Healer's Heart
Section 4
by
Ann Marie Olson
Story © 2002 Ann
Marie Olson
Chapter 16
It took long, long moments for Dimitri to wake up. Given his early bad experiences when he established, it was no wonder he wasn't overfond of mornings, whenever they happened to occur during the day. But this time, waking up, he found a warm, delicate, sweet scented Sime in his arms.
Unable to think for being as low field as possible and still alive, he gently lipped the Sime's slender neck. The thin, delicate skin was scented with both familiar and wildly unfamiliar scents. He knew the lavender, mints, sweet citrus and clove, but there were other, darker scents he didn't recognize at all. His tongue caressed the tiny points of the Sime's spine, tracing each little bump in loving detail.
Dimitri'd never known was it was to have truly untrammeled access to any Sime. But here and now, he did. He'd been in need with Khristov, with Karola, he'd been too shy, and Vayer was his father. His hands slid around to his Sime's front, tracing the lines of muscle so very close to the surface, from flanks, to collarbones, to knees. Everything he could reach, he explored, wondering at the silky sleek hot body so pliant against his own.
Then he woke enough to realize what he was doing. For a moment, he couldn't move at all. Mitka stared at him, eyes hot over Danyel's shoulder. Dimitri spread his hands over Danyel's chest, where they couldn't get into too much trouble, Danyel pressed his body hard against Dimitri's chest. From his nager, he was still mostly asleep.
Dimitri trembled with how close he'd come to simply taking advantage of the fragile Sime he held so closely. There was not a single thread of clothing between them, and with the night air, he'd automatically covered them in their soft nest of cushions.
Then he looked to the window and nearly whimpered. He didn't want to think of the time. Why did he always have to be the one to be punctual, to not be able to relax, to have to follow through on everything? Could he, for once, not fulfill his obligations? A knot in his throat refused to go away. It spread through his body, and before he could stop it, the first tears burned in his eyes.
Mitka relented, brushing his jaw against Dimitri's. He too was grayer than Dimitri'd ever seen him. Then he saw the coarse stitching on Mitka's wing and they immediately blurred in his vision as the tears threatened to overwhelm him. How could he have been so stupid as to neglect Mitka so badly? His hand trembled as he reached up to caress Mitka.
"There's nothing to forgive." Mitka said. Then with a very toothy grin, "Unless you want to apologize for not giving me what I want now."
"He's asleep." Dimitri whispered, wondering at how trusting Danyel was. Even Karola woke easily, every time he'd moved. Vayer'd gotten used to Dimitri's thrashing, but probably because he was a restless sleeper himself. Dimitri would have guessed Danyel would have been a very light sleeper, as he was so sensitive to everything.
"I'm helping." Mitka told him. Dimitri narrowed his eyes at the dragon. He didn't understand. Then he felt the weight of Mitka's compulsion on Danyel's mind.
"Don't do that." He hissed, outraged Mitka would do any such thing. "He has a right to his own mind, his own body." The dark cloud lifted slowly and Mitka backed away, good wing rustling, the other held tightly to his side.
"You've never been like this before." Mitka trembled all over. Was he actually afraid?
"I'm not going to hurt you."
"You've been hurting me." Mitka didn't cry, or wail, he just stared.
"I have." A tear ran down Dimitri's cheek. He did love Mitka. Mitka meant no harm. He tried to stroke Mitka's head and he ducked away. Dimitri bit back a harsh sob. Mitka'd never refused his touch before. "I'm sorry."
"So am I." He nuzzled Danyel's face. The lord shivered awake with a start.
"Dimitri?" He rolled over so fast half the blankets went with him. Dimitri couldn't meet their eyes. Shame burned like acid in his heart. "What's wrong?" His work roughened thumbs brushed Dimitri's cheeks.
The ache turned to agony. Danyel's kindness, and Mitka's, were tearing him apart.
"We have a dinner date." His head spun, not to mention his stomach was tied in knots. "Or at least I do."
"No," Mitka told him, his eyes brassy. "Arkay pounding on the door is what woke you up in the first place."
"Why didn't he come in?" The last thing Dimitri remembered was arriving at Kaon and his relief at Sevrin meeting them. After that, nothing.
"Because no one could find the key." Mitka smirked, his old humor coming back for a moment. Then it stilled, as if it never had been. "I saw it in Sevrin's pocket. Did I do right to not say anything?" The resemblance between Mitka's hurried, hollow tones and Lira's shocked Dimitri to his core.
"You did perfectly." He pleaded. How he wished Mitka wouldn't pull away. He longed to fell Mitka's sleek scales and life. Without him, Dimitri was no one. A ghost without drive or passion. He fought more tears, not wanting to act the fool. "Did Sevrin sew you up?"
"What?" Danyel's eyes widened. The blankets got more twisted. Made of linen, they were stronger than even a thrashing Sime. Danyel struggled against his bondage.
"Still, easy," Dimitri breathed. Then a fold caught one of Danyel's lateral sheaths and he doubled over in sympathetic pain. The sudden shock, with him so low field, caught him off guard. He clawed his way back to full consciousness. Mitka was staring straight into Danyel's eyes.
"Yes," he felt Mitka's soothing wash over them. It was gentle enough; Danyel didn't struggle.
"I hate being bound too." He sympathized, carefully tugging loose the blankets. When he'd finished, Danyel relaxed in truth, falling back against Dimitri's front. Hadn't they started here when he'd woken?
"Its a good thing I have almost no selyn in my body." He tried to reassure Danyel himself.
"Are you all right?" Danyel asked Mitka. The automatic reaching for Dimitri's nager was like nothing he'd ever known. Mitka preened under the attention, sliding his teeth along the leading edge of his uninjured wing. How he wished Danyel didn't have southerner's. The denial brought back all his heartache.
Dimitri forced himself to think about tonight. It was nearly six in the evening. They'd only gotten about ten hours of sleep in the last forty eight. With Mitka's injury, it wasn't enough. But needs must when the Veiled drove. He braced himself and heaved. And almost heaved up the breakfast he'd not had.
With a painfully loud thump, he collapsed back into the cushions. Dimitri grabbed the corner of one of the blankets and put it over his face. He didn't have the foul breath of a hangover, but someone was driving two long, sharp, needles through his eyes all the way to the back of his skull. For a moment, he flailed around, trying to wave down the lights. Not finding the controller, he gave up. The only place for his arm was along Danyel's side.
Not wanting to seem rude, or rejecting, he put his hand on the relatively neutral area of Danyel's chest. He hoped Danyel did not favor such things, as did a number of Dimitri's close relatives. Dimitri hardly had any idea of what he himself enjoyed in bed. Mitka cocked his head.
He spoke to both of them. "I've had sex once, with one woman. Well, call it one seclusion. I know the basics, but anything more?" Dimitri shrugged helplessly. Danyel'd gone as still as a horse scenting a wolf. The tension in his body warned of his conflict between remaining frozen and hoping the predator would miss him standing there, or bolting and risking the chase. "I don't know what I like, what I favor, even what is possible." He'd contemplated finding some of the pillow books he'd heard of, but had never had the time, or the selyn.
Dimitri looked at the stitching on Mitka's wing. It was beginning to loosen already, even as it had been weeping slowly over clean scales when Mitka'd felt rejected. "I love you Mitka. I don't want to hurt you. But I don't want to hurt anyone else, either, including myself." He felt as if there were dozens of people, all yanking on him and demanding he please them, with no resources and no time for himself.
A glance told him Sevrin had arranged their clothes on the valet. The shirt had been hanged properly on the broad back and even the tights had been neatly folded. Which was a good thing, as knit wool would bag horribly if not cared for correctly.
Danyel's hand came to rest on his. "I don't really know either, Dimitri." His voice was a whisper so low, only Mitka's excellent hearing picked it up. "I've always wanted to know. Maybe if Rik hadn't ...."
"Maybe if we are careful ..." Danyel shivered, not with cold, but with fear. Icy feet of near terror crawled all over Dimitri's body. Dimitri held him close, wishing he knew what to do. Danyel's body was Sime hot, but the softness had left it. The rank stink of fear was both horrifyingly seductive, and at the same time, disgusting beyond words. Mitka yanked his head back as if struck on the nose. Danyel's hand shook violently as he reached out toward him.
Mitka rocked back and forth, his whole body shaking no. "This is wrong."
"It is." Dimitri said, holding perfectly still. Danyel was trembling all over, violently. Sweat sprang out all over his body, sour with fear. Mitka hissed, baring his fangs. Dimitri caught his eye and held it. Mitka froze beneath Danyel's hand. Then he brushed his nose along the palm, as a cat would beg to be petted. This was obviously enough for Danyel, as he slumped and stroked Mitka's head. Dimitri relaxed for a moment, letting his eyelids fall closed. His headache throbbed in the darkness which was no where near dark enough. He wanted to bury his aching head beneath a whole pile of pillows and never come out. But what he wanted and what he was going to get were two radically different things.
Dimitri'd looked at some of the other Simes in the Center, ren and lord. They'd been as thin as a starving Teke, all bones, hair and hide. Danyel was thin, but sleek with a good layer of muscle over bone. His chest was not hollow or his waist. With a mindless fascination of its own, his hand slid down Danyel's body. Mitka steered, nudging the path of his hand this way and that.
Surprisingly, Mitka didn't shove Dimitri's hand into Danyel's groin. Was he actually growing up? Mot that Dimitri was complaining. Warm, safe, in their soft nest, Dimitri stroked Danyel's slender form, exploring the simple miracle of larity in skin on bare skin. Everywhere he touched, he knew he touched a Sime. From the slight quivers of selyn taut nerves to the easy motion of muscles working to something other than calories.
Dimitri also didn't want to force himself on Danyel's arms. He kept his wandering hand to those areas of their bodies they shared.
"May I roll over?" He asked, hand suddenly still on Mitka. Mitka didn't bump Danyel's hand in a rough reminder to keep petting him. Mitka instead, pleaded with Dimitri with his eyes. He was learning tact, at least enough to get what he wanted.
"You don't have to ask." He gave Danyel a quick hug all over. The way the cushions sagged in the middle, the bedding surrounded them and nestled them together whether they wanted to be or not. Dimitri didn't know what he wanted. That was what he knew. There was a tiny line between Danyel's brows as well. Dimitri touched it with one forefinger.
A faint smile came to his face, lighting his fascinating dark eyes. His hand came up, trembling slightly. Dimitri ducked his head into the tentative caress. Danyel's hand flicked away for a moment, but Dimitri could feel his whole body threatening to cramp from memory's claws and didn't move. One delicate tentacle traced Dimitri's face so lightly he wondered if he were imagining it.
"I've never done this." Danyel's normal self confidence had fled.
"Never?" He too was trembling deep inside. "I haven't either, not really." Dimitri brushed his hand over the white scar on Danyel's shoulder. It had healed beautifully. Soon even this mark would be gone, leaving only the faintest line beneath the skin of deadened nerves. There was nothing he could do for nerve damage, unfortunately. Danyel's thin skin fascinated Dimitri utterly. "Oh, certainly I've touched many Simes, inside and out.
Danyel shuddered violently.
"Is it any different from zlinning an utter stranger's innermost nager?" Dimitri countered. The past few days had been one long disaster after another. In the quiet, he basked in the early night. "Although we should be getting up."
"You already are." Danyel glanced down, and then blushed. Beneath his dark skin, the effect was astonishing. Danyel wasn't as dark as Darya, but rather he seemed as if he were, probably because of his thin skin and finer build. On Darya it seemed more expected, common, on Danyel the effect was stunning. Beneath his fingertips, Dimitri could feel the blood rush to the surface. Then the words sank in and he winced, drawing away.
"No," Danyel's hand came to rest on the pulse point below Dimitri's ear. Even without zlinning, Danyel had to feel Dimitri's pulse racing frantically. "I'm not upset." There was a glassy calm beneath the surface of Danyel's words, as if he were speaking them from far away or with the detachment of a healer. A shiver ran over his body, digging in all over with icy talons. "Dimitri?"
"Yes?" His voice shook.
"I don't know what to do now." Danyel's voice shook as badly. Dimitri dared look into his eyes and found them shadowed with confusion.
"Then we should get up and go to dinner." His hand stuck to Danyel's shoulder, as if glued there. He didn't want to let go. Mitka nudged at his fingers, pressing them against Danyel's shoulderblade.
"Someone took the key." A faint twinkle of laughter came to Danyel's eyes. Dimitri craned his head around to look at the table. The key was gone.
