2. RIEKA
2
RIEKA
E verything about Leon Arnow was in one word—desirable.
If the gods still took human lovers, there would have been wars fought over him. He was charming, affectionate, had a voice like malt whiskey and if he smiled, a woman was likely to come right there in her undergarments.
Of all the men who I’d convinced to let me tag along on their travels, Leon had been my favourite. He had just one flaw.
Pride. Which is what I gathered Kris had stepped on escorting him from the ice mines to Keltjar.
“You think he still holds a grudge against you?” As though he had heard Kris’s words, Leon looked at me from across the room and the acrid scent of negativity struck me at the same time his inner voice did.
“ You should have left! ”
Kris' nose twitched. She’d caught the scent as well. I tried to keep the disdain from my voice. “You were saying?”
My efforts to avoid his table during service were the equivalent of forgetting to heat the oven before baking a cake. Impossible.
The miners were quite eager to stuff themselves, a lack of quality food a likely reason for their overindulgence in fats and ales. The several times I had served their table today, Leon’s commentary had been exactly as I’d expected.
“I can’t believe you’re still fucking here!”
“Gods I miss those legs.”
“Your ass looks great in those pants. Mountain life suits you.”
Sena, the local girl Engar had hired to replace me arrived on the tenth hour, and with the dining room having dwindled down to Leon’s table and the three latecomers, I was keen to head back to my room. I just had to deliver the last order to his table and then I could go.
Easy .
Except, Leon’s table was rowdy.
“No. My ma always said it was a war between the Isles. Turned the God Sphere dark when they fell,” insisted one miner.
“You’re wrong,” the second one said with a hiccup. “It was those Preans. They stopped worshipping The Nine and the whole damn isle fell out of the sky and took all the others with it.”
The first slammed down his mug of ale. “No. It was a war. Why do you think the five pantheons don’t talk no more?”
“And how do you know they don’t talk no more, you met any gods lately?” the first jeered as I stopped at the table, the heat of Leon’s stare reminding me just how long it had been since a man looked at me that way.
“You don’t know. I could have.” The second hiccupped again.
I’d been surprised when travelling through this part of the continent that such worldly topics were being discussed. I’d known Kanahari villages were not the only ones in The Hetra. Thousands of humans had settled in these parts after the Fall, generations isolated in the cold, cut off from the world down south, where the Gods used The Fall to implement their rule in person.
I had expected the conversations to come from travelling scholars from the Prean Schools of Engineering. Not locals and definitely not from overworked labourers mining for ice.
Leon’s hand moved closer to the edge of the table, inches from where mine hung at my thigh. I withdrew it and placed the tray of crispy fried chicken on the table.
He cleared his throat beside me. “Why don’t you ask Rieka here? She knows more about Idica than anyone I’ve ever met.”
The two miners looked up at me like they hadn’t even noticed I’d placed the food on the table, despite the fact one of them already had a piece of chicken halfway to their mouth.
I refused to look at Leon. He’d done this intentionally, an excuse to talk to me. I opened my mouth to object, but he cut me off. “They’re arguing over The God Fall. What started it, war or the Preans?”
The two men continued to stare; Leon continued to burn a hole into the side of my face. I wasn’t going anywhere unless I answered this question it seemed.
“Neither,” I said casually. “It was the Athusians.”
Confusion lined the second miner’s features. “Aren’t they the same as Preans?”
Number one elbowed him with a hiss. “Leon’s Athusian.”
“Prea is the region, Harol. Athus is a kingdom within the Prean Union,” Leon said, addressing the second man without removing his gaze from me.
Harol grumbled. “So why aren’t you telling us how it happened?”
Finally, Leon looked away, the smallest of smiles on his face as if amused by his fellow minor’s comment. “Do you know what happened in your village five centuries ago?” The miner closed his mouth slowly and returned his gaze to me.
I took a half-step away from Leon before I spoke. “The accounts are all slightly different but, they all agree the science and technology that now rules the Prean Union was used to attack the Prean God Isle. The device they used to target The Nine not only brought down their Isle but it made the other Isles fall from the God Sphere.”
