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The Battle Mage

1.

Capturing a battle mage is probably one of the dumbest things a person can try to do. They are slippery little spell weavers that have dedicated the greater part of their lives to the study of rapid-fire magic and wand-waving. They are notoriously hard to kill, even when cornered or unconscious, for their magic keeps on working even if their bodies aren't. Kilmara folktales would have people believe that they can turn aside an enchanted weapon with but a thought, and that poison-tipped arrows seem to slip right through them without harming a single hair on their bodies, so strong is their magic. Some even say that they can freeze you with a stare.

For my part, I didn't believe most of what I heard. I had been a member of the Guild long enough to have heard the tavern whispers of awe and terror of our deeds and members. Kilmara folk believe that members of the Guild are all black-as-midnight cats, silent as a poisoned blade and quick as an eel, able to walk through shadows, with eyes red as angry coals. The Guild itself had a hand in perpetuating such rumors, of terrifying beasts with nothing but malice in their black hearts, of beings hardly more than shadow. The result was that nobody ever noticed a mild-mannered coyote who wandered into town, got a room for a night at a local inn, and was out again the next day. And mild was a manner I had learned to cultivate for myself from a very young age. Now I didn't even have to think of the small smile I always carried, or the way I would speak to people without quite meeting their eyes.

No, the rumors of battle mages were founded, as always, with a seed of truth. The catch was that I did not know for certain which part was the seed, and which part was the true lie. The Guild had been started by eight jaguars, after all, all of whom had dyed their fur black and one of whom was an albino. So we have been told.

The Guild is not a centralized entity, the founders having decided that many small houses were slightly more unobtrusive than a large headquarters in Greenford. They had purchased a small space on the market street and the lot immediately behind it, and set up a front as a jewel dealer. The current "owner" was a wily ferret named Garot, and his greed was honest enough to be convincing, even to me. As far as I know, he was never directly involved in any under-the-table dealings, but I know enough not to know for sure.

Garot was smart enough to not ask too many questions, which was another reason the Guild liked him. I don't know if he knew exactly who he was working for, but he seemed to have an idea of the type of people they were. So when he was asked to do something such as delivering a strange message to somebody, he didn't think too hard on what it might mean. He just delivered it and went about his work, subtly robbing his customers of their coins.

For the sake of convenience, I lived with him on the upstairs level, along with one other, a red fox named Ezra. It was a good arrangement for all involved, as it allowed me a place to stay and the illusion of a legitimate job. And Garot had the vigilance of two trained killers as his security.

I had been lazing upstairs with Ezra when Garot knocked on the door twice.

"Come in," I said. Ezra grunted.

The door opened and the ferret stuck his head in. "I've got a--oh!" He halted as his eyes came to rest on my lap and, subsequently, Ezra's head. "I thought you said for me to come in."

"I did," I said, and I could feel Ezra grin. I tried to keep my face serious. "What is it?"

"Oh. Well, a gentleman just came by and then left without buying anything."

"Garot, if everyone--Ezra, stop that--if you came up here every time somebody refused to be swindled by you, you'd never leave and we'd be forced to find an honest man to mind the store."

"Mm, and what a waste that'd be. We'd never sell anything then." Ezra wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and grinned at Garot, who looked back impassively.

"Well, not all of them leave these little letters so beautifully addressed to no one." He produced a small folded note barely the size of his palm from his front pocket and held it between two fingers.

"Who's minding the store?" I asked.

"Nobody. But nobody knows that. Here's the letter, I'm going back downstairs."

"What? Come, Garot. Come on in and spend some time with us." Ezra was grinning like a jackal. Garot raised an eyebrow, pointedly not looking at my crotch, and just as pointedly set the little note on the floor just inside the door. "Spoilsport," Ezra called after his retreating footsteps. He looked up at me. "Shall I?" In response, I reached out and cupped his face gently in my hands, then guided his muzzle to me. He chuckled, but opened his mouth obligingly.

A few minutes later we had both read the letter and I had my pants back on. Ezra was sitting with his feet dangling off the foot of his bed toying with a small earring I assume he had quick-fingered from someone on the street. Something I had noticed early on was that fox always had to have something in his gray paws. I sometimes wondered how he was stealthy if he couldn't stand still, but I never did ask him. I did not believe it was an accident Ezra and I ended up sharing a room together, but I did not presume to think that asking would get a straight answer from him. I did have my pride, after all.

Ezra looked up at me with a strange look in his eye, though I was too preoccupied with my packing at the time to notice. He stared at me in silence for some time, but he said nothing. Finally, tired of the prickling sensation my neck was giving me, I said, "You're going to burn a hole through me if you keep that up."

Sorry," he lied. He looked back down at the earring as though ashamed to be caught looking at me. Looking back, I think that he really didn't think I'd notice his expression. At the time, however, enervated as I was by the letter and our play not too long ago, I allowed my mind to wander while I was in the safety of my home.

"I did not mean to rebuke you for looking, Ezra. But you looked ready to say something, so say it." I laced up the leather walking pad around my feet and slipped a tiny needle into a seam.

"Planning on being gone a while?" I didn't recognize the note of longing in his voice as something other than a friendly jab.

"Yeah, I'm going to go see the sights and wonders of the world while you sit here in our cozy little room." I took a moment from checking my poison box to grin at him. "What's the matter, you wanna go instead?"

For a moment he looked startled, as though something I said had tugged him from a deep reverie. It lasted only a moment, though, for the next second he was grinning back at me. He tossed me the earring. "Maybe you can barter that somewhere along the way," he said. I caught it reflexively and put it in my money purse.

"See you," I said, and stepped out of the door.

I am sure, now, that I was a fool, then. Ezra had been friends for a long time, both having been apprenticed at the same time, though to different masters. It was with me he'd shared his first kiss, and after that, his first night. He was the one who gave me this journal, quietly telling me that he'd love to read my thoughts uninhibited by my words. To this day, I don't know why I hadn't seen before that he loved me. I still don't know why he didn't tell me. But I suppose there are some things we are not meant to know.

The note had told me, among other things, to meet a stranger in a pub called Kettles. The stranger, a bobcat in worn travel clothes who looked as though he ate far more often than not, told me succinctly that I was to go find a battle mage named Henet and bring something of him to a man in Holdin Town. When I asked sarcastically if I should carry his head back with me, the bobcat scowled and told me to use my imagination.

I set out that night and just managed to secure passage aboard a caravan making its way west from Durnings to Paggon with many stops on the way. I would remain at Waterford, a town halfway between the two that sat at the narrowest point of the immense Star River. From there I would travel south by way of the river to the even smaller town of Halford where this Henet was supposed to be.

Now I was on the river barge headed south, sitting cross-legged on the deck and looking through the rail at the forest that lined the river's edge for most of its charted length. Below me I could hear the scuffling of feet and rapping of hands as the passengers watched some kind of dice game between two large and rather angry mutts. Their accusatory voices drifted up to me through the wood planking, but I ignored them. I focused instead on the job I was supposed to be doing, and on my target, a wizard whose true name and species I still did not know. It seemed as though the majority of the people to whom I had mentioned Henet either did not know who he was, or else did not want to talk about him. From the others I had managed to learn that he had apparently been accused of killing his master, a crime for which he had been expelled by the Order. One person had told me that he no longer lived in Halford, though the fox was sure he still lived somewhere nearby. I had nodded pensively at that, and bade him drink more of his brandy. I was well out of town the next day when the wracking pains would have started, and hopefully he wouldn't die for a whole week, until I was well away. I couldn't afford to leave a trail of people behind me leading from a dead mage to Greenford. The line had to end somewhere.

I pondered the by-now-comatose fox's words. If Henet was not in Halford, my job did not become impossible, only much more inconvenient. I hoped that he was either lying, or else mistaken. Right now, though, I didn't have to worry about that. The barge was still three days from Halford, and the captain didn't seem in any hurry to put oars to water, content to let the current carry us.

I stood and stretched, enjoying the wind and soft spray on my face. I had found my sea legs not long after boarding, and was able to handle the constant rocking better than the majority of the passengers, most of whom were still wary of showing their faces above deck. I decided I should get some sleep. Maybe I would have an epiphany.

Halford was situated on a lake. The Star emptied into the lake with a kind of reckless abandon that made it impossible for ships to survive the transition from the one to the other, so the barge anchored about a mile up shore, though it was close enough to see the spray from the waterfall.

When the barge arrived at Halford it was raining. On the last day of the trip clouds and settled overhead and a light drizzle had begun that did not let up all through the night. The next morning, the tiny drizzle drops had turned into full-blown rain that worked its way sideways into the seams of one's clothing and made being outdoors miserable. The wind made it worse, buffeting the barge so hard that I thought I might lose the fine last meal the cook had made us. I was sick of eating fish and did not want to have to taste it again.

As soon as I was ashore I made straight for the Inn. When I got there, I was definitely not alone in my misery. At least half the patrons seemed to have only just stepped out of the lake. I called for a serving boy and asked for a brandy and dinner, and he hurried away to fetch it. While I waited I took stock of the people around me.

At least five of the people I had traveled with were here, huddled within their clothes and shivering. The fire roaring in the fireplace had enough of an effect that people were huddled around it. It reminded me of the beggars in Greenford.

