THE APPLE OF SNAKES

xviii. inverted

The longer Nerluce looked at her, the more he noticed about her.

Her skin was the color of the earth, brown and warm. Her hair was a cluster of black curls around her shoulders. She was a couple of years older than Nerluce and had the body to prove it. She was curved and well-muscled. Powerful. Nerluce could feel it in the marrow of his bones. He saw it in the way she moved, burning and bleeding and staining the pages of Nerluce's mind just by being.

The light of the fire gave more definition to her features. It wasn't as if she was perfect. Nerluce saw every pore and imperfection on her. She wasn't skinny - not in the way the women back home so desperately craved to be. The only way that Nerluce could describe her was beautifully and wonderfully human.

Her dress - her white dress - was lacey and layered but cheap and stained. It had been torn at its ends. The forest nipped even at her heels. Her feet were dirty and her hands were callused. Every one of her human features just enhanced her beauty. Nerluce found that he couldn't take his eyes off of her.

"Here you are," she said, offering him a cup of tea. "May I have your name?"

"Oh- uh. I'm Nerluce," Nerluce stuttered out, trying to focus on the cup in front of him. He was never this flustered around other girls. Why did she make him so nervous?

She smiled, her teeth slightly crooked. "Rieka. Rieka Accalia."

Rieka. The name was so simple that Nerluce couldn't help but feel as though it suited her. She wasn't a woman who needed a complex name. She was just... Rieka and so Nerluce thought of her as such, even though she was older than him and probably deserving of more formality than that. 

"So..." Rieka said, sitting down next to Nerluce on the furs, her hands wrapped around her own teacup. "What brought you here?"

"Oh, I'm..." Nerluce trailed off, trying to figure out the best way to phrase what he was doing here. He then decided that it wasn't worth it. "I got separated from the rest of my group. They were going too fast." He rubbed the back of his neck. "I climbed a tree in the hope I'd be able to see where they went and then... my horse ran off on me."

Rieka nodded, solemnly. "Don't be ashamed," she said. Which was easy for her. She didn't look like a woman who had ever felt shame a single day in her life. "It happens more commonly than one would think."

"Really?" Nerluce asked.

Once again Rieka nodded, but this time a smile graced her lips. "Yes," she said. "Horses are easily spooked in these woods. The high concentration of spirits is to blame."

"Oh... I haven't seen very many spirits," Nerluce said.

Rieka paused for a moment, wrinkling her nose. "Of course," she said, shaking her head. "Pardon me, there used to be many more spirits here before those two troublemakers showed up." She clicked her tongue. "There's a code between those who live here. Don't make a nuisance of yourself. We're all hiding from something."

"Even... even you?" Nerluce asked.

"Especially me," Rieka said, her eyes twinkling.

Nerluce stared at her, shocked. His mind started to race through the possibilities of what she could possibly be hiding from. Was she... was she a bad person? Perhaps just as dangerous if not more so than the air and water magickians that Taayir and Aristide were hunting. However, as Nerluce dissolved into a panic, Rieka let out a low and charming laugh.

"Pardon, I didn't mean to startle you," Rieka said, giggling a little more as she pulled out a fan from one of the layers in her dress. "I suppose you'd like me to elaborate?"