Beneath the Thirteen Moons by Kathryne Kennedy Read Free Book Online Page B

with everything she lacked loosened her tongue. “I grew up on the water, had only my father to guide me until I was ten. Then even he left me and I was on my own. With no one to tell me what to do.”
    Korl looked taken aback, his arms fell loosely to his sides, scattering his own bounty of flowers. “What about this village? Don’t you have family there?”
    “My lifemate’s,” she murmured. “For a time, I did have someone who cared enough to try and tell me what to do.”
    But not for long, Mahri thought. Not long enough to get used to that sensation, to appreciate it. So that when it was gone she could only feel relief at being free again. And a terrible guilt because of that feeling.
    Korl’s face reddened and the curls at the edges of his mouth turned downward. “I’ve had plenty of people telling me what to do, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they cared. In the palace everyone has a hidden agenda.”
    Mahri’s arms trembled and she sank back. This conversation had become dangerously intimate and she’d end it now. “I can’t even move. I just need enough zabbaroot to stand and pole.” She truly hated justifying her actions to anyone. She blew petals away from her mouth. “You have to save your Power for Healing the village. I’ll make sure we get there.” It was absurd, really, that he thought she’d put her trust in him. He’d never even been in the swamps much less navigated through their dangers.
    Korl stood, put his hands against his lower back and arched it, his eyes closed against the falling whiteness. Mahri groaned. He looked like some god accepting homage from the heavens.
    Quit trying to distract me, she thought.
    He looked down at her and grinned, as if he knew exactly what she was thinking. “If you chew anymore root you won’t make it to the village.”
    Conceited… “I didn’t know you cared,” she snapped.
    He came over and squatted down next to her. “You’re my only way out of this swamp—you bet I care.”
    Mahri refused to be caught in his gaze and instead watched Jaja pile up mounds of petals then gleefully dive into them. Of course he doesn’t care, she chastised herself. You kidnapped him, put his life in danger, forced him to do your will. Worse, an ignorant little water-rat had done it!
    Korl sighed and looked up over the bow. “Still, it’d be a shame if you didn’t see this.”
    Mahri stared down the smooth line of his throat, to where the top of his spider-silk shirt had been torn open. She wondered idly if the rest of his chest was also speckled with dark-gold hair.
    “Here, monk-fish,” he called, his chest rising and falling with each word. Mahri swallowed hard.
    Jaja managed to look indignant at the way he’d been summoned but hopped to the man’s side anyway. Her pet accepted a small piece of root and held it over Mahri’s mouth. She opened and wondered why Korl hadn’t just given it to her himself, until she saw him swallow. Hard. With a grin she accepted the piece of tuber, wrapping her tongue around it, closing her mouth ever so slowly. He reached out and traced the outline of her lips with a finger that trembled. Mahri grinned wider and crunched the root.
    He jerked back like he’d been struck, shook his head as if to clear it. Mahri tried to rise to her feet, accepted his hand when he offered it and stood close beside him, using his body to anchor herself. Their eyes met, almost on a level, and he looked away down the length of thechannel. She followed his gaze, acutely aware of the heat of his body.
    She gasped and felt him grin in response. The lavender vines wove walls between the trees, a ceiling over the snaking passageway of the water. Those exploding buds grew tightly layered together and masses of white flowers flew from every direction. The farther they drifted down the channel, the thicker the cloud became. The stronger the perfume. Mahri filled her lungs and lifted her face, felt the barest breath of a touch from each downy-soft