Beautiful Warrior (4 page)

Chapter Four

I awakened to the sound of silence:
no rain, no gorgeous man breathing roughly beside me. I did smell coffee, though.

I sat up
and reached for the blanket, covering my nakedness. Then I noticed the warrior. He was seated at the table with a mug in his hand. Beside him was a tin pot that I assumed was the coffee. I also assumed that he’d brewed it over the flame that burned in the fireplace, much in the way he’d cooked the stew.

“Do you want some?”
he asked.

I
nodded, still keenly aware of last night’s sex. “Yes, please.”

He
poured a cup and brought it to me. He wasn’t naked. He was wearing the same buckskin pants as yesterday and the same bone-handled knife. His hair was long and loose and looked freshly washed.

I thanked him and took a si
p. The coffee was thick and strong, too bitter for my taste, but I drank it anyway.

The
warrior returned to the table and went back to his coffee. Originally I’d met Duncan online, but the first time we’d met in person was at a trendy Starbucks-type place in the Media District. He’d gone for a double caramel macchiato, and I’d ordered a vanilla latte. This was definitely a far cry from that.

“Today is the day,” he said.

“The day?”

“That I will help your sister’s people get across the border
. Seven will be here in about an hour, along with the others.”

“How do you know when they’ll be arriving?”

“I can feel them.”

“You should be the psychic instead of Seven.”

He shrugged. “I just know what I feel.”

I knew what I felt, too, and my heart was
still painfully tangled with his. “I need to get dressed. But first I should get cleaned up.” 

“You can wash in the stream
, like I did this morning. Or I can heat some water and you can bathe with a cloth.”

I
didn’t want to venture outside, not if he wasn’t going to join me. “I’ll take the warmed water.”

He put a large pot
over the flame, and I watched him through troubled eyes. On the morning after I’d lost my virginity, Duncan and I had showered together, kissing and caressing and doing erotic things.

Once the water was warm, he poured it into a basin and dunked a chamois cloth into it.

“I can bathe you,”
he said.

“That would be nice,” I replied, sounding far too polite.
I wanted him to touch me so badly, I ached.

“
Then come here.”  He gestured to where he stood, beside the table, where he’d placed the basin.

Nervous and naked
, I padded over to him. I could only imagine how I looked, my skin dappled in fire-lit hues, my nipples pebbled in the morning air. No doubt I appeared beautiful to him. But if he was aware of how mixed-up I was, he might think otherwise.

He lifted the cloth
, wrung it out, and washed my face. Although the water was luxuriously warm, I felt chilled, as I so often did when I thought about the extent of my illness. Being schizophrenic wasn’t romantic, and I had no business encouraging this fantasy. I’d skipped my meds to help make it happen, but it hadn’t done me any good. Not if the warrior was still destined to die.

He
wet the cloth again and moved it to my neck and chest. He squeezed the excess water onto my breasts and down my stomach. The water formed iridescent rivulets. My hallucination was becoming even more dreamlike.

More dangerously romantic.

He lowered the chamois, sliding it toward my nether regions. I was shaved smooth. I’d done that for Duncan. Not because he’d asked me to but because a mutual friend had suggested it. Her name was Lori and she was my only female friend. We’d just recently become acquainted, and she didn’t know I was schizophrenic. I worried that she wouldn’t like me anymore if she knew the truth. Lori thought mentally ill people were creepy.

Duncan promised that he wouldn’
t tell her about my illness. But what if I landed in the psych ward? Or what if I was already there? Would he be able to hide it from her then?

By now, the warrior
had the cloth pressed between my legs. I sucked in my breath. Duncan affected me in the same way. I was always struggling to breathe around him.

He didn’t linger as long as I would have liked
. He finished bathing me, front and back, and then dried me off.

He stepped away
, and I asked, “How much do you know about my world?”

“Enough, I suppose, to a have a fairly good understanding of how it works
. Everyone here knows how crucial it is to our existence.”

“
How far back can you remember about this world? About 105?”

“What do you mean?”

“Do you remember when you were first created?”

“I was thirteen
, the same age you said you were when you created me.”

“Where did you live?”

“Here in the woods. By myself.” 

“Duncan lived on the streets when he was that age
. He was just wandering around by himself with no memory.”

“From the trauma
he can’t recall?”

“Yes.”

“So he survived alone, the way I did?”

“No
. A homeless man named Jack looked after him, then he was taken away from Jack and put into foster care. That’s where children live in other people’s homes,” I added when he gave me a puzzled look. Apparently what he knew about my world didn’t include social services. “But Duncan didn’t like staying with unfamiliar families. He considered Jack his family. Jack was sick, though. In the head.”  I pointed to my own brain, demonstrating what I meant without really saying that I was sick, too.

“Where is Jack now?”

“Gone.”

“Dead?”

“Yes.”

“Death is power.”
 

“No it isn’t
. Not to me.”  I’d started to go mad after my parents were killed. The stress of losing them had kick-started my schizophrenia into high gear, triggering psychotic episodes, like giving myself a little sister who believed in a place called Room 105.

