FSE

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Tryk lifted his nose to the warm breeze, taking in the rich smell of loam and trees and countless people and animals. He kept his eyes up, worried that if he looked down he'd lose his nerve. The jungle wasn't all that far down (four hundred feet? five?), and the foliage was thick. If this didn't work, the fox was reasonably certain he would survive a fall. As long as the rope he'd tied in a harness around his chest didn't break or shatter his ribs.

He spread his arms wide, and the light cloth he'd tied to his wrists and waist billowed out in the wind. He gauged the strength of the wind, giving his "wings" a flap. With the extra fabric, he should have enough lift to--

A gust came up and caught his wings. He stumbled trying to regain his footing and flailed his arms, which unbalanced him even further as one wing caught the air and the other folded in against his body. He spun and tottered, and then his foot caught the edge of the rock.

Fortunately, he had the presence of mind to jump, aiming for the area beyond the edge as he tried to spin his body around. For a heart-stopping moment he was falling, just falling, and then he got both arms out again and the updraft caught his wings and then, well, he was still falling, but more slowly. He opened his eyes.

Below him the jungle spread out, bright green broken up with dark patches where the fronds of the banana trees spread between the larger kapok trees. The air currents that brought him the smells of unfamiliar leaves and fruit from the jungle gusted more strongly around him now, but with some wiggles of his arms he was getting the hang of it. A mile to the left, the shimmering snake of the Longua River broke the green carpet, and right around one of the bends, a cleared spot where there were mud huts that he couldn't see because the trees were too high.

All of this he took in quickly as he realized he was gliding. For a moment he luxuriated in the feeling of flight, of being right and making wings that worked, of hanging suspended above the world. A smile spread over his muzzle, and he turned to look in the other direction from the river.

The rope harness caught in his fur. Oh, Fox, the harness. He'd have to unhook it. He reached around to where the harness hooked onto the rope, but just as he got it unhooked, the wind spun him around and around. Of course; when he'd reached around, he'd folded the wing and lost his lift on that side. At least he still had hold of his tether--no, his momentum whipped it out of his paw. Falling freely now, he spread his arms again, but that only accelerated his fall.

His body turned and the wind caught his wings, slowing him but pushing him from his back. The blue sky stretched unbroken in front of his eyes. How far was he from the jungle? He twisted his body, desperate, and there were the trees, far too close, closing fast. Tryk squeezed his eyes shut and kept his wings spread. The air rushed past his ears, and behind that sound was the whistling and rustling of the leaves of the jungle, getting closer and closer. In that moment he thought about how foolish he'd been to jump off a cliff when he lived by himself, nobody to come rescue him, nobody to take word back to his family if he died. He could have asked one of the jaguars maybe, bribed them with medicine...but now if he died, he would rot on the jungle floor.

This thought remained in the forefront of his mind as the jungle noises came closer. He tried flapping his arms, but that didn't seem effective either. And then he crashed into leaves and through them, struck branches and snapped them in half. He grasped at the next branch he hit and missed it, and something tore at his fur and caught his wings, tearing the cloth. The next branch slowed him long enough that he could crook his arm over it. When he was sure he wasn't falling any more, he opened his eyes.

His arm had settled in the one-foot gap between two large thorns on the branch of a kapok tree. Of course he would've had to crash into the spikiest tree in the forest. That explained the large rents in his wings and the pain that shot through his thigh. The ground still lay probably a hundred feet below him as best he could tell, with seemingly as many spiky branches in the way. His arm was already growing sore, so he hooked his other arm over the branch, mindful of the thorns, and stared enviously at the banana tree growing just out of reach across from him.

He'd have to get down somehow, and likely as not that was going to mean climbing down the thorny branches. That would be easier without the wings. So he pulled himself up onto the branch, balanced precariously, and set about unbuckling the straps on his wrists, then the one around his waist. They'd taken him a long while to make, and he hated to lose them, but they'd encumber him on the way down, so with a sigh, he dropped them. Hopefully he could recover them on the ground.

They caught immediately on one of the branches not ten feet below him. There was his first goal: get down to that branch and drop them again.

He lowered himself and dropped to the branch, intending to hook his arm over it again. The impact came with a thud that set off a raucous screeching of birds around him, startling him so that he clutched and stretched the wound in his side. He tensed and his fingers slipped from the branch. Desperate, he grabbed at the fabric of his artificial wing, draped nearby, but it came free with a snap of the wooden struts and a loud tear.

