Healer's Heart
Section 3
by
Ann Marie Olson
Story © 2002 Ann
Marie Olson
Chapter 12
Dimitri knew he'd alienated Danyel completely. Silent, he looked out the other window. Certainly he'd have regretted the necessity for killing Marc if he'd killed Hari. But he'd have done it anyway. "Danyel, I am human."
"With talking about killing a renSime for something they couldn't help?" Danyel's snarl was so like a hunting Sime's Dimitri turned back to him. His wrists throbbed with the need he'd been unable to fulfill for so long.
"There's always a choice, Danyel." He tried to keep the pain from his voice. "Marc chose not to kill."
"Only because you went through a glass window to get to him. If I'd shoved his mother into him with the door ..."
"He'd have killed her." Dimitri finished. "And I'd have had to take him down. Kill him." Dimitri wouldn't hide from himself, even here. "Can't you see it would have torn me apart?"
"But you still would have done it."
"Yes," he said simply. "I would have."
"How could you do it so coldly."
"Because if I allowed myself to hate, for something so cruel, it would turn me cruel." Dimitri knew, far better than most, the cost of holding the power of life and death over the Simes he loved so much. "Danyel, I'd never, ever kill for my own vanity or ego. I love Simes. I find them the most fascinating creatures on earth, but ..." the words stuck in his throat. He tried to swallow down the lump choking him.
"But what, Dimitri?" His tentacles loosened in their sheathes. Dimitri wanted to touch his arms, stroke out his tentacles and feel them so alive against his skin. Instead he looked down at his hands in his lap, so very cold with Danyel's rejection.
"But there is the law. And the law is for everyone." He whispered. "I was nearly killed last winter. If Diomid had not come here." He waived out the window. "I'd not be here now."
"Why?"
"I was accused of rape." The words came out without tone, without inflection. It was as if it had happened to someone else. "I gave a woman, in labor, transfer, without her permission, without being a part of Sergei. For someone not protected by our healer's oaths, such is rape."
"Did you force her?"
"Effectively." He went on. "Legally, yes. I did nothing to stop her. She was in attrition. I offered her my hands ... " Dimitri took a deep breath, "without asking if she were willing."
"She was in labor?"
"Yes," Dimitri nodded. "The child had drawn her down too far and her partner wasn't there. Diomid was there as well. He could have done it. I interfered."
"She didn't know what she was doing." Danyel's misplaced sympathy brought a small, sad smile to Dimitri's face.
"I should have asked when I offered her assistance." Dimitri wished he could rub at his eyes. They ached with the blur passing by outside the windows. "I didn't. I was much younger then. Far more naive."
"From what I know, by your standards, still a child." Danyel's voice was tight, his brows drawn together tight.
"Yes," Dimitri nodded. "Which was part of why my father, Vayer, tried to get Diomid to back down."
"But he'd made up his mind?" A flick of Danyel's tentacle turned it into a question.
"Yes," Dimitri nodded again. "He'd decided, since I'd overrided him in the delivery room, to take out his frustration on me. We often don't match hands. Although we know now not to interfere in each other's specialty. I no longer deliver children, he stays out of surgery." Dimitri smiled sadly to himself as he thought of Mitkya, Gregori and Tanya's son. He was incredibly cute. Even Mitka adored the youngster. "Actually I do nothing with the children unless they are brought in for a major injury."
"Do you like children?" Danyel held up a tentacle. "No, you don't have to answer that question. I could see it in your field yesterday."
"Yes," he chuckled softly to himself. "Usually, now, I only see children when they're mangled from some horrible accident. Diomid takes all the pediatric work as well."
"Why do you let him?"
"I have no choice there. At least not one I'm willing to make otherwise." The ache in Dimitri's chest reappeared, choking off his words. "I'd have to leave Sergei, work as a freeholder, if I wanted to help children. I'm not willing to let people die for my own pleasures."
"How so?"
"I am probably the best surgeon Sergei's produced in over a century." He looked down at his hands again. "I've sewn up everything from slashed laterals to massive head wounds. Often enough on the same victim. Sergei is the home of healers. If I left him, I'd not be able to practice as a surgeon because I wouldn't have the support."
"You could work here." Danyel's misplaced offer made him smile
"No," he shook his head sadly. "Rodina is my mother and my lover, as no human could ever challenge. I love her children, Danyel. I'm here for one of her children, far from home, and to be certain those who visit do no harm to her. I can't abandon her for my pleasures any more than I can abandon Sergei. Not with the price I've paid to be able to heal."
Danyel stiffened suddenly. His field knotted into spirals of confusion. "I've never heard of anyone else talking of the price the healer pays."
"You know of what I speak." This was not a question. Danyel nodded anyway. "You are a healer, Danyel." He turned his hand over, offering it. As if it were a wild, timid creature, Danyel's hand came to rest in his.
"I'm a channel." He shrugged. Slender, delicate looking tentacles twined in the palm of Dimitri's hand. No one he'd ever known had tentacles so fine, not even Nashen. Not that he should have been looking at Nashen's tentacles. "Its what we do."
"No, not all channels are healers." He caressed one of Danyel's ventrals between his fingers. It slid between them, sending little warm shivers of pleasure up his arms. "Only those who still feel."
"But you have to be able to isolate yourself to a certain extent." Danyel's tentacles didn't agree. They were warm and soft in his hand.
"The law." He said simply, giving those incredible digits a gentle squeeze. Vayer had never been even as forward as this with his tentacles. How he wished there'd been someone else who'd been willing to take him on in Russia. If not in love, then in simple friendship. Even his near vision blurred as the thought overwhelmed him. "I am the law in Sergei. The only one in Sergei who can override my decisions is Diomid."
"Not Kirina?" Danyel's tentacles stopped. The sudden cessation of movement left Dimitri off balance.
"No," he shook his head quickly. "Of course not. Kirina does not have the Sergei gift, nor could she. She's Sime, not Gen." Dimitri was not going to go into the genetics. Or at least he'd planned on not doing so.
"Larity linkage?" Danyel asked. As Dimitri was coming to learn, Danyel always stuck his tentacle right in the middle of the knottiest problem.
"Very much so." He tried to loosen his shoulders. Arkay'd given him one of his heavier kadors, probably in hopes Dimitri'd manage to stay out of trouble this morning. "Diomid, my sire, can't sire anything other than male and Sharm Lord. Anything else dies before five months in utero." Dimitri didn't want to think of how many of those abortions had been caused by the veiled. Perhaps he himself would have been aborted if they'd known about Mitka. Although Cadek, Diomid's Veiled twin would have known.
Dimitri'd met him once, formally, at his own Claiming. And even in the incredibly heavy kador of a Veiled Sharm Lord, it had been obvious Cadek had the Sergei gift of prophecy to a crippling degree. He'd come in hopes of being able to turn aside Dimitri's fate. Afterward, Cadek had come to Dimitri in his dreams and given his regrets for the pain Dimitri'd gone through with Salkov. He'd shocked Cadek, he thought, when he'd replied how he'd known it would turn out for the best because of his own foresight.
Although in his waking mind, at the time, it hadn't been for the best. Even still, at night, in the dark, sometimes Dimitri woke bound with Salkov's threats ringing in his ears and Salkov's body falling limp from Dimitri's hands. Certainly it had been in self defense. Salkov had tried to strip him and managed. The violation still cut bone deep.
Dimitri put his hands over his own wrists, thinking of how Salkov's tentacles had first burned, then gone ice cold as Dimitri'd driven selyn into Salkov so hard it shattered his nager, killing him. He could still feel the wrenching sense of loss as Salkov's life fled his body, trying to take Dimitri's with it.
The trial still lived in his mind; where he'd stood before his father and pleaded for his freedom despite Salkov's death. He'd knelt before his father, Lord and Ruler, with the marble hard beneath his knees and the back of his neck bare. A shiver ran through him at the memory of his life at the mercy of his Lord and Ruler, even though he knew Vayer, personally would never do him harm. His sire had been right behind Vayer, nager stone gray and unforgiving, with all the power of the Veiled behind them. Dimitri'd been bound to Salkov, beyond the grave, as Salkov had feared for this very thing.
He'd looked up into his father's slate eyes. They were soft, even as his nager rang with the unforgiving presence of steel. His heart had been as cold. Under the terms of his bond, the Veiled could demand his death here and now, or worse, the ban. He'd shivered, the marble sucking away what little warmth his body tried to hold.
"Dimitri?" Danyel's soft voice, softer even than his accent, startled him badly. He yanked his hands off his arms as if he'd been caught masturbating at Year's Turning.
"Yes?" He croaked, grabbing the seat. The remembered fear of his trial, and worse, his Claiming, held him in icy claws. The car seemed to sway beneath him like a boat rocking at anchor in a storm. For a moment, he had to force his gorge down.
"What is it?" Danyel's field brushed skin with the gentleness of the first snowflakes of winter. Dimitri gulped in some air. "You're dead white, even your field."
"Probably." He ran his hand through his hair, no longer caring if he mussed it. Dimitri shuddered once all over and then looked at Danyel's pocket. "Slept through it all." He'd been horrible at Dimitri's trial, alternately gnashing his teeth at Diomid, who ignored him, or weeping so loudly it was all Dimitri could do not to cry with him.
"Something is hurting you. I don't have to zlin to know that." Danyel's voice was not the soft, impersonal warmth of a healer or even the kind, but still somewhat distant warmth of a parent, but rather the imagined gentleness of the lover he'd never had. "What is it?"
"I had to be tried, later, in front of the Demense for both rape and the kill before Diomid could swear me to Sergei. As no one who is under ban or otherwise condemned in any way can be sworn to a Demense." His voice cracked. Dimitri set himself to speak more.
"You don't have to talk, but it would probably be good if you did." The response called to him, soul to soul. He wanted to throw himself into Danyel's arms and cry on his shoulder, but he knew, with all his gifts, Danyel would be horrified if he did any such thing, if not hurt by it. Instead he shook, deep inside, where Danyel couldn't see or zlin it.
"I know." He forced himself to smile, although he knew Danyel found it as false as he did. "It," his words stuck in his throat. His skin was cold with how distant Danyel sat. "I'm not putting this well." For him there was no language barrier. He could speak any language as fluently as any Sergei ever had. High Simelan was only one of too many to count.
"It can't be easy to talk about." Danyel's hand approached him again. He didn't want to seem greedy, but he couldn't help grabbing it and putting it to his face. Other than when they'd tussled, he'd been horribly distant, physically, all last night. Danyel's skin was softer than any Sime's he'd ever touched. Many of them bore thick callouses from hard work and weather. His skin was smooth, relatively.
"I was tried, and found innocent of rape, and justified in killing." His throat tightened again and he tried to swallow. "I was raped, Danyel. Salkov took my selyn without permission and against my will. Do you know what that's like, even for someone like me, who isn't physically harmed by it?" He put Danyel's hand against his cheek, unwilling to see the scorn in Danyel's eyes or feel it in his heart. "I'd have rather been killed, sometimes, Danyel. Some mornings, I wake up feeling his tentacles on my wrists and his mouth on mine. And I drew him in. I wanted so much to be free of him, I taunted him into attacking me."
"Why didn't you just shen him and be done with it?" The simple question jerked a bark of bitter laughter from him.
"Gods, Danyel, if I could have." He jerked his head up. The grotesque rictus of the kill on Salkov's face haunted him from beyond the grave. How did Arkay live with his ghosts, the dozens, if not hundred of Simes he'd killed in his life? Dimitri'd never been able to ask. "I was badly injured. Salkov had denied me even the most basic means to heal myself. The bones in my shin had been broken in six places, total. I'd finally managed to pull it straight enough to hold together for healing when he'd tied me to my own bed." The tiny metal box they were in contracted around him. He clutched at Danyel's hand in desperation.
"I'm claustrophobic, Danyel. He put me in a room, deep within the earth, where I couldn't reach out, even with my mind, more than five meters, at most, in any direction." Sweat traced down his ribs, inside his heavy robes.
"Sounds like a nice guy." Danyel's sarcasm brought Dimitri popping out of the dark, draped room with a start.