I walked up to the barkeep and asked him if he had any more first floor rooms available. Though at first he seemed ambiguous, he became must less so when he palmed the gold coin, pointing to a room about which he had apparently forgotten. "I'm a wily cougar," I said without force.

"You most certainly are, sir," the ferret agreed. Though his eyes were shifty, I'd given him a glimpse of a purse which he was sure to covet. Nothing was good for keeping a mouth shut like the promise of a good meal and a quiet client. And money, of course. That was another good one.

The room was unremarkable in every way, but that was fine for me. I deposited my wet bag on the bed and looked around for something to use to lock the door. I wasn't planning on needing anything other than the complimentary stop bar, but one should always be prepared for the unplanned.

I donned my rain cloak and slipped quietly out the front door. The cloak had been enchanted so that although water would make it look wet, the wearer would stay almost completely dry. And it was wool, so it was warm.

I made my way through the town, stopping here and there, just learning what my eyes, ears and nose could tell me unaided by my own words. I was on my way back to the inn when I first heard someone mention the island. An island is of its own accord a rather unremarkable thing, but Halford's nearest body of water besides the lake was the ocean, which was some ways away, and it has always been my experience that people native to small towns harbored only minimal interest in the things that did not immediately concern them, far away oceans among those.

The men whose conversation apparently concerned an island were sitting under the awning of a shop that, while open, was currently devoid of customers due to the weather.

(It should be understood that I had no prior knowledge of any sort of island, for I had not seen one while we were coming in, and no map showed any. As such, though I was chasing a lead of a sort, it was only because I didn't have anything more tangible to use.)

"Evening," I said, slipping under the awning with the pair of badgers. They gave me a look that was altered somewhat when they saw that I wasn't soaked, and would therefore not be dripping water all over their feet.

"Evening," the one nearest to me said. He had a deep voice and calloused hands that I supposed belonged to a blacksmithâ€"as it turns out, I was right about that, by the way.

I decided that I was convincingly uncomfortable that I didn't need to bother with much preamble. "I overheard one of you mention the island," I said, making a show of huddling against the wall of the building. "I hope you don't mind me using this space to keep dry, by the way."

"Course not," said the other badger, a considerably smaller fellow with a scar running down his left arm.

"What do you know about the island?" the first badger asked.

"Well, that's just the thing," I said. "I don't know of any island, but from the way you were speaking, it was as though there was one in the center of this lake. Yet, I don't recall seeing one as we came in. Though," I added in a sly humor, "that could be because of the none-too-accommodating weather."

The badgers nodded sagely as I said this. The smaller one said, "Well, the weather being as it may, it's nothing to do with why you didn't see an island in the lake. That would be because there it isn't there to see."

"Ah," I said, somewhat disappointed but not really any worse off.

The badger continued, "It's invisible, is why you didn't see it."

I didn't quite know what to make of that, so I let my real reaction be the one they saw. "I beg your pardon?"

"There's an island in the lake, all right. 'Cept, thing is, you can't see it."

"Then, ah." I racked my brain. "How, exactly, does one know it's there?"

"One who?" the big badger asked, looking around.

"I mean me. Or you, actually. I mean," I said, backtracking, "you just said that there's an island in the lake, but that it's invisible."

"The island, not the lake."

"Yes, I gathered. I just mean to say, how do you know it's there if you can't see it?"

"It's there, sometimes," the small badger said with the air of one discussing that because one and one makes two, you're an idiot. "If I's understanding how you're asking, you're meaning how do we know it's there if we can't see it?" I nodded, keeping my thoughts on his deductive reasoning to myself. "It's ‘cuz it's there sometimes, sometimes not. It's not there right now, but on some days, you can see. 'Specially if you're out in the middle of the lake right near where it is, or rather isn't, but sometimes it is. You see?"

"No?" I hazarded. We shared a laugh at my humor.

"What's got you interested in the island, anyway? And where are you from, by the way?"

"I'm just staying here on my way through to what remains of my family," I said, trusting that if I left it at that they wouldn't question too closely. They didn't, simply nodded in commiseration. The Ongoing War took more and more lives every day, after all.

"Well, misters, I'm going to head back to the inn, and hope that I don't drown in all this rain." I shook their paws and they nodded as I left.

By the time I got back to my room the rain was coming down so hard that even the cloak was just barely enough to keep me dry. I went over all I had learned over the course of the day.

All in all, it wasn't much. I had learned through the casual talk of the inn's patrons that the town had indeed once been the home of mage named Henet, or else that a strange and reclusive cheetah around whom strange things were said to have occurred had lived here. I was able to bridge the gap that was apparently impassable to most of the town's inhabitants. So, I was looking for a cheetah battle mage who, unless my intuition was completely off, lived on an invisible island in the centre of a lake.

Have I mentioned the part about it being foolish to hunt battle mages?

I decided that the morning would be a better time to continue my search, when the weather was clearer and the icy rain wasn't soaking through my fur. I also figured I'd work better after a full night's sleep on solid ground.

When morning came, the rain was, if anything, heavier and icier. And, just to make things better, the wind coming off the lake had strengthened overnight. I considered waiting inside for another day to see if I could wait out the inhospitable weather, but the sooner I got started, the sooner I could return to warmer climates, and the more civilized cities. I donned my cloak and left the shelter of the inn.

This day I decided to go to the lake and see what I could see, but that turned out to be barely anything. The rain was falling in sheets, and it was falling into my face instead of toward the ground. I decided that waiting out the storm was actually the best course of action and left the lakeside for the warmer confines of the inn. The ferret innkeeper was most hospitable, practically throwing himself at my every desire, much to the consternation of the other patrons. This confused me until I remembered that I had given him a gold coin instead of whatever the meager fare actually was. So I acted the part of well-off-but-bereft family member in mourning. I must have done a pretty good job since no matter how agitated the others got none of them seemed too terribly willing to say anything to me.

After an hour or so of sitting around doing nothing I got restless. It's a curse, really, that I get restless at all, and normally it's a trait I do my best to conquer, for obvious reasons. Way out here, though, so far from civilized people, I felt my control slip, and soon enough I was back at the lake. This time, though, I had found a boat and a couple of oars. I tied the two handles together with a short piece of rope, then pushed off and started rowing.

I must admit that of all the ideas I'd had, rowing out into the middle of a lake where there may or may not have been an invisible island housing a battle mage, during a storm, was probably not one of the better ones. There was something pulling me toward the island, though I wasn't to figure out what it was until later. At the time I chalked it up to my desire to be finished with this mission and head home. I'd left my box back in my room, but I had several sharp implements coated in substances that made even touching the flat of the blades inadvisable if one wanted to stay conscious. There was even some green powder I'd acquired that was supposed to weaken magical defenses, though what it could have been, I didn't know, and I didn't ask. I also had my journal, which may have been a risky move had it not been enchanted to show nothing to anyone who just happened to pick it up; I had to allow them to see what was within.

Out on the water, the wind was fierce. Not only was the rain painful against my back, but the very waters of the lake itself were continually coursing up and over the sides, to the point where I seriously began to wonder about whether or not the boat could sustain all that weight. Instead of turning around, though, I resolved to go faster, and hope that I ran into the island before something bad happened to me. That was made difficult by the boat itself, which seemed to be weighted down by something; it was dragging too heavily.

After several minutes I could not see the shore. Several more minutes passed before my fingers went numb, and by this point I was shivering. I tried to bring my hands to my mouth to warm them, but each time I did so I nearly lost control of the oars. At a loss, I settled for rowing as quickly as I could. It was not an easy task, as the cold was sapping all of my strength. My ears and nose were numb, and the parts of me that were underwater were getting there. I opened my mouth to gulp in air and ended up coughing up water instead, and that was when I realized exactly how low the boat had sunk. Now frantic beyond the point of thinking, I dropped the paddles and started scooping the water out of the boat with my hands. It was no use: the water was already up over the sides. I tried to grab the paddles, but they had floated away. The boat rocked, and I slid out and into the storm-tossed water.

I tried to scream, but the water forced its way down my gullet and replaced what little warmth was left in my chest and stomach with ice. Then I was pushed under by a wave, and I couldn't bring myself back to the surface. I was frantic, but the lake would not let me go; it had grabbed me and was pulling me down, down. It was only when my lungs were burning and I gasped water that the weight lifted, but by then it was too late.

A cold so terrible I could not even shiver embraced me, and I closed my eyes and lost all sensation.

When I woke, I was, for lack of a better word, hazy. Nothing was in focus, visually or otherwise; all my senses were deadened. Whatever I was lying on was as soft as down feather. I felt something that I deduced to be a blanket draped over me, and what must have been a pillow under my head. As I eased my eyes open I saw a fire.

I have trained my mind to be the best I can make it; my profession is one in which one sleeps with a knife under his pillow and his hand on the handle. As I came awake I realized that someone must have picked me up when the water tossed me to shore. A few seconds of silence revealed that the storm had ceased, and a quick mental check that my limbs seemed to be intact.

Sitting up proved to be far more difficult than I'd thought it would be, and once I'd managed it, the effort had my head spinning so fiercely that I was afraid I would be sick, though I was sure I hadn't the strength for it. I settled for groaning and leaning over, supporting myself with weak hands and heaving nothing onto the floor, which I realized was actually stone.

