Her eyes quickly darted up from the shreds of sheet spilled over her lap when the dark blue that had colored the hole in Nyx’s crypt was suddenly draped in black. The next moment what was left of Nyx tumbled onto the floor, his kukri first. For a moment her shock seized her. From the screams she had heard she had expected him to be in bad shape, but this… this was worse than she had been expecting. His luminescent skin reflected none of the candle’s light, and if she had not been so certain that no one else would be coming out of that hole she likely would have suspected it to be anyone but him. Only his clothing bore resemblance to the man she knew, and even that was soiled and wet.

The strips of yellowed linen fell off her lap like confetti as she lurched forward and caught in him her arms before he spilled across the hard tiled floor of the crypt. Slowly he opened the one eye that would still permit such activity and his bleary yellowed orb met her.

“Mae govannen, Cayrimsa,” he rasped on a nearly laughing breath, his gaze searching for her but unable to focus, “You should… go now… amin… anta… kaima…”

Her jaw clenched a little bit as she stared down at him, so helpless in her arms right then. The dirt and grime and the elven blood that seeped from his wounds sunk into the fabric of her skirts.

“You should be glad I don’t much care for this dress… and yes… I’m sure you do want to rest. However, I think if you tried to sleep right now without having whatever was done to you tended… you might not wake up again. Not that that is an altogether bad option for either one of us right now, but I’d rather you died at my hands instead of those filthy humans. Now behave yourself, or I swear what Dmitrova and that ugly bitch did to you will only be the beginning. Do you hear me Nyx?!” she stared down into his face and gave him a good shake when she noticed his eye had fallen shut and he had not replied.

“Nyx! I said do you hear me!?” She shouted when his eye blearily tried to reopen for her.

“Yes… kaima…” he muttered weakly.

“I swear to the Gods! If I didn’t feel somewhat responsible for your condition I’d finish the job myself! Just…. Lay here will you? Not as if you are going much of anywhere like that I suppose…” the normal bite in her tone was still there, but she used surprising tenderness when she pulled herself out from under him and laid his limp frame on the ground, letting his cheek rest along the cool tiles.

She grabbed the two bottles and a handful of linen and settled down next to him.

“Alright you Gods forsaken elven rubbish, the first thing we need to do is get something down your throat, you’ll need fluids, got to replenish what you’ve leaked all over my skirt. Which by the way is worth quiet a bit more than that orange you put on my tab… not to mention how much I spent on the whore to get Mouse off my trail and all these supplies. You’re so in my debt you’ll be washing my feet like any other elven bastard for the rest of your life! Now come on, sit up a bit for me so you don’t choke to death before you can start to repay me.”

Edging her knees back under his head she slips her fingers to the nape of his neck and supports him while her other hand brings the bottle of wine to his split lips. The effort ends with him coughing and a majority of the wine spilling down his throat and into her lap, but some gets down and for what will come next the effects of the alcohol are likely going to be beneficial.

“Perfectly good waste of liquor if you ask me, but you aren’t… so then… back down you go. I guess I should first figure out where you are loosing the most blood I suppose and stop that up.”

As she starts to put him back on the ground and begin her examination his eye rolls open at her again and he groans. “Pocket… “

“Pocket? Yes you have pockets Nyx… now please…”

But she is cut short as his hand reaches up and clamps over her wrist. Again he pulls her breath from her chest and the pulse beneath the tips of his fingers quickens.

“Nyx I told you to behave!”

But the hand pulls her own closer to his chest and into the folds of his coat, guiding her fingers past the weaker beating of his own heart and to a pocket hiding in the shadowy depths. Her eyes narrow on him as she yanks her wrist away and rummages through the pocket. A moment later she holds a few of the grayish leaves up over him, they are limp and soggy but she still recognizes them as the leaves he gave her the previous night to help with the pain in her throat. She sighs and nods to him.

“I see… Well…. I’m not going to prechew them for you, I’m not a cow. Besides they seem pretty damp already. Here…” her fingers fold the leaves into a square packet and she pushes it gently between his lips, pulling her hand back and shaking it the moment his tongue presses against her fingers.

“Ehh!” The spittled fingers are drug across his shirt and for a moment she can almost swear that a smile crosses over his lips.

