Warrior Knight

by Aarti V Raman

  But, Wood had never used the fork or a bullet.

  There was the knife, when some up close and personal fucking up was required, Wood had only used the knife on Maria and Raoul, so far but mostly it was all technical.

  ~~~~~

  “You’re very good at what you do, Helena,” Wood complimented her, stroking her hip again. “I’m going to be in town for a couple of months, maybe you would like to spend some more time with me.”

  Helena sat up and the sheet dislodged down to her waist, with those extraordinarily firm breasts, standing to attention all by themselves. No surgery here, nothing artificial. All natural beauty and flowing hair and big brown eyes that were the strangest combination of cynicism and innocence.

  Wood touched one hardening nipple and Helena came forward, wrapping her legs around Wood’s waist.

  “You’re very good at this too, querido corazon. I would love to spend time with you. For as long as you will have me.”

  Helena kissed Wood and Wood wrapped hard, rough fingers in those masses of hair and kissed her back.

  And then Helena earned her keep some more.

  Seventeen

  Ziya had lived in Kashmir for more than a year and had still not visited Ladakh.

  Sam had spoken of this harsh, beautiful terrain with lakes that had pure turquoise for water and mountains that were considered difficult for the most nimble of goats to clamber around. The sky was supposed to be an endless even blue with not a cloud in sight, and everywhere, for as long as the eye could see, was the stunning panorama of never-ending landscape.

  She had thought he was exaggerating, that underneath the body of an Army boy lurked the heart of a poet.

  She discovered she was wrong.

  Sam had been wrong too.

  His description had fallen short of describing the vista unfolding before her eyes as they passed Kargil and Baramullah and climbed higher and higher over the mountains.

  They were all in Sam’s Jeep because it would give them automatic clearance over Army check posts.

  Since 2001, Ladakh and surrounding areas beyond Kargil were all declared sensitive and were under year-round military protection. Insurgency was the biggest problem faced by the military and they were trying to negotiate a fragile truce that didn’t destroy the lives of the people who inhabited these harsh terrains.

  Sam had set the GPS navigator on the dashboard to a campsite, which was right on Pangong Lake. But, on the other side so that the road they were currently bouncing on, after almost half a day of travelling was jostling.

  They hit a new gravel patch and the rear tires shot up a little into the air before Sam settled the vehicle.

  Noor grabbed hold of the arm-hold again. “How much farther, Sam?” she yelled, over the roar of the engine.

  “An hour, babe,” Sam yelled back.

  Noor shuddered and shot Ziya a look of pure misery. Ziya smiled back in sympathy. She had done some hard driving in some dangerous places. This ride was up there with the best and worst of them.

  Sam took a hard left, to avoid a wayward goat and Ziya was thrown to the other side of the Jeep.

  Where she landed against Krivi’s hard chest.

  Immediately, his iron hand came around her waist and settled her before she could really hurt herself.

  Ziya smiled as she braced a hand on his chest. She flicked back a gold-streaked bang,

  “Thanks, Rambo,” she said.

  She sat next to him and he kept his hand on her waist for the rest of the ride. The hold impersonal and secure and somehow hot at the same time.

  Maybe it was the way her internal chemistry that acted up every time he touched her. Maybe it was just a horrible quirk of fate, but whatever it was, Ziya knew it was time.

  Past time to take this ‘thing’ to the next stage.

  She had packed the lingerie along with the woolen socks in her functional, oft-used backpack and she was planning on using it to good effect. She was not a woman who had had to chase a man down, ever.

  Mostly the morons chased her and she responded if she was in the mood and had the time and inclination for it, but mostly she just shot them all down.

  But Krivi… she took a covert look at the black wife-beater and beaten leather jacket, shades and old jeans combo that worked so well for him. It was almost criminal how good he looked in the worst clothes.

  Hard eyes, hard face, and oh my, that hard body.

  She wondered, as her eyes wandered down his chest to his fly if he was as good there as he was everywhere else.

  Then Ziya mentally snorted.

  Here she was, fantasizing about a man’s penis, when he had not tried to put even one single move on her.

  She, Ziya decided with a burst of good humor, was pathetic.

  The Jeep jounced along and Krivi held her tighter, holding onto the edge of his seat with an ease she sincerely envied.

  “Sam, we are going to need body bags to pour us into by the time we reach this perfect spot of yours.”

  Krivi smiled, showing a flash of teeth against the brown of his face. And her insides practically melted. Her spine curved into the hard planes of his body and she was really, really glad that she had packed in her lingerie with the woolen socks.

  Sam shrugged. “Sorry, Zee. But it will be worth it when we get there. I promise you.”

  “You won’t end up in a body bag,” Krivi said in a low voice that she could barely hear over the engine.

  “Why not?”

  “Because I will carry you out.” The words were a hard, confident murmur.

  And what was left of her reserve and good intentions went up in smoke, and she knew the first thing she was doing when they set up camp was change underwear.

  Krivi Iyer, she decided, was a very lucky, very dead man tonight.

