Clutch

by JA Huss

  Chapter Nine

  He pulls me towards him and I melt at his contact even though his hands have been touching me on and off for the past two days.

  "Come here," he says in a low voice.

  I do.

  Of course he's pulling me so if I wanted to resist I probably couldn't.

  But anyway, I don't resist.

  He pulls me into his chest and spins me around and I feel something cold dribble onto my head and it smells like flowers. His hands move to my scalp and begin massaging as I smile. "I could almost love you right now for doing this, you know."

  "That's pretty much the point, Junco."

  I don't have anything to say to that, so I keep still and quiet and his fingers dance along the length of my hair like he's massaging the shampoo into each individual strand. Finally, my entire head is frothy. He turns me around again and says, "Rinse."

  I dunk under and shake my head, then pop back up. As soon as I surface he's pulling me again, and this time he leads me over to the small rushing waterfall. "Go ahead, stick your head under," he says with a smile. I do, and the shock of cold water snaps me out of my fog. I gasp for breath and rake the droplets across my lashes to clear the blurriness.

  I look over at him and shake my head, but I can see a real smile underneath his pretend innocence. "Here, catch!"

  I do catch and find hair conditioner in my palm. "OK, shampoo I can understand, but conditioner? You must bring all the girls down here for a midnight bath."

  He laughs at that and begins to shampoo his own hair. "Right, because there are so many avian girls to choose from on Earth."

  I watch him in silence for a few minutes, thinking about what he said. "How long have you really been down here?"

  He dunks under to rinse out the bubbles, then bobs back up and runs his fingers through his black hair as the water trickles down his chest. "Here? About two years."

  "Two years? What the hell have you been doing here for two years?"

  He scowls at my cursing but answers my question. "Watching you, Junco."

  "That's really creepy."

  "Yeah, well. I guess it is what it is."

  "Why not just leave me alone? Why do anything?"

  "Because if you're avian you belong with your own kind."

  "If. If I'm avian? But I've been raised human, I'm human. And I don't even have wings, so how can being avian even be a possibility?" We float there, looking at each other and his eyes slip down to my chest just below the surface of the water, making me blush and avert my eyes.

  "You haven't even matured yet, Junco."

  "Ouch," I say, looking up at him. "That stings. I might fight like a boy, but I'm not shaped like one."

  He shakes his head, says "I'm not talking about that," and then laughs a little. I think I just made him blush.

  My mouth forms a little O.

  "Avians grow much like humans do, up to a point. Then we go through a second maturation process and that's when your wings form."

  "You aren't born with wings?" This fascinates me. "Does anyone else know this about your race?"

  "I dunno," he confesses. "Probably some of them do. The ones responsible for this... mess we're in now certainly must."

  "Then why are you telling me?"

  "Because in all likelihood, Junco, you are avian. At least," he pauses, "in part."

  "What does that mean, in part?"

  "It means that you might not be one hundred percent pure avian, but might have human blood mixed in."

  "Maybe that's what I am then, part human and part avian."

  "I hope not."

  His words come out too quick and sting me into silence. But then I shake it off and ask the obvious. "Why?"

  He leans his head back and floats there in the steam for a few seconds, thinking. "Isn't it better to be one or the other?"

  "I don't know, is it?"

  He laughs. "It definitely is."

  "What do you want me to be?"

  He smiles at me. "I want ya ta be yerself." I'm just about ready to think that's the perfect answer, but then he continues. "As long as yer one or the other."

  "Oh." I can't hide my disappointment and he can't take back the words, so he moves toward me, grabs my hand, and pulls me over to the other side of the pool. "Here," he says as he takes my hand and places it on a flat rocky ledge under the water. "Sit." His smile is back, but now that I've seen the real thing, it looks superficial.

  I sit and he sits next to me. Then he pulls me to his chest and wraps his arms around my stomach. His wings curve in, and cradle us both. "You want to know what I think, darlin'?"