“Go ahead laugh all you want now, as soon as I get you healed up I’m going to kill your lily ass!”

With Nyx humming to the sweet effects of the leaves seeping into his tongue Cay restarts her examination of him. Before long she notes that the majority of the blood seeping onto the floor is from his legs, likely the wound she witnessed that mohawk woman administer.

“Of course. Going to not only make you see you naked twice tonight but now I get the honors of removing your pants this time. I hate you… I truly hate you!”

Grimacing the whole while she obligingly carries out what she intended to do tonight. His pants are removed and as quickly, and blindly, as she can she uses a strip of linen soaked in water to clean the dirt and the blood from his legs. Under it all she finds the wound he had stitched earlier, now broken open and spilling out the blood soaked herbs he had stuffed into it, and the cleaner line on his inner thigh.

When she digs out the herbs in the older wound he tenses and gasps in pain while his fingers reach down to stop her.

“Lay still you horsefucker! It’s ladled with sea scum and dirt… you want it to infect? Trust me I don’t enjoy being this close to your precious family jewels… I’ll get it done and get you patched back up as quickly as I can, now lay back!” Her hand curls around his wrist and she presses it to the ground where she then captures it under her knee, holding it still while she cleans out the wound. The same treatment is given to the other, then carefully she pulls a thread off one of the linen sheets and threads it into a needle she also picked up at the tavern.

Straining to not only keep his hands from clawing at her, but to also see in the dim candle light and tune out the groans coming from his lips she rather expertly sews up the gashes in his legs. The linen catches now and then on his tender flesh and if he had been in any shape to watch he would have noticed the grimaces that flash over her face when she pulls the thread to get it through and hears how it makes him cry out beneath her. Soon enough, though, she tears off the last bit of extra string and then binds the wounds tightly under a few strips of linen. They turn pink where they touch the wounds but the blood flow seems to have ceased.

Pleased with that work she then moves to his upper half, covering the lower with his cloak. Ever careful to support his head, especially now that his groaning and facial contortions have died down and she suspects that he has finally fully passed out on her, she removes his shirt. There had been an angry red welt on his thighs and now that she had his shirt off she noticed the others that crossed over his chest. She sighed and gently brought her fingers down upon one that crossed near his heart. She closed her eyes and felt the heat from the wound and the way his heart continued to beat just under the bones protecting it.

“You’re a damn fool Nyx Syndyn. I’m not worth all of this. You should have told Dmitrova I was a damned liar and let him string me up instead… hell you should have left town on that horse you picked out…or even better yet, walked away this morning, let me finish my battle with the human woman by having the Imperial Guards drag me off her. That’s what you should have done… that’s what everyone else has done…”

With a heavy sigh she finally opened her eyes and stared down at him.

“Well you’ll come to regret it someday I’m sure…”

The next hour she spends tending to the more minor wounds, cleaning him off until his alabaster skin glows in the soft candle light. Linen bandages are tied around many of the welts, cuts, and scrapes that adorn his body. The last leaves he had in his pocket are in his mouth now, so when she gets him mostly cleaned up she goes to the sarcophagus and pushes back the lid to go through the few items he has stashed there. She finds a few more herbs and manages to grind them with a rock and mix them with some of the wine to create a salve that she rubs into the bruises and the twisted joints.

She watches as her fingers glide over his body, rising along his muscles and falling into the cavities between them.

So strange to touch a man like this isn’t it?

“I can’t do this right now… don’t start in on me… I’m tired… I’m hungry… and I just need to get this done”

Alright… but trust me we’ll talk later…

“Don’t I know it…”

Finally she has managed to tend to most of his wounds. The light filtering in through the stained glass windows is a lighter grey now. Dawn will come soon. The candle she had been working by has burned itself into a puddle that has long since dripped over the edge of the pedestal and onto the floor. Yawning she gets a sheet she had not ripped up and his cloak.

Sitting she leans her back against the sarcophagus and pulls Nyx’s head into her lap while she adjusts the cloak and sheet around his still bare body, with him situated she closes her eyes. In the fuzzy grey light that comes just before the dawn her hand lifts up into the air and hovers over his head for a moment, a canine nibbles at her lip and then with a sigh she lowers her fingers to his brow. With his mane tangled in her rather gentle caress she joins him in sleep.

