A dozen hollows were carved in the floor. Each would fit two or three of him, and he was both taller and broader-shouldered than the average stonekin. Most enclaves had ten members or fewer, so there was plenty of room, but the lack of walls or screens was startling.
“Privacy is less of a concern for them, from what Ulamir’s told me.” Vivian chuckled, beginning to unpack her belongings. “He said it made matters awkward when he was first joined with a Sentinel. He’s learned odd human customs since.”
“That’s a relief for me,” said Olvir. Admittedly, he’d never bothered worrying about Ulamir the last few times he’d embraced Vivian: he’d assumed the two of them had worked out their own arrangement years ago, and he’d been very focused on other matters.
Remembering those made him fumble as he lifted his bedroll out of his pack.Business first, he reminded himself and spread it out in one of the hollows. The stone was warmer there. He arranged the rest of his belongings to take advantage of it.
“I’ll sing the stonekin’s praises for the rest of my life,” he said when he finally had tended to his gear and could sit down to tug off his boots. Freedom from wet leather briefly overtook lust as his dominant sensation. From Vivian’s gusty sigh while she did likewise, Olvir suspected she’d understand very well.
“Gods, yes… Oh.” Vivian made the most girlish noise Olvir had ever heard from her and pointed to a pearl archway on the wall. It was too narrow to provide a good view of the room beyond, but above it sat a rose-quartz flower with many points. “Am I right about what that is?”
“A water lily,” Olvir confirmed, “and I think you’re right about what it means.”
Chapter 23
The jade chamber beyond the pearl archway held three pools, all with abundant room to fit a score of people at once. The one nearest to the door was shaped like a crescent moon, the one in the center like a star, and the one on the far side, from which steam gently rose, like a sun.
All three contained fresh water, as Vivian and Olvir found by dipping their little fingers in each. The moon pool was ice cold, the sun pool not quite boiling—Vivian tested that one, taking her cue from the rising steam—but the star-shaped pool was pleasantly, if a bit intensely, warm.
That was all she needed to know.
They left their weapons carefully outside the door so that the moisture in the air wouldn’t damage the blades. It was the last careful action Vivian took for a while.
She was the first through the door, and as Olvir came in behind her, she turned, caught him by the shoulders, and kissed him hard. For a moment, he was stiff with surprise. Then his lips parted and he pulled Vivian close so that her breasts pressed against his broad chest.
Despite haste and hunger, Olvir’s lips were deft. His hands wandered after that first urgent grip on her waist, sliding up to cup the back of her head. Vivian did the same to him, and his wet hair twined like silk around her fingers.
He rapidly grew stiff for reasons other than surprise and in more pleasant ways. Vivian felt that pressure against her, its size a pleasant promise of the future.
For a moment, she considered taking him then and there, not bothering with undressing any more than was necessary—but it would probably be almost as much trouble to get damp trousers down without taking off the rest as it would be to disrobe fully.
And they did have time now. Later, they might not.
“Pool,” she said, pulling her mouth from his with a distinct effort of will.
“Hmm?” Olvir’s eyes were dark and dazed. The sight sent its own thrill through Vivian, as did the half-drunk huskiness of his voice. “Oh. Yes. Should undress, too, I shouldn’t wonder.”
“Mm-hmm.”
Vivian let him take care of his own armor—chain mail was difficult to remove at the best of times and the Sentinels not generally accustomed to it. She slipped off to the star-shaped pool. Standing beside it, she got herself out of her jerkin, moving as fast as she could without snapping the laces.
The shirt was easier. The trousers were not. Leather had many good qualities, but the way it clung when it was the slightest bit wet wasn’t among them. Vivian had wriggled the waistband down past her hips when she heard Olvir’s sharp intake of breath from the doorway behind her.
“You’re not making my task any easier, you realize,” he said, speaking low and unevenly.
“No?”
She didn’t turn to face him but glanced over her shoulder as she worked one leg free of the leather. Olvir, unlacing his breeches, was staring up at her, his eyes gleaming. Vivian couldn’t see lower than his waist from her position, but the hunger in his expression was quite clear.
Giddy joy, the sort she hadn’t felt in years, shimmered through her all of a sudden. The cave was its own little world and duty as far away as the end of the storm. She could think of nothing they could do until the blizzard ended, so there was nothing they needed to do.
Vivian grinned, then slipped into the pool.
Hot water closed over her head, cushioned her sore feet, and began stripping away the grime that days of travel had left. If Vivian hadn’t been underwater, she’d have moaned again, in sensual delight different from what she’d felt when kissing Olvir but equally as powerful in its own way.
The water wasn’t still but flowing slowly, draining into some space below that Vivian couldn’t see and constantly replenished with clean, hot water from an equally invisible source. She felt the currents move past her, gently tugging at her hair.
Another form sliding into the water made the waves briefly more dramatic. When Vivian surfaced to breathe, Olvir was behind her. He grasped her hips and pulled her back against him, until his cock slid just slightly between the cleft of her buttocks. “Mmm,” he said and bent to kiss her neck. “You’re the loveliest woman… My imagination wasn’t anywhere near adequate.”
