“It’s nothing,” she said. “Not even intentional. He just struck out blindly and I got in the way. By morning it’ll be gone.”
Hunter felt her drawing back, and his hand fell to his side. “You said you couldn’t heal yourself; this won’t be gone by morning.”
“I can’t heal myself, but I do heal quickly.”
He looked at her, barely visible in the darkness. Woman, warrior, Keeper. A gentle, protective touch for the Unicorns, a wary, unwilling passion for him, death for the Huntmen. An easy wisdom at odds with unknowing innocence. Battle skills warring with healing ones. The stoic strength of Winter coexisting with the freedom and beauty of Summer.
She didn’t know how incredible she was.
How inexplicable.
How magical.
It was the warrior, the fascinating, intriguing warrior, who brought him back to more dangerous thoughts. Her eyes and mind probed the distant camp before she said, “Neither of the others will venture away, I think, until morning. They’ll keep guard tonight. We can’t get close enough unseen to use the arrows or spears.”
“So we wait,” Hunter finished.
“And we’d better sleep while we can; tomorrow will be a long day, I think.”
“I’ll take the first watch,” he said instantly.
Siri didn’t protest. Nor did she protest when he remained close beside her as she stretched out on the ground and settled herself. The last thing she saw before sleep claimed her was the shadowy image of his profile.
And she dreamed about him. Dreams which had nothing to do with Huntmen or Unicorns or danger or the knowledge of something forbidden. Dreams about unfamiliar, longed-for things. Dreams about a kind of love she was never meant to know.
—
He had done a fine job, he decided complacently, in wiping all knowledge of himself and these last days from the Huntmen’s minds; the sorceress would have nothing to be suspicious about if she read their minds. He hid and watched, paying close attention to her methods.
Boran was impressed. Granted, neither Con nor Stovin had been strongly skilled or particularly fierce, but the sorceress had dispatched both neatly and with almost no noise.
From his position deep in the forest, he reflected on her skills, and on her courage. It would be, he thought, a pity to break the spirit of such a woman. But necessary, of course. He began working his way cautiously toward the other side of the valley. At first light, he planned to return to the city and recruit a second group of Huntmen; they would be required for his final assault against the valley and the sorceress.
And Hunter.
And when his tools were safely in the valley and hidden, he would summon the sorceress to him again. She would be weakened after her battles. Weakened enough so that he could seduce her completely this time.
He pondered then, not for the first time, his inability to discover within her mind the hiding place of the unicorns. Like the taboo preserving her virginity, that knowledge seemed rooted deeply, and she would not give it up. But once he had taken her precious virginity, he was certain her mind would be so shattered he would have no difficulty in tearing that knowledge from her.
Still moving cautiously, he thought idly that it would be pleasant to force Hunter to watch him destroy the sorceress. Tied helplessly, he would be an attentive audience. And it would likely drive him mad, due to his fatuous love for the woman, to watch her mindlessly succumb in wild passion to another man, and an enemy at that.
Boran chuckled softly deep in his throat, absently stroking the front of his trousers as he walked. What an enjoyable scene that would be! Hunter struggling against his bonds, shouting his rage and anguish, while his chaste ladylove was willingly spreading her legs for another.
Hardly conscious that this near-constant state of sexual arousal was unusual for him, Boran put distance between himself and the others before finally giving in to his building need for release. He found a secluded place on the far side of the valley and made himself comfortable after casually dropping his trousers around his ankles. And the soft little chuckle continued to rumble from his throat as he half-closed his eyes and focused his mind on the scene he had conjured.
Hunter would be bound close by, of course, with an excellent opportunity to see it all. And Boran would have total control of the woman’s mind, ordering her to strip away her clothing and watching while she obeyed. He might even comment crudely on the various parts of her body as they were revealed. Then he would lay her down close to the bound man and discard his own clothing before beginning to caress her pure body.
How Hunter would fight to free himself! And the agony he would feel when the woman moaned frenziedly in her passion! Would he scream in his rage as her slender hand boldly stroked Boran’s turgid member? Would he curse savagely when she begged in complete abandonment for his possession? And would he go utterly berserk when her legs parted and her slick virginal opening eagerly accepted his swollen organ?
Boran’s chuckles had become panting gurgles, and he changed the fantasy scene suddenly to allow for a greater punishment to Hunter.
He would take her like an animal, he decided. On her hands and knees, rump jutting, moaning like any bitch in heat. He would fondle her dangling breasts and the smooth curves of her buttocks, and then nudge her legs farther apart and mount her. He would linger over the act of deflowering her, letting the other hear her moans of need, allowing him to watch the first slow moments of penetration. And when her maidenhead gave way beneath the force of his sudden lunge, he would laugh as he heard two animal cries of anguish—one male and one female.
And while both of them cried with the pain, he would hunch over her body like any rutting animal, pounding into her tight passage, hauling on her breasts. And then he would strip the walls from her mind just as she was beginning to enjoy it again, and her horrified writhing body would draw forth his seed in a jetting rush of pleasure.
