For the June of Doom prompts: 27 "Or what?" & "Defiance"
The sorceress waits until she can hear her unlikely companion's breathing even out and turn into a regular, soft snoring. Well, 'companion' is a bit of a euphemism. Her 'prisoner' would be more accurate as Sabrina does not intend to let Cahir leave any time soon - if at all. She is going to make sure he will not be able to get away, too - which he will certainly try once he wakes up and finds he can trust his legs to carry his weight again. No visible fetters, heavy manacles or iron bars, though, no. Provided you are a mage and know your spells, there are a lot more subtle and still extremely efficient measures.
Casting a last look at the sick Nilfgaardian, Sabrina rises to her feet and marches toward the entrance of the cave. There are things she has to do and as she is awake already, she can as well do them now. A hike back up the cliff to Aretuza is not exactly her preferred start of the day activity, but it cannot be helped. For one, her absence might have been noted by now and she definitely would not want any of her fellow sorceresses to put together a search party to look for her. Therefore, showing her face to some of her friends is of importance. Plus she needs supplies. Sabrina's stomach has started to grumble loudly just at the thought of food. Cahir will need something to eat and drink, too, to regain his strength and to not die of dehydration. Some things she can conjure up, of course, but magical food and drink have always felt kind of empty to her, and unsatisfying, much like having sex with conjured up illusions, no matter how gorgeous they look. No, Sabrina prefers the real stuff, both in her bed and in her belly. Fresh bandages, the one or other healing potion and ointment, blankets and a change of clothes for the both of them will also come in handy. She would love to have a nice, hot bath and a proper massage as well, but it might not be a good idea to stay away from the cavern for too long. The bath will have to wait.
She steps outside the cave. Far on the horizon the very first rays of morning light cast a faint shine onto the ink-black sea. The sun will rise soon. Before Sabrina starts to climb the path up the cliff, she mutters a few incantations. Then, satisfied with her work, she sets out for Aretuza at a brisk pace.
It does not take Sabrina too long to collect everything she needs and to share an early breakfast with Tissaia and Yennefer. Tissaia looks so much older now with her snow-white hair. It will not be easy to get used to it. But the three of them have survived, that is what counts. Like herself, both Tissaia and Yennefer seem not to have enjoyed a good night's sleep after yesterday's events, yet for very different reasons, Sabrina suspects. Luckily they are so preoccupied with their own sorrows and worries that they do not pose any inconvenient questions about where she was all night and what she is planning to do today. All in all, it is an unusually quiet and sombre breakfast, and soon they part again, Yennefer to continue the search for her ward in the rubble of the collapsed tower and Tissaia to do whatever a headmistress has to do when her school gets attacked and burnt to the ground. Left to her own devices, Sabrina sneaks away toward the cliff with several big bags full of useful equipment.
The morning air is still chilly and crisp, but it is a welcome change from the sooty tang of smoke that seems to cling to every room in Aretuza. The sun peeks out from between the clouds - white cumulus ones that promise a fair summer's day - and with her belly nicely filled and the heavy weight of the bags alleviated by a handy weightless spell, Sabrina almost enjoys the walk back to the cave, and to her prisoner.
He is still deeply asleep and shivering slightly when she enters their secret hide-out. From one of her bags, Sabrina produces a warm, woollen blanket and drapes it over the man. Then she spreads out a fluffy fur as a bedroll for herself, places several downy pillows on it and curls up under a nicely warm and fluffy duvet. After the hike and the far too short night the sorceress has decided that she deserves another hour or two of rest. Maybe even three or four.
Being much more comfortable than before, Sabrina almost instantly drifts off to sleep.
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
Gasping for air, Cahir wakes up not much later, his black shirt and vest drenched with sweat, his lips parched from agonising thirst. Just a moment before he was in a deadly desert, the scorching, merciless sun burning the skin off his bones. Not any longer, it seems. Was it a dream? He shudders, still feeling hot, but cold at the same time. Disoriented and with a pained groan, he sits up and looks around. A cave. Right. He fell asleep in a cave. And there, not far from him, she is. The blonde sorceress that has, for whatever unfathomable reason, not delivered him to the headmistress of Aretuza and to what is left of the Brotherhood of Sorcerers for more torture and a certain, grisly death. What was her name again? Sabrina something from somewhere. Usually Cahir prides himself on being exceptionally good at remembering names and locations - it is an important skill for a commander general - but his brain feels all foggy, like stuffed with nothing but wool, and his head is hurting far too much to recall more than her first name. Or to ponder on anything else at the moment, like on why she has healed his wounds and brought him here to this cave. It is a total mystery to him, probably one involving some sinister and fucked up political intrigue, or maybe a personal vendetta of sorts, born of jealousy or greed or spite. Yet, against all odds, he is still alive. He can mull over this mystery later. When he feels better. Now he needs to take a leak. And find something to drink.
