The Rabbit Dies

A haunting note carries over the lake, echoing into the overcast sky. Sad, forlorn, melancholy and defeated, it sinks into my chest and makes my steps slow, just a tad. It comes again. The echoes mingle into a chorus of spirits that chill my soul and deaden my spirit. Just a bit of panic creeps in at the end. It's not a happy cry, and the echoes only serve to instill dread in me. It works. I keep marching, but it works. A moment passes and the echoes still and I am left in the stillness of death once again.

"Red Throated Loon," I say.

"Right," says Annette. She thinks for a long moment and takes a deep breath.

A jaunty march, a single hit to start it off, that bleeds into a trill that reaches the heavens. Again and again, the march thunders on, filling the empty air with hope and joy. The gray sky does not seem so gray anymore, the trailing fingers of mist lingering over the lakes surface don't seem so haunting and grasping.

"Eastern, wait, Southern Whip-poor-will."

"Damn. Right again." Another moment of thought and she inhales once again.

"I don't know what's more impressive," Amaru says, "The fact that you know these birds, or that she can mimic them."

"Shush."

Kweh. A short simple bark that only comes across as kweh. It's happy, much like the whip-poor-will, but my mind comes up with nothing, nothing at all. A short noise not of this existence carrying joy and jubilation and it's made up.

"Not fair. You can't just make up noises like that. Doesn't exist. I win."

"No, no, no. You don't know the bird, so I win. I'm finally on the board. You can't take that from me."

"Ok then, what's this bird called? The kwehbird?"

"No, it's not the kwehbird. I... I don't remember what it's called. But I saw one. I saw a whole herd of them when I was in the Palegrass Marsh. Think really big chickens. Like horse big. And you can ride them and they kind of smell weird. But they're awesome. I love them."

"I think she's making this all up," says Amaru, "I've been to the Palegrass. They have chickens, big chickens, but they're more or less normal sized."

"Agreed. Still my point, and you still have nothing on the board."

"Not fair. Not fair at all. Just because you two have no sense of ornithology doesn't mean I'm a liar. The kwehbird exists and it makes kweh noises."

I put the point into my mental tally. Annette will have nothing and like it.

The game continues and I do very well. Cardinal, white throated raven, even a golden bittern, although that one does stump me for a bit. She finally gets me with a double crested cormorant. I have seen cormorant, and I'm pretty sure it only had one crest, but if there is a type with one crest, then it stands to reason that there would be a type with two. If she said a triple crest, then we would have had the kwehbird argument again. Things don't come with three crests.

Three days though, that is a common enough occurrence. Every single day is the third day, depending on how you count it. But this is the third day of us walking and it has been absolutely banal. The sky threatens rain, but it never comes to pass. The travelers we met give us a fine how do you do and a tip of the hat, with the occasional lingering glance on my figure, but not an ounce of trouble. And I love it. Nothing is happening and I am bored, which means I am safe. I am safe to play asinine games with Annette and Amaru as the steps start bleeding into one another and the blisters form and pop across our collective toes. Even that hasn't been so bad. Amaru had one on the heel that cleared up in a day after wrapping his feet properly. Poor boy has grown too used to carriage rides and horseback.

The short sword sits awkwardly at his hip. Too small, for someone his size, but it was the only thing he insisted on using. Never mind that a Zweihander would be more like and einhander with him, but it's what he knew and traveling by foot unarmed is just foolish. Even Annette has a quartet of daggers stashed around her body. So, he had to have something, if only for show. At least he's not stupid enough to start twirling it around like a baton. That's liable to get someone down an arm.

But it feels good to be moving again, even under the gray oppressive sky. It keeps the sun off my back and keeps everything cool. Lake Fine Mist has been at our right for morning and it should be there until tomorrow afternoon. All in all, a fine way to spend a few days and I am not complaining.

My precious bastard hasn't even decided to make an appearance either, and that's just great. I've been able to devote myself to the current moment and my current company with little to no distractions. And I have done so voraciously. Despite the rather soft ministrations of the morning we applied, by the time noon rolls around, I feel that familiar tug in my stomach. But we have to keep walking, for now. Evening, we will deal with all of this in the evening when the world is dark and the moon is high. Part of me wishes we brought along some wine, just for the treat, but drunk and horny is a bit too much of a setback around here. As beautiful as Lake Fine Mist can be, it is still a long way from anywhere with law and order. And we're only going further and further into the wildlands with each and every step.

