Chapter VIII
VIII.
She intended to ask him about his distraction without trying to intimate that anything was amiss.
She didn’t actually know if anything was amiss.
She intended to make a passing mention of it to see if her misgivings had some foothold in reality, but after yet another span of days, the suspicion abandoned her foremost thoughts.
While inelegantly poised on the countertop, she scrubbed the cabinet shelves and picked at the food tray every time she came down for something.
Her plans required the Fir’Darl’s assistance.
The jars she retrieved from her vyardin, strewn about the kitchen, would not suffice.
She might have asked the Magic for jars that morning but recalled his instructions to bring her requests to him.
“Fir’Darl,” she addressed when he entered, still perched on the counter. “Just the fellow I wished to see.”
“Goode morrow to thee, Rivani,” he bid her, falling back on courtesy.
He came from the direction of the great hall today and paused.
He raised his brows, clearly caught off guard when she expressed delight at his interruption.
“Mooste pleased am Y that Y mayest satysfy thy desyres.” He spread his arms out and inclined his head. “Lookest thou as long as thou needest.”
She screwed her mouth up at his literal interpretation of her request, giving him a disapproving glare.
She clambered down from the counter and straightened her skirts before she surveyed him, intending to do as he suggested.
She had not gotten much of a look at his feet the other day, having stopped herself from her study once she had reached his hips due to intrusive thoughts.
She expected the same as his hands — dexterous clawed paws — but found instead massive hooves at the end of spindly ankles, features too precarious for a body of such size.
“Still the same Fir’Darl,” she pronounced after a cursory glance over the rest of him. “Did you intend to join me in breaking your fast?”
“Nay.” He tilted his head. “And whilst thou art styll uncerteyn, thou art not afrayd today.”
“Do you want me to be afraid?”
“Ydeallie, nay.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “Y woldest perhaps have preferred to accorden styll somewhat ymprefsyve for yet a lytle whyle, however.”
“Proud and vain, I do believe!”
“‘Tis nary so much as once Y was. Alas, permanent flaws of character.”
She almost patted his arm in consolation of his mournful tone. She clasped her hands behind her back to keep herself from doing any such thing.
“I do not think you need fear losing your impressive nature, Fir’Darl. A person can only maintain a level of terror for so long. If we are to live together, it does not suit either of us for me to remain afraid.”
“Aye,” he conceded. “Thou speakest verrilie.”
She redirected her attention to the reason he had been in her thoughts. “I need more jars. I brought everything I had, but it will not be enough.”
If he had asked, she would not have been opposed to telling him her reasons.
He did not.
“How manie?”
Good. He trusts that I need them for a reason and is showing me enough courtesy not to question my needs. She bit her lip, thinking that he showed real promise. Promise of what she did not explore, but if this behavior continued, there was hope for their cohabitation.
“Many more.” She scanned the kitchen to judge what the vyardin could hold. “Perhaps that cabinet full?” She paused, trying to think about food stores too. That would keep her busy here and well-stocked when she left. “Maybe more? How many can I request?”
She spied the doors to the larder and the buttery, the former which she had inspected and cleaned in her first days there, the latter which had not opened for her at all. She glanced at him over her shoulder.
“You do not happen to have food storage anywhere I haven’t seen, do you?”
“Woldest thou lyke to rephrase thy questionne?” The corner of his mouth quirked up. “Y know not all that whyche thou hast seen.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Aye, Y know.” His expression sobered. “Yet here, yf thou speakest a neede or ynquyrie, thou must be precyse yn wordage. ‘Tis not always kyndlie, the Magyck here.”
“Ah, yes,” she agreed, realization dawning on her. “I know that the Magic brings the food,” she waved towards her breakfast platter that sat neglected on the long work table, “but I know magic can dry up. Do you keep food stores? If so, may I be taken to see them?”
“Thy mete ys magycked ynto exystence.” He crossed to the buttery via the other side of the table from her, his hooves making that unnatural sound on the stones. “Y gather or hunt for my mete.”
She canted her head and teased, “Do you not like the food here?”
She thought he would be amused at her question but instead, he paused at the door, his brows drawn low.
He stared at the door for a long moment before he turned his attention back to her.
His gaze did not meet hers. “Y can do naught for myself,” he admitted.
