Arc 4: Chapter 16: A Cold Warmth

Arc 4: Chapter 16: A Cold Warmth

Cat gasped into my mouth, my kiss taking her by surprise. She relaxed after a moment, her eyelids drifting together to narrow the red orbs within to slits, not quite closing. She lifted a hand to curl her fingers into my short hair. I tasted her satisfied sigh.

Encouraged by this response, I leaned in. She pressed closer to me, so we folded together. I pulled back to take a breath only for her fingers to tighten into my hair, dragging me back with an impatient hiss. My lips parted more in that second kiss, letting her tongue slip into my mouth.

She tasted very faintly of copper.

Catrin pressed closer to me as we held one another. Without thinking about it, my hand drifted down to her waist, feeling at the thin, flexible leather of her leggings. They softly crackled as she slid her thigh against mine. Through the thin material of her camisole, I felt the tips of her breasts harden.

She pulled back, leaving me breathless and letting out a quick, nervous laugh. “Sorry,” she said. “I get excited easy.”

“You could give me some credit,” I complained lightly.

She didn’t seem to hear me. Her eyes were fixed on some point below my own, almost hidden beneath her lashes, her lips slightly parted.

“Cat?” I asked, still holding her.

She licked her lips, though the gesture seemed more nervous than seductive. “Get that coat and your boots off. I… I’ll be right back.”

She slipped out of my arms, to my disappointment. There was another smaller room connected to the bedroom, probably for washing — Garihelm had very nice inns. She vanished into it.

Sighing, still feeling my heart pound in my chest, I stripped out of my coat, tunic, and boots. This left me in my long undershirt and trousers. There was a draft somewhere, drawing a shiver from me. I lifted up my axe, for a moment unsure what to do with it. I hung it on one of the wall hooks meant for cloaks and coats. It emitted a hard, decisive clink as it settled into place.

It sat there, sharp, gnarled, accusing. I sniffed and tossed my coat over it to hide it from view.

What was I doing?

Catrin was an attractive woman who wanted me, and I hadn’t been with anyone in years. I needed to relax, to get my head on straight, to relieve some stress.

Excuses. If I did this, it would change things between us. Did I love Catrin? I hadn’t known her that long, all told.

I didn’t know. I felt like I could. Maybe it was time to start looking to the future, like Rosanna and Lias had.

I’ll stay here tonight, I thought. And tomorrow… I’ll figure everything else out.

Outside the window, someone let out a loud whooping sound. A few others answered the call. Revelers still out in the dark hours. Probably, the guard would round them up and send them home, possibly with a few new bruises for the trouble.

I heard shuffling in the washroom. A sudden flash of something very like vertigo hit me.

I was about to make love to a vampire. One who was experienced, yes, and who I doubted would kill me, but I hadn’t truly wrapped my head around what that meant, and what else might happen during. My heartbeat ticked up again for a wholly different reason to my earlier excitement.

Would she…

Probably. This was her usual method, wasn’t it?

“This has to be some kind of heresy,” I muttered to myself, running a hand through my hair. Umareon would think so, but…

Fuck him.

“Alken.”

I turned, and my breath caught. Catrin stood in the doorway to the side room, lit by a soft union of the alchemical lamp and the moonlight filtering through the window. Just enough shadow clung to her to provide an oddly surreal silhouette.

She’d stripped out of the boots, leather trousers, belt, and layered sleeves, leaving the tight fitting camisole and waist cape. She’d removed most of the black threads that’d helped secure the loose garments. The top came up beneath her arms, revealing her athletic build and clinging to her breasts.

The skirt, like before, didn’t have much of a front, but hung almost to the floor like a silky train. An arch of frill-lined material hung down in the front to cover her sex, though I could make out just a hint of dark hair through the almost transparent silk, above the slight gap between her thighs. Her long legs poised at an almost catlike angle, one crossed in front of the other as she rested on the balls of her feet.

Her mop of chestnut hair hung around her face like a cloud. One eye peered out at me, glinting bright red in the poor lighting.

I drew in a deep breath, surprised by the sight and my own reaction.

“Bit tacky,” Cat said, ruffling her hair with unusual self-consciousness. “I just, I dunno… I thought maybe you’d like it. Kind of elfy, isn’t it? I used to hear things about you Alder Knights.”

I just shook my head, running a hand over my mouth. “You’re beautiful, Catrin.”

She blushed. “Thanks.”

