by Catt Ford
“Don’t bother putting on your tux for me, old boy,” Dingo said in perfect, haughty society tones.
Henry had to laugh; Dingo sounded so like his pompous uncle Ferdy. “We’re dining informally tonight?”
“From the tin, as it were.” Dingo held up a tin of beans. “But first, your foot. You can’t hike if it gets infected, and I’ll leave you behind if you can’t walk.”
“Sure you will.” Feeling a bit self-conscious but oddly free without his clothing, Henry sat on a convenient rock, sighing as he took his weight off his foot.
Dingo squatted on his haunches and lifted the injured foot with gentle hands. Henry wanted to cross his legs, but Dingo had one of them in his firm grip.
“There’s a tip of the thorn still in there,” he said. “I’m going to have to cut it out.”
“Go on,” Henry said.
“Right.”
From his tin box, Dingo extracted a knife, smaller than the one he carried on his belt. “This is going to hurt a bit.”
“Good thing we’re lost in the bush, so no one will hear my screams.”
“I’ll never tell.” Dingo grinned. “Shriek all you like.”
“Too right you’ll never tell, I’ll just murder you and throw your body into the river,” Henry countered.
He grabbed onto Dingo’s shoulder when the other man turned his back, lifting Henry’s foot and throwing him off balance. Dingo tucked Henry’s leg between his arm and his body to hold him still. “Right then.”
“Go on.” Henry liked the flex of muscle under his hand. He tried to avert his gaze, but the swell of curved buttocks was right in his view, and it was a tempting sight. He didn’t even gasp as the blade probed his foot, he was too busy suppressing his desire to reach out and grab—
Finally Henry could no longer resist. He leaned forward and bit into the round cheek being so temptingly displayed to him.
“Oi!” Dingo yipped, sounding like his father when demonstrating the tiger’s call. “What was that for?”
“Because your backside is so beautiful,” Henry said. He rubbed a hand over the firm behind. “And so conveniently close.”
“So I’m standing here all innocent, trying to dig this thorn out of your foot, and you take a bite out of me?” Dingo sounded more amused than anything.
“I couldn’t resist the forbidden apple.” Henry snickered at his own sly allusion.
“So you regard my bum as the fruit of knowledge in the Garden of Eden?”
“Absolutely. At least for me….”
Dingo succeeded in extracting the thorn at last. “Don’t put your foot down just yet until I get something on it.” He went to his rucksack and dug around, giving Henry an excellent chance to ogle the portion of his anatomy in question. When he came back, his face was serious. “You know what happened when Adam and Eve ate of the fruit, don’t you?”
“They were kicked out.”
“It wasn’t the sin, it was the knowledge of the sin,” Dingo said. “Perhaps I’ve ruined it for you. Now that you know, you’ll never be the same, out there.”
“I’d rather know,” Henry said softly.
“Spoken like an academic. Sometimes knowledge carries a heavy burden.”
Henry had the feeling they weren’t just talking about being queer, that somehow this connected to the tiger. “You think it’s better to live in ignorant bliss?”
Dingo gave him a twisted smile. “I guess it depends whether ignorance makes you happy.”
“It doesn’t. Are you going to put that stuff on or stand there holding it?”
Dingo held the bottle out to him. “You put it on. I’ll get a bandage. Rub it on the blisters as well.”
Henry felt the sting of the liquid as he poured it onto the gash, and a rich earthy scent made him a little dizzy.
“I’ll bind it up so you don’t get sand in it. Keep it off the ground,” Dingo instructed.
Henry did as he was told, feeling very exposed with his bits hanging out. His cock felt heavy, and he wanted to cover himself, uneasily remembering his wanton behavior of the night before.
He looked at Dingo’s face, surprised when the other man stood before him. He was half hard as well.
Dingo merely grinned and kneeled to bind a strip of fabric around Henry’s foot. “There. Put on some socks and your boots and don’t step onto any more thorn bushes tonight.”
“I wouldn’t have stepped on one at all if you hadn’t fallen into the river in the first place!”
