the door open, I had called out asking who it was.
“Tis bit I, lass.” As soon as Trice answered me, I relaxed back against the edge of the tub knowing that he couldn't see me. But then the second I smelled it, my hands gripped the sides of the bath and I bolted upright, making water spill over the sides and splash onto the floor.
“Oh, my Gods. If you tell me that is food I can smell, I will think you're an Angel on the wrong side of the tracks, I told him making him laugh before shouting,
“Heads up.” This was before I saw a bread roll being thrown over the top of the screen, making me catch it quickly before it could drop into the tub and become nothing but a mound of soggy bread in my hands. I couldn't help but moan around the first bite, feeling as though it was the best thing I'd ever tasted, I was that hungry.
“You sound like a wild hungry bear,” Trice commented, clearly amused and I answered him unashamedly, and with my mouth full I told him,
“I feel like one.” It was after this that I ended up having the strangest conversation, not only because of all the things I had to tell him when explaining to him exactly what had happened, but also because I was sat in the bath and there was nothing but a screen in between us.
Thankfully, this conversation took so much effort and explanation, that it didn't give us time to address the elephant in the room, that, of course, being me, and why I had kept the knowledge of who Lucius really was to me from him. Because this was the first time I had spoken to Trice since that day. The one shortly after I had been imprisoned in the dungeon. Since then it had been one thing after another that had kept me from being able to speak to him and explain. Which I had to question why neither of us was taking the opportunity to do so now. Especially when we were alone and quite possibly would not get another moment like this to present itself.
But then I had to confess to be following Trice’s lead, as he too didn't seem to want to talk about it and knowing him, he would have simply asked if he had. In fact, the only time that we touched on this subject was when he explained to me what he was doing here. That after what happened in the field of souls, as he had called it, the King had charged him and his brothers with the task of finding anyone that had the ability to remove a hex. A person that apparently he was supposed to find here, as it was said this was his usual place to meet a particular female demon with whom he was having an affair with.
My last question I asked him before getting out of the bath was how this person was supposed to help in removing this hex, to which Trice’s cryptic reply was a simple,
“Ye wull see.”
A short time after this I found myself clean, fed, and well rested after Trice had suggested I get some sleep before the demon arrived. I thought this was a great idea on account of me being exhausted, but before my nap I had asked him where his brothers were if they had all been tasked with the same job of finding this hex removal guy.
It turned out that only a few hours before I turned up, word had reached the brothers that Lucius needed them back to help him find me. Of course, hearing this and I inwardly winced at this painful image of what Lucius had been through in the time that I had been taken. I had to wonder if he would have found us by now, and more importantly if he had found Nero?
Telling Trice about Nero had been one of the first things I had said, even before I found myself being unceremoniously showered in a bucket. Naturally, I then tried to get him to go and save her. Trice was clearly frustrated and worried for Nero’s life, as I was, and I could see it pained him to have to tell me that he couldn't do this. Before I could argue he held up a hand and explained to me why.
He told me that where I had come from, he did not have access to.