Once to save Reshina from a sure death.
The other…
The Other.
It was a sure way to die unless a Goddess arrived to save you.
But I could not call what Ishtak did to me a rescue. A curse,maybe. An affliction, most definitely, and the truth of it had been revealed recently. The teeth marks from a Beast remained on Reshina’s skin, and therefore, so did I.
She had taken my book. I was sure of it.
I contemplated whether I was irritated at the theft or that she hadn’t said a word about it. No snide remarks about my notes in the margins. No questions as to why I’d taken such a liking to poems of love and loss.
Instead, she’d spoken nothing more than simple pleasantries in passing.
Good morning, Arthur. I am well, Arthur. Goodnight, Arthur.
It’s all she’d given me and it was all the pleasant remarks I could stand. Worse than silence, I took each one as a hit—a slap to the insignificance I was to her.
But perhaps it was for the best. The longer she saw me as nothing more than a happenstance she’d make her way out of, the more likely she’d kill me one day and take us both out of this curse.
The clack of her thinly heeled shoes echoed in the hall behind me, and I turned instantly, my heart racing at the sight of the Goddess draped in another of Piffle’s creations. She wore a tailored black men’s jacket, taken in at the waist with a point to the shoulders. Fabric had been added, trailing down her back to the floor while a thin black floral lace made up her skirts in many layers. A long slit split across her left leg, all the way up her thigh.
I swallowed my initial desire, one I was sure she would deny me. “I see Piff is raiding my closet to clothe you now.”
Her approach was swift and confident, an eerie power radiating wherever she roamed that sunk into my belly and pulled like a string to her side. I quickly met her across the hall, careful not to touch what the Beast screamed was mine.
“Something you hadn’t worn in years, he told me.” Sheplaced her hands firmly on her hips. “Piffle figured you wouldn’t miss it.”
“How could I, seeing it on you instead?”
Refusing my bait, she lifted her chin. “He mentioned you had something to show me.”
“I’ve barely seen you in a week. Will you tell me how you’re feeling?”
Her eyes met the floor briefly. “Fine.”
“Fine,” I repeated. “You’re fine.”
Her chin lifted even higher in an impressive attempt to look down at me, though I towered above her. “What is it you wanted to show me?”
I looked her over, deliberately taking my time.
She radiated otherworldly beauty. Anyone with working eyes could see that. But it was the underlying soul of the woman I wanted to get to. To see. To hear. To taste again. I’d known her past for many years of my life, but I wanted to know hernowas the Goddess dragged into the Underworld, scheming her plans of escape.
“Dine with me,” I said, taking another step towards her.
Her head fell back to keep my gaze. “I’m not hungry.”
“You are,” I laughed. “I hear your stomach churning. I smell your blood working to keep you alert. Your short clipped answers tell me even more so?—”
“You cannot possibly hear my stomach or sense my blood. My answers are short because you are wasting my time.”
I shook my head. “The Beast can sense these things. Dine with me.”
Her eyes shot past me, darting to the western corridor.
“Please,” I added, shifting in front of it.