“And someone fetch Cay,” the Hellkite Lord added, “I should like to be able to see her face, as well, when Nyx is asked to verify her tale.” The door to his office opened and shut as yet another of his minions set out on the task.

Out in the bar Cay was on her second drink, her eyes swirled in the foam that danced on the dark surface of it. She was starting to feel a bit fuzzy from it, drinking was something she did not do often so into her second drink the liquor was already tingling at her nerve endings. She had watched as the mohawk woman walked in with her muscle carrying a bundle into the bar. The rest of the room had begun to whisper about its contents. Cay did not join in, she knew who was in that bundled cloak. It churned her stomach and made her take another long swig from her glass.

Not like the others? Got himself caught pretty quickly didn’t he? Typical elf

A few minutes later a hand slammed down onto her table and her eyes bounced up to one of the muscles who carried Nyx in. “Dmitrova wants you.”

“Again?” she sighed. The last inch of her drink disappeared down her throat and she stood up to follow the man into the back room again, noting that her shadow stayed on her as she went. The door closed behind her and her shadow. Dmitrova sneered something at her to which she simply nodded silently to. Her eyes were fixed on Nyx. 

Like the fish that slowly rotted beneath her home his pale limp body hung from a hook hanging off a rafter. Purple badges of his violent life stood out in the dim light of the room. Under them was the firm well-toned body of a male elf in his prime. The smoldering fires in her eyes narrowed on the sight, the anger she felt was real enough although where it was that she wished to direct it was as fuzzy as her head right now. The sight made her sick, so soon after she had determined that Nyx was not like other elves he had allowed himself to be strung up like some slave. Dmitrova also made her sick though, gloating in his triumph over Nyx when it should likely be the other way around.

Quietly she watched as Nyx came around, fluttering into consciousness then thrashing against his bindings before finally laughing.

“New protocol for summoning me, is it, Vadim,” he snickered.

Cay returned her fingernails to the wound in her palm, digging into it silently. Nyx swung before her back and forth slowly.

“I’ve been trying our standard methods most of the day, Nyx,” the Captain informed him, “with little success. You left me with few other options.”

“And hanging me here naked?” Nyx arched a brow as a young, grinning, and almost familiar female human face swung into view for an instant and then was gone again.

“Insurance,” Vadim answered, “just in case you had been entertaining that you’d be able to draw steel in here, again.

You remember, Tselika, I presume?” It was as if Dmitrova had timed the question to coincide with the Mohawk wearing lady swung into Nyx’s view again.

“Ah,” the assassin grinned, nodding as best he could but wincing at the jolt of pain that shot through his skull when he did, “I thought I recognized the face… but the hair… it reminds me of a horse I once pached, yes?”

A smirk and a slight laugh escaped from Cay, but with what happened next it was only Mouse who noted it. In a flurry of activity that Cay struggled to comprehend in her current state, the assassin woman rose up to attack Nyx and was pulled back by the man who had collected Cay from the bar. As she was thrust into a chair Cay let her eyes fall back on Nyx, noting the blood that ran down his leg and the dark bruise rising on his cheek while he swung wildly on his hook now. For a moment his yellow eyes met hers, and she took a breath.

“Oh,” he grinned almost wickedly, “hello, Cay. I might have expected you to be here…”

As soon as his eyes swung away hers turned into little slits again. “Rot in Hell hwandi!” 

“And I might have expected,” Dmitrova groused in response to that, “that you would have returned with the partner I sent you out with to deliver a report on a job that you were to be working together.”

Nyx chuckled… coughed… spat a glob of blood-tinged saliva onto the floor between his dangling feet… “I haven’t even seen the slitch since she tried to have her way with me in an alley last night,” he smirked, “How am I, then, supposed to report with her?”

“Hmmm… Cay says it was you who tried to rape her in that alley, Shyndyn.”

“She would…”

“Elven scum!” Cay shouted at that and stepped closer, lobbing her own spit onto his toes. “Ten minutes Dmitrova… give me ten minutes with him please… I’ll bring you the pieces when I’m done!” 

A glare moved over the witch from Dmitrova and behind her Mouse smiled. “Cay, back down.”

