Healer's Heart
Section 8
by
Ann Marie Olson
Story © 2002 Ann
Marie Olson
Chapter 41
Vanesa paced behind her desk. Miran had been a huge help today. She'd rarely gone south of the river, even under guard, such as it was. Every time she'd done so recently, she'd had Danyel with her. She missed his company, really.
Miran stood hipshot before her desk, chewing on some more gum.
"Get rid of that stuff." She flicked a tentacle at him.
"Gotta do somethin or I'm gonna drool all over you." He flicked his hands open, like a Sime in change over. His whole body was trembling, as if he were suffering a high fever. Vanesa sure as shen recognized the symptoms.
"I don't know what I'm going to do with you, Miran." Vanesa leaned against her desk.
"You could do it." His blue-gray eyes darkened as he purred the words. His voice cracking in the middle, however, was enough to bring Vanesa out of any distraction, no matter how far into need she was. Or he was, really. "Come on."
"I'm married." She still felt a bit uncomfortable with the status of bound spouse in the way of the Russians, but she'd not trade her relationship with Sevrin for any name. "I'm not going to step out on him."
"You sure?" He tried to croon. Again his voice broke, this time across three octaves. He'd once been a treble. Now he was heading for baritone, getting lost along the way. "I'm not happy." He put his hand to his throat.
"I can tell." She rested her hip on the desk. "I wish I knew what to do for you." She crossed her arms over her chest, neither feeling great about the gesture, actually. Kolya was still nursing at night, and her tits ached horribly late in the day. She resettled her arms beneath them and winced as she leaked a bit. Miran glanced down at her breasts and stepped back a pace. "Yeah, I didn't think you'd be too interested in sharing a bed with Kolya, too."
"No," he said quickly. "I'm not. I have some brains. I'm not gonna get strapped down with puking babies and a whining Lord before I'm twenty."
Vanesa blinked at him. "And you think so highly of all Lords?"
"Only those who won't give out." He overcame his reluctance pretty easily, she noticed. He swayed forward toward her. He probably intended to be enticing. He zlinned silly. "You know you want it." This worked a bit better, he whispered the words.
"From my husband." She pushed him away. He fell. She ran forward. He flipped her over, kneeling over her and grinning.
"And now you're going to say you don't want me?"
"Get off." Vanesa shoved him back into the wall. All he did was grunt and chuckle at her. "You weren't serious."
"Nah," he grinned. This time she felt the first flutter of interest. He was cute. More or less. Well, less. His big hands, knobby joints, crooked teeth and once broken nose did little to actually lend him anything approaching actual comeliness. "Just wanna get laid."
"You're rude, crude, and quite offensive, Miran." Vanesa snorted.
A corner of his lip turned up in a sneer. Then his features went blank. He ran his hand over his hair, then his face. The need lines vanished, as did the tightness around the eyes. His stance changed too, as did his nager. It was still high, but not feverish with need. "Excuse me Sectuib Kaon, I'd heard you might be able to find assistance for a Sharm Lord in need?" His fluid High Simelan, as the Russians called it, was as different from his normal drawl as attrition from post.
Vanesa straightened her back.
"I don't mean to be botherin ye if its too much trouble. I'll go down to the local center and see if there's anyone who can help me there." His voice had smoothed out as if he'd been drinking cream, although it was considerably higher than she guessed he'd land as an adult. He reached for the doorknob.
"No, stop," she put her hand over his.
"Its fine." He glanced down, cheeks flushing a bit. Even his nager turned a tiny bit pink.
"Who are you?" She asked at last.
The rogue returned. "Miran Sergeyevich." He grinned. "No one else."
"I liked the other one." Vanesa admitted. It really was too bad Danyel'd fallen so hard already for Dimitri. He'd suit this young rogue pretty well, if she didn't miss her guess.
"Ah, you like trader Mikarin Likanovich?" His voice returned to the rich purr. "Or perhaps you might like ..."
"No," she shook her head. "If you were anyone else, I'd send you to the center."
"Then do it." His hand tightened on the doorknob.
"I wish I'd done as much with your brother." She yanked her hand back. "You're just trying to get me to touch you."
"Can you blame me for trying?" The strutting peacock was back.
"I'd tell you to get lost but then you'd do it and I wouldn't be able to find you if my life depended on it." She sighed. "And with Diomid's heir and first spare here at Kaon, I'd better keep track of both of you."
"Good luck with my big bro." His face turned serious for a moment. "He's had a death wish since he was born."
"I thought it was since he established." Vanesa blinked. Who was Dimitri, really? Was he as changeable as Miran? She hadn't thought so, but now she didn't know.
"He's always been a bastard." Miran stared down into her eyes. "And I don't mean it literally."
"Darya and Vayer certainly seemed like his parents."
"There's something about blood."
"Oh, bullshit," she fought not to laugh. "You obnoxious, self-centered brat!"
He cocked his head at her.
"Viasha's not Sevrin's."
Miran paled, turning dead white for the briefest instant.
"Give it to me straight this time, Miran." She reached past him and locked the door. "We have fifteen minutes before we have to rouse your brother and his lover out of their little clutch."
"I thought they were working with Tami." He ran his hand through his hair, again the kid just after establishment. Miran stuffed his hands in his pockets and hunched his shoulders. Dealing with Tami was most likely the last thing he wanted to be doing. Vanesa was no healer, but she knew enough to get out of the way of healers. Dimitri, after scaring them all witless, seemed to have recovered all of his own wits and then some.
"They wanted to be there when we reintroduced her to her family." Vanesa's caught one whiff of the bag they'd thrown Tami's clothes into. It had been more than enough to turn her stomach. She'd thought Jarmin had been in bad shape when Aliana'd first dragged him to Kaon.
"Yeah, probably smart." He shrugged, obviously not really caring one way or the other. There was something else bothering him though. Vanesa narrowed her eyes at him. It was so hard to think while this high field child stood right in front of her nose. "So. What I want. I want a transfer and to be left alone."
"You don't want to see your cousin Aliana?" Vanesa'd thought all the Russians closer than this. Miran didn't seem to care about anyone other than himself. Then she caught the flash of heat from his nager before he could choke it off. "You're staying under my thumb."
"How about under your laterals, sexy?" His grin promised things he had no reasonable chance of knowing about. Things only Sevrin knew, and probably Dimitri. With his half-brother here for comparison, Vanesa realized how very gentle and loving Dimitri was. Yeah, he'd made a mistake with Mitka. He'd more than made up for it afterward. "Go get your brother."
"He's not the one in need?"
"Obey my orders or you're on the next plane back to Russia."
"At your will." He tugged at his forelock in mockery of the renSimes.
Vanesa's sidekick just tapped his taped ribs, but still he tried to double over with a shock of pain through the ambient. "Give it up. I might be older than you are, but I am even meaner."
"At your will." He repeated, but this time with true respect. Vanesa sighed and made a show of returning to her paperwork.
"I'm waiting." She glanced up at him. He vanished as if she'd kicked him a lot harder.
Chapter 42
"I'm really sick of sleeping in deferment suites." Dimitri couldn't help mentioning to Danyel. Eyeing the door warily, he stood behind his partner, hopefully ready for this interview.
"Are you saying you want me to get you back into Vanesa's good graces?" Danyel's field held the tang of amusement at another's expense.
"I'd like to spend our last night before turnover in a real bed." Dimitri put his arms around Danyel and nuzzled his springy black hair. "I love thee so much." He held Danyel to him with all his strength.
"You're going to break me." Danyel's complaint was belied by the shimmers of warmth rushing through his nager.
The door opened. Dimitri blinked at it senselessly. He had better things to do. Instead he nibbled at the delicate skin below Danyel's whiskers. "You smell good." He licked, having well learned the pleasures of such things from Mitka, and now experience.
"Go, go, go," Mitka chanted in his ear. "He's ready for you."
"I am." Danyel said, then gulped. Dimitri looked up and echoed his comment.
"Hi," he said, feeling like some sort of demonic creature trying to devour Danyel alive on Vanesa's doorstep. She hadn't said a word. Her nager was almost completely ineffective, as she was probably overdue for seclusion. Even so, he had to keep himself from cowering in fear of what she'd do to him next.
"Hey," her gray eyes softened. "You're afraid of me."
"Yeah," he admitted, trembling and wishing he could hold Danyel closer. "Oh, please, don't let her split us up. I want you." Dimitri knew better than to say he'd die without Danyel. He'd want to, but they weren't matchmates. "No, you've found your matchmate."
"Would you quite babbling?" Danyel chuckled, patting at Dimitri's hands. "I'm not going to step in on someone else's marriage. I already said as much earlier."
"To you it isn't stepping in. Its just transfer. You aren't going to want me this month!" Dimitri wailed, probably too loudly.
"Dimitri, hush," Danyel's tentacles came out and twined with his fingers.
"You'd ..."
"Hush," Vanesa repeated for Danyel. Her tidy little feet were wrapped in very sensible clogs. "Has he fallen apart on you like this before?"
"More or less," Danyel shrugged, holding Dimitri's hands. Otherwise Dimitri would have been tempted to pull away. "You're fine, Dimitri. Take a deep breath and hold it."
"I'm not." He knew he sounded like an idiot. Then he did as Danyel said. It would serve him right if he passed out.
"OK, exhale," his soft voice was rich with amusement, but without any taint of bitterness. Dimitri sagged against his back, releasing his emotions with his breath. "There we go."
"You don't get all excited." Dimitri muttered in annoyance, and now embarrassment. "I'm sorry." He glanced at Vanesa. "I made a fool of myself again. I don't mean it."
"Very few people do." Vanesa's need denuded nager shimmered with amusement. "I'll forget it ever happened."
"Thank you," he breathed, knees shaking. How he hated getting overwrought. It really was a pointless expenditure of emotion. Mitka gold eyes shimmered deep in Danyel's hair, reproaching Dimitri for his thoughts. "I love you." He deliberately used the plural, stroking Mitka with his face even as he hugged Danyel to his chest.
"Good," Mitka snorted, sending selyn deep into Dimitri's ear. It tickled and he fought not to wince away.
"You have the most expressive nager I've ever zlinned." Vanesa sat on the edge of the desk. Not wanting to look more the fool, Dimitri figured he should probably let Danyel go rather than try to waddle with him to the chairs before Vanesa. Then Miran's field exploded into raucous laughter, even as physically, only his eyes glittered.
"You're going to have to learn some control." Danyel sat, crossing his ankles and putting his hands on his knee. Dimitri debated standing behind him, then decided he should probably sit. If nothing else so Vanesa wouldn't get a kink in her neck.
"I do fine." Miran's attention went to the window, splashing the glass with nageric rainbows.
"Your nager is all over the place." Danyel didn't move, even though Dimitri could feel him brace. Sure enough, Miran turned on him, field whipping out in anger. "Yeah, if I weren't with Mitka, you'd have hurt me."
"So?" He scoffed. "What difference does that make? You have southerner's."
"Does everyone know I'm Ferris?" Danyel muttered, brows furrowed.
"Its pretty obvious to us." Dimitri then leaned over and whispered in his ear. "Mitka wouldn't love you so much if you weren't Ferris." He used the Western term deliberately. "You're beautiful to him."
"I'm a bother." Danyel's knuckles whitened as he clenched his hands.
"As if I'm normal?" He put his hand over Danyel's. "Do you think my little display of emotional incontinence at the door a few minutes ago is normal?" Dimitri couldn't stop the ringing in his ears. "I hate it when I do things like that. At least you get some good out of your differences." He wished he could make all this go away for a moment. Long enough to put his head in Danyel's lap and cry.
"Without Mitka's help, I couldn't even touch you." Danyel put his hand on Dimitri's knee.
"Oh, how cute." Miran cooed.
