“I’ll see that he gets one.” But the innkeeper still did not move away, and the twist of her hands revealed that anxiety had joined the guilt. In a rush, she admitted, “I spit in your ale at the midday meal.”
“I knew,” Mala said easily and took a swig.
Selaq looked at her in astonishment. “But you still drank it.”
Of course Mala had. She wouldn’t waste good ale because of a little spit. “Have you never kissed someone? It is the same—mouth to mouth and spit to spit. So a drop in that ale was no different than a kiss from you. I considered it my welcome to Blackmoor.”
And she’d had kisses thrown behind her feet all day. Word of her encounter with Barin in the citadel had already traveled through the city. No matter that they called Kavik a beast, not everyone Mala met had approved of her quest, and their reaction told her what she’d already guessed: many of these people cared for Kavik, even though he didn’t want them to show it. Yet they cared enough to risk both Vela’s and Barin’s anger by spitting on the path she walked.
“A poor welcome,” Selaq said.
Mala shrugged. A welcome mattered not at all. Only the man across from her did.
His gaze had risen from his plate again, but not to look at Mala. Instead he frowned up at Selaq. The color rose in the innkeeper’s cheeks.
“I shouldn’t have,” the woman said, as if in reply to a silent admonishment.
Had she read disappointment in his expression? Mala searched his face, but she didn’t know it as well as the innkeeper did. She could see nothing at all but his frown, then even that was gone when he began eating again.
Oh, but that small exchange gave her hope. The woman had admitted to spitting in Mala’s drink, yet he hadn’t enjoyed hearing it. For all of his hatred and anger—justifiable anger, if what Mala had guessed of his history with Barin was true—he hadn’t taken pleasure in Selaq’s insult. Mala suspected that, in his place, every single soldier in the common room would have mocked her or tried to make her feel shame for having sipped a little spit.
He was an angry man. But unless Mala had completely misread the reason for his frown, he wasn’t a cruel one.
And there was one way to be certain. One that might put them on a more level understanding.
But she waited, gathering her courage. Mala expected pain on this quest—but she believed it wouldn’t come at Kavik’s hands. Still, she feared being wrong about him more than she feared what he might do.
Quietly she ate the meal Selaq brought her, and after Kavik refused to touch the ale she’d bought for him, she took it back and drank it herself. When he cleaned his plate, every last crumb of bread and shred of meat and drop of gravy, she couldn’t wait any longer.
Without a word, she brought the coiled leash and collar from beneath her cloak, and placed it on the table between them.
And Temra forgive her, because this was cruel. For an instant, there was not just rage and hatred when he looked at her, but an agony so deep she didn’t know how he’d survived it. An agony she’d seen before, on the faces of some older women at home—as if they’d been subjected to a torture that simply wouldn’t end.
She forced herself to speak past the constriction in her throat. “This isn’t what it means to tame you.”
Jaw like steel, his gaze a cold blade, he only watched her.
“What do you think it means?” Mala hoped to understand him better. “Whatever you believe I would do to you—do to me, instead.”
His eyes narrowed. “You want me to show you? To tame you?”
“Yes,” she said simply, but when his gaze went to her neck, she prayed to Vela for strength and courage, because she didn’t know how she would bear the collar around it.
And he seemed more enraged now than he’d been. No longer cold but hot, with a pulse pounding in his temple and a flush over his skin. He reached for the collar. His voice was hard. “Come here, then.”
First she placed her sword on the table, followed by the daggers from her thighs. Her heart thudded in her ears. Dimly aware of the sudden quiet in the common room, she rose. The jawbones swinging from her belt clicked together as she moved to his side. He stood, so tall, and his gaze locked on her throat. His knuckles were white. The thick leather of the collar had folded under the pressure of his fingers.
His bare chest lifted on a ragged breath. “Put your hands together.”
Why? But she didn’t ask; she simply obeyed. Kavik moved closer, then relief and hope lifted through her when he wrapped the collar around her wrists, instead. He was angry, so angry. But he wouldn’t do to her what was done to him.
Maybe.
Abruptly he yanked on the leash. Her body slammed against his, her armor hard against his chest and her arms trapped between them. His left hand fisted tightly in her hair, tilting her face up. He lowered his and spoke through gritted teeth.
“Now I bend you over this table and fuck you, before I give you to every soldier here. You want me to show you that?”
Perhaps the first part, one day. But it should not be today. “In a half turn,” she said.