Glowering she dropped her eyes to the floor and snapped her lips shut. As her eyes fell to his feet she caught sight of a scar pressed into his ashen rump, it was circular, a crude fist smashing into an intricate elven knot. The symbol was familiar to her even when it was so poorly branded into flesh. 

My my Nyx… you’ve had an interesting life haven’t you?

“So, since you weren’t out on the task I assigned you, then… Where have you been since you left here last night?”

“Oh,” Nyx sighed, “that would be a tale long in the telling, my Captain.”

Dmitrova laughed, then. “I’ve got plenty of time to listen, mith’ganni,” he said, “and an ear just itching for the tale to be told… I’ll want truth in the tale, though.”

“Hmmm. I shall certainly see if I can manage…”

“You’ll manage, Shydyn, don’t worry,” Vadim was out of his seat and waving to one of his attendants, “I’ve got other people who will see to that for you, hmm?

Take him to the back room,” he ordered, before turning to regard Cay again.

“I want you to stay right here,” he ordered flatly as Nyx was jerked roughly down and dragged off to some darkened corner beyond the desk, “I’ll be getting the painful truth from your partner soon enough. If it turns out that I believe you over him, I’ll send you home and let you prepare for your continued stalking of the Bolstoii girl… If it turns out otherwise…” Vadim shrugged, turned, and followed in the path taken by his henchmen.

“Have something to eat while you wait,” the man’s voice called just before a door could be heard to bump shut, “between the chewing and the grumbling of your stomach, maybe you’ll not have to hear much of the screams…”

Soon enough the room was vacant save for her and Mouse. 

“Not going to go join in the fun?” her skirts billowed out around her legs some as she plopped into a chair.

“Not my kind of party” The fondant cooed from his position near the door.

“Yeah…” the fires rolled in her head and she leaned back fully in her chair falling silent.

Through the walls that separated her and Nyx now she began to hear screams echoing. Closing her eyes tightly she kept her fist drawn up. Her heartbeat made time with his screams, bringing back the memory of how his pulse had throbbed through his veins earlier, how it must be coursing through his battered body now. In silence she waited it out, trying to keep her breathing as level as she could knowing that her every twitch was being watched and recorded by Mouse across the room. 

Let him guess at what is going on through my thoughts. I think I would even have to guess at this point

Instead of thinking she tried to give into the pain that started in her palm and spread up her arm, tried to imagine that the chorus in the next room was not Nyx, was not being done in order to save her own reputation and skin from the same fate. The minutes passed and the noises grew worse, her heart beat continued to speed along with his, the blood spilled over her palm as it spilled down his body.

When the door finally opened again to allow the muscle to walk in she jumped out of her seat. Her heart catching in her throat as her eyes opened and she looked at the figure in the doorway.

“You’re free to go Cay. Keep with your assignment and make another report tomorrow.”

Free to go? He didn’t betray me then? Despite all the screams? Despite what they’ve done to him? He didn’t betray me...

He didn’t betray me… 

The voice went on in her head, but outside she kept her cool, kept up the act same as him. If Nyx could keep his cool under the pressure he was facing, she would keep hers.

“And him?” she cocked her chin toward where the screams were still coming. “I don’t get a chance with him?”

“No… Dmitrova isn’t done with him yet. I think he plans to keep you two working together though, so you’ll get your chance. Unless Tselika gets to him first that is.” He laughed.

“Tell Dmitrova I’ll come back on my own tomorrow.” Her voice cold as she left the room. 

The streets were still cloaked in darkness when she left the Hydra’s Breath. A few more hours and daylight would chance across the ripples of the sea once more, but for now the darkness still held sway. At this early hour there were few out and she moved confidently toward her goal.

Where to now Cay?

Don’t make me say it… you know full well where I am off to…

Be careful though…

She paused and out of the corner of her vision noticed the flutter of grey that paused with her.

“Mouse…” she sighed and made a quick examination of her surroundings. The darkness was in her favor, but little else was. The crowds she could easily loose herself in were gone for the day, no mists clung in the alleys. A few other figures moved about around her: a noisy drunken couple stumbling toward a tavern, two men in dark cloaks and a group of three or four women narrowing in on the two men. A smile curled across her lips before she flitted over to the women. 

