Kinta woke up again after a series of confusing dreams, all of which faded into a vague feeling of unease. She started to roll over, but the jolt of pain when her broken leg hit the floor jerked her fully awake. She lifted her head to look around, and froze when she saw two hulking shapes slowly moving into the main cave area. Neither one was Eli or Lakshmi. The trogolydyte cave-dwellers moved forward cautiously, pausing every so often to sniff the air.
She didn't move, uncomfortably aware that creatures that lived in the dark relied primarily on their sense of smell and hearing. One of them stopped to pick something up. It looked like most of one of Lakshmi's rats. They kept moving forward, and she frowned. Soon they'd be close enough that they wouldn't be able to miss her. But if she whistled for Lakshmi, they'd be on her before the raptor would even get into the same room.
Her ribs were starting to ache with the difficulty of not moving. Then a dazzling flash went off, blinding her and the troggs, who screeched in surprise. She took advantage of the moment to whistle sharply and scrabble for a handy rock. Her vision cleared in time to see the second trogg falling on top of the first one, his throat ripped out by the blades on Eli's fist. She blinked. It had only been a few seconds. Even she and Lakshmi couldn't kill two troggs that quickly. He also looked different. It took her a moment to realize the difference was the fact he was wearing tightly-fitted black leathers, as opposed to the cheap linen robes, and his hair was pulled back into a ponytail instead of falling loosely around his shoulders.
He knelt down to rifle through the troggs' possessions, even as Lakshmi came bounding into the room at a dead run, skidding to a halt next to Kinta's side, hooting anxiously.
"You're a bit late baby." She murmured to the raptor in Zandali, even as Eli stood up and walked over. She looked up at him, disconcerted by the difference in him. It wasn't just the clothing, though the fact that the leathers seemed cut to accentuate his muscles didn't hurt. He had completely shed any pretense of harmlessness, with the relief of someone who doesn't need to hide what he is anymore. His movement was now more like a predator's, the attitude of lethality restrained. He absently shook the blood off the two fist weapons, even as the blades retracted.
"All right?" He asked tersely in Common, before turning to give Lakshmi a dirty look. "Tell your lizard that next time it's her turn to watch you, she shouldn't go chasing cave rats."
"It's not her fault," said Kinta automatically in defense of her beloved pet. "She don't understand Common. And she ain't likely to listen to an elf anyways."
Eli made a noncommittal noise, even as he squatted down next to Kinta, and pulled the blanket back. She screeched in protest, automatically trying to cover herself with her good hand. He sighed. "Look, lady, I have literally seen and felt every inch of you naked. Amazingly enough, I have managed to restrain myself from raping you so far. Can you please stop freaking out every time I need to check your injuries? I'm not in the habit of forcing myself on women."
She blushed and turned to look at the wall. "Sorry. It's not you. Well, it's sort of you, but only because ya the one sitting there. I just don't like … feeling exposed." She muttered.
"Or vulnerable, I suspect. Most people don't." His hands gently prodded the arm bound across her chest. "Does it still feel broken? If not, we can unwrap it."
"It doesn't hurt as much." She kept looking determinedly at the wall trying to pretend she was somewhere else.
He started unwrapping the arm, his fingers so quick and light she barely felt them touching her. When he'd finished, she gently pushed against the ground with her newly freed arm to test it, at first lightly, but then with enough pressure to push herself up into a sitting position, facing away from him. "Hurts, but I don't think it's broken any more."
His fingers traced down her back, along both sides of her spine causing a ticklish sensation that made her shiver. "Bruising's better too, almost gone in some places. Breathing's still shallow so the ribs aren't fixed yet." He muttered. "Think you could stand a short ride?" He watched her shoulders slump and added, "There's a bath at the end of it. A hot one!"
She turned her head to glare at him suspiciously over one shoulder, "If ya lying about a bath, I will find a way to hurt ya. A lot."
"That's the spirit. Will your raptor let you ride her? I'd rather have my hands free." He said cheerfully.
"I'll ask her." After quite a bit of argument and coaxing in Zandali, Lakshmi agreed. Eli folded up the bearskin into a pad, and set it on the back of the raptor. Kinta stood nearby, using his staff as a crutch, scratching the raptor's chin while he packed.
"Hold still baby." Kinta murmured, as she hopped closer to the raptor. She set both hands on the raptor's shoulders, and took a deep, painful breath, preparing to jump. She hadn't heard Eli come up behind her, so when his hands landed on her thighs just below her buttocks, she jumped in shock. He promptly lifted her up onto the back of the raptor, and she had to cling onto Lakshmi's neck to keep from going right off the other side again.
He slung the two packs they had left over his shoulder, as well as the staff. "It's not far." He said again, in encouragement. Her jaw was stiff and she nodded in silent acknowledgement of his comment. She knew as well as he did that the bouncing of the raptor's gait was going to be agony on the broken bones and bruises. Lakshmi wasn't trained for riding, wasn't trained into a smooth gait or being guided. He didn't say anything else, but headed off down one of the tunnels.