Thousands of artistic depictions of the event were spread all over Idica, in tapestries and sculptures, media reels and paintings. It was what was depicted after that wasn’t widespread. How the different pantheons chose vastly different methods for dealing with those that caused The Fall. Genocide, empowerment, forgiveness, submission and one disappearing altogether.
“And now they walk among us,” miner number one mumbled, his words indicating he was a believer in the Prean tale that The Nine after The Fall chose to hide amongst humanity, disguised as humans.
Harol just looked more confused. “But they’re the gods. Doesn’t our being able to do something like that to them mean they aren’t that powerful?”
I picked up their two empty ale mugs and stood back. “Who says the gods didn’t let it happen? Athus and Lycoa had stopped worshipping The Nine long before the Fall. Halinon had been at war with The Gods Hold over opinions of heresy for almost half a century. The first School of Geomechanics had just been built in Torvar and Setria had just named Ormus Steamwell the Dean of the School of Hydromechanics. I’d say the gods abandoned them. But that’s just one woman’s opinion.”
I turned from their table.
Glass shattered as the empty ale mugs I’d been holding fell from my grip. The sudden contact of Leon’s hand as he touched my wrist sent my body into a sudden panic.
A glance over to Kris told me she still sat in her chair by the hearth, her pipe still smoking, wedged between her teeth. But she stared at Leon with a cutting glare. Tiny, who’d scented my shock sent a spectral of himself, offering to tear apart whatever had frightened me.
I reassured him I was fine.
Because I was.
Leon had already rushed to the floor to pick up the pieces, an apology falling from his lips. I signalled for Sena to bring me over a dust bucket and broom and began sweeping it up.
When he realised he was being of no help he ran his hands through his hair, the whiff of almonds a reminder I used to enjoy doing the same thing. That I had once made myself care about this man because it was the only way to survive. Leon apologised again and I assured him it was fine.
I stood, the shattered glass screeching loudly in the pewter bucket and walked over to the bar. I'd only just handed the bucket over to Sena when Leon sidled up beside me.
“Your hair changed,” his inner voice said softly as he leaned on the bar. I could feel his eyes, their gaze heavy as they trailed the braid down my back. The drastic change from black to white occurred very soon after we parted. It was a new facet of my blessing, and one I suspected was due to my new environment. Brutes this far north tended to have white fur. And it was just another part of my blessing I couldn’t control even if I wanted to.
“I didn’t know your taint could do that.”
Sometimes, living this far north where the Kanahari treat our Blessings like gifts, it was easy to forget half the continent didn't see them the same way. Taint was the term decreed by the first Imperator of the Prean Union, and until I crossed the border from Deos, I'd never heard a single soul speak it aloud.
I took a deep breath before turning to face Leon.
He was still so damn handsome. Coarse black curls, square chiselled jaw and those pale green eyes.
And a beard! He’d always seen them as a sign of laziness, and now he sported a thick black one that made his lips look all the more desirable.
Of course he looks more handsome with a beard!
“Good Harvest, Leon. I hope the season has been kind to you,” I said, greeting him as pleasantly as I could. His anger, confusion and desire swirled around in the space between us like a snowstorm.
“It has, thank you, Rieka.”
One of the miners mumbled under his breath, “Ain’t Rieka the one that taught him how to make them sweet cakes?”
Leon scratched at his beard. “I didn’t expect to find you still here, not after—”
After I’d left him unceremoniously standing outside in the snow after having accepted Engar’s offer of employment? Me neither.
“It’s been six months,” he continued. “I thought you’d have made it to Prea by now.”
I stared at my ex-lover nonchalantly. “It took me six months to save enough coin for the passage to Prea.”
His calm exterior faltered. “So you’ll take everyone else’s coin except mine?” There it was. That pride he’d held so dear. It carved away at the smile lines of his face, by his eyes, turning that boyish charm I’d so admired into harsh steel.
My silence made him shift again, straightening himself off the bar top. “Sorry. I just don’t understand why you didn’t just let me take you?”
