The Rings Fighter Read online

  He smiled at her. “More than marginally, from what you just said.”

  She nudged him with her shoulder, embarrassed, then covered it by rolling her eyes. “Answer the question. Did she beat you or not? Or are you trying to weasel out of telling me, Ringmaster Trazen?”

  “Yes,” he said at once, smiling at her and kissing her again. “Yes, she beat me. She kicked my ass, as the human expression goes. It was quite impressive, Chloe... quite impressive. I have not enjoyed myself on a run like that since it was me running in the Rings... and you will watch it, and provide me with intelligent commentary with your ‘marginal’ education.”

  Chloe laughed again.

  Something about the pure sincerity of his happiness made it utterly irresistible.

  He continued talking about the run the rest of the way to the restaurant.

  Once they pulled up in front of their destination, however, his demeanor shifted.

  Glancing out the window up at the pale blue, glass-covered structure, his long, Nirreth-dark face grew serious, more how she remembered it from that morning. He also moved away from her on the bench, unwrapping his arm from around her shoulders and studying her face. She watched him look at her in the dress and felt her own nerves worsen.

  “We are not going in?” she said, feeling her face heat under his stare.

  “Not like this,” he said. Hesitating, he gave a Nirreth shrug, holding up a hand in apology. “I must sting you first, Chloe.”

  A light bulb flashed over her head. “Ah. Yes. Of course.”

  How had she forgotten that?

  Then, looking at Trazen, her nerves worsened for a different reason.

  Nirreth tended to get pretty, well, sexual... if not out and out turned on... when they stung someone. Humans got turned on by the stinging process, too. The venom acted as a drug on both ends of the sting, lowering inhibitions in humans, making them want physical contact, making them affectionate, sexual, even emotional. But Nirreth...

  Nirreth often lost control entirely.

  She’d managed to forget about that, in the stress of everything else. While she didn’t mind Trazen stinging her per se––certainly not the way she dreaded it with Agnon or most of his Nirreth pals––he was still a stranger to her.

  If nothing else, the idea was awkward.

  Seeming to read something in her face, Trazen let his own expression smooth.

  “I plan to take something, Chloe,” he said, his voice reassuring. “The venom won’t affect me. Well, not in the usual way.”

  “Take something?” She gave him a puzzled look. “Take what?”

  Rather than answer, he leaned back on the bench, reaching into a pocket of the dark pants he wore. After digging his hand deep enough, he produced a small metal case. Pressing a raised button on the side to pop it open, he removed a glass syringe.

  “I’ll take this,” he said.

  Staring at the cylinder in surprise, she looked up at him. “Will it hurt you?”

  He smiled that faint smile of his, shaking his head. “No, Chloe. But it is kind of you to ask.”

  Before she could decide why some part of her wanted to tell him not to do it, he’d already placed one end of the glass cylinder against the skin of his dark forearm. She watched, frowning, as he depressed a yellow button on the end, releasing the vial’s contents.

  She watched his face as he grimaced.

  Then, as his expression began to smooth.

  When he met her gaze next, his eyes looked slightly flatter.

  “It works almost at once,” he said. “Are you ready?”

  She nodded, but tensed slightly too.

  Uncoiling his tail, he slid closer to her on the bench, moving cautiously. Catching hold of her arms in his long fingers, he held her gingerly, as if she might break, and at a distance from his body. He continued to hold her as he pressed the end of his tail to the bare skin of her side where it showed through the pale blue dress.

  Before she could wrap her mind around that, he stung her.

  She let out a pained gasp, caught off guard.

  Immediately, the venom flooded her skin with heat.

  She was gripping his corded arms by the end of it, avoiding his gaze, feeling her mind tilt as his presence flooded into her, as her breath quickened...

  When he stung her again.

  That time, she let out a low sound, and felt him flinch.

  When he withdrew his tail, releasing her arms, the lack of contact caused an immediate reaction in her, one that was almost animalistic.