I also belatedly realized that someone was watching me.

Knowing that there was nothing I would be able to do to stop any malicious advances due to my weakened state, I turned slowly around so I was facing away from the fire. There was a plush red chair behind a table that had obviously only recently been moved to make way for me, and in the chair was a cheetah. He was watching me with apprehension, sitting on one of his legs and holding one arm across his stomach and the other across his chest.

My heart caught in my throat. Two reasons: first of all, he was extraordinarily beautiful. I had no way of judging his actual age, but he looked to be only a couple of years less than my twenty-five. His eyes reflected the light in that queer way all cats' eyes did, making their natural green all the more entrancing. His fur was immaculate. He was stunning.

The second reason, of course, was he was undoubtedly my target: the battle mage Henet. Which meant that underneath the beautiful exterior was a trained killer, someone who could probably get rid of me without lifting a finger. His stillness was much more unnerving now.

My mind was racing. Perhaps I could grab that poker and spear him with it. But besides the fact that he would most likely have some sort of shield that protected him from such things, I doubted I had the strength to do it, anyway. The only option I had besides something directly physical was the green powder in my pack. I probably would have been able to fling some at him, and possibly even finish the job, had I had it with me. In fact, as all of these thoughts were going through my mind as I was rolling over, I realized that I was naked. No, almost; he had seen fit to leave me in my undergarment. He had a sense of modesty, or else he was just shy. Perhaps he was merely too trusting and the thought that someone would carry a concealed weapon that close to their valuable of valuables simply didn't cross his mind. My money was on the latter until I realized that the weapons I usually carried with me down there were down there no longer. Those weapons were made to be both concealed and deadly, and nobody with the wherewithal to find them could possibly be confused as to their purposeâ€"and, by extension, the purpose of the wielder.

He was saying something, but I missed it. "Huh?" I managed weakly.

"You were someone else."

The Void was that supposed to mean? I think that was what he said, anyway. I tried to ask him, but all that came out was an unintelligible sort of gurgle. My stomach protested something, I'm not sure what, and I ended up dry heaving again.

I felt soft hands on my face, accompanied by a cool wet cloth. I realized that I was both shivering and sweating, somehow, and that the cloth felt very good, especially right around my eyes and nose. I opened my eyes and looked into the cheetah's face. He was on his knees next to me, one hand holding my muzzle and the other dabbing, and his face was so close to mine I could feel his breath.

The professional in me willed my arm to reach out and grab his neck, he was so close. But nothing would have come of it, I'm sure. Battle magi are well-known for being at all times under the protection of their own spells, spells designed to prevent just this sort of thing. Still, it was aggravating, having my target this close and not being able to take advantage. If only I'd have been better prepared for this situation.

If only I'd have done something other than rowing out onto the lake...but I've already been over how dumb that idea seemed, even at the time, and especially now.

Some black swam in my vision, and then engulfed me, and I fell unconscious once again. I don't even remember hitting the floor. Maybe he caught me, I don't know. What I do remember well is waking up the second time. I was in a bed, somehow. The storm had apparently passed, as light was streaming in the window. I was under proper covers this time, lying atop a gentle mattress, on my back. I was also, I realized as I sat up, dressed in some light robes and nothing else. Well. Perhaps my original estimate had been way off.

The floor was cool stone. Looking out the window I saw that I was off the ground some several feet, possibly as high as four stories. Beneath the window, which was open to let in a breeze, the water of the lake lapped at a wide sandy shore. It turned to green grass and bushes as it approached the base of what was undoubtedly the mage's tower. What was it, I wondered with bemusement, about wizards and towers? Was it something phallic, or was it perhaps more complicated? Whatever it was, I certainly wasn't jumping. I thought briefly about scaling the walls, but that didn't seem like such a good idea in my current state; I still was very weak, though more of my strength had returned during the night, or however long I had actually been out. And even if I made it to the beach, there was the matter of finding the boat, assuming the mage hadn't gotten rid of it, and, if that failed, whether or not the mage would even let me back in. The mage was a wildcard, one that was supposed to be dead.

Henet. I tried his name out loud again, partly to make sure my voice worked, and partly for some other reason, something I couldn't quite define as of yet. His name caused his face to float in front of me. I was so groggy the last time I'd seen him that I didn't remember him in great detail. I did remember he looked pretty young, though.

The door to my room was not locked, which I found strange, but again, I very much doubt I was a threat to the battle mage Henet, such as things were. There was no way to tie my robe shut, so I simply crossed one corner over the other and held onto it with my hand as I made my way down the torch lit stone hallway. It curved around slightly to the left, following the general shape of the tower. Nothing save the torches themselves adorned the wallsâ€"no brackets, evenâ€"and the floor was clean and uncarpeted. A door at the end of the hall stood open, and I went through.

I emerged in what would have been a stairwell had there been any stairs. Instead, there was simply an open space that extended so far down I couldn't see where it ended. Looking up I saw the roof two stories above me. I was standing on a ledge without a rail, and as I was still not quite in full possession of my faculties I backed up. What on Gaia's earth would that ledge be for? I stepped forward again and shouted down the empty shaft: "Hello!"

I waited for a few seconds, but I hadn't expected anyone to hear me. I started back in the other direction, figuring I'd have better luck at the other end, when I heard something behind me. I turned to find the cheetah standing on the wooden ledge. His expression was a mixture of curiosity and wariness, though there didn't appear to be the sort that was associated with meeting someone who had clearly come to take your lifeâ€"more, the kind that was associated with the new, the unexplored wilderness.

"Hi, there," I said amicably.

"Hi," he returned. He didn't approach, so I turned to face him fully and took a step toward him. He didn't back away.

"Did you pull me out of the water?" I asked for a lack of anything else to say.

"Mm, yes. You were drowning. Or drowned. I'm not entirely sure."

"Drowned already, you mean? How?"

"You breathed in water, I guess."

"No, no, that's not...." I rubbed my head, berating myself. "I mean, how is it that I'm alive if I drowned? Unless I'm...." The thought was too bizarre to even say.

"You're alive, not dead, if that's what you meant. I always thought drowning was just breathing in water until you stopped breathing."

"I stopped breathing?"

"You did. I had to start your heart. It was a near thing, I think."

"Oh. Ah. Well, thank you." I stood there awkwardly, unsure of myself for more reasons than one. This cheetah was amazingly cute, more so than I would have expected. And I was supposed to kill him. Problem was, I didn't have any of my tools to deal with the second one, and I was sure I did not want to get at all attached.

"Are you hungry?" he asked, sparing me having to think too much.

"Yeah, actually," I said, realizing how true it was as I said it.

"Come on, then." He beckoned me forward. I approached slowly, but he didn't move, and soon I was standing right next to him on that narrow ledge overhanging what could have been a bottomless pit for all I knew. "You'll need to, er." He faltered, then held out his hand for me. I took it, then realized what he meant to do.

"Youâ€"you can't be serious."

"Um. It's the only way to get to the kitchen," he said apologetically.

I most certainly did not want to jump off the edge of anything right then. On the other hand, maybe there would be something I could use to complete my job downstairsâ€"or just down, as the case happened to be. Maybe I would even find my things. I looked at the mage again. Nothing about his bearing or expression suggested that he wished me harm.

"Okay," I said finally. "What do I do?"

"Just step with me. Ready?" We stepped.

The feeling was unlike falling in every way, except that the air still rushed up at me and flipped my robe about so that I had to redouble my efforts at holding it to make sure I didn't wind up naked next to this pretty cat, which would certainly have been a bad thing as far as first, or second, impressions went. It wasn't until that moment that I realized how pretty my body found him, too.

The ride only lasted a couple of seconds, fortunately. We landed softly on another platform. There was no hallway at this door; instead, it led directly into the kitchen.

A plethora of scents assaulted my nose so that I scrunched it up against the smell. There was a long cutting table in the center of the rectangular room, piled high with pots and utensils and other dirty kitchen accoutrements. A massive oven dominated one corner, and a counter similarly dirtied with cutlery lined the adjacent wall. The opposite wall was simply a series of cabinets, the doors of most of which were open, showing off their disorganized contents. The wall opposite where we were standing had an open door, beyond which was another hallway.

"How did we do that?" I asked. My knees chose that moment to give out. I collapsed, and the cheetah caught me, though it was obviously an effort to hold me up.

The killer in me wanted to reach out and elbow him straight in the solar plexus, then snap my wrist up and cleanly snap his neck.

Instead, as I moved to do just this, completely automatically, I got still weaker and ended up collapsing into his arms. The mage grunted with effort, but managed to keep me more or less upright. He was stronger than he looked. I tilted my head up to him and grinned sheepishly. "Sorry," I said. "Still weak from the whole not breathing thing, apparently."

"Apparently." He shifted me around a bit until I was able to push myself upright. "Come right over here." He led me to a chair, into which I sank gratefully. It was not the kind of chair that belonged in a kitchen, but I didn't worry about that. "And magic."

"What?" My head was still spinning somewhat.

"How did we do that? It's magic."

"Ah. Makes sense." I nodded, unthinking.

"Does it?" When I looked up I realized the error I may have committed. He was watching me, face obviously carefully impassive. He didn't say anything more, though. He simply turned and started gesticulating strangely.