"He'd set up to either kill or cripple my father just so he could try to claim me. He used Lord Kirov as his cat's paw to bring me up as a prize to be won. Then he crippled me and tried to chain me." His breath tore in his lungs. "I hated him Danyel. And still, my body opened to him as a flower opens to the sun because it needed to be able to heal the wounds he'd put in it!" Dimitri slammed his fist into the door at his side. "I couldn't stop him from taking me because my body rolled over and held out its hands. I know all about not being able to help one's self." He turned to Danyel, wishing he could convey how horrible that night had been. Seeing both his sire and his father at the creature's mercy. Himself unable to do more than call Salkov to him in hopes he'd go the once step beyond what was allowed.
"Salkov went far beyond any point he'd have been condemned to the ban. So you know, the ban is impersonal transfers for the rest of the criminal's life, no matter how long that may be." Dimitri hardly remembered when Tzer'd been put under ban. He'd been too young. But he had remembered seeing the life come back to him when he'd returned to Russia with Mikhail years later.
Mikhail had actually offered to let Tzer go to Dimitri for one month, but they'd been unable to even have transfer, much less consummate it. Neither of them could forget growing up together at Fatima.
"I'd hoped to be able to ward him off. But I stumbled, putting weight on my shattered leg and the pain was too much." The thick scar twitched with the memory. The bones had knitted, yes, but the nerves remembered. "He'd done so much damage, well, it will never be completely sound again."
"So you consider yourself guilty for tempting a Sime to trying to kill you?"
"No," he shook his head, rocking on his seat bones before getting himself back under control. "I couldn't keep from driving my selyn on him. I couldn't finish healing with it in my body, but I didn't want him to touch me like that." Dimitri hugged himself, shivering.
"Why were you put on trial?"
"Because if I'd said yes. Ever made any physical sign I accepted him, the kill would not have been justified." He look at Danyel. "I'd have been guilty of killing, Danyel. Which is a capital crime where I come from. The one person a Sharm Lord may not legally kill is their bonded Lord. Salkov was mine, even though I hated him with all my heart and soul. But a Lord may not rape his Sharm Lord, and in so doing, he forfeited his protection."
Dimitri paused. "I hadn't meant to kill him."
"You hadn't meant to be raped." Danyel's nager flickered.
"You don't believe me, do you?" Dimitri dared reach out, brush his fingertips over Danyel's shoulder, the one he'd healed. Danyel's field responded with the speed of lightning to his touch, reaching out and grabbing at his own.
"I've never had a Donor who felt a great deal in transfer." Danyel swallowed heavily. What Dimitri heard, was that he'd never truly known any of his transfer partners. Not in all ways. "I'm not saying it can't be otherwise." He added quickly.
"I'm sorry." Dimitri murmured.
Danyel closed his eyes. Dimitri's emotions were battering frantically at every attempt he made to protect himself. He'd zlinned Sevrin hold himself in so as to not harm him, but the feelings driving Dimitri's field wild were too strong to be denied. "So am I, now that I've met you."
"Truly?" Dimitri's field was a whirling tangle of sharp edges and bitter dreams. "You've never known otherwise. Wouldn't it be better not to?"
"No," he shook his head quickly and dared look again. In the close confines, he could smell the sharp bite of horror. He didn't have to zlin that. "I believe you." Danyel couldn't deny the truth of his senses.
"Thank you." The simple words bit deep, wrenching at Danyel's reserve. "I've never talked about it with anyone."
"Why?" Danyel knew Diomid and Arkay both were superb healers.
"Because I could not open myself up to those who were so far above me." He glanced away for an instant. "I will not show myself so much to those I know as parents. Its too personal, to talk about such a thing."
"Then why me?" He tried again, feeling as if he were as over faced as a third trying to give transfer to Digen Ferris. Dimitri, by his own admission, could kill as easily as he breathed.
"The only other Sime I've touched in transfer had been crippled at his change over." He shrugged. "For good reason. He was completely mad. Oh, not in a way harmful to others, but to himself. He takes his pleasures in being hurt by others, particularly Donors."
Danyel felt a shiver go up his own spine. How could anyone take pleasure in being hurt? This was insane!
Dimitri gave him a gentle, sad smile. "He'd been twisted into that shape by those who would use him as their own creature. It is not something we talk about much, but all of our ancestors did so. Some more than others. But it would not have worked so well if the tendency had not been congenital."
"Oh," he breathed. "So he was not someone you could talk to, then, I take it." Danyel struggled to contain his frantic thoughts.
"No," Dimitri shook his head. "He'd listen, certainly, but he'd never understand. He'd been used, so often and so willingly, on his part, he couldn't know what it was to be violated anymore. He had, and has, no sense of self left to be violated."
Danyel went cold all over. "And you certainly do." He tried to wrap his nager around the idea of a Donor, any Gen, feeling as if transfer were rape. "To me. From here." He waved to the world passing by outside the windows. "Involuntary transfer means the death of the Gen and a junct Sime."
"Ahhhh," he breathed, his hand coming to rest on Danyel's shoulder. "To me, from where I come from, it is to be violated. To be taken against one's will, selyn or body. Although I think I'd rather be raped physically than nagerically. The physical is so less personal. The body can be healed so much more easily."
"No," Danyel disagreed. "The body heals, the mind does not."
Dimitri raised a single eyebrow. Danyel fought down his own memories.
"Tell me." The words struck him like a hammer between the eyes. Danyel found himself reliving, and telling the story as if it had only happened yesterday.
Danyel tripped. The cracked pavement bit into his hands. He tried to roll away from Rik. A knee hammered into his kidneys.
"Stop it!" He tried to get away. The cement scraped against his cheek. His vision grayed as Rik slammed Danyel's head against the sidewalk. "Let go of me." The dark chuckle was too familiar.
"I don't think so." Rik stood, dragging Danyel with him. "Oh, don't be so hard to catch. We're just playing freeband raiders."
"You're Gen, Rik." Danyel snarled, struggling in his hold.
"Yes, and I'll never have to work another day in my life, unlike your whore of a mother, Danyel." His low, adult, chuckle terrified him. Danyel'd learned long ago, probably in his cradle, few adults were worth trusting. A Sime scurried by, hands shoved in his pockets up to the wrists. Of course he wouldn't zlin the little scene.
Danyel knew he'd go into change over soon. It would only be another two weeks. But it wasn't now. He needed for it to be now. Danyel tried grabbing at Rik's arms.
"The game doesn't work that way, little raider." The fire in his eyes had changed. They'd played, as Rik called it, like this as children. Usually with Rik pounding on Danyel's chest and belly until he threw up. Now it was more serious. True, Rik didn't dare mark him for fear of Gis' wrath, but the cracked ribs lasted far longer than black eyes. "Let me show you." He yanked Danyel close and touched Danyel's lips with his own.
"Yes, almost as good as the real thing." This time he wrenched Danyel's head back until he yelped. Instantly Rik put his mouth over Danyel's. The taste of rotten teeth and cheap, home distilled whiskey made him gag. "Oh, we'll play a lot today." He slammed Danyel against the nearest building. Dust rained down on both of them and a few bird droppings. "I think we should go someplace a bit more private." Danyel's heart thudded in his chest.
"No," he looked around. There were people in the street, cars passing by, no one seeing or zlinning anything. Rik ground his hips into Danyel. His backbone grated against the brick facade. Something equally hard was digging into his sore guts. He'd eaten a whole sack of stolen oranges yesterday and they'd not treated him well. "Stop it!" Fear fought with the twisting in his middle.
"Not this time." There was a vicious edge to his smile. "I know what I want little raider to play."
"Its going too far. If you hurt me." Danyel couldn't think of anything he hadn't already threatened to do.
"No one will believe you. You're just a kid." Rik licked his lips. The smell of his breath would have gagged a renSime. Danyel wondered how he managed to donate. The channel probably had to use mouthwash afterward, or maybe even soap. "I can do whatever I want with you."
"I'll tell Gis." Sweat was streaming down Danyel's sides. His stomach gurgled again, telling him it wasn't through. A sharp cramp knotted his guts. "I have to go."
"Oh, I'll stop it up." Rik put his mouth over Danyel's again, jamming his tongue deep into Danyel's mouth. He stomach muscles clenched as he gagged on it. "You'll learn to like it."
"No!" He screamed, no longer caring what price he'd have to pay for his rescue. Soon enough he'd be out of here permanently. Danyel struggled to get his knees between Rik's. Instead Rik levered his legs apart.
"Almost as good as a girl." Rik's hands traveled down Danyel's body in a parody of a caress. Danyel'd seen people on video touching each other with love. He knew the difference. Rik lifted him off the ground. "Lets go." He hauled Danyel back into the covered doorway. It stank of piss and shit. A dead bird rotted in one corner. From the street, no one could tell they were there.
Cloth ripped and Danyel put everything he had into gouging Rik's eyes, kicking him, even trying to bite at him, anything. Rik tied the torn shirt around Danyel's wrists. "There, retainers for my little raider. You always bragged you'd be one of those high and mighty channels some day. Lets see you beg first." A sharp crack and Danyel sagged with the pain. Again Rik slammed him into the wall.
It was too much. Hot, stinking shit ran down the inside of his pants.
"Oh, look, the little thing soiled itself." Cold air struck his butt as Rik ripped his pants down. "Can't have that." The wall came back and slammed him in the face again. "Have to clean everything out."
Danyel screamed as a pain sharper than any knife speared through him. He came back to awareness huddled in the doorway, clutching his soiled and ruined clothes to his chest. Danyel stroked the silken feathers of the dead bird. How he'd wished he could join it.
"I never went back to Gis'." Danyel stared out the window. He wasn't looking at the scenery. He was looking at the broken winged pigeon lying in the filth on that stoop. They'd gone by that building last night. The old pharmacy on eighty-sixth had been where the secret pen had been hidden in the basement for semi-juncts. That was the reason it'd once had the doubled doors with the hidden entrance. He'd found the information buried deep in Kaon's old archives when he'd gone digging for old song lyrics from the time.
"You felt as if she'd betrayed you?" Dimitri's voice came from far away, down a long, dark tunnel to the present.
"No," Danyel said at first. His body ached in remembered memory. Then he shook of some of the spell of his memories. "Yes. She wasn't there. Her protection couldn't keep Rik from me."
"How did you survive?" The words slid around inside the darkness in his mind. This time he didn't relive them, but he felt them all the same.
"I washed as best I could in the river. My shirt was ruined. My pants hardly any better." He shook all over, his tentacles knotted in their sheathes. For a moment, he looked down at his wrists. The delicate looking digits were buried hard up against the extensor nodes, making them ache. If he'd had them only two weeks earlier, he'd have been safe. They too had betrayed him. A broad, unmistakably Gen hand covered them, protecting them from all harm. Unlike Rik's hands on his body, wrenching him around as if he were a rag doll.
"I hid under a bridge. It wasn't so cold yet I would freeze, but it was cold." His own voice had gone flat, inflectionless. "My teeth chattered so hard I thought they would break. Someone had thrown out some boxes. I crawled in among them, hiding from the rats and feral dogs. There was an old Gen there who'd drunk one to many things he shouldn't have. He babble and screamed at all hours, as blind as a cave rat and just as insane."
Dimitri's fingers caressed his tentacle sheathes, soothing the digits hidden deep within. The touch was so personal, so intimate, Danyel couldn't hide from it as he often did with his Donors. They too were Gen, but not like Dimitri. They cared, but not so gently, as if he truly were fragile and precious in some unknown way.
"I think he was why another like Rik didn't find me. I bled after he left me. I remember waking up with my pants soaked through from it. Within days, the fever started, and I ranted as well, remembering everything that had happened, over and over again." His tentacles slid out to twine with Dimitri's long, strong fingers. The human touch, not for transfer or for sex was something Danyel'd not really known he'd missed, if he'd ever once known it. "I couldn't get away from it."
"Not in fever dreams. Not alone." Dimitri's words, so calm, so plain, soothed him as his hands did. "Not a child."
"I was almost an adult." Danyel leaned his head against the seat.
"No," Dimitri murmured, still stroking Danyel's tentacles as if they were the most wonderful thing he'd ever touched. "You weren't, and expected yourself to act like one. It takes more than physical maturity to be an adult. A child can still bear, but they can not raise a child themselves."
"My mother was probably no more than a year or two past change over herself when she bore me." Danyel remembered how young she still looked, even after years of drinking and self abuse. Although her hatred for him and his father had never lessened. Danyel'd never found out his father's name, or even if she knew who it had been. She'd had no idea he was Ferris. He'd taken the name for the lack of any better.
"Too young."
