by Amy Star
She took it. Without warning, she charged through the underbrush and barreled toward the lighter colored Bear, blindly thrusting her whole body toward him with claws outspread. Connor turned and his ruffled ears flinched, and Sarah thought he looked unusually complacent for someone being ambushed.
As she brought down a claw against his unprotected face, she was surprised at his agility – he deftly dodged and plowed his whole shoulder into her like a football player, an uncharacteristically bear-like maneuver that caught her off guard and she gasped trying to fill her lungs with air.
She growled and tried to swipe him again, but he was ready, ducking on his hind legs and swiping out with his own bared claws. Sarah felt several cuts indent against her belly region, a stinging pain that filled her whole body and she howled. Connor took advantage of the opening and lunged down on top of her again, pinning both her paws under her and raised his right paw high above his head in a threatening death-move.
Sarah closed her eyes and turned her head, waiting for the final blow and cursing her own stupidity and uselessness. But the blow never came. Slowly she opened her eyes. Above her, a lean young face stared sternly back, his fist raised. His tousled shaggy hair was the same color as the bear, but his eyes had become human – they reminded her of Patrick. Hard and uncompromising, but never reckless. Like me, she thought bitterly.“What the fuck?” she heard him ask.
His straight jaw had only the hint of hair on it, and he was quite handsome. His long tanned arms flexed with inherent muscles, a kind of wiry and ripped whipcord frame that bespoke of an athlete. He was still breathing hard, and his broad muscular chest was brimming with sweat. A hot drop left his shoulder and she felt it land on her abdomen, and realized that they were both naked – in her fear and acquiescence to her death, she’d unconsciously reverted to human Form, and so had he.
He seemed to notice it first and leaped off her, taking a few steps back. Sarah saw that he was at least six feet tall, and quite well-built. His abdomen heaved with washboard muscles, and the defined angle of his pelvis bent gracefully toward his groin where a full black shock of hair obscured his penis. She suspected that in the heat of their fight it had swollen, for it hung large and oblique between his legs.
“Why did you attack me?” he asked levelly.
Sarah tried to sit up and gasped when she felt a sharp pain in her abdomen. She looked down and saw three parallel cuts in her stomach, oozing blood. They ran in bright red rivulets down her thin mid-riff, and pooled in her navel for a moment before branching down over the scant stiff bristles above her labia. Connor’s eyes bulged and he quickly rooted around in the nearby grass, returning seconds later with a small med-kit.
“Hold still,” he warned, bending down beside her. The heat of his body was overwhelming, almost enough to distract her from the lacerations to her stomach.
He reached down and she tried to strike out again, this time in fear. The fact they were both naked seemed somehow secondary, and she grappled with him for a few panicked moments before he finally managed to pin her arms again. She had felt fear before, but nothing like this. Connor put his full weight on her legs, and she could feel the skin of his inner thighs against her shins.
“Would you knock it off,” he finally exclaimed.
It was enough to silence Sarah, who froze, eyes wide with fear and her black hair muddied by the grass. She looked down and saw that he had a water bottle and jolted when it touched her wound. From the med-kit by his knee, he withdrew a white linen bandage and put it onto the cuts. Sarah gritted her teeth against the pain.
“It’s not deep, but that’s a sensitive spot. It’ll hurt before it starts to feel better,” he said at last, standing up and walking back to the grass where he reclaimed a small backpack and a bundle of clothes. He tossed an emergency blanket in her direction without looking. “You should cover up. When you’re not in Form, you’re just as vulnerable to the elements as any human.”
Sarah looked down and saw her small breasts were erect, a bit paler than the rest of her body, and the pink nipples bulged from the broad perimeter of each dark areola. She sat up and saw that mud from their struggle in the grass had also stained the inside of her taut legs and dusted the round rise of her pubis. She quickly covered her crotch, but not before seeing Connor turn his head abruptly. If she hadn’t been in pain, she could have sworn he was blushing.
