Famine (The Four Horsemen #3) - Laura Thalassa Page 0,45
to walk away from the horseman, looking for a secluded place to do my humanly business, but then I pause.
“Do you not have to go to the bathroom?” I ask over my shoulder.
Now that I think about it, have I ever seen him relieve himself?
“I’m not talking about this with you,” he says, fiddling with one of the saddle bags.
“But you eat and drink.” That must come out.
“Not talking about it.”
Fine.
With a sigh, I wander away to go to the bathroom. When I return, Famine is stroking his horse, his back to me. I pause for a moment, just watching him being gentle with his steed.
Just when I was certain the man was wholly evil, he goes and pets his horse like he cares about something.
“Does he have a name?”
I see the horseman subtly jolt; I guess he hadn’t realized I was there.
“Does what have a name?” His voice drips with disdain, his back still to me.
“Your horse.”
Famine turns to face me. “Are you ready to go?”
I sit down on the ground. “I mean I’m not unready, but I’m in no rush either.” It’s a lovely day, now that the sky isn’t filled with locusts or the screams of the dying. I could linger.
“I don’t really give a rat’s ass about your concerns.”
“You know,” I say, tipping my head back to get a better look at his annoyingly handsome features, “it’s bad enough that you’re a mass murderer, but I was at least hoping that you wouldn’t be such a dick when you weren’t killing people.”
“Up.”
“I’ll get up—but first, you have to tell me one redeeming quality about myself.”
“There’s nothing redeeming about you.”
I huff. “Well, sure there is. I have a banging body, for one thing.” I mean, that’s undisputed. Just ask my clients. “I’m also easy to talk to.”
“Up.”
“It’s okay if you’re a little shy about opening up—lots of men are. It’s really endemic to our culture—okay, my culture. Anyway, I’ll go first: I think you’re obscenely handsome, and your smile lights up your whole face.”
Of course, that smile usually precedes violence, but … it’s still a nice smile, and there’s not much else left to compliment. The man’s got a shitty personality.
The Reaper approaches me, and before I can say anything else, he heaves me up over his shoulder.
“Whoa. Hey, wait—we’re not leaving yet, are we? What about your neat food trick?” As if on cue, my stomach growls. “I’m hungry.”
“You get two more stops,” Famine says, dropping me onto the horse.
I frown at him. “I do need to eat, you know.”
“I know what limits the human body is capable of when it comes to food,” Famine says, pulling himself into the saddle. “You’ll survive a few more hours of fasting.”
He steers us onto the dirt road, and we resume our travels.
“So,” I say as we pass a tiny farm, “you can control swarms of bugs.” My tone is light, but I have to swallow down my alarm.
“I don’t control the bugs, I just call to them.”
Because that is just so much clearer …
“How do you call to bugs?” I ask as the farm’s small orchard withers away.
Famine sighs.
“I’m sorry,” I say, “but do you have something better to do right now?”
“If I give you one of your damned compliments,” he growls, “will you stop questioning me?”
My eyebrows hike up with surprise. He’s actually going to try complimenting me? This I have to hear.
“Sure,” I say.
But in the silence that follows, I brace myself for some stinging barb.
“You have a lovely voice.”
I feel an unexpected flush of warmth at his words.
I tilt my head in confusion. “But I thought you wanted me to stop talking,” I say.
“About me. Talk your ass off about anything else.”
“I’m sitting here with a man who says he’s not actually a man, riding a horse that might not actually be a horse—”
“He’s a horse.”
“—and I’m supposed to not talk about any of it.”
“Precisely.”
There’s a long pause.
“Fine. I guess that leaves me to talk about sex. Moist, thick, wet sex.”
Another beat of silence passes, then—
“Would you like another compliment?”
The stars are out and the night has turned chilly and I’ve long since lost feeling in my ass and yet we’re somehow still on this godforsaken horse.
“Eventually, I’m going to need to sleep,” I say.
“I’m not stopping,” Famine says.
“And you wonder why I didn’t join you years ago.”
He says nothing to that.
“I’m cold.”
Silence.
“And hungry.”
More silence.
“And tired.”
“Deal with it, Ana.”
I purse my lips. “You’re really not going to stop?”