11. Renard #3
“My wife,” I say softly, the pain no longer raw but scabbed over and aching dully.
“When she was heavy with child—our twins—she fell quite ill. Scarcely had the energy to lift a brush, let alone braid her long hair. She had lady’s maids, of course, I was First Knight then and we were still living at the seat in Valehar.
But it became one of my favorite evening rituals with her. ”
She is quiet for a moment. “You don’t like to mention them.”
“I try not to mention my family unless forced.”
“That seems healthy,” she says, but I’m coming to find her sarcasm somewhat… comforting.
“It has served me adequately. It does not do to dwell in the past,” I say abruptly.
The comb catches on a stubborn knot, but I untangle it slowly before continuing.
I pluck the pine needles and bits of dirt away as I go, taking note that some of the moss around the base of the antlers seems to be growing from her.
It doesn’t seem to bother her when I pull the pale green growths away, using the comb to restore her hair to the color of snow-reflected moonlight.
Her hair is colder than I expect near the ends, damp from melted snow, but warmth emanates from the base of her elegant neck.
My attention snags on the exposed line beneath her ear where her hair has fallen forward—an empty canvas that beckons a man’s lips and promises ruin.
I force my gaze to the knot instead, accidentally tugging the strands with a bit more force than I mean to. Vireth hisses in pain, and I freeze.
“Sorry,” I mutter.
“Do be careful. They’re sensitive.”
“My deepest apologies.”
I move more gently now, taking the opportunity to thread my fingertips through the strands to massage her scalp. Her eyes drift closed and her mouth drops open, and the soft moan she unconsciously makes is sin itself. My cock hardens in my breeches, distracting me from my ministrations.
She glances back, then seems annoyed that she finds this pleasing—in that, we are in agreement.
“Hold still,” I tell her.
“I am holding still.”
“You are practically vibrating with distaste.”
“That is my natural state.”
“Poor thing,” I tease, smothering a chuckle. She huffs in exasperation.
Dividing her hair into two sections, I plait them quickly and pin them around the top of her head where the antlers are poking through her scalp. It gives her the air of a severe governess, but with her hood up, it’s much easier to hide them and doesn’t seem too strange.
When I’m finished, I step back and she reaches up to run her fingertips across the new style.
“Well,” she says, surprised by my skill, no doubt. “That is… not an abomination.”
“High praise, indeed,” I chuckle.
“It’s the highest praise you’re likely to get,” she chirps, but offers me a faint smile that’s open and genuine.
I busy myself putting away the comb so I don’t stare and dwell on the way her smile summons blood to inconvenient extremities.
We continue downward through the pass, the mountains rise around us in towering black walls streaked with snow.
Vireth explains the layout of the mountain range, pointing up at the left peak—called North Fang—and the broader one on the opposite side, called South Fang.
It’s easy to see why, since the whole passage curves inward like the mouth of some enormous beast, stone teeth overhead and ice gathered in the cracks.
“When I was little, my mother and sisters used to tell me stories about this place. They say the pass was bitten open,” Vireth tells me.
“Bitten by what?”
“Well, it depends on who’s telling the story. A monstrous wolf, an evil dragon, an ancient god whose name I have quite forgotten now. The one Bronwyn used to tell me became my favorite version—it involves a giant hag with iron teeth.”
“Of course it does.”
“The other versions were all about chasing power or wealth, but she was following a lover who’d abandoned her. And she was so practical about it! There was a mountain in her way, and she solved the problem.”
“A lesson for us all.”
“Exactly.”
The path widens as we descend into the valley and the wind loses some of its bite. Snow still decks the tops of the pine trees, but around the trunks there are patches of black soil where roots and sparse growth have broken through.
Smoke rises up above the treetops, curling like beckoning fingers. As we get closer, timber-shingled rooftops appear down below.
The village sits tucked comfortably between the mountains, blanketed with a thin layer of snow from last night’s blizzard.
Houses crowd together, almost as if they are huddling for warmth against the bitter wind that gusts down through the pass.
Narrow black streams of icy water thread through the settlement, crossed here and there by crooked wooden bridges.
“What’s the name of this place?” I ask.
“Morsell. A little bit of something stuck between the Passage of Teeth.” She grins, and my heart gives a pathetic thump at her amusement.
