Note: This story was dynamically reformatted for online reading convenience.
 
 "Served Cold" by Absinthe (soloset@yahoo.com)

   [ This is a fairly short work about a roleplaying episode between some
of the characters my SO and I play on our favorite mud.  It features angst,
betrayal, and some cruelty.  Since I play both Mina and Ryele, and you can
only have one character logged in at a time, this was a bitch to roleplay,
but hey, my SO *loved* it.  I think his jaw hit the floor when- well, read
for yourself.  ^_^ ]

   Rye was pissed.  He could tell that as he walked through the door into
the dining room of Talmud's, could tell from the glower on her pretty face
and the hard set to her triangular jaw.  He was pretty sure he was the
focus of her anger, a surety increased by the black glare she gave him when
she looked up and the "Hello, you lousy piece of troll dung" that greeted
him as he sat down.  Davarian Saronas was not a man generally given to
accepting abuse in silence, but this time he held his peace.  After all,
odds were good he'd done what she was pissed at him for.  Inwardly sighing,
he waved over the barkeep and ordered a whiskey, a double, neat.

   She kept her eyes down for a moment, focused on the slender wine glass
in her hands.  Her voice was taut with anger, and something else, when she
finally spoke.  "How could you?"

   He settled back in the intricately carved chair, tipping the legs back
slightly, considering how best to answer.  After all, she might not be
angry with him for the reasons he thought she was, and it was always better
to avoid giving anything away.  He needn't have bothered, however, as her
next words confirmed his suspicion that he'd been found out.

   "How could you- how could you sleep with that vicious, amoral,
life-sucking, cold-hearted bitch?" she practically spat out, her mismatched
brown and blue eyes sparkling with anger and, he was surprised to see,
supressed tears.  Not at all what he would've expected, given her own
penchant for infidelity- the sole reason he'd found himself tumbling into
bed with the next comely wench who came along.  He was about to point this
out when she suddenly leapt to her feet, knocking her empty glass over, and
stalked out, slender shoulders rigid with emotion.

   Dav let his chair thump to the ground, rubbing one large hand over his
eyes and the bridge of his nose.  Women- the only subject he ever found
himself at a loss on, and one of the few that could actually evoke emotions
in him he'd prefer not to have evoked.  Which might've been the reason he
found himself in this situation, but he carefully avoided thinking about
that for too long.  He thought about the first time he'd seen Rye instead-
in the thick of battle, her long, slender limbs and graceful body blurring
in and out of the hail of blows like some sort of unearthly fae, a wild
expression on her face and a heart-wrenching, blood pounding magical song
on her lips.

   With a surge of desire he remembered his first good look at her,
surrounded by dead and dying soldiers- there was blood on one high
cheekbone, emphasizing the heart shape of her face and the wide set of her
mismatched eyes, her creamy white hair curling around her face and ears and
falling over the curves of her crimson silk covered breasts and shoulders,
and the way she leaned on the hilt of her sword when she looked over at him
and smiled, a smile so sweet and purely joyous that for a moment he forgot
to breathe.  He'd vowed in that instant to have her, little knowing the
cost to his heart.

   He glanced moodily down at his drink.  Like everything in Talmud's, it
both complimented and was complimented by the decor, swirling with a muted
amber light that caught the color of the warm wooden bar perfectly.  Even
he matched fairly well, in dark reds and black, the amber highlights in his
auburn hair echoing his drink.  He sighed suddenly, tossing back the last
mouthful of golden fire and setting the glass back down on the bar with a
crisp motion, his eyes like shards of ice in his reflection in the long,
dark mirror over the bar.  He'd lost her, like a damn fool, and there was
no profit in continuing to suffer over it.  He was raising his hand to call
over the barkeep again when the faintest hint of wild orchids tantalized
his nose.