“I didn’t fall. I jumped!”
“Fell! I had to rescue you.”
“Did you now?” Dingo gave him an odd look. “Well, let’s eat.”
After a quick meal of beans heated in the tin, Henry limped down to the water’s edge, using the tin to scoop water for a quick bath of sorts. As he sluiced the sweat off his skin, he turned to find Dingo watching him, his eyes bright.
“Want a bath?” Henry dropped the tin in his confusion and bent to rescue it from the stream before it could be swept away.
“Careful with that,” Dingo warned. He came forward to take it from Henry, his fingers warm as his hand closed over Henry’s. “It’s the only one we’ve got.”
“One tin?” Henry demanded. “What do you mean, one tin?”
“Yeah,” Dingo scratched his head ashamedly. “I hate to tell you this, Dash, but one of our bags must have got washed away.”
Henry deflated visibly. “Let me guess. It had most of the provisions in it?”
“You got it in one,” Dingo said, sounding more chipper than he actually was.
“Fantastic.” Henry grimaced. “And what exactly are we supposed to eat for the rest of the expedition?”
“Hey, look on the bright side,” Dingo said. “I don’t fancy carrying a smelting mill’s worth of metal with me. This tin will come in handy for things like washing and getting water. We have dried fruit and vegetables in your pack to eat. And I have a little bit of flour and some staples. Besides, we can forage off the land. Plenty of good eating if you don’t mind snake.”
“Snake?” Henry wrinkled his nose at the thought of it. “Things just keep getting better.”
Dingo took pity on him. “River’s full of lobster and fish. There’s honey, roots, tubers, berries. There’s a bread plant and onions. We won’t go hungry. Anyway, you signed up for adventure, remember?”
“I didn’t sign up for starvation.”
Dingo laughed and quickly rinsed off. Henry eyed his gleaming skin, watching the rivulets of water bead and slide down Dingo’s trim flanks and rounded arse. He only realized that Dingo was finished with his bath when his eyes traveled up to see Dingo staring at him hungrily.
“My turn tonight, remember?” Dingo held out his hand, and Henry took it, his heart threatening to pound its way out of his chest.
Together, they spread a ground sheet and tied off the tarp to make a rude tent. The sound of the water rushing nearby made a soothing backdrop as they crawled under the shelter.
Henry leaned over Dingo to kiss him, and all his antagonisms of the day melted away with the beads of sweat starting to form along his forehead. There was no mistaking that the hunger in Dingo’s eyes was real and all for him. He stroked over Dingo’s chest covered with golden hairs that gleamed in the half-light of dusk, over his stomach and down to trail his fingers in the furrow that defined the divide between torso and thigh. Dingo moaned and spread his legs as Henry took him in hand, wrapping his arms around Henry and pulling him closer.
As they moved together, Henry lost himself in the shining reflections of Dingo’s eyes as he was buried within him, the blue of the Australian skies overlaid with the green of the verdant jungle, and when they cried out at the peak of their pleasure, the triumphant sound seemed to be part of the primal wilderness in which they lay.
Chapter 18
Henry looked at the messy thatch of sandy hair resting on his shoulder, waiting for Dingo to wake. For once, he had awakened first, a fact he meant to thoroughly
impress upon Dingo as insurance against being called a slug-a-bed in future.
Dingo stretched and made a contented sound, tightening his arms around Henry without opening his eyes. “Good morning.”
“Dingo.”
“Yeah?”
“Where are all the animals?”
“They’re all around us, Dash.”
“We’ve been trekking two days, and I’ve heard birds in the distance and rustling in the bushes, but I haven’t seen a single animal.”
Dingo chuckled. “That’s because most of the denizens of Tasmania are nocturnal.”
“Then why aren’t we watching for them at night instead of keeping to daylight hours?”
Dingo sat up and gave Henry a quick kiss. “Because we’re not there yet. And if you want to get caught up in the jungle, tripping and staggering over things you can’t see at night, well, I don’t.”
“Where?”
“Where we’re going.”