I meant it. Catrin couldn’t be called conventionally beautiful by the standards of elves or nobles. She had a long, narrow face just shy of being gaunt, a long nose, thick eyebrows set above large, intense eyes shadowed by a nocturnal life. Her lips were wide and set low, the upper larger than the lower. A painter might soften some of these edges if they were to put the face to canvas.

I did find her beautiful in that moment. It took me off guard, stealing my words, stalling my thoughts.

We watched one another for a time, locked in that moment. Then, the motion full of deliberation, Catrin took a step toward me, then another, her movements a cautious dance as her bare feet glided across the floorboards. She kept her eyes on some point below mine. Her lips were pressed tight, as though she were restraining some thought or focusing on a difficult task.

“Do you trust me?” She asked.

I watched her. “Do you trust yourself?”

She scoffed, drawing another step closer. “With you? I’m less certain than usual.” She nodded to the bed. “Sit down?”

I did, with deliberate slowness, patient and with minimal movement. I had the same sensation I did facing off with some predator in the wilds, unsure if it would attack or not. Though Catrin seemed poised, I sensed a shivering energy in her, an impatience she barely kept control of.

She stood over me then, framed half in light and half in shadow. She tilted her head to one side, studying me, her expression almost critical.

“Why don’t you trust yourself with me?” I asked her. My voice sounded rough. It had taken me off guard, how arousing the sight of her in the doorway had been.

She thought about it a moment. “I think… Maybe because you seem like a dream?”

I frowned, tilting my head to one side. “A dream?”

“I told you what I was,” she said softly. “How could Half Dead Cat expect to catch the eye of a man like you?”

“Cat…” I set my jaw. “I don’t like all of this self disparagement. I have enough of that for the both of us.”

“I stopped being ashamed a long time ago,” she told me seriously. “But even still, I have been thinking about you a lot. Ever since Cael, I’ve wanted this.”

She bit her lower lip, leaning forward. I leaned back, and she crawled onto the bed over me, poising on all fours. Our mouths drew close together, lips parting at the same time.

“I’ve been dreaming about it ever since that first time,” she murmured, her vermillion eyes drifting down. “The way you taste. Your blood was like fire in me.”

She shivered, letting the long fingers of her left hand crawl up my stomach, feeling my muscles through the thin undershirt. She let it slide back down, lower, lower…

We kissed as her hand began to work below. I groaned. She breathed a pleased laugh into my lungs.

We stayed like that a while, just feeling one another. I ran a hand up her ribs, glided my thumb across one breast. I felt something I didn’t expect and paused.

Cat pulled back and let out a breathless titter. “Ah, forgot about that. You’ve probably not seen it before, good knight that you are.”

I tilted my head, curious. Cat pulled back, rolled her shoulders, then folded her camisole down. In the moonlight, I saw more of her then, including the glint of little metal studs.

“Silver for the dead, right?” She grinned at me, blushing.

I grimaced at her joke. “That’s terrible.”

“Heh.” She smiled, but her humor turned coquettish as she took my right hand and guided it to her breast, letting me caress it. Once I got used to the unexpected feel of the piercing, I found I liked it.

“They’re popular in a lot of brothels,” Cat explained, letting out a murmur of pleasure as I ran my thumb in a slow circle. “Your nobles use them too, you know. Lot of chaste corsets hiding jewels, if you know what I mean.”

She leaned down to kiss me again, wrapping her arms around my neck. Her chest pressed against mine, the bits of cold metal there making me shiver. I moved her hair aside and bit her ear gently, finding it was tapered to a slight point. Returning the favor she’d done me before, I slid my other hand down beneath the front of her skirt. I massaged gently. Her teeth clicked together next to my ear, a sharp breath hissing through them.

She gasped a short time later, flexing against my hand. “No more,” she panted. “I’m ready.”

I laid down against the pillows. Cat stripped out of her top, leaving the waist cape on, and began to glide across my stomach, moving with slow, irregular rhythm. She’d gotten my shirt unlaced at some point — how had I missed that?

I could feel her beneath the thin garment, damp and soft. I ran my hands up her thighs, cinching the cloth up further. Cat rolled her neck, leaned down, and pressed her lips against mine hard.

We found one another in the dark, and I slid into her. She let out a sharp cry.

“Fuck…” She pressed her head to my chest, pausing a moment.

“Too fast?” I breathed into her hair.

She shook her head, then lifted her eyes to mine. Liquid red and full of hunger, they narrowed as though looking into a torch flame.

