Alaskan Fury (38 page)

Chapter
15: Unfulfilled Wishes

‘Aqrab followed his magus at a
sullen pace as she trudged up the rock-studded south face of one of the last,
larger clusters of mountains in between the Alaska Range and their destination,
ignoring him completely.  She was still avoiding him due to the tantalizing
results of their last serious bargain, and the fact that the Inquisitor had
somehow cleaned herself of all
three
of Kaashifah’s Marks had left his
little wolf in an overall ill temper.

What was worse, she had been
stalwartly refusing any
good
bargains ever since he had curiously brushed
his fingers across the sensitive spot at the nape of her neck and made her collapse,
shuddering, into his arms.

Stubborn, willful little beast.  After
uncovering such an…alluring…secret, ‘Aqrab was
desperate
to get her into
another bargain with him.  The vision of her tawny body stretching and straining
beneath him once more was blotting out all other thought, an image that had
been seared into the back of his mind, leaving him perpetually hard and
achingly uncomfortable, despite multiple attempts to get himself back under
control.

A Fury.  Writhing in
pleasure
. 
Perhaps the gods were not as cruel as he thought.

“I could just ask for something
simple,” ‘Aqrab said, into her stubborn silence.  “You haven’t eaten a good
meal in too long, mon Dhi’b.”  Over the last weeks, she’d been unwilling to let
him so much as touch her, so ‘Aqrab had likewise refused to produce more than a
tiny snack to tide her over, waiting for her to realize she was being
ridiculous.  It was, in ‘Aqrab’s opinion, taking much too long. 

“And I don’t need to, either,”
she replied mulishly.  But her gaunt form belied the truth of the matter.  While
her Fury did not need food, the Third Lander she carried had been devouring
her, from the inside out.

“
Please
mon Dhi’b,” ‘Aqrab
sighed.  “Don’t be stubborn about this.  You are wasting away.”

Rounding on him suddenly, her
brown eyes livid, his magus growled, “If you’re so worried about it, djinni, put
action to your words and grant me the boon of some
real
food.”

‘Aqrab’s hesitation was all she
needed to turn infuriatingly on heel and continue to plow through the neck-deep
crusted snow like a fool.  “A djinni doesn’t grant
boons
, mon Dhi’b,” he
growled at her floundering back.  Especially when one had been robbed of his
nightly entertainment for weeks in a row.

She laughed, without looking back
at him.

“Oh, by your Lord’s sweaty
balls!” ‘Aqrab cried.  “At this point, I’ll trade a
massage
, mon Dhi’b. 
Stop being stubborn.”

Over her shoulder, she sneered, “I
saw
the look you gave me, ‘Aqrab.  You’re not going to be happy with a
massage.  The only reason you offer one is to put me back under your spell.” 
She gave him a sarcastic look.  “After all.  You
wished
for me.  That
makes me yours, doesn’t it?”

‘Aqrab slapped his face into his
hand.  “You are being unreasonable,” he said through his fingers.

She stopped to glare at him.  “But
that
is
the way you see it, isn’t it?”

“You are mine, yes,” the djinni
growled.  “But—”

She interrupted him with a laugh
and kept trudging up the slope.

“But not even a
wish
can
make someone love another,” he growled.  “It cannot change
emotions
, mon
Dhi’b.”  Coming abreast of her, he looked down at her tiny form and said, “So
while you are bound to me, I still have to woo you.”

She laughed again.  “We’ll see
how ‘bound’ to you I am when I wish you to a dragon.”

‘Aqrab felt his knuckles
tightening into fists.  “Mon Dhi’b,” he growled.  “I’ve done nothing to deserve
that.”

“Except give me three thousand
years of Hell.”  She was aiming towards what looked like a cleft in the rocks,
high above.  A cave, by the looks of it.

“You can
not
tell me that
the last three months were Hell,” ‘Aqrab retorted.  “Tell me, truthfully, they
were Hell and I will retreat to the firelands and not bother you again.”

“They were Hell.”