He fell, bouncing off branches, grasping at them and missing. One struck his paw so hard that he heard the crack and felt the sharp pain a moment later. He curled up, hit one more branch, and then struck the ground with an impact that left him dazed and the world spinning. All around, the rustling noises of small animals scurrying away from him slowly died down, leaving him with the smell of crushed leaves below him and the background noises of the birds high up returning to their perches.

He was alive, but everything hurt, including even the thought of moving. The canopy of leaves covered him completely; nowhere could he see even a speck of the blue sky he'd just been soaring through. And now his wings were ruined, and he was going to have to go back to the base of the cliff and climb hundreds of feet and hope that the trail brought him out near his cabin. Lying here on the dirt and vegetation of the jungle floor was soothing and every minute he did so put off that future pain.

He closed his eyes and let the warm, moist air wash over him, full of floral scent and animal odors. His body relaxed and the sharp pain of his wounds faded. He would just lie here for another moment or two, or three. Maybe when he got up he could at least collect some of the plants he was interested in. It wouldn't be a total loss for his first flight.

Crashing sounds through vegetation nearby jolted him to a sitting position, looking around wildly. His paw went to his waist before remembering that like an idiot, he hadn't brought his wooden knife. He'd expected to go soaring over the jungle and then return triumphantly to his little cabin. He could have broken off one of the thorns of the kapok tree if he'd thought of it, but before he could scramble over to the trunk and make the effort to snap off one of the foot-long thorns, a shape swept aside branches and stepped out into the little clearing around the kapok.

Tryk scooted back. This was one of the fruit bat tribe, a short fellow with dark eyes and russet and grey-patched fur, much like Tryk himself though in different patterns. This fellow had orange borders on his cheek ruff like Tryk did, but also orange borders over his eyes that met at the bridge of his nose. A dark ruff of fur surrounded his neck and then faded into a russet chest and a tan stomach, below which hung a simple tan cloth and then dark brown legs. From his dark brown arms, folded leathery brown wings hung, attached to his side down to his hips. Granted, Tryk hadn't seen many people over the last few months, but even so, this bat was cute. Very cute.

He cleared his throat and tried to remember the rudiments of their language he'd learned. "Good...sun," he attempted.

The bat cocked its head to the side and then spoke to him fluently in his own language. "Good day," he said. "Did you want to get bitten by ants or did you not know about them?"

Tryk jumped to his feet, brushing his fur frantically and in the process bringing all of his wounds back to life. "Ow ow ow."

"Did they bite you? I mean, lying there without even a cover for your..." He gestured to Tryk's midsection. "If you get bit on that, it can be very painful."

"No," Tryk said. "I didn't know. I mean, they didn't bite me."

The bat looked around. "Where did you come from? The path is a hundred yards that way."

The fox pointed up. "I fell."

"I know you fell. I figured you wandered in and climbed up to pick bananas. That's how most people fall. Sometimes they die." His eyes slid down again. "Sometimes they have clothes I can take and trade."

"No, I mean..." Tryk suppressed the urge to drape some of his tattered wing over his privates, very conscious of the air on them and the eyes of the cute bat. "I was trying to fly. Like you do. And I hit the tree and I fell."

The bat's eyes widened and now he took in the tattered cloth. "With that?" Tryk nodded. "I've never heard of such a thing."

The fox perked his ears and allowed himself a smile. "It worked...for a little. I made some miscalculations. But I flew down from the top of the cliff."

"Sun and Moon!" The bat's eyes widened. "From the plateau? Wait! You're the stranger?"

Tryk tilted his head. "Am I?"

"They said he was a fox, and I thought of the red coats, you know." He brushed a paw down his own chest. "But you're brown, with just red around the edges."

"I'm a cross phase," Tryk said. "I really never thought I'd need to explain that again. You see other foxes down here?"

"On the ships." The bat pointed over in some direction, probably away from the cliffs. "Every eight or nine tenday they land over at the river mouth."

"Oh." Tryk held on to one of the broken wooden struts of his wing and folded the tattered cloth over his forearm, trying to be casual about it. To hide his privates, though, he had to lower his forearm to the point that it was not only obvious what he was doing, but awkward. And yet, he was committed at this point. Maybe if the bat thought he was cute, too, he'd tell him there was no need to cover himself.

