Guardians of the Portals (11 page)

“Enough,” she mumbled and rose slowly to make her way down the slope to where they’d ground-tied the two horses and the mule. This escape into an alternate reality had taken on a strange hue, all grays and tans and muddy browns. She felt aged, far beyond her twenty-eight years, each one a burden on her soul.

Her brain still struggled to wrap around the unseemliness, the incongruity, of why anyone would find her worthy of such extreme measures. Surely
who
she was,
what
she was, paled to insignificance when measured against ... what? No yardstick of merit applied, not now, not here. Not from him.

“Come here, you damn ornery mule,” Caitlin muttered as she slipped even further into the bizarre persona that now defined her existence. “Move over, you hear me?”

She shoved, hard, and felt insanely pleased when the beast moved a mere fraction of an inch. She took her victories in small doses in her new reality. No sound gave away the stealth approach, yet she knew,
she knew
, when he came near. There would be heat, pressure and inexplicable sensations racing up and down her spine, a herald of nerve-endings running rampant. She knew it, for it welled uncontrollably every time he came near.
Lust. Shared
. His in denial; hers barely contained, each ready to explode. It was more, far more than a mere rutting would sate. She needed a proper term, in recognition of the reality and the essence of the man, for what he represented. Fear. Temptation. Otherworldliness. If he was all this—and her mind no longer rebelled at the implications—she could draw a small comfort from this hidden knowledge. She steeled herself, preparing to engage with her ...
Demon
.

“You are...” he hesitated, then moved in tight, almost nestling his broad frame against her back, in the not-so-subtle dance they’d been doing since time ceased to exist. It was a tango so tense and intimate, so annoying, that she cringed, the closeness now cloyingly claustrophobic. He continued, her Aiden-not-Aiden, “...not as unsure now.”

Well, whoopti-fuckin’-do
, she thought and flinched at his snicker of derision. She had no clue how he could read her body language so well. Familiar fingers of terror pricked at her spine as she once more entertained the possibility that he could actually read her thoughts.

“Let me,” he murmured, a whisper in her ear.

His lips brushed a feather touch against her lobe, sending spirals of tension winging across her scalp, painful in its piercing intensity. He gently moved her out of the way. Caitlin marvelled at the false consideration, the unnecessary attention to her obvious inability to learn her new role.

Her inner voice clanged a warning:
you will pay for that tiny kindness, in spades.

“I can do this.” Caitlin stepped in front of him, ever surprised that they stood at exactly the same height, nose-to-nose at five-feet-ten, but he out-massed her by an order of magnitude.

The demon-stranger sneered, “No, you can’t. Or won’t.”

Won’t. Can’t. Shouldn’t
. She remembered the line from an old movie, one her dad had loved so much. Desperately clinging to reason she searched her fractured memory, the phrase an anchor in the wilderness to which she’d been damned.

She bowed her head and mouthed the words:
‘He tasks me and I shall have him.’

“I think not.”

Once more his prescience burned into her, like ice over fire, a hot poker in her gut, followed by a gully wash of frigid ice, leaving her trembling. She was sick of his meddling with her thoughts, her very essence.

Caitlin hissed, “You think wrong...” and the ‘asshole’ petered out in the back of her throat as he grinned down at her, sanctimonious and sure of himself.

How could he
, she wondered. How could he look down, when they were so evenly matched in height, yet he seemed to levitate, his control so complete. Once again he forced her to feel insignificant, insecure.

I am nothing, no one.

“You aren’t.”

Startled, Caitlin backed up a step. The bizarre dialog was the most loquacious her handler had been since their frantic rush through the Portal, that thing that passed for salvation in a time-space that no longer computed for her.

He carefully adjusted the straps on the panniers, then shifted what little remained of their provisions so that both sides carried roughly equal amounts of weight. The loose packing threatened to throw the poor animal off balance on the steep descents.

Caitlin despised that he was right, that he always was. She simply could not perform to his expectations so she added disappointment to her laundry list of woes, with unrequited love being the least of her concerns.

