Authors: Arielle Archer
A blinking light showed in the top right corner of my heads-up display. I felt butterflies running through my stomach. I felt my breath start to quicken. Hell, I felt my nipples start to harden and I even felt a tingle between my legs. A hell of a reaction to a chat notification.
And it might not even be him. I had that reaction every time I got a chat notification. That’s how powerful his hold on me was.
I glanced over my shoulder to where Samantha sat bathed in the glowing light of her massive monitor engrossed in a raid or something. She was thoroughly engrossed in whatever raid she was doing. It looked like she was just clicking her mouse over and over, but I knew from the way she was staring at her screen with intense concentration, the way she was listening intently to whatever voice chat was happening over her ridiculously expensive gaming headphones that the entire world, myself included, was shut out. She wouldn’t be paying attention to anything going on over on my screen.
Good. I still didn’t want her to know about this guy. Not yet. Both because I didn’t want to deal with the inevitable barrage of questions and because I didn’t want to hear her not-so-expert opinion on the state of my love life.
I turned back. I clicked that blinking icon, a thrill running through me as I did so, and it popped up with a message.
“Good evening my lady,” he said. “Ready for that date?”
Those butterflies in my stomach were fluttering around on overdrive. To the point that I thought I might actually get sick from how nervous I was. I’d been doing this for years and yet this guy was the only person who’d ever managed to get this sort of reaction out of me. I forced myself to control my breathing. Maybe it was a date but it was also a role-playing session. I needed to get in the zone and I definitely wasn’t going to get there if I was acting like a silly girl with a crush!
“Mother fucker!”
Samantha’s shout pulled me away from the chat window which I quickly minimized since that phrase coupled with the sound of her expensive headset being thrown against the wall usually meant she was back in the real world.
I looked over my shoulder. Samantha looked over at me but there was a frown on her face. Obviously the raid hadn’t gone well, though at least she hadn’t launched her mouse across the room along with the headset this time.
“I take it the raid didn’t go well?”
“No, not really,” she groused. “We’re stuck on a boss because this idiot healer keeps fucking up and he’s trying to blame me for it! I can’t take this shit. I need to go get drunk. Wanna hit the bars?”
I blinked. This was definitely a development I hadn’t anticipated. It was an unfortunate development considering that I had date night planned with Conlan and it didn’t seem like he’d be available any time soon if I passed up on tonight. Damn it.
“I actually think I’m going to stay in tonight,” I said. “I’ve got a scene I’ve been working on for awhile and the person I’m doing it with is only available tonight.”
Samantha grinned and I winced at my choice of words. Perhaps “doing it with” somebody wasn’t the best way to phrase that. Damn it.
“Oh really? Is this special person a dude?” Samantha asked.
“Maybe,” I said. I wasn’t going to reveal anything else unless she dragged it from me.
Samantha walked over to stare at my screen and I quickly flicked it off. She crossed her arms and looked down at me with a huge grin splitting her face. A grin that made me blush as much as I would if I was talking with Conlan. I knew I was giving myself away, but what could I do?
“Keep your secrets for now Jess,” she said. “I’m going to go get drunk. Maybe head down to the bar if you get done with your new boyfriend.”
“He’s not my boyfriend,” I said.
“So it is a guy!”
I rolled my eyes as I realized I’d given myself up once again. Damn Samantha and her ability to get stuff out of me without even trying!
“Go have your drink Samantha,” I said.
She took her sweet time getting ready. I waited until I heard the front door slam shut before I moved back to my own machine and clicked on the blinking chat icon. It felt like it’d been an eternity, I wondered if he’d even still be there, but when I looked at the screen I was surprised to see that only about five minutes had passed.
“I’m ready now,” I said.
“Glad to hear it. I was starting to wonder where you’d disappeared to my lady elf.”
I glanced over towards the front door one last time and then put my hands on the keyboard. I closed my eyes, opened them, and I was in the world of Elassa.
I stood at the entrance to the Pirate Caves of Aktor. This was one of my favorite dungeons in the game, even if it was one of the earlier dungeons that only new players tended to go to. New players and higher level players who were looking for a convenient spot for a quick role-playing session. Samantha always laughed when she saw me exploring the place. She always acted like it was ridiculous that somebody with a character my level would bother with the place, but I loved it.
I rounded the corner towards the dungeon entrance and moved inside. My breath caught as the screen loaded. We were already in a party together and he was waiting for me in there. As soon as I stepped through, as soon as that loading bar finished, he was there. Towering over me.
Or, rather, towering over my character. But it might as well be the same thing. It caused the same reaction sitting in the real world in my computer chair as it would have if I’d suddenly rounded a corner and saw a tall beautiful man staring at me in the real world.
This was ridiculous. I’d only seen that one picture of him before and I was drooling over just the thought of that delicious body. Assuming he actually was who he said he was, and I wasn’t just getting catfished.
I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, put my fingers down on my keyboard, and when I opened them I was my character. I was Maia the high priestess of the Hokuten Order. I was a gorgeous high elf priestess going to meet a human adventurer in a forbidden rendezvous in a less than savory part of the world.
I eyed the human barbarian warily as I stepped into the cave leading to the pirate’s cove. I called him a barbarian, though to be perfectly honest that wasn’t an entirely accurate description of what he was. That assessment was a product of one of the unfortunate attitudes towards the lower races I’d picked up. I tried to be careful about those assumptions, but it was difficult after so many years of seeing humans prove themselves time and again as worthy of the barbarian name.