“Not sure I’ll ever get used to that,” she said. “But God, your eyes are pretty.”

“Yours too,” I told her, meaning it.

“Heh. No they’re not. But thanks.” She ran a thumb along my brow, then kissed me. She placed more soft kisses at the corners of my lips as she moved atop me, even as her sharp nails cut into the sheets, flexing in time with her body.

The bed was old, and not very large. After less than a minute, it began to creak beneath us. Cat didn’t have what I could call a pretty voice — rough and unrefined, but I liked the sound of it. There was no artifice in her. She didn’t fake pleasure. I heard it in each moan or soft cry I pulled from her, every hiss and grunt.

Cat pressed a palm to the sheets by my neck and rested her forehead against mine, panting against my face so I all but drowned in her storm of tangled brown hair. A low growl bubbled in her throat as she slid her lips down my jaw, down to my neck…

She paused, slowing, restraining. Her brow furrowed as though in concentration. I felt her clenched teeth against my skin, felt her nostrils flare. Her chill breath cascaded over my skin. She let out a soft whine. My blood pulsed through me in rhythm to my pounding heart. A siren’s song to those red eyes and sharp teeth.

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

Perhaps I could blame the fact that all the blood had rushed out of my head by that point, but I made another foolish choice.

“It’s fine,” I panted. “It’s fine. Just do it.” I curled my fingers through her hair, holding her lips to my neck.

Her breath against my skin was too cool, and full of indecision. I felt her sharp teeth, poised, pressing.

“I trust you,” I whispered. She needed this.

I wanted to be needed.

She hesitated a moment longer, then drifted further down to the place where my shoulder and neck met. Her eyes burned with need, with hunger, with lust.

Despite all that, despite how long I’d made her wait and how close she was, she took her teeth off my skin to lift her face to mine. She leaned forward and kissed me softly. When she pulled back, her red eyes were warm. She brushed my cheek with her hand, the gesture full of affection, before lowering her lips back to my shoulder.

Then she sunk her fangs into my flesh.

Some time later, we lay together in a tangle of bedding. The room was dark, only a sliver of moonlight coloring the mist on the window.

The faint glint of one red eye watched me from within a mess of brown hair. Cat lay on her side, still and relaxed. One of her sharp nails circled in my palm idly, a pleasant feeling.

“So” she said, watching me.

“So,” I agreed, shifting.

We lay together in the dark for a long time. A cloud passed over the moon, drowning the sparse light so all I could make out was her bare outline on the bed, and the almost animal glint of her nocturnal eyes.

“Did I hurt you?” I asked her softly.

Cat shifted, pillowing her head on her arms. “Yeah.” She sighed in satisfaction.

“It’s been a while,” I repeated, feeling embarrassed. Then, more hesitantly I added, “Are you going to be okay?”

I’d finished in her. She’d seemed to want me to, but even still I inwardly kicked myself for not being more cautious.

She smiled. “Can’t get pregnant. I’m only really alive sometimes. Never long enough for it to take.”

I chewed on that a moment. Her hand reached out in the dark and felt at my jaw. Her thumb ran over my bottom lip, the sharp nail tracing the upper.

“Did you…”

“I did,” She assured me. “The blood helped. Always does.” She gave me an odd look and added, “Not used to anyone worrying about me.”

“Don’t much see the point if it’s not good for both of us,” I said.

She blinked once, making her red eye wink out for a brief moment, then shifted to press closer to me, snuggling against my broad chest. She let out a sigh at my warmth. I wrapped an arm around her, holding her close. The cuts on my shoulder throbbed dully. A minor pain, all considered.

Catrin stared at the wound hungrily. “That’s going to bleed a while. Can I…”

I nodded, brushing her hair with my nose. She pressed closer and put her lips to the cuts her fangs had made, almost a kiss. I waited a while as she sipped at the remnants of the wound. Once I’d gotten used to it, it wasn’t a bad feeling.

“Thought I might never get to feel you like this,” she murmured once she pulled away, the bright red of her eyes slitting as she lowered her lashes. “Never met a man who played hard to get so well. Usually I just say hey, shiny coin you got there, want a tumble? By the by, you into bite play?”

“I wanted to,” I admitted. “Several times.”

She didn’t say anything to that, only curled against me and closed her eyes. I held her, cold and slender and soft in the darkness.

