Tula also jumped to her feet, attempting to forestall my exit from her small, quaint office.

  “I wasn’t quite finished, you know? I’ve heard rumours of a dark spirit sighted near the border not seven days past! An evil creature with a fear of iron. Such a thing would fetch an exorbitant price if offered to the right buyer.”

  I quirked an eyebrow at her, which, evidently, wasn’t the response she’d expected from me. She redoubled her efforts to maintain my interest.

  “If you’re going about dismantling this sordid group of ruffians, then perhaps you should keep an eye out for that! Strange magics seem to wind themselves around such creatures.”

  I rolled my eyes. No doubt she was speaking of Nia’cyl, whom I’d already liberated from the Brigands. Liberated? I supposed that wasn’t quite right. Nia’cyl had simply used the Brigands to get to me, so I wasn’t really doing any ‘saving’ there.

  If anything Nia’cyl’s involvement with me had led to benefits that I still couldn’t grasp the implications of. It was very much possible that she’d saved me, in some far-flung situation the future had yet to present me.

  I idly ran a finger across the back of my hand, exploring the mark that had entwined itself with Armela’s band as I replied to Tula.

  “I’ll take your information into consideration while conducting my business, Tula. Thank you for both your hospitality and time, and I look forward to a fruitful partnership with you going forward.”

  With that, I stepped through the door and across the lobby of the building. It had felt as though that meeting was supposed to be important, like I needed to be there at that specific time, but I couldn’t determine why.

  I scanned through the footage of our meeting over and over to the same result. She was utterly mundane. My pattern recognition wasn’t triggering on anything. Nothing stood out about her, or around her.

  So why did she make me feel like that?

  She hadn’t given me any substantial information, and we hadn’t discussed any critical topics that I wasn’t already working on. But the lingering feeling that our interaction needed to happen persisted as I walked towards the inn where Armela had taken up a room.

  There were still several hours until the meeting tonight, and I needed to spend some quality time with her before preparing for the presentation. I was curious to see what kind of mood she would be in after the events of the afternoon.

  From what I could tell, it didn’t seem like any of it had affected her negatively, but who knew what lay hidden beneath the surface. It was possible that she’d been putting up a front in order to obfuscate her discomfort.

  As unlikely as that may be, she would still need aftercare and some decompression to process what she’d gone through.

  It had only been three and a half days since she’d come to know me, and things had progressed between us at an incredibly fast pace. The quiet moments between us while making love or idly chatting had certainly helped close the gap, but it wasn’t anywhere near enough time to truly get to know one another.

  There was a lifetime of experience being carried within her I hadn’t even scratched the surface of, and while I was invested enough to want to go deeper into who she was, it would take more time before I could say I truly knew her.

  This, of course, was mutual. And while I’d changed significantly from who I’d been before meeting my God, I was, at heart, still the same man I’d been on earth. Mental scars and all. I was doing my best to take this all in stride, but even I would need some time to process the events that had taken place over the past 4 days.

  I’d never killed someone before—or anything for that matter—save for a small fish I accidentally hugged to death when I was a child. And while I could disconnect myself from the action, compartmentalise myself from its consequences, it didn’t remove the fact that I’d done it.

  And easily.

  Almost without thinking about it.

  Some of the men I’d slaughtered might have had families who’d never see them again, or never even learn of what happened to them. Some of those men may have completely resented what they were being asked to do.

  Some of those men may very well have been incredibly dear friends to me, were I to have chosen a different path.

  I stopped outside the door of the inn, lost in thought. The sun cast long shadows across the street as it hung lower and lower in the sky. Everything was moving so quickly around me: the relationships I was forming, the plans I was making.

  It’d only been 4 days, and I was about to address an entire village on wide-sweeping changes to their lives.

  I had millions of years of… this?

  Was this what it was going to be like for me? An endless assault of ‘the next thing’ until I either completed what my God had selected me for or I was unceremoniously ended?

  My mind reeled.

  I understood it; the calculating part of my mind had figured this out early on. I’d admitted it to myself, but maybe I hadn’t truly wrapped my head around what that really meant for me. Panic welled up in my chest again, losing my family and friends once again closing in on my heart.

  The absence of Ava and the familiarity of my God’s heart.

  I slumped against the inn and slid down the wall until I was squatting. Trying to keep my breathing under control.

  I was just some fucking guy.

  Some schmuck trying to untangle the knot of fuckery I’d tied myself up in. What the hell did I really know about any of this shit. How could I even face a crowd of people and talk about this stuff without sounding like an absolute fool?

