She smiled and turned toward it again. “May I?” she asked, raising her hand toward its muzzle. The horse allowed her to close the distance between them, and Victoria carefully lowered her fingers to its fur. She wasn’t sure this was the correct way to approach a horse, but it had always worked with the wolves she’d occasionally come across on the Field.
“I’ve never been this close to a horse before,” she whispered, grinning broadly. The animal was warm and soft, and when it whinnied again but remained still as she slid her hand over his mane, she giggled despite herself. “This is wonderful.”
“The experience is pleasant for him too,” came a voice from behind her.
Victoria spun around, her arms and hands flooding with instinctive heat.
A man stood on the top step of the wooden stairs that led into the large building. He was leaning against a wooden support beam, his arms crossed over his chest.
Victoria blinked. So much about this man took her by surprise; she wasn’t certain where to begin assessing him. For one, he was as large for a human as the stallion was for a horse. No one on the Field looked like this. It was as if someone had plopped muscles on top of muscles and then molded them perfectly to his tall form. He also had a good foot and a half of height on her.
His white-blonde hair was so long that he had gathered it at the back of his neck with what looked like a leather strap. She couldn’t see where the locks ended, as he was facing her at the moment. There was a bit of a goatee-like beard on his chin, also very blonde. His eyes were a deep, dark brown that reminded her of chocolate.
He had a strong square chin and bone structure so male it was intimidating. There was absolutely nothing small about this man. The strange clothing he wore did nothing to hide these assets, either. A light tan leather vest was draped over his shoulders and chest. His massive legs were encased in darker, stronger looking leather, much like that which constructed her downtime uniform jacket. There were designs on the sides of his leather boots that were matched by tattoos that ran the breadth of his immense biceps.
The man appraised her with his deep brown eyes, just as she did him. He stayed where he was, as if he knew what she was capable of, and that might have been the only reason Victoria hadn’t yet telekinesed him into the wall of the building behind him.
“I’m sorry?” she finally asked, trying her best to keep any kind of quaver from her voice.
He smiled, flashing very white teeth, and gestured to the stallion. “Brom doesn’t normally take well to strangers,” he told her in that deep timbre of a voice. “He hasn’t tried to bite or kick you and he’s actually let you stroke his withers. Trust me,” he chuckled like the rumble of thunder, “that’s impressive. He likes you.”
“Oh,” she said. It was all she could think of saying. Both the animal and its master were larger than life – and it had been a long night.
The stranger pushed away from the support beam, coming slowly down the stairs toward her. Victoria backed up; she couldn’t help it. Her power swirled beneath the surface, ready to tap and release.
The stranger stopped after descending the last step and held up his massive hands in what appeared to be a universal sign of peace. “I mean you no harm,” he said, his smile appearing genuine. “You’re awfully skittish.” He paused and then cocked his head to one side; Victoria could see that his hair fell clear to mid back as it moved into view. “You running from someone?”
She blinked. “It’s that obvious?”
“Fairly,” he told her, shrugging.
She moved out of the way as he made his way to his horse and the stallion nudged its master’s open palm in loving familiarity. The man glanced at her over his very broad shoulder. “It’s clear you’re new to these parts, if your clothing means anything.”
Victoria glanced down at herself. That was fair enough.
“Something made you leave your home. You’ve got no bags, seem to have no food or drink on you. Which means you left in a hurry.”
He was hitting the nail on the head so far. Victoria absently touched her locket as if it could soothe her tired anxiety.
“So who or what is it, then?” He asked, turning to face her fully.
Victoria squeezed the crystal pendant. He wanted to know who she was running from? What should she tell him? What business was it of his, anyway?
“I’m sorry,” she said, squaring her shoulders and dropping her hand. “I need to find a place to stay for the night. Do you happen to know if there’s….”? She searched her thoughts for the right word. This town looked nothing like any city in the Field, so it most likely wouldn’t have a Gamer’s Auberge, where team members could pay by night to gather with their friends and throw parties, or get together with romantic interests away from the sometimes invasive aspects of a team tower.
Suddenly, she recalled that Room 73 in the TGB was known as a “tavern.” It was supposed to have rooms on its second floor. She didn’t know what they were for. Perhaps they were to purchase for the night?
It was worth a try.
“Do you know if there’s a tavern nearby?”
At this, the man blinked. His smile was back. “You’re standing in front of a tavern, little one.” He gestured toward the double front doors of the building behind Victoria.
Now that she thought about it, she recognized that the sounds coming from inside actually sounded familiar to her.
She’d heard them in Room 73.
“Would you like me to escort you in?” He looked at her clothing again, his expression thoughtful. “I’m betting you have no coin. I’ll buy you dinner and an ale. Any friend of Brom’s is a friend of mine,” he offered, his smile putting her at ease, despite herself.
Victoria considered his offer for a moment. It was a very short moment.
“All right,” she nodded, speaking softly. “Thank you. I would like that.”
“It’s not a problem,” he nodded back, raising his hand to gesture for her to go inside ahead of him.
