She tried to resist, lips closed, hands pushing his shoulder, but he just held her, lips pressed together, eyes closed, hands on her head, and she surrendered. Her lips opened and she was flooded with him, lips, tongue, noses, breathes, hands. It was everything she had feared, everything she had denied herself, everything she wanted, everything she could never have.
“Stop,” she mumbled through a break in their embrace. Dasen ignored her, brought his hand from her head around to her chest. His lips moved to her chin, down to her neck, sending spasms through her. She groaned as he touched her, feeling her through the cotton shirt. His lips moved down her neck, warm and thrilling. His other hand found her leg and began moving up, taking the hem of the nightshirt with it. She felt her entire body aching, wanting. His lips rose back to hers, he moved his hand from her breast to her rear and tried to lift her from the chair as his other rose between her thighs.
“No,” she said pushing him back enough to create some separation. They panted together, staring at each other. Dasen’s hand was frozen on her leg, her nightshirt pooled around it. His other rested on her hip, urging her still from the chair. He fought to kiss her again, but she held him away. “No,” she said. “I . . . I can’t . . . it isn’t right.”
“What isn’t right?” he whispered. “We are joined in every way but this. Tomorrow, it may be all over. We might die, we might be captured. I don’t want to face that wondering what could have been, knowing that I might never be with you. Do you understand that, Teth? I don’t care about the consequences. I love you, I want to be with you, and if this might be our last chance, I won’t let that slip away.”
A tear formed in Teth’s eye. Her nose crumpled and turned red. “I can’t,” she whispered. She fought the despair that threatened to overtake her. Dasen deserved better than that. He had done nothing to earn her tears. “Not now. Not like this.” She kissed him, but he was frozen, barely reacted.
“When, Teth? The Order help us, we are joined. There is nothing to stop us. It is what the Order wants.”
And that is it exactly, Teth thought, feeling the full devastation of that simple truth. She took a long shaking breath, pressing her head against his so that it hurt. “I’m sorry,” she said, having to fight her emotions for every word. Her entire body trembled, fighting with its every fiber for what her mind told her she could never have. And that is why it had to end. She couldn’t do it any longer, couldn’t fight it any more. “Soon. Soon, this will be over. For tonight, can you just hold me?”
Dasen sighed, long and slow. He moved his hand from between her legs to her face, sliding it along her cheek. “Okay. For tonight, that will be enough. I will hold you as long as I can.”
Teth stifled another sob as she kissed him, but this one lacked the passion of before. “I love you, Dasen. I’m sorry. Everything I do is because I love you. I hope someday you’ll see that.”
She thought about what was to come, what awaited her tomorrow, about the boy in her arms, and everything she was giving up, and almost lost her resolve. But that was it. As wonderful as all this was, it was still a lie, an illusion that she could never have. Better to die than to put up with that torture, and not only her, but him. Better to let him go, to set him free. There was tonight, and then a hope that he would someday understand, that he would find happiness somewhere else.
#
Dasen woke with Teth still in his arms, her smell in his nose, legs wrapped with his, body pressed against him. He moved almost subconsciously, rubbing himself against her, running his hand along her stomach to her breast, lifting his leg up between hers. He kissed her shoulder, barely able to contain himself.
She turned, rolled toward him, disentangling herself and kissed him, gently. Her breath was sour, but he doubted his was any better. “Thank you,” she said lowering her face from his so that his attempt to deepen the kiss met her forehead. “Thank you for understanding. I know it was hard, but . . . but it is what I needed.”
Dasen could barely find words. “Uh . . . sure. I was . . . I was just happy to be close to you again. The last couple of months have been hard.” Despite his words, he longed for more. His hand moved down her back, to the leg that was looped up over him. She was so close. Already they were almost there. The slightest movement, a tiny shifting of clothes, the slightest roll of their bodies and it would happen. His hand came back up, bringing her nightshirt with it. He rubbed himself against her and tried to find her lips.
“Dasen,” Teth moaned. She wanted him just as much, he knew she did. “Please, not now. Not yet.” She eased herself away from him, arrested the movement of his hand, and stood from the bed. She watched him, breaths deep, hands trembling. It was clear that they wanted the same thing, so why deny it?
Dasen rolled onto his back. “Arghh,” he sighed involuntarily. He was so hard it hurt, but Teth was already pulling on her pants. He would receive no relief from her. “So what am I supposed to do about this?” he asked, trying to be playful.
Teth looked at him in seeming surprise. Already, she seemed distracted, thoughts far away, eyes sad. “Doesn’t it just go back to normal on its own?” she asked, surprisingly without sarcasm.
Dasen sighed again. She was not getting the hint. “Eventually, yes, but it is . . . uncomfortable.”
“Oh,” Teth said, eyes shifting. “I don’t know. Do you want me to leave so you can . . . ?”
Dasen just shook his head. He could not believe he was having this conversation. “No. I want you. I don’t know how much longer I can wait. I mean, what if it gets stuck like this?”
Teth looked shocked. “Can that happen?”
Dasen laughed. “No, but sometimes it feels that way.”
