Page 55 of By the Horns
“It’s just a small injury. Should be better in a day or two.” Please, please don’t ask to see it.
He studies my face and then grunts again. “See that it is.”
Then he turns and leaves, heading for his quarters, his traveling pack still on his back.
I don’t breathe until I’ve washed up, rebandaged my hand, and returned to bed. Raptor hasn’t moved from his spot, but a brief time after I lie down, he quietly gets to his feet, no doubt to go clean up.
Before he does, though, he moves to the side of my bed. I keep my eyes closed, even when he brushes a finger over my mouth.
It’s wet. Tastes like seed.
I suppose I deserved that. I smile even as I lick the taste of him off my lips. Perhaps he felt like branding me, too.
Twenty-Six
Gwenna
We line upin the morning for our weekly check-in. Normally Master Jay asks us how we spent our weekend, quizzes us on whatever he thinks we’re needing work on, and then sends us off on a task or two. Today, though, he does none of that. He simply eyes us as he walks back and forth in front of our lineup at the fore of the house. He paces and says nothing.
Is it possible that he guessed what I was up to last night? Or did someone snitch on me? Did the room smell like sex? Did Raptor say something?
No, I think. Raptor wouldn’t. If nothing else, I can trust that Raptor wouldn’t say anything about our fooling around. It’s a gut feeling I have.
Master Jay strolls past our lineup, and I wait for him to nitpick something. To ask me an obscure location in the city. To ask me what a specific Prellian symbol is. Or he’ll just decide that I look too out of shape and make me run an obstacle course alone. Instead, he pauses and eyes all of us. “What did you do this weekend, Kipp?”
Kipp gestures, indicating handing out letters and running the streets.
Master Jay doesn’t follow. He stares at Kipp and then looks at me to interpret.
“Courier,” I say, and I lose a little respect for him. Truly, how difficult is it to attempt communicating with Kipp? Even if he’d guessed incorrectly, I’d have had respect for that. Didn’t even try, though.
The guild master just eyes me instead. “And you?”
I have no idea how much I’m supposed to say. I gesture at Raptor. “Shadowed him.”
“I was pulled into a tunnel excavation,” Raptor says, his voice carefully bored, as if he’s determined not to show any emotion to Master Jay. “Gwenna held a lamp while I worked.”
The teacher grunts and goes down the line. “And you, Hemmen?”
Hemmen’s eyes go wide and he gives us panicked looks. “I, ah, went to the library to read.”
“Arrod?”
“Met up with some old friends. Had a few drinks. Nothing special.”
Master Jay clasps his hands behind his back and turns around, pacing down our line again. “So out of a team of five, I have four different answers. Why is it that no one spends their time together other than these two?”
He gestures at me and then at Raptor, and even though I try to betray nothing, I can’t help but think of that slippery hand job I gave Raptor last night under the blankets, and how Master Jay caught me as I went to clean up. Is he going to confront us in front of the group?
“It’s clear to me that you are all still acting as individuals and not as the Five you should be,” Master Jay says, looking us each in the eye. “It is crucial that you are a team. Your first test will be all about how you function as a Five, and right now I’m not seeing success at all. If you want to join this guild, it’s important that you know how to work as a team. I think we’ll start with the obstacle course for the first half of the day.”
I bite back a groan, because I hate getting sweaty. Well, that’s not true. I hate getting sweaty for the wrong reasons. An obstacle course is absolutely the wrong reason, as far as I’m concerned.
“I’ll get the belt rope,” Raptor says cheerfully, almost like he’s pleased that we’re going to be jumping over walls for the next several hours.
Twenty-Seven
Raptor
