The thought brings another wave of that near-grief, but makes him want to be generous to the other, at least in the ways he can.
And yet, he wants this thing. He wants it badly enough that Wreg must see some indication of the hunger on his face.
“You haven’t before, have you?”
Nenzi feels his jaw start to harden again. He stops it before it would hurt, but can’t stop the flush that creeps over his cheeks.
“No,” he says, blunt.
Wreg sighs, clicking.
Shaking his head, he walks to where Nenzi stands by the door, one of Wreg’s clean shirts thrown around his shoulders over the fresh bandages, a pair of Wreg’s pants hanging too big on his hips.
“Are you sure you’re up for this?” he asks him, once he is nearer.
Nenzi nods. “I’m sure, brother.”
Wreg smiles. “You think you are.”
Still the smile is not unkind, nor even overly condescending, and Nenzi finds himself relaxing a little when he reads the other’s light.
“You’ll let me go?” he asks.
“How much money do you have?”
Nenzi hesitates, then walks back to the cot, where his torn and bloody pants lie on the floor. Lifting them by one end, he feels for the correct pocket, and pulls out his winnings from the fighting he did the night Gretchen’s brothers beat him into the dirt.
They had been honest in that, at least. They left him the money.
Perhaps they’d only done it so the police would not come after them, accusing them of theft, but even so, Nenzi felt a brief pulse of gratitude that they had left it.
Pulling it out, still feeling that relief, he tosses the bundle to Wreg, who catches it easily and flips through the stack of marks. After he has, he frowns slightly, gazing up at the low ceiling as if thinking, or perhaps counting. Once he has, he shoves his hands into his own pocket, and pulls out another stack of bills.
He tosses both stacks back to the younger seer.
“If it is your first time,” he says only. “You might need more.”
Nenzi feels a flush of warmth. Half of it is from shock at the generosity of the gesture, the rest is embarrassment at the other’s words.
“Thank you, brother. I have money at my uncle’s. I can pay you back. I know I still owe you for the inks––”
“It is nothing. Pay me back when you are better.” Wreg grunts, raising an eyebrow at him. “You’d do me a kindness, actually, if you kept the money and listened to me now and then, as payment instead.”
“Yes, brother, I will.”
Clicking softly, Wreg folds his arms, gauging his eyes.
“You will stay off the street?” he says.
“I vow it, yes.”
Wreg grunts again. “Tell your uncle, and I’ll skin you, runt. I really will.”
Nenzi shakes his head, gesturing no in seer. “I won’t tell him.”
Wreg nods, smiling a little, as if in spite of himself.
“All right,” he says. “Well, listen then… and look for the markers in my light. You can get to this place by alleys, so follow the way I show you. You know the little blue house, behind the general store run by those Jews?”
Nenzi nods. “Yes. I know it.”
“Behind there, there are trees. And behind that, a garden. Cross the fence on the other side of that garden, and you will find a row of smaller places, built together in a long row. It goes far back, with the shoemaker having his workshop and apartment on top. They are green and white… do you know this?”
Nenzi nods again, picking up impressions off the other’s light.
“I have passed that way,” he says.
“Third door from the stairs,” Wreg says. “The blue door. Ask for Nina. Send her my regards. Tell her I have not forgotten, and still intend to return that favor to her.” His eyes turn openly warning. “…and be polite, runt.”
“I will.”
“You had better. Or I’ll take that money out of you in ways you can’t imagine.”
Nenzi meets his gaze, and nods again, opening his light enough that the other can feel that he hears him, and that he understands. “I will be polite.” He hesitates, then says it anyway. “Thank you, brother Wreg. I won’t forget this.”
The older seer looks at him, his eyes once more holding a near amazement.
Still, the pleasure in his smile is genuine, or feels it.
“You should get the tar beaten out of you more often, runt,” he says, slapping his good shoulder affectionately. “It makes you much more agreeable.”
“That is probably true,” he concedes.
“And watch the inks, brother,” Wreg adds, as Nenzi turns back to the bed, picking up his boots and socks and carrying them with him to where he can sit to put them on. “One of them digs their claws into that, and you’ll feel it, believe me. Tell them to take it easy.”
“I will.”
Even so, he is already buttoning the front of his shirt, casting around for his coat as he pulls the suspenders up over his shoulders with a wince. He sits on the edge of the cot, still running over the path Wreg has shown him in his light as shoves his feet into socks and then boots, lacing the latter with jerking pulls once he’s stomped his heel all the way in.
He is out the door pretty much the instant he finishes and shoves the money, both his own and what Wreg gave him, into his pockets.
Now, a half-hour later, which is as long as it’s taken him to cross town via the circuitous route Wreg mapped out for him through backyards and alleys, his steps slow before a low green building with an upstairs workshop. He scans four doors which are painted white, then his eyes stop on the third door from the stairs, which is painted a sky blue.
He touches his bicep where the new bandage covers it, feeling a ripple of nerves when he realizes he has already scanned too deeply.
They know he is outside.
Picking up his feet, he moves quickly to the door before they can decide he is not friendly, or perhaps before he loses his nerve.
