Lev shrugged and received his refill.“That’s what deep pockets are for.What’s the point if not to make our lives better?If not, all it’d be is fighting.That’s all we’d have.”
Alobaz, who’d been about to comment how, actually, they were running low on funds, didn’t.
Serious for once, Lev asked Baz, “When do we get to leave the castle?”
Ed, Aziza, Moncho, and the final two soldiers that made up their questionable band, Félix and Night, looked at Baz too.
He sighed.
Night asked, “How long?”
It was at least twice as much as he usually said.
Alobaz sighed again.Ran a hand through his hair, which he shouldn’t have done, because then a thick strand kept tumbling into his face.
“I don’t fucking know.Every time I ask, they don’t really answer.”
They, of course, were the emperor and empress of Domdurro.Worse, they were his parents.Worse even than that, they were his commanding officers, and he was obliged to follow their every order without question.
“Fuck,” Lev growled.
Moncho upgraded to, “Titfucker.”
Aziza stretched her legs out under the table, bumping Alobaz’s.“So we just have to wait it out.”
“Yeah, but for how long?”Lev said.
Alobaz took another sip, not bothering to hide his wince—at the bitter taste and the conversation topic.“As long as they want.Nothing I can do about it.”He scowled so ferociously that he got lost to it for a few moments.“We’d better make ourselves comfortable.”
“There is no ‘comfortable’ at Castle Hawxfure,” Lev said.“How the dragonfire are we supposed to get proper sleep?”
Aziza frowned.“We aren’t.”
“You offerin’, love?”
Ed brought a hand to Aziza’s arm, half the size of hers.“Zi … the keep’s got an eye on us.”
Alobaz glanced toward the bar.A man about his size stared back with the yellow glowing eyes of a changeling.He dried a glass that didn’t need drying—repeatedly.
Eyes on him too, Aziza finally nodded, daintily sipping at her glass of blood—a deer’s, and fouler-tasting than the ale.
Alobaz was wise enough not to laugh at the contrast between some of her delicate mannerisms and her kill count—second only to his.
The barkeep caught Alobaz’s eye, not for another unreasonably generous tip, but for the other—feeders.
Alobaz nodded once at the single furry unibrow arched in silent question.
Before Lev could order another round, the keep’s wife sauntered out from the back room.She was also a changeling, but her eyes flashed like deep-winter ice when they caught the lumoons.Behind her walked eleven of her finest feeders, most a bit on the rougher side, much like her and her mate’s bar.Their garish makeup seemed only to accentuate that very roughness they were trying to hide.
She slid an arm along his shoulders before purring against the shell of his ear in a mist.“Hello there, Alobazzzzz.How nice to see you again, and so soon too.You’re a man of … hearty … appetites.”With all the subtlety of a pygmy ogre, she licked her lips.
From behind the bar came the snap of cracking glass.The she-changeling didn’t so much as glance over at her mate.
“What’ll it be for you today, Alobazzzzz?”
So fervently did she believe in her sexual prowess—due in large part to the regular adoration of her mate—that she missed the way Alobaz tensed beneath her touch, how he was resisting the urge to throw off her arm.
His friends, however, with evident apprehension, all watched her squeeze his bicep.Even Félix, who never lost his composure, nibbled ever so subtly at the inside of his lip.
