"And thee'll take care of me?"
"Aye," he said, and grinned back at her. Susan nodded, then also turned on her back. They lay that way, hip to hip, looking up at the sky. She took his hand and placed it on her breast. As he stroked the nipple with his thumb, it raised its head, grew hard, and began to tingle. This sensation slipped quickly down her body to the place that was still throbbing between her legs. She squeezed her thighs together and was both delighted and dismayed to find that doing so only made matters worse.
"Ye must take care of me," she said in a low voice. "I've pinned everything on you. All else is cast aside."
"I'll do my best," he said. "Never doubt it. But for now, Susan, you must go on as you have been. There's more time yet to pass; I know that because Depape is back and will have told his tale, but they still haven't moved in any way against us. Whatever he found out, Jonas still thinks it's in his interest to wait. That's apt to make him more dangerous when he does move, but for now it's still Castles."
"But after the Reaping Bonfire - Thorin - "
"You'll never go to his bed. That you can count on. I set my warrant on it."
A little shocked at her own boldness, she reached below his waist. "Here's a warrant ye can set on me, if ye would," she said.
He would. Could. And did.
When it was over (for Roland it had been even sweeter than the first time, if that was possible), he asked her: "That feeling you had out at Citgo, Susan - of being watched. Did you have it this time?"
She looked at him long and thoughtfully. "I don't know. My mind was in other places, ye ken." She touched him gently, then laughed as he jumped - the nerves in the half-hard, half-soft place where her palm stroked were still very lively, it seemed.
She took her hand away and looked up at the circle of sky above the grove. "So beautiful here," she murmured, and her eyes drifted closed.
Roland also felt himself drifting. It was ironic, he thought. This time she hadn't had that sensation of being watched ... but the second time, he had. Yet he would have sworn there was no one near this grove.
No matter. The feeling, megrim or reality, was gone now. He took Susan's hand, and felt her fingers slip naturally through his, entwining.
He closed his eyes.
9
All of this Rhea saw in the glass, and wery interesting viewing it made, aye, wery interesting, indeed. But she'd seen shagging before - sometimes with three or four or even more doing it all at the same time (sometimes with partners who were not precisely alive) - and the hokey-pokey wasn't very interesting to her at her advanced age. What she was interested in was what would come after the hokey-pokey.
Is our business done? the girl had asked.
Mayhap there's one more little thing, Rhea had responded, and then she told the impudent trull what to do.
Aye, she'd given the girl very clear instructions as the two of them stood in the hut doorway, the Kissing Moon shining down on them as Susan Delgado slept the strange sleep and Rhea stroked her braid and whispered instructions in her ear. Now would come the fulfillment of that interlude . . . and that was what she wanted to see, not two babbies shagging each other like they were the first two on earth to discover how 'twas done.
Twice they did it with hardly a pause to natter in between (she would have given a good deal to hear that natter, too). Rhea wasn't surprised; at his young age, she supposed the brat had enough spunkum in his sack to give her a week's worth of doubles, and from the way the little slut acted, that might be to her taste. Some of them discovered it and never wanted aught else; this was one, Rhea thought.
But let's see how sexy you feel in a few minutes, you snippy bitch, she thought, and leaned deeper into the pulsing pink light thrown from the glass. She could sometimes feel that light aching in the very bones of her face . . . but it was a good ache. Aye, wery good indeed.
They were at last done ... for the time being, at least. They clasped hands and drifted off to sleep.
"Now," Rhea murmured. "Now, my little one. Be a good girl and do as ye were told."
As if hearing her, Susan's eyes opened - but there was nothing in them. They woke and slept at the same time. Rhea saw her gently pull her hand free of the boy's. She sat up, bare br**sts against bare thighs, and looked around. She got to her feet -
That was when Musty, the six-legged cat, jumped into Rhea's lap, waowing for either food or affection. The old woman shrieked with surprise, and the wizard's glass at once went dark - puffed out like a candle-flame in a gust of wind.