He reaches the covered porch, and is standing in front of the blue door, about to knock, when it opens.
He finds himself looking at a pair of bright blue eyes, nearly opaque they are so filled with color, and brighter than the deepest blue sky––brighter than the painted door. He has never seen eyes of such a color, and can only stare at first, watching them glint in the light from inside the dwelling.
She smiles, and he notices only then that she is wearing an exotic-looking robe that leaves her legs and knees bare, and that her hair is coal black. She looks foreign, like Wreg, as if she comes from the place on the other side of the mountains.
He finds his eyes riveted to her bare legs, which he’s never seen before, not on a woman he hasn’t undressed himself.
Her eyes swivel to someone behind her, even as she laughs.
“You’ve got one, all right, Nina. He looks ready to burst, this one…”
Stepping back, she lets the door swing open, gesturing in seer for him to enter.
His eyes are still on hers as he crosses the threshold, knowing he is blushing from her words, but lost once more in the color of her irises. It occurs to him he hasn’t seen a seer female since he was a child, and pain slides through his light, strong enough that he has to fight to control it as he follows her past the foyer and into a low-ceilinged hallway beyond.
The woman walks in front of him, her strides casual, athletic, and he notices her feet are bare, along with her legs.
She turns left at a lit doorway, the first he sees, and he follows her warily, only to stop at the entrance to the room, watching her as she stalks directly to a couch upholstered in dark blue, and sits beside another female, this one with hair that is a honey-blond.
The second one’s eyes are not human either, but they are closer; a pale brown, they are almost the same color as her hair, but for gold flecks that shine from them, visible even from where he stands.
“And what do you want, young sir?” a
voice asks, to his left.
He turns his head, and finds himself looking at a small female, much shorter than the others. She looks Asian, as well, and her eyes burn a dark violet color that seems to turn crimson, depending on how they catch the light.
He clears his throat, glancing around.
He realizes there are eight of them, and that he is the only one standing. Fighting his expression still, he holds out his hands, a peace gesture in seer, following it with a more polite gesture of greeting.
The smallish female smiles, her eyes following his hands in faint amusement.
“Yes,” she says. “We will not attack you, brother. What is it you want?”
“One of you is Nina?” he says finally.
“I am Nina,” the small one says, her eyes turning slightly more appraising. “But I do not know you,” she adds, her voice not unfriendly.
“You don’t,” he affirms. “I am Nenzi… of Outer Reach. I asked a brother for directions here, and he gave me your name.”
“And what is his name? This brother of yours?”
“Wreg.” He hesitates, realizes he has no other name for Wreg, nor a clan affiliation. He speaks over his own pause. “He said to send his warm greeting, and to tell you he remembers his debt to you. His gratitude remains, and his will to return the favor.”
“I know brother Wreg is good for his debts,” she says, smiling below the appraising look in her eyes. “Did you come all this way, in the night and the rain, to tell me that? If so, I think brother Wreg owes you something, as well.”
Nenzi feels his face tighten, even as he remembers not to clench his jaw. It hasn’t occurred to him he would have to explain why he has come. He is about to try and speak again, when the female who answered the door laughs.
“Nina, you will give this youngster a heart attack.”
A quiet coil of laughter whispers around the room. Most of it is in his light, not audible to his ears, but it is good-natured, not derisive. He feels himself relax slightly, even as his eyes return to Nina, who he assumes is in charge.
“You have money?” she asks politely.
“Yes, sister.”
“Well?” She smiles, gesturing around the warmly-lit room. “Choose. Unless you brought enough for all of us?”
He feels his skin warm again, but his eyes follow the direction of her hand.
He finds himself looking at faces, feeling less comfortable letting his eyes stray much lower, given that none of them are dressed the way he is used to females dressing. He pauses on a few of those faces, on golden, violet and deep black irises.
Then he sees one of them sitting off by herself, in a corner by the window.
She is wrapped in an Asian-looking robe like the first one, but her face is less Asian, despite the high cheekbones and faint slant to her eyes. Her skin is a tawny brown, darker than he is used to on the humans, and her hair is nearly black. Her eyes are hazel in color, green with gold and brown flecks. But it is her stillness he is drawn to, the faint tinges of gold and white he sees in her light. She is looking at him, too, but not smiling like the others.
She looks at him as if trying to figure him out, her large eyes serious.
“I think we have our answer,” the seer with the blue eyes says, her voice a hard smile.
Nina is smiling too when Nenzi turns his eyes back to the rest of the room, but on her it feels more genuine. Instead of him, she looks at the female in the corner.
“Will you have him, Lena?” she says.
“I will,” the other says easily.
She stands up when Nenzi turns, moving like a cat coiling out of repose.
His eyes drift down involuntarily. She is tall, as tall as him, with legs that are thin but muscular, as if she does mulei daily, like the seers in his unit.
He watches her walk towards him, and doesn’t move as she takes his arm. With scarcely a pause, she tugs him with her towards the darkened hallway. His feet move before he’s let himself think, his mind distracted when he feels her light already exploring his.
As they reach the door, she glances back at the others.