Half a dozen pairs of eyes remained fixed on us, his table companions drunkenly snickering to themselves about Leon being a lovestruck fool. Lovestruck was an understatement. My mistake in choosing Leon as a travel companion was underestimating his capacity to love. The last I’d heard of him before today was that he’d managed to find employment in the Farbor Ice Mines wallowing over the woman who’d left him for an apple pie.
“Like I told you when we first met Leon, I only needed your help getting to Keltjar. We parted ways per our agreement. I thought you understood that?” My voice was as genuine as I could make it. And the fact I wasn’t lying should have helped the matter, but Leon had a stubborn streak.
He scoffed, his mouth twisting into a smirk. “And I thought you weren’t this callous.”
“I call it being practical. We kept each other company during the day and warmed one another’s bed at night. If you felt anything more, it was unintentional. Good day, Leon.”
And therein lay my biggest issue. It wasn’t unintentional. Life had taught me that there were two ways to get someone to do what you wanted. The first was by force. But since I wasn’t a god who could enforce their will upon anyone, I was left with option number two.
Seduction.
The problem with intentionally making a man fall in love with you so that you can travel across the continent, fleeing for a crime you can't remember committing, in the hopes of ending up in a place where the crime isn’t recognised, was making them fall out of love with you.
And since I’d never fallen for any of them, my behaviour after the relationship ended, if I’d ever been so lucky to run into them again, made me look like a cold-hearted bitch.
So I should have expected his behaviour. But the moment I turned to walk away from the bar, he grabbed my wrist, his fingers digging into the flesh beneath my sleeve. My body froze.
Tiny bombarded my vision with images. Visceral, angry spectrals. Begging me to let him come so he could rip apart to pieces whatever had frightened me.
Kris had risen from her chair, her presence however small, was threatening enough to send one of the guests scurrying up the stairway.
“I thought you loved me Rieka!” The stench of ale invaded the space between us, tainting his every word. It explained his reaction. Leon had always avoided alcohol, he didn’t like who he was when he drank. Now I knew why.
My heartbeat thundered in my ears, threatening to beat out of my chest.
Damp soil after a rain—the kind that gets stuck to the bottom of a boot—pine needles clinging to the mud, perfumed the air. I focused on that and inhaled until my knuckles were no longer white from holding the broom handle as if it were the edge of a cliff. I had to force Tiny’s spectrals to the edge of my vision as the knot in my stomach tightened.
“Leon you’re hurting me,” I finally managed to say as I glanced down at his hand on my wrist.
The alcohol-infused stupor that had overtaken him was broken through by my words and he suddenly realised what he was doing and released my wrist. But Leon refused to move, blocking my path.
My blessing was uncooperative most of the time. If I tried to move him by force, I’d likely break a hand. Even though he was human, Leon was still built like a bear.
His eyes narrowed. “I don’t believe you Rieka.”
“Believe what you want Leon, there is nothing between us any longer.”
With his voice low, and the alcohol aiding in his discontent, Leon closed the space between us. “All those nights together in the Pass, and you still felt nothing?” His eyes fell to my chest.
“Oh how I’ve missed your body,” his inner voice crooned as his eyes trailed down my figure.
I attempted to move around him, but it only urged Leon to close the distance. I walked right into his chest.
Trying to ignore the way the alcohol-induced smirk on his face twisted his lovely features, I took a deep breath. “This is beneath you, Leon.” His expression hardened, his eyes darkening.
This was not the man who’d carried me on his back for two days when he thought I’d sprained my ankle. This man was the perfect example of what happened when selfishness met kindness. And broke it.
He opened his mouth as if to say something else.
“Is everything alright, darlin' ?” came a smooth mellifluous voice.
The Lycoan, at least three inches shorter than Leon had silently wandered over to us moving his body to within a foot from mine, his gaze directed on the broader, much larger man before him. Much to my surprise he’d addressed me in Deogn when earlier we’d spoken in Prean.
Flattered that the man thought I needed saving, I opened my mouth to inform him I had everything under control when at that exact moment the Lycoan’s inner voice spoke up.
“I wonder if you’ll think this chivalrous, sweeping in to pretend to be your lover to get this guy to piss off,” he said as he looked down at me from the deepest of blue eyes. “I should have called you wife instead, right?”
