Firestone Hot Springs mare's milk

Here lies Jamukha: second son to Qara of Yazgur, decorated Jagutu-iin Darga of Alukhai, architect of the silk road, ambassador to the Khagan Hotula.

Neck-deep in a pool, sprawled out on his back with layers of dust weighing an already matted pelt. Half conscious, he was, muttering about a crusader knight and a beautiful woman crowned in white magnolias.

Death, sure. Or something like it.

atoztli takes the shell and the pronghorn cape, and leaves all else behind. mictec's scent faded some weeks ago, with qvasir following.

unsuited to solitary life, atoztli set out among a world wizened by overcast skies.

muttering draws her to a pool of water, its dark surface reflecting the stormy skies above. at its banks laid a male on his back, fur drenched and dust tattering his pelt.

thinking of crixus, atoztli comes close. has he food? has he anything of use?

she slaps a wave of water to his face, mirthless eyes in a blackened face the first thing he'll see as he comes to.

anoré stalks silently along the bank, the spring wind the only comfort as she made her way through unfamiliar grounds. she had no particular destination—just the need to keep moving.
her ear flicks when she hears a quiet, belligerent grumbling from the pools. there was someone already there, assaulting an unknown figure with slaps of water. without hesitation, she approachs.
"what is this?" she asks, her voice gruff when she addresses the night-clad female. her gaze falls. a body. half-submerged in the water and awkwardly sprawled. there was still a shallow rise and fall of the chest, and weak, broken mutterings that made no sense. well, if he was talking, he wasn't drowning.
for a moment, she contemplates leaving the man there. he'd wake up on his own, eventually. but she decides against it when she looks at the waggish girl.
"wake up." her paw prods his side, "þú ert ekki dáinn ennþá. hættu að láta svona." her heavy paw finds purchase on his shoulder, nudging him again, this time with more force.

Lungs full of sulfide, Jamukha is dragged, coughing and limp and laid out bare like a drunkard beneath the eye of the sun and feminine voices. They are close enough that he can smell their scents; a savage alchemy of leather, curds, and female musk. The drifter feels himself stirring.

“Новш! There are kinder ways to wake a man,” he grins suggestively, squinting into day’s light at the pair of women overhead.

she moves away in graceful step as a woman cowled in greystone arrives. not left to wonder long if this was a friend to the waterlogged man, atoztli watches from safe distance as the stranger prods his rough pelt. 

when he stirs she notices his eyes foremost; alive and glinting with mischief. leaning close, atoztli surveys his sodden condition with a single sweep of flat bloodstone gaze. 

settling back upon haunches thin by travel, she shares a conspiratory glance with her feminine compatriot. is waking up next to two beautiful women not kindness enough?

anoré exhales through her nose, unimpressed. this was no dying man—just a wayward fool. she flicks water from her paw, stepping back as the man grins up at them, all bravado despite his sorry state.
her gaze shifts and meets the other woman’s with the faintest trace of dry amusement, "if he is well enough to joke, he is well enough to stand." she reasons, and faces the man again, "how is it that you found yourself in the springs?"

A trickle of femininity broadens the fanged grin, yet horselord makes no move of his own to rise, rolling instead onto a wide belly and plunking gracelessly back into the spring like a fish returned to his brook. The hollow is redolent with the scent of sulfur and brine. Jamukha sinks against the smoothed rockface, leering overtly.

“Depends on if two beautiful women are joining me,” eyes fall down to admire slender legs of black and gold before flicking to take in the sight of ice framed against a pale sky.

A man would gladly drink two servings of koumiss even if he was not thirsty, but Jamukha was parched.

single ear turns as ice-maiden shakes river from her paw. atoztli's eyes trace the thin humor framing her face, finding it pleasing.

the man plops back into the river as if a bear's salmon loosened to tidewaters. he does not answer the stormcloud woman - at least not directly.

sensing his eyes upon her, atoztli's gaze is direct and almost too hungry. but there is company present, and atoztli prefers working in the dark.

a smile thin and radiant plays across her muzzle as she decides to indulge him.

only beautiful? she wades into the river in graceful steps, ignoring the brace of cold as she turns to ice-maiden. look at her. a woman so beautiful is divine. stopping just as the river came to her hocks, atoztli speaks once more. how does a man before two beautiful women find himself on his back in a pool?

anoré observes with something akin to mixed amusement. she laughs dryly, "divine? speak for yourself, gullfugl." her attention fixes upon the male once more, "well, at least this man knows how to enjoy his company." her ear flicks, "where do you come from?"

Cool jade took in this sightly visage, admiring each woman for her disparity from the other. Dark and light. Warm and cool. A canine shown in crude desire as the women played off each other.
As if bid by the first, Jamukha rises, heavy, sopping, stalking through chin-high steam to round the pretty pair.

“The land I come from is the Khan’s high steppe.” He rumbles in a circling baritone, tail giving a dominant lift. “No trees, no mountains, but grass stretching endlessly into the horizon. The northern wind is sharp enough to freeze the marrow in your bones. We have no heated springs. There is only one way for men and women to warm themselves.”

