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ANTON
Anton Bereza lay restlessly in bed with an unclothed Maryska. He stared up at the ceiling, his body still drenched in sweat from how hard she’d made him work for his money. As the morning light spilled in through the window, he knew he had to leave soon and quite possibly take a long bath to rid himself of her overwhelming scent. It was a mixture of an overly sweet orange with a tinge of something he could never name—yet didn’t like—hidden somewhere in its beauty. No matter how well he washed, her smell always seemed to linger.
With quiet precision, Anton lifted his head to peer over Maryska’s still form and settled his gaze on the four silver coins gleaming on the wooden nightstand beside her bed. Perhaps I could grab them quickly and run. But no, that wouldn’t be possible. Then she would gossip to all the other village folk, which, in turn, would destroy his reputation from future work.
And he needed the money.
He was physically and emotionally exhausted from having to pretend to worship and yearn for these customers. Although he enjoyed the burst of in-the-moment bodily pleasure, it never felt good afterward. If he was to have a lover for his own, he didn’t want it to feel like this anymore—he wanted it to be real.
“Maryska, I have to leave,” Anton whispered, giving her a soft nudge of the arm.
Maryska’s eyelids fluttered open, her dark brown gaze catching his. “Stay a little longer?” With a yawn, she stretched her body as she rolled to face him. She knew the whole reason behind him being there was because of the money.
Anton mentally groaned and displayed a seductive smile anyway. “If only I could, my goddess, but I need to check in on my sister and help her at the market today.”
She sat up, pressing her shapely lips into a pout, then crossed her arms against her youthful light brown skin. At that moment, she appeared more like a petulant young girl than a woman in her twenties.
In answer to her pout, he tugged on his worn trousers, tossed on a gray tunic, and slipped on his boots. Rubbing the side of his jaw, he hesitated, before turning back to her. “May I have my payment?”
Maryska’s chestnut-colored brows furrowed, and he knew in an instant that it was the wrong thing to have asked. Anton didn’t understand a lot of these customers, but that was why he’d come there. He knew that—she knew that.
While holding her breath, Maryska pulled the knitted covers back and stood from the bed. She snatched the silver coins and slowly sauntered toward him, leaving her form unclothed, trying to tempt him again.
Even though his body would have considered giving in to a quick tumble, he was not in the mood for her attachment. He was done with her.
Sliding his arm forward, Anton held his palm open for Maryska to drop the money in. She released one silver coin against his flesh, then came the second, with a clang and a clack against the other. The pouring of coins stopped.
Anton stared at the two pieces of silver for a moment before returning his gaze to Maryska. He avoided looking at her large breasts and focused on her hard stare. “You owe me four, Maryska.”
“You can have the two other coins”—a smirk spread to the left side of her cheek—“when you come back tonight.”
Anton inhaled sharply, his voice coming out low. “That’s not part of our bargain.” He held back the growl that wanted to escape as a frown crossed his face.
“I changed my mind,” she cooed. “Didn’t I tell you that last night? Two coins per session.” Her head tilted to the side as if Anton was a child and should know better.
“You didn’t mention that.” She hadn’t told him anything about flipping to a new payment arrangement. He would have remembered that.
“Oh, well, it must have slipped my mind.” She shrugged and inched closer to him, tapping two of her long fingernails against his chest.
There was nothing he could do about this. Nothing. Despite the blood boiling through his veins, he accepted the situation for what it was, and closed his hand into a fist. His grip tightened on the coins, causing them to dig into his flesh. “Fine. See you tonight, Maryska.”
Without another word, he turned and trudged his way out of her room to the front door, shoving the coins deep into his pocket like they might disappear. As he yanked the door open, he wanted to slam it shut, but he knew angering her would only lead to losing the rest of his payment.
“Oh, and Anton?” Her voice came out laced with false sweetness as she sauntered into the candle-decorated sitting room. The candles were everywhere, hanging on the walls, resting on the table, some fresh, others used almost completely.
Gripping the golden handle in one hand, he twisted his head over his shoulder and unclenched his teeth. “Yes?”
“I’d watch how you act around me, or I may take it down to one silver.” Maryska walked to the circular wooden table and set down the two remaining coins. One spun several times before falling over with a ping.