"Yes, too young to be a whore." He growled, snapping out the words. "Not that my father cared even enough to be certain he hadn't sired a child on her."
"He had to have been a channel?" Dimitri's tone turned it into a question.
"Oh, certainly, I could look up the records to see which Ferris was in Navean at the time I was conceived, if my mother had not run here from elsewhere." He'd never wanted to know so badly, as there was no way to be certain. Dimitri's field said not. Danyel ignored it. "If he were so cold as to not care, then neither do I and to shen with him."
"Go on." Dimitri's words prodded him.
"I slept a great deal of the time, dreaming. I'd thought I'd had two weeks. When the fever started, it came early. One morning the sick fever had broken and I'd woken hot and dry. My arms and neck were sore. I knew instantly what had happened. I staggered out of my den and fell to my knees, vomiting." A cold sweat had broken out on his brow at the memory. The sound of his own breathing was loud in the confined space.
How did Dimitri stand it if he were so claustrophobic? Then he realized it was because he couldn't truly see how close it was, with the images outside the windows only being a blur.
"I hadn't eaten anything in over a week so it tore my throat to bleeding. I knelt in the cold, spitting up blood and crying. I knew what was happening and couldn't get to the center. I'd known to go early, as my change over might go fast, but I didn't know it would go so fast." His throat knotted on the words.
"What about the drunk?" Dimitri's insight knifed him to the core.
"He started singing. I could hear him howling to himself. Then I could zlin. His life called to me, even as it twisted around my arms and grabbed my heart like a vise." He shivered. "I realized I could kill him with no one the wiser. I'd heard of very sensitive channels with black hair and dark eyes. I guessed I'd turn out Ferris. I certainly looked it, even as a child." The words tumbled out, one over another.
"But I hadn't known what it would mean to a starving child in the gutter." He gulped in a deep breath.
"Slow down." Dimitri's fingers squeezed a bit on his wrists. "We have time, now."
"Yes, now." Dimitri took another deep breath. "I could zlin Gens, people walking by over the bridge and down the murky waterway. There were other Gens, as twisted and sick as the one I'd shared the boxes with. None of them would be missed. They were as outcast as I."
"But you knew they were people?" Dimitri's field gave nothing away. It was as quiet and expressionless as a still pond.
"Not then. I," he stopped, seeing again the scene in his mind. "I went after the Gen nearest me. All I could zlin was the life in him. Because it was early, my tentacles were only red lines on my arms, but I could zlin. I knew I had to have him. I stalked him. When I came around the corner, he took a swig off the bottle he always had with him. It was only then I realized he couldn't see.
"I stopped and stared, well, zlinned." He wanted to make it all go away. Talking about it wasn't helping matters any. He'd had plenty of counselors tell him none of it was his fault. That he was not responsible for his elder's failures.
"And you made the decision not to kill." Dimitri struck straight to the heart of the matter. Danyel'd never seen it like that. He'd always thought of it as running away!
"My anti-kill ..."
"Didn't take." Dimitri shocked him to his laterals. They flailed deep in their sheathes, trying to get away from the information. "Oh, no one will ever know unless you are tested with certain machines, or a higher order Donor/channel examines you minutely."
"How do you know?" Danyel shook all over. He could kill? With all the donors he'd touched. Even the ones who'd nearly wet the lounge! "I've never felt any desire for Gen fear or pain."
"Has nothing to do with your will, Danyel." Dimitri's eyes bore into his. They were the gray of a hazy summer sky now, and as calm.
"So," he moved away from those eyes. They could see through anything, any lie. "Yes, I ran. In my filthy clothes with my hair caked with sweat and my pants stiff with blood. I ran as fast as I could. Even so, no one saw me. It was as if I were invisible. I knew the Center was close. Just over the bridge." In his mind Danyel could still zlin the renSimes turning their faces away, as if that kept them from zlinning.
"I knew I looked like a berserker out of myth. Finally I saw the bridge. When I got half way across, I looked down into the water. It was dark and gray with spring runoff." He glanced at their hands, tangled together in his lap. Dimitri'd turned, so he faced Danyel with his knee up on the seat. He was so large, the position looked horribly awkward. But Danyel had seen what lay under those robes, layers of muscle and dense bone any man would envy, or woman covet. Then why was he stroking the backs of Dimitri's strong hands with his tentacles and spilling out his sordid life's story?
"Why didn't you jump?"
Danyel nearly asked how Dimitri knew what had been going through his mind. The faintest glimmer of humor shone in his eyes and he blinked. "Because someone grabbed my ankles on the way over."
"Oh," his smile was not in the least bit mocking. "Because you didn't jump fast enough?"
"Exactly. I didn't want it so badly I just jumped. After that incident, the last in a long line, they fenced off the bridge so only a Sime could jump." The smile he gave back was mocking. "Protect the Gens again."
"Nothing should protect Rik from the consequences of what he did to you." Dimitri's eyes and field both turned to ice. "A rabid dog should not be caged or tranquilized, it should be murdered, plain and simple."
"I once thought as much." Danyel pushed away his adolescent dreams of revenge on Rik. Going back and stabbing him late one night. The knife he'd gone back for, adorned, sharpened and kept through every thing still rested against his lower back. "I learned forgiveness." When he'd gone back for his knife and found Rik drunk out of his mind, blind and rotting alive beneath another bridge.
"Forgiveness or fear?" His impossible question wrenched at Danyel's self control.
He started to answer, and then stopped. "He doesn't hold my chains anymore, Dimitri." It came out a deep growl. All those hours he'd dreamed of returning to Navean, across the shenned bridge, and slitting Rik's throat bore down on him. All the time he'd spent fantasizing about Rik's blood spilling out to the cement as Danyel's had. He zlinned Dimitri, not as a friend, but as a Gen, something to rip the life from to feed the demon riding his back.
But there was nothing to fight. No demon driving its claws into his arms. Only Dimitri's hands, caressing them over and over again. The faintest copy of a field surrounded his fingers, as though he were a ghost. A ghost with a warm, living body. Even the scent of him had changed, turning soft and sweet. For an instant, he longed to throw himself into Dimitri's arms, as he'd done with Gis as a child. She'd been the only mother he'd every truly known. She was the one who'd listened to his little triumphs and failures. When Rik had not stopped at her name, he'd known he could no longer risk her. If he'd been willing to go against her commands, that meant, in the neighborhood Danyel had grown up in, he'd been willing to do anything to stop her from sending for the police.
Certainly he'd have not hurt Danyel so much otherwise. Not if Rik had thought Danyel'd go back to her. When Danyel splayed his hands to release his tentacles fully, Dimitri caught them, giving them a home. The gesture drew them out and they lashed around his wrists, bracelets and all.
"Neither of us are in need." His voice carried a thrum Danyel'd never heard before. Their fields didn't interact at all. Although Dimitri's eyes were as hot as he'd ever seen anyone's.
"No, we aren't." He slid his tentacles back over Dimitri's hands. They lingered over his fingers, twining with them. Danyel didn't want to let go. When they slipped over Dimitri's fingertips, Dimitri grabbed them in his fingers as if to say, "Don't go."
Chapter 13
Dimitri, for the first time since establishment, didn't know what to say. He looked in Danyel's eyes and saw the reflection of his own demons and doubts. In another's face, so alien and so beautiful at the same time, they called to more than his talents as a healer. Stunned, he said the first thing that came to mind, "When we are?"
"We are what?" Seems it was another first for Danyel. He too was taken on the curb.
"When we're both in need." His heart was hammering in his chest. "Oh, I wouldn't ask you to accept me. Not with your history, but ..." he kept his hold on Danyel's tentacles.
The car slowed and came to a stop. At first Dimitri took no notice of it. He had the first few times as they'd gone through some kind of town, but this time the engine stopped. He felt his eyes widen. Danyel chuckled softly. Then he leaned forward!
Yes, this was what he wanted. Dimitri didn't dare let go of Danyel's tentacles, so he simply leaned forward as well. Danyel's lips were hot and soft against his own. Dimitri's pulse thundered in his veins, and elsewhere. Shut up! He thought to himself. It had been too long, too many lonely nights, too many cold sheets, Dimitri sagged. Or at least parts of him did.
As Danyel arced over him, he gave, softening his mouth and his body to Danyel's advance. This was what he'd waited for so long. Then the door opened. The moment was gone. They both pulled back. Dimitri knew the look of shock on his face had to match Danyel's. Fortunately it was Vayer who'd opened the door.
"And what were you two doing back here?" He winked, letting Dimitri know he was playing. From how red Danyel's lips were, Vayer was wrong. No helping for it. He couldn't let Arkay see the lipstick on Danyel. He pulled out a handkerchief and wiped it from Danyel's lips. Most of it was just blood flush, unfortunately, much like his own, and much harder to get rid of.
"We were talking and Danyel bit at his lip." He dared meet Vayer's eyes. Fortunately his own were still in partial shadow.
"Hard enough to smear your lipstick?" He put his finger to his own lips. Dimitri looked at his reflection in the glass. He repaired the worst of the damage. Vayer nodded and then backed away from the door. Danyel was still rigid with shock.
"You're fine." He put his hand to his chest. Danyel copied the gesture, touching Mitka. Who, of course, now woke up.
"No, stay here right now sweetheart." If Danyel cooed at him like that he'd do anything Danyel wanted. Dimitri had to swallow back a sudden flood of saliva. He'd never worn such heavy robes before and squirmed in his seat trying to readjust his pants. It wasn't working.
"Excuse me." He lifted the hem and unbent things.
"You're ready!" Mitka caroled at the top of his lungs.
"Oh, God," Dimitri put his face in his hands. He didn't give a damn about his makeup anymore. He didn't require blush now. Hell, he didn't require heat of any kind either. The palms of his hands were far better than anything else he could look at.
"Dimitri," one dainty tentacle wiggled through and tickled his nose. He wiggled it in retaliation. "I know you're in there."
"No, I'm not." He snorted, unwilling to do more than that.
"I got excited too." He said quietly.
"Really?" Mitka announced to the world at a large. Danyel's shirt did nothing to moderate his voice.
Danyel winced, his tentacle curling up into a little spiral. Dimitri flicked his tongue over it, peeking between his fingers. Yes, he was blushing too. Mitka was squirming frantically in his pocket. "Don't damage his cards." It was a pointless comment, but he was shy a few wits at the moment.
"He's a little upset with me right now." Danyel's dark eyes twinkled. Seeing the life come back into them was worth any pain on Dimitri's part. He hated not knowing how to help. Even being honest with himself, he hadn't been bragging in what he'd said to Danyel about his ability to heal. But with Danyel it all seemed to drift out the window
His way with words. His ability to touch and soothe. It had all fled before the confusion rising within him. Was this love? It was so messy. "Let him out, Danyel." Dimitri could see Mitka panting in Danyel's pocket, his tiny ribs fluttering frantically against the thin silk. Mitka shot out, resembling a hummingbird far more than any dragon Dimitri's ever heard of. He buzzed in front of Danyel's face, coming nose to nose with him. Danyel's eyes crossed. Dimitri giggled at him.
"Love you." He chirped, licking the end of Danyel's nose. Then he rubbed it with his jaw. It was a very good nose, Dimitri did admit. Not at all a timid or dainty one. Very fitting with Danyel's dark hair and eyes. Danyel was quivering all over, nearly as quickly as Mitka's beating wings.
"Would you settle down?" Dimitri laughed himself as Mitka zoomed around the inside of the car. "I think we let him sleep too long." He muttered, sotto vocce.
"Perhaps," Danyel had one dorsal out, flicking after the wild flyer. He went one too far. With a heavy thump Mitka'd flattened himself against the shielded window. Dimitri caught him, rubbing at the echoed ache in his own nose. Mitka was out. He looked like someone had killed him, with his wings spread and mouth gaping. He wasn't even breathing, not that he really had to.
"Is he all right?" Danyel's head cracked with his.
"Ow," Dimitri rubbed at this second bump, a bit more real this time. His head swam. "You have a hard head, Danyel." He shook his own, trying to clear the fog.
"He's not breathing!"
"Calm down, Danyel." Dimitri sighed. But Danyel'd exposed himself, all four laterals pink and damp against his arms. The sight was more erotic than Dimitri could have imagined. No, he wasn't in need, but he did have a Sime's tentacles cents from his arms and pointed in his direction. He wasn't dead!