"Then we have a reason to stay here." He traced the lines of muscle down Danyel's spine. Like most Simes, there was little fat on him, but his backbone should not have been so prominent. Dimitri could count every single one of his vertebrae. The cushions were sucking them together. Dimitri tried to resist, until Danyel grimaced slightly. Or was it Mitka shoving Danyel into his arms the rest of the way?
With a long, drawn out sigh of bedding, and perhaps relief, Danyel came to rest against his chest. The heat of his slender body yanked at Dimitri's reserve, and his unruly body. Careful to keep his hips back, he gathered Danyel in as close as he dared.
The wonder of having a mature Sime in his arms, alone, without fear of being made to look the fool through ignorance or ill-comparison, was as sweet as sunlight. Dimitri tucked Danyel's head under his chin, as he'd wanted to since he'd met him. Danyel sighed, a long sound full of wonder itself. It was a happy sigh, as if he'd come home at last.
The room darkened slowly, shadows lengthening along the worn floorboards with wonderful deliberation. With each breath, each heartbeat, he felt Danyel relax against him. His field had always been frantic, dancing away at everything that went on. Here, in the quiet silence, he eased, and Dimitri with him. Mitka rested his chin on Danyel's flank, looking up at them.
Dimitri'd rarely seen him so quiet either. They were all awake, enjoying the silence, as far as he could tell. Dimitri knew he himself certainly was. Sleek muscle slowly softened beneath his fingers and Danyel's nager gave a gentle sigh of pleasure. How he'd wanted this! Amazed, he looked through Mitka's eyes at Danyel's field pooling around both of them. Head, throat, chest, stomach, loins all gleamed as Danyel's field lost its frantic nervousness.
A shining line of light finally stretched from the top of his scalp to the root of his spine, as it should be. Dimitri nuzzled the bright nexus of selyn and life, pulsing with the rhythm of Danyel's unique consumption of selyn. As slowly as the shadows grew, Danyel's arms slid around him.
As patient as the stones beneath Moskva, Dimitri at least hoped, he relaxed into Danyel's so very tentative touch. The unease behind it had vanished with Danyel's relaxation, but even still, Dimitri could feel his last remaining tremors of insecurity. Yes, his own body was telling him it was time to get laid. He didn't want it. What he wanted was what he had.
Despite the aches of denied desire, he didn't want a quick fumble in the dark, desperate for release and nothing else, no matter what Mitka wanted. Mitka blinked slowly, then looked away, toward Danyel's face. He shook his head.
Dimitri raised an eyebrow at him. Was he finally gaining some maturity? If so, he was amazed. Mitka snorted a bit and stropped his jaw along Danyel's side.
"Are you comfortable?" He murmured, wishing to hear Danyel's voice, with its soft Western accent.
"I'm about to fall asleep." Danyel yawned, as if to try to prove his words. He'd had plenty of true sleep, for a Sime, and more than Dimitri usually got. The softness to him was not sleep, but rather a relaxation he'd probably never known.
"Then you should." He brushed Danyel's hair back from his face. It was far coarser than he would have guessed from looking at it, even as the hair on his chest and arms was far softer. Not that he'd been paying that much attention to the hair on Danyel's chest. Really he hadn't. A cool breeze stole between them, trying to drive them apart.
He tugged a blanket around their shoulders, covering Mitka completely. Through Mitka's eyes, he could still see Danyel perfectly, and he knew Danyel could zlin through the cotton with ease. Although he didn't have to use the blanket. Danyel warmed him through, even his shin, just with his presence. But he didn't want Danyel to get a chill, which would be too easy with Dimitri so cool against him.
Dimitri felt a trickle of something wet bind the two of them and winced. Why did Mitka have to drool all over everything? Danyel shifted restlessly, even though his nager remained as calm as a forest pond in summer. All along the edges of it, there were sparkling glitters of true life, but in the center is was a perfect mirror of all that went by over it.
"I like it." Danyel licked Dimitri's chest, in echo of all the times Mitka'd done the same. So much for Dimitri's reserve. The sensual gesture yanked tight the muscles in his abdomen and his hips jerked forward uncontrollably.
He tried to apologize and push himself back at the same time. His arms had gone limp, draped around Danyel's sleek body, except as the clutched at him for a brief, heart-stopping instant. "Reflex," he said, gulping down a fission of embarrassment. There really wasn't anything to be ashamed of, Dimitri knew, but he still felt it.
"You taste Gen." Danyel said this as if he were surprised.
"Of course I do." Dimitri looked down at him. He'd certainly, well, acquired, enough of the finely milled Azov soap to keep his skin soft and sweet smelling. "I might be as poor as a teenaged renSime, but I wasn't going to ruin all my chances of attracting a partner because I didn't have any money, so, well, I acquired a few things I had to have otherwise."
Danyel chuckled softly. "Acquired?"
"Yes, well," he shrugged, stroking Mitka's back. "There was a reason you didn't require the key that first morning."
"I knew I'd locked it." Danyel looked up at him and grinned. Dimitri desperately wanted to protect this poor little Sime. He was so fragile, and so defenseless, here in Dimitri's arms. The harsh lines in his face had softened for the first time since he'd met Danyel. Khristov had been defenseless, more so really without his handling tentacles, but with him, Dimitri had merely feared killing him. It had been nothing like this boundless desire to keep Danyel safe forever in Mitka's wings.
Dimitri kissed the smooth skin of Danyel's brow. Yes, certainly, his body wanted to roll Danyel over hand have its way with him. but his heart wanted to wrap him in the softest selyn imaginable and keep him to himself.
"Bad aim," Danyel said, looking up into his eyes. Dimitri found his mouth suddenly overflowing for a moment. He swallowed heavily. Danyel's lips were parted a fraction, soft and as inviting as his silken, shimmering field. Mitka nuzzled the curve of Danyel's ear. Dimitri didn't know if he could keep himself from demanding things of Danyel he didn't really want. Danyel's eyes closed, offering himself to whatever Dimitri chose to give.
Keeping a steel grip on his unruly libido, Dimitri brushed his lips over Danyel's. Mitka thrummed, goading him to drive himself on Danyel with all his strength. Dimitri resisted, keeping his kiss softer than the breath of the first of winter's snowflakes, even as his whole body trembled with raging lust. Danyel's lips opened to him, as if begging Dimitri to do Mitka's bidding.
"No," he breathed, pulling back a cent. Danyel's eyes opened wide. Dimitri smiled at him, gently moving his wavy hair back from his face. "There is time." He kissed Danyel's temple, tasting the rushing pulse of blood so near the surface.
If Dimitri had pushed, driven himself on Danyel, he knew he could not have stopped his body from resisting. His training had been too strong, too overwhelming. But he hadn't.
Danyel's lips tingled where they'd touched Dimitri's. Danyel could remember every moment, every fraction of a second of their contact. He let out his bound breath, with it, sagging against Dimitri's length. Dimitri's skin was unmistakably Gen. Danyel'd held enough Gen arms, touched enough Gen lips with his own, to know, down to the core of his being, how wonderful any Gen could feel.
But there was so much more behind Dimitri's touch. Not just the incredible compassion of any natural Donor, but an honesty of spirit he'd zlinned in none of them. It wasn't that they'd lied, but they'd held back. Danyel knew he held Dimitri's heart and soul in his tentacles. And Dimitri'd given Danyel back his own.
Dimitri's hand traced the line of Danyel's back, again. The simple touch of skin on skin, all over, filled some need Danyel'd never wanted to know. No, it wasn't for transfer, it was something more primitive. The comforting quiet soothed his nerves. He could hear Dimitri's breathing, the steady sound hypnotic in its soothing regularity.
The bedding rustled as Dimitri slipped his other arm around Danyel completely. He'd never thought to simply pile up pillows and sleep on them. Although he had to admit it was convenient. Dimitri's breath was as sweet as the rest of him. One benefit to youth, Danyel supposed.
Dimitri chuckled softly, again brushing back Danyel's unruly hair, this time with his lips. "No, its only because I haven't really eaten anything since last night and my body doesn't try to rot my own teeth." The words, right in Danyel's ear, would have startled him if something, or someone, hadn't turned his whole body into mush.
Even as a child, Danyel'd never felt so calm. Here, inside Dimitri's arms, was the eye of the great storm. He couldn't help but sigh. Dimitri chuckled softly, the feeling of protection from him growing greater than anything he could have ever earned.
"I've gotten you calmed. Don't go fretting on me now." His deep voice rumbled in his chest, warming Danyel to his toes.
"You aren't all calm." He pointed out and immediately felt the fool for doing so.
"Oh, it doesn't have a mind to do anything on its own." Then he gave another of those wonderful, caressing chuckles. "Although I do wonder if its simply a sib of Mitka's."
Mitka growled, the effect spoiled entirely by his tongue tickling the inner curve of Danyel's ear. "I have more of a brain than Dimitri's dick."
"Really?" He dared tease. Mitka sneezed, right in Danyel's ear, most likely in retaliation. It was effective. Danyel tugged on Mitka's tail as he'd seen Vayer do earlier, was it only today? Mitka groaned and Danyel echoed him, for entirely different reasons.
"I'd planned on getting some things done today." Danyel thought over his schedule. He'd had to trade with Nessa to get this morning free, and she'd wanted him to take her afternoon shift! It was already seven fourteen in the evening.
"Yes, well, we had had dinner reservations at eight." He stopped suddenly. "And I know as soon as I manage to become vertical, I'll be starving. I always am when I recover from the night before, and now I have two of them." He gave Mitka one of those so loving looks Danyel wished he could intercept a tiny sliver of it. Then those wonderful sky blue eyes turned to him.
For the first time in his life, he found himself the entire focus of another human being's will. For there was no other way to describe it. Dimitri seemed to be able to not only hold his body, but his mind, and only by the grace of fate did he not turn away.
"You are beautiful, Danyel." His lie, after all the truth, drew a snort from him. Dimitri just shook his head slowly, still looking at him with his eyes soft, his lips so tempting to touch again. A tremor of unease passed through him again, to be stilled immediately by the warmth in that gaze. Danyel could look into those eyes forever, loosing himself in their concern. "You are." Dimitri's hand caressed his jaw.
Dimitri's fingers were scarred with dozens of tiny nicks, but Danyel couldn't zlin any loss in sensitivity at all. Dimitri's fingers traced his cheek with all the deftness of a Sime, but the feathery coolness seemed to draw out some sense of being Sime in Danyel he'd never known existed. His own tentacles came out in response and mirrored the gestures of Dimitri's fingers.
For an instant, Dimitri's pupils expanded to flash back over his irises. He didn't move, but Danyel could feel the response in his body to the light caress. Without demand, but unmistakably, Dimitri was so aroused it had to hurt. The visible sign, however, was that flash, and then it was gone. Even his field was calm, twining around both of them like cool morning mist.
Danyel opened his mouth to say something about it and Dimitri's forefinger came to rest on his lips, asking in silence, for silence. Unable to resist, he brushed the pad of his finger with the very tip of his tongue. Dimitri's breath caught in his throat. Mitka stirred on Danyel's side. Then Dimitri's eyes slipped closed. Pale lashes fell over his cheeks in a golden, feathery spray.
One of Danyel's dorsals slipped around behind Dimitri's ear. Dimitri shook his head, not much, but just enough to know Danyel's touch wasn't wanted.
"Not true." He breathed, his eyes opening as slowly as they'd closed. Now they were pitch black, as black as Mitka's scales. "Your touch is more wonderful than sweet cool water on a summer day or warmed cider in the depths of winter." Dimitri's voice was so low Danyel felt it in his wrists more than heard it. The caressing vibrations teased his tentacles from their sheaths. One lateral brushed Dimitri's skin.
Together, they gasped. Danyel could zlin his reflection in Dimitri's field. A flicker of bone deep embarrassment etched away at the composure he'd gained.
"No," Dimitri said, as quietly and as simply as he'd described Danyel's touch. His body grew heavy, softening beneath a compulsion as nearly as irresistible as need. "I think we could work beautifully together."
"Work?" That was the last thing on Danyel's mind. Dimitri's thumb traced Danyel's lower lip. He forgot about words, sighing into the caress. Mitka's scales rustled as he shifted his weight on Danyel's side.
Dimitri chuckled, as softly as he'd spoken. "I do tend to focus on it." His fingertips slid down beneath Danyel's jaw, tracing the line of his pulse. Danyel swallowed heavily, lost in the purely human touch. "From me, I suppose such could be a complement."
Danyel's mind was in a whirl, even as his body and nager melted under Dimitri's regard. "I weren't intendin te be mean." His tongue slipped on the common words, reverting to the dialect he'd learned at Gis' knee.
