Hounded [Wild Hunt Series: 2]

20: Which

Natural - Imagine Dragons

The old man ran his tongue over his pink lips: a small, lizard-like flash. "Ah," he said, "But my dear you know it's often best to let trouble find you, rather than the other way around."

"Ah," I replied slowly, struggling to find a balance between poise and the unsettled feeling in my gut. "But he's my kind of trouble."

The peddler's smile was warm, and kind, and reached the corners of his eyes like people say a true smile always does- but nothing about him in that moment felt friendly. I found myself glancing over to Shail, watching the crag cat's expression for signs of someone else coming from behind. When I was in the cart, I'd checked about for some kind of a weapon, but it seemed the only knife he possessed was the one currently in hand as he sawed a piece of white meat from the breastbone of quite probably the Mid's version of chicken. On the same rock as the chicken, lay a satchel, in which I could see the smokey glitter of a filled vial.

"Thought demons don't have to eat," I observed.

"Throughout the course of their development, that is the case, my dear. Some enjoy the novelty, though."

"You're half-starved." His robes were layered but large, his cheekbones strong against thin tan skin and the hand with the knife made the chicken seem an effort to raise to his lips. Yellowed crescent pockets of skin beneath his eyelids deepened the darkness of his gaze. "What are you?"

He chewed his lunch. Every so often the tongue flicked back out, catching flakes of roasted skin and blackened herbs.

"What are you?" I repeated. "Besides a clear and obvious enemy to me, of course."

"You should really eat, my dear Queen Wilson. A child needs its mother's care." He shaved off another slice, held it extended.

Shail's head lifted. I pushed the crag cat's face back down, took the meat, and dropped it into the fire. The cat's jaw chittered and his claws tensed as if readying for launch, but he stayed put. 

"It won't hurt the baby," the peddler continued, regripping his knife for a second cut. Juices pooled down the rock he'd set the cooked meat upon and stained the edge of his sleeves.

"It isn't the baby I'm worried about," I said, but still felt my hand drop protectively against my belly. I wasn't sure how I felt- the thought still made me sick but anything that was mine would stay mine and I wouldn't let it or myself or Shail get taken. "What are you?"

"Why would you care to know? I might be stalling for time."

"I believe you are," I said. The road around was peacefully still. Most of the terrain I didn't know, except for the narrow path I'd taken to arrive at the peddler in the first place. Overhead, the green skies were calm and cloudless. "But I don't think they're close. Maybe they haven't even received whatever signal you've sent. Smoke, I'd guess, while I was in looking for clothes."

The peddler's grin was short on teeth but long on satisfaction. "Warm."

"And you probably haven taken or have something handy so that you can eat just fine, but anything Shail or I consume will knock us for a loop."

"Oooh," he said, leaning forward on his rocky seat, bony knees jiggling. "Warmer, much warmer!"

"And you don't work for It. You're poor, dirty-"

"It has worshippers from all walks of life," he said. "And the after life."

"But you're a peddler, someone who sells to all sides. You're the listener in a crowd, maybe the bargainer of whatever band or troop is coming. You'd catch me and sell me. There's a reward, isn't there?"