“Thy mete ys for thy nourishmente. Thy brush ys for thy hair. Thy clothes art for thy drefsyng. Thy jars wilt be for thy use.”
“I suppose you made your trousers then.”
“Y can do naught for myself. Y can but ask,” he explained. “Yf mine ynquyrie ys granted, thanne such pryce ys oft too great.”
“You have to bargain if it’s for you.” She worried her lip with her teeth.
“And bargayn dearlie.”
“How do you bargain with the Magic?”
She could tell he was thinking, weighing the wisdom of answering. The moments rushed by in the space of his silence.
“Y can think of no way to explayn yt.”
She accepted this answer. Although unsatisfying, he offered none of the insulting responses for which she braced herself, responses to the effect that it would be beyond her comprehension or outright lies. In appreciation for his honesty, she acted upon a thought she had while his silence reigned.
“I will never be able to finish this all on my own.” She grabbed her breakfast platter and brought it to the end of the long table closest to where he stood at the buttery door.
“Let us wait on the food stores. I started the morning project too eager to give much time to break my fast. Would you help me finish it?”
The confusion and consternation that passed over his face might have caused her to chuckle if it had not been so disconcerting to think that such a small gesture befuddled him.
“Thou art offeryng to share thy mete? Of thy own free wyll?” His hand dropped away from the door handle.
She settled on the bench, her legs on the outside of it as she waited for him either to join her or leave.
She chided herself for being a foolish madwoman.
Who encouraged the Fir’Darl to stay in their company?
Maybe she lay dying out in the storm and all this had been a fevered dream just before her final oblivion.
Her posterior ached too much on the unyielding bench beneath her to believe her experiences only a fantasy.
Her imagination lacked such thorough attention to detail.
“I said as much,” she said.
“Thou must speak thy consent playnlie.”
If he could do nothing for himself, then it made sense that she needed to allow him to partake of the Magic that had been allotted for her.
“I, your Rivan guest, do hereby invite and include you to the informal ritual that is my meal, to keep company with me and to share my food when you wish. I offer this by choice, without aid or coercion.” She raised her brow at him. “Will that do?”
His eyes darted around as if he awaited an answer from another. After a moment, he redirected his attention back to her.
“Y thynk that yt myght.” He inched around the table as if trying not to startle her. He pulled the bench out to accommodate his larger stature but did not sit. “Thou art certeyn?”
“Sit,” she insisted, “before I throw food at you for vexing me.”
He did as she commanded and sat. He folded his hands on the table where she might see them. The muscles in his neck twitched. “Thy vyttles mayeth turn to ashes whylst Y attempt to consume them.”
“And then we’ll know,” she said. “You mentioned that you hunt. Do you only eat meat? I recommend the cheese. Dairy is such a luxury that I enjoy it most. But if no dairy, try the sausages.” She froze. “You don’t mind it being cooked, do you? I’m afraid that’s all I get served.”
“Thy kyndness astounds me.”
She groaned and pointed a stalk of asparagus at him in as threatening a manner as she could.
“I have a new bargain to propose — I will let you continue to be impressive so long as you will let me be begrudgingly civil. You will cease to be impressive when I start being kind.”
He smiled at that, a grin so large that from anyone else it might have been charming. With all his pointed teeth clamped together like a bear trap, no one would have called it anything other than terrifying.
“Thy begrudging cyvylytie ryvalest mine ymprefsyvenefs.”
“Better.”
He unfolded his hands and reached out with a single claw, skewering a sausage. He sniffed it first and then ate it off the tip of his claw. He chewed, his pink tongue running over his lips.
“Y have forgotten the taste of cooked mete.”
She would not ask about it now, but if he had forgotten it, it must have been a long time since he had enjoyed such.
She had the impression that this act of sitting across from each other, sharing food presented enough of a shocking novelty to him that to ask probing questions might ruin the ground they managed to cover.
“I am assuming that means you did not taste ashes.”
“Thy afsumptionne ys correct, unlefs ashes taste lyke cooked mete. Yf Y cook, thanne aye, ashes for thy dynner.”
“Then you hunt, and I will cook,” she smiled.
“Woldest thou?” He breathed hard through his nostrils. “Thy begrudging cyvylytie extends fer.”