  My thoughts swirled, and I lost grip on what I was doing. I wanted to run. Get away from all of it and hide deep in the ground where no one could find me.

  That’d be better for everyone, they’d learn eventually that I had no idea what I was doing, and it would all come crashing down around my head. I had to go; I had to—

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  “Vita?”

  My thoughts froze in place, and I looked up to see Armela poking her head out of the door of the inn. She had a worried look on her face as she stared down at me.

  “I could… feel… that you were here, somehow, so I came to check. What’s wrong? Are you well?”

  I looked away.

  “Sorry… Armela, I—“

  I cut my words off, unable to speak what I was thinking. Not finding the right way to articulate them; not wanting to burden her with my selfish need to flee from my responsibilities.

  “Come here, come.”

  She came out the door and crouched to grab my arm before she pulled me to my feet.

  “Just come with me, and we’ll sort it out. I’m sure whatever it is will turn out to be a smaller problem than you think.”

  I didn’t think that was true, but ended up following her into the building, anyway. She led me by the hand past the clerk’s desk. It was neatly tucked into a small cubby with a large board on the wall behind it that had several rows of dozens of hooks with numbered keys hanging from them.

  The hall directly to the right after entering led to a small dining hall for patrons who needed breakfast or dinner for their accommodations. It was cosy-looking—with several small booths lining the windows facing the street.

  The interior was bright, lit by more wall sconces carrying the crystal and sigil combinations that I had seen in Tula’s office. Our room was on the second floor, three doors down from the top of the stairs on the left side of the hallway.

  Armela opened the door and pulled me into the small room. A writing desk was directly across from the door, under a window overlooking the small shop directly north of the inn. The red tiles of its roof gave the room a slight tint that seemed to warm the interior.

  A small chandelier hung from the centre of the ceiling. To the right of the door was a small single bed with neatly made sheets and two straw pillows. Simple paintings adorned the walls, and a throw rug covered the wooden floorboards between the door and the desk on the far end.

  A small side table was on the north side of the bed, favouring right-handed occupants, which was unsurprising. Armela spun me and then pushed me onto the bed.

  I quickly adjusted my relative weight so as not to destroy the bed frame. Then temporarily made the same adjustments to Armela—now didn’t seem like the time to explain her relative weight. I was thankful she hadn’t tried sitting on it before she found me.

  I sat on the edge of the bed and found it to be firm, but softer than the bedroll had been. Armela mounted me, straddling my hips as she swung her arms around my neck and nestled herself in my lap.

  “Now, why are you sulking?”

  She was as direct as ever.

  “I wasn’t rea—“

  “Fuck you. You looked like a kid who’d been caught stealing dessert before dinner. Out with it!”

  Alright, I was about two steps away from being spanked like a toddler. Shame crept up the back of my neck, and I tried desperately to look her in the eye.

  “I’m not sure how to explain this to you.”

  Her eyes softened slightly as she searched mine.

  “Try starting from the beginning. I’m here to listen, so if it takes a long time, then so be it. If you can’t find the right words, then just keep spilling them out until you come across the right ones.”

  I huffed through my nose, caught between a rock and a hard place. Before I started my walk over to the inn, I’d fully prepared myself to be the one listening. My own doubts and concerns had seen a swift end to that, though. How pathetic.

  And now, to top that off, I was struggling to communicate with the only person I had who would listen. I was disgusted with myself. I wrapped my arms around her waist and tilted us both over to lie on our sides, heads on the pillows and embracing each other.

  Then I started talking.

  About who I was, what kind of life I’d led, the goals and expectations my God had given me. My doubts and fears, the morality of my choices and the dread of not being anywhere near good enough to not only achieve what had been laid out for me, but to keep her happy as well.

  I said all of this to her. Closing my eyes partway through so I didn’t have to see what kind of face she would make by the time I finished.

  I spoke for 23 and a half minutes. All the while she peppered in some ‘mhmm’s’ and ‘uh huh’s’.

  As I spoke, I could feel the weight slowly shifting in my chest. The pressure and need to inhale deep, gasping breaths faded. The simple act of talking it out with Armela, even without her input, was making a world of difference to me.

  At some point during my ramble, she’d started playing with my hair, stroking my head affectionately.

  It was incredibly soothing.

  “I guess, really, I just don’t know if I can do it. Any of it. I’m scared the weight of it will crush me.”

  She smiled.

  “You know, I think I like this side of you. It’s cute.”

  I rolled my eyes.

  “You think my fear of failure and concern over the slippery slope of tyranny is cute?”

  She playfully pushed my shoulder.

