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“What are you looking at?” Parthenai asked looking up from her book.
Cambrie smiled at her, “Nothin’”
“Ever since those two ducked away to tend to his sores you’ve been looking over here like that”
“Well,” Cambrie stood and walked around the fire to sit next to her, “I was just thinking that you look awful cold over here and that maybe” she scooted closer, “You and I might find some way to stay warm once the fire dies down a bit”
“No.”
“No?”
“No.”
Cambrie moved so she wasn’t sitting quite as close, “I was just thinking that you might-”
“That I might what?”
Cambrie shrugged, “Well you spend almost as much time in the brothel as I spend playing dice so maybe you might want the company.”
“Bath and massage”
“What?”
“That is what i spend my time there on. Bath and massage.”
“That’s it? surrounded by all of those beautiful girls and you just get a soak and a back rub?”
“Yes.”
“Never anything more?”
“They braid my hair and trim it”
“That just feels soo.. wasteful. You get three girls to wash you and help you unwind and that’s all you do?”
“Yes.”
“In that case,” she moved further away, “I am taking back my offer and my wool blankets and sleeping over here, sorry.” The two sat in silence, Parthenai reading through the tome she had brought and Cambrie mending her coat. After fifteen minutes that felt longer than she thought they could, Cambrie stood stretching her arms, “I take that back. You are more than welcome over here. It is way too cold out tonight. Hell, I’d take just about anyone tonight. I don’t want to wake up with frostbite.”
Parthenai looked up from her book as Cambrie laid out her bedroll, “It’s really not that bad tonight, should have been out last week in the Ruins.”
“I’ll pass on that haunted mess. At least out here nothing is as wrong as it is in there. Just bandits and rabid hounds.”
Parthenai laughed, “Wouldn’t have taken you as the superstitious type.”
“And why is that?” Cambrie was pulling at her tie.
“Well, you rob graves.”
“And?”
“To say that its bad luck is an understatement.”
“Well, how it see it,” she tucked her tie into her pack, “is I could either rob the dead, or rob the living and you tell me which one fights back more often.”
“Around here, the dead.”
“Exactly why I won’t go to the Ruins.”
Parthenai shook her head but smiled as she went back to her reading.
“So.. what brings you here? I’m here for gold and perhaps some glory, but you don’t seem interested in either.” She pulled her shirt off and set it on the ground next to her as she pulled another blanket out of her pack. “Shit its cold out here.”
“Perhaps leave some of your clothes on while you get ready for bed?”
“And deprive you the view?” Cambrie smiled, “I think not.”
Parthenai kept smiling and looked down at her book.
“Honestly though, what the devil are you reading?” she draped the blanket she had pulled from her pack over her shoulders before moving to sit next to the vestal again.
“Just a book.”
“I can see much,” she scooted closer again, “what book are you reading?”
“Nothing really,” she quickly closed it as Cambrie leaned in.
“Nothing?” Cambrie smiled, mischief in her eyes.
“Nothing.”
“In that case,” she inched closer so her thigh was against Parthenai’s, “I need to take a look!” in one fluid motion she pinched Parthenai’s side, grabbed the book and lept away laughing. It took a moment for Parthenai to realize just what had happened, but that was enough for Cambrie, “POEMS?! I’m being passed by for POEMS?”
Parthenai looked down at her feet, “Mostly, yes.”
Cambrie’s laughter faded fast as she walked back over, “Sorry, didn’t mean to make you upset, was supposed to be in good fun.” She sat down next to her, “Which is your favorite?”
Parthenai looked over at her as she took her book back, “I’m not really sure. These ones are.. well the book was a gift from one of the girls… for when I felt lonely she said.” Parthenai was blushing.
“Well, which one is your favorite?” Cambrie scooted close again.
“I’m not sure. They’re written in about a dozen languages, lots of styles. Some have beautiful imagery but are too… I don’t know too something and it makes my stomach tie in knots.”
“You are thinking about them waaaay to hard. I don’t want an analysis, I just want to know which ones you keep going back to once we’re all asleep, or before we’re up because you always seem to be in a good mood in the morning.”
Parthenia’s face was bright red, “In this volume none really.”
“Wait this past month I’ve seen you reading,” Cambrie tallied the different covers in her head, “Eleven books. Are they all-”
“No,no- not all, some are just histories, local lore, religious texts.”
Cambrie shook her head and picked her blanket back up from where she had dropped it, “You could get away with just about anything you know that? We should play cards sometime, if you can keep a straight face reading these,” she motioned toward the book on Parthenai’s lap, “I don’t think there is anything in this world that could make you give up what cards you got.”