Kinta clicked her tongue, and murmured in Zandali, "Follow the bossy elf, Lakshmi. Quiet as you can." Lakshmi headed off after the elf obediently.
Kinta had a few moments to be impressed with how invisible he was. A few times she only caught sight of his outline in the darkness, or a gleam of white hair. If it hadn't been for Lakshmi's nose, they would have lost him after the first turn. Soon she forgot to watch for him, as the throbbing got worse and worse. The pain seemed to travel up her leg and into her torso, until she was nearly crying with the effort to keep from gasping for breath at every step. She couldn't keep track of how many twists or turns they took, as she buried her face in Lakshmi's neck, to try and muffle any cries of pain that escaped whenever Lakshmi took it in her head to jump down a small incline, or make a sudden turn. She knew she should be listening for troggs, or watching the path in case they needed to find their way back, but she simply couldn't spare any energy past the struggle to keep from crying out loud.
She didn't notice when the raptor stopped, her teeth gritted together, her fist knotted in the bearskin pad. Eli patted the raptor, who was anxiously craning her head around to check on Kinta who wasn't responding to her. "Come on lady. We're here."
Kinta lifted her head, though she didn't look at him as she took a shuddering breath. "Thank th' loa for that." She ran a hand over her face, obliterating any trace of the tears that had managed to sneak out.
"Try to lean over this way, and I'll catch you." He said, a hint of admiration in his voice hiding behind a great deal of sympathy. He hadn't expected her to manage to be as quiet as she had. The troll uncurled her fingers from the bearskin slowly and stiffly. She took several ragged breaths, before she slid towards him.
He caught her easily, but even that small motion elicited a hiss of pain squeezed past tightly compressed lips. "Hang in there. If you can manage to stand for a few seconds, the worst is over."
She wanted to burst into tears, glad that the ordeal was over, glad that she was finally off the raptor, but that inner core of resolve kept them back. He was still an enemy, even if they'd been forced into an intimacy that still bothered her. The strangely comforting feeling of being held and supported was diminished by the fact that she was being held by a night elf. She managed to say, "I can stand."
He handed her the staff, before carefully setting her down on the one leg. She wobbled, and he reached out to stabilize her. "Are you sure?"
"Yes." She said with determination, though she wasn't sure that she could follow through. She could feel the muscles in her legs quivering from the exertion of the ride, and the stress of the pain. Her hands tightened on the staff, and she looked around at their new location.
He waited until he was sure she wasn't going to fall down, before removing the bearskin from Lakshmi and the packs from his shoulders.
They were in an underground hot spring, the room at least twenty degrees warmer than the other one, and filled with clouds of steam. She also noticed that there was only one entrance, as well as multiple shadowy nooks and crannies to hide in. The strong smell of volcanic sulfur meant that the troggs shouldn't be able to smell them, but the real joy was the warm water softly bubbling a few feet away. It promised to take away all the aches and pains, and she had never wanted anything so much in her life as to just sink into that hot water and turn into a prune.
"Want your bath now or later?"
"Now!" She said fervently.
He laughed, and started taking his clothes off. Her eyes widened.
"What are ya doing?"
"I am not ruining my armor in the hot spring. Besides, I'm not sure which one of us smells worse." He slid out of the leather vest, and his hands went to the ties on his pants.
She quickly turned back to stare at the water, blushing and wishing she wasn't.
"Is it my being naked or your being naked that bothers you more?" He asked. "You're not deformed or ugly so it can't be shame. Bad memory?"
"No." She said tersely, wishing he'd change the subject.
"What then? I mean, past the initial embarrassment of someone else knowing that you have adorable dimples on your ass, what harm does it cause?" He folded up the leather armor neatly and set it on top of the packs.
"I don't … wait, what?!" A very small part of her brain squeaked in delight at the compliment, even as the rest of her brain immediately quashed it for taking his flippancy seriously.
"I said what harm does it cause?"
She tried to figure out how to say it without sounding crazy. Whenever I'm naked, I feel like I'm being stared at, and it makes me nervous and anxious? Other people being naked scares me because it seems like they're staring at me wondering why I'm NOT naked? I don't want people to think I'm something I'm not, to expect things of me, to think I don't care who sees me naked, when I do care. I care a LOT. "I don't want people looking at me and thinking they're seeing me because I'm not wearing clothes, when everyone knows what trolls are like, and I'm not." She tried.
He knelt down next to her leg and started untying the knots of the linen around her cast. "I hope that made more sense in your head."
She winced as he tugged on a particularly stubborn knot. "Look, everyone knows what trolls are like. It's like night elves all dance naked in moonwells."
"I've only danced in one moonwell, and I was really drunk at the time. Not sure if I was naked or not. What does stereotyping have to do with anything?" His fingers worked at the last knot. She glanced down, staring for a moment at the long white hair trailing down the elegant line of his spine, muscles bunching and smoothing again along his shoulder blades as he undid the last one. She waited until he looked up, before continuing. For some reason she wanted to make sure he saw her face when she tried to explain something so important.
