Blood of the King - Khirro's Journey Book 1 Page 0,96

urge. This was neither the time nor the place. The gentle hills of her shoulder and hip were a dark silhouette against a gray background; his imagination filled in the details. In his mind he saw her strawberry hair, the swell of her breasts, her soft, white skin sprinkled with freckles. His breath shallowed as a tingling began between his legs, radiating into the bottom of his gut.

One touch wouldn’t hurt. She won’t mind; no one else will know.

The sensation in his loins made him brave. He reached his hand toward her waist slowly, carefully. Elyea sighed in her sleep, startling him, and he pulled his hand away too quickly, smacking his elbow against the wall and sending pain shooting up his arm. He hissed a curse between his teeth. The impact made his fingers tingle—a distinctly different feeling than the one in his pants. He lay still, waiting to see if she’d wake, but her breathing remained rhythmic.

Khirro took a breath of his own, wondering what he was doing. Not so long ago, he thought Emeline would be the only one for him, now barely a thought of her came into his head. He tried not to wonder what had actually happened, it was easier to accept blame than imagine possibilities like Elyea had suggested. At least in accepting responsibility, it made sense for his parents to give him up to the army while hiding his brother. If he’d done what Emeline accused him of, he didn’t have to ask the harder question: why did they want him to leave?

By the door, Athryn shuffled his feet as rain continued to fall. Khirro reached his hand toward Elyea again, feeling it shake in the darkness. Breath held, he moved his fingers closer until they brushed flesh. He drew away for an instant, then touched the tips of his fingers to bare skin again. He thought of the gentle curve of her hip but as his fingertips kissed across warm skin, he found the flesh tougher than he’d imagined. And hairy.

“Not my type, Khirro,” Ghaul grumbled from the other side of Elyea where he lay with his hand on her hip. “Keep your hands to yourself.”

Khirro jerked away, banging the same spot on his elbow against the same knob of wall. He gritted his teeth at the pain and cursed to himself, then shifted to face the wall. The darkness hid his embarrassment and disappointment, but he still couldn’t face them. Ghaul said nothing more and his snores soon overpowered Elyea’s gentle breathing.

The tip of Khirro’s nose brushed the wall as he scoured his mind for soothing thoughts that might let him sleep. He crossed his arms in front of his chest and felt the warmth of the vial. Somehow, the curse thrust upon him by the Shaman had become the least complicated thing in his life. It didn’t judge him for being a farmer, nor for possibly impregnating a woman not his wife. It didn’t shun him for being a coward or a poor warrior. All it wanted was for him to take it to the Necromancer.

Hours later, when Athryn woke Ghaul to take over the watch, Khirro pretended to be asleep. Not long after, he managed to convince his body it was true.

No tyger spoke with Khirro in his dream. No one stalked him. Instead, he dreamed of a woman lying on a bed of straw, knees drawn up and belly full of child. Her face looked like Emeline one instant, Elyea the next. Khirro watched, panicky because he knew nothing about birthing a baby.

The woman screamed and cursed. Sweat streamed first from Emeline’s forehead, then Elyea’s. Her skirts were pulled up above her knees and Khirro peered between her legs at what his mother would have called her woman’s flower. It didn’t look like a flower. It bulged and undulated as the woman screamed again. He didn’t take his eyes from the spot between her legs to see if the sound came from Emeline’s mouth or Elyea’s.

Khirro blinked his eyes firmly and knelt between her knees, not knowing what to do but feeling compelled to do something. In life, he’d only seen women’s genitals four times: Emeline’s, which he didn’t remember; his mother’s when they bathed together in his youth; Elyea’s when they found her and again when she danced in the rain; and a girl from his village named Maree who made him pay with a piece of candy to see it when he was six and