The bat watched him, clearly noticing, but only said, "You haven't been to the river mouth?"

"I, ah, no," Tryk confessed. "I stay mostly on the plateau, the savanna."

"That explains why I haven't met you. I live about halfway up the cliff."

He felt bad immediately. "I should have checked. I have seen you and your tribe flying, but I thought everyone lived down here in the jungle."

"Most do, but it's hard to glide from down here." The bat spread his wings. "You can only get about three spans and then you land again."

A span, if Tryk was interpreting correctly, was either wingspan or the head to toe height of the bat, so either seven feet or a little over five. Either way, he suspected that the bat had a sense of humor. "How many are in your tribe?"

"My family lives farther along the cliff. We have to go where the caves are and mine is a little away from the others. There are bat families all along the cliff for miles. We give each other some distance."

"I didn't know you lived so close." Tryk cleared his throat. "So how do you get back up?"

"I walk for about a quarter-light. So I try to start by the beginning of last quarter-light."

The days here didn't vary much, being all around twelve hours long, so a quarter-light was likely a three-hour walk. And if the bat lived halfway up, then it would be another three-hour walk up the cliff to his house. "I suppose I should get started, then," Tryk said. "Thank you for the warning about the ants. My name's Tryk."

The bat nodded. "I'm Flit," he said, and then extended one wing, the skinny fingers on it outstretched. "Your people clasp fingers, is that right?"

"Ah--yes." Tryk clumsily switched the wing to his other arm and reached out to grasp the bat's fingers. "It's a pleasure to meet you."

"Tryk." The bat sounded out the name. "I would be pleased to offer you my hospitality for a night. After your fall, I would not want you to spend a half-light climbing back to your home."

"Oh, no, I can..." Accepting hospitality could have a number of different obligations, and despite wanting desperately to fly like them, he knew very little about the fruit bat tribes. Families, Flit had called them families. But even as he worked out how to politely frame his refusal, he took a step and his hip wound flared again. It was either accept hospitality or spend a night sleeping on the jungle floor with the ants and whatever else came out at night, or maybe sleeping on the road up the cliff in the wind, one bad dream from rolling to his death. And also he could sleep near a cute bat, if nothing more. He gulped. "I, uh, I would be honored, but I have no gift to offer in exchange."

Flit smiled. "I came down to collect fruits. If you carry fruits, I can bring back twice as many, and that will be enough of a gift."

"As long as we walk slowly." Tryk touched his hip. He could possibly bind it with some of the wing fabric, but it wasn't actively bleeding, so it should be okay, and that was the worst of the wounds, apart from his paw, which ached and hurt whenever he put pressure on it. It wasn't his right paw, thankfully, but Flit noticed and stepped closer.

"You're hurt? Let me see?"

He crouched down in front of Tryk to look at the hip wound, and then his left paw, which happened to be the one holding a tattered cloth in front of him, so all the while the bat's nose was only separated by that thin cloth from Tryk's sheath. Despite the stirrings of interest he tried desperately to quell, the bat didn't seem all that interested in what was behind the cloth, though he did rub a finger delicately along the fox's paw.

"You might have broken something," he pronounced, standing. "Only use one paw for gathering fruit." He frowned. "You won't be able to hold very much."

"Oh." Tryk wondered how Flit was going to hold fruit, and then the folds of the wings rattled and he understood, and also had an idea. "Say...are there small kapok trees around? Like...my height?"

Flit tilted his head. "Yes, but they don't bear fruit."

"No, I know, I just--can you take me to one?"

Walking wasn't so bad, especially if he favored the wounded hip. The repetitive ache from jarring the leg with every step grew routine quickly. He thought about what his mother would have said about his wings--"easily the stupidest idea you've ever had, thank Canis you weren't killed." Gregori would have shaken his head and said, "Glad that handsome tail is intact." Kena would have sighed and told him for the twentieth time to go back to printmaking.

But even though his hip and paw ached, even though there might be ants (he watched where he was stepping), Tryk loved that he was walking through a jungle, seeing plants and trees that nobody back home had ever seen, behind a fruit bat, a real fruit bat, who spoke his language and talked to him and had all his own life and customs. That thought alone was enough to keep the pain at bay.

"Here." Flit held aside the leafy branches of a bush and gestured forward, where a small cluster of saplings stretched up.

Tryk limped forward. "Perfect," he said, reaching out to the trunks.

"Careful."