  ~~~~~

  Sam and Ziya were pros at setting up camp, so Krivi took Noor for a firewood expedition.

  Noor thought it as good a time as any to subtly but expertly pump her best friend’s beau. She’d decided to call him beau, because Krivi Iyer with his fuck off signs and scary eyes was not exactly boyfriend material.

  She took a covert look at his forearms, which bulged under the strain of holding the driftwood she was collecting, skipping ahead of him.

  Noor stopped suddenly and sat down on a log of wood, that was beached and which had been stripped of all its brown color. It was bone-white, and she made a striking picture in her bright orange parka and match stick jeans and snake brown flat pleather boots.

  She pushed her stylish designer sunglasses up her forehead to rest against her hair and looked at him appraisingly. “So…what’s your deal with my girl?”

  Krivi bent down and picked up more driftwood without answering her nosy question.

  Noor tapped her feet against the white pebbles that dotted the shore of the part of the lake they were inhabiting and said, “I am known for my patience when I need it, Krivi. So I can sit here forever while you figure out a way to blow me off.”

  Krivi caught a sweet smile playing on her lips from the corner of his eye.

  “I’m not going to quit, you know. So the best thing would be for you to start talking. Like, now.”

  Krivi stooped, picked up a small twig and added it to the pile in his arms.

  “Kid, I don’t--"

