Page 22 of Feral Guardian
“Johan, find them clothes,” Maria says as she bustles into the kitchen.
“Nothing will fit him,” the man mumbles, eyeing me like he doesn’t trust me. Still, he steps away and sets the knife on the counter beside his mother.
Maria comes in with a pot, her back hunched and feet shuffling. I take the heavy cauldron from her, and she smiles appreciatively. I’m not much better at handling it, but I get it to the hook beside the fire and she pushes the food into the heat of the low flames.
“Sit,” she commands.
I lower myself cross-legged beside my princess, my hand falling to her hair. It’s wet, but warmer now. Her lips are pink, and her body is still aside from her rhythmic breathing. She’s well.
Maria moves around Lily’s legs and hangs a kettle on another hearth crane, then pushes it into the low-burning embers. Johan says something in a hushed voice to the children in the back room before returning to the living area with a bundle of clothes.
“This should cover you,” he says as he sets the clothes on the floor just out of my reach.
I assume he’s trying to avoidmyreach. I don’t blame him. I broke down their door looking like nine hells, roaring and carrying what probably looked like a very dead pirate.
“Forgive me,” I say. “I was desperate. I didn’t mean to scare them.”
Johan tenses and moves to block my view of the back room.
Good father.
Maria picks at the clothes on the floor. There’s a moth-eaten dress sized for an adult woman and a pair of breeches that will in no way cover my lowers. Johan is not a scrawny man, but I am not average, either.
She pulls up the dress and fluffs it out. “Turn away so I may change her.”
“I mutilated myself.”Lily’s voice wavers through my mind.
“No,” I say, blocking Lily. “No. The fire will dry us.”
“I won’t harm her. She smells worse than death,” Maria says as she bats my hand away.
“Please,” I say and plant my hand firmly on the ground between Maria and Lily.
I can’t think of an excuse, and Maria’s eyes are scrutinizing me, expecting one. I can’t reveal Lily’s power. But more so, I can’t let her magus ability be known as this monstrous thing she’s done to herself when I’ve seen all the beauty she’s capable of.
“She…has a,” I pause, begging for words. “Skin ailment.”
Maria’s brows rise incredulously. “You are a terrible liar. Fine. Change her yourself.”
She hands me the dress and turns away. “Mind the pot and tell me when it bubbles.”
I nod and she takes Johan to the back room.
My mouth dries out as I look down at Lily’s resting form. Yes, she does smell like death, but she looks like a goddess.
I shake my head. I’m so tired my thoughts are drunk.
I kneel beside her and take care in peeling off her layers without looking at her. I don’t want to see what’s between her legs. I don’t want her to think about that image being in my mind and make her worry how I might think of her differently. I do think of her differently, slightly.
But it is only deeper reverence.
She’s a warrior through and through. She always has been. She committed the most gruesome act against her own womanhood to survive. Her tenacity and strength know no bounds. It hurts me to think she’s ashamed of herself.
The pot begins to bubble when I’ve secured the moth-bitten dress around my princess. No matter what she wears, she is a warrior goddess. I call Maria back, and Johan emerges with a small bucket of tools to fix the door. My need to protect my princess wins out over helping repair the damage I’ve done, and so I stick by the fireside as he haphazardly corrects the bent hinges.
Maria serves me a bowl of pinkish-red stew that smells sour.
“Yesterday’s borscht,” she says, then hands me a slice of tough bread.
