The Bargaining Path

by T. Rudacille

  ***

  “Brynna...” Adam's weakened voice called from behind his closed door. “I know that you are out there. Please come.”

  At first, anger prickled all through me, starting in my chest and cascading down all four limbs to my fingers and toes. With precise and unrelenting needling jabs that lasted milliseconds but left reverberating aftershocks, the anger consumed me. The only remedy for it was to turn away from his door and gather up my gun, but when he spoke again, the desperation in his voice gave me pause.

  “Please. You do not have to let me up, nor do we have to talk, but I just need water.”

  My head tilted to one side, my lips pursed, my eyes rolled upwards in most venomous irritation, and my lungs heaved a great sigh. All of that, and then my feet stomped off in his direction.

  “Thank you.” He said when I came into his room, “Thank you, Brynna.”

  I ignored him and picked up the jug of water that had been sitting there all day. To my displeasure, the water was still slightly cold. When I approached him, he avoided my eyes. It was only after I placed the water on the bedside table that he looked at me.

  “Would you really be so cruel?” He asked me, and behind the crackling in his throat that was a result of being so thirsty, I heard his growing anger.

  “I do not know, Adam. Would I?” I asked back, with malice. “Would I be so cruel to a man who shot me? You are lucky that I have bigger fish to fry, as they say, or else I would be considering very seriously killing you for what you did to me!”

  “You would kill me when I cannot defend myself? Or would you unlock these chains and give me a fighting chance?”

  “That I do not know. I do so love a fight, so I would have unchained you. How about that? I do know.”

  “That would have been unwise. In fact, it would have been downright stupid. But do you know, I am not surprised. It was unwise of you to make a deal with that despicable man, Paul, that involved exchanging my life for a phantom. They do not have your mother, Brynna, and if you believe that they do, then you are stupid. You are just a stupid, fanciful little girl who allows her allegiances to be shifted by empty promises and her own pathetic hopes and dreams.”

  “Do you remember what you have done?” I snapped at him. “You spit this vitriolic babble at me like I have committed some foul act when it is you who shot three innocent people at point-blank range and countless others randomly, simply because I offended your pride.”

  “My pride? You think it was my pride that you offended? Think on that again, you despicable, hollow-headed traitor! Does that designation tell you what you have offended? It was not my pride! It was my adherence to principles of loyalty that you offended!” His eyes burned even more, “You saved my life. You carried me through the forest, fighting off creatures and men alike, to bring me here. And I have saved you before. I have been kind to you and your people. But no more, Brynna Olivier. You are dead to me. If I did not owe you for your two-faced act of saving my life, I would kill you now!”

  The words stung, to say the very least. But I did not cry, nor did I lie to him about what I had done, nor did I tell him the truth. The whole matter would have been settled, maybe, if I had just clarified then and there what had happened: I was going to tell him about my plan, and together, we would have gone to the meeting place to see if the Old Spirits were being truthful about my mother.

  “A likely story.” He snarled at me. “And I am sure that you think yourself very clever for not saying it, but rather screaming it at me with your thoughts.”

  My thoughts had wanted him to hear again, and he had heard. So, obviously, my prior belief that telling him everything would quickly absolve the tension between us and restore our relationship to its former solidity was wrong.

  “Janna read your heart. I knew that there was darkness in you, but never did I think you could betray me this way!”

  “Oh, Janna told you that I am nothing but a sadistically deceitful monster who was going to willingly trade your life and hers? Your wife told you that?”

  “Yes. My wife. Do not pretend that my omitting of the fact that Janna is my wife is tantamount to what you have done. Do not try that. You will simply make me even angrier, and I am already having great difficulty hearing your voice and looking at your face!”

  “Believe what you want, Adam.” I told him, “But believing her without question might one day be the death of you.”

  “How dare you?!” He hissed at me, “I should kill you for saying that! Do not say a negative word against her! She has been my wife for twenty-three years, and she would never tell a lie to me or anyone else!”

  “Twenty-three years?” I asked, and I could not fight the derisive snort through my nose that was my classic response to stupid, pathetic, or otherwise unintentionally hilarious things.

  “Goodness, that is impressive, Adam.” I continued, “It took twenty-three years for you to go searching for love elsewhere, specifically, with me?”

  “Oh, my darling girl, I was not searching for love with you. I was merely weakening your defenses to see if I could. Also, I admit, and I am a dog for this...” He actually laughed coldly, “I was seeing just how long it would take after you dropped your guard for me to get you into my bed.” His evil grin widened, “And just as I suspected, you bent, quite literally, to my will. You bent backwards, I mean.”

  The anger exploded, and my arm jerked out. He was the first person I had slapped in a long while. At first, I thought he was going to break free of his restraints and strangle me. Either that, or he would heave his body up and ram into me like a bull. Somehow, he would hurt me for hurting him.

  “You bitch!” He spat at me.

  “No. I just slapped you hard enough to dislodge one of your teeth.” I pointed at the bed beside him where one of his gleaming white molars lay in a sick puddle of spittle and blood. “I think, by the very slang connotation of the term, that makes you the bitch.”

  I started to walk away, not lamenting the disintegration of mine and Adam's relationship in the slightest. He was a vile, cruel, evil man, and I had known that by instinct the first time I had met him. His charisma had been undeniable, and his power had seduced me. His kindness had been a show by which I had been easily transfixed. I was disgusted by how easily he had fooled me and vowed silently that I would never be taken under his spell again.

  “We are finished now.” He said to me somewhat softly, “You are finished with me. Are you not, Brynna?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then perhaps you will do me just one favor, and allow me to have a drink of water.”

  I turned back to him, actually laughing now.

  “And why would I do that, Adam? After all you have said, after the insults you have spat at me, after threatening my life, why would I help you?”

  “There is no reason why you would. But perhaps you might, just for old time's sake, as they say.”

  I still do not know why I did it. But after a long moment of gaping at him, I walked forward, picked up the glass, and pressed it to his lips. Perhaps it was because at the moment he asked me to aid him on behalf of times that had passed between us, I felt an uneasily throbbing bloom of nostalgia for when he had been so kind to me, for when he had kissed me while we were awaiting our deaths, for when he had held me while that Shadow paced in front of us with that hungry lust in her eyes, for when we had almost...

  Then, his hands came up to grasp the cup, and I knew that I had been played by him once again, as I had been played by him so many times before.

  He chuckled the way he always did, except this time, I recognized the spite behind the sound. When he spoke, he whispered his two words with poison and rage, so I could not dismiss his ire and deep, unrelenting hated of me.

  “Stupid girl.”