He clamps a hand around my ankle. “Be still!”
“What are you doing? What is that?”
“Mud,” he says. “It’ll draw the poison out. Soothe the pain.”
The mud feels cooling, and medically speaking, he’s probably right—it’s a form of poultice. Probably especially effective if there’s a lot of clay in there. “That’s smart.”
His motions are slow, big fingers gentle. How did he learn to do this? Is this what animals do when wasps sting the fuck out of them? They go into the clay?
“So many stings right here. Your calves will feel stiff for a day or two.”
“My muscles already feel weird.”
“Stand,” he says after my calves are half-caked with mud.
I stand, and he dabs the mud onto my thighs, my ass. I’m freezing and I almost died a horrible death, but there’s something weirdly sensual about him painting me like this. He stands, holding the tin. “Raise your arms.”
I comply and he paints my midsection with the cooling mud, strokes slow and sure. He gets every sting. I can feel his hands trembling. He says he’s fine, but he has to be freezing.
“Get those clothes off, Kiro. I can finish.”
He ignores me and moves around to my back, pushing aside my hair. His touch is strangely nourishing. He dabs mud on my neck, lastly my cheek. Then he gets the dry sleeping bag and wraps it around me.
Only then does he peel off his own shirt.
I sit, covered in the sleeping bag, but keeping my toes and fingers exposed to the fire.
“Don’t let it catch fire,” he warns.
“I won’t.”
He strips off his pants. His body is shockingly covered in red. More stings than not.
“You must feel like you’re on fire.”
He says nothing. Yeah, he’s on fire. Because of me.
He grabs the stick and stalks back over to make more of his mud stuff, his thighs and ass pale curves in the firelight, dotted with red.
He dabs the new mud stuff all over himself, smearing it on his neck and chest in the firelight. He’s a warrior, ancient and fierce in the fire glow.
This shit is way beyond competence porn. It’s no wonder he could beat the Fancher Institute system.
“Let me get your back.”
He squints, like he doesn’t entirely trust me in this.
“Iama nurse.”
Our hands brush as he gives me the small pot. He turns.
I loop the sleeping bag around my shoulders in the chilly air, shivering as I paint the thick, cold mud over the lumps that cover his muscular back.
I finish and he turns to me. Kiro has a way of staring shamelessly into my eyes long past the point where civilized men would look away.
“What?” I ask.
He wraps the sleeping bag around me. “Sit.”