Chapter Nineteen – Taran
Chapter Nineteen
Taran
There was no abandoned cabin in this part of the woods. We stopped in a clearing after the sun set and it was too dark for Thea to see. Not that she needed to see where we were going, but I was also thinking about her comfort. She’d been shifting and shuffling in my arms for the past hour. She needed a break, and I needed it too. All her moving around was making my cock strain in my pants.
I brought her a clean, shiny rock to sit on, and she set about making a fire. While she heated up a can of soup, I looked for a good place to build a nest for her.
“I’ve never slept outside before,” she said. There was a hint of anxiety in her voice.
“I can gather leaves and make you a decent bed.”
She shivered. “Leaves from the ground?”
“Well, yes.”
“Won’t they be damp after the rain? Rotten? Or full of insects?”
Right. I had to remember she was suffering from a crippling fear of all organic things that lived in the woods.
“I may have another solution,” I said. “But it would mean going back to how I looked before.”
She cocked an eyebrow. “Explain.”
“I can make you a nest from my branches, vines, and leaves. I’m clean of any insects, dampness, or rot. I promise.”
She laughed. “I believe you.” She was silent for a moment as she stirred her soup. “I’m sorry I’m being so difficult. Markus said I should’ve never left my ivory tower. He wasn’t wrong.”
“It’s not your fault,” I said.
“Maybe, but it’s stupid to expect nature to be the way I want it to be, just so I can feel comfortable.”
“You have me, and I can help. Nothing wrong with that.”
She looked at me, biting her lower lip nervously. “Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“Okay.”
I let my body grow and morph back into my original shape. It felt good. The human shape I’d taken for Thea was too constrictive. I wasn’t used to being so short and thin. I liked to occupy space, and be tall enough to see in the distance, survey the landscape with ease. As a leshy, I could grow bigger than all the trees in this forest. I didn’t do it because it would’ve been impossible to interact with Thea.
To make it as pristine for her as possible, I started building in the middle of the clearing, away from any trees and bushes. I cleaned the spot from twigs and leaves, then used my branches to cover the ground. Over my branches, I placed leaves, which I shook out of my crown and let fall in a thick blanket.
“Incredible,” Thea remarked. She was eating her soup, and she’d stopped with the spoon between the can and her mouth. “I don’t understand how you do that. Doesn’t it hurt to snap off your own branches and pluck your own leaves?”
“It’s how my body works.”
“And you don’t feel anything?”
“I feel some pinching and itching, but that’s it. And I regenerate immediately, see?”
I demonstrated by growing a branch. She watched with wide eyes, nodding.
“That’s amazing,” she said. “If I lose a limb, it will not regenerate, let me tell you. And it will hurt like hell.”
I laughed. “I know. You don’t have to look while I do this, if it makes you feel uncomfortable.”
“It fascinates me.”
The fact that Thea found me fascinating made me feel good about myself. To her, I was truly useful. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d been useful to someone, aside from the jobs I did for Monster Security Agency. Since I worked with monsters only, I’d been useful to them, but only to a certain extent. Thea was my first client who needed me fully and completely. Almost as if she couldn’t exist without me, at least not in the woods. Had it not been for me, she would’ve been dead the first day.
I kept building her nest, big enough for her to sit and lie in. I created an arch over it, then used it to build a roof. The end result was better than an old, dusty cabin, if I said so myself. It looked like an oversized egg with a leaf-covered floor that doubled as a comfy mattress, three rounded walls, and a round roof. The opening was big enough for Thea to sneak into the nest, and for plenty of air to circulate. I was proud of my work.
“What do you think?” I turned to her, and at the same time reshaped my body into its more human form.
“I have no words. Thank you!” She stood up and came to inspect it. She poked her head in and patted the bed of leaves. “Wow. This is soft.”
I beamed. “I’m glad you like it.”
She threw her arms around my neck. It took me by surprise. I almost pulled away, not knowing how to react, but she pulled me in and hugged me.
“No one has ever done something like this for me. You built me something, literally from your own self.”
I might’ve looked human, but I still couldn’t blush. Which was a good thing. A not so good thing was that the upper part of Thea’s body was pressed to mine, and I could feel the roundness of her breasts through her sweater. If she hugged me any harder, she would certainly feel my cock press against her belly. I patted her lightly on the arm, which I realized was a ridiculous gesture. I wanted to pull her in, hide my face in her beautiful hair and breathe in her unique scent, but something like that was unacceptable. She was my principal, and I was her bodyguard.
