Erzili made use of her power wisely. If you could turn into anyone or anything you wanted to be, it’d be a waste not to turn into someone that could set the genitals of the opposite sex alight with but a glance and a smirk. Vanity upon vanity, Solomon once said. Coming from the man who’d enjoyed over seven hundred wives. It was like finishing a full cake someone baked and then telling them that it wasn’t worth it to have eaten it.
“Lord Janus… were you… talking with someone?”
“Just having a conversation with myself,” I said, easily. “Last night was fantastic. Where did you learn that trick with your tongue?”
Her eyes sparkled with amusement. “At an Oreillan whorehouse in Qu’bal Lang.”
“I’ll remember to visit there one day and thank them. And perhaps learn a thing or two myself.”
She crossed her arms. Her dark Elvani hair changed color to red. Her eyes changed color to pink. “Erzili is more than willing to teach all that you wish to know.”
I clapped my hands. “Excellent. We’ll invite Arol into the mix to make sure the learning session is very productive.”
“Sunny! What are you saying?!”
Oh, right, he was still listening in.
“Of course I’m still listening in!”
Erzili laughed. “Erzili is certain she will be honored.”
“Good. Schedule it for the evening. Right now, I have some important things to do.”
Donning my full armor and descending from the Commander’s Quarters, the Lieutenants of Fort Zyvar were gathered, each one bowing, albeit some of them did so reluctantly. The reluctance came, mostly, again, from Onna.
“I’m heading out to stretch my legs. One of you is to accompany me.”
“Erzili will be glad to –”
“You.” I pointed. My finger landed upon the pale-skinned, white-haired being of frost. “Follow.”
There was no need for second doubts. The nightmares of Fort Zyvar were terrified of me, and more than that, they looked up to me as a King. There was no reason for me to throw aside this privilege to the wayside and bring myself down. In a lot of ways, it was fitting. I was better than them. Smarter, more powerful, superior in a lot of ways.
To act like royalty was to be perceived as royalty.
Onna pointed at herself with a small amount of confusion. “I?”
“Did you hear me stutter?”
“N-no, but –”
“Bite off two of your fingers,” I said cheerily.
The silence was such that a feather could have landed on the ground and made waves. The Yuki-Onna stared, wide-eyed.
“W-what?”
“Make that three,” I added, clapping. “Either you bite off three of your fingers, or I take your entire arm. You have five seconds.”
Onna froze, no pun intended. “I –”
“Four seconds.”
Erzili tried to speak. “Lord Janus –”
I rose one hand to silence her. “Three seconds.”
Onna stared at her two hands, hesitating over which one to bring up.
“Two seconds.”
“Sunny – you wouldn’t really –”
“One second.”
Her teeth clamped down, hard. She spat out three ice-covered fingers, bleeding blue blood. The fingers landed on the ground directly in front of me. She froze over her wound immediately, ice covering and coating the bleeding stumps of her index, middle and ring fingers on her right hand.
Commanding the earth to rise, I picked up the discarded digits.
“The next time I give a command, and you question it, you will lose an eye. The time after that, a tongue. And after that, a leg. And for each error, I shall take a part of you. Make enough errors, and I will take until there is nothing left. Is that understood?”
“Yes, Lord Janus,” came the consensus from the Lieutenants.
“Excellent!” I clapped my hands. “Now, you, seven-fingered snowwoman. I’m going for a walk. Accompany me.”
My hands were put softly behind my back. I walked forward, not bothering to look back and see if she did.
Frost and cold air approached me along with cautious footsteps. I increased my stride, idly whistling a song that I’d long since forgotten. Ah, that’s true. We need to remember to ask Erzili if she knows how to play any instruments.
‘Why did you do that?”
I almost sighed.
They’re nightmares, Janny. Nightmares, not people. Or if we must think of them as people, think of them as prison inmates who follow a pecking order. Nightmares don’t have or fully understand empathy, so attempting to get them to obey out of loyalty or love is a fool’s errand. But fear – now, fear is something that everyone understands well.
‘You want them to fear us?’
It is much safer to be feared than loved because love is preserved by the link of obligation which, owing to the baseness of men, is broken at every opportunity for their advantage; but fear preserves you by a dread of punishment which never fails.
‘Quoting Machiavelli now?’
Trust me, Janus. I’m you. We’re the same. At the end of the day, we have the same interests, the same goals, but I’m simply the part of you that doesn’t feel the need to reign it in.
Making my way towards the giant gates of Fort Zyvar, I felt elated at knowing that my other half was no longer whining about the methods used. Oh, I know he knew the value of such methods, but the problem was he was intentionally restricting himself. Limiting himself with halfhearted arguments. For shame.
Onna trailed behind me at a steady distance. I could hear the uncertainty in her breathing. Beyond the uncertainty, I could smell it, as a High Ghilan had senses attuned to finding and hunting Alamirians, my nose was attuned