“Where are we going?” Henry didn’t quite like to mention it, but he was completely dependent upon Dingo for their whereabouts. Nothing would happen to either one of them, but if by chance something did, he wasn’t sure he would be able to make it out of the jungle by himself. Even with the upside down, backward, down-under compass that Dingo had gone to such lengths to save.
“Further into the woods. It’s not like saying meet me at the Parliament House, is it? Besides, I didn’t think you’d be too keen on that tiger snake we walked past yesterday so I didn’t bother to point him out.”
“I didn’t see any snake,” Henry said suspiciously.
“Just as well. I don’t think he saw us either. They’re poisonous, you know. Wait, don’t get dressed yet,” Dingo said.
Henry paused by the bush that held his clothing. They were still a bit damp anyway. And he didn’t even want to contemplate hiking in his wet boots. If he thought his blisters from yesterday were painful, it could only be worse today. “Why can’t I get dressed?” he demanded crossly. He felt foolish and suspected Dingo of ogling his bum. Not that he objected, if that proved to be the case.
Dingo had dug the bottle of clearish liquid out of his pack and was now searching for something amongst the grasses by the stream. “River’s gone down. We can wade across today.” He stood up holding what looked like a hollow reed.
“Pity we didn’t get here later then, before you jumped in,” Henry grumped.
“Close your eyes and cover your ears,” Dingo instructed.
“Why—”
Hurriedly Henry obeyed when Dingo sucked some of the liquid through the straw and sprayed it at him. He stood motionless while Dingo circled him, feeling the misting spray on his skin. His nose wrinkled as the camphorated scent drifted up to him. Clenching his teeth and barely moving his lips, he asked, “What is that?”
“Tea tree oil, made from native plants,” Dingo said. “Another reason we haven’t seen any wildlife is our scent. Did you know that a devil can smell a carcass from up to a mile away? The tiger has an even more sensitive nose.”
“Well, I hardly think I smell like a carcass,” Henry muttered.
“Here, be a sport and make me smell pretty,” Dingo said, thrusting the bottle and straw into Henry’s hands. He shuffled in a slow circle to make it easier, and Henry enjoyed the view without hindrance, as Dingo had squeezed his eyes shut. “Now you can get dressed.”
Henry squeaked as Dingo took the opportunity to pinch one of his nether cheeks. “Lecher.”
“Too right,” Dingo agreed, unperturbed. “Let’s go.”
They were soon dressed, with their few possessions once more packed securely into their rucksacks. As Henry had anticipated, his boots squished with every step he took. The leaves of the trees standing next to what today was a sleepy stream glittered white in the sunlight, nearly blinding him and making him feel dazed. He was about to plunge into the streambed to cross it when Dingo grabbed his arm.
“Natural bridge,” he said, nodding at a dead log that yesterday’s torrent had deposited across the water.
“Where are we anyway?”
Dingo turned to face Henry, a teasing glint in his eyes. “You are about to cross the River Styx.”
“Very funny.”
“Really, that’s the name of the river.”
Henry gaped at him and then laughed uncertainly. “You almost drowned in it yesterday.”
“But I didn’t. And now that we’ve had a dip in it, we’ll be invulnerable to danger. Like Achilles, except better because we went all the way in.”
Henry suspected Dingo of trying to bolster his confidence but played along. “So, you’re playing Charon for me?”
“After you,” Dingo said, sweeping a low bow and waving his hand at the log.
“Thanks.”
Henry led the way across, grateful that he didn’t have to walk through the water with it filling his boots. Today the placid stream was clear, and he could see pebbles at the bottom through the amber-tinted water. The welcome shade of the forest closed around them once again, and he revived a bit, now that shimmering reflections of the water were behind them. His ruminations about the mythology of the Styx and how it might relate to the ultimate fate of the thylacines were cut short when he caught sight of some movement in the bushes.
“Dingo,” he whispered. “I think the oil is working. Look over there.”
Dingo looked where Henry was pointing. “Excellent spotting, Dash. It’s a native hen. Not that tasty, but the devils like it. Dead or alive.”
