Vassal

by Sterling D'Este

  When she pulled away, Alphonse could feel herself glowing. “Wait here.” She wobbled to her feet, looking around the clearing for… something. Anything to give the warrior and her love. Any gift she could give besides her bloody self.

  Thankfully, there were flowers blooming by the side of the stream, and she picked white and yellow ones. A shiny quartz rock caught her eye as well, and Alphonse clutched it in her palm. It was warm from the summer sun it had been baking in all day.

  At the last second, she spotted a large feather, perhaps from a red eagle or hawk. She stuck it in the middle of her strange bouquet and approached Delyth, suddenly shy.

  “I wish I had more to present you with… But— Here.” The flowers, the feather, the pretty little rock.

  Delyth looked… well, she looked a little confused.

  Alphonse blushed and laughed.

  “In Ingola, when two people decide to share their lives, the girl gives her dowry…” Alphonse settled on her knees in front of Delyth again, eyes wide and rimmed with tears. “I can’t marry you, and I don’t have anything but my heart and a rock and a feather and some flowers— But I love you Delyth, and I want you to have all that I am. All that I have… Even if they are little pieces.” Was it silly? Was it a foolish tradition? Was she ruining the moment by handing Delyth a feather and a rock and some weeds?

  ༄

  Delyth took the little presents Alphonse had found for her gingerly. They were such small things to hold so much meaning.

  Little treasures. Little pieces.

  Like Alphonse.

  She placed the flowers in the crook of her arm and the stone in one of the pouches at her waist. The feather she wove into one of the braids that fell around her face, then looked up at Alphonse for her approval.

  “I don’t have anything to give you, little bird.” Delyth’s face was twisted in concern. She wanted to do this in whatever traditions Alphonse followed. “Nothing but myself. And I’m yours, Alphonse.”

  The healer smiled and shook her head, brushing the feather affectionately. “The protector doesn’t have to give gifts. Their shield and their home are enough. You’re enough. Always.” Alphonse sighed and brought Delyth’s hands up, kissing each one. “I love you.”

  Chapter XXIII

  Eighth Moon, New Moon: Thloegr

  It was morning, Tristan’s tent dim and smelling of too many nights’ travel. Beyond its fabric walls, none of the others yet stirred, their roadside camp soundless but for nature waking around them. Enyo would like that, Tristan supposed. But he preferred human settlements to the vast wild.

  There was more fun to be had.

  The rogue had not seen Enyo since the previous day when she had reached through the chest of a still-living man to tear his heart free of its moorings, rabid and dangerous.

  The years of captivity hadn’t changed her.

  Now, he was eager for her return.

  Tristan stood and dressed, careful with the satchel he carried slung over his shoulder. He wore no gloves, though even the days had become cold. He stepped from his tent and resolved to wait. Thankfully he didn’t have to wait long.

  Tristan looked up eagerly when Alphonse left her tent but scowled on seeing her expression.

  Enyo didn’t smile like that.

  She looked too happy, a wide grin pasted across her features and her tawny hair a little… out of control. As if someone had run their fingers through it too many times. She hadn’t been just sleeping the previous night. He rolled his eyes.

  They were positively gooey, especially since returning after the battle the previous day. It was a wonder Etienne had failed to notice it.

  She was tugging on the front of her bodice, straightening it when she spotted Tristan.

  Surprised and a little embarrassed, she turned away from him to start breakfast.

  Tristan had all but given up to go back to sleep when Alphonse left her domestic meddling to veer off into the forest. She moved alongside the bank and then jumped over the stream where the water had gotten bottlenecked. Strange behavior for Alphonse.

  Not for Enyo.

  Tristan smiled, showing teeth, and rose to follow her across the stream. “Enyo,” he called, still behind her as she wended between trees, “I’ve got something for you.”

  Slinging one arm about a tree trunk, she twirled around it merrily. Beaming up at the canopy above, her flame-filled eyes flickered to Tristan just once before she wrapped the other arm tightly across the bark, hands clasping in the middle. Embracing the tree. The Goddess actually sighed contentedly. At peace for once. Because of the battle.

