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“Who was it?” he asks, sitting up beside me.
“They called him the Kennel Master,” I say with a shrug.
Rej’thorek’s eyes widen again. Then he throws his head back and laughs. “The Beast Herder?” he exclaims, dissolving into another fit of laughter.
His laugh fills the room, though he begins to settle down. But every so often he laughs again. “I’ll have to see this for myself,” he replies. “I hadn’t heard that the Beast Herder was bonded.”
He finally pulls himself together and grows serious again.
Taking my hand in his, he gives me a solemn look. “The other women will be okay,” he tries to reassure me. “The King really does need them to produce and grow our army. He wasn’t lying about that. They’ll take good care of them so that they can bear children. You were the only one they thought was barren.”
“Thought?” I echo, wondering what he means.
He shrugs. “I just don’t know if the soz'garoth were right. Only the Gods can really know what’s in your womb.”
I flinch at the mention of Gods. They have never been kind to me. “I hate the Thirteen,” I confess. I wonder if he will think I am blasphemous.
Instead, he just wrinkles his brow in confusion. “Who are the Thirteen?”
I stare at him, agape with confusion. “The Gods? I thought everyone… You said Gods.”
He shakes his head. “Demons don’t believe in the nonsense that the dark elves do. We have our Seven real, immortal Gods that we worship.”
This intrigues me. I’ve spent my life surrounded by the dark elves and it’s never really occurred to me to question their beliefs. I took them as truth, assuming that everyone had heard the same stories that we did.
Until this moment, the idea of Thirteen beings sleeping underground, washing their hands of Protheka’s problems, seemed indisputable. I had grown to resent them, wondering why they could let their favored dark elves commit such atrocities in their name. The dark elves believed that they were the highest beings on Protheka because the Thirteen had bestowed the honor upon them.
The idea that other groups, such as the demons, do not even believe in the Thirteen is hard to wrap my mind around at first. But it appeals to me, to think that these gods that the dark elves have used as an excuse to torture me are a lie. I’d like it to be true.
“Tell me about your Gods,” I say.
He seems to think about it for a moment. “Well, we have the God of War, God of Whispers, God of the Forge, God of Dreams and God of the Earth,” he says. “And two goddesses. The Goddess of Destruction and the Goddess of Chaos.”
I grin a little at the names. “Your Goddesses sound tough.”
“They are,” he agrees. “Our beliefs are a far cry from the dark elves’ ways. We value our females and their strength because that is what allows our race to exist.”
I lie down, patting the bed beside me. He leans back, pulling me into his arms once more.
“And we only need Seven. That’s because our Seven are twice as tough as theirs.”
“Do you ever wonder why they let us suffer so much? That’s what I hate about the Thirteen. Some of them think it’s fair to make humans suffer the way we do, and some of them don’t. But if they don’t think we should be treated so badly, why don’t they help us? Why don’t they look out for us? They’re Gods!”
He strokes my short blonde hair thoughtfully. “In our religion, we don’t ask the Gods for help,” he explains. “We believe that we must accomplish what we want or need for ourselves. If we fail, we didn’t deserve it in the first place.”
“Hmm,” I hum softly, thinking it over.
“Maybe,” he offers tentatively, “you had to accept my father’s call. It was hard, but you would have stayed a slave of the dark elves otherwise. You accomplished what you needed for yourself, and now you are free to get what you deserve.”
“Maybe,” I say slowly. I wonder what it is that I deserve. I’m still not sure if that is a good thing or not, for all the damage that I’ve caused. I’ve hurt so many people.
I rest my head against his shoulder, burrowing into his side. With a sleepy yawn, I say, “Tell me more about your Gods.”
He obliges, spinning fantastic tales of their bravery and lore. He never uses their names, explaining that only the soz'garoth are permitted to do so.
Everyone else can only use their title.
My mind fills with the scenes that he describes, relishing the vivid stories of a world long gone. Before long, my sleepy eyes drop shut. As his words wash over me, I drift off into a peaceful sleep in his arms.