“Fuck off pretty boy,” Leon growled at the Lycoan. “This is none of your concern.”
Completely unaffected by Leon and his threatening scent, an indication of the Lycoan not possessing a Brute blessing, he quite casually responded.
“I’m flattered you think I’m pretty. My mother would thank you for the compliment. I have her cheekbones,” he said breezily before his tone starkly shifted. A warning, in tone and scent. He took a step towards Leon. “And you are incorrect. It is my concern when you make threatening advances on my wife.”
Leon’s mouth formed a hard line as his attention was ripped from the Lycoan to me, the woman who had betrayed him in more ways than one.
His inner voice shook. “You married this asshole?”
Whilst no Brute was capable of entirely shapeshifting into the creature of their blessing, as an Apex Brute I should have been able to call on any aspect of that metamorphic state. However, I had been defective since birth and could only hope my wolf side didn’t show up in high anxiety moments, let alone the traumatic ones sending me into a blackout with no recollection of what had occurred during the interim. So the only parts I could always rely on was my instincts and my senses. And right now, without looking at him, I could tell the Lycoan’s body was mere inches away, his hand hovering by my hip and not a speck of ill intention in the air between us.
I took his hand. His body was utterly at ease with the sudden contact from me, and so I entwined our fingers together.
Leon saw this and his entire presence seemed to deflate, like a puppet whose strings had been cut and he was seconds away from collapsing onto the ground.
One of the miners quickly approached and wrapped a wind-dried hand around Leon’s shoulder. “And he’s very happy for you, aren’t you mate?” He tried moving Leon, but the Athusian was fused to the spot, my previous rejection of his affections made all the more painful by this sudden announcement.
Leon chose to remain silent, so I chose to end the conversation. “I wish you nothing but happiness Leon, and I truly hope you find it one day.”
He did as I’d hoped. Leon glowered one last time at the Lycoan and then let his colleague lead him back over to their table where he proceeded to take one of the mugs of ale and swing it for several seconds.
After a minute, the consecutive string of spectrals Tiny had sent since my confrontation with Leon finally faded, the last one being the image of himself dining on a snow hare. He informed me that since I did not need his assistance, he would be unavailable for the next hour. The near-altercation had ignited his hunger.
The Lycoan whose hand I realised I was still holding chose that moment to whisper in my ear. “Not that I’d ever object to holding a beautiful woman’s hand, but perhaps now would be the right time to move this ruse away from the jaded ex-lover.”
I turned and found myself facing the very source of the earth and pine scent. It took me a moment to curb my wolf instinct and not rub my face against his, letting my skin soak up his scent. Longer than a moment if I was honest.
Get it together Rieka!
I smiled coyly, flirting to distract myself from the consequences of my past actions. “Jealous husband?” The word felt odd on my tongue, a dare that sent shivers down my spine. However, that may have been because the Lycoan was caressing my thumb as we continued to hold hands.
His blond brows knitted. “Certainly not. My mother always said a husband should trust his wife.”
“Really? And how would she feel to know you married a woman you just met?” I smiled, unsure why I was continuing this train of conversation. It wasn’t at all because of those blue eyes and the way they reminded me of the ocean as the tide came in and the joy I’d felt as the waves threatened to take me under.
The corner of his mouth perked up, the golden bristles of his beard rising with his smile. “I’ll have to tell her when I return home.”
As his eyes slowly dropped to my lips, I whispered, knowing the sound was beyond Leon’s or the miners’ human hearing. “And where is home?”
He opened his mouth to respond when another inner voice broke me from my reverie.
“Married?” Kris asked, knowing I could hear her since she and her brother alone knew of this facet of my blessing. I looked over the Lycoan’s shoulder at her. An amused grin was plastered to her face, her pipe once again perched between her teeth as she stared at me and my "husband . " “ Why didn’t I get an invitation?”
The air was cold as it brushed against my hand having quickly withdrawn it from the Lycoan’s grasp. I cleared my throat as I stepped away.
“I need to go…bake.”
