Page 17 of The Manticore's Fire

“Oh, Samir,” she whispered. “It’s like a page out of a novel, when the wearied hero, battered and bloodied from his missions, rises from the battle grounds and looks out across the distance to see the promise of new life that makes everything he suffered worth it.”

“And you believe that you lack the ability to write,” Samir scoffed, bringing a blush of pleasure to her cheeks. His glowing green eyes focused on her, however, their luminosity brightening with the fading light in the sky. “Would you say that this is worth everything you suffered?”

There was a vulnerability in his voice as he asked but she knew that he spoke more of the hardships she had endured. She was certain that he wanted to be reassured that he was worth it and that vulnerability touched her heart in an unexpected way.

“Hmmm, well, it’s certainly not bad. It’s a good start at the very least,” she said with a cheeky grin that drew a smile from him in return.

“Come,” he murmured. “You haven’t even enjoyed the best part.”

Abby couldn’t imagine how exactly it could get better but allowed herself to be led down the slope until they were amid the flowers, the leaves and steams brushing her boots. Very gently, Samir drew her down to a relatively bare patch of sand amid the flowers and they lay down together, stretched outside by side so that there was nothing in their world but the two of them and the flowers encircled around them on all sides, their sweet, delicate perfume filling Abby with every breath. The perfume grew deeper, muskier, and she looked at the flowers with wonder as they began to fully bloom with the arrival of the night. Creamy, pale petals opened to reveal glowing golden stamen dusted with luminous pollen. These were not of the human world before the collision that had brought the worlds of the fae, spirits, andhumans together as one. The flowers were as magical as the manticore lying beside her.

The darker it got, the brighter the flowers became as they bloomed as if to salute the moon until not a trace of sunlight lit up the desert. Samir smiled over at her as she studied a flower between them, and he nodded toward the sky.

“Look up, kitten.”

Her eyes lifted and beyond the glow of the flowers the moon hung in a sky filled with stars more brilliant than she’d ever seen them, with bright dusty arms roping across the heavens. It was like existing in a sea of pure magic with the glow of the flowers around them and the stars up above. For the first time she felt like she was seeing all the potential of magic and beauty within the world which her mother had so often spoken of that existed beyond blood and dirt of the hunt. Seeing it all now for the first time, brought tears to Abby’s eyes.

“Thank you,” she whispered, and Samir’s responding purr seemed to make everything dance and glow even more brightly around her.

Chapter

Thirteen

“So, this is your study,” Abby commented, her eyes wide as they moved over the room that Samir typically kept closed out of habit.

“It is,” Samir agreed as he followed her inside, warmth spreading through his chest at the way she looked around with rapt fascination.

It flattered him that she appeared to like it. He knew it did not fit the aesthetic of human comfort. There was not much wood in the place to give an illusion of warmth and ease, but every bench and table had been harvested from the natural stone of the cavern, and stuffed cushions made from lush fabrics and animal skins gave the chairs some modicum of comfort. The only real wood in his home was for the doors, and that he had acquired by apologetically tearing apart a wagon or two from caravans passing through.

Though perhaps he should be grateful that he had not felt compelled to do more. Wood was not always as forgiving as stone. Where stone could crack and fracture with the wrong force, it seemed that wood enjoyed splintering for absolutely no reason or develop cracks with the slightest change to thehumidity, or lack thereof. Truthfully, the doors had been a special challenge that had dissuaded him from making anything else from wood and had required regular attention. He might have continued to forego them entirely, but that changed when the human, Jeriah, came to dwell with him.

Even though he had to carve the cavern walls themselves in order to fashion properly fitting doors, he had them fashioned and put in place within a short time after finding the male wandering back to the deeper passages of his home uninvited after numerous polite requests and warnings. Even when he had fancied himself in love with the male and was eager to share his life with him, he had been unable to fully trust Jeriah, though he had not understood why at the time. After observing the male for a time, he had somehow arrived at the conclusion that it was just a human’s natural tendency to explore open spaces.

He had believed the doors would solve that issue.

The rooms of his study, his treasury, and his room of fire where he was able to bask in the hot flames drawn up from within earth, had all come under lock and key within weeks. In retrospect, the male’s consternation about being blocked access to them should have provided him with some warning toward the human’s ulterior motives. How many times had he complained about being locked out when something required Samir’s attention? How many times did he put on a great show of wishing to gain access so that he could be of better service and help? It was so obvious, but he had been foolishly blind to it then.

Because of this, he had carefully watched Abby to see how far she was willing to go to pry into his secrets. He had watched with suspicion when she attempted to open the doors, and had witnessed how, upon discovering that they were locked, she had disregarded them. There were occasions afterwards that she had glanced toward the passage curiously, but she never again wentnear them, nor had she once mentioned them. She was content to let his secrets remain his own.

It was for that reason, paired with the warm glow that still filled him from their night basking among the flowers beneath the stars, that he had decided to show her what rested behind this door. He wanted to share more of himself with her and foolishly wanted to bring her more into his life. He wanted more after a mere couple of weeks than he had wanted even after a century with Jeriah. There were times where, before the betrayal, he had wondered if things would have grown further between him and Jeriah if he had opened himself more to him, but he had not been able to make himself that vulnerable to the human. But now that he was doing so with Abby, he recognized the difference. Abby never pushed him to share his secrets—he wanted to share them.

He had come to trust her.

“Do you like it?” he murmured after several minutes of silence.

She looked up from a bookcase beside his desk and grinned. “It is incredible. I confess I’m surprised to see yet more books, but these appear more worn than any of the others in your possession.”

“That bookcase does not contain leisure reading nor that of academic curiosities. It is filled with my personal diaries and ledgers since I reached adulthood and settled in this cavern. The blue one there,” he said, nodding to the volume her hand rested on, “records the year the convergence… the collision as humans like to call it.”

“Wow,” she quietly exclaimed and turned hopeful eyes to him. “Do you think I might be able to read it? All of them actually?”

“Once you have become accomplished enough in your lessons, perhaps,” he agreed, secretly delighted that she wanted to.

“Oh… right. Not in common northern,” she said and grimaced.

Samir chuckled and followed her around the room as she explored, his stinger curling and extending with his pleasure so that the tip lightly tapped the floor. The sound startled her initially, and she had glanced at his tail several times before she was able filter out the sound and ignored it.

Of course, such things were easy enough to ignore when surrounded by a trove of Samir’s most beloved items. She ran her fingers over the larger harp that sat in one corner, the body carved in the representation of a bull, and she paused and bent to examine several little inventions and toys he had made that sat on the shelves lining one wall. He was especially proud of those. He had painstakingly folded the metal and learned the art of cog-making to enliven his little creations. Even without cubs of his own, they were amusing and a constant challenge to perfect his craft and do more. There were also shelves filled with jars of rare herbs and minerals that he utilized for various bits of magic, but also in making medicines as required. Medicine not only for himself but to treat those individuals he came across that were near unjustly at death’s door. Abby marveled at them all until at last she arrived at the great wall that carried the trophies of his many triumphs.

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