Just Lyca Lady

Chapter 6 : Known As

Propped against the front of the tavern, head and shoulders slumped, the drunkard was out of reach of false accusations. The roll of laughter and voices within the pub had slowed and grown far more hushed. It was late by anyone's standards, my own included. All it'd take was a notice of my not being at home to stir up some rather distasteful words thrown my way. My luck had already been stretched thin. Perhaps it was time to return.

"Should I be wary of what you are?" My question lingered in the air, Gray taking a moment before looking from the patron to me.

"You should always be wary of strangers," Gray said. A clever man was once something I wished to meet, but having finally stumbled across one, I wasn't so certain I liked the challenge even basic conversation held. Getting simple answers was more laboring than an afternoon of pulling a bowstring taut repeatedly.

With an annoyed shake of my head, my gaze left him and found the distant roof of my home. "True indeed."

Was this his way of saying I shouldn't be worried about what sort of being he was, but rather I should just be cautious because I did not know him on a more personal level? Why could he not just say that instead of being obscure?

Returning my sights to him, I said, "I need to head home."

"I'll escort you." Of course he would; no likelihood of the lycan ending the night on a note anything short of gentlemanly-like. It would have been far easier to forget him, to let my curiosity of and draw to him go, if he had simply dismissed himself. But no, Gray was not that sort of man; it was that truth that made him all the more dangerous for me considering it was a beacon to come closer—to learn more.

"If you must."

Without waiting for him to offer his arm to me, I looped mine through his and began to guide the way to the rooftop down the dirt road. Dermwick was a quaint town, just large enough to not know every face by name but have seen them all before, sitting in the southern region of the land of Harron. It was a town some could never even consider leaving, while getting away to something 'bigger and better' was what all others wanted. Personally, I was content. Staying or leaving, it made no difference to me.

"That's where you live, I presume?" asked Gray, nodding his head at the gate at the end of the road we walked.

"You presume correct." Had he not already figured out where I stood in Dermwick, I would have been a bit shocked considering how quick on his feet he was with that wit of his. "For the next several months or so, at least." Until I was married off. Seventeen was the average age in most cases to be handed over to a man, some being married off years earlier, but I was nearing eighteen. It was not for lack of suitors, per say. It had more to do with my father not wanting to let go of his only daughter...better yet, it was my father not wanting to let go of the face that reminded him of his wife, my mother.

The topic wasn't a fond one of mine. Being handed over to a titled man was a grantee; it was one of the few things I could not find my way out. The curse of being born privileged was knowing love was not to be the driving factor for courtship. My parents were fortunate enough to gain an undying amount of care for one another despite their being married as a contract of sorts. I was raised in a home where love existed amongst my mother and father, but it was not a thing of pure beauty...no. The pitfalls to caring for someone were...they were devastating. In truth, I was not sure I even wanted to fall for someone ever, even my betrothed, after seeing the toils it took on my father. I could live a perfectly fine life without it.

But to have a burning passion for someone so fierce that it could ruin my entire life if something bad ever befell my lover, well that was something no one could say in full earnest they would not want, no matter the risk.