"Shut up." Dimitri said, in unison with Danyel. Miran's return blow was ineffective, despite the huge amount of selyn behind it. Being virgin, his field wasn't going to be dragged down for trivialities like a half dozen cracked ribs. It blazed through the room, advertising its presence to any Sime within zlinning range. "Your nager is screaming 'do me' so loud I'm surprised we don't have two or three channels up here on their knees. Although it isn't like your ego requires the help."
"Oh, I'd appreciate it." He leaned against the door frame, winced, then shifted his weight more to one shoulder. Dimitri'd been very careful in pounding on Miran. They'd never hit each other on the face. Neither of them had much to start with, although when Miran'd broken his nose falling out of a tree, Dimitri hadn't been above telling him to just leave it alone and so it'd set crooked. That had been a big mistake. He looked better this way. "No one ever looks at little Miran."
"Your little boy look would work a lot better if your field weren't panting like a bitch in heat after every Sime." Dimitri never could understand why Miran could get under his skin, even when nothing else could. "You zlin like a slut, little bro." Vanesa twitched a bit. "My brother the whore. Great. He's a drug dealer, whore, probably thief, and what next? A little murder for hire?"
"That's your bailiwick, big bro." Miran swaggered forward. It would have worked better if Dimitri'd not taped his ribs so tight he could barely breathe.
"And now you're threatening me?" Dimitri forced himself to lean back in his chair. It felt so good, so normal, to spar with Miran again. They'd grown up exchanging nasty words and more than occasionally, fists. "Stupid." Miran paled. Dimitri grinned. He'd gotten a good hit. "Don't mess with the executioner." He leaned forward in his seat. Miran stepped back, field tightening around his body.
"They call you that." Miran whispered, eyes wide. Dimitri hadn't know he was called the executioner on the streets. It had obviously been a good guess. "Everyone down on the docks, in the markets." He jerked his chin up. "You The Executioner, in capital letters. How many has it been, big bro? One hundred, two?"
"Forty-four." He added Cami and Volen to his list. "At least people who've died at my hands." Vanesa's eyes had gone wide. She backed away. Dimitri flinched from the wariness in her field. He begged her with his eyes not to run.
"How many here?" Her tentacles were clamped deep within their sheathes, knotting the delicate skin covering them.
"I don't want your fear." He tried to reassure her.
"Stop being afraid of him." Mitka stuck his nose out of Danyel's hair. "I did it. You don't have to fear him. I'm the bad one. I'm the killer."
"No," she shook her head, keeping her attention on Dimitri. "How many?"
"Two," he wished he could bite off the word before it came out.
"Who?" Her lips tightened further. Even Miran was silent, for a wonder. "The child rapist and who else?" She paled. "You killed Cami."
"Yes," he nodded, praying Mitka wouldn't do anything rash if she bolted for the door. Danyel moved, but Dimitri didn't have the attention to spare for even him at the moment.
"She was dying, Vanesa." Danyel added his own minutes. Dimitri wished he'd stayed silent. It had been his decision.
"Danyel had nothing to do with it." Dimitri had to protect him.
"Like shen I didn't." Danyel's nager didn't have the strength to shift the ambient with Dimitri and his brother in the room, but it sure tried. "I took him to her. They'd met. I knew what would happen."
"Danyel, please, don't get more tangled up in this mess than you already are." Dimitri pleaded with him.
"I didn't know it had been so many." Miran whispered, probably to himself. Or at least effectively.
"You can't go around killing people, Dimitri." Vanesa tried to resume her relaxed position. Her arms gave her away, however. Her tentacles had knotted even tighter into their sheathes and Dimitri could see the skin over her roniplin glands redden as the pressure from her laterals cramped the sensitive nodes. Miran shifted his weight. "No," she waved him away. "This is between the two of us." She stared at Dimitri, not zlinning at all.
"I never kill when I don't mean to." He winced at how horrible that sounded. "I have no desire for fear or pain." Dimitri didn't look at Mitka.
"I was going to offer you Kaon's sanctuary." She crossed her arms over her chest again. "At least if Danyel were willing to make up his mind and finally answer my question the right way." She shot him a bemused glare. "Shen it, Dimitri, you can't kill people here."
"I couldn't let Cami waste away or another child die." Dimitri rubbed at his wrists, still feeling their touch in his mind.
"The child murderer. He would have done it again?"
"He was trying to buy Kreg." Dimitri leaned forward. Vanesa leaned away, but at least she didn't step back again. "He was planning on raping and then murdering him."
"I thought he said Kreg was too old?" Danyel asked.
"You were there?" Vanesa blinked.
"Of course," he shrugged. "Where do you think I got the gun?"
"That's his?" She winced, glancing over at Miran. He shrugged, nager blank, but giving Dimitri a wide berth. He felt like a pariah, as he'd done so often at home. "OK." Vanesa straightened her shoulders. "You aren't going to kill anyone else, Dimitri."
"I can't promise that." He rubbed the bridge of his nose, readjusting his glasses. It was very convenient to be able to see the window washers, but not particularly necessary. "I won't promise that."
"Then I can't give you Kaon's protection."
"You'd already taken it away." Dimitri reached out for Danyel's hand. It was waiting for him.
"Then ..."
"Don't say it." Dimitri squeezed his hand. "Don't throw away your future for me."
"I won't have a future without you."
"How touching." Miran crooned, or tried to. He hadn't figured out falsetto yet, not having finished finding his own voice. "Does this ever stop?" He put his hand to his throat, which had betrayed him entirely in returning to soprano.
"Yeah," he sighed, grinning at his brother. "You're such a jerk, Miran."
"Yeah, and you're an uptight bastard." He shook his head. "But you are The Executioner."
"Even Arkay didn't get that sobriquet."
"Such a vocabulary." Miran slipped off his jacket and tossed it over the back of Dimitri's chair. "Everyone here knows I'm armed."
"You like guns." Dimitri scrubbed at his face. "Oh, bless it all. Get this bitch a dog, Vanesa."
She rubbed the bridge of her nose. "If I locked up you three, I'd probably prevent dozens of crimes in the next week alone."
"I don't actually hurt anyone." Miran pouted. It looked awful.
"You're too old to pout." Dimitri winced.
"Yeah, I know. Habit." He straightened. "Would begging work? I'm not the one going around killing people."
"Cami asked." Dimitri watched Danyel's tentacles come out and bind their hands. "She knew she was going to die."
"You gave her peace." Miran shrugged, the light through the window reflecting off his eyes. Dimitri could see the window frame outlining bright white squares. "Better you than me, in her case, at least."
"Yeah," Dimitri crossed his ankles, the better to look harmless. "She asked."
"Unforced?" Vanesa asked Danyel.
"Yeah," he nodded. Dimitri saw his mouth tighten in the mirror over the fireplace. "Completely. She knew what he could do and asked for it. Well, not all of it. She didn't know how good it would feel."
"It felt good?" Vanesa shivered all over. "And you say you don't want to do this?"
"No," Dimitri shook his head.
"I don't." Mitka's words were just as clipped. "Dimitri did a good job. He'd just gotten over turnover. He was sick, still. He'd been attacked by what he thought was a renSime then teased by his matchmate."
"What?" Dimitri stared at him.
"Larin's your match." He glanced out of the corner of his eye at Dimitri. "I notice these things."
"And you didn't tell me?"
"Fuck you too, Dimitri." Mitka sniffed. "She's as much of a slut as your bro. I'm not touching her."
"Why not?" Danyel asked. He was probably the only one with a voice in the room, other than Mitka of course.
"She snailed out after Lorn." Mitka curled his lips away from his fangs.
"Snailed out?" Vanesa blinked, her need darkened nager completely still for a long moment. "And what does that mean?"
Mitka looked at him. Danyel looked at him.
"I'm sure you know." Dimitri handed it to Miran. This was even a bit much for him. He opened his mouth, and nothing came out.
"She was very post. Danyel got her good, even if she was pretending to be a donor." Mitka flicked his wings to his back. "She snailed. You know, got all wet and slid out." Dimitri winced.
"That is descriptive, yes." Vanesa covered her mouth with her hand. She shouldn't have bothered. Even in need, her internal laughter rang on the ambient. "I take it you had no interest?"
"I was after Danyel. He's neat. I like him." Mitka curried the leading edge of one wing. Then glanced down, stuck his fist in his mouth, and chewed on one of his claws. "He gets all wet at the right times."
"This has wandered afield." Vanesa stood up straight. "I could strip you, but not until after seclusion."
"I don't want a strip." Miran's neck tensed, even as his forearms flushed. His need was painfully visible. Miran rubbed at his own arms, probably trying to smooth the hair standing on end.
"Then go to the center. See if Hiklan can find you someone." She finger combed her hair, still keeping her tentacles in their sheathes.
"I'm not going to settle for just any Sime."
"You don't have a whole lot of choice." She looked to Dimitri for support.
"There isn't any court here where you can look over the available Simes." He shrugged. "Actually, I don't know how the Techton assigns Donors." He lied, passing the hour to Danyel.
"The Techton assigns Donors to channels by strength, speed and geographic location. Sometimes Donors are lucky and are allowed to stay in one place for a few months if the Techton has a use for their other skills in the location. This is pretty rare." He shrugged, as if it made no difference to him. But Dimitri could now sense the aching loneliness this had caused Danyel, personally. "They move channels around too. Don't want anyone to get into a dependency. Makes it too hard to move people around when they have to."
"What's this 'they' business." Miran snorted. "You got out."
"Yeah, and as soon as Hiklan figures out what happened, my tenure at the center is going to be very short."
"Why didn't you tell me?" Dimitri knew how important Danyel's work was to him.
"We'll be able to find a place to live."
"I don't care about that." He tightened his grip on Danyel's hand. "For you to lose your job would be as devastating as my brother behaving himself."
"Oh, Miran is going to behave himself." Vanesa rubbed at her face again. "Oh shen, I can't think right now." She pressed a button on the intercom. "If you would, Sevrin?"
"I was waiting." His low voice hissed in the tiny speaker. "Should I bring the restraints?" She stared at Miran for a long moment.
"Yes," her eyes had flicked to Dimitri. His heart raced. She looked back at his brother. "Two sets."
"Then you'll have to lock me up too." Danyel held out his hands. "You know where the retainers are."
"I wouldn't do that to you."
"Then why do you want to do it to Dimitri?"
"He's a danger." Her eyes hardened. "I won't have him threatening Kaon."
"Yes," Danyel nodded. "I accept your offer to join. My dependency partner is Dimitri Sergeyevich."
"You can't do this." Dimitri hissed, watching Vanesa's reaction. She'd paled further.
"He can." She slammed her fist into the desk. "Shen you, Danyel Ferris. He's a first, you're a second, how can you claim dependency?"
"Because I need Mitka." He stroked Mitka's back. "I've forgotten how to protect myself from other people's nagers. Without Mitka, I'd be dead." His own field held steady as stone.
"He's a good one." Miran's voice had lost its mockery. "He managed to shove one right up ..."
"Don't say it." Vanesa waved her tentacles at Miran. "No more profanity? At least for tonight?"
"Then I hope you had Sevrin bring a blanking ball gag." In other circumstances, Miran might have gotten a laugh with that line. As it was, Dimitri kept his attention on Vanesa.
"I want options, Dimitri. Give me something to work with." She cocked her head to the side. "Come in!"
"It would help if you'd have unlocked the door." There was a pause then it opened. "That one has a metal case to slow down Sime thieves."
"Sorry," she shrugged, grinning at him. The gesture didn't reach her eyes.
"I found these in a box marked 'For Dimitri'." Sevrin's hands were covered with the most amazing collection of 'things' Dimitri'd ever seen. "I remember seeing Nashen and Arkay bring back more stuff from their shopping trip than they gave you, but this?" He dumped it all on Vanesa's desk and held up a particularly large dildo. "What is all of this?" Mitka flipped his head out from behind his wing, grooming his tail.
