buds of her breasts where she strained her arms upwards. So that after she had picked several of the fruits, and he relaxed his grip to let her slide down between his hands -
- He'd marvelled at the sight of her brown legs, revealed where her dress rode up about her waist. She had seen his eyes on her and felt him against her where she stretched her toes for the forest's floor; and she'd told him, however breathlessly, impulsively:
'Ah, see! Your little man is jumping again .. .'
And when he'd turned away, embarrassed and reddening:
'Nathan, wait!' she had taken his elbow. 'It's all right. I understand. There's no harm in him. He jumps for joy -for the joy of me!'
For her brothers had girlfriends, too, and Misha knew how they dealt with their frustrations, how they gained relief from the overabundance of their emotions. 'You should let him out,' she told Nathan then, still clinging to him, 'before he bursts!'
And in the secrecy of the long grass under the plum tree, she had whisperingly, wonderingly compared the purple of his swollen glans to the tightly stretched skins of ripe plums, and stroked him to orgasm. Since when and for three long years, she had satisfied him in this way, and allowed him to return this most tender compliment. But wise beyond her years, she had not once let him into her.
'Ah, no!' she would say when his flesh seemed most insistent. 'For when my children come along I must be able to teach them, which I can't do while I've still so much to learn. Also, I have not made up my mind. I may love you, Nathan, but I can't be sure. What if I discover someone else to love, but too late? If I let your flesh into mine now, this very minute, it might decide me against my will.'
And finally, just a year ago, walking in the twilight before the night, when they paused to fondle a while on a grassy bank and she'd held him throbbing in her hand, and Nathan had told her:
"Vampire World 1 - Blood Brothers"
'H-h-he wants to k-kiss you, too. Where only my f-fingers have kissed you.'
And again on impulse she'd taken him deep into her mouth to draw his sting, and afterwards told him:
'There. Flesh is flesh, Nathan, but this way makes no new flesh.' And putting her finger to his lips, she'd added, 'Shh! Say nothing, make no protest! We are grown up now. Give me just another year, and then - I shall make up my mind. But it won't be easy. My father and brothers see many men in Settlement, and they see you. Oh, I know - I know you are more different than even they suspect - but harder far to convince them of that. And anyway, there could be someone else.'
The only 'someone else' there could be was Nestor and Nathan knew it, but he'd said nothing. Except ... he had wondered. For there had also been times when Nestor and Misha were alone together, too, and who could say but that - ?
- But no, for Nestor chased after the other girls of the village, while Nathan had no one but Misha. Surely that must make a difference?
Now that his brother had entered his dream, Nathan moved on, moved forward, to the present. And now Misha was no longer a slip of a girl but a young woman, sitting there in his mother's house, like some warm wild flower in the light of lamps and the glow of the fire.
Small but long-legged - elfish as the creatures of Szgany myth, which were said to inhabit the deep forests - Misha Zanesti was the focus of Nathan's fascination; indeed, she was his only fascination in the world! So that it was hard to concentrate on what they were saying, she and his mother, when all he really wanted to do was look at Misha. Even now, dreaming, he couldn't remember what had been said, but he certainly remembered the way Misha had looked: Her hair dark as the night, velvet, the darkest Nathan had ever seen, which in the light of the sun shone black as a raven's wing. Her eyes - so huge and deeply brown under black, expressive, arching eyebrows that they, too, looked black - all moist and attentive where she listened to Nana Kiklu's warm low voice, and now and then nodded her understanding and agreement. Her mouth: small, straight