Cutlery and dishes started pushing themselves aside, clearing a space on the counter in front of me. More gesticulations, and water was drawn from somewhere. The fire started, and things started moving so quickly that I didn't even try to keep up. I just sat as still as I could so that I wouldn't be hit by any errant pieces of flying cutlery.

It's one thing to know how magic works in theory and to see a little used in practical situations. It's another thing to see someone craft something with it, something that is so obviously in their field of specialty; I had seen a cacomistle witch make and enchant charms once, and that was plenty scary.

It was yet another thing to watch someone so obviously well-acquainted with magic as to be able to do something like this without putting forth any apparent effort. Even the witch, who had been using her magic as she did every day, as her livelihood, had been concentrating so hard that the world could have ended around her and she'd have had no idea. In contrast, this cheetah was still watching me, though I couldn't see his expression as I was not looking at him.

I mentally added a few years to his apparent age and raised my estimation of just how dangerous he actually was.

Within a few minutes I was eating something that vaguely resembled pasta, though it had obviously been prepared by someone who didn't make it too often. Still, it was food, and I wolfed it down. He cleared himself off a stool. We sat in silence for several minutes, until he said, as I was swallowing my last mouthful, "Why do you want to kill me?"

I choked. It took me several seconds of coughing before I could breathe again, but even then I was not sure what to say. I rebuked myself for being surprised, though, as I'd known that if he found the weapons on me he could not help but come to that conclusion. Still, the way he'd asked it....I'd become pretty good at reading emotions in people. He sounded almost sad.

"What do you mean?" I asked. I looked up when he didn't say anything.

He was watching me with a more serious expression now, though he still didn't look angry. It was some other emotion, not so easily distinguishable form anger. I realized with a start that it was hurt. What could he possibly be hurt about? Offended, possibly. Angry, surely. But hurt? He spread his hands in a minute gesture and said, simply, "Why?"

"Iâ€"" But my voice caught. I am usually able to come up with something to say, but I couldn't decide what was appropriate in this situation. He looked so beautiful and vulnerable sitting there like that. My loins decided to pick that moment to liven again.... Then I laughed at the idea of anything being appropriate for this situation. The mage jumped slightly. "I wish I could say it was personal," I said at last, spreading my own hands. "It would be more fun, that way. Really, it was a job." I tilted my head. I could affect nearly any kind of persona I wished, a skill I had cultivated over the years, ever since I was a young cub; now I chose a slightly cocky attitude, the attitude of a killer who's been found out and can't do anything about it. It was close enough to the truth that I had no problem. "Why'd you save me if you knew why I was here?"

"I didn't realize you were...."

"A killer?"

"Whatever you are."

"Ah, I see." I set my plate back on the table, where it blended in more with the pile of dirty things. "Actually, I'm still wondering about a few things."

"Why would I answer your questions?" he asked matter-of-factly. "You're here to kill me."

"But we both know I can't do that, now, don't we?" It was a question that would have been delicate under normal circumstances. I hoped that the timing would outshine the phrasing. I breathed normally, but I felt like holding my breath. After several seconds, the mage nodded, slowly, once. "Let's assume, just for the sake of argument, that I were to attack you in your sleep, to gut you like a fish while you were unconscious. I bet I wouldn't even be able to do that without getting fried, or frozen, or killed in some other fashion, right?" Again, he nodded.

"Right. So, you have to figure out what to do with me. But whatever it is, you have to make sure I'm not a threat." I let him agree with me again before I continued. "So, whatever it is you decide to do with me, can it really hurt all that much to let me ask?"

He thought about this, and I watched him. He was wearing baggy pants, and nothing else that I could see. With each breath his slender chest rose and fell, and I found myself watching the curves and white of his stomach as they approached his waistline. I couldn't stop myself from imaging what lay beneath that, what the subtle curve of his hips suggested.

Once again, his body made my blood annoyingly honest.

Finally, he nodded. I looked up at his face, which was as open as could be. I realized that he truly didn't fear me at all. It wasn't as though there was an overabundance of confidence there, but there was so little fear that if it was there I couldn't detect it. Well. I sighed, then decided that, if I was going to be killed, well, Void's Eye, I'd let my curiosity get the better of me first.

"You hide your island, do you not?" He nodded. "So, who, exactly, did you think I was?"

There, a flicker of hurt that was gone almost as soon as it appeared. "I don't know."

"Liar." I sat back in the chair, which was one of those fluffy deals that belongs in a drawing room, not a kitchen. "If you thought I was someone else, how did you figure out who I was?"

"I...when I pulled you ashore, you had...things. On you." He made shapes with his fingers.

"Knives." I nodded. "You found my knives. But how, I wonder, did you find all of them?" I angled my shoulders just a bit so he'd be uncomfortable.

It worked. I watched the blush creep its way onto his face and he shifted on the stool. "That'sâ€"" He stopped, perhaps hoping I'd interrupt him. I didn't, and had the satisfaction of watching him squirm just a bit more. It was an appealing thing to watch. "This isn't fair," he declared suddenly.

I admit I was taken aback. "I beg your pardon?"

"You came to kill me, and now you're making me feel uncomfortable about figuring it out? How does that work?"

I couldn't help myself: I laughed. I laughed because he was completely right. "It's just fun to watch you," I admitted. "Though, I must admit, I am curious about how you managed to find my more...concealed weapons."

"Iâ€"I justâ€""

I got up and walked over to him, slowly. His jaw dropped cutely, and it took me a moment to realize that he was staring because I was no longer holding my robe closed. "You just...?" I prompted.

He sputtered as I approached. When I was less than a foot from him he seemed to come awake: he jumped up and knocked over the stool, and when his back was against the cutting table he raised his hands in front of them so that all of his fingers but his forefinger and thumb were curled under his palms and said in a shaky voice, "D-don't, don't even think aboutâ€""

"About what?" I asked, still closing the distance, albeit slowly. Having a battle mage pointing his fingers at me was, I'll admit, probably the scariest thing that's happened to me. Yet, somehow, it was also exciting. Perhaps it was because of the source, but I found myself even more excited than I had been. In a flash of inspiration I let my robe sag low about my shoulders, before dropping it completely. His eyes widened. "We've already established that I can't do anything to harm you, and you've got only too many ways to cause me harm. So, what's the harm in this?"

He choked on something he was going to say.

"Unless...you don't like what you see...." I stopped when his fingers touched my chest. Where he touched me I felt something almost electric flowing into me, and I realized with a start that he was in the midst of casting a spell. He'd stopped it, though. His breathing was heavy and rapid, and the table was pressing into his lower back, causing him to arch, and, looking down, I said, softly, "Well, that, at least, doesn't seem to be the case." I could see the evidence of his arousal clearly. My staring drew his attention down.

It was at that point that I threw my caution to the proverbial wind, figuring that either I was going to die or I wasn't, my fate was already decided. I closed the remaining distance between us and grabbed his lower back. He gasped, and all of the energy in his fingers seemed to disappear. In that instant I bet I could have done anything: his defenses seemed to be completely gone. I could have broken his neck, or punched him so his heart stopped, or pinched his nerves and paralyzed his lungs, or grabbed one of the many knives within easy reach and sliced his spine, or clawed his brain through his eyes as I had done to one of the previous Counts of Gibruon...

I brought my muzzle to his neck and opened my jaws and bit downâ€"softly. He gasped again, and I felt that surge of electricity through the palms of his hands into my chest, but I didn't stop. I pulled him into me and pushed forward, so that he had to bend at an almost impossible angle. I moved my mouth from the side of his neck to the front and felt him swallow past my lips. I kissed his throat gently and moved my lips up from his Adam's apple, to the underside of his jaw. He had to look up as I moved.

I ran my tongue over his chin, then kissed his bottom lip. The moan that escaped him was delectable. I pulled back just slightly and waited for him to lower his head; when he did, his eyes were half-lidded and his mouth open, panting. I grinned and brought my muzzle up close to his ear so that our cheeks rubbed together. "Seems like you like," I whispered, licking the edge of his ear.

"Oh!" He practically melted into me as I did that. I welcomed him. With a grunt I flipped him gently so that he was on his back, on the table. There was a clatter as forks and pots were displaced by his jerking feet.

When I was confident he wouldn't fall off if I let go moved one hand around to the back of his head and married his mouth to mine with what I truly suspected was this cat's first real kiss. He let a small "Eep!" out into my mouth, but otherwise didn't seem to mind. I rested my other hand on his belly as I probed with my tongue. Finally, he allowed me to enter, and this moan was even better than the last. I tasted every inch of this young cheetah's muzzle. At the same time, I slipped my right hand under the waistband of his baggy pants and, very gently, cupped his sac.

His eyes flew open, so I knew I only had a small window. His erection slid along my wrist as I brought my hand back up and placed it there, gripping him gently. His eyes closed again as his back arched and his hands didn't seem to know whether they wanted to push me away or pull me closer. I started moving my hand slowly, up and down, up, down...

His hands finally found purchase and he pushed me away, though I could see that it cost him every bit of resolve that he had. I gave him a questioning look as I straightened up, though I kept my hand on his maleness, now still.

"You...hah...stop," he panted, squirming still, though now he was opening his eyes again. "Stop what?" I asked gently, beginning to rub his erection again.

