Dreamer's Redemption

Chapter Two

            Dominae stood with her hand against the door for some moments after she'd left the kitchen. She stared thoughtfully at the werewolf. He met her gaze only briefly before turning away. "What?" he asked, voice rough.

"I was just thinking," Dominae said, "that I never said thank you."

"What for?" Torrin wiped at a spot on the bartop.

"You kept me out of the middle of that fight in the woods," she said. "But I suppose that's only the tip of the iceberg, isn't it?" To the werewolf's puzzled look, she said, "There are a lot of things I ought to thank you for."

"Forget it," Torrin said. "I hardly expected thanks. You humans are an ungrateful lot."

Dominae sighed and moved to the opening in the bar, slipping through. "I suppose we are," she said.

"Dominae?"

She turned to look back at Torrin. "What?"

His eyes still focused on the bar, he said. "You're welcome." He looked up at her for a second, then away again.

Dominae felt a surge of hope. She nodded and walked to the fire, wondering if her friendship with Torrin was finally starting to heal.

###

She was still sitting at the fire over an hour later when Cacia came down. Minion had not returned, and Dominae was beginning to worry about him. She didn't notice her friend until the other girl was making her way through the crowd to the fire. "What's all this?" Cacia asked.

"Interviews for our new party members." Dominae shrugged.

"Odd," Cacia said. "Who's interviewing them?"

"Perry," she said. Seeing the blank look on Cacia's face, she added, "He was the bartender yesterday."

"Oh," Cacia said with a blink. "I see, I guess."

Dominae chuckled and shook her head. "Never mind that. Where's Jason?"

"Asleep," Cacia said. "It takes a lot out of him, keeping me from feeling the-- you know." She looked away shyly.

"Ah," Dominae said. She glanced toward the door. Still no Minion. "Do you trust him, Cacia?"

"Of course! He rescued me, didn't he?" Cacia said.

"Yeah," Dominae agreed. "Funny, I never thought anything was wrong with him or Hope."

"I know," Cacia said with a sigh. "Aside from the fact that they wanted to hang around with us, that is."

Dominae mused. "Now that you mention it, they did show up while we were talking about Agasha."

"Dominae," Cacia said, rolling her eyes. "Before we left home, we didn't talk about anything but Agasha. It would have been more weird if they'd showed up when we were talking about something else."

"You have a point," Dominae said. She looked at the fire, brooding. "Hope wanted to be my friend pretty badly."

"Yeah," Cacia said. "And no one in their right mind wants that." She made a face at Dominae. "Come on, Domi. Admit it. You liked Hope and Jason."

"I did," Dominae agreed. "And I thought they liked us, too."

Cacia sighed. "That's where it gets hard to take," she said. "Knowing that they used us to come here, and that Hope wanted to leave us for dead."