“Then I wouldn’t return.” He shouldn’t have said those words, but he couldn’t hold them back. Maryska knew how much his family needed the money. Everyone knew. It had only been two years since his father passed. That day never went away, the image of his father collapsed outside their cottage with his hands sliced clean off after being caught stealing at the market. Anton and his sister had done all they could to save him, but the infection had taken him anyhow, leaving them orphaned.
Maryska held it over him, continuing to taunt him more and more with each visit.
Grinning, she edged alongside the silk-covered chair, running her fingernail down the blanket resting on top. “I just might have to spread word around Kedaf about you.”
Anton’s heart lodged into his throat, and he pulled his face into as much of a smile as he could muster. “I’ll be here right on time.” If she were to spread those vicious lies—most likely that he had a spreadable sickness, or worse—they would be ones he could never wash away. No customers would want him after that.
“Good.” Maryska waved him off as though he were her pet. Perhaps he was.
After stepping outside and leaving Maryska behind for the time being, he withdrew a leather strap from his pocket to tie back his disheveled blond hair. Maryska’s large orange tree, full of ripe fruit for the picking, stood in front of him. He plucked a perfectly-shaped orange from it, despite the threat of a reprimand he’d get over taking her precious fruit if she saw.
He peeled the orange and ambled carelessly down the dirt path, rolling up his sleeves as perspiration gathered on his back. Anton tossed the rind to the ground as he walked toward the market, leaving a trail behind him.
A heavy gust of cold wind blew past him with an angry howl, rumpling his hair and causing a chill to race up his spine. The sound of something clacking echoed around him. He looked up into the trees, and all the birds seemed to be peering in the direction behind him. Nothing was there, not even another gust of wind. It was way too early for cold weather to start trickling in. Very strange. He shook his head and continued on.
Luscious green hills in the distance stood out against the foliage. He lived in the less populated village of Kedaf, full of dense forests, near the border of Verolc, where gossip grew fast and hit hard. The three territories—Kedaf, Verolc, and Narwey—were once united neighbors, then became divided by war. Peace now reigned. However, what happened on the other lands across the sea, past Huadu, he didn’t know much about, besides tales of magic. But that was all they were, only tales.
Up ahead, as Anton approached the market, all the booths appeared empty. No morning breakfast smoke filled the air yet as he passed a wooden stand and table. The sun was rising higher in the sky, and the vendors should all be there soon.
A row of sellers’ stations extended on each side as he walked by. Down the line, his family’s booth came into view. His sister, Yeva, always insisted on getting started as soon as the sun rose. She had a good head on her shoulders, except when it came to doing things too early without getting paid. She and their brother, Pav, could show up later, and they still would make the same amount of coin.
Across the table, various shades of green herbs were sprawled out and separated into bundles. Anton searched for Pav’s strawberry blond mop of hair and his sister’s wheat-colored braid, but they were nowhere to be seen. He would shake them both if they’d left the herbs alone for the taking.
A heavy sigh of relief escaped his mouth when a head sprung up from inside the booth. He stilled after noticing that the girl’s braid was the color of a fallen raven’s feathers instead of wheat. A delicate hand of rich olive clasped a bundle of rosemary—his family’s rosemary.
Anton scanned the surrounding area to see if other sellers or early customers had trickled in. None had. It was only him and the thief. This should be amusing.
Shuffling his feet past the jewelry vendor next to his sister’s booth, he stopped directly in front of the waist-high wooden door and prevented the girl’s escape.
“Good morning,” Anton sang. He wished he had a hat atop his head to remove and bow to the girl, in order to sarcastically appear more gentlemanly in contrast to her thieving ways.
The thief whirled around to face him, startled. Her shocked open-mouth expression vanished, turning into something much fiercer, making her facial features sharper. He only felt tired for a moment until his eyes lowered to the bag beside her feet, stuffed with herbs. Annoyance fluttered through him and his heart started to pump harder.
“We’re closed,” she said, lips pursed while her fist squeezed a bundle of lemongrass.
Anton wanted to roll his eyes as he tilted his head to the front of the booth. “Sign up there says you’re open.” There was no sign, but she didn’t have to know that just yet.
The girl stood on her tiptoes, trying to see over the edge. She appeared close to his nineteen years, perhaps a year younger.
Before she could look, Anton moved forward and shoved his open hand in her face. “I need my palm read.” After all, his sister did read palms for the customers at this booth.
