Rhea stood by the curtain to his room. She was already dressed for work, leather breeches that hugged her thick, powerful thighs, and a sleeveless tunic that left her arms bare. Her muscles were defined, corded under skin that was tanned from labor but still showing the soft feminim skin. She held a wooden bucket of steaming water, her expression hard, but her eyes… her eyes betrayed her. They flickered over his prone form, lingering on the sweat that made his shirt cling to his ribs.
"We don't have the coin for rumors, Mother," Rhea said, walking into the room. She set the bucket down with a heavy thud. "Get the towels. I'll handle him."
Mina hesitated, looking between them, then nodded and scurried out.
Nnael pushed himself up on his elbows, watching Rhea. She didn't look at him directly. she was busy rolling up a rough cloth, dipping it into the hot water. Steam curled around her face, dampening the loose strands of hair that escaped her braid.
"I can wash myself," Nnael said.
"Shut up," Rhea grunted. She didn't say it with malice. She said it with the exhaustion of someone who had been carrying the weight of the world for too long. "You can barely lift your head, Nnael. You want to fall and crack your skull? Then who chops the wood? Me. Who hunts? Me. Just… let me do this."
She moved the stool closer to the bed. The air in the small room suddenly felt very tight.
"Sit up," she commanded.
Nnael obeyed, dragging his legs over the side of the bed. He stripped off his soaked tunic. The air hit his skin, cold and biting, but then, heat.
Rhea wrung out the cloth, the hot water running down her strong forearms. She stepped in between his legs, ignoring the intimacy of the position. She slapped the hot cloth onto his chest.
Nnael hissed at the heat.
"Too hot?" she asked, her voice dropping an octave. She didn't pull away.
"It's fine," he muttered.
She began to scrub.
Rhea wasn't gentle. She didn't have Mina's soft, suffocating touch. Though her hands were rough, calloused from the axe and the plow, but the skin still smooth, like they were always taken care of. She scoured his skin, rubbing red circles into his chest, cleaning away the toxic sweat of his night's labor.
But as she worked, the rhythm changed.
Nnael watched her. He watched the way her breath hitched slightly as she leaned in to scrub his neck. She was close, dangerously close. He could smell her, pine needles, woodsmoke, and the sharp, musky scent of a woman who worked hard.
She was scrubbing his shoulders now, her face inches from his. He looked down. Her tunic was loose at the collar. He could see the beginning of the swell of her breasts, bound tightly with strips of leather to keep them out of the way, but fighting against the restraint. The skin there was flushed, a blotchy red creeping up her neck.
She was affecting him. And he knew, with a certainty, that he was affecting her.
His body, weak as it was, responded. He felt the blood shifting, pooling. He saw Rhea's eyes dart down, catching the movement, the tenting of his pants. It was huge.
She froze. Her hand stopped on his collarbone. She licked her lips unconciously.
For a second, neither of them breathed. The silence stretched, filled only by the crackle of the fire in the other room and the wet sound of the cloth dripping onto the floor.
Rhea swallowed. He saw the soft muscles in her throat work. She should have pulled away and slapped him or made a joke about him being a pervert.
But she didn't.
Instead, her hand pressed harder against his chest. Her breathing grew shallow, quick. He saw the fabric of her tunic shift, a small, distinct point hardening against the linen as her nipples reacted to the sudden, electric tension. She bit her lower lip, her eyes glazing over slightly, lost in a sudden haze of confusion and instinct.
She was twenty-two. She had no husband. No lover. Just work and survival. And here was this boy, not a boy really, a man in their teen, this stranger who looked like her brother but felt like a wolf, sitting naked from the waist up between her legs.
"You..." she started, her voice sounding thick, like she had a fever of her own. "You're getting... bigger."
"Trying to," Nnael whispered. He didn't look away. He held her gaze, letting a fraction of his old self, the Emperor of the Great Mandala of Wilwatikta, the Lover, bleed through. He looked at her not as a sister, but as a woman.
