Mrythdom: Game of Time (38 page)

Her eyes rolled up and closed with a flutter as he found her sole remaining article of clothing and tore it, too, at the waistband. It peeled away easily, and then he trailed his fingers lightly over her. He caressed and stroked, teased and tantalized, but went no further than that. She opened her eyes wide with outrage and now she reached up behind his neck, locking her arms there and pulling him down for a vengeful kiss. He grinned and refused to budge, giving his head a little shake.

“No,” he breathed. She opened her mouth to object, but he placed a finger to her lips, and then his other hand, still teasing, stopped with a sudden thrust. His fingers slipped inside her easily, and her mouth opened in a sudden scream of pleasure that made him worry the guards would burst in on them, so Aurelius swooped down on her to silence it. She bit his lip so hard that he tasted blood, but he kept going, drawing muffled moans and gasps from deep inside her heaving chest. He felt her reach around and grab his buttocks, then her hands wandered in a vellicating line beneath his tunic . . .

Suddenly her hand dipped beneath the waistband of his shorts, and soon she was drawing gasps from
him
. They stayed like that a long time, provoking one another, seeing how long each could last, a torturous game that had them both longing for the end, but as he felt his end nearing, Aurelius withdrew, seizing her hand in his. If this were to be his last taste of anything good the world had to offer, he was determined to make it linger.

He fell upon her once more, and began rocking her with his hands. She began moaning softly, but with rising volume, and her eyes closed tightly. Whenever she drew near, he backed off, teasing her cruelly. Eventually she seemed to realize what he was doing. She opened her eyes and seized him below the waist. He stopped with a sudden intake of breath. She squeezed just enough to make her point, and then she let go. Her hands found the hem of his tunic and pulled it over his head, revealing every ridge of muscle outlined in the low, amber light of Lashyla’s quarters. She didn’t stop there. With a coquettish smile she tugged his shorts below his waist, her eyes dipping to watch as she undressed him. He helped her, and soon his shorts were piled on the floor with his tunic.

Then her hands began trailing over his pelvis, lower still. She ran them lightly in infuriating circles. He shuddered with building need, but forced himself to remain calm. That drew a wickedly playful grin from her, and suddenly she stopped caressing and seized him once more. She pulled him slowly, inexorably toward her. He held her gaze as she brought him close. She released him at the threshold, waiting for him to come the rest of the way, then he watched her eyes widen and heard her gasp as they touched, lightly at first. He penetrated her with agonizing slowness, and her eyes rolled up once more. She let out a little gasp when they were fully joined, and her eyes opened wide in shock. He began rocking her powerfully, and she moaned and bit her lip to hold back a rising scream. Her nails dug into his back and soon she couldn’t hold back her screams any longer. Her eyes flung wide, and every muscle in her body tensed, and now she moved quickly against him, insistently. He felt a rising wave of pleasure and pent-up desire overcoming him, clouding his already hazy mind. Suddenly Lashyla stopped writhing against him and held still for a long, tense moment, eyes wide and mouth gaping in a scream that had turned to silence for want of air. He kept going until the building tension inside him exploded like a flash of lighting from the sky. He let out a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding and Lashyla finally relaxed beneath him with a sigh. He collapsed on top of her, both of their chests heaving in synchrony as they gasped for air.

She kissed his neck and whispered in his ear: “You were different this time. I didn’t know it could get better.”

Aurelius’s eyes opened suddenly wide, and in that instant he knew what it was he’d been trying to remember. The last time she’d been with him, it had been Malgore, not he, who had made love to her—old, wrinkly Malgore. Aurelius felt abruptly ill and got up from the couch to stumble across Lashyla’s room.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

He stood at the viewport, looking down on the glowing city below. The colors swirled into a maddening rainbow, making him abruptly dizzy. He felt her arms circling his waist, her chin on his shoulder, and her breasts pressing warmly against his back.

“What is it?” she asked again.

He shook his head. “No, nothing,” he whispered back.

Malgore, still wearing Cardale's face, filed into the Ring with the rest of the vestals and took a seat among them in the uppermost rows of the ancient stadium. Here the fighters in the ring would be little more than specks to his eyes, but with a simple spell he would see them as though they were only a few feet away.

Malgore began impatiently rapping his fingers on the armrests. His decision to attend the challenges tonight had been a simple one. It would look suspicious not to, and while he was still looking for an opportunity to escape Meria undetected, he had to entertain himself somehow. . . . Watching Aurelius and his pet wolf die was as good a way as any.

The stands filled to past full, and then the aisles and staircases began to crowd with guards and vestals offering platters of fish and cool glasses of water in exchange for strange circular chips. Malgore studied the bustling crowds and cocked an ear to listen to the babble of conversation going on around him. He noted that the level of anticipation and excitement tonight was higher than usual; then he caught a few snippets of nearby conversation and he thought he understood why: no one wanted to miss the legendary Thorin fight a challenge, even if his opponent would likely die within the first few minutes. And the other fights scheduled were equally enticing. Never before had the Ring of Meria seen a werewolf fight.

