Gyn Wolf's Story: Chapter Five- Fast to Heal, Quick to Temper
Riddick took a step towards Gyn when he saw the blood drain out of her face. Her golden skin turned deathly white and she dropped to her knees in the dirt, her shoulders slumped.
Unable to comprehend what had just happened to her, he merely stood there, staring at her bent head. Then he was kneeling in front of her, his hands cupping her shoulders. “Gyn. What’s wrong? What just happened?” He could feel the slight tremor that ran through her body.
She lifted her head slowly and looked at him, her expression unreadable, her gray eyes darkened to almost black. “Ven? And Brand? Are you sure that’s what their names were?”
“Yeah, sure enough. The reason I remember the names is because the two of them reminded me of you so much.” He searched her face carefully, tried to pick up on her emotions, but they were strangely sheltered from him.
“How did they look?”
“How do you mean?” he asked her.
“Were they well? Beat up? Hungry? Dammit, Riddick, were they well!?”
Riddick surprised himself by rearing away from her sudden outburst. The last part of her question had come out a primal sort of roar, her teeth bared. She’d even risen up high on her knees so she’d seemed to suddenly grow a half foot in height.
She slumped back down. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, head bent down once more. “It’s not your fault. I never should have... but I had to. Otherwise...” she trailed off, not completing her thought.
He laid his hand on her shoulder and she looked up at him. “They looked fine. Strong, like you. She has different hair than you and so does the boy, but otherwise, they look like you.” He smiled at her. “Except, of course, for the major injuries and bandages.”
She nodded, not smiling like he’d hoped. He didn’t understand his need to make her smile. His need to make her happy. For one thing, he didn’t know anything about her, except Jack had said she could help him. For another, he’d never felt like this for anyone. But he was feeling it now. He hadn’t thought he could ever become attached to someone, but Jack had proven him wrong.
After leaving Imam at New Mecca, they’d been together for four months. Planet hopping. Then he’d gone and gotten spotted by a merc. No good, that. So he’d left Jack with the two miner siblings on Dres and went looking for the woman Jack said could make him disappear. He hadn’t told Ven and Brand who he was, where he was going, who he was looking for, or when he’d be back. They’d said they’d look after Jack until she got settled, but couldn’t make any promises for anything permanent. They were miners, and they never stayed in one place long.
That had been eight months earlier. “Who are they?” he finally asked Gyn.
With a groan, Gyn pushed herself to her feet, stumbling weakly, and he swept her up into his arms. She stiffened and pushed against his chest. “I can walk,” she stated.
“And I can carry you.” His voice was deeper and more gravely than usual, brooking no argument.
“Fine,” she grumbled. “Carry me, slave.” She yelped as he dropped her to the ground with a thud.
She sat on her butt in the dust, looking up at him, teeth bared in feral a manner.
“No one calls me ‘slave’,” he growled, his own teeth bared.
With speed Riddick didn’t even see Gyn possessing in her injured state, he found his feet knocked out from underneath him. Before he could roll back up she was on him, her knees in his chest. And she had a blade to his throat. His blade to be specific, and he hadn’t a clue how she’d gotten it out of his waistband and to his neck.
“And no one tells me what I can do and can’t do, Riddick.” Her teeth were fully bared, and he saw that they weren’t just a little canine like. The long, white fangs seemed to have grown, and he didn’t wonder that maybe they had done just that. Then she was off of him and on her feet, the shiv on the ground beside his head. “I wanted to walk. I’ll walk.”
With that, Gyn turned on her boot heal and stalked back into his cabin. He more than half expected her to slam the tin door, but instead she closed it very calmly, which seemed even worse to him.
When he finally went inside after her, ten minutes later, she was sitting cross-legged on the mattress. Her boots, socks, and the bandages that had been around her ribs all lay on the floor beside her. The bandages had been neatly cut off and he wondered what she’d used to do that. She didn’t look at him, didn’t even acknowledge his presence with so much as a sniff. He thought maybe she was ignoring him, but upon closer inspection he saw that she was in deep meditation. He wished he could drop everything like that and just relax for once.
Her eyes suddenly flashed open and she gasped, holding her throat. He leapt at her, grabbing her shoulders. She rolled using the leverage she had in her position and his weight that he’d thrown at her to her advantage, launching him over her head and into the wall. He slammed into it with a thud, the breath knocked out of him and landed on his back with a grunt.