"I know." He fingered the tiny thorns. "These are what I want."

The bat frowned and then shook his head; that at least was a familiar response to things Tryk said. The fox smiled. "I'll show you. Give me fifteen--er." He squinted up at the sun and held his fingers a half-inch apart. "This much time."

The bat nodded. "I will go gather while you work, then."

"Please." It would be easier to do his work while the bat was gone anyway; he could set down his cloth and walk around naked.

The first thing he did was place a broken piece of wood against the back of his injured paw and wrap it with cloth to keep the bones straight. He could still flex his fingers and use the paw fairly well, as he discovered when he went to break off thorns of the proper length.

When he had several, he stretched out his torn wing to find the largest intact section, and then folded it around, securing the folds with thorns. One of the holes was large enough for him to slip his arm through, so he worked around that, pinning the fabric up onto itself until he had a large pouch he could wear over one shoulder, with the lone unbroken wooden strut as support.

With that done, he stood and began folding the other wing, considerably more tattered, into a shape he could pin around his midsection. Before he could cover himself, rustling of leaves announced Flit's return. Tryk hurried to get the cloth around him and pin it in place, poking himself with a thorn in the process.

"Ow." He licked his paw.

The bat pushed his way into the clearing. "Stop injuring yourself," he said with a slight smile. "Or was it the ants this time?"

"No, no ants." Tryk finished pinning his makeshift loincloth and then showed off the sling. "See? Now I can carry more fruit for you."

Flit's eyes widened. "That's very clever," he said. "May I?"

Tryk nodded as the bat came closer, inspecting his work with the thorns. "It's cleverly done," he repeated, and then held out his other paw, revealing three thick, waxy leaves. "These leaves have a juice that helps wounds. Put them on your wounds and they'll feel better."

The fox's ears perked up as he took the leaves and sniffed them. The scent tingled in his nose; perhaps a numbing agent? Medicines were something he'd hoped to find here. "Thank you," he said, and broke one of the leaves. A viscous whitish goo oozed out.

Flit gestured encouragement, and what was Tryk here for if not to immerse himself in the customs of the local people? Trust their ways, he'd told himself the whole journey down.

("You'll need them to survive," the captain had told him.)

So he pressed the leaf to his hip wound. There was a flare of pain that made him hiss through his teeth, but then the whole area tingled and lost sensation.

"It hurts at the beginning," Flit said.

"No, it feels good now. Thank you." Tryk dropped the broken leaf and put the other two in his sling. "Now, where are these fruit?"

He'd worried that Flit wanted bananas, and indeed the bat sought those out, but only when they'd fallen from the trees. Tryk prided himself on his sense of smell, but he invariably caught the scent of fallen bananas after Flit had already veered from the path to find them. Similarly, the low trees that bore mangoes and the bushes that bore small red berries that Flit called "riberries" each had distinctive scents that Tryk recognized sometimes a full minute after Flit had already scented them.

He asked Flit about the various plants they passed, and often the bat was able to point out plants that had various uses: one's leaves gave a pleasant taste (minty, Tryk discovered on chewing them); another could make one mildly giddy; another had nutritious, starchy roots. He took samples of each of them and committed their descriptions to memory.

Around the time the sun was directly overhead, Flit called a halt at a large outcropping. "Here on the rock we can see the ants," he said, sitting down and resting the wing in which he'd been putting all his fruit. Tryk wondered why he only used one wing and then realized that the reason was the same one he'd forgotten in designing his harness: Flit's wings were also his paws and so if he burdened both wings, he'd have no paws free.

"Is there water anywhere around?" The sun and the walk had left Tryk's throat dry. He had figured he would be able to get to the river easily, but the crash had left him well short, and he hadn't passed any water sources that morning.

Flit looked surprised. "I don't drink water very much," he said. "The fruit is very water-heavy."

"Oh!" Tryk looked into his pouch. "I thought these were to take back."

"Of course." The bat smiled. "But also to eat. Collecting is hungry work."

The tart, juicy berries satisfied most of his thirst, though he still longed for the cool barrel of rainwater he kept in his small cabin. He could survive until tomorrow though for sure. And it was interesting that the bat didn't drink as much water. Tryk didn't lack for water, but he wondered if that were a technique he could learn. Maybe eating the berries would supply his water needs?

