Page 57 of Camriel
“I like it,” Camriel said supportively.“May I escort you home, my lady?”
She gave him an incredulous look.“It might have escaped you, but I’m no cork sucking lady, dude.”
The girls snickered and Vic joined them.It was nice to have female company again, even if they weren’t in the wrestling business.
“There are wild animals in the woods,” Amaros said to warn her of the danger.
“A bobcat crawled under my log a couple of nights ago.It curled up against me to sleep,” Victoria said, grinning at the memory.“It was awesome.”
“I guess animals must like you,” Grace figured with yet another hint of envy.
“Tell that to the rabid dog and the bear who tried to kill me,” Vic said wryly as she headed for the back exit.“I’ll be near the cabin or out hunting if you need me.Just yell and I’m sure I’ll hear you.”
“Come visit us anytime,” Zoe said.“Would it be okay if we come and see you sometime?”
“Sure,” Victoria replied, pausing at the doorless exit.“Thanks a bunch for giving me this stuff and for being so nice,” she said shyly.“It’s fudging rare to meet good people now, even if they are aliens and half-aliens.”
“Let me carry those for you,” Camriel offered as they started away from the huge stone building.
Victoria sighed and handed him the hotplate and a couple of propane bottles.“Your friends are pretty fudging cool,” she said, glancing back to see Zoe and Grace wave at her.She waved back and the trio went inside.
“We all really want you to live with us,” the warrior told her, tone serious rather than flirtatious.“It’s going to be brutally cold once it starts snowing.”
“My cabin is in pretty good shape,” she said.“I’m sure I’ll be warm enough.”
“Do you have an indoor toilet?”he asked slyly.
“No, but I can always use a bucket,” she countered.It would smell gross keeping the bucket inside, but it beat freezing to death every time she had to pee in the outhouse.They walked in companionable silence for a couple of minutes before she ventured a question.“What’s the Void like?”
She glanced at him to see his gaze going distant.“Zoe said it sounds like cryogenic sleep,” he said.“Except it’s not cold.It’s just a vast, empty nothingness that feels like a slow, endless death.”
Victoria was surprised at how poetic he sounded.His tone was full of dread and he shuddered.“You hate it,” she surmised.
“I only remember being in the Void during the moments when we win and return from war, after I die during combat, or when I’m reawakened for the next conflict,” he said.“There’s no sense of time passing, yet I feel the crushing weight of eons passing during my eternal lifetime while I’m in stasis anyway.”
“Becoming bonded to me will mean you won’t have to vanish into the ether rather than returning to the Void, since Order decided to sideline you all,” Victoria said, recalling what Amaros had told her.“Is that the only reason why you want to bond with me?”
Camriel startled her by moving to stand in front of her.She halted and stared up into his eyes.“I want to bond with you because you were made for me, female,” he told her.“We’ve been destined to become mates since Order first created me.I just had to wait a very long time to finally meet you.”
Her heart stuttered at the intensity of his longing.“You only just found out about the deal Fate made,” she pointed out.
“I always knew something was missing,” he insisted.“You are the other half of my soul, Victoria Tudor.We belong together.”
His certainty unnerved her, yet thrilled her at the same time.“Don’t push me into something I’m not ready for, Camriel,” she warned him.“I’ve never even been in love before.Now you want me to commit myself to you for however long we both shall live.”
“You’re a virgin?”he asked, shocked and apparently pleased at the idea.
“Of course not,” she scoffed, shoving him to get him moving again.
“Why would you give yourself to someone you’re not in love with?”he asked in a disapproving tone, falling into step beside her again.
“Did you love every woman you’ve ever fudged?”she pointed out.“No, of course not,” she said with an eyeroll at his guilty expression.“Nice double standards you’ve got going there,” she added.
“Do you desire children?”he asked next and she almost stumbled in surprise.
“Sure,” she replied cautiously.“I love kids.At least the ones who don’t stab me in the face with a scalpel anyway.”
He gave her a scorching look that made her toes curl even though he wasn’t touching her.“If you agreed to bond with me, I could impregnate you right now,” he told her.
