Wolf Who Rules

"What are you doing here?" She asked Esme's photo. "I wasn't looking for you. What was I looking for?" She had to think a moment before remembering that she wanted to find her grandfather's notes on the spell at Reinholds so the walk-in freezer could function again so she could store the black willow. But why? "Why am I doing this again?"

Lain wanted the black willow (thus the whole reason it was salvaged in the first place) and it might revive-good reason to lock the tree in the cooler. The cooler was broken. She needed to fix it. They were all nice, sane, and logical links in a chain.

What made it all weird were her dreams and Esme popping up in odd places. It jarred hard with Tinker's orderly conception of reality. It pushed her into an uncomfortable feeling that the world wasn't as solid and fixed as she thought it was. She wanted to ignore it all, but Windwolf had said that it wasn't wise to ignore her dreams.

Perhaps if she dealt with them in a scientific manner, they wouldn't seem so - frighteningly weird.

She got her datapad and settled in the sun to write out what she remembered of the dream, and what had already materialized. The pearl necklace headed the list, since it was the first to appear. Second was the black willow and the ice cream. She considered the hedgehogs of the dream and the flamingoes in the book's illustrations and decided her future might be decidedly weird.

And who was the Asian woman in black? She felt that the woman had to be tengu because of the crows. She had felt, however, that she knew the woman, just as she knew Esme. Perhaps she was another colonist, which was why the birds kept repeating, "Lost." Riki had told her that the first ship was crewed by tengu. Then it hit her - Riki lied about everything. She flopped back onto the sun warm cement and covered her eyes. Gods, what was she doing? Trying to apply logic to dream symbols was not going to work! So how was she going to figure out the future with only dreams and possible lies?

***

" Domi," Pony's voice and the touch of his hand on her face yanked Tinker out of her nightmare. "Wake up."

Tinker opened her eyes and struggled awake. She lay on the warm, rough cement of the parking pad. Stormsong was doing a leisurely prowl in the alley. Pony knelt beside her, sheltering her from the sun. She groaned and rubbed at her eyes; they burned with unshed tears. "What is it?"

"You were having a nightmare."

She grunted and sat up, not wanting to fall back to sleep, perhaps to dream. Lately dreaming was a bitch. The oni had really force-fed her id some whoppers, not that her imagination really needed it, no thank you.

" Domi? " His dark eyes mirrored the concern in his murmured question. "Are you all right?"

"It was just a bad dream." She yawned so deep her face felt like it would split in half. "How can I sleep and wake up more tired?"

"You've only been asleep for a few minutes." He shifted so that he sat beside her. "Nor was it restful sleep."

"You're telling me." In her dreams, she hadn't been able to save him from being flayed of his tattoos. She leaned against his bare arm, his skin and tattoos wonderfully intact, glad for the opportunity to reassure herself without making a big deal of it. Just a nightmare.

He smelled wonderful. After weeks together, she knew his natural scent. He was wearing some kind of cologne, an enticing light musk. She felt the now familiar desire uncoil inside her. Gods, why did stress make her want to lick honey off his rock-hard abs? Was this some kind of weird primitive wiring - most of us are going off to be eaten by saber tooth tigers, so let's fuck like crazy before the gene pool lessens? Or was she uniquely screwed up?

Every night with Pony among the oni had been a torture of temptation. There had been only one bed and she had been stupid enough to insist that they share it. She would lay awake, desperately wanting to reach out to him-to be held-to be made love to-to be taken care of. She managed to resist because of a little voice that reminded her that she would swap Pony for Windwolf in heartbeat-that it was her husband she really wanted. There been no way to kick Pony out of the bed without admitting how much she wanted him, so he and her secret temptation stayed.

Even now she fought the urge to plant little kisses on his bicep. I'm a married woman. I'm married and I do love Windwolf. She couldn't even imagine being married to Pony, although she wasn't sure why - he was to-die-for cute. Unfortunately, she could imagine having hot sex with him. She sighed as her curiosity stirred to wonder what running her tongue up the curve of his arm would taste like. Now I've done it - it will eat me alive wondering…

" Domi, what is it?"

Embarrassment burned through her. "N-N-Nothing. I'm just tired. I haven't been sleeping well."

"Have you found what you needed?" He asked.