Page 54 of Marked by the Demigod

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That evening, the blurry bartender is back behind the wine bar, and Katya already has a glass poured for her, waiting.

Great. Means she thinks that she needs Aimes to be drunk for the conversation.

"Without naming names," Katya starts, in lieu of a greeting, "I must say your guy is trouble.

Aimes sits next to her, picking up her glass and clicking it with Katya's. "Cheers."

The blurry bartender makes a show of turning away and not watching them.

Katya clinks her glass back. "Poland, eh?"

"I have a passport." Aimes says, as if it matters. "He said he was taking me out for food. Turns out his idea of food was pierogies."

"So he's just showing up?" Katya isn't looking at her.

The back of her neck prickles. "Rarely, but yes."

"You shouldn't go with him." Katya all but blurts. "There's buzz...a lot of buzz...that he's planning something dangerous. Something big."

It rankles her, although she knows it shouldn't. He’s dangerous, the packet and the random cross-world trips only reinforce that. "He said he was constantly on the run right now," she says, staring at the empty rows of wine glasses behind the bar. "Says that he doesn't know what time zone he's in or when he should be sleeping."

Katya's brow furrows just enough to show the words making a small impact on her. "I mean, he's always done that, but..." she sighs, reaching behind the bar and pouring herself another glass of wine, before gesturing with it to see if Aimes wants more.

Aimes scoots her glass over to her, and Katya finishes the bottle into her glass. The bartender wipes his hands and leaves through the backdoor, and Katya’s eyes follow them as he does.

"But people are dying, somehow. I mean, not human people. At a more than...regular rate."

Aimes gets the sudden feeling that Katya is keeping something from her, something big.

"And there's talk, there's rumors, that he's somehow involved. Names dropped, languages spoken, signs that it's someone with more power than normal and..." She takes a gulp of her wine. "People are talking of taking him down. They just don't know that they...can't. Yet."

Her stomach settles, cold, and wine seems like an excellent idea for the moment. "So that's why I need to keep things secret?"

"I don't trust him to not do something too impulsive. I don't know why he's running, but there's a Demigod who's pissed off and killing people and there's not really anyone with the motivation or reputation."

The wine tastes like ass, but she drinks it anyways. "What about his brothers? Why aren’t they under suspicion? He said they were...after him?"

She wrinkles her nose at that. "They need him alive, they wouldn't jeopardize their grand plans of apocalypse or world domination." She rolls her yes, sudden and irreverent to their conversation. "Iakov wouldn't be scared of them."

But Aimes remembers his face, his desperation, his exhaustion, and privately doubts anything Katya says.

* * *

A few afternoonslater when she has no more libraries to visit and nothing interesting to code, she decides to walk to the Cahuenga General Store to get a fancy salad instead of cobbling together a depressing one at home.

It's a nice walk, with a shaded walkway and houses that are just on the rich side enough to be nice but not so rich she feels like she doesn't belong on the street. Burbank in the afternoon is beautiful and breezy, with kids skateboarding and just enough sound of humanity to soothe.

It's lovely, and it's one she did all the time with Rocky, so she hasn't done it in a while, halfway out of fear that it would be too painful and then halfway out of the shame for avoiding it for so long.

And now, as she strolls down the sidewalk, a small part of her muses that, if nothing else, at least this Iakov thing kicked her ass enough that she's no longer hung up on how shitty of an asshole Rocky was. Silver linings and all.

She kicks a small pebble, and as if summoned by her thoughts, Iakov appears mid-step. It doesn't even startle her this time.

"Does anyone ever see you appear midair and ask you about it?" Instead of the usual jump of emotion and adrenaline, she just feels a peaceful calm steal over her.

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