Page 27 of What Blooms in Barren Lands

“We are. Why would you choose to sour such a promising deal with crude insistence on something I might have agreed to willingly in time? You can’t be that insecure, surely, not with your looks. What then, do you not think me worth a little more effort? Does humiliating women excite you? Or do you just get off on making others feel powerless?”

Einar’s eyes narrowed and darkened, the anger distinct in them this time. His features hardened ominously.

“Ooh, did I strike a nerve there?”

Einar took the knife away from my throat and fastened it back to his belt. It took him no longer than that to get his face under control and give it back its appearance of pleasant nonchalance.

“I am sorry if I offended you.” He made me shiver with the intensity of his gaze. “When I was aiming to do the exact opposite. I simply wanted to be sincere with you. If you are to live here with us, if I am to see you every day ... well, I know what kind of a man I am.”

“And what kind would that be?” I raised my eyebrows.

“A man almost incapable of repressing his desires. I know I wouldn’t give you a moment’s peace till I got my hands on you. Better you know it too.”

“Why do you want this—me—so much?”

“What can I say, I’m intrigued. How often do you get to meet a beautiful woman who dances while shooting fifty furies single-handedly?” He shrugged, his slight breathlessness the only hint of him being anything less than perfectly composed.

“And what happens if I disappoint?”

“I doubt that you will. I wouldn’t worry about it.”

Despite his imposing, threatening presence, there was something strangely straightforward about him, something transparent that I found appealing.

“Will you swear to me that neither you nor anyone else will force the same deal on Monika here?”

“Nobody will force her,” he assured me. “I’m sure she’ll have some fairly insistent suitors, but it’ll be up to her to choose among them. Or not.”

“Yeah, some of us are gentlemen, unlike this brute here,” the shortest of Einar’s companions commented in an unusual, hard-rounded accent and smiled at Monika pleasantly while lighting a cigarette.

“Albert is wrong. I’m not a brute,” Einar said seriously, not taking his eyes off me. “I’m just a man who knows what he wants and is honest to a fault about it.”

Reluctantly, I had to admit that I found his sincerity compelling. Whilst I abhorred people with no moral compass, I reserved a certain fondness for those who had one that pointed not to the north but to a pole of their own making. I cared about a person being principled more than I did about what their principles were. I considered it futile to debate whether someone was good or bad, for those were shifting, unstable criteria. Strength of character was what I looked for, and I was already certain I could find a great abundance of that in him.

“Yes or no, Renata?”

There really was nothing to consider given that my choice was either to accept Einar’s suggestion or to subject us all to grave danger. We needed our bows and we urgently needed a shelter. Fulfilling his request wasn’t too high a price to pay. Did I not find him immensely attractive? Sure enough, once we were alone, he could treat me in any way he chose to, nice or brutal, it would be his call. But even if he chose cruelty, what did that matter to me anyway, if it served a purpose? There wasn’t much he could do to me that I would truly mind.

“Oh, what the hell. Why not?” I let out a breath, and already some of my courage blew out of me with it. “Now, will you finally lead us tooursettlement, or do I need to sign something in my own blood first?”

10

SALUTE

We entered the colony, and I could immediately see that the weather-worn gate as well as the surrounding wooden fence had been fortified with barbed wire.

“Have you had many fury attacks?” I asked.

“Nah,” Einar’s English companion replied, “we ain’t got many of them foockers up ’ere. Reckon only ’em you just kilt. Russell by t’ way.” He offered me his hand and I shook it, introducing myself.

I estimated Russell to be close to forty. He was of medium height and build, ginger-haired, and had a startling full beard.

“Hey, Maya.” Einar stopped a girl passing us by. “These lot here will be joining us. Show them around and tell what’s what, alright?”

Maya had long black hair, slanted brown eyes, caramel skin, and a pouty expression. She wore black leggings and a smudged white tank top with considerable cleavage. She turned to face Einar, putting all her weight on her left foot so that her hip jutted out exaggeratedly.

“Joining us?”

Her accent was Spanish. She ran her hand through her hair as she stared at us with her eyebrows raised in an expression of baffled disbelief.