I felt… I wasn’t wholly sure. I felt calmer than I had in a long time. Even though the woman in my arms was a hemophage, even though she fed on me, I felt safe with her. Yet, despite the pleasing ache in my muscles, despite my exhaustion and the heaviness overtaking my eyes, I couldn’t fall into sleep.

My mind churned.

When Rosanna had introduced me to her children, I’d berated myself for wasting a decade wallowing in self pity. I’d made a commitment to being Headsman, true, but I could have been accomplishing more within that role. I could have used my influence and connections to help people like Emma much earlier than I had.

And I was tired of being alone. I was tired of silent campfires and cold beds, with nothing but hateful shades to keep me company. No ghosts bothered me even in that dark room — they were afraid of the dhampir.

I pulled Cat closer, pressing my lips to her mess of chestnut hair. She murmured something I didn’t quite catch and pressed firmer against me. I’d never known her to be so still, so at ease. She had always seemed furtive and nervous beneath her outer shell of confidence.

I could start making a change here. I could heal.

“Cat,” I said, feeling breathless again, my heart quickening as the thought boiled up, ready to burst out into action.

“Hm?” She asked, on the verge of sleep. The blood had done something similar to alcohol to her, making her drowsy and content. But she felt my heartbeat, and heard the urgency in my voice. Whipping her hair out of her eyes, she propped herself on one elbow to look at me. “What is it?”

We were both naked in the darkness, vulnerable to one another.

“Leave the Backroad,” I told her. “Leave the Keeper.”

She blinked as my words registered. “What?”

I spoke more quickly as my mind raced with the possibilities. “I’m inside the imperial court, now. I have the ear of powerful people in the Accord. If I play my hand right, I might be able to get my knighthood back, my titles.”

I rested my hand on her shoulder, staring into her eyes. She winced as the light in them caught her unexpectedly.

“You don’t have to work in that place anymore,” I said, intent. “You could get away from it, have a life… With me. I’m not saying it would be easy, or that you’d be safe all the time, but we can make it work.”

Cat didn’t reply for a long while. She searched my face at first, then dropped her eyes down to the bed. I waited, breathless, feeling more certain about this than I’d felt about anything in forever.

Finally, Cat turned onto her back and sat up, pulling away from my hand in the same motion. She winced as she bent one slender leg, cupping the knee with her hand. She blew out a breath.

I felt my heart skip a beat.

“Al…” She tilted her head back, rolling her shoulders. “You’re asking me to, what? Become your mistress?”

I shook my head in denial. “It’s not like that.”

“That’s how it would be,” she replied seriously. “Not that I’m picky about that sort of thing, mind, and I’m flattered, but…”

My shoulders slumped. But.

Cat sighed, looking for words as her eyes wandered the moon-touched shadows of the room. “You remember my story about that farm boy?”

“I do,” I said, not sure where she was going.

“I’ve thought about it before, you know?” She shrugged with one shoulder, pulling her leg up against her body. “Settling. But it doesn’t work. I don’t even think I want to.” She frowned, her brow furrowing. “I’d end up killing you.”

“You wouldn’t have to,” I insisted. “We can figure something else out.”

“So I still sleep around even when I’m with you?” She asked, serious. I didn’t mean to react, but she must have seen the slight twist in my face. In the dark, I saw her mouth form a sad smile. “That’s what would need to happen, Alken. Maybe I could separate the feeding from the sex, but then I’d be her again. That thing I was when I was young. The monster.”

She turned, crossing her legs and facing me directly. “I chose to live like this. I’m happy enough, and… This is going to sound twisted, but I like it. When I’m taking a bit of someone’s life away, because that is what I do, I can at least make it enjoyable for them. For both of us. It’s my way.”

She shrugged, slender shoulders moving in the darkness. I'd sat up as she talked, so we spoke level with one another.

“I can accept that,” I said, telling myself I could with time. “Whatever you need, we can work it out.”

Cat shook her head. “I won’t do that to you, Al. I care about you too much to do that to you.”

Anger flared up in me, hot and sudden. “Then what was this?” I snapped. Did she just want my blood, all this time?

She didn’t rise to my temper. Placing a hand on my knee, she replied in a quiet, calm voice. “You were hurting. And… I wanted to. Does it need to be more than that?”

Maybe not. But I wanted more. I grit my teeth before I could say anything I might regret.