One of those delicate organs brushed Mitka's unmoving back. Dimitri twitched all over with the shock of it.
"Are you all right?" Danyel said, from someplace else. Dimitri was staring at his laterals. They were still out, roniplin making the surface gleam in the dim light.
"If you don't stop waving your laterals around, I'm going to cover them for you." Vayer growled. He might as well have been on the far side of the moon. Danyel's lateral, this time, traced Mitka's flank. Dimitri groaned. The sensation had grown far from delicate. His back arched, his mouth instantly filling with saliva.
"Don't do this." Dimitri breathed, unable to draw back and unable to advance. "Please." His arms flushed, the hair on them standing on end from his fingertips to his shoulders.
"What?" His laterals flicked back into their sheathes. Dimitri wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
"Even high field you almost got yourself jumped, Danyel." Vayer's hand landed on his shoulder. It was Danyel's turn to hit his head.
"What did I do? Is he going to be alright?" Danyel's arm came back up.
"Don't tease me like this." Dimitri pleaded, the ache of unfulfilled need in his chest now warring with the bite of repeated unfulfilled lust. It was a hideous sensation, and one Dimitri would have previously thought impossible. "I can handle one or the other, not both."
"Both what?" Danyel leaned over, his entire attention focused on Mitka. He stirred, writhing in the sensations of being zlinned.
"Sex or transfer." Dimitri writhed inside as the warring sensations clashed deep within his body. "Right now you're teasing the shen out of Mitka!"
"I'm what?" He almost hit his head again. Idiot Sime. When he'd gotten his field in a twist, there was no stopping him.
"You're hurting him!" Vayer was no help. Without leverage, his yank on Danyel nearly launched Vayer into the car. Mitka writhed on Dimitri's hand, struggling with the chaos going on around him.
"Hush, my little one." Dimitri murmured, stroking Mitka. He settled, panting slightly again. At least he'd closed his mouth. He looked truly dead with his mouth agape and his tongue lolling out. Dimitri brushed his tongue and it slipped back in. He'd left a tiny pool of selyn beneath his cheek.
"Wha?" Mitka's eyes opened. One pupil was wide open, the other a tiny slit. "Who?"
"You knocked yourself out." Dimitri nuzzled Mitka. He was cool, his scales dulled with shock. Mitka blinked again. His pupils shifted, but were still horribly uneven. "Silly dragon."
Mitka licked between Dimitri's fingers. Dimitri giggled, still cupping the little beastlet.
"I love you." He murmured, stroking Mitka with his cheek. Dimitri liked Mitka so tiny.
"And I love you, even if you did let me hit my head." He grumbled, curling up and currying the base of one wing. "It hurts now."
"I know." Dimitri added their headache to his list of woes. "I can't heal you, my friend."
Danyel stroked Mitka's wing, this time with the back of a knuckle. He arched against the pressure. Dimitri could feel his purr all the way up his arm. "You're going to vibrate your bones loose."
"Good," Mitka curried Danyel's thumb. The worst of Dimitri's headache began to fade. Mitka twined himself around Danyel's hand, still nibbling on his fingers.
"You were talking about teasing?" Vayer asked, looking toward Mitka and grinning. Dimitri followed Danyel to the edge of the seat. He turned. The speed of it would have dislodged Mitka, if Danyel weren't practically wearing a scaly little glove with wings.
Danyel's eyes were midnight black, but even so he held out his other hand to Dimitri. Danyel's laterals were shifting about restlessly beneath the skin, but other than that, Dimitri's wouldn't have known what sort of effect Mitka was having on him.
"I asked him not to tease me, Mitka. Now don't you tease him." Dimitri quivered inside with nerves. He prayed Mitka wouldn't take offense and bite, or worse, ignore him completely and decide to slide up Danyel's arm.
"I'm not." His fangs gleamed on either side of his jaw. Dimitri knew well the dark twinkle deep in his eyes. "Am I?" He rubbed his head against Danyel's thumb, sliding between it and his fingers, and pointing straight at Danyel's laterals.
"Mitka." Dimitri knew he was growling. Getting upset with Mitka would solve nothing. He took Danyel's hand and let Danyel help him out of the car. "Thank you." He didn't want to let go of Danyel's hand. It was incredibly warm and gentle against his own. Instead he raised it to his lips and kissed the knuckles, as he would have from behind a veil. Danyel licked his lips, his neck cording for an instant.
Dimitri glanced down to see Mitka slobbering all over Danyel's wrist.
"If you don't want him drooling all over you, you'd better speak up soon." Dimitri glanced around at the swarms of people running all over the place. The were almost all renGens, as naked as a child. Not a one of them had on anything like a kador. He'd known Westerners didn't wear them, but to see so many arms bare of cloth or tentacles made him gulp. How did any Sime avoid killing here?
"It feels good." He cupped Mitka's back, holding him close. Dimitri would have sworn Mitka couldn't get any closer without being in Danyel's sheathes. Even so he had his tail buried in one ventral sheath and his tongue flicking at one tightly closed lateral orifice. The latter was gradually loosening as Mitka worked at it.
"He's about to lick his way into your lateral sheath." Dimitri pointed out.
"He's what?" Danyel's shriek made everyone stop and stare. Dimitri wished he hadn't taken off his own kador. Mitka nuzzled the opening with his nose, then rubbed against it. The sphincter opened the tiniest fraction and he jammed his tongue into it. Danyel looked as if he's swallowed an eel. One of Arkay's live ones. Although it couldn't have felt bad. He didn't shriek again.
The look of shock changed suddenly to a violent twitch. Mitka went flying. Dimitri ducked. Someone looked down from a catwalk. It had to have been a Sime.
"What in shen is going on here?"
Dimitri blanched.
"What do you lorshes think you're doing? Get back to work, right now!" The slender figure slid down the railing. Definitely a Sime. Even Dimitri wouldn't have tried a stunt like that so casually.
"Now if you make me interrupt my work again, I'm going to have to ask you to leave." His field jarred against Dimitri's. Mitka hissed his annoyance. The renSime glanced over him as if he didn't exist. Actually, Dimitri'd found to a lot of people he didn't exist. Particularly when he didn't want to be zlinned. "Well?"
"I think you're looking for me?" Dimitri stepped forward. He really had no idea about fashion. He'd always picked what fit, before. The selection of which was growing slimmer by the month. Already Arkay's kador was so small across the shoulders he'd feared he would tear it. The renSime backed a step, only by augmenting, saving himself from a nasty fall. "Do I really look that awful?" He turned to face Danyel, spreading his arms.
Danyel's jaw dropped. He forgot all about what Mitka was doing. Until he felt his chest nearly explode, he forgot to breathe.
"That bad, huh?"
"No," he shook his head. Then he shook it some more. He couldn't take his eyes off Dimitri. His laterals came out. Something wrapped around one of them and one side twitched violently. He glanced down to see Mitka's tongue reaching for it again. The second time wasn't as bad and by the third he could ignore it, more or less. Zlinned, Dimitri was fascinating as well, but in a different way.
Now Danyel knew he was not tiny for a Sime, even though he was considerably smaller than many of the Russians. But Dimitri towered over him, and it was more than height. He looked up into those gray-blue eyes again. They were framed with dark lashes. Broad brows dropped straight down to high, broad cheekbones. His cheeks were a bit hollow and the muscles at the corner of his jaw twitched slightly.
There was no taper between his jaw and his neck, just strong muscle eventually flaring out to impossibly wide shoulders. Dimitri took a deep breath, his heart and selyn pulsing through his body in perfect syncopation. The silver embroidery seemed to caress that very node of life, framing it for him to zlin. The silver arrowed down to a slender waist and nearly fine hips. Dimitri was turned a fraction to the side and Danyel could see his muscles tense, front and back.
Dimitri's heavy thighs could be seen clearly, as if the tights were not fabric, but rather paint. The boots he wore were nearly as tight, showing his thick calves leading to strong ankles.
"You're drooling, Danyel." Vayer murmured to him. "Pull in your laterals before you leave a puddle."
"I'm not in need." He shook his head.
"Which way?" Vayer's eyes flicked down so fast Danyel thought he'd imagined the gesture. But even still Danyel looked. Another jolt went through his body before he figured out what was going on.
"What are you doing with your tongue in there?" Danyel was not entirely sure if he should be disgusted or aroused by Mitka's tongue licking the inside of his lateral sheath! The poor tentacle was crammed as far back out of the way as it could go. Even still those little twitches had to be from Mitka's tongue brushing it. "You." He prodded Mitka's side. "Yes you." He glared at the one eye focused on him. Still he zlinned Dimitri, utterly fascinated. "He's beautiful."
"Mitka is." Dimitri's darkened lashes laced those amazing cheekbones. His nager gleamed through his skin, like light through the finest porcelain.
Danyel looked at him again. No, he was not smooth cheeked like a woman, but Danyel could still zlin the lush softness of his skin. "On me, its the clothes." He looked through those devastating lashes at Danyel. For a moment, all he knew was Dimitri as Gen and wanted him, as he'd never wanted anyone before in his life.
"I thought you said you weren't in need." Vayer murmured, his hand coming to rest on Danyel's shoulder. He'd never felt the touch of one of the Russian channels and his whole backbone seemed to collapse under the weight of it. He must have grunted, as Vayer said. "Sorry, is this better?"
"Much," Danyel blinked his vision clear. It still felt like he had a four plus Donor sitting on him, but at least he could breathe.
"He is gorgeous." Vayer's sigh probably echoed his own. "There are times I wish he weren't my son."
"And you'd run off on your wife for a pretty nager?" Darya flicked her long hair back over her shoulders. It coiled in midnight tendrils, set off by long silver strands. The gold dress shimmered around her, as if it were fog and not cloth. But her nager seemed to be warning him off, a malignant black cloud hovering on the horizon.
"No, I think not." He squeezed Danyel's shoulder slightly. Through the contact, he could feel Vayer's tremendous strength. Too well aware of his own fragility, he sighed, turning his attention back to Dimitri. "Although I think we have a very smitten channel here."
"We couldn't." Dimitri's face fell. He glanced down, at first with his brows furrowed. Then he stared at Danyel's now dripping wrist and sighed. "I'd pull him off if I could." Dimitri gave Danyel a lopsided grin and a shrug. In the formal evening wear, the effect was stunning. He lost control. It wasn't long. But it was long enough.
Mitka buried his whole face in Danyel's lateral sheath.
"Get out of there!" He thought of shaking his arm, then froze. His whole body tensed.
"Mitka, no." Dimitri stepped toward him, then froze. "Oh shen." He breathed, holding out his hand.
Tiny pinpricks of what could be pain or pleasure shot up his arm. He couldn't see what was going on, but he knew Mitka had grabbed his lateral in his teeth. Sweat beaded on his brow. Danyel trembled. If Mitka bit down, or even slipped, well, if he were physical, he could kill or cripple Danyel for life!
"He could do it now." Dimitri'd gone completely still. "It's no longer a game, Mitka. Stop it."
"Who are you talking to?" The idiot lighting director asked.
"Quiet." Arkay snapped. The renSime jerked back and froze. His eyes were wide with shock, then he collapsed in a heap. "I didn't mean to knock him out. Sorrry." Arkay winced, stepping back from the renSime.
"You didn't harm him." Dimitri said, without taking his eyes of Danyel's wrist. Mitka's tongue was tracing the length of his lateral and probing for the nerves at the base, his teeth now brushing the nerve laden organ with every stroke. "If he jerks, or bites, he could kill you, Danyel."
"I had that idea, yes." He sweated some more. It was a good thing he wasn't going to be doing this shoot. His clothes were sodden.
"Let me." Darya stepped forward. Danyel leaned back. Her nager twined between them, an ebon stormcloud. "Stay put."
"I'm trying." Danyel wondered if petting Mitka would do good or harm. Then Mitka's teeth clamped down a bit. "No, stop."
"I can see, yes." Her voice was low. Mitka'd lashed his tail around Danyel's arm hard enough to have left bruises if he were physical. The old wood floor creaked as Dimitri came forward. His eyes were a brilliant reflection of his mother's dark gray. Danyel let himself give in to that gaze, one he'd only seen on a woman's face before. It was hot and dark. His whole body tightened. He wanted Dimitri like he'd never wanted anyone else. Without warning, his whole groin seemed to catch on fire. He had to take.