"Oh," he righted it. Then nearly dropped it. The weird material it was made out of jiggled a bit. Dimitri really wanted that tail right now to protect his butt. That dildo was even bigger than Avilan! Sevrin put the thing on the desk behind him. It fell over. Vanesa tried to right it. It fell back over with a thunk. She looked out the window. Her throat tightened and her eyes closed. She wasn't seeing a whole lot.
"Its just a dildo." Danyel shook his head. He stood, went to the desk, and picked it up. "A very nice one at that." His eyes widened. "Its a little big, isn't it?" His fingers reached around it, but they didn't overlap a whole lot.
"Yeah," Dimitri nodded, staring at it, fascinated and terrified at the same time.
"I think they were going to give you this stuff in private, after the shoot, then decided not to when Mitka ended up hurt." Sevrin winced when Mitka poked his nose into the pile of straps and other things. "I knew there were restraints in there. I didn't know what else was in there."
"You couldn't feel that thing?" Miran pointed.
"I can't tell what something looks like." His field focused on Mitka for a moment, outlining him in bright gold. "Not without Mitka's help." Mitka groomed at his wing. "It helps when I don't make him preen, however."
Vanesa pulled out a contraption of rings and leather straps. "What is this?"
"Tentacle restraints," Dimitri muttered, his ears burning. "Not like retainers." Whatever those were.
"Restraints?" Vanesa put the things along her arms. "These are too big, I think."
"Yeah," Dimitri looked at Danyel's arms. "They are for a male, someone with fine tentacles, but heavy wrists."
"Like me?" Danyel's grin peeked out, as if it weren't sure of its reception. "Arkay was going to give you sex toys?"
"Zlins like." Sevrin seemed to be having a similar problem. Mitka'd gone back to his investigations. "What are the little things with teeth?"
"Clamps." Dimitri studied his feet. He wasn't going to look at anyone.
"Some of these aren't too bad." Miran held up a slender, abstract dildo. He fiddled with it a bit. It buzzed. He dropped it back on the desk. It crawled toward the edge, under its own power. Mitka nosed at it, then jerked back. Vanesa caught it before it could fall of the desk. She did something with the base and the buzzing stopped. "Maybe they are."
"I think it might be fun." Danyel dropped into the silence.
Dimitri looked at him. Everyone in the room looked at him. Then Dimitri thought about the possibilities of the situation.
"You don't want to be tied up with these things, do you?" Vanesa jangled the restraints.
"Never tried it." He held out his hand. Vanesa dropped the restraints into it. Danyel held the contraption against his arms. The black leather matched the sleek hair on them perfectly. "How does it work?"
"I don't know if you want me to show you right here." Dimitri blinked away the vision of Danyel bound, hard, and at his mercy. It didn't help his own condition any.
"And you call me a slut." Miran pulled out another item. This one obvious in its applications. A blindfold lined in fur.
"I didn't buy it." Dimitri stared at the tool Mitka was nosing around. He knew what it was. He wasn't going to think about it.
"We are overdue for seclusion." Vanesa said, even though all her attention was on the stuff on the desk. "I don't want to hear about any of you getting into trouble. Will you give me your word not to go out for forty-eight hours?"
"That's too long!" Miran protested.
Dimitri scooped up the stuff as he stood.
"Let me talk to a nurse for Tami, give us a room and you won't hear a thing." He winked at Danyel. Danyel's glance back was just as hot.
"I'm sure we'll hear it." Sevrin shook his head. "Go on. Take the room at the end of the hall from ours. Slide a note under the door for instructions on Tami."
"Luxurious prison." Danyel brushed the back of Sevrin's hand. "Thank you." He murmured. Sevrin waved them to the door. Dimitri didn't look back. They ran all the way to their new home.
Danyel rubbed at the faint lines the restraints had left on his tentacles.
"Nashen has a set of rings he wears all the time on his." Dimitri grinned. He rolled over on his belly and stretched like a cat.
"I've zlinned them." Danyel admitted. "I was fascinated."
"Would you like me to get you a set?" Dimitri's grin broadened. He arched his back, then sank down onto the cushions.
"I don't know." Danyel guessed they had to be expensive. Everything Arkay and Nashen had was. "I wonder what its like to not have to worry about money."
"I never really did." Dimitri rolled onto his side. Yeah, turnover was soon. He didn't respond. Dimitri nodded, his eyes graying for a moment. "Then I established. Oh, I had clothes, but nothing fancy except what was owned by Sergei. You saw everything I owned when I came here."
"And now?"
"A lot of sex toys." Dimitri prodded at one with a finger. "Not that I'm complaining." His cheerful grin held the first shadow of need. "Oh, that was fun." He purred.
"It was." Danyel stroked Dimitri's back. It was still damp from their earlier play. "I've never just had fun in bed before."
"Neither have I." He winked. "I like it." Then he kneaded at his middle with one hand. "Although I think we cut things a bit fine."
"Yeah, me too." Danyel felt his own body protest the rather strenuous exercise it had gotten for the past two days. They'd hardly stopped to eat or sleep. "Why haven't I had a single problem with entran?"
"What's entran?" He blinked, eyes completely unfocused. The odd question made Danyel blink in surprise as well. Dimitri didn't ask questions, he answered them.
Danyel tried to gather his wits. They seemed to be scattered to the winds. He gave up on sitting. Dimitri cuddled him in close.
"Its warm." He muttered, stroking Danyel's back.
"Are you complaining or commenting?" Danyel purred, trying to sound like Mitka. He was gazing down at them with bright eyes from the canopy overhead.
"Both," he sagged. "Oh, I've never been so exhausted in my life."
"Neither have I." Danyel rolled onto his back and spread his arms wide. "I've never felt better, either."
"So, what's entran?" Dimitri's fingers twined with his. Mitka's tail flicked down into view.
"I'd have thought you'd known."
"I don't want to try to think." His thumb caressed Danyel's palm, sending little shivers up his spine. Good little shivers.
"Oh," Danyel stared up at the canopy. He didn't want to think either, particularly about something like entran. "Its when a channel's two fields," he blinked away his daze. "Oh, that isn't right." Rolling over, he looking into Dimitri's amused blue-gray eyes. "Its when a channel doesn't get enough work. They get cramps."
"Is that so?" Dimitri's lazy grin looked good enough to taste, so he did. Dimitri's lips opened beneath his, sweeter than anyone he could have ever imagined. Dimitri then licked his lips, grinning. "We both have to get a shower." He grinned even broader.
"You mean I have to brush my teeth." Danyel snorted. "Oh, reality, where is thy sting?" He flopped back. "In my mouth."
"Yeah, well," Dimitri sighed. "Love thee anyway."
Danyel glanced over to see him kiss the air. "And yeah, you don't have entran because I'm messing with your fields all the time."
"You're what?" Danyel rolled over, rested his head on his hands and blinked at Dimitri. He really wanted a nap. Although he could smell his own breath, a sure sign of really having to brush his teeth.
"I didn't notice it until I looked closely at Miran. He doesn't do it smoothly yet." Dimitri's eyes focused for a moment. A gentle surge in the ambient gave him the sensation of the bed rising under him then falling away with a gentle swoop. It was a bit disturbing, but didn't hurt. "That's a stronger version of what I do by habit all the time."
"You aren't ever still." Danyel zlinned him closely. "In need I didn't care. You were there." He winced "I ..."
"I know." He kissed the back of Danyel's hand. "Yeah, when I'm in need I get pretty focused too." Dimitri's ability to slip Danyel from the hooks he kept hanging himself on was amazing. Another of those surges caught him and then released him. "I'm surprised you didn't notice."
"I did, I think." Not that he was doing a whole lot of thinking at the moment. The bed seemed to rock under him in time with Dimitri's pulses. A catch in the steady movement made him gasp.
"Sorry," he breathed. "I think its time to get ready."
"For?" Danyel asked, not liking the gray cast coming to Dimitri's field.
"Turnover," he shuddered.
"Now you relax." He shoved Dimitri back on the bed. Danyel ran his hands though Dimitri short hair, feeling for the muscles tensing beneath his scalp.
"I'm going to be sick." He muttered, although he showed no signs of nausea.
"Don't borrow need." Danyel shoved him back again. "You watched me do it last month."
Dimitri opened his mouth, then thought better of it. "At least let me get sluiced off."
"Hold still." He glared. Dimitri looked away, his shoulders tight. "Trust me now?"
"OK," Dimitri sighed. His heavy muscling began shivering, starting with his heavy pectorals and tracing down his body. Danyel ran a basin of warm water and got a cloth.
"I'm back." He put the basin on the bedside table and stroked Dimitri's face with it first. "You have more than three whiskers."
"But not chest hairs." He glanced down. "OK, maybe four."
"Does it really mean so much to you?" Danyel breathed through the first intimations of his own need. Dimitri gasped, muscles locking. "Don't fight it." He quickly cleaned the last of their playing around from Dimitri's skin.
"Better," he blinked, hands still clawing at the sheets.
"Don't," Danyel pried his fingers loose. "Don't fight it." He felt as if he were talking to a child in change over. "Do you remember your establishment?" He asked, wanting to get Dimitri talking.
"Not a whole lot." Dimitri came out of his introspective fugue. "I went to put some roses on my mentor's grave. I sang for him, the last time in treble." His eyes unfocused again, but this time in memory, not on what his body was going through. Danyel tugged a light sheet over him, so he wouldn't get a chill. "There's some jarli in the cabinet. I saw it when we first moved in here."
"No," Danyel said. He got some fresh water and returned. Beads of sweat had collected at Dimitri's brow. Danyel wiped them away, as gently as he could. "So you sang for Chernoye. What happened next?"
"Its one of the few things in my life I don't remember clearly, like my birth." He winked at Danyel. "Although I do remember Diomid fainting."
"At your establishment?"
"No, when I was born." He actually managed a faint smile. "I remember Arkay's hands. They were warmer than other Gens. I found out later because he has severe degenerative arthritis. Needless to say, I didn't know that at the time. All I knew was the shock of being cold and alone after so long warm and safe."
"I've never known anyone who could remember so far back."
"Oh, I have faint memories of the time before I was born." He snorted. "I remember Darya singing to me, her hand holding me. Or I think it was her hand. It might have been Vayer's."
Dimitri shook his head. "Anyway. Arkay tried to hand me to Dimitri. All I knew was a blur of light and dark. I think I tried to focus my eyes. The light hurt them. I didn't like it. The cold air bit at my skin. Something drew me to this warmth I remembered sensing before I could no longer absorb selyn from Darya. Then that something vanished utterly. I probably screamed." He chuckled softly. "The next thing I remember was mama's milk in my mouth and her warmth. I knew her too."
"So you recognized Diomid as your sire?"
"Yeah," he blew out a breath. "He recognized me too." Dimitri rolled his eyes. "Even if he did keel over because of it. From what Arkay said, he went over like someone had field slammed him."
"Probably felt like it to him." Danyel continued to stroke Dimitri's wonderful hair. "I know I'd probably react the same way if someone presented me with my son like that. What did he do, anyways? Just try to hand you to him?"
"Yeah," Dimitri shook his head. "No one had warned him. He didn't even remember he'd had sex with Darya."
"He didn't?" Danyel dropped the washcloth in the water, splashing a bit of it. He wrung it out and tried to go back to what he'd been doing.
Dimitri swiped it from him and said, "Your turn."
"You can't always be the healer." Danyel zlinned him closely. He'd only started the ramp up in selyn production. Shen he was slow. "Lie still."
"All right," he leaned back. "No, he'd have never remembered such a thing. He has a very strong block against other Gens in his bed. Its just not something his mind can deal with."
