Vassal

by Sterling D'Este

  Hungered for it.

  “That is because you are a pure soul. Only good could battle that… That piece of Enyo…” Alphonse trailed off, realizing what she was saying. Even as she believed it was true, then that meant her own goodness. Her own purity was fading or changing… And that was why Enyo was able to take hold so much more easily now.

  Frowning, Alphonse pushed the thought away and turned her amber eyes upon Tristan.

  “You shouldn’t call her a halfbreed. She’s a warrior priestess, and she fought for the title. She’s stronger than all of us, and we should treat her with that respect.” Her tone was admonishing and strained.

  Alphonse didn’t enjoy arguing or any sort of conflict. Normally, if Tristan bullied anyone, her especially, Alphonse would ignore it or crumble.

  But Delyth had fought so hard for her rank, for her place in the world.

  Swallowing, she did her best to hold his gaze though it made a pit of snakes open in her belly. She could do this. For Delyth.

  Tristan rolled his eyes at Alphonse. “So what? She passed some little test set up by twittering rule-lovers. That doesn’t make her any less… mixed.”

  He sat back and looked over at Delyth, who was blushing fiercely, her usually granite features open in a mixture of gratitude and embarrassment. “bykhan…” she muttered, her eyes on Alphonse.

  “What do you think, Del? Would you prefer mutt or Cabot or mule?” His face was twisted in a smirk.

  There was a rustling of cloth, and suddenly Alphonse was standing before Tristan. Her eyes were watering over, and her cheeks were a mottled red of… rage?

  Alphonse?

  Angry?

  And before she could think or breathe or do anything at all, she leaned down and slapped Tristan forcefully. The smack echoed through the cave, and Alphonse stumbled back from the blow, shocking herself at the power she had put into the strike. Her hand stung, and now she was crying, but she realized they were tears of wrath.

  Bracing her hand against her chest, cradling it, Alphonse swallowed and fought the urge to apologize.

  She looked around at the startled faces of her companions, then back down at Tristan. There was a red handprint on his cheek.

  Embarrassment washed over Alphonse, and she hastily retreated to her tent.

  ✶

  Etienne was standing when Alphonse rushed away, but he didn’t remember jumping to his feet. Delyth had gotten up as well, her face shocked. Only Tristan still sat, his cheek red with the force of Alphonse’s blow.

  The rogue was grinning, his eyes wide with ridiculous amusement. “So fucking predictable,” he said, and his laugh rang throughout the cave.

  Etienne wasn’t sure whether to be more disturbed by Tristan’s response or that Alphonse had slapped him in the first place. She was a healer for Gods’ sake. Always, she had treated the vow to do no harm to others with a near-spiritual fervor. It was her deepest calling.

  And now?

  She’d been so moved to anger that she’d lashed out. Hot and violent. For Delyth no less, who she had known for a matter of moons. All these moons, Tristan had treated him with careless malice, and never once had Alphonse stepped in. But all Tristan had to do was call Delyth a halfbreed to invoke the healer’s fury?

  Etienne turned his eyes on the warrior, but she was looking away, back towards the tent she shared with Alphonse. Etienne had known that the two were getting closer, but since when had his dearest friend come to care so much about Delyth that she would strike someone just for taunting her?

  Alphonse wasn’t just changing physically, not anymore. Her very personality seemed to be altering. And why, if not because of Enyo’s influence?

  Delyth turned, meeting Etienne’s gaze only briefly before looking away again. She completely ignored Tristan, where he sat, now doubled over by his own mirth.

  If Etienne had thought she might explain, he was wrong. She just turned and swept away from them both, back to the tent where Alphonse had disappeared.

  Chapter XXI

  Seventh Moon, Full: Thloegr

  The healer had been looking down at her palm, which was equally as red as Tristan’s face, rubbing it in some mixture of regret when the tent flap opened.