"I don' want people to assume they know what I'm like." She said slowly. "When ya naked, ya invitin' people to look at ya, think about ya in a specific way, and everyone assumes that all trolls welcome that sort of attention. I don't like being looked at by ... strangers."
He studied her face for a moment, before saying quietly, "And everyone else is a stranger." Her jaw dropped. She swallowed, and looked back away from him, his understanding bothering her more than she was willing to admit. "Yes."
"Interesting." He stood up, and stretched, yanking the leather thong holding his hair back out and tossing it over with the rest of his clothes. Her eyes flickered towards his chest for a second before she looked back at the other side of the room. "Post-awkward conversation bath time!" He said cheerfully as he scooped her up, one arm under her thighs, the other around her shoulders before she had a chance to protest and headed into the water. She crossed her arms over her chest out of habit, staring down at her navel.
He waded in until he found a relatively flat rock, and set her down on it. Kinta groaned in pleasure as she sunk into the hot water, though after the first haze of bliss faded, she shifted down a bit until her breasts were completely underwater. As soon as she was seated, he immediately took a few steps away, and sunk happily into the water himself. They didn't speak for long lazy minutes, as they both savored the feeling of the dirt and grime slowly bubbling away. She reached up to start undoing her thick braid of hair, as the heat drew the pain out of aching muscles, and relaxed the tension away.
He lifted his head up from the water just in time to catch a wide dreamy smile of pure sensuous pleasure on her face, as she ran her fingers through her hair, letting the long waves of indigo fall around her shoulders. He stared in surprise. There was nothing coy or come-hither in the look, nothing contrived or deliberate. It was startling and compelling in its honesty and purity of emotion. He had a sudden and powerful urge to kiss the smile, to see what that pleasure tasted like. He took a step towards her before he realized he was moving, and the realization stopped him dead.
She looked up at the sound of his splashing, the smile remaining even as she arched her eyebrows in curiosity. The intense frown on his face made her blink, the smile fading into her usual solemn expression. "What?" She whispered.
"Nothing, just realized I forgot the soap." He turned abruptly, and swam over to the shore. She watched him, confused. His sudden irritation was a sharp contrast to the joking humor he'd usually maintained, and she couldn't tell what caused it. He stalked out of the water, and she stared, unable to help herself. The water had turned his white hair into a silvery curtain that clung to his shoulders and back, and he moved like a wild cat, muscles starkly drawn with a seamless sinuous grace. She felt the same admiration whenever she saw a supreme specimen of wildlife, the admiration she'd felt when she'd first seen Lakshmi running through the jungle after prey. When he bent over to dig in the pack, she mumbled "Dimples."
His ears were sharp, and the acoustics in the cave were excellent. He glanced over his shoulder at her out of the corner of his eye, and caught her staring at him. He suddenly felt his good humor restored, an impish spirit taking hold, as he picked up the soap and turned around, heading back into the water. "What was that?" He asked.
The steam had already darkened her skin, so if she was blushing, he couldn't see it as he swam over towards her rock. "Nothing." She lied.
"Oh. I thought you said dimples." She could see the mocking twist of his mouth, as he grinned at her.
She stiffened and her chin lifted. "I was wondering if ya were joking about the dimples on my ass."
"Adorable dimples, I said."
She cleared her throat. "Well, I can't see myself from the back. Could I have the soap?"
"Given your preference for clothes, I can see why no one has mentioned them to you before, but I can assure you, they're quite adorable." He started lathering the soap between his hands, as he moved to sit next to her on the rock, his thigh touching hers.
"Mm." She didn't know what to say to that. Thanks, you too, seemed a little weird given that adorable wasn't the word that sprang to her mind. She shifted over so they were no longer touching.
He held the soap out, and she took it. She flinched in surprise when his hands started washing her hair, though the immediate frisson of enjoyment made her almost go limp. She occasionally paid for the goblin hair shop to cut her hair just so they would wash it. She closed her eyes, trying not to move or react, but his hands were larger than the little goblins, and he was washing more slowly. It felt wonderful.
"I think you've got some cave rat in here. Hand me the soap again." He said. She held up the soap instantly, unwilling to rise to the teasing in case he stopped. He took it and scooped up a handful of hair at the base of her neck to rub soap into. His fingers massaged every inch of her scalp, careful not to pull too hard on the tangles set in days of dirt. She could feel herself melting, even as she sternly told herself to stop it.
As for him, he watched her stoic expression crumble under his ministrations. He watched the slow dawning of that wide smile again even as she fought to try to keep it from showing, listened for the soft whimpering moans whenever he accidentally tugged a snarl or found a particularly sensitive spot, like the ones just behind her ears and at the base of the skull, and smirked whenever she forgot for a moment to breathe.
She'd never thought of washing her hair as a sensual experience to be shared with someone else, but his fingers seemed to leave nerve endings twitching in their wake. She could feel her nipples hardening as he seemed to take an eternity with his task, though she didn't notice the soft sounds she made, or realize that he was watching the expressions on her face with an intense scrutiny. She hoped he didn't realize how very much she was enjoying it.
