by Joey W. Hill
Her screams woke him on the second night. Her bed was small and she was too uncomfortable to have him on it with her, so he’d taken the floor. The nightmare brought him fully awake in an instant. Unfortunately, it didn’t bring her out of her nightmares.
“Stop. Stop. Please…”
She was back there, in that memory of her rape, and the way she was struggling against the bandages holding her wing and arm said they were contributing to the dream. Fucking bastard.
“Easy, easy.” JP coaxed more painkillers into her as he soothed both of them, along with the snakes moving restlessly about her head. Treebark was still groggy and mostly unresponsive, stretched out on the pillow next to her. Hopefully because his body had all it could do to concentrate on healing.
JP held Medusa as closely as he could without causing her more discomfort or fear. She was crying. When she spoke to him, her voice was so much younger and more vulnerable, it raised the hair on his neck.
“Please don’t let him hurt me, John. Help me…keep him away.”
“I won’t. I’m right here. You killed him, Medusa. He’ll never hurt you or anyone else again.”
“But he’s here. He’s come again. He’s here.”
“No, he’s not. I’m here. Not him. He won’t come again.”
Her other arm was folded up against her front almost as tightly as her bound wing. She pressed her face into his chest, her tears wetting the tunic he was wearing. “Never again,” she whispered.
“No. Never again.” That hollowness returned. He’d die to protect her, but he knew that didn’t mean he could protect her from everything. No matter the amount of training and prep, luck could turn sour. Which was why there was prayer, hope and the psychological games they all played. Like telling her he’d never let anything hurt her again.
She wasn’t an idealistic girl. She knew he couldn’t protect her from everything. But if she knew he wanted it to be true more than he’d ever wanted anything else, it helped. He had to believe that.
Medusa dropped her head back, her wet eyes trained on his face. Lifting her fingers to his mouth, she traced his lips. “Please be inside me, John Pierce. I know I am not strong right now, but I need your closeness to feel strong. Can you… Would you mind terribly? Can you be very gentle?”
He couldn’t think of an answer to that which would sufficiently convey how very not terrible he found that idea. And how very gentle he could be. He answered her with action, closing the distance between them to kiss her lips, stroke her hair and throat.
He slid his hands up her legs. Because of her wing’s binding, she’d preferred wearing no clothes at all and lying beneath a light sheet, so as he drew that from her, he encountered only smooth skin. Her eyes fell half-shut as he caressed her inner thighs, coaxing them to open to him. Biting her lip as he brushed his knuckles over her clit, she opened her eyes fully again to meet his and hold.
He kept stroking, a slow, rhythmic massage, watching every change in her face, the beautiful transition as it became suffused with arousal, banishing any pain or discomfort she was feeling. The beauty of endorphins. As she said and he knew, she had limited mobility and she was in a fragile state, so he slid his erect cock into her with utter gentleness but implacable demand. The combination worked for both of them, if the tightening of her hand on his arm and the latch of one of her legs over the back of his was any indication.
He kept himself braced as he thrust slowly, watching her lips part, her forked tongue touch them, her eyes go to a red glow in the darkness, as if the fire he was building inside was coming forth in that direct gaze.
He realized she didn’t have the strength to climax, but she’d conveyed that wasn’t her primary reason for this, and he understood that. She wouldn’t let him deny himself, though.
“This is all I need,” she whispered. “But I would love to hear you release, feel your seed inside me. Will you please…”
“I will. But for every climax you get from me, you’ll owe me two of your own when you’re all better.”
A glimmer of a smile touched her lips. “It will be…arduous, but I will pay the price.”
“Yeah, you will.” He shot her a look that brought forth that tiny flush, and then he had to concentrate on reining in the strength of his body’s response. He managed the release in a shuddering, near-motionless way that didn’t jostle her or give in to his urge to rut on her like a beast. There’d be time for that later. All he wanted to do now was care for her, and he was humbly grateful for the gift of her trust that was allowing him to do just that, in this and myriad other ways.
She’d been right about her healing. Within three days of the break, he was able to remove the bandage and she could stretch out the wing, exercise and test it. To their joined relief, her healing powers and the medicines finally worked on Treebark too, the wound knitting far more quickly than John would have expected. Her stitches were also ready to be removed, the gash in her head sealed beneath their hold.
When he unwrapped the bandage from her arm and wing for the last time, he had her sitting on a stool he’d constructed from green branches and woven grass during his idle time spent watching over her. While he’d created it, he told her more stories. She’d listen and doze. Sometimes it looked like the other snakes were listening too, lulled by the rise and fall of his voice.
Now she sat down on the stool tentatively, making him grin at her probably justified lack of faith in his furniture-making skills, but once there, she seemed pleased with it. She watched him closely as he began to unwrap the bandage. “You look tired,” she said. “You need to sleep. I am recovered enough to keep watch.”
He lifted a shoulder. “I’m good. I’ve been catching some shut-eye here and there.”
“You will take a much longer rest this afternoon. I will sit on the patio and keep watch on the shoreline while I re-tell your stories in my head.”
