I was ready to give my virginity to her.
For the next fight, a thick, burly woman I recognized as one of the goatherds faced off against a sekɪwa I'd seen when I first came through, the same one who'd thrown her laundry at me.
But I needed a bath. Amid the heavy smell of sweat from the crowd around us, I still caught the coconut blossom in Miyani's hair. Amber light from lanterns throughout the back end of the castle grounds reflected off thick muscles in her legs, and I needed a bath right now.
I tapped Blue's neck. He'd lain across both our laps and acted like he was asleep even though his muscles twitched in response to every blow in the last fight. Miyani laughed. "tuzubo, pʊ baɣe!"
He squawked, raised his neck, and turned his head around to put one eye with a black, vertical slit on each of us.
She and I got up, and he stood on his hind legs, stretching out his tail.
Miyani brought his lizard face close to hers and cooed something.
He squawked and sat next to Bilal and Renou. Miyani and I escaped through sweaty bodies while men cheered the two women stretching out their arms. The sekɪwa in the stone circle raised her middle finger and sneered at someone in the audience while we were leaving.
My heart thundered and I couldn't breathe. This was the moment.
"pʊ xeŋise!" She took my hand and led me past stone buildings along the outer wall, away from the light and through shadows. We passed between two of the mud hut apartments towards the central area. Moonlight broke through a cloud overhead to cast faint blue over a ring of bricks and a small tree, and I could barely hear the crickets over my own heartbeat. The sensation of her hand in mine pulling me through the darkness, the giddy smile in her voice, this felt right.
This was right.
We crept through the common area to the side, between two mud walls and off to the left behind another mud building. A delicate amber glow filled the ground around the corner, and she brought me to a large, wooden wash basin filled with water that smelled clean beneath a paper lantern.
Her curvaceous silhouette in the flickering candlelight drove me insane.
She turned around and brought me closer to the lantern. Half her dark-green skin was cast in low amber and her face beamed up at me. I couldn't wait. I lifted my thumbs to her nipples and stroked gently across. She allowed it and shifted her yellow eyes back and forth between mine with her lips cracked open. I covered both her breasts in my hands and squeezed gently, wrapping my fingers over them. My mind shuddered over the sensation of her taut nipples in my palms. She smiled lightly and watched my eyes.
Miyani rested her hand over my heart and held still as if listening for something. She giggled lightly. "Your heart fast!"
I took a deep breath. I was racing. I'd never known excitement, not like this.
Her smile melted away. "You want that you are sure you this?"
Her arms were feminine power at its fullest. Strong, graceful and firm, wrapping my fingers over her muscles was like probing the greatest wilderness. I wanted her. I wanted her, and nothing else in the world mattered. "I'm sure."
My shirt was drenched in sweat. She peeled it away from me with a laugh while I dropped my trousers.
I was ready.
Her fingers crawled over my shaft, and her other hand pulled me down into her lips. And as we kissed, I rolled my fingers down her back until I could fit them beneath the silk belt of her yithi. From there, I sated my world in the sublime curvature of her body and knelt so my hands could trail down over her delicious legs to her adorable feet.
I couldn't stop myself. On my knees, I picked up one of her feet as she stepped out of her garment and kissed around her ankle. I kissed my way back up her leg, across her knee, and up her thighs, one after the other, and wrapped my arms around her legs to pull her in close.
Her skin smelled faintly of coconut blossom. It was all I could do to rub my face in her thighs, desperate for more and more of her.
She giggled and ran her fingers through my hair. Then she grasped at the back of my neck and pulled my face right into her pussy.
And so I thrust my tongue between her legs and flicked upward, allowing the tip to glide across her folds. Oh, the taste of her! Like sweet, intoxicating musk. I opened my lips wide and kissed all over her mound. Left, right, up, down, I filled my lips with the soft hair of her pussy before gliding my tongue deeper into her folds.
She groaned and held my head in place. I licked the wetness from her, only for her to give me more wetness. I pressed in to pull her clitoris between my lips and sucked. She exhaled sharply and moaned, sifting her fingers through my hair.
A sudden noise. Something fell.
I jumped.
A jolt of terror shot through my chest.
A dark form ducked low in the shadows.
My fingers shook.