"All done." He murmured, as he tilted his head to catch the expression on her face. She looked a little dizzy, eyes half closed, and that wide smile in place. It was all the more enticing this time because he'd put it there.
"Hmm?" She said, slow to catch back up to reality. He couldn't help himself. His lips pressed against hers for a brief second, a second in which she responded unthinkingly, her mouth parting under his. Then both his hands on her shoulders dunked her backwards into the water, and started vigorously rinsing the soap out.
Soapy bubbles swirled on the surface as she pushed herself upright again, sputtering.
He reached over to push the hair out of her face, and asked innocently, "Should I wash it again, d'ya think?"
Her eyes went wide, and she blurted out, "No! I mean, it's ok, I think it's clean." If he'd been any more thorough she might have imploded. And did he really kiss her, or had she been in the hot spring long enough to get delirious? It seemed impossible that it really happened, especially given the blank expression on his face.
"If you're sure." He gathered her hair into a makeshift ponytail, and tossed it over her shoulder. "What's your name?"
Her eyes narrowed in suspicious confusion. "Why do ya want to know now?"
He shrugged a shoulder. "We're stuck together for at least another week, more like two, since we still have to get back to civilization after we find a way out of here, and the game is up anyways. You have discovered my clever disguise. Might as well know."
She felt strangely reluctant to tell him all of a sudden, sensing that it could somehow be dangerous. That feeling made no sense. If he wanted to hurt her, he could have just left her to die under the rocks, but her mouth twisted for a moment with hesitation before she said, "Kinta."
He started rubbing soap on her shoulders, working his way down her back to the base of her spine. She didn't make a sound, though her spine stretched up a bit in response. "Whatever. I think I'll call you Kitten. It's always so hard to wash your own back without a scrub brush." He said idly. "It's a shame the front's easier, it's much more entertaining."
"Are ya hinting you want your back washed?" Kinta asked, a strange nervous tension arising as she asked the question, trying not to think about what it would be like to have him washing her front .
"Nice of you to offer!" He promptly handed her the soap, and turned around.
"I didn't exactly …" She stared at his back and shoulders. She suddenly wanted to touch him. The steamy haze made him seem unreal, like a dream. She reached out, her hands shaking, and started rubbing the soap onto his shoulders. Her nails scraped over his shoulder blades, and he groaned. Her hands immediately stopped.
"Did I hurt ya?"
"Not yet. Try a little harder." He hunched forward, "Scratch, Kitten." She started scratching, while he stretched and wriggled and gave directions. "Up. Left. Your other left. Right there. Harder! Mmmm ... there." She scratched until his back was covered with red marks, and he was practically purring.
"Ya look like ya got in a fight with a tiger." She muttered, before she started washing over the welts with the soap, feeling the ridges of muscle and bone under her fingers. She marveled at the feeling of the smoothness of his skin. There was none of the fine body hair that covered the trolls. But the lumps and cords of muscle were as hard as iron, unyielding to her fingers.
"You'd be amazed how similar that is to having sex with a druid." He said, eyes closed as her hands slid down to his lower back.
"If ya say so." Her hands moved back up, exploring and admiring. They roamed down his shoulders to stroke his triceps, circling around to trace his biceps.
"It's not a task for the faint of heart." He paused as her hands slid back up his arms. He was almost positive she didn't realize what she was doing, but the unconscious sensuality of her touch was arousing him to an almost painful level. This is not a good idea. He thought.
"I think my back is clean, lady." He said with a grin. "But if you want to wash the other side, I won't argue." He waited for the soap to go flying overhead, and her embarrassed protest.
"All right."
He turned his head to look at her over his shoulder, startled. She lifted her chin, as she fidgeted with the soap nervously. "What?" She said. She was doing her best to keep her face neutral, but she wasn't practiced nearly enough at it. He could see the tension in her lips and in her shoulders.
"You think that's a good idea?" He asked.
"Ya said you weren't g-going to argue." Kinta could feel the panic rising as Eli looked at her with those glowing golden eyes under arched eyebrows, but it seemed like an imp had a hold of her tongue. She felt instinctively that if she backed down and agreed that it wasn't a good idea, that somehow she'd lose, though what exactly she'd lose and who was keeping score wasn't clear. This isn't a good idea. She thought.
"And I'd hate for anyone to call me a liar." Eli said, with deep sarcasm. Lying was part of his job description after all. He wasn't going to back down from a frightened virgin a tenth his age who'd found a spare bit of courage in a little pleasurable contact. He was certain a little more pressure would crumble her newly found resolve and allow them to regain the status quo after she backed down. He slid off the rock, letting the soap on his back rinse off, before he grabbed her good leg and lifted it up. He ducked underneath it, and stepped in between her legs. A second later, his hands slid under her butt cheeks, and pulled her forward against him hard, so she was barely resting on the edge of the rock. She clutched onto his shoulders for balance.