Because I was getting cold,
I wrapped my arms across my freshly bathed body. The fire wasn’t keeping me warm. The conversation wasn’t helping, either.

I wanted to change the subject
. But the only thing that came to mind was another emotional topic. I asked, “How many other women have you been with?”

He furrowed his brows
. “Why does that matter?”

“It just does.”  Duncan had been with a slew of other girls
and I did my darnedest to keep from being jealous.

“I don’t keep count
. But there have been quite a few.”

“Who are they?”
I boldly inquired, reminding him of how isolated he was out here. Besides, he’d told me that he rarely had visitors. Had he lied about that?

“My other lovers are wood nymphs.”
 

I blinked in surprise
. Then I imagined how enchanting they must be, these female sirens who danced through the trees and offered themselves to him. “Am I the first mortal girl you’ve been with?”

“Yes
. That’s why I wanted you so badly.”  He moved closer, and we kissed.

I couldn’t help how special he made me feel
. How seductive. How wild. I tugged him tight against my body.

He backed me against the wall, and I knew that he was going to make love to me one last time.

He removed his knife, but not his pants. He merely pushed them down, freeing himself quickly.

Lord
. Mercy.

He filled
me with his hardness, with his strength and power, and my body pulsed with every thrust. As he lifted my arms above my head, holding me in place, I thought about how people collected dead butterflies and put pins through them.

I was being pinned, too
. Only, unlike those butterflies, I was alive, my heart fluttering as rapidly as a pair of wings.

The warrior pounded
into me, moving fast and rough, pushing me toward a heat-spiraling climax, my arms still raised above my head. When it ended, when we both came, he released me, and I nearly sagged to the floor.

Once I
recovered, I gathered my clothes and got dressed. All he had to do was readjust his pants and strap the knife back on.

“
Am I supposed to leave today, too?” I asked. “To go home after the others are free to cross the border?”

He nodded
. “You can restore what you have with Duncan.”

I longed
to see Duncan, to resume our relationship, but not if he remained in danger of dying.

I gazed at the w
arrior, still feeling the impact of his pinned-against-the-wall lovemaking. I wanted to wrap my arms around him, but we were standing far apart now, a painful gap between us. He was willing to let me go and return to his wood nymphs. Would Duncan do that someday, as well? Would he say goodbye to me and return to the other girls who warmed his bed?

I frowned at my
buckskinned companion, laying the blame on him. “Yesterday you said that you might be capable of falling in love someday.”

He
cocked his head. “And how is that relevant to what is happening today?”

“It isn’t,” I replied,
feeling hurt and dejected. I couldn’t force him or Duncan or anyone else to love me. Nor could I force him to help me break the curse.

Still frowning, I damned this hallucination, right along with myself
. Nothing was going my way.

Chapter Five

Seven
arrived at the warrior’s door with the rest of Abby’s people in tow. Since I was meeting them for the first time, I went outside by myself. Although Abby had described them to me over the years, and I knew their personality quirks, it wasn’t the same as seeing them in person.

First up
was a Jack Russell terrier named Dingo. Abby often referred to him as a dancing dog, but he just jumped around like a typical little canine. Dingo was normal in every way, aside from not being real.

Next was
Face, and he was about as abnormal as it got. He was an oversized, disembodied head with no hair and generic features. He also had hands attached to his chin that he used like wings to keep himself afloat. His function in life was to berate you when you did something wrong. But he could also humiliate you just for the fun of it. He was already looking at me as if I was an idiot, and we hadn’t even exchanged a greeting.

Bud, however
, seemed like a decent old guy. Short, fat, and partially bald, he worked as a movie director, making low-budget films in Room 105. I doubted that he appreciated the realm we were in, considering that filmmaking wasn’t part of this era, but he appeared to be making the best of it.

When he
smiled, the lines around his eyes crinkled. Although he spoke with a Bronx-type accent, he’d been created as a tribute to Alfred Hitchcock, the British master of suspense, and Carlo Ponti, a highly respected Italian producer who’d been married to Sophia Loren, a glamorous movie star from back in the day. My sister knew who Hitchcock, Ponti, and Loren were because our aunt, who’d raised us after our parents died, had familiarized us with Old Hollywood.

“We brought you a gift,” Seven said, drawing my attention to him
. He extended a pair of ladies’ shoes to me. “We got them in town at the general store. It’s the only style they had.”

“There’s a town around here?” 

“It’s actually a ways away. We had to hitch a ride on a buggy to get there.”

“Thank you for thinking of me.” 
I bent down to put on the shoes. They looked like something a schoolmarm would wear, with their simple, sturdy, matronly design. Luckily, they were a good fit, surprisingly comfortable and certainly better than going barefoot.

I noticed that Seven had
also wrangled up a shirt for himself, which appeared oddly poetic on him, with its rough 1800s flair. Other than that, he looked like his usual self. The rain from last night had done a number on his hair, making it even messier.