Miyani scolded the shadow. "mewa ʃæ'ize ʃa ga'ibiɣe!"
Caws and clicks answered, and the giant lizard scampered off.
I sat in the cool water by the edge of the washbasin trying to stop my fingers from trembling. I felt her fingers on my shoulders behind me, and she gently stroked my arms. "Is only Blue."
I'd figured as much, but my nerves were already shot. I closed my eyes and breathed in deep.
Behind me, the sound of soap being ran across a washrag, and a crisp perfume wafted over to me. Miyani started scrubbing circles around my shoulder, down my back, my arms, my neck. She leaned in, pressed her body into my back and reached her arm over my shoulder to scrub across my chest. She whispered. "You talk, I listen."
That made me laugh. I turned my face to kiss her lips. "What should I talk about?"
"What you want?"
Her fingers worked soap through my hair, and I turned around.
The overhead lamp painted highlights all over her naked body dotted in sparkling water droplets, but her face trapped my eyes. Her pixie-cut white hair framed round, high cheeks and wide eyes. She leaned in and became a shadow straddling my legs, and she lowered herself into me. I pushed my fingers up along her body until I found her breasts once more, and worked her taut nipples around in circles, pinching them gently between my soapy fingers and allowing them to slip free only to go at them again.
She lowered herself against me and reached into the water to grasp at my swollen cock and held me in place, bringing her mound against my shaft.
I felt like I was about to explode.
She kissed me.
I kissed her back.
We pulled apart for a moment, and she rested her forehead on mine, looking down and toying her fingers around the tip while pulling my shaft against her mound. She whispered. "You are sure?"
"Yeah," I whispered back.
She pulled away and sat down in the water in front of me.
I got up to take her, but she put one hand on my shoulder and directed me to sit back down. "Caleb, you have first time. Sure you sure that you want? With me?"
"I've never been so sure of anything." I sat up. I wanted to consume her.
Once again she held up a hand to steady me. "Your god is OK?"
"If you don't want to, it's OK. I'll understand."
"No!" she leaned in to grab hold of my arms. "I want!"
She kissed my lips and pulled away to tell me again. "I want!"
And I melted into her. She became my everything. I rolled my hands all over her body and lifted her out of the water, pushing her back to sit on the edge of the washbasin and spread her legs.
She kissed me hard and wrapped her fingers over my cock, stroking and squeezing, then looked down and brought me to her entrance.
Oh, the sensation of her wet, warm skin enveloping me! Never could I have imagined this, and I finished.
Just like that.
My whole body pulsated in waves and sprayed slimy goo all over.
Miyani pulled my face down to kiss me, but I was trying to catch my breath.
It was supposed to last longer. "I'm sorry!"
"No sory!" her voice was light.
"That was too quick…"
"Shh," she kissed me again. "No sory! I like!"
Was that even an inch?
My hands shook, and my heart pounded. My whole body felt spent, and she gently guided me to sit back down in the water. "I like!"
Again she straddled me, wrapped her arms around my body to pull me in close, and kissed my lips, only to pull away long enough to whisper, "I like!" and kissed me again.
I wanted to spend forever with her in my arms. Our lips danced, and nothing else mattered.
Until something sniffed my side.
I jumped, and his lizard face in the lamplight chirped back at me, sniffing up and down my body.
Miyani waved him off. "vʌ ŋo'oze zuʒʊ!"
Once again Blue squawked and disappeared into the shadows.
She shouted after him. "'oto zætubiɣe!"
He chirped. I tried to laugh it off, but I was still shaken.
Miyani directed me to stand and filled the rag with a strong lather that once again saturated the air with sharp perfume. She cast her eyes all over my body with a smile that filled her wide, round face. Her wet, naked body shimmering in the lamplight was a glimpse of heaven.
She scrubbed in circles starting with my chest. "You talk, I listen!"
There was something. My heart jumped into the back of my throat. "Actually, I do need to talk to you about something."
My breath grew shallow. I didn't know how she was going to handle this, and I felt like a jerk for not mentioning it sooner. "I spoke to Chaos."
"Ahh," she scrubbed around my legs and lifted up each of my ankles, inspecting my skin in the light. "Didi says this. Inferno also, yes?"