Eyes pinning on one, then the other. He begins with the lady of ice, words dropping off into a suggestive note, seeking to push his wet chin along the silken slope of her winter spine if she does not first shift away. Then he approaches the other, the one haughty like a mare and takes in her scent, dragging his fangs through her nape before pulling back to the spring’s heated edge.

she basks in the warmth of anore’s compliment, a coquettish flicker of her gaze lingering on the scar laid across her slender face. some day, maybe, their bodies entwined, icewoman would tell priestess how she came by so stunning a kill mark. 

back to the man now; his fur sodden and heavy as he moves closer to them both.

she allows him this one touch — only that he may sup the first draught of a drink he will pine the rest of his life. a chill takes the skin where his fangs brush through dark fur.

atoztli moves to the reeds, short laughter springing from slender throat. are the women of khan’s steppe so easy? she wonders if he’s princeling as she splashes water towards his longing face. you will have to work harder than that, should you want to feel more than wind on that bone of yours.

the cold in her gaze answers before her tongue does, and her muscles tense with the restraint of not baring teeth.
"you mistake proximity for invitation," she says, steady and firm. she does not rise, nor does she flee, but the way she angles her body—away from his touch, closer to the steam-veiled reeds—makes clear her boundary, "i only came to see if you were breathing. not to roll in your want." 
her gaze flickers between the pair, clever words and salacious laughter rich on the wind. she felt silly for being here, out of place. there is no ceremony in her departure as she steps away.
to the lady, she casts a wry glance, "don't drown him. wouldn't want him to make a habit out of it."
let them have their heat. her fire lies elsewhere.

exit!!

Jamukha's maw splits to a toothy smile upon a wake of iced words the horselord would have liked to tongue. His gaze does not linger, shifting back to the laughter of the gilded girl and returning his feet to the warm, cresting shallows.

This woman’s question is meant to tease, but he gives it a fair amount of consideration as he laps at too-briny waters.

“Easy and hard, these are concepts in marriage conditions. There is no idea of modesty on the steppe. On the road, I see women issue challenge— because she is made to be gentle like spring, with a mellifluous voice. She is ashamed of those things which makes her a woman and not a goddess. Pleasure. Lusting. Fornication," his mouth curls. "Steppe women do not have this. They lose their blood-veil early— and like every good mare they give it during long sprints,” a crude grin now as muscles press into rock and loosen the span of shoulders. Through the steam the woman's black and gold dances.

“You are not from this world,” he claims, and despite his many wanderings the nomad could not place her origin. “What is your language?”

leaving so soon? atotzli pouts, sharing one last look of kinship with the woman who made her preferences clear. arrested by intrigue, atoztli decides this one is worth pursuing later. 

don’t drown him. a fluttering laugh; was it so obvious? safe travels, stranger. she rejoins as the woman’s willowy figure disappears into the gloom.

back to the man; loose-limbed and steeped in his own masculinity. she appreciates the ardent muscles; that blackened crook of shadows marking the pocket between shoulder blades.

you would not know it. and that is as much the man would wrestle from her. it’s his job to be gregarious and open — hers to be coquettish and private. yet, if the women of his homeland were as he described, atoztli was outmatched.

she could not say she favored women being likened to horses — having only learned of their existence a few weeks prior, atoztli found them bizarre. she wondered, mostly, what they tasted like.

you say marriage conditions. easy and hard. how many wives does a man like you have? in her estimation the measure of a culture was in how it treated its women. she wished to hear more of it, portrayed in the sultry timbre of his voice.

remaining where she sat among the reeds, atoztli took one thin stalk and spanned the waters with barbel end. meeting his gaze once, she smiled again. you did not say your name.

“I do not know it; that is why I wish to hear it.” He sees her dark eyes and the glow of the water reflected in them.

“I am not married. If a nomad has wives, they are not happy ones. We are on the road too long.” It was not a stallion’s appetite that constrained his desire for women, it was his wealth— and the horseman had nothing but the skin on his back to offer a kept woman. Though it was more than this. He had chosen the furthest path away from the khan land; away from a proper ger. Wives wanted children, and children were raised in homes, not on the road.

“Jamukha,” he rests impassively, but with ears trained for the woman. “And your’s?”

he’s playful, and atoztli likes that about him. their banter comes easy, making her wonder if she was not just another pit stop in the road. 

bringing the reed’s head underwater, one ear flicks as he mentions no wives. she cannot decide which she’d hoped for; a man with many wives was rich, but often full of callous disregard for the women he claimed. these men she likens to grasshoppers; always flitting from one doe eyed beauty to the next, never appreciating the women who quietly and steadfastly kept his hearth warm for him. and a man without wives was dangerous: hungry and looking to prove his worth to the world. often these men were poorer than atoztli preferred. having her taste of both, she’d been left wanting. she wonders if he’s a new, different kind of man. where does his road take him?

little ripples dance along the surface as she played the water. lowering her head until it was level with the steaming pool, atoztli breathes upon the water’s surface and watches as little beads dance. 

atoztli. this road of yours, jamukha, where does it go? what waits at its end? her dark gaze lifts and holds him in full, sensing a revenant power within him.