  His words come out soft and he even makes the darlin' part sound sexy, but my mind is thinking about what I am. "Sure," I say halfheartedly.

  "I think yer one hundred percent avian and I think that in the end, it will be something you'll come to love about yerself."

  "Yeah, maybe," is all I have to say to that. I recall the scars on his upper body and turn to look at them. "What's all this?" I ask.

  He eyes track down to the scar my finger is tracing on his chest. He turns me back around and his fingertip traces a scar on the fleshy muscle midway between my neck and my shoulder, but at the same time his other hand slips to the skin just below my belly button and finds the raised horizontal line across my lower stomach. "What's all this?"

  I shake off the hand on my shoulder and force his other hand up higher so it can't touch the scar. "You're in my personal space, Tier."

  I feel him shrug and we move on. "So, Junco Coot. Why did ya not just walk home when ya got out of the cave earlier?"

  I sigh as his hands wrap a little tighter around my middle and I try and pry them loose, but don't succeed. "Would you have come gotten me from my home, if I did?" I ask, looking back at him. He studies my face and nods. "So, there was no point then, right?"

  "And?" he prods me along.

  "And–" I'm not sure, but he's waiting. "I dunno. What am I gonna do in that house by myself?"

  "So, yer lookin' for company?"

  "Jasus, Tier. I don't know. I'm looking for answers, I guess. Just drop it."

  He moves his hand up to my neck and strokes the ugly scar on my shoulder and I feel a wave of heat rush up into my face. His hand continues, then slips over to my chin and he gently turns my face toward him and reaches down to kiss my neck. I gasp and he takes this as encouragement. His mouth reaches up to meet mine and for a moment I let him.

  But then I pull away. "Don't – do that."

  My words come out low and deep because I can't hide my desire, and I look into his eyes but see only sadness. He smiles again, then releases my head and I am once again facing forward.

  "Do ya want me to give ya the answers yer looking for, then?" he asks.

  I pull my legs up onto the rock shelf and rest my head on my knees as I hug them to my chest. Then I tilt my head enough so I can see his face behind me. "Do you have them?"

  "I'm not sure. Some. Maybe."

  I don't say anything to that, just sit and think.

  His hand tracks to my exposed back and his fingertips trace a line down my spine into the water. I buckle at his touch.

  "Does that hurt?" he asks.

  "A little, why?"

  "Plasma burn on yer back. When did that happen?"

  "The MR. They stunned me when I was running in the tallgrass."

  "Why?"

  I shrug. "Who knows."

  "Ya know why, so tell me. Why did they stun you, Junco?"

  I look sideways at him. "Back off, OK? It's none of your fucking business."

  He lets out a little burst of air and transitions into neutral territory. "How about a story, then?"

  I stay silent for a moment, lost in the shiver that bursts from his dragging touch up and down my back. "What's it about?"

  "The goddess, our greatest goddess, Inanna."

  I look back at him, interested now, and he begins.

  "We have two parental deities, the God Old Crage, and t
he Goddess Inanna. Old Crage is just your regular pantheon figurehead. He's pretty laid-back and he only has a few hard and fast rules for his children to follow. Nothing too extraordinary.

  "But Inanna, she's something else altogether." He smiles at my smile, and then continues. "She's never satisfied, like most women." I grunt at his jab, but let it slide.

  "She's already the ruler of all heaven and earth, all space and sky, and all the world's water. But there's one place where she can never go, and that's the world down below. This really ticks her off, so she conspires with her faithful servant, the magpie."

  I groan at the mention of the trouble-making bird and he reads my mind. "Aye, you'll never make the right choice if ya conspire with a magpie, they're always up for trouble. But anyway, she tells the magpie that she's going to the world down below to demand that the ruler, who happens to be her sister, Eresh, submit the final realm to her and Old Crage. So she dresses in her finest attire to tempt the seven gatekeepers who guard the path to find Eresh."

  His fingers are still tracing a pattern across my back and I realize with a start that he is drawing wings.

  "And then off she goes.

