Chapter Twelve
Taming the Night
The fire in front of me was small intentionally so. It barely illuminated the night. All was still except for the evening chirp of insects. Despite my best efforts I was depressed.
I leaned back against a deadfall tree and morosely considered the situation. I had hoped to come away from the north with twenty thousand hardened warriors at my back with which I could smash into the enemy’s rear and take them by surprise.
Now…… now I had several thousand girls that had done little more than hunt for deer.
There was no way that I could attack the enemy from the rear with such a small untrained force.
Creator what am I going to do?
There seemed to be only one thing that could be done. After giving the girls a week’s worth of training or so we would move south and slip into the besieged city and wait for whatever our fate might be with the rest of the Eastern Kingdom.
I had been turning the stolen apple over and over in my left hand, which was propped up by my left knee as I reclined back against the dead tree. I threw the apple out into the darkness beyond the little fire. I saw the faint movement of a hand and the apple was snatched out of the air.
There was stillness for a moment and then part of the darkness moved and I saw the familiar glowing eyes watching me. I’d surprised her I could tell. She moved closer to the fire and I watched her come.
“How did you know I was there?” She asked in a softly perturbed tone of voice.
“Had a feeling you were there. My feeling was off by about a foot and a half though. You have to teach me how you move around so quietly.”
She moved closer and sat down.
Almost as if to herself she said, “The skill comes easily if your life depends on it each day.”
“And I thought it was just some of your demoness powers on display.” I said wondering if she would see the humor in my statement.
I wasn’t disappointed. I saw the faint glint of her sharp teeth, when she smiled slightly. We both knew that she was no demon, as to what she was though that was still a mystery to me. I could see her hand where it gripped the apple that she had snatched out of the air. The hand itself seemed normal and feminine enough looking, but her fingernails!
They had to be at least an inch past her finger tips and they looked as sharp as an eagle’s talons. She caught me glancing at them speculatively and she smiled wickedly flexing her fingers and sinking her talons into the apple’s skin.
I smiled back at her, which seemed to surprise her once again. She sure was a wild thing!
She began to eat the apple taking crisp clean bites out of it with her teeth that were as imposing as her nails were, perhaps even more so.
I just leaned back and smiled at her as she tried to intimidate me by eating the whole apple in front of me her teeth flashing in the light of the small fire.
The apple gone she tossed the core away with a flick of the wrist and then for dramatic effect she licked the taloned nail of one finger free of apple juice watching me all the while. I just continued to smile at her intimidation tactics. She looked away and seemed to sigh slightly right before she stood up to go.
“Leaving so soon? We have all night yet to have enlightening conversation.”
She looked at me enigmatically for a moment, “The road is long and the news you carry bad. You need your rest.”
I gazed at her surprised by her knowledge of what was going on.
“How do you know that? Are your kind in league with the North?”
Her eyes seemed to close off from me and she spoke disdainfully to me, “You ask too many questions!” And then she turned to go with a swish of her black silky cape.
“Wait a moment!”
She stopped and looked back her gaze a questioning icy glow.
“I got you a present.”
Her eyes widened in surprise and then narrowed suspiciously, “A gift?”
I held up the little bottle of perfume and then with great show I pulled the plug out. Taking the plug I shook a drop of the perfume off into the fire. The immediate area around the fire was suffused with the sultry essence of the perfume.
I watched her large pupils dilate for a second and her eyes glowed brighter as she turned around more fully to face me.
Oh she wanted the perfume I had no doubt of that, but how far would she be willing to go for it. I decided to press the limit with my midnight temptress.
“It comes with stipulations though.”
“Stipulations?” Her gaze was now openly suspicious.
“Yes you have to do three things.”
Her expressive eyebrows rose theatrically.
“First you have to walk over here. Then you have to tell me your name and then you get to take the bottle out of my hand.”
I held the bottle up clasped in my left hand, which had held the apple earlier. She looked at the bottle and then at me.
“I could just kill you and take it.” She said matter-of-factly.
“True, you could but what would be the fun of that and besides, who would you have to talk to in the middle of the night then?”
She confirmed my logic was sound when she moved toward me slowly. Her wary approach reminded me of the wariness of a wild animal sensing a trap.
“It’s okay you can trust me.” I said softly.