"Nether was I." Dimitri's hand slipped over Danyel's shoulder and traced the selyn paths beneath the skin, as if he could zlin them. As far as Danyel knew, Dimitri could. Then the pressure intensified, as if Dimitri were reaching through Danyel's skin to stroke those pathways with his fingertips. Danyel's back bowed beneath the pressure, giving to it with his entire body. Dimitri wasn't a healer, he was a wizard.
Then his hand slid all the way down to the base of Danyel's spine. His fingertips pressed against his tailbone, as if searching for something within Danyel's body.
Dimitri found it. Danyel's whole body seemed to expand to consume the fire Dimitri'd set in his core. Danyel cried out with it, as if he'd reached release, but the ephemeral pleasure he'd known before was nothing compared to the promise inherent in this glimpse of what he could receive at Dimitri's hands. "Has no one ever given you pleasure?"
A sweat had broken out on Danyel's body and a cool breeze trickled in under the covers. He shivered at its bite. Dimitri said nothing but stroked him with the worn soft cotton sheet and then somehow made it vanish. The dry, warm cloth against his bare skin felt wonderful. "Poor healer I'd be if I left you in a sweat."
"What did you do?" Danyel yawned, much to his own embarrassment. The corners of Dimitri's lips turned up, allowing his dimples to reappear. Dimitri's fingertip brushed Danyel's upper lip this time.
"I touched you." The dimple in his chin made a brief appearance. Mitka purred, resting the side of his head along Danyel's ribs. Mitka's gold eyes seemed to glow in the deep shadows. Dimitri rolled over for a moment and turned a lamp on very low. "I was prepared, too."
Danyel cocked his head in question. He couldn't do a whole lot more. The lassitude that had settled on his limbs had grown to make him feel as if he were melting into Dimitri's arms. Dimitri stroked the back of Danyel's head, finger combing his unruly hair and neatening it. Dimitri's thumb brushed Danyel's sweat dampened temple.
"The lamp." He said, blinking like a great, pleased owl. His features had softened completely. Then he too yawned. "I'm sorry."
"No reason to apologize." Danyel had tried to touch Dimitri's lip. He didn't want to mention the fact he'd been entirely unable to move. His eyes began to sag shut. "I just woke up." He protested.
"You also released a lot of tension." Dimitri's eyes were half-lidded as well. "Oh, so did I, beautiful one."
"I'm not." He shook his head.
"To me you are." Dimitri tipped Danyel's chin up. He couldn't help but look him in the eyes. They were glassy, unfocused. "Oh yes, I joined you. I couldn't do else but." His phrasing turned archaic, as if he'd learned the language ages ago.
"How?" Danyel wanted to growl. Instead he whispered. It wasn't the same effect. Nor was it the effect he wanted.
"As you'll probably wake in less than an hour and I still haven't had a full night's sleep ..."
Danyel managed to get his finger up to silence Dimitri. His soft, cool lips were just ever so slightly roughened. Dimitri glanced down, lashes spreading over his cheeks, as soft and as feminine as any woman, bur at the same time undeniably male with his whisker roughened cheeks.
"I'd like to think you zlin me as Gen." Dimitri's tongue flicked out and brushed Danyel's finger, as he'd done to Dimitri. But this time the only effect was to deepen the call of sleep.
As he nodded, his eyelids slipped down. Dimitri kissed each of them. "Yes, rest for this brief while. When we are both awake next, we shall speak of this. I swear this unto thee." The ancient familiar touched something as old in Danyel's head as Dimitri's touch had reached in his body. It was the same as the term a pre-Unity Companion would use with his or her channel.
Danyel'd never head the word spoken, but his brain knew its meaning without hesitation. He bowed his head to his Companion, trusting Dimitri to keep him safe in his sleep. Certainly he'd slept with Donors, when he'd been in need, to make sure he didn't succumb to need nightmares. Never had he slept with any Gen between transfer and turnover.
"Hush," Dimitri murmured, holding Danyel's head and back, as Danyel'd held all three of the Kaon children now. The comfort of it surprised him. It was as if by being held so securely, his body relaxed because it knew it was safe. "Exactly so." Dimitri breathed. "Exactly so. You are very reactive and my holding you so tight distracts your body's fears and lets it relax."
He could barely breathe, but he didn't have to. Dimitri's breath sounded in his ears, filling them with a sound more reassuring than silence. The last thing he remembered, was wondering if this was what the channels of old had enjoyed, and if so, how could they have ever let this go.
Chapter 17
Dimitri hated fogging anyone's mind, but Danyel was so responsive, it did him little harm, relatively. It harmed anyone, to steal memories from them and replace that time with silence, but as his was the ability, so was his the responsibility to use it when necessary. He brushed Danyel's hair back from his face again, making sure there was nothing to tickle him awake. His harsh features were so impossibly soft in sleep.
No one, not even Vayer, had slept so soundly in Dimitri's arms. Truthfully enough, Dimitri wouldn't have expected otherwise. In need, no one slept soundly. After transfer, well, Dimitri'd only napped with Karola the once they'd been together. There'd been other things on both their minds that seclusion.
Danyel was another matter entirely. His response to Dimitri's touch had been more than a bit excessive. Dimitri'd loved riding, as a child, even though he'd not had the chance since he established. He clearly remembered the one time he'd gotten to ride Kika, and not through his Sergei memories. They were clear and precise, but lacked the same visceral impact of those things he remembered through flesh and blood.
Kika had given to Dimitri's hand as if he were mist and light, not a living animal. Danyel'd been even lighter in his response to Dimitri's touch, dancing to Dimitri's caresses as if he could truly hear Dimitri's thoughts, not just zlin. For zlinning was far coarser a perception than the ability to directly touch another's senses. And Danyel's reactions were even more deft, as if he could see what Dimitri would do, not just what was.
Often enough the Sergei gifts were mistaken for being able to see the future. But it wasn't precognition in the sense most people thought of it, but rather a memory that disregarded time. Which was a different thing entirely, not that Dimitri himself often bothered to make the distinction.
There were many times where Dimitri'd woken in the middle of the night, sodden with sweat and desperately wishing he could talk about his own abilities with his Uncle Cadek. But Uncle Cadek was entirely a creature of the Veiled.
The one time he'd spoken with the man had been in a dream, where Dimitri had not even been sure if he were actually talking with Cadek or the Fellowship. Not that there was a great difference between the two. He sighed and Danyel stirred restlessly in his arms.
Dimitri tightened down his hold on the fragile Sime. Like the young people who were oversensitive to physical stimulus, this all over pressure seemed to help Danyel as well, even in his sleep. A chill made Dimitri shiver. Those children did not live 1ong once their problems became clear. Although one who was otherwise functional would often enough be taken behind the Veil.
Be that as it may, Danyel was not bound to the traditions of the Rus. He was Techton, and so remained alive. For which Dimitri was very grateful. Because Danyel was not a syndrome or a disease, he was a human being, albeit one with greater challenges than most.
For very personal reasons Dimitri was uneasy with the way anyone who was flawed beyond a certain point was put to death, either by the Veil or Azrael's blessing. One facet of pediatrics neither he nor his sire enjoyed was the maturation process.
They let the coin decide which of them would get to deal with change over cases. As when a child in change over came to them, it often meant a problem. Otherwise the youngster would stay below, in the creche.
Dimitri'd never seen a completely normal changeover before today. He'd only read about them in books. More often than not, by the time the young Sime came to Sergei, there was nothing he could do but give the child peace. He looked down at his hands. They'd snapped the necks of more than one Sime to be who was too crippled to be allowed to suffer through breakout.
It was truly the only painless way to give peace to a Sime whose tentacles had not broken out. And if the laterals were deformed, the child would never mature properly and would die of attrition. Dimitri knew it was the kindest thing to murder them so. He knew they felt no pain beyond the shock of it. But he did. The pain of not being able to heal.
Which wasn't why he defended Danyel with all his heart. Danyel was adult. He'd learned to survive and had grown strong, if not entirely straight, here in the West. At home, he'd have been broken or killed at change over, most likely. They always asked with a southerner's child. Often enough the Veiled did take them. In the protected environment below, sufferers of southerner's could lead relatively healthy, productive lives. As much so as any of the deformed or congenitally ill who lived below.
For theirs truly was a community of the mind and spirit, not the body. There were times when Dimitri's heart yearned for the Fellowship. He'd known the touch of the Veiled on his mind and body when he'd established. They'd bound Mitka to his name and his form, before he could run wild without any kind of restraint.
In naming Mitka, they'd given Dimitri a way to speak with him, by giving him form, they gave others a way to zlin him. Together, they'd given Dimitri a chance at independence. Without them, he'd have been destroyed by his own power.
For Mitka truly was Dimitri, but those parts of Dimitri he could not face in himself. Those needs and compulsions he couldn't embrace. It was no one's fault, other than his being Sergei. And personally, when he thought about it, like now, he preferred being able to keep an eye on those needs and wants, external to his own mind. He'd seen Diomid's mood swings and reactivity get the better of him too often for his own peace of mind. In Mitka, those things were externalized, and he could bargain with them, as Vassili Illyanovich Kirov the Wise had bargained with Master Tzarinov for the independence of the first Demense so many centuries ago.
Myth had it, Tzarinov had actually been the founder of Fatima, the second of the great Demense. Another myth had it his nager resembled the great firebird of legend when someone or something had roused his ire. Dimitri'd scoffed at such myths as a child, having been thoroughly trained as an artist since his stubby little fingers could hold a stick of charcoal or a brush. Such images, to him then, had been the work of other artists.
He'd managed to return to his art when Diomid had taken him on as his second. His favorite subject had been Mitka. For a moment, he wondered why he'd not brought any of them. He thought Danyel might enjoy them. Or perhaps not.
Mitka whistled softly in his sleep, sprawled all over Danyel like a scaly blanket. He'd never shown such true affection for anyone, even Vayer or Karola. He'd certainly appreciated Valtanir's attentions, but Dimitri'd thought Val a bit cavalier with Mitka's affections, and so had not pursued the relationship after Alexandrya'd given birth. And with Dimitri's unease, Mitka'd also not pursued the Lord. Which was probably wise, as he'd nearly shenned out on them each time they touched. Like Danyel, Valtanir's external strength had little foundation. Although Val was not so labile as to collapse with the slightest shift in the ambient.
No, that wasn't fair to Danyel. Dimitri nuzzled Danyel's midnight black hair again. He'd been able to keep Mitka from harming himself with far greater ease than anyone Dimitri'd seen. But then he was faster than anyone Dimitri'd ever seen either, bar none. Even Nashen zlinned as if he were half frozen with cold compared to Danyel. When he'd yanked Mitka back from the stage, even Dimitri'd not seen him move.
Yes, Simes could augment, but Danyel's quickness was nearly as fast as Fatima's teleportation! And effectively it was faster, because Danyel didn't seem to have to think about what he was doing, he just did it. Which wasn't so unusual for a Sime, but in Danyel's case, it was so extreme it was nearly crippling, just like Dimitri's own abilities.
The similarity made him smile, even as he lipped Danyel's curls. The release he'd given them both had been a poor shadow of orgasm, but Danyel'd responded as if it were the greatest sensation he could possibly imagine, or more. Which was a truly saddening thought. But Dimitri wasn't ready to open himself up more. He liked Danyel a great deal. They shared many things, not just a desire for transfer or sex. However, Dimitri was not Mitka. Nor was Danyel driven exclusively by his laterals, it seemed.
Dimitri wanted to get to know Danyel better before he thought to accept him physically, or give himself over physically, for that much matter. Immediately after a true transfer, lust was like the weather, unstoppable and uncontrollable. He was far enough from the immediate ravages of transfer to want something more than slaking his body's lusts. Or Mitka's for that much matter.
But he'd been unable to think clearly for the frantic hormones released in his body by being nearly stripped clean of selyn, so he'd triggered those sensitive nerves deep in Danyel's body and given them both at least the physical component of release. He'd been less effected by it, both by virtue of being Gen and because he knew it was only a tiny portion of the whole.
It had been the work of moments to clean them both up and then release Danyel's mind to the present with only the memory of Dimitri drying his body of sweat. He didn't think Danyel'd deal well with having ejaculated all over both of them. Or the fact Dimitri'd joined him in that as well. He chuckled softly and nuzzled Danyel's temple again.
He had to agree with Mitka. It had felt good. Quite good, actually. His detachment with Mitka's slumbers was not so great as to deny him the acknowledgement of such pleasures. It wasn't an issue of sex, purely, here together with a member of the opposite larity. It was far more an issue of reaching out for completion. And that he found without stint in Danyel. There was no mistaking him for anything but Sime.
