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Chapter Sixteen

Ena awoke with a deep feeling of warmth and contentment.

Her face was pressed against something impossibly hard, and her nose was filled with the scent of stone, woodsmoke, and honey.

She nuzzled deeper into the hard thing and the smell, sensing in her half-asleep state that closer meant warm, and to pull away would be cold.

She felt the hard thing surround her, wrapping tighter around her, and as she shifted her leg, she found it was sandwiched underneath something heavy, and her hip was pressed up against… Oh, Gaia.

Ena cautiously opened her eyes. Her face was nuzzled into Ty’s hard chest, his arms were wrapped around her, her leg was in between his, and yes, that was indeed his extremely erect cock pressing into her hip.

Ty’s breaths were still even and slow, so he was clearly still asleep.

She went to extract her leg from between his and tried to turn out of his grasp, but his embrace was like iron.

There was no way this wouldn’t be awkward.

“Ty,” she whispered gently. “Ty, wake up.”

He stirred slightly and rolled his hips, pressing his cock more firmly against her. Heat shot straight to her core, followed by an intense wave of embarrassment. She began to struggle slightly against him, and the act of her shuffling caused him to wake up fully.

All at once, his arms loosened and he lifted his legs apart, allowing her to escape.

She rolled away from him and stood up quickly. “I have to pee,” she announced awkwardly, and practically ran behind a nearby tree.

She heard him stand up, cough in an extremely masculine way, and then heard the stream of his own morning urination nearby.

How he managed it with his cock in the state it had been, she did not want to know.

Ena took her time, only to buy herself some additional space to clear her head. She heard Ty wander off after a minute, presumably to check the traps he’d set last night, so she came out from behind the tree and set to work building up the fire.

By the time he returned, she had decided that the best thing to do was to not reference the state they’d awoken in at all and continue on with the day. She did not have the mental energy to dissect what had happened. It was all far too confusing.

Blessedly, Gaia had granted them breakfast. Ty came out of the woods holding a decently large squirrel by its furry tail. He sat down wordlessly and proceeded to skin and gut the animal deftly, then speared it on an appropriately large stick before starting to roast it over the fire Ena had built.

The smell of the roasting meat made Ena’s stomach grumble, and while she waited patiently for it to cook, she re-braided her hair and obsessively picked small pieces of moss and sticks from her woolen cloak and dress.

Once the squirrel was cooked through, Ty pulled off some of the biggest pieces of meat tenderly with his large fingers and handed them to her.

The freshly cooked meat scalded her fingers, but she popped the pieces into her mouth one by one, not caring if they burned her tongue. They were absolutely orgasmic.

After Ty had picked over the rest of the squirrel carcass until all that remained was bones, they put out their fire and continued on their way.

Ena was surprised that Ty did not seem to have to stop and get his bearings the way she had.

He seemed to intuitively know what direction they were heading without orienting himself to the mountains or the sun’s path.

That was clearly because of his venator .

He’d said he had an unparalleled sense of direction, but damn, seeing it in action… Ena was reluctantly impressed.

They had been walking at a brisk pace and making good time, so Ena assumed they were only a couple days of travel away from the Western Road.

She doubted they’d travel directly on it to get to Attax—two people on foot would draw too much attention—but they’d likely walk parallel to it and make their own path.

At least that’s what Ena would do, but who was to say what Ty would do.

He was constantly, annoyingly, surprising her.

Around mid-morning, they came to a stream that bisected their path.

They stopped at it to rest for a while and refill their waterskins.

Ena had taken up residence against a fallen tree while she snacked on a pawpy fruit that Gaia had granted her.

The season for pawpy fruits was still in full swing since the oval-shaped yellow fruits didn’t fully ripen until around Samhain.

The trees were rare, though, and only grew sparsely on the banks of creeks and streams, so she was blessed to have found one, because their fruit were absolutely delicious.

The creamy-textured pulp inside was sweet and floral with an ever-so-slightly rancid undertone.

They were definitely an acquired taste, but they were highly nutritious.