She drew back for a moment and practically hissed at me, “I trust no one!”
“Then perhaps you should start. Everyone needs someone they can trust.”
Contemptuously she spit out, “And do you have someone you trust?”
“Why yes I do my brother for one and the warriors I fight beside.”
She remained silent, but kept moving towards me until she stood directly in front of me. Her hand reached out and tugged on the bottle, but I didn’t let go of it. One sharp fingernail pressed down on my hand and after a moment’s resistance punctured it causing blood to escape. She looked at me threateningly her intentions clear.
“Trust goes hand-in-hand with another worthy attribute, which is honor. Without honor it’s hard to trust.” I said softly.
Our eyes were locked together, but hers were the first to drop away, which seemed to bother her greatly. She gave a tug on the bottle, but my grip on it didn’t budge. She withdrew her taloned fingernail and mumbled something unintelligible.
“I can’t hear you.” I said firmly.
She tossed her head back, which sent her lightly glowing hair cascading out from the hood she had worn on her head and glared sullenly at me and said in a higher audibled tone, “My name is Raya’nasa!”
I repeated the name liking the sound of it as it came off my lips.
“A well fared and pretty name for a beautiful woman such as yourself. Thank you Raya’nasa. You may collect your prize.”
I let go of the bottle and she quickly stepped back with it, looking around as if to make sure she wasn’t in the process of being ambushed.
Assuring herself of her surroundings she glanced back at me, “Good night Raya’nasa.”
That said I slumped down against the trunk and closed my eyes.
I heard her say, “You’re a fool!”
I smiled not opening my eyes and said, “That may be Raya’nasa, but at least I’ll die a happy one.”
Then there was silence and I peeked out of my eyelids and saw that she was gone. I shook my head, as she was right. I was a fool to try to tame such a wild creature as she was.
It could have been ten minutes or a half hour I wasn’t sure which, as I had been lost in my thoughts, when I heard the faintest of sounds.
My hand went towards my sword, but stopped when I heard her soft voice, “It’s only me. Raya.”
I moved my hand away from my sword completely puzzled as to why she’d come back. If she’d come back to kill me why announce herself?
I couldn’t see anything as the fire had gone out, but her voice had been close. And then of all surprises I felt her hands touch the one she had punctured with her taloned finger. I let her lift my hand and pull it towards her.
I felt her fingers wipe something wet across the puncture she had made. Her fingers were gentle as she cleaned it and then she pushed something spongy against it and then I felt her wrapping my hand with cloth. She tied it off and before she could disappear I brought one of her hands to my mouth and I kissed the back of it softly.
“Thank you again Raya’nasa.”
“Raya.” She said softly and pulled her hand free as she rose to her feet and was gone.
I lay there quietly feeling the neatly done bandage on my hand in the dark. Maybe I wasn’t such a fool after all to try to tame such a wild natured girl.
I opened my eyes alertly the next morning and I wasn’t overly surprised to see an apple sitting beside me on the ground or to hear Relentless still munching on his late-night snack in the background.
One thing was for sure neither I nor Relentless were likely to go without a healthy breakfast while in these mountains. After breakfast I rode off towards the secluded valley in the mountains that I had discovered on my way north.
The morning was hot and the sun felt good after the chill of the night air of the mountains. There were narrow openings into what I believed were other valleys to either side of the main trail that I followed.
It was a good place for an ambush and I wanted to make sure that I knew the lay of the land so that there weren’t any surprises when Ziya got here with her girls. I was about to pull Relentless down one of the narrow valley openings, when I heard what sounded like a distress noise emanating up a narrow opening on the opposite side of the main trail.
I pulled Relentless back around and waited listening intently. There it was again!
Something was definitely in distress. I drew my bow from behind my back and held it at the ready as I eased Relentless down through the narrow valley opening.
It began to open up some, but it continued on downhill and forested slopes rose sharply up on either side. The grassy bottom of the valley began to turn swampy and the going got trickier to navigate through. Open bogs and marshy ponds popped up everywhere.
It was not a very nice place. I had been following a set of horse tracks in the upturned mud. Why had the unknown rider come to such a place?
Why not skirt the swampy valley bottom and go along the edges of the forested slopes to either side?