  Alphonse glanced over her shoulder quickly, half expecting Tristan to have come back for revenge. It was Delyth instead, and she sighed. “I’m sorry, Delyth. I shouldn’t have hit him. It’s not right to turn on one another like that…” She held out her hand imploringly, certain that some reprimand was coming. “I’ll apologize—”

  Delyth smiled a little ruefully. “I think Tristan was overdo for a sound slap. Not that it did him any good. He’s out there cackling like a jackdaw.” Hesitantly, she stepped forward and took Alphonse’s outstretched hand in one of her own. “You needn’t worry so on my count, though,” she said. “I don’t need Tristan’s respect. I have my own and… and yours.”

  Alphonse looked down at their hands, Delyth’s stronger, calloused one sheltering her small delicate one. A hand meant for healing.

  Not harming.

  She turned her hand over to see the slowly fading red mark on her palm. “No one ever told me it hurts to hit someone…” Her whole hand was stinging. “I guess that’s the price. If you raise your fist in anger…” She closed her fingers to hide the offending evidence and peered up through her lashes at Delyth instead.

  “You do have my respect. But Delyth, I am sorry if I embarrassed you. I know you’re much stronger and braver. You don’t need me raising a fuss just because of Tristan.” She swallowed. “Well. Even if I didn’t like him saying those things to you. About you. Even if it did make me… angry.” She whispered the last word.

  She felt like a brute.

  But he had sneered and called Delyth a mule and… It wasn’t right! Delyth was beautiful and wise and careful, thoughtful. She was patient, and— Alphonse sighed. “You deserve better than that.” Better than Tristan name-calling, better than Alphonse lashing out, better than the temple warriors pushing her harder than the rest of the initiates in her story.

  ༄

  Delyth blushed again, her stomach twisting with equal parts warmth and discomfort. “That’s a high peak you’ve set me on. I’m afraid I might fall off and disappoint you.”

  Some of the things that Alphonse said, Delyth had believed herself when she was younger: that it hadn’t been fair to be put in the world so different and despised.

  But, it was just the hand she’d been dealt. She’d jresponded how anyone would have if faced with her odds.

  And Gods knew she’d made plenty of mistakes. Some of them bloody and gruesome.

  She squeezed Alphonse’s fist, where it lay closed in her own. “Violence always has a cost. Some of my worst mistakes have been made forgetting that. And I’ve made plenty of them. Mistakes, I mean.”

  It seemed important to get Alphonse to realize that, if only so that Delyth wouldn’t let her down in the future.

  ❀

  She very much doubted Delyth’s mistakes remotely resembled the magnitude of her own… Sneaking up to the temple to destroy Enyo. Lying to Delyth about her real purpose on this journey. Letting herself tumble into whatever this was between them without any real hope for a future. Making Etienne worry over her…

  Not stopping Etienne before he enacted an ancient ritual they had no business attempting…

  She had known it was beyond their abilities. She had known it was dangerous and wrong. It required blood magic for Gods’ sake! Yet she had done nothing to stop it. She hadn’t said no.

  Her biggest mistake.

  “Do you ever see yourself with a family? Children and a home and the likes?” she asked, opening her hand again. The red was fading.

  ༄

  The abrupt change in topic took Delyth by surprise. She blinked down at Alphonse, unsure how to answer.

  When she was little, Delyth had longed to be a part of a family. As a teenager, she had scorned those who had them, angry at whatever force of happ
enstance had led her to be brought into the world without one. As an adult, she had assumed that her family would be what she could cobble together out of the bonds she formed with the other warrior priests.

  Now, she thought she might one day like to meet others like her, to see if they could be a form of family.

  And, if they survived this and Alphonse was willing, to make a family out of the two of them. Etienne could be a part of it too, she supposed. Since Alphonse had said he was like a brother to her.

  But children?

  She knew she preferred women, and the two of them could not…

  Delyth swallowed. “I would like some form of family,” she said finally. “And a home. But children… I don’t know how— it’d not work…”

  Did Alphonse want children? That farmer she was engaged to could give her children.

  The thought made Delyth wince.

  Alphonse shook her head. “I just wanted to know more about you, Delyth. Your story… It made me realize I hadn’t asked much of your past. I thought it might be too personal. But now… Please.” She urged Delyth to sit, gesturing to the pallet they had shared last night. “I don’t want to keep my distance anymore.”