"Ah! That! Stop...stop it...."

I did, and slowly withdrew my hand, making sure to run three of my claws gently over his tip, which elicited one final loud moan and a spasm. I leaned down and ran my tongue over one of his nipples instead. He let me keep that up for a good half a minute before he pushed me away again.

"What's wrong?" I asked, keeping my body close to his.

"No-nothing's wrong. Not, not at all. I don't, ahâ€"" He pushed himself weakly into a sitting position. "I don't think I, um." He was talking with his hands, and it took me a moment to decipher what he was trying to say.

"You don't think what? That you want to?" I licked the tip of my finger suggestively; I hadn't actually got any pre on it, but he didn't know that. "Seems like you do."

"No. I mean, yes! That's not what I meant at all. It'sâ€"" he waved his arms around again "â€"I want to," he finished. "It's just, I don't know howâ€"or I mean, whatâ€"" His eyes were wide, trying desperately to get me to understand.

"You don't know how?" I leaned over and cupped his cheek. "I guessed, actually. I don't mind showing you, though."

"I...you...really? I mean, that's not what I meant, but...." He looked down, then realized I was still naked and looked quickly back up. He took a deep breath, and I could see the sentence arrange itself in his mind. "I don't quite know what will happen," he said in a carefully-controlled voice.

It took me a minute, but I got it. "You mean, what will happen to your, er, magic?" He nodded. "Ah. I see."

"I'm sorry." He looked like he meant it.

"Not to worry." I grinned, standing, grabbing his hand and guiding it to my thigh. "Your loss, though."

He stopped just shy of actually touching me, and nodded. I looked down, then at my forearms. "You didn't happen to wash me when you were taking care of me, did you?" His face turned red again and he shook his head vigorously. I suppressed a laugh. "Well, then, could you direct me to a tub?" He nodded wordlessly and pointed out the door opposite the one we'd used to enter. "What, just out there?"

"And to the left," he said, nodding.

"Hm. Thanks." I turned and stooped to pick up my robe, taking my time as I did so, though I kept my tail maddeningly between my legs. Then I left, making sure to sway my hips as I walked.

The washroom was indeed located just outside and to the left of the kitchen, and I was baffled by the layout of the place. Who would put a washroom just behind the kitchen, in the center of the tower, when the water in the kitchen was drawn from the outside wall? Never mind, though. A large tub dominated the room, so large I could have lay flat and been able to fit, albeit barely. Two spouts hung suspended above opposite ends. I stepped into the tub, tossing the robe on the floor, and selected one of the spouts at random. Small ropes hung from each. I pulled one.

Icy water splashed off the bottom of the tub, a couple of drops reaching a part of me hitherto the warmest thing in or on my body. I managed not to yelp, but barely. I turned around and pulled the other rope, and was relieved and somewhat surprised when hotâ€"not warm, but hotâ€"water streamed out. I suddenly understood why the other side was ice cold.

It took several minutes, but eventually I had filled the tub with a mix of water that I found acceptably warm. A small table with shampoos and oils on it sat next to the tub, but I figured I could deal with the actual washing part of the bath after I'd let the water soak through my fur and dislodge whatever needed cleaning. I sighed as I lay back, and closed my eyes.

Now that I had time to think, my mind, the rational part, came after me with a vengeance. Just what on Gaia's earth was that all about? Throwing myself at some young cheetah like he was the thing I'd been missing all these years. Had I forgotten that I came here to kill him? Justifications immediately started swimming through my mind, but I dismissed them before they could find purchase. I had a job to do.

And yet...

And yet, as I was there, sitting in the tub, berating myself for misplacing my priorities, I found myself thinking again of his face, of the way he'd responded to my touch, and the feel of his maleness; and the way he'd responded when I'd touched that. There was something almost ethereal about my attraction to him, but I couldn't figure out what it was. Well. I was sure I'd get it eventually. Hopefully, I'd get it before he decided to kill me.

I soaked for about an hour, and then, when adding more hot water to keep the temperature up would have caused the tub to overflow, I rubbed some of the shampoos into my fur. It was cleansing in a strange way, cleaning the grime I hadn't known was there from the water of the lake. As a point of reflection, it's a wonder how water can both dirty and purify one, depending on the circumstanceâ€"of the water, not the individual.

When I was finished I dried off and donned my robe. It occurred to me to wonder how to get up to my room, when I thought that maybe the magic was in the stairlesswell, and not the mage who made it. It made sense, so I, perhaps foolishly, stepped off the ledge.

It took me a while to get a hold of how things worked, but eventually I figured out that if one stepped off of the ledge and concentrated on where they wanted to go, they would end up there. After about five minutes of falling both directions in every orientation possible, I wound up on my ledge.

The mage was waiting for me when I got back to my room. He was sitting on my bed, still dressed the same way, and looking shy and vulnerable and delicious.

"I'm Henet," he said, looking up as I entered.

"I know," I said, pulling him to his feet. Our lips met again, and this time I met no resistance whatsoever. This time his arms found purchase on my shoulder blades, and his mouth and tongue welcomed mine. This time, there was much less resistance when my hands went to his waist. I had already shrugged my robe off again, and a part of me found humor in the fact that here I was, in this person's house, the person I was supposed to kill, and not only had I been spending the majority of my time naked, but half of it locked in embrace with my target. Only, the wrong kind of embrace. Except it didn't feel like the wrong kind at all.

He broke the kiss to gasp when I pressed our naked bodies together for the first time, and he nearly tripped over the pants still around his ankles. I laughed and shoved him back onto the bed, onto his back, and straddled him. Leaning down to lick his muzzle got a cute moan, which turned into a groan of pleasure as I ground our hips together.

After a while of this, he pushed me away again, though this time his eyes were less earnest, more clouded by lust. "I want to..." he tried, then, when he couldn't say it, motioned down at me with his hands.

I grinned for him. "If you want to, be my guest. But, first." I grabbed his shoulders and, in a movement derived from years of hard training and muscle-building, flipped us around so our positions were reversed, with him atop me. He squeaked as I did this, but the squeak turned into a shy sort of giggle.

He sat up slowly, running his hands down my abdomen, feeling every bit of fur, bone and muscle there. The way his eyes lingeredâ€"and I don't mean to beleaguer with this pointâ€"it would have been obvious, even had nothing else occurred, that he had never seen a male like this before. I am pretty well-muscled; I keep my body in shape for obvious reasons, but, even when lovers past had seen this, and complimented me for it, none of them had ever seemed to wonder at it quite the way this mageâ€"this Henetâ€"did. His eyes lingered so long he almost looked reluctant to allow them to be drawn to where they knew they wanted to be; as though looking would take something from him that he would never regain.

Finally, though, he did. He looked up at me, but I just watched him, waiting to see what he'd do. He took me with his paw and, with the mien of an explorer, explored what I had to offer him. Tentative fingers explored my length from base to tip, stopping there where they collected some of my pre; then back down, hands lubricated. He explored my sheath when he reached that. Then he felt my sac, running his fingers over and around each orb slowly and deliberately. His face shouted his pleasureâ€"no, his satisfaction. I realized how long he must have wanted to do something like this, then, so I let him continue.

He continued for a few more minutes, then started to rub my length, tentatively. He looked up at me as though seeking approval.

"Just pretend you're using that paw on yourself," I said gently. He swallowed, nodded, and started working his paw more rhythmically, with strength. I lay my head back and closed my eyes and let him work.

What a strange situation I found myself in, here. I have mentioned it before, but I feel the need to impart to you just how strange it was, for me. I, a trained killer, being intimate with one of my targets, who was quickly becoming something else. As I lay there, Henet working at me with his beautifully soft hands, mage's hands, I realized that I no longer had any desire to kill him. Oh, it was not as though I'd had much of a desire to begin with, other than the overwhelming desire to see my order fulfilled. But even that need was gone, replaced by something that lust alone could not understand.

Was I falling for this cheetah?

The thought was almost laughable, and I almost laughed, except that he chose that moment to stop. Both of his hands settled around my base, making a ring with his thumbs and forefingers, and a warm tongue flicked across my tip.

I actually let a moan go at that, unexpected as it was. I opened my eyes and found him watching me. When I offered no objection, he looked back down at his work and licked some more, starting at the base and moving up, long, languid licks that caused me to squirm, however lightly. When he had covered my whole shaft he looked up at me again. Then he placed my tip in his mouth.

"Ah!" I'm sure that was very unprofessional of me. But Gaia damn did it feel good. His tongue, too eager but for its own virginity, was torture. I let him work at it for a bit, watching him figure things out. After a minute or so I pulled his head off of me, pushed myself back so that I was sitting up against the headboard. He looked at me curiously. I beckoned him closer, grinning. Then I grabbed his cheeks and, gently, guided him down to my lap. He opened his mouth obligingly, watching me as he did so, only looking down when he felt me against his tongue.

I hissed in pleasure, but I didn't stop, pulling him onto me until I felt the faint tug of resistance from him. I settled there, allowing him to acclimate to my size and the feeling of having me so far in his mouth. Then I pulled him up so just my tip was in his muzzle, and brought him back down.