"Yeah, but I said something to Chaos that I probably shouldn't have. I'm afraid I put you in danger. I should have thought about it… I didn't think about it, I just spoke. It was in the moment, and my mouth went off in ways I didn't stop to think about what I was setting you up for, and…"
"What you say?" She found a few of those white worm-eggs on my heel and picked them out with her fingernails, then scrubbed my feet clean.
I swallowed my breath and forced the words out. "I told her… she… has pretty ears."
Miyani stopped everything and looked directly at my face. Then, after a few blinks, she went back to scrubbing my legs. "The explens. Today she hunts at me."
My mind broke and I froze. A chill washed over my skin, I sat down to face her. "She came after you?"
Miyani grinned wide and set her hand over my heart again. "Is OK. She has name Chaos because she, eh… what is… vʌ ba fosiye?"
"No can… she's unpredictable?"
Her eyes went wide. "Big word!"
That made me laugh.
"Thy say she this… un-pe-di?"
"Unpredictable?"
"This word because dangeris. But I know. She this word because meat. I shoot almost. Today she escape me. Tomorrow…"
"So… you're OK with me putting you up to that?"
Miyani grinned and leaned in close to kiss my lips again. "Which ear you want? Right or left?"
She had me. I was hers.
We stood naked together beside the bath with the lamplight flickering above. My mind prayed for spontaneous daylight, I longed to see her fully. To sate my eyes in her.
She poured oil into her palm from a small decanter and rubbed it into my skin. I wasn't about to miss out on that, so I reached for some oil to rub into hers.
"Wait," her voice smiled. "My fun part."
I laughed again. "Your fun part?"
"Yes," she grinned, saturating my chest up and down with her fingers. "You talk. I listen."
"How about you talk, instead? What's one thing you want to tell me, but don't know the words?"
A squawk and more chirps and clicks called out from the shadows.
She rolled her eyes and looked down with an exasperated sigh, then shook her head with a muted laugh. "'eʒu!"
I laughed with her. "What does he want me to know?"
"He wants that I say how, eh… he wins his name."
"He won his name?"
"'uzi gʊŋaze ŋæɣʊviza."
"How he got his name?"
"ti. How he got his name. He says that you think because blue stripe for his body. Yes?"
"That's not it?"
"No."
She was very thorough. She worked her oily fingers into every muscle in my chest, my back, my butt, my legs, my balls, every inch of me many times over until she ran out of oil, then groped all over my skin some more with a wide grin across her gorgeous face. "He was baby when he look sky at dry season. He wonders at mountain in sky and says what is there? He wants see. Pu'iyo says Heralia is there. He says 'I go there.' Pu'iyo says 'you no can live there because a lot cold.' Still he looks sky. So Pu'iyo says 'he wins… got Herali name for Blue sky.'"
When she was done, I couldn't get more than a few drops of oil, but that didn't stop me from putting my fingers everywhere they wanted to be. I knelt low, and she giggled while I worked imaginary oil into her skin. Between her legs, gliding up along her thighs, up and around her glorious arse, back down her arse, I lingered a lot on her arse, and she giggled more at that.
My fingers traced the bite scar on her shoulder on the side opposite her white bat's wing tattoo. "How did you get this?"
"Is Blue."
My eyes opened wide and I pulled back for a moment.
She smiled up at me. "Is bond. All sekɪwa has this."
"All of you?"
"ti. They say, eh… bond no finish before bite. But need, eh… we say suve maða."
"suve maða… uh…" It took me a moment to recall those words. "Natural anger?"
"Yes. Need suve maða bite and finish bond."
"So wait," I tried to assemble the pieces. "You have to legitimately piss him off until he bites you, and only then the bond is complete?"
She paused to work through my words in her head, then nodded. "Yes! No can try. Need natural anger."
"What did you do?"
"I take his food."
"What?"
She laughed. "I say is no good. You will sick. I take, he bites. Tomorrow he xatʌ very bad."
"Very bad?"
"Oh!" she smiled wide. "Very, very bad 'awafixatʌ."
"Water-shit?"
"Yes," she laughed. "'awafixatʌ everywhere! He no cans move and sleeps whole day. Very bad!"
