10. 9
Davian answered the door in a manner I had never before seen.
He still wore his mask, but below it, his face was relaxed and his posture at ease.
He wore a loose linen shirt half-tucked into sleek black trousers, unbuttoned to his chest. I could see dark hair and a hint of gold peeking from the parting of his shirt.
His mark from Samiscus. I couldn’t help the curiosity.
So, this was the man when he was at home. Something playful danced in his eyes as he took me in, from my uncovered dark hair to my booted feet, drumming his fingers on the doorframe. “What changed your mind?”
I tried not to blush under his gaze. I reminded myself that I had seen many men in far fewer items of clothing, and that the attractiveness of this specific man should not undo my years of experience. I was Ekrissian. “Does it matter?”
He tutted. “If we’re going to be working together, yes.”
There was a pause as I stared at him.
The House of Pain was situated on the far western edge of Dytho, against the city walls themselves.
It was a large building with the same capped triangular roof propped with stone columns as the other godly Houses.
They’d each been built with the same structural frame.
A decision made by the first Leaders in Dytho to ensure fairness between all the Gods.
Its doors and window frames were painted in black, however, and its servants matched the aesthetics of night.
Behind him, though, the hallway gave nothing away.
A plain wooden facade sat on the walls and a runner lay on the stone floor.
I swallowed and gave him part of the truth. “He didn’t love me.”
Davian had the gall to look sympathetic. “Ah, I see.”
“He just wanted an Ekrissian.”
He nodded, and there was another pause as I waited uncertainly on the doorstep to a House I had never expected to set foot in.
Davian rubbed at his jaw. “Did you decide how you wanted to be paid?”
“Do you know anything about Ragnifort? The God of Fire?”
A surprise widened his silver eyes. “Little, but we have ways of finding information.”
“Good,” I said. “I need to know where he is.”
“Can I know why?”
I shook my head.
Davian studied me, then nodded. “I’ll see what I can do.” He took a step backwards, and wafted his hand. “Do you want to come inside?”
Did I? I supposed I would have to. This was where Davian lived, and I had agreed to help him find the truth.
My motivation wasn’t entirely spiteful. I wanted to have a purpose, to help something and have some agency, when it felt like I had no control over my own life.
There was no way I could find out where Ragnifort was lurking alone, nor could I convince Robar to love me again now that he had eyes for Jusia.
I needed help, and I needed distractions. Davian provided both of those.
I nodded, and he smiled. This one met his eyes, as it never had when we had walked around the city and sat in the Folly. It disarmed me to see it, and I started to worry if the true distraction wasn’t the mystery, but the man.
Davian led the way, and I guiltily admired his height and his wide muscular shoulders as he walked, pushing open the door to what appeared to be a reception room.
A counter, similar to one at a taverna, protected half of a clerk from view.
She wore spectacles and a knowing look as I walked in behind him.
She nodded to Davian, and then left the room holding various sheets of paper.
Davian turned to me as I studied the high windows and low seats. This wasn’t quite a reception room. It was more of a waiting area. A place for deals and decisions. Ink pots and quills were positioned on each table, ready for a customer. Curious.
“That’s Whip,” he said, pointing at a huge black cat lounging over a table in the corner, stretched out and asleep. And then he pointed to a tiny white cat, sitting beside a plant pot on top of the counter and licking her front left paw. “And that’s Carnage.”
“Carnage?” I asked. It was a big name for such a small thing.
Davian grinned. “She was originally called Nine Tails, but then she knocked so many of the patrons’ cups off the table that a rename was in order.”
“Why Nine Tails?” I asked. That was an odd name, too, though I figured it had something to do with that myth of cats having nine lives.
Davian coughed, smothering the noise with his elbow, and looked away from me. His black hair curled slightly under his jaw. But all I could see was the mask, and I couldn’t discern his expression. “House joke.”
I furrowed my brow but nodded. I walked slowly over to Carnage and offered her my hand.
She paused, her paw still lifted. She sniffed my fingers, and then stood up.
Her tail raised into the air as she nudged into my hand, and I rubbed her head with a smile.
She was the cutest thing, dusted with grey on her face.
Then she turned around and brushed her body against the plant pot.
It wobbled, and then it toppled.