  She found herself sliding into his lap, winding her arms around his neck. He seemed about to protest then didn’t, wrapping his arms around her waist before he stung her a third time. That time, his chest tightened where she pressed hers against him, but she still felt nothing but that calmness on him as his mind grew into a steady heartbeat inside hers.

  She could feel him all around her now, like a living force.

  By the time he’d finished that third sting, she was stroking his neck and chest, sitting deeper in his lap, sliding her hand under his clothes to reach bare skin.

  She felt him reacting to the contact, but mostly, he felt calm.

  Utterly peaceful.

  “That drug,” she managed, watching his face. “It makes you not want me?”

  Her voice seemed to come from far away.

  Looking up at her, he chuckled, his voice holding a barely perceptible strain.

  “I’m not dead, Chloe,” he said, avoiding her eyes as he smiled. “And you’re hardly making it easy right now... but yes, it allows me to control myself.”

  She nodded, but didn’t let go of him, or stop stroking his skin. She shifted deeper into his lap, aware of his hand stroking her thigh through the slit of the dress.

  “Do you want me?” she said.

  He averted his gaze a second time, but she saw his long throat move in a swallow.

  “Yes,” he said. “But you don’t owe me anything, Chloe...”

  “Yes, I do.”

  He gave her a harder look. The gold flecks seemed to spark at her from inside those obsidian irises.

  “No,” he said, his voice bordering on cold. “You don’t.”

  She nodded, but continued to stroke his skin.

  After a few more seconds of that, he closed his eyes, shifting his weight under her.

  “We should go inside,” he said, gruff.

  He didn’t attempt to move out from under her though. She rearranged her weight on his lap, watching him wince before he turned away. He was hard. She could feel that now, too, and couldn’t stop herself from pressing against him when she felt him against her. His fingers gripped her arm when she did it a second time and she heard his breath catch.

  “Chloe... for the grace of the gods...”

  “You like her,” she said. “This Rings fighter today. You really like her, don’t you?”

  He glanced up, his eyes showing a faint surprise. “What? What do you mean?”

  She smiled, but didn’t answer him.

  Touching him like she was, she could feel faint currents through his mind as he thought about her question, even as he reacted in a more visceral way to her stroking and exploring hands, the weight of her body in his lap. She felt whispers of emotion there, too... even now, when his mind was relatively quiet from the drug.

  The longer she touched him, the more she suspected that his mental quiet wasn’t all from the drug. She could feel an interesting kind of control within him, like a veneer over the surface, something that felt practiced. It was as if he’d learned to hide the bulk of his more private thoughts behind a denser shield, even through the venom.

  “I have,” he said, giving her another bare glance. “I’ve been trained in it, Chloe.”

  She nodded again, still stroking his neck and chest.

  “What for?” she said. “Is that part of the Rings, too?”

  “Yes,” he said.

  He said it too quickly though, and it crossed her mind t
hat there was more to that story than he was pretending. Moreover, he hadn’t meant to tell her that––about him being trained to use his mind in such a way. That had been a mistake.

  He slid out from under her while she was still watching his face. She continued to stroke his arms and hands until he moved far enough away from her that she couldn’t.

  As soon as he broke physical contact with her, those murmurings of his mind faded.

  He watched her warily now, near the door on the other side of the trolley.

  “Are you ready, Chloe?” he asked, his eyes still studying her face.

  Thinking about his question, she nodded.

  Then, thinking again, she met his gaze before he could open the door.

  “I want you,” she told him.

  His jaw tightened. He didn’t look away but she saw a muscle twitch on his forehead.

  “I’ve just stung you,” he said, his voice gruff. “You must know that’s manipulating what you feel right now, Chloe.”

  She shook her head. “Only in that I’m telling you,” she explained. “I wanted you before. I wanted you at breakfast... last night, even. Well...” Pain rose in her chest, somehow worse under the liquid heat of his venom. “I did before Agnon killed my sister. Before that.” That pain worsened briefly. “After... I was sad. Remembering Kiji.”

