Heirot

Tenara could tell by the change in his breathing, in the way he laid, he was awake now. "Good morning," she whispered softly, fingers sweeping across his head. "I was just about to... to help your wound." Her hand strayed from his horns to his shoulder and then the place where the knife had been driven into his chest from behind.

He blinked back his shock as he realized she'd been touching his hair. How long had her hand been on his head? He glanced up at her, but it was hard to see from this angle, and he didn't want to rub his horns all over her trying to adjust his angle. For multiple reasons...

He held very still. "Does helping my wound involve touching my hair?"

Tenara blinked, confused. “No…” she said. “It was soft and… I was curious what your horns felt like.” She blushed. It had been soothing to pet his head. Her nerves had eased, and the anxiety had diminished. She didn’t want to compare him to a pet, though. So she cleared her throat and reached for the sword.

He stiffened and pushed himself upright with a wince. "You..."

He was speechless. It was hard to say what was more shocking - that she'd done it, or that she admitted it right to his face. Behind his surprise, a bigger, darker reaction was building. He'd killed people for less. His eyes settled into their ironclad calm. "Just curious? So you did whatever you pleased?"

Her face burned. “I…” Had it been so wrong? She had stroked Rami’s hair often when he lay across her… But Havitharon was not Rami. Perhaps it wasn’t… Of course it wasn’t right. He hated women. He hated her touch. He’d fallen asleep across her out of exhaustion, not because he liked her or felt safe with her.

She sat up as best she could in the space and edged back, to give him room and to get out from beneath him. There wasn’t far to go. She winced as she did, the dried blood painting her skin cracking and flaking, and the pain in her hand announcing it hadn’t faded in the night.

“I didn’t think. It isn’t.. it isn’t a strange thing in my world. It’s a… an act of endearment.”

Havitharon raked a hand through his hair and took a deep breath. "Where I'm from, it's not." He was relieved to feel the anger deflating out from under him. He believed her. And shocked as he was, he was too tired to fight. He leaned back into the wall as best he could, looking as exhausted as he felt. He examined her more closely, now that he was upright. He hadn't properly seen what happened last night. "How do you feel? Were you injured?"

Tenara felt the bite of tears in her eyes. She hated how sensitive she felt, but she was so tired, and in pain, and it all made everything so much heavier than it actually was. He wasn’t angry, at least he didn’t seem so, but she still couldn’t shake the feeling she’d done something wrong to him.

“I’m fine,” she whispered. “It’s not all mine. The blood, I mean.” She did not tell him about the cut on her shoulder or the one on the inside of her thigh. For one, there weren’t enough bandages to go around, and he wouldn’t want her to help him if she were hurt beyond the hand.

She coughed to clear her throat, nodding to his chest. “May I?”

He looked down at his chest grimly. One look at her arm told him what the cost would be for fixing him. That was part of why he couldn't bring himself to be angry at her. The wrapping she applied to him the night before had held up well against the bleeding, but it didn't change what was underneath. If he didn't depend on her to fix it, he wouldn't make it far on foot.

"If you can. Please," he said. "Just so I'm in one piece. Do not overdo it."

Tenara scooted forward on her bum. It was easier than crawling in the space. She thought that they might should leave the cave. It put them too close together, especially when her magic tended to make them feel a certain way. But it was still safe in here, and she didn’t want anyone who might be looking for them to strike when they were—eh—distracted.

Tenara unwrapped the messy wound, wincing at the sight of it on his gray skin. Again, guilt swelled in her.

Her fault. This was her fault.

She pulled the sword to her, placed her hand on it. Tenara had thought about not using the sword, but she still felt too groggy and exhausted for the concentration needed to call her power.

So she ran her thumb along the edge, felt her blood smear the steel. Tenara opened herself to her magic, feeling it swell in her, a lick of power, a rush of need. But… no pain. Not yet.

She removed her hand from the sword and placed it on his chest, smearing her bloody thumb across his skin, painting a red line she wished was drawn by her tongue instead. Tenara shook her head, pressing her palm flat over the wound.