"Can yours?"
"Probably." He shrugged. "Not that I have any desire for a Gen. They're OK, but not, well, interesting?" Dimitri's brows furrowed. "Can you understand what I mean?"
"Maybe." Danyel tried to think about it. His own heartbeat was speeding up, in sympathy with Dimitri and in fearful apprehension of his own turnover. Dimitri's nerves were getting to him. "But you're the only Gen I've ever tried to have sex with, so I don't have a lot of comparison."
"I think after your enthusiastic cries of, 'oh yes, do me more!', you can drop the 'tried to'." Dimitri grinned. Then he winced and leaned back against the pillows.
"I don't want to think about that now." Danyel felt his own innards try to knot. It had been fun at the time.
"Yeah, well, need," Dimitri took a deep breath and opened his eyes.
"So, Diomid fell on his face when Arkay tried to hand you to him." Danyel din't know what to think of this. "I take it you figured out names, later?"
"Oh yes. All I knew was mama, and then after a bit of confusion, papa." He reached up and rubbed at one temple. Danyel replaced his hand with his own. "That feels so good." His skin was wet with sweat, but he wasn't trying to lock down his field any more. "It took me a bit to figure out who was really papa."
"I didn't know infants were aware of such things."
"Oh yes," he blinked. "I'm always careful when, well, the few times I've caught newborns to put them on their mother's abdomen immediately after I'm sure they're breathing well."
"I've never even thought to assist in a delivery."
Dimitri's smile grew wistful. "Its the most wonderful thing in the world, when it goes right."
"And the worst when it doesn't."
"Yes," he nodded, then sighed. "I only had one that didn't go well in the end."
"What happened?"
"Null infant," he glanced away. "Its when the child doesn't make the final selyn draw from the mother."
Danyel'd heard about techniques for making sure the child did get enough selyn, but the set of Dimitri's jaw kept him silent.
"Oh, here, certainly I wouldn't let the child die." He shook his head. "She, the baby, had other deformities. Her heart had a hole in it and her brain wasn't completely formed. She'd have died in days."
"Oh," Danyel looked into those blue-gray eyes, now so full of pain when they'd been as full with laughter so recently. "I think your way is better."
"Ultimately, I think its a decision every society has to make for itself." Dimitri squirmed around, as if trying to get up.
"No," Danyel pushed him back. Dimitri's heart was hammering in his chest. Danyel could see his pulse in his throat. He touched it, lightly brushing the fluttering beat. "You stay put."
"I'm going to have to get up." He glared.
"No," Danyel augmented to empty the basin, just in case it was necessary, and came back. When he sat, the falling sensation of turnover hit him. For an instant, the world dissolved into a black vortex of need, then the light returned. "OK, like that." He wrinkled his nose at Dimitri.
"I wish." He blinked. "So you've never done it?"
"Never sired or caught." He put the cool, damp cloth on Dimitri's brow. "Never thought to want to, either."
"Because of your father?"
"Yeah," he admitted. "I don't want to be like him."
"You wouldn't." Dimitri caught his hand. "Particularly if you had a bonded partner. I doubt if they would let you."
"Probably not," Danyel studied the faded coverlet. It had once been red. Now it was a soft rose. Not very flattering against Dimitri's fever flushed skin. "I'd hope I could find someone who wouldn't." It was Dimitri's turn to look away.
"Do you want me to stay with you?" Danyel knew this wasn't the time to talk about things like this. They had too much ahead of them, and not enough behind.
"I do and I don't." His production rate was quickly reaching its peak. Danyel had to keep him talking. "I love thee, Danyel. I just don't know if I can live here."
"And I can't live there." Danyel asked Mitka to come down with a wave of his hand. Mitka slid into his lap, shivering. Danyel tugged a blanket over his lap and Mitka. It shivered. "He's cold."
"I am!" Mitka whined. "I didn't want to interrupt."
"Ask!" Danyel scolded him. "I don't mind your asking."
"You tell me to shut up."
"Not always," he stroked the form under the blanket. Mitka sniffled. One of his fangs caught Danyel's thigh. Danyel winced, but didn't pull away. Mitka's tongue slipped over the nageric wound, healing it instantly. "But sometimes I'm busy and we have to come back to it later."
"You never get back to me." Mitka's talons dug in hard. Danyel grunted with pain. "Yeah, I'll hurt you." He growled.
Dimitri's eyes widened. "Stop him." He mouthed.
"Are you talking about me behind my back?" Mitka appeared on top of the blankets. "I didn't interfere with any of your fun. Now you're trying to tie me up. Are you going to throw me in the river next?"
"You're hysterical." Danyel zlinned him closely. "And you're sick."
"Its just turnover." He swayed, even as he looked away. "I'm fine."
"You will be after I pay attention to you." Danyel stroked his back, digging his tentacles into all the places he knew felt good. Mitka sighed, a bit of the rock hard tension leaving him. "I didn't mean to neglect you. I've never had a partner before. You'll have to teach me what you want." He kept his voice soft and even. "And sometimes even remind me of things."
"You forget everything." Mitka turned his head around and curried the back of Danyel's hand. "But I forgive you. You're Sime. Simes forget things."
"I do." He was glad it was harder to blush after turnover. "Particularly if I get distracted."
"You get distracted a lot."
"I do." He cradled Mitka to his chest. "Then you'll just have to stay with me to be my memory."
"I like that idea." Mitka purred, curling up against him. "There, see, you survived turnover."
"At least the worst of it." Dimitri blinked, putting his hand against his chest. "I've never had so easy a turnover. You're a wizard."
"No," Danyel smiled at Dimitri's exaggeration. "I just guessed right."
"You do it a lot." Dimitri captured one of his hands and put it against his cheek.
"Its because I'm Ferris."
"Its because you care."
There was nothing Danyel could say to Dimitri's words.
Chapter 43
Dimitri rubbed away the fog of turnover, trying to get his memory to come back. He was always fuzzy headed for hours afterward, although not having his body screaming at him did improve the situation tremendously. "Danyel, I love thee." He grinned, grabbing the slighter Sime in a huge hug. Danyel's ribs creaked under the assault. Dimitri hugged him harder.
"Enough!" Danyel laughed, breathlessly, of course. His return hug was almost as hard. "I love thee. But why all the excitement?"
"Because I feel better now, for being pre-transfer, than I ever have in my life." He tried to sweep Danyel into a dance. He was Sime graceful, that is he didn't actually fall down, but that was about all Dimitri could say for the exercise. "You don't dance, do you?"
"Not really," he rested his cheek against Dimitri's bare chest.
"Tami!" Dimitri finally remembered what had been bothering him.
"A nurse came in right after we holed up here and you gave her instructions, just like you'd told Sevrin and Vanesa you'd do." Danyel reminded him.
"I did what?" Dimitri shook his head. "I'm a fool Danyel." He searched around for anything like clothes. He wasn't going to visit a patient in a bathrobe. Tami had enough problems already without learning her healer was as mad as she. "I should have checked on her."
"We were under house arrest, Dimitri." Danyel sat on the bed. "Let me get a shower."
"We don't have time." Dimitri got down on his hands and knees to look under the bed.
Mitka landed on his backside, claws out. "Hey!" He yelped, displacing Mitka from his behind. "You little brat." He flailed at Mitka.
Mitka's tongue lolled out. He knew Dimitri was playing, mostly. "Get your shower. I'll keep him busy." He flitted out of range.
"You win." Dimitri gave in. "I really want to get washed up too."
"Then join me?" Danyel held out his hand.
"Do I have any choice?" Dimitri took it. Danyel's tentacles came out to bind their wrists.
"I have no fancy jewelry, no glittering gems, no elegant words." He brought Dimitri to his feet. "I don't even have a home." His expressive lips turned down for a moment. Then he knelt and put his face against Dimitri's hand. "Would you have me anyway?"
"Yes, I will have thy need to cherish, thy sanctuary to be safe kept, thy true home to find refuge." Dimitri couldn't remember the proper words. His head was in a whirl. "Get up, silly Sime." He tugged Danyel to his feet. Danyel overbalanced and fell against his chest. Dimitri staggered a bit. "I'm a mess."
"So am I." Danyel sagged. "Oh my, I think we overdid it."
"I know we did." Dimitri's knees wobbled a bit. He bent down and picked Danyel up. "You're so light!" Dimitri tossed the Sime into the air and then caught him. "You hardly weight more than Kolya!"
"I am Sime." Danyel's laughter was no where near as free as this morning, but it still rang. "You're the moose."
"I am not." Dimitri preened. "I'm Gen." He flexed the muscles in his chest. "See." There was a moment's hesitation, yet again, before Danyel put his hand over Dimitri's heart. "Do you ever think you'll get over my being male?" His bubble of joy turned sour.
"I like it." Danyel's lips pursed, contradicting his words. "No," he shook his head. "Listen to me."
"I am." He went into the bathroom and flipped on the shower. Dimitri set it hot enough to nearly scald him. He didn't want Danyel getting a chill right after turnover.
"No you're not." Danyel said.
"Why do you say so?" He stared at a tile that had cracked years ago. Dimitri knew they were lucky to have gotten a room with its own bathroom. Or at least it was a bright side to having been locked up. "I didn't intend to force Vanesa to lock us in a room together."
"Dimitri, hush," Danyel squirmed out of his arms.
"If you like, go ahead and renounce your relationship with me. If you do it, I'm sure Vanesa will let you swear to Kaon." Dimitri winced as he stepped into the shower.
"You aren't listening." Danyel vanished. The water grew cooler with a flick of Danyel's hand when he returned. "Open up."
"Danyel, I ..." Dimitri's started, trying to turn to face him. "Garmph," was all he got out next. Biting down on the rubber ball Danyel'd forced between his teeth he was reduced to glaring.
"Better," Danyel's impish smile didn't go well with the reddened irritation showing in his nager. Dimitri reached up for the buckle on the gag. "Try it." He didn't move. Dimitri struggled with the buckle until he found it locked.
Dimitri bared his teeth in fury. He wasn't going to mind call. Sevrin'd never let him live this down. Mitka flitted in and snickered. He landed on the shower rod, rested his chin on his crossed forelegs and licked his lips. Mitka obviously thought this was all hysterically funny.
"Are you ready to listen?" Danyel asked, soaping up a washcloth and scrubbing at Dimitri's chest. Dimitri spread his fingers for a moment, desperately wanting to grab this impertinent little Sime and make him release the gag. His fingers fumbled with the lock again, but it was a simple cylinder, probably a selyn pulse coded lock. "You, or Mitka, can't undo that one." Danyel chuckled softly. "Vanesa couldn't undo it."
Mitka's laughter, this time, overtook him. He fell off the rail. Danyel caught him and flipped him over his shoulder. He sagged, still laughing, one foreclaw pointing at Dimitri. Dimitri'd never seen him laugh so hard after turnover. All Dimitri could do was glare. He wanted to strangle the little beast. Mitka snickered, then licked Danyel from chin to crown.
"And I know you aren't going to run out of here covered in soap and gagged." Danyel finished soaping Dimitri's rigid body. "Here, do me." He turned around.
Glaring at Danyel's hair did no good. Dimitri leaned so hard into scrubbing his back, Danyel grunted and leaned against the wall. "Oh, that feels so good." He purred, tentacles twining around his fingers. After turnover, Dimitri stared at them. Well, and drooled, but that was the fault of the gag. He rubbed his chin against his arm. "More?"
Dimitri ran his hands down Danyel's arms. His tentacles twined around Dimitri's fingers. He didn't want Danyel to get soap in his sheathes. He rinsed his hands and got the cleanser. Danyel squirmed around and held out his hands. "You want to clean them again?"
