Meta Gods War 3 by B. Miles (the ebook reader txt) 📕

“I guess he’s not so bad then.” She got up and came around the table. She pushed Cam’s chair back then sat in his lap and leaned her head against his chest.

Cam wrapped his arms around her and held her tight.

“I need to leave again,” she said. “I’ll have to travel hard so I can tell my father the plan.”

“I know.” Cam held her tighter, her body warm and soft against his. “I love you, Miuri.”

“I love you too.”

He kissed her hair. She tilted her head and met his lips.

They stayed like that for a while. Cam couldn’t tell how long, but it didn’t matter. The lamplight dimmed as Miuri stood, stooped to kiss him one more time, then slipped away without a word.

Cam leaned back and let out an exhausted breath.

Then looked back over the maps and began to plan.

22

“Shut your eyes.” Cam crossed his arms over his chest.

“You keep telling me to shut my eyes,” Theus says, “and then you kick me.”

“So what?” Cam asked. “You think the wolves are going to come up and give you cute puppy kisses?”

“Cam—”

“Close your eyes.”

Theus clenched his jaw and sat up straight. Cam walked around his friend, circling him slowly. They were alone in a clearing within shouting distance of the camp, but far enough away that the constant noise wasn’t too distracting. Theus wore a pair of loose trousers and an old white tunic stained with road dust and tree sap.

Theus let his hands hang limply in his lap. Cam nodded to himself and Theus shut his eyes.

“Concentrate,” Cam said.

“It’d be easier if—”

Cam kicked him in the back. Not hard, but hard enough to make his friend grimace.

“Shut up,” Cam said.

Theus grunted, sat up sat straight, and didn’t move.

“Concentrate on my voice,” Cam said. “Picture this. There’s nothing, just black—”

“—where I’m going to end up if you keep doing this,” Theus said, grumbling.

Cam kicked him harder in the shoulder. “Do you even want to learn?”

“Yes,” Theus said. “Okay, alright. I’ll shut up.” Theus took a few deep calming breaths.

“Picture this,” Cam said again, “there’s nothing, just black. The voice is there, it’s a part of you, but also separate from you. It’s like a limb, but it’s also not. Picture this. The void fills you, swirls around you, is you.”

Theus didn’t move. Cam continued to pace around him.

“Picture this,” Cam said. “In the voice, lemon flowers recall olden times.”

Theus frowned. Cam kicked him in the shoulder.

“Picture this,” Cam said. “Flowers above the night’s moon. Roasting leaves. Liquor poured on a fire.”

Cam kicked Theus in the back. Theus didn’t move.

“Picture this,” Cam said. “Candle flame in the void flickering formless against the black. It breathes like a heartbeat. It grows bigger, grows taller, grows thicker until it flares into an inferno. You are that inferno.”

Cam stared at Theus then kicked him in the shoulder.

Theus rolled onto his side and let out an annoyed groan. “I don’t understand what you’re trying to do,” he said.

“I’m trying to get you to concentrate and picture what I’m describing,” Cam said. “Now get back up and try again.”

“Oh, Cam.” Another voice from the trees. “Are you abusing your friend?”

Cam watched as Brice made her way toward them with one hand on the pommel of her sword.

“He’s beating me bloody,” Theus said. “Send help.”

Cam kicked at him but Theus rolled away laughing.

“He’s a terrible student,” Cam said. “I’m starting to think I made a terrible mistake.”

“Maybe you’re just a terrible teacher,” Brice said. “I never learned when my training master beat me. Only after the beatings, when he explained why he took me down so easily.”

“That’s what I keep saying,” Theus said. “The kicking just isn’t necessary.”

“If we weren’t in the middle of a war, maybe it wouldn’t be,” Cam said. “But you need to learn ten times faster than I ever did.”

Theus got to his feet and stretched. “And how’s that going?”

“So far, terrible.” Cam shook his head. “Maybe I have it all wrong.”

Theus grinned at him. “We’ll keep trying,” he said.

“Let’s take a break,” Cam said. “Go sit and meditate for a while, okay?”

“I can do that,” Theus said. “I was feeling pretty tired.”

“No sleeping,” Cam said. “And think about that last image I gave you.” Cam met his friend’s gaze and held it. “Seriously, Theus. That last one.”

Theus frowned. “The flame?”

“Sit and picture it.”

“Alright,” Theus said with a shrug.

“Maybe you’ll burn down the whole camp,” Brice said. “Wouldn’t that be nice?”

Theus laughed, waved, and walked back toward the camp. Cam watched him go then leaned his head back and let out a breath.

“I take it your training isn’t going great,” Brice said.

“I don’t know what I expected.” Cam sat down in the grass and leaned back on his hands.

He was exhausted from planning half the night and most of the early morning, and even more worn down from speaking with the men then working with Theus. There were no breaks for him, no rest, and even sitting on the ground in the sunshine was more than he deserved.

Brice walked to him and lingered, her eyes taking him in, before sitting down to his right. She leaned close, within inches of touching, but didn’t cross the gap between them.

“What’s it like?” she asked. “The magic, I mean.”

“Hard to explain,” he said.

“Try anyway.”

“It’s like… taking something that isn’t yours. Then turning it into something else. At the time, while you’re doing it, it feels like heaven. Like the best sex you can imagine, but so much better.”

Brice’s cheeks turned pink. “Really?”

“Really,” he said. “It’s hard to control at first. You get better at it, but those first few times, all I wanted to do was keeping using it.”

“And then after, when you stop?”

“Then the Need hits. And you sort of realize just how badly you abused yourself.”

“Huh.” Brice sniffed the air. “And you deal with the Need through… uh…”

“Sex,” Cam said. “Fucking releases it from my body. The magic, I mean. I guess it builds up, and orgasm helps release whatever’s left over.”

“Got it,”