Page 29 of Rauf: Minotaur Mates

I reached for the nearest one. It backed into the others, then tried to squeeze past me along the ledge. Teresa would probably have known how to coax it closer. I caught it around the middle before it got away.

It bleated and kicked me in the stomach.

“Hold still, damn it.”

I shifted my arm beneath its chest and tried to keep its hooves pointed away from me. It was slippery with water and whatever filth it had been lying in, and it had no intention of making this easy. I got it against my shoulder, high enough to keep its head clear, and started back.

The swim would have been easier if the goat hadn’t kept trying to climb over me. I came out with a hoof caught in my shirt and mud smeared up the side of my face. Drev caught hold of the goat while I climbed onto the bank, and Teresa hurried over to take it from him.

“Oh, thank you.”

She knelt with the animal between her knees and ran a hand along its side. When she looked up at me, there was enough warmth in her face to make me consider going back for a whole fucking herd.

Almost.

Gods, I wanted to kiss her. There was mud on her cheek, and I wanted to wipe it away so I could put my mouth there. We were both filthy, my clothes were dripping, and I would have happily sat down beside her and pulled her into my lap.

I left the rope around me. Once Drev had the line again, I went back into the water.

The ledge was empty when I reached it. Wet marks led farther into the cave, where the other two goats had apparently decided they’d be better off.

“It’s like you buggers don’t want to be rescued.”

I followed the strip of rock along the water until I spotted one of them above me. It had climbed onto a narrow shelf well over my head. I couldn’t even see where it had put its feet to get up there. At least it was safe from the water.

The other one was gone. I peered into the gaps between the rocks and listened for it, but I couldn’t hear anything over the stream. I was turning back when someone shouted.

“Help!”

I stopped. That hadn’t sounded like a minotaur. The voice was too high, without the depth I was used to hearing.

There was a light farther in. I followed it around a jut of rock and found a lamp lying on its side beside a heap of fallen stone. Water washed over the lower rocks, carrying grit through the beam.

And a man.

He was half sitting against the cave wall, tugging at a leg buried beneath the rocks. His head came up as I got closer.

“Hello? Can you hear me?”

“I’m here. Are you injured?”

“Oh fuck!”

He tried to scramble away. He didn’t get far, and I stepped closer to see what was holding him.

The only human men I’d seen on Ceres-9 were Theeodus, Nezara’s assistant, and the occasional transport pilot. I had no idea what this one was doing out here. He certainly hadn’t come to look at the goats.

“Please don’t kill me.”

He was staring at my horns. He’d called for help on a planet full of minotaurs. Who the fuck had he expected to answer?

“I’m trying to help you. Are you injured?”

“I’m fucking stuck.”

A slab of rock lay across his leg, pinning him against the cave wall. I cleared the smaller stones off it, then crouched to get my hands beneath one edge.

“Stop pulling. Let me lift this.”