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Raider’s stomach twisted briefly, half tempting him to ask what he’d said or done, but he didn’t really want to know. Instead he studied the handsome Curator in the firelight and said, “Not all of it was bad.”
Seth scowled and rotated the spit. The man’s face gave little away.
“Did we fuck?”
Seth’s head whipped Raider’s way so fast it must have cricked his neck. His eyes blazed with … something. Raider couldn’t tell if it was anger or desire. Maybe both?
Seth’s nostrils flared. “What you did today was reckless—no, it was stupid, and it was completely unnecessary. You know I’m an experienced combatant. Why the hell did you go off on your own like that, baiting the jackals on purpose, instead of working together? We could have made a plan, one that could have been executed without injury. Instead, you endangered yourself—and that endangered my mission.”
“But did we fuck?”
Seth’s eyes glittered in the firelight. His expression was so intense, so burning that Raider felt his body heat, felt his breathing shallow, felt his blood move down to swell his cock. All that even before Seth spoke.
“If we had fucked, you wouldn’t be asking. You’d feel where my cock had been inside you. You’d feel where my hands had gripped your legs, your ass, your wrists. You’d feel where my teeth had been at your throat.”
Raider’s body rocked at the onslaught of arousal, the fierce stiffening of his cock. He grabbed himself through his pants and squeezed. “Fuck, Seth.”
“No,” Seth said severely, “there will be no fucking. We’re out here together only because I hired you to help me complete my mission. We’re not here to fuck. And we’re not here for me to waste an entire afternoon taking care of you in the wake of your stupidity.”
Raider took his hand away from his cock with a sigh. “You can be quite cutting, you know. And you might consider thanking me instead of being an asshole.”
“Thanking you?”
“Yes, thanking me. You lost half a day to the revolting task of taking care of me, but if you had gotten bitten or clawed by a black jaw? It could have ended your hunt on day one. I can take a lot more damage than you.”
“You lied to me. You said you were scouting.”
“Because I know how fucking proud you are! You would never have agreed to my plan.”
“Which was my decision to make. You work for me, Raider, and you will do things my way!”
“I certainly will not. And if you believed that when you hired me, then you’re a terrible judge of character.”
“No, I judged your character rightly,” Seth snarled. “A liar and a rogue. I won’t trust you again.”
“You stubborn asshole, why can you not appreciate that we’re on track, a mere half a day behind, and you weren’t hurt?”
“Because you were!”
“So what? It did not endanger your precious fucking mission, no matter what you think. I told you: I can take the damage. You can’t. I told you that from the beginning.”
Seth fell silent. His eyes remained locked on Raider, but something shifted in them. The anger left, but what replaced it was worse: a calm, thinking, questioning look.
“You did tell me that,” Seth acknowledged, “and I saw how your body healed. But I don’t understand it.”
Why the hell had Raider taken the conversation in this direction? If his brain hadn’t still been half fried from the quiva, he would have better heard the words coming out of his own mouth, would have realized how much he was admitting to Seth.
Fuck. He’d backed himself into a goddamn corner. He would have to say something. So he said, “Neither do I, so don’t expect an explanation.”
“What do you mean, you don’t understand it? Is it the quicksilver?”
Raider felt himself lock up inside, the resistance familiar and automatic. “I have no idea.”
“Bullshit. You weren’t born with quicksilver in your body. An arcanist implanted that for you. I find it impossible to believe that you don’t know anything about it.”
“Well, I don’t. You can believe me or not.”
Frustration flashed through Seth’s eyes. “Why can’t you just be clear—”