Boran caught his breath finally, becoming aware of his surroundings again. It occurred to him vaguely as he cleaned himself and adjusted his clothing that for a second time he had given in to the need for release with no female body to accept his heat. It was faintly disturbing, but no more.
The sorceress would take him soon.
He was regretful that such a scene as the one that had so recently given him pleasure would not actually take place. He reluctantly doubted that his control over the sorceress could withstand the presence of Hunter. She was far more likely in such circumstances to break free of his mindspell. He could rape her, of course, but he still wanted her willing—which meant that Hunter would not watch it happen.
But it didn’t really matter. Hunter would know soon enough just how thoroughly she would be destroyed. And there was a great deal of pleasure in that.
—
…and he was hunched over her body like any rutting animal, pounding into her tight passage, hauling on her breasts…
Siri woke with a start, her body aching and cold, and she realized that her first yearning dreams of Hunter had become something else, something terrible and painful. But even as she tried to recapture her nightmare, it was fading away, until finally she could remember none of it. All that lingered was a sense of disquiet, an unnerving blankness where something should have been visible.
Her internal clock told her that hours had passed, and she watched Hunter for a few moments while he remained unaware. He was relaxed but wary, ceaselessly vigilant as he watched the Huntmen’s camp. And her disquiet faded as she became totally absorbed by his face. A hard face, a face with much experience stamped upon it by time. A face that had known battle, known rage and fear and driving purpose. A face that softened suddenly as it turned toward her, the green eyes lighting with pleasure.
Without even realizing she spoke aloud, Siri murmured, “You are a beautiful man.”
Lips softened in a smile that was startled and amused. “Sleep,” he said quietly.
But Siri sat up in one fluid motion, unsettled and embarrassed
by her own words. “We divide the watch,” she reminded.
“Siri—”
“I’m fine, Hunter. And you need rest as well as I do.”
After a moment, he stretched out as she had done, pillowing his head on one arm. He watched her for a while; she could feel his gaze even though she kept her own attention fixed on the Huntmen’s camp. But soon she knew from his breathing that he slept, and her eyes moved as though pulled by a lodestar to gaze at his face.
No beard growth.
She thought about that for a while, her attention divided between his face and the Huntmen with the automatic awareness of a warrior on watch. Her mind, needing to be busy, toyed with the thought of Hunter’s nonexistent beard. She hadn’t thought about it before, sharing in a way his trait of not thinking about some things until she was ready to, or had the time to, or was curious enough.
Men grew beards, she knew; the Huntmen were nearly always bearded. Yet Hunter had not shaved since coming to the valley. She formed the question in her mind and then released it, tossing it into her subconscious where the deep well of knowledge her mother and the old Keeper had provided lay waiting. And she waited, content in the certainty that knowledge handed down from Keeper to Keeper and enhanced by the wisdom and learning of her mother’s racial memories would provide the correct answer. And it did.
Growth retardant.
She weighed the new phrase in her mind, understanding the meaning of the answer provided. Of course. Hunter had traveled the stars in his search for myths, and he was a man who would choose the convenience of an injection to halt beard growth rather than the daily ritual of shaving. Of course.
Had Hunter been privy to those few moments, much that he found confusing in Siri would have made sense. That the knowledge of three races—Unicorn, Human-Keeper, and Merpeople—reposed deep in her mind Siri knew, but it was a matter-of-fact knowing and nothing she found surprising or worthy of comment. The transference of that knowledge had occurred early in her childhood, a painless, interesting process, leaving her with a well to draw answers from should questions trouble her.
From generations of Keepers came the instincts of warrior, protector, and healer, the knowledge of herbs, food-gathering, and tracking an enemy. From the Merpeople’s galaxy-encompassing racial memories came knowledge of what lay beyond this valley and planet, the sciences and technologies of man and beings other than man, and the gift of Sight. And from the Unicorns came a history that their own creation had bound to mankind’s, and the wisdom and learning of a people known only as Guardians who traveled beyond man’s scope and saw what was to be seen.
In a vague sort of way, Siri understood that the knowledge was hers only to be used sparingly and passed on, called when needed but never drawn in totality from the well. A part of her understood that the well held the horrors of the bloody wars, destruction, and evil that Hunter had seen so much of, but that was a part meant only to be passed on so as not to be forgotten. That there would one day come a need for such knowledge she did not doubt; that certainty had been placed with her just as the knowledge had.
But that was for a distant, unseen future, and another Keeper, perhaps. It troubled her no more than her own possession of the knowledge troubled her. A fact of her life, and real as she knew reality.
Siri frowned a little, though, and looked again at Hunter’s face. How her life had changed! The simplicity of her existence had been challenged by his coming, and there was a part of her that could not regret that. There were more questions now than answers, questions her well of knowledge had not been meant to cope with. Yet she had learned.
She had learned that all men were not, could not, be her enemies because he was not. She had learned that the Unicorns felt privileged to have Hunter with them, and deeply grateful; here was one of their gods who was not bent on hunting or killing them, and they felt that to be an affirmation of their faith that man would one day reclaim his myths and dreams.
She had learned that her body had needs unknown to her until now. And she had learned that neither her unique heritage nor her inborn responsibilities could spare her the painful awakening of her female flesh.