We approach the edge of the village slowly. The air is thick with peat smoke, roasting game, and bread fresh from an oven. People notice Vireth almost at once. Or rather, they seem to notice the odd shapes hidden beneath her hood.
A boy carrying turnips stops outright until an older woman cuffs him sharply between the shoulders and sends him on. Two women near a stall of carved wooden cooking utensils fall silent. A man mending a gate looks once, then lowers his gaze.
There is wariness, certainly, but it lacks the sharp edge of disgust that she—we, if I’m honest—likely expected. There is an alien sense of recognition, perhaps, or caution, or maybe even expectation from everyone we pass in the streets. Vireth stiffens, anyway.
“You are making a face,” I murmur. “We’re here to make inquiries about your seer, and if you keep making that face, no one will be amenable to answering our questions.”
“What face?”
“You’re scowling at everyone, as though you’re expecting someone to point at you and scream ‘Monster!’ at the first opportunity.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I am doing no such thing.”
“You are.”
She throws me a glare, and when I raise a hand to prove my point, she relents and wipes the sulk from her face.
Fixing her lips in a polite smile, she pushes past me and walks at Magnar’s head.
With her cold-pinked cheeks, haughty posture, and fierce gaze, I reckon it is the loveliest fit of ill temper I’ve seen in a long while.
The village square is busier than I expected—although, in hindsight, I’m not certain what I expected from a fae village.
It’s close enough to a human village to be mistaken for one, should you overlook the pointed ears and needle-sharp fangs on the passersby.
Stalls crowd together beneath colorfully patched awnings.
Smoked fish and fresh rabbit carcasses hang beside ropes of onions.
A baker sells dark loaves from a stone oven built into the side of a hill.
The smell should be comforting, but it’s not.
Something is… off. Just to the side of the baker’s stall, a woman gnaws at the end of a loaf of bread, but her expression is still sharp with hunger.
Beside her, two children bicker over a bruised apple while a basket of them sits within arm’s reach—each one looking more perfect than the last. A goat tied near the well chews steadily at a bundle of hay, but its flanks look thin beneath the shaggy coat.
Vireth notices it, too.
“Renard…”
I nod, anxiety twisting my insides, because this is familiar—all too familiar. “Yes, it started just like this in Valehar. The famine.”
Her jaw tightens, brown furrowing in confusion. “But it is here. How? How do you think it found its way up through the mountains when Hollowmire has remained largely untouched?”
I exhale. “I don’t know. It must be spreading somehow.”
“I suppose everything finds a root eventually.” She says it absently, attention still on the woman with the bread. I frown at her answer, considering.
Near the center of the village stands an inn beneath a faded painted sign depicting a white stag. Age and weather have worn the beast’s face into something solemn and rather unwelcoming.
“Let’s try in there first,” she says. “Maybe they can point us in the right direction.”
Immediately, we’re met with a wave of warmth that smells of woodsmoke, sour ale, hot stew, and years of travel-sweaty bodies packed together. Conversation lowers when we enter, then rises again by cautious increments.
The innkeeper glances up from behind the counter, his gaze moving over my sword, our travel-stained clothes, Vireth’s hood, and finally Nibblebones peering out from beneath her cloak.
He pauses just long enough to decide he is not being paid enough to ask questions—then again, perhaps the swords have more to do with it. By all rights, a sensible man.
“We need rooms,” I tell him.
“How many?”
“Two,” Vireth says immediately. “Two rooms. A bath, if you have it, and whatever meals may be added on.”
“I have a horse outside, as well, if you’d point me in the direction of the stables.”
The innkeeper blinks. “We only have the one.”
“Stable?”
“Room.”
“What utter nonsense,” Vireth scoffs. “This is an inn!”
“It’s a small inn. Not many travelers on the eastern road these days. We’ve the one room, and our other one we turned into a second storeroom. We’re bringing in lots more preserved foods these days, gotta have room for it all.”
“Poor harvests this year?” I venture. “Or something more serious?”
The innkeeper’s expression turns suspicious, and he merely shrugs at my question by way of answer. Vireth’s brow furrows, and she opens her mouth to argue, but I cut her off before she can offend the man.
“We’ll take whatever you’re willing and able to provide.”
Vireth’s gaze snaps to me, but I ignore her simmering outrage. I also ignore the thrill winding through me at the thought of another night spent close to her.