Amaru does considerably worse at the bird game, even when Annette starts mixing in the ones I've already done. He does manage to identify eagle and crow, but anymore distinctions beyond that elude him.

The bird game continues then falters. There are only so many noises we can make, so many names we know. And it's over and the walk continues in silence. Every so often, Annette or Amaru try to stoke the conversation again, but the embers are cold, with only ash in the pit. We need new wood to stoke and burn and that will have to come when we are still.

"How about that for tonight?" asks Annette. She points a hand to a village on the shore, abandoned.

"It's still a bit too early for us to call it," Amaru says.

"But it is a roof," I say, "And I'm fine with dragging this on a bit. I'm in no rush."

"Won't Warren be mad?"

"Then let him be mad. We can stop walking for a bit. And I still don't trust that sky."

"It's been like that since we left. I don't think anything will happen. I can't smell the rain."

"I could never do that," says Annette, "It just always smells like outside."

"Dad had a bad ankle that would always act up around storms," I say, "Always made me go out and milk the cows. I think he was just lazy."

"Wait, you grew up on a farm?" Amaru says, "I had no idea."

"Nothing worth talking about there. It had a lot of cows and I milked most of them. It was a dairy farm. Also had to churn the butter."

"I thought you were a lifer or something. Born at a monastery like I was."

"Nope. Burrowmeisters found me while I was milking and started talking to my parents. And now I'm here and I say we make this a camp for the night."

And just like that, they all fell in line with the idea. It was a good idea. I am always a fan of sleeping with four walls and a roof. A good hollowed out tree also works, although it is always dicey to start a fire in there. But walls and roof and assumedly a fire pit that is safe and warm.

The buildings at least have that, no matter how dilapidated and overgrown. Moss and vines and shrubs dot the side streets. Odd that no one else has moved in. Everything is still standing, still sound. Each roof sags with the weight of decades, but a little youthful energy should fix that right up. Ready access to clean water and all the bounties of a lake, it should be full of life.

We all fall to our respective tasks. Annette plays homemaker, clearing whatever beams and plants have decided to take the place of a good sleeping arrangement. Amaru decides that he is a fisherman and takes off to the lake. I also think he just wants to bathe and a lake is the closest thing he can get to a decent tub and soap. I don't blame him. A handful of nights in a real city and I already miss hot water and perfumes.

I take a stab at foraging. Firewood mostly, but the songs of the forest carry some threads to follow. A few steps here and I have lemongrass. A few more to my right and there are mushrooms that might kill me. I don't think they will, but I decide to play it safe. Fungi always seem to be a coin toss. But I have sage and some mustard greens as well. And some pine needles, for tea if we feel in the mood for it. I never really cared for the stuff. Tea in general, really. Always tastes like oiled perfume. And I do get the appeal of hot beverages, but nothing is quite as good as something cool and clean down the throat. I almost trip over a bed of dandelions and those are some of my favorites.

A white rabbit jumps and hops from the underbrush and I bristle.

"I am doing the thing you want me to do," I shout to the trees and the leaves, "Get off my back."

The wretched little fluffy thing twitches his nose at me and hops away.

I don't hear his smoky voice come from the trees in some languid perch, so I might just have terrified some poor rabbit for no good reason. I am justified though. Rabbits are bastards and the one that hopped in front of me is no different. Probably on his way to cheat on his rabbit wife with his rabbit mistress. But I have my greens and my treasures, as well as a decent bundle of kindling and tinder, so my little adventure away from the occupied camp comes to an end.

My efforts to gather firewood were completely unnecessary. I see a talk plume of gray smoke trailing up from the roof of our chosen hovel. Annette probably just used some poor wall and floor to get it started and provided the spark with a snap of her fingers. Knowing her, she also made it green. Unnatural, that's what that is. Fire should be red and orange and yellow. But no, she has to keep up with her color scheme and gods forbid she do anything natural. She's already strumming her strings, some meandering tune that shifts the mist into dancing swirls. I can almost make out the bodies of the world waltzing in time.

