"Sorry, you were saying?" Sometimes I really hate myself for being such a perv.

“I was saying it does not matter where we think an Aspect will go. It depends on where they arrive during the Anticipation. After all, I arrived in Aventine, and it was supposed to be a city loyal to me.” His lips thin with distaste. “We might as well point at a spot on the map and head there. It’s as good a guess as any.”

“Okay, well if you were Hedonism and you wanted to head someplace specific, where would you head?”

He thinks for a moment. “Mephis, I suppose. They are fond of nose-spices there.”

Drugs. "It's as good a guess as any other," I admit, because I don't have any ideas of my own. I don't know this place like he does. "And it's somewhere to start, I suppose. Is Mephis far from here?"

"Is Mephis far?" He snorts. "Is Mephis far? What a foolish question. Are you human?"

"Wow, are you a huge asshole?" I retort. "I was just asking."

"Everything will be far. Every place we travel will be grueling. Do you think the High Father sent me here so I could trot gamely between two neighboring cities and then return to him with my tail tucked between my legs, lesson learned in a day?" He straightens and crosses his arms over his broad chest, the look on his face downright scathing. "The High Father means to break me to his will. He plans to remake me and to teach me lesson after lesson until I come crawling to him, begging for forgiveness. So yes, it will be a long journey. It will be terrible. It will be dangerous. My other Aspects of self will be doing their best to purge my existence from this world to ensure their own survival. So no, it will not be a pleasant little voyage."

I gape at him for a moment as he bends down to study the map once more. "Wow, I think I really, truly hate you."

Aron shrugs. "I do not imagine I came to the mortal plane to make friends. It is no concern of mine what you think."

Yeah, he made that pretty clear from the start. For a moment, I glare hatefully at his shoulders, wondering how one person can be so damn unpleasant when a moment ago, I was blushing at the thought of him. I'm the idiot here. He's just being who he is—Arrogance. It doesn't mean I have to like him.

I really, really want to go home. For a brief, despairing flash, I think about packing up my things and abandoning him. Better yet, sending him on his way to Mephis or wherever the fuck he wants to go and staying behind with Omos and his cheese and his goats and his books.

Except…I can't. I remember the wracking pain when Aron and I were separated. I'm stuck with him.

And everyone's going to try to kill me because of it.

I lie down on the bed, too depressed to even consider what the next few weeks—or hell, months! years!—of my life will be like. I pull the blankets over my head and roll over to face the wall.

"What are you doing?" Aron snaps, rustling the map. "We are discussing strategy. Stop this foolishness."

"Go fuck yourself," I tell him and ignore him. If he wants to be an asshole, I can be one, too.

I ignore Aron for the rest of the day, no matter his attempts to get my attention. After a while, he gets surly and leaves to go prepare for our journey. From my half-assed listening, he chided Omos that the monk had no weapons at his house, and has spent most of the afternoon creating his own. He's whittled wood, broken pottery, and used the shards to craft some deadly-looking objects. Omos has fluttered around the little library itself, sometimes scratching notes into one of his books, sometimes packing up more food.

I ate. And slept. And ate some more. No one seems to think I can help out. I'm not talking to Aron and Omos just shoos me away when I try to help, so I keep busy with making clothes for myself and washing what I do have. Omos donated one of his gray robes, but it hangs on me like a potato sack and chafes against my skin, so I've done my best to modify it and make it less bulky. I ripped up the seams under the arms and took out a large chunk of fabric, then knotted the sides so they fit tighter. I tore off the hem of the robe and made myself a long wrap-around skirt that's easier to walk in. The remnants of my filmy dress from the Citadel have been scrapped and torn to pieces and now serve as a belt and scarf to keep the worst of the sand and dirt out of my hair.

I made a bra band out of it, too, because everyone seems to think a girl should jiggle but me. Screw that. They might not believe in bras in this world, but I can stage a one-woman revolution if it means I can run unhindered. I work on shoes, too. Omos gave me a pair of sandals that were far too big for my feet and seem to be nothing but straps attached to a wedge of thick hide. I do my best to work those down and resize them, too, because I suspect I'm going to be doing a lot of walking in the near future.

I'm still mad at Aron, of course. I carry that irritation with me throughout the day, though it fades as Omos makes a warm vegetable stew for dinner and adds fresh-baked bread. Aron's just being his usual dick self. He is the way he is because the High Father is working on purging the dickishness out of him. It could have been worse, I suppose.

I could have ended up with the lust Aspect of his personality.

I ignore the way certain parts of me tingle at that thought. I also ignore the fact that my mind goes back to the log he was packing under his kilt and the way I rubbed up against him and how good he felt.

Ignore, ignore, ignore.

OceanofPDF.com

25

As I eat my third bowl of dinner, Omos fusses over both myself and Aron, who is poring over maps as if they'll give him answers. I still have a million questions that need answering, but Omos carefully steers the conversation to neutral territory. I suspect he doesn't want to piss off a god…or he and Aron had a conversation this afternoon about keeping things from me. Either way, it doesn't take long to realize I'm not going to get what I need tonight.

I crawl into bed and pull the covers over me, achy and tired. I still hurt from our last journey and the thought of starting another in the morning makes me want to despair, but I like breathing. If we stay in one place too long, someone's going to come after us with murder on his mind. There's no choice but to leave.

I'm just about to drift off to sleep when the narrow cot shakes and an enormous body thumps down next to me, pushing me over to the side. What the fuck? I look over, yanking my blankets back as I realize it's Aron, coming to lie down next to me. "What the hell are you doing?" I hiss at him, trying to keep my voice down.

"Getting into bed with you."

"I realize that! Why? You don't freaking sleep, remember?"

"I didn't say I was going to sleep," he tells me, cranky. "But you need to sleep, and this way I can keep an eye on you."

Aron ignores the outraged noises I make and gets under the blankets with me. After a moment, he steals one of the pillows and shifts his big body, trying to get comfortable. I grit my teeth, enduring his constant bouncing of the bed.

"Hm," he says after a moment.

I fight the urge to roll my eyes. "What?"

"This is rather comfortable. I see now why mortals are so lazy."

Boy, he really is something else. He puts his hands behind his head and I shove back at the elbow jabbing me in the back of the neck. "One of us has to sleep, you know."