The scent of flour and eggs, of butter and sugar always brought with them memories of my mother in our small bakery in Aronbok, before we were elevated to Devout—the highest caste in Deogn Society. I could recall my brother sneaking in to steal a pastry right off the hot oven tray, my father gently wiping the flour from my mother’s cheek, and my mother instructing me on the most precise way to knead the dough. It was a form of expression, of artistry, of devotion.
Now it gave me control. A constructive and healthy outlet for my emotions. I was aware of that fact. I admitted I knew I needed it. Needed the control that baking gave me. There was a structure to the art that when followed correctly provided a result that was satisfactory for both parties involved. Any deviation from those rules and the sense of achievement deflated like an undercooked loaf of bread.
The strawberry pie I had decided to bake for instance; the filling needed exactly two tablespoons of lemon. Any more, and the taste was unbalanced. The crust required cold butter to be worked quickly into the flour mixture or else the texture was wrong, and the moisture should be evenly distributed after the dough is formed, so it must be placed in cold storage for one hour. And if it was baked over thirty-two minutes the base would be burnt.
It was particulars like those that kept my thoughts focused, concentrating on the task at hand to ensure that when the occasional stray thought did persist I was quick to refocus. I had to bake three pies just to ensure I remained in the kitchen for the duration of Leon’s wallowing.
I could smell and hear him in the dining room for a few hours after our encounter, chugging down his third mug of ale, his thoughts of rejection intruding on my own. It would do neither of us good to meet again. I needed to think about something else. The scent of the strawberries, the force with which I was kneading the dough.
Don’t overdo it. I don’t want it to be rubbery.
I focused on my arms, on the movement they made when they applied pressure and released it. On the muscles.
The Lycoan was quite muscular. The way the veins popped in his forearms when he held out his book to me. When he had held my hand.
He was still out there. The scent of pine needles and earth snuck their way in amongst the butter and milk. I also detected parchment and ink. And he certainly hadn’t been intimidated by Leon’s size. Most men would have recoiled. And he spoke both Prean and Deogn, so he was educated. It made me curious. Scholar, wanderer, or something else. He most certainly could have learned the language from a parent, his mother perhaps. Or he could be like myself, self-educated. Though Prean wasn’t as difficult as Old Prean and that book was most definitely Old Prean. So many vowels.
He wasn’t a Brute. That type of physique came naturally to my kind. A circumstance of our blessings. But he didn’t smell like one of the Blessed, so it had to have been worked for. Either pride or necessity led to his appearance.
His very attractive appearance.
I decided to bake bread as well.
It was midday when Leon finally ventured up to his room, his almond scent thinning as he rose to the second-floor rooms, and late afternoon when I heard Kris’ soft snores coming from her place by the hearth. Engar, who thankfully had no knowledge of what had occurred in the main room left me to my work.
When the dinner service started, with Sena taking over once again, I took out two plates of perfectly cooked, deliciously smelling golden-crusted strawberry pie.
I carried them into the dining room, now crowded with a third of the inn’s guests. Leon, now having sobered up refused to look me in the eye from the table he occupied in the corner, his shame a harsh cloud hazing the air around him.
When I placed the plate in front of Kris’ nose, her eyes shot open and she happily took it from my hands. I then walked over to the far table where the Lycoan was still sitting, the book from earlier keeping his attention, his gold blond hair out in waves just tickling his shoulders. I placed the pie down in front of him.
“It’s strawberry pie,” I said when he looked up at me curiously, adding that it was on the house.
He instantly brightened at my words, a single eyebrow rising. “Because I’m the in-house baker’s husband?” he asked.
“Obviously.” The ruse had absolutely not been the reason. But if that was what he thought, I would happily play along. Leon was still in the room after all.
“Who can say no to free pie.” He then proceeded to tie back half his hair with a long hairpin from the table.
I watched him intently as he turned the plate to examine the pastry. He took the spoon and almost haphazardly cut through the crust and into the filling.
“It’s good,” he finally said after the third bite.
I opened my mouth to comment when I heard footsteps approaching from behind. Kris appeared holding a bottle of Torberry Wine in one hand and three glasses in her other. “Who’s up for a game of “Have you ever?”