  Tristan gave a long-suffering sigh.

  Of course, she’d go all tree-stroking nature Goddess this morning. Just when he had something interesting to tell her. “Yes, the trees are very nice.” Tristan sounded as though he couldn’t care less about the scene around them. “But, Enyo, wouldn’t you like some tears?”

  Finally, those cat eyes slithered to Tristan, her lips peeling back from her teeth. Were her canines sharper today? Was that possible?

  “Tears of true despair? Raw emotion? Not just physical pain….You remember?”

  Of course, he had remembered. Tristan knew the old ways just as well as she did. Tears from raw emotion would always be more potent than those released from pain. Tears held the memories that had brought them in the first place. It was what fueled the spell.

  It wouldn’t do to admit he understood, though. Tristan cocked an eyebrow. “Do you doubt me?”

  He opened his satchel and pulled out the glove that’d been soaked by Etienne’s tears the day before. It’d been a pretty clever way to get them if he did say so himself. It wasn’t as though glass vials grew on trees.

  And the emotion had been real enough. Tristan didn’t think he’d ever seen a creature so pathetic.

  He held out the glove to Enyo. “Yes, piteous despair-induced blubbering. Can’t get much more hopeless than the boy was yesterday.”

  Taking the glove, she sniffed it as one might inhale the essence of a bloom and growled appreciatively. “You’re a wretched, terrible boy,” she murmured, the words purred compliments. She inhaled once more then handed the gloves back. “Did you enjoy the battle yesterday?” Clearly, she had.

  Tristan’s grin widened. “Their trick wasn’t very good, was it?”

  The bandit’s pitiful attempt to ambush them from behind had done nothing to help them. They should have given up their ridiculous notion of letting the travelers go free if they gave up their things. It might have been less of a pitched contest if they had just attacked entirely by surprise.

  Then, maybe Enyo would have gotten a few more. He doubted even the priestess would have been so easy with Alphonse had her mouth been dripping with sinew.

  Ah well. “It was nice to punish them for it, to prove that we’d not fallen for their little ruse.”

  ❂

  Enyo’s arm dropped away from the tree, and she slunk over to Tristan, her body loose and easy. Had anyone realized she had been getting wound tighter and tighter? The bloodletting had been a release for the Goddess.

  Now, she glowed.

  He reminded her of Va'al in all the right ways. Smart, cunning, ruthless, wicked. Perhaps he was a descendant.

  Perhaps he’d be more…

  The Goddess curled up against his chest, rubbing her cheek across his body affectionately. Like a wild animal greeting one of the pack.

  Or marking her territory.

  Those hands, which had so easily punched through a man and yanked out his heart, slipped about the belt at his waist, pulling it closer...

  “Well then…” Tristan took Enyo’s hips in wide hands and ran them up her sides. “I guess that was the answer you were looking for.”

  Tristen pressed one hand up beneath tawny locks to grip a fistful of hair just behind the Goddess’s skull, pulling her head back to look at him. Then he kissed her, hard and demanding.

  She actually gasped, startled by the sudden grab. H
er face contorted in feral temper only to be tamed by his ferocity. She growled deep in her throat and yanked Tristan’s hips closer with enough force to make him stumble.

  Then, she was climbing him like he was one of her many beloved trees, arms wrapped about his neck, kissing him ravishingly as her legs locked about his hips.

  Enyo peeled herself away long enough to bite cruelly against his throat, perhaps thinking for a moment to rip out that lovely voice.

  ⚄

  Tristan clenched his jaw at the press of Enyo’s sharp teeth, lips locked in a smile. He gripped her thighs where she wrapped around him and shoved her against the tree where he’d been leaning.

  By all the fucking realms, why did she have to be wearing so many clothes?

  Tristan growled, the sound coming deep from his chest, and yanked at the folds of the dress where they hung from Enyo’s knees, struggling to shove them back, up and over her waist. He’d made some progress too when someone shouted incoherently behind them.

  Tristan half-turned his head, preparing for some violent blow from Delyth, but only the boy stood there, pale-faced and wide-eyed. He chuckled. “Shoo, little mage. The adults are talking.”

