Arms of the Ocean Ch. 04

Fortunately Ronav didn't have to wait much longer. The entourage rounded a bend in the road some thirty minutes later before veering off and into a grassy clearing that they would use for the night.

For some minutes Ronav milled around as the guards began setting up their tents and the driver tended to his horses. His eyes kept drifting back to the carriage's doors in the hopes that Vyla would soon emerge and brief him on what had changed. Ronav even found himself hoping that she would tell him what to do as far as setting up their sleeping arrangements went. Anything to keep busy and it served the story she had woven that he was her servant.

At last the carriage opened and Vyla stepped to the ground then turned and lifted her hand to help Lady Telra down. The Lady, though still dressed extravagantly, at least wore an outfit that looked a little more suited to the road. She had black stockings with a sky-blue skirt that ended above her knees at the front but curved down and reached nearly to the ground at the back. A violet long-sleeved shirt covered her torso which would have been plain if not for the curtains of purple fabric that ran from her shoulders to her wrists. Woven into her hair were two more lengths of fabric, dark blue this time, that trailed from her all the way to her ankles. Looks like a bird, Ronav noted with a degree of mockery, albeit an exotic bird.

Telra glanced around the developing campsite briefly before locking her focus on one of the guards whose red-striped helmet denoted him as the captain. She said something that Ronav didn't quite catch at this distance and direction, then strode towards the man.

Vyla, meanwhile, glided across the grass, as smoothly and silently as she always moved, to where Ronav stood. "What do you think, Sye?" she asked.

"Of?" he replied warily. This wasn't going to yet another of the Siren's strange ideas for a game.

Vyla pointed to the Lady who was currently giving out orders to her entourage. "Of our benefactor."

"She looks good. I take it you two enjoyed yourselves?" Ronav asked with feigned interest.

"You have no idea." Then Vyla paused a second before gradually turning her playful smile upon him. "She doesn't realize it, but I've dressed her as close as I could manage to the outfit of a PleasureSister."

It took a moment before understanding flashed into Ronav's mind. "You're telling me that you got the person helping as and dressed her up as a whore against her knowledge... why?"

Vyla turned her eyes upon him and Ronav saw at once how cold and dark they had gone. "Are you questioning me, Shasling?" she asked, her voice filled with venom. "Do you think yourself somehow more intelligent and cunning than I?"

Ronav tried to swallow but his mouth had suddenly gone dry. "I don't—"

"Forget it," Vyla broke in, though her smile didn't return. With that she turned her back on him again and watched, cross-armed, as their campsite slowly unfolded.

Ronav stifled the urge to snap at her. It didn't take a genius to know that doing so would only make things far worse. Confusion clouded him momentarily. Didn't the Siren flip her emotions back to normal, or at least happy, when she did this sort of thing? Yet this time her iciness failed to fade.

"Can you please tell me what the change of plans was?" Ronav asked stiffly and hoped it wouldn't make things worse.

"Well... since you're being so polite."

Her voice remained harsh as before as she turned around in a manner that only a shape shifter could. Her front and back folded together such that Vyla faced Ronav in an instant. "I've revealed to Lady Telra that I am a Siren. I—"

"What!?" Ronav hissed quietly as he could.

"Hush, Sye," Vyla commanded and she held a finger over his lips for a fraction of a second. "She can be trusted and it will be to our benefit. Now she will hold a far greater respect for us, both out of fear and curiosity. Who, she will wonder to herself, are these travelers and what do they intend. And beneath all that, she will find me irresistibly exotic. Not to mention," Vyla added as her voice took on a husky tone, "The leagues of possibility that this will add to our private fun."

As usual, Ronav couldn't help but briefly envision the two women lying in each others arms and joined in some teasingly erotic manner that he knew had to be totally unrealistic. He shook the thought away and challenged her plan instead. "How do you know all this?"

"I know this because this is how the minds of you Shaslings operate. What is the phrase you have? Inquisitiveness slew the cat? You will chase mysterious things even if they may get you killed. But you remain right to be skeptical and that is why you will cooperate with me in my efforts to win her over completely."

"Ugh, fine," Ronav groaned as he rubbed his eyes. This day had been far too long. "Can we at least set up the tents first?"

"If you wish, Sye. Where did you pack them, on the carriage?"