  “You ass, you know that’s not what I meant. And before you get your hopes up, don’t think I’ve got any answers for you regarding all… that. I’m more clueless than you in most everything.”

  She sighed and rolled over to stare at the ceiling.

  “If you need a strong sword-arm or other more… pleasing services… then I’m your woman. But taking on all those lofty arguments is way beyond me. Especially all that stuff about economies and infrastructure. I understood maybe half of the words you were saying.”

  I frowned.

  “Buuuuuut what I will say is this: you’re here now. You can’t be expected by anyone to be infallible. You are not a god, as far as I know. And that comes with fucking up now and then. When those moments come, you just need to do what you can to face them.”

  She turned her head to look into my eyes once more, putting a hand to my cheek.

  “The way I see it, you can only do what you can do. If you can’t manage a planet, then you just need to find folks who can. If you can’t manage designing some new… thing, then you’ll just have to find someone who can. Don’t spend so much time up in your head, or you’ll forget what it’s like down here in boring old reality.”

  She pulled my head gently into her chest.

  “You’re liable to forget some other important things as well! So pull your head out of your ass and focus on what you’ve got set out before you. Literally and figuratively.”

  I cupped her breasts, breathing in her scent and letting her words wash over my mind. Once again Armela was correct, letting my unknown future and whatever failures might be hidden there dictate how I lived was unfeasible.

  I’d spend every moment of every day miserable and cynical, scared of every passing shadow and the consequences of every decision. I’d be paralyzed into inaction by my unwillingness to take risks or move forward without knowing every outcome.

  Even if she admitted to not knowing much, there was a very reliable wisdom in her brain. The simplicity of it made me feel like a fool for letting myself spiral out of control.

  “I’m an idiot.”

  Armela laughed, a deep and throaty laugh, as she pulled me tighter into her chest.

  “Say that again! It sounds so good coming from you.”

  I huffed out a laugh and repeated my words.

  “I’m a big, dumb idiot!”

  Armela kissed the top of my head.

  “Vita, I’ve learned that the wisest men are the ones who admit their foolishness. It’s the true idiots who preach their wisdom. Let go of your worries for tomorrow and let’s just bask in the joy of today; we’ll cross whatever torrents the river of our future brings us together. Alright?”

  For the first time since coming to this world, I felt tired. Like the unwinding of a great spring, I could feel all the tension bleeding out of me.

  “You’re right, Armela. Yeah. Thank you for being here for me. Thank you for listening. It really means a lot to me.”

  She snorted softly as her hands drifted down to my face and lifted it out of her chest.

  “This is but a small fraction of what I owe you. And if I could spend the rest of my life offering you such small comforts, then I would be a very, very happy wolfkin.”

  She kissed me then.

  It started soft—gentle—the way one would kiss a delicate flower petal. Letting it press against your lips before pulling back to peck lightly at it again.

  But as I sought her lips, the kisses began to linger; brief moments of contact slowly turned into seconds of embrace, until her hand snaked down my trousers and stroked my hardening length. Then our tongues met and entangled, our bodies inching together as my clothes melted away.

  Her dress, too, was consumed by her body; this surprised me as I still wasn’t sure exactly how intricately her body would be capable of reacting to her subliminal thoughts. My hands drifted from her breasts down to the swell of her ass, cupping her cheeks and dragging her hips into mine as we lay face to face.

  Our primal desires overwhelmed us as we yearned for each other’s bodies. We made love loudly, passionately, wantonly. To the degree that I worried we might upset the other patrons of the inn. She was insatiable as we went round after round until finally we were both spent.

  I gave her ass one final slap before collapsing onto the pillows beside her. I reached over and clasped her left hand in my right, content to let her take her time recovering from what had just been done to her.

  It had been about half an hour since the start of our session; there was just under two hours until the sun sank below the horizon, so we had some time to decompress and simply enjoy each other’s company. I was exhausted now and found that even moving my arm to hold on to Armela’s hand had taken some effort.

  If this kept up, there was a genuine risk of falling asleep, even though I knew I didn’t require it. My mind seemed to yearn for the peace and solitude of dreams, and so as a precaution I set an internal alarm to wake myself 20 minutes prior to the projected onset of dusk.

  Armela finally flopped over onto her left side; falling on top of my arm, and then attempted to shuffle herself back-first into my chest. I wrapped my arm around her chest, cupping her right breast and then slid my other arm under her hips, scooting her towards me on the bed.

  She nestled into me, not saying anything, but sighing contentedly as I laid my right arm across her stomach. And in the quiet of that moment, I slept.