  From where she was pinned against the tree, Enyo was squirming, trying her best to unlatch Tristan’s belt. She leaned forward to run the tip of her tongue up his neck and along his ear, uninterested in their audience.

  “You know mages, they like to watch,” she murmured into Tristan’s ear, one hand creeping below the neckline of his shirt at the back of his neck. Perhaps giving Etienne a little show.

  ✶

  Etienne had never been a violent person, but as Tristan laughed at whatever Enyo had murmured in his ear, he wished for a sword as wicked as Calamity to drive through the other man’s back.

  “You— you can’t—” he sputtered, the words sounding pathetic even to his ears.

  Tristan and Enyo didn’t care that he was here, wouldn’t so much as give him the respect of hesitating.

  Delyth, at least, could have made them listen.

  Tristan’s word’s from the day before came back to him, ringing through his ears like some macabre nursery rhyme: You couldn’t save her. You couldn’t save her. You couldn’t save her.

  And there was nothing he could do this time either, but let some shitty excuse for a thief and a bastard use his best friend’s body while he stood there, useless.

  Etienne gripped big handfuls of his own hair, tugging at his scalp. He had no supplies for spells, and any magic would only set the Goddess off. Should he go get Delyth? Would she get there in time?

  He couldn’t leave, couldn’t leave Alphonse alone with Enyo and Tristan.

  But maybe… maybe he could do what Delyth would?

  Etienne reached for the simple eating knife at his belt and slid the blade across his palm in a searing line of pain. His blood ran freely, red and glaring.

  What was it that Delyth called Enyo?

  “Taouk.” Etienne’s voice shook. “I would like to make an offering.”

  ❂

  Enyo had very nearly gotten that unwieldy belt unlatched when the smell of blood hit her. She stiffened and peered over Tristan’s shoulder with wide eyes. They were filled with lust and hunger.

  Each impulse warred within her and the Goddess growled, nibbling Tristan’s neck with her eyes clamped on Etienne. The mage had never offered her blood before. And even as sated as she was from yesterday’s fun…

  He was a powerful mage. A death speaker too. His blood might be particularly potent. Each sacrifice was making her stronger, Alphonse weaker, Enyo’s control cementing and complete.

  When would she get the chance again?

  Her hand at Tristan’s belt slipped lower, brushing against the length of him, hard and ready, and separated only by clothes. She moaned.

  Etienne’s blood was pooling in his palm. But Tristan was so firm and terribly mannered…

  The coppery tang of blood filled her nostrils, filled her mind. How could she think straight?

  Tristan leaned his head back and huffed in need or frustration. His hands still tugged at Alphonse’s dress.

  Etienne stepped forward, his eyes desperate. He was open and bleeding.

  He reached out his cut hand towards her, squeezing it shut so that more blood flowed. It squelched from his fist in a wet spurt, droplets of the stuff sprinkling the ground around him. When he unclenched his fist again, his fingers were coated, a grisly glove.

  “For you, Enyo.”

  Well, that settled it. She kissed Tristan one last time, whispering something intimately in his ear before slithering off his body and prowling over to Etienne.

  Her eyes were like saucers in her face, and she barely bothered to treat the blood sacrifice with the reverence it deserved before she was greedily scooping up his palm and pressing it to her mouth.

  ✶

  Etienne watched Enyo in horror. Just a few moons ago, those same hands had left tea and pastry on his work table. That mouth had chided him gently to attend his exams. Those were Alphonse’s cheeks, made to smile sweetly. Alphonse’s eyes, so often turned down in modesty before.

  And now she smeared her face with blood. Gorged herself with it.

  The image of Alphonse folding her veil neatly upon his desk was another glaring contrast. Her hair was free and wild from passion. She gave no indication that she even noticed the ichor dripping down her chin and onto Alphonse’s dove grey dress, the white shift underneath blooming with each red splotch.

  His oldest friend had been corrupted, her humanity dispensed in pieces until all that was left was this wild, hungry thing, dripping blood—bathing in it.

  Killing.