He wasn’t sure he was ready for her to be anywhere near the patio because of what had happened to her last time, but she shook her head at him impatiently, reading it in his face. “Your Maddock told you that he has sealed all the portals they know about. And you said he is never wrong.”
“I just don’t want to see the day he is, especially not with you in the crossfire.” But he knew she was right. He was dragging his ass, and he was no good to her that way. At the height of his career, he’d been able to function capably at high levels of sleep deprivation, but he’d gotten out of the habit. He needed to recharge. He finished unwrapping the bandage and set it aside, caressing her shoulder. Ratqueen had been following the unwinding of the bandage from the top of Medusa’s head, spiraling around with his movements until she’d almost tied herself in knots and toppled. “Idiot,” he told the snake. “Sometimes I think you do things to purposefully entertain us.”
“They do,” Medusa said fondly. “Snakes have a very good sense of humor.” She tested the wing and John watched her face closely to be sure she didn’t overdo, but he needn’t have worried. She’d been on her own for quite a while and understood the limitations of the healing process. She knew taking two steps back to take one step forward wasn’t a smart plan, which was probably why his practical girl had admonished him about his sleep.
He was relieved to see the wing looked pretty much the same as the healthy one when she stretched the latter out. So the bone setting might have worked okay. He’d know for sure when she could fly again.
“So how does it feel?”
“It is tender, but I will try a test flight in another several days.” She gestured to the bed. “You take my place. I will sing you to sleep.”
“Oh?”
“I am an accomplished singer. The songs I know are mostly praises to the Goddess, but I also know a few others that can help you rest.”
“I really am fine.”
“You are saying that because you are male and you think it is against your rules to admit you are less than a god. But I could ‘kick your ass’ right now, even with this one inju
red wing.”
His brows raised at the charming mischief in her face, the twinkle in her eyes. “Yeah, yeah, big talk, snake-girl. Keep it up and I’ll squash that sassy attitude like a bug.”
She merely pointed to the bed. Truth, nothing had ever looked so good except maybe the same thing with her in it, her arms raised in eager invitation for him to go into them. He managed not to groan in relief as he collapsed on the mattress. She dragged his stool closer to take a seat by the bed, leaning forward to stroke his hair. Despite their teasing, he saw the concern in her face.
“I’m okay,” he said. “Just tired.”
“You cared for me well,” she said. “Now let me care for you this little while.”
As she began to sing, his eyes drooped like pulled down window shades. “Wake me if you’re worried about anything.”
“No,” she said, bending down to touch his brow with her lips. “Because you’re the only thing that is worrying me. Trust me, John Pierce. Trust me to watch over you as you have done for me. You are part of my family now.”
In his entire adult life, he’d never had anyone express that to him…not with the potent weight of simple truth behind it.
He’d tied this female up and brought her submission to glorious life. He’d tended her wounds and vowed to protect her. He’d always thought it a man’s job, to care for a woman, and he still thought that. He’d just forgotten that women could feel the same responsibility, and do a hell of a job with it besides.
She’d pulled him off a cliff before he could do himself grave injury. She’d also trusted him enough to help him achieve a lifelong dream, to find a woman whose heart and soul he wanted to serve forever. Now, in this blessed moment, she would watch over his sleep.
He might have longed for this dream, but thinking about it and having it were different. He had a lot to learn. He looked forward to it.
She sang of Athena in her guise as an owl, soaring on strong winds above the forests, dipping wing tips into a sparkling stream. Perching above her city and seeing where justice and wisdom were needed. He took Medusa’s voice into dreams with him as he drifted off to sleep.
Medusa listened to his breath evening out. Treebark rested on her shoulder, and she stroked him in reassurance. All the snakes had been quiet during her recuperation, as they were when the soldier had wounded her side. At such times it seemed her body’s need for healing energy pulled from all reserves, including theirs. She hoped Treebark was getting the benefit of that, too. He did seem like he was healing.
John was sleeping deeply now, something she’d not yet seen him do, since he typically came awake at the slightest sound. She could take the knife he’d left on the side table and cut his throat.
She thought of the day on the beach when he’d trusted her enough to curl up behind him. She’d rewarded his trust with four wounds on his chest that had become permanent scars.
It alarmed her some, to realize her hand was on the knife, fingers curled around the hilt. When she’d felt the pull of the rope around her throat, that horrible vortex of energy at her back like boiling water too close to the skin, the rage had broken open inside her.
That terrible rage that always lived within her had howled at the betrayal, at John’s betrayal. Animal response had taken over, so no matter how illogical it was, she’d been absolutely certain he’d engineered this. He’d won her trust, her body, just to get close to her and take her off guard. If he’d been close enough to her, she would have killed him without hesitation. She’d been heedless of her own fate; just determined that he would not survive to see it.
She lifted the blade as the snakes moved restlessly over her, picking up her mood. So sharp. It would cut into flesh so easily. He kept his weapons well honed. He was a fighter. He was foolish to sleep around her simply because she reassured him. Just as she’d been foolish to trust him for the same reasons. Why could she never learn?
