Lips were on hers, warm and soft and wet. Enticing and intoxicating. They pushed into her own tentatively, a tongue running over her bottom one, begging for entrance. A small gasp of shock was all it took for the slick organ to gain entrance into her mouth where it collided with her own. One hand cupped her cheek while another trailed softly up and down the column of her neck.
Tongue on tongue and the kiss deepened. It pulled her in. Encouraged and enticed her in its lewd venture. The hand that so gently caressed her throat now curled behind her neck, sliding through her hair, to grip the back of her head. It pulled her closer and a body met her own; larger, toned and masculine. A leg slid between her thighs, lifting her for better access as their tongues played with one another, his so easily coaxing confidence from her own.
Warmth traveled through her as they pressed into each other. Clouds and mist and chill spread- made way for rays of light that cut through their centers. Cleared away the fog and highlighted an igniting passion coated in infatuation and desire. It begged to be acknowledged and explored. It was a torch of smouldering embers with the goal to be a lit.
Deep and musical hums vibrated between their lips as oxygen dwindled. With a final flick of his tongue and squeeze of his fingers he parted from her.
A deep breath and Korin was opening her eyes. She first noticed lips; sculpted, peachy and bruised. They curled at the end in a mischievous puppy dog tilt and recognition dawned on her. Her mouth formed a little 'o' and her eyes trailed up to his aquiline nose then to those greens eyes, staring right at her.
"Gods I'll never get tired of that." He sighed, just as dazed as she.
Sun rays fell between them, the air in her room swirling thickly in its beams. And where the light hit him, he glistened. Green eyes the color of spring and life swam and sparkled, bronzed skin shone like buttery metal, pale silken hair curled and fanned around them- white gold mixing with her own oily locks. The wetness on his lips glistened, reminding Korin of what he–they–had just done.
"Mikhail." The quizzical shock in her voice was choked out by breathlessness. His name morphed into a breathy sigh.
He let out a soft laugh and before she could protest, dove in, delivering another kiss to her lips, his hands still holding her face in its pleasant cage. This was shorter than the first but no less intimate and the heat inside her burst forward in a parade of flaming butterflies. They swirled up into her heart then made home in her lungs where they burnt up what little breath remained. They threatened to spew from her mouth but his lips sealed away their exit.
When he pulled back his whole body left her, taking his warmth with him. The chill and the clouds swept back in, despite the comfort of her bed and the heat in her sheets. "We can't sleep all day, my beautiful owl." His fingers tucked strands of hair behind her ear as he stood.
"What?" What are you doing? Confusion swept over her as her awareness spread beyond him. "Why?" Why are you kissing me? Is what she meant to say but her stifled questions came out cut short.
"Because your father has been calling for the last ten minutes." He ran his hands through his hair, tidying his appearance, still smiling at her with that smile. The soft one that she'd only seen once before. The one Korin felt like was only for her. "Hell will break loose if he comes up here and finds us tangled in your sheets."
As if on cue, "Korin! Mikhail!," came from the kitchen downstairs. He sounded annoyed and his voice carried loudly in a way she did not know her calm and low toned father to speak. Typically he would have just come up before having to yell.
Mikhail was already pushing her door open, hinges whining under the weight of the heavy wood. A rush of morning air mixed into the room from the darkened hallway. The sweet ambery fragrance of Mikhail met with dust, wood, and breakfast. Salt brined and fat trimmed pieces of thin cured pork, sizzling hot with chunks of bread drenched in chunky fruit preserves. Her favorite.
Mikhail disappeared into the darkened hallway followed by the faint jot of footfall descending stairs and then incoherent murmurs between men. The shadows outside the door absorbed their words and fed them to her ears as if she were underwater.
She pulled back the sheets to find that, thankfully, she was clothed in one of her night shirts and a loose pair of pants. Nothing too lewd had taken place.
