Page 110 of Famine

“W-why?” I ask.

He gives me another loaded glance, and I feel that look right to my core.

“Would you rather I leave you at the door to your room?” he asks.

“No,” I say too quickly, and ugh, I want to cringe. I sound like a horny teenager.

The Reaper’s mouth curves up on one side and the world feels like it’s turned on its axis.

Famine stops at a door just down the hall from mine. He opens it, then holds the door open for me.

I step inside the room. The place is already lit by candlelight, the flames dancing in wrought iron sconces.

I move towards a side table that has a globe made entirely from inlaid stone. I spin it a little before my attention moves to the stack of books sitting next to it, their names painted along their spines.

“Why yes, please explore my room,” Famine says, his voice laced with sarcasm.

“Was I not supposed to?” I say, raising an eyebrow as I turn to him. “You invited me here, after all.”

Famine doesn’t say anything to that, which I take for capitulation, so I continue to peruse his quarters. I toe the rugs, eye the bar in the corner of the room, stare at the mounted paintings, touch a sculpture of a nude male with a huge phallus—clearly wistful thinking on the artist’s part—and eye the bed. The entire time I feel Famine’s gaze on me.

I keep waiting for him to make some sort of move; he’s the one who led me here after all. He was the one with desire in his eyes and suggestion on his lips. But he doesn’t even try to approach me.

So weird.

As he watches me, Famine begins to unfasten his bronze armor. And now my blood heats. This is what I’ve been waiting for.

It doesn’t take him long to remove it all. The sight of the horseman in his black shirt and breeches has me swallowing. The candlelight does nothing but heighten his beauty, dancing over his sharp jaw, high cheekbones and bemused lips. He watches me like a panther, arms folded over his chest.

The sight causes my heart to leap and my abdomen to tighten in the strangest way …

Still, I am reluctant to move to the horseman, now that I’m acknowledging my own desire. I don’t want whateverthisis between us to echo every other experience I’ve had, but I don’t know how to make it different. That’s why, when my gaze snags on the Reaper’s bronze scales, I move over to them instead of the horseman.

I’ve only caught glimpses of this device since I started traveling with the horseman.

I step up to the scales, drawn in by their odd existence. The delicate circular pans are polished to a shine. There are a series of symbols etched onto each, and I think it might be the same markings that cover Famine’s body.

“Are you ever going to tell me what these scales are for?” I ask.

“They’re for weighing items.”

I give the horseman a look. “I figured as much.” I touch one side of the scales with my finger, the shallow metal pan bobbing a little at the contact before it resettles. “Why would a horseman need to weigh anything?” I ask.

Famine runs a thumb over his lower lip, watching me for a moment, like he’s deciding on something.

“It’s a metric to weigh men’s hearts,” he finally says.

He walks to my side, unaware that I was trying to put some space between us. “The scales represent truth, order, peace—essentially, the world as it ought to be,” he continues. “Whether humans are worthy of that world is for these scales to judge.”

I glance over at him, my heart beating a little faster at his nearness. It takes me a few extra seconds to process what he said.

“That sounds like the story you told me,” I say. The one about the Egyptian goddess who weighed men’s hearts. She had scales too.

“Ma’at and I have much in common,” the horseman says softly.

I touch one of the shallow pans again. Of all the beings who should wield such a device, vicious, violent Famine seems like the worst candidate for the job.

“Would you like to see how it works?” he asks.

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