The Shaman of Kupa Piti

by A. Nybo

  In complete contrast to Leon’s inner turmoil, Sergei exuded composure with the barest hint of wildness in his eyes. Sergei stood back in invitation, and without sparing a glance at Simon, Leon stepped into the room. Sergei closed the door behind him.

  “Do you need my help with Evgeni, or are the police just dead weight?” Leon asked.

  Sergei cocked his head to the side. His nostrils flared briefly, as if he were cataloguing Leon’s needs and desire with his sense of smell. He stepped into Leon’s space. “I need you.”

  Despite feeling like prey under a predator’s gaze, Leon maintained his stance and cleared his throat. “I meant with this case.”

  Sergei’s head came forwards a fraction, closing in on Leon’s neck, and Sergei tipped his nose up as though catching a scent on the wind. It was thrilling and intimidating all at once.

  “I… I don’t know…,” said Leon, distracted by the potency of Sergei’s slow movements.

  If there ever had been pretence, Sergei dropped it altogether and openly sniffed Leon with deep inhales.

  “…whether…”

  Sergei’s eyes sank closed as he moved his face up Leon’s neck to his cheek.

  “…I’m just….”

  Maintaining such a small distance between their faces without touching, Sergei must’ve been using the heat from Leon’s skin as a guide. The power of Sergei’s concentrated attention made Leon weak at the knees.

  As Sergei’s lips came near his, Leon breached the final distance. The slow gentleness of the touch allowed him to fully experience the softness of Sergei’s lips and the depth to which his own could sink into them. A soft groan escaped him, and he knew if he didn’t stop now, he wouldn’t be able to. He broke the kiss as slowly and gently as he had entered into it.

  Sergei’s eyes remained closed, and although Leon drew back, Sergei followed, his face staying close. “Come back, Leon.” Sergei’s warm breath whispered across his cheek, but it was the sensual inflection Leon couldn’t defy.

  Entranced, Leon leaned forwards to reclaim Sergei’s lips. Heady sensations pulled him into a lustful haze. He offered no resistance to Sergei’s calm movements as he turned them in a half circle to press Leon’s back against the wall, as if offering Leon time and opportunity to resist. Sergei undid the button and zip on Leon’s jeans and slid his hand down beneath the waistband of Leon’s trunks.

  As if of their own accord, Leon’s arms went around Sergei’s shoulders and drew him in so Sergei’s firm upper body pressed against him. As Sergei wrapped his hand around Leon’s hard-on and exposed his sensitive glans, Leon breathily kissed and nibbled at Sergei’s neck and ear. Sergei’s hand was cold in comparison to Leon’s heat, but in seconds the temperature evened out.

  Sergei’s opening strokes were enough to squeeze precome from Leon’s slit, and he used the foreskin to catch and spread the moisture to the sensitive underside where head and shaft met. As Leon’s excitement grew, he reached down to free Sergei’s erection. Sergei added a twist to his strokes, and a few quick slides had Leon on tiptoes, trying to relieve the delicious intensity before he prematurely came undone. He wanted to luxuriate in this moment.

  Breathing heavily and pressing against Sergei, Leon sought out his mouth and unleashed a passionate kiss on him. Sergei yanked his head away, but a flicker of pain in his eyes was quickly replaced with a glimmer of humour. One corner of his mouth lifted in a droll smirk. “Be gentle with me, Leon. I am an injured man.”

  Leon smiled apologetically and leaned his forehead against Sergei’s. “Sorry. No kissing in the heat of the moment. Anything else I need to be aware of?”

  Sergei started up the stroking again. “General care,” he whispered against Leon’s cheek. The statement sounded more like a claim of excitement, and they were right back to where they’d been, both struggling to keep their pleasure quiet.

  “Turn around,” whispered Sergei.

  “We can’t. The cop is out there, and we don’t have lube or a condom.”

  Sergei drew back and grasped Leon’s chin so he couldn’t turn away. “I’m not going to fuck you, Leon. I’m not clear yet.” Sergei grinned and kissed the corner of Leon’s mouth, the growing stubble still a little prickly against the tender skin of Leon’s lips. “Don’t think it hasn’t been on my mind, though.”