The thought of intimacy beyond the kiss brought a strange rush of heat into her cheeks and an ache in her chest as her heart sped up. Korin shook her head, tensed up, clenched and muscles in her body then shook her head again, attempting to fling away the odd sensations. Something was off-different. But she couldn't quite understand what or why.
"Korin!" Came again and this time it was hard to distinguish if it was her father or Mikhail. The sound of her name entered the room in a bubble and burst upon her ears and the swirling rays of light with a thrumming hum. "Come on!" More bubbles of sound bursting and the dust in the light vibrated in waves.
Korins eyebrows knitted in confusion as she stared into the darkened hallway. Her legs swung over the edge of the bed and her feet pressed to cool wood. She rose, left the warm bed, softly padded towards the door. The sunlight should be coming down the hallway, reflecting off walls and bouncing its way into her room. She usually had to shut her door lest its morning rays shoot right into her eyes. Instead the darkness loomed in its frame, eating the light and distorting sound.
Grains and grooves in the old worn floor tugged at the skin of her feet as she cautiously stepped up to the doorway. She poked her head into the hallways. Its walls seemed to stretch and curve unnaturally. An ominous mouth with a dim uvula of light at its very end.
She stepped forward. Then took another step and another. The light seemed to come no further. Two steps turning into four and then eight, and soon she was trotting forward with an odd panic swelling in her chest.
She came to a halt, heading whipping back to now find the door to her room warped and distant as well.
The anxiety stummed at her heart.
A sudden burst of force and she was sprinting forward, panic pounding into reality in the heavy sound of her feet slapping the floor.
The light drew no closer.
Her breathing grew ragged and a small whine escaped her throat.
"Korin?" Mikhail stepped around the corner, sudden worry etched into his face. And she was hurriedly rushing up to him as light flooded the hallway and it snapped and shrunk in a nauseous wave.
His arms automatically reached out for her. Warmth once more clearing some fog that existed inside of her. Her eyes were round with confusion as she looked up to him and then back to her room, her door now only a few meters away.
Mikhail smiled softly, hands trailed down her arms to gently grasp her own. "My love, are you okay?" He pulled her under his arm, tucked her into his side as he guided them through the entryway, down the stairs, and into the living area.
Korin pointed back towards the hallway, "The hallway was long."
Mikhail giggled. "Long? I don't remember it being more than a few meters. "
"It was. " Koring insisted. "I couldn't get-" Her thoughts cut short as she took in her home. A sofa and two plush cushioned armchairs sat in a circle, anchored in the center by a thick wooden coffee table. Light streamed into the house through clear windows framed in tied back cream curtains. A sweeping glance into the dining room and kitchen and she found a table set with plates and her father over a stove. Loading sizzling slices of pork onto a serving plate. Next to him, in a neat display, were eggs and the fluffy torn up pieces of bread.
Samhirs bright expression turned into annoyance as he rolled his eyes and leveled a look at Mikahil, pointing fork in his direction. "Must you always cling to my daughter? Can't you just wait until I leave?"
Mikahil chuckled but separated himself from her. "I'm sorry, Samhir." Well all except a hand, his finger intertwining with hers.
"Give a father a break." Samhir scolded.
Korin did not hear their exchange. The environment around her buzzed in visual stimulus. Or the lack thereof. Flashes of metal and wires, screws and bolts temporarily distorted reality. Messes on tables. Wear on the couch half hidden with woven blankets. Stains and burns shotely sanded out of the floor. The room rippled.
"Korin!" Her father snapped. "Good gods, you're spacey today. Come sit down."
Mikahail was lightly pulling on her arm, waiting for her to follow.
Samhir was already seated and taking a sip of steaming tea from a cup. On the table in front of him was a plate, loaded with food, and utensils neatly placed on the sides. But also the faint hues of loose screws and tall bottles.
Korin squinted at the bottles, just faint images, like stars in her vision. And yet she stared at them, twinkling in and out of reality in front of her father. A small glass sat next to their side, a ring of condensation seeping out from its base.
Her father took another sip of his tea.