“And, don’t take this personally, please…” She sighed. “I don’t like the nobles. I don’t give a damn about the Accord — what’s it ever done for me? For anyone like me? I don’t want to become indebted to them, even through you. I won’t kiss some great lord’s pointy shoe every time I walk into a room. I like to be where I can say my mind.”n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

“You could with me!” I insisted, jabbing a finger into my chest. “You could be whoever you wanted.”

She shook her head. “No. You feel too much loyalty to them. I’d just end up being your shadow, Alken.”

I tried to find more words, to find a way to convince her. Nothing came.

She took my hand, rubbing it as though to put warmth into my skin. Only, she was too cold.

“I love you, Alken. I’m here for you. If you need someone to lean on, talk to, to join you for a scrap, or even for a good lay, I’m your girl.” She lifted my hand to her lips, her eyes full of regret. “But I can’t be your lady wife. I’m sorry.”

We sat a while in silence. Wind rattled the window panes briefly. Something on the roof stirred, a bird or gargoyle perhaps.

In the cool room, my anger ebbed. Feeling foolish and embarrassed, I turned my back on her and put my feet down on the floor, propping my arms against my knees. I exhaled, trying to calm the unexpected surge of emotion that’d compelled me to make my hasty offer. A long silence, broken only by the night’s ambience, lingered in the dark room.

“Who’s Dei?” Catrin asked suddenly.

I stiffened. Had I said her name, while Cat and I had been…

Was I really so much of a bastard?

The wound in my neck prickled, and I understood. She’d taken it from my thoughts along with the blood.

Didn’t make me much less of a bastard.

“I’m sorry,” I said, groaning and burying my face in my hands. “God, I’m sorry Cat.”

I heard her blow out an exasperated breath behind me. Then, taking me off guard again, she reached out with her long legs and crossed her ankles in front of my neck, pulling me back with a swift movement. Deflated, I didn’t resist as she pulled me into her lap.

Cat let me rest between her thighs, pillowing my head below her navel. She played with my short hair. It grew coarse when short, almost like angry hackles.

“You’re hardly the first man to see another woman’s face while he’s inside me,” she told me.

My heart sank even further. “That’s awful, Cat. That doesn’t make me feel better at all.”

She shrugged, her expression calm. “Tell me about her,” she said quietly, tracing one of my ears with a thumb.

I narrowed my eyes, staring at the misted window. “Why?”

“I want to know you better. Her name is very loud in you. It’s like a drumbeat in your blood. There’s so much pain there.”

I closed my eyes as she massaged my scalp, unsure if I’d respond. Then, finally, I spoke.

“She was a priestess in the golden country. A cenobite. I loved her.”

Cat leaned down to look into my face, searching. “Did she die? During the war?”

“She did,” I said. Then after a pause I added, “I killed her.”

Cat’s playful hands paused. I expected shock, even horror. But her cool fingers glided down to the left side of my face, feeling at the long scars there. “She give you these?” She asked.

I glanced up at her, taking my eyes off the window. “Yes. How did you know?”

“They’re deep,” she said, running her hand along the four lines of damaged tissue. She traced the marks from my temple down to where they terminated on my cheek, the longest nearly touching the corner of my lip. “Like claw marks. But I recognize the shape of a woman’s nails.”

“She was…” I sighed. “She was a demon. A succubus. One of the eight the Traitor Magi bound to help him destroy the realm. She was using me to get close to the council, and also to get free of her master, I think. When I found out, we fought.”

Cat didn’t speak again for a while as she thought that over. “That’s why you didn’t trust me back in Caelfall. God, and I tried to take your wits. I’m surprised you didn’t run me through right there.”

I closed my eyes again. “I am sorry for that. I didn’t trust anyone. I still don’t trust anyone.”

“Not even me?” The dhampir teased.

I smiled. “Maybe a bit more than most.”

“That’s all very big,” Cat noted. “But I want to know about her. What was she like, this dark seductress? What kind of woman was able to steal Alken Hewer’s heart?”

I thought for a while, remembering. It had been a very long time, and my own memory wasn’t infallible. I’d colored over real events with half remembered dreams. A while passed before I spoke again. Cat didn’t rush me, only ran her fingers through my hair, along the hard angles of my face.

“I could never figure out what color her eyes were,” I said at last, staring up at the ceiling. “Sometimes they seemed green, other times gray. Sometimes a bit of both. Sometimes faded blue, like a lake under a misty sky. She had pale yellow hair, but she always covered it — nuns, you know? I only saw it a few times.”