She felt the flesh stitching together, felt her power pouring into him, mending internal damage she couldn’t see. All the while, a pressure of desire and need spread through her, flushing her cheeks and lips and chest. She looked at him to see if he was feeling the same want, but only for a second. She was afraid to see his disgust.

When the final thread of flesh stitched together, she drew her hand away like his skin had scorched her, and fell back against the dirt wall near him. Her hands dug into her dress, knuckles white. She had to hold onto herself, or she would touch him or herself to fill that need for release.

Usually, this was where she would flee the room and coach herself down on the porch, but to get out of here she would have to crawl over him and if she crawled over him…

Tenara grabbed her bandaged hand, thinking she could use the pain to counteract the need. The idea made her nauseated, so it was already working. But, when she looked at her hand, she saw some of the black marks had receded since she’d started healing Havitharon. Healing him… helped her? Was it because she was mending him or because it was magic born of her mother?

It was so hot. Sweat needled on his scalp as her magic pulsed into him, and if he hadn't had the wall behind him, he might have slid to the ground out of sheer helpless need. He dared himself to look at her, his eyes glowing in the dim space between them. This sensation wasn't new, but it was the first time he'd wondered what it might be like to do something about it.

It was like someone was caressing his entire body at once. He thought of her hand on his horns, stroking them. The sense of outrage was barely audible over the rush of excitement it gave him. Shit, was he actually fantasizing about it? For the first time, this wasn't just anonymous pleasure. The need he felt was specifically for her. He felt so good, and her magic kept coming and coming. Instincts he normally repressed rose up like a storm inside him. He wanted her to grab his horns, pin him down into the dirt, and milk him until he screamed... His fingers dug into the earth at his sides as the sensations pummeled into him.

Then, the contact broke. He nearly protested when her hand finally withdrew from him.

Without her spell, he began to sober up almost immediately. Horror at what he'd been imagining began to sink in. That stupid dream was still fresh in his head, and the boundary she'd crossed by touching him that way, the boundary he'd crossed by not retaliating... He'd forgiven her, and yet it was difficult to put an egg back inside its shell. He wasn't ready to trust her. Were these sensations really accidental? She'd told him herself that on this world, they had sex just for pleasure. Was she using him for pleasure as well?

Anger bristled up in him. He touched the smooth skin where his wound had been. "I am whole," he said. Sensations that still hadn't come to a complete stop swam in his voice.

“I’m glad,” she replied, a strained sound in her voice. She showed him her arm, the black lines had faded in some areas to a dull gray stain. “Seems it was good for both of us.” She blushed a little at that, because it sounded different than she intended. Instead of saying something that would dig her in deeper, she nodded to the opening in their shelter. “We should get out and get our bearings.”

Havi leaned forward and examined her arm closely. How? "Using magic caused those scars. What was different about this time?" He phrased it carefully, wondering if she would admit to using him sexually as lightly as she'd admitted to touching his horns.

Tenara shook her head. “I don’t know. I kept waiting for pain and it didn’t come. Maybe because the part of me that can heal is of my mother? She’s the opposite of my fathers’ magic. Or maybe it’s intention? I wanted to help you, where the other times I was trying to harm people? Or maybe… maybe it’s just you? I mean the sword and you, whatever that connection is. I fixed you, and it fixed me. Sort of.” She still felt the pain of the burn, but the rot of her magic had faded somewhat. She wondered, if she kept trying to heal him, would it go away completely.

She bit her lip, letting the proposal simmer for a second. “Got anymore scratches? I could, I could see if mending you reverses the damage?”

His expression flatlined. It was actually true. "So doing that to me heals you?" What should he do when she asked for more so casually? He was angry and worried at the same time. "Do the lines pain you?"

She shrugged “I guess no more than the burn itself.” It did hurt when they formed, but once they’d cut their way across her skin, the only real pain came from the holy wound. That did not seem to get better with healing him.