The Empty Ones (Fantasy Romance)

71. Willing?

His gaze is on me like an annoying awareness I cannot shake off. This is the price for his silence, I suppose, feeling him watch me in the dark.

Other times, when someone watched me sleep it was with concluded murderous intent. Might he want me dead too?

Then he wouldn't have to do this work anymore, that's clearly bothersome to him.
But he would also get less coin, according to Chaled.

What do you want, Mute? Are you torn? Do you want to get rid of me and yet not?

So it's difficult for me to sleep but in the end I do, accompanied by the image of that dying girl in the brothel.

And for the, I don't know how manyeth time, I wish you were here, Theon. I wish I could talk to you and know what you think.

And then there's that other thing... Aphrodisiacs, but for women. If you make them more willing maybe their body is more likely to receive a child. Is it crazy and having no technical explanations? Yes. Do I have a better idea? Not really.

So many things: my father's journals, that I haven't touched out of fear that Mute is a spy, the dying girl, Laini and there was also that strange woman at the brothel.

Her eyes, the cracked lips, the wounds on her body, the peculiar shape of her ears and the way she spoke. She was rolling the consonants even more than Fera and that sound follows me into my dreams.

When I wake up, I am drenched in sweat.

Mute frowns when I sit up abruptly and tightens minimally the grip around his spear.

The sleeve of his tunic slips. There is a thick black circle composed of intricate patterns swirling around his wrist. And, on the inside of his arm, several small parallel cuts try to interrupt the patern.

The cuts are fresh and too straight to be an accident. He either did them to himself or someone did that to him.

I meet his eyes and his frown deepens, the fingers of his other hand dragging the sleeve down over the cuts.

Chaled is here two hours later, approaching Mute timidly and whispering something to him.

To my surprise, something in Mute's eyes sinks.

And I... Am intrigued.

"What did you tell him? It seems to have upset him," I ask Charles after Mute is far enough to not overhear.

"Ah, Mahrani. I'll rather not say. Please don't make me. It's not my story and I don't want to lie to you either."

My eyebrows jump up in surprise. I don't insist but am still intrigued. One more reason not to trust him.

The whole day I keep researching two things: the yellow powder Theon possibly has given the girl from the brothel and the possibility of female affecting aphrodisiacs.

I happened to have found a recipe in a book for some but they are labeled explicitly male. However. Is there that much of a difference?

What if I brew a potion like that and see what happens?

Anxious, I knock at Laini's door, Chaled following near by. Her designated guard is still waiting at the door. Only Mute seemed to have decided on his own to change guarding positions.

"You want me to swallow aprodisiacs for males? And that should get me pregnant?"

Laini frowns at me.

"I don't have a better idea. I just thought that if the body is tricked into being more willing to... You know. Maybe it's more willing to receive a pregnancy too."