Chapter 8
Chapter
Eight
Durom
My lanky mate travelled with me.
I was pleased she chose to be with me. For me, there had never been a question of whether I would follow where she went.
The only question had been whether she would turn, bare her teeth, and tell me to leave.
If she had, I would have. Mate scent or no mate scent, I would not force my shadow over someone who did not want it.
I knew my courtship attempts had been heavy-handed.
Restrained for a Minotaur, yes. But to a Mundane female who had survived years inside the Order Academy's marble rules and rigid hierarchies, I had flirted like a brick through glass.
Sudden, loud, and invasive.
Her walking beside me gave me the chance to mend the fracture she hadn't yet expressed.
We moved through the campsites scattered across the labyrinth, the tunnels stretched wide beneath the surface river, damp air cool against my horns, water thundering faintly overhead where the stone grew thinner.
My herdmate Kuonim was guarding the new surface entrance, and with that entrance reopening, there was the risk that the school would find it and begin an attack from that direction.
So my self-assigned task was to go around to the different monster campsites and prepare them.
The Dungeon could have done it. It already shifted walls, moved rooms, and enticed the groups deeper along paths that would eventually bring them to exhaustion and death if they pushed too far.
It already did so much for us who dwelt within it.
So I scrubbed bedding in cold underground streams, wringing thick woven blankets until my forearms burned from the physical labor that came with a good, thorough cleanse.
I shook out dust and beetle shells. I reviewed supplies for rot or damage, and set them aside for the Dungeon to compost. I trimmed back the vines, staying well out of their reach, cutting them with careful strokes to guide their growth along the towering walls so that they could serve their purpose as a defense and offense.
I cleared loose rock, checked fire pits, reset cook stones, and built obstacles that would trip up a sneaky adventurer but wouldn't impede a directly charging minotaur.
Kyle travelled with me and did her own work.
Most days, she would find a flat outcropping of granite, or a comfortable spot by an underground stream near where I was working, parking herself there with the lesson book the Dungeon had given her open across her knees.
The pages smelled like ink and dust. She traced each spell carefully, long fingers steady as she copied the runes into the air or onto scrap parchment or fabric.
She learned each spell with a determined methodology, memorizing them and practicing her casting.
I learned the meals she favored. Simple stews thick with root vegetables. Flatbread crisped on a hot pan with tomato and cheese. I adjusted my recipes, finding the seasonings and flavors she liked, and was rewarded by her smiles and gratitude.
I learned about meals that she enjoyed, learned to cook them with her, and then for her.
Kyle travelled with me and let me do my own work. For the most part, she spent the time studying the lesson book the Dungeon had provided.
She worked through the spells, memorizing them by drawing them out and practicing them.
When she moved onto the section of attack spells, she began helping with the vines, using them as target practice for her ranged attacks.
When she reached the section on attack spells, she began marking the vines and testing her range.
She listened to my guidance on where to strike, and her practice blended well with my plant maintenance tasks.
It was peaceful, and the days and nights blurred together.
Nights became painful when she invited me to sleep with her in the bed I made for her. She was soft and small in my arms, and she slept so peacefully, even as my body burned with the craving of her.
But still she did not run.
We talked about her youth, the difficulties she had in expressing herself, and how the world she grew up in seemed to want her to fit into a neat little box of its expectations.
She told me about past lovers and books she had read.
I told her about the culture of my people and how the different societies in the Dungeon fit together, accepting each other's strangeness within the boundaries of our magical world down here.
I kept my aggression to a minimum, ignoring the maddening scent of her, focusing on getting to know her and finding out what she enjoyed.
For her part, she did not run, though she did ask me pointed questions about minotaur mating practices to the point that the conversations became delectable torture of the difference between what I wanted to do to her and what she had yet to initiate.
Then we arrived at my new home and everything changed.