Page 10 of The Manticore's Fire

She was a hunter not a trollop for fuck’s sake!

That comingling of frustration and annoyance was what had her pacing along the passages of the manticore’s den. While she was not permitted past the outer edge of the common area into the main passage of the cave system, Samir seemed to care little about where she explored within the passages contained within his den. Perhaps that was in part due to the fact that the passages and chambers were open to her exploration except for the furthest passage that she had seen from his bedchamber—and that was solved by locked doors. And locked they were. Buteverywhere else she was permitted if she had the temerity to explore it. Abby considered herself brave enough but not foolish to explore parts of the cave that remained unlit. For whatever reason, Samir only kept a portion of the passages lit with torches, leaving the remainder ensconced in darkness.

The part of the passage that remained lit boasted even more brightly illuminated chambers. The first two chambers were quite practical and somehow unexpected to see in a monster’s lair despite the fact that she’d been clothed and fed by the manticore for days. Both were cool and dry and filled with supplies, one with all manner of preserved foods while the other contained woven linens and other fabrics shelved neatly among piles of leathers and hides. Just beyond that was a library that made her parents’ resources look laughable, which was saying something since her family was known to possess a magnificent collection of books pertaining to geography, medicinal and obscure sciences, as well as any other book imaginable that could be of some use to their trade. It surpassed any other hunting family in the kingdoms, rivaled only by the great universities of the arts of magery and sorcery. And yet the chamber that housed Samir’s collection was an enormous gallery with shelves that rose to the ceiling, much of it only accessible by the rolling ladder.

She shook her head, impressed in spite of herself. She never would have guessed that the manticore’s den would hold such treasures. She had assumed that the bookcases in the common room held the entirety of his collection and had truly believed that he acquired most of them by accident. She hadn’t believed he could even read until she witnessed him leisurely reading one evening. But this… this defied expectations.

Her fingers twitched with the desire to touch the books in the nearest bookcase. She was tempted to linger and explore the contents of the numerous shelves that filled the chamber, butshe reluctantly backed out from the room to continue to the next one, her footsteps echoing on the stone floor beneath her.

The next chamber, though considerably further from the others, was far from disappointing, however. Her eyes lit up upon entering, a small gasp escaping from between her parted lips. A bathing chamber! At least that was what she assumed it was. Hot spring water burst from between a crack in the limestone, filling a blue pool. It wasn’t bubbling but this room was a bit warmer than the others, which was enough to lead her to believe it was thermally heated. The pool itself almost appeared to be artificially carved and expanded from its natural state to provide a deep, rounded basin that was positively inviting.

She stared at it with longing. Her skin was already beginning to itch with the reminder that she carried the dirt and dust accumulated over more than a couple days on her skin. She swallowed a groan. She would give anything to be clean right now but luxuriating in a bath seemed pretty self-gratifying when she was supposed to be exploring the further recesses of the manticore’s den. What if there was an emergency exit somewhere back there? She should at least find out first.

“I will be right back,” she promised before slipping back out of the room into the passage.

She jogged a short distance but there, just beyond the entrance of the bathing chamber, the lamination continued for several more feet before stuttering out completely in a stark fall of darkness. Abby crept forward as far as the light allowed and then stopped.

Standing at the edge of darkness, Abby gnawed her bottom lip as she considered the black pit ahead of her. If Samir wasn’t going to keep it lit, then she would need to take some form of illumination with her. Her eyes drifted upward in a leisurelypath back along the walls before resting on the torch held upright in its sconce.

“That should do it,” she murmured and hurried back.

Taking the torch in one hand, she attempted to lift it free but was nearly set completely off balance when it did not so much as budge. She gave the torch a glance of disbelief and tugged harder. When that failed to work, she turned toward the torch, wrapped both hands around it and began pulling for all that she was worth. She lifted her foot and braced it against the wall for extra leverage. The torch wiggled slightly, and she grinned in response.

“Yes!” she whispered. “Come on baby, come loose for mama?—”

“What are you doing?” Samir purred from a spot so close behind her and so unexpectedly that Abby lost her grip on the torch and went crashing to the ground.

Her butt absorbed most of the impact, but it didn’t save her from much of the pain that immediately shot through her backside. Rubbing it, she turned and shot a look of accusation toward him, to which he grinned mildly in reply.

His gaze drifted back to the ensconced torch, his brow raising. “Were you trying to disassemble my den?”

“Not exactly,” she muttered as she pushed to her feet and winced at the sharp pain that shot through her. She immediately rubbed at her rump again. “I just wanted to see what was down there.”

His gaze drifted over to the dark point, and he grunted quietly. “Nothing of interest. Empty and unused chambers for the most part. Unfortunately, the torches cannot be carried that far… or be removed at all, as you can see. I seldom have a reason to go that direction myself.”

“Perfect,” she muttered as pushed by him.

An exit wasn’t going to do her much good if it was beyond her means to access. The manticore might have special abilities that allowed him to travel to those parts of the cavern unassisted, but Abby was just shit out of luck unless she could perhaps devise something to provide what she needed. As far as what she could do at that moment, she was out of ideas except for one particularly appealing plan that had nothing to do with her escape and involved a whole lot of hot water.

Samir’s head turned, his amused gaze following her as she passed. “Where to now?”

“I have been stuck here and haven’t been clean for days,” she replied testily. “What else but go and drown myself.”

His laughter followed her as she made her way back to the bathing chamber. She sighed happily at the sight of the blue water and immediately began to strip off her clothing. Tossing them to the cavern floor, she walked to the edge of the pool. Her toes curled with her eagerness as she stood there, staring down into the smooth surface. Just below the water she could make out smooth walls and carved out shelves for sitting. Her suspicions were apparently correct. Samir had definitely refashioned the hotspring’s pool into something luxurious. She dipped a toe in the warm water and smiled. It was very warm but thankfully not intolerably so.

Biting back a moan of pleasure, she stepped down onto the carved-out ledge that served as a seat and slowly lowered herself into the warm water. Abby leaned back against the wall of the pool, allowing her eyes to flutter shut. Being stuck in the cave with Samir was a pain in her backside but at least there was some compensation for it. Dropping her head back onto the pool’s edge, she allowed herself to luxuriate in the heat. Even as relaxed as she was while reclining in the pool with her eyes closed, she could never completely tune out her surroundings. Because of that the scrape of claws against stone was loud toears, alerting her to the fact that she was no longer alone in the room. She waited to see if he would announce himself in some way. It seemed that was not the case, however, and she smiled when the manticore remained silent.

Was he embarrassed? Or did he believe that her senses were so dull that any mistakes he made would go unnoticed?

“I know you are there; you might as well cease stalking me and come out,” she called, not even bothering to open her eyes.

“Ah,” Samir rumbled with a chuckle, “very good.”

Opening one eye, she glanced toward him in disbelief. “Are you really going to tell me that you were just testing me?”

“Perhaps,” he purred as he padded on all fours toward the pool. “Would that not be plausible?”

Abby snorted in amusement. “Believable as a possibility—sure why not. But it is unlikely. If you were testing me then you wouldn’t have made such an obvious mistake. You would have retained your stealth—which was very good, by the way. If you hadn’t made that mistake, there is a good chance I wouldn’t have heard you until you were much closer.”

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