Blinking, Dimitri stopped what he was doing. Why wouldn't Danyel want them cleaned? If nothing else it probably, hopefully, felt good.
"I cleaned them last week."
Dimitri winced, his stomach churning a bit. Admittedly Danyel's tentacles smelled good, but they were a bit strong on occasion. He snorted, trying to get his point across. His fingers scrubbed gently at the soft, silky skin, working the gentle cleaner into the wriggling digits.
"I get the feeling you think I should clean them more often."
Dimitri nodded so fast he got some water up his nose. He snorted, then rinsed his face off under the faucet.
Danyel's head tipped down. Dimitri tugged out one set of tentacles to full extension. There was a ring of grime and oil at the base of each one. He wrinkled his nose and got to work after pointing it out. He'd let those in his mouth? Yuck! It came off easily, but even so, the stuff was vile. As bad as smegma in its own way. "You really feel so strongly?"
"Yes!" He mangled through the gag.
"How often do you think I should clean them?"
Dimitri pointed at his penis. Then cleaned it as well, trying to give him the hint.
"Every time I shower?"
Dimitri rolled his eyes. Of course every time he showered. The oil and dead skin that collected at the base of tentacles sheathes was almost the same stuff. And it turned sour and smelled just as fast. Dimitri went back to cleaning Danyel's tentacles, and sheathes. He'd wondered why it always took him so long. His first, charitable, thought had been that Danyel simply produces more oil in his sheathes than some Simes. It was true, some did. But the thought that Danyel hadn't been cleaning them regularly kept returning.
"It really bothers you, doesn't it."
Nodding, Dimitri studied his handiwork. He stroked more cleaner onto Danyel's tentacles then rubbed at the retractor nodes until he drew the stuff deep into the sheathes. Danyel squirmed, not pulling away, but tensing all the muscles beneath his hands. His tentacles finally came squirting back out.
"Well, then I'm going to clean you up." He nearly managed to pull away. Dimitri captured all eight handling tentacles and tugged them to full extension. "Oh, that feels so good." Danyel leaned back, bracing against Dimitri's feet.
Dimitri agreed with him entirely, caressing Danyel's lithe tentacles with his fingers while rinsing the last bit of cleaner from them. The stuff was very simple, glycerine with the tiniest bit of detergent, just enough to lift the oils from the surface. Although from the look of utter bliss on Danyel's face, Dimitri wondered why he didn't clean them more often. He tried to open his mouth to say, "If this feels so good, why don't you do it more?" It came out a garbled mess. He bit down on the rubber ball, hard, in frustration.
Danyel chuckled softly. "I think this is good for you." He slipped Dimitri's hold and touched his face. Dimitri tried to beg Danyel to remove the gag with his eyes. "Now, you're going to listen to me as I finish washing you. Right?"
Dimitri stomped his foot, splashing water all over the place.
"I think you don't have a lot of choice." Danyel's gaze was steady.
After biting at the gag once more, he nodded slowly.
"Now, I love thee." Danyel's lips twitched into a gentle smile. "Yes, it does seem strange to me. I love thee, Dimitri. I'd never thought to love another man again. I'd put it out of my head. If nothing else, I would have never hoped to find a man who would accept me."
Dimitri garbled, "You are wonderful. Of course I would." He shook his head, as if it would do any good. He growled and fumbled with the lock again.
"I never thought to approach a man again. I know I wasn't responsible for Patrik."
"You don't have to tell me that! Of course you weren't." Dimitri tried to get out. He snarled his frustration.
"Listen," Danyel gave him a very wicked smile. "I should have done this earlier."
The only thing Dimitri could do was gnaw at the ball, like a horse chewing on the bit.
"Because I didn't think I could, I was afraid. I didn't think it would be worth the pain of losing another because I could never have, could never even touch." He stumbled over his words. Dimitri ached to try to catch him. Danyel reached up. Dimitri knelt, looking up. "You don't have to kneel." Danyel winced.
Dimitri chuckled a bit, leaning into him. Danyel's warmth added to that of the water. He felt wonderful. No, he didn't have tiny hips and no butt. Actually he was perfectly grabable, firm and sleek, but not at all dainty, not after gaining a dozen good kilos. He turned his face and rested his cheek against Danyel's chest.
"Close your eyes." He murmured, then washed Dimitri's still short hair. "This is so much like a dream come true. A dream I'd never thought I could have, so I locked it in the back of my mind and never thought to look at it. I didn't know anything about sex between two men other than what happened with Rik."
"That was rape!" Dimitri shivered, leaning back.
"Hush," Danyel stroked him, pulling him back. "I can tell what you're thinking. But it was sex, physically, rape to be precise. He hurt me badly. If I hadn't changed over, I'd have died." Danyel shivered all over. Dimitri reached for the taps. Danyel swatted his hand.
"I know all that. I'd never press you. I've had a wonderful time. Its more than enough. You don't have to try to change for me." Dimitri waved his hands around. Danyel rubbed the muscles of Dimitri's jaws, which were getting a bit stiff and sore.
"I know that wasn't all there was to it." Danyel sighed. "A handful of renSimes, here, form same sex partners, both male and female."
Dimitri blinked a few times. This was so very strange compared to home. He wanted to tell Danyel so, and couldn't. Danyel brushed a tentacle tip over Dimitri's lips. "I think this is very good for you, too." He stroked Mitka with his other hand. "Although I do wonder why you're being so quiet?"
"You need to talk." He said, resting his chin on Danyel's hand, then licking between his fingers. "Go on." He nudged at them.
"I think you don't give Mitka enough credit." Danyel murmured.
"I know I don't." Dimitri tried to admit. Although a part of him was starting to relax as well. He didn't have to fret about saying something wrong now, either. He couldn't say anything at all.
"They were very happy with their relationships. I was the only male channel who'd take them, particularly the men. They often enough wanted transfer at the same time, and I could give that to them. It was a way, by proxy, I could have the one thing I wanted and couldn't have." He stilled, as if ashamed of this confession. "Sometimes I thought I was taking advantage of them, then I'd think of someone like Lorn, who I doubt has ever loved anyone or anything."
"Better you then. You care about them. That's important." Dimitri's frustration came back. Danyel's fingers dug into his shoulders, rubbing at the sore muscles. Right now he had them all over his body. Danyel might be light, but they'd just spent two days romping around in bed, often quite acrobatically.
"I know, in my head, it wasn't selfish, but it did sometimes feel like it." He held Dimitri close. "Just as sometimes I feel as if I'm taking advantage of you. You're so young. I wonder how you can know what you want at all."
He took a deep breath. This time Dimitri managed to at least stop talking before he made more useless noise.
"We're so very different, and yet at the same time, we work so well together, as if we were one person, in two bodies." He stroked the back of Dimitri's neck. "I love thee as I've never loved before. I'd do anything for thee. You've shown me so much of the world."
"Wait until we get back to Russia." Dimitri couldn't leave Sergei. Kirin showed even less promise as a Sharm Lord than Miran. There was no one for Sergei but Dimitri.
"You, in some ways, are older than I am as well." Danyel caressed Dimitri's face. He really should shave again. His whiskers had to be very rough against Danyel's tentacles. It was why Gens shaved, after all, so they'd feel soft to a Sime's tentacles. "You have a wisdom and balance in yourself ..."
Dimitri snorted at this so loudly Danyel stopped in midsentence. "You flatter me." Dimitri widened his eyes and pointed at himself.
"Yes, you," Danyel tugged Dimitri to his feet. "Your knees have to be getting sore."
Dimitri shook his head, even though they were.
"You've shown me a new way of life, Dimitri." He turned around and leaned back against him. Dimitri put his arms around Danyel's chest. "I want to take you and I will. I will make the chance. I've always made my own luck. You've shown me though, that I haven't even tried on something that is very important to me. I gave up one of the most important dreams any person can have, a family."
"What about Kaon?" Dimitri ended up growling.
"You've shown me the open door I didn't have the courage to even look at. I'd thought it was locked, barred and welded shut." He sighed. "I want to go to Russia with you, Dimitri. I want to see your home. I want to know what it is like to have a home."
"We'll make our own home." Dimitri bit at the gag again in frustration.
"That's why I was so upset when my house was destroyed. I'd thought it meant our home would be destroyed as well." He turned, putting his hand on Dimitri's chest. "You then showed me our home was something we shared with each other, not things."
Dimitri hadn't thought any such thing. He'd frittered away his time, the time he should have been spending with Danyel, on everyone else.
"Yes, you get excited and go flying off the wrist, saying things you don't mean." He leaned against Dimitri's chest. Dimitri held him close, the silly Sime. How had he ever earned Danyel's confidence like this? "You also see to the heart of things. You've saved people's lives, Dimitri."
"I've killed, too." Dimitri thought to himself, grimacing. "We wouldn't be locked up here if I hadn't."
"You saved Cami's life." Danyel gave him a rib cracking hug before he could protest. "You gave it to her as a gift. Something no one else could give. It was short, but it was the most beautiful thing I'd ever zlinned."
Dimitri couldn't have said anything to this. Anyone who knew how to do it could have. He'd only given her the one gift she could receive. There was no glory for him in killing, no matter how merciful.
"I want to spend the rest of my life with you, Dimitri." He said, after a long pause. Dimitri gasped, feeling as if the sands of time were sliding out from beneath his feet. "I know we will have to find other people for transfer." His mouth tightened into a hard line. "No, that isn't true. I could be content forever with you in my arms."
"What about Tami?" Dimitri garbled through his gag.
"It doesn't hurt me at all to have a transfer partner so far over myself, but I know, eventually, you and Mitka would want someone who could take you, in all ways, without tricks." He sighed, leaning on Dimitri's chest. "I'll take what I can get though, until that day comes."
"I want thee." Mitka murmured. Water shone on his scales like gems. "You make me feel good. We're good together." He snorted, shaking more water from his wings. "Wash his hair, oh gargling one." He winked up at Dimitri.
Dimitri had finally given up on trying to talk. Perhaps they had been right. He did feel better with knowing Danyel's thoughts, and he probably wouldn't have gotten to hear them with all his own interruptions. He washed Danyel's wonderful black hair for him, marveling again at how thick it was and the way it tried to twine around his fingers, even soaking wet.
"Thank you," he murmured. "I hope I haven't offended you." Danyel reached up and removed the gag.
"No," he grinned, then winced. "You did the right thing." After working the worst of the stiffness out of his lips, he bent down and managed to slide himself under Danyel's kiss.
"You are so silly about that." Danyel said, when they'd broken off. "Why do you bend yourself in knots so I'm dominant?"
"You're Sime." He shrugged, returning Danyel's grin. "Its more than worth the slight effort to be able to give to you."
"Goofy Gen," Danyel swatted him on the behind. "You are the most generous, compassionate person I've ever met."
Dimitri snorted, but remembered the lesson of the gag. He didn't want that thing in his mouth again. The taste of it lingered.
"You were really mad there at one point." Danyel held up the thing. There were deep teeth marks in it, not at all perfect ones. Obviously Dimitri's. Danyel's teeth were pretty straight.
"I don't know if I'd say mad." Dimitri leaned back a bit. "Its literally true, but I don't much like the term."
"Huh?" Danyel blinked at him.
"I'm crazy." He clarified.
"Oh, angry," Danyel muttered, snorting. "You idiot Gen." He swatted at Dimitri with his field, exactly as any Russian would, except far sharper.
Dimitri winced away from the blow.
"Did I hit you?" Danyel leaned back as well.
"If you ever could get inside someone's shields, you could really do some damage." He tickled Danyel's field back out. "You're quicker than any Russian and what you just hit me with was as sharp as a diamond blade." He managed a precious moment of caressing Danyel's nager before it skittered away again. It truly was like caressing quicksilver, or pure light. "Although I do miss being able to touch your field." He'd only managed a handful of times.
