Chapter 136: Show a little restraint
Three days passed faster than Ethan had counted on.
When he stepped out onto the western landing field of Silver Moon City, mountain wind struck his face cold, carrying the smell of wet stone and energy oil from engines spinning up. The sky had just come fully bright. Sunlight lay across the large airship waiting in the open ground, its white-silver hull throwing the whole field brighter than usual. Compared with the small craft Xue Ji had once sent to Spring Village, the thing standing ready in front of him was nearly three times as long, its nose tapering, both flanks carved with patterns that looked like hand seals stretched into veins of light.
Ethan drew a deep breath. Mountain air went into his lungs, cold and clean, but it was not enough to erase the shadows under his eyes.
Laira walked half a step behind him, red hair tied hastily into a long tail, her footfalls improbably light for a body nearly two meters twenty. Her cheeks were pink, her eyes bright, her color that of someone who had slept half a day through. Rou Yan on the other side was the same. White hair combed neat, the corner of her mouth holding a very small curve, her skin carrying a freshness it had not had three days earlier. The two of them walked at Ethan’s sides as if nothing had happened. He was the only one who looked as though he had just been dragged out of a long fight.
Xue Ji was already waiting in the airship’s shadow.
She wore black embroidered with gold, a hand on her hip, looking Ethan over from head to foot before her gaze moved to the two people with him. Thanh Lien stood not far away, white robes edged in red stirring in the wind, no sword in her hand, her face as calm as if she were watching a matter that had nothing to do with her. Behind the two women were several of the ship’s crew, all silent. No one stepped forward to make trouble.
Xue Ji studied the shadows under Ethan’s eyes a while longer, then looked at Laira glowing, then at Rou Yan trying to keep a cold face while her ears ran a little red, and only then smiled, her voice pitched for the four of them. "These past three days you have been working very hard, haven’t you?"
Ethan raised a hand and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "That is quite enough from you."
Thanh Lien glanced at him once. Her eyes traveled from the shadows under his eyes to the slight heaviness in his step, then she spoke, her tone indifferent, as if reminding him of a simple rule. "You should show a little restraint. One day you will die on top of a woman."
Laira pouted and stuck her tongue out at Thanh Lien, very fast, not quite a challenge, more like a child told off in adult company and choosing to act spoiled on purpose. Right after that she stepped in, looped both arms around Ethan from behind, and pulled him into her chest as if using her own body for a shield. Her large breasts pressed against the back of his neck and his shoulders. Her chin settled on the crown of his head. Her shadow swallowed the whole upper half of him in front of everyone.
"He will not die," Laira said, her voice certain. "He is only short on sleep."
Ethan stood inside that circle of arms and truly had no way out. For three days Laira and Rou Yan had pinned him to the bed often enough that his original schedule had come apart in pieces. Time spent on his feet, counted strictly, had been meals and short walks around the house so his body would not lock up, after which he was pulled back again.
Laira did not know fatigue. Rou Yan could still blush in daylight and still refused to stand aside at night. Ethan had once meant to use checking the Mystery Boxes as an excuse to sit still for a while, but the moment his backside touched the edge of the bed one of them had his wrist and the other had his shoulder.
Now the entire landing field could see the result.
Rou Yan folded her arms, red to the roots of her hair, and offered not a single word of defense. She only stood a little off to Ethan’s side, her gaze sweeping Xue Ji and then Thanh Lien, her face caught between wanting to sink into the ground and refusing to let anyone think she regretted it.
Xue Ji looked at that scene and smiled more clearly. She stepped closer and had to bend because Laira was holding Ethan a little off the ground. The distance shortened all at once. Xue Ji winked, her voice low, sweet enough that Laira’s arms tightened at once. "I still do not have a lover. If you are considering it, leave me a place."
Laira growled in her throat. The sound was not loud, but her chest vibrated against Ethan’s back, and both arms locked tighter, almost lifting him out of Xue Ji’s reach. Ethan felt that strength clearly. If she were truly angry, Xue Ji would have had to give ground. This time Xue Ji did not. She only smiled, reached up to give Ethan’s lapel a light tug as a farewell, then straightened.
"Go. Try not to die on the road."
She turned. Black cloth cut a line across the bright stone as she walked toward the city people waiting nearby. The black-haired secretary followed, glancing back at Ethan once as she went, her expression tangled between gratitude for the resource chest and the fact that she had just watched her city lord ask for a place as his lover in the middle of a landing field.
Ethan let out a breath. Laira still had not let go. "Can you let me walk onto the ship myself?"
"No."
"Everyone is watching."
"Let them watch." Laira bent, her mouth against his ear. "She just winked. Holding you is not nearly enough."
Rou Yan tugged Laira’s sleeve. "Get on the ship first. Do not turn this place into our yard."
Laira snorted, and at last loosened her arms, though one large hand stayed at Ethan’s back like a warning meant for anyone else who still wanted to come close.
Thanh Lien’s airship was not as loud as Ethan had expected.
When the group stepped onto the bridge of light, the people on deck moved aside on their own. There were none of the measuring looks from the time he had shared a ship with Silver Moon City’s team when they first met.
Someone nodded. Someone bowed slightly. A woman Awakened near the hatch watched Laira have to duck to get through the frame, then looked at Ethan, her voice very careful. "The cabin is ready. Please."
That respect did not come from empty courtesy. He had just taken first place in this Trial Gate, and he had beaten Thanh Lien’s projection, a thing that had stood at the final ring for years without anyone bringing it down. Add the fact that he was boarding as a guest of the very woman whose projection that had been, and no one on the ship was still foolish enough to test him with attitude.
Ethan nodded. "Thank you."
Their guide led them down a white-silver corridor, thin lines of light running the walls like the ship’s veins. Now and then a small window opened on the outside. Silver Moon City was sinking in the view, the gold lamp-lines of early morning shrinking to points between the cliffs. Laira came behind, having to dip her shoulders at a few doorframes, but she did not complain. She looked at everything with the eyes of someone locked for the first time inside an iron beast that knew how to fly.
The cabin door slid aside.
The space inside was wider than the sitting room Ethan had used for three days. A large bed stood against the left wall, a low table in the middle, and the entire wall toward the ship’s nose was almost one unbroken pane of glass from floor to ceiling, looking straight into the sky. White cloud drifted slowly. Farther out lay a thin skin of atmosphere and a horizon broken into pieces by stone peaks.
Laira stopped dead in front of the glass. She stepped forward and set a large hand on the cold surface, her eyes wide. Light from outside lay over her red hair and the curve of her horns, and for a moment that tall body looked as if it had been pulled up off the earth.
"I have never been anywhere with a window this wide." Her voice was lower than usual, greed mixed into wonder. "Looking straight at the sky. First time."
Rou Yan stood behind her, ears red, her eyes also unable to leave the glass. "Same for me. First time."
Ethan set his pack on a chair, looked at the two of them, then at the cloud sliding against the pane, and let out a very quiet breath. Two days of travel. A picture formed quite clearly in his mind: this bed, this glass, Laira with her eyes lit, Rou Yan flushing.
The last three days had wrung him nearly dry. The road still ahead, he suspected, would have him playing the hardworking ox again, ploughing one field after another, the only difference being that this field lay in the clouds.
Laira turned at that exact moment. She looked at Ethan, then at the glass, and the corner of her mouth curved up very slowly. Ethan had seen that smile through three nights already. It was not fierce. It only announced that the bed would not be used for sleep first.