“She sounds beautiful,” Catrin murmured.

“She was,” I admitted. “That face, anyway.”

I thought more before continuing, more details coming back in a sudden rush.

“She had this way of pursing her lips when I said something she didn’t agree with, like she didn’t like its taste. I always wanted to know what she was thinking, and she gave me little for free. So many of our conversations were like talking to some royal tutor. She liked lessons, and puzzles. She could be brazen, and demure, even shy. When I figured out what she was thinking before she was ready to tell me, she’d blush and get put out. It was cute.”

I smiled at the memory. “She could be sharp tongued, too. I don’t think she liked the other nuns too much. Makes sense, in retrospect.”

“What was her name?” Cat asked, tracing my jaw now. She toyed with the stubble there. I hadn’t shaved in some days. “Dei sounds like a nickname.”

“It is,” I agreed. “Her name was Fidei.”

Cat tasted the name. “Fidei… That means faith, doesn’t it?”

“Sister Faith,” I confirmed. “All the Cenocaste nuns had names like that. It’s their habit when they take their vows. They’re scholars and confessors, scribes and historians. There’s a reason cleric and clerk sound so similar. That’s where the order the Church evolved from, the Clericastia, got its name. The clericons are the scribes of God.”

Cat hummed. “I never thought about it. But don’t try to change the subject on me, Hewer.”

I closed my eyes at the pleasantly cool feeling of Catrin’s fingers.

“She had a way of making my problems seem small. All my fears, all my doubts, all my regrets and confusion. I saw and did some terrible things as a soldier, and she never seemed bothered by any of it. We could always cut to the heart of a problem when we talked. It helped me feel more certain of myself. For all that, she seemed sad somehow. It made me want to help her, but I didn’t know how, ironhead that I was.”

“Beautiful and smart too,” Catrin noted. “No wonder it took me so long to get you in bed.”

“Cat…” I sighed.

“Just teasing,” she laughed, though I heard a touch of doubt in her voice.

I opened my eyes and stared at the window again, watching the fog curl against it.

“And it was all an act. All her empathy, her charm, her interest. She played the role of exactly the kind of woman I’d fall for. She had me on her strings, and I had no idea. I told her about the goings on of the other knights, the lords, the king. Just as bad as the fools back in Karles who gave secrets away in pillow talk to spies. She seemed more real than anything else in that damned city, but she wasn’t.”

I quoted a line I’d once heard from a priest in Seydis.

“Hell is full of the dupes of the Abgrûdai. That’s how they managed to bring down the gates of Heaven — with seduction. I was a paladin of the Alder Table, and I didn’t see her for what she was. I didn’t want to. I just… Wanted something that felt real.”

I stared at my right hand, flexing the fingers. “And I killed her. Even then, even when I knew what she was, I didn’t want to do it. She came at me, and I had my sword, and it just… Happened.”

Above me, Catrin sniffed. Had I made her cry?

“Alken…” She leaned down and kissed me above one eye. “I’m so sorry.”

I shook my head. My throat felt tight. “You’ve been good to me. More than I deserve.”

“I rejected you,” Cat said, her voice small. “God, I wish I could heal this hole in you. I want to so badly, but…”

She was crying. I felt a tear land on my cheek.

“I understand,” I told her, and think I might have even meant it. “It’s my sin. This is enough, I think. It helped.”

My mind felt clearer. I knew what I had to do.

“We can keep doing this?” Cat offered. “I can’t promise you it’ll be more than that, but I had a good time tonight.”

“…Maybe.” I rested my hand on my stomach, settling back into her lap with a heavy sigh. “I enjoyed myself too. Can I stay here? With you? Tonight, at least.”

She took my face in both hands and leaned down, kissing me on the mouth. It was almost chaste, for her. “Of course,” she breathed into my lips. “Long as you want.”

My eyes felt heavy. Everything felt heavy. I hadn’t rested in so long.

I didn’t want to sleep. I didn’t want to dream. I was afraid of it.

And I wanted it. To see her.

I closed my eyes.

I was wounded. Twisted. How could I still feel this way, even after all this time, even knowing the truth?

Everything faded away. Cat’s hands on my skin, the moonlight, the city, the tasks ahead of me. Sleep, when I allowed it, came crashing in. Even still, thoughts and memories drifted through me like a languid fog through dark woods.

In the end…

In the end, when I’d had my sword, when Fidei had lunged at me, she’d been crying too.