Though this human probably wouldn’t have considered himself a barbarian. Not in the way they reckoned it. Muscular men in loincloths wielding giant swords and attacking one another with no care in the world aside from where their next meal or their next mating would come from.
This one, at least, had once fine boots and wore a tattered shirt and pants that looked like they were well cared for but a far cry from the finery they’d started as. He also wore a belt with a buckle on it that bore some house sigil. Not that I could determine which house it was just from looking at that sigil. There were so many minor human noble houses scattered by the sundering that nobody could keep track of all of them. Not even the humans.
I could guess his story from a simple look. He was the son of a minor noble house. The sundering had hit him hard, had separated him from everything he once knew, and so now he wandered the world selling his sword for his next meal and probably holding himself to some outdated moral code that didn’t apply in the new realities of the world after the sundering.
But still, it also meant I could probably trust him. To a point.
Still, trust could be dangerous and I wouldn’t throw caution completely out. I was well aware it was a dangerous place I was going. I was well aware that the world wasn’t the perfect place that the Order would like to believe, to be cataloged according to their view of things.
I was aware of all of those things, and so that’s why I was keenly aware of the incredible danger I could find myself in if this strange human I’d only met once in a tavern was hostile. If he decided to cause trouble.
I prepared several nasty magic spells that would catch him by surprise if he should choose to try and take a high priestess. If he tried anything then I would at least make him very sorry that he tried, if not kill him out right. Assuming he didn’t have that little toy that negated my magic spells.
“My lady elf,” he said, sketching a quick bow.
My eyes narrowed. There was a rakish grin that crossed his face as he made that bow that told me his supposed show of respect was anything but.
I raised an eyebrow. “Is that mockery?”
He moved up from his bow and that rakish grin was still on his face. I had to steel myself. Had to suddenly concentrate on my breathing so that it didn’t start coming in quick gasps. This man was beautiful, there was no denying it, even if he was just a lowly human from what looked to be a noble house fallen on hard times.
“Merely showing my lady elf the respect she deserves,” he said.
His voice was deep, hypnotic. It had me swaying and I had to blink. I had to shake my head and concentrate on the business at hand. I was here on the Order’s business, and I definitely didn’t have time to indulge in impossible fantasies about lowly human nobles.
I sniffed and turned to enter the caves that led to the hidden cove. “Very well human, we must be about our business.”
“Are you sure you want to do this? I wouldn’t go in there if I were you,” Conlan growled.
I turned and looked at him, once again trying and mostly failing to control myself. Tried to control my breathing. I was not some novice to go mooning over a man of all things! Especially a human!
“And why is that?” I asked in a quiet voice. I wanted to laugh. He obviously hadn’t yet realized that I was easily one of the most dangerous women he was ever going to run into in the course of his travels.
“Lots of criminals, thugs, nasty people in there,” he said. “I’d hate for a pretty little elf such as yourself to get in trouble.”
This time my eyes lowered in a stormy expression. Who did he think he was? Pretty little elf? And yet even though I was indignant, even though I was angry, there was also a part of me that was undeniably flattered. My body was betraying me and a blush was rising to my cheeks. I felt a rush between my legs at his words. There was a part of me that was definitely interested in the promise that flirtatious smile offered, and the fact that this was a random guy I’d just met who I didn’t know much about didn’t seem to mean anything as I stared at him.
I pulled my hands away from the keyboard. I had to stop and catch my breath. This was so wrong. I was on the verge of going to a very dangerous place that I promised myself I’d avoid when I started in the role-playing community on this server. l shouldn’t be indulging in this fantasy.
I should go to a public role-playing location with him where I wouldn’t be tempted. I should be anywhere but where I was, continuing this role-playing session with a flirtatious man who got my blood pumping with just words on a screen! I paused in the quiet of the computer room. Made my decision. I reached my hands out, placed them back on the keyboard. Found myself transported back to the forbidden world.
I looked the human up and down, an appreciative glance that took in his rippling muscles, his broad shoulders, the way his armor barely covered all of the above. And yet I kept returning to that easy, cocky, rakish smile with his tousled mop of hair above it all. There was no denying it. This man was gorgeous. Not just for a human. He was one of the most gorgeous creatures I’d ever laid eyes on, and it was no surprise he was having such an effect on me.
Of course his attitude was infuriating. That ruined the other effects he was having on me slightly. But only just.
“What makes you think I can’t handle myself in a den of thieves such as this?” I asked. As I did I held my hand up and a small flame danced from finger to finger. His eyes widened for a moment, but that was the only surprise that he registered. I felt another stab of frustration. Usually when humans saw me working the elements like that it sent them running in terror, but not so with this man. He was calm, confident, collected, and he still had that cocky grin plastered on his face. Then again if I had an ancient artifact that wasn’t supposed to even exist that negated magic I’d probably have that same delicious smile on my face.
This man was as infuriating as he was beautiful!
“I’m not saying I don’t think you could turn any of those ragamuffins into a pillar of fire if you saw them coming at you,” he said.
I nodded and smiled in satisfaction at that admission. But that smile soured at his next words.
“Of course you have to be able to see someone coming at you to turn them into a pillar of fire. That won’t help you much in those pretty robes if someone comes up behind you with a knife.”
“Then what do you propose I do?”
The human stepped forward from where he’d been leaning against the cave wall and he stretched his massive shoulders. He lifted his arms up above his head which gave me a clear view of his incredible muscles. I realized I was staring, captivated, with my mouth hanging wide open and quickly remedied that situation. I was not going to sit here and stare at this man like some hormone addled novice, no matter how beautiful he was!