In his sleep, Danyel pressed up against Dimitri even more tightly than he was being held. Dimitri would have thought this impossible. But then Dimitri admitted to himself he'd not quite been bold enough to press Danyel's hips against his, nor had he been willing to twine their legs together. Vayer had often enough twined his fingers with Dimitri's deep in the night before transfer. But the feel of so much warm skin against his own, when he wasn't burning up with need, was something Dimitri'd never known.
He kissed the top of Danyel's head and tried to settle down for a brief nap. His stomach growled. He hushed it, fearing it would wake Mitka or Danyel, neither of which would be well served by such an awkward interruption to their slumber. Dimitri knew Mitka'd not truly slept in months and doubted if Danyel'd ever slept deeply in his life!
Danyel rooted about in Dimitri's chest for a moment and then settled back down. There were few things, he was finding, more wonderful than having a Sime trust you so far as to truly sleep in your arms, not just nap for brief moments and then half wake. Danyel was so soundly asleep he didn't even notice Mitka drooling all over his chest.
Dimitri certainly did. He wished he dared wipe some of it up. It was disgustingly slippery and clammy. If he'd wanted to remain sticky, he'd not have bothered cleaning both of them up after their mutual endeavors. He moved slightly. One of Mitka's eyelids flickered, as if he were contemplating opening his eye and glaring at Dimitri. He knew the expression well and forced himself still again.
With a restless squirm, Danyel expressed his own discomfort with Mitka's drooling. Dimitri snorted softly and held Danyel tight while he applied a corner of a blanket and then tucked a silk handkerchief under Mitka. Often enough Dimitri wondered if this was what it would be like to sleep with a baby. Although at least Mitka's incontinence was not fragrant at all, normally.
Mitka's tongue flicked out, redistributing the mess he was creating. Fortunately, Dimitri'd foreseen this and had used one of his larger cloths. Mitka's whistling snores rose in volume. Danyel smiled happily in his sleep, joining Mitka's noisy pleasure.
Dimitri's limbs were heavy with the desire to sleep, but he wanted to savor these long, slow moments. Besides, his stomach was waging war on his backbone with ferocious intensity. He'd not been this hungry since his one complete transfer with Karola. Getting up and fetching food, however, was not an option. His stomach growled again, far more insistently.
He'd never gone to bed hungry as a child, unless he wanted to count the times he'd forgotten to eat until long after everyone else and hadn't bothered to say anything about it. Often enough he was near enough to breakfast by that time it made little difference. Dimitri stroked Danyel's back, wondering anew at the silky feel of him, so sleek and fragile seeming. His thin skin and sharp cut muscles teased at Dimitri's resolve to be patient.
For make no mistake, he wanted to loose himself in Danyel's warmth. To take his fill of his lord and be filled in turn. It was his turn to squirm. Those nerves he'd caressed deep in Danyel's body ached in his own, desperate to be stroked and caressed. Avilan had sensitized those nerves, well over a year ago now, and Dimitri could still feel the touch of his broad, cool hand on his lower back.
For all of Dimitri's control, he knew he was still as driven by hormones as any young adult. Restless with desire for both food and attention, all he could do was wait. His mind knew he'd find satisfaction, eventually. His body ached for it, strident in its frantic demands. How had Sevrin managed?
*Well enough, youngster ... sometimes.* His Uncle's distinctive mental voice echoed between his ears. He'd not meant to be overheard.
Cheeks burning in a frantic blush, he bowed his head over Danyel's and sent back, "I hadn't meant to broadcast."
"I was listening for you." The response came, as clear and bright as if they were speaking out loud. "Besides, you're noisy."
Dimitri's blushes worsened. Sevrin had to have heard their delicate intercourse.
"I thought you handled the situation very well, youngster." He didn't have to keep reminding Dimitri of his immaturity. "Oh, I'm a cad and a boor, Dimitri. Don't mind me."
This brought a whisper of a chuckle to Dimitri's throat. He'd never spent much time with his Uncle Sevrin, only having met him for a few brief moments the winter before his own establishment. Then he'd been completely focused on his handfasted wife, Vanesa. "How can I help but with you listening in on my thoughts?"
"True enough." A multicolored sigh punctuated his agreement. "So, do you think you'll be able to work with me anyway?"
"Do you really want me to?" Dimitri was surprised at the wistfulness in his Uncle's tone, dulling the bright colors of his words. "It has been one bright thought in my mind since I was sent here, without so much as a by your leave."
"Not Danyel?"
"I didn't know about Danyel." He fired back, caught out.
Sevrin chuckled at him, his mind as brilliant as magnesium fire. "I like you."
"You're as honest as the stones beneath Moskva, Uncle Sevrin." Dimitri laughed himself. He'd never met anyone he felt comfortable like this before. Usually he was painfully aware of his own inadequacies and did not wish anyone else to know of them. Sevrin seemed so relaxed with himself, and what he was, it was as if Dimitri could say anything and not offend.
"Oh, I can be crafty, when Vanesa kicks me hard enough." The sense of laughter strengthened and deepened, backed by a solid wall of love for his partner. "I have no problems in your seduction of Danyel. Just don't steal him back to Moskva permanently. It would kill him."
Dimitri blinked at the bluntness in Sevrin's words. He must have stiffened a bit as well, since both of his bedpartners snuffled in irritation. "I know that." He sent back at last.
"I'm such an idiot." Sevrin snarled, curling Dimitri's hair with his irritation. Mitka opened one eye and gave him 'the glare'. "Oh, go back to sleep, idiot." The wash of power that followed the command nearly drove Dimitri under. Mitka flattened with a huff ... and more selyn.
"Don't call my nager an idiot." Dimitri growled right back. He'd never commanded Mitka like that. Never. It was rude. Mitka was as much a person, at least to Dimitri, as anyone born of man and woman.
"He was certainly an idiot earlier." The overwhelming strength of Sevrin's ire reddened Dimitri's vision for a moment.
"You will not speak so to Mitka." Dimitri let his sending go as flat as sheet ice.
Sevrin's laughter rang on the ambient. Where was he? Next door? Dimitri reached out with his mind to find Sevrin halfway across town, eating dinner with the rest of his family.
"I'm used to shouting like this." His shrug was a brief twist to the words. "Besides, Mitka is a sweet idiot." This was probably the best he was going to get. "I like him."
Dimitri was surprised. When he'd asked Valtanir about his older brother, surreptitiously of course, Val'd said Sevrin in no way tolerated fools or imbeciles.
"Mitka is neither." Sevrin broke in again. This time Dimitri smacked him one. He'd gone too far. It was one thing to overhear unspoken thoughts when in the same room with someone, not from kilometers away. That was just nosy and rude! "You hit hard." A silvery sheen of respect colored his nager.
"I do." He held his friends safe, even from his Uncle.
"I'm sorry." This time real regret came through. "I didn't mean to insult Mitka." Dimitri winced. "Oh, as usual, I'm not putting this well. Mitka is an idiot. He doesn't plan or consider the consequences of his actions. Would you expect anything else in a creature hardly more than a year old?"
"No, I suppose not." He sighed at last. "Not that you do any better in how you say things."
"True enough." He snorted. The smells of tangy tomato sauce with lots of garlic and onions came through the link to make Dimitri's stomach renew its gnawing on his backbone. "You have to eat, Dimitri."
"I know." He whined, knowing it would do no good to try to hide his dislike of the reminder. Then Sevrin took a bite of the spicy noodle dish and his stomach growled loudly enough to be heard in the sharm ... back in Moskva!
"I'm going to have to call it an early evening, I'm afraid." Sevrin said to their family.
"You stay put." Dimitri told him, hoping with Sevrin's reach, came an equal sensitivity. Sevrin sat back down, hard, as if he were a Sime at Dimitri's command. Sevrin snorted and began backtalking again. "I also have to sleep."
"You'll wake with a headache."
"Then bring me something back." He echoed another frantic growl from his stomach. Was he going to have to stash things to eat in his room? He'd done so to make sure he ate at least something substantial every day. Old Sharm Lord Vanya Sergei'd had a cooler put in his rooms, and Dimitri'd taken shameless advantage of the luxury. He was paying for it. Between the cooler and the tiny two place hot pad, he'd had no problems with making anything he wanted, no matter what time it was in the sharm.
His grandfather had probably had to do much the same. He'd rarely had a partner for more than seclusion after Larisa, Arkay's mother, had died in childbed. Dimitri could understand why. Although the fact Vanya'd had twenty-eight children total showed he hadn't lacked for female companionship. Not all of his children had been engendered at the whim of the Veiled like Diomid and Cadek.
Again he thought of Cadek, wishing he could reach out and touch his mind now. With meeting Danyel, Dimitri wanted to know how Cadek survived alone but for the fellowship of the Veiled. Was there some way he could join them? Being so near Danyel gnawed at his resolve to only partner with someone suitable. He couldn't possibly find anyone more suitable than Danyel, except perhaps poor damned Khristov. And he'd been set up by Salkov to destroy Dimitri's self confidence and drive him into Salkov's arms.
"Then sleep and food will be waiting for you." Sevrin's voice stroked Dimitri's spinning thoughts to stillness. He was an exceptional healer, if in a very different way than any Sergei. He healed with truth, not talent. Sevrin chuckled softly to himself, "From Sharm Lord Sergei, I accept the complement." Dimitri's eyes widened, then he remembered the source and sent back an elaborate bow.
"I'd appreciate a bit of a shove." He sent back, showing how off balance he still was, even with Sevrin's help. Sevrin assented and between one breath and the next, Dimitri collapsed into a deep sleep.
Dimitri spun around. The gray plain extended in all directions, featureless and undefined past the range of his vision. Then he looked down to see Danyel sprawled at his feet, as gray as this world between that of selyn and reality. He knelt. Danyel's pulse beat steadily beneath his fingers.
If he was here, and Mitka wasn't, What was going on? Dimitri tried loosing the bindings on his talents and got nothing beyond the screaming chaos inherent in this place. For here was the land of dreams and belief, where all things were possible.
Every time he'd been here before, Mitka'd been with him, often enough commenting loudly on how boring this place was to him. Dimitri shuddered all over as he realized even Mitka's presence in his mind had vanished. He was alone, as he'd rarely been since he established. Although he retained the icy detachment of those times Mitka slept, unlike when their bond had been inadvertently attenuated, such as by disorientation, which was why Mitka hated anything that might leave him disoriented.
The fear grew with each moment he knelt on the plain. Why were they here? It couldn't be to speak to the Veiled, as they'd never stand bare before one not their own. Even Cadek had left on a single veil when speaking to Dimitri, even if all it had done was blur his excruciatingly familiar features.
Danyel moaned, his head moving restlessly, as if fighting off something in his mind. His eyes snapped open. He screamed. The sound faded across the featureless plain, the lack of echo reminding Dimitri of where he was, even as he struggled to back away from Danyel.
Eyes wide and black, with madness and a need Dimitri didn't feel, Danyel lunged for him. This time Dimitri screamed. Dimitri's wrists burned as Danyel's tentacles yanked at him.
"No!" He tried to stop himself. Salkov's face interposed itself on Danyel's. There was no sense to his features, just blind need. Dimitri struggled not to strike out. Danyel's lips brushed Dimitri's cheek. Too low field, his body defended its life.
Danyel's harsh death shriek, the mocking perfect echo of Salkov's rolled across the endless plain. His tentacles went limp, falling from Dimitri's arms, even as he tried to catch him. But there was no him left. Faster than any other form of death, his spirit had long since left his body. Still warm, Dimitri cradled Danyel's shed body in his arms, damning himself with the smell of the man he'd have loved, not killed. "Why didn't you take me?" He screamed to the uncaring gods.
Dimitri'd have given anything to be taken in Danyel's place, but his reflexes had been too fast.
"They always will be." Cadek's voice held none of the chording of the Veiled, only a sorrow he'd have never thought to hear from the man.
Weeping bitterly, he bowed his head over Danyel's body. Deep in his mind, he knew Danyel was alive, asleep beside him with Mitka resting on top of him.
"Why did you send Mitka away?" At least he'd been there when Dimitri'd killed Salkov. At least there'd been someone with him them, someone who loved him.
Cadek snorted. "Oh, I don't think of you as my nephew."
"What?" The seeming non-sequitur stopped Dimitri cold, then he grew colder.
"No," he breathed, backing away, taking Danyel's body with him, a shackle to the evil he'd done. Dimitri refused to relinquish even this last breath of a link between them. "We're too alike."
"Not," the chording returned, even as a tear traced Cadek's bare cheek.
Dimitri stopped, trapped by that single silvered drop. He'd never heard of the Fellowship weeping. Cadek's head shook, then the sense of presence relented.
"Oh, I'll not ask again." His half smile was sadder than the tear. "But I had to show you." He waved to Danyel's body.
