Atalanta claps, apparently delighted with what she sees. I don’t look. I refuse to look.
“The treasure you need, you’ll receive after the deed. As you depart, it will”—she looks Kato up and down with unabashed libidinous craving, her tongue sliding along her lower lip—“warm your manly parts.”
I glare at her. “That does not rhyme!”
She unslings her bow, nocks an arrow, and shoots me. Sort of. If she’d meant to kill me, I’d be dead. I think I lose some hair, though. In any case, Kato is faster than I am. He spins me out of the archer’s path again and deposits me back behind our stalagmite. In the time before he lets me go, my face is buried in his chest. Crisp, golden hair tickles my nose and brushes my lips. His skin is still warm, and smells of man, and frost, and leather. He turns almost as fast, leaving my face against his back. I exhale, and goose bumps spread across his skin.
“I go with you now,” he tells Atalanta, “and you leave her alone. You will not harm her. Ever.”
Atalanta makes no response that I can hear. Maybe she nods. I don’t know. I can’t see around Kato and about a mile of naked back.
He seems satisfied, but then adds, “I’m keeping my boots.”
I can’t help it. I look down. Before I get to his boots, though, my eyes snag on a very fine backside. I’ve only ever seen one naked male bottom. I tilt my head to the side. There’s no real harm in seeing two.
Kato half turns, looking at me over his shoulder. My eyes jerk back up, a ridiculous blush hitting my cheeks like a thunderclap.
“Griffin will kill me for leaving you alone in here,” he says.
“Griffin will kill you for being naked in the same room with me,” I answer.
He grunts. “Believe me, I’d rather be dressed. It’s bloody cold in here.”
“Go, then,” I reluctantly urge. “Atalanta will warm you up.” The words almost stick in my throat. It’s hard not to choke on them.
The muscles in Kato’s bare arms ripple as he clenches his hands into fists. “There’s still the lyre, and the monster.”
I push on the middle of his back with the flat of my hand. He needs to go before he freezes to death. The warmth is already seeping from his skin. “That’s my part, I guess. You just heed the Goddess’s needs when you see Artemis. Needs,” I remind him. “Not wants.”
“Heed the need,” he echoes, looking less enthusiastic now that he’s freezing cold and actually parting from me.
Kato suddenly turns and grabs my wrist, crushing Ariadne’s Thread into my skin. “Keep the string tied. No matter what, you find your way out.”
Does he really think I’d leave him in here? “I find you, and then we both find our way out.”
He looks ready to argue. He looks ready to turn this whole plan on its ear.
“Go.” I give him the hard look Griffin is always giving me. “Go before I give in to my base feminine curiosity and look at your ‘manly parts.’”
Kato slowly drops my wrist. “I’ve seen you naked. We’d be even.”
“Being even isn’t high on my priority list.”
He grins. Then he sweeps his big hand over the top of my head, turns, and walks away.
There’s a long moment when my heart forgets to beat. Atalanta takes hold of Kato’s arm and drags him toward a shadowy tunnel. As she turns back to me, her long hair sweeps over his bare skin, and I wonder what she’d do if I took out a knife and sawed it all off.
Shoot me probably. For real.
“Don’t follow us. Go that way.” She points to the third tunnel on the left.
No rhyme this time? I bare my teeth, a horrible pressure building in my chest. I’m terrified of never seeing Kato again.
They enter the dimly lit passageway. Rows of uneven icicles hang from the rounded entrance of the tunnel, making it seem as though they’re disappearing into a monster’s gaping maw. Sharp teeth. Dark gullet. Ready to swallow them whole.
I shudder as they disappear from sight. To keep myself from chasing after them, I fold Kato’s clothes and then tuck his things into our satchel before strapping his leather armor to the outside of the bag. His cloak is too big to fit inside, so I throw it over my shoulders and fasten it at the neck. The heat of my own cloak diminishes as the two fire-wrought garments balance their warmth together.
There’s a cold spot deep in my chest, and nausea plagues my stomach as I walk toward the third tunnel on the left—into my own gaping maw. More than a foot of cloak drags on the ground behind me, sweeping my footsteps from the frost.