Curious, she touched his elbow to draw his attention, never a safe act, but one she rather enjoyed, just to see how far she could drive him, as if his irritation would net her a badge of merit. He’d rolled the sleeves above his elbows as the heat of the day had taken its toll on all of them, humans and animals alike. As she fingered bare skin, he tensed but let his right arm lay quiet on the mule, in silent invitation; for what, she wasn’t sure.

“Can I ask a question?”

“You can,” he murmured, “but you know the answer, don’t you?” With preternatural speed he spun around and drove her to the rocky ground. Her spine screamed in agony as sharp points bit into bony flesh and elbows ricocheted off loose rock, leaving them to cannon down the slope. The horses shifted nervously but he paid them no heed, too intent on making his point.

Caitlin held her breath, as breathing caused far too much pain, her ribs and tailbone screaming in agony. He would pay little heed to her discomfort, unconcerned that the healing would take time, though heal it would. Nothing and everything lasted forever in that time-space. Her penance was to bear his weight, to feel his burly chest flatten her breasts and his legs pry her thighs apart until rough denim braked against coarse homespun. She shuddered with anxiety, praying, hoping.

“You know, don’t you?” he breathed in her ear, insistent. “And what is the answer?”

Caitlin prayed for relief from the pressure as he crushed the life out of her. Dead weight. Yet she’d dreamt of it every night. Consuming her, wrapping her in hard muscle, sinew and bone. The rocks and stones and gravel cushioned her battered body like the softest duvet as he spread her arms wide and pinioned them to the ground. Her fists curled reflexively, the knuckles raw from scraping against jagged stone, bloody, but still he pressed his advantage.

She mouthed
fuck you
and arched into him, seeking relief, fighting the unholy wash of lust and longing that threatened to drown her. She had only moments left, then he would lift off her body and that ache, that glorious throbbing in her gut and groin would leave her bereft, unfulfilled and stagnating. Then she could hate him once again.

The man smirked as he mercilessly hefted his solid bulk off her wiry frame using her bruised wrists as leverage.

“Get up. We need to make the flats before moonrise.” He extended a hand, coated with sticky blood, already drying to a dull patina in the unrelenting heat.

Caitlin gritted her teeth and allowed him to pull her upright. She swayed unsteadily but he turned away, ignoring her once again, leaving her to fight through the agony as her nerves fired in a healing frenzy. She longed to undo the tight leather laces on the bodice, to let her lungs expand and suck in the superheated molecules of stagnant air. She glanced up at the white-hot single pinprick of light and marvelled at how such a tiny object could send a tsunami of crushing heat across the barren landscape.

Her captor busied himself with adjusting the saddle pads and tightening the girths. Caitlin approached cautiously. This was a dangerous time in their relationship. He’d exerted his dominance as usual but now he had an additional opportunity to inflict—if not pain—then humiliation as she attempted to mount the squirrelly steed.

He moved aside to allow her to place a booted foot into the stirrup. Caitlin prayed to every deity she could think of as the beast sidestepped coyly, leaving her gasping and cursing under her breath. His smile of derision, sensed but not seen, burned into her back as she hopped awkwardly over the loose stones. Her sweaty palm quickly lost purchase on the high pommel and she fell backwards on a sob.

She stuttered, desperate to avoid punishment, “I-I’m sorry. I’ll do better...”

“You will, but not today. Here, let me help.” He held his hands at stirrup level, cupped to cradle her foot. “Gather your skirts, woman. Don’t make this harder than it needs to be.”

Caitlin quickly pulled the rough cotton layers up to her hips, her face flaming. She would need to carefully adjust the fabric to cushion sensitive skin. How he could possibly overlook a necessity as basic as knickers, or whatever undergarments were called in this dimension, escaped her. Setting her foot onto his locked fingers she allowed him to hoist her onto the horse. The only thing saving her from permanent damage to her nether regions was the sheepskin cover on the saddle. Even then, the rough fabric grated and pulled and tormented her irritated skin until it seeped and oozed. She carefully lowered herself while frantically stuffing the skirt between her legs.

The man watched with a small smile before turning quickly away to mount his own steed. He tied the lead line from the mule to a ring attached to the pommel of his saddle, then urged his horse onto a barely discernible path leading down a steep slope that canted to the left between jutting granite outcrops.