His breath caught in startled
dismay.  Then he narrowed his eyes at her, realizing her shoulders were much
too tense, her back much too straight.  “You
enjoyed
our bargains. 
You’re lying through your teeth.”

She said nothing, and kept
climbing.

“What are you
afraid
of,
mon Dhi’b?” he cried, out of desperation.  “You act as if this is some great
conspiracy on my part.”

“And it isn’t?” she demanded,
still floundering through the snow like a swimming camel.  “You
aren’t
trying to bargain your way into my bed?”

‘Aqrab winced.  “All I want is
for us to see eye-to-eye,” he said.

She laughed.  “Not going to
happen, djinni.  I finally came to realize I’ve been eating of the forbidden
fruit.  I need to wean myself of the poison before I become addicted to it.”

“You are
starving
yourself,” ‘Aqrab snapped.  “That is foolhardy, considering what pursues us. 
You
saw
her.  She’s a
thinker
, mon Dhi’b.  Like a spider building
its web.  She’s going to weave us into a
trap
.”

“Thunderbird said nothing’s tried
to follow us after I sacked the helicopter,” she said blithely.  “You saw it. 
She’s afraid of us.”

“She dropped herself into our
path wearing
explosives
, mon Dhi’b.”

“She also said she stopped
hunting us.”

“Probably because they’re
plotting
a
trap
,” ‘Aqrab growled.  “That’s what I would do, if I had listened to
you rant about bathing in my blood and my family’s blood and then casting our
corpses into a sewer.  While it was highly distracting, I’m sure, you gave her
every reason to renew her attempts to
kill
us, mon Dhi’b.”

She had nothing to say to that. 
Finally.  He’d said something she understood.  Leave it to a Fury to only
understand death and strategy.  Faced with the magus’s obstinance, however,
‘Aqrab was willing to latch onto any advantage he could.

He gestured at her bony body,
even then being consumed by the Third Lander in her veins.  “Every hour you go
without food, it weakens you more.  You’re already bare bones.  What are you
going to do, a day from now, when they pop out of the snow ahead of us?  When
they shoot you full of silver?  Or when you can’t walk the Void when they seek
us out with in-for-red?  You’re not only risking
our
lives, mon Dhi’b,
but those of the phoenix and her mate.”

His magus slowed to a halt on the
slope above him.  Reluctantly, she turned back to face him, glaring at him in
silence.

‘Aqrab’s heart began to pound,
sensing the possibility of a bargain.

“What do you want?”  Her voice
was strained, ‘Aqrab saw for the first time the extent of the burden that the
lack of food had had on her.  Her brown eyes were tired and anxious, having
little of the ancient depth he was accustomed to.  Her features were gaunt and
lean, and she’d actually taken on the same skeletal look as the Inquisitor who
had come to visit them two weeks ago.

He also knew, however, that he
was only going to get one chance, and if she found his offer unreasonable, it
was the last bargain she would ever hear from him.  In a rushed mental scramble,
he wracked his mind for something innocuous, yet something that would satisfy
his yearning for companionship.

After a moment of consideration,
he folded his arms over his chest and said, “Tickle me until I beg for mercy.”

He watched as the Fury’s face
cleared with surprise.  Obviously having expected something much worse, she
cocked her head at him, as if she had not heard correctly.  “
Tickle
you.”

He shrugged.  “We’ve already
established that I’m cursed with a djinni’s need for physical touch.”  He
allowed himself to grin slowly.  “The question is whether or not, in your
weakened state, you would be able to get me to beg for mercy.”

She continued to watch him with
the mistrust of a wild raptor.  “Just tickle you.”

“Tickle me until I beg for
mercy,” he agreed.  “That’s all I ask.”

Glaring at him, she hesitated,
then, haltingly, said, “I am…weaker…than I was.  I might…lose.”

‘Aqrab caught himself before he
sucked in a startled breath between his teeth.  If she was already that far
gone, she was probably having trouble
standing
.  And, no sooner did he
have the thought than he realized that her knees were trembling, her bony
fingers balled into fists.