  Leon kissed the bony part of Sergei’s nose below the bridge. He grinned. “I don’t know whether to say ‘that’s a shame’ or ‘who says I’d let you fuck me anyway?’” He kept stroking Sergei’s hard-on.

  “I don’t much care how we connect.” Sergei delivered a kiss to Leon’s cheek. “I just want us to.” He breathed by Leon’s ear. “Somehow. Anyhow.” Then Sergei snorted quietly. “Now turn around. Your last kiss shows me we can’t be trusted not to injure me further.”

  Leon moved, and before he’d completed the turn, Sergei was yanking Leon’s jeans down to his thighs. Leon tried not to laugh at the man’s eagerness. His humour was quickly lost to excitement when Sergei pressed his cock into the cleavage of his arse and thrust as he simultaneously stroked Leon’s erection.

  Cool air brushed against Leon’s buttcheeks as Sergei stepped back and used the tip of his cock to paint Leon’s cleft with precome. Moving back in against him, Sergei renewed the rhythm.

  The way Sergei strained against him made Leon want to feel Sergei inside him. He could imagine so clearly how potent it would feel to have Sergei stretching him, stirring him to rapture. He clenched in desire as he thrust into Sergei’s hand, and with his arms stretched behind him, he held Sergei’s hips hard against him and pressed his arse back.

  Leon’s balls began to tighten, and he suffered momentary surprise when Sergei’s other hand clamped over his mouth—he hadn’t realised how loud he’d become. Recovery from his surprise was quick, but when Sergei bit the crook of his neck, he fought to keep quiet as his body spasmed and come spurted against the wall.

  Lost in ecstasy for moments, he gradually became aware of several suppressed huffs as they came from over his shoulder. The flap of material against his back was followed by Sergei’s fingers digging into his hips, his mouth pressed to Leon’s nape. Sergei’s body went rigid, and with a suppressed grunt, he convulsed several times before his muscles loosened and his weight came onto Leon.

  They remained still until their breathing calmed. Sergei ran his hand up beneath Leon’s shirt and caressed his stomach as he delivered several kisses to Leon’s shoulder. He sucked softly on the skin of Leon’s neck and held him for a moment longer before he stepped back. The breaking of the connection left Leon feeling desolate, and he rested his forehead against the wall while he collected himself.

  He pulled his jeans up and zipped them as he turned around. Sergei removed the shirt he’d thrown over his cock before he came so he didn’t release over Leon’s back and balled it up before using it to continue mopping the remnants that had dripped down amongst the dark orange curls on his groin.

  “I guess come all over my back would have looked a little suspicious.”

  “Just a little.” Sergei smiled and gave himself a few last swipes.

  The welts criss-crossing Sergei’s chest were little more than bruises now, but they looked bloody vicious. Most of them were paling from black to purple and green, but there were a few that remained an undeveloped red colour.

  Sergei’s eyes twinkled with mischief. “One day, Leon, I will get to hear your uninhibited pleasure.”

  The thrill of excitement Leon experienced from the promise of a replay was overwhelmed by deflation from his lack of control. Any professionalism he had managed to fool himself into believing he still possessed was now in tatters.

  Sergei wiped the wall where Leon’s come had spurted and threw the soiled shirt near his bag. He pulled a clean shirt over his head before glancing at Leon. “Regrets?”

  Leon moved to sit in a chair that was off to one side of the bed. “Yes… no. I don’t know.”

  “Well, that’s clear.”

  “I th
ink I need to resign from this case.”

  Sergei grew still. “I would prefer you didn’t. If that means anything to you.”

  “Why? So we can continue this”—Leon waved a hand between them—“whatever it is?”

  “I’m not going to mislead you, I want more from you than what we just shared, but I also need you to be Doris.” Sergei sat on the edge of the bed facing Leon. “I need someone who can watch over me. To fight this, I am going to need to engage in the spirit world, and if Evgeni finds me unprotected, he will kill me without physical resistance.”

  “If you are going to fight Evgeni in the spirit world, how is he going to be in this one at the same time and you can’t?”

  “If I am right, it is not Evgeni I am going to fight. He is here to kill me while I am otherwise engaged. No, I think my fight is with the Karelian.”