The first one that caught her eye was a middle aged human, her smile was sans a few teeth and Cay could almost see the dirt that collected in her wrinkles under the layer of heavy makeup. 

“Lookin’ fer sometin’ nice?” The woman scooted up close to Cay.

“Hardly… not for me no. The man in the grey robes behind me. My boss, he wants something nice. I’m just here to set it up.”

The woman leaned sideways a bit to get a look at who Cay was talking about. “ohhhh… well... in dat case… 30”

Cay laughed, “30? For you? For 30 I could get a nice girl with all her teeth to suck on it…” with a flip of her head she started to walk away.

A hand reached out for her, “20… an I’ll do whate’er he like”

“17”

“Drive a hard deal der miss…”

“17”

“A’ight… 17…” The hand went palm up and Cay fished a few coins out of her pocket and slapped them in the woman’s palm. 

“Be persistent, he likes to be seduced.” Cay winked then started to walk off. 

* * * 

Half an hour later she stared down at the stone that hid the entrance to his crypt. In her arms she carried a bundle she had put together at a tavern along the way, with enough money you can get just about whatever you would like at a tavern it turned out. The stone standing in its proper place confirmed that Nyx had not been nabbed here and that this was still a safe place to come, and that Nyx would then return to it again. 

So she moved the stone and left it slightly out of place purposefully before taking herself and her bundle inside. Once again she went about waiting for him, this time inside his lair. A candle poised on one of the pedestals lit her in the soft glow of its light. The sheet she had procured lay across her knees while she sat on the floor, it unraveled into strips under her fingers. Between strips she paused to take a swig from the bottle of wine to her left. To her right there was another bottle filled with water. 

She focused on the task she was working on and tried to tune out the voice that kept asking her what she was doing in her head.

“Yes sir…” her chin rising in the air a hair as she said it and then spun out of the room. The passive protest hanging over the door fluttering against the purple of her skirts as she stalked out. She had a gray shadow she noticed as she moved up into the main rooms of the Hydra.

A drink… yes… a drink sounds wonderful right now. she mused to herself as she wandered over to the bar. The shadow found his way to a table near the main entrance, positioning himself out in the open letting her know where he was and what he blocked from her. A snarl curled at her lips and she slammed a coin onto the bar top.

“Something hard and dark!” her voice hit Ruun’s back while he was attending another customer down the way.

Immediately the barkeep’s face turned sour and after pausing to give an apology to the guest he had been speaking to turned around. “You know Cay… just because you’ve got a cut on your hand doesn’t give you the right…” he stopped as he took in the specter that had spoken with Cay’s vocals. A tall woman wearing a purple dress that hugged in all the right places and a face that was finely chiseled and not veiled in dark shadows. “to… boss me around.” He finished without the same bite he had begun with.

Keeping his eyes on her he pours her a mug and sets it before her. “You clean up rather well if I might say so myself.”

“Shove it Ruun, I’m not tipping you.” Her fingers curl around the handle of the mug and she turns around giving him the subtle curve of her back as she leans against the bar and begins to nurse her drink. Across the bar her shadow tips her a smile.

Mouse. Prior to this afternoon she knew him only by reputation. When she rounded the corner and saw his grey personage crouched under the ‘Vergal Sea Port’ sign however she knew the day had taken an even further turn for the worse.

”Ah sheit!” she murmured under her breath. “Fires of hell that pale pointy eared bastard will be the death of me!”

And yet you haven’t rid yourself of him, in fact you are planning on lying to the Hellkites to save his pale ass… so very interesting…

“Not in the mood right now…” grimaced through her teeth.

Pulling herself together she stepped out of the shadows and toward the skeleton stairs that led to her apartment.

“Cayrimsa?” The muscle spoke first, stepping forward to keep her from the stairs, his voice held a bit of apprehension to it though.

“Well… a Cayrimsa lives here, I’m trying to go upstairs… yeah I think I’m Cayrimsa at least that is what logic would suggest, then again I’d imagine you don’t have much of a brain under that thick skull of yours. What do you want?” Her eyes tried to keep both of the men in her view, the muscle was a worry, but the man in grey bothered her more.

“It ain’t what I want. It’s what my boss wants… Dmitrova wants to see you.”

Her eyes narrowed into slits. “I’m on my way there now, I just wanted to change before I went.”