  "Inanna approaches the first gate and demands, as goddess of heaven and earth, all space and sky, and all the world's water, to be let in, but the gatekeepers demand a gift of power.

  "As a token of her power she leaves her lapis rod and goes forward to the second gate. There the gatekeeper demands a token of humility, and so she strips off her gown and goes forward naked.

  "At the third gate the keeper demands a gift of beauty, so she takes off her royal beads and drapes them over the skeleton of bones as she passes through.

  "At the fourth gate the demand is for treasure, so she takes off her jewel-encrusted wedding ring and hands it over.

  "At the fifth gate the keeper wants service, and so Inanna, goddess of heaven and earth, all space and sky, and all the world's water, bows her head and bends down to wash his feet in a tub of warm water.

  "At the sixth gate she's asked to give wisdom, so she recites the prayer of protection that Old Crag uses to keep the whole world safe.

  "She finally reaches the seventh gate and there the keeper is a large angry spirit who has been sent to the underworld as punishment by Old Crage. His demand is the truth.

  "Inanna, who is not privy to the secret council kept by her husband, cannot provide the truth he is looking for, so she improvises and casts a spell that will reflect the world back to him in the gazing pool, and then tells him his truth is in the mirror.

  "Finally, stripped of everything she has and standing naked in the unbearable heat of the sun burning the world down below, Inanna reaches her sister Eresh, sitting on her throne, and demands that her sister submit."

  Tier pulls me back against his chest and begins to whisper in my ear, the magic of his words dancing across my cheek to make their way into the depths of my head, and I shiver with anticipation.

  "Eresh looks at her visitor in all her nakedness and says, 'Sister, there is no reason to beg for my realm. You are my blood. And now that you have come here I think you should stay, and feel the heat of the darkness, while I shall go up and feel the glow of the light.'

  "Inanna is about to disagree when Eresh takes her prisoner and traps her inside a dark trunk. Then she takes her leave of the throne room and one by one, on her way past each gate, collects Inanna's personal items so that when she comes up from the world down below she is wearing Inanna's wedding ring, her royal beads, and her dress, and has her all powerful lapis rod.

  "Nins, that's the magpie's name, is tricked into thinking Eresh is Inanna by all her royal garb, and is astounded that she has made her way back and plans a great party. Later, after the party is over, Eresh is lying next to her new husband feeling satiated and glowing with excesses of food and drink.

  "But Inanna, in the world down below, is plotting her return. She is well on her way to escaping the trunk, and soon, she is well on her way to escaping the Seven guards at the gates. She is the Goddess Inanna, blessed by her uncle, the god of all that is known, with more gifts than one woman would ever need.

  "But her greatest gift is that of decision-maker. No other gift makes her so powerful or so feared. And her Sister, though she does possess an entire world, cannot prevent Inanna from making the decision to leave.

  "Inanna crosses back over the first six gates that bind her to her sister's realm, but at the Seventh, she is instructed to provide her proxy. You see, you cannot leave the world down under unless there is someone to take your place.

  "Inanna, being a goddess of love and battle – among many other things – promises a suitor to stand in for her and then she makes her way back to her home. When she sees Old Crage in bed with Eresh she is crazed with jealousy. She snatches them both up and drags Eresh back to her realm and leaves her there. To punish Old Crage, she makes him stand for her at the Seventh Gate for half the year, while her suitor will stand for the other half.

  "From that day on Inanna is also given the title of Goddess of Retribution. Eventually Old Crage does get out of his commitments, but only because Inanna feels guilty and helps him trick another suitor into taking his place."

  Tier stops and waits to see if I say anything. But I don't. I just lie against his chest for several minutes counting each time it moves in and out.

  "Junco," he says finally, turning me to look at him. "Do ya see?"

  I let out a long exhale. "Yeah, I get it. Don't be a victim."

  He laughs. "Yeah, that's one way to see it. Don't let life happen ta ya, decide how it will go. We all have the power of decision, unless yer a slave." He lifts my chin up from his chest. "And yer not a slave, Junco."