Not to mention, their branches were extremely pliant and were excellent for making animal traps.

She wondered idly if she would be able to convince Ty to cut some with his axe and bring them to use at their campsite tonight.

Ena had been so lost in the deliciousness of her foraged fruit that she had barely taken note of what Ty was doing.

Standing up to rinse her sticky hands and face in the water, she noticed that he was staring at the stream in a calculating fashion.

He walked up and down the bank a few times in either direction, like he was looking for something.

Eventually, he came back, a look of decision on his face.

“We’re going to ford the stream up here,” he announced, pointing just around the bend where she couldn’t see. “Crossing it is the quickest way to get where we’re going. There’s some stepping stones and downed logs that should make a fairly easy way across.”

Ena stared at the stream in horror. It wasn’t as big as the River Wry, but it was certainly no babbling brook.

It looked quite deep in places and was flowing pretty fast. Did he not remember that she couldn’t swim?

What if she fell in? For fuck’s sake, she’d had more than enough of almost drowning, not to mention being sopping wet and cold.

Ty seemed to understand her train of thought.

“You’ll be fine, I pro—” He cut himself off suddenly, realizing what he’d been about to say.

“I mean, you’ll make it. It’s not that bad,” he ended gruffly.

At least he had the presence of mind to not use the “P” word with her anymore.

She’d be out of her mind to trust any promise he made ever again.

Ena followed him huffily to the spot he had selected. There were, indeed, a few well-placed stones scattered throughout this section of the stream that would allow them to get halfway across, leading to a downed log that they could use to cross the rest of it.

Ena stared at it cautiously before turning to Ty. “You first,” she said, with a saccharine smile.

Ty gave her a bland look before using his long strides to gracefully step from one stone to another, then, making a small leap, he landed on the downed log before balancing across it to the bank on the other side. He made it look way too easy.

Ty stared at her haughtily from across the stream, his arms crossed, and an impatient look on his face.

She recognized this for what it was—another challenge, just like when he’d pushed her to climb the cliff.

Are you as brave as me? he seemed to say.

Are you going to let me win? He knew she really fucking hated to lose, and she’d never back down from his challenge.

Steeling her courage, she began to cautiously walk on the stones, following the path Ty had taken.

They were slipperier than they looked, and she had to use all her concentration to focus on keeping her balance as she stepped from one to the next.

She was beginning to feel fairly proud of herself, until she came to the leap that was required to get her onto the downed log.

She was significantly shorter than Ty, and therefore the distance would be that much harder for her.

She paused on the last stepping stone, the water rushing around her.

She looked cautiously up at Ty, who stared back at her, seemingly unconcerned.

Fuck it. There was no going back now, she thought.

She launched herself off the stone, stretching her leg as far out in front of her as possible, reaching, reaching for the log.

Her foot made it! But just barely, and the log was slippery too.

As her full weight landed on the log, she began to lose her balance.

She felt her foot lose purchase on the wet bark and her body started to careen towards the water.

Then, something gripped her arm, stopping her fall.

Looking up, she saw Ty balancing on the log in front of her, his hand wrapped tightly around her upper arm.

Ena reached towards him to steady herself, gripping his shoulder before getting both feet once again on the log and regaining her balance.

She stared up at him in surprise. She knew daemons were fast, but Gaia, he had gotten to her in seconds.

They both breathed a little heavily as they stared at one another for a second too long.

“Thanks,” Ena breathed. He was entirely too close for comfort. Her body hummed in his presence.

Ty released her arms, but didn’t move away. “Don’t mention it, little viper,” he said, continuing to stare down at her. “Besides, I didn’t want to have to stop and make a fire to dry out your soggy ass again.”

Ena scoffed at him as he finally turned away from her to walk back across the log to the other side. “Don’t call me that,” she said, scowling as she, too, balanced her way across the rest of the log until her feet blessedly landed on the bank.

“What? ‘Little viper,’ you mean?” he asked innocently.

“Yes,” she snapped.