Shakily, Cahir gets to his feet. For a moment, his vision starts to swim and he has to support himself against the cave wall until the dizzy spell is over. Then, squinting against the light from the bright morning sun, he stumbles toward the cave's entrance.
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
This time it is a bang and a thud accompanied by a loud 'Fuck!' and an equally loud groan that wake her up. The Nilfgaardian - again. Damn him! She should have let him tumble down the cliff and to his death after all. Or taken him to Tissaia with the nice prospect of another execution - a fatal one this time. Cursing inwardly, Sabrina rises from her make-shift, but surprisingly comfortable bed.
"Wanted to leg it, Nilfgaardian?" She glares down at the man who is lying in a heap on the ground a few metres from the entrance. He is holding his left shoulder, his face a grimace of pain. "Idiot! Sorry, but not sorry!"
"I didn't intend to, you crazy bitch!" Cahir grinds through gritted teeth. "I needed to take a fucking piss! But what did I expect of a witch, you're all stark raving mad. Fuck you all!" He struggles to sit up with another groan.
Ah, here we go, finally some defiance! Sabrina thinks with a satisfied smirk. Not just a sogging wet handkerchief of a man after all. He must be feeling somewhat better despite the magical backlash. Excellent.
"You didn't expect me not to magically secure the entrance, did you?" she hisses. "I might be blonde, but don't insult my intelligence!"
"Or what?" Cahir spits in return, his voice raspy from thirst. "What will you do? Hurt me? Torture me? Kill me? May I remind you that your beloved headmistress has tried all that already?"
"And may I remind you that you deserved it all?" Sabrina scolds, her eyes ablaze.
"But don't you worry, Cahir," she adds, her voice taking on an almost friendly tone all of a sudden, "I believe I've already mentioned that I'm different from Tissaia de Vries." Now the blonde sorceress even smiles at her prisoner benignly. "You can relieve yourself in that corner over there. In the bucket. I won't look."
A bucket? How is there a bucket in the cave? Perplexed by her very sudden mood swing and the surprising information, Cahir gazes into the darkest corner of the cave. He can indeed spot the vague shape of a bucket there. The blankets and pillows on the ground must be new, too, and there are several big bags by the wall that could not have been here when they first arrived. Cahir hardly remembers anything about how they got down the cliff, only that he was in pain and felt thoroughly shitty and close to blacking out the whole time and that, almost the very second they set foot in the cave, he did collapse. But why did he not check the cave more thoroughly before trying to get out? The witch is right, it was idiotic not to anticipate that there would be some kind of spell in place to prevent him from escaping this weird prison with his even weirder jailor. What was he thinking? Must have been the effect of the lingering fever and the headache, and the overall crappiness. Still holding his aching shoulder, Cahir scrambles to his feet. Funnily enough, the magical blast that hit him square in the chest and has thrown him several metres backward somehow helped to clear his mind a little. Thinking straight is not quite as hard anymore as it was when he first woke up. Yet walking the few metres to the back of the cave turns out to be an embarrassingly taxing feat. And being forced to piss into a bucket while having to lean heavily against the wall for support in the presence of the witch is no less embarrassing. However, he has no choice. And, luckily, he manages without blacking out and landing on his butt again.
"You're bleeding," Sabrina says when Cahir is done and staggers back to the place where the outline of his shape is still visible in the sand.
"Thanks to your fucking locking spell," he grumbles and flops down onto the ground with a tired grunt.
"Thanks to your stupidity, you mean," the sorceress corrects him. "But I gather you won't make the same mistake again, will you?"
He shakes his head. No, he will not. Definitely not. Once was bad enough and exactly one time too many. The crazy bitch probably also has a spell in place that would knock him out or pulverise him if he tried to touch a hair on her head in her sleep or to nick the knife she is carrying in her bootleg. Whichever way one might look at it, it seems he is completely at her mercy. And, most likely, royally fucked. Is that what the punishment for his many sins looks like? Blonde and beautiful on the outside, but duplicitous, scheming and sadistic at heart?
Sabrina throws Cahir a surprisingly sweet smile.
"I knew you're teachable. Now be a good boy and let me take care of your shoulder," she says. "I promise to be very gentle with you this time."
Her voice has taken on a strange and very unexpected sensual timbre that gives Cahir sudden goosebumps all over. Not from fear for a change, but from something else entirely. Is the crazy bitch-witch toying with him? And he cannot control his visceral reaction to it. Fantastic.
It gets worse when her fingers glide over the naked skin of his shoulder, just a whiff of a touch, gentle like a summer's breeze or a lover's whispered kiss. Shit, this was much easier when she was angry and spiteful and rough with him. The spell itself hurts, yet somehow, it is a weird mixture of pain and something else, something exciting. Cahir is suddenly acutely aware of how close she is, of her perfume, a bit too heavy and flowery for his liking, but there is a nice undertone of vanilla and lemon and something that he is unable to put a finger on. Something prickly, exotic and titillating that makes his heart beat faster and all but takes his breath away. Bloody hell, has the witch cast some kind of spell on him? Or is he getting delirious with fever and dehydration?