  Delyth relaxed with Alphonse’s admission and settled beside her, encircling the smaller woman with a wing. It’d become habitual now—that little form of contact.

  Sharing more of her life with Alphonse was a welcome idea. Delyth wanted to know the healer better as well, and perhaps… Perhaps this meant that Alphonse had not completely given up hope of a life after Thlonandras.

  But where should she start? Alphonse knew that she’d been raised at the temple, struggled to become warrior priestess, and then left to protect the vassal. She wasn’t sure she wanted to bring up past lovers, though if Alphonse asked, she’d be open about it. “What do you want to know?”

  “Everything.” Alphonse scooted closer, letting her shoulder brush Delyth’s as her massive wing sheltered them both.

  “Ummmm…” Delyth breathed. It was hard to concentrate with Alphonse looking up at her, eyes soft, and focused on Delyth’s.

  The priestess swallowed and glanced away so that she could think.

  “I taught myself to fly,” she said finally. “But not until I was nearly a teenager. When I was really small, my caretakers hid my wings. Quickly, they grew too large, and then I was told to keep myself firmly on the ground. I’m not even completely sure why I decided to disobey them. It wasn’t easy. But I started slipping away to practice and eventually got the hang of it.”

  It wasn’t a particularly dramatic story, but perhaps it’d be something Alphonse wanted to hear. Delyth turned back to the healer, pulling her knees up to her chest to rest her cheek on them. “Does that count as part of everything?”

  “Yes. It does.” Alphonse looked at Delyth’s mouth and then smirked, leaning in to brush her lips against Delyth’s in a soft kiss. Pulling away, she blushed. “Were you afraid to fly? Or was it simply something you knew how to do, once your body learned each step?”

  “I was afraid,” Delyth said. She was smiling, her belly aglow from Alphonse’s quick kiss. “In the beginning, I fell often. Every new height was terrifying.”

  She turned over her arm and held it out for Alphonse’s inspection. There was a poorly mended scar winding through the center of her forearm. “I still have the scars because I refused to go to the healers. I was afraid they would make me stop.”

  ❀

  Alphonse touched the scars, gentle and thoughtful in her examination. She could have healed those wounds so quickly. Delyth wouldn’t have even had scars to remind her of those falls. But then…

  Alphonse traced her fingertips down one scar.

  They were parts of Delyth, of her history. Pieces Alphonse didn’t want to be hidden or erased. “But you learned. And now you fly faster and higher than even the birds…” she murmured, letting her hand travel up to the crook of Delyth’s elbow, back down to her wrist, up again… long, smooth strokes.

  “What do you want to know of me?”

  “Mmmm...” Delyth hummed, closing her eyes and shivering a little at the light caress of Alphonse’s fingertips. She opened her eyes with a playful look and repeated Alphonse’s answer from a few moments before. “Everything.”

  Alphonse giggled. It sounded silly now that the question was posed to her...What could she tell Delyth that she didn’t already know?

  Plenty.

  Delyth knew the most intimate facets of Alphonse, but she didn’t know the mundane details. “I miss my veil every day. I was teased by the other girls at Moxous for not wearing bright or pretty colors. For being a Mother Agathi follower. The first bones I ever healed were my own. I haven’t been back home to my village since I was fourteen when my grandmother died, because Moxous doesn’t allow the students to leave regularly. I hate beets. I love fresh fruit and, ah… I had never been courted before.”

  Was that enough? Was that everything?

  Hardly.

  “Why did you stop wearing your veil?” Delyth asked. “How did you break your bones? Do you miss your family? How do you feel about your family? Have you ever wanted to be courted by anyone before?”

  Alphonse shook her head. “I’ve never wanted to court anyone. Ever. It didn’t occur to me as interesting or… valuable.” But being with Delyth… It was perfection.

  The healer felt herself smiling despite how silly it must have seemed, to beam up at Delyth for no good reason. But…

  They were sharing their lives. Right now. And Delyth would remember Alphonse when she was gone. When Enyo took it all.

