Crusader: The Sanctuary Series, Volume Four (48 page)

“Looks like,” she answered as they came upon it. It was square, two posts on either side and a lintel over the top, a beam to keep the roof from collapsing. It jutted only a little out of the rock, just enough to be noticeable if someone was traveling along the ravine.

Cyrus carefully dismounted and ducked into the entrance. The cave was dark, and his eyes couldn’t adjust to the low light.

“You blind fool,” Aisling said, appearing at his side. “Here.” She pulled something out of a pack on her belt, and grabbed an old discarded stick out of the ground at their side. She ripped the sleeve under her armor, pulling a layer of cloth out and wrapping the old branch with it. When she was done she opened the small container she had pulled from her pack, then ran it along the blade of her knife. Sparks came, and the cloth caught, the stick becoming a torch, burning brightly and lighting the cave.

It turned ahead of them, twisting off to their right. Cyrus heard Windrider snort behind him, then felt the horse put his face on the back of Cyrus’s head and push him forward. “You know,” Cyrus said, looking back at him, “every day I’m with you, you become less a horse and more of a comic sidekick, I hope you realize.” Windrider whickered and shuffled off beside Aisling, who idly stroked his face as they stared into the darkness ahead of them, contemplating it.

“If we don’t look around and make sure the cave is secure,” he said, staring into the distance, “we’re probably not going to have a lot of luck sleeping tonight.”

“Agreed,” she said. “You first.”

He sighed, and drew his sword. “A comic sidekick for a horse and a skittish ranger as a traveling companion, miles from a friendly face, surrounded by savage creatures that want to eat us alive.” He frowned. “Why does this always happen to me?”

“You wanted to be an adventurer,” Aisling said, with a little snap, “now you are. And oh, what an adventure we’re having today, eh?”

Cyrus prowled forward, sword in hand, Aisling and Windrider behind him. Three branches of the main chamber turned into dead ends, and a fourth led to a narrow passage. When Cyrus thrust the torch into it to shed some light, it stretched through a narrow gap in the rock that was only just large enough for him to squeeze into.

“I think we’re okay,” he said, “though I suspect we’ll be in some manner of trouble if the light from our fire or the smoke is seen outside.” They walked back to the entrance, and as they approached the mouth of the cave, Cyrus realized that was no concern. Outside, the snow fluttered down in heavy waves, and had begun to stick to the ground and the rock face opposite them.

“Midsummer snow storm?” Aisling asked. “Perhaps the gods are with us after all.”

“The Luukessians say the gods do not know these lands,” Cyrus said. “And I doubt the God of Storms is much of a fan of our work anyway.”

“Speak for yourself,” Aisling said, doing a little pirouette that caught Cyrus’s attention. “Everyone’s a fan of my work.”

“Oh?” Cyrus asked dryly. “Do you do a great deal of public exhibition of that sort of thing?”

She shrugged airily. “Only when I have a partner I really want to work with. Otherwise I tend to perform in private—and on privates—”

“Okay,” Cyrus said, brushing past her, “you’ve found the edge of my comfort zone again.” He took the torch and gathered a few more pieces of wood, setting them in a small pile further into the cave, just out of sight of the entrance. “Let’s make a fire, then maybe we can take turns getting some rest.” He looked to the mouth of the cave. “Seems like this will be far enough back to avoid any suspicion or anyone seeing the light of our fire.”

“You know,” she hunched next to him as he worked to start the fire, “most men might find themselves grateful if they’d had their life saved by a beautiful, mischievous, young woman—flexible in all the right ways, if you catch my drift—and might find some way to repay her for such a kindness, perhaps in a way she had long been asking for.”

Cyrus stopped what he was doing, and a piece of wood slipped out of his hand and almost put out the kindling he had been trying to start. “Now? We’re surrounded by enemies, in the middle of their territory,” he waved at the walls around him as though they were under open sky, “and now you come back to propositioning me?” He sighed.

“Is it really such a bad thing?” She was hushed, deflated, all the air out of her.