“Perhaps my friend here was not clear… Dmitrova wants to see you now.” Mouse came into her field of vision. His accent was strange, clear but languid. Each word stretched over the skeletal knobs of consonants like sugary fondant.

“Well if you would let me pass I’ll go change and be there in a moment.” Without waiting for their agreement she moved to push past the muscle and toward her stairs. His hand fell on her arm.

“Don’t touch me!” she shrieked before spilling out the spell that she had worked on Nyx not long ago. The muscle leaped back and clutched his arm in his good hand.

“Ack! Mouse! The bitch just bit me! She bit me!”

“Idiot! She didn’t bite you. She shocked you. Do your job…”

“You do yours…” the muscle spat back at Mouse still rubbing his arm.

“Fine.” The wand came out from a fold in his robes and Cay found herself staring down the end of it. “Now then witch… are we going to have any further problems out of you?”

In typical Cay fashion a blob of spit launched at his toes became her answer. From her side the muscle grabbed her arm again and held it fast this time. The three of them began rather noisy trip back to the Hydra’s Breath. Every spell she attempted to cast was countered by that wand.

Mouse. She had little respect for the man who had no panache with his magic. He casted with rote memorization and because of his position within the Hellkites his spellbook was loaded with boring spells designed only to castrate those like herself. So Vadim had called in the mohawk woman to handle Nyx, and Mouse to handle her.

She smiled down into her reflection.

Glad to see he is worried enough about me to call in Mouse. Worried about us.

Her amber eyes dissolved in the thick ripples she created when she took a drink of the heavy ale.

Using that word again Cay. Us… We…

So?

Just point it out. It’s always been I.

I think we will work well together. He seems to almost predict what I’m going to do sometimes. He didn’t scoff at this scheme I concocted. He saved my ass.

He’s an elf… a full blooded mith’ganni at that…

The ripples died down and she stared into her eyes again, noting the way they curved slightly toward her temples.

How far are you willing to go? You are lying to Hellkites already. If they find him… how much do you trust him and his twilight blood? Think he will keep to the story you wove with him? Or will he crack like his kind always do? Confess not only his own sins but take you down with him… he could. All he has to do is explain what he did, and why he did it… Dmitrova will know you are full of shit. Mouse will be on you before you can even squirm and everything you’ve worked for will be gone in an instant.

The smile she had toyed with a moment ago fell into her ale. Quietly she whispered, “He’s not like the others… I’ve seen that…”

The admission turned her stomach and under the watchful gaze of Mouse she found her way to a table near the edge of the room, where the shadows clung to the walls and she could hide the torment on her face. Reflected out of her mug the way Nyx was pulling at her emotions played out before her.

There is a flurry of purple material that rushes into the room, blazing amber eyes floating above it. “Where is my partner!? You sent these gorillas to bring me here to ask me about Nyx!? Get them off me!”

“Are you going to behave yourself this time Cayrimsa?” 

She responds with a curt nod of her head.

“Well if you promise to behave yourself…” Dmitrova nods to the two men who have got her by the elbows and they let go. “But boys, stick around in case the witch changes her mind.”

The dark muscle gives Cay a wicked grin as he steps back a few feet and positions himself between Cay and the door, while the tall thinner man in the grey robes simply wanders to the corner of the room and keeps his eyes on the woman in purple. She shakes her arms out as they let go and she smoothes out her dress some before glaring at Dmitrova.

“Good… now as for Nyx… if you find him you let me know. I haven’t seen him since last night. Apparently he felt I owed him something for backing me up when I was here last, or else he got me confused with one of his horses. Tried to take me in some alley after we left here!” She touched the bloom on her cheek, “Got in a few good hits before I managed to get a spell out on him and he ran off with that tail tucked between his legs. Haven’t seen him since. Which is good for him as I have plans to start hewing body parts from him starting with his ears and working my way to his toes… I imagine about midway through he’ll be screaming for me to stop. I don’t know what this is all about! And I don’t think I care. I’ve done my job and I was on my way here to report to you, when your thugs drug me here. I don’t appreciate being handled like this Dmitrova, especially not when I’ve been doing exactly what you told me to!” 

“So you don’t know where Nyx is or what he has been doing all day?”