“I will take the blue room,” she says. “Let me know if one of you would like him, as well.”
He feels his face flush hot at this. He glances at the other seers before he can stop himself. A few of them are looking at him as well, eyes appraising.
“Let us know if he is worth it, first,” the blue-eyed one says.
“Elan,” Nina says softly. “…Manners.”
But he barely hears this.
Turning his eyes from the others in the room, he follows the one they call Lena down the hall. She takes him past four more closed doors before her hand falls on the handle of the fifth, and he realizes the building is longer than it appeared from the outside.
She glances back at him as he thinks it. From her eyes, he can see she has heard him.
“Yes,” is all she says. “There is an underground component as well. It is a seer building, brother. It is only built to appear human.”
He nods, swallowing a little when her light is in him again, pulling on his.
They don’t speak again until after she has led him to a low couch.
Sitting beside him, she starts to take off his shirt and he just sits there, half-leaning on velvet cushions. He is uncertain for the first time he can remember, maybe the first time in years. He doesn’t know how to tell her that, though, or even what to ask her.
He feels her notice, but she doesn’t laugh at him.
Instead her eyes study his as she finishes with the shirt, sliding it and the suspenders off his shoulders. Looking at his body, she touches one of the bruises on the side of his ribs, lightly with one hand.
“Humans?” she asks only.
“Yes.”
Sliding closer to him, she coils a hand into his hair before he’s finished reacting to how close she is. He is still looking at her face when she pulls him down to kiss her mouth. He does as her fingers and light ask, tensely at first.
Gradually, he begins to relax. It hurts a little in those first moments, but he forgets that after awhile, too. Her light helps this along, until his breath begins to clutch in his chest, until he is tense for a different reason.
Once she feels his shoulders unclench, she is touching him more intimately, caressing his neck and chest, sliding a bare leg between his, until he gasps against her mouth. Her light is in his now, pulling on it gently, coaxing it open, and when he notices he has to fight to maintain control.
He remembers his uncle’s warning, his caution to leave his sisters alone––
But she has her hand in his pants and he groans, pushing the warning from his mind. He doesn’t move as she touches him, following her light as it asks him to be still, letting her push him back on the couch. She uses her light and her hand until he is fully extended, half out of his head when she starts caressing the end of him.
“Stop,” he manages after a moment of this. “Sister… stop…”
His fingers are gripping her hair, and he gasps when she complies, laying her hand back on his chest. She sits astride him, and now she is looking down at his face, her own eyes glazed with light. Looking at her, he feels desire in her, a dense wanting that coils into him, pulling at him.
It shocks him––it shocks him beyond words that she wants him.
“Why?” She smiles at him, tugging at his hair, her voice amused. “Your light is beautiful, brother. I was wet before we even got in here.”
He can’t answer. Pain floods his light, enough that he sees her expression change.
Her face tightens as her own pain meets his.
He has his hand under the robe then. He slides his fingers inside her, watches her face as she gives a surprised gasp, and the pain worsens, blinding him.
But he can’t––not fully extended. He knows he can’t, but he can’t do anything about it. He doesn’t know how to even begin pulling it back.
He can feel her waiting. She wasn’t lying; s
he is wet, ready for him. After another moment, he groans again, removing his fingers from her, gripping her hair tighter in his hand.
“Please,” he says. “I haven’t done this.”
Her eyes flicker with surprise.
“You haven’t had sex? Intercourse?”
He shakes his head. “Only with humans.”
Her eyes change. At first, he can’t read the difference in her expression or her light. When her lips purse, pain sliding through his light in another pulse, he realizes he has startled her––and turned her on. His hand clenches her hip, hard enough that she arches against him, her hand on him once more. He grips her wrist, crying out as he tries to stop her.
“Please,” he says. “Please. I won’t last…”
She smiles, and again, he sees empathy in her look. He realizes it bothers her, too, that he hasn’t been with one of his own. She doesn’t voice it, though.
“A little faith, brother,” she says only. “I can hold you off.”
“I doubt that,” he says, looking up at her.
She smiles. Her eyes light up when she does, making him hurt again.
Then she is kissing him, and her hand is still on him, her light flooding his, coaxing out his pain, pulling at him.
He groans, louder when she doesn’t stop, half-pleading with her as she explores him with her fingers, undressing him as she goes. She avoids the bandages, and her fingers are light on the bruises and cuts that still litter his body. When his hands begin to explore her skin in return, sliding up under the embroidered robe, she lets him at first. A few minutes later, she pulls his fingers off her though, pinning his wrists to the couch.
Then she has his boots off, and is tugging the pants off his legs, and he is under her once more, only naked this time, and half out of his head again.
He can’t look at her anymore. It feels like he won’t last beyond another touch, another sensual pull of her light, but her light is doing something to his, and somehow, whatever it is, it is holding him back.
He groans louder when she has ahold of him once more. She uses her light to calm him down. He can barely move when she presses at the base of the head, her voice and fingers firm.
“Retract, brother.” It is soft, but a command nonetheless.
Shadow (Bridge & Sword: Awakenings #4): Bridge & Sword World Page 39