“I want another kiss,” she said, stepping closer.
A few guffaws sounded from the men outside, but Legacy’s eyes looked soft, not cruel. She took another drink, less obviously this time, and buried one hand into my hair. I gruntedin pain as she yanked my head back, and then her lips found mine.
I gasped in surprise as her cool, refreshing tongue parted my own lips. The sensation of water pouring into my parched throat from her mouth caught me off guard, and I struggled to swallow it down without choking. She placed a careful hand on my throat, steadying me as I took in the precious liquid.
Despite the unexpectedness of the moment yet again, I couldn't help but savor her soft, skilled kisses. A faint moan escaped my lips, and I knew the men outside the door would interpret it differently than the relief I felt from the water. Their minds would be filled with thoughts of lust and desire, while the water’s soothing trickle consumed mine.
Not the heat of her touch and the way her tongue danced against mine. Not at all.
I had to focus on survival first and foremost. Whatever Legacy was thinking now, I doubted she would spell it out for me, and I didn’t know if I could trust her even if she did.
She pulled away from me, leaving me blinking at her as she brought the canteen back to her lips. I shook my head, realizing that I shouldn’t act like I’d enjoyed that, even if I could barely admit to myself that I had.
“I know you can tell if I’m lying when you touch me.” I tried to lean back, to put a little more space between us despite my bindings.
I needed room to think, but Legacy just nodded.
“I can. But kissing you is a privilege. I don’t do that with many prisoners.” Her cheeks flushed, and she turned away.
Something shiny glinted on the side of her belt. Not keys—those appeared to be in her jacket pocket and jangled slightly when she walked—but something easier to lift from her than the keys, something I could maybe use. I just needed to get a little closer to her.
“Collie,” I blurted, the chains rattling as I shifted.
Legacy turned back, the narrow sigil above her eyebrow rising toward her flaming red hair. “Pardon?”
“You asked for my name. I’m called Collie.”
She frowned and stepped closer, studying me carefully.
I winced as I shifted again, my cuts and bruises howling a warning that the less I moved, the better.
“What is a collie?” she asked.
“I am.” I grinned without thinking, my split lower lip cracking open once more. Not that it mattered, considering the blood and mud already covering my face. I sobered, trying to keep my expression still so the pain in my lip might recede. “A collie is a dog. Often black and silver. They can smell magic.”
I'd had the silver in my black hair for as long as I could remember, despite my youth, although I had no idea as to why. The coloring was the main reason I had been called Collie for as long as I'd had a name, although I had been well into my youth before anyone had bothered to call me anything at all.
I must have had a mother and father, as I couldn't have spawned out of nowhere, but I'd never known them. If they had ever given me a name other than Collie, I didn't know it.
Legacy frowned again. “You can smell magic?”
If Tannin already knew, it didn’t really make a difference if Legacy did, too.
I tilted my head forward, the remnants of my braid tangling in the chain around my throat. “My hair is black and silver. That’s why they call me Collie.”
She gently freed my braid from the chain, twining her fingers through the strands as they snagged on her fingers. I flushed with shame, hating how much she had to work to see even the faintest glint of silver under the grease, blood, and dirt.
I hadn’t had a bath in days. I couldn’t have looked any worse unless I tried.
“Can you clean up any?” she asked, and then immediately cringed at the look I shot her, my head jerking back and tugging painfully on the hair still wrapped around her fingers. “Apologies. I realize now that was a foolish question.”
Still, I wasn’t ready to let it go so easily. Perhaps foolish, because she was one of two people in this camp who didn’t actively want to hurt me and the only one of those who wasn’t chained.
“Sure, with all of the copious clean water I get. Hell, I’d take dirty water at this point.” It hurt to speak, my throat burning from thirst; it was far worse than my hunger, which had faded to a dull ache in my gut that I was well familiar with.
“My apologies,” Legacy repeated.
She let go of my hair and stepped back then turned on her heel to leave. As she opened the door, I stretched out my leg as far as I could, hooked my big toe through the silver loop on her belt, and yanked.
