Page 23 of A Taste for the Peculiar

Lord Riften traces indiscernible patterns on her leg. It almost seems accidental, an errant finger brushing the outside of her skirts. Her face flushes, gaze darting to the others around the table, but no one looks their way.

Lord Riften’s hand wanders higher.

Gingerly, he rolls up the fabric of her skirt until the hem bunches around her thighs. She can’t look at him, but she can’t focus on anything else when her body pulses with desire.

She doesn’t want them to stop. She has never wished for an end to anything Lord Riften does, but this is completely absurd. How can she crave their touch at this crowded table? How can she be so entranced by the thought of sneaking by unnoticed? Why does the thought of being caught thrill her more?

Lord Riften’s fingers tease the slick heat between her thighs. No one else knows what he’s doing to her. No one else knows the great and terrible way she needs him.

“If I were your husband…” Lord Riften inclines their head, breath warming her cheek. “Would you let me feed your hunger?” His teeth graze her earlobe. “Would you allow me to show you things you’ve never let yourself imagine? Would you trust me with every part of you?”

Avirin’s fingers curl desperately into the tablecloth. “Yes. Anything, anything, anything —”

“You’ve been awfully quiet lately. Are you in another one of your dudgeons?”

Avirin tenses. Her mother stares from the far end of the dining table. The rest of the house is silent around them. There is no dinner party, no guests, just Avirin’s active imagination. She wills the heat away from her cheeks. “I was just thinking.”

“About what?”

Lord Riften’s face between my legs. His teeth scraping my thighs. His tongue stirring my —

Avirin swallows the truth with a spoonful of soup. “Bees,” she coughs. “Honey. How it’s made.”

Her mother clucks her tongue. “You need to get your head out of those books and start concerning yourself with something real.” Her mother punctuates the word with a clink of her spoon. “This season has gone on too long without any prospects of a husband. I finally made some progress, but it will take an inordinate amount of convincing.”

One of the housemaids enters to stoke the fire. When she turns to leave, Avirin ducks her head. “Thank you, Ms. Haskett.”

The woman pauses, but only long enough for Lady Ellison to set down her spoon. “I have told you not to speak to them, Avirin! You converse with them far too readily.”

While Ms. Haskett retreats, Avirin lowers her gaze and stirs her soup absently. “Will father be joining us for dinner?”

Her mother sighs and waves the question away. “You know he’s busy. He had some business to settle at the club.”

Avirin does not know why she feels a pang of disappointment. If her father were here, he would be alone in his study, away from them. His presence has long felt incorporeal, as fleeting and untouchable as a ghost.

Avirin wishes she did not yearn for him to haunt her.

She wonders if he is where her peculiarities come from — withdrawn and reclusive, discomforted among crowds, a desire to be surrounded by books. She has always thought the two of them were more alike than different. What would have happened if he’d allowed her into his world? If he’d taught her how to navigate her strangeness? If he saw his own strife reflected in her?

But her father does not struggle. He does not need anyone else, certainly not a curious daughter reaching for his hand. He is strong and silent. He provides. He knows his role among society, as Avirin must know hers.

Her mother dabs her lips with her napkin. “You’re not taking this seriously, Avirin.” Her tone is pinched thin, much like her patience. “I told you what will happen if you cannot fix this. You nearly threw all your chances away when you danced with that cockteaser weeks ago.”

Avirin jolts at the word. “Don’t call them that!”

“And why shouldn’t I?” Her mother smooths her hand over her napkin. “It’s what he does in those whorehouses, wearing clothes that aren’t made for him, defiling his body alongside everyone else’s.” Lady Ellison shakes her head like a prayer, repetition to keep the evil at bay. “Is that who you got it from? This sickness?”

Avirin tries to shrink her human pupils further. The awful man from the pleasure gardens flashes through her mind, a caricature of herself. Perhaps he was right. Since Avirin became this, she’s been drawn to things she never considered before. Her mind has been consumed with lust, and her situation grows more dire. For the past week, her hunger has been harder to control, her eyes growing black at the slightest provocation.

Is this the punishment for her sins — or worse, her enjoyment of them? Guilt pulses through her. Will every moment she indulges transform her into something beastly and obscene?

Her throat grows tight. She knows what she’s doing is wrong; it’s what she’s always been taught. Marriage to a proper member of society is the only thing that can save her. She needs to secure a fitting husband before she succumbs to this curse completely, before she is sent away and loses any semblance of freedom she has.

“I’m not very hungry tonight, mother.” Avirin sets her silverware aside and tries to keep her voice from shaking. “I think I shall retire to bed early.”

After she’s dismissed, Avirin lies in the dark for hours. She knows what she should do, but no matter how she tries, she cannot find the strength. The threat of losing everything she knows sinks like a weight in her stomach — but the thought of never being touched by Lord Riften again steals her breath. Everything about him is so…free. He is a stallion galloping across an open field, and he carries Avirin with him. How can that be wrong, when it feels exactly like the sun on her skin and the wind in her hair?

One more night, she tells herself. Tonight will be the last. After tonight, I will do as I am supposed to. I will be good again.