He was seated at the woman’s rough wooden kitchen table, and the contrast between him and the modest human dwelling was almost grotesque. The ceiling beams seemed too low above him, the hearth too small, the very air too thin to contain the vastness of what he was.
Across from him, the woman stood rigid, her hands clasped so tightly before her apron that her knuckles had blanched white, her gaze fixed somewhere near his elbow rather than upon his face.
She did not dare meet his eyes.
She avoided his gaze just as Lyssena once had when they first stood before one another.
“It . . . it is perfect, Greatest,” she whispered, her voice thin and strained, her entire body shaking in small tremors that made the fabric of her skirts rustle with each unsteady breath.
“Look at it,” Erevos said, tilting the jar toward her. Instead of lifting her gaze, she shook harder.
“I—I trust it is as it should be,” she stammered, her eyes squeezing shut altogether now, as though blindness were safer than sight.
Erevos regarded her for a long moment, observing the rigid line of her shoulders, the rapid flutter of her pulse at the base of her throat, the thick bloom of fear scenting the air around her. He had told her several times that she might look at him. He had clarified that he would not harm her. He had even softened his tone—marginally.
None of it had altered the outcome.
After a pause, he decided the effort was unnecessary.
“It will suffice,” he concluded.
The woman exhaled, and Erevos rose from the table, his height forcing the kitchen into deeper shadow as his presence expanded, the corners of the room darkening in response to him like obedient hounds moving closer to their master.
“You have been efficient,” he said. “Thank you.”
Gratitude was a human custom.
Without further explanation, Erevos allowed his shadows to unfurl.
They slipped from beneath his feet and along the walls like living ink, pooling at the threshold before vanishing entirely into the seams of the house, into the cracks between timber and stone, into the narrow spaces where light never lingered.
The woman made a strangled sound in her throat but did not move.
Moments passed.
Then the shadows returned.
They re-entered the kitchen, coiling upward before solidifying at Erevos’s side, depositing at his feet a heavy leather sack that struck the wooden floor with a heavy weight. The sound alone caused the woman to flinch violently.
Erevos bent to retrieve it and placed the bag upon the table between them. Coins shifted inside with a thick metallic clink.
The woman stared at it.
At first, she did not move. Then, slowly, cautiously, her gaze dropped to the mouth of the sack, where the drawstring had loosened just enough to reveal the gleam of gold and silver within.
Her breath left her in a broken whisper.
It was more coin than most households would see in several lifetimes.
“For the ingredients,” Erevos said evenly. “And for your time.”
Her knees buckled, and she caught herself against the edge of the table, eyes wide. Erevos observed her reaction with mild curiosity. Humans valued metal greatly.
It seemed appropriate compensation for the preservation of his songbird’s comfort.
“You taught me how to take care of my songbird. For that I am grateful.”
Without further ceremony, Erevos dissolved into shadow, leaving behind the scent of cold night and the overwhelming weight of fortune upon her kitchen table.