"I didn't pack them, you did." Ronav thought back to this morning which now felt more like it had happened several days ago. They had been about to leave for market street when he remembered that they would need sleeping arrangements for the journey. Then he had fetched two old and tattered tents that were scarcely more than a bit of cloth with some sticks to stretch over and Vyla had agreed to carry them. "You said you'd carry them... inside you..."

"In— inside me? Where, pray tell?" Vyla looked herself over as though the tents might suddenly burst from her stomach. "Do you think my body somehow has infinite space for storage?"

"But you keep other things inside yourself."

"Yes, a small pouch of pearls, a set of knives and some other possessions that take very little space. Not two whole tents."

"Then why did you say you would carry them?" Ronav groaned.

"You didn't hear the sarcasm in my voice? You are the mighty Taigin, why didn't you carry them?"

Ronav opened his mouth to argue further but shut it again when sense told him how pointless it would be to do so. Besides, he had to admit a fair degree of fault here. Still, it would help if the Siren spoke plainly from time to time. "Okay, so I guess we're sleeping outside."

Vyla scoffed. "Perhaps you are, Sye. I imagine that I will find a place in the carriage." And with that, the Siren spun around and stormed towards the campsite and the fire that had begun to blaze there.

Ronav watched her become a silhouette against the flickering, orange glow and wondered for a while if he should follow. The right choice would be to do so, he knew, but at the moment he felt unable to stand facing her again. No doubt, the second he sat with Vyla among the Lady's entourage, the jokes and taunts would begin.

Instead of chasing that possibility, Ronav turned around and walked from the grassy clearing to the darkening fold of the forest. He trod between the evening-shadowed trees and plants and thought about the journey that he had embarked upon. Already regret was gnawing at his insides. Maybe this wild pursuit had been a bad idea. Certainly it didn't make a lot of sense. But now that the wheels were in motion, Ronav felt powerless to stop them. He had tied himself to a Siren and he knew that undoing such a bond would take far more work than what had gone into bringing it about.

After several minutes more of walking, Ronav found a dense copse of trees from the center of which jutted a particularly large redwood that had wrapped its roots and trunk around an outcropping of granite.

Ronav sat upon one of the comfier looking roots and stared up at the blackening sky. He turned his thoughts to the events of the day. So much had happened since he had risen from bed to go fishing this morning. Where would he be right now if he hadn't gotten involved with those fishermen who had caught Vyla? He knew one thing for certain, he wouldn't have returned home soon after to have that other-worldly turn in the sheets.

As much as Ronav tried to resist it, he began reliving that section of the day. The sensations of her body against his and the electricity of being inside her.

In the confines of his pants, Ronav's cock began to awaken. He could almost feel her supple, smooth skin and deliciously full breasts pressed against him. Curse the Siren for effectively enslaving him with her body. Even now he felt the urge rising to return to camp and seek her out. And what of the Siren they were supposed to be pursuing? Ronav wanted to think that he would leave Vyla immediately and go to the Southsea Siren at once. After all, his dreams of the past few months had left him wanting nothing less. But now he had known Vyla far longer than the other predator of the ocean and would no doubt only become better acquainted as the journey wore on.

As abruptly as they had surfaced, Ronav tore himself away from such thoughts. No point in considering them now when that future remained so far away and so shrouded in uncertainty. Instead his focus shifted back to the growing bulge in his pants and again his mind rewound to this mornings activities and Vyla's energetic folds that had enveloped him so well. It had been a while since Ronav had last jacked off. With the orange-haired Siren visiting him every night, he had hardly felt the need to. Yet now as the tightness of his pants continued to build, he began to consider the option.

With a will of its own, Ronav's right hand began undoing his belt. Soon his cock sprang from its well-worn fabric confines and into view with his hand wrapped tentatively around it and, just as suddenly, there came a soft yelp from somewhere in the trees nearby.

Ronav froze, but not before stuffing his rigid member back into place, and perked up his ears. Someone was out here with him. "Who's there?" he called into the darkness while his eyes scanned the black lines of the trees. "Vyla?"

At that moment Ronav realized that the cry had come from the treetops rather than the ground. He looked up to where a light breeze was rustling through the canopy and parting branches. Then he noticed a shadow among them that looked far too person shaped to be anything else. "Who's there?" he called again, far more warily this time.

No voice replied but he could see the figure moving forwards and pushing through the foliage. Ronav stood and took on a stance that he hoped would be a little more intimidating than he had been sitting down with his cock out. Finally the figure, seemingly floating, emerged enough from the treetops to pass through a ribbon of moonlight and Ronav saw that his onlooker in this patch of woods was a woman.