  “You watch her. When you think no one is watching you, you watch her. And there is the strangest expression in your usually blank eyes. It’s…” Noor hesitated. “Frustration and puzzlement. I don’t understand, because Ziya is the easiest woman on earth to read.”

  ~~~~~~

  “That’s what you think,” Krivi muttered, mostly to himself.

  “What did you say? I didn’t catch that.”

  He sighed, and sat down next to her, placing the bundle of wood next to him on the ground. “I think you underestimate your friend, Kid. She’s not as easy as she looks.”

  “Why?” Noor winked. “You tried getting it on with her and got nowhere?”
/>   Krivi snaked an arm around her shoulders and squeezed.

  She hit him on his buff biceps and squeaked. “Let me go, you idiot.”

  He let her go and spoke calmly, “Are we really going to have this conversation?”

  Noor shrugged; her green eyes abruptly and totally serious. “I am all the family she has left. Well, Dada Akhtar, Sam and me. I can’t let her be hurt.”

  She touched his forearm in a touching gesture that tightened something in his chest.

  He was stunned to recognize the emotion. Hurt.

  “I am not saying you are going to hurt her,” she rushed to reassure him. “You’re the gentlest man I have ever known, Rambo and I love you for it. If you weren’t the man I know you are...I would never have told Zee to jump your bones.”

  Krivi spluttered.

  Noor laughed. “Gotcha, buddy. But seriously.” She bumped a friendly shoulder with him. “What exactly are you waiting for? Go get her already. I know she wants you to.”

  “You’re hopeless, Kid. Sam is going to have his hands full with you. Full.”

  Krivi shook his head and rose up, picking up the driftwood as if it weighed nothing.

  Noor looped an arm around his elbow and chattered about nothing particular as they took a rut that led them past some dense forest land and then to the other side where the lake and their camp was.

  There was a sappy love song playing very loudly as they neared the campsite.

  Noor stopped mid-chatter as she listened to it. “That’s the song that was playing when…”

  Noor broke off and unlinked her arms from Krivi’s and ran ahead, with a vague gesture. Her hair flying like a banner behind her.

  Krivi followed faster at a brisker pace, a smile playing on his iron-hard face, because he knew exactly what was transpiring back at the campsite.

  He reached the campsite just in time to hear Noor squeal, as she took in the ring of candles that Sam and Ziya had placed around a wide circle. Inside, was a small stick on which was tied a single red, heart-shaped balloon.

  She caught sight of something glittering on the balloon as it floated and bobbed in the breeze and she rushed into the circle, uncaring of if her jeans caught fire.

  Ziya was on the sidelines of one tent, grinning and Krivi discreetly stayed at the perimeter of the scene as Sam followed a hyper-excited Noor into the circle.

  She snatched the balloon with its stick and the balloon whipped too, straight into Sam’s face. He dodged it manfully and she held the stick to him, an expression of such hopeful, terrible love, even Krivi’s blackened heart was moved.

  “Ask me,” she ordered in a shaking voice.

  He took the stick from her and untied a tiny thread with a diamond ring dangling at the end of it. “Nuria, I love you. You know I do.”

  She shook her head, wiped her face clean as if rubbing at the traces of tears.

  Ziya punched in a button and their song came on. The song after which she had told him she loved him, back in the eighth grade. He’d been attending his tenth standard farewell dance with a date and she’d been waiting for him to come back.

  The song had been playing in his car radio. A beat up Maruti he had long ago sold off.

  Sam went down on one knee and Noor put a hand to her fast-beating heart as if to contain it inside of her chest.

  “I love you so much; I wonder sometimes how I can live with so much love inside of me. I tried giving you up, but you wouldn’t let me. I tried not to give you what you wanted, until I realized I could lose you as much as you could lose me.”

  Noor sniffed and two happy tears rolled down her supermodel-sharp cheeks. “Oh, Sameth, you romantic fool.”

  “Let’s not lose each other, Noor. Let’s just have each other. Marry me. Please?”

  With a happy lunge, she took the ring from him and kissed him and he shoved it on her finger and they were laughing and grinning and she was crying at the same time.

  When she took her head off his shoulder, after he had finished hugging the life out of her, she looked at Ziya. There was a brilliant smile on that lovely face as she wailed, “Zee…I am wearing jeans! I got engaged while wearing jeans!”

  Ziya shook her head, shut the music off and came forward, into the circle.

  “You two should just start your own theatre company.”

  But they didn’t let her get another word because they were hugging her as tight as they were hugging each other. When they finally let her go, she looked at Noor, while hugging Sam.

  “You made her the happiest creature alive today, honey. You should remind her of this day every time you fight.”

  Noor shoved at her elbow. “Hey, whose side are you on?” Then she hugged her and they jumped up and down while Noor sang, “I am engaged. I am engaged. I am engaged.”

  Sam got out of the circle and walked towards where Krivi was breaking out the wine. He took a glass and Krivi toasted him with the bottle.

  “Congrats, Major. You stuck gold there. Pure gold.”

  Sam shook his head, as if trying to clear it.

  “I can’t believe she said yes.” He drank some of the wine and eased the pounding of his heart.

  “Why not?”

  He shrugged. “I made her suffer so much. She should have kicked my ass on principle.”

  “She loves you. Take your miracles where you can get it, Major.”

  Krivi poured himself some of the Pinot Noir and tipped it inside.

  “Are you going to do the same?”

  Krivi, who had been watching the two women dancing like schoolgirls inside the circle of candles, one who was tall as a beanpole and built along the speed of a bullet train, and the other one with quiet eyes and golden hair that he wanted to just…touch…

  And he shook himself. “Hmm? What did you just say?”

  “You should take your miracles where you find ‘em too. And Ziya,” Sam nodded at Ziya.

  She was crying right along with her best friend… and they were both hugging and wiping their faces and just basically acting like excitable girls.

  “She is the most wonderful miracle a man can hope to deserve.”

  Krivi said nothing.

  He just tipped his glass to Sam’s and watched the two women goof around like little kids. And in his head, he came to a painful, potentially hurtful conclusion. Especially, when Ziya turned from Noor and nailed him in the heart with her glowing silver eyes and her warm touchable hair and that soft skin.

  But he knew that it was the right one because her smile hurt his heart too. And he hadn’t even known he had one anymore.

  Eighteen

  Ziya took her time coming out of the girl’s tent, later that night. Noor had dragged Sam off for some alone fiancé time, as she put it, as soon as they had finished dinner so Ziya knew the time was ripe to get her alone Krivi time now. She washed up at the lake, taking time to moisturize thoroughly after liberally applying the mosquito repellant.

  Non-greasy, from the magic basket of the soon to be Mrs. Major Sameth Qureshi.

  She wore a fleecy hoodie over the layered full-sleeve tee and thick cords and two woolen socks under her combat boots. For the sake of the occasion she had slicked on the lip gloss that Noor had instructed her to use. It tasted of grapes and made her full lips shiny in the light of her camera phone.

  Finally, all her preparations were complete and she unzipped the tent flap and stepped out.

  There was a huge bonfire roaring, that would be fed by the men over the night, should it die down.

  The weather was chilly and the air had a bite to it.

  Despite being fully covered, Ziya wrapped her arms around her elbows and walked forward. Toward Krivi.