“I said no didn’t I? Are you deaf!?”

Dmitrova rises up and pushes his large frame into Cayrimsa’s personal space.

“Have you forgotten your place already Cayrimsa?!” he glowers over her. Tselika leans forward a bit fingering the short sword on her belt anxiously.

“You start dressing up like an elf and forget that you have sworn an allegiance to me? To the Hellkites?”

Her fist tightens and she takes in a deep breath. “No sir. I haven’t. I simply don’t understand why you keep bringing up Nyx. I have information that I’d imagine is much more interesting than that festering pile of hwandi.”

“Then what is your report Cay?”

“I spent the afternoon cooped up in the Bolstoii barn. I was not certain I would get anything, the murder this morning put everyone into turmoil.”

“You know something about the murder?”

“Know something? By the Gods… I know more than you would imagine. Kharinya is sleeping with the murderer.” She watches as Dmitrova’s face contorts into confusion and then nearly shock.

“You heard me. His name is Aelion. He’s a slave in her father’s household, takes care of the horses. He poisoned Lady Olsta a few days ago, sounded like it was an accident, that he meant to kill Senator Olsta instead. He is using a trip to get a horse for Styopa as his alibi… was on his way back when he ran into a woman on the street who remembered seeing him near the Olsta estate the night of the murder. Seems he panicked and killed her and her child. He admitted this all to Kharinya. She’s going to try and help him out of town tomorrow.”

“Lle sarigrien,” he growled through clenched teeth, “are you completely mad?!?

You know Cay that is a very valid question he poses. Are you mad? Completely and utterly mad? You of course realize that you are the only one who keeps bringing up such things, don’t you?

The fire in her eyes flickered when he growled at her and her grip loosened just slightly on his wrist. For a brief moment the tip of her finger presses against the vein running along the inside of his wrist. The quickened pulse of his elven blood pumping through his body consumes her senses. It speaks of raw emotion, of pain, regret and anger… and passion. Pounding through his body and then through their touch up into hers, paralleling the pulse that her own heart is now throbbing out.

“Get your hands off of me, woman,” he hissed, and the pulse that she had just found was wrenched from her. The sudden breaking stills the blood flow in her veins for a moment and she takes in a sharp breath. The elf vanishes from sight while she retrains her heart to beat on its own again.

“Lle sarigrien, indeed,” he murmured at her right and she turned toward the voice.

On the tomb he perched, another statue in this necropolis. Under his narrowed gaze she watched for a moment as he rubbed at his wrist. His fingers were pale and thin, yet strong. The moons around his fingernails were dark with blood and dirt. Scratches screamed out in pink against the whites of his knuckles. Her eyes followed the trail of his fingers up his arm and across his body, noting the way he favored the one leg in his crouch. Like his hands the rest of his body bore the wounds he had incurred during the day. There was a tenseness to his pose, however, and she knew he was still prepared to fight if he must. That he would fight to death if it was required of him.

Not like any others of his kind you have seen is he Cay?

They are all the same… a weak pitiful race that feeds off the scraps of the Imperial table.

Those eyes stayed fixed on her still, they did not waiver but eventually softened slightly as he sighed.

“You should go, now, make your report to Dmitrova…”

The mith’ganni regarded her for a moment longer, the whisper of a smile played on his lips for less than that, and he finally allowed his eyes to close once more; his head rocking back to rest against the wall, his arms wrapping around his aching ribs, and his legs drawing in closer to his body, the tug in his thigh evoking a faint grimace. “Amin anta est,” he added, “I shall find you in the morning, yes?”

He was still close enough for her to reach over and touch him again. Part of her wanted to, her fingers twitched momentarily as they remembered the feel of his pulse moving beneath them. She wondered if it had slowed as his breathing had slowed down. She wondered if it would spike again if she touched him, if her mere touch would stir the heavy palpations of his heart, if his eyes would open and how he would look upon her then.

If he would look upon you as Sidhion looked upon you?

No!

Why is it so hard Cay?

With a sigh she turned from the main object of her own personal torment and crouched down to crawl out of the hole. On her way out she whispered, “Quel kaima.”

The North wind whipped against her as soon as she was outside. Icy fingers ran through her hair and down her body. With a shudder she glanced back into the dark hole at her feet.