"That you're trying to trick me?" Dimitri started out frantic and relented by the end. "No, you wouldn't." He bowed his head over Danyel again. "I learned."
"But are you going to leave him be?" Cadek's voice remained unblurred, singular.
"Did you come all this way to ..." Dimitri couldn't say make an incestuous proposal. Who was he to talk about incest? His cheeks burned as he looked away.
"Yes and no." This time there was a softness to Cadek's tone Dimitri'd never thought to hear. "I don't want to see you hurt.
"You did." In his mind, Danyel's scream echoed over and over again. Not his snarl, the hunting scream of any Sime, but his death shriek, echoing impossibly back across the empty plain. Dimitri screamed his own anguish and hurt to the unchanging sky. Without control, without the chance for release, he loosed the bonds on his own power. Alone, unloved, utterly alien, he let his fury and hatred for what had been made of him loose into the uncaring, unchanging spaces.
"I love thee." Cadek said, even over the chaos Dimitri'd loosed. Through burning, blurred eyes, Dimitri tried to see him. He looked so much like Diomid!
The same hair, eyes, face, even his hands. There were fewer lines on his face, and those he had, less deeply drawn. He stood straighter, not quite so heavy through the shoulders, a bit heavier through the waist. Dimitri's lips threatened to lift up in a tiny smile.
Then he came so close Dimitri could truly see him, not just work from memory and guess. Less than a meter away, he looked nothing like Diomid.
"I don't want the veil." He rested Danyel on the smooth surface beneath them. Dimitri closed the staring eyes, loosened the rictus of terror, gentled the sprawled limbs. Soon he looked, to a child at least, as if he were sleeping. Dimitri bowed his head over Danyel one last time and kissed his brow. Dimitri stood, backing away.
When he'd relinquished him to Cadek, Danyel took a huge gasping breath. Cadek's eyes widened. He put his hands to his face. "Don't look." He turned his whole body away from them.
"What's wrong?" His brows furrowed. "Where is this place? What's Diomid doing here?"
"Simes," Dimitri rolled his eyes. "I don't know if you'll remember this place. It is the basis for dreams, the blank canvas your mind uses to paint them. And that is not Diomid." He waved his hand at Danyel to listen closely. Danyel leaned in, but didn't move, just as he'd have wanted. Dimitri knew it did no good to try to keep anything from Cadek, but the gesture of trying to allowed him to save face. "That is yet another of my Uncles. He's uncomfortable with being seen."
Danyel turned away from Cadek, deliberately turning his back in a sign of trust Dimitri would have never given any Gen if he were Sime, "I will not zlin you deliberately, but I can't help but zlin the fear you're putting on the ambient."
"You weren't supposed to awaken." Cadek's voice shook. He'd put his hands up his sleeves, but it did little good. His bare head was enough to make such a limited attempt at modesty ultimately futile. "Are you sure your middle name isn't Sevrin?"
The prosaic question was so surprising Dimitri laughed. Then his laughter turned to hysterics. He collapsed, crying and laughing at the same time. Hugging his knees to his chest, he bit at them, rocking back and forth, trying to settle the unease in the pit of his belly.
Cadek's hand came to rest on his shoulder. Dimitri could feel his attempt at healing. It reminded him of the sense of Danyel dying at his hands and he screamed. His throat raw, he screamed again, trying to flee his tormenter. He could hear his own cries ring hollow in his ears, and still could not stop.
Danyel's tentacles landed in the bone deep bruises on his wrists. The pain surged through him, driving his madness in deeper, like a stake deep into his mind. A gasp brought him part way back. "Who did this to you?" Pure moral outrage and shock derailed Dimitri's hysteria for a brief moment.
"You did." He giggled. Then he laughed. Tears of laughter streamed down his face. His sides ached with it.
Crack! A searing shock went through him. He froze, then doubled over, gasping for breath. His stomach churned, and for a moment he had to swallow down bile as he nearly vomited. But the shock had at least driven him back to himself. Panting for breath, he looked up to see Danyel struggling to get loose.
"He did the perfect thing ... again." Dimitri told his uncle. "Let him go."
"How did you wake up?" Cadek asked.
"Why didn't you use a true construct?" Dimitri shivered at the horrible risk Cadek had taken, bringing Danyel here in mind as well as flesh. Did he remember what had happened? As the thought flashed through his mind, Danyel paled.
"We didn't use a construct because you would have known the difference." Cadek was still singular, still unveiled, even as he warily let Danyel look at him. He flinched as Danyel blinked at him. "You're too clever by half, young Sergeyevich."
"What in shen is going on here?" Danyel frowned. "I remember him killing me!" His voice grew faint. He certainly looked as if he were going to faint. Dimitri struggled not to grab him out of Cadek's arms. If any Sergei could deal with a Ferris, it would be his uncle Cadek.
"We're in the land of dreams." Dimitri struggled to rise. He was not going to grovel at Cadek's feet. Well, maybe he was. Another wave of dizziness washed over him, tipping him back onto his butt. He sat, head between his knees, trying not to faint himself. It wasn't doing a whole lot of good. His skin tightened down another notch, squeezing out more sweat. "You were brought here to show me what it would feel like if I killed you."
"I'm not going to let you kill me, Dimitri." He sounded so prosaic about it, Dimitri could just stare at him. He shook his head no. "Let me show you something, you, you ..." Danyel tightened his so expressive lips.
Then his eyes went black, as they had in the first sequence, Dimitri struggled to scrabble away from him, crablike. Terror, compounded by his earlier reactions, only drove him away harder. Danyel snarled, this time for real. Dimitri could sense the need, bone deep attrition, rising from him.
His own body struggled to produce enough selyn to serve that need, but it was no good. There just wasn't anything to produce. He'd been drained too recently. His heart ached, even as his wrists tingled beneath his heavy bruising, draining away even more selyn for healing, but producing more than enough to make up for it in response to the need his body felt. But it wouldn't be enough.
This time Dimitri didn't see Danyel move. He found Danyel's lips pressed to his own. His reflexes rose up and tried to swat down this insolent Sime. He found Danyel's lips opening under his own, giving over to him as he had so desperately wanted earlier, but hadn't dare pushed for. Here, in this place, in their dreams, he could give in to the lust rising within him, at least for a brief instant.
When he looked down, Danyel's dark lashes traced over his cheeks, making him look absurdly young, even for a Sime. The harsh lines had vanished, fading with his obviously growing arousal. Dimitri let himself brush Danyel's front with his own before stepping back. Danyel winked on the side away from Cadek and then turned. He'd fled. Two white roses, both with the crimson heart of Sergei's Tears, lay where Cadek had stood.
"I didn't mean to hurt him." Dimitri now regretted his cavalier rejection of Cadek's suit. But he didn't want a Sharm Lord, particularly not a Veiled one, he wanted a Sime. Was it so wrong to want something so normal?
"I think he hurt himself." Danyel's insight was almost Sergei in its perspicacity. "Oh, I've just been around a bit more than you, or your Uncle, did you say?"
"Yes," he nodded, picking up the roses, then he noticed the midnight blue one, a color completely unknown before the mutation, turning the ill omen to good. He tried to hand the trio to Danyel, even though it felt very odd to be handing flowers to a Sime.
For a brief moment, Dimitri wondered if anyone would ever give him flowers. His father had not, although Dimitri would have felt very strange accepting such a thing from him. The faint citrus tang of the type of rose, known as Sergei's Tears, brought another lump to his throat. They were his favorite.
"I've never smelled anything like those." Danyel pointed at the white and crimson roses. Dimitri touched the soft petals, wishing he had skin so soft.
"They were created by Sharm Lord Dimitria Sergei, the first Sharm Lord Sergei for her lover's Sharm Lord. They're called Sergei's Tears." He rubbed his nose with the blossoms again, wishing he could take them with when they left.
"What is the dark one called?"
"Azrael's Kiss." He winced a bit as he said it. "Azrael's Kiss is death, Danyel." He managed to get out. "The two white roses were for me and Cadek."
"Does he think I'm going to kill you?"
"He knows someone is going to die." Dimitri had never doubted his Uncle's ability to foresee the future. Or at least he hadn't, until now. Had he even waited until Danyel'd proven his strength? Then he thought of Mitka's reaction to today's events in the studio and blanched. If Dimitri'd gone hysterical with what Danyel'd done to him, he didn't want to think of what would happen to Mitka. Although Dimitri knew it would he far, far worse than a ripped open wing.
Danyel zlinned the rose Dimitri'd called Azrael's Kiss. It shimmered, unlike any plant or even animal he'd ever zlinned. Utterly fascinated, he reached toward it. A sudden bite of pain stopped him. He had his pricked tentacle in his mouth before he knew what he was doing.
"Yes, they have thorns." Dimitri's faint nager kept twining restlessly around his body, as if in search of something. "I'm sorry I didn't warn you."
"Where's Mitka?" There were far more critical concerns than the fact Danyel'd pricked a dorsal on a thorn.
Dimitri took his tentacle in implacable fingers and tugged it away from Danyel's mouth. "Don't do that, you idiot Sime." His growl sounded so much like Mitka's he couldn't help but grin. But when Dimitri brushed one of those amazing fingertips over the tiny thorn prick, the sensations transmitted themselves all the way up his arm. He sighed, closing his eyes to savor the feel of cool, slightly rough Gen skin against the sensitive surface of his tentacle.
Dimitri's thumb caressed the other side, as if he enjoyed touching tentacles. They were only extra digits, supremely flexible admittedly, for holding Gens. Dimitri bent over Danyel's hand and kissed the very end of the tentacle he still held. "I don't like seeing blood on tentacles." A muscle at the corner of his jaw flexed as he looked up at Danyel through those lashes.
"They're just like extra fingers." Danyel cringed away from the rings of bruises marring Dimitri's wrists. He'd seen the marks left by berserkers, even if such a thing never officially happened anymore. But where he'd grown up, he'd seen it too often, usually on an obviously strip killed corpse. One of his ventrals reached toward those reddened marks. It looked as if someone had wrapped his wrists in rope and then yanked. Danyel wished he could heal them, but it would take holding Dimitri still with his tentacles, right on those marks.
"Not to me, they aren't." His tongue flicked out, brushing the surface. Maybe it was just because all his other partners, so far, had been Sime, maybe it was just Dimitri, but Danyel'd never felt anything so strong as the wave of lust that ripped through him with the contact. Then it faded, as if it had never been. The floor, such as it was, swayed beneath Danyel's feet. "No, pretty one." This time his touch was just that, a light touch. "You felt my response."
"You want me so much?" He shook his head, confused.
"My body does." Dimitri shrugged. His shirt was so thin, Danyel could not only zlin through it, he could see through it. The pants he were no help. They were skin tight and like the shirt, made of nearly as many holes as cloth. "It likes you."
"Like Mitka?" He dared ask.
"Very like, I think." He chuckled softly. Dimitri's hands rubbed at his own wrists, each touch sending a shock of pain through the ambient. Danyel couldn't help but wince away. "Oh, I'm sorry." He blushed furiously, their nageric surroundings turning bright pink. "Its easier for me to keep my hands away from my crotch than my wrists."
"Its just skin." Danyel snorted, staring at Dimitri's wrists. Danyel'd made those marks on Dimitri's skin. Thankful he wasn't actually in need, he set his show field to display need, as when he'd shown Dimitri the flaw in Cadek's little show, but not quite as strongly.
"No," Dimitri shook his head, not backing away, but his whole body tensing. "Don't tease me. Not after ..." he dropped his gaze. Strong looking toes curled under highly arched feet. They were truly amazing feet, with clean bones and tendons showing through pale skin lightly dusted with golden hair.
"You are easy to distract." Dimitri's tone was still strained, but not quite as tense. He wiggled one big toe.
"Sometimes," he admitted, trying to find a safe place to rest his eyes. The featureless plain gave nothing. Danyel tried zlinning and found nothing but Dimitri, only a dull haze. "I've never been here."
"I'd have been surprised if you had, and known it." One corner of his mouth quirked up in a grin. "Its only accessible in this form by very highly talented members of my family, and possibly Uncle Sevrin."
"Why?" Fell out before he could stop it. Dimitri's grin grew, showing his dimples.
"Because it is a state of mind, not a true place." He shrugged, as if this sort of thing were commonplace. "I can't get here on my own."
"Can we get back?" He tried zlinning again. A sharp pain knifed his chest.
"Don't reach." Dimitri warned, a bit too late. He blinked slowly, as if in some inner amusement. "At least beyond the two of us."
"Why?" Danyel was fascinated. He'd always wanted a place, safe from intrusion, where he could simply relax and not fight with other people's nagers clashing with his own.