  I smile. "No."

  And then Tier pushes me off him, stands up, gets out of the pool and walks away. "I'll get our clothes."

  Chapter Ten

  True to his word, he does have something for me to wear, but it's one of his outfits that was never made for humans. The soft, thick black shirt is tailored to fit a being with wings. It's really more like a vest that fits over the head and there are seals which hold it together under my arms. The thick, black, canvas-like jacket is made the same way. The pants, also black and made of the same material as the jacket, are way too long, but he cuts them with a knife, just like I did a few days ago with the jumpsuit.

  Everything is over-sized in an exaggerated manner, but it feels good anyway. I have to wear my old boots because his are made for talons, and would never work for human feet, even if he had my miniature size, which he doesn't.

  When we are finally dressed in the clean clothes the dreamy feeling in the hot springs pool is gone and I feel warm and fresh. He looks me up and down, then smiles and takes my hand as we walk back the way we came.

  Tier halts abruptly and I slam into him in the dark. "Hey," I say in a joking tone, "what's the deal?"

  He turns to face me and I see his eyes are glowing bright green. "Shhhhh," he says.

  I'm quiet, more curious than worried, and stand behind him as he waits, maybe listening. Or maybe his eyes see in the dark. I'm not really sure which.

  After a long several minutes, he looks back, his eyes still bright, and tugs me forward with him. "What is it?" I whisper again. But he just squeezes my hand and stays silent as we continue to make our way in the blackness. I figure we are about halfway back to the main cavern.

  My arm is jerked as Tier ducks into a small side tunnel. He pulls me in close so he can whisper in my ear. "There's a pack of nightdogs ahead."

  "What?" I whisper back. "Where did they come from?" My heart beats faster with each second.

  "Junco," he says so softly that I can barely hear him. "This entire mountain is a major breeding den for them. They're everywhere."

  "You mean I could have been eaten alive when I left the cavern?" His eyes glow as he looks down at me, but he doesn't say anything, so I take that as a yes.

  We wait there for several minutes and I can feel him st
raining to hear any sign that they are either still around, or are gone. He grabs for my hand, but instead of leading me out into the main tunnel, he continues down the side shaft. I have no choice but to follow him and spend a lot of time looking back over my shoulder. This is a futile gesture because it is pitch black and I don't have glowing night-vision eyes.

  We both hear the haunting vocalizations at the same time and the hair on the back of my neck stands on end, charged with the chill that seeps out through my skin.

  We freeze and listen. The howl begins low and ever so gradually grows in pitch and intensity, until finally it is a blood-curdling chorus of screams that makes my stomach shift in terror. They are very close but I cannot tell if they are ahead in the small tunnel or behind us in the main corridor. I trust Tier to keep their location straight and just try to keep my breathing under control, but I am not having much luck. Tier squeezes my hand again and moves forward, then stops and pushes me into a crack in the wall.

  "Go to the end of this crevice, it will be tight, but you'll fit, I promise. Then use the formations on the side of the rock to climb up." His green eyes look up and I follow his gaze. "There's a ledge up there. Get to it and don't move until I come get ya."

  He pushes me in as I nod my head and I begin to move forward into the narrow passageway. I have both arms stretched out so I can feel for the rock formations on either side as I make my way deeper and deeper into the crevice, all the while Tier is getting farther and farther away from me.

  About thirty paces in I begin to doubt him and almost turn back when the passage becomes so narrow that I have to squeeze sideways. I scrape against the rough rock and am thankful for the thick alien clothes to protect me from the ragged edges. I continue to force myself to move forward, even as the rock presses up against my chest so hard my lungs are pushed in.

  There is some shuffling behind me and I stop and consider calling out to Tier when the screaming starts. I panic and begin forcing my body into an opening that continues to get thinner and thinner. The sound of bones breaking echoes through the caverns and I can hear the nightdogs snarling and howling. The screams are etched into my brain, but I cannot tell if they are avian or canine.