The only time he wasn’t right next to me is when he dumped me with the captives in the town, and when he returned, he was spattered and smeared in blood.
He killed someone. I don’t doubt that.
But he also stole some time to…
To what?
Loot through the clothes of the stores and the homes around that forest town, pick out the warmer things he could find?
Not hard, given the overall climate of this area, most of the clothes from the people who once lived here would be on the warmer side.
Still, he went out of his way to loot these things for me. He picked out an entire wardrobe.
I must stink a hell of a lot more than I thought.
I have a nose, and it works. I do smell it too, that stale ammonia stench, but maybe there’s another layer to that, the stagnant residue of the old water in the tunnels I waded through before this warrior trapped us.
Guess he wasn’t lying when he said my odour offends him, or whatever the fucker said exactly.
I have half a mind to stick to my stench, just to get under his skin, but I don’t have nearly half the courage to do that.
I sigh a dreading breath, then start the awful process of peeling off my layers. One by one, leggings and tops, kicking off my boots—it fast exposes me to the cold.
The trembling starts before I’ve even peeled off my underwear.
I throw a narrowed look at the warrior, as though I’ll find him in a lie, staring at me, but he walks that slow, steadycircle around the perimeter of this little nook of the forest, a wandering pace, a patience that has him.
My hands quake under the assault of the cold, but I take the cloth to the pour of the waterskin, then lather the soap.
It froths nicely, with the strong scent of…
I don’t know what.
Something not of our world, I guess, but close to the citrusy zest of lemongrass and the sharpness of mint.
Whatever those scents are, they are undeniably fresh—and a whole lot better than I smell right now.
I start before the cold can kill me.
I don’t just wash, I scrub.
I scrub every bit of my body I can reach, until my flesh is red and raw and scratched, then I use the other cloth, wet but not soapy, to rinse.
And fuck, it hurts.
Every touch of the cloth cuts a wince through me or twists my face or bares my teeth. And through all of that, I make sure to keep my crotch hidden from the fae’s view.
Folded legs beneath me, if he deigned to look my way, he wouldn’t see anything. Even as I push the lathered cloth between my thighs, I hunch over to shield myself even more.
Every glance I throw up at him reassures me.
His gaze doesn’t wander to me.
Not once.
I believe what he said to me.
He’s never desired a human, he loathes our bodies, what we are, and to him we’re justoff.