“So are
you ready to get this show on the road?” he asked.

“The warrior is ready, but I’m not.”

Seven didn’t look pleased. “What’s the holdup?”

“He won’t help me find the magic to break
the curse. Instead, he wants me to go home with the rest of you.”

“But he’ll end up dying by next year
. Does he understand that? Did you explain it?”

“Yes, of course I did
. But he thinks death is power, and is willing to accept the curse as his destiny.”

“
Fuck.”  Seven kicked the damp ground. “I didn’t see that coming.”

I merely sighed, but
Face, who’d been in the background, flew forward and said, “You didn’t see it coming because you’re a shitty psychic with a dick for brains.” 

“And you’re an
overblown Mr. Potato Head,” Seven retorted.

Face
snorted. “Well, at least I don’t pretend to be some all-knowing, all-seeing rock star. You couldn’t find your ass in a windstorm if it blew your butt cheeks apart.” 

Seven spun around an
d smacked him. Face fought back, and they went after each other like snot-nosed boys fighting over a toy.

“They
do this all the time,” Bud said as Dingo jumped around and barked.

“How do you stop them?” I asked.

“I don’t. I just let them hash it out.” 

We didn’t have time for th
at. Nor was I going to put up with it. I snapped at them, raising my voice above the commotion. “The warrior is going to save both of you from the border monsters. So maybe you could help me figure out what to do to save him?”

Seven ended the altercation, shoving Face away and making him roll like
a bowling ball in the air. Face recovered quickly, landing right side up and flashing both of his middle fingers. But at least it was over.

After a beat of silence, Seven said to me, “It isn’t going to work, Vanessa
. We can’t accept his help.”

I gaped at him
. “You’re not going to let the warrior protect you from the monsters? How are you ever going to get back to Abby if you refuse his protection?”

“We can go to the next warrior and enlist his help.”

“The next warrior?”

“In the present realm
. I doubt he’ll be as archaic as the dude we’re dealing with now. The present warrior can get the rest of us across the border and he’ll probably help you find the magic that will keep him alive, too.”

It hadn’t occurred to me that there would be
other versions of the warrior in other realms. But it made sense, I supposed, in a strangely schizoid way. Since he’d been created as a protector of Abby’s people it stood to reason that he needed to be available on every realm.

I asked, “If the present warrior doesn’t come through, will we go the future and see that warrior?”

“No.”

Puzzled, I shifted my feet
. “Why not?”

“Because things are always changing there
. The last I heard, there weren’t any borders left on that realm, so there would be nothing to cross.”

“
You wouldn’t be able to leave 105 from there?”

“Nope
. You could, using the same portal that brought you here. But that won’t work for the rest of us.”

“Th
en we’ll focus on the present.”

“That’s the plan
. Now go ditch that hard-ass you slept with last night so we can get going.”

“What should I tell him about us leaving?”

“Tell him the truth.”

“He’s not going to like it.”

Seven shrugged, refusing to make it his concern
. But all of this was my fault anyway. I was the crazy one conjuring these details. Still, I didn’t relish what I had to do.

I reached for the door
. “You guys wait here. I’ll be back after I talk to him.”

“We’re
not going anywhere,” Seven assured me.

I entered the cabin
and found the warrior standing in the center of the room. We made eye contact, and he stared at me in that feral way of his. He seemed to suspect that something was amiss. I wanted to turn tail and run.

But I said, “The mission is off
. We don’t need your help anymore.”

He narrowed his gaze
. “What does that mean?”

I tried not to hesitate, to just get it over with
. “It means we’re going to travel to the present realm and see the warrior who is there.”

A muscle ticked in his jaw
. “So you can bed him, too?” 

I had
n’t actually thought about what the modern man would expect in exchange. “If that’s what it takes.”

“No other warrior will
make you feel the way I do.”

He stepped closer, and I shivered from the want of him
. But I held my ground. I held up my hand, too, stopping him from sweeping me into his arms.

I said,
“You don’t know how he will make me feel.”

“I don’t wan
t you to bed him.” 

“Then help
me break the curse, and I won’t need to go to the present realm.”

“
I already told you that I won’t interfere with the curse.”

“Then I
’m going to have to hire him instead of you.”  What else could I say? What else could I do?

A
tight smile tugged at the corner of his lips. “You already paid me, little butterfly.”

“That doesn’t mean I have to follow through on using your services.”  I wasn’t going to let him die so easily. Not him or Duncan or any of the other warriors created in his likeness.

“So you’re determined to leave?”
he asked.

I nodded, and he closed in on me
, saying goodbye the only way he knew how. At this point, stopping him from taking me into his arms was impossible. He yanked my body against his, holding me far rougher than necessary.

He kissed me,
and my knees went unbearably weak. I couldn’t control the way I melted from his touch. Or how much I missed him after he released me.

All I could do was lift my chin and walk bravely out the door, doing my damnedest to keep him alive.