the fire, her husband's hand on her shoulder. Both of them look ready to faint at the slightest indication of rage from Aron. To my traveling companion's credit, he's calm. It's as if he expected this sort of thing. Me, I still feel slightly betrayed that we stayed here overnight and were friendly and they're just now deciding to tell us about the other Aspect that's looking to kill both of us.
I remind myself that Vian is mortal and poor and pregnant and worried and possibly starving. We're the enemy in her eyes, and she's making a great concession by telling us. It's clear from her husband's tight mouth that he didn't want to say a thing at all. Him, I can't like. For all of his obedience and terrified kneeling to Aron, he was ready to not say a peep about the other guy that came through a few days ago.
I kind of hate him for that.
Vian gives me another worried look. "Travelers stop by our farm all the time," she tells me. "At first we didn't think anything of it. They wore cloaks and they brought more rain with them. It's the rainy season anyhow, but there's been more and more ever since the Anticipation, and our crops have suffered. These particular travelers were a large band, maybe ten men, all armed. There was a wizard with them." She purses her lips. "And a man in a cloak. They asked to stay at our farm and for us to feed them, but times have been hard, and we didn't realize…" She trails off, then gives her hands a nervous twist. "We told them it would cost a drab a day if they planned to stay. That's when their leader took off his cloak and we realized…" Her mouth trembles and her eyes fill with tears.
"That it was Aron," I say, voice flat.
"Yes. With two eyes and no axe, of course, but it was impossible to mistake him." She stares down at her hands in her lap. "Once we realized our error and that we had been blessed by the god's presence, we gave them whatever they wanted, of course. We let them clean out our stores and take two of our woale. We had three, you know. It's just that…the only reason they left the one behind was because it was limping." She won't look me in the eye. "They stayed with us overnight and the god never spoke to us. Not directly. Until it was time to leave. Then he came up to us and said that we had been good hosts and he would reward us suitably. We thought he meant coin, compensation for what he and his men were taking. Instead, they beat Cathis and rode away, and he left the rain behind. It has been pouring ever since. It will not stop. Not ever." She picks at a string on her tunic. "I guess we were not good hosts after all."
Aron and I exchange a look.
"Lies," Aron says.
"Unless he's trying to make us think that, and he's actually something else." I eye Vian and her husband. "Uh, so while they were here, did they have sex?"
She frowns at my question, confused. "Do you mean the god and his devotees? He had a concubine that he shared with the wizard, but that was it."
Sharing? That dirty bird. I'm guessing the wizard is his anchor, like I am to this Aron. "I mean like…you guys. Did you feel overcome with the need to have sex?"
"My wife is very heavy with our child," Cathis tells me, outraged. "I would not dream of touching her while she is carrying."
I don't bother to tell him that I've heard that's not a problem, but I also don't care about him, secret-keeper that he is. Fuck him. "No orgies amongst his soldiers?" When they give me baffled looks, I sigh. "Okay, maybe it wasn't Hedonism then."
"It is Lies," Aron says again. "And he is heading to the tower as well."
"How do you know for sure?"
"Because I am him and he is me." He crosses his arms over his chest. "We are heading there ourselves, are we not?"
He has a point. But if we're drawing parallels… "So you're telling me that you'd share a hooker with your wizard, too?"
"Why does that matter?" He frowns at me as if I've lost my mind.
Oh, sure, it might not matter to him, but it sure as fuck matters to me. "No reason. Just that we're