"Almost done. You'll be as good as new in a jiffy," she purrs into his ear from behind when she has finished rubbing a cooling ointment onto the wound and starts to dress it in a fresh bandage. A cold shiver of excitement runs down Cahir's spine and he holds still, like mesmerised.
"By the way," now her full lips are so close to his ear, he can feel her sweet, hot breath on his skin, "did you fuck Yennefer?"
"What?" he asks, waking up from his weird trance-like state, taken totally by surprise by the unexpected question.
"Did you fuck Yennefer when you were on the run together?" Sabrina repeats, this time in a normal tone of voice and not from quite that close to him. "Or maybe rather, did she fuck you?"
"Hhm," Cahir huffs. Of course, this is the very first personal question the blonde sorceress would ask him. How could it be otherwise, everything is always about Yennefer of Vengerberg. But why would he want to answer that question? Well, it is better than if Sabrina asked about secret military intelligence, Cahir has to admit, and nothing happened between him and Yennefer other than that they saved each other's life. Still, he was very relieved that she was not at Aretuza when they attacked. He would never have wanted her to get hurt or killed, and for weeks he had dreaded the possibility that he would have to look his beautiful saviour in her purple eyes while he and his men were invading and burning down her home. Tissaia, yes, he wanted her dead with all his heart for what she had done to him. Vilgefortz, too, and all the rest of those bloody mages. Maybe if they perished, his nightmares would, too. He wanted them to die in agony, every each of them, but not her.
"So, did you and Yennefer have sex?" Sabrina insists while rising from her kneeling position. She gets one of her bags, pulls something out of it and holds it up for Cahir to see. A waterskin. "I promise you won't regret answering my harmless, little questions," she adds, flashing him another sweet little smile.
"We just so managed not to kill each other for several days," Cahir finally says. He is dastardly thirsty, and Sabrina knows it, the cunning bitch. It might not be the worst survival strategy to try to keep his jailoress happy - as long as it is not strictly classified information, and this is not.
"It was more than I expected," he continues. "At the end, we were kind of friends, I think. Or maybe not. It was hard to tell." It is true, too, but not the entire truth. There were these electrical vibes between them that went beyond mere friendship, and Cahir would certainly not have said no to having sex with the incredible, purple-eyed witch if she had initiated something, the contrary. However, the vibes were probably only there in his imagination, not in hers. Most likely, she would have turned him into a toad as soon as he had suggested anything more intimate than riding double on a horse. He might have burnt to ashes from her mere touch, too. Or maybe not, she did not have her magic back then. But still, it was better, safer that he had never acted on his feelings, for why would she have wanted him?
"'Hard to tell', yes, that sounds very much like Yennefer," Sabrina giggles. A pleasant sound, like the tinkling of a silver bell. "Good for you that she wasn't at Aretuza when you attacked. She'd have made mincemeat out of you and eaten you for breakfast."
Cahir does not reply. The blonde sorceress is probably right. Yennefer would have been beyond furious with him, and he knows from experience what the witch is capable of when she unleashes her fury. It did not happen, though, and therefore it is of no importance.
"Here, your reward. I keep my promises," Sabrina then says, passing the waterskin to Cahir. "Drink as much as you want. I can get more."
Cahir does not need to be told twice. Thirstily, he takes a long, long draught of the water, and another one, and yet another until the waterskin is almost empty.
"Thank you," he mumbles, handing the leather vessel back to Sabrina, who closes it again, but leaves it in Cahir's reach.
"I brought a bedroll for you, too," she says, producing something that looks like sheepskin from another one of her bags, and spreads it out for him on the sandy cave floor. "There are pillows, another blanket, lots of food, even some wine. You can take whatever you want. No protective spells there."
"Just like this? No more questions?" Cahir asks, genuinely surprised by Sabrina's sudden generosity.
"Not for now. Now I'm going back to Aretuza to have a nice long nap which will not be disturbed by an annoying Nilfgaardian." She looks at Cahir pointedly, but without malice. "And after that I'll have a wonderfully relaxing, hot bath. With loads of scented bubbles and rose petals and fragrant oils for my wonderfully delicate skin. But, no worries, I'll be back." She smiles at Cahir suggestively. "And you better rest some more, you still look like death warmed over. See you later, Cahir."
Sabrina turns on her heel and walks toward the cave's entrance without looking back.
Cahir stares after her as she steps outside into the sunshine, her turquoise cloak billowing behind her, her long, blond hair a waterfall of shiny gold. So very different from Yennefer, but gods, she is beautiful.
Damn, he snaps himself out of his revery, what is it with him and highly attractive, but lethally dangerous sorceresses? Is it some kind of curse? How is he supposed to sleep now, with the image of Sabrina and her rose-petal bubbly bath on his mind? Not to mention her delicate and presumably very naked skin. And what did she mean with 'I'll be back'? Was it a promise? Or a threat?
Bloody fuck, how can one ever know with these magical women?