“You’re going to have to ask for a room,” I told him.
“Me?”
“Well it can’t be me! I’m a woman.”
His sigh would have made Father Garius proud. “If I die up there,” he gestured toward a long counter where a burly man with small eyes and no neck stood pouring tankards of ale, “Tell my mother I went valiantly, on a quest to save a princess.”
I pressed my lips together to keep from smiling. “I swear on my life, I wouldn’t let her believe anything else.”
He continued to grumble as he made his way through the room, trying to avoid touching anything human in his path.
The patrons of this tavern were boisterous and well into their ale. I watched as a man half the size of one of the trees outside swung his tankard wide, sloshing amber liquid all over poor Oliver.
I was just about to wave him on when another gigantic man stepped in the way, blocking Oliver from view.
Spittle collected in the corners of his mouth when he grunted, “Girl.”
I raised my eyebrows at him and waited for more.
“You don’t belong here,” he snarled. His booming voice drew the attention of several surrounding tables.
My cheeks flushed. Glancing around the room, I noticed that most of the patrons were male and stood as tall and thick as he.
Scratch that,allof the patrons were male.
I straightened my shoulders. Chairs scraped against the food-littered ground as more men rose to their feet.
“What’s the matter?” I heard one of them ask.
“There’s a girl in here,” growled someone else.
A hostile rumble rippled through the room.
What did they have against girls?
“I take it you have a no female policy?” I asked the original behemoth.
“No girls after twilight.” His meaty fist jabbed toward the door. “You need to leave.”
My shoulders sagged with a sigh. I opened my mouth to argue, but Oliver pushed through the crowd and appeared at my side. “We’re travelers,” he explained. “We weren’t aware of your rules.”
The expression on the original man’s face shifted from furious to irritated. Apparently, they’d dealt with unwanted females before. He took a step back, but still pointed toward the door.
“Females are not allowed outside after dusk,” he huffed as I stood.
“Why not?” The words slipped out before I could temper them.
He leaned forward and I inhaled the sour smell of ale and animals clinging to him. “The demons prefer the girlies.” A lascivious grin lifted the wet corners of his mouth. “They taste sweeter than the menfolk.”
“Demons?” Oliver gulped.
“That haunt these woods,” the man explained and the other men laughed as though he’d made a joke. It wasn’t a happy laugh or even a taunting one. A bite of nerves clung to the sound, causing chills to race down my spine. “The demons would like to find you, lassie,” he said to me. “They’d love to happen upon you while you’re stumbling about in the Blood Woods in the dark. Love to snatch you up and ferry you away to Denamon.”
I felt light-headed. I wasn’t scared of demons or the Blood Woods or stumbling around in the dark. And yet these men believed in the curse of this forest stronger than anyone I’d ever met. And they lived here. This was their homeland.
The man’s attention swiveled back to Oliver. “Get her inside somewhere soon or you’ll lose your pretty companion to the Woods.”
“Th-thank you,” Oliver stuttered.