“No, it’s not. And if you had done so almost anytime in the last thirty days—at the right moment, at least—I would have given in to you without question.” She brightened as he said it. “But.” He watched her pause, uncertain again. “I would have been using you,” he said. “You were right; I was in love with Vara. Completely, utterly, soul-consumingly, if that’s even a word. I wanted her more than anything, and when she cast me out of her graces, I moved to Cattrine.” He felt a grimace. “When she hurt me, it was only after she had … accustomed me again to something I hadn’t realized I had been missing. It’s left me … somewhat confused, full of sensation and emotion and urges that I honestly thought I had well and truly suppressed.” He looked back toward the little fire, placed a few small sticks onto it and watched it begin to catch.

“But it’s not suppressed anymore, is it?” She eased next to him, took a small piece of tinder and put it on the burgeoning flame. “You’re loosed, and you feel it now, the blood in your veins, and …” Her hand reached down, under his armor, through the gap in the chainmail, and he felt her warm touch on his side, on his skin, and somehow it lit a fire of its own in him. “You’re not cold to me like you were before.”

“I’m not,” he admitted. “I was in love. I had no room in my mind, my heart, for anyone but her. But then I started to feel something for another woman, and it changed things. She changed things,” he corrected. “But she’s gone now, and I’m empty, Aisling, empty all the way to the bottom of me. Whatever is left is only desire, there’s no emotion behind it.” He looked into her eyes, warning her with everything he had.
Turn back, understand how burned up I am inside, how cut up and bled out, there’s no feeling left, nothing for you …

“I want it,” she said quickly, urgently, and she kissed him on the lips, a kiss he did not return. “I don’t care how empty it is, I want it. I’ve wanted it all along.” She kissed him again.

“I feel nothing,” he said, stopping her. “There’s nothing in me, now. Whatever I had, the two of them took. It’s not fair—not to you, anyway—”

“I’ll decide what’s fair for me,” she said, kissing him again, pushing herself into his arms. “I’ll decide what’s good for me, what I want.”

“This …” Cyrus kissed her, felt her kiss back, let her hands run over him, taking his armor off, “… this is all you get, you realize? No emotion, no heart, just … the physical. It’s all I have left.”

His armor dropped off, piece by piece, and her dark blue hands ran across his pale, hairy chest. She tugged him closer, letting her leather armor slip off over her head, exposing herself to him and pushing close. He could see the contrast now, the dark navy skin against his winter white; the night and day, the difference between her and the other women. “I want it,” she said again, and she helped him out of his pants. “I want it. To hell with the rest.”

The fire had taken on a life of its own and burned, quietly, a slow roar next to them while the snow and wind howled outside the cave, and the warmth within took on a life of its own.

Cyrus awoke to a long beam of light reaching across the dirt floor of the cave. He started to sit up and realized there was something on his arm; after a moment he acclimated to his surroundings and remembered why Aisling was lying across his body, her hair tickling his shoulder and her soft, steady breathing rising and falling against him. A forceful whinny behind him caused him to look over at Windrider, who glared at him accusingly. “I have no oats,” he said. “Maybe some grass.” A snort from the horse caused Aisling to stir, then sit up, allowing his arm to be free.

“Good morning,” she said, blinking the sleep from her eyes. She pushed the stray strands of white hair off her face, tucking them behind her in a ponytail that she made by tying her hair with a string. “Did you sleep well?” she asked with a mischievous grin.

“I did,” Cyrus said, trying to keep his expression carefully neutral, even as she let the blanket fall away from her chest, and the cold air became obvious. “Which is surprising, given that we’re in a somewhat sticky predicament.”

“Mmm,” she said, stretching. “Were you talking about our escape and flight from the scourge or what happened last night?” She lay back across his chest for a moment, teasing him with a gentle bite to the ribs that caused him to jerk in surprise. She sat back up and laughed, looking at him with undisguised mirth. “Still so sensitive. We’ll work on that.”

“You sure?” Cyrus asked. “I mean, what I said last night stands …”

“I heard you then,” she said coolly. “I’m a big girl. I told you what I wanted all along, and if what you want from me is just the thrilling realm of a physical relationship,” she swung a leg over him, climbed on top and straddled him over the blanket, “then I promise, I can thrill you more than those other ladies could.”

“Oh?” Cyrus said, leaning back on his arms. “As much as I’d love to test that assumption this morning, it’s going to have to wait. We need to get moving.”