The rest of the day proved that wrong. Tryk stayed thirsty most of the afternoon, only slaking his thirst once when he found a bush with broad round leaves that still held some water cupped in them, rainwater or dew. He drank while Flit watched in amusement, and that held him until the sun had sunk halfway down the afternoon sky.

"Now we should begin the climb up," Flit said, regarding the cliff face with his ears back. "The worst part of every flight is getting back to the top."

Here, Tryk felt he had the advantage of the bat. Flit had to walk up the trail with the use of only one paw to hold onto scrubby branches, keeping the other curled so his wing remained a pouch, and the weight of his fruit pulled him to one side (now Tryk saw why Flit had used his right hand side; that side faced the cliff, so the extra weight pulled him toward rock rather than toward a fall). Tryk was able to shift his sling to the right side, but he still had both paws to balance with. The one he'd banged still hurt, but thankfully it now felt more like a bruise than a break, enough that he felt he could take the splint off if he wanted to.

Marching behind Flit up out of the trees and undergrowth, with no scents of the jungle to muddle the bat's own and an unobstructed view of his body, Tryk could not escape how attractive the bat was. It wasn't just the wings, though he did envy those. Flit's lean, muscular body matched what Tryk aspired to, what he still worked toward even half a year removed from the temptations of Divalia that he couldn't resist. And whenever the bat turned his head to check on Tryk--well, he'd done that in the jungle, of course, hidden by leaves and shadows. Here it was unbearably cute, the perked ears, the side smile, the muzzle just foxlike enough to be familiar and different enough to be intriguing.

Besides which, Flit seemed to be a good person (one who took clothes from dead people, but...they wouldn't be using them anymore, surely). After what Tryk judged to be an hour of climbing he turned and said, "Let's rest." Tryk was fairly certain that Flit, who wasn't breathing hard, didn't need to rest, but he accepted the break gratefully. For a moment they looked out over the jungle, sharing a comradely silence until Flit got to his feet and Tryk followed.

As they got higher Tryk became more nervous about the altitude. If Flit fell, he could--presumably--push off and glide to the bottom, but Tryk had no desire to bounce off rocks or take a kapok thorn to the chest. Plus, as the sun fell in the sky, the shadows became longer and trickier to navigate. Twice he caught his toes on pebbles and his heart speeded up for the microsecond until his feet found firmer footing again.

All the way up he was picturing what he'd find when he got to Flit's cave. Bare rock, a carpet of fronds? Simplistic wooden furniture? A cave next door that he used as a toilet? Or did he just piss out over the rocks down the cliff? That thought made Tryk look up apprehensively, wondering if other bats also peed off the cliff.

Would there be another bat in the cave, a mate? Flit had said he lived alone, but maybe Tryk had misunderstood. Or he had a mate who lived in another cave, perhaps; Tryk had known one couple back in Divalia who kept separate apartments. Maybe she came over for fruit in the evenings, and they shared a bed--no, he cut that thought off, because his makeshift loincloth would not hide an erection well.

Two or three times he thought they must be almost there, but the sun still shone, though redder and swollen now (rather like his feet would be tomorrow, Tryk thought). And then Flit stopped, though the path went on, and angled his muzzle upward. "There," he said.

There appeared to be a steep path mostly consisting of sandy-red rocks sticking out of the cliff. After a moment looking at them, Tryk pieced together the way up. It looked difficult for a bat with only one free paw, so as Flit set one foot on the first rock, he stepped forward. "Say," he said. "Would you like me to go first?"

Flit turned without stepping back. "I know the way."

"I know, but I could go up, empty my sling, then drop it down and you could fill it and then use both paws to climb up?"

Flit shook his head, then considered. "You could do that?"

"I think so. I'm a good climber."

The bat stepped back and gestured to the cliff. "Then I accept your offer."

Tryk made it up the cliff in not terribly embarrassing fashion. "There's a small table in front," Flit called as the fox clambered over the edge, hauling the sling of mostly-unbruised fruit after him. "You can put the fruit there."

He hadn't mentioned another bat, so there was that at least. Facing Tryk as he straightened was a dark hollow in the stone of the cliff, but it was not a natural cave, at least not entirely; what looked like crude wooden beams framed the entrance, supported by stones that had been cemented together. Just inside, he found the small table and emptied his sling onto it, taking in the rest of the room.