Riddick rolled onto his stomach and looked at her. She was crouched about three feet away, but for once her teeth weren’t bared at him, and she wasn’t growling. That was a plus, he decided wryly.
“Dammit, Riddick, you can’t sneak up on me like that. I could have killed you.”
He pushed himself upright. “You didn’t seem to object to that very idea outside a few minutes ago,” he said, rubbing his bruised stomach. She’d shoved her feet into it when she’d launched him into the wall. That had been her leverage.
She stood up and brushed off the seat of her pants. “If I’d wanted to kill you out there, I would have.”
He knew she wasn’t bragging. It had been the truth. He’d been underestimating her because of her injuries. And, he admitted to himself, because she was a woman. He’d stop sneaking up on her, he decided. And he’d stop underestimating her under any circumstances.
“I thought you were choking to death. One second you’re quiet and the next your gasping for breath and grabbing your throat. What was I supposed to do? Let you choke to death?” He was indignant. It didn’t help when she burst out laughing, clutching her ribs.
“Stop!” she gasped. She continued to laugh, loud belly laughs that filled the small room. Tears began to roll down her cheeks as she laughed. He wasn’t feeling well. No one had laughed at him before. Ever.
“Why are you laughing at me?” he growled.
Gyn sucked in a couple deep breaths and attempted to compose herself. She finally succeeded to some point and looked at him semi-seriously. “I’m not laughing at you,” she insisted. “I’m laughing toward you.”
His lips twitched. “Okay. Why are you laughing ‘toward’ me?”
“Because first I threw you against the wall when you tried to help me, and then you acted hurt. The great, evil, escaped bad ass con Richard B. Riddick was indignant because he actually tried to help someone and then got his ass whomped on.” She started laughing again.
“I didn’t get my ass whomped on. You took me by surprise.”
“Only because you took me by surprise. “She became serious very suddenly. “Look, Riddick. I’m sorry. About this, about a few minutes ago, about everything. About all the trouble you went to get me out of that hell hole back there. It’s just... I’m not used to anyone giving a shit about me and then you save my ass. I don’t know how to act. No one has cared about me in over six years.” Gyn shoved an impatient hand through her blonde hair, throwing the short strands into spikes.
“No one has cared about me in a lot longer than that.”
“I know.”
He looked into her troubled eyes. “You never told me who they are.”
She cocked her head to the side. “Who?”
“Ven and Brand. Who are they? Are they from Trys-Ornay?”“Yeah. They’re my little brother and sister. Ven and Brand Wolf. We’re family. At least we were.” She sat back down on the mattress beside him. Then she shot him a sidelong glance. “My ribs are better.”
He frowned. “Can’t be. There were at least four broken ones and more than that were bruised or cracked.”
“I told you, I heal fast.” She lifted the hem of her shirt, exposing her ribs to his gaze.
He pressed his fingers against them tentatively. She didn’t flinch. Even the bruising was gone. He checked her shoulder. The cut was almost gone and the bruise was completely absent. “Legs?” he asked.
She nodded. “Them, too.”
He leaned in close, examining her face. Lips weren’t split anymore. Black eyes were gone. So was the bruising on her cheeks and jaw. “Your back?” he questioned.
She shook her head. “No. Not those. They’re still too fresh from last night.”
He dipped his head. “I’m sorry.”
“I told you not to be sorry, so don’t be. You’ve seen how I get when I don’t get my way.” She smiled at him.
“Yeah. You get down right bitchy.” He smiled back.
“And don’t you forget it.” Then her expression became serious and she bent her head to look at his throat. She’d drawn blood when she’d pressed the shiv against his neck, marring the dark gold of his skin. “Shit, Riddick, I cut you. Now, I’m sorry.”
“We’re even then,” he murmured, transfixed by her soft blonde hair. He sucked in a deep breath when he felt her tongue flick out and lick the blood from his skin. “Don’t do that.”
Gyn pulled back and looked him in the eye. “Why not?”
“Because I don’t want to hurt your back again,” he growled.
She smiled. “Mmmm. Is that the only reason?” He nodded. “Good. Then we’ll just have to put you on the bottom this time.”
And then neither of them were worrying about anything anymore, except making the other one happy.