V2Ch162 New Snowy Night

I finished cooking dinner. I ate my fill and retreated for the night. My clothes stayed on for extra warmth. I left some stew in the pot outside while the fire was dying down.

I heard footsteps. The lid of the pot opened. I could hear some slurping. The lid jittered some when it was replaced.

I had left a towel out, just inside to the left of the tent entrance. I heard it fluffing around after my follower entered. I could hear the unsettling breathing that came from the extreme cold. I left an unrolled sleeping bag to the right of me.

While the sounds that came next were those of a sleeping bag, I was taken by surprise when it was my sleeping bag that she was entering. I thought about yelling at her. I wanted to. Maybe I didn't because it might help me sleep without my Babur.

The fit was tight. She squeezed in against my back. Her fur was still slightly wet. Her body shivered for an eternity. She shamelessly intertwined our legs and reached around the front of my chest. I failed to respond the way my brain wanted to. I covered her hands with mine in an attempt to help her warm up.

I know what she did to me recently was far from an appropriate interaction but, I didn't want her to die from the cold.

It always seems to come back to the fact that, I've already killed too many and I don't want to needlessly kill more.

I couldn't sleep with her constant shivering. I heated my hands with my breath and warmed up hers one at a time. I unlocked our legs and turned around. I found her eyes looking directly into mine like she was searching for a sign of my intentions.

"I-I'm s-s-sorr-ry"

"I know. You said that already."

My cold response made her recoil in an attempt to pull away from me. The close quarters wouldn't allow for much of that kind of movement. She clasped her hands together between our chests. Her gaze attempted to avoid mine.

My neck felt tense. I realized I was holding my head up to look at her. I relaxed my muscles and rested my head on the pillow. I felt my face relax too. Maybe I was scowling at her without realizing it.

"I'm... not particularly mad at you..."

She brought her gaze to mine again. I could see she was still fearful of me. Her shivering continued. I clasped her hands and brought them up so that I could attempt to warm them again. She closed her eyes and quivered. Her body inched closer to mine.

"What are you thinking?"

Her teeth chattered as she asked.

"We hurt you. Wh-why-w AHCHH"

Her question evolved into a sneeze. A sneeze that covered my face in her salival spray. My eyes closed at the sudden wetness of my face, I let out a sigh.

"I'm sorry! I'll find..."

She was starting to get out of the sleeping bag. I placed my hands on her shoulders to stop her. I wiped my face with the inside of my hood. I was getting tired of wearing it anyway. I started to remove my shirt and hood.

That was the moment I discovered she was topless. I froze halfway through when I felt the soft skin of her furless stomach against my own.

"Are you... Naked?"

"Sorry. My clothes were all wet. I had to wash them in the river..."

Aaand that would be my fault. Another sigh came out of me. My face was covered by my shirt and my arms were stuck in an extended state outside of the sleeping bag. I was about to give up and just drop my arms where they were.

My shirt began to tug. It slipped past my head and was removed from my arms. She had finished removing my shirt and tossed it away.

"Can I see?"

she asked.

"Huh?"

"Y-your wounds. my saliva has some he-healing properties. I could... help with the wounds. S-some of them were... my... my..."

She held back a sneeze.

"My fault."

"No need."

"Please. Let me do something to repent for what I've done."

"Why are you trying so hard to repent?"

She was surprised by that question.

"I... You saved me and my friends from the Nightmare. The three of us would have been dead, if not for you."

"What was going through your mind as I got closer to you after I killed it?"

"I don't... know."

"Don't know, or are afraid to say it?"

"I..."

"How about this? Let's pretend that the earlier events never happened. Would you still have wet yourself in fear AFTER I killed it? I still would have been a stranger but saved from certain death, most would simply be grateful. Right?"

She began to tear up.

"I was frightened. You heard what I said. I didn't want to die. When you killed something in an instant that's taken the lives of thousands over many thousands of years... You, who my friends and I played with as if you were some kind of toy to be destroyed... What was I supposed to think? That you came to rescue us?"

Tears were freely flowing from her eyes at this point.

"The way you killed that monster, I could only think that IT was in YOUR way, that you wanted the satisfaction of killing us for yourself. When my friends left me alone... They left me to die. It made me realize just how fickle our friendship was. I was only friends with them because others our age didn't want to accept me. We were the outcasts. I thought if I was like them, I could fit in somewhere. They both liked to pick on people, so I kinda followed suit."

Her tears calmed down at this point.

"There is always a bigger fish."

"What?"