He got the rhythm pretty quickly, and I knew how to move him. I let him do most of the work, but I kept my hands on his face, putting just a bit of pressure here and there so that he'd know I was still in control. His tongue was like warm sandpaper, only somehow more glorious than any of the other cats I'd been with. Perhaps it was his need that made him so wonderful, the energy of a desire that was finally being fulfilled.

Whatever the reason, it was almost an embarrassingly short amount of time before I clenched my teeth and grabbed his ears, forcing him to take more than he'd taken before. His eyes went wide and he tried to pull off, but I held him there as I emptied into his throat. He swallowed around me, his tongue going crazy, and it just made me yelp and thrust up and down his gullet. A second later I let go, my hands weakened, and he pulled off, sputtering. The last couple of spurts landed on his muzzle.

"Hah! Wow." I sighed as I say my head back. "Apparently I needed that." I looked back down at him, smiled as I saw his face. "Here, let me help you with that." I brought my muzzle down to his and licked my salty seed off, making several passes to make sure I hadn't left anything there. Then I kissed him deeply.

"So," I said, looking into his eyes. "Do you think you'd like a turn, now? Or should I just lay down and go back to sleep?"

His expression left no need for verbal approval.

Before long I had him on his back, legs spread and head back and moaning as I bathed his sac. I moved my attentions to his sheath, then to his barbed member, kissing along its length; and when I took him completely into my mouth he bucked his hips and gripped the sheets and cried out.

When he came, well, I wish I could have been watching from a distance. He twisted the sheets and yelped, and I watched his face, swallowing him to the hilt and swallowing his seed.

Afterward we lay together, me holding him and stroking the back of his neck, and I couldn't have said what made me do it. It was a very tender motion and touch, and I'd never exactly been tender with my lovers in the past.

No, I told myself, you are not falling for him.

Maybe too late, I thought.

His green eyes watched me for a time, but then he fell asleep. I watched him for a time, then, too, but his steady breathing drew me in and my last conscious thought was how nice it was breathing him in.

2.

The next few days were some of the most memorable and pleasurable of my life, though not pleasurable in the sense that one would think. We only danced one time more, when I showed him the pleasure of being within another.

Other than that, our relationship was platonic, as far as physicality went. We shared kisses here and there, and one time when I was feeling particularly raunchy I tried to catch him off-guard in the kitchen. Do you know, it's really hard to catch a battle mage off-guard. We ended up on the floor, where we stayed for a good twenty minutes. Okay, so there was one more dance than I thought.

We were eating lunch one day, sitting atop his tower, which was flat and open to the elements, though the stone was cleaner than rainwater should have allowed for. We were looking out over the lake at Halford and the bustling trade that was no doubt taking place, laughing at our own invisibility and at the apparent urban legend Henet had unintentionally created when he asked me about the journal. Apparently he'd never seen a proper Ideolan journal before, though he later confided that he had heard stories and was curious.

We were sitting on a blanket I'd brought up through the trapdoor with us, nibbling on some cooked meat. The top of the tower has no rails, so we were free to gaze out and feel the wind in our faces.

"What's it that you keep writing in?" he asked suddenly.

We'd been enjoying a brief few seconds of silence, and I was holding onto his paw. I had also just taken a bite, and I indicated as much. "It's a journal," I said. I told him what kind, and his eyes widened.

"Really? That's neat!"

I laughed. "What, you know about them?"

"I've heard of them. How does it work?"

"Simply, actually. Well, what do I know of the mechanics of magic? For me, at least, it's simple. You put ink on the page, and it writes your thoughts."

"So, like a regular journal, then?" He scooted closer and put his free hand lightly on my thigh. I let him lean into me.

"Yes and no. It's like a regular journal in that you put your thoughts into it. It's different, though, in that it arranges your thoughts into words for you. You just put ink on the pages, and it takes your thoughts and turns them into words. And, if someone who isn't the owner, or who the owner doesn't trust gets their hands on it, it will just look blank to them."

"Sounds efficient." His head pressed into my chest. I felt his sigh.

I told him I write in it whenever I get the chance, but that I had left the other pages upon which I'd written back home. Though, to be fair, this tower is my home now, and I hope it shall forever be so.

I was sitting in my room in some of the beautiful cerulean robes he'd provided me when he came in to see me. He had a weighted look about him, as though whatever the reason for his coming he wished he could avoid it.

I patted the bed next to where I was sitting. I'd been reading up on some rudiments of magic; after having expressed an interest in his abilities, he'd gladly shown me some of the books which, he told me, helped him get started. It was slow going, as my experience with actual magic is very limited. I'd so far only managed to get through half of the first volume, which was titled in a language I could not read. Henet had offered to help me, but I'd told him I could probably manage it on my own. He spent an extraordinary amount of time studying for things I couldn't even begin to grasp.

"What's the matter?" I asked him.

"It's about our, um." He waved his hands again. He did that whenever he wanted to say something but the words just weren't there. Originally I'd assumed that it was because he didn't want to say it. I'd been wrong.

"Our relationship, you mean?" I prompted.

"Yes. Well, yes and no. I mean, that's what'sâ€"it's what I wanted to talk about."

"Okay."

He padded up next to me and sat. He was wearing the light royal blue robes I'd told him he looked ravishing in. Those words always made him blush, so I told him again. I licked his cheek as I said this.

He took a deep breath. "I've been alone here for a long time. And I've always...I've been lonely. I wanted someone to be with me, someone to be with, very badly, but I just...I couldn't seem to leave to go after him." I cocked my head. "Not anyone specific, just...someone. I wanted to be with someone, but because I'm a coward and, well, everything that I am, I couldn't get what I wanted. So I, uh, made one." He'd been looking at the floor as he spoke. Now he looked up at me, to see how I'd taken the news.

"I admit, I don't understand," I said truthfully.

"Well." He started to move his hands again, then stopped, wringing them together in his lap. "I mean."

He started again. "I made a spell. It was supposed to bring me myâ€"" But he choked off here, and I realized with a start that he was embarrassed to continue. I thought about saying something, but I could think of nothing to say. So I simply put a hand on his thigh. He smiled sideways at me and continued. "It was supposed to bring me my true love. The one I was supposed to spend the rest of my life with, the one I'd stay with and be happy with until I died."

"Ah." I paused. "I still don't understand."

"When I saw you the first day, in the water, I thought, ‘he must be the one!' And you were so handsome, and beautiful, and perfect. And then it turned out you were here to kill me." I nodded. "But you didn't. But that's not the point. The point is, I don't know if this is...." He waved his hands around. "This. I don't know if it's real, or not. If our love is real, or something I made up in my solitude that came true."

It took me a moment to realize what he was saying. When I figured it out, I couldn't help myself: I laughed. Loudly.

It made him start, so I reached over and gave him a big kiss. He responded after a moment. "That's it?" I asked as I pulled away. "That's what's been eating at you?"

"Um. Yes?" He looked confused, and that always made him look even more adorable. "How is that not a bad thing?"

"Why would it be? Look, your spell worked."

"I know! At least, I thought so, which is whyâ€""

"Dear. Shut up." I took his hand. "I don't mind."

"But youâ€""

"I said shut up. Remember, I'm a trained killer." It was something that had become a non-issue between us over the past couple of weeks, and I liked the fact that when I said it, he just smiled. "You're worried that it will make me angry, but here's the thing: it doesn't. In fact, it doesn't make me love you any less than I do right now, or than I did before."

"But it might not be real!"

"But it's real to me. And to you. And isn't that what matters?" His green eyes were wide, and his hand gripped mine like a vice as I spoke. "Does it really matter if it's magic or not? I feel for you, and I don't feel anything strange about it."

"But that's not how it works. I mean, that is how it works! You're not supposed to."

"Well." I turned away from him, stung. "I just know what I know about these feelings. They feel real to me."

There was an uncomfortable pause between us, the first ever, really. Finally, though, he reached out and touched my shoulder. "Hey."

I looked up at him. "Hey."

"So...."

"Look. I love you. Whether or not you engineered that love with your magic is irrelevant, because it feels real to me. A month ago, had you told me something like this was possible, I would have laughed in your face and told you that I'd be angry should anyone try to use it on me. But that was before I knew quite what love actually felt like. Now, for the first time, I understand what they mean when they say Gaia blesses a couple, or more, and why they aren't angry when they say this. I may love you because of something you did, but it doesn't make it any less real."

"If you're OK with it, then I am, too."

I smiled. "Good. Because I am way more than OK with it, dearest." He squeaked as I pushed him down on the bed.

â€"ohGaiaandsqueaksas I push him onto the bed. I stifle the squeal with a gentle kiss. When I break it, he's smiling.

"I spend far too much time in your house with none of my clothes on," I observe. It's the truth; I've taken to walking around naked, or mostly naked, during the regular day. At first I was simply wearing my pants and no vest, but as time went on, I discovered that the climate was hot enough to justify showing off my fur. Besides, nobody but Henet ever sees it, and Henet likes it.

"Not enough," Henet corrects me. I grin. I like this new, devilish sort of creature that Henet has become in the two months I've been here. It's a far cry from the shy, quiet little thing I first met, but somehow he's lost none of his appeal. He hasn't changed that much, really. He's still sweet, caring, and beautiful. I mean in the bedroom, though, in the bedroom he's really come into his own, now.