“What?” The girl’s brown eyes flicked back and forth between his hand and her satchel on the ground. As her fingers nervously twitched, his irritation altered into gratification that she would slip up.
“I need you to read my palm.” He wiggled his fingers in front of her and moistened his bottom lip, holding back a bemused smile.
“You want a palm reading?” Her dark brows rose, and he could tell she was trying to figure out a way out of the situation.
“Yes. Please tell me what you foresee in my future.” He knew he could pick this girl up and set her outside the booth before she even realized what had happened. But he preferred to see what she would do next.
“Sure. Come inside.” There was a slight hesitation and a hint of a Huadu accent within her words. She waved him in and set the lemongrass on the table.
“You look nervous.” He studied the beaded perspiration that had gathered on her forehead and upper lip.
She brushed her hands against the sides of her pants. “I’m not. It’s hot out here, is all.”
“And you are?” Anton asked, not really interested in who she was, yet he couldn’t help but enjoy the charade.
The girl’s eyes angled to his and narrowed. “Why?”
“I’m just curious.”
She paused as if she wasn’t going to answer, then nodded and glanced away. “I’m Nahli.”
Something in his chest tightened as he could have sworn he’d caught a glimpse of a hollowed expression on her face. There wasn’t time to feel for someone who was trying to steal from his family, and he needed to put an end to this. “Can you tell me my name? Since, as a fortune teller, you know all.”
Her eyes fluttered as she gently took hold of Anton’s hand that had become a fist. She unwound his tight fingers, then stared at the center of his palm. With the tip of her index, she softly drew a circle in the middle of his hand. “Your name is Anton.”
His body stilled, stunned by the fact she knew his name. Perhaps she was a real fortune teller. “And how do you know that?”
“Your reputation precedes you, Mr. Bereza.” She shrugged and removed her fingers from his palm.
“You mean I’m a whore. That’s what you’re trying to say.” Bitterness found its way into his voice, and shame seeped into his words. He told himself he couldn’t care less what people thought, but being confronted about it directly instead of behind his back was more insulting.
“We all have to do what we must. You’re not harming anyone,” she murmured, seeming taken aback by his words.
But he was harming people. Himself, most of all. “What else does my palm say?”
Nahli studied the thin lines intently. “You will find a love one day that will conquer all obstacles, and you will be happy forevermore,” she replied with the generic answer of most fortune tellers, besides his sister, who at least tried harder.
“Let me read your palm now.” Anton stirred out of Nahli’s grasp and clasped her wrist. “Ah, yes. Nahli, it says here”—he ran the tip of his finger softly along the curve of the line in between her index and middle digit—“that you are a thief.” She tried to pull out of his hold, but he fastened his grip. He slid his finger to the center of her palm. “It also shows here that you are in my booth.”
He glanced up and met her eyes with an even stare, a wicked smile on his lips. But she was beaming right back at him, feral. Two dimples showed in her cheeks.
“Look over there.” She cocked her head in the direction of the forest behind the booth.
“I’m not that foolish.” If this girl thought he would really turn his head to look at the trees so she could run off, then she needed to learn more about thieving.
“Maybe you are.” She reached her other hand to his arm and pinched the delicate skin of his inner wrist with needle-like claws, even though they were only her fingernails.
Out of instinct, Anton ripped his arm back with a curse, releasing her. “You have claws like a cat.” He couldn’t believe how much his skin throbbed, more than getting bested by his younger brother.
Before he could grasp her arm once more, she darted past him and leapt over the fence with quick reflexes, angling her head over her shoulder. “More like a leopard.”
“Don’t forget your bag.” Anton bent down and held up her satchel, dangling it on his finger by the strap, letting it sway side to side.
She slapped the side of her thigh. “Damn.”
“Be careful, you might lose both your hands if it’s someone else who catches you next time.” Thieves always reminded him of his father, and he didn’t even know the girl’s story. He didn’t want to know it, either.
Nahli didn’t glance back at him as she scurried out of the market. After her image faded, he grew frustrated since his brother and sister still hadn’t come back. What would have happened if Yeva had come to find Nahli instead, or if it had been a larger man trying to steal their herbs?
Kneeling, Anton gathered the fallen herbs from the ground, then opened the brown leather satchel and fished out the remainder. He rolled them back out on the table where they belonged, before shoving the bag in the corner. It looked like his sister would have a new satchel.