Driven crazy with lust, he lunged. Dimitri caught him, wrapping his arms around Danyel. "I have you, little Sime." He breathed, seeming to ignore Danyel's frantic grinding against him. And then it was all over. All but the ache left behind by being teased so violently. His arm was dripping roniplin and selyn, but Mitka was gone. "I'm sorry, Danyel." He murmured in his ear, then released his arms.
Danyel stood, still pressed against him. The overwhelming lust was gone, but a small part of him wished it had not been a dream.
"No, no dream." Dimitri stepped back this time. "I had to dislodge Mitka before he bit you."
"How?" Danyel asked. "He's gone." His eyes stung for a moment. Had Dimitri hurt him? Danyel zlinned around, careful to avoid the other two Russian Donors. He couldn't find a sign of him. His vision blurred as he looked away from Dimitri's now harsh expression. "You hurt him."
"No," Dimitri chuckled softly. "He's fine."
"Then where did he go?" Danyel put his hand over his very soggy wrist. It wasn't all Mitka's doing. The heavy scent of roniplin gave that fact away.
"I scared him." Dimitri glanced away. "I had to. He was hurting you."
"Not really." Danyel felt a matching grin come to his face.
"Well, he was about to." Dimitri shook his head. "I'm sorry he got so forward."
"I'm not."
"Although what are we going to do for lighting?" Karin had finally shown up, it seemed. Arkay knelt, supporting the now groggy renSime. What had he done to the man?
"I'm glad she didn't see Mitka's little stunt." Dimitri muttered under his breath, in Russian.
"Me too." Danyel managed, in the same language.
Dimitri looked down on him, dainty nager bright with surprise.
"I've been working on it with Sharm Lord Sevrin." Danyel winked. His arm felt cold without Mitka's scaly little body wrapped around it. "Not that she'd be able to see him, Dimitri."
"Oh," his cheeks pinked. "I'd forgotten."
Karin turned to Dimitri. She backed up a step. Her instant flare of piqued interest was unavoidable.
Dimitri appeared right in front of Danyel. If he'd blinked, he would have sworn Dimitri'd teleported. Stunned, he leaned back. Danyel could hear a low rumble from Dimitri's chest. Mitka reappeared, mantling on Dimitri's shoulder. Danyel yanked the tip of his thrashing tail. With a yelp, Mitka launched himself for the ceiling.
"Why did you do that?" Dimitri turned on him.
"Why did you jump in front of me?" Danyel watched as Mitka circled. He'd already learned to be wary of being drooled on. It wasn't particularly pleasant, at least not from any distance. He rubbed in a bit more of the saliva Mitka'd left behind.
"What's going on here?" Karin didn't sound too upset. Her attention was entirely on Dimitri. Which Danyel supposed was better than her paying attention to Arkay helping the lighting director back to his feet.
"Oh my." Even around Dimitri, Danyel could zlin her flare of interest. He could also hear her gulp. Dimitri yelped, spinning back around even faster than he'd moved the first time. Mitka's teeth were bare. He hissed at Karin and lunged for her. Zlinnably oblivious, she kept staring at him.
"You are wearing padding, aren't you?" Her lust was a clammy blanket in the ambient, a rather dirty one. Danyel grimaced.
"What?" Dimitri choked. "Where?" He glanced down. Danyel tried to move around him. Dimitri moved, blocking him.
"Let me by." He tapped Dimitri on the shoulder. Mitka landed on Dimitri's head and stared down at Danyel. He looked up at the dragon, wondering if he'd offended. Mitka blinked, his huge gold eyes bright. He licked his lips with a long, pink forked tongue. A bit of saliva trickled from one fang.
"That's all you?" Now it was Karin's turn to choke.
"As I assume you're talking about the tights, yes, that's all me. I was not going to stuff them." Dimitri's tone could have frozen water in August.
"I ..." Karin broke off. From her nager, what Danyel could zlin of it, she was speechless.
Danyel tried to get past Dimitri again. Mitka's wing smacked him right in the nose, hard enough stars appeared. Danyel bounced back, rubbing at his face. "Hey!"
Vayer's fingers brushed his shoulder. Danyel looked at him. Vayer shook his head no.
"I don't understand why you're gaping at me." Dimitri's confusion was painfully obvious. "Is there something wrong that I didn't want all that fluff in my underwear? Its not as if everyone in the world can't zlin me in this."
"And you zlin incredible." Danyel murmured, unable to help knowing of the shimmering life standing right in front of him, no matter which way he was looking.
"You can zlin him?" Vayer asked, in Russian.
"Yes," Danyel blinked. "As obvious as anyone."
"I can't." Vayer glanced down for a moment. "Only Mitka." Then he asked with his tentacles. "What does he zlin like?" His nager roiled slowly, caught between obvious curiosity and sadness.
"Like dawn on fog." It was hard to put the words on his wrists, so he amplified Dimitri's nager for his father.
"Thank you." He flicked, his mouth tightening, as if he were trying not to cry. "Even in transfer I couldn't zlin him."
"Mitka's a bit overwhelming." Danyel admitted. Mitka cocked his head, obviously listening to their conversation.
"That he is. Thank you." Vayer nodded.
"I'm not going to add any, if that's what you had in mind." Dimitri's field was twisting around his body, bright pink, just like the back of his neck.
"No, not at all." Her interest redoubled. Danyel was confused. She was not an unattractive woman, not at all. Again he tried to get past Mitka. He bared his fangs, not hissing, but not friendly either. Danyel brushed his tentacles across Dimitri's neck.
The flush darkened, turning bright red.
"Yes?" Karin asked, her nager now flickering with confusion.
"Danyel," Dimitri said to him. He looked back over his shoulder. "Don't do that."
He yanked his hand back. "I didn't hurt, did I?" Danyel zlinned him. Mitka raised his wings. He'd grown to nearly Dimitri's size, towering over all of them.
"No," his voice dropped nearly an octave. He turned the rest of the way. Then he yelped, nearly jumping into Danyel's arms. In the tights, against his body, it was obvious he'd not been immune to Karin's charms.
"It wasn't her." His arms came around Danyel's shoulders, as if of their own accord. Then Mitka's huge wings enfolded both of them. "Oh, gods, Danyel," he murmured in his ear.
The tremendous size of him seemed to envelope Danyel as well. For a moment, he trembled, overwhelmed.
"No," Dimitri let him go. He glanced down. "I probably shouldn't have done that. But your touch ..." He took in a deep breath, his huge chest expanding to impossible proportions.
"I just brushed your neck." Danyel blushed, wondering at his own tentacles now knotting in their sheathes. Dimitri'd felt so wonderful against him. For all his strength, he was as soft skinned as any Gen he'd ever touched.
"Which I happened to like, very much." His eyes were half lidded and smokey. "You are teasing the selyn out of me."
"Not Karin?" Danyel did his best to slow his pounding heart.
"She's Gen." Dimitri blinked. "Of course not."
Danyel shook his head, not understanding at all.
"We'll talk about it later." Dimitri shifted his weight. Mitka had not released him, however. Here, cupped deep in Dimitri's field, Danyel dared reach up and touch Dimitri's face. Dimitri pressed against the contact. His face was slightly roughened with whiskers and the strangeness of it made Danyel drop his hand. Dimitri winced, his whole body tensing.
"Later," he promised, looking straight into Dimitri's eyes.
"I wish we were making other plans for later." He purred. Danyel's eyes widened. He'd wanted this, but now, here, he didn't know. "Hush." Dimitri's eyes were still dark, but his voice had risen. "There is time."
He turned to Karin for a moment. "Is there any place my mother and I can touch up our makeup?" Dimitri was lying through his nager! What was he after? His back tightened and Danyel had to choke off a snicker. He wouldn't mind getting a few moments alone either, at this point.
"I don't have to." Darya said, stepping forward at last. Karin gaped at her, too. Well, no accounting for tastes, Danyel figured. As if he were a one to talk. What was he doing looking at a Donor? A man, for that much matter. He'd never slept with any of his Donors, ever. Not that it seemed like either he or Dimitri would thinking of sleeping. Last night he'd been able to sleep with Dimitri, as he would have a child. He didn't think he'd be able to manage the same again.
Something had gone between them in the car. Some invisible line had been crossed.
"I do." He said. Mitka's eyes twinkled. He seemed to smirk. All his fangs were showing as he winked at Danyel.
"Through the far door." She said, after a bit of hemming and hawing about having her own makeup artist do it. Dimitri had said no, politely, of course. He didn't seem to be able to do anything rudely. Danyel breathed a sigh of relief, or was it regret, when he slipped out. He watched Dimitri's retreating backside. Karin was staring at him, her attention burning a hole in he back of his neck with her field. She'd donated less than a week ago, but still he could feel it like the light of the sun focused to a single point.
"I'm not used to competing with a male channel." Her painted lips curled up in a wicked smile. "I thought you couldn't."
"Couldn't what?" He adjusted the fit of his belt on his hips. It had gotten slightly twisted with all the excitement in the car.
"Be interested in another man." She leaned over the photographer's shoulder. The technology behind the selyn camera was still very new, and awkward to use. Any Sime could zlin and see what they should be getting on film, but a Gen had to check to make sure the registration was right.
"I'm not." He ran his hand through his hair. Darya was draped over a high stool, leaning back. Danyel could zlin where her son got his looks. His skin was many shades lighter than hers, and he was blond, but still he had the lush features and generous proportions. Vayer slid over to stand behind him. Danyel glanced back.
"I'm not going to adjust myself in front of all these Gens." He muttered, reaching into his pants quickly. Darya had leaned back so far the dress didn't caress her figure, it molested it. The high split sides were open to her waist, which was incredibly slender, as he knew she was no maiden.
"Its the tits." Vayer muttered, stepping back out into view. "Thanks." He leaned against a post.
"A little to the side, honey." Karen waved.
"Like this?" Darya leaned. Danyel was treated to the sight of her breasts doing their level best to escape confinement, not that there was much.
"She glued it, Danyel." Vayer muttered. "And she's Dimitri's mother."
"I like older women?" Danyel turned it into a joke. Or at least he tried to. Vayer glared at him. "Playing." He spread his hands.
"Like that?" Vayer glanced at his hands.
"Oh," Danyel ducked his head and clenched his hands. Sevrin always had to remind him of his body language.
"I understand." Vayer reached out for him. After having been reminded of his body language, he didn't flinch. But only because he'd been reminded. "I give permission for you to court my son." He nodded to the far wall.
Danyel turned to see Dimitri return. "Thank you." He murmured. Appreciating the gesture, but not entirely sure if he was able for it.
Dimitri's cheeks were flushed still, and Mitka was busy grooming himself. It was painfully obvious what he'd been doing. At least to anyone who could zlin.
"Good!" Karen called out. "I want you up there too. We'll do the other two after lunch." She glanced at Arkay and Nashen as if they didn't quite count. And really, for Karin's primary clientele, they were not exactly ideal. Darya and Dimitri were perfect, both of them as Gen as it was possible to be.
Dimitri's eyes widened for a second as he looked at his mother.
"You know she's my mother." He reminded Karin.
"She is?" Karin asked, glancing back and forth between the two of them. "But you're blond. You have to tell me who does your hair."
"I was born this way." His expressive nostrils flared. Darya giggled behind her hand. "She's naked!" He glanced down. "And so am I." He winked at Danyel.
"Oh, you both have clothes on." She swatted him on the butt. Mitka snapped at her, teeth sliding over her field. The nageric screech of clashing selyn twisted Danyel's own field into knots before he caught it. Vayer stepped closer, projecting Gen, well, Sharm Lord. It was some help. Dimitri jumped into the puddle of light. Mitka was still gnawing on Karin in total frustration, from the murderous glare in his eyes. Dimitri's look at Karin wasn't a whole lot kinder.
"You think this is funny, mama." Dimitri glanced down at his mother, still draped over the simple stool.
"It'll do you good to laugh." Her nager was shimmering around her with the effects of the golden dress. Against Dimitri's black and silver, the effect was stunning. The camera clicked again and again.
"What are you shooting?" Karin asked.
"Look," he flicked a tentacle at the viewfinder. Danyel wandered over as well, with Vayer a dark shadow at his side. Through the viewfinder for the camera, Darya's field was caressing Dimitri, cloaking him in an evershifting veil of shadows. His own nager was invisible other than faint streamers of light, as if the sun were shining down through clouds. The cameraSime kept clicking the shutter.
