Tessa woke up because of the noise created by the fuss of the detachment preparing to leave. Before she could open her eyes, she sensed a strange aroma hovering in the air. He was vaguely familiar to her and in a moment made her remember what happened last night. Embracing herself, the girl tucked her knees in and whimpered plaintively, trying to understand what was going on in her head right now.
She removed her hands only after a couple of minutes and, opening her eyes, noticed several white spots on her sleeping bag. This made her even more angry. The very body of Tessa, who, of course, was completely naked, was now completely cleansed - the law of the developers extended to the inhabitants of this world as well.
Looking around herself, she stood up with a sigh, feeling a tingle in her stomach. Putting one hand there, Tessa clenched the other into a fist, trying in vain to extinguish her anger and some other feeling she did not understand.
Having dressed and straightening her slightly disheveled hair, the girl gently pushed the exit curtain. At the same moment, several pairs of curious eyes stared at her, causing the hand clutching the fabric of the tent to tremble treacherously. Tessa suppressed the urge to hide back with all her might, understanding the reason for such an interest. Taking a deep breath, she gave her face a confident expression, after the brow immediately went out.
At that moment, to her left, she heard a familiar voice:
- Good morning.
Slowly turning her head and looking into her emerald eyes, Tessa involuntarily clenched her thighs, which were strained to the limit. Immediately looking away, she froze for a moment, trying to organize her thoughts.
After standing like that for a few seconds, she silently walked past Ray, who watched her staggering gait with a smirk. After yesterday, the guy did not help her with the "wounds", so the result was, so to speak, on the face.
- Wait. he said when Tessa moved away a little.
The girl's head was lowered, because, no matter how hard she tried, she could not look into the eyes of the members of her squad. Hearing Ray's words, she wanted to ignore them at first, but wisely chose not to.
- What do you want? Tessa asked, turning her head towards him.
- You promised to teach me your language. Or is that a promise you're not ready to keep either?
The words cut to the quick, but she could not be worse.
- Later. - answering, she turned away and continued to walk towards the tigress, who was lying nearby.
Ray seemed to be satisfied with this answer, because he immediately went home.
Tessa, sitting in front of the tigress, affectionately stroked her fur, listening to the cat's guttural rumbling.
To her surprise, she didn't know how the night had ended. The last thing she could remember was making her cheeks blush, but beyond that, there was only darkness.
“Have I really lost consciousness…” - the thought was interrupted by the displeased growl of the tigress, whose hair was pulled hard.
Apologizing to the pet, the girl lowered her head, in which there was no longer a single coherent thought. At that moment, she felt something wet and rough pass over her face. Tensing sharply, Tessa saw in front of her only the huge head of a cat, from the mouth of which the tip of the tongue still protruded. This gesture amused her a little and made her hug the neck of her faithful friend.
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After collecting her own things, the girl decided that it was worth clarifying everything that had happened to the rest of the detachment. She understood that most of the camp, if not immediately guessed the reason for Rey's visit to her tent, then the sounds emanating from there dispelled all doubts. Therefore, as soon as the squad was ready to depart, she took her place and spoke loudly enough for the nearby mercenaries to hear her:
- I lost. His stake was a panther, and mine ... - the girl's voice trembled a little, not allowing her to finish the sentence.
At that moment, her second deputy spoke up, because the first, after being wounded in the stomach, had not yet come to his senses and was now lying down on one of the wagons traveling at the very end of the detachment.
He told us last night. I do not understand Faroese well, but I caught the main idea. Like: “Your leader is a worthy person. I proudly kept my word."
Hearing the man's words, Tessa was momentarily stunned. She didn't understand why Rei did it, but she was a little grateful to him. At the same moment, the girl noticed a huge shadow that covered part of the space in front of her eyes. Turning sharply, she saw Cess - the steps of the cat were so quiet that she could not feel his approach due to the conversation. The panther was now wearing a huge saddle, which greatly spoiled its imposing appearance, but now the rider could hold himself much more confidently.
The girl did not look up. She didn't want to see the guy's smug face, but he spoke first.
- We can start. We'll start shooting when the squad gets to the parking lot. As he said this, Rei involuntarily noticed that the rest of the mercenaries were now even further away from him. If earlier everyone was afraid only of Tsessa, now the young son of the forest instilled a slight fear in them, because they did not consider him a part of the detachment, however, like himself.
Not knowing what to say, the girl involuntarily expressed her previous thoughts aloud:
- Thanks. For what you said to the others.
- It does not matter. You can thank me tonight.
Hearing his words, the mercenary still looked at him in amazement. The guy calmly looked at the girl and answered the question standing in her eyes:
- Yesterday you "left to rest" too early.
Tessa's face turned crimson, either from anger or shame, so she immediately lowered her head.
Ray, noticing that she was not going to answer, decided to change the subject:
- Human language. Focus, there are only a few days left.
Gritting her teeth, she began to explain.
***
This language turned out to be a little more complicated than Faro, consonants in it were in a large preponderance, making it slightly cutting to the ear. Ray chalked it up to being unaccustomed and was simply listening intently to the explanations of his teacher, who clearly wasn't enthusiastic about teaching him.
The guy himself, on the contrary, was in a great mood. Let the night go a little differently than he imagined, but he was able to let off some steam and now even the surrounding plain, which had begun to bother him, seemed to be brighter and more alive. The only thing that spoiled such a beautiful day was Tessa's displeased face, which now and then looked angrily in his direction, but as soon as their eyes crossed, she immediately turned away, either blushing, or frightened.
Ray was a man of action, so he immediately asked:
- How long are you going to act like this? Just tell me what's up.
She just rolled her eyes in response. Glancing around, she made sure that no one could hear them because of the noise created by the movement of the camp, and because of the certain distance between the mercenaries and Ray. After thinking for a while, she nevertheless decided to throw out the accumulated discontent on him:
- How dare you say that!? You… you took me by force! And now, as if nothing had happened, you are forcing me to teach you, besides, you say that you want to do it with me again. How do you think I should behave!?
After listening to her, the guy had to admit that there was some truth in her words, but this did not mean that he considered them completely true.
“I just made you keep your end of the bargain. The same is true for language acquisition. And why are you so worried? I thought you liked it too.
Tessa didn't understand how he could be so thick-skinned. In this regard, even Cess would envy this strange guy. But the worst thing was that his words made her blush, because the Faroese was right to some extent. The girl did not say anything, turning away, she stopped paying attention to him.
But Ray was straight as a board, so he didn’t pay attention at all to Tessa’s obvious unwillingness to continue the conversation.
- Do you have a favorite? Is that why you feel so uncomfortable?
The girl believed that he would no longer say anything, so this question was a surprise to her.
- None of your business. And if you talk about it again, I won't teach you anymore.
These words made the guy frown, but he still restrained himself, deciding to save this conversation for later. In addition, the girl sighed several times and continued to explain to him the basics of language proficiency.