No fronds littered the clean stone floor, but on one side of the room a cloth had been laid down as a sort of carpet. Only one chair sat beside the table, and all along the wall, small wooden shelves protruded at regular intervals. At the back of the room, the cave narrowed and there were more wooden beams, more masonry, and what was clearly a doorway to another room. The only smell in the cave was Flit's, and that comforted Tryk, even though he reminded himself that the odds of finding someone else who shared his intimate preferences were slim.

"I like your place," he said when the bat had invited him to sit on the chair. "Did you build it?"

"I added a few things." The bat went into the back room and returned with a box, which he filled with the fruit. "The cloth, and the chair and table. Mostly bats don't sit at tables; we sit on the floor and eat. But I, I saw some of the travelers using them and I thought it was interesting. Also I thought if ever a traveler came here, I could have a table for them."

"They're very nice. I don't know the maker. Who sold them to you?"

"A weasel, I think he said he was, named Blomen. He said there's writing on them but I can't read it."

Flit pointed him to the underside of the table, where Tryk deciphered the three letters "DFE" in the fading light. "It's three letters," he told Flit. "They probably stand for the maker's initials and the town where he lives. But I don't know where that could be. Probably he was from Ferrenis."

Then he had to explain that he was from a country named Tephos and there was another country called Ferrenis whose population resembled Tephos's very closely and yet they fought all the time. "Like brothers," Flit said, and Tryk thought that was close enough.

The darkness that crept over the cave wasn't a huge problem for Tryk as his eyes adjusted to the dim light. Flit made his way around well enough, too, and as they both settled on the cloth, lying propped on elbows, he took a turn telling Tryk about his family, how he had grown up in a large cave area half a mile toward the sunset with three brothers and sisters but had elected to come out on his own. He still saw his family, "every two spans of lights," he said with what sounded like a shrug, "and for our worship days, when the nightsun is full. Not every time, but when it is full and shares the sky with the sun."

"Moon," Tryk said. "That's what we call the nightsun. But I like nightsun better."

"Ah. Moon." Flit tried the word. "Thank you."

"Do you miss the...uh, company? Of other bats?"

"Sometimes." The bat lay on the floor on his stomach, both slender paws under his muzzle, which made his wings fan out. His eyes glittered in the dim light. "How does your wound feel? You haven't mentioned it."

"I put some more of that leaf sap on it when you went to get more fruit," Tryk said. "I didn't want to be a bother. It's fine."

"Would you mind if I take a look at it anyway?"

"Uh..." Tryk was feeling very relaxed, but the prospect of the bat poking around near his privates again sent a shiver through him. "You really don't, uh, I mean..."

The bat raised his head and smiled. "Then would you care to share a coming-together?"

When Tryk blinked, trying to figure out if the bat was really asking what he was thinking, Flit tucked his wings under him and rolled to a sitting position. "I don't know if I said it right," he said. "When the wolf from the ship said it, he said, 'share a bed,' but I don't have a bed, properly. I sleep hanging in the other room. I have this cloth but I don't know if 'share a cloth' would be right. But a 'coming-together' is when we would take clothes off, and--"

"Yes," Tryk said hurriedly.

Flit cocked his head. "Yes, you understand? Or yes, you wish to..."

"Share a bed." The fox gulped. "It works--I understand what you mean by 'bed' even if you don't have one, and yes, yes, I would like that, you're very attractive."

"Oh, good. Not everyone likes their own kind, you know. Not kind, like bat or fox, but male or female."

"No, I know. I know that well," Tryk put a paw to his chest to feel the racing of his heart. He'd started this day hoping to fly, had crashed terribly, and yet it was looking like the day might turn out in the positive ledger after all.

Flit pulled his loincloth off very casually and crawled over to him. He cocked his head and smiled. "Don't be nervous. Have you never done this before?"

"Oh, ha ha." Tryk reached down to take his own wrap off, which he'd planned to do anyway because of the thorns, and then one caught him as he fumbled with it. "Ow. No, I mean, yes, I have, many times, but it has been a while. I just thought..." He tossed the cloth aside. "I thought you were attractive but you didn't seem interested in me."

"Oh no?" Flit pushed his muzzle closer to Tryk's and grinned. "I can climb that cliff outside my cave very well with one paw."

Now seemed the right time to take his makeshift splint off his bruised paw. He unwound the bandage. "You can?"

"Of course. I do it every day or two."

"But you let me go first."

"So I got to watch."

The fox recalled his loincloth and the way he'd had to spread his legs, and his ears folded back, but he couldn't help a smile. "Uh, so...did you like what you saw?"