Because he has done nothing to betray you. Nothing. That darkness inside her was a worse vortex than what had opened behind her before she fell off the ledge. It was the gloom she’d expended on those who’d come to her shore before him. She often thought that the ritual the priestesses had performed had taken her soul when it turned her outer body into a monster’s. Perhaps that was why she could remember so little of that night.
She’d implied she’d let some of the others leave the island. That was a lie. Except for that young girl and her friends, she’d let none of them go. They’d all died here. She remembered how unexpected it had been, that first time interlopers had come to her island. An abyss had opened up inside her when she saw their intent was to harm her, mock her, treat her as a monster. In those early days, she didn’t even really remember killing them, not until she came to shore later and saw the motionless statues. But eventually she did, and she acted with full knowledge of her actions. Ironically becoming exactly what they accused her of being.
Why had she lied to him? Because she didn’t want him to believe her a monster, to know that when she was threatened, the darkness was as much a part of the spell that had been placed upon her as anything else. Or so she told herself.
It was better for him to think she was like a wounded predator, striking out in fear. Not because she wanted to kill and harm, to assuage this rage inside her.
He was alive because of the grandmother and grandson. That was why he’d made it this far. They’d reached inside her and found her humanity, at a terrible cost. But the darkness was so close. Too close. She’d given herself to it far too many times. John was the exception. Whoever came after him would meet the same fate as those who had come before.
“Goddess, help me,” she whispered to herself, bowing her head. The pain inside was too much. She closed her hand over the blade, intending to cut into her flesh, move the pain from within to without. She gasped as his hand clamped down on hers, and she looked up to see John Pierce’s eyes open, his mouth set in a thin line as he pushed up on an elbow and took it from her.
“No,” he said.
“I killed all of them,” she blurted out. “I lied. I was not afraid. I wanted them dead. Had it not been for the grandson, you would have been dead, too. This evil, it comes upon me. I look at you asleep, vulnerable, and I think of killing you, merely so I won’t have to have this endless ache inside me, waiting for your true side to show. I can’t let down my guard around you, and it’s exhausting.”
“Yeah, I get that.” He spoke slowly, his steel-gray eyes measuring whatever he saw in her face. His fingers had eased on her wrist, but she still felt their hold. He wasn’t letting her go. “But you did trust me. You’ve been sleeping for the past few days.”
“It suited your objective to return me to health. I could find an explanation for your behavior that allowed me to sleep. Plus, I had no choice, injured as I was.” She tried to remove herself from his grip, and felt a surge of anger when he wouldn’t let go. “Do not excuse my actions. I am not some helpless damsel, broken in mind.”
“You’re not helpless at all, my lady. But yeah, you are broken. You just told me so. Being around anyone is exhausting for you, Medusa. You’re not used to it. And you’re always waiting for them to hurt you, which makes it doubly strenuous. Just because I get that doesn’t mean I’m making excuses for you. I just won’t give up on you.”
Her fingers curled into tight knots over his. “I do not know how to do this with you.”
“You don’t have to know. We can just feel our way.” He paused, and his fingertips stroked her pulse. “What happens if you say fuck it, I’m going to trust the crazy guy from the portal? I’m going to stop worrying about it and, if he betrays me, the hell with it. I’ll tear out his liver when the time comes. If it never happens, well…maybe over time, that feeling, that worry, will lessen. You just have to weather through it until repetition, waking up each day and going to bed each night trusting me, starts to make it true.”
She blinked, and he took the knife from her hand, putting it on the opposite side o
f the bed, behind him. “Is that what you have done?” she asked slowly. “You will trust me, even if I one day end you?”
“I expect you will be what ends me,” he said mildly. “One way or another. But it’s the end I’ve chosen. I’ve chosen you, on every level.” He squeezed the hand she’d intended to cut, lifted it to his mouth and kissed her palm. “Don’t let me catch you doing that shit again or I’ll wear your ass out.” He flopped back down on the bed and turned his back—turned his back—to her. A few minutes later, he was snoring.
She didn’t know whether she should be insulted or laugh with despair. She didn’t know if he was really asleep or if he did actually snore, but she sat there, fists clenched, mind whirling. She fought the darkness, beat it back, and focused on the man on her bed. The man who’d held her, taught her to trust her body’s responses again, who coaxed things from her she never expected. Who had no fear of her, yet acknowledged her strength and power as a fighter.
I expect you will be what ends me.
She wondered if the same was true for her, but wondered if he meant it as she felt it now. Not an ending of her life, but ending of parts of her life she wanted to end, so she could embrace a different beginning.
With a sigh, she slid onto the bed, stretching out behind him on her hip. There really wasn’t room for both of them, but it worked out, because her wing beneath was clear of the bed, trailing along the floor. Her injured wing was on the upper side of her body and, while not completely comfortable in this position, it was comfortable enough. She slid her arm under John’s, and felt a spurt of confusing pleasure and relief when he shifted, pressing his muscular backside into the cradle of her thighs and abdomen. He wrapped his fingers around her hand and held it close to his chest, her talons ironically resting on the scars she’d already given him.
“Let them come if they’re going to come, sweetheart,” he muttered. “MyTech, your people, your darkness, my darkness. We’ll knock all those bowling pins down together.”