Suddenly, Teth looked sad. She walked to him and sat beside him on the bed. She bent and kissed him, which did nothing to help his discomfort. “I am sorry I haven’t been a better wife. I hope you will remember . . . remember the good things . . . before all this.”
“What are you talking about Teth? I told you, I don’t want a better wife. I want you.”
Teth laughed. “So there is a better wife out there, but I’ll do?”
Dasen’s face fell. “No . . . I mean . . . there is no . . . that is not . . . .”
“Shut up,” Teth said and kissed him. “Just remember that I love you. It may be hard, but know that I have done all this for you. This is how it had to be.”
Dasen didn’t understand a word of what she was saying. He was barely listening for the thoughts of pulling her onto the bed and everything that might follow. He moved to kiss her again, oblivious to the distant look in her eye. His hand moved back to her legs. Even covered with the lambs’ wool pants, they felt wonderful, firm and soft and warm.
A knock at the door made him jump and sent Teth springing from the bed. “Time to rise, my dears,” Mrs. Tappers called a second later. “I have your breakfast here and will be back in ten minutes to do Deena’s face.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Tappers,” Teth called after her. “We are up and will be ready.” She gathered herself then pulled off her nightshirt. She was naked from the waist up. Dasen stared, thinking, for a moment, that she might actually give him what he longed for. He waited, barely breathing, for her to unbutton her pants. She did not. “It’s nothing you haven’t seen before,” she said, teasing.
“Yeah, but you were screaming at me then and it was dark, I couldn’t . . . .”
“Well, now you have seen in the light, without the yelling.” She turned and walked toward the chair where she had laid the cotton wrap she used on her chest. Dasen came from the bed and caught her, cupping a hand around one of her breasts before she could wrap the cloth around it. It fit almost perfectly into his palm, soft but firm. He moved his face down and kissed her neck.
“I need to visit the toilet,” she said quietly, voice husky. She stepped away from him and began wrapping the cloth around her chest. A white dress-shirt followed. The leather vest she wore to train with Garth completed her transformation into
a boy. The small, white breasts, the long firm legs, the round rear pressing against him were a memory.
Dasen’s desire was not. How can she keep doing this to me?
She took a deep breath, looked back at him with what could only be sadness and opened the door. She delivered the tray holding their breakfast to the table, then departed again without a word.
This is hard for her, Dasen told himself. She is almost there. Soon. Maybe after the madness today. Isn’t that what she said, after today? Dasen took a deep breath and walked to the wardrobe in the corner to find the dress he would wear. Just make it through today. Tonight, you will be on the boat leaving here. You will be safe and free. There will be nothing more to worry about, and she will open up to you. Tonight, it would happen. He was sure of it.
Chapter 68
The 54 – 55rd Day of Summer
“They’re getting closer,” Noé stated what had been true for a week now. The lead they had secured on the plains was being steadily eroded day after day as they picked their way over the rough ground at the base of the mountains. The Morgs had pushed them ever farther east, hemming them against the mountain crags that defined the only other available direction. That morning, they had run out of food and had neither the time nor ability to forage for more. With nothing but rocks and scraggly pines for days, the horses were getting just about as desperate as their riders. Ill-equipped for the rocky terrain, they had let the charger go when they reached the mountains, but feeling his stomach cramp, Cary almost wished that they had eaten it. The thought was blasphemy, but the rumbling of his stomach was getting stronger than his esteem for the animals that carried him.
The only consolation was that Noé had healed enough to ride on her own and proved surprisingly capable on the mountain pony he’d given her. Her cuts and bruises were slowly fading. Her face was still a patchwork of purple blurring to yellow, her nose would never be straight again, scars would mar her smooth skin to her death, the missing tooth would never return, but the swelling was gone. The cuts had closed. The stiches had been removed. The pain had faded. And she was almost more beautiful for the scars, more real.
Cary sometimes wondered if he was falling in love with her. He looked back now and she smiled. Even starving, aching, desperately tired, that smile warmed him, but he hadn’t even kissed her since he’d found her. They slept together every night, wrapped together against the cold, under the single fur cloak, fearing a fire would give them away. Cary had not been so close to someone since Allysa, and maybe that was why things never went further or maybe it was just that they were too exhausted by the time they stopped each night. Or maybe it was Juhn’s stupid refrain that ran through his mind every time he looked at her: be the man your sister needed.
“We need to get through the mountains,” Cary finally answered.
Noé was right, of course. The Morgs were getting close. They’d seen their fire in the valley below them last night. They were only a few miles off. It was only a matter of time before they were close enough to take them. To this point, the only thing that had saved them was that the Morgs stopped every day when the sun was still a hand’s breadth above the horizon. Noé said that was tradition. Morg men did not travel at night and the extra hand was for making the camp and foraging food. It gave Cary and Noé an extra hour each night to rebuild their lead, but it was not enough. The horses rarely went faster than a walk now, and even that was halting. It was only a matter of time before one of them broke a leg – was a miracle it hadn’t happened already – and then they’d be as good as caught.
“We should just go then,” Noé said. Cary turned again to look at her. She watched the mountains above them, rising in granite spikes across the entire horizon. “We’ve been skirting them for days. I don’t know what you’re looking for.”