"What the hell are ya …?!" She started, before she realized that there was a very distinct part of him pressing against a distinct part of her, and her train of thought derailed into a cliff. She started to automatically retreat, but his arms were locked around her hips, and when she moved, he theatrically moaned. She froze.
"Where did that come from?" She asked stupidly. She could barely think with that rigid flesh pressing so insistently against her, an inch and an angle away from … from something that she couldn't remember why was wrong right now.
"It might have been the sexy noises you were making while I was washing your hair. Or it could have been the way you were washing my back. Both maybe." He murmured. Her body was so close with the way she was clinging to his shoulders that he could feel her breasts pressing against his chest. His hands squeezed her ass, and he forgot that he was only trying to prove a point.
"I wasn't making noises." She managed to get out.
"Soft little moans. Tiny whimpers. Sometimes you'd even squirm a little." He whispered loudly. "You have a sensitive neck."
"I do not."
He leaned forward and kissed her just behind and below the ear. She shuddered. He could feel the shiver all the way down in the places where he was pressing against her. "Do too." He said, his voice huskier than usual. He nibbled at the spot for a second, before kissing his way down to where her neck and shoulder met.
Kinta's fingers dug into his shoulders, as she inhaled sharply. She was trying to make her brain work, but she was lost in wonder at the physical sensations washing her towards utter madness. Was this what all the fuss was about? No wonder everyone thought she was crazy. She was crazy. She was currently squirming naked in the arms of an elf. That was beyond crazy.
He let her weight rest back on the rock as his hands slid down her thighs, before skimming delicately over her ribs to cup her breasts, his thumbs circling her painfully tight nipples. "You have lots of sensitive bits, Kitten."
She tried to remember how to breathe. Surely it wasn't always this hard. When his hands reached her breasts, she groaned raggedly. "Who knew?" She muttered. He was dangerous all right. Anyone that could elicit this sort of madness was definitely dangerous. She understood vaguely now what sort of danger, but she also couldn't make herself care. Her hands slid down his shoulders and his forearms, to his wrists, but instead of pulling them away, which would have been the sane thing to do, she let her hands ride on top of his, as he squeezed and played with her breasts.
Eli was having a difficult time concentrating. It had been a long few days in the cave, and he'd been too busy to relax. It didn't help that she was so responsive to every touch and caress that all he could seem to think of was finding every single spot to make her react. A light pinch of her nipples made her squirm against him and whimper. Each squeeze of those large soft breasts made her groan. He lifted one of her breasts out of the water and ducked his head to suck on it. She cried out loud, her hands coming up to his head to tangle in his hair.
"Shh Kitten, we've barely started." He lifted her other breast to his lips and bit down gently on the nipple. The fine hair on her breasts tickled his lips in a way that was strangely erotic, a constant reminder of her exotic nature.
She clenched her teeth in reaction, but even so a muffled moan escaped. She looked down, watching his fingers, teeth, lips, and tongue play with her breasts. It almost seemed as if they belonged to a stranger, and she was spying on two other people. Slowly his comment penetrated around the way he was savoring every square inch of her breasts. "Barely started?!" She squeaked.
"Mmhmm. Don't be impatient Kitten." He lifted his head to kiss her, cutting off her gasp of pleasure as his thumbs stroked over both nipples again. Her lips parted under his as she kissed him back inexpertly, but somehow that made it sweeter to him. There was nothing practiced or artificial about her returned passion. She wasn't playing games, or pretending to an interest she didn't feel, and to him that was surprisingly intoxicating. Normally sex was just a pleasant but somewhat mechanical exercise with the goal of mutual satisfaction, his partners surprisingly similar and equally forgettable. But he knew that Kinta's reserve wasn't an act, that she was unhappily but genuinely attracted to him. For some reason the combination was utterly irresistible. He didn't want her to be merely satisfied. He didn't want to squander the rare gift, with cursory foreplay and the minimal efforts, whether she'd know the difference or not.
So he kissed her until her lips were swollen and nibbled on her neck and breasts until she was almost crying with frustration and squirming against his dick with an abandon that tore holes in his self-control. Her hands roamed along his shoulders and biceps and back, reveling in exploration.
"Eli!" She said with increasing desperation, her accent thickening. "Eli, please." She couldn't concentrate enough for Common. She begged in Zandali.
"Please what?" He growled. He was barely holding onto what was left of his self-control. He wanted to sink into her, his dick throbbing with the desire to take her. His own breathing was ragged, and he didn't realize his slip as he responded in the same tongue.
"Please f-f-fuck me!" She whispered in Zandali, her voice urgent.
His hands came back down to cup under her thighs, and he lifted her up that crucial inch, the water splashing him in the face as her breasts crested the water. He reached down to adjust the angle, placing the head of his cock right against her opening.