  She saw his eyes flinch at her words.

  He nodded then, his face unreadable. “Kiji is your sister’s name?”

  “It was, yes.”

  That tension in his face grew into a nearly visible indecision, as if he were searching for what to say to her. Then, all at once, his expression smoothed.

  “We’ll talk about it later,’ he said. “And whatever else you want. But right now, we need to do this. I need this favor from you. All right?”

  “All right.”

  Averting his dark eyes, he held out a hand to her, his other hand now on the latch of the trolley’s sliding door.

  “Come then,” he said, his voice still gruff.

  She didn’t hesitate, sliding her fingers into his as soon as they were close enough.

  THEY HAD BEEN there for at least an hour... although time was fuzzy inside Nirreth venom.

  Chloe drifted around the room with Trazen, clutching his arm and watching his face without paying much attention to who he spoke to or even whether they tried to speak with her.

  Part of her fascination, she supposed, was how different he acted here.

  She was so caught up in the incongruities of him––between what she felt on him, that quietness of his mind and the arrogant, even brutish-sounding words coming from his mouth as he spoke to other powerful Nirreth––that she jumped in surprise when she suddenly found herself looking at the girl from the Rings.

  She hadn’t noticed where he was taking her.

  Chloe hadn’t known the Rings fighter was there at all. Now she found herself standing in front of a low table where the girl sat with another human and a muscular Nirreth who wore a stone pendant around his neck.

  All three of them stared back at her, their faces tense.

  Well really, they stared at Trazen. They looked only at Trazen... not at her.

  They seemed afraid of him almost.

  Then again, given how much his demeanor changed once he got inside the building, Chloe didn’t find that particularly surprising.

  The change was so dramatic she’d gotten whiplash at first. It felt like she was with someone else entirely, not the person she’d just been speaking to inside that trolley, or the one who’d preferred to pet a deer that morning to eating his breakfast.

  That is, until she touched him. Then she could feel the person she recognized.

  Now she watched in a kind of awe as he transformed back into the Ringmaster again.

  He smiled a cold-eyed smile, arrogant and borderline predatory, folding his muscular arms over his broad chest. He loomed over that table, his whole demeanor vaguely threatening.

  “Come to check out our girl, Trazen?” a voice jeered in human English.

  Chloe’s eyes swiveled to the source, right before the human sitting there let out an arrogant-sounding laugh.

  “...I suppose you’ll throw both barrels at her next time, eh?” the man smirked, taking a few swallows of Nirreth beer before setting down his mug. “Get her back for making you underestimate our lowly human female?”

  Chloe found herself studying the middle-aged human in curiosity, even as Trazen’s dark eyes appraised the same. The human male was handsome, stocky in build and had a curious streak of gold in his hair and strangely riveting, light-brown eyes.

  He didn’t act like a slave.

  Chloe glanced around the rest of the table then.

  She refocused on the girl sitting there––young woman, really, with straight black hair, darker brown eyes and a narrow face. Her features looked familiar right off, although it took Chloe a few seconds more to put the male human’s words together with her face, and then understanding bloomed in her mind.

  This was her. The Rings fighter.

  Like Trazen, she looked different outside the black sense-suit.

  Looking her over more carefully, Chloe wanted to smile suddenly.

  Trazen’s enthusiasm and his sudden bursts of affection suddenly made a lot more sense.

  She was beautiful. More than that... she was sexy, borderline dangerous-looking.

  She was definitely ex-skag––meaning one of the humans who lived outside the Green Zone in the toxic wastes that made up most of what remained of Earth. She had that wiry, scrappy look, and her muscles were lean and highly-functional looking, not like something sculpted in one of the Nirreth’s many exercise centers.

  She also had that hunted look in her eyes that Chloe recognized from so many of her neighbors growing up in Kabasi.

  So yes, definitely a skag... but she was also beautiful.