*
“Care to explain yourself yet?” Connor asked.
He had put on pants, a pair of heavy-duty cargos with pockets on the side, but he was still naked from the waist up. In the light of a small campfire he had built, his torso still brimmed with an untapped ferocity. He squatted down opposite her and prodded the ashes. Several squirrels were spitted on sharpened stakes above the flames.
She guessed he’d been hunting at the time she had attacked him, and her stomach growled in spite of her situation – she rubbed her stomach and tried to avoid his gaze as he continued to toy with the coals.
Sarah balked, and wrapped the emergency blanket around her body tighter. Connor saw the edge of the blanket slip down her leg, revealing a narrow slant of her inner thigh and the darkness that ran further up. She quickly pushed her knees together. In truth, she didn’t know what to say to him – she didn’t have a good reason for rushing him, and she felt ashamed and embarrassed about the events that had led up to it. Then she remembered the gun, still hidden in her backpack.
“I’m sorry… I… wish I could tell you,” she said.
The linens on her stomach tugged as she straightened herself. He had cleaned the small cuts on her stomach, which upon closer inspection hadn’t been as deep as she had feared. Some of her fears about Connor had been abated. If he, too, had meant to kill her, he could have done it a long time ago. He didn’t want to hurt me, he deliberately held back, she thought. No, the more she thought about it, the more she was willing to believe that she had been used as a pawn in someone else’s game. Force of habit prevented her from saying it aloud, but a name kept swimming in her mind. Caroline.
“You’re her, aren’t you? The Greyback girl…. Sarah,” he said, “I can't think of any other Bears who would be out here. And certainly no one ridiculous enough to try and sneak up on me when they’re upwind.”
His chiding remark hit her like a nail and she flinched. It was true, she had forgotten all her training and merely acted on reflex – that kind of thinking could get you killed out here, and it was a mistake she couldn’t allow herself to make again.
“You’re Connor,” she replied, as if confirming the fact.
“Guess we found each other,” he said grimly.
There was something aloof and cold in his tone, but it wasn’t the same as the sort of distance she had come to expect from the others in her family, such as Caroline – this was a distance created out of suspicion and exhaustion of rules. Maybe he really is like me, she thought. They were both anchored to events out of their collective control.
“I’m sorry about earlier,” she admitted.
“You still haven’t told me why you attacked me,” he said, raising his eyes.
“It’s difficult to explain. I wish I could tell you, it’s just-”
“It’s fine,” Connor interrupted brusquely, and tried to smile, but it was like he wasn’t used to using the right muscles, and it made him look more menacing in the dim orange light. “I’m sure you had your reasons, it doesn’t matter.”
No, it definitely does, Sarah said. She scooted forward on the log, and shivered in spite of herself. “I have something to tell you,” she said very softly.
“Wait, you didn’t start off in Form, did you?” Connor said, his eyes growing wide and comical again. It was a peculiar quirk of his, one which was in contrast to the gruff adult exterior – this side of him, when he became excited, was boyish. Almost charming.
“Uh, no, I… I took them off, and hid them. About a three kilometers back,” she said.
Connor stood up, and raised his arms above
him in a stretch. “Well, I don’t recommend trying to track through the bush after nightfall. The mosquitoes will suck you dry before you get there. You can stay here for the night, I’ll try to erect a shelter.”
The idea of spending a night alone with the strange man whom she had only known in whispers gave her a thrill, and she felt a warm giddy feeling bubbling up in her chest, spreading downward.
“Connor, I know… what we’re supposed to do,” she said.
He stopped, and turned, and the adult façade disappeared again, the bashful boy staring back. “You mean the marriage, the ceremony… I know. Listen, I know that you’ve just been manipulated into this, just like me. We don’t have to… y’know,” he said, not able to actually say it out loud.