"Howdy Cottontail," she sings with the wind, "Get anything good."

"Depends on whether or not Ammy pulls through," I say, "Otherwise, we are just having greens."

"Boo. I know you and Lop Ear are used to that, but I need meat."

"And Ammy's still the backup plan for that."

"Poor boy's going to be drained dry by the time we get where we're going."

"He'll be fine. He's up for it. I imagine he's still recovering from Dantea. A few months with a succubus will take out a lot from anyone. I'm surprised he can still get it up at all."

"Look at this huge fish!" commands the triumphant Amaru. He kicks in the door and I am fairly certain that he will bring the entire thing down on us if he does it again.

It is indeed a huge fish. Almost as long as he is tall, although I think the tail does more for it than anything else. The head ends in a snout and four dangling barbels dance as he parades his catch for us. Honestly, I am impressed. I didn't think he'd catch anything and if he did, it would be a couple of bass or loaches or whatever lives in lakes. I did not expect a sturgeon.

"Wow," Annette says, "Big fish. Really big. What even is that? Can you eat it?"

"It's fish," he says, "of course you can eat it. And it's big. Really big. Look at how big this thing is."

"Yes, we are all proud of your big fish," I say, "Do you know what you caught?"

"Yeah, a fish.

"It's a sturgeon, Amaru. Do you know what caviar is?"

Annette snickers and stops playing her song for a minute.

"And thus, Lop Ear is now the best part of this whole damn thing, because I have never had caviar on the road and he just goes out and brings it back like nothing at all."

"I have no idea what caviar is," he says.

"Well then you are in for a treat, Lop Ear. I've had it when I've done royal gigs and it's amazing."

Amaru beams and I feel my insides twitch and melt. He has a wonderful smile. And he knows how to dress fish very cleanly. Annette lends him one of her daggers and in no time, the thing if fileted and cut and roasting over the fire with my accompanying herbs. A little less meat than I thought there would be, but there is delicious roe spilling from its innards and I am happy.

It's a good meal, all in all. Fish has a bit too many bones stuck in its flesh, but it's still one of the better field meals I've had. And there is fresh caviar and I really regret not bringing wine with us because that would just make this heaven. The world outside is darkening. With the waning sun and I can feel the moon hiding behind the clouds. I even think I can pick out the glow of light behind the clouds.

Amaru, to my slight surprise, is the one to start the night's activities. As I sit and stare into the fire, watching the flames lap and lick at the wood, he moves closer in some futile attempt to be stealthy. I've seen big men move quietly, but it's just one of those things that don't quite meld into the action. Small men can't hit quite as hard, big men can't step as quietly, and medium men aren't quite good at anything. Passable at a lot, but not quite good.

His presence isn't supposed to be masked, anyway. He's supposed to fill the room, the very essence of his being meant to soak into the wood grains and make it smell of him. He always smells so clean and crisp, of morning brisk and clean stone. I assume it's a part of the lake's doing, the way he smells of fresh water and fresh air, but I also assume that is just him at this point. Annette smells of green wood smoke and sour sweet candy, and I apparently smell like wavering grass and dense wooded places far from the damning touch of civilization. We could all smell worse, and I half expect we do. Several days on the trail just doesn't lend the pretty scents any ground to stand on.

His arm is still nervous as it slowly creeps around my shoulder, like I'm going to throw him off and bite him. Well, bite with malicious intent. I do bite him and it feels very nice and I think he likes it in certain contexts. But a mean bite, not a good bite, the ones he doesn't like. And every time, I just press into him a bit more.

His skin is cool to the touch, like stone and gravel. He just saps away the heat of the fire and whisks it away to the place all banished things go. I can hear his heartbeat, strong and steady in time with his breath. His chest, his gloriously broad chest of marble rises and falls and I feel everything inside of me start to go limp.

Full belly and tired legs, I just want a night to let it all fall. Marches and hikes, campaigns and quests, each one starts to fall into the past as I simply let each breath from his chest synch with my own. Even now, I have to make my will slow. Even now, there is a bit of me that just wants to keep going, keep everything rapid pace and breakneck so I don't have time to count the breaths. I shouldn't be waiting here. I shouldn't be taking the moment to myself.