We almost slipped down into a boggy marsh and I made the decision that I was turning around, when I heard the sound of distress much closer. It was a horse, probably the horse of the unknown rider. It had probably slipped into a bog like we had just nearly done and was now stuck.
The sound had come from just around the bend and I let Relentless go onward. The scene of distress quickly revealed itself. The horse’s rider wasn’t a he it was a she and in particular it was my midnight temptress.
A beautiful roan mare was bogged down in a marshy bog. Her backend haunches were sunk in deeper than her front shoulders were. She was shivering visibly from both fear and fatigue.
Raya’s black hair hung free and didn’t show any of its glow in the sunlight. Her shimmery black cloak was completely mud splattered and she was knee deep in the mud herself. She was urging her mare on in a soft encouraging voice that sounded more like a plea to me.
The mare tried again valiantly, but she was stuck fast and soon gave up exhausted. Raya had been pulling hard on her bridal, but gave up when the mare did. She stepped forward and leaned against the mare’s chest looking exhausted herself.
I would give a good bet that she was shedding some tears too. She seemed to be very attached to her horse, which was something I could understand well. One of the stranger aspects of the whole situation was that both the mare’s head at the eyes and Raya’s head were wrapped with a black cloth.
Why would Raya blindfold herself and her horse?
I dismounted and walked to the edge of the bog they had fallen into. The mare had noticed me, but was too exhausted to warn her master.
“Looks like you could use a little help Raya.”
Raya spun around at my voice her sharp teeth bared and her claws ready to strike at anything that approached. She was such a wild creature this strange girl of the night.
“Easy Raya! I’m not here to hurt you. Do you want my help to get your horse out?”
I wouldn’t say she relaxed any, but she did manage to utter a monosyllabic, “Yes!”
She’d proven to me before her wild natured behavior and in her present condition of frayed nerves I didn’t trust being right next to her, because in the passion of the moment she might lose her temper and run me through with her sharp fingered hands.
“Alright you’ve done enough in there come back out and stand up here on the bank where you can encourage her.”
Raya didn’t move but just stood facing the direction of my voice her face mutinous.
“Raya if you want my help you do it my way or not at all!”
She gave a strangled sounding grunt of frustration before she began to slog through the thick mud.
“To your left more Raya.”
She corrected her course and reached out blindly for the bank. She was completely exhausted looking as she tried to pull free of the thick mud. Her hair was soaking wet and what part of her face that was visible was streaming with perspiration. It dawned on me then that she wasn’t used to the heat of the day and on top of a several hour long struggle to free her mare she was dressed up in a cloak made heavy by mud.
She would’ve fallen back into the bog, if I hadn’t grabbed her arms and helped pull her up and out the rest of the way.
She was surprisingly heavy for her size. Another mystery to be discovered no doubt. I led her by the arm over to some dry looking ground, grabbing my water satchel off of Relentless as we went by him.
I stopped her. Her lips were dry, which meant she needed fluid in a bad way. She’d sweated too much out, but convincing her of the next step was going to be hard.
“Raya you’re burning up. You need to get this cloak off and get cooled down or you’re going to get heat sickness, which you may already have!”
My hands went to the clasp of her cloak, but her hands came up and grabbed mine.
“Let go. This has to come off.”
Her hands went to the clasp and I read her intentions, “You want to do it?”
She nodded and I let my hands fall away. I hated not being able to see her mesmerizing eyes. The cloak came apart and fell wet and heavy to the ground. She wore a woolen overcoat sort of dress that went to her knees. No wonder the girl had been sweating!
“That needs to come off too Raya.” I said thickly wondering if she would obey me and if she did what if anything she had on below the woolen dress.
Her fingers reluctantly went to the big buttons down the center of what was more of a shift coat than a dress. Enough buttons undone the heavy shift fell to the ground and as it did Raya folded her arms defensively across her surprisingly ample chest.
The women of Assoria typically weren’t endowed in the chest as much as the women I had grown up around were, but Raya was an exception to that. As well as was the rest of her.
I had never seen another woman that could compare with her. She was the most physically fit woman I had ever encountered. There were fit and lithely muscled warrioress’s among my own people and the women of Assoria, but nothing like this!