The first coupling was a very important part of the marriage process. Of all the aspects of her upbringing, Sarah had secretly wondered and yearned over this one the most. It was true, there were suitors on the Estate. And even after their marriage, it was quite common to find another suitor or mistress – their marriage in this remote wilderness was, as Caroline had put it, merely politics.
Still, she had never felt the warmth of another man. It wasn’t anything to do with propriety, it just hadn’t happened for her. She had read the books, that was it – and learned, in her own way, a number of things. But it was all theoretical. She felt another surge of warmth between her legs and pressed her knees tighter together until they hurt.
“I have to tell you something,” she repeated, raising her small childish features toward him. That stopped him again, because for a moment he seemed transfixed. It was a look Sarah had never been given before – one which was part awe, and part desire, a burning combination of the two that smoldered in her chest and made it difficult to breathe.
Connor stepped past the fire and kneeled down in front of her. His shaggy brown hair covered his brow and he looked up at her. For the first time, she saw how hazel his eyes were, a deep auburn hue that caught the fire and reflected it even brighter. He rubbed the square edge of his jaw again, as if trying to contemplate something – or find the right words.
Then, in a surprising gesture, one which was on par with Caroline being kind, he reached forward. But this time, she didn’t flinch. Gently, almost with abject curiosity, like a man discovering a woman for the first time, he touched her cheek. She held his gaze and blinked back and cursed herself again. It was all so stupid. She had embarrassed herself by attacking him, and now she was naked, with none of her possessions. On top of that, she was wounded, and probably looked like a mess – but she couldn’t move even to straighten her hair as he reached toward her. It was like she was paralyzed, waiting to see what he would do next.
He rubbed his fingers further up her cheek, and she let him touch the edge of her lips. They barely parted and she let out a slow breath, felt another surge of blood flood her legs and groin. His hands went further up the side of her neck and she quivered in spite of herself, which seemed to surprise Connor back to reality. He lifted a lock of the black hair over her ear.
“You have really black hair,” he said.
“Yeah, it’s a gift from my mother,” she said.
“You’re lucky,” he said, grinning a bit more naturally, “all I got from my mother was a bad temper.”
“You don’t seem that bad,” she said.
He shrugged. “You said you had something to tell me. Why don’t you fill me in while I finish the shelter,” he said, picking up a small hatchet among his belongings and indicating the tall cedar boughs that overlapped downward from the pale trunks of trees nearby.
CHAPTER THREE
Sarah was quite candid when she described the events leading up to their being dropped off on the rocky outcrop, and even mentioned the gun and what Caroline had told her.
She blushed again when she got to the part about spying him through the bushes and attacking him. He listened impassively, never interrupting, as he worked away on a small lean-to shelter. He cut down a few small saplings and skinned them with the hatchet, and used a bit of cedar-twine to hold them fast. Next, he made a thin makeshift framework of interwoven cedar branches to lay against it at an angle. Finally, he picked up the cedar boughs he’d chopped, and in no time there was a crude but functional shelter standing nearby.
“Well I’m glad you didn’t kill me,” Connor said at last, stuffing the inside of the shelter with moss and ferns to make a serviceable mattress of sorts.
“I thought, maybe, you were told the same thing by your father.”
“To kill you? God, my father adores you, and he doesn’t even know you. No, this sounds like the work of your aunt. I don’t want to pick sides here, but… the evidence is there.”
Caroline had taken care of Sarah through the worst parts of her life, and it seemed completely unfathomable that she could be the engineer of such a cruel and daring conspiracy. Yes, she could be cruel, and there were plenty of people who feared her, for good reason.
But Sarah could scarcely imagine that she would put her own cousin at risk. And yet, a lingering doubt reminded her.
“I don’t want to admit it, but… you may be right. The question is…”
“Why does she want me out of the picture?” Connor filled in, and nodded to himself. “I can’t answer that. But if my father taught me anything, it’s that if you’re ever in doubt, follow the trail of money. Since money isn’t much of an object for our families, follow the next logical aim. Power.”
“Power to do what?”
