CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Bodies

Cheers, jeers, shouts—the heat and smell of thousands of bodies packed together—dim light on a seething crowd—bright lights on the game.

Melín breathed in chaos and life until the numbness eased.

The cut by her ear didn’t hurt as much as she’d feared. Her ankle was sore, though.

She should sit somewhere.

She scanned down along the rows of metal benches. Wysps floated here and there in the air, common when you got a big enough crowd. Her ears throbbed with the din. Down in the targetball cage—not really a cage when you played at the professional level, but a long, rectangular room with polyglass walls and ceiling—the game had just started. The magnified excitement of the commentator came over the speakers, talking about leaps, swings, dodges, passes. This obstacle layout of ropes and stones was new, the commentator said approvingly, and a great challenge to the players of the Pelismar Cave-Cats and the Herkethi, since none of them had ever seen it before.

From here, Melín couldn’t see more than half of the players, much less the ball, though huge suspended mirrors gave a view around some of the obstacles. The glow of the targets at either end of the cage was clearly visible. She hated watching a game from the stairs. But she’d never get a decent seat.

She should have been at the Cohort’s station reporting First Karyas to Commander Abru, instead of following her feet.

But here she was.

It was too hot in here. She took off her helmet and coat, and draped them over her arm. The scabbard of her blade hung empty over her shoulder. At least she’d recovered her old Division rank pins.

Varin’s teeth.

She trudged down into the layers of noise until she reached the first crossway path, and started moving to the right, keeping her eyes on the players in the cage.

“Seni, don’t block the play!”

“Don’t make me punch you,” she shouted back. She kept moving.

“Melín!” someone shouted.

She turned, searching for the voice. The buzzer sounded and the crowd leapt to its feet with a roar. She turned back toward the cage—the Cave-Cats had scored, their target was flashing, and she’d missed it.

“Gnash it!”

The roar died down. An official with a new ball climbed to the top of the cage, readying herself to drop it through the chute. A man and a woman hung from ropes below, waiting to leap for it.

“Melín!”

“Where are you?” she bellowed.

A man in a white shirt and dark trousers separated himself from the crowd and ran up with the most amazing look on his face—so obviously wanting to grin, but not sure he could get away with it.

“Pyaras!” She grabbed him by both elbows and shook him. Something like a scream rose in her throat, but what came out was, “To life!”

“To life, Melín!” He flung his arms around her.

Oh, the feeling of him surrounding her . . . Tears welled in her eyes. His chest under her cheek smelled sweaty and delicious. His arms were strong, his body hot, and he was definitely excited to see her. Tempted to touch him, she breathed hard, and leaned into him instead. Lust coiled and burst, a splash of fire in her stomach.

Voices shouted, “Get down!”

She shouted back at them, one thumb hooked in her helmet strap and Pyaras’ belt loop. “Fine, fine!”

“I’m here with my friend Veriga,” Pyaras said. “Want to sit with us?”

“Yeah!”

He led her two rows up. Veriga was a big scarred man with knotted shoulders, who greeted her with a nod and a short, “Seni.”

“Seni,” she said. They could talk after the game, maybe, when it wasn’t so loud. She arranged her scabbard inside her coat, folded it, and put it on top of her helmet underneath the bench. Seating was tight. She tucked herself in at the end of the bench, but if she wanted to stay on, she had to press her hip hard against Pyaras. She wanted to press him harder. Gnash it, no point pretending for some police officer she’d never met before. She wrapped her arm around Pyaras’ waist, startling his nearer arm up into the air.

The crowd roared. People all around leapt up, even Veriga. Pyaras didn’t stand. He lowered his arm around her shoulders, squeezed her arm, stroked it. Oh, yes. She shifted her arm, so his hand slipped in against her breast. She clamped her arm down, holding him there.

Pyaras gulped, staring at her.

She held his gaze. “Yes?”

He nodded.

She already had her arm around him, so she tickled up the hem of his white shirt and sneaked her fingers in, to the skin of his side. His hand moved on her breast. Gods, yes. Him, definitely. And definitely at a targetball game. There was a wet throb between her legs—the kind you had to do something about, one way or another.

She was alive. Here. Now.

She looked up at him.

Pyaras was breathing hard, his mouth half-open.

She mouthed at him, I want you.

He nodded.

Melín stood and started climbing back up the stairs. At the top, she looked around. Where was private in a crowd? Bathroom? Gross. They were nowhere near home, or the barracks. Where?

Was he even coming?

Yes, here he was, running up the stairs. The top of his head was almost healed now, and he swooped up and kissed her. Gods, she wanted to eat him up—she tried, and got in deep, a drink of his throat, a bite of his lips, not near enough. Her whole body vibrated.

He was panting, quivering. “Not here?” He asked like it was a question, like he’d actually have her on the dirty steps in front of six thousand people. Gods, the idea that he could want her so badly! But she wanted him with no one watching.

Then she spotted the ladder against the arena’s back wall.

“Follow me,” she said.

The crowd roared again. She climbed the ladder, intensely aware of every sliding movement of her thighs. At the top was the walkway where they serviced the lights and mirrors. It was flat. Narrow, but wide enough. It had wire mesh safety barriers on both sides, and through them you could see down into the crowd below.

Pyaras climbed onto the walkway and came out toward her. His eyes took in the safety barriers, and the closeness of the steel ceiling beams. “Sirin and Eyn,” he said.

She grabbed him, pulled him to her, pulled up his shirt and yanked on his waistband. Why did he have to be wearing a belt? He groaned and reached under her shirt. She pushed her breasts into his hands—aah—and then pulled herself tight against him, pressing her face into his chest, biting at his nipple. His hands moved on her back; one went up to her neck, while the other went down into her pants. Her knees buckled. He held her up.

“Gnash you, isseni,” she gasped. “How dare you be so delicious.”

She pulled away and went for his belt. Loosened her second buckle of the day even faster than the first, and slipped her hand in where she’d wanted to before, to the root of his excitement. Pyaras fell to his knees on the walkway.

She had the height advantage, now. She pulled her pants down to her ankles and fell on him, covering his mouth with hers, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and seizing his hips between her bare knees. He surged up at her, cushioned her as she fell back onto the walk, and then came down over her. Into her.

Oh, Sirin and Eyn!

The crowd roared.

The walkway dimmed in the sensations of pulse, rub, pull, gasp, moan. She buried her fingers in the hair at the back of his head, and he stroked up her side from knee to breast, and when he was spent thank the gods he still didn’t pull away, but rocked with her, nuzzled her, nibbled her, stroked her until she screamed out everything she had into the noise.

Then he pulled away, and fell onto his back on the walkway, chest heaving up and down.

She curled and got onto her knees. “Pyaras. Again.”

He laughed as he panted, mouth open. “Give me—just give me a minute.”

She walked forward on her knees. They were flying, untouchable above the thousands.

But something below caught her eye through the mesh. She swiveled fast, and instinct sent her into a crouch, pulling her pants up and fastening them before she could even put words to what she’d seen.

“What?” Pyaras asked, pulling himself together in a messy hurry. “Melín, what’s wrong?”

The Eminence’s bodyguard, Drenas, had just entered the arena and plunged down into the crowd.

Alone.

“Danger!” she hissed. “Danger!”