Rhea shivered. It was a visible ripple that went through her powerful shoulders. Her thighs clamped slightly, an involuntary motion, as if she was trying to scratch an itch she couldn't reach. A flush darkened her cheeks.
She abruptly pulled her hand back, dipping the cloth into the bucket with a splash that was too loud.
"Don't get used to it," she snapped, but her voice lacked bite. It was breathless. "Once you can stand, you're washing your own filth."
She moved to his back. Nnael turned, presenting his spine to her.
He let out a breath he didn't know he was holding. The lust in the room was thick enough to chew on. It was a distraction, a dangerous one, but it was also a sign of life.
As she scrubbed his back, faster, as if trying to erase the moment that just happened, Nnael's eyes narrowed.
He saw it.
On the inside of her right wrist, revealed as she reached around to scrub his ribs.
A black, jagged tattoo. It looked like a shackle made of ink.
"What's that? On your wrist?" Nnael asked.
Rhea paused for a second, she sighed. "A brand." She said softly, "I'm a laborer, Tier 1, well, I'm still at Level 15 though." She explained plainly.
"What's it for?" Nnael asked her more, "It's flaring."
"Yeah, sometime when I feel…" her face flushed, "anyway, I'm a laborer, wood-worker, working for the Empire. This tattoo gave me +2 STR, but also dropping my INT -3." She continued.
"Doesn't seem fair to me." Nnael said.
"Yeah, that's just how the imperial work. I'm bound to the Duchy of Valerius and can't leave without a Master's permission." Rhea added.
"And who is your master?" Nnael pushed his back, pressing against her breasts.
"Ohh-ngh! Nnael!" Rhea let out a soft moan suddenly, "don't push me like that, it's…" she confused of what she felt, but she didn't pull away.
"Habbit, sis." Nnael stared at the mark. The ink seemed to pulse with a low, faint magic. It wasn't just a tattoo, it was a limiter. The Empire didn't just enslave them legally, they enslaved them biologically. The brand actively suppressed her cognitive functions to keep her docile, boosting her strength so she could work harder until she died.
"I'm gonna wipe it off your wrist Rhea." Nnael said convincingly as rage started to boil inside his chest. It wasn't the hot, fiery rage of a hero. It was the cold, absolute void. She was his. In this life, in this lie, she was his sister. And they had branded her like cattle.
"Acting big, huh?" Rhea finished washing him, her movements jerky. "Get better soon, then you may try." She stood up, wiping her hands on her breeches, refusing to meet his eyes again. She was flustered, her chest heaving slightly against the bindings, the air around her practically vibrating with unspent sexual frustration and confusion. She grabbed the bucket.
"My little brother is growing up, huh?" She pinched his cheek as she turned around. "I have to go, now, works, you know." she muttered, heading for the doorway. "Wood needs chopping."
"Rhea," Nnael said.
She stopped, hand on the curtain. Her back was to him. The line of her spine was stiff, showing the soft skind of her neck.
"Thank you."
She hesitated. Her shoulders slumped, just an inch. "Just get better, Nnael. You know we can't do this alone."
She fled the room, the curtain swayed behind her.
Nnael sat on the edge of the bed, the damp air cooling his skin. He looked down at his own wrist. Nothing there, blank, unbranded.
He closed his eyes and focused inward again. The pain from the night before was still there, a dull throb in his veins. But the channel was open. The Z-Rank skill was hungry, and he was still a wolf.
He had a family of women who were starving for protection and touch. He had a world that wanted to keep them in the mud.
Nnael smiled. It wasn't a nice smile.
He raised his hand, looking at his pale, trembling fingers. He focused his mana, pushing it not into a spell, but into his eyes.
Shift.
For a microsecond, the world flickered. The grain of the wood on the floorboards sharpened. The dust motes dancing in the light slowed down.
He saw the flow.
Faint, grey lines of energy drifted through the air like smoke, trailing after Rhea's heat signature where she had just stood.
...
...