the remains of his bolt stuck in the wood from his horrible shot four months ago, she stopped. “Legend, my butt,” she mumbled.
Which brought Kylar’s attention to her butt. Again. While the first word that popped into his mind wasn’t legendary, Vi’s butt was quite pert. Nicely round. Worthy of the stretchy-tight garb she wore. Unlike many athletic women, Vi had curves. Nice hips and awe-inspiring breasts.
Why am I thinking about Vi’s breasts?
Kylar kept pulling himself hand over hand, scowling. This was a distraction he didn’t need. He looked at Vi’s butt again. Shook his head. Looked again. Why am I attracted to her butt? How weird is that? Why do men like butts anyway?
Vi reached the castle wall and let down a rope. She whispered something and shadows obscured her. It wasn’t great, not nearly what Durzo had been capable of, much less Kylar. Her shadows were merely black, and obscured the recognizable humanity of her shape. Still, it was less conspicuous than a half-naked tart whose entire body shouted, “Look at me!”
Following her, Kylar slid down the rope quickly. They huddled in the shadow of a rock as the patrol boat passed.
“So, you haven’t said anything about my grays.”
Kylar raised an eyebrow. “What? Do you want me tell you if your trousers make your butt look big? They do. Happy?”
“So you have been looking at my butt. What do you think of the rest?”
“Are we really talking about this? Now?” Kylar glanced at her breasts again—and got caught.
“The haughty disdain thing will work better for you if you don’t blush,” Vi said.
“They’re great,” Kylar said. He coughed. “Your grays, that is. Not that your breasts—I mean style is perfect for you. Just over the line between sexy and obscene.”
She refused to take offense. “First I take their attention, then I take their life.”
“It looks cold.” This time, he didn’t look at her breasts. Barely—despite the small attention-getters standing at attention on top of her large attention-getters.
“I’m a woman. I don’t get to pick clothes for comfort.”
“I can’t believe I’m having a conversation this long about clothes.”
“You call this a long conversation about clothes?” Vi asked. “Haven’t had many lovers, have you?”
“Just one. And not for long, thanks to you,” Kylar said.
That shut her up. Thank the God.
He got up and started moving. They had to hide every time the patrol boat passed, Vi so she wouldn’t be seen, and Kylar so Vi wouldn’t know he could go invisible. Kylar had worn fairly tight clothes himself, an old pair of grays that Momma K had had fetched for him. The more anyone knew about the extent of his powers, the more vulnerable he was.
They reached the sunken gate to the Maw an hour after midnight. There was no one guarding it.
Kylar tried the latch. It wasn’t locked. He looked at Vi. Obviously, he liked that as much as she did. Still, how could the Godking know they were coming? He moved to open the door when Vi touched his arm. She pointed to the rusty hinges, motioning for him to wait.
She touched each of the hinges in turn, murmuring, then nodded to him.
He tried the rusty door. It opened silently.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” Vi said. “So it doesn’t just work on little girls.”
Kylar eased the door shut and stared at her. “Why don’t you try it on yourself?” he asked.
“I already did,” she said. “Anyone further than five feet away can’t hear me.”
“That’s not what I meant. Anyway, how can you be sure it works?”
“You didn’t hear what I just called you.”
“Which was?”
“True, but not clever enough to repeat.”
He hesitated. “Vi, before we go in, I need to ask you something.”
“Shoot.”
“I got into wet work because of a child named Rat. He was Garoth Ursuul’s son, and it was to please Garoth that Rat cut up Elene’s face and raped Jarl and tried to rape me.”
“I didn’t know,” Vi said. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s not important,” Kylar said gruffly. “I got away.”
“I didn’t,” Vi said quietly. She sank into herself, into those years of nightmare. “For me it was my mother’s lovers. She knew what they did, but she never stopped them. She always hated me for what I cost her. As if I was the one who fucked some stranger and got pregnant and made her run away. I don’t know if she wanted me at first or if she was just too much of a coward to take ergot or tansy tea.”