  Leon didn’t know what to think or the best way to deal with this. Sergei clearly needed help with Evgeni, but how could he, in good conscience, allow this to continue? Jesus, what was he thinking? Did he really have any good conscience left after what he’d just done with a witness? As if that wasn’t bad enough, the AFP would crucify him for doing it with a male witness. Of course discrimination laws wouldn’t allow them to do it openly, but experience was a great mithridate of naiveté.

  “Stop it.” Sergei set a hand on Leon’s lower arm. His flecked hazel eyes were so focussed on him, Leon could believe Sergei was seeing his very thoughts. “You are worrying about something that is so miniscule in the scheme of things.”

  “Really?” Leon bit out. “I’ve just breached professional protocol. I’ve compromised the situation to a level that is a potentially terminable offence.”

  “Who’s going to know? Besides, would you seriously consider it more important, or even equally important as saving lives?”

  “I’ll know, and we don’t know for sure that Evgeni is going to kill again. Even if he does, it’s not as if another cop can’t do whatever it is I would do.”

  “Leon, another cop couldn’t do what you would do.”

  Leon snapped his gaze up to study Sergei. “Why not? I’m not doing anything special—except fucking around with a witness.”

  “That’s definitely part of it,” said Sergei. With hands clasped around a raised knee, Sergei leaned back. “This thing between us isn’t just a chance occurrence. We need to have a close connection. I think we’re being guided into it.”

  Fuck, was Sergei really going to throw spirituality in the face of his career with the AFP? Leon drew breath to speak, but Sergei held up a staying hand.

  “Very few shamans have—” Sergei stopped abruptly and regrouped before continuing on a completely different tack. “I had a dream this morning. In it there was a wild boar attacking and killing people. I walked down to a murky river, and the boar followed me, but it came down a different track. I heard it come after me, and I started to run, but then you barked from behind me, and the boar stopped midway between us.”

  “I barked,” Leon said disdainfully. “What was I, a dog?”

  Sergei broke into a grin. “You were a seal. But I knew it was you instantly because it had your little silver patch.” Sergei touched the patch of hair above his ear.

  Leon pulled his head from the touch. “A seal.”

  Ignoring him, Sergei continued. “The boar attacked me. I had blood all over me, but you came and helped me kill it. It disappeared, but we kept heading towards each other, and when we touched, a beautiful beach with white sand was by the river, which was so clear we could see the stones on the bottom even though they were at least two lengths away. Then you led me across the beach to the water, and we dove in.”

  “That’s a real nice dream, Sergei.” Since the dream obviously meant something to Sergei, Leon tried hard not to sound derisive. “But it doesn’t help.”

  “I’m sorry it doesn’t help you, but it is clear that the spirits mean us to be together. If you agree and we survive this, it will be the beginning. It tells me you are the person that will lead me down the path I need to go.” Sergei’s bitter chuckle surprised him. “Probably the same path I’ve been trying to avoid since my father’s death.”

  “What path is that?”

  Sergei unclasped his hands from his leg and set his foot on the floor. He rested his elbows on his knees, focussing as he pulled tight a thread he’d plucked from somewhere. “I was meant to be noaidi, but I haven’t come close since my father….” He let the sentence tail off. “Anyway, I ran from it all. I did as little as necessary to survive without constantly falling to spirit sickness, and….”

  “What’s that, spirit sickness?”

  A dry smile twisted Sergei’s lips. “The spirits do not like to be ignored. They harass me to the point it is a very emotionally painful state of being. They induce me to look quite mad in the eyes of others if I refuse to pay them attention.” Sergei shook his head in dismissal. “I have barely been a shaman.” He threw his hands in the air. “Who knows, maybe this is their way of bringing me back to where I belong.”

  Leon’s heart sank. “So you’d go back to Murmansk?”

  “What?” Sergei looked aghast. “No. Heritage connects me to the Sámi, but I have found a different way. I belong in three worlds, not a particular geographical location. Most people’s horizons are on a horizontal plane, mine are on a vertical plane. I don’t want to go back. I want to go forwards, but if I go forwards, I want to be running to something, not away from it.”

