Not even a few stolen touches in the tent can make this any better. Not that there’s been many of those lately, either. After that first explosive interlude when Hawk made me come, I’ve been aching for him to touch me again. Aching.

Instead, we just talk.

And while I find talking to him joyous and incredibly satisfying—he’s as fixed on Old Prell as me in some ways—I wish he would touch me again. I think it’s my fault. I told him I wanted to get to know him during rest times in the tent, and I think he interpreted that to mean I didn’t want to be touched until we knew each other better.

Is it greedy to want both? I certainly don’t think so.

Magpie grows steadily more ornery as the nights pass as well. She doesn’t look so good. Her hands shake with tremors constantly and she sweats even when it’s cold. Her face is pale, her eyes are hollows, but she’s determined to keep us moving. She’s grumpy, too. She yells at us constantly to pick up our feet, or to move faster, or to swing a sword harder. To make a fire faster.

In short, she’s horrible.

Hawk isn’t much better. He doesn’t speak much outside of our rest times inside our tent, alone, and when he does, it’s to point out something our Five is doing wrong. That we’re going to fail if we keep going as we are. That we need to shape up, do better. We’re giving everything we’ve got and yet it’s still not good enough for him, or for Magpie.

“You’re using your eyes too much,” Hawk tells me, batting aside my attempts to stab with my training sword. “I can predict where you’re going with your weapon. Quit projecting.”

“I’m not projecting.”

At my next stab, he makes another growl of frustration and bats me aside again, as easily as batting away a fly. “Eyes.”

“What else am I supposed to do?” I sputter, even as I stab and feint again. My vision is blurry and I’m focused more on shapes and colors than actual objects, but I can’t let him know that. “They’re eyes! They’re meant for looking!”

“And in the tunnels, your lighting is going to be almost nothing. The shadows are going to trick your vision. You need to rely on your other senses when you fight, Aspeth, or we’re going to have to break out the mucking blindfolds again.”

I make a frustrated sound and stab again, just as he’s taught me.

Hawk parries me easily, and when I stab at him wildly a second time, he smacks my hand with his blocking staff.

Yelping, I drop my blade and bring the back of my hand to my mouth. My skin stings at the contact, but more than anything, I’m humiliated. I can’t tell him that I can’t see enough to follow his lessons other than the broad gestures. I can’t tell him that I’m doing good just to not run into walls. I have to pretend like I can see as well as anyone else. This is something I can’t master, and I can’t tell him that. “I need a moment.”

I walk away, sucking on the back of my hand, determined not to cry. Tears of frustration don’t solve anything. They won’t make me better at sword work. They won’t fix my vision. They won’t get me into the guild, so I need to channel that helpless anger into something else.

“Aspeth,” Hawk calls after me.

“I said I need a moment,” I call back, walking into the thick copse of trees. “Let me be and then I’ll come back to training.” I keep walking, and my frustration mounts when I can hear him crashing through the underbrush behind me. I hike a little faster, only for him to keep following me as if what I want doesn’t matter. It only adds to my bad mood, and by the time I hit a good spot to sit and relax, I turn and glare at the big bull-man who has followed me all this time. “What part of ‘I said I need a moment’ did you fail to understand?”

He ignores my bad mood and marches right up to me and takes my hand, turning it over and examining it. “Did I hurt you?”

Oh. “It stung, but you did the same to the others.”

“I’m not married to the others.” He lifts the back of my hand to his muzzle and rubs his nose against my skin. “I’m sorry. I was trying to be gentle with you and instinct kicked in.”

“I don’t want you to be gentle with me,” I tell him, distracted as he continues to rub his muzzle against my skin in a way that makes me feel shivery inside. “I want you to treat me the same as the others.”

“But you’re not the same,” he murmurs, and his golden gaze meets mine. “You’re my wife, and I’m supposed to be teaching you about pleasure. I don’t like seeing you hurt.”

His response leaves me flustered. “It’s not like it’s been about pleasure over the last few days. You haven’t touched me since the first day we got here.”

“Missing it?”

Oh gods. My face heats. “I mean…no…”

“Liar.” He grins, his expression practically feral as he releases my hand and takes another step forward. I automatically take a step back, and stumble over roots, only to find myself with my back against the nearest tree. His hand goes to my waist, and then he flicks open my belt and slides his hand into my pants.

Sucking in a breath at the feel of his warm fingers against my skin, I flick my gaze up to him. “What are you doing?”

“Making you feel better.” The heat in his eyes is playful, even as he cups the back of my neck with his other hand and draws a teasing circle around my clit. The pose makes me gaze up at him, and when I brace a hand on his chest, I can see a smile curving his mouth. “You sounded sad that I haven’t touched you lately. I’m making it up to you.”

“You—you don’t—I wasn’t—”

“Shhh. I know, little bird.” He strokes against my clit, and my knees almost buckle. “I have you.”

My lips part, and anything I want to say, to protest, disappears from my mind as he keeps touching me. His fingers dance through my folds, slicking them with my juices, and when he dips a finger into the heat of my channel, my body makes a wet squelch. I jerk, startled and embarrassed.

Hawk only hums with pleasure. “Feel how wet you are, Aspeth? When the moon is upon me, the more I touch you, the more slick your body will create so you can take me. You’re going to be twice as wet as this, so wet that it runs down your thighs and soaks the bed. It’s all so I can stretch you to take my knot, and it’ll make you feel so good.” He eases his finger into me again, his thumb moving to rub my clit as he does, and then starts a slow, regular motion, pumping into me with his hand. His gaze is locked on mine as I curl my hands in his shirt, clinging to him as he pushes me toward a climax.

When I come, it’s with a muffled cry, my face pressed against his chest as he keeps fingering me. Pleasure bursts through my mind and sweeps down my legs, and then it rolls through me, leaving me sated and weak-kneed. “Oh. That was…nice.”

“It was, aye.” He rubs his muzzle against my ear, as if drinking in my scent.

“I wasn’t begging for you to touch me,” I tell him primly. “I just thought that we were supposed to be spending our time here in the woods getting to know each other. Our time alone, that is.”

“Oh, we are.” He chuckles, amused at my prissiness. “I’m getting to know which touches make you squeal, and that you talk about Old Prell in your sleep.”

I wriggle until I free his possessive hand from my body and slip away from him, flushed with embarrassment. “I do not.”

He licks his fingers clean of my taste with lascivious strokes of his tongue that make me think all kinds of naughty things. “You do, and it’s charming. Last night you were discovering bowls in your sleep.”

“Last night” was actually “last day,” since we’ve been sleeping in the daytime, but I don’t correct him. I’m a little too mortified that he’s right. I do have vague dreams of unearthing glowing bowls from a big pile of rocks. “What kinds of bowls?”

Hawk chuckles, his expression amused and full of affection as he gazes at me. “I don’t know. You kept saying it was a secret.”