More like a girl, he decided after a second or two of staring.

The girl's features were youthful and soft, even buried under the thick layer of dirt and grime that marred her skin. She hovered closer down to him and Ronav at once confirmed that she was a Chayli, one of the wind-winged people.

The girl's eyes were brimmed with curiosity as they stared at him. She had clad herself carelessly in brown-furred skins of animals that matched her similarly brown hair which, Ronav noted, looked long enough to reach the backs of her knees were she standing and were it not such a tangled mass. At the moment it looked like a long, singular growth that had been caked with the filth of the forest.

"Hoy," Ronav ventured. What would a Chayli girl be doing out here. She had obviously been living in the woods for quite some time. Ronav quickly flashed his memories back through what he knew of the flying people. They liked to roam, they tended to live in windy places and sometimes settled far from civilization since distance didn't matter much. The women tended to keep their hair quite short as it interfered with flying. Strange then that this one had let hers grow to such a length. And she looked far too young to have settled out here. Yes, she had clearly crossed into womanhood, but only just and she had just as clearly been living here for a while. At least a year, Ronav had to guess by her wild and curious eyes. But it almost looked as if she hadn't seen another person in eons.

"Hoy?" he tried again after the first received only a curious tilt of the head.

"Qual cur zee?" she said and he could hear the question in the tone.

"Uh..."

Had he misheard? Definitely not. Just as definite was the fact that her words were not in the common tongue. The only other spoken language he knew of, but didn't know, was Auddes, the spellwords of the Ralta who were the masters of sound. But why would a Chayli girl living in the forest be speaking such a language? If she even was.

"Do you speak common?" he hazarded.

The girl cocked her head and floated closer on a steady breeze that emanated from the four, razor-edged appendages on her back. "Quol cur zee? Cur zee... la nalat?" She tilted her head the other way inquisitively and awaited an answer

"La nalat?" Ronav replied with the obvious subject of her question.

"Teb, la nalat." Still with the inquiring stare but she added a slight nod of encouragement.

For wont of something better to do, and at least satisfied that this girl wasn't somehow a threat, Ronav nodded back.

That seemed to get him somewhere. At once the girl swooped down to the forest floor and landed several feet from him. "Fril nalat," she remarked more cheerily. Then she held out both her hands, palms facing up, to a point halfway between her and Ronav.

Ronav stared for a moment with the sense that she was awaiting something. Still relatively lost, but driven by apparent success, he tried mimicking her action, seeing how that had seemed to work earlier.

Once Ronav's palms were presented too, the girl turned hers over and touched them to his. A greeting of sorts? The girl then withdrew her hands and met his eyes with her wide, curious gaze.

For several moments, silence reigned as one waited for the other to speak. At last Ronav decided to take the reigns. "What are you doing out here?" he tried, though he didn't really expect her to understand.

She didn't judging by the frown. "Quol cur zee ispavis?"

The time had come, Ronav decided, to accept that this girl and he didn't speak the same language. Although, at the moment, it seemed as if she didn't fully realize this. Ronav supposed that he had managed to bluff at least some degree of communication. Perhaps she thought he had the whole language under wraps.

Someone had to know something about her, even if she had been living in the forest for years. They were near a road, right? Someone had to have seen her during that time. And she must have parents somewhere. At this stage they had traveled to be closer to Shadetree Fold than Ripples on the Water. Perhaps one of the members of Lady Telra's entourage could shed some light on this person.

"Do you want to come with me?" said Ronav cheerily and he held out a hand for her.

She looked at the hand and her frown creased further. "Zee'ur yvull." With that remark, the girl spun around and sprang towards the treetops on a gust of wind. She grabbed hold of a branch, peered over her shoulder and waved. "Lees yvull nalat."

Ronav almost called to the girl but she vanished so quickly into the darkened canopy. What could he have said?

For several minutes he stood waiting in the dense copse of trees and watching the gentle breeze's influence on the branches that the girl had moved between. Eventually Ronav had to concede that she had no intention of returning. At least not in the space of time he felt willing to remain exposed in this forest. No doubt the wolves and other, lesser nocturnal life would be heading out for the hunt.

Ronav's stomach rumbled abruptly at the thought of food and he realized at once how long it had been since he had last eaten. With one final glance at the shadowy treetops, he began the journey back to camp.