Chapter Twenty-Seven

“It is cold tonight.” Barta snuggled closer to True in their blankets. Though several huts had been raised at this new camp beside the stream, those had been given to the elderly, the infirm, and the very young. She and True lay in the open with nothing overhead but the bare branches of a tree. Past those branches True could glimpse widely flung stars, and the air stung with frost.

He had tried to speak to the goddess that afternoon, after leaving Pith—had gone off by himself and called out to her. He’d won no response. No doubt Pith had it right—all the times he’d called to her and received an answer, he’d been under great duress and suffused with longing. His heart told him it must be thus before he reached her again.

Barta wiggled in his arms and buried her face in his neck. He recalled doing the same to her when he was her hound and wished, in the night, to gather her scent.

Now, though, her movement only served to arouse him. He recalled Pith’s words of caution and strove to rein in his emotions.

“Hold me,” Barta requested. “Closer. You know just how close I want to be.”

He did. Moreover, so did that part of him which served to link them in such pleasure. He sighed; this looked to prove a difficult night.

“What is it?” To be sure, near as she was to him Barta could feel his discomfort. “I thought you loved it when we are together.”

“So I do—” He got no further, for she slid her tongue into his mouth. Oh, most glorious sensation! He loved her, yes, from her head to her toes and especially this well of wild flavor when she desired him.

As a hound he’d lived always and ever for the moment. Must that change?

She wiggled again, mouth fused to his, and he felt her unfasten the ties on her tunic. Suddenly he wanted her breast in his mouth, desired it more than breathing. He wanted the strength and completeness that came when he slid into her. But…

He broke the kiss to say, “Barta, do you think you carry my child?”

“Is that why your hesitate? It is well, True; folks continue to make love together even when the child becomes great; it harms nothing.”

Not like hounds, then. The few bitches he’d successfully bred wanted nothing to do with him when not in heat and snarled if he came after them.

Barta definitely did not snarl—she caressed his face with her fingers and plunged them into his hair.

He struggled to retain control of his thoughts. “But—do you?”

“Think I’m carrying your child? No, not yet. Of course I can’t be certain. Why do you ask?”

“If you have my child, that will make it that much harder for me if I must leave you.”

“That, again?” She yelped the words and stiffened in his arms. “I thought I told you, you are not allowed to leave me. Promise you will not!”

“I cannot give that promise. It is a very real possibility—I might be recalled at any time.”

“Yes but—so much has happened since you were sent to me. The contest, the destruction of the settlement…the loss of my parents. Our love for one another. Surely that changes everything?”

“I fear not. Were it up to me, Barta, I would never leave you. It is not up to me.”

She thought on that with an intensity he felt. “There must be a way.”

“I have tried to think of one. The spell that holds me—that allowed me to come here—might dissolve at any time.” Unless you guess who I am, he added silently.

“Unbearable.” She huffed the word. “It seems as if I have known you and loved you forever. How could I hope to endure losing you?”

He had no answer for that and remained silent. He felt her thoughts rushing.

At last she said, “But it is as I told you before: should that dire event occur, I can imagine no greater joy than having your child with me for always.”

“Barta…”

“Do you mean to tell me you intend never to make love to me again? Even when we lie together like this?”

Make love, as he knew very well, was what she called breeding. But it remained breeding, all the same.

“It would break my heart,” he told her, “to leave both you and my child.”

“I had not thought of that. Am I being selfish again? True, I’ve tried so hard to change.”

“You are perfect just the way you are. Perfect.” He licked her cheek, and she turned her head so their open mouths met once more, tongues tangling. This time when she broke the kiss they were both breathless.

“Surely, though, one more time won’t hurt,” she wooed.

He wondered. A hound, he nonetheless wore the body of a man, compatible with hers. Yet might it be possible he could not successfully breed her? Might the goddess have lent that protection against their eventual parting?

But there were so few protections in the world.

Barta whimpered, “We can do it the way you like best, like beasts.”

He quickened still farther and groaned. He did prefer her in that position, though front to front allowed him access to her beautiful mouth.

“I will take you,” she breathed, “any way you desire.”

Ah, and was this an opportunity to seize the autonomy Pith recommended? Should he impose his will on hers? A shocking prospect.

“Or,” she continued when he did not respond, “we might do it all the ways we’ve tried so far, one after another. You decide.”

He smiled wryly despite the fierce ache of his desire. “And if I decide not to breed you this night?”

“Breed me? That’s an odd term for lovemaking.”

“That’s what it is, Barta.”

“If you would withhold yourself from me, that’s your right. I do not command you.” She slid her hands downward from his hair, over his shoulders, around to his chest, and lower still. Her fingers wrapped around the hot, heavy length of him. “But why would you decide such a thing when we have a whole, long night ahead?”

Why, indeed?

He growled deep in his throat. If he must decide, he would choose as he always had—for the moment. Tomorrow would come, or it would not.

He turned her over beneath him, with gentle hands.