A Dark and Deadly Beauty

The Warfare Guild

It had been years since Beck had toured the grounds of the Warfare Guild, a standard inspection of facilities by the Prince to ensure that funds were being spent appropriately.

Then, the miniature village of huts were quiet, children’s silent, curious faces peeking out through cracks in shutters. The warriors standing in ranks outside their homes and on the training pitches were stony-faced and menacing, trying to prove to the Dragon Prince that every shilling spent on their guild had yielded rigid, fierce fighters ready to overcome threats to the crown and its people of the time ever came.

Beck had trailed behind Faren, lazily taking in the still, eerie village as if he was a spoiled school boy on a summer sojourn to the countryside. Beck usually filled many roles inside the palace, but today he was merely a disinterested servant following his master.

It didn’t escape Beck that because he was just a common man, like they were common folk, they seemed able to ease some of the tension that thrummed beneath their skin like tightened harp strings. He may be the Prince’s right-hand, but the need to impress him was minuscule.

The moment Faren passed, the hardened men would cease to suck in their guts, the women would soften the hardness they forced into their jaws.

Beck had tried to keep the amusement from his eyes as he walked down the dirt paths of the village in Faren’s wake.

But what greeted him when he arrived at the Warfare Guild this evening was a different scene entirely.

Grim faced warriors had morphed into smiling fathers, bouncing children on their knees. Wives were cooking savory soups in great iron kettles over fires outside of their thatched huts. A burly man the size of a boulder strolled down the narrow lane with his arm around a slender woman with a round face and an even rounder pregnant belly, smiling down at her in adoration so pure, Beck had almost felt like an intruder in seeing them. Children rolled hoops and played games of marbles, whooping with laughter and shrieking with victory. Dogs lazed in the fading light of the day while family cats slunk silently between the huts like shadows.

Gone was the image of stern fighters and still, soulless huts full of noiseless children.

This was a community of families, young and old. This was a haven. This was a home.

Even now, as Beck sat planted on Electra’s settee waiting for her, he could hear the symphony of life and family outside - sounds of babies’ cries and shushing mothers, the clatter of spoons in empty bowls being carried off to be washed, the throaty chuckle of older fay men telling dirty jokes to their friends and busying their hands with sharpening knives.

The fire burned in the hearth, crackling and snapping as wood fell to cinder. Beck shifted in his seat, crossing his legs, and leaning back against the overstuffed settee. When Electra had opened the door, Beck had to keep his hands at his side to stop himself from unbinding her hair and taking great handfuls of it while he tasted her tempting mouth.

She had slipped into her room, leaving him alone in her house with nothing but the fire and his imagination to keep him company.

To keep his mind from wandering to the warm brown skin and dark, scorching eyes behind that closed door, he examined every corner of the open room, from the embroidery on the pillows to the stack of well-worn books on a low shelf.

On his walk over here, Beck had tried to imagine what the inside of Electra’s home had looked like- practical, utilitarian, with little glimpses of decadence and small personal touches like an intricately designed candlestick sitting unperturbed on an otherwise bare mantle or a soft pelt from one of her kills thrown over the back of a plain, wooden rocking chair.

But nothing he had conjured had touched on the sheer Electra-ness of the inside of her little wattle-and-daub cottage.

Everything inside echoed with Electra’s voice. The walls were lined with immaculately kept blades, knives and swords and axes of every size gleaming like a silver-toothed predator’s grin from where they rested on their iron hooks. While other unmarried women would rely on a guard dog to deter prowlers and burglars, Electra had no need. Anyone trying to come into this home to do harm would take one look at the walls, s**t their pants, and flee.

But as menacing as the blades were, the rest of the home was both soft and vibrant, welcoming and comforting. Rich silks covered the seats and cushioned, embroidered with entwined floral patterns in silver and gold thread. Plush lap blankets of downy worsted wool covered the backs of the settee, creamy ivory against the shock of teals and purples on the cushions. Vases of dried roses littered every counter and lined the evergreen-trimmed mantle over the hearth.

If the Guildhall was where Electra honed her abilities, her home was where she nurtured her heart.

At the sound of door hinges creaking, Beck’s mind was drawn back to the moment. Electra walked out, her leather slippers silent on the stone floor. She seemed to glide, Beck thought, like a swan on a lake.

She had combed her hair and pulled it into a tight coil at the nape of her neck. It would have perhaps looked too severe with her sharp cheekbones and hooked nose, but the pale yellow ribbon she had tied around her twist trailed sweetly down to her shoulders that made her seem sprightly, frolicsome. She had dressed warmly against the winter’s chill, in a brown woolen skirt and a thick cream cotton blouse that hugged her torso tightly where it was cinched at her waist with a brocade leather belt.

She had dabbed her cheeks with a shimmery pink powder and stained her lips red. Her eyes glowed, rimmed thickly with kohl liner.

Lovely. She was simply lovely. And, for tonight at least, she was his.

“I hope this is suitable, I haven’t sent my clothes to the laundress yet this week.”

“You will have every eye on you.”

“Kind of you to say. So, how far of a walk is this tavern?”