Eventually we made it to the stall, where we lay down together in the soft, shredded-coconut-husk bedding. Blue lay across the opening to block anyone from casually looking in. She snuggled her body into mine, resting her head on one of my arms and folding my other around her like a blanket, lacing our fingers together. I kissed her neck and whispered. "I want to know everything about you."
In the morning, my spirit was overcome with power. Waking up with her in my arms, feeling her body with mine in the encroaching daylight, knowing where we went together last night—
God would understand.
Right?
I wanted to stay with her, but she hopped up instead. "I have idea!"
Just as quick, she sat up and reached into a sack she'd kept in the corner. I lay in the bedding addicted to her sublime figure. She peeked over her shoulder, saw me looking, and giggled lightly before pulling out a cotton loincloth.
I was entranced by the way her body moved, sliding the simple cotton up across her legs and onto her hips. "What's your idea?"
She flashed me a sly grin and spoke very quickly. "ʃoθo dima wæfɪðase ŋuwe ʃa ʒʌgu."
I scratched my head. She didn't normally talk to me so fast, but she eyed me with an expectant grin.
"Uh…"
She slowed it down. "About…"
"No. Say it again at full cadence."
Words came out as a blur, but remarkably, I was able to pick them apart. I think. "You… want to… no. dima?"
She nodded, still smiling wide.
"You plan to teach the recruits about the jungle?"
"ti!" She smiled effusively.
"OK," I sat up. "Uh… plan you teach is what thing?"
She nodded, then looked away and frowned, searching the world with her eyes. Then she looked at me and shrugged. Again, she didn't slow down for me. "ki'i zoʃu'udexa."
She had to think about that. "We think us maybe."
She furrowed her brow, but I was more fascinated by her initial idea. "Why don't you hunt us? Uh… ba tayeseθo?"
Her eyes bulged and she pulled her face back in shock.
"With practice arrows."
"Oh!" she chuckled hard and sat down in the bedding across from me. Her yellow eyes glowed in the impending dawn.
I loved the flow I had with her. The rhythm. Everything was so perfect. "I'll pick twelve of the recruits, we'll go out like it's an op, and you hunt us with practice arrows. Show them what they're up against."
She took a moment to assemble my words, then nodded, "Yes!"
Then she leaned in close to kiss my lips and left.
Her absence left an imprint in my soul that I wanted to absorb and have it become a part of me until I could see her again. It was all I could do to bask in the experience of her. Blue, on the other hand, scooted over to sprawl his body against mine and rested his head in the center of my chest.
So we snoozed for a while.
Breakfast at the Lake of Doom was the same paper-flavored gruel they served at Carthia. I didn't see Ta'o or Bilal, but Renou sat at a table beside a Na'uhui woman and three of the conscripts. Elsewhere in the mess hall, the sekɪwa and the burly goatherd who'd wrestled after we left sat together, and there were clusters of recruits scattered throughout.
I took my bowl over to Renou's table.
Before I could sit down, the woman looked up at me and spoke in a slower cadence than Miyani had used. "Fine sex last night! Good job!"
I blushed. "Thanks."
Then she turned to the recruits and spoke Herali with the same excited tone. "He sex Miyani only one second!"
While she glanced up at me with an excited grin, I froze. I couldn't begin to consider thinking about contemplating what to say or do next. My heart was in my ears, and whatever else was going on faded into a blur.
Two men stood beside me. "Let's go."
"Let's go?" I looked between them.
Each wore a cotton loincloth like mine and had their share of battle scars, and their long hair was tied behind their backs. The man on the left wore a Falcon tattoo on his shoulder. "You Caleb?"
"Yeah?"
The other had a Wolf. "Hoden would like a word with you."
They led me outside and up a staircase to a level above the laundry, through an archway, and down a narrow, dark corridor. A doorway on the left opened to an expansive room with three wide windows overlooking the courtyard and out through the gate beyond to where the goatherds tended their flocks. The left half of the room was bare, nothing but gray and yellow stone walls, floor, and ceiling. To my right was a gathering.
Around a circle table that felt small for the space sat the older Herali gentleman who'd shooed us out the first time I came through here, the important-looking woman, four Herali men dressed as the natives, and a short, muscular Na'uhui woman about Ahmi's age, maybe a few years older, with a bite scar on her knee. The Wolf guy and the Falcon guy each found an empty bag chair like the ones everyone else sat upon.
