What if I ask for proof and they bring me back his head?They hadn’t touched her since they took her weapon but they all stared at her with a fierceness that frightened her.They watch me now.
Aldora shook her head. “When is nightfall?” she asked instead.
“Several short hours away.”
She had that much time to get to him. “Then why stay here?”Vedikus never stopped unless he had to.
The centaur raised a hand to his chest and ran it across his bandage. “The wounded need time to heal, to cauterize their skin and prevent further damage. This place is a bad place to bleed.” He ran his eyes over her body. “I see you have wounds that require healing yourself.” He reached for her and she shrunk back.
“Are you afraid of me?” he asked.
“I don’t know you.”
“Would you like to know me?”
“No.”
Several of the centaurs laughed, but the bandaged one’s face hardened.
Aldora chewed on her lip realizing her mistake. If she angered him what would he do to her then? “What are you going to do to me?” She slowly moved her eyes down from his face and to his front hooves, taking stock of his weapons.Two spears. A shortsword. A bow and quiver. And my dagger.Aldora itched to wrap her fingers around it again.
The hardness of his features eased. “That depends on you.” The centaur shook his head, rattling her ears with more clinks. But then he moved away. He picked up a discarded spear and began to sharpen it near one of the fires feverishly. Their eyes met through the flames and she quickly looked away.
What can I do?
The centaurs convened in small groups around her, weaving in and out of the three bonfires they had erected. Several of them lit their spears on fire and used them as torches. Whatever they were made of repelled the flame and kept them from burning up. Aldora felt around the spear at her back wondering if it were fireproof too. It was smooth and cold to the touch, and when she wrapped her fingers around the shaft and pulled, it still wouldn’t move.
It bode ill for whether or not she could even wield it. She had nothing else on or near her that she could find that would be able to help her. She dropped her fingers from the spear and returned her attention to the encampment.
What would Vedikus do if he was in her place? A self-deprecating laugh left her lips, bringing all eyes back to her, reminding her of how exposed she was. Her gaze lowered to her torn, damp clothes. They clung to her and left little to the imagination, and even with her undergarments still intact, her nipples poked through from the abrasion.
She could still feel the ache between her thighs where Vedikus had worked his cock into her, forcing her body to stretch and take it. She flushed and squeezed her legs together, feeling even more vulnerable under so many intense stares.
She had noticed the centaur’s pricks remained erect, much how Vedikus’ had at the beginning. Her eyes were drawn to that area despite the fear they made her feel. Was it because she was surrounded and that they all displayed hunger in their eyes? Or was it the sudden threat they posed that made her stiff and wary? These men were half human, half horse, just as Vedikus was spliced with his own beast, and like all beasts, they were well endowed.
An idea came to mind, and a very real shiver came with it.
Aldora moved to sit on her knees and met the eyes of the bandaged one again. “I’d like to be closer to the fire,” she whispered, unable to make her voice rise. He seemed to hear her though. The centaur stabbed his spear into the ground and came back to her side. In one quick move, he yanked out the stake that bound her to the ground, reaching his other hand out to grasp her arm and help her to her feet.
She bit down on her tongue and focused on the pain as she accepted the touch and was led away from the middle, immediately feeling better now that she wasn’t so fully encircled. Aldora slunk to the ground by one of the bonfires, surprised to find the dirt and grass dry.
“What’s your name, human?”
“Aldora.”
“What does it stand for?”
She frowned and looked down at her hands. “It stands for nothing.”
He whinnied and moved into her line of sight. “Then it stands for you, a survivor of the barrier paths, a rescued human, and a killer of bulls.”
Her gaze snapped up, narrowing. “I haven’t killed anything.”
“You may not have held the blade but we have decided to gift you with the minotaur’s death, our gift to you for being alive when we found you.”
Her frown deepened and she glanced briefly at the other centaurs.I don’t understand.She had lived next to this world her entire life. Why had there been so little knowledge of what happened within? There were survivors that made it out and her mind lingered on them, disturbed why Savadon and its authority took their accounts with distrust.
Savadon should have been preparing to fight those that frightened them, that had taken away their land, but instead, her people had tried to appease the mist.
