Wolves Among Us(40)

“Can you just go? Now that Rose is gone, you’re finished here. Can you leave us now?”

“Mia, you are a mystery. What do you think I am?”

“You said there were witches? More than one?”

“Yes, there are others. I had only to get the names from Rose.”

“No. Surely I would have known.”

“I doubt that. You do not seem to have many friends. And you should quit trying to find the fault with me. Do I not know my work? You have a problem, and you won’t admit it.”

“I have no problems.”

“I’ll tell you what it is if you want me to.”

Mia started walking.

“You’re blind, Mia. Beautiful and blind. You don’t even know your own husband has been unfaithful.”

Mia’s mouth fell open. Bastion caught up to her, wrapping an arm around her waist as if for support.

“Bjorn has been bewitched, my child. Have you not noticed his odd hours, his preoccupations? Has he not been cold with you?”

“You do not understand Bjorn,” she said in a tiny child’s voice, afraid to take a deep breath, fearing her body would press further into his warm palm. “He is strong. Even if what you say is true, he could be bewitched and not sin. He could.”

Bastion nodded, his mouth a tight line. “I have upset you. I can be such a fool sometimes. Not everyone is ready for the truth.”

Mia shook him off. “You did not speak the truth.”

“Perhaps these would be of some consolation?” He produced a string of pearls with a clasp that Mia knew at once. She frowned to see them in Bastion’s hand.

“I will not tell you where I found them, so do not ask. Not today. No more truth today for you. You need rest. And comfort.”

The ground went soft under her feet. Bastion caught her as she fell. He held her up, pressing her into his body.

“Why?” Mia asked. “Why is this happening?”

“No more talk of witches, I said. I will keep you safe if you will let me. I can keep you all safe.” He gestured toward her home and Alma. “I am not a monster, Mia. I am a good man.”

“Why would you care about me? You don’t know me.”

“I know you better than you can imagine. I see who you are, how you strive to be a good and faithful wife. It moves me.”

He pressed his lips against her neck, moving up. “Give me a kiss to seal my pledge to you.”

Mia turned her head and looked down to the side. She did not know what to do. She had no experience with bold men.

He pressed his mouth on hers, but she did not respond.

He pulled back and looked down at her, then kissed her again until she responded. She did not know what another man’s lips would feel like or the taste of his skin. He tasted salty, the skin around his mouth rough, just like Bjorn’s. But Bastion did not push her away.

He moved her hand, hanging at her side, and placed it around the small of his back. “It’s all right,” he whispered.

She left her palm there. She remembered the warmth of flesh. He pulled her to him until her belly was pressed against his. She could not tell if his stomach burned like hers. He took her other hand and brought her palm to his mouth, kissing it before he wrapped this one behind his back, too, and they stood entwined. She lost herself, not knowing his limbs from her own, not knowing where he was taking her, or if she led them there.

His mouth on hers was an education. Men had appetites too, hungers that waited and grew no matter what good women did. She rattled off her childhood lessons in her mind. Was she not modestly dressed? Had she not refused his advances? And still he desired her. Those lessons had not been wrong, but they had been incomplete. Not all appetites could be guarded against. No one ever taught that. But she suddenly saw that now. No matter how good she tried to be, how faithful and devoted to God, she lived in a broken, bitter world, a world of raging hunger. She struggled to break free.

He released her.

“I will not fail you,” he said. “I am not Bjorn.”

Mia looked back at the home. Alma was standing in the doorway watching them.

“Leave. Get away from me.”

“You are protecting your family. You are a brave and good woman. Perhaps that is why no one trusts you. You live in a village of secrets.”

Mia shook her head. There was nothing good about what she had just done. Even a fool like herself knew that.

“Mia, look at me. Do not dwell too much on your emotions, for by emotions many women are snared by the Devil. You must trust me.”

Mia looked again at her house, empty save for a table and a bed, where her husband ate and slept. There was a tiny mattress nearer the fire, a child’s bed that would be empty this winter if the healing did not hold. Mia looked down at her hands, at her ring of betrothal. Hope held it all together. Nothing else. Only her blind, foolish hope.

“Who am I,” she asked, “that a great Inquisitor should show me any affection? What have I to offer you?”

“Any other woman would ask what I, a great Inquisitor, could offer her.”

“I did not bid you to come.” Her heart beat fast as she spoke, so fast that she rushed the words out before she lost nerve. “You came to me because you want something. Even a fool like me knows that. Why can you not find it among the other women?”