“Not much of a gambler I’m afraid.” Parthenai moved to put the book into her bag.
“NOPE!” Cambrie snatched the book from her hands again.
“Give that back!”
Cambrie let the book open to where it would, a small crease in the spine the only indicator she needed, “I think I need you to lend me this for the night,” she said as she looked down at the the page. “And I think I need you to read it to me because I don’t have any idea what language this is.”
Parthenai leaned over looking down at the book, “If you travel east for about a thousand miles, trip takes the better part of two months if you follow roads, ‘bout a month if you travel by boat, you’ll hit what remains of a once proud empire. Many of the languages we speak and write in are heavily influenced by it, though it is for all purposes dead.”
“Ugg no history I just need to know what it says. The spine has a break in it that means that it keeps getting opened up to here. if not by you then by the girl you got this from which means it must be good.”
Parthenai’s lips moved as she scanned the page, “Roughly its about the feeling of silk being pulled across your body, the sound it makes as it slides along and..” her blush managed to deepen somehow, “and the feeling of hands moving down your back to your hips, the feeling of lips running from your throat down to your breasts to your.. umm.. ”
“Damn that is not fair,” Cambrie glanced over at Parthenai, “read it aloud to me, maybe I can pick up on some of it. I can speak far better than I can read.”
Parthenai sat upright her face still ablaze, “I- that is- I can’t that would-”
“Too much for ya?” Cambrie looked back down at the book, flipping through the pages looking for something she could read.
“Cambrie.”
“Yeah?” as she turned and looked up Parthenai leaned in and pecked her lightly on the corner of her mouth.
“My book!” she took it back from her hands as Cambrie sat frozen.
As Parthenai stuffed it into her pack, Cambrie was smiling, “That was low, unfair and-”
Parthenai turned back to her smiling, “So was pinching me so we’re even.”
“Mine was fair that was cheating. You can’t do that! What’s a girl to think?”
“I don’t know what she is supposed to think, all I know is that I,” she stood pulling at the tie on her robe as she did, “Plan on going to bed. and really its up to you to decide whether or not you’re going to come with.”
“Why the sudden interest?” Cambrie stood, following Parthenai to the bedroll she had laid out.
Parthenai turned to Cambrie and shrugged, “You make me smile whenever we're together both in town and on patrol in this dismal place. I guess I just hadn't really thought about it before tonight.”
Cambrie looked at Parthenai, a touch of red on her cheeks, “Seriously?”
Parthenai shrugged again, “I guess I just don't really think about people that way, not often at least.”
“So all this time I've spent with you, eating and drinking and dancing and sitting unreasonably close, never once did it prompt you think of me? Are those books really that good?” she sat next to Parthenai.
“Yes. Well.. no, I mean I thought about you, but not like that. Just things like 'I wonder if she's doing alright,' or 'I hope she comes back the new dish the inn keeper has thrown together is amazing.' or-” She froze as Cambrie's hand ran up her thigh.
“You seem to talk a lot when you get nervous,” Cambrie whispered as she leaned in.
“Do I? I didn't think-” Cambrie brushed her lips against Parthenai's neck and she shivered, “I- th-that was nice.” She tilted her head away from Cambrie exposing more of her neck.
“You do.” Cambrie smiled and kissed her neck again, lips lingering for a moment. “You should probably get out of that robe,” Cambrie kept brushing her lips along Parthenai's neck, “and I should probably ditch these trousers don't you think?”
Parthenai nodded and quickly pulled her arms free of her sleeves, shifting awkwardly from one side to the other as she pulled the robe out from under her. She started to fold it but stopped, instead staring at Cambrie as she stood unfastening her belt and pulling the stiff canvas trousers off, “Those do not look comfortable.”
Cambrie stopped, one foot free, the other with canvas wadded up around it, and began to laugh, “If you were changing out of these that would be the last thing on my mind.”
“No I mean.. just that is very heavy canvas and I know that having durable, well cut clothes is import-” Cambrie threw the trousers at her cutting her off. Parthenai laughed and tossed the pants and her robe on top of Cambrie's pack as Cambrie sat next to her again.
“You talk way too much” Cambrie smiled and kissed Parthenai on the cheek.
Parthenai kept smiling and pulled the blankets around their feet up over her legs, “It's freezing out here.”
“That's what I was saying.” She smiled and led Parthenai's hand to her waist as she leaned in to kiss her again.
Parthenai smiled as Cambrie kissed her, “Seriously get under the covers. Its freezing and your hands are cold.”
Cambrie grinned and pulled the blankets up around them, laughing when Parthenai squeaked as she laid her cold fingers onto her thigh. “Better?”
"Better."