Again, Connor shrugged and went to the squirrels, testing them with a bare finger. He pulled them off the flames and offered her one. Sarah accepted, keeping one hand firmly braced around the emergency blanket. The meat had been cooking for a while and she tore it into it ravenously – with all the excitement, she had ignored her appetite.
“Hungry much?” Connor said, and Sarah looked up and realized she had squirrel fat all over her face, and it ran down her chin. The young man let out a laugh, the first she had ever heard from him, and she found it sincere and endearing.
They’d both spent so much of their lives perfecting their facades, each in turn. It felt good, for once, to be able to relax the mask. Even if it was something silly as squirrel-face. She had to laugh back, and wiped her chin.
After they’d finished, the fire was already dying down, and a silence descended on all of them. The familiar moon snuck out again above the sky, and they could glimpse it through a hole in the canopy of trees. The blue light painted them both in a kind of muted glow, and she closed her eyes, felt the coolness of the forest wrap around her. Native scents began to emerge. Devil’s club, the specific perfumes of moss. Even the water itself had a smell; sharp and clear like a bell.
“I don’t think either of our Tribes expected us to find each other so quickly,” he said after a pause, “but if what you told me is true, then, there might be more going on here than meets the eye.”
“What are you thinking?” she asked.
He sat down beside her and rubbed his bicep. “I’ve been trying to think who would benefit from my death. I can’t think of anything, but maybe it isn’t just about me.”
“I don’t follow. You think I’m a target, too?”
“I think we both are,” he growled, letting the Bear voice its dissent again. “In any case, nothing more can be done tonight. We should get some rest.”
Sarah looked at the lean-to again. It was relatively small, and she realized that with both of them in it together, it would be very cozy. She had never been so close to a man, and already the heavy musky odor of him was sweltering between them.
“You can have the lean-to!” he said suddenly, “I mean, I’ll… keep guard.”
She had to smile at his awkward formality. “No, it’s fine. Like you said, in human form., we’re both susceptible to weather, and I can already feel the temperature dropping. We’ll need all the body heat we can spare,” she said, her survival instincts kicking in again.
Both of them w
ere tentative as they laid down on the bed of moss that was already warm with the radiant energy of the campfire. Sarah chose the inside while Connor took the outside. The safety blanket was still wrapped around her like a shawl, and she realized she was actually taking his intended blanket and felt a pang of guilt.
As they scooted together and he spooned her, she felt something hard knock against her buttocks through the blankets, and when she realized what it was, opened her mouth. They laid there for several moments before she had the courage to look over at Connor. He was still awake, and had started to shiver quietly.
“Here,” she said, unwrapping the blanket from her back and offering it. As she did, Connor glimpsed the whole length of her naked backside. The long ladder of her spine descended to the small dimpled divots of her lower back, and even lower to the crease of her perfect buttocks, which arched toward him eagerly. There was a small dark bulge just barely discernible between her legs.
“Are you sure?” he asked.
She merely nodded, and tried not to gasp as she felt the warmth of his body press against her. His chest buried into her back. This is what we were supposed to do, she said to herself, as if to rationalize it. Part of her wondered if Connor was actually attracted to her at all. She couldn’t ignore the fact that even while this might be a marriage of convenience, Connor had his positive qualities. She also couldn’t deny the fact that part of her wanted him.
She scooted her buttocks into his crotch again and gently grinded. He let out a small grunt and innocently ran his hand over her stomach, avoiding the bandages, and let them follow the spiral of her ribs upward. As his hand reached under her left breast, she slapped a hand to her mouth to keep from gasping with an unreleased and unquenchable desire.
She reached behind her and ran a hand against the bulge that was pressing at the seams of his pants, and he wordlessly unbuttoned them and slid them down in one deft movement. The full girth of his member struggled in her grip, ripening as she pulled at it up and down, and Connor made another grunt and fondled her breasts. His fingers played across her nipple and she let out a moan to signal her pleasure.