“Couldn’t it wait just a little while?” she asked, teasing one of his chest hairs by twirling it on her finger. “It wouldn’t take long at all … at least for me. You might take a little longer, based on what I’ve seen so far.” Her face split with a wicked grin, her eyes shining even in the light of the faded fire, burnt down to embers.

“Later,” Cyrus said, and indicated for her to move. “I’m not immune to your charms, but I am possessed of a sense of self-preservation, and we have no idea how many of those things are out there nor where they are. We need to start hoofing it.” He looked to Windrider. “Literally, in your case.”

They dressed quietly, Cyrus eating some bread from his saddlebag, giving some to Aisling, and then feeding the rest to a semi-appreciative Windrider, who still seemed to be glaring at him. Once they were done, Cyrus started toward the entrance to the cave but felt a subtle tug on his arm. He looked back to see Aisling, shaking her head at him. “Let me look,” she said. “You’re absolutely terrible at any kind of stealth. You’ll give us away if they’re out there.”

He shrugged and stood back, extending his arm toward the entrance in invitation. Aisling crept to the side of the cave, hugged it, and seemed to blend into the shadows. He could see her move, slightly, every now and again, but only because he knew she was there and where to look. She crept to the entrance of the cave over the course of five minutes and looked out, avoiding the sunlight that was coming in. After a minute, she turned and slipped back toward him, taking another couple minutes to make it over to him.

“Nope,” she said, her voice hushed “this is bad.”

“Bad? Bad how?”

“They’re out there,” she said. “About eighty, by my count, in a line, moving through the ravine below us, just over the ledge that goes past our cave. If we go out, they’ll see us. We need to wait.”

“I don’t love that idea. What if they circle around and come check this place out? It’s not as though the entrance is well hidden.”

“Agreed,” she said. “I was thinking … how about the narrow passage at the back of the cave? It might lead to another exit.”

“And it might lead to us getting trapped in a tight space when they overrun us,” Cyrus said. “Plus, Windrider is gonna have a hell of a time fitting through there.”

“So you’d rather go the way that we know includes scouts for the enemy?” She shrugged expansively, her white hair highlighted by the darkness. “Have it your way.”

“No,” Cyrus said. “The other option is that we can sit here and wait for them. They may just pass by. Or,” he said with more of a smile, “we could fight. Though I’m not exactly sanguine about our odds, especially without a healer. Eighty of them is a lot, and I wouldn’t be surprised if there were more.”

“So we wait?” She had her arms folded, looking at him with a sly expression, waiting to see what he said.

“Hell, no. I’m terrible at waiting.” He sighed. “To the narrow passage. We can at least take a look around.”

Despite a slight argument from Windrider in the form of resisting Cyrus’s attempts to pull him along gently by the reins, the horse did give in and follow. Aisling slipped into the narrow passage first, having to make little accommodation to enter, given her slight figure and short stature. “You want to go next?” Cyrus asked Windrider, who just stared at him. “Fine. I’ll do it.” He slid in, having to turn sideways to avoid an edge of rock that jutted out, but once past it, he found he could walk comfortably. Windrider followed, stepping over the obstruction, but the wide-bodied horse’s progress was slow, taking time and brushing against the walls of the passage. When it began to widen again, Cyrus checked and found a few places where the jagged rocks had broken the horse’s hide. “Sorry,” Cyrus said, patting Windrider’s neck. “But it looks superficial.”

“Cyrus,” Aisling hissed at him, a low noise that caught his attention. He trudged along the widening path of the cave, and realized for the first time that there was light ahead of them, coming from around a corner. Aisling was against the wall, he finally realized, blending with the shadows. He saw a dark blue hand beckon him forward, and he left Windrider’s reins behind, creeping up behind her. When he got close, she grasped him firmly, pushing him slowly against the wall, her arm across his chest. She held a single finger up to her mouth, then slid out from cover and inched around the corner.

Cyrus edged up and looked around. Ahead was a slight drop, some form of embankment. He frowned; the horse would have some difficulty getting down that. He froze and caught his breath. Aisling was creeping ahead, and something was moving below. Two somethings, he realized, with grey, pallid flesh, and jagged teeth, rounded heads. A long, thick tongue came out of one of their mouths as it appeared to say something to the scourge next to it, a high, throaty screech from deep within that sounded like nothing Cyrus had ever heard before.