"Indeed," Karin looked at the two on stage. "I thought you were a Donor, Dimitri?"
"More or less." He winked at Danyel. Mitka was still trying to rip Karin's head off. It was a very good thing she couldn't zlin. The cameraSime was oblivious.
With a last desperate lunge, Mitka nearly swallowed her head. She waved her hand around by her ears, as if waving off flies. Danyel fought not to snicker.
"Let me change film." The cameraSime threw a heavy cloth over the camera and did arcane things to it in the shielding.
"We're not going anywhere." Dimitri was looking at Mitka, who'd thrown himself on the floor. He'd really gotten upset about something. The way he was thrashing reminded Danyel painfully of a toddler who'd been denied a cookie. "You're going to make yourself sick, Mitka." Dimitri muttered in Russian.
"Will that hurt you?" Danyel asked.
"A headache, most likely." Dimitri shrugged. "He gets too excited sometimes and then has one of these little fits.
"I'm sorry." Danyel winced. He'd had enough bad headaches in his life to not wish them on anyone.
"OK, I'm ready." The photographer returned to peering through the viewfinder. "If you could put your arms around her." Dimitri cringed a bit. His field was twining restlessly about him. But he did as he was asked. "No, more, like you mean it."
"She's Gen and my mother." Dimitri took a deep breath, looking down at Darya. She smiled, putting her hand to his face. It wasn't sexual. Not in the least. But rather it was something far sweeter. The ambient shimmered around all of them. Even Mitka stilled, panting on the floor. He glanced up. Dimitri echoed his mother's gesture. The similarity between the two of them was fantastic.
"Good, great!" The photographer called out. No, it wasn't going to be a sexy shoot, but they were beautiful together. "Now lean over her." To have the single mindedness of a renSime would be wonderful sometimes. Danyel knew he'd be able to zlin Mitka if he zlinned that direction.
"No," Dimitri said, glancing at him. The camera clicked. It was obvious Dimitri was protecting Darya. His field was wrapped around her and now her shadows shone through as his light had earlier. The effect took Danyel's breath away.
"Turn back to her." He waved his hand, tentacles extended.
"What do you want of me?" Dimitri's nager twisted. Mitka rose up off the floor.
"No you don't." Danyel ran forward and yanked Mitka back. He did not want Mitka's picture all over every tabloid in the Techton. Mitka turned on him, and for the first time in his life, Danyel froze in terror of a Gen's nager. But it didn't last for even a heartbeat. Even as Mitka lunged. Danyel reached into his mouth and grabbed his tongue. Mitka jerked back, nearly yanking Danyel off his feet.
Mitka thrashed his head from side to side. Danyel hung on for dear life. Selyn went everywhere. Blinded by it, all he knew was to hang on. Before anyone else could react, Mitka had sagged, his eyes sinking shut. He shrank to hand sized in a heartbeat, sliding out of Danyel's grasp. "You poor thing." He murmured, scooping him up off the floor and augmenting back to Vayer.
Mitka panted in his arms, wings draped limp. Danyel stroked them, wondering at how soft his skin was. It was so fine, he could see the selyn pulse in the veins beneath the surface. He bent down and kissed Mitka's forehead. Mitka looked up at him, at last, eyes wide. "How?"
"I don't know." He smiled, nuzzling Mitka's brow. Mitka shivered a bit and then curled up against his chest. Danyel looked up to see Dimitri giving him the oddest smile. It was half wonder and half awe. Danyel shrugged.
"He loves you, Danyel." Vayer whispered.
"Why?" Danyel knew he was not a very lovable person. Not at all. He'd never had a true lover, only friends. Not that he derided his friendships, but they weren't the same, from what he'd heard.
Vayer chuckled. "I don't know why one person loves another."
Danyel glanced down at Mitka. The thought that Mitka wasn't exactly a person crossed his mind. Mitka's claws wrapped around his hand. No, Mitka was a person. He was part of Dimitri. And Dimitri was one of the most interesting people he'd ever met. Mitka's threat turned to a gentle caress. "Although I'm zlinning it might be mutual."
"No," Danyel quickly rejected the idea. "We're too different." And too much the same. He knew the male Russian channels could take other men as lovers. He couldn't. No matter how much his heart wanted to. He'd always been told such things were wrong. The memory of Rik's torment was strong enough to make his guts cramp even now.
Why had he told Dimitri that story? It was certainly true, but he'd never spoken of it with anyone. When he'd changed over, his body had healed enough he hadn't had to explain what had happened to him. Mitka gently rubbed the side of his face over Danyel's arm, exactly where he'd crammed his head into Danyel's lateral sheath earlier. It still tingled a bit from having been invaded so strangely.
"I didn't hurt, did I?" Mitka asked, then hiccuped. His wings were still limp over Danyel's arm.
"You almost did." Danyel felt his molested lateral twist restlessly in its sheath. It was an uneasy feeling, as if he both were in hard need and wanting to extend it to release the pressure and wildly post, when he wanted nothing to do with it. "But you stopped."
"Only when Dimitri scared me away." Mitka blinked, rubbing against Danyel's arm again. His lateral knotted up this time, cramping a bit. It was sore. As if it had gotten rubbed up against something rough. Danyel'd once had a Donor whose familiarity with soap and water had been at a minimum. Below minimum for him. Her arms had been so dirty one of his laterals had picked up a large grain of sand and it had buried itself deep in his skin, creating an abscess.
It was not an experience he'd ever wanted to repeat. But Mitka's attentions had left an unfortunately familiar burning sensation in his lateral. "I did hurt you." He whimpered, rubbing his face harder. If Danyel'd had any doubts about Mitka's maturity, this would have destroyed all of them.
As gently as he could, Danyel moved Mitka's face away from his sore arm. Mitka stared, his attention warming the already too warm digit.
"He listens to you better than to me." Vayer shrugged when Danyel zlinned at him. "There isn't much I can do."
"What do you do with the others?" Danyel couldn't think Vayer'd had no experience with such creatures of selyn. His wife and his son both were like this. Mitka was nuzzling Danyel's fingers now, nibbling along the edges and licking between them.
"Mitka is unique, Danyel." Vayer said. Stunned, Danyel looked down at the dainty creature trying to make up for his wrong so frantically. "We have no records of others like him."
"The Veiled do." Dimitri added from the stage, in Russian, thank goodness. It was very helpful to be able to speak hidden around others. Vayer winked at him.
"Then you do, right?" Vayer grinned at his son. They looked nothing alike, really. Although Danyel knew Vayer was Arkay's son. Which might explain some of the resemblance between Dimitri and Arkay. Although who Dimitri most strongly resembled was Diomid.
Dimitri winked at him, grinning.
"OK, now, I want some of you alone." Karin waved Darya off the stage. No, Darya did not look like a woman who'd had five children.
"You're so sweet." She leaned over and before he could escape, planted a light kiss on his cheek. "Oh, I'm sorry." Darya giggled, brushing his cheek with her fingertips. "I forget you don't like to touch."
"You're just all excited from having that renSime's nager all over you." Vayer's tentacles were out and twining about his hands, rubbing at the backs of his nails. Danyel knew such a display was hardly usual for the Rus, who were nearly as bad as people from far out territory who turned Sime and managed to run for the nearest Sime Center.
"I had your and Danyel's nagers all over me." Her eyes were bright, particularly against her smoke dark field. Danyel would have repaid her compliment of a kiss, if it weren't for her nager. She cocked her head at him in question. He waved it away, stepping back so he didn't get slapped by her field in passing. Her face fell.
"No, not you." He pointed at her field. Unfortunately, he did so with the arm Mitka' was dozing along. His eyes got really big and Danyel could tell what he was after, Danyel's tentacles.
"No," he wrapped two dorsals around Mitka's muzzle. He wasn't going through the bit with his lateral sheath again. Mitka struggled against his hold, twisting his body until he slid part way off. "No you don't." He bundled Mitka into his arms, holding him still. Mitka thrashed, but thankfully didn't grow to impossible proportions. He glared, though, fury red hot in those gold eyes.
"What are you doing to my nager?" Dimitri asked.
"Keeping him from making himself sick again." Danyel gave Mitka another good, solid shake. "You stop that you little spoiled brat." He growled.
Mitka's eyes grew huge. He began to swell in Danyel's hold. But it was a slow thing and each time another pulse of growth went through his body, Danyel crammed him back together again. Eventually his struggles slowed and then stopped. He panted, limp again in Danyel's hold. This time Danyel released his mouth. It fell open and his tongue fell out. It too was completely limp.
Danyel looked up to realize Vayer had only moved a step toward him. Had their struggle really been over so fast? Danyel didn't feel as if he'd been augmenting. Vayer stopped, his eyes unfocusing as he zlinned. Danyel'd never seen a Russian zlin so obviously.
"Sorry," Vayer ducked his head, as if he were a naughty child and glanced at Darya.
"Oh, I certainly don't mind."
"He knows I'd tweak his nose for zlinning anyone else." Darya's nager gleamed with good humor. Mitka was panting again, having worn himself out with his struggles. Danyel remembered making himself sick once with fretting, if not as obviously, and he held Mitka to him, as he'd wished someone had done for him. For that much matter, Danyel doubted anyone had ever held him.
"I'm sorry." Vayer twined a tentacle. Danyel stared at it for a moment, wondering if he'd misinterpreted. It assured him not. That same tentacle asked if he'd like to be held. Danyel looked down at Mitka, curled quietly in his arms. No, he didn't want to disturb him now that he'd gotten him calmed down. Danyel brushed away tear marks. Poor little thing.
"Would you get your mind back on what you're doing up there?" The irate renSime snapped. His field was spiky with irritation.
"Certainly." Dimitri breathed, and with a last flicker of icy longing, he was gone. Someone had found a huge faceted clear crystal and Dimitri was holding it. Danyel gaped at the nageric image. The glass fractured Dimitri's rainbow nager all over the room, creating little dancing spots everywhere.
"Can you zlin his field now?" Danyel smiled, entranced at the vision in front of him.
"No," Vayer glanced away for a moment, the play leaving his own field.
"Then go look." Danyel pointed. "He's not having any problem zlinning Dimitri's nager. Its beautiful."
"I'll take your word for it."
"Oh, don't be so superstitious." Darya snorted. "Here, I want to be able to see with my eyes." She walked forward. No, she didn't walk, she swayed. Danyel's never seen a woman's hips swing quite like hers did. "Do you keep her in a kador because of those hips?" Danyel felt like an utter fool drooling over someone's mother.
"I've thought it on occasion, yes." Vayer winked. "Although that dress ..."
"On her is enough to give a renSime in attrition a hard on." Danyel finished Vayer's statement. He wrinkled his nose and then laughed so loudly half a dozen people shushed him. "I didn't think it was that funny."
"I did." His dark blue eyes twinkled. "So, you've tamed the wild dragon, I see." Vayer leaned forward, his hands behind his back. Mitka recovered enough to lick him. It was a stealth lick. Even Danyel hadn't zlinned it coming. Vayer just wiped off his face with his sleeve.
"Almost." Danyel rocked him gently. Mitka squirmed, but not upset, more just wanting to move, so Danyel let him. He ended upon his back with his legs in the air. Danyel'd met a few cats who liked to be held on their back as well, so he just let Mitka sprawl. Although one wing joint was digging into his thigh and he knew if he tried to move, he'd trip over both wings, Sime or no. Mitka's mouth fell open and his tongue spilled out the side. Cats didn't do that. It was actually fairly disgusting.
"He zlins content." Vayer grinned, even as his nose wrinkled.
"What a wonderful, odd creature." Danyel stroked Mitka's lower jaw, not incidentally easing it closed. His tongue slipped back into his mouth. Mitka snorted hard, choked and doubled over. "Oh, I'm sorry." Danyel hunched his shoulders around Mitka, wishing he could take it back, protect him somehow. Dimitri's immediate attention chilled Danyel to the bone.
"If you don't keep your mind on what's going on here, I'm going to have to ask them to leave." Karin's demand did more than chill him. Danyel tipped Mitka so he was upright. Mitka wheezed. Dimitri's attention didn't waver. Danyel pried open Mitka's jaws and yanked on his tongue. Mitka gasped, huge gulps of air.
"I thought he didn't have to breathe." Vayer muttered.
