Kim Harrison - Hotter Than Hell

A helmet. A mask, even. Made of bone and steel and hide. A terrible thing; terrifying. I feel straps run down the sides, behind, all around, holding it in place. I cannot imagine wearing such a device.

The Minotaur releases me, but I do not stop. I do not want to. My fingers explore and connect with flesh, a jaw, his lips. A flush steals through me. I pull away, but again the Minotaur catches my hands. His mouth moves against my fingers as he speaks. It feels like a kiss.

“A moment,” he whispers, as his breath flows over my skin. “Just one moment, please.”

I give him his moment. I cannot help myself. I feel in my own heart a pang of longing, a sympathetic echo, and it cuts. I live in my own oubliette, my own labyrinth. I am a forgotten woman, invisible as the Minotaur to eyes beyond this dream. I cannot remember being anything else. I cannot remember being held, ever.

I rest my forehead against his broad chest, pressing close to stand between his feet, seeing him with my body, feeling him lean and strong. I listen to his breath catch, and inhale a scent of sand and rock and something sharper still.

“I did not bring you here for this,” whispers the Minotaur.

“I did not come here for this,” I reply. “I do not know why I am here.”

“A selfish reason.” The Minotaur’s fingers tighten, briefly. “To save my life.”

“I don’t save lives. I barely have my own.”

“You live in darkness. Amongst the books. You go there in the night to hide.”

“You’ve watched me.”

“You know I have. You have felt me.”

“Yes,” I breathe. I have felt him for a long time. My watcher, my only friend in the catacomb darkness, who has always felt more real than imagination should allow. Now, here in the flesh. Perhaps.

The Minotaur loosens his hold, his hands sliding away even as my own fingers trail down his throat, soothing a path along his shoulders. His skin is warm. His hands are warm, as well. He touches me again, palms resting against my spine. I am wearing very little. As is he.

I open my eyes and tilt back my head, trying to see the Minotaur. I cannot. The fleeting light is gone. His face is lost. I am afraid that I am lost, as well.

“Why me?” I ask him. “Why?”

The Minotaur stands very still. “Because you know this. You know this pain. You know what it is to have no one. To be…no one.”

My heart hurts. “And so? Because of that you think I can help you?”

“I hope,” he says simply. “I hope you will understand. I hope you will have compassion.”

“No. This is not real.”

“It is real to me.” The Minotaur pulls me tight against him. “And I think it is real to you. More real than the life you have left behind.”

It is true, but I will not say that. “And this? Your life?”

“This is no life. Not here, in this place.”

“You are confined?”

“A prisoner.”

“Why?”

“For living. For breathing, for being. Much the same as you, I think.”

“I’m not locked up.”

“Are you not?” The Minotaur’s hands tighten against my back. “I think we are the same, you and I.”

I close my eyes. “I am alone, that’s all.”

“Alone,” he echoes. “This place would be sufficient, if I was not alone.”

“So you brought me here to stay with you?”

“No.” The Minotaur’s voice is rough. “No, I would not ask that of anyone. Only, there is a world beyond this darkness, and I would see it, find it, live within it.”

“You might not like that world,” I tell him. “You might want to come back to this place after you’ve seen what you want.”

“Like you?” says the Minotaur softly. It is impossible to know his meaning, to dare divine those two words. All I know is that I wish to echo them, to say, like you , or to add another word: I.

I like you , I want to tell him. I do not know why, but I do. And I am crazy for it. All of this, crazy .

But the Minotaur is right. He has chosen well. I understand him. Or at least, part of him. The rest is mystery. The rest is insanity.

“I need to sit.” I slide out of the Minotaur’s arms to kneel unsteadily in the sand. The odd shadows of light are still gone; the darkness is profound. I cannot see myself. I am only voice, thought, sensation. But I feel the Minotaur crouch beside me, and savor the contact of his knee against my thigh, the heat of his sigh. Touch is a lifeline in this place. A reminder.

“How long have you been here?” I wonder if I could survive in the oubliette, alone.

The Minotaur rumbles. “Years. Centuries, even, though time moves more slowly in this place. I suppose millennia have passed in your world.”

“And how do you live?”

“There is water and food. Magic sustains the rest.”

I look toward the sound of his voice. “Magic.”

“It is what brought you here.” The Minotaur touches my hand. “The first time was the hardest. This time, easier.”

I feel numb. “You have magic. You should be able to leave this place on your own, without me. There is nothing I can do for you.”

“So you are an expert on such things now.” His tone is light, but I protest anyway, embarrassed. The Minotaur touches my lips with his fingertips. The contact startles me into silence.

“I meant no harm,” he says. “And if you do not trust me, if you still believe this is all a dream, so be it. I cannot force your heart to change.”

The Minotaur pulls way. I reach out, blind, and catch his wrist. I feel bold and foolish.

“Dream or not,” I whisper. “I don’t want to be alone.”

I hear his breath catch, and I listen for more, listen hard. There is nothing else beyond the two of us. A strong arm drapes over my shoulders. I do not flinch. The Minotaur surrounds; he lays me down against his broad smooth chest until we stretch close, entwined. I have never been held in such a way. Never been touched so gently. It startles me.

“You need to leave soon,” he rumbles. I try again to see his face. Nothing. I reach for where his jaw should be, but I find the mask instead. My fingers glide along a curving horn, wicked and cruel.

“Why?” I ask, then forget my question as his large hands trail up my sides, beneath my shirt. I am surprised at the pleasure I feel; even more, when my own palms glide down his throat to his chest. There is cloth over his groin, but nothing else. So much skin.

He swallows hard. “You do not want to become trapped here.”

No, I do not. But that does not stop me from inching up his body, savoring his long lean muscles, touching him with my hands, gentle and curious. Curious about him, about myself.

“What are you doing?” whispers the Minotaur hoarsely.

“I don’t know,” I admit. “I don’t know about any of this. Except, I am here…and I want to know you .”

“Then know me,” he murmurs. “Be the first to try.”

I hesitate, listening to the echo of his words, his pain. Something comes over me—the darkness, a cocoon—and within it I find myself a stranger, as strange as this man who calls himself Minotaur.

Magic, I think. Dreams and magic.

I touch him. The pulse of his throat is quick, his hands raw and hot. When he turns us on our sides the sand is gritty and soft, climbing into my clothes, rubbing my skin. I am blind in the oubliette, but my fingers are not, and I find again his jaw, his lips, and press close enough to taste his breath, to taste him.

I kiss the corner of his mouth. I capture his sigh with another kiss, this time on his bottom lip. The edge of the mask rubs against my cheek and brow; bone and hide protrude over the Minotaur’s nose. More wolf than bull, I imagine.