   "You're looking down this evening, Human." The falsely sympathetic voice
was a crystal stroke, higher and more feminine than Rye's smoky alto, a
voice that touched off thoughts of dark assignations and illicit meetings
that ended with pain.  He glanced up at her- the infamous vicious, amoral,
life-sucking, cold-hearted bitch herself.  Looking as inhumanly lovely as
always, her dark as blood hair waving lusciously over smooth, toned curves
that held very little of warmth or love in them, only a raw animal passion
that was at once her game and her sole true emotion, her deep, velvety
purple eyes too vivid to be real, Mina Direwolf was all Elf, all Sidhe.  He
thought about calling her on the ever so subtle way information of their
previous liason had somehow found its way to Rye, but didn't bother.  He
found himself staring at her slim fingered hand as she placed it on his
arm, hot enough to light a fire.

   Her hand slid lightly along his wrist, where the sleeve of his dark red
coat and the crisp cuff of his black silk shirt overlapped, burning his
forearm and almost searing a thin line into his flesh where her nails drew
along the sensitive skin.  He controlled a shiver, knowing it was the
liquid fire working its way through his bloodstream and the faintly
intoxicating smell of her working on him.  Suddenly irritated, he jerked
his arm away.

   "Oh, sulky, now... don't be like that... come upstairs with me." Her
voice was velvety now, most of the sharp crystal well hidden underneath the
silken sound, causing him to shiver again.  Davarian toyed with the glass
in front of him for a moment longer, half of a mind to refuse just to see
her reaction.  A pang of resignation stabbed him, and he knew that at least
in her arms he'd be able to forget for a while.  Wearily, he nodded to her,
climbing slowly to his feet and following her, eyes on her shapely backside
as she slipped lithely up the stairs.

   No sooner had he stepped through the door than she was all over him, her
hands busily unfastening his breeches, pushing him insistently down onto
the thick, soft rug, not even bothering to lock the door as she freed his
hard cock from the confining material and dragged his hands along the silky
skin of her thighs, pushing her skirt up above her waist and impaling
herself on him in one deliciously swift move.  He stifled a groan as he
entered her, part of his mind distracted from her wet warmth by the
suddeness of her need, the ferocity of her love-making.  Irritated with
himself, he slid his hands up under her soft shirt, along the smooth, taut
muscles of her back, crushing her against his chest as she straddled his
lap, arching along his length and sinking down to meet his deep thrusts.

   Her hands slid along the work-toughened muscles of his chest and
shoulders as she increased her pace, nails dragging across his skin in
sharp, stinging lines, an urgency in her movements that he couldn't force
himself to match.  That cold, objective part of his mind kept turning the
situation over and over, even as his powerful thighs and ass forced his
hard cock up into her and his strong hands worked with a semblance of
passion over the soft skin of her back and shoulders.  A sudden flicker at
the corner of his eye made him turn his head reflexively, to see the door
pushed open and a flash of creamy white hair as Rye looked up from the
paper in her hands, a smile on her face that died instantly.

   Her voice seemed loud over the frantic sliding and shifting of their
half-naked bodies, a strangled cut-off gasp that started out as his name.
Rye backed away, stumbling over her own feet, the look of horror in her
eyes searing him to the core.  Without another word she turned and fled,
crashing into the door jamb in her hurry to escape.  A sick feeling spread
through him, heightened by the sudden distraction as Mina climaxed around
him, a sharp, sudden stroking that twisted something inside him painfully,
threatening to send him into his own climax.  He fought the sensations for
a moment, struggling to maintain a balance against the waves of wrongness
that swept over him.  Gritting his teeth, he covered his face with his
hands, torn between self-reproach and resignation.

   Body and mind locked in a chaos of emotion, Dav stared down at Mina,
collapsed limply against his chest, sweat darkening her nearly crimson hair
and curling it fetchingly around her face.  She looked like an angel
against his bare chest, innocent and lovely and almost human, all lies so
utterly false they were painful.  Sleepily, sated, she raised her eyes to
his, a lazy, satisfied smile curving her lips.

   "Enjoy yourself?" she asked throatily, one finger tracing slow designs
on his chest, her hips shifting slightly, mockingly tightening around his
still hard cock.  His face twisted as he stood suddenly, dumping her onto
the soft throw rug.
   "No, I didn'