Trying his best not to show his
concern, lest his compassion give her reason to change her pig-headed mind,
‘Aqrab nonchalantly said, “If it would improve your performance, I could be
convinced to produce a small meal beforehand, to give you the strength to
properly do the job, mon Dhi’b.”

He saw her hesitate, saw the
desire
in her eyes, obscured by a wall of wariness and shame.  She glanced down,
unfisted a hand, and stared at her shaking fingers for a long moment.  Several
moments passed, the only sounds that of the wind whipping across the white
dunes of snow around them.  It seemed like it took an eternity for her to say,
“Let me hear the bargain.  Then I will decide.”

In a rush of excitement, ‘Aqrab
pulled the full force of the Fourthlander Law into himself and felt his world
start to spin and take on a violet hue as he boomed out his conditions, bound
in Law.  “I, Yad al-‘Aqrab, sand-singer of the Scorpion clan, firstborn son of Bakr
al-Shihab, eleventh djinni Lord of the Fourth Lands, hereby offer a bargain to
you, Kaashifah the Fury, Handmaiden to Ares, Warrior-Priestess of Horus, Angel
of Vengeance, and Justice of the Battlefields:  Using the power of the Fourth
Lands, I will create a snack to sustain you, after which, you will tickle me until
I beg for mercy, and, if you succeed in making me beg, I will deliver unto you
a meal fit for a king.  Do you accept?” 

Her eyes sharpened.  “A snack?”

“Something to hold you over,”
‘Aqrab said, as indifferently as he could.  “I’ll derive more pleasure from the
act if you are not being distracted by the Third Lander.”  The
last
thing he wanted was for her to get it in her head that he was taking
pity
on her.  He’d learned long ago that there was no surer way to earn her
complete, irrational lack of cooperation than to bring her pride into play.

His magus took a deep breath and
let it out through her teeth.  She turned and looked out over the white,
windswept mountainside and considered in the long silence that followed.  “All
right, you damned word-weaving snake,” she finally said, “I accept.”

‘Aqrab’s breath left him in a
whoosh with the dual impact of the two bargains at once.  “You have reset your
seven days—as agreed, so decreed, the bargain has been made.”  He doubled over
into the snow, giggling at the sky as he surfed the dizzying, exhilarating rush
of Fourthlander power as it washed through him.

The magus watched him giggle into
the snow for a long moment, then with a slow, tentative grin, she shook her
head and said, “Djinn.”  She turned and continued her way up the mountain. 
‘Aqrab found her later by following her tracks into the crevice for which she’d
been aiming.  It was, indeed, a cave, he realized.  And a
large
one. 
Its tiny opening completely belied the vast, warm interior, leaving his magus
without the need to expend her energy on their nightly sanctuary.

Which, he realized, watching her
slump to a seated position against one wall, was probably a good thing, at this
point.  She had obviously exhausted her resources.

“All right,” she said, gesturing
tiredly at the floor in front of her.  “Do whatever you need to do.”  It was
that bone-deep weariness, the defeat visible in every line of her face, that
pulled on ‘Aqrab’s heartstrings enough to make him take pity on her.

The meal that ‘Aqrab made her was
technically larger than a ‘snack,’ but he had never specified a snack for
whom
,
so he simply gave her enough food to temporarily satisfy a rather large
dragon.  Considering the sheer
amount
of food he put in front of her, he
actually didn’t think she would hold up her end of the bargain, because it was
certainly enough to satisfy, at least for a couple days.

Thus, when he wandered over to an
abandoned corner of the cave and lay down to face the wall and contemplate just
how un-djinni-like the magus was beginning to make him, he was surprised to
hear the sound of soft booted feet approaching on the stone behind him, a few
minutes later.  He rolled over to peer up at her.  “Yes?”

“That was a lot of food for a
‘snack,’” the magus muttered.  She was wiping grease from her mouth with the
back of her hand.  Her brown eyes were filled with distrust…and grudging
gratitude?