Caitlin allowed her mount to move at its own pace. The animal had an uncanny knack of picking his way down the impossible slope. She wriggled in the saddle, pressing her legs forward to brace against the high-backed cantle. Keeping her eyes glued to the ground ahead of the horse, she anticipated his movements as best she could. The man led the mule through the narrow opening and disappeared from view. Caitlin fought against the urge to turn away from the path, to bolt upslope, away from her handler and toward ... freedom? She had no idea what that word meant anymore. She’d been locked in a hell not of her own making for so many weeks that she barely fathomed a life outside of the daily torment that was her desire and ultimate downfall.

Escaping into the weak surcease of memory, she knew the gods surely laughed at her.

****

“W
ake up.”

Caitlin’s head snapped back as the man slapped her cheekbone, a single hard smack that shot a bolt of pain through her left eyeball.

“We’re not going to make it.”

“I-I’m sorry.” Again, with a pleading, begging note, she tried to come to terms with the here and now, but her brain refused to function. She could barely see in the dim light. How had it gotten dark so soon? Where were they?

“You fell asleep. I told you, never go to sleep out in the open. Not here. Not ever.” He clasped her upper arm in a vicious grip that immediately cut off her circulation.

“W-what time is it?”

“Time? Time has no meaning here. Light, dark. That’s all you need to know.” He released her arm and spun his horse in a circle. The mule was nowhere to be seen.

“Please. Wait. What do we do?”

“I found a cave on the other side of this ridge. It’s just big enough to hold the horses. Otherwise...”

“Otherwise, what?”

“It’s not easily defensible.” He tried to hide the worry but the pronounced crease to his brow gave away his concern.

Caitlin tried to hide her dismay. She’d relied on this stranger to protect her, to clothe and feed her in return for her utter obedience to his every whim. She had no doubt that he was all that stood between her and chaos, despite the pain and sweet caresses doled out in exquisite disharmonies. The harsh landscape robbed the eye of color and definition, and behind it all lurked the predators, caught in a mental freeze frame, ever present and lethal. They’d drawn blood, his blood. The thought of abandonment in this alien hell churned her gut, taking the small step beyond fear into a world of terror and helplessness.

They were in danger, both of them, for he put himself at risk on her behalf. He asked for nothing from her—and everything. She had little to offer, her powers useless, gone dormant, inexplicably so. From the first moment he touched her, he owned her. Given the chance, she would run, run fast, run far, yet she would never leave him for that empty space inside her belonged to him alone.

She husked, “Where?”

He pointed slightly uphill. Caitlin urged her horse toward a notch, black on gunmetal grey, etched into the side of the ridge about two hundred meters to her left. The man hung back, guarding their flank. She smelled the mule long before she heard the restless stirring as his hooves shifted loose gravel at the entrance. The heat and the hard going had them all in a lather, with the stench of sweaty equines overpowering all other odors. She had no idea how disgusting she must look, let alone smell. The last passing attempt at hygiene had been at a sluggish trickle of a stream thick with red algae that clogged her sinuses and left her skin itchy and blotched. That had been days ago, though time seemed to pass with irregular beats. She threaded raw and swollen fingers through her hair, a nervous gesture from her younger days that would leave her fine flyaway white blond locks in a tangled mass. Time and exposure had darkened and dried the filthy mass into dreadlocks that slapped annoyingly at her chin or neck whenever she, or the horse, made an abrupt move.

The man rode up beside her and dismounted. He reached over to take her horse’s reins, smugly leering as she unfolded the skirt fabric from between her legs and wrapped the material around her waist. Even now, with nightfall and the full moons poised to snap above the horizon, and danger lurking under every rock or behind every stunted bush, he still stared with unabashed interest as she ‘put propriety at naught’ as her favourite author was wont to say. She had no choice. She could either sit on the beast all night, or dismount and expose her raw flesh to his prurient interest, if indeed that’s what it was. Perhaps he merely enjoyed seeing the evidence of her discomfort. She drew a small degree of satisfaction from the brief encounter. It was the only time he seemed interested, perverse as that interest might be.