Neither did Cary. He looked at the great field of jagged rocks to their side. They formed a wedge defined by sheer rock faces on either side that angled up to a pair of boulders. The boulders were far away, but Cary could see that the rocks below them were wet. Water was running between them. That meant there might be a gap between and a valley beyond, but it was a steep, rocky ascent. The horses would have to walk. The mare might not make it even then. It would take hours, and they’d be completely exposed.
“The men behind us will be stopping soon,” Noé continued when Cary did not answer. “They are still below us but are close enough now that they will probably run hard tomorrow and take us. We don’t have any other choice.”
Cary felt the air go out of him. Noé was right. They were out of options. They couldn’t fight. They couldn’t outrun them. They were tired and hungry and spent. For all the effort, their time was up. By this time tomorrow, he’d be nailed to a tree for the birds as he watched those men do whatever they pleased with her.
“The moon is nearly full,” Noé continued. She brought her horse up to his, put her hand on his arm to get his attention. “The sky is clear. Those rocks will be as bright as daylight. We’ll cross them in the night and disappear into the mountains.”
“My horse won’t make it,” Cary said, almost unwilling to accept that hope remained. He was so tired, he almost wanted it to end.
“Then leave her. Send her on. Maybe the men will follow her instead of us.”
“And if your horse can’t make it either?”
“We’ll walk. It is our only hope. Have you given up on that?” She caught his cheek with her hand and brought his eyes to hers. “For the first time in my life, I am happy. As absurd as that sounds, it is true. I did not think that anyone could ever be kind to me, could ever . . . love me?” She said the last as a question. Cary knew that he should answer it but couldn’t seem find the words. Noé’s eyes lost a bit of their glimmer as the silence grew, but she swallowed and went on. “It doesn’t matter. I am happy, and I won’t give it up. Not yet. And . . . and I don’t think that is the Order’s plan. It cannot have kept us alive through all this so that we can be killed here. The order master used to say, ‘the Order guides, freewill decides.’ I feel the Order guiding us. I think It wants us to escape, but we have to trust It. We have to trust this.” She put her hand finally on Cary’s heart. He felt like it would leap from his chest.
She looked like she wanted him to kiss her then, just staring at him with those big pale-blue eyes framed in hints of purple and yellow like the cosmetics that noblewomen wore, chapped, split lips parting ever so slightly, bent nose heaving. Just kiss her, Cary screamed at himself.
He cleared his throat and looked away. “Alright, we’ll try it,” he said. His voice was husky. “We have some time before the sun’s down. We’ll continue to where the trees rise over there then cut across the rocks with that wall at our side. I’ll let my horse go. She’s hungry, so she’ll want to get away from this high country as fast as possible. She might even lead them for a day before they catch her.”
Noé smiled at that. “Thank you,” she whispered.
Cary took another breath, felt exhaustion weighing on him like he was carrying the mountains on his back. His stomach rumbled and cramped. Be the man your sister needed, he repeated to himself.
#
Cary reached a hand to Noé and lifted her as she leapt across a three foot gap between the last two rocks. She panted as he placed his hands on her hips to steady her. She shook, legs wobbling. Despite the cool of the night, sweat ran from her hair in great beads down her face. The fur at the top of her dress sparkled with droplets as if laced with jewels. She rubbed her hands together, wincing against the pain of the scrapes that marked them. A line of blood ran over her ankle and stained the top of her shoe from her knee. Her face, illuminated perfectly by the full moon behind them was marred with streaks of dirt so that he could hardly see the scabs and bruises. Her hair was pulled back into a great frizzy tail tied by a leather band. It was knotted and matted, would probably have to be cut just to get a comb through it. Still Cary’s hands trembled as he held her. He told himself it was from exhaustion.
> Feeling his legs shaking, wondering if he had enough left for the final few paces, he looked back over what they had just accomplished. Ahead of them was a tiny stream, its progress down the slope lost between the rocks below. It ran from between two boulders that marked the entrance to a narrow valley. As Noé had promised, the moon had illuminated their way, making the grey rocks nearly glow, but the climb had been farther, steeper, and far more grueling than it looked. It had taken the entire night, moving slowly, cautiously, silently from stone to stone, leaping over gaps, straining through each step, fighting to keep moving up. The miraculous, Order-sent horse had led the way, its reins providing Cary with a boost when needed. Noé had follow, with Cary helping her through each step. She had fallen once – scraped her hands, cut her knee – but she had done it silently and had not said a word about it since. Cary had never seen anything like it, would have never imagined a woman making this climb, but then if her life had given her anything, she was strong, she knew pain, and she knew how to survive.
Lifting his eyes, Carey looked for the Morgs that he still thought should be somewhere behind. There was no sign of them. They had been maintaining their camps down the slope, keeping themselves where game was plentiful and their quarry would be trapped against the mountains. And they were still there. A single slim streamer rose through the night from the trees well down the slope and only slightly to the west. Too close, Cary realized. Noé had been correct. The Morgs would have surely overtaken them if they’d stayed on their previous course. Now, with any luck, they would follow the mare back down, would waste a day searching for their true track, or not find it at all.
The False Martyr Page 83