The air was choked with the sound of people shouting, but soon a slow drum beat rose from the Ring below, cutting through the confusing babble. With ever-increasing tempo, the drums called the savagery to order. At the crescendo, a man stepped out into the middle of the Ring, and the drums abruptly cut off with the sound of a gong. The man raised his arms high for silence. A sudden hush fell that left Malgore's ears ringing, and then a booming voice began, carrying neatly to every corner of the Ring,

“Welcome, Merians!”

Whispering a spell to enhance his eyesight, Malgore saw that the man speaking was not Thorin the Triumphant, but another man, one who was almost equally as large, but not nearly as lean.

“Tonight, we have three fights for you. First you will witness Gral, the hideous troll fight against an evil pirate captain and his crew. One giant monster against over twelve men! Who will win?” The announcer gestured to one side, and then both Gral and the captain and his crew were edged into the ring, guarded by a large, anxious knot of guards wielding their glochi sticks like spears to keep their captives in order. Malgore smiled to see Gral roar at his guards. The crowds cheered wildly, and the announcer had to raise his arms for silence once more.

“Then you will see Reven the werewolf fight. He was condemned to die as an accomplice to theft and conspiracy against our queen, but in her mercy our beauteous queen has given him a chance to survive: he will have to fight twelve challenges to win his freedom.”

The announcer gestured to another corner of the Ring, where Reven was brought in between five guards, almost the same number as Gral. Now Reven was clothed in tattered shorts, but his hairy torso was left bare. Upon seeing him, the crowds erupted in chaos once more.

As the noise died down, the announcer went on, “Half man and half wolf, a giant from Nordom and the Elder Forests whose feral green gaze will freeze your breath in your chest faster than the air of the snowy peaks where he was born. Tonight he will fight against Ciffrux and Tagrim, two men of the Royal Guard who have volunteered to execute this animal in order to earn a few pearls for their beauteous maidens. Should he triumph in this challenge, Reven will face eleven more such challenges, each more difficult than the last, until he either dies or wins his freedom!”

At this, the crowd went wild with bloodlust. Malgore smiled.

“And finally,” the announcer said, “Saving the best for last, we will witness Thorin the Triumphant answer a challenge for our beauteous queen’s most recently-acquired mate. A challenge offered by none other than the alluring princess Lashyla!”

The crowds gasped and shrieked with delight, greedily absorbing the scandal and begging for more.

“But the princess has none to fight her challenge . . . none other than the man she seeks to win—Aurelius!” The crowd erupted louder than ever, shocked and driven to frenzy by the strange turn of events. Not only were mother and daughter fighting over the same man, but that man was to fight his own challenge! It was an event that almost never occurred in Meria, since both maidens risked losing the object of their desire if the mate in question were to lose. It was the closest thing to romantic tragedy Meria ever saw.

Gesturing broadly, the announcer drew attention to Aurelius and Thorin as they walked into the ring, side by side. They wore loose tunics, and shorts with slits cut in the hems to make them less restrictive to movement. Aurelius wore blue, while Thorin wore his usual green. They were escorted into the ring by a pair of guards, led straight up to the announcer while the crowds cheered and chanted and stomped their feet: “Thor-in—”
Stomp, stomp,
“—Thor-in—”
Stomp, stomp,
“—Thor-in . . .”

Malgore grinned broadly.
This
was the fight he’d come to see. Before the night was over, the infuriating elder would lie broken and bleeding on the sandy floor of the arena, and Malgore would have his revenge for all the times that Aurelius had defied him.

With the two challengers before him, the announcer turned first to Thorin and asked, “Is there anything you’d like to say to the crowd before you fight?”

Thorin turned to look up at the queen’s private balcony, bowed low, and said, “Tonight, as I have ever done, I will honor my most beauteous mate, the one and only queen of Meria! My blood should it be spilled, will not spill lightly. This worthless dog,” Thorin turned and spat on Aurelius, “who presumed to steal from my queen, will regret it before the end.” Thorin gave a feral grin. “I will not grant him an easy death. . . .”

The crowd erupted with more cheering, and they resumed stomping and chanting: “Thor-in—”
Stomp, stomp,
“—Thor-in—”
Stomp, stomp . . .

“Well!” the announcer said, letting out a breath. “Let that be a warning to others who might think to betray our stunning queen!” He turned to Aurelius. “Any last words?”

“Yeah.” The boy nodded once, decisively, then turned to address the queen’s balcony as Thorin had done, though
he
did not bow. “I agree—it won’t be an easy death. Not for me, anyway.” He raised a finger and pointed at the queen. “You will know the shame of defeat this night!”

The Ring went deathly silent, and Malgore heard a few people gasp around him.

Thorin began raising his voice to denounce Aurelius further, but Aurelius rounded on him and cut him off with a hammer blow to his jaw. Thorin’s head snapped around with the force of it. Aurelius grinned, and Thorin slowly turned his head back to meet Aurelius’s laughing eyes with cold, deadly calm.