In truth, I don't think we've slept together as much as we could have, and now that I'm horny I'm really thinking that's the case. The truth is that we enjoy each other in different ways. He was sexually starved before I came, and I was starved in such a way that I didn't even know what I was missing until I found it. Instead of leaping into bed with each other at every available opportunity, though, we spent a great deal of time just watching each other. At night, we lay together on the carpet by the fire or on the roof, naked, but content to just be close to each other. Oh, I won't pretend that sometimes we don't let our nakedness-inspired ideas get the better of us, but we don't plan on that happening. I can't count the number of times now that we lay atop the tower and he crawls atop me and falls asleep with his head on my chest, and you'd think that would be uncomfortable for my back, but it's really not.

No, we haven't slept together nearly enough, I think. As I look him in the eye, though, as I press his chest down with one hand, I can see in his eyes that he's seriously considering it. I lean down and lick his nipple again, and he squirms, as he always does. Then I move lower, to his belly, then the defining curves just under it, then lower. Our clothes lay discarded on the floor, so there's nothing stopping my tongue and its ability to make him squirm so prettily. I take one of his orbs into my mouth and suckle on itâ€"and I only do this because it drives him crazy; I think he's ticklish. I move onto the other one, then. When they're both nice and soaked, I stop sucking and start licking, trailing my tongue up and around his sac. I stop when I get to his inner thighs, then start again.

After only a minute or so of this torture he is moaning uncontrollably. I trail my tongue up his sheath and wrap my lips around the exposed glans. My tongue teases his tip until he's grabbing onto my ears and twisting lightly. I grin around him.

"Oh! Oh!" He starts bucking his hips, but I choose (evilly, I suppose) that moment to stop. I slide up his body and take his mouth in mine, controlling him, owning him, but in a way that makes me want him more and more. I'd never dream of hurting him, but I know he wants me to treat him as though he is mine, so I do. Of the two kinds of people in the worldâ€"those who need to love, and those who need to be lovedâ€"he is the latter, and we both know it.

I move away from his mouth and lick the top of his muzzle, then right between his eyes, then across his cheek and around the rim of his ear. I don't stop my oral assault until I am right on his Adam's apple again and I can feel every vibration of every noise he makes.

I pull up and watch him struggle to regain his composure.

"So," I said, reaching to the bedside table. I've been living with him, in his room, in his bed, for a couple of weeks now. It was this huge thing that was far too big for even the two of us, but it was so comfortable I didn't complain, and I never will. "Do you think you're ready?"

"Yes," he whispers, and I can tell by his face that he means it.

I grab the jar of oil that I had made myself. I pour some onto my hand, but stop before I have too much. "You want to?" I ask, holding out the bottle.

For a moment he looks confused. Then his face brightens and he holds out his hands, and I have to laugh at his expression. I pour some into his open palms, then set the jar aside. I crawl up his body until I am positioned right in front of his chest, andâ€"Oh! He surprises me by leaning forward and engulfing my tip, then sliding his muzzle slowly toward my body. He's got his hands held out to the side to keep the oil from getting on anything.

His mouth is exquisiteâ€"he gets better every time, and the last time he used it, he let me hilt myself and he didn't even chokeâ€"but the position is uncomfortable for me, so I pull back just a bit, though I do let him suckle on the tip until he gets tired of it. Then he grabs my erection and starts rubbing the oil onto it. He knows every inch of me by now.

When I'm more or less ready to go, I tell him to roll over as I slide back. I dip my fingers in the jar of oil and then place them against his opening. He moans, trying to arch his hips but unable to because of his position. I can hear him trying to stifle himself with the pillow.

I slather the oil around his opening, and then gently push a finger inside.

I do wish I could hear that sound forever. It makes me chuckle, and I say, "Relax," a few times before he loosens up enough for me to continue. I push the finger in all the way to the knuckle, then withdraw, then repeat the action a few more times. When that's easy I add a second finger.

After a few minutes of this I nudge his legs to flip him onto his back again. One thing I've discovered is that he is incredibly agile. I pull his legs up over my shoulder and position myself at his entrance. Then I lean over so that our faces are mere inches apart.

"Ready, love?" I ask softly.

He mewls in response.

I can feel his warmth against my tip already, and I know that he's never been taken before, so it's all I can do to keep my anticipation in check. But mine is not the important pleasure tonight. His, is. I press forward slowly and feel his claws dig into my back.

"Shh, love. Relax, relax," I mutter as I continue to press slowly forward. His eyes are closed and his head is back, and he looks ready.

He cries out when my head slips past the barrier, eyes wide. I know exactly what to do, now. I bend over and grab onto the front of his throat with my teeth and bite down slowly as I push in. I can feel his muscles quivering beneath me, struggling to stay still. He hisses, actually hisses, which is something I've not heard before.

Then I'm in. I slide forward with almost surprising ease, stopping only when my growing knot hits him. He yelps.

"Sorry," I manage, weakly, and for the first time I realize how badly I've needed this. We've been together for a while, but until now we've never actually mated. I throw that word around mentally. Mates. After this, in a very short amount of time, we would actually be mates. I said so, with a big grin on my face. He gasped back at me.

"Are you ready, dearest?" I ask, leaning over him. He opens his eyes and whispers, "Yes."

I lean forward and kiss him. It's not the passionate kiss of lust, though, but a slow, assuring kiss. I probe his mouth and he lets me in, and somehow it brings us closer together than anything we've done before. He is hot inside, both above his neck and under his tail. I revel in the heat even as I pull out to the head. He gasps through the kiss but I don't let him go. I likewise stifle his moan as I push back in.

I set a slow rhythm, knowing that I should be gentle, and wanting to be nothing but. The way he squirms around me is phenomenal, and I let him know as much. With each thrust, I make sure to at least brush that spot within him that makes him jump.

I place a hand on his member. In all the time we've been together he's never leaked this much. I break the kiss long enough to ask, "Should I...?" and for him to say, "No," followed by a look that says everything more clearly than words ever could. I bring that hand back to his face, cupping his cheek with sticky fingers. My other hand is busy holding my body off of his.

He's so tight! I made sure to coat the inside of his ring thoroughly so I have no trouble slipping in and out, and I revel in the feel of him. I've been waiting for this for so long! And, I can tell, so has he. Each thrust is a new moan. I feel his sac against my stomach, feel it draw up close to his sheath. I lean over him so the fur of my chest brushes his member, and I can feel it jump each time our hips are joined.

My knot is getting big, and I'm less and less concerned about driving too deep into his body, confident that is tight entrance will stop me. I pull out and the grind back in, feeling around inside of him, and eliciting another of those precious sounds from his muzzle. His tongue is hanging out, so I grab it with my own and pull it into my mouth, and then we're kissing again, only now I'm shoving my tongue deep into his maw.

His body is tensing; he's close. I pick up my rhythm, Just a bit, and put more effort into driving my hips up and directly into the spot that makes him yell. Actually yell. The motion of my hips is more violent now, but he most certainly does not mind. If anything, the loud "Oh! Oh!"s are encouraging, begging, pleading.

He's so close now, I can feel it building deep within his loins. I've been careful. I'm close, now, too. The bed rocks and absorbs our motion, but still his body writhes and arches and

he grips my back more tightly, claws extended and digging into my fur, into my skin, his mouth is wide open and

he screams, loud, Oh Gaia

I slam into him as hard as I can as I bite down on his throat, harder than I've ever done, forcing his head back. He screams, or tries to, as my knot slips past and into him, and then we're joined, hip-to-hip. I thrust one last time, and his whole body convulses as I jam myself into that one place, and the warm drops of his desire actually hit me on the chin, two, three, four times, as I empty into him, andâ€"

FUCK!

â€"electricity burns through my body; every one of my muscles tenses, and my jaws close down but I can't even think to open them, and he gurgles and his claws grip and tear outward, leaving painful lines in my back, and my eyelids are shut so tight it hurts, and I can taste blood, oh Gaia, and his member jumps once more against my stomach and my member releases seed it didn't know it had and everything is in a vise and on fire and frozenâ€"

And then everything stops. The current cuts itself off, his claws retract. My jaws relax of their own accord and I let go quickly, panting. Above me, he pants, too, hard. I collapse on top of him. The motion tears a moan from my lips as my over-sensitive knot is squeezed. I can feel his chest moving under my cheek. I can taste salt on my tongue.

"I'm sorry."

I look up at him fiercely. "Shut up," I say simply. Apologizing? Void's Eye, he is. I flip him onto his stomachâ€"a movement I immediately regret as my member cries out at meâ€"then twist his head around and kiss him more fiercely than I ever have before. Our tongues dance an electric dance, and it's bliss. Within him I feel my seed, kept warm by his body. He surrounds me inside, so I surround his outside, slipping one arm under him and the other over. I pull him to me by his member and, in a burst of naughtiness, reach down to hold his hips and grind myself to him.

"Iâ€"Ah! AH, Gaia!" Unbelievably, his member jumps again and I feel first a spurt, then a dribble of warmth coat my paw. I use it as a lubricant and slide my paw gently up and down his member in a slow rhythm, the kind lovers use not to arouse, but to reassure of the other's presence, of their love. I reach down and cup his sac gently, realizing as I do so that I'm probably spreading his own seed there, but I don't care. I scratch up his member lightly as I thrust one more time, and he cries out again.