  Etienne felt himself dry heave. She would have eaten that villager’s heart with just as much relish.

  When she was finally finished, Enyo licked the length of the cut, and Alphonse’s green healing magic mended it, leaving a scar. “To remember, mage, who your Goddess really is.”

  He was only dimly aware of Delyth storming into the clearing, eyes wide and gripping the great black sword. Tristan snickered at her as he reclasped his belt. “The boy’s gone and done your job, halfbreed.”

  Etienne was looking down at his hand, heedless of Delyth’s reply. Blood still filled the creases between his fingers.

  What had they come to?

  ⥣ ⥣ ⥣

  * * *

  Delyth flinched, torn suddenly from more pleasant thoughts. Enyo was at her side, reaching around a wing to stroke Calamity as they trudged up towards Thlonandras. The Goddess’s face was rapturous, but there were dark circles beneath those eyes, the once smooth cheeks shrunken.

  So much malicious glee leaking out of Alphonse’s gentle body.

  The halfbreed turned away, and Enyo was gone again, flitting over to Etienne to walk alongside him in pleasant silence, occasionally looking down at his healed hand then up at his face. She smiled slowly and licked her lips before frolicking off to other delights.

  A beautiful formation of clouds, the way the wind sung to them, the “absolutely breathtaking’” views from the mountains. Enyo’s good mood was unflagging.

  For the noontime meal, she lounged in Tristan’s lap and fed him little bits of cooked rabbit from her eating knife. She preened his hair back and whispered things that neither the priestess nor the mage could hear, but made the rogue smile fiendishly.

  Somehow, no amount of knowing that Alphonse loved Delyth made it any easier to see Enyo draped across Tristan in her little bird’s body. If anything, it just made her angrier.

  She watched Enyo closely throughout the day, hoping for any sign of the healer. Enyo stopped for a nap, but not even sleep seemed able to free Alphone from the Goddess. She was too pleased, likely from the attention of the two men that morning.

  Delyth closed her eyes. She still felt the echoes of the panic of waking up to find Alphonse gone, not only from their pallet but from the camp, of waking up alone again. Calamity had been a crippling weight,
a fever. She thought that if she had gotten there before Etienne, she would have killed Tristan.

  Neither had explained exactly what had happened, but it’d been easy to discern from Tristan’s rumpled clothes and Etienne’s desperate act of giving his blood to Enyo. Thank the Gods he had gotten there in time, had been willing to give his blood.

  She hadn’t expected him to do it, but she was grateful for it.

  Now, as the afternoon gdeepened, Enyo looked like the healer, with her hair neatly braided and flowers crowning her head, all the delicacy of Alphonse’s features and the crown of petals above. Some of the buds Enyo plucked were white and yellow like those Alphonse had brought her the day before. The memory made Delyth ache.

  Like clockwork, as soon as the time came for actual chores to be done, Enyo vanished. One minute she was glaring at Delyth holding the shovel to dig the latrine, the next Alphonse was looking around in confusion.

  Incredulously, she reached up to touch her crown of flowers and laughed, the sound leeching all the tension from the warrior’s shoulders. It melted her hard edges, like the mountains in spring. Ice to summer stream.

  Alphonse walked over to Delyth and smiled up at the warrior shyly. “Good morning,” she murmured, handing a daisy to her paramour. It was evening, but Delyth understood. They hadn’t said it that morning.

  She reached out and took the little white flower and tucked it behind her ear, just above the feather still entwined in one of her braids. “Good morning, bykhan. I’ve missed you.”

  She wanted to sweep Alphonse close just then, but held back with Tristan and Etienne bustling by to set up camp. Instead, she just smiled warmly.

  ❀

  “I missed you too…” Alphonse stepped closer, nearly going on her tiptoes to kiss Delyth before remembering they weren’t alone.

  Sheepishly, she looked around and instead stole a brief touch, her fingers curling around one of Delyth’s locks and slipping across her shoulder in unmistakable tenderness. Her expression was open and loving as she carefully placed that lock of blue-black hair behind Delyth’s shoulder. Preening her lover.