"Because there really isn't anything out there and you'll create things out of your imagination." He brushed the petals of the roses again. "Although I do wish Cadek had not made these with thorns."
"Why?" Danyel knew he sounded like a first year Sime, but couldn't help himself.
Dimitri laughed, sniffing at the roses. "Because I'd give them to you without your hurting yourself."
"Now that I know, I won't." He caught the fringes of something unsettling Dimitri on the corner of his field. With innate talent, he tracked it down. Danyel chuckled softly. Remembering what Dimitri'd said about creating things, he thought of his deck of cards, nestled safely in his pocket. When he looked down, they were there. He chuckled to himself.
Feeling a bit off balance, he reached out into the gray fog and brought back a bouquet of roses, of all colors of the rainbow, trin roses this time.
Dimitri gasped. "There are twelve of them." His brows drew down. He glanced away, as if trying to ward off some ill omen.
"Look again," Danyel caught the reference at last. He created a tiny, gold rosebud amid the rest. It was the exact color of Dimitri's hair.
Dimitri blushed, ducking his head and grinning. "I've never had anyone give me flowers."
"Cadek did." Danyel had caught the flash of interest in the ambient before Cadek had vanished. It had made him very uneasy, as if Cadek were trying to lure Dimitri away, as if he were a woman to be interested in either of them.
"To both of us." Dimitri waved it away, as if it were nothing. He took Danyel's bouquet into his arms, breathing deeply. They held the tang of all trin roses, heady and sweet at the same time. Danyel loved trin roses, wishing he had the skill with them Sevrin had with classical roses. "His were a reminder of what we are."
"I'd ..." Danyel didn't know what he was going to say. He'd never given roses to a woman, and certainly never to a transfer partner. Honestly, he appreciated the Donors who'd given him selyn over the years, but had never formed any kind of bond with them. "I know what I am."
"Lucky man." Dimitri's nager trembled. "I don't."
"You will in time." He tried to remember his position of elder. But in this strange place, alone with Dimitri, he wondered if he truly were more mature. "Although I don't know if its a bit too much pride to say the words."
"Perhaps," his dimples made a reappearance. "You learn very quickly."
"Do you?" Danyel flicked a tentacle at Dimitri's wrists.
"That you're not as easy to kill as perhaps I'd thought?" His cutting right to the answer startled Danyel, yet again. By this time, it shouldn't have. "I don't know. This place is strange, and neither of us are in true need."
"Then let me prove myself." He nodded to the roses cradled in Dimitri's arms. He couldn't look at the bruises on them. They reminded him far too painfully of the corpses he'd seen in his life, marked just the same way.
"I don't want you killed, Danyel. Can I make myself any more plain?" His lips tightened into a harsh line.
"And I don't want you killed, Dimitri." He couldn't look away from the lines on Dimitri's wrists either. He knew his own tentacles had put them there. "You're so self confident, but what if some Sime startles you?"
"Then they die." Dimitri clenched his jaws. "I can't stop what I am."
"I did."
Chapter 18
Dimitri stretched. It felt so good to move freely again. The last week, with so much of his family in Kaon, had been nerve-wracking. Other than a very pleasant breakfast with Uncle Sevrin and Danyel the morning after the debacle at the photography session, he'd hardly seen either of them. Even the Techton'd had to relent to his family's dragging him all over. Dimitri didn't start work until this Wednesday, the twenty-second.
He looked up at the steel bar over his head. Taking a deep breath, he grabbed it.
"Breathe, you idiot." Uncle Sevrin's now well loved voice acted like a fist in the gut, which was probably what he'd intended. They were both taking a well deserved hour in Kaon's tiny weight room. Dimitri before he bit someone, Sevrin out of habit, most likely. He bit people anyway.
Sevrin laughed, hands resting lightly on the bar as spotter. Dimitri tried again, this time breathing easily with the motion. No one had ever really taught him how to lift, it was just something he'd done as soon as he could be trusted not to drop a bag of sand on his foot, with only moderate success at that. But the stresses in his life were coming out here, even. The hundred and fifty kilos of lead and steel did his bidding, with some sweat, but not much.
"You have to step up sometime." Sevrin leaned on the bar. Sweat sprang out on his chest and flanks, not to mention his face. "Come on lad, work for it."
"You're as heavy as a horse." Dimitri managed to grunt out. A wonderful ache spread across his pectorals. He gave in to it, struggling with the mass of iron and his Uncle. Was he leaning his whole weight on the shenned thing? "... eight, nine, ten." He reset the bar on the rest. Only then did he see Sevrin's grin.
"Pretty good, youngster." He swatted Dimitri on the shoulder as he went to grab a couple of weights. "You'll pass me before you return."
"You're doing two twenty!" Dimitri swiped at the worst of the sweat threatening, and succeeding, in running into his eyes.
"Yeah, and you were just doing two hundred." He snorted. Dimitri gave him a hand. At these weights, the bar bowed, threatening to spill the lead to the floor with every change. The floor would loose any conflict with these things.
"Hardly," he was sure Sevrin was teasing. His nager prodded Dimitri in his sore chest. "Ow," he rubbed at the spot. No, from his nager, Sevrin wasn't teasing at all, he was serious.
"You have old Sharm Lord Sergei's body type. Muscle, muscle and more muscle." He snorted, leaning back under the bar. "Now lets see if I can manage." Sevrin nearly yanked the bar off the rests. Dimitri steadied it before it could fall. How he wished he could find a pair of trustworthy renSimes to spot them. Or even better, lords. Not that he'd have wanted any lord to zlin him so scantily clad, other than Danyel, that was.
Stroking the tentacle in the sheath, Sevrin asked, "How's Danyel doing?"
"He's coming over for dinner tonight." Dimitri didn't try to hide the butterflies in his middle at the thought.
"Work out in here enough and you'll match him." Sevrin grunted, hands slipping a bit on the bar. Dimitri nearly missed grabbing it. Sevrin's nager slapped at him, futilely, as he'd just come out of seclusion, thank goodness. He'd been treated to one of his Uncle's 'love pats' before, with the result being a gruesome headache.
"I hadn't remembered that." Dimitri eyed the equipment. He truly had forgotten about the effects of extreme exertion on the part of Gens, a temporary lowering in stored Selyn. As much as being a cutter, Diomid's hours a day, every day, had contributed to his survival celibate for many years after Sasha's death. Also, now that he thought about it, his grandfather had done the same thing. "OK, I claim family tradition."
"Just don't murder yourself with it." Sevrin relinquished the weights for Dimitri's second set. "I'm not going to pick up the pieces, unlike the rest of our family.
"Even Vanesa?" Dimitri tried adding a chuckle. Instead a sharp grunt came out as he struggled with all two hundred and twenty kilos. Sevrin's hands wrapped around the bar. "Don't help." He growled. Sweat poured off him. Selyn burned in his overburdened muscles, drawing down his field, slowly but surely as his body struggled to heal the immediate damage he was causing.
"Bitch," Sevrin snarled, leaning on the bar. Dimitri growled back at him, forcing it up with steady pressure. He put the bar back on the rest. Sevrin chuckled softly. "Oh, yes, young lust."
"Wasn't that long ago for you, if I remember correctly." He didn't ask. Sevrin's snarl turned dark. Dimitri goaded him. Selyn twined around the metal obstacles in the room. Mitka chuckled, giving him away. Dimitri threw a soaking wet towel at him.
With a squawk of protest, he fell off the weight rack to land with an ungainly thud. He was still not up to flying yet, although he could glide a tiny bit. When Dimitri checked on him though, Sevrin's fist nearly caught the point of his chin.
Dimitri ducked back, his own block followed by a side kick in inevitable progression. Block, strike, parry, the automatic movements danced through his mind and limbs, matched perfectly by Sevrin, despite the weights littering the whole area. Dimitri snarled in frustration. Damned bastard was picking the moves from his mind.
"Nothing's cheating compared to trying to beat up on a poor blind old Gen." Sevrin's field danced with his movements, belying either age or being a renGen. Dimitri wasn't going to comment on his blindness. Placing the room in his mind, he closed his eyes. He jumped over a bench and then slid back under it on his belly. Sevrin crashed down on his back.
Dimitri flipped his Uncle over, coming to rest kneeling on his back. Sevrin's hands flailed for his. "Getting slow." He growled, catching both hands. Sevrin slumped in surrender.
"You cheat." He rolled over. Dimitri bounced to his feet and offered Sevrin his hand.
"Open your eyes, shen you." Sevrin glared. He did it nearly as well as Mitka. Which was a good trick for him to tell as he hadn't opened his eyes yet.
"Make me." Dimitri didn't want to do as he was told. He crossed his arms over his still aching chest. Sevrin lunged up off the floor, nearly catching Dimitri's groin. He pulled himself up onto the weight rack and ran along the edge, praying it wouldn't tip. The far side rocked slowly off the floor.
"Shen!" He shouted. As the whole thing reached nearly fifteen degrees, he tipped it back. It crashed to the floor, denting it rather badly. The shock made him open his eyes. Sevrin was just standing there, panting. He tipped his head up toward the top of the rack and then back down. Dimitri'd left a damp streak along the ceiling. Even Mitka was looking up.
Then he spun around. Danyel was looking at the ceiling as well, all twelve tentacles out.
Danyel tried to close his mouth. He tried to draw his laterals back in. His body wasn't listening to him. Not one tiny little bit. He could not believe what he'd just seen, or zlinned. Dimitri's clothes, even scantier than anything he'd seen him wear yet were soaked.
Dimitri grabbed a towel draped over a rack and dabbed at his forehead.
"What were you thinking of?" Danyel had no idea what was going on. He'd never thought to go into this tiny cubbyhole Sevrin'd claimed for his own before now. The heavy, musky scents that had already penetrated the wood did strange things to parts of his brain he didn't much like thinking about.
He breathed in deeply, eyes roaming over both Gens. Only now did he realize both of them were quite undressed. Certainly Danyel'd gone swimming with dozens of other men, of both larities. Sevrin and Dimitri together, well, um ...
"Something wrong?" Dimitri fluttered his eyelashes. The combination of so much muscle, all wet with sweat, flirting with him, brought Danyel's glib tongue to a snarled halt. His tentacles froze half way out of his sheathes. It had been nearly six long days since last he'd talked with Dimitri.
Danyel'd tried convincing himself his time spent in the world of dreams with Dimitri had been exactly that, a dream, nothing more. Light shone through misted windows to echo Dimitri's glowing nager. Then Danyel's tentacles sucked back into their sheathes. Dimitri's field had shrunk. Who'd taken it down?
A snarl rose from him. He stepped up to hyperconcious, unaware of anything but the fields surrounding him. Who had dared touch Dimitri? Didn't they know he could be dangerous? Danyel knew how to deal with dangerous fields. Hadn't he been working with Sevrin for over two years now to get his field under control?
Something stopped him. Danyel growled, deep in his throat. Wisps of light and shadow twined around him. "Danyel!"
He blinked away the last shreds of pure selyn and found Dimitri holding his head, as he'd have held a child back from trying to swat him. The position was both ridiculous and humiliating. What had happened? He didn't dare look into Dimitri's eyes. They were probably too amused.
Danyel's tentacles hid in their sheathes, just as if he'd had a tail, it would have been between his legs. Dimitri was staring at him. So was Sevrin. This was a good trick. His embarrassment grew. What had he been meaning to do?
"I'd like to know what you were doing?" Dimitri didn't sound mad. Although this quiet amusement was worse. It was as if he'd pointed a gun at someone and they'd turned it to celery with a look.
"Who stripped you?" And did such a lousy job, Danyel didn't add. He didn't have to. Dimitri had to know someone had stolen a few hundred dynopters from him. He'd so far seemed to zlin as well as any Sime.
"No one." He stretched, pain burned across his chest, melding with an unholy sort of pleasure. The pleasure came from the damage slowly dragging down Dimitri's field. The absolute disgusting waste of selyn turned Danyel's stomach so hard he had to duck away or vomit. "I'm sorry." Dimitri's accent thickened. "I didn't mean to sicken you."
"I'll be fine." He winced away from Dimitri's touch. Then he saw Mitka sprawled awkwardly on the floor, looking up at him. Mitka's huge eyes were beginning to pool silver tears. Since he'd been injured, for Danyel at that, he felt like he had to do something for him. Mitka tucked his head under his wing. Why had he rejected Danyel?
"He doesn't want to be someone's responsibility any more than I do." Dimitri said, so softly he could hardly make out the words.
