Page 223 of Fangs
The tiny bit of stew I’d eaten threatened to come back up.
“He bandaged your arms and carried you to the bed, then he told me to watch you while he got food.”
Roe’s face was pale, his dark eyes wide. He looked like he was a second away from bursting into tears. I reached out and took his hands, squeezing. “I’m ok, buddy.”
“I don’t like them,” he whispered, tears welling up.
“Me either,” I muttered.
Talmar reappeared with another bowl of stew. He handed it to Roe, picked mine up from the floor, and held it out to me again.
“You must eat, Goddess.”
“Don’t call me that,” I snapped, but I took the bowl.
“Whether you like it or not, you are our Goddess.” He stroked my arm, and I tried to subtly shift away. “But if you prefer, I can call you Ember.”
I gripped the bowl so tightly my knuckles turned white. “What the fuck are you doing?”
His brow furrowed as though confused by my anger.
“You nearlydrownedme.”
“What?” Roe gasped.
“The rite of correction is not meant to harm you, merely to cleanse you. What you experienced was intense, yes. The sensation of drowning was a direct confrontation to your mortality, a reminder that life is fragile.”
I scoffed.
He smiled and the patronizing expression reminding me of Juck. He reached out again, combing his fingers through my tangled, damp hair.“You have undergone a great ordeal, and now it is my duty to ensure you are comforted as well as corrected. The water has done its work, and now you must be restored for the path ahead.”
“Don’t touch me,” I gritted out.
“We are bound to ensure you are cared for,” he murmured in a soothing tone, ignoring me. “None of us are permitted to touch you intimately.”
I tried to shift away, but his fingers tightened painfully in my hair, and panic sparked in my brain. “Let go of me!” I shrieked.
The tent door whipped open, and Sax stooped over to fit his tall frame through the entrance. Talmar released my hair, dropping his hand into his lap and pressing his lips together as he regarded Sax with narrowed eyes.
Sax scanned the tent, his face unreadable as usual. “Orin is lookin’ for you, Talmar.”
Talmar let out a sharp breath through his nose, but he stood. “Make sure she eats,” he ordered before pushing past Sax to exit the tent.
Sax stepped into the tent, moving to stand in the center where the ceiling was the highest. He stared at me as I stared at him. He was probably around the same age as Pa, somewhere in his fifties. His greying hair was long enough that it almost brushed his shoulders, and a grizzled beard covered his jaw. He’d never been a clean-cut figure, but he looked wilder than he had at the Vault—skinnier, too, but I knew from being manhandled that he was still stupidly strong. His hands curled into fists at his sides, and I remembered how he’d knocked me out with one blow in Madame’s dungeon after I refused to heal Nemo, how he’d stripped the skin off my back with that whip?—
“Eat,” he commanded in his gravelly voice.
“Fuck you,” I snapped, and beside me, Roe let out a distressed squeak.
Sax’s expression didn’t change. “Don’t push me, Bones.”
“Or what? You gonna hit me again? Whip me again?” The rage building inside my ribcage felt unbearable.
“If you wanna protect the kid, you better learn to keep your mouth shut,” he stared hard at me as Roe cringed into my side.
“If you touch him, I will kill you,” I snarled. “Just like I killed Madame.”
He didn’t react, so either he already knew, or he didn’t care. “Use your head, Bones, and fuckin’ eat.”
