Page 33 of Snake Eyes & Bad Luck

Avelina didn’t know about bards. But she knew books. And if this were one of her books, Callum would have already had a change of heart. Heroes, anti-heroes, always have an epiphany and turn to the light. They become good people, try to do the right thing. She couldn’t even fantasize a version of Callum where he was anything but the rotten man she’d come to know.

Funny enough, she wasn’t sure she’d want him to change either. Avelina liked him just the way he was, as terribly awful as that seemed. The warlock liked her outlaw, she wouldn’t change a hair on his head. It was a shame her life wasn’t a book, because she could almost imagine a happily ever after for them.

Chapter Seventeen:

Cottonmouth

Avelina woke the next day with far more pep in her step than Callum saw the day prior. Her pallor was better for sure. She still coughed like she smoked tobacco pipes all day inside four steel walls with no windows or doors, but outside of the occasional rattle from her lungs, she was back on her feet. Which meant they could at least leave the cabin in search of food. Callum was grateful the last time Neddy helped him with a wound, that she’d left some of her special pixie dust behind. It was meant to heal ailments, poisons, infections, etc. Which didn’t help him much except for when his little warlock decided to call his bluff and race out into a storm.

The sun was brighter as they slid onto the soggy path beyond his cabin. “Where are we going?” Avelina glanced around.

“Get some fresh grub.”

“You…want me? To help you hunt?” Her face twisted up all kinds of disgusted and disgruntled.

“You wanna eat broth for another full day?” he countered.

“No, but don’t you have underlings to do this?” Her tone suggested she was teasing.

Callum stopped in the middle of the trees, twisting at the waist to stare at her. “You? Want me? To trust those buffoons with grabbing fish?”

He wouldn’t trust his crew to grab anything edible. They’d likely spend the whole day dicking around, panic at the last second, and bring home something poisonous in nature. Or worse, they’d actually try and fail.

“We’re getting fish?” Avelina immediately deflated.

Callum snorted, “Did you think we were gonna go skin a Paladin and throw them on the spit for dinner?”

“Oh! I’m sorry! Was that so far outside the realm of possibilities?” She threw her hands out in exasperation.

“First off, fuck you.” Callum jabbed a forefinger in her face, then stabbed it in the direction of the shed. “Secondly, get yer ass in the shed and grab the fishing trunk.”

She glanced past him with furrowed brows. “How will I know what’s the fishing trunk?”

“Ye’ll smell it.” Callum smirked as she stomped past him, through heavy, sticky mud toward ‘the shed’. Which was less an actual shed and more a one-bedroom house with no working pipes, dangling from ropes instead of standing on legs. Like a hanging pothos, it swung delicately in the humid breeze in a net. Moss dangled out of its base, along with other rotten boards that swung beneath, creaking eerily. No windows, no lights, just a door at the front. She approached, stared up at it, then glanced over her shoulder at him. Callum put his hands on his waist, smug as could be. “Need a boost, darlin?”

“Fuck you!” she spat, grabbing a hold of the door frame and hoisting herself up into it.

“Atta girl.” While he could have simply reached inside the door and grabbed it without having to look, he wouldn’t lie, he enjoyed hearing her curse and kick things about. Five minutes later, she dropped out of the building, coughing up a storm. He grinned from ear to ear as she foisted the crate into his chest. It hit him hard and he grunted in response.

She snarled with her teeth bared as she dusted herself off. “What’s in there, anyway?”

“Junk, mostly.” He slithered past her, leaving her to furiously stomp her foot, then cough hard into her elbow, then pitch another fit. Eventually, his poor warlock followed him. Callum continued steadily toward the docks, leaving the creaking shed behind. The crate in his arms stunk. Hard enough to make eyes water, but he’d grown used to the stench of dead, hot fish. During the summer—which was funny, as when it wasn’t storming, it was always summer—the swamp waters evaporated a bit. Enough to catch some fish unaware and flopping in the mud. On the hottest days in the middle of the year, the smell was enough to knock a person out of their boots.

Callum slithered up onto the dock, happy to find the river a foot lower than the dock. Perfect. Setting the crate down, he pulled out the fishing rod and assembled it with a singular click. As far as rods went, his was decent. It was a thick wooden base with a skinny metal extension with eyelets. But this isn’t for me, not really. He threaded it before she made it up the steps. When she approached, mouth open to likely sass him once more, he shoved the rod into her arms.

She made a sound that was between a squawk and snarl as she stumbled back a step. He grinned, peeling off his shirt. One hand up and over his head, he tugged the fabric off his shoulders. He dropped it over her head. She scrambled to remove it. Callum took the momentary distraction to slip down into the water and wade out far enough that she couldn’t reach him. Or cannon ball. He was bobbing a few feet out when she managed to throw his shirt onto the dock.

Callum harrumphed, “Now, that’s just rude. I’mma need that.”

“What!” she snapped with a hard click of her teeth. “Are you doing in there? What am I doing with the rod? I thought you were fishing?”

“I am!” He swiped a hand down into the water and snatched one of the looky-loos that swam up to see what all the splashing was about. Callum threw it overhead onto the dock. It sank into the box and Avelina gasped. Ducking down, he dropped into the rather steady lull of the water. His tail flicked through patches of vegetation, hunting down the larger game. After a tango with a school of roach fishes, and wrangling a gar, he returned to the dock with his catch.

Slapping the long, toothed beast onto the dock and Avelina shrieked. “Why does it have teeth?”

“The better to bite ya with, Darlin. Just wait till I find the paddlefish in here. That sonofabitch gonna feed us for days.” Before she could blast him with magic or backtalk, he sank back down into the river. He circled the patches of moss and roots that reached up into the lake. The paddlefish in his lake preferred to stay deeper, further away from the dock. He found them when the largest fish, like the size of a hog, darted out of the mud. Silt kicked up around him, but he zipped through it. A knife through the water, he cut into the thing with his claws and dragged it back home. It thrashed in his grasp until he hoisted it out of the water.

The dock rattled from the pure weight of it.