Chapter 10

Bad Mushroom

Greeves walked side by side with his daughter in the castle's outer courtyard. The sun was burning fiercely down on them, and he was sweating beneath his heavy leathers but he’d be damned if he was going to take them off. Not with those bone barbarians skulking about the place. They were trouble and he knew it, he’d refused to hand over his sword as well when they’d gotten here. The guards had refused them entry and nearly turned them away. Mercy had been furious, but once again Zanzo had been there with his silver tongue and the guards had relented. He suspected Zanzo was interested in Mercy, he was altogether too fond of spending time with her.

A pleasant breeze rolled through the area taking the edge off the damned heat. Mercy turned into the breeze smiling as it tousled her fiery hair.

“So,” she began, “what do you think of my outfit?” She asked before doing a twirl to show it off. Greeves thought it looked ridiculous but he doubted she wanted to hear that, he’d suggested sensible garments to her but she’d paid no mind to him as usual. Still, he’d have to say something nice.

“The pauldron will be good defense if things go bad at this wedding, have you got your daggers on you as well?”

Mercy laughed like he’d asked something funny, then came to a stop and studied him seriously.

“Are you joking? you’re not wearing your sword to it are you?”

“Of course I am, if you’re not—“

“Prepared for an emergency, you’re already dead” she finished for him in a gruff monotone then began walking again.

“Da, it’s a summer time wedding not a melee tourney.”

“If you’re pointing out the occasion then you don’t understand the words you just said. If something bad can happen, most of the time it will. It’s like the mushrooms saying. When life gives you mushrooms you eat them.”

Mercy scoffed, “I’ve been meaning to say about that one, not all mushrooms are edible da.”

Greeves shook his head.

“No they’re not but sometimes you have to eat them anyway. Some things in life are unavoidable and we have no choice but to face them. A bad mushroom might make you sick or kill you, but if you live, you learn.”

She didn’t look convinced. “I’ll keep that in mind da..” She wouldn’t.

“Anyway some marriages can be just as deadly as a melee” he joked trying to lighten things up.

But this one actually could be, he thought. Two formerly opposed people uniting.

He’d seen the Yashai ‘princesses’ men about the castle and they didn’t look enamoured of the union. Hard men and women with hard faces and darkness in their eyes.

“Well anyway I won’t be wearing the daggers, I’d look a fool”

Greeves barked a laugh at the irony of that, but it was a bittersweet one. He knew there was only a finite amount of them left, there was a strain in his chest every time they talked now, that he hadn’t experienced in a long, long time.

Love what you're reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on.

He turned and rubbed his eye with the back of his fist. “Have you decided where you’re going after this?” He asked, hearing a croak in his voice that he got whenever he broached the subject. Mercy came to a stop again and looked back the way they came.

“I was thinking I might go North, see the rest of the kingdom, but I’m not sure now…. Maybe I’ll join up with Zanzo and go wherever he’s going.”

Greeves grimaced, he had known this was coming. Zanzo was arrogant, a womanizer and drunk more often than not, but he was also handsome, largely admired and popular wherever he went. He could talk and talk nonsense that if anyone else dared utter they would be rightly taken for a mad fool.

But people seemed to hang on his every word instead. In short he was the kind of man every young fool tried to emulate and every young woman is usually attracted to.

Greeves knew if he tried to tell her this it would only draw her to Zanzo more so he stifled the beginnings of a heavy, disapproving sigh and gave her a terse grunt of acknowledgement to think about instead.

Mercy saw right through him though, “you’re not happy with that then?” She asked, her tone had a hint of annoyance to it. He grunted again, “did I say I was unhappy?” He turned from her and continued walking along the path leading back to the castle centre. She stomped after him, her wooden sandals clicking on the cobblestones with a snap that resounded around the courtyard. Greeves gritted his teeth.

“it’s what you’re not saying that tells me you disapprove” he ignored that and kept walking, then felt her hand close around his forearm. He turned and looked at her, her brows were furrowed in a frown and her eyes were two slits of green fury, there was a flush to her cheeks as well,

damn Zanzo and his wine.

“You think it’s a stupid decision for me to go with Zanzo don’t you?” She asked, her voice slurring slightly.

“It’s your decision Mercy, it’s not for me to say it’s stupid”

“Well it is if I’m asking you!” She was starting to shout now which irritated him further.

“I don’t think it is a good idea” he snapped back at her, pulling his arm from her grip.

She looked shocked for a moment but quickly mastered herself.

“I knew it! You don’t think I can take care of myself, you think I’ll just end up in a ditch within a week of you not being around!”

“If I thought that, I’d tell you Mercy!

Getting involved with that man as soon as you go out on your own is like jumping into the ocean during a storm to learn how to swim”

She looked at him even angrier than before.

“Yea!? Well what about fucking mushrooms and life?!”

“Yes and Zanzo is a bad one!” He shouted back

She put her hands on her hips, her frown deepening. “This is just like three years ago..”

Greeves mood darkened further at the mention of that.

“This is nothing like that business with the farm boy, you were only seventeen, it was foolish puppy love.”

“It wasn’t foolish to me!! You beat him half to death!!” She raged at him.

“I barely touched him” he objected “the stairs he fell down did the lions share of his injuries and that was on him not me”

“Even still it was your fault. I could have had a life with him.”

Greeves snorted “he could have had a life with you, you mean. You are aeth remember. Human lives will pass by you in the blink of an eye, it’s not worth getting attached to them.”

She gave a snort of her own at that, “yea really? Is that why you spend so much time with Eli and Jax?! You’re a hypocrite.”

That gave him pause, it was true he did like them, but it hardly made him a hypocrite. Like all humans Greeves had known in his long life, they would grow old and die, but a part of him liked to hope that they would live long enough to grow old in the first place.

“I’m not getting attached to them, they’re sword work is awful though and it’s not like it’s going to get better with the teacher they have!”

Mercy laughed but there was no joy in it, it was a mocking laugh. “So we’ve made it back to the source of all the problems have we?” She shook her head “how about you just worry about yourself from now on and I’ll worry about me?..”

she said coldly before marching away from him. He stood there listening to her annoying clicking footsteps fade away. The day was suddenly darker with her gone now and the pleasant breeze from earlier seemed chill of a sudden and he knew he would be fully alone again soon.