★ Wattpad Featured: #FreshReads #InHerWords2022
❝You're not taking me to bed. Ever.❞
❝...Who said it had to be on a bed?❞
A disgraced immortal and a legendary folk hero are desperate to locate a blacksmith who can break the enchanted handcuffs that...
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Something changed.
Sunkanmi couldn't quite pin down what, exactly - call it human instinct - but she was certain something changed and nothing would ever be the same again.
Sunkanmi watched Xosa trace the path to the Goldsmith's forge, waiting for him to flip a nonsensical joke about how meeting Laqueheia would've been impossible without him and that he deserves ten prayers for his contribution, at least.
"We need to find some willowbark first," Xosa said instead.
"Oh," Sunkanmi nodded, almost disappointed. "Okay."
"It only grows in Mana Country. A week's worth of walking away."
"There's a Fanatic war camp by the main river," Sunkanmi's mental map filled in the details. "Hopefully they haven't chopped it all down yet."
Unsure of what to make of this... development... Sunkanmi studied Xosa like a hawk and waited for him to crack. She wanted to personally witness the gold fracture behind his midnight patina.
Surely he couldn't keep up this charade for much longer. Surely Xosa's baser instincts would overtake his sudden melancholy and he would resume his normal antics in time, back to his irreverent self once more.
To be fair, it wasn't as if Xosa was any less annoying or self-serving, but the subtle tells in his mannerisms gave him away. The changes in his stature hinted at a deeper disturbance.
Before the temple, Xosa carried himself with all the self-conscious confidence of a teenager who lost their grandmother's favorite pearl necklace but was pretending their darndest to know where they last had it. Clumsy in his mortal body and slightly manic, ripe for drama and eager for an argument.
After the temple, Xosa lumbered to their next destination with the weight of a million years on his shoulders. The forgotten ages draped over his body like iron chains.
Before, Xosa pronounced his Misaelese perfectly but with the self-conscious temerity of someone who didn't quite understand the language - an overly confident foreigner who had no clue what he was actually saying, unsure if his grammar made any sense.