There was no seat for me.
The older Herali gentleman spoke first. "Caleb of Gath, is it?"
"Yes, sir."
"We haven't been properly introduced. I'm Hoden. I'm the quartermaster here, and this is my wife, Meyisi." He gestured to the important-looking native woman. "These are my captains. I'd give you their names, but you'll forget them all."
An older captain laughed lightly and shook his head.
Hoden held out a hand for the sekɪwa. "And this is Commander gædi."
I bowed my face at them. "It's great to meet you all…"
"What makes you think you can walk in here and pull rank?" One of the captains crossed his arms and glared at me with a stern face. Hoden sat up and raised his eyebrows as if that were his question, too.
"Well, I… uh…" I still couldn't get over what that woman had said out loud in the mess hall.
Another captain crossed his arms. "You just made captain, you don't even have a team yet, and here you are issuing orders like you own the place."
Another added, "we've got seventy-nine juvenile rejects to deal with already; we don't need one more."
"Seventy-eight," the Falcon captain corrected him. "OnTime ripped a guy's head off yesterday morning."
"Please tell me it was that moron from Waziri."
"Sadly, your favorite moron breathes still."
I tried to collect my thoughts. The floor beneath the table had a plush rug that Commander gædi was rubbing her toes in, and Meyisi propped her chin up in one hand with her elbow on the table. One of the captains picked up a cup before him and sipped, another was looking at books on a shelf in the corner.
Hoden fixed his face at me. "I sent a pigeon to ask about your presence here. I thought it was… odd. Princess Rosalynd wrote back." He unrolled a small slip of paper before him. "Her reply was," he cocked his neck. "I'll spare the sensitive ears among us."
Some of the men laughed.
His wife, Meyisi, blinked at me slowly and grinned. "You're to return to Carthia. Immediately."
Another captain, the wolf guy, added with a smirk. "I can hear the headsman grinding his axe from here!"
Then the captain sitting next to Hoden eyed me with a smug grin and leaned forward. "Let me spell it out for you. Ever since we lost Praying Mantis, we've been seeing a lot of enemy activity in this area. We need every capable man out there, and we don't have time to babysit."
"Um…" I hadn't really thought this through. As for Ranía's gift, I couldn't read anything on these people, though I wasn't sure if I felt normal enough. Whatever the hell that felt like.
Meyisi chirped up. "I have an idea! Why don't we put Caleb, here, in charge of babysitting until we can finally get rid of these delinquents?"
Hoden answered his wife as though reading from a script. "But he has to go back to Carthia!"
"Oh," the sekiwa set her cup down and spoke with marked indifference. "It's my line isn't it? Sorry. Yes, um… the road is too dangerous."
Hoden leaned back and gazed at her with a warm smile. "How unfortunate!"
"Here are the rules," Commander gædi settled her yellow eyes on me. "First, you are subordinate to everyone at this table. Is that clear, Second Captain, Caleb of Gath?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Second. You will report to me, daily. Before dinner. I want a full briefing on the day's activities. And third, how this goes will directly influence how long that road remains too dangerous. Do you have any questions?"
"So, I'm beneath you all, talk to you daily, and don't screw up?"
Hoden grinned and looked around the table. "I told you he'd understand!"
I couldn't have asked for a better opportunity. We'd come here to recruit some of these men for our team, what better way than to oversee them all?
Bilal had them all gathered in the sitting area by the courtyard, and he was writing names down on a roll of paper. Rolon of Kyfe rushed up to take me by my shoulder into the center, but some of the men were pointing and whispering.
One of the recruits spoke through barely-contained laughter. "Don't worry, guys, this won't be long!"
Several others laughed.
"Alright, enough!" Bilal shook his head in frustration.
Rolon lifted his chin at my tormentor. "At least he's got a girlfriend, man!"
"For a second, at least!"
More laughter erupted from the conscripts. My heart froze. The shock was so sudden, and I couldn't move. I couldn't breathe.
Another mocked. "And why should we listen to you? You're only a second captain!"
And they laughed.
They knew. Somehow, they all knew.