Danyel looked in Mitka's eyes. He could have imagined the twinkle of glee in Mitka's expression. Possibly. Danyel doubled it. Danyel hugged him tight and murmured in his ear. "All you had to do was ask."
"No," Mitka blinked, stiffening his whole body.
"Truly," Danyel told him, holding him even tighter. Any other creature's ribs would have given way long since. Mitka thrummed against his arms, growing warmer with each passing moment. "I love you." He said, as softly as he could.
Mitka gasped, starting at him.
"Get back to work. All of you." Karin's voice came from a distance. All Danyel know was Mitka's wide eyes staring into his own. A tear appeared, pooling silver and then tracing over his cheek.
"You're beautiful, Mitka." Danyel spoke the words he'd never said to any human person. He felt his lips tremble.
"I'm weird." Mitka snorted, adding more goo to Danyel's face. By this point he couldn't tell the difference. "You'll never have me. No one normal will ever want me." He craned his head around and tried to cram it under his own wing.
"Not true." Danyel coaxed it back up. "I want you."
Chapter 14
Dimitri could often hear things said to Mitka. This time he could hardly believe his own senses. Could Mitka possibly be falsifying this?
"If I could have a moment of your time, Mister Mir." Karin growled at him.
Dimitri glanced down. He was not at all accustomed to being accosted by renGens. From meters away he could tell she thought he was attractive. Although her pinching his behind would have been enough of a clue even for another renGen. "Its Sosu Sergei." Dimitri looked down his nose at her. His sire had certainly given him a fine one for it. The camera clicked frantically in the background.
"Hold it right like that, Sosu." The photographer, however, had been amazing. He'd not once acted the least bit unprofessional. As a matter of fact, he'd been so professional Dimitri had to keep checking to make sure his tentacles hadn't vanished.
"He's not thrilled."
"I don't care. He's focused." The shrouded figure held up a hand. "A little to the outside right." The term he used was not physical, but nageric. Dimitri wasn't sure he could turn his nager that way, but tried anyway. He could hardly sense it himself, and Danyel, it seemed, was the only Sime could directly zlin his nager.
"Perfect, perfect!" The man caroled. He'd never even zlinned Dimitri directly, only though the metal and glass contraption in front of his face. "Oh, no, no! Stop that. Go back to hating her!"
Dimitri laughed. He'd never had anyone tell him to hate someone.
"Precious, brilliant, yes, I love you. Just like that honey." He purred, clicking away. "Now I want to see your basket. Can you do that for me darlin?"
"My what?" Dimitri froze.
"Karin, honey, pout for the man. Give him something to look at."
Dimitri stared at Karin utter horror. He'd never touch her. What do that person think he was talking about. Danyel waved his hand. Now there was someone who was worth his time.
"Get up here you idiot Ferris. Make yourself useful." Karin rolled her eyes. "Yeah, I know, ye could care less 'bout me. Fore he gets here. What is it? The hair? The makeup? I don't want te let yer little brother by without a fair chance."
"You're Gen." He tried not to be rude. After her initial pass, Dimitri could tell she was simply very focused on her work.
"Come on here, come on! We're wasting selyn! Lets get a move on."
Danyel came up behind Karin, as quiet as a shadow and holding Mitka in his arms like a child. Dimitri blinked and saw Danyel actually held the kador Dimitri'd worn here. He met Danyel's eyes and found himself drawn into their brilliant depths.
Never before had he seen anyone with such dark eyes and they fascinated him. Or at least not when he'd been paying attention. He might have as a child. Right now all he knew was the warmth in them, reflecting Mitka's onyx scales perfectly. Dimitri leaned toward him, knowing it could never be, but even still, wishing he dared try.
Never, ever, had Mitka let anyone hold him the way Danyel had him. On his back and pinned. Even when Darya'd held him close, Mitka'd insisted on having his hocks and elbows out of the embrace. With Danyel he'd curled up so close only the tip of his nose showed above the elegant lines of Danyel's tentacled arms.
Danyel flicked a corner of the kador over Mitka, as he would have a child, and Dimitri warmed with the comfort the gesture gave Mitka. No longer did Dimitri feel his headache or the ache in his groin. All he knew was the warmth he shared with Mitka in Danyel's arms.
"That's a wrap!" The cameraman called out. Dimitri backed a step. People were running all over the place as if someone had let a renSime loose in the sharm. Dimitri looked at the camera. Its glass eye had been covered.
"That's it?" He asked.
The cameraman glanced at him. "Yeah, that last roll of film of you trying to get mister iron nager Ferris over there interested in you'll be worth a mint in that outfit." He shrugged, as if such a thing were mere playacting. Mitka was oblivious, cuddled so close in Danyel's arms. Dimitri stepped to the edge of the light. "What's it to ya?"
"I've never done this before."
"Hey, you done good kid." The renSime patted him on the butt. "Good ass, great nager, hot, hot bod. Ya wanna do this for a livin, give me a ring." The man pressed a small square of thin greasy plastic into Dimitri's hand.
Dimitri stared at the piece of plastic for a long moment. He couldn't make ventrals or dorsals of it. There seemed to be some kind of raised lettering on it. He brushed his fingertips over it and then held it up to the selyn lights. "Oh, there it is."
"You can zlin it?" The renSime had a pen out and was writing on another of the little cards.
"Yeah," he shrugged, flipping the card between his fingers. Nashen's amused chuckle carried on the ambient with the chiming of silver bells. "Here, let me have the other one." Dimitri held out his other hand. On this card was a name and a number, the name was Jon Krith. "You're Jon?" He passed the two cards back and forth, practicing some of the exercises Nashen'd taught him at four to work his hands and fingers. With learning to heal, he'd gotten serious about keeping his hands in shape
"Yeah," the ren watched Dimitri's hands with an unwavering gaze he thought he'd never see from any renSime. "Yer good. Ever play?"
"I play. I don't gamble." Dimitri knew Nashen would pound him into the floor if he left such things up to the odds entirely. "You know of a game?"
"Dimitri!" Danyel hissed, his nager like ice.
"What?" He flicked a whisker of his question back. There was a game afoot and Dimitri didn't want to loose the chance. The renSime was as crooked as a dog's hind leg. Which was all to the good from Dimitri's point of view. He didn't want to take from an honest man. Then Danyel's heat pressed up against his back.
"The man's a crook." He said in Russian.
"I know." He looked back over his shoulder. "You want in?" His hand slid into Danyel's shirt pocket. He shuffled the cards in one blur. "So, Jon, where is it?"
"We don't play up front." His eyes were flicking from side to side, as was his attention.
"I don't much care for simple games." He slid through the deck, getting a feel for the much lighter, slicker cards. They were considerably easier to manipulate than the often slightly irregular and thicker stiffened parchment ones he was used to. Before long, he had them flitting back and forth in the air between his hands, while he still held the two phone cards. Jon's eyes were locked onto Dimitri's hands.
"I can tell." He gnawed at his lower lip for a moment. "The lip wanna join?" Dimitri'd never heard this bit of slang, but he figured Jon had to have meant Danyel.
"Lip?" He glanced back at the older man.
"Yeah," he tapped his own lips. "For the fifth contact point." His dark eyes twinkled. "And you're a slick." Dimitri winced and Danyel snorted. "Yeah, its crude. And yeah, I want in. If nothing else to be bein sure ye bein home after all. Yer a bit young."
"Where and when?" He asked Jon. Vayer was listening in and he wished he could ward him off as other Sharm Lords did with their nagers.
"Dimitri," Vayer used his best papa voice.
"I'm an adult, papa." That didn't come out the way Dimitri planned. He tried it again. "I have to get some money."
"What if you loose?" Vayer had always had that conservative streak, particularly for a Sime. Mitka raised his head and looked around. His long pink tongue flicked across Danyel's face like an overcooked noodle.
"I don't think it will be a problem." Mitka looked at Vayer and then curled even deeper into the nest Danyel made for him. "I can see everyone else's cards. We've done this before."
"Not for money." Dimitri said before Vayer could rip his arms off. "Its cheating at home."
"Its cheating here, Dimitri." Danyel's eyes were huge.
"Are you going to say something about it?" Dimitri'd made up his mind. "Besides, I'm an adult here and can do as I like as long as I fulfill my obligations."
Jon had been incredibly patient for a renSime and Dimitri wasn't going to push his luck. "Yes, there will be two of us. Myself and the Ferris." Jon blinked at him. Dimitri thought about what he'd said and tried to clean it up some. "Yes, I would like to play, as would Hajene Ferris." He wasn't entirely certain if this was so much better as to have been worth the effort.
Dimitri certainly hoped the effect Danyel had on his tongue did not extend to his card playing. He flicked through the cards and found all the aces in a row. Yes, good, he did still know what he was doing. Then he shuffled them behind his back and let Mitka look. He was actually better at catching all the cards than Dimitri, since his timesense was even more flexible.
He only had a fraction of Mitka's attention, but it was enough. Dimitri cut the cards behind his back as well, showing Danyel the aces. The lord's nageric flicker of surprise was so fast only Mitka caught it. He licked Danyel again. Dimitri wasn't too sure of this. The taste of him, at least through Mitka was enough to make him very aware of the tightness of the binding he'd tied around his loins to keep from embarrassing himself.
It was far from comfortable and he sucked in a deep breath as the pain of being so tightly cramped fought with how desperately he wanted to taste Danyel's skin for himself. Through Mitka he held the rich musky darkness of the scent of young studs turned out to grass for the first time overlaid with a sweet delicacy that instantly piqued his interest. That lightness, that deftness had Dimitri utterly fascinated.
"Then," Jon nodded and held out his hand. Dimitri flicked all fifty four cards over his shoulder, landing them neatly in a pile in his other hand. It helped to have big hands. Jon's eyes widened as they landed. Dimitri spread the whole deck, now in order. Jon's nager froze, as a cat would freeze under the shadow of an eagle. Dimitri handed him one of the plastic cards.
"No," he shook his head. "Not like this." Jon flicked a tentacle at the cards. The trembling fear Dimitri'd felt from every single renSime but Dorityan chewed into his nerves.
"Good enough." Dimitri couldn't help the stinging disappointment. But it would not have been legitimate, to himself if no one else, to hide at least this much of his skills. "The other?" He used the card between his fingertips to indicate the camera.
"Yeah, sure," he nodded. "Bring the lips with you though, slick. I don't want you alone." His tentacles were locked tight in their sheathes.
"I'm only a Gen." Dimitri tried to slide into the role so many expected of donors here.
"I know you're TN1 even if I don't dare zlin you personally." He flicked a tentacle at his camera. "No, I'm smarter 'n that. Karin there wouldn't have me if I couldn't keep m' eye on the lens."
"No, she wouldn't." Dimitri felt another chill run over his skin. "If you would." He held out his hand to Danyel. He'd tired horribly of all these people looking at him. Even Jon's attention was now rubbing his nerves raw in his whole body.
"What?" Danyel came up at his side. Mitka was painfully zlinnable, wrapped up Danyel's front like some kind of fantastic pectoral. Dimitri winced and glanced at Jon.
"Yeah," he nodded, lips tightening. "Naw. There's no game. Not with that." He pointed, with a finger. His fear was so rank Dimitri could smell it. "I'll take pictures. Two lips, you, and a cage."
"I don't want the money that badly." Dimitri backed up.
"Your call, slick." He flicked out a roll of bills. Dimitri looked away. Even so he knew that wad of money was more than he'd earn in months of sweating for the Techton. With it, he could rush through the interviews and not have to worry about anything until Aliana and Jarmin got here.
"No," Danyel put his hand on one of Dimitri's bracelets. The intimacy of the gesture took Dimitri's breath away, literally. He gasped as the pressure returned to clamp his heart in talons of steel. "You can't."
"Who are you to tell me what I can and can't do." Dimitri stood up straight. How dare this dainty little lord tell him what to do? "You aren't my conscience."
"No, I'd like to think I could become your friend." Danyel's dark eyes held his.
"Shen you, Danyel." He swore, furious at having his dreams crushed.
"I'd rather not." Danyel muttered. Dimitri's wrist turned to ice as Danyel tried to reclaim his hand.
"You cheated me out of thousands of days." He captured Danyel's hand and held it to his wrist. Vayer's shock rocked the ambient. "I'll have my pay."
"With my hand on your wrist?"
"You put it there." Dimitri forced another breath. "OK, no cage. He'll behave. I'll accept two channels. You won't require them."