"You want to?" Danyel seemed shocked. As if Dimitri'd asked to do something very intimate. Well, he had, actually.
"Yes," he admitted, stroking Danyel's still damp shoulder instead. Danyel made a clucking sound at him and held up a towel. Dimitri ducked his head and let Danyel dry him off. All the hair on his arms stood up with how good it felt, then Danyel rubbed at his arms with the towel. Dimitri's breath caught in his throat. Without thinking about it, he reached for Danyel's nager again.
This time it stroked him in return. It was softer and silkier than even sable. "You like petting Mitka." His wrists felt chilled when it fled again to hide beneath Danyel's skin. Dimitri didn't chase it, even though he longed to.
Danyel stroked Mitka's length, slicking a bit of the water off him. Mitka purred so loudly the tiles vibrated beneath Dimitri's feet.
"He's gotten more blase about your touch." Dimitri ducked Mitka's swipe. "OK, I take that back." He nodded to Mitka. "He doesn't usually purr so loud for your petting the top of his head. You have to be a bit more enthusiastic."
"True," he winked. Mitka was studying the tiny frosted glass window so hard Dimitri's vision doubled. "You like it." Dimitri gave Mitka's tail a gentle tug. Mitka continued to stare out the window.
"You're the only Gen I've even been close to who can sense fields," he paused. "Directly, that is."
"There are very few Gens who can't sense fields at all." Dimitri stretched. "I don't know what its like to be adult and not be able to sense them directly." He tugged a towel off the rack and returned the favor of being dried off. It was the little things, like this, he'd always dreamed about as a child. To be so close to someone else, you even shared showers. Although he'd forgotten some of why until he established.
"Darya and Vayer used to make very sure we kids enjoyed getting clean." He grinned at Danyel. "Showers and baths were always fun at home. When we were really little, it was a chance to be close to both of them, as it was one of the few times Vayer shared the child rearing duties. Oh, it wasn't that he wasn't around. He was more remote, is all. Except when it came time for a bath."
"Oh?" Danyel let Dimitri take his hands. He dried Danyel's wrists, making sure he hadn't left any cleaner, or gotten any soap, inside the delicate tentacle sheathes.
"I think he liked playing around in the water." Dimitri grinned at his own memories. The silly part probably came from fondling Danyel's wrists. It always amazed him how endlessly fascinating they were after turnover. "Half the time we soaked the whole bathroom."
"I wonder what it would have been like to have a father." Danyel glanced away for a moment.
"I have spares." Dimitri caressed Danyel's wrists one last time. His roniplin glands warmed a tiny bit, sending a shiver of interest up Dimitri's arms already. "Although I think Vayer would like you for a son-in-law."
"I doubt it." Danyel's arms tensed under his hands.
"Then why did he give you explicit permission to court me?" Dimitri was still a bit stunned by this. Vayer had never done any such thing with any other of Dimitri's partners.
"Because he thought you were lonely?"
"He didn't even approve of my going to Val while Lexi was late in pregnancy." Dimitri stroked the fragile extensor nodes of Danyel's tentacles. Their responsiveness to him, far more than anyone else's, was endlessly fascinating. Danyel's tentacles twined with Dimitri's fingers. Dimitri bent down and kissed one of the sensitive ventrals that had wrapped itself around his ring finger. "Valtanir did need me, even though I'm not sure why he picked me, in particular." Dimitri brushed the tiny digit with his tongue. "Probably because there wasn't anyone else.
"I don't think so." Danyel squeezed Dimitri's fingers. He looked up, not believing him at all, even though his nager showed he did. One of the first things Dimitri'd learned of Danyel. The Sime could lie to anyone. "I don't know how anyone could resist Mitka."
Mitka nearly backwinged himself off Danyel's shoulder, eyes wide.
"He's beautiful, clever, quick and very good in transfer." Danyel gave him an odd grin. "I can't believe I'm blushing about such a thing." He shook his head. "You've changed me, Dimitri."
"I know." He studied their fingers and tentacles intertwined for a long moment. "Have we destroyed you?"
"Rik did." Danyel dropped the words between them. "Lorn did in his mismanagement of that disjunction."
"I've shown you a way of life you can't live." Regrets, always stronger in need, no matter how faint, gnawed at him. "I don't know if you'll be able to truly enjoy transfer with a Techton donor again."
"Then take me with you, back to Russia." His nager blazed, as brilliant as an ice sculpture, but also as fragile as a single crystal. "But you can't give up Mitka. Not for the rest of our lives." He held Mitka to him, as he would a child. "The only child I'll ever have."
"If you come with me, you'll have more." Dimitri turned away. He couldn't think with Danyel's dark eyes looking up into his. Not with his quicksilver nager and brilliant joy in life beneath Dimitri's fingertips. Drops of water fell from the faucet, trailing off into silence. He bowed his head, unable to keep it up. "I love thee. I love thee too much to destroy thee."
"You won't." Danyel's hand felt like a burning brand on Dimitri's shoulder. He still couldn't face him.
The tiles echoed his voice back into his ears. "Sergei destroys those closest to Him." Dimitri reached up and put his hand over Danyel's. "I am no kind of partner for thee, Danyel."
"You are wonderful." Danyel's hand tightened. "I couldn't ask for more."
Dimitri turned. "You could." He said.
Danyel shook his head. "I've learned to accept what I have, Dimitri." He tipped his chin up. Mitka matched the stubborn set to his jaw. "Right now, this moment, I have your attention, your love, your friendship."
"I've changed your life, your expectations." Dimitri wished he could get Danyel to listen as easily as Danyel'd coerced him.
"You have." He smiled. There were faint lines on his face, already darkening by need, but they were negated by the warmth in his field. "Thank you."
"You idiot Sime." Dimitri held Danyel's shoulder. "I've ruined your chances of ever regaining any peace in your life."
"You gave Cami peace." His eyes were bright with life.
"I killed her." Dimitri stomped out into the other room. He yanked on his pants and struggled into his shirt. He was buckling his belt when Danyel came out of the bathroom. "Do you want me to do the same to you?"
"If necessary." He dressed as if nothing were going on. "But after transfer, please."
"How can you be so calm?" Dimitri waved his arms in the air.
"Why should I be upset?" He rubbed his knuckles over Dimitri's jaw. "I have what I want. I have thee."
"But what about when I, when we, go to Russia?" He stalked back into the bathroom. "I have to shave." He muttered, feeling the utter fool. He'd never meant to allow Danyel to go with him. It would be too dangerous, even with Mitka on Danyel's shoulders all the time.
"We worry about it then." Danyel leaned on the door frame behind him. "Let me shave when you're done."
"You aren't going to grow a beard?" He finished up and thought about giving Danyel the razor. "Hold still." Dimitri held up the brush thick with shaving cream.
"Why do you insist on shaving me?" Danyel rolled his eyes, but still submitted. His nager, however, thrashed with annoyance.
"Because I don't want you to possibly cut your tentacles." Dimitri grumbled. "They're too fragile."
Danyel chuckled softly. "Yeah, well, we used to keep Gens from sharp objects so they wouldn't hurt themselves and make a Sime kill them."
"There's no way to force someone else to kill." Dimitri finished his work. "At least not in the law. I could be forced, as could Arkay."
"Why you two?"
"We've both killed a lot of people." Dimitri sighed, rinsing off the razor and drying it. "If I'm attacked, I'll kill."
"You didn't do anything to me." Danyel rubbed at his jaw. "You do that very well."
"I've had a lot of practice with sharp objects." He shrugged. "And Mitka likes you."
"Did he like Khristov?"
Mitka nodded, frantically at first, then slowing. He glanced out the window. Danyel made him face them. "I think not."
"I get excited." He licked his fangs, drooling down Danyel's once clean front. It hadn't stayed clean for long. "And there was something wrong with him."
"Yeah, he was as crazy as I am." Dimitri reached out with his towel to wipe off Danyel's chest. Danyel waved him away.
"Still, Mitka didn't even threaten me."
"Hardly." Dimitri blinked.
"Welllll, threat? Um, I did really, really want to bite you." Mitka licked his lips again. Dimitri gave up with the towel. Cotton didn't really work. "And I did, too!"
"He was bigger than both of us and his fangs went right through your vriamic node."
"They did." Danyel purred. "It felt wonderful."
"You had to fiddle the fields. Drag me down by a few hundred days." Dimitri didn't understand how Danyel couldn't be affected by having to do such a radical shunt every month. "Your field was all over the place until we managed the actual transfer."
"Next time I'll do it all at once." He grinned, looking years younger than his real age.
"You'll end up killed." Dimitri gasped. Mitka's eyes were huge.
"Nah," he winked. "Its easy for me."
"It can't be healthy for you to fiddle the fields every month."
"Try me." He held out his arm, as if ready to go. "If it doesn't work, then it doesn't work."
"What will you do then?" Dimitri balked at the door. This wasn't something to discuss walking the hallways.
"Come up with something else." He shrugged, as if it were no matter.
"I couldn't do that to you." Dimitri protested.
"Then don't." He grinned. "Come on. Tami's waiting for you."
Dimitri followed him out into the hall, cursing the short sightedness of all Simes. Mitka gave him a disgusted look. OK, cursing the shortsightedness of all those driven by selyn. Mitka snorted and returned to his rapt contemplation of Danyel's neck.
Danyel waved away Pyotr's assistance with the door. His nager was in a knot and he knew it. Mitka curried his ear, soothing him slightly. It had been hard talking with Dimitri's so openly, earlier. He'd never been so open with anyone before. Shen, he'd never really had a close friend, much less a lover.
As he'd nearly become accustomed, Dimitri seemed to be able to hear Danyel's thoughts. His fingers curled around Danyel's arm, caressing it and soothing some of the worse of his nerves.
Tami's eyes flashed white around the rims, then she seemed to settle a bit. "You're back." She breathed.
"Of course," Dimitri strode into the room. Within a selyn beat, he controlled the ambient with undeniable power. Tami slumped back in her chair.
"Thank you," she breathed, putting her hand on her chest.
"Where are Lukus and Kreg?" Danyel couldn't zlin them anywhere.
"Sectuib put Kreg in schooling with the other children of Kaon." Sweat beaded her brow. "Lukus, I don't know where he is."
Dimitri put his hand on Tami's forehead. "Hush," he breathed, putting his other hand behind her neck. "Relax against my hands."
"I'm scared." Her eyes widened again.
"I know." He murmured so low Danyel could barely hear him. "I know you're scared."
"Where is he? Where are they?" She looked around, body tensing.
"Breathe with me a moment." Dimitri's voice never raised. He continued to hold her head as her frantic panting slowed. "There." He whispered, letting go. "I have to know what the nurse did."
"She came in. Blamed me for what happened to Kreg."
Dimitri put his finger on her lips. He glanced at Mitka. Mitka's wings rustled in an obvious shrug. Dimitri took Tami's hand and turned it over. The three needle tracks were still there, but no more. He turned over her other hand. No marks.
"They're going to get Kreg." Tami lunged forward.
"Danyel is going to go check on him right now. He can augment to find out faster than I can." Dimitri turned his face away from Tami. "Get the harilin right now, and be ready to do a shunt." He added in Russian. "She's nearly out of control." Then he glanced down and raised an eyebrow.
"You don't have to mention my fly is open in Russian, Dimitri." Danyel zipped it up, turning everything into a joke. Tami put her hand over her mouth, covering a giggle. "I can take my embarrassment like a Sime."
"You've had practice?" Dimitri teased, winking at Tami. Her giggles strengthened. "Get some harduran as well."
"The nurse said I couldn't give transfer if she ..." Tami bit at her lower lip. "She was trying to trick me. I know it. You gave me something that made me feel really good. Of course no one else would. Particularly not a Sime."
