"I can walk. Walking is fine. I have excellent stamina. Very strong legs."
"It's half a day on foot."
"Strong. Legs."
He reaches for his shirt.
And here's the thing—the awful, terrible thing I can't tell Kestria or anyone or even the privacy of my own skull without cringing—I know what's under that shirt. Not in the abstract way I knew at the cottage, when a glimpse of scarred chest was shocking and new and I could squeak about architecturally sound walls and pretend my reaction was curiosity. I know the specific weight of him. The texture of his skin under my palms. The scars I've traced—not on purpose, not deliberately, but with my hands pressed flat against his chest while bark bit into my back and his mouth—
He pulls the shirt over his head and I know every line that appears. The long scar across his ribs. The thick one at his collarbone. His shoulders flex when he reaches for his waistband.
I don't look away.
I know where the next one is before he turns. I know what his skin feels like under that one—rough at the center, smooth at the edges—and I know that because my hands were on it while bark scraped my spine and his mouth—
So I look at the ground instead, which isn't the same as looking away. The ground is just convenient.
"You can watch." Low.
"Nope."
"Melori."
"Lots of leaves. Good decomposition. Healthy soil."
The crack of bones reshaping cuts whatever he was going to say.
Bodies don't do that. Joints don't bend that way. Bone doesn't reshape in—
Yes it does. I've seen it. Moving on.
And then there's a wolf where he was.
Massive. Black fur eating the morning light. He lowers himself to the ground and the meaning is clear.
Get on.
"Right." My voice cracks. "I've never ridden anything. You know that. I mean—technically once. One of the goats. Before your pack ate them. Sorry, that's not—I'm not bringing it up to be passive aggressive, it's relevant, it's a goat-riding anecdote. The goat ran under my legs because a chicken pecked at it wrong, and then I was just—on the goat. Carried me halfway across the yard before it remembered I was there. So. Yeah. Goat. One time. Not a choice. Also your thigh, which doesn't count, that wasn't transportation, that was—we're not talking about that. We're not. I haven't said it. Forget I said it. I rode a goat one time and that's the entire list."
He waits. Patient. Which is worse.
His clothes are on the ground next to him. I scoop them up, stuff them in my basket without thinking. Habit. He'll need them later.
I grab a handful of fur.
Coarse on top. Underneath—dense and warm, warmth climbing through my fingers immediately. I swing a leg over, graceless, baskets shifting on my back, and settle.
His spine between my thighs. The width of him forcing my legs apart. Heat radiating up through my core before I've even adjusted my weight.
"Okay." Breathy. "Ready."
He stands in one smooth motion and I grab tighter, thighs clenching around his ribs, fingers buried in the fur at his neck. The baskets dig into my shoulders. My weight tips forward and I'm pressed against him, chest to his back, my body wrapped around his.
He starts moving.
Fast.
“OH SHIT—”