"It isn't that." Danyel protested. He could hold Mitka, even if he didn't dare touch Dimitri for making a fool of himself. He understood, and disregarded, the illogic of these concepts combined. As if he'd been dragon tending all his life, he scooped Mitka off the floor and tossed him in the air.
Mitka crowed, his wings extending nearly two yards across. The white silk Sevrin had used had nearly worn away to nothing, although Danyel could see where Mitka still had to regrow muscle, tendon and bone, or whatever he used for the same. Honestly Danyel didn't care. He kissed the injured wing, licking it for good measure. Mitka thrummed so loudly Danyel's bones shook.
"He missed you." Dimitri said, placing his shaking hand on Danyel's shoulder.
"You have to get a shower." Danyel pointed out. The smell in the air was driving him mad.
"Want to scrub my back?" Dimitri turned half way around and looked over his shoulder.
"You're too young to flirt like that, Dimitri Sergeyevich!" Sevrin, fortunately, reminded Danyel of his audience. Mitka nibbled his wrist, drawing out a dorsal and grooming it thoroughly. Audience, what audience? Less than a week to turnover, Danyel fought not to display need all over the ambient, his intil was bad enough.
Danyel studied the smooth lines of Dimitri's body. His closely cut hair showed off a body already massive with a great deal more lifting, as he had to have done today. But his dancing run along the weight rack proved he was not only strong, but agile as well. Danyel tried moving one of the weights, one with a fresh towel thrown over the end and warm handprints remaining on the grip. It didn't budge.
Round objects should budge when pushed along flat ones. He set Mitka down carefully and leaned against the bar. Mitka snickered, eyes bright with amusement. Danyel glared at the bar. Dimitri snorted at him.
Dimitri walked over and set himself over the bench. With a slow squat, he got his weight beneath the bar and lifted. Danyel could clearly see the steel bend along its length. Sevrin stood behind his nephew, as if guarding him. Danyel set himself to augment.
Dimitri's grin matched Mitka's, full of fangs and good humor. This was a challenge, was it? No Gen could outdo a Sime in pure, physical strength. The sense of laughter strengthened. He took the bar in both hands. Danyel set himself to augment as strongly as he could.
A few pounds at a time, Dimitri released his hold. There was nothing to this. Dimitri's knees were bent deeply under the weight. Danyel could see him strain. He tried to take more of it. His eyes widened. No matter how much he augmented, the bar kept slipping toward the floor. Sevrin's hands came around Dimitri, just under the bar, but not touching it.
The bar slipped lower and lower. Danyel struggled with every bit of will at his command to lift it. The shenned thing kept dropping lower, and lower, and lower. Dimitri chuckled finally and reset his hands.
With a tremendous nageric thunderclap of effort, Dimitri lifted the weights back up to the rest and then set them down, with only a slight tink of metal on metal.
"How?" He breathed. "How much is that?"
The two Russians looked at each other. Dimitri wandered around the end of the bar. Sevrin around the other. "I couldn't measure it since I never took the weight.
"Then take it now." Dimitri shrugged, then repeated the gesture, as if working out knots. Danyel would bet he had knots, like cheap fishing twine. He'd never seen strength like this. Sevrin set himself under the bar and shoved at it. "I did it with my legs."
"Mostly," Sevrin muttered. Then he lifted it just a fraction of an inch off the rest. "Kids." He snorted. "Its about two-ten. I couldn't get a solid measure like this. Its just too awkward for me."
Dimitri blinked. "I don't think it will be this summer I pass you up."
"You already have."
"I get the feeing you don't mean two hundred and ten pounds." Danyel knew he could have easily lifted so much, without augmenting much, really.
"No," Dimitri's grin turned wicked. Mitka's tongue curled around one long fang. Danyel retrieved him from the cold bench and hefted him over his shoulder. Mitka curled around Danyel's head, leaning with one foreclaw on Danyel's scalp. He moved the tip of one claw out of his skin. That was not a good place for it. "Four hundred and sixty pounds, or thereabouts."
Danyel choked. He looked at Dimitri again. He was sheened with sweat, as no Sime would ever be, unless they were deathly ill. Dimitri was obviously in the prime of health, despite three fine, long, scars tracing from collarbone to beneath his ribs.
He stepped forward and brushed his fingertips over those lines, staring Dimitri in the face. The scent of him was like nothing Danyel'd ever known before. Pure Gen, not male, made his heart race. "Yes, I am Donor Sergei." Dimitri's expressive nostrils flared.
Emboldened in Mitka's grasp, Danyel tried tugging Dimitri down to his level and ended up lifting himself off the floor. "Your selyn is mine." He growled, quite put out.
"Oh?" Dimitri's mouth formed a perfect circle of surprise, even as his eyes twinkled in laughter only to be outshone by his nager. Sevrin didn't bother. His snickers were enough to made Danyel's ears burn.
"I can't believe I said that." He didn't regret it one bit, however. It was what he felt.
"Neither can I." Dimitri rubbed his sweaty face against Danyel's. Rough whiskers just beneath the skin bit at Danyel's cheek, far too much like Rik's. Mitka hissed, flicking his tail across Dimitri's face. "Oh, I'm sorry." He breathed, sweet breath and gentleness nothing like his childhood tormentor. Dimitri reached toward Danyel's face.
Danyel, this time, stepped forward and pressed himself against Dimitri's chest. The heat of Dimitri's body was stunning, warmer than even Sime normal.
"You have on your good clothes." Dimitri protested.
"They'll wash." He growled. Unfortunately, both of his hands were tangled up in dealing with Mitka. He couldn't grab Dimitri no matter how badly he wanted to. Mitka stuck his tongue into one of Danyel's tentacle sheathes, fortunately not a lateral this time. Even so the sensation bothered him so much his skin crawled all over his body.
"Stop that!" Dimitri grabbed for Mitka.
"No!" Danyel protected him. "I don't mind." He rubbed his face against Mitka's. Mitka stopped what he was doing. From inches away, Mitka stared into Danyel's eyes, as if looking for something. This time his tongue went up Danyel's nose!
Danyel sneezed, trying to dislodge it. What was Mitka trying to do, reach Danyel's brain?
Dimitri giggled. The sound was so like a girl, Danyel stopped struggling. At least until he sneezed again. His eyes watered. "That is disgusting, Mitka." Dimitri winced. "I'm so sorry." He made a grab for Mitka. That tongue renewed its efforts. "I think I'm going to be sick." Dimitri's nager had turned an odd shade of green.
"Why?" Danyel finally captured Mitka's tongue and yanked. He sneezed again. In retaliation, he rubbed his nose on Mitka's back. It was convenient. Dimitri's nageric unease grew. Now his stomach was twisting into knots again, just not as badly as before.
"That was grotesque, Mitka!" Dimitri shook his finger at his nager. Mitka licked his lips, like a cat licking up cream. This was a bit disgusting even for Danyel, and he'd had the recent thrill of dealing with three toddlers.
"Mitka," Danyel winced, wrinkling his well traveled nose. He'd had few things quite that disgusting happen to him, he had to admit. It wasn't as if it hurt, it was just, well, disgusting. Although it hurt less than a baby's razor sharp nails. Mitka's expression matched Kolya's right down to the little grin. Without a free hand, Danyel grabbed his tongue with the only thing he had left, his mouth. He was not going to get that tongue up his nose again.
This was probably not the brightest of ideas, Danyel realized, as soon as he had done it.
"I thought I'd seen it all." Dimitri's dry comment was a help.
"I know I hadn't, and I'm still a bit shocked." Sevrin's, however, was not.
Honestly, Danyel was not at all sure of this. From the expression on Mitka's face, neither was he. Mitka's tongue was surprisingly slick, and not at all mushy. Curious, he sucked on it, as he would a strand of spaghetti. Mitka's eyes widened even more. They looked like they were going to fall out. Danyel decided to get some revenge.
Danyel was not so inexperienced as to have never had oral sex with his partners. Actually, more often than not, he preferred it. It was awfully difficult to get anyone pregnant that way. It took more bad luck than he'd had in his life. His tongue curled around Mitka's as he would stroke the edges of a woman's delicate lower lips.
Mitka's response, however, was overwhelming. He sagged, draping himself all over Danyel and danced his tongue deep in his mouth, a bit too deep. He pulled back a bit. Mitka moaned, sounding like Danyel'd kicked him, hard.
"No, no, pretty one," he finally managed to capture Mitka's face with his hands. Delicately this time, he licked at that scaly muzzle. It was no stranger, he supposed, than licking as deep as he could into a woman's body. Not that he really liked doing such things, when he thought about it so clinically.
Dimitri chuckled, his hand resting on Danyel's shoulder. "You don't have to indulge him."
"He needs some spoiling." Danyel thought back to how open and unstinting Mitka's affections could be. He'd never known anyone like Mitka, who trusted so perfectly as to say all those things he felt, much less to show it. Mitka's lips were hard and cool against his own, as so many Gen's had been. Then they opened to him, so slowly and carefully Danyel made sure not to force himself.
Mitka was frighteningly young, for all his obvious enthusiasm for sex. It was the enthusiasm of youth, that of yearning for any kind of release from hormones, very much like those times when Danyel'd been forced into sexual therapy so he didn't destroy himself with the CD's.
Trembling and obviously scared, Mitka otherwise held still for him. One slow bit at a time, he explored Mitka's lips with his own, brushing his mouth over those long, hard fangs. They felt cool and hollow to his own sensitive lips. For a moment, he hummed softly against one. Mitka flicked his tongue over Danyel's lips. The tooth instantly soaked up the moisture and Danyel knew why Mitka drooled on everyone, to keep his teeth and lips from drying out, poor thing.
Danyel tried to help, licking his way over Mitka's lips. They shed his saliva as if it were dust. Instead he showed Mitka need, drawing out Mitka's own selyn. Mitka slobbered down Danyel's front, but all through Mitka's body, muscles relaxed and the worst of the trembling stilled. "You're beautiful, Mitka." He spoke the words, as if to a lover, and knew he did love Mitka. There was something about him, even as young as he was, that spoke to Danyel's heart.
"I'm a monster." He muttered, so softly only Danyel could hear him, although from the stricken looks Mitka was getting, both Dimitri and his Uncle knew what he'd said.
"I would not do this with anyone but a beautiful person." Danyel gently teased Mitka's lips apart, drawing out his tongue and loving his mouth as he would the most beautiful woman in the world. Before even he could truly think about it, Mitka's abandoned surrender drew him under. He ravished Mitka's mouth, caressing his razor sharp fangs without fear of harm for they were no different than his own laterals, and loving Mitka's sweetness, for it was no different than the selyn that drove his very nerves.
Chapter 19
Dimitri was not going to move. He'd never seen anyone kiss a dragon before. Even when he'd teased his father into sitting for a portrait with Mitka, there had been a distance between them. He leaped over a bench, wincing at muscles that had stiffened and grabbed a piece of chalk. He broke it in two and sketched the scene in front of him quickly on the slate. Neither Danyel nor Mitka were still for even a breath.
Twined like tentacles in hands or on wrists, the impression was endless coiling. Dimitri sweated more as he sketched bits and pieces of the scene. Mitka's tail caressing Danyel's ear, his eyes closing as Danyel caressed the sensitive lids, their hair and scales, both so perfectly black. Even the stitches falling loose at last to trail from Mitka's wing, now tangled in Danyel's hair.
"You're running out of blackboard." Sevrin muttered, pointing to the bench. Instead Dimitri got down on his hands and knees, using the wooden floor as another flat surface to record the fantastic images. Sevrin snorted and put his foot on Dimitri's butt. He would. Dimitri didn't care. By the time Danyel and Mitka came up for air, he'd covered nearly a meter and a half with his working sketches.
He wiped off his forehead, probably leaving chalk behind, as usual. Oh well, chalk cleaned off better than ink or paint. He probably looked the idiot, chalk dust all over and panting. Dimitri glanced at the sketches again. He stepped back from them, rather bemused at his own awe of the subject.
Certainly it could be seen as a grotesquerie, a mockery of all that was normal and right. Dimitri grabbed a towel to wipe it all away. Sevrin's hand wrapped around his wrist with stunning force. He tensed, trying not to pull away, but even still not wanting to let anyone see the images. Sevrin was alright, he couldn't see them.
"I can through Mitka's eyes." He said. Dimitri looked down at the sketches he'd made on the bare wood of the floor. Why had he done any such silly thing?
"He's beautiful." Danyel murmured, looking down at the images, then he hopped over them to look at the bits he'd sketched on the slate on the wall. At first all Dimitri could see was the bizarrely sinuous effect of the overall composition. "I wish it were more permanent."