"The nurse was Sime?" Dimitri blinked.
"Yes, she was." Danyel hadn't thought anything of it. "Most people who work in medicine here are Sime."
"That's stupid." Dimitri blinked. Tami stared at him, then laughed, a bit too harshly, however.
"I'll be right back." Danyel fled. The insanity in Tami's field was like sand in his sheathes. Irritating to the point of nearly driving him crazy. He knocked on Miran's door, praying he'd still be here.
"What do you want?" Miran's field hadn't grown, even though it felt like it.
"Dimitri is looking for the harilin he set up for Tami. He also wants some harduran."
"Do I zlin like the local pharmacy?" He opened the door a crack.
"Yes," Danyel shoved his way into the room. Miran had covered the windows with multiple layers of thick, dark cloth. The tiny room was a black cave. He had to zlin just to find his way around.
"I've had a headache." Miran muttered, throwing himself back into a chair. He picked up some knitting. The sight of yet another big, strong, very male Gen knitting stopped Danyel in his tracks. "What are you staring at?"
"I don't read Cyrillic." Danyel had found the bottle and syringe Dimitri'd used for the first drug, but had no idea what any of the rest were.
Miran sighed and lunged up out of his chair. His field filled the tiny room and battered at the shielding walls.
"I wish I could take down your field." Danyel put his hand on Miran's. It was warm, even to his touch.
"I've been getting by." He pointed to the table. "Take it and get out." There was another drug vial and syringe.
"I thought you didn't do the drugs you sold."
"I had to do something." Miran wasn't as tall as Dimitri, but he was still taller than Danyel.
"I understand."
"You're Sime." Miran hugged his arms to his chest. "Besides, harduran doesn't feel good."
"Then why were you taking it?"
"Because I had no choice." His eyes were dilated and completely black. "If I don't get a transfer soon, I'm going to burn up."
"Hold still." Danyel put down the things he'd gathered.
Miran shook his head, backing away. "No, not a strip. I'll die before I loose my virginity in a strip."
"Why have you built this up so much?"
"Because I have." He clutched his arms to himself. Danyel could see him shiver all over, even as his nager flared brighter. "Get out!" He snarled.
"You're sick too." Danyel looked at the things on the table. "What does harduran do?"
"It shuts down selyn production, or consumption, depending on larity." Miran shivered again, even as sweat beaded his brow.
"You're too young for this."
"Don't I know it." He panted. "Get out. Don't come back. Not unless you're willing to take me."
"I won't be in hard need for nearly two weeks." Danyel didn't know what else could be done. "There are channels coming into the area for the job in Russia."
"Oh, great, more people who think my family can do no wrong." Miran walked to the blacked out window. "I should never have even tried to run."
"I'd trade places with you."
"Oh, you would, would you?" Miran snorted. He turned back to Danyel. Zlinning him was like trying to look directly at the sun. "You'd go into that nest of vipers and hold out your wrists? I don't think so."
"I do." Danyel picked up the things. Then got another vial out of the box sitting on the sideboard. He split the prepared harduran. "I don't know how to inject it, but there you go."
"You just don't want to see a good selyn source go to waste."
"No, I love your brother. He's worried about you."
"He probably hasn't even said one word about me." Miran turned away again. Without his direct attention, Danyel could zlin his field try to stabilize.
"He hardly knows more than a handful of people here." Danyel put the things he came to get in his pockets.
"I only require one." Miran's eyes seemed to glow in the darkness, as Mitka's often did.
"First order channels don't grow on trees." Danyel knew this well enough. In everyone's opinion he was a failure for not being a first.
"I'd take one like you." Miran stalked across the room. Danyel'd only seen the silky smooth movement once before, when Dimitri'd stalked him for transfer. "You and I would fit well together."
"I have a prior obligation." Danyel backed toward the door.
"What about when Dimitri returns to Russia?" Miran's hand held the doorknob. Danyel stared into his insane black eyes.
"How did I go from being as interesting as boiled wheat to the chocolate cake at the end of the hundred mark dinner?"
Miran blinked at him, corners of his mouth twitching upward. Dark lines cut his face into shadow and night. Then he too dipped his head and turned his face, as if begging for a kiss. Danyel fled. He slammed the door behind himself.
"Teasing bastard!" Miran shouted, then kicked the door for good measure. Danyel heard him return to his chair and throw himself into it with a heavy whump. He muttered something about Dimitri's tight ass couldn't possibly be worth dealing with his personality.
On shaking knees, Danyel returned to Tami's rooms. Pyotr put a tentacle to his lips and flicked open a tiny metal door. Danyel tried to look through the door and could see only wood. Then he zlinned. Pyotr winked at him.
Dimitri and Tami were talking calmly at the table, more or less. Tami took a sip of her tea then her field brightened at something Dimitri had to have said out loud. His field brightened too, what Danyel could zlin of it. He raised his hand to knock on the door.
"Its clear?" Pyotr had grabbed his hand.
"Yes," Danyel nodded.
"I can't zlin Sharm Lord Sergei." Pyotr gave him a bit of a nudge, as if to a friend, not a noble. "Ah, yer a good sort. Don't be worryin it. Yer a lord. One a' us. You'll do right by him though," Pyotr winked. "Again if I don't miss my guess."
"Are you sure you should be gossiping like this?" Danyel asked, his hand on the doorknob.
"How else are you going to keep up with him?" Pyotr grinned. "Its traditional." He stretched out the long word, as if savoring it.
"Can you find me a channel for Miran?" He glanced around. Mitka snickered in his ear, obviously enjoying this bit of subterfuge.
"Never zlinned 'em."
Danyel put his chin in his hand for a moment, thinking. "He's a low first, but slow. Don't know what you'd call it."
"Ah, compared to you or Vanesa?"
"Oh, I don't know." Danyel clucked his tongue against his teeth. Pyotr stared. "Considerably faster than Vanesa, almost as fast as I am, but no where near her strength. Only a bit more than I am, really. He's right over the line into first."
"So about a twenty-one, but fast. Fatima fast?"
"Oh, I don't know, probably though." He remembered Dimitri's comment about him being very Fatima, whatever that was.
"He'd probably make you a good match." Pyotr zlinned him. This time Danyel could clearly feel his attention sliding all over Danyel's nager. It was like having greasy fingers stroke a clear pane of glass.
"No," Danyel shook his head quickly.
"If you're sayin' he's quick, but lower than 'im." Pyotr pointed to the door.
"Dimitri's mine." Danyel growled, not liking the way Pyotr was zlinning him at all.
"I'll be givin the lad my 'grats." He grinned. "He's a good kid."
"You don't even know him." Danyel turned the doorknob.
"Ah, but I'm a renSime guard. We know everyone and everything, eventually." He lost his sloppy accent entirely. "We don't have to do things all the same way here."
"Can you find out who's trying to murder him, us, I mean?" Danyel said quickly.
"Now that I didn't kow." Pyotr's tentacles lashed around his spear. "We're afraid of the great Sharm Lords. But not Dimitri. We know he'd kill any of us in a heartbeat, but we also know he'd defend any of us to the death." He sighed, lips tightening. "Someone's zlinnin for ye, huh?"
"Yeah," Danyel shifted the weight of his knife against his back.
"You keep the knife. We'll keep our spears." Pyotr stood back against the wall. "We'll get the shidoni bastard."
"Yeah," Danyel winked at him, then slipped into the room.
Chapter 44
Dimitri had felt Danyel chatting with Pyotr at the door, but had no idea what had kept him so long before that. Mitka's scales, however, had dulled to a matte gray. Something had stressed him badly.
"And then we got our first big contract." Tami babbled on. "It was so wonderful. Then only thing better was the fact Kreg was born nine months later."
He laughed, not entirely feeling it. "So you celebrated?"
"In the best way." She ran her hand through her dark hair. "I wish we could have had another."
"Why didn't you?" Dimitri waved Danyel forward.
"They wouldn't let us." The hardness of insanity returned to her field.
"Your parents were wrong." Dimitri grabbed the line of thought and gave Tami the support she'd been begging for all her life, as far as he could tell. "You have to live your own life."
"Easy to say when you aren't dependant on someone else for everything you own."
"I wouldn't know." He put the two vials on the table. "I've never had anything but necessities given to me. In the past year and a half, I've had to struggle for even those. My family isn't cash rich."
"Then how did you get this job?" She blinked.
"Because no one else wanted it." He leaned forward. "I heal because I must. Its a vocation. I've had to struggle for everything else."
"Even him." She jerked her chin at Danyel. "He's not stewed celery."
"There's a big difference between money and wealth." He looked into her eyes. "You have a choice."
"You think I can make one?" She snorted, harsh lines turning to black deep in her face. Tami zlinned years older than she really was.
"You must." He put his hands on the table. "I can drug you the same way I did before." She shuddered, mouth tightening into a fine line. "Or I can have Danyel strip you all the way down and keep you there with a different drug."
"Never have another transfer?" She winced. "Can't I just, I don't know, change?"
"You can learn." He leaned on the table. "But not right now."
"Why not?" She was so tense she was vibrating. "Did they set you up for this? I won't stand for any more of their manipulations. It isn't fair. They ..."
"Hush," Dimitri struggled to damp her wild oscillations. She panted, staring at him in wide eyed terror. "Strip her." He commanded.
Tami bolted. Dimitri grabbed her. Danyel dove in, grabbing for her wrists. She nearly hit him. Dimitri winced, sliding his hands down her arms. She bit him. Dimitri grunted, ignoring the pain. Danyel jumped back, field fairing in panic.
Mitka hissed, venom fangs extended.
Dimitri pried Tami's teeth out of his arm. He let his own field flare and heal the worst of the wound. "Get her." He commanded, whipping at Danyel with his field for the first time. Danyel collapsed. "Shen!" Dimitri cursed. He grabbed the fields. Tami fought him with all the strength in her body. Fueled by madness, the only thing that saved him was his mass. Finally he clipped her on the chin. She slumped into unconsciousness.
"Danyel?" Dimitri scrabbled for him.
He groaned, reaching up to rub at his head. "What did you do?"
"I hit you." Dimitri winced, brushing his hand through Danyel's still damp hair. "I'm sorry."
"I should have protected you better." Mitka grimaced. "I goofed."
"I'll be alright." Danyel lurched to a sitting position. "Why did you do that?"
"An accident," Dimitri helped Danyel sit up straighter. Then he sagged, putting his head between his knees. His field twisted in the sickening distortions of nausea. "Should I get a basin?"
"No, I'll be fine." He pulled his head up. After swallowing heavily, the worst of it faded. "Remind me not to fight with you."
"I got a bit excited." Dimitri admitted. "I'm not good for you."
"Not right now." Danyel grimaced. He shook his head then scooted over to Tami. "You did the same thing to her?"
"No," his whole body seemed to burn with his embarrassment. "I hit her, physically."
"I admit to having wanted to do that to a few patients." Danyel's expressive lips twitched up into something approximating a grin. "Never have, though."
"Its harder than it looks." Dimitri was amazed at how quickly Danyel was recovering. Although at this point he probably shouldn't have been. "You have to hit them just right."
"Then I'll let you do it." He snorted. "Although at least I won't have much of a bruise." He rubbed at the back of his head. Dimitri winced then put his hand over the knot. The pain faded from the ambient before he could do anything about it. "I'll be fine. What about Tami?"
Dimitri sighed. "I don't know." He checked her pupils. She wasn't badly concussed, the dilatation was equal. "I'd like a second opinion."
"Well, I've seen the effects of both now." Danyel grimaced. "I don't know enough about what's wrong with her."