“Oh, sorry.” She pulled away and chuckled awkwardly. “I got carried away for a second. I’m just so happy I don’t have to sleep under the open sky.”
“Just doing my job,” I murmured.
She rolled her eyes. “Please. This is more than doing your job. Or wait. Do you build shelters for all your clients?”
I laughed. “No, this is my first time. I hope I did a decent job.”
“You did more than a decent job. I feel like this is going to be more comfortable than my bed back home.”
The bed she was probably never going to sleep in again. Because she’d be sleeping in Sinclair’s bed from tomorrow on.
I had to stop thinking about that. My job had always been to deliver her safely to her husband-to-be. It didn’t matter if he was a jerk, twenty years older than her, and led a crazy cult that had orgies in the woods. Thea had agreed to marry him, and if she didn’t change her mind, there was nothing I could do about it.
Gods, I still hoped she was going to change her mind. Maybe a good night’s sleep was all she needed.
She kicked off her boots and slipped inside, lying on her back, testing the softness of the makeshift mattress. Maybe I should’ve made her a pillow too. It wasn’t too late.
“Come here.”
“What?” I peered inside the nest.
She got up and moved towards me on all fours. “I said come here.”
“Inside?”
“Yes.”
“Why?” I wanted to follow her request, but I knew it would only get me in trouble.
She rolled her eyes again. “I want to ask you something.”
“Okay.” I fell to my knees and crawled into the tight space with her.
For Thea, the space was just perfect. But for the both of us, it was a little small. I shortened my legs. I’d left them a little long when I’d changed them from my usual roots. There was no need for me to have such long legs.
Thea didn’t even notice. She sat with her legs crossed and looked at me. I was feeling slightly uncomfortable. I was on my side, using my elbow for support. I’d never been in this position before. Leshy didn’t lie down or lie on their side. It was unnatural to us. We had no need to put our bodies in so many sitting and lying positions.
“What did you want to ask me?”
“You’ve watched me all this time,” she said.
“Yes.”
“You were at the stream when I washed myself?”
“You know I was there. You told me to keep my back turned.”
“No. The first time. Yesterday, after the bear chased me.”
I averted my gaze. I was starting to see where this was going. “Yes, I was there.” It wasn’t like I could lie to her. She already knew. She just wanted confirmation.
“And you were at the cabin. This nest looks awfully familiar. You covered and protected me from Kyla.”
“Yes.”
She covered her face with one hand and chuckled. “I even thanked you. I put my hand on your trunk, like this, and thanked you.” She touched my shoulder.
I would’ve said that made me hold my breath, but it wasn’t something a leshy could do. We breathed through our entire body, all the time.
“And later that morning,” she continued, “When I fell asleep... Um... did you move me from the log I clearly remember sitting on and place me on your roots?”
“You were about to fall over. I caught you, and... You needed rest.”
“So, you held me.”
It was hard to look into her eyes when she was being so direct, but at the same time, her eyes were so mesmerizing that it was impossible to look away. Every time I averted my gaze, it wasn’t for more than a few seconds.
“Are you mad at me?” I asked.
She shook her head and scooted closer. Her hand traveled from my shoulder to my neck. I leaned into her touch, which was not lost on her.
“Have you changed your mind about Sinclair?”
“I don’t know, Taran. I don’t want to think about that now.”
“What do you want to think about?”
“Anything else but that. Will you help distract me?” Her hand caressed my temple.
I smiled. “I’m at your service.”
“So, it’s part of your job?” She said it in a banter-y way.
“Consider it a bonus. This is me going the extra mile.”
I reached out and brushed her cheek with my spindly fingers.
“I’ll give you a good review.” She turned her head and bit my thumb playfully.
“Thea... Are you sure about this?”
“I think you like me,” she said. “Tell me if I interpreted the signs wrong.”
“You didn’t. But the question is, do you like me?”
She looked down, then back up at me through her thick lashes. Her finger traveled the length of my nose, from in between my eyebrows to the tip, and I swore it was as if she’d done it to my cock.
“I do.” She shifted even closer, until our lips were only inches away. “And I don’t know if I’ll get married tomorrow, but what I do know is that I’m a virgin, and I want you to be my first.”
How I didn’t die right there and then... would forever be a mystery to me.