"Yeeeesss!" She wailed, as she felt him start to push into her. She'd never felt anything like it as he slowly worked his way in, the intensity of the feeling making her dizzy. It was a tight fit, each movement of his hips shoving in a little further. His arms tightened around her hips, pulling her down on the last few inches, sending her over the edge when she felt his pubic bone pressing against her clit, realizing dimly that they were fully and intimately joined.
He groaned into her shoulder as she clenched down on him, howling her orgasmic gratification out loud. His fingers dug painfully into her ass cheeks with the effort of not moving so he could savor the sensation of her spasming around him. When she exhaled with inevitable relaxation, he withdrew a little, and then pushed back in. She was so tight and hot that the sensation was mind-blowing. Each slow thrust was delightful, though soon she had loosened up just enough that he could fully slide in and out of her. He didn't speed up though, punishing himself with a long, leisurely ride that was driving him mad. Somewhere behind the red fuzzy thoughts of titillation and passion was the reminder that she was still hurt, that he couldn't just fuck her hard and mercilessly against a handy rock or wall, until they were both screaming with pleasure. Later, he promised himself, even as he gritted his teeth when her fingers brushed across his nipples.
Kinta hadn't expected his gentleness. She wasn't ignorant of the mechanics of sex. It was almost impossible to grow up in a troll village and remain completely clueless, but the examples of sex she'd seen had been wild and violent, feral exchanges that drew blood as often as not. She'd been steeling herself for it, willing to pay the price of pain in order to satisfy that burning desire inside of her, hoping that perhaps it wouldn't be too bad. When she realized that it might not be coming, she relaxed, impulsively leaning forward to kiss him.
"Not as bad as you thought, Kitten?" He whispered in Zandali, as she turned her head to the side afterwards, embarrassed by her display of affection. He planted a kiss on her shoulder in silent acknowledgement and approval of the gesture, as he thrust back in as deeply as he could.
"NoOOOOhhh. No, it's … wonderful." She said honestly, even as she felt that strange urgency building again as he kept moving in and out of her, each stroke piling stimulation on exhilaration, until she was whimpering, and then moaning.
He had been holding his own until she started making those noises. For some reason, those wordless cries of arousal that went higher the deeper inside her he was drove him wild. He started moving a little faster, even as he felt his balls tightening. He tried to resist, unwilling to let it end. Then she started whispering to him in Zandali in between her moans and cries, the syllables strange and musical as she told him things she wouldn't have been able to say if she thought he understood them.
"Ya makin' me feel so good… Eli, I can feel ya …. getting harder, feel ya getting bigger! I want, oh I want to feel ya explode inside me. I'm so close … please don't stop!"
He couldn't hold on any longer. He threw his head back as he let go, his orgasm deep and utterly satisfying. Dimly he could hear her own screech of joy, triggered by the sensation of his throbbing deep inside her.
For a few moments they stayed comfortably twined around each other, both limply relaxed in the aftermath. The bubbling and hissing of the hot springs, and Lakshmi's snoring were the only sounds echoing in the chamber, neither one of them willing to break the silence.
Kinta slowly drifted back into reality, staring at the white strands of his hair wrapped around her fingers. As the silence stretched out, she began to get more nervous by the second. What were you supposed to do afterwards? Say thank you? Say nothing? Pretend it didn't happen and act blasé? Decide it meant something? Decide it meant nothing? Ask him politely to put her down? Ask him firmly to put her down so as to establish that this wasn't intended to be the first of a series of repeat performances? (Did she want a repeat performance?) Would that be offensive or even smart given she was sort of dependent upon his care? Was there a socially acceptable time limit before one asked the member of the enemy faction to kindly remove his dick from inside one?
Eli wasn't bothering with complex thoughts aside from a brief and unrepentant ~Well, fuck.~ He was allowing himself the rare chance to drift along in the haze of contentment, when he noticed Kinta's spine stiffening in his arms and felt her fingers twining nervously behind his back. ~Oh right. Nervous post-sex jitters. I hate those.~ He sifted through the options that came to mind, before deciding on the most annoying but safest one.
He dramatically sighed in a way that indicated satisfaction, which made her turn her head to look at him, startled by the sudden sound. He kissed her quickly, a hard peck on the lips, before sliding her back and sitting her on her rock in one fast smooth motion. "Whatever did you do with the soap?" He asked absently in Common, turning to look around for it, carefully not facing her.
She stared at him in shocked silence, unable to pick between anger at his casual dismissal of something that had shattered her so completely, and relief at his casual dismissal of something that had shattered her so completely. Questions and comments surged and died on her lips, before she managed in Common, "I don't know." Something was niggling at the back of her mind, something important that she should have noticed.
"Mmph. Ah, there it is!" He splashed over towards the merrily bobbing soap which had escaped and floated off to the back of the pool. He rescued the soap, and swam back over. He held it out to her, "Want to finish up first?"