The crowds went wild with cries of “Kill him now! Kill him now!”

Thorin launched himself at Aurelius, but the two guards who had escorted them grabbed him and held him back. The announcer watched with darting eyes. Suddenly the crowd’s attention was drawn from the center of the ring where the confrontation was taking place, to the queen’s balcony. She was standing now, her gaze directed balefully down on Aurelius. The queen didn’t even need to raise her arms for silence. The crowds hushed almost instantly and then the queen’s imperious voice carried out angrily across the Ring, “In exchange for his insolence, Aurelius will be the
first
to die this night! Take them to their starting places!”

*   *   *

Aurelius was escorted to one side of the Ring while Thorin was escorted to the other. The remaining challengers were hurried back into their cells. When Aurelius reached his side of the arena, he turned and took a deep breath. One of his guards tugged at his blue tunic, and told him to take it off. Aurelius frowned but followed orders, revealing a trim, muscular body, but compared with Thorin, who was busy removing his tunic on the other side of the ring, he looked like an ectomorph. Thorin looked every bit the monster he was with his hairy blond chest bared and heaving with deep, controlled breaths. Aurelius watched the giant man's asymmetrical face, broken and reformed countless times in the Ring, further twist into a sneer. Just off center of the Ring a rising mountain of coral separated them.

Aurelius began jogging on the spot, rolling his shoulders and neck, loosening up for what was to come. Maybe he’d been foolish to insult the queen so openly, but he didn’t expect to survive the coming fight anyway. It made him feel better to have let her know there was still one man in Meria she hadn’t broken or subdued. It must be a novel thing for a woman such as her.

Drums began beating again.

Dum,
dum
.
Dum, dum. Dum, dum . . .
Aurelius peripherally noted his guard hurrying out of the ring. The drum beats quickened until they stopped with the sound of a gong, and the announcer yelled from somewhere in the arena, “Let the challenge begin!”

The crowds went wild. Aurelius heard booing from the people in the stands behind him. Something light hit him in the back of the head, but he shrugged it off and sprinted for the coral in the middle of the Ring. He watched Thorin sprinting in from the other side, and hoped to beat his opponent there. Aurelius had already been briefed that all of the weapons would be hidden around the rocky clumps of coral. Neither he nor Thorin started with anything more than their fists; they would have to scavenge what they could, but they’d been allowed to select one weapon each which would be placed closer to them than to their opponent. Based on Cardale’s advice, Aurelius expected his enemy to have chosen a trident.

Coming to the first coral mound, Aurelius spied a glint of steel. He stopped there and fetched up a short, slender sword.
Perfect.
Further up ahead he caught a glint of bronze which would surely be the shield he needed to compliment it. The shield lay at the entrance of a little gorge between two sheer cliffs of glowing red and purple coral. He ran as fast as he could for that opening, and took a moment to note that he’d lost sight of Thorin. He wasn't given long to wonder where his opponent had gone. As he came to within a few feet of the shield, Thorin stepped out from a hidden nook in one of the opposing cliff faces. He placed a booted foot on the shield and grinned. “Looking for this?” Thorin asked as he brought a long, double-handed sword into a high guard across his chest.

Aurelius skidded to a stop, just out of reach of that blade. He blinked furiously, considering his sudden disadvantage. Sweat trickled down from his temples, itching maddeningly through his scraggly brown beard. He shook his head in disbelief. What was Thorin doing with a sword? Why hadn’t he chosen a trident?

“What’s the matter, dog?” Thorin taunted. He followed Aurelius’s gaze to the shield at his feet, and then looked up from it with pretended innocence. He gave the shield a kick. It flipped up and landed in the sand between them, within tantalizing reach. Aurelius licked his lips, considering a mad dash for the shield. “Come and get it, doggy.”

Aurelius did a quick mental calculation and realized that by the time he’d bent to pick up the shield, Thorin would have cleaved him in two. So he shrugged with disinterest and dropped his sword in the sand beside him. Cardale had said Thorin would not fight an unarmed man, and given his disadvantage in weapons, he could at least stall for time in a bare-handed fight.

Thorin eyed his fallen sword with eyebrows raised. “You must be gluey.” Thorin nodded to the sword. “Pick it up.”

Aurelius shook his head and began raising his fists. “Let’s give the crowds a show. No weapons.”

Thorin appeared to consider that for a moment, his brow furrowed in thought, and then he grinned. “No.”

And with that, Thorin charged.

*   *   *

What is he doing?
That was the question Gabrian had been asking himself since before the fight had even begun. What had that
sherpish
boy been thinking to publicly defy the queen, to throw an illegal punch against her champion, and now . . . and now to appeal to that monster’s absent sense of honor by throwing down his weapon and hoping Thorin would do the same? In the second it took for Thorin to reject Aurelius’s proposal for a fair fight, Gabiran whispered a spell to at least enhance Aurelius’s speed and reflexes. He was about to need it.