Vassal by Sterling D'Este (ebook reader computer TXT) 📕

care she took while arranging the sleeping quarters she would share with Alphonse later. It hadn’t been difficult to see how close the two had grown over the last few weeks. Was she so enthralled with her new friendship that she had forgotten that they were trying to bind the Goddess? That both Tristan and Delyth would stand in their way?

He should have never told Delyth how to repair her relationship with Alphonse.

“Besides,” he said, still whispering viciously. “I’m not really your best friend anymore, am I? You’re closer to someone else now. Someone who you’ll have to betray in the end.”

❀

What little color remained in Alphonse's face drained. Because Etienne was right. She had allowed Delyth to become a friend. More than a friend. Even knowing that Delyth served Enyo, that in the end, Enyo would retain Delyth’s loyalty. That banishing Enyo from Alphonse’s body would ultimately break the sacred trust between her and the priestess.

Ashen and feeling like she might weep, the healer tried to find the steel in her core that Enyo always wielded. Surely if she could be so strong, so too could Alphonse be a force of nature?

“You don’t know what it’s like! You don’t understand what I’m going through. I’m dying. Dying Etienne. Every day I feel my body becoming weaker. Every day I succumb to her all the faster. She is weedling me down into nothing more than kindling for the fires of her desire and—” Alphonse tripped over her tongue, trying to find the right words to explain. To make him understand. “For once in my life, I wanted to be… special. To someone.”

But to let Delyth remain unaware of their true purpose…

To lie.

To be dishonest.

Alphonse’s face was starting to crumple. He was right.

Etienne just considered her silently for a moment before shaking his head. He didn’t bother to answer her. Just stalked off to set up his tent.

Alphonse debated following her friend, but after a moment's indecision, she let him go. What would she say? That she regretted getting so close with Delyth? That she hadn’t allowed herself to become distracted from their goals?

Those would just be more lies. And she was tired of lying.

Hastily, with her back turned to Delyth and Tristan, she wiped at her cheeks and eyes and sniffed.

Straightening up, she turned to help Tristan with the small fire he had managed to get going. She knew if Delyth looked too closely at her now, she’d know something was wrong, and Alphonse wouldn’t be able to explain it. Let the priestess think Alphonse’s eyes were watering from the smoke of the campfire as she hastened to put together something warm and filling.

By the time Alphonse had dinner simmering contentedly on the fire, the tents were set up around her. It wasn’t but a short while longer before it was finished, and they were filling their bowls.

Delyth sat beside Alphonse, as was her habit, and draped a wing around the smaller woman for warmth. The others were busy filling their bowls when Delyth turned to her, brows drawn together in concern.

“You are quiet, aderyn bak dewr,” she said. “What’s wrong?”

Alphonse’s lips trembled and wobbled the moment Delyth turned her concerned gaze upon the healer. She felt like her innards were about to turn into a puddle.

“Etienne isn’t… happy with me.” She shifted her hand to brush against Delyth’s, hidden in the shadows of their bodies. It was safe enough for that contact. “Please don’t say anything to him. He is like my brother. Sometimes we fight.”

That was nearly a lie. In their entire friendship, she and Etienne had only truly fought three times, if that. Still, it wouldn’t do for Delyth to try and defend Alphonse or talk to Etienne and learn the nature of their disagreement.

Swallowing her remorse, Alphonse squeezed Delyth’s hand and then turned her attention to her other travel companions. Both looked worn, cranky, and about ready to start another fight.

Given the limited space and Etienne’s helpful spell that effectively sealed them in, a fight could be quite caustic in here. Alphonse hurried to think of a distraction.

“Who knows a good tale to share while we wait out the storm?”

༄

Delyth tightened the wing around Alphonse in comfort. For all Alphonse said about her and Etienne fighting occasionally, Delyth did not think it could be so simple. They had been traveling for moons now under tense conditions and never once had a sharp word passed between the two. Besides, Alphonse looked more upset than her words gave credit for.

Still, Delyth would not speak to Etienne about it. It was clear that Alphonse did not want her to, and it would be foolish to stick her nose into something she did not understand. Besides, she would rather hear about it from her little bird than from Etienne.

Delyth resolved to ask Alphonse about it again later that evening, in the privacy of their little tent. For now, she turned her attention to the conversation at hand.

“Something to pass the time is a good idea,” she said. “I have known mountain blizzards to take days to blow themselves out.”

Etienne paled at this, but Tristan only smiled crookedly. “How about we make it a competition? Winner doesn’t dig the latrine pit for a week.”

Of course, he would see it as an opportunity to get out of work. Delyth nearly rolled her eyes.

Alphonse swallowed but nodded. “Very well. But Delyth decides whose story is best. She isn’t spiteful nor easily impressed.” Alphonse smiled at Delyth, and something in the priestess’s belly warmed at the compliment. “Since the competition was your idea, Tristan, perhaps you should go first?”

Chapter XIX

Seventh Moon, Waxing Gibbous: Thloegr

“Once, in a town called Trefdwr, I won a game of Liar’s Dice,” Tristan started, his sonorous voice rolling like a storyteller’s. “That in itself was hardly a noteworthy occasion, but this time the man who came closest to winning was a crafty old adventurer who promised to give me a treasure map in exchange