Total pages in book: 204
Estimated words: 193124 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 966(@200wpm)___ 772(@250wpm)___ 644(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 193124 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 966(@200wpm)___ 772(@250wpm)___ 644(@300wpm)
“Yes, sir,” I say.
Gathering my cloak, I start to walk up the stairs, and as the warrior falls in behind me, I imagine he’s not led very often by another. My employer stays below, watching us, but not because he’s protecting me. He’s curious to find out, as the others are, what this killer in my wake will do to me as a way to judge what might come in their own direction.
The Gauntlet’s second floor is a cave-like hallway of closed doors that’s illuminated by oil lanterns that have stained the ceiling and walls with smoke residue. I go straight ahead, and given the sounds of moaning and creaking beds, I gather that business continues apace, in spite of our newest lodger. I blush ferociously as I take him down to the last room on the left, and I feel his presence looming behind me, the floorboards protesting under his weight, the soft jangle of his weapons and chain mail like the hiss of a coiled viper.
Though he brought the cold in with him, he makes me think of fire: At the moment, he is banked and contained, but the potential for destruction is never far, and I tell myself that it’s because of this latent threat that my body is aware of every move he makes.
Yet I’m not afraid, for some reason. I feel … alive.
When we get to the door, I go to open it for him, but a long arm extends over my shoulder to push the panels wide. He smells like leather, metal, and cedar soap, and I breathe in deep as I stare into the darkness of the room he’s been assigned. Only a slice of restless, golden light spills inside, and even still, he walks right in. The fact that he doesn’t know what’s awaiting his entrance seems not to worry him in the slightest. Then again, anything with a wink of self-preservation would get out of his way.
As he turns around, the illumination from the hall bathes him, and nothing else. He’s not just of the shadows, he’s tamed them.
“Are you not coming in?” he asks as he sets his plate and tankard down out of sight.
“Why would I…” I clear my throat. “I’m sorry, what?”
“Or has that villager already engaged your services?” I feel his eyes traveling down my cloak. “Never mind, I can wait while I eat my meal.”
With a frown, I struggle to understand. “The farrier? I have no business with him—”
“Didn’t look that way.” He shrugs. “There’s no need to be shy about our professions, is there? I do what I do best for pay, so I don’t judge others for the same.”
Someone orgasms across the hall, as if to back up his point, and all I can do is stare in disbelief at the mesh covering his chest. Incredulity aside, when I consider all the illegal things I’ve done, I guess it’s far better to be thought of as a whore than risk anything even close to my truth.
“I’m glad you understand,” I mumble.
“So you come back. When you’ve finished with him.”
Lifting some of my cloak up, I lean in. “Do you not know what this is?”
“Of course I do. It’s a Pox cloak.”
Measuring the power of his body, and his long, flowing hair, I shake my head and think of the way Sallae Mae and the other women stared at him with hunger that hadn’t been faked for effect.
“Whyever would someone such as yourself pay for something … like me.”
His nostrils flare as he breathes deeply, and when he closes his eyes, his head falls back a little, as if he’s savoring something. “Meadow flowers. Sunshine. And … a fresh, mineral spring in a basin of crystal stones.”
He relevels his face, and his voice is something altogether different now. It caresses me: “You smell of a freedom I once had, a long time ago. How could you not be beautiful.”
Before I can respond, he extends his hand. The copper piece he put on the table downstairs is in the center of it. “Take this. And come back.”
In the pause that follows, the loneliness that’s always defined me mixes with a need I’ve never felt before. I’m a virgin, utterly untouched, and up until now, my spinsterhood has always been the least of my concerns. Standing with this stranger? I suddenly find myself wondering what the sexual act is like.
And I decide that just once, I might want to share my body, especially with him—
“No,” I say sharply. “I’m not coming back here.”
“Why?”
I blurt, “I don’t know you.”
“You can call me Merc.” He bows. “And you are…?”
“As in mercenary?” And no, I don’t want to know what he’s called. He’s already too close, no matter the physical distance between our bodies. “Your name is your job?”
“Precisely. So what does that make yours?”