"This isn't real." The word left her mouth airy and small–a whisper as realization dawned on her. This wasn't real. A dream perhaps, but not the world in which Korin knew to be her own.
And just like that, it cracked. Her father, their clean tidy house, and a lovestruck Mikhail with his warmth left her. Searing white light bursting through the scene ahead in beams until the illusion shattered and all that was left was harsh white.
She squinted and blinked fuzz and blur. She was laying on her side, cold stone pressing into her face, bruising her shoulders, elbows, and knees. Her head rolled to the side. White brick lay before her, spanning out then shooting up and bending. A circular room of white with a ceiling shrouded in a heavy and unnatural darkness.
"Very interesting," came a man's voice from high above.
Korins eyes searched for him, but her body did not move. Her limbs were under the weight of a heavy sedative still running through her system.
"Are you not having relations with the Maaroi man?"
Maaroi? Mikhail?
"Intelligence informed us that the two of you were intimately close. Perhaps they were wrong." The man's voice was nails on a chalkboard to her static mind. Her ears pulsed and her temples throbbed. He laughed and little stabs of pain shot into her skull. "I was told he catered to you quite dotingly. Was this a one sided infatuation? Oh, how sad. Being led on by a homely Ipanish peasant must be a hard hit to his ego."
Warm touches and wet kisses still fresh in her mind, he hit something heavy within her. A cruelty that smacked her down like cold filthy water poured into a smouldering hearth.
Her mouth would not open to defend herself, her numb body would not move. Just her eyes, which rolled around uselessly trying to find the voice in the darkness above.
Korin could hear rustling.
"You know had it not been his odd obsession with you, you probably would have slipped our notice." A pause and then more rustling. "The Maaroi have always been on our watch lists. Mercenaries and dark practitioners of all sorts, but the Maaroi family has a special spot at the top. They've stepped into aristocracy and wealth using those dark powers of theirs. So when one of them ended up in Ipahn catering to a plain, regular, low class citizen, naturally our interests were piqued."
"What interests our enemies, interests us. So we've brought you here to learn what about you has him so infatuated." A twang of thick string and the creaking of bending wood circled down the tower. "It is my job to extract this information."
Thomp!
Wap!
Her body shook from the impact of an arrow in the abdomen, but the sedatives numbed her. Her eyes rolled down to look at the thin dowel lodged into her solar plexus. Right below it in her gut was another, blood crusted and dried around it. Her breathing cut out in sharp pants. Eyes widening as blood gurgled from the fresh wound, releasing little spurts between the arrow. It spilled onto the floor and pooled under her.
"Were will we go this time?" The man trilled, his voice twisted and carrying the disease of lunacy. "Hmm, yes. I know!"
Korin blinked as the white brick began to green. The world began to swirl and morph once more.
Why is this happening to me? Korin knew why. That thing inside of her. Whatever it was. It had always been there and so had fate, the little card flashing through her muddled mind. She was probably lucky something like this had not happened sooner. The way she had seen her own self reflected on Talis, tasted it in her fear. The insidious command that had thundered from the fibers of her being with cruel force.
If she had been smarter she would have ran away long ago, consequences be damned. Ran away that night before the world awoke. Looking back now it seemed so stupid to just sit on the mountain. And it all felt like wasted time. It was foolish and she didn't know why. Had she ever aspired for anything besides what she knew her reality was capable of? What it would allow her? No she hadn't. She'd always stayed within the bounds, never wishing for more or exploring the possibilities of what could be, secretly afraid of disappointment. Her circumstance had her pruning and trimming her thoughts. Cutting them down lest she upset those around her with her existence.
Had the world not brought her here, had it not begun to tick, would she even have ever considered running away from the mountain?
Probably not.
"Any second now."
Korin took one last look at the arrows in her, for the first time in her memory the hot bile of crying itched up her throat. A single tear slipped down her cheek as her head lolled to the side. Trembling wet eyes fogged over in white and her mouth went slack. And then she was away, sprinting through a rolling field of green.