"I'm glad it isn't." A single drop of sweat dropped with a splat amid the dust and chalk. Dimitri smoothed the edges of Mitka's neck in the image, drawing out the tension he'd shown when first, tentatively, returning Danyel's bold kiss.
His fingernail traced out one of Mitka's fangs, etching the line of the venom duct, showing his ability to harm even as he loved so clearly. For there was no mistaking the desire in every line of Mitka's body as he strained to devour Danyel with his coils.
"Is there a way to preserve these?" Danyel asked, gazing down at the two of them.
"I can come in here later with my sketch pad and some charcoal. More habit than anything else." He shrugged, feeling uneasy, both physically and mentally. He rarely drew or painted for anyone now. And even before he'd established, he'd rarely let anyone but his mentor, Mikhail Chernoye, examine his work. It was not the sort of thing the heir to a Demense did for entertainment.
"You're good." Danyel snorted. "Is there anything you don't do well?"
"Most things." He really wanted to just clean up the mess. Sevrin's nager tucked around him as if he'd kicked it. Dimitri sighed. "There are artists far better than I at home."
"I know what I like." Danyel's dark eyes blazed, reflecting Mitka's gold ones hovering so close. "He's beautiful." Those expressive lips curved upwards, reddened with the force of his kisses and still dampened. This last caught Mitka's eye, as well as Dimitri's. His hand twitched on the bit of chalk he held. "Go on." Danyel waved to the corner of slate Dimitri hadn't filled.
Dimitri found himself drawn by that open space. He sketched out the reflections of Sime and nager in each other's eyes. Soon enough, he ran out of room and dropped down to the worn wood floor, desperate for space to record the fleeting images crowding his head to overflowing. Soon he had another meter of quick sketches, just enough he could come back later and transfer those moments to parchment or canvas. Dimitri brushed at one spot showing the arch of Danyel's nose.
"You could shrink it a bit." He muttered. Dimitri'd forgotten he was there.
He tried backing away from them. Sevrin's hand on his shoulder stopped him. He yelped and nearly bounced forward. This time it was Danyel's hand. Dimitri shook his head, coming out of his daze at last. He set down the chalk.
"I've never seen anyone quite so intent on anything, except for need."
"Sergei," Dimitri shrugged, not really wanting to into it in greater detail. Even as a child he'd been susceptible to overwhelming enthusiasms. Now it was far, far stronger. His back knotted as he tried to stand. Danyel's hands were burning hot as they landed on his shoulders.
"Don't lift and then stop moving!" Sevrin's love pat, with his fist instead of his denuded field this time, did knock Dimitri off balance. He ended up against Danyel's chest. Against his locked muscles, the heat felt wonderful. He sighed, leaning back and sagging. Danyel staggered beneath his weight.
"Sorry," he murmured, trying to keep his balance. It wasn't working very well. Danyel was too wonderfully warm. Dimitri wanted to turn around and drape himself all over Danyel, no matter how awkward it would be. His legs trembled, as the squatting he'd done under all that weight, had been after his normal session.
"Your back is as hard as a rock!" Danyel's reminder only made his abdominal muscles threaten to lock up as well. Dimitri kneaded them, trying to head off their rebellion. "Its like bone." His fingers prodded at the stiff muscles, to no effect but to make him realize he had a lord at the unprotected back of his neck.
He turned around, slowly, so as not to startle Danyel. But the instant he saw Danyel's face, he knew he'd done something to startle him, quite badly, as a matter of fact. His eyes were huge and he looked as if he'd swallowed a live eel. Dimitri'd done nothing quite this surprising, or at least he couldn't think of anything.
"You're amazing." Danyel said, in a completely calm, self-contained voice. His expression had been wiped clean of his surprise as if it never had been there. If Mitka hadn't craned his head around to stare Danyel in the face with his own expression one of absolute befuddlement, Dimitri would have thought himself imagining things, or overreacting, of course.
"I started young." He shrugged, with half a grin. Mitka groomed his wing, preening, and giving away Dimitri's own embarrassed pride in himself at the complement.
"He doesn't let you get away with anything." Sevrin grinned. "I like having you around." Dimitri wasn't sure if this was to him or Mitka. He figured anything that would give Sevrin back his sight would be wonderful in and of itself. Sevrin snorted, his nager trying another swat. "You, Dimitri, idiot." He muttered. Dimitri was definitely going to have to work on his own defenses, both nageric and mental.
"He's not an idiot." Danyel growled, still stroking Mitka's head with proprietary affection. His field was twining around Mitka as if he were actually thinking of offering himself in transfer.
"You shouldn't be getting so intimate with him." Dimitri frowned, thinking of how heartbroken Mitka would be when Dimitri told him he could never have Danyel. One of them, Dimitri wasn't sure which, would not survive the experience.
Mitka glared at Dimitri. This wasn't fair. Danyel liked him. Honestly liked him. He butted Danyel's hand, accepting his suit. "You can't take him away."
"He'll be hurt by it." Dimitri didn't say which he.
"Sevrin is hard to hurt." Mitka licked Danyel's hand, reveling in the musky traces of roniplin left on them. He must have been giving transfers. Mitka dug his tongue into one of those sweet places, where his laterals came from.
"I was talking about Danyel." Dimitri tried to glare again. Danyel shivered a bit, as if what Mitka were doing felt good. It should. He meant it to feel good. Danyel liked it when Mitka licked him.
"He isn't hurting me." Danyel was a very good lord. Mitka tickled open the sheath, getting a rush of sweet roniplin on his tongue. He liked roniplin. It tasted so good. Mitka breathed in the scent of him. Mature Sime, without the slightest taint of bitterness. He liked this.
"I like him." Mitka purred, rubbing his face against Danyel's wrist. The life, so close to the surface, was fading ever so slowly. He wanted it to go faster. He wanted to give his own life to Danyel, filling him with his own fire. Vayer was so cold and remote, not like Danyel's quick heat.
"He's not for you, Mitka." Dimitri spoiled all his fun.
Mitka growled, stropping his teeth over the lines of heat on Danyel's arms. They should be brighter. He reached for them, grabbing Danyel's arm in his talons. This way he couldn't get away.
"Stop it, Mitka." Dimitri was such a pain. "You can't do this."
"I'm not in need." Danyel was so sweet, especially compared to Dimitri.
"He's Techton." Sevrin stuck his fingers in too.
"So?" Mitka glared at him. "I can have who I want."
"You're being a problem, Mitka." Dimitri warned him. He always told Mitka to stop. First he wouldn't have sex with Danyel, now he was saying he couldn't even touch him? This was entirely unfair. "Don't do this."
"Or what?" Mitka reared up, talons firmly around Danyel's wrist. "You'll hurt me again?"
"I didn't mean to."
"That's what I said with Khristov and it didn't matter then." Mitka didn't like the knot in his throat and chest. It felt bad. He wanted to make it go away. Danyel could make it go away. He sniffled, looking up at Danyel. "I like you." He said, not wanting to say he loved him. That was scary. He didn't know what love was. Not really. "I like being with you. You make me feel good." Or at least better, so Mitka thought.
"We're too different." Danyel was sad. His nager had melted, turning dark and gray. This was bad. Mitka's eyes burned with tears. This time for real, not show. "Oh, poor little one." One of those wonderful tentacles came out and stroked his skin. It warmed away the knot in his chest, soothing it.
"Don't lead him on, please." Dimitri was impossible. Mitka hissed at him, telling him to go away.
"This is my Sime." Mitka trembled with how good Danyel's touch felt. It warmed him all over, soothing away the cold loneliness. "I've been alone too long. I've been alone all my life!" He wailed, crying.
"I'm sorry, Mitka, but you can't have him." Dimitri made it sound like this upset him. If it did, why was he saying no? "He's not for you."
"Why not?" Mitka could taste Danyel's warmth, so close and Dimitri was saying he couldn't? This was bad. He clamped down his talons on Danyel's wrist. Danyel hissed, pain joining his own in the ambient. "Oh, I'm sorry." He licked at the wounds, closing them instantly with his own selyn. "I didn't mean to hurt you."
"Is that what we're going to have to write on his grave marker?" Sevrin asked.
"I'm not going to kill him." Mitka promised. Danyel was so quick, so strong, he could duck. He could keep Mitka's fangs from going too deep. "We can do like we did with Tzer last time."
"You're offering to give a secondary? Willingly?" Dimitri didn't believe him. His nager said so.
"I'm telling the truth!" Mitka put his head in Danyel's hand, keeping it out of trouble. He liked Danyel's touch, even like this. "I want him, Dimitri."
"I know you do." Dimitri frowned. "I'd rather find someone who could accept you in all ways."
"There isn't anyone." Mitka growled, tail lashing around Danyel's arm. Danyel was the closest he'd ever found. Bright, quick, happy and clever. Danyel knew things too. Mitka could hear the clever thoughts in the back of Danyel's mind, richened by all the things he'd seen and done. He wasn't shallow like those other lords Dimitri'd talked to for him. "I want Danyel."
"You wanted Vanesa earlier." Dimitri tried to distract him.
"Before I met Danyel." Mitka insisted. "She's pretty, but dangerous. I like her, I think." He glanced quickly at Sevrin. He didn't want to insult Sevrin's mate. That would be bad. Insulting Sevrin would be very bad. Sevrin had healed Mitka. Sevrin waved a hand at him. Mitka ignored it.
"Go on." Sevrin insisted.
"She scares me." Mitka hid his face between Danyel's fingers. "I'm not big enough for her."
"Oh?" Dimitri asked. "I didn't think you'd ever met anyone big enough for you."
"She's too strong."
"Because you can't wrap her around your tail?" Sevrin needled him. Mitka clamped his wings to his side. He didn't want to be big right now. Big things got hit. He wanted to be small. Danyel's fingers soon cupped him completely, hiding him from Sevrin's anger. "I shrank him."
"You did." The laughter in Dimitri's voice stung. Mitka hadn't meant to be funny. He was scared of Vanesa. She could hurt him. He didn't want to be hit by her. Sevrin was big and scary too. Mitka trembled, hiding himself on Danyel's warm palm, soaking up the heat.
"You're hurting him." Danyel held him close, protecting him. This was what he wanted. No one ever thought to protect him. Other Sharm Lords were protected by their Lords. It felt really good. Why hadn't he wanted this before? Although he did know no one had ever offered it to him before either. He rested his head against the base of Danyel's thumb. "I think you're very sweet, Mitka."
"Thank you." He did remember his manners. Mitka looked up at him, wanting to see his beautiful face. It held so much brightness, set off by the shadows of his past. Mitka could look at Danyel all the time. Danyel was always changing, always new. "I love you." He whispered, trying out the new words.
Danyel smiled, warming Mitka all the way through. He purred, rolling onto his back and showing his belly. Mitka wanted it rubbed, trusting Danyel not to hurt him, like Dimitri had, and Sevrin. One ventral stroked him from chin to tail. His scales tightened, holding the touch to him with all their might. He wiggled, asking for more.
"Stop teasing him, Danyel." Dimitri was mean!
"I'm just touching him." Danyel was good. Mitka licked that tentacle, tasting the soothing sweet musk of Sime. It made him shiver all over it tasted so good. He loved the taste of Simes. All sweet and musky and salty and special. "He likes it."
"Of course he does." Dimitri sighed. "You're only making things harder on yourself, Mitka. He can't take you."
"Yes he can." Mitka wrapped himself around that ventral, wanting to hold onto it with all his might. He liked ventrals. They were much softer and silkier than dorsals. "I can do a secondary."
"If you slip, which you will, you'll kill him." Sevrin butted in. Mitka didn't want him saying things like this. It wasn't true. He wasn't going to kill Danyel. He'd never kill someone so nice.
"I've grown up since Khristov." Mitka glared at him. Then Danyel cheated. He rubbed Mitka's ribs. Mitka sprawled again, relaxing with the wonderful touch. He liked being touched, just as he liked touching. Touching Danyel's mouth with his own had been incredible. He'd never known such closeness. Before now he'd just bitten with his mouth. Danyel'd touched those places which ached so badly at the end of the month and soothed them. Not just now. He'd sooth them later too. He promised with that wonderful touch. "He kissed me. Me, Mitka, not you, Dimitri." He'd never felt so alone.
Danyel continued stroking him, warming that empty place his words had made. No, he wasn't alone. He had Danyel now. Mitka loved Danyel, not Dimitri.
Chapter 20
Dimitri'd had enough of this nonsense. He grabbed a towel, threw it over his knotting shoulders and headed for the door. Mitka'd have to follow him, no matter how besotted he was with Danyel. He opened the door and tried to walk out. Mitka's high pitched whine ate at his nerves. He turned back to see him clutching at Danyel with all his might.
"Come along, Mitka." He wa