"I did." Flit nosed his muzzle. "May I touch as well?"

"Uh-huh." Tryk's throat felt dry, his heart pounding as the bat reached down with delicate fingers to take his sheath. He moaned, already getting hard.

And then Flit curled his other arm behind Tryk's head, wrapping part of a wing around him, and Tryk pressed closer, finding the bat's stomach fur soft. Exploring farther down, his fingers met a slender, warm shaft and curled around it eagerly. Flit made very cute squeaking noises when he did that, so he stroked at teased, heat rising under his fur as the bat's fingers worked similarly.

Flit rubbed his muzzle along Tryk's and then pulled back. "If you would like to enter me," he said, "I would like that."

"Ah," Tryk gulped, "yes, yes, that would be very nice."

The bat smiled and worked himself free, then got up. "I have to prepare a fruit," he said, which seemed odd but Tryk trusted that it was relevant. Flit disappeared into the back while Tryk lazily stroked his erection, lying on his back and staring up at the rough contours of the cave ceiling. No, not completely rough--there were designs up there, lines that glimmered lightly and made patterns he could barely decipher.

A wave of spicy fruity scent preceded the bat's return. He settled himself astride Tryk's hips and nudged aside the fox's paw, stroking his shaft with something slick. Tryk's erection had retreated slightly as he studied the ceiling but returned quickly. "Ah," he gasped. "Preparing fruit--I see."

"The whitefruit we gather has an oily juice." Flit squirmed and moved his body over Tryk's hips. "But we have to go quickly before it gets sticky."

"Oh," the fox said, "I have something that doesn't--ahh, ohh." He rested his paws on Flit's hips as narrow fingers guided the fox's shaft to the bat's rear and warmly inside.

"Take as long as you need," Flit said with arched neck, "and if it starts to get sticky we can get more."

"No," Tryk breathed, "it won't...take long..."

He pushed up, and muscles clenched around his shaft, rippling and teasing it. It had been long enough since his last time that already waves of pleasure built in him, rippling up through his legs to his hips and focused in his shaft as it slid back and forth. The smell of the fruit over Flit's own pleasant, slightly fruity scent gave the whole experience a slightly dreamlike feeling,

As his body squirmed, Flit leaned forward, wings forming a canopy over him, and Tryk let his paws slide inward to find the bat's shaft. The tip gave him enough moisture to spread up and down the whole length, and made his strokes easier.

The bat's movements matched the thrusting of Tryk's hips, a quickening rhythm that pushed the fox's shaft deep inside, pulled it almost all the way out, and then thrust it in again. Each thrust jumped his arousal, higher and higher, and it felt like no time at all before he was gasping out, "I'm, hah, I'm ah going to--"

Flit's response was to push down harder, burying Tryk completely inside him, knot and all, and Tryk let out a little yelp, squeezing his eyes shut and gripping the bat's hips. A moment hanging on the precipice and then he toppled forward, nerves singing, body tensed as though he were falling, falling...but this time he landed easily on his back, soft fur surrounding him, looking up into a warm smile.

As far as he could tell while he recovered, Flit hadn't come yet. So he gathered his breath, tightened his grip on the bat's shaft, and resumed stroking. Flit squirmed around Tryk's knot, making the fox clench his teeth, but almost as nice as his own orgasm was feeling the wings rattle around him and watching the bat's body writhe atop him, fixed to his at the hips. When Flit did come, after a couple minutes of stroking, he jerked forward and spattered Tryk's paw and chest with his seed, and said something that sounded like, "shah!"

Tryk waited, loosening his paw, as the bat sagged atop him and pulled his hips forward, then sank back when Tryk's knot didn't pop out. "Ah," Flit panted, "yes. You have the knot."

"Sorry," the fox said. "I thought you knew."

"I have seen...before."

"Didn't you feel it go in?"

"I felt...a lot of things. How long does it last?"

"Not much longer. A few minutes." Tryk slid his paws down the bat's soft fur. "I hope you don't mind."

"Not much." Flit smiled and put his paws on the fox's shoulders, rubbing. "This was nice. Thank you."

"It was nice." Tryk exhaled. "I haven't done this with anyone--well, since I got here. So...six months?"