"No?" Jon snorted, spreading both hands. "Look at them."
Dimitri didn't have to. "Vayer is my father, Danyel is," Dimitri had to pause. Why was it Danyel was affecting him like this. Normally he didn't have to think twice about anything he wanted to say. He shook his head and forged on. "He's my paramour." Came out. Dimitri blinked in utter shock. That wasn't what he'd meant to say. He opened his mouth to correct his words and realized nothing could help. He was blushing down to his toenails.
"Really?" Danyel, of course, asked. His nager was iridescent with all the colors of the rainbow. "I'd have liked to have gotten to know you better first."
"We slept together last night." Fell out of his mouth. Right there, in front of Vayer and everyone. Dimitri really regretted he was a physician and therefore knew he was extraordinarily unlikely to die of embarrassment. However his ears were burning so hot he swore he could have lit a match on them. "In the same bed.
"I'm going out to the car." He turned, unable to face Jon any longer. He yanked his borrowed kador over his head. At least then he wouldn't have everyone zlinning his new won verbal incompetence, only hearing it.
"What got into you?" Danyel, it seemed, had forgotten to let go, or had grabbed him again, one of the two. Dimitri yanked at the door handle.
"Oh shen," he breathed, realizing this was not the door out. He glanced into Karin's office.
"Did you want something of me?"
"How reliable is Jon?" At least his talent still worked with her.
"Very, to a point." Her lips tightened. "Come in."
Danyel was attached to his bracelet. Dimitri didn't remember chaining him to the jewelry. At the moment, he wasn't complaining. "I just wanted to be certain. He's offering me the chance to review a contract for him."
"I can pay more. Stay with me." Her nager softened. "Yeah, well, I made a pass at you. You aren't interested, are you?"
"Not at all." Dimitri struggled not to squirm. Danyel'd pressed himself against Dimitri's backside. All of Danyel had done so. The kador helped, slightly. Through it he could only feel the heat of Danyel's body, as if Dimitri were truly post, not just stripped. Maybe it didn't help. Dimitri slid his hand through the lacing and released himself. He was surprised Danyel couldn't hear the smack as it hit his belly. He'd have to wash the tights, but no one would see him in this outfit again until .... tonight.
"I want a night off, Danyel." He pleaded. "All I want is some peace, quiet, and maybe a night's sleep."
"Leave it to me." Danyel's smile held as many fangs as Mitka's.
Danyel didn't have to zlin to know Dimitri was about to collapse. "We'll be in touch." He said, again blocked by Dimitri's huge body. Karin chuckled, her nager rippling with amusement, even though she didn't say a thing.
"I know you will, you old thief." As always, she gave a friendly swat with her field. It was totally wasted with Dimitri between them. "What is he, your protector?" Her throaty chuckle would have utterly fascinated Danyel if she'd been anything other than a renGen. As it was, he couldn't touch her. Dimitri's attention came to rest on him, slowly, as if with sadness. His fingers curled around Danyel's wrist, cupping it with impossible gentleness.
"Something like that." Dimitri's accent thickened. "He's with me."
"Oh, I've known Danyel for years." Karin snorted. "He'll break your heart, young man. Stick with your own kind."
"He is my kind." Dimitri's fingertips stroked the soft skin between Danyel's ventrals. "Human."
"So am I." She rasped, with a lilt of laughter. Dimitri's dimples appeared. "Oh, the woman who catches you is going to be so lucky."
"I'm not that picky." His fingers slid up Danyel's arm until his hand came to rest in the curve of Danyel's elbow. Now he'd been flirted with before. And he was certainly no virgin, but inside, he trembled as if he were twelve years old again and standing in front of his sexual initiator's door. Dimitri glanced down at him, brows furrowed slightly.
Danyel shook his head slightly and put his hand over Dimitri's. "My client will look over any offer you are willing to make."
"Get out of here, you snake." She waved her hand. "Let me get some work done. I just hope you didn't run Jon off. He still has the whole afternoon to go, along with my whole crew." Her sultry eyes and wry grin told him exactly what she thought he'd do getting Dimitri alone. Karin might not be able to zlin, but she read people very well all the same.
"No," Dimitri shook his head. "He's still messing with his camera. I think I delayed him."
"Good," she stood. "I have to talk with him about how we want to shoot the other two."
"Do you think there might be a problem?" Dimitri asked. It was a very good thing Karin couldn't zlin. The suspicion in his field was as dark as night. Mitka hissed in Danyel's ear. Then he drooled down the side of Danyel's neck. Danyel could do without Mitka's slobbering on everything.
"No, no," Karin jittered. It would have been obvious to another renGen she was lying. Danyel flicked a tentacle at her. "Oh, well." She relented! Danyel'd never zlinned her back down.
"If you lie to me again, I'll certainly entertain Jon's proposal." Dimitri's fingers tightened a hair on Danyel's arm. It was very strange. Well, another strange thing, how big Dimitri's vocabulary was, with how thick his accent could become. "You wouldn't want that, now would you?" He purred. The sound would have made harder nager'd Simes than Danyel quail. Although to him, it thrummed along his nerves, setting them to vibrating. Mitka stroked his ear. A very wet tongue slid inside it. Danyel shook his head, trying to dislodge him.
Dimitri looked at him, all three of his dimples appeared. "Do you have a problem, Hajene?" His field twinkled like summer fireflies.
"Your nager, Sosu." Danyel contemplated prying Mitka off his shoulder. Sixteen needle sharp talons dug into his skin.
"Do you really want me to do something about it?" His grin broadened.
"Lets go home." Danyel ached. He knew Simes weren't supposed to get tired the way Gens did, but he was utterly exhausted. Dimitri gave him a gentle tug and he found himself pressed against his side.
"Let me go talk to him." Karin was right in front of them. Danyel, giving in to Dimitri's protectiveness, let him guard Danyel with his body. No Donor had ever made him feel quite so cherished. When she'd gone, Dimitri pulled Danyel into his arms. Nor had any Donor ever handled him so physically.
"I like you like this." Dimitri purred, his voice rumbling deep in his chest. And what a lot of chest there was. Danyel turned his face to the side so he could hear Dimitri's heart beat. "You're so little." His chin rubbed the top of Danyel's head.
"And what are you two doing?" Arkay asked. Danyel slumped. He was not up to dealing with Arkay right now. "Hiding in the shadows. I heard about your little display for Jon."
"Why did you even come?" Dimitri asked. His arms were around Danyel's shoulders, as if they were lovers, not Donor and channel. They were softer around him than he could have imagined. All his lovers, if you could call them that, had been Sime, not Gen. "You could have slept in and shown up this afternoon."
"Because I didn't want to see you frittering away yourself on this." Arkay snorted. If Dimitri hadn't been holding him, Danyel would have been badly shocked by the nageric blow warded off by Dimitri's attention. As it was, his wrists rang with it.
"He's as much a person as you or I, papa." Dimitri's hands spread over Danyel's back. They were so large, they covered nearly all of it.
"He's sick. Of course you want to do something for him." Arkay sighed. The harsh words churned Danyel's stomach into knots. "Can't you see what association with us is doing to him?"
"Arkay, you're being an ass." Dimitri's protectiveness was a two edged blade resting on Danyel's laterals. One breath more pressure, and he'd be badly injured. As it was, the checked threat thrilled along all his nerves. He must have been tired for such a thing to feel good. "You didn't have to come here."
"Leave him be, Dimitri." Nashen said. The condemnation from the sweet old man wrenched at Danyel's heart. He'd never head Nashen say an unkind word of anyone. "I've zlinned people with southerner's. You can't help him."
"How do you know?" Dimitri stiffened. Mitka curried the edge of his ear, teeth making little clicking sounds. It felt wonderful and Danyel leaned into the gentle grooming.
"Don't do this, Dimitri." Nashen's field was as soft as moon mist beyond Mitka's protective wings. "You'll only end up harming him." Before, even Nashen, however, had held more threat than kindness to Danyel with his nager. Not intentionally, none of them ever meant harm, truly, but simply with the force behind their nagers.
"He's human too." Dimitri held him so tightly he could hardly breathe. Not that he really much wanted to at the moment. A lump had lodged in his throat and his eyes stung with unshed tears. Now Danyel was not a one to cry. He'd given up such things as a very young child. But here, in Dimitri's arms, he felt as if he could do anything, express anything.
"I love thee." Mitka whispered, for Danyel's ears alone. His innocence made the lump grow to impossible proportions. A single tear escaped his control. Mitka's tongue caught it before it could wet Dimitri's finery. This was silly. He shouldn't be crying about such nonsense. Danyel was a grown man, not a child. "I don't want you to cry either." Mitka sniffled, rubbing his cheek against Danyel's.
"He's not suitable." Arkay's nager was a towering spire of poured stone.
"Vayer gave me permission to court you." Danyel glanced up at Dimitri. One of Dimitri's eyebrows raised and he smiled.
"He did?" Dimitri grinned. The expression erased every last bit of early aging from his strong face, turning it as young as Mitka's. "I didn't know that."
"I don't know if it means much." Danyel said. "I'm not ..." he put his face against Dimitri's chest. "Arkay doesn't seem to think I'm good enough. Even Nashen doesn't." He'd never really thought much about trying to impress any of the Russians. Danyel didn't try to impress anyone, really. He'd always been too busy trying to survive. His cards pressed against Dimitri's chest.
"I meant to say I don't think it would be wise ... for either of you." Nashen's field had softened even more. Harsh words would have been kinder than this. "You can't have transfer."
"There's more to life than transfer." Dimitri murmured, still holding Danyel tight.
"Wait a couple of weeks and say that." Arkay's voice was harsh in Danyel's ears.
"You won't be here." Dimitri gave him a squeeze all over. Mitka too, his tail wrapped around Danyel's throat.
"Then we'll take Danyel with us." Arkay said.
"No you won't." He snapped. "I'm my own person."
"You're sick, Danyel. Its my professional judgement you have no business with Dimitri." Arkay's words were echoed by a gasp from Dimitri. "He can't help you now."
"What?" Dimitri vibrated against Danyel's cheek. "How dare you look into my mind?"
"You're a child. He has southerner's. And your nager is too young to know any different." Nashen sighed. "I love you Dimitri. I don't want to see you hurt. When you kill him, you will be."
"How dare you speak of Danyel as if he weren't here?" Dimitri's hands tightened down further. If he'd have been of a mind to complain, Danyel would have squawked. As it was, all he could do was huddle in the scant protection afforded by that grasp. Outside Mitka's influence, Danyel could clearly zlin the nageric firestorm surrounding them. "You're as human, and as lovable as any Sime who ever changed over, Danyel. Don't let Arkay or Nashen convince you otherwise."
Danyel was trapped between blushing and wanting to strike out in self defense. He'd never let anyone talk to him as if he were a child or deformed. Not after he'd changed over. He paid too high a price for his self confidence.
"You're just attracted to him because you think you can heal him. I can tell there's more wrong with him than just southerner's, bad as that is. He's mind sick and badly wounded inside, with old scars going back to when he was a toddler. Don't let those needs of his tempt you, Dimitri. You can't heal everyone." Arkay sounded almost reasonable. He would have if he'd been talking about someone else. "And a patient can not be a lover." This last echoed in Danyel's mind. How many times had he heard those words? Spoken both to himself and to others.
"I'd have you as my friend." Dimitri spoke to him, his lips tightening and chin beginning to quiver. "If you'd let me?"
"Let him go, Dimitri." Nashen insisted. "You can't heal him. Not from so close."
Danyel cocked his head in question.
"I can't heal those I love." Dimitri focused his eyes on Danyel's brow. "Its impossible for any sane, well, relatively sane, Sergei to do so."
"Are you saying you're not sane or that you love me?" Danyel tried to jest.
"Both," Dimitri said, looking down in to Danyel's eyes. The blunt honesty took his breath away. "I can no longer speak with you other than with my heart. My easy words have fled and I can't find them regarding you."
A tear pooled in Dimitri's eye and began sliding down his cheek. Danyel reached up and brushed it away with a tentacle. It tickled, wet and cool down to his wrist. He touched the dampened tip to his own lips and kissed it, as he wished he could brush his lips over Dimitri's cheek. Mitka's wings caressed him, guarding him from Dimitri's field, even as, for the first time in his life, he shared a Gen's emotions rather than being overwhelmed