"It is my damn soap." She had had time to decide that the best response was none at all. No embarrassing conversations, no emotional chinks to be taken advantage of. She was technically on a mission, and compromising it by allowing an enemy spy to manipulate her emotions would be traitorous. The problem wasn't the ... the physical aspect. It was whether or not it affected what she had been sent to do that could be bad. As long as she kept telling herself that, she could manage to not freak out. So she'd managed a level tone, and even if she was flushed, it was perfectly understandable given the steam and … other things. No signs, no tracks. Perfectly composed.
"Point." He admitted, and tossed it over to her. She caught it easily in one hand. He leaned back to float in the water, resuming the hazy relaxation he rarely got to enjoy after sex. Usually he had to go find his pants and make a graceful exit quickly, especially if someone's husband was coming up the stairs.
She didn't look at him as she finished washing all the bits. She managed not to let her face change when her fingers trailed across any of the spots he'd left sensitive or lightly bruised. She gave herself an A for effort, as she pitched the soap casually right into his midsection, when she was done.
He gave her a B+ for effort. Her nostrils flared whenever the soap went across a sensitive spot or any of the spots he'd been careless enough to mark. And she kept glancing over his direction in what she thought was a subtle way to make sure he wasn't watching. He even saw the soap coming but let it hit him, making a grunt as if in surprise.
"Oof! Thanks." He said with a sarcastic tone, even as he grabbed the soap, and started soaping himself up quickly.
"Don' mention it." She said with a cheerful tone. She felt decent for the first time in days. She was clean, she was relaxed, and while there was still the ache in her ribs and leg, they didn't seem quite so bad now. She could handle this. It wasn't so difficult after all. The trick was not to think about it. She leaned back deeper into the water until only her face was above the water level, and closed her eyes.
He snuck back over after he finished washing, and tapped her on the nose. "Ready to get out?" He asked when she opened her eyes to look at him. She sighed, and sat up, reluctance in every move. "I suppose. " He nodded and scooped her up, heading for the shore. She managed not to flinch and cover herself up when they left the water, though when she noticed the marks on her breasts, she had to look away quickly.
He set her down on the bearskin after spreading it out with a foot. He then went digging through one of the packs. She snuck another glance at him out of the corner of her eye, admiring the definition in his legs and shoulders with what she assured herself was purely aesthetic appreciation. He pulled out what looked like his old linen robe, except that it was now four feet shorter, the edge ragged.
"This is all that's left of normal clothes. I used the rest of it for bandages and … hygiene." He said. "Your armor popped about thirty rivets from the crush, and all of the buckles and straps are shot, along with several impressive holes. I had to cut a couple more to get you out. You're going to need a blacksmith to repair it before you can wear it." His tone of voice was clinical. "We might be able to reuse the bit of linen that was your sling to create some sort of underwear, but it's not going to be very useful in terms of modesty."
She glanced at the thin linen robe, before holding a hand out for it, saying only "Better than nothing." He tossed it over to her. She pulled it on, but it barely made it to her hips. Still, she felt a little more secure as she belted it tightly.
He picked up his loincloth and walked back to the water's edge. He could feel her watching him as he washed the cloth out, and her silence was simultaneously reassuring, and disturbing. He couldn't think of a single female he'd ever been acquainted with that would have managed to stay quiet this long, all things considered. Most would have tried to start a conversation by now, proffering some gambit to try and figure out how he REALLY felt. He always found it irritating because for the most part, he didn't really ever feel much of anything besides a mild satisfaction at having indulged in a biological need. He had a whole host of convincing lies about how deeply meaningful the experience was, and how sorry he was that his profession meant that he couldn't pursue something more long-term. Sometimes, if they cried, he'd remember to send flowers a week later with a note saying something like "Thanks for the memory." He never made promises for anything more, and the ones who slept with him anyways were the ones who had decided to hope that they could change his mind or figured they could guilt trip him into a relationship. He couldn't help but feel that both types didn't really deserve his solicitation.
He glanced over his shoulder and was surprised to see she wasn't looking at him. Instead she had moved down the bearskin to reach the bits of her bow and the bandages, and was re-building the splint with a look of concentration.
"I was getting around to that." He said, feeling almost as if her actions were a silent rebuke.
"I'm wounded, not helpless." She said in an absent tone, as she pulled a knot tight. He didn't respond. She whistled, waking Lakshmi who sidled over obediently, yawning. Kinta pulled herself to one knee, and unbuckled Lakshmi's harness, pulling it off into her lap. A snap of her fingers, and a gesture sent the raptor bouncing past Eli to splash around in the water vigorously.
He walked back to the skin, and dropped down next to her, leaving his underwear on a handy rock to dry. "I don't think helpless is a word I would use to describe you, Kitten." He said cheerfully in Common. He felt rather good himself, as he closed his eyes.
She smiled that quick brief smile of hers at that, before reaching up to start finger-combing her wet hair, trying to get the tangles out. "I tell ya what a good word would be." She said. Her eyes narrowed as he didn't respond, looking like he wanted to go to sleep. She leaned over and squeezed some of the water out of her hair and onto his stomach. He made a grumbling noise in protest, before opening his eyes to look at her reproachfully. "I can think of plenty, but which one were you going to pick?"