Annette slithers in, finding a gap to fit her body. It's mostly across our collective lap before the fire, a little bit of her torso propped up on mine. She's heavy, good heavy, another body to press into and be pressed by. Her skin is warm, so warm, soaked in firelight and dancing green with the embers. The temperatures collide in me and find some happy middle that feels like nothing at all. Weightless, I am weightless and floating through the gray clouds, unaware of the world at large as it turns.

Then Amaru grabs my breast with ravenous abandon and I am a being of flesh and blood and bone once more. I was getting tired of trapsing around the astral plane. I like to feel things. And the cold fingers, the delightfully singing cold fingers digging into my soft skin do wonders for getting me out of my head and into my body. I sigh and press deeper and deeper.

"Horny face," says Annette, "Both of you."

"Are you saying we shouldn't?" I purr into cool statue next to me. Slow, terribly slow. Part of me wants him to pinch and squeeze and suck with wanton abandon. Later, that can come later.

"Hell no. But you both got it on now and I feel the need to point it out. Mainly for my own amusement."

Amaru is content with his idle fondling for the moment and I am content to be fondled. Touching and being touched, stroking the hard lines in his chest his stomach as he does with me, Annette watching all the while. The players are all the same. The game itself has a similar end every time we play. But the permutations, and the sheer joy of playing it bring it back to us again and again and again.

Annette seems to be getting pouty. Lack of attention, and she happens to like attention. When it is being given to someone else in her vicinity, she thinks someone is robbing her of attention that tis rightly destined to her. My hand goes to her chest and that seems to appease the poor thing. Soft, just as soft as me, although not quite as filling. The palm likes it, to run it back and forth, to let the weight glide between the fingers and she hums, pleased with herself and the beginnings of the ritual. Her hand takes mine away for a moment, and I feel her tongue slip between my fingers. She hums around them, licking and sucking and getting them nice and deliciously wet. I am still lost in the cool mount of stone muscle and dark lines to fully care what she does.

It's always so lost, always so gone when there are three or more. Limbs and bodies, tongues and lips and everything else mixing and melding with blurred outlines. I know when I am being touched, more or less, but not quite by whom. And I close my eyes to keep the mystery alive. I do not mind whose hands are on my chest, my hips my thighs, only that there are hands there and that they are doing as I wish them to. And they are, soft and hard, working in tandem to make something bigger when whole.

Hands, glorious hands, running up my body, hot and cold, gentle and rough, mixing together and I am not sure who is doing what. The cold is rough. The cold is gentle. The warm is gentle. The warm, is rough and it's all mixing and melding and stirring within me to get my chest heaving and throat moaning. It's all a tapestry of colliding sensation that I can't escape from even if I wanted to.

The hands get me nude. My hands do the same to a vast expanse of stone skin that must always be exposed. Amaru is too sculpted, to line to be hidden away in something civilized and woven. Annette can stay within the confines of cloth. The color, the dye plays with her skin. Her shape lends itself to being hidden and teased and suggested. Amaru just is. He is looking over me, pressing his mouth to mine as I taste the cool of his tongue, lingering lemon grass and dandelion greens hinted through the overwhelming avalanche of sensation. My head is turned, I do not know by whom and I am kissing Annette again and She tastes just the same Her tongue is small, nimbler, almost dagger like and that is how I know. Amaru kisses my neck and bites. And I am the one with the sharp teeth that bleed and nope. I gasp all the same as he starts tracing down my chest with that cold tongue.

The heat creeps up to my neck as the chill leaves and I am kissing Annette again. That's wonderful. I am fine with that, perfectly fine. Not sure which I like better, in all fairness. More research to get a full breakdown of pros and cons. I have to be scientific about it. But she is good. Darting her tongue, letting it move and dance and twist while I just bludgeon against t her with my unfiltered will. She is soft in my hands and she gaps and moans and I pinch her.

Her lips leave mine and her neck comes to greet me again. I am being led down her chest her stomach her hips and it all springs back with the tingling of her voice. I feel the heat of it press against me, and my fingers come away wet once more. Heat on my tongue and a sudden chill bite at my thighs.