* * * *
In the darkness beyond the reach of the village lights, a man in black watched the golden-haired woman disappear into the tavern’s warm environment. His gaze narrowed, his eyes glittering with dark deliberation as the tall, fair-haired stranger followed closely behind her.
The watcher’s blue eyes began to glow in the shadows, jealousy rearing its head and rushing liquid fury through his tall form. He stood from where he’d been crouching beneath the sheltering black leaves of a low-lying tree and waited there silent and still for several minutes. He weighed his options carefully.
And then he stepped out onto the village road and made his way toward the tavern.
Chapter Twelve
Victoria sat down in the wooden chair the large man pulled out for her, and then jumped only slightly when he pushed the chair back in with her in it. He took the seat across from her, his massive form as sturdy looking as the rough-hewn furniture that supplied the tavern.
He looked around and raised his arm. Victoria assumed he was going to wave a server to their table, as she’d seen people do in Room 73 at the TGB.
“Wench! Over here!” he barked.
Victoria’s eyes widened.
A woman with short black hair and breasts shoved up so high were nearly part of her chin spun around to face him. Her young face was ashen. “I’m on me way!” she responded, hurrying around several tables to head toward them.
Victoria’s gaze narrowed. “You could have said please,” she told the man across from her. “You scared her half to death.” It didn’t matter that Victoria didn’t know the man – or, apparently, that he was three times her size. He was being rude to an innocent young girl, and Victoria could always fry him in his boots.
Brown eyes cut to her, and Victoria suddenly stilled in her chair. She felt inexplicably pinned beneath the weight of his gaze. He smiled, but for some reason it didn’t so much put her at ease as change the nature of her anxiety. Still, she noticed that his eyes glittered with somet
hing like amusement.
“Is that what they say where you’re from?” he asked. “Please?”
Victoria took a moment to clear her throat; it had closed up a bit. “Yes,” she finally replied. Then, with more force, “It is.”
“I see.” He nodded his understanding and she wasn’t sure whether he was teasing her or not. “Very well.”
The woman approached the table and the man turned to her: “Please bring my companion a dinner and an ale, wench. And make it quick. I swear I can see her losing weight even as we sit here.”
Again, Victoria’s eyes widened. She blushed furiously this time, a hard retort rising to her tongue even as the serving woman nodded her consent and spun away.
“Excuse me!” she hissed, trying to keep her voice down despite her sharp disapproval. “My weight?” she asked incredulously. “What in the world is wrong with my weight?”
He chuckled. “Not a thing, little one, except that you need more of it. You’re a pretty girl, don’t get me wrong, but you look as if you’d break in a bit of rough and tumble.”
Victoria stared at him. She was at once torn between being complimented, albeit embarrassed, by his calling her a pretty girl – and being insulted by his blatant reference to sex. After several seconds, a firm retort had landed on her tongue, and she opened her mouth to let it loose.
But her mother had always taught her that if she couldn’t say something nice, she shouldn’t say anything at all. She thought of this now, reconsidered, and closed her mouth again, sitting back in her chair. Besides, he was buying her a meal.
Victoria froze.
My… mother? She frowned, feeling discombobulated in the worst way. The world receded a little.
She had no mother.
That’s what Game Control had told her. She’d been told she was an orphan taken from one of the sectors when she was ten years old and brought to play on the Field after one of those tests they gave to every child, orphan or not.
But the memory she suddenly had was so real….
The stranger across from her was watching her carefully now. His expression was guarded, but his intelligent eyes took everything in.
She cleared her throat as a faint dizziness hastily swept through her and was gone. “What… what is your name?” she asked.
Beyond him, people dressed much the same way as the stranger came into the bar as others left. She observed them with a team leader’s acuity, despite her current state.
“I’m Anders,” he told her, his tone friendly. “Now, you.”
She considered not telling him, knowing Victor might later question him. But it didn’t matter; Victor would just read his mind and come up with her image. The name meant nothing.
“I’m Victoria,” she said, “Victoria Red.” She started to extend her hand in order to shake his, but when she recalled that she was no longer on the Field, she hesitated. Did they shake hands here?
As if to quell her fears, he extended his own hand over the tabletop. When she relaxed and brought hers out again, he grasped it firmly at the wrist.
Victoria’s power leapt to life, and her palm grew warm.
But just as she was beginning to wonder if she would have to set Anders on fire, he chuckled and gestured to the hand he held. “You’re supposed to take my wrist as well, little one. It’s the way people greet in these parts.”
She blinked. “Oh.” She took his wrist. “Why do you grasp wrists instead of hands?”
“To check for blades,” he answered, easily. He released her wrist and they settled back into their chairs.
Victoria’s hand tingled where his bare skin had come into contact with hers. Vaguely, she wondered if it was her imagination. Maybe she was too hungry and tired.
“Blades,” she repeated, thinking that over. That was where Max kept his knife. “That makes sense,” she conceded.
Another patron came into the tavern, this time a small-boned blonde man. He rubbed his hands on the ash-covered apron he wore and looked around. His gaze skirted over Victoria and Anders as he searched the room. He had very blue eyes. After a second, he made his way to the bar and ordered a drink.