"Hungry." said Kinta, ignoring the urge to ask him which ones he was thinking of. "Which pack has food in it?" Her eyes kept trying to sneak peeks at that most interesting part of his anatomy, and she had to keep making herself focus on the harness in her lap.
"Are you always this subtle?" He rolled over, and got to his feet, before heading over to the packs in question. He grabbed one, and brought it back over to the blanket, setting it in his lap as he sat down cross-legged. Kinta was a little relieved at having the temptation to look hidden from view. He reached in and pulled out a half-loaf of bread, a hunk of cheese, a bottle of melon juice, and a big green-leaf package she knew contained smoked fish. Her stomach growled. He laughed.
"Help yourself. I'm not hungry yet." He said, moving the pack to the side, and laying down again, determined to snag a brief nap in order to catch up some on the sleeplessness of the past few days when he'd been the only one really capable of keeping watch. The raptor had done fairly well, but got distracted easily since he wasn't her master, and he'd only been able to catch a couple hours here and there. He closed his eyes, and was completely out a few moments later, a bemused thought crossing his mind before sleep took over. Lot of trust in a troll. Sleeping naked and unarmed next to her. Your teachers would skin you alive if you were still in training.
Kinta forced herself to eat slowly. A bite of bread. Wait. A bite of cheese. Wait. A drink of juice. She felt like she hadn't eaten in days, and she hadn't asked Eli what he'd fed her. The last thing she wanted to do with broken ribs was start throwing up. She took a few moments to braid her hair tightly. She felt a little more like herself after doing that little chore, though now that she had time to think without the elf's far-too-perceptive golden eyes glowing at her in the dark, she didn't want to.
She glanced down at him as his breathing slowed and deepened. He really was asleep. She realized guiltily that he'd probably not been able to sleep much the last few days, if at all. Seeing him asleep and vulnerable next to her made her feel strangely hot and uncomfortable.
She still wasn't sure what had happened. Had he set out to seduce her on purpose? Was he just trying to help by washing her hair? Were elves just that much more touchy-feely? The previous two weeks, he hadn't offered to wash her back or hair, so that didn't seem like it could be it. Had she been so ready for sex that the unforgettable sensation of his hard length pressing against her had crumbled all the inhibitions she had been harboring so long? She'd wanted it so badly the instant she'd felt his dick start pressing her folds apart. She hadn't ever felt that sort of desperate need before, and it scared her. Was it because of their situation, or ... was it because of him? Was she some sort of pervert who got off on fucking the enemy, or was it just the enforced close contact of the last two days? Was it some sort of survival reaction to not being dead? Would anyone or anything have done?
Her fingers came up of their own accord and brushed the spot where his lips had first gone, on that part of her neck behind and below her ear. He'd known right where to touch her. Well, that wasn't that surprising. Spies and assasins were trained in anatomy, trained in reading people. What if this whole episode would be featured as a light-hearted note in his report? The image of several elves sitting around reading the report and laughing swam in front of her eyes. What kind of seven kinds of fool was she? She gripped her forehead between her hands, as the old familiar panic rose up again. That throat-closing feeling, the thumping sound of the blood pounding in her veins painful and too fast. It had been so long since she'd had an attack, but she was so tired, and then all the emotional upheaval had left her self-control in tatters. She was breathing too quickly, and now Lakshmi was nosing at her, and chuffing worriedly. She grabbed onto the scaly snout and rested her forehead against it, dragging in painful breaths, holding them against the urge to blow them out too fast, then releasing them in slow ragged wisps.
Long minutes passed before she could push the sounds of laughter and the images of the laughing elves, centering around a callously smirking Eli out of her head. She stroked Lakshmi's warm neck gently, murmuring in Zandali, "Don't be listening to that voodoo. Ya don't know what'll happen. Mebbe he won't want tell the elvies either. Be embarrassing, or mebbe they don' care. Either way, he been takin' care of ya, ain't been hurtin' ya. What kinda person assumes the worst all the time?"
"The kind with good survival instincts." Eli muttered, still half asleep.
He was woken up a second later by a fist landing in his ribs. "OW! What the hell was that for lady? I'm trying to sleep!"
"You speak Zandali!" She accused. "I knew something was bugging me. You spoke Zandali when … before!"
He swore in Thalassian, before sitting up. What was wrong with him? He was never this sloppy. This entire mission was turning into a disaster. "Yeah. That's why they chose to send me."
"You could have said something! You understood … things I wouldn't have said if I thought you'd understood." She could feel the hysteria returning, rising up in waves worse than before.
"I don't remember you saying anything you'd need to be ashamed of." He said seriously, laying back down. "People always say things in the throes of passion that they don't really mean. Only a fool takes any of them seriously. Can I go back to sleep now? Please?"
She made a disparaging noise, feeling much better suddenly. He probably didn't want to report on the 'liaison' either. "Go on then, lazy bones."
He made a grumbling noise of irritation in response before letting himself sink back into sleep, leaving her to watch over the silent steamy room .