He doesn't have much left to give. What he does have, though, he does give.

I bring my paw up to his face and he licks it, and I lick his ear, and he sucks on my finger, cleaning it, nothing more. He moves to the next one, then the next, then licks my palm, then my wrist. I stroke his throat, feeling the marks I left there. The lines on my back burn, but it doesn't matter.

"I love you," I whisper, pulling him into me.

"I love you," he says, quietly, serenely. I kiss the nape of his neck, but I can tell he's already falling asleep. So I put my arms around him and drift away with him.

I'm awake, I'm tired. What...oh, yes. My knot has softened, so I pull gently out of him. He stirs, and a moan escapes his lips, even in sleep, but he does not wake. I need to go relieve myself, as I'm sure he will in the morning when he wakes. The sun has not yet poked over the horizon, but he gave me the gift of something he called mage sight, and even in the dark everything is clâ€"oh, ho. What's this?

My journal?

Ha! We must have knocked the inkwell and the journal off the table when we were in such a rush to strip each other of our garments. Well, I of his, anyway. Silly thing has been transcribing my thoughts without a proper editor's eye. Raw material. I shall have to revise it. That's one good thing about these journals: the owner has the ability to revise whatever he wants. Later, perhaps when Henet is studying, I shall set to doing it.

Henet. Beloved Henet. I turn to watch him sleep. His rising and falling chest are magnificent in the moonlight shining through the room's invisible walls. I lean down. He smells of seed and sweat, and it's beautiful. I kiss him lightly on the nose. "I love you," I say, and I've never meant anything I've said more than I mean those words.

Now, I need to

*

The words stopped there. Henet looked with mage sight but saw nothing else. Apparently, the journal had used all of the spilled ink. Well. He set the journal down carefully on the table, replacing it exactly as it had been. That way it would look as though it had not been touched.

He looked back at the bed, and at the coyote lying there, and his heart melted. The coyote who had come to kill him, who had probably come because of him; the coyote with whom he would spend the rest of his life. Henet sighed and touched his nose gently, imagining his lover's kiss, and realizing, for the first time, what the word lover meant.

The journal had been right. He had needed to relieve himself. For some reason, he hadn't thought of that, but it was OK. He needed to wash, he knew that. But, there would be time for that in the morning. He looked down at the naked coyote, his gaze moving all the way from his feet to his face.

Yes. It could wait 'til morning.

With a sigh of deep contentment Henet slid back onto the bed. He worried his head under the coyote's arms so that he was face-to-face with him. Silvery moonlight glinted off the single earring through the coyote's right ear.

"I love you, too," he said, and was surprised to feel a single tear course down his cheek. He tried shutting his eyes, but more came, so he opened them and watched the sleeping coyote until sleep claimed him. He drifted off, knowing in his heart that they would spend the rest of their lives together, and that, finally, he would know contentment.

*

The fox reclined on the uncomfortable bed, ankles crossed and hands behind his head. His eyes were half-lidded, as they always were when he was sleeping. He'd trained himself and been trained to be alert at all times, regardless of circumstance, including sleep.

Motion caught his attention and one of his eyes flew open. The book was lying open on the bed next to him, pages blank but for a single line of ink that formed itself into letters moving from left to right: Done, meet by lakeside, four hundred paces southwest of dock. He raised an eyebrow and closed the thing, packing it in his bag and removing a bottle half-filled with water. He hoisted the bag over his shoulder, and doused the single candle and left his room. As he approached the main room he added a certain sway to his demeanor, his footsteps became uneven. "Look sharp!" he advised the innkeeper as he passed, bringing his paw to his chest in a mock salute and nearly tumbling in the process. "Oi! Dinn't they teach you to make th' floors steady?" He laughed, then, and took a swig of the water. Nobody seemed to be watching him anymore.

The wind from the lake was calm when he got there, moon hidden behind the clouds. The fox watched from the shadow of a tree as a single boat made its way to his position. There didn't appear to me an occupant from this distance.

It hit the sand and stuck, motionless. The fox looked around, whistled quietly but piercingly. A head emerged from the bowels of the boat, followed by the muscled body of a coyote. He was carrying a sack over his shoulder. With a flick of his head in either direction he walked to the fox's hiding place.

"Hi, stranger," Ezra said quietly.

The coyote nodded. "Ezra."

"What did you get?"

"Guess."

"His head? Could you have been slightly less original?"

They started away from the shore. Ezra walked a step behind the coyote, though they both knew where they were going.

"I thoroughly enjoyed your entries," Ezra said, swatting a nighttime bug away from his face. He rapped lightly on the side of his bag, within which lay, among some sharp and hazardous objects, a journal identical to the one the coyote had hidden down the back of his pants. With a deftness that would have betrayed to any onlookers his sobriety Ezra pulled the journal from his pack and flipped it open. He began to read: "‘My tongue teases his tip until he's grabbing onto my ears and twisting lightly. I grin at him. Oh, oh!'" He started bucking his hips obscenely.

"Don't be so morose, fox. You got to read all the good things while lying in bed."

Ezra managed to look offended. "I was merely commenting on your exquisite use of alliteration. Tuh tuh tuh.' Very nice." They emerged from the foliage. The town was, unsurprisingly, mostly asleep. A few lights glittered in windows, most prominently at the inn. Of course a small town such as this one would have no nightlife to speak of. The coyote couldn't wait to be back in the city. "No offense, but I'd rather not read descriptions of your encounters with any more young males."

"Ha. That makes two of us." Neither of them mentioned the bit early on about their relationship. Neither of them had to. The description had been a bit of a white lie, embellished by both of their pens well into the night before the coyote had left the mainland to venture out in the storm. It was in fact a snickering Ezra who had alluded to the love affair between them that Could Have Been, the naïveté on the coyote's part and hinted at the brief, flickering longing in his own eyes. It was the coyote with a sense of the dramatic who had turned that look into a simpering paragraph of lost opportunities. "I'll bet Madame was thrilled."

"There has to be an easier way to take down those types," Ezra mused, more to himself, as they approached the inn.

"What, battle mages?" The coyote thought. "Can't think of any. It took a stroke of genius to work this one into actuality, and it wasn't even our idea. Let's leave that kind of thinking to the professionals what get paid to think and not do."

"I don't envy you."

"We can switch places next time. You must have been bored."

"I was, but not that bored. As cute as he sounds, I can't imagine keeping up that kind of a façade for that long."

"Advisors to kings do it all the time."

"Yes, well, I'm no advisor, am I?"

They arrived at the inn. "When's our out?" the coyote asked, as though the thought had just occurred to him.

"When, or what? When is tomorrow at first light, what is the trader's caravan that leaves at first light. They're headed to Baraka."

"Crossing the desert?"

"Aye."

"Wonderful. I hope they have supplies for us."

"Garot sent a letter, said they had things ready for us for whenever."

"Good."

They squeezed through the main room, which was crowded with patrons and an angry innkeeper. He caught sight of Ezra and nodded once, curtly. "We're drunk," Ezra explained, then managed somehow to gracelessly trip over the coyote's paws. The coyote, for his part, snorted with unfeigned amusement at the fox's graceful gracelessness, then tripped over the floor. This set the two of them to laughing. Voices behind them grumbled disapprovingly. They continued up to their room.

"Just the one bed?"

"Don't get any ideas, boys' boy. We need to be up early for the ride tomorrow."

"So, what's in Baraka?" the coyote asked as he pulled off his shirt. He'd set the bag, heavy with the severed appendage, next to the bed so it was not immediately visible from the door.

"Someone or something, I don't know. I've never been."

"I hear it's beautiful."

"Hope so, after this place."

They got into the bed. Ezra pulled the single sheet up to his neck; the coyote left it bunched by his waist. He put his hands behind his head and looked at the ceiling. His mind traveled back to a couple of hours before, and to the previous months.

To the powder he'd been ingesting daily, specially made with special properties that only affected those who could wield magic; to the hours he'd spent convincing the overly romantic cheetah mage that he was in love; to the oil he'd made using a pinch of the powder as one of the ingredients. The man who'd sold it to them, a rickety old bear of an apothecary, had told him succinctly that he needed to get it within the target's body for it to have the desired effect: the leeching of the power that made up protective spells. He'd also been non-specific as to how one was to accomplish such a feat when the target in question was a battle mage.

Well. The coyote rolled over, head still resting on his hands as he closed his eyes. Maybe that cheetah's spell had been more realized than he'd first suspected it would be. He wondered briefly what the mage had done to acquire a price on his head so high that the Guild was involved. Then he dismissed it from his mind. It wasn't his job to know that kind of thing. He was the blade, not the head, not even the wielding arm.

There came the soft sound of a single scratch against page from the fox's side of the room, accompanied by a slight shift of the vulpine's position. The coyote leaned over the floor, upon which his own notebook lay open. Possibly Ezra was writing that things had gone swimmingly; Madame would like to know. Instead of that, there was a slash, which denoted a private scribble made out for him alone.

roll over

So he did. "You're that bored already? I thought you'd had enough of me for now."

"Enough of the narrated and fictitious you. I was by myself, here."

"Excuses."

"Either shut up, or I roll back over and go to sleep."

The coyote shut up.