“What’s the name of the place you left?” Anders asked.
Victoria frowned. What would she tell him? She was from The Field? The other side of the wall? She was baffled by her incredible difference from everyone else in this tavern, and it made her wonder how much she should share – how much they would even understand. Again, her doubts resurfaced. Where was all of the technology that could be found on the Field? Where were the cities?
She winced as a sharp pain shot through the right side of her head. She was getting a migraine.
“I’m….” She racked her brain. “I’m from Red Tower.” Then, before he could ask what “Red Tower” was, she countered with a question of her own. “What is this place called?”
Anders watched her in his dark, keen way for a few seconds before he sighed heavily, as if he were unduly weary. “It’s Ocanus. It’s a fishing village off of the Mare. There’s nothing else anywhere near here for miles.” He leaned forward, placing his muscled arms on the table to lace his fingers together. The leather straps of his bracers swayed slightly as he moved; the leather smell that wafted toward her reminded her of Victor. “Not for hundreds of miles,” Anders added meaningfully.
He wanted to know where she’d come from. By all rights, she shouldn’t have made it to Ocanus alive – not across hundreds of miles. Not without food or water.
He was suspicious, and she couldn’t blame him. But again, it wasn’t any of his business.
She tore her gaze from his, concentrating on the door.
Another man walked through the double doors, accompanied by a teenage boy who was, by the looks of him, his son. The pair made their way to an empty table, and the serving woman was at their side moments later.
“You’re waiting for him to come in, aren’t you?”
Victoria blinked and turned back to face Anders. At first she wasn’t sure what he meant. And then she realized that he was talking about the person she was running from. He’d figured out that it was a man.
Anders was very smart. It was a touch unnerving.
Victoria was saved from having to say anything when the serving “wench” sidled up to the table and placed a dish full of food and a mug full of ale in front of Victoria.
“Here you are, miss. That’ll fill you up right nice.” She turned to Anders. “Anything for you, sir?” she asked. Her voice carried an accent that Victoria had never heard.
Anders shook his head, waving her away.
The food on the plate in front of Victoria smelled divine. It smelled better than anything she’d ever caught a whiff of on the Field. She stared down at the meal. There was a baked potato, still in its skin but split open, and atop it was some kind of gravy. The gravy was thick and creamy looking, and covered both the potato and the sliced, juicy meat beside it. There was some kind of vegetable there as well, which seemed to have been roasted. Instead of each item being compartmentalized in portion-appropriate division platters, as she was used to, it all ran together.
And it looked so good like that.
She picked up her fork. The prongs on the fork were roughly hewn, and there were three as opposed to the four she was used to. The knife beside it was also roughly shaped, seemingly sharpened using some kind of scraping technique, if the scratches down its length were any indication.
“Fascinating, is it?”
She jumped a little and looked up. “What?”
“You’re staring at the cutlery. I take it you do use these items where you’re from?”
Victoria smiled, a little embarrassed. “We do, but they’re different.”
With a touch of regret, she began cutting into the meat. She didn’t normally eat meat. She’d never liked the way it tasted, and she’d grown too fond of the wolves on the Field to appreciate the thought of eating animals.
But right now, she was very hungry – and t
his smelled very good.
She forked a piece of gravy-covered meat and stuffed it into her mouth.
It tasted as good as it smelled. She couldn’t help an eye roll of pleasure, as she started eating the meal with genuine gusto.
Anders was polite enough not to mention the speed with which she downed her dinner. He said nothing as she ate. He just sat there and watched her in silence, smiling a small, pleased smile as she finished each bite off with a few swallows of her ale.
When she finished, she placed the knife and fork across the plate and licked her lips, picking up her goblet for a final drink.
“Better?” Anders finally asked.
Victoria nodded.
“Good. Now, here.” Anders set a small leather pouch on the table in front of Victoria. “It’s enough money to pay for a room tonight and breakfast in the morn. I wouldn’t argue if I were you, little one, as I can see you’ve no money on you.” He nudged it toward her. “Take it.”
Victoria truly didn’t know what to think of this. “Why would you do this?” she asked.
“It’s my right, little one. You’re a woman in need, and I am a man who can provide. Take it and think no more on it.” He rose then, drawing to his full height with the effect of a mountain growing from a chair. “I’ll see that you get to your room safely and I’ll bid you goodnight.”
Victoria gazed up at the stranger before her. He looks like a god, she thought, bewildered. She recalled stories Simon had told them all of ancient gods and goddesses, figures from fantasy and history that he’d read about in his plethora of books. The man before her now fit the profile of one of those ancient figures perfectly.
Victoria felt a little overwhelmed. She was blissfully full and inordinately tired and very confused about where she was and what the hell she was going to do next.
It was hard to make sense of all that had happened to her over the last few days. In the end, she really didn’t have the means, or the reason, to argue. If he wanted to help, she would accept.
She nodded, closing her eyes and looking down as she said, “Thank you.”