Page 27 of Unhaunt Me

“Might not be a bad idea in case we want some alone time or not to be woken at the crack of dawn by giggling tiny people.”

I nodded and headed off to the edge of the clearing with him following on my heels. A crisp, cool breeze played at our hair and Casimir glanced at me. A thought of offering me his jacket crossed his mind before everything slammed shut again.

“I’m not cold but I’ll wear it to smell like you. You’re still dressing like a Moony. You don’t have to do that to blend in here.”

“It has pockets,” he shrugged as we set to work on the tent. “When you all run around mostly naked, I don’t know where you carry stuff.”

“Wherever,” I shrugged. “Not that much to carry. I know Earthside has money and identification papers and stuff like that but we don’t need that stuff here and if I go shopping I’m not going to stuff my pockets full of stuff. That would be awkward.”

“Maybe,” he shrugged. “Maybe I’ll fill mine up with snacks.”

“You don’t have to hide your snacks here either, mate,” I teased him.

“Might. Those kids look ready to swarm on the first bag of marshmallows they notice.”

We fell quiet as we staked the tent loops down. He paused and glanced skyward as if listening to something.

“Castor?” I asked him, walking up to hug him from behind.

“Casalona is eating,” he shook his head as I buried my face between his shoulder blades to take in his scent. “She’s thinking something that sounds like ‘zoink’ over and over.”

“Maybe that’s what she calls milk,” I said, nuzzling him.

“I can’t wait until she’s old enough to bring out here too. I almost asked Melon if we could bring her but didn’t want to push my luck. It’s one thing to take her to your house or the Star Room but out in the middle of nowhere.”

“We’re not in the middle of nowhere. I know where we are and there’s a little cabin back there for kid stuff if it’s needed. Still, I can’t say I’m sorry to have you all to myself out here in the wild.”

The others gathered up and organized how to start the bonfire. Usually, I loved helping to light it up but that evening I wanted to stay connected at the hip with Casimir. He turned to face me and rested his forehead against mine. His gaze was soft and only a little horny. His heart thrummed in time with mine and for a moment I thought he’d kiss me right there in front of all the world. Picking up my stray thoughts over the flight link, he grinned.

“We are not at the purple district, mate,” he teased me, but his words were soft and thick.

Tonight was going to be the night. It was as if leaving the city behind, freed something inside Casimir. His muscles weren’t as tense and his words not quite as guarded as they usually were.

“The fresh air suits you,” I said, wrapping my arms around his neck. “Suits you very well.”

“Are you two coming to roast weenies or not?” Roary called out to us.

Most likely, someone volunteered them to be the one to interrupt our ‘love birds’ moment. Grinning, I stole one quick kiss from Casimir before sprinting off toward the now roaring fire. He jogged at my heels. I waited for him to catch me and carry me off back to our tent, but he didn’t. I plopped down near Roary, Breezie, and their brood of hatchlings and Casimir sat down behind me. I leaned back against him as snacks were passed this way and that and children giggled about how much they were going to eat. Breezie and a few other carriers forbade any eating contests but I wasn’t sure they would succeed in keeping ‘illegal’ contests from happening.

As the sun sank low, and the mountains swallowed up its light the kids started to doze off and the conversation turned to the nameless woman we’d all researched so much. At least, had tried to research. It was as if by giving her magic and her name away she erased herself from the very memory of history.

“What if we start looking into magical commands that mean open, door, or adjacent things?” Roary was the first to offer up an idea that shut the rest of us up long enough to hear them out.

“Then what?” someone else asked.

“We start cross referencing anyone with anything similar to any of those words for a name,” Roary shrugged. “I’m not gonna lie. It will take a long ass time to do it that way and it might not even pay off in the end but it’s all we have unless someone else has a better idea. We can’t keep randomly reading things and hoping to find what we’re looking for.”

We could keep doing things that way. I’d stumbled across a lot of interesting things along the way. It wasn’t like anyone was dying to get back to Earthside. No one that I knew of anyway. Sure, some folks would probably find their mates if they couldbut this was one of those projects where things took as long as they took.

“I think we go for it,” someone else shrugged. “It at least points us in some direction.”

Casimir kissed my cheek and inched back from the fire. I inched with him until we were nearly in the trees. Only then did he stand up and pull me to my feet. He stole a quick kiss, and we took the long way back to our tent. In the dark, it seemed further away than it had before sunset. I held onto his hand tight, and my dragon shifted my eyes to his so that I might borrow his night vision.

The scents of the forest crawled under my skin – trees and flowers, both alive and half-dead. Little animals and birds nearby. The ground itself, rich with the nutrients that nurtured the lives of the forest. Then there was Casimir. He smelled of scales and seduction. I fought off the urge to pat his crotch and check for a hard-on. I didn’t need to. My mate smelled hard as he led me back to the tent.

He unzipped the flap without letting go of my hand and held it open. I crawled inside wiggling my hips at him as I went. A second later, he was inside with me and the tent was all zipped up tight. He shrugged off his jacket and spread it over the blanket. Then he took off his shoes before stealing mine and placing them in the far corner of the tent. Glancing down told me he was as hard as I suspected. I swallowed down the anticipation creeping into the back of my throat. Was I reading him wrong? Was this our normal romping around or were we going to go all the way?

Pulling me close, with both of us on our knees, he claimed my mouth in a long, drawn-out kiss before I could ask. I gave in to his lips parting mine so that his tongue slid into my mouth. I savored the taste of him – metallic like a dragon and sweet and burnt like the marshmallows we ate around the fire. His handsslid up and down my bare sides and I tugged at the hem of his shirt until he backed up just enough for me to pull it over his head. I kissed his neck and his shoulder, avoiding his claiming gland. If he wanted my mouth there, he’d put it there himself.

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