Why are you out here when you could be stirring that heartbeat? The fire that burns in him would keep you so very warm…

Dragging the stone he had moved earlier over the hole, leaving enough room on the one side for his hand to get a grip and thus not trap him inside, she began to respond to the voice in her head Fires burn…

Whatever else she had in mind was cut short by a soft whisper that drifted from the tomb.

"And for what it's worth, nwalmaer... that is a thing I should never take uninvited... from anyone..."

Her eyes closed, she touched her cheek, not the one with rose blossom on it, but the one that his fingers had graced, it was still warm as if the fire that burned within him had left a shadow of itself upon her skin. Without thinking she clenched her fist and let the pain sharpen her senses so she could stand and walk out of the cemetery.

As she schemed his moonlit eyes had become lost in her own, both wrapped up in the sudden excitement that tingled through the air. No matter how much she denied she too felt how close he was, but her mind was working too hard on the plan formulating across her synapses even as she spoke to really pay too much attention to what he did with his tongue and with his fingers.

Finally she stopped talking and waited for his response to her plan. He was close enough that when he drew in a deep breath she could almost feel the air pull from her own lips and into his, which gave her a slight jolt.

“You are a wicked paching slitch, Cayrimsa Etellenya,” he managed to say after a moment, “I am very impressed…”

A look of pride flitted through the amber fires and she just barely lifted her chin further into the air with it. That slight change in her position closed the breadth between the tips of his fingers and her cheek. A dangerous flash of light crackled through the pride that only a moment ago had taken over her features.

Without a single moment’s hesitation her left hand had risen and clamped over his wrist tearing it from her face and twisting it down between them even as she uttered a soft whisper and a jolt of tingling power ran up and down his arm.

“Not your melamin!” she hissed through her teeth. “No matter how impressed with me I am not your melamin and for your sake I’d hope you’d remember that. The last, and the only time an elf has ever been foolish enough to try and have me… I bit off his ear…” the last bit is snarled at Nyx and she twists his hand further as another jolt shocks through his arm. “I swear I can find more interesting parts to remove from you…”

“Working with you is one thing… lle sarigrien… is something else.”

“Is that what you want, Cayrimsa?”

As his eyes fixed on hers she turned her head and let the bonfires light up the darkened stain glass.

It’s a good question Cay, what do you want, what are you doing here?

She sighed a moment and curled her hand into a fist again, working to dig her fingers into the maw there so that the pain would spark more intensely. If he was watching the knuckles on her hand turn white and next to the scorch mark he had been looking at a drop of her tainted blood hits the tile.

Work with Nyx again? Is that it? Or is it more?

Over the sound of Nyx breathing she could hear the way the stable barn had been shuddering earlier in the day, it was oddly connected with the pain that rove up her arm. She had made a fist then too, desperately trying not to focus on the lustful activities that went on below her.

Why did you try so hard to block out that foolish human girl and her elven lover?

Her lover!

The fires flashed for a moment.

They say the murderer has eyes like yours… another horse elf. Kiki’s voice repeated in her head.

Before she could stop herself her head snapped back toward Nyx and a slight smile played over her lips.

“Aelion… He is not a full blooded Mith’ganni from what I could tell, but he has your eyes. Technically he did not arrive in town for several hours after the murders… but who would believe him anyway? He’s a slave, and with some digging they would find not only who he is sleeping with, but perhaps more… well behaving slaves don’t need their lovers to get the cargo manifests to Avenon now do they?” She licks her lips a moment. “Who knows what I might have heard the two of them talk about in the barn? Say he admits to his love his crime…” She is actually smiling now as the fires dance behind her eyes, and leans closer to Nyx in her excitement, “admits that he poisoned Lady Olsta, too, and that the wench on the street asked him something on his way back… suggested to him that she had seen him around the Olsta house the night of the poisoning… so he acted out rashly… killed the mother and the child to keep them quiet… finally came back to get Kiki to help him escape… I can tell all of this to Dmitrova. And keep the nugget about Avenon to ourselves until we can learn what the little human-loving-elf wanted with the information…”

She was doing it again using pronouns that she would not have perhaps even a few hours ago. It also was not a direct answer to his question, instead it was a possible solution to what she might have given as an answer.