Moments passed by, and vendors were starting to slowly come in and stock their booths—fruits, vegetables, candles, fabrics, and other tinctures displayed for all the customers. A heavy clacking of iron being struck by hammers and wood being cut pierced his ears. The fresh aroma of cooking meat filled the air, and his stomach rumbled with hunger. Anton patted the coins in his pocket, shoulders slumping when he realized he wouldn’t have enough to purchase any meat. There was just enough to stop by a seller on his way out to pick up a loaf of bread and vegetables. That would have to be satisfactory.
“Ton-Ton, what are you doing here?” a gentle voice asked.
Anton spun around to find his sister, Yeva, opening the rickety wooden gate, her hands holding two wicker baskets flowing with herbs. Shoved under her arms were even more.
“You know you don’t have to call me Ton-Ton when Tasha isn’t around.” Anton was used to the nickname their younger sister had used since she could first speak.
“Sorry, it’s a habit—and a hard one to break, at that.” Yeva smiled, closing the gate and dropping the items on the table with a sigh.
For a moment, Anton almost forgot that he was supposed to be angry with her. “Where’s Pavla?” He surveyed up and down the market strip for their younger brother, his eyes settling on a customer trying to barter for thread.
“He’s—”
Anton glanced back at his sister and pressed a hand against the gate. “Neither one of you are supposed to leave the booth unattended when you have all the merchandise exposed. There was a girl here earlier trying to swipe the herbs.”
Yeva’s smile faltered, then faded. “Sorry, but Tasha’s not feeling good, and Pav had to stay home and look after her. Mrs. Evanko wouldn’t watch her because she didn’t want her other children to get sick.”
Anton’s back straightened with worry. “Tasha’s sick? You could have come and found me.” He would have gone home in an instant.
“From Maryska?” Yeva let out a harsh laugh. “She would have been angry with me for showing up and interrupting.”
Once, his sister had stopped by Maryska’s home to retrieve Anton when she’d thought Pav had broken his arm. Maryska didn’t know Yeva was his sister, and she’d been furious. Even after she’d learned of their sibling connection, Maryska still resented her.
Lately, Maryska had become even more jealous of the time he spent with his family.
“You still should have come, Yeva.”
She waved him off, then spread out the herbs on the counter in a precise manner and set up small display signs in front of each type. His sister’s mannerisms reminded him more and more each day of their mother’s. He prayed the day would never come when he recognized the same haunted sadness in her eyes. The deep depression after Tasha’s birth that had driven her to hang herself from a tree. His father had told them she just wasn’t ready for another child.
“I have to see Maryska tonight,” Anton said, stomach sinking at the thought of it.
“Already?” Yeva threw her hands above her head. “You’re supposed to have dinner tonight with us and Ionna.”
“We really need the coin,” he muttered while helping Yeva organize the herbs.
His sister gripped his callused hand and stopped him from setting down a bundle of thyme. “No, we don’t. The business has been picking up and seeing that I’m to marry Ionna in the summer, I’d like you to spend more time with her.”
Anton slipped out of her grasp. “You’re too young to get married.” Ionna was a good enough woman, and she had her own farm at only twenty, but he didn’t want his sister to feel as if she needed to marry someone.
“I will be eighteen by then.”
“No matter.” Anton knew he was hitting a wall because she was set on marrying Ionna. He only wanted her to be sure about it.
“Ionna promised to take care of all of us, and I will continue to work the market. It’s not only that—I love her. You know I wouldn’t marry someone only for money.” She paused, then clapped her hands. “Oh, and she told me she found work for you.”
“What kind of work?” Anton lifted a skeptical brow. But he would take any other trade he could if the coin was right. Yeva might be all right with Ionna taking care of the rest of his family, but he wasn’t. He wanted to provide for Pav and Tasha, not Yeva having to do everything.
“Gathering herbs.” She smiled, though it looked more as if she were wincing.
“You mean you found me work.” He hated to think that Yeva bothered Ionna to do this for him. Yeva’s poor brother can’t find honest work on his own.
“Just take it until you find something better. Please?” she begged, clasping her hands and knocking them against the wooden table.
Anton pressed his lips into a thin line. She had taken on a parental role in the family after their birth mother had died, and he just couldn’t tell her no.
“Fine, but only after I get the rest of my coin tonight, then I promise I will do what you ask.”
