The Witch's Want Ch. 05

His eyes traveled over her body, taking in all of the wonders that were Farah. There had been a time perhaps when he might have done something like this to look at a woman a little as though she were a prize, but even so, he'd always had Dimme and her immense love of him to return to. It had never been so much as a troubling thought for him to let those women go the next day, or the day after that.

Some of them had it in their hearts to be the one for him, but they all knew that there was another who waited for him. He might have been a lord general of huge conquering hosts, and he might have been a fearsome warrior. Whatever he was to them at the outset, they all came to know him as a powerfully strong, yet gentle man with a kind heart inside him, but they all knew it at the end that the heart belonged to another - even if he never said it.

A woman who has had any real experience at loving a man just knows these things.

Now his eyes looked at her, so taken by her features. He could have lost himself in only the soft light chocolate color of her beautiful skin. Her breasts were not large, and yet, whenever his lips were on them, he had the impression that they were more than lush enough for him. When he pulled back to look at them again, they seemed magically smaller and of a size that were perfect for her. Such a mystery, he thought.

Her hips were a lifetime of study unto themselves.

He was no boy here, losing himself in the wonders of the female form for the first time, but by the gods, if he'd had to stand up while she danced for him, he'd have only had the option of being on his knees in front of her. A rather humbling thought to one such as he was and had been. But then he remembered the sense of honor that he'd felt then to have one such as her make her offer to a man like him.

That was the humbling part and he was delighted to have had the privilege. He wanted with all of his heart to have that again.

His eyes went to her cleft, just visible there the way that she slept. From there, he looked at her breastbone, as though he wished to be able to see her heart underneath. The two parts of her together, he thought...

Now that was something.

And he had that something now. Her love of him was perhaps the most humbling thing to him of all. He bowed his head for a moment and gave his thanks for the gift of her to him.

He looked at her face, so trusting and peaceful in sleep that he wanted to cry. Such a lovely person who wanted to love him. He surely didn't deserve this. He remembered how her soft eyes looked at him so brightly when she was happy, and so filled with love and hope. She surely must be the embodiment of all of her noble ancestors.

And she'd offered her love to him, asking for his love and protection.

He looked away for a moment and reached up to wipe away a tear from his eye. The motion almost made him chuckle. He'd been a warlord in such a way that the word today had no connection to what he knew of it. He'd never been a cruel man, and never rode out to battle for his own greed.

But he'd crushed everything from single opponents who had challenged him to entire armies sent from rich cities with the very same purpose.

He'd accepted every challenge and crushed them all into the dust, literally breaking men apart to end it so that he could rebuild and make something good out of the ruin left behind.

And what had it bought him?

He asked himself this, and the answer came to him that he'd been bested and killed by a hidden necromancer, and not for any higher purpose other than the mage's want to own a powerful servant.

The battle had meant nothing to the man. He'd only made his promise to the king so that he could be there, hidden when the young general came to kill the king so that the fight would end.

Because he'd known that the Martu general would do just that if he could.

And for that, the once mighty Ur-Nammu had lost his wife and his children while he'd lived on as a ghost.

Thousands of years of solitude, and now he was here, with the love of this wondrous creature.

He looked at himself - what he could see, at any rate. He smiled a little grimly.

Well he was alive once more, and he was the last living warrior priest of the eresh-dingir - perhaps the only living member of the cult left on earth, but that didn't matter, he thought. He wondered what she felt that she needed his protection for. But that didn't matter either.

He'd do what she needed. They both carried the lock now and that provided them with its own protection. If he'd had this that fateful day, ...

But then, he'd never have known love such as Farah's. He wasn't the sort of man who believed in his own importance enough to make any selfish or pompous connections in this.

He just knew his incredible luck in this. Dimme's love for him had been immense. Farah's was already there, and more because he knew what he felt. Another gift that he had, this ability to know what the heart of another carried.

Farah's love for him was boundless, and he'd never cause her to give that up.

He looked at Farah again because he had to. He had no choice in it, and that made him smile.

He saw that she'd opened her eyes and was looking at him.

"What are you thinking of?" she asked.

"Nothing worth waking yourself up for to even ask," he smiled, as he eased himself down again. "Come and lie against me, Witch, and I will hold you so that you may feel safe with me."

Her sleepy little smile was worth tons of gold to him as she nuzzled her face against him with a gentle sigh.

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Outside, in the dripping forest, the spirit that was once Dimme stood in the trees, knowing how it felt to be happy and sad at the same instant. She wanted to fade to nothingness, but she knew that there was one more journey that she had to make.

Just then, her attention was diverted to a slim form stealing up the long drive. In his hand, he held a bottle that had once been filled with bourbon. Tonight, it was a little more than half-full with gasoline, and there was a rag stuffed into the neck of it. For three thousand dollars and a bit of coke from a man who'd said that he wanted the bitch who lived here dead, Old Harry was in. He stood in front of the house fumbling with a lighter.

And then he was gone, bottle and all.

He suddenly found that he was so very cold, feeling the rush of the wind around him. He could barely breathe for a moment, and then looking down, he knew that he wasn't falling from a great height so much as he was being driven.

The earth was dark down below him, though he could see the sky lightening off to the east. He looked down again and began to make out a large area there on the ground. In the middle of that he could see a dark swatch which glowed a little oddly at one of the edges.

He couldn't make sense of what was happening to him until he became aware that his shoulder hurt something awful. Looking there, he noticed a set of claws on a furry hand, and beyond that, there were eyes; cat's eyes which he found that he could see through somehow. The visage glanced at him only once with an enigmatic smirk and then looked forward once more.

He looked down again and saw that he was being pulled straight toward a forest fire. He cried out in fear and began to struggle, but the claws only held him tighter, tearing deeply into his flesh, dragging him down as they hurtled together through several hundred feet of choking smoke.

The sensation of speed was without measure to him. He only knew that they were traveling very quickly. He opened his mouth to scream, but they were moving faster still and it was all that he could do to close his mouth again so that his cheeks weren't ripped open by the wind. He had to narrow his eyes down to slits.

Then the pain eased for him somewhat. He had the briefest moment to notice that he was alone now. The face there was gone, along with the claws which had pulled him.

The worst of the smoke only lasted for a second or so, and then he was smashed into the ground in the middle of the advancing line of flames. The gasoline in the bottle flared as the bottle disintegrated on impact. No one would ever know what had happened to old Harry. Farah's first husband certainly wouldn't.

Only the spirit of Dimme knew, and when she thought of it again, she found herself half a world away, her feline legs staggering along on an old worn path. She was happy for her old love, and even happy for the woman that he'd taken for himself now.

But it all left her with a dull ache, made stronger now that she'd seen that it would work between them. She was still a bone dry female corpse somewhere, with no way to ease the ache that she felt in her own loins anymore. The one in her heart hurt her even more.

Suddenly, she found that she was standing in the valley, looking at the keep of Jebel Bishri, full of spring-like beauty and wonder once more. That it looked like this to her now told her that she'd been successful.

She felt the first of her tears on her cheeks as she walked to the gated bridge to where her mother stood with Nisi-ini-su. She began to weep in joy as she stumbled into their arms at long last.