The hen scuttled off through the underbrush, and Henry watched it vanish, leaving only a swaying branch behind to mark its passage. “Where are the signs of all this nightly carnage? And how come we’ve never heard any of this going on?”
“Speak for yourself, mate. Didn’t you hear the screaming last night?”
Henry shivered, remembering the descriptions that he had read in the books. Sounds so bloodcurdling that the first European settlers cowered in their beds at night, sure that the denizens of hell were making themselves known. Maybe it wasn’t that bad not to have heard it. “Afraid not.”
“You must have slept well.” Dingo gave him a lecherous smile.
“I was the one doing all the work, if I recall,” Henry replied tartly, although it wasn’t as if what he had been doing to Dingo was a chore.
“Your turn. I’m surprised you didn’t hear it, though. The devils were fighting over something, yowling and cursing like the little demons they are,” Dingo said with relish, as if he admired them more than anything. “They don’t leave much behind. Crunch right through the bones with their heavy jaws. Usually you only find bits of bone and teeth the next day.”
“Charming.”
“Useful. They’re the housekeepers and undertakers of Tasmania.”
Henry decided that Dingo was altogether too cheerful about this. “Would they eat a man?”
“They’re actually rather timid around humans. We rather tower over them. But if you were to be incapacitated or they found you injured and unable to get away, they’d take care of you all right, and leave little evidence behind.”
Henry shivered. “What about the tiger?”
“They’re even more skittish about being near us. But there haven’t been authenticated reports of one attacking a human being.” Dingo’s mouth was set in a grim line. “I’m not entirely certain that they really have eaten any sheep either. There are plenty of predators to share the blame. Quolls, devils, feral dogs, even feral cats.”
Henry wouldn’t have been surprised to hear that the government had heaped their transgressions upon the tiger as well in its quest to stamp them out. He blinked in surprise when he stepped out into what looked like a snug pasture transplanted from England in the midst of the trees. “Does somebody live here?”
“It’s a kangaroo plantation; they keep the grass cropped like this,” Dingo said. He held out his arm, stopping Henry from stepping into the grassy pasture. “We’ll skirt around it. If we trample the gra
ss, it’d be like leaving a signboard for Hodges. ‘Dash and Dingo went this way!’”
“What if he has as good a tracker as Jarrah?” Henry asked.
Dingo didn’t even hesitate in his answer. “There’s nobody as good as Jarrah.”
Henry found Dingo’s loyalty to his friend admirable, but there was a little niggling voice in his mind whispering that Dingo still seemed to underestimate Hodges and what he was capable of. Henry hoped that Dingo was right; after all, he did know Hodges and had for a long time. But Henry brought a fresh perspective to their history, and his brief encounters with Dingo’s nemesis would not allow him to subscribe to the lackadaisical analysis of the man that Dingo was trying to sell.
“This looks like a fine spot.”
Henry came out of his fugue state with a longing expression on his face. “We’re here?”
“We’re here.”
The climb up the mountain had been arduous; Henry had overcome his pride and asked for frequent rest breaks along the way. Dingo had been attentive but firm. They had to get to what would become their base by early afternoon.
“You rest,” Dingo said. “I’ll pitch the tent.”
Henry shook his head. “I’ll do my share.”
“How are the feet?”
Henry tested them with a quizzical expression. “Better actually.” What he didn’t mention was that the rest of him more than made up for that.
Dingo gave him a nod of approval. Henry was glad that he was at least proving some kind of mettle on this expedition. Perhaps Hodges had been right and Dingo hadn’t been expecting as much from him, given the look on his face. And maybe now certain affections had been revealed, Dingo might have been tempted to make things easier for his new lover, make allowances he wouldn’t have done for anybody else. Henry didn’t want to be given such liberties. He wanted to be worthy of Dingo’s merit; even though there were many things Dingo was better at than he, Henry knew there were other things he could bring to their partnership as adventurers.
But he was relieved when the tent was up, and Dingo crawled within to lie down.