  She had a kind of grace to her features and even the way she held herself that had “hunter” written all over her. Long black hair hung down her back and over one shoulder, silky and straight. Her almond-shaped eyes shone with an obvious intelligence despite the faint sheen Chloe could see from Nirreth venom.

  She looked young, but also like she’d seen a lot for her age.

  Chloe glanced at the male Nirreth sitting next to the girl, and realized he must be her lover.

  He looked like a fighter too, although longer of limb than Trazen, and with a more narrow face. He was handsome though. As handsome as Trazen, if in a different way.

  Trazen’s thoughts had been so quiet in those few seconds that Chloe didn’t realize he’d placed his fingers back on her... not until a flush of jealousy hit her, hard enough that she flinched, jumping a little. She glanced over at Trazen’s face but he wouldn’t look at her.

  Focusing back on the table and the girl sitting there, Chloe smiled again.

  He really did like her. A lot.

  Stop it, he growled in her mind.

  Fighting to keep the smile off her face, Chloe glanced back at the girl. The Rings fighter, Jet Tetsuo, hadn’t taken her eyes off Trazen either, but the ex-skag watched him warily, like he was some kind of dangerous animal.

  Even as Chloe thought it, the male Nirreth sitting next to the Rings fighter pulled his girlfriend closer, wrapping his arm around her tighter. He must have said something to her too, because she dropped her eyes, taking on a demure, almost submissive posture as she pressed into the tall Nirreth’s side. Chloe had an absurd desire to laugh; the pretense at submission was so obviously put on it struck her as funny.

  Her Nirreth boyfriend must have warned her to play the pretty plaything in here.

  Trazen glanced at Chloe at that, but scarcely long enough to meet her gaze.

  His tail lashed violently behind him in an arc. He looked back at the table, smiling and relaxing some of the heat in his stance. Even as he did, a more lecherous look rose briefly to his dark eyes, as if he were reappraising Jet as a sex toy.

  Interesting,
Chloe thought.

  She could clearly see Trazen’s end of the dance, too.

  He was pretending to be appeased by her submission, and turned on by it... as if he was some egomaniacal dingbat who needed humans to cower in front of him.

  She felt a pulse of... something... off Trazen at the thought.

  He didn’t look at her, but continued to focus on the female Rings fighter, looking her over as if she were a slab of meat.

  “She is exquisite,” he said, bowing to her Nirreth companion once he’d finished his heavy-handed appraisal. “You are quite fortunate,” he added, even as Chloe felt another pulse of that very real jealousy vibrate under his skin. “...I’m afraid the virtual screens did not do her justice, and I thought her quite unique, even then.”

  “Thank you, honorable friend,” Laksri said, bowing.

  “I don’t suppose either of you is open to share... or perhaps an exchange... ?” Trazen added, nodding towards Chloe.

  Chloe tensed. She couldn’t help it.

  Do not worry, Trazen assured her softly. He will not agree to it.

  The girl fighter at the table had a similar reaction to Chloe.

  She turned, her almond eyes widening slightly, to look at her Nirreth companion. Then her eyes darted up, focusing on Chloe herself for the first time. Chloe fought not to flinch under the other woman’s stare. Not because it was hostile––more that it was not. The girl fighter looked at Chloe with sympathy in her eyes, a kind of longing, as though she felt deeply sorry for her and wished she could do something to help her. Realizing the girl thought it was Trazen she needed rescuing from, Chloe bit her lip, fighting the impulse to reassure her––maybe even to laugh––to at least let her know in some way that Trazen wasn’t what he seemed.

  Do not do that, my friend, Trazen warned her softly. Continue to look sad, if you can.

  Chloe sighed internally, but let her feelings about Kiji return to the surface.

  She saw the girl wince, like she’d felt her grief empathically through the air.

  Somehow, seeing that made Chloe feel guilty.

  Why are you being so awful to her? she thought sharply at Trazen. You obviously like her. Maybe more than like. Why are you so determined to make her hate you?