"It's a saying where I'm from. In the ocean, there are thousands of kinds of fish. Almost every fish in the ocean has a predator. Even the largest fish you can find in the oceans could be fished up by fishermen. The fishermen could be killed by pirates. The pirates, killed by diseases. Diseases are killed by natural ingredients from plant life. Everything is part of the cycle of life. To you and your friends, the Nightmare was the bigger fish, so to speak. And I was the bigger fish to the Nightmare. While our social natures make our races act like larger fish in groups, individually we... well, our kind, are weak. You had the right idea to find a pack. But, you kinda picked a shitty pack."

After she seemed to have some things rattling about in her head, her tear-stained eyes met mine again.

"Were you?"

"Going to kill you?"

She nodded.

"As I was reaching out at you, that was the intention. When you started apologizing, I remembered that you were a person. A living breathing person with thoughts and feelings. I don't want to be the kind of person that could kill you in such a merciless way. It would have been too cruel. You have a life to live. I already have past burdens stacked on top of me. Literally mountains of burdens. I didn't want to add you to my conscience."

That seemed to reassure her. I blew my hot breath into her hands once more. She let a faint smile escape.

"Then, let me see to your wounds. Please. It's the least I can do."

"Sorry. Not possible."

I said with a smile on.

"One way or another, I will take care of those wounds."

She was so determined now. It was kinda cute.

"Here."

I took her left hand and placed it on my skin, just under my neck.

"Right about there is where the bunny girl started her second assault."

She felt around the area. She spread her search out even further, examining my upper and mid-torso, my sides, and finally my back.

"But... I know she cut you. I saw the blood."

She suddenly remembered something. She felt down my right leg.

"Eh, Hey! What are you doing?"

She grew bolder as she started loosening my belt then unbuttoning my pants. She reached down my pants and found a particular spot on my thigh. She found a hole in my pants right about the same spot that she was feeling around my thigh.

"There's no wound. I know I... I left a pretty nasty wound right there."

Her boldness shriveled into uncertainty with a hint of regret.

"I told you. Not possible."

"But why? How?"

I pulled her hand out of my pants and took control of her hand once more. I singled out her index finger and balled the others into a fist. I pulled it up to my cheek. Once she realized what I was about to do, she tried to pull her hand back.

"No, don't."

"It's okay. I just want to show you."

I placed the short-bladed nail against my cheek and drove it into my skin. I pulled down for about an inch and released her hand. She pulled it back instantly. Her eyes watched the spot for a moment and seemed to have trouble discerning something.

"Oh, here. Let me clear it up for you."

I wiped off the blood that emerged from my cut and revealed smooth scarless skin.

"You can heal?"

I nodded in affirmation.

She began to laugh out loud. Her emotions were all over the place tonight.

"I'm sorry. It's just, my friends thought they got you so good. They were so ecstatic over the amount of damage they caused, and you don't even have a scratch on you."

Her laughter continued through her words. It was almost infectious. I allowed a smile to peek through.

Her laugh was so real, so genuine. I felt my heavy heart lift, even if it was only a little bit.

I appreciated the feeling.

Her laughter eventually died down. I felt certain that I could have kept her going longer if I had joined in. I wasn't about to risk a lesser elemental attack right now.

"Now, we need to get you warmed up. We don't need you ending up as fish food to the "big fish" known as, the cold."

"So stupid."

She whispered.

Her body seemed to agree with my statement though. We made as much skin-to-skin contact as we could. I felt my body tense up at the multiple combinations of nearly sensual contact. I felt her leg pull up and over mine. I could only assume her toes grabbed hold of my already loosened pants and pulled them down. I held the underwear in place as my only objective was to make sure she didn't freeze to death.

We both pulled ourselves deeper into the sleeping bag. I pulled my shirt over the entrance in order to cover it. Our combined breath started to warm us up quite nicely. It wasn't long before we were only trying to warm up the extremities. She turned her back to me and fit her posterior right up against my crotch. Her back, which was still slightly cold, flattened out against my chest. A sigh of relief escaped her when her back met my warm skin.

She commandeered my hands and started warming them up with her breath.

"I'm fine. You don't need to..."

I misinterpreted her intentions. She moved my hands into position to warm up her breasts. Her nipples were rock hard and freezing. My hands were her warmers. She placed her right hand between our connected thighs. Her left hand covered mine. Her breath was still steaming down into the sleeping bag.

I gave up my tenseness and relaxed into her. My face pushed into her hair and against the back of her neck. She seemed to lean back a little in response.

No matter how you cut it, we were warm and we slept well that night.