"She can't tolerate selyn. Its like an allergy." Dimitri put his hand on her chest, monitoring her heartbeat out of sheer paranoia. After talking with the woman for nearly an hour, he felt it wise. She was not in any way sane at this point, and with modern humans, the mind affected the body far more strongly than in other animals. Dimitri wondered if ancients had such a thin mind/body interface. Although Miran's was nearly Fatima thin. "Oh, shen, Miran!" His eyes widened. "Is that who's using harduran?"
"Yes," Danyel nodded.
"He's going to kill himself." Dimitri grabbed the harduran off the table. "How much?"
"I don't know. He currently has about the same amount left." Danyel's field fluttered with distress, not to mention the residual effects of getting clobbered. "I don't know what he started with."
Dimitri cursed the lack of alcohol or anything else to clean Tami's skin. "You didn't zlin this." He brought her arm to his mouth and sucked at the spot for a moment, as if trying to give her a faint suction bruise.
"What are you doing?"
"My saliva, unlike most people's, is sterile." He muttered. "Don't pass it along."
"Why not?" Danyel asked. Of course he'd ask why. He always did.
"Because it makes me zlin weird." Dimitri injected the first two cc's into Tami's veins. Her body seemed to sag as it hit her main production centers. "Strip her."
"While you're poking a needle into her?" Danyel's tentacles were knotted in their sheathes.
"Just do it." Dimitri pleaded. "I know I'm an idiot. But it will be easier on her if we can do this together."
"I like doing things with you." He put his hands on her arms. His tentacles refused to come out. "I'm trying."
Mitka slithered down Danyel's arm. He looked up at them, then wrapped himself around Danyel's arm, first one and then the other.
"Your nager is fondling me." Danyel's expression of dismay slid sideways a bit.
"I am." He purred. "I have to make up my earlier mistakes."
"You only made a little one." He took a deep breath. Tami's heartbeat fluttered a bit.
"Do it, Danyel." Dimitri muttered, hoping he could keep her stable long enough. "We don't have a whole lot of time."
"Why didn't you say so?" Danyel snorted, sounding just like Mitka. Dimitri didn't even have time to blink and Danyel'd leaned down for the fifth contact. "How far?"
"As far as you dare." He murmured, watching Tami's heart struggled with the conflict between her field and her mind.
"That's pretty far." Danyel took a deep breath and made the fifth contact. Unlike any normal transfer, it was over faster than Dimitri could zlin. Tami's whole body softened, as if she were stretching in her sleep and then giving over to some great pleasure. Dimitri couldn't zlin her at all.
"She looks dead." Dimitri searched for her field. A fluttering, faint pulse grew out of the complete darkness. Dimitri slowly injected the harduran into her until it stopped growing. Each pulse was the same as the last. "I wish I had an IV setup." He now knew where to put one, at least.
"We can set up something later." Danyel winced as Dimitri removed the needle. Dimitri wiped clean the tiny blood spot with his thumb. Danyel got up and closed the blinds.
"Why are you doing that?" Dimitri asked.
"Your brother is nearly blinded." Danyel blinked at him in the now darkened room.
"Help me get her back into bed." Dimitri held out the syringe. As if they'd been working together for years, Danyel took it, stripped the needle off the barrel, and pulled the plunger. It wouldn't be used again until he'd had the chance to clean it. Dimitri picked up Tami and tucked her into bed.
"Why don't you put her on her back?" Danyel asked as Dimitri hurried to Miran's rooms.
"Do you like sleeping on your back?" Dimitri blinked at him.
"No, not really," he zlinned confused.
"Well, I noticed she curls up too in her sleep."
"You sleep on your back." Danyel pointed out.
"Yeah, and I probably snore." He grimaced. "Lets go deal with my bro." He packed everything into the cabinet in the bathroom and let Danyel lead him to Miran's rooms.
"Not yet," Danyel knocked on Miran's door. Dimitri winced as the gesture jarred Danyel's laterals. "The door is shielded."
"Likely excuse." Dimitri breathed. "She'll be more comfortable this way."
"Will she wake up before we get back?"
"Probably not." Dimitri shrugged. "She'll probably be out until this evening."
"I'd like to vote for sleeping on the couch." Danyel winked. The door opened.
"A Sime after my own heart." He peered into the pitch black room.
"So good to see you, brother mine." Miran growled. His nager more than made up for the lack of physical light. From book beside his chair, the same was true for Miran.
"I came as soon as I could."
"As soon as you were no longer able to get it up." The door snicked shut behind them. A harsh, blue-white glow shimmered around his brother.
"You're destroying yourself." Dimitri put it into words.
"What difference does it make to you?"
"You're my brother." Dimitri twined his fingers with Danyel's tentacles again. The gesture had become wonderfully familiar.
"And you're still my obnoxious, insufferable older brother." He paced, shadows of nageric lightening shimmering through the room and making Dimitri's hair stand on end. "You always did know everything."
"I don't." Dimitri shifted his weight on his feet.
"Sit," Miran waved him to a chair. Dimitri sat, Danyel curing up at his feet. He'd never done this before. A bit stunned, Dimitri stroked his springy black hair. "And now you have a dog. Although you both are well trained."
"You're so high you can't even see your own feet." Dimitri flinched away from a stray tendril of lightning. "You're not doing yourself any good by self medicating."
"Our family is known for it." Miran smirked. Dimitri quailed, then realized he could not be referring to Arkay. Few enough people knew about his harilin addiction at this point, it had been so long ago. "I'm sure our sire has done his share."
"You're so far off the mark it isn't even funny." Dimitri shot back, without thinking first. "Don't even try reaching for the Sergei record. I know."
"Then who?" Miran leaned on him, so high field Dimitri struggled to fend him off. "Tell me."
"No," Dimitri focused on the feel of Danyel's need coming to life beneath his hand. "I won't. You're going to get a transfer."
"Not an impersonal." Miran's field hardened to a blazing sphere of light. Danyel held his arms to his chest, trying to protect them. Mitka slithered down and shielded both of them with his spread wings. "Oh, your other little pet is getting into the act now."
"He's as much a person as any of us." Danyel relaxed a bit.
"You're the freak." Miran scoffed.
"You aren't going to win a partner this way." Dimitri rolled his eyes. "Give Danyel some of your selyn and we'll find you a partner. You aren't fit to be zlinned."
"What if I hurt him?" Miran stalked forward. "I've already run him off once."
"And you brag about it?" Only someone very familiar with Danyel would be able to feel the unease in his field. To Dimitri, its restless shifting had grown to frantic dimensions. But Miran wouldn't have known how bad it was. To anyone else, it would have just zlinned like southerner's.
"I can make him react." Miran glared down at them.
"You made Vanesa react." Danyel huddled against Dimitri's knee. "She locked you up."
"I could walk out at any time."
"And loose all chance at a decent transfer."
"Yes, shen you." Miran turned away. He paced again, throwing off sparks of agitation. "I need a transfer, Dimitri. Help me."
"I will." Dimitri promised. He felt as if someone were stretching him over a hundred klick wide abyss. Danyel caressed his calf, the warmth of his hand and support the one constant in this mad world. "I just don't know how."
"I thought you knew everything."
"I don't." Dimitri growled. "I wish I did."
"So you could have your little pet there for the rest of your life?" Miran swaggered back to his chair. He fell into it with a heavy thud. A blue-white halo shadowed his face. "Or because you'd want to change him into something better."
"You're a royal pain in the nager, Miran." Dimitri muttered. "No wonder you're in this predicament."
"Like you aren't?"
"No, I'm not." He stroked Danyel's hair. It felt so good. "I have a partner."
"One who's days short of you."
"So?" Dimitri shrugged. "Its not the quantity that counts."
"It does for most people." Miran's field gave off a shower of actinic sparks. "I need, Dimitri. I know most young Gens don't, but I'm a Sharm Lord. I could sense fields within hours of establishing."
"Like I did." Dimitri squirmed in his seat. Miran sounded so much like Dimitri a year ago. Dimitri didn't want him to end up with a Salkov, however. He wouldn't wish that on anyone, no matter how annoying. "We can't just line them up and parade them before you."
"Why not?" Danyel asked.
"Because I'm running out of time." He sagged against the back of his chair. Lukus, Tami, Miran, Lira, Kreg and Danyel all were looking to him to solve their problems. Cadek and others just kept piling them on. "I don't know what to do, Miran. Help me and I'll help you."
"I don't know anyone here." He leaned forward. "You, Vanesa and Sevrin are the only people I've met."
"Then come with us on my rounds." Danyel offered. Dimitri blessed him and cursed him with the same thought.
"I don't think my bro wants to share." Miran muttered, bitterness tingeing his brilliant field with sickly green shadows. "You're his."
"Danyel is no one's property." Dimitri wasn't sure if he was lying or not. He wanted to keep Danyel all to himself; never let him go.
"We have to get you out and around other people." Danyel leaned forward. "Or we can just slip you onto the Techton rolls."
"How?" Miran scooted to the edge of his seat.
"You'll be shorted more often than not." Dimitri warned.
"I don't care." Miran panted. "Give me something, anything. I can't keep on like this."
"I know." Danyel sighed. "Once, I wouldn't have agreed."
Miran jerked back as if slapped. "How could anyone not know?"
"Because, before Dimitri, I didn't believe in Gen need." Danyel sounded abashed.
"No one who is truly of the Techton believes Gens feel anything in transfer and can't comprehend the fact some Gens can sense fields at all, much less directly." The abyss beneath Dimitri widened, added to by the cultural gulf he strained to span. "You'll be treated as a convenience."
"I can convince them otherwise."
"Good luck." Danyel muttered. "Although you just might." His attention focused on Miran. Dimitri clutched at his own self control, fighting not to put a barrier between them. "Come with me." He stood, taking Dimitri with him. Dimitri wasn't going to let either of them out of his sight until this was settled.
Larin was not someone Dimitri'd planned on dealing with. This much was obvious from the loud thump as he backed into the desk.
"Do you really think we can't tell you're not a renSime?" Miran licked his lips. Danyel winced away from his blinding nager, which was now growing to match Larin's need with frantic speed. Even Mitka protested, flaring his wings and tangling one in Danyel's hair. Miran swayed forward, all swinging arms and rocking shoulders.
"Do you think I'm going to answer that question?" Larin thumped back against the door. She'd lost all control over her fields. This time she was in true need, not just show. Danyel blinked at her. "Oh, I'd hoped to find him here." She glanced up through her lashes at Dimitri.
"He's taken." Miran was probably trying to purr. His voice shattered into dozens of pieces.
"And you're a kid." Larin grabbed the doorknob. Miran pinned her to the door. They were of a height.
"Cute couple." Dimitri muttered.
Miran didn't go for the submissive approach with Larin. He shoved her against the door with his hips and captured her mouth with his. It wasn't gentle.
"Don't rape her." Dimitri stepped forward. Miran snarled at him. Dimitri flew back through the air to crash against the wall. The scent of ozone filled the air. Danyel ran to him. Plaster dust showered down on both of them. Dimitri shook his head, then stuck his hand into the huge hole the lightning had cut in his overalls. "Good thing I was wearing a silk shirt."
"Yeah," he braced and helped Dimitri to his feet. He shook more dust out of his hair. It was still damp and plaster stuck. Dimitri scrubbed some of it in. "I prefer other ways to get messy." He muttered, then pushed past Danyel, with a pat on the butt along the way.
Miran's hands had slid down Larin's arms. They caged her wrists.
"Get your filthy hands off her." Dimitri grabbed his brother by the collar. His fingers tightened. Larin tensed.
"Stop," Danyel augmented to them and slipped his own tentacles among Larin's to try to protect them. They weren't strong enough to force Miran's hands away. "I never thought I'd be doing this." He complained under his breath. Danyel'd pulled more than a few Simes off Gens. Accidents happened in the world he lived in.
"Block her laterals." Dimitri growled.
"No," her head thumped against the