  ~~~~~

  He was lying on the other side of the fire, facing the lake, because he knew that activities in one tent would make it uncomfortable for him to sleep in the night.

  But, here, under an inflatable bed that was as hard as the rocky shore underneath he could breathe in the fresh, uncontaminated
air, look at the plethora of stars that dotted the velvet blanket of a sky.

  And think nothing thoughts.

  He’d not been so at peace in…four years.

  Then, a face swam into his periphery, right above his bed.

  It was upside down, with silver eyes that were star-bright and golden hair that glowed with some secret fire and lips that he ached to consume. To possess.

  Krivi shut his eyes.

  Ziya knelt down next to him, her jeans making a rustle as she settled her knees on the edge of the mattress.

  “Hi,” she said.

  He said nothing.

  “Look at me, will you? I know I am not that ugly.”

  She touched his shoulder, the lightest of touches and it acted as a lightning rod because a tremor went through him. He clamped her wrist in an iron-hold.

  “Krivi—"

  “Why don’t you stay away from me?” he murmured as he turned on his side and looked at her.

  ~~~~~~

  Krivi just looked at her. His dark eyes unfathomable in the night, his hard-planed face with the faintest stubble on the stubborn jaw, all in shadows…all in darkness.

  And yet she was drawn to the darkness, to the man. The ache a deep gnawing in the pit of her stomach, in the back of her spine.

  Ziya leaned down and kissed him.

  He shoved a hand back in her head, spearing his fingers through the golden, silken strands, sitting up, so that she was forced to lean on him to keep her balance. Her arms went around his neck as he hauled her closer, settling her on the bed, and she scooted forward, as they were still kissing.

  His lips went down, past her jaw to the fast-beating pulse at her throat and he sucked the soft, fragrant skin into his mouth.

  Ziya moaned because it felt so good, she wanted his mouth everywhere on her. The hunger immediate and uncontrollable. She shoved his black wife-beater out of the way and he tossed it off his head. It landed in the water.

  Then he unzipped her hoodie and ran his hands up her sides, coming to rest at the edge of her breasts.