She had learned to love a man.
And she knew then that, despite everything, she would not have chosen to repeat this Summer with his presence wiped away. She felt immeasurably older, painfully wiser, and more human than ever before. She was Keeper—but she was also woman, and women were no more perfect than the male half of their race. Cut, she would bleed; bleed enough, she would die; and nothing of that had changed except her own awareness of her mortality.
At the beginning of the Summer, she had been perfect in her certainty. Arrogant, strong, confident, selfish in her possessiveness of the valley and the Unicorns, unmoved by the dark history of this planet and its peoples, uncaring of other races and other worlds. As much obsessed as he had been.
And then he had come. Questioning her certainty. Mocking her arrogance with his own vital determination to save a world. Moving her with his pain and shock, forcing her to feel the near-extinction of a race and its struggles. Appalling her with his memories of countless worlds and wars, of races dying and dead. Shaking her confidence, splintering her obsession.
—
Mother?
Daughter?
I’m different, Mother.
Yes, child.
Was this intended for me?
I cannot answer, child.
Does it have to hurt so, Mother?
I’m sorry, child.
—
Siri was distracted then, in that moment of communication, by the blankness she felt. It hovered just beyond the fringes of her awareness where she couldn’t touch it. A wrongness in the balance of things. A blankness where something should be seen. It was there, and she felt that there would come a need for knowing that wrongness, but she couldn’t grasp it. And there was a sense of time slowing and then speeding, of events that would stretch painfully the space of heartbeats.
Chilled, she looked at Hunter’s sleeping face. His obvious strength comforted her somewhat, and there was not even a faint shock that she could now look to someone else for a strength to add to her own.
Dawn came to the valley. A gray, troubled dawn, its arrival heralded neither by bird nor beast. The cloudy sky lightened reluctantly, slowly, dropping a thin mist over the meadow and the stirring Huntmen.
She looked down, about to call gently, but there was no need. He was awake and gazing up at her. And his features held such an expression of love and tenderness, it made her throat ache.
“I was afraid I’d dreamed you,” he said softly. “I’m always afraid to wake up now for fear you were only my dream.”
Siri heard her brisk warrior’s voice suggesting breakfast as he sat up and saw her hands reaching for the fruit they had saved, feeling divided from that warrior because another part of her had changed. Could her life ever be the same again?
“Siri—”
“There’s something wrong.” She tried not to think of what had not changed. There was still Hunter. There were still the Unicorns. There was still the dark foreboding of a choice she would die not to make.
Hunter glanced toward the Huntmen, assuring himself they were still at their camp, then looked back at her, waiting.
Siri shook her head. “I just don’t know. Huntmen always bring imbalance to the valley, a sense of wrongness. But there’s more this time. A—a blankness somewhere. As if I’m looking right at something I can’t see.”
“The cards?”
“No. This is me.” She chewed on her lower lip unconsciously, staring off toward the Huntmen moving stiffly and cautiously as they built up their fire and prepared a silent morning meal for themselves.
Hunter gazed at her taut, seeking face and felt the growing battle-tension of her slender body. He almost wished that he had dreamed her, because she would be safe in his mind and she would never be as safe as he wanted her to be in her lifetime.
Born to keep and
protect the Unicorns.
He waited stoically for the resentment, the jealousy to gnaw at him. But it didn’t come. He realized then that his final understanding and acceptance of the Unicorns as an ancient and mystical race had healed the hurt of knowing she could never learn to love him as she loved them. They were in her heart, her mind, her very soul; everything she was bound her to them with a tie nothing could destroy.
He had come so close to losing her so many times. Words wrongly spoken. Intentions misunderstood. Actions that would have driven her irretrievably from him halted just in time. In his arrogance and insensitivity he had hurt her more than once, and angered her frequently.
If he could somehow win a part of her love, it would be enough. Sharing her with the Unicorns would be enough. And if the knowledge of being second in her heart would haunt his dreams and solitary moments, then he would live with that.
If he could only win some part of her heart.
A brief touch on his arm. “Hunter?”
He looked at her, forced a smile. “Can’t read my thoughts?”
She was gazing at him, intent, sober. “Even if I could, some thoughts aren’t meant to be read.”
He was saved from having to respond when the Huntmen took up weapons, left packs behind, and began to move cautiously in their direction. And the warrior he loved was moving instantly to gather her weapons, then lead the way as they faded back into the forest. And it was the warrior who saw and was troubled by the Huntmen’s unnatural woodcraft.
“They know too much,” she whispered to Hunter. “They learn to hunt in the warrens of cities, not the silence of forests; they know too much!”
“They guessed what would be here,” he reasoned. “They prepared for the valley.”
Siri tossed the useless puzzle into the winds, her mind turning to strategy. “They’re keeping to cover; we can’t use the arrows or spears with so great a chance of wasting them. I’ll have to draw them out first.”
As they continued moving stealthily among the trees and screening brambles, Hunter voiced a rapid protest. “They’ve lost two men; they’ll be quick to fire now. Especially at you, since they fear you. I’ll draw them out.”