Her chest was encased in a halter top of leather, which left her shoulders, belly and lower back completely bare. She had leather shorts that conformed tightly to her legs and ended just above the knees. Her shoulders were solid corded muscle, which trailed down to equally strong forearms. Her belly was completely ribbed with muscle and her muscularly corded thighs that swept down to merge into defined calves showed easily how she could have conceivably jumped the abyss of several nights ago that she had almost lured me into.
What did this girl eat?
And beyond that what did she do to get so physically fit?
She didn’t have a bit of extra fat or flesh on her muscular frame minus her ample chest. Yet she didn’t appear mannish at all, but was altogether entirely feminine looking even with all the muscles, as evidenced by the arching curve of her form from her chest down to her wide hips.
It was like the muscles were a natural occurrence on her instead of something that had been gained through exercise. She was beautiful and powerful and I was grateful for my own great strength, because without it this woman could probably mop the floor with me.
I realized I had been staring fixatedly at her body for a long time and I blushed slightly as well as from the urge that came to me to ask her to keep shedding layers of clothing off.
“I’m sorry! It’s just that the rest of you is as mesmerizing as your eyes and face are.”
Her eyes?
“Why do you have your eyes covered?”
Her cheeks were rosy whether because of my comments or being overheated I wasn’t sure.
Her voice was soft almost to low to hear, “If I or my horse see daylight it will cause us to go blind.”
Go blind to just seeing daylight! What was going on here?
“Are your eyes closed?”
She nodded and I took the cloth away from her eyes.
She gasped and reached for it, but I held it out of her reach. I soaked it with the cold water from my bottle and started mopping her face with it. I swallowed hard as my eyes involuntarily followed the path of several rivulets of water as they ran off her face and down her neck to disappear into the cleft of her breasts visible above the leather halter top.
Dousing the rag again I laid it around her neck and gave her the water bottle and then forced myself to step back.
“You stay here and look beautiful and I’ll get your horse out. Does she have a name?”
“Starfire.” she said softly.
I turned and grabbing the length of rope that I kept on Relentless I headed out into the bog towards the stuck mare. She stirred nervously as she smelled and heard me approach.
“Easy girl I’m a friend. We’ll get you out of here Starfire.”
She seemed to settle down at my calming touch on her. I fastened the rope securely to the saddle and then I slogged back out of the sucking mud to the bank. I backed Relentless up as close as I dared to the edge of the bank and stopped him.
I fastened the other end of the rope securely to him and then eased him forward to take the slack out of the line.
“Whoa boy.”
I jumped back down into the bog and eased up alongside of Starfire. I got ready to push behind one of her front legs.
“Okay pull Relentless!”
Relentless knowing what was needed of him instantly pressed forward his massive muscles bunching and snapping as his hooves sank into the soft ground deeply. With sucking protest the mud started to let go of the mare.
I was pushing so hard I was starting to see stars in my eyes. The mare was moving forward farther and then she got her back legs under her and surged for the bank taking me along with her. Relentless didn’t leave any slack, but just kept pulling the mare up the bank. Once on top I yelled as best as I was able to as I was out of breath.
“Stop Relentless! Stop!”
He jerked to a halt and so did the mare and I. The mare stood there quivering and dripping muddy water. I gently felt over her back and legs checking for injury, but I found none. She was just tired.
Relentless came back around and start paying the mare more interest than he should and I realized that the mare was in heat. I quickly pulled Relentless out of the way and tied him off to a tree.
I turned and saw Raya patting her beloved mare on the shoulder with one hand. Her back was to me and I watched the scene unfold for a moment glad that I had been here to help her. I walked up towards them wanting to assure Raya that Starfire had checked out all right.
When I had drawn close to Raya I said, “She seems fine except for being fatigued by the ordeal she went through.”
Raya nodded and for a moment all I could do was to admire the lovely form of Raya’s rear encased in leather before me, when suddenly she moved with blinding speed.
She had a heavy branch in her hands that she had concealed in front of her. I barely got a hand up to help block the branch’s impact with my head.
The impact drove me to my knees and then the branch exploded across my back jarring my breath from me and knocked me to the ground. Desperate to defend myself I started to push up, but a terrific blow to my head arrested my movement and sent me back to the ground.
The little ungrateful witch had turned on me! I tried to stay conscious, but the darkness closed in fast.