City of Ruin - Mark Charan Newton [69]
Because he didn’t know where or what this place was, it presented itself as artificial. It was a world without context. A world frozen, ironically and practically, in time. Beami wondered what would happen if they remained here permanently, but there was very little around for her to measure herself against. It was simply a world to escape into, a world in which they could conduct their affair without being discovered.
Lupus noticed a cluster of bruises across Beami’s back, and the narrow scoring across her shoulder. Shuddering gently, she let him run his fingers along them. Softly.
‘I can do something, you know,’ he offered. ‘Have a word or two with the lads.’
‘You can do nothing, Lupus.’
‘Makes me angry.’
‘And you think I’m not angry, too? Leave it alone. I give as good as I get.’
‘I’m sorry. I’m just a fool who thinks he can solve all your problems.’
Mellowing, she realized he only meant well. This conversation was almost impossible to start on. ‘He gets angry, but I’m not some meek woman. He’s hit me, yes, but once I even used a relic to stop him, and he didn’t even notice.’
A garuda came in, one of the local, feral ones, with different colouring from those found in the Boreal Archipelago, their plumages brighter and, of course, with no armour at all. It swooped in about forty paces from them, skimmed the tip of the grasses, its head craning in their direction, then banked away towards the deep blue.
She said, ‘It’s all because he hasn’t been able to have sex for some time.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘He . . .’ she searched for the right words. ‘He’s impotent, and he hates to talk about it. For us women, that’s acceptable, isn’t it? We can talk openly about how we feel – well, most of us can. But all he can say is that he doesn’t feel like a man any more – the rest of it he says with his rage. Maybe that’s why he leads such a dark life. I don’t know half of what he gets up to any more. I used to be attracted to the element of danger – you know what I’m like – but I know it’s not me. I’m not some dumb, weak-willed heiress who can’t even wipe her own rear. It isn’t me. It’s only important to him to be able to . . . fuck. Let’s say it – that’s what it is, isn’t it?’ After dwelling on this thought for a moment, she faced him again. ‘I’ve craved you for so long, you know.’
‘Merely glad to be of assistance,’ Lupus replied. His smile diffused the tension. ‘And my rates are very reasonable these days.’
‘You became a man-whore while you were in the army, did you? All those lonely soldiers away from home . . .’
‘You’d love it there, all those men . . .’
‘Hell, yes,’ she said.
‘Pervert.’
‘Dickhead,’ she said.
They kissed.
The first signs of dusk, a change in temperature, a shift in wind and the smells of vegetation gaining in intensity. The wolf came again, delighting Lupus. He leapt up as soon as he saw its face peering from within a cluster of sedges – two curious eyes.
‘Hey,’ he called out gently. He walked towards it wearing only the trousers of his uniform, carrying some of the meat they’d brought earlier. He crouched, offered the meat, while the animal cautiously approached. At first it just sniffed, twisting its head this way and that. Then with a quick nip, it plucked the meat from his grasp and withdrew into the sedges.
Lupus merely laughed, then returned to Beami.
‘You two are a bit like each other,’ she observed.
‘How d’you mean?’
‘A brief appearance, take the good stuff, then disappear again.’
‘That’s not fair. I need to get back to the barracks for training and strategy. I’d take you with me, if you wanted. You only have to say the word . . . but you’re married.’
‘It’s just not easy,’ Beami sighed. ‘He works so hard and provides us with that magnificent home, amazing food. I can’t say he doesn’t love me exactly. He just gets angry, but sometimes I think he’ll change, that I can help him change. This was what I was like, Lupus,