Davian came from nowhere, catching the pot before it smashed all over the floor. He crouched, his hands and shoes covered in dirt as he placed it down on the ground.
I couldn’t help the laugh that bubbled out at seeing him staring miffed at his dirty hands. The cat, for her part, only jumped down from the counter and twirled around Davian’s legs. He looked at me as he straightened, and he smiled at my laugh. “Told you. Carnage.”
Our amusement faded as our eye contact lingered. We both looked away. I was in love with Robar, even if he didn’t want me. This man was clearly still in love with his wife. We were here to try to understand her murder. Jusia’s warning replayed in my head. ‘Stay away from Davian.’
I had done the exact opposite. I had run right to him a single night after the Fancy. And yet, she hadn’t stayed away from Robar. Whatever fleeting happiness that Carnage had caused turned sour in my gut, and I gestured to Davian to continue.
He led me through into an empty corridor, and then paused. “I’ve asked one of the clerks to get a room prepared for you.”
I froze. “What do you mean?”
He flicked a look at me as if I was being incredibly stupid. “You can’t stay at the Eclipse whilst we’re investigating.”
My hackles raised and I felt a burst of hot defensiveness. “Why not?”
“Many reasons,” he said, dragging his eyes over me with a stern look that felt infuriatingly superior.
Why had I found him attractive two minutes ago?
He was clearly determined to boss me around.
“Mostly, though, if the wrong person finds out what we’re doing, you’re too accessible there.
Anyone can pay for your time and hurt you. You’d be safer here.”
I hated that I immediately saw the logic.
If Davian was right, the answers at the end of this mystery weren’t likely to be pretty.
Working as a courtesan left me open to persuasion, to access, and to questions.
I hadn’t realised that helping him would mean giving up my only source of income, my livelihood.
“I need that work. She’ll replace me if I leave. She might not take me back after.”
We both stilled, thinking about what I said. After. When we’d found a killer, or a body. Hardly a simple task.
Davian’s face hardened, and he rubbed at his cheek. “Can you find a reason to need a month off? Say you’re visiting family, or you need longer after what happened with your betrothed?”
I grimaced. “She knows I have no love for my family.” His face softened, and I didn’t want to see the pity rise as it always did. So I shrugged. “But yes, she might give me a month.”
Davian reached his hand out. Not in sympathy, not in a tantalising touch. But as a nobleman might do for another man. A deal to be clasped. “One month, Annie. You’ll have a room here and money for whatever you need. If we’re going to find a killer, I want you here.”
I looked at his hand. His bare fingers were completely steady. Nothing of the shaking grip around the pipe from the other night.
“Besides,” he continued, his hand unwavering. “I think you overestimate how easy you are to replace, and just how rare you are.”
I smiled, instinctively, beneath the praise. Then I told myself off for it. It wasn’t a compliment, it was a statement of fact. I was an Ekrissian. That was hard to replace.
But nevertheless, I placed my hand in his, and grasped it as his hands swallowed mine. Call it whatever you wanted, I wanted to help him as well as myself.
“Alright,” I said, raising my eyes to his pleased silver ones. He reminded me of a cat himself at that moment. “I’ll stay. Though I don’t want any part in whatever it is you do here.”
Davian tipped his head back and laughed for the second time that day. His changed mood was remarkable. This was a carefree man, one unshackled from whatever had been haunting him the last few days.
He smiled. “Can I ask you a personal question, Annie?”
I nodded cautiously. I wasn’t a private person by nature, though Vasile’s warning from yesterday rang in my head. If we were to be investigating, I ought to close myself off more.
Davian’s gaze did not waver. “What do they teach you about pleasure in the House of Love?”
Again, I fought against my blush. There was nothing too personal about it.
It was a matter between us and our God. It was not sexual, necessarily, in the same way that a chosen intimacy between two people is sexual.
Our intimacy was worship through pleasure.
I enjoyed the act of giving pleasure such that I could serve Ekris, not for my own relationship with the patron.
I made myself keep my eyes on the Samiscan.
“What every Ekrissian is taught. To give relief through touch and tongue.”
He clicked his fingers together, and I blinked in a fraction of a flinch. “That’s exactly it. Relief. We do the same.”
I narrowed my eyes. “You hurt people.”