"Ah, you poor thing." Flit laughed, and Tryk felt the warm trembling on his knot. The bat's fingers moved down to his chest, wings folding up. "If you go down to the port when the ships come in, you can usually find someone. After weeks on a ship, even if they don't prefer males, sometimes they are still willing."

"Good to know. Maybe I will have to visit this port sometime."

Flit sat back, fingers trailing down the fox's stomach fur where it shaded from brown to russet, and then back up to his chest. He touched the three white patches of fur. "This is an interesting mark."

"An accident from a long time ago. Fur over scar tissue grows back white."

"Ahh." The fingers trailed back down his chest and stomach in a very pleasant pattern, then down to his hip, where the dull pain of his wound had returned once the far more pleasant sensations that had masked it had faded. "Will this grow back white as well?"

"Maybe. If it doesn't heal well. But I can take care of it once I get back. On the subject of history," Tryk said, "how do you come to speak my language so well?"

The bat's fingers stilled. "Maybe that will be a story for another time," he said. "But most of my tribe speak it passing well. A trader lived among us while I was growing up and he taught us his language as he was learning ours."

Of course he wasn't the first northerner to come live in these parts, nor even to be fascinated by the subject of people who could fly. "Does he still live there?"

"No. A small camp live near us." Flit lifted a wing and gestured along the cliff. "As far beyond my family as they are from me. But they don't live with us." He cocked his head. "You have been here six months and not ventured down the cliff?"

"There's a port on the other side of the plateau." Tryk already felt bad about having neglected the cliff. He could have been lying here with this bat months ago. "I didn't know any of you. I've seen you flying and I just wanted to make wings work so I could fly, too. And I thought maybe if I did then I could say hi to you. But before I got them to work, maybe you'd think I just wanted to--to study you, or something. I don't know. Sometimes I jump into things too soon, but also sometimes I'm worried I'm jumping too soon and I think about things until it's too late."

The rationale felt weird to him now, but he couldn't explain it any better without explaining why he was so cautious, which related back to why he was here in the southlands in the first place, and he didn't want to start that story.

"Do you want to study us?" Flit looked down the length of his muzzle.

"Well." Tryk cleared his throat. "I wouldn't mind studying you a little more." He put his paw flat to the bat's stomach fur and rubbed in a gentle circle.

"Of course. But I mean." The bat stretched a wing. "Would it be helpful for you to see our wings up close?"

"I think so. I mean, yes."

"You may do that, then." Flit settled his weight back on Tryk's hips and spread his wings out. "Tomorrow, if you like, or whenever you want to come back."

"Thank you." The fox reached out to touch the leathery membrane of the wings, both lighter and stronger than any material he had access to. "But regardless, I would like to see you again."

"I would too." Flit wiggled his hips and lifted. Tryk's knot had gone down, but the fruit juice had dried enough to be as sticky as the bat had warned, so it was not an entirely smooth dismount.

The smells of fruit and sex mingled, and though Tryk enjoyed them, he said, "I can bring some oil next time, too. It won't get sticky."

"That would be nice." Flit smiled as he got to his feet. "I hope you rest well."

"Ah, you too." Tryk raised himself up to his elbows and watched the bat disappear into the back room. Right, he'd said he slept hanging upside down. Couldn't really cuddle that way. And he didn't drink much water, so there wasn't any to wash with. So...there were worse ways to go to sleep than sticky with sex, he supposed, and he'd be able to wash in the morning when he got back to his cabin, presuming they didn't get one of the morning rainstorms that swept in out of the south with little warning.

Still, the abrupt end to their evening felt a little strange. But, Tryk reminded himself, just because Flit spoke his language (very well) didn't mean he shared the same customs. Clearly sex was more casual to bats, and wasn't a big deal to ask about, so it probably didn't mean you had to assume some kind of emotional connection afterwards.

Of course, Tryk himself was starved for any kind of connection after six months only seeing the jaguar and capybara tribes on the plateau (plus one chance encounter with an ocelot), avoiding the northern port and working on first his water purifier, then his smokehouse, and then, once his necessities had been taken care of, his gold prospecting, his medicines, and his wings--all of which were very solitary endeavors.

He rolled onto his unwounded hip and faced the cave entrance, the dim light of the clouds familiar, though he was used to seeing the whole broad expanse of them from the skylight over his bed. This was nice in a different way: enclosed, protected. Even if there were no emotional connection here, at least he'd made a friend. Flit had definitely encouraged future visits, and that was heartening enough for him to consider his first flight a qualified success.