Page 44 of Thief of Roses
“I have helped you so little.”She laughed, remembering she had intended to groom him.“Forgive me, Baró.My selfishness demanded I spend more attention on my appreciation than my offer.”She ran her hand down his arm.“May I?”
He nodded, sobering his expression and preparing himself as if he were again not her Baró, but just anyone who needed tending.
Even if she recognized a similar desire in him, a craving for touch and affection, a heat she had sworn he did not have, so much of it could be explained by the hormones he could smell and the lack of healthy sexual expression.Unless he ever told her that he desired her, her fantasies would have to go unfulfilled and she would have to restrain herself from acting upon her perceptions.Running her hands through his fur was not a good start.She tenderly worked around the long welts at his back and shoulders, now faint flush pink lines.The fur was growing back and she traced the wounds.
“Should I apply more boarberry when we get home?”
He shook his head.
She stroked the line of the tufted fur down his back but stopped before she reached the tail.His back tensed when her touch neared.She withdrew.
“You’re clean.”She ran her hand over his shoulder as she moved around him again.She sighed, preferring to be touching him even under the pretense of care than facing an immediate future of laundry.
“I’ll go look after the clothes now.”She paused her progress to the shore to turn back to him.“Baró, in the spring,” she grew shy for a moment but forced herself to continue, “there is a spring rite, Narrapaug Seip, the Rivan New Year, to celebrate the coming of new life and new beginnings.The spirits gather to witness those of the mortal realm, to see our joys and our sorrows, to see our dedications and the circumstances of our lives.Sometimes the gods deign to visit and preside.We still must face winter, but I would like to ask you now — will you sing and dance with me around the bonfire?”
“If you wish,” he offered, but added in lower tones, “though I speak poorly and do worse with singing, and my legs are no longer meant for dancing.”
“You are the Fir’Darl, my Baró.Remember that.No one dares tell a god that they sing poorly or that they are not meant to dance.”
When Rivani retreatedto her laundry, Baró abandoned the pond to find their dinner.They were both nearly dry by the time he returned to her, a young stag draped across his shoulder and back.The faint glow of the moon and its reflection in the water illuminated the darkness.Rivani finished dressing in her dry clothing before setting the wet bundle upon her hip.Her hair still dripped, but she had rung it out and tied it up so that she could properly dry it in front of the fire.Baró did not have the modesty afforded to him by his pants as they kept company with the rest of the sodden laundry so he remained on all fours.
“I always attempt to dry off after bathing before I return to your company,” he confessed.“I have developed too much of a tolerance to my own scent and fear I must smell like a wet dog.”
Rivani furrowed her brows.“No.You smell earthy.Musky.Perhaps a little floral because of the oils we use for bathing.But I’ve never drawn the likeness to that of a dog, wet or otherwise.”She stuck her nose behind his ear to take a good, long, dramatic whiff.“More like wet bison.I suppose that makes sense since you have more of a bison look to you than anything else.A carnivorous bison,” she amended.
He harrumphed.
She scratched behind his ear and let him take the lead.She pointed up at the sky as he passed her.
“You can see all the stars tonight, Baró.”
“I forget how beautiful it is.”He paused, his eyes following the trajectory of her finger.
“Forget?”She cast a skeptical glance at him.“I imagine that you always have the best views out here without any villages nearby.”
“Once, I used to stargaze.I used to know all the stories of the constellations.Over time, I have forgotten them.And as my vision worsens and I increasingly walk on all fours, keeping my nose to the ground, I rarely remember to look up.”He turned the topic to more serious matters before she could respond, resuming their walk as if his confession of lost humanity did not merit any considerable thought.He could not bear to dwell on it.“I leave again in a few days.You should be well-stocked until I return.”
As he resumed their walk, the fragile hoofed legs of the deer bounced in time with his stride.
“Did you eat my horse?”
“Pardonne?”He halted and turned back to her.Her question bordered on accusatory and his back bristled.
“I wasn’t prepared to hear the truth before,” she confessed, her throat constricting.“And I know, rationally, if you did, she served a purpose and it was better than having her decay on the road, abandoned and unloved.”
“Thou dydst say that thy horse pofsefsed thy affectionnes.Y wolde not be so cruel.”
“You are not cruel, Baró,”she put her hand on his shoulder,“but you did say you ‘attended to’ her.I did not know what that meant.”
When they were within sight of the fire’s glow from the kitchens, he had released whatever insecurity made him feel as if he were being accused of fresh horrors and atrocities.He heard voices that weren’t there and felt judgment for things he did not do.He did not need to assign those things to Rivani.She did not judge him and he did not wish to feel like they were quarreling.
“Yf thou shouldst lyke, Y wyll take thee tomorrow to see that place wherein she resteth.”
“Oh, yes, Baró.Please.”She gave him an appreciative pet on his arm before she rushed ahead of him to get the door that he may pass into the kitchens with his burden.
“Rivani,” he called before she made it into the light coming through the kitchen window.
“Yes, Baró?”She turned around to face him, the light of the moon full upon her face, washing her in celestial brilliance.The tied hair had come undone and laid in a long wet rope over her shoulder.He wanted to lie with her in front of the fire, her hair drying as it created a blanket over them.He longed for her touch.
