost their luster. She studied the Outliers in minute detail with no sign of fatigue. Taig stole glimpses of her out of the corner of his eye. She’d come so far from the delicate princess her parents brought to the Lycaon village.....how long ago? Taig had long since lost count of the weeks and months since he’d left his home behind, probably forever.
He turned toward her, and she smiled at him. This situation with the Outliers didn’t phase her a bit. “How are you?”
Taig nodded, and his eyes swept the Outliers guarding them.
“I’m hungry,” Reina told him.
His hand drifted with a mind of its own to his pocket, and he took out his last hunk of dried meat and pressed it into her hand. The Outliers saw them, but made no move to interfere. Reina put the meat into her mouth and chewed. Then she took the water pouch from his belt and drank the last mouthful.
Taig paid no attention. Let her have the last of it. It could be her last meal, if the Outliers took them back to Rolling Ridges. His heart quailed when he thought about it, but at least he had a few days travel left before they got there. He wouldn’t lie unknown and forgotten on the plain like Lilith.
Aimee showed no emotion at the death of her daughter. She hugged Sarai close to her, but she set her mouth in a hard line and stiffened her neck. She wouldn’t show the Outliers what they cost her by cutting Lilith down in cold blood.
Taig searched the Outliers as far as he could see, but he didn’t see Old Ponchy. That man struck terror into the hearts of everyone, but he never came in sight of the captives again after he killed Lilith. Taig could only guess he’d gone ahead to Rolling Ridges to prepare....Taig couldn’t bring himself even to think the words. He’d narrowly escaped being sacrificed once already, and no Lilith would save them from it next time.
The Outliers kept their distance from the prisoners while keeping them under constant observation. They marched them down the canyon during the day, into the forests between the plain and Avitras territory. At night, they camped on the bare ground with no tents for shelter. They posted guards, but no one spoke to the captives. There was nothing more to be said. Old Ponchy already told them what they planned to do.
The Outliers made no attempt to stop the prisoners from interacting with each other. Taig murmured words of encouragement to Reina on their long daily marches, but Aimee kept Sarai to herself. Taig hesitated to intrude on her grief, and Aimee needed no encouragement to keep pace with the others. No one could travel like her. She could run as fast as any Lycaon, and she could march all day without food, water, or rest. Not even the Outliers could keep up with her.
In the evening, Aimee took Sarai off into a corner by themselves. The Outliers indulged her even in this, and p
osted two sets of guards, one around Aimee and Sarai, and another around Taig and Reina. Reina remained almost irrationally cheerful and enthusiastic through the ordeal. When exhaustion overpowered Taig and his head fell onto his chest, he started awake to find Reina alert and smiling at him. He hadn’t seen her sleep in four days.
Darkness blanketed the land. Outliers silhouettes hovered around the perimeter of the camp, and Taig relaxed. They were still there, but at least he couldn’t see them. They might be able to see him, but he didn’t have to watch them every second when he couldn’t see them.
He sighed, and Reina murmured into his ear. “Go to sleep. I’ll keep watch.”
He shook his head. “What about you? You must be more exhausted than I am.”
“I’m all right,” she replied. “Felsite don’t need as much sleep as the other factions.”
“How do you know?” he asked.
She shrugged. “My father told me.”
Taig snorted. “I’ve heard a lot of strange things about Felsite. I’ve heard the males can make themselves infertile whenever they want to. They can willfully decide when to impregnate their mates. Is that true?”
Reina’s laughter rang through the scrubby trees dotting the rolling steppe. The Ursidrean Mountains loomed in the distance. “Who told you that?”
“My mother,” he replied. “Carmen told her.”
Reina’s smile faded at the mention of her mother, but she didn’t answer.
Taig scanned the dark shapes of trees against the dusky sky. “We have to get out of here.”
Reina’s head shot up. “What?”
“We can’t let them take us back to Rolling Ridges,” he murmured. “If we go back to Rolling Ridges, we’re dead.”
“How are we going to stop them?” she asked.
He lowered his voice to a whisper. “We’re going to get out of here.”
“How?” she countered. “They have all those Ursidrean weapons, and we have nothing. They even took away our hunting knives. There must be a hundred Outliers in this column. We’re only three people, and we have Sarai to think about.”
The New Angondra Complete Series Page 24