“Ātoztli,” a purl inflects each vowel. “Russian. Khotanese,” he feigns at guesses. The woman has guarded herself and so had a reason for caution. Jamukha had met fugitives on the path. He’d also met his fair share of spies with orders to watch him, though in surrendering direct ties to Qaidu his foes had also faded. And yet, Ātoztli seems aptly inquisitive.

He leans into the stone edge, buffing the grit from greasy hackles, all the while his eyes watch her face, downturned and newly compelling in the dimming light.

“Everywhere,” he grunts, as if it were explanation enough, “there is no end, only many thoroughfares for the purpose of trade, for communication and the exchange of ideas.” Not all of them good; not all of them safe, but such was the nature of man, and would not stop the horselord from further marking the road’s reach.

Sufficiently washed, he turns, half-submerged and slithering as would a crocodile to the glistening plane below the woman's nose. “You ask many questions, Ātoztli. Are you not also repelled?” Grinning jowls empty their fill, but it is also to elicit her retreat. For Jamukha desired her, and if she stayed any longer, he meant to have her.

her name on his tongue. a stirring in her chest brings a light smile to her face as he guesses.

watching him as he picks specks from deep auburn fur, atoztli wonders who orders these long miles for him. what lord of the steppes does he serve? is he merciful? is he cruel?

as he slips crocodilian into the river, she catches the wanting glint of his stare and paddles out of range, limbs splaying as she navigates deeper water. with face framed just so by the murkwater, she blows bubbles from her nose and thinks.

repelled? a serpentine turn of her long body as she encircles the horselord. you have not get given me reason to be. will you? i should like to see this road of yours and its sharing of knowledge.

She dances out of reach, defiant. Slender she is, graceful, with youthful fullness and a narrow waist. Men would call her beautiful.

Jamukha makes no reply, save with his eyes. She already knows this answer. He doesn’t care to play the noble lord.

“To reach the silk road, you must first cross the Roof of the World. They are the highest mountains on earth, under the harshest conditions, and they are only passable in late summer.” Amusement ghosts his lips, but his eyes had grown flinty. “A mongol rides hard, and alone. You may come, Ātoztli.”

There are thousands of battleworn men with a thousand different strengths, and none that move with the accuracy of a moyol mercenary. In one deft thrust he had cut the water and pinned his desire between foreleg and stone. He holds her there, un-touching, picking out shards of muted light in the void of raven eyes. “But you pay my cost.”

His mouth curls cruelly.

she should have known the moment the light dances from his jade green eyes.

pinned between stone, his breath spilling across her face and a tension radiating between them, atoztli curses her stupidity.

all this time, she believed she was the danger! stupid girl. she let her guard down, dreaming of romantic high rises, the roof of the world, and the blue shale roads leading up to them; these images fade, replaced by jamukha’s leering face.

this close, and she can see the murkwater refracting across his pupils. the knifelike twist of his smile that now, atoztli found no charm in.

and what cost is that, jamukha? a marvel the priestess manages to keep her voice level, her heart a deluge of icewater. instinct tells her to prepare; muscles coiling for what she believes must be inevitable.

Mature Content Warning

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The participants have indicated the following reason(s) for this warning: for sexuality, violence & obviously toxic behavior

Shame would have no dominion. Under the contortions of harsh wind women submit themselves to Jamukha in mutual affairs; for thrill, for protection or food or warmth, and just as assuredly the man gratified himself on mutual pleasure, from which his own was derived.

But his flesh is dissatisfied and the heat of her belly infamed those senses susceptible to ignite. She smells clean, even in this reeking pool and with broad, assured paws he grips Ātoztli by the waist. A twist would have her fitted to his contours, him buried in the softness of femininity. There is some fascination when he is moved by the mere presence of a woman. He had never bewailed the ramifications of desire over the tyranny of reason.

And it is not the sudden stiffness, as happens when a woman braces for a man. It is the effrontery in her eyes. Jamukha felt his size and position before the tucked points of her body— the most dangerous cliché, and one who yet craved lust in intimacy.

A moment to linger upon the upturned face, then in a gruff voice came his command: “Carry the bounties from Alukhai, and don’t slow me down.” His eyes gentled, but his fangs shown still in amusement.

Freeing her waist, the horselord hauls himself out of the water and strides, pouring towards a thickening in the treeline. They would make a temporary settlement in this veld, and Jamukha would not touch her.

once before a moment like this happened, and atoztli learned much from it.

already she’s mapped out what must be done. she will yield until he becomes drunk on his own lust; and just as he reaches to insert himself, she’ll drive fangs into his constricting throat.

that moment never comes.

pushed and pulled so that their bodies fit nearly perfectly, atoztli loosened a soft gasp as he releases her and clambers up the bank.

was it for show? she could have done without it; already the heat felt between them flutters out to something cold.  remembering her station despite the humiliation burning her cheeks, atoztli remained in the water. 

she said nothing else; he’d engendered a quiet rage within her, and she sought to placate its burning edges in the pool.