  “I feel… sad. About my family. They love me, but they follow Mother Agathi’s teachings very strictly. They would not understand my being with you because I enjoy it. And I know that if I ever returned to the farm, they would want me to marry Henri and have children as Mother Agathi dictates and… I don’t think I want to have children with Henri.” So she didn’t miss her family either. At this point, Etienne was more her family than anyone else. She’d spent more of her life with him.

  And he was mad at her for the same reasons she couldn’t wear her veil anymore.

  ༄

  “Thank the Gods.” The words were out of Delyth’s mouth before she could think about them. “I don’t want you to have children with Henri, either.” Perhaps that was a little insensitive… She didn’t want to belittle the way Alphonse thought about her family.

  “But I understand, I think. I might not have grown up with a typical family, but the temple wants things for me that I no longer really want. It makes me feel a bit guilty, though I don’t think it would be healthy to go back and do what they want just to keep myself from feeling that way.”

  She grinned at Alphonse. “Also, I’m particularly glad that you enjoy being with me.” She leaned over and brushed a kiss against the corner of the healer’s mouth.

  “I…” Alphonse started and trailed off, distracted by the kiss. She brought her hand up to take Delyth’s chin, gently guiding it back for another kiss. And another. She was a rosy pink when she pulled away and sighed. “How did you learn to kiss so well?”

  Delyth was breathless by the time Alphonse pulled away, her eyes heavy-lidded. She sobered at the question, though, examining the healer’s face.

  “When I was sixteen, a girl from a nearby clan came to study at the temple.” She turned away, thinking back to the day she had met Tanwen, flame-haired and wild. It felt like a lifetime ago now. Something that had happened to someone else.

  “We became friends, and then as we got older, lovers.” The priestess swallowed, watching for Alphonse’s reaction. “She left a while after I made the rank of warrior priestess. To fulfill her duties to her clan. There were a couple others, but Tanwen was the only one I loved.”

  ❀

  Alphonse had been smiling as Delyth explained, thinking it nice to know the priestess had something sweet and amorous during those training years. Years that had sounded very challenging.

>   She pushed a bit of her own tawny hair over her shoulder and realized that Delyth looked… on edge.

  Having never had a paramour before, Alphonse hadn’t realized that perhaps talking about past lovers was a sensitive topic. Perhaps that woman had left on bad terms? Or perhaps Delyth still missed her and wished to have her back…

  “Fulfill duties… Like the duties I have to my family and Henri?” she asked carefully, a sinking feeling coming to Alphonse’s stomach. Perhaps Delyth had been cast aside for a male and children and a typical life.

  The idea made Alphonse feel sick.

  ༄

  Delyth’s brows rose. That was a very intuitive question; Alphonse had hit on it exactly. Perhaps because the duties requested of the healer and Tanwen weren’t incredibly different, for all that they came from very different peoples.

  “Yes, sort of.” Delyth tightened her wing around Alphonse in a comforting gesture. The smaller woman looked uneasy. “She was heir to her clan, and the position came with certain responsibilities.”

  Delyth left out just how certain Tanwen had been of their ability to get around the rules. How she’d wanted the halfbreed anyway until the raiders attacked… The priestess didn’t want to acknowledge that darkness inside herself.

  “It was a long time ago, though,” she went on. “Besides, if she had not left, I might not have ended up here with you. And I wouldn’t trade that for anything.”

  Alphonse flushed happily. “I broke my bones falling down some stairs. I was hurrying to get to class on time and tripped over my skirts.”

  The priestess’s eyes widened. “Did you heal them right then?”

  It seemed miraculous to her, how easily Alphonse could knit bone and sinew back together. She had taken the broken bones in Delyth’s wing and mended them in moments, just the moon before.

  She nudged Alphonse with her shoulder. “I’ll bet you weren’t even late to class.”

  Shaking her head, Alphonse held up her wrist. “The masters decided it was time for me to learn, so they permitted me to do my own wrist. It took me three days to get it right. Of course, when I got it wrong, the bones had to be rebroken.”