  “Well, there’s no point running to me,” Leon said, his scathing tone hinting at his own troubles. “At the moment I can’t even fight my way out of a professional dilemma that, as you point out, doesn’t need to be a dilemma unless I make it one.”

  Sergei smiled. “That’s what comes from being a man of integrity, Leon.”

  “Integrity?” he huffed. “It would seem that’s one thing I lack.”

  “Not at all. You wouldn’t have thought twice about becoming involved with me if you lacked it.”

  “What would you suggest I do?”

  Sergei snorted. “You’re asking that of an erstwhile shaman?”

  Leon liked that Sergei pointed out the irony. “Who else is there?”

  There was a knock at the door.

  Sergei lifted an eyebrow.

  “No,” hissed Leon.

  “Come in,” Sergei called.

  The door opened, and Leon held his breath, hoping Sergei wasn’t about to put a version of the dilemma to the cop, who poked his head in the door.

  “Changeover is about to occur,” Simon said.

  “I’ll be there in a minute,” Leon replied before Sergei could say anything.

  The cop nodded and backed out, closing the door as he went.

  “You know,” said Sergei, “if I had my drum I could always use it for divination and ask the spirits, but I already know what they’d say.”

  “What would they say?”

  Smiling, Sergei leaned forwards, pinched Leon’s chin, and jiggled it. “That we are meant to be together.”

  Taking Sergei’s hand from his chin, Leon stroked his fingers, kissed them, and then let go as he stood. “Would you tell me even if they said otherwise?”

  Sergei gave him a sly grin. “Don’t you trust me?”

  “With a smile like that? Not bloody likely.” Leon turned and left, Sergei’s chuckle trailing behind him.

  Chapter 11

  LEON LOOKED at the screen on his phone and pressed the Answer button. “Hi, Charlie. What’s up?” Rising from the airport café table, he set the wrap he was having for lunch on his plate.

  “We’ve got a few results back from forensics. The second set of prints on Miro’s vehicle match those you sent through for Evgeni Volkov, and the bones from the end of the drive at Sergei’s claim were kangaroo tibias.”

  “So what happened to Miro’s bones?”

  “Maybe they were the bones we found in the kangaroo at Goodwin’s mine.”

  “What the hell i
s this guy playing at? Musical bones?”

  “No idea,” said Charlie. “We’ve left a photo of Volkov in most of the shops and pubs, but no one has reported a sighting. We’ve sent his details to surrounding towns from Marla to Woomera. But still nothing. Volkov has to be getting his fuel and supplies from somewhere.”

  “The guy is a ghost,” said Leon in agreement. It wasn’t the first time he’d used that term in reference to Evgeni, and it struck him as odd that he kept going back to it. Maybe it was Sergei’s influence, with all the talk of spirits.

  Charlie heaved a sigh. “Well, I guess we just keep doing what we’re doing and hope someone can identify him. With a bit of luck, he’ll have a car crash and need our help to get out.”

  Leon snorted. “That would be the courteous thing for him to do. Somehow I don’t think manners are high on his list.”

  “No. How is Sergei?”

  “We’re at the airport now. I managed to convince him to stay long enough to have his stitches removed and a check-up, but now that’s done, he’s refusing to stay any longer.”

  “Why does that not surprise me?” asked Charlie. “He strikes me as the bloody-minded type. What’s your game plan?”

  “Well, since he has refused police protection where it can be offered, it depends largely on your beneficence, and partly on how flexible Sergei is prepared to be. I’ll sound him out and let you know, if you give your end some thought. I can cover one shift, if I can get access to the internet wherever we set it up. Other than that? He’s on his own.” It wasn’t what Leon wanted, but he couldn’t offer Sergei resources if he wasn’t prepared to take them where they were available.

  “Right. Well, do you need a pickup at the airport?”

  “That would be great if it’s doable.”

  After they hung up, Leon returned to the table to finish his lunch. Sergei was just finishing his sandwich.

  “You’ve already said you prefer to be at home rather than staying elsewhere,” said Leon. “But we can’t offer you protection if that’s the case. If I’m to do one of the shifts, then I need to be somewhere where we have access to the internet. I don’t know if Charlie can spare the manpower.”