Basila didn't dare speak as the two of them made their way down. Icarus led them through the corridors so, as if he had walked them many a time.
Basila really wanted to ask him what this thing Ingrid was about, but as Icarus knocked on a door from which a lovely smell was coming, Basila got her answer.
Or at least she thought she did.
"Icarus!" Ingrid was around Icarus in an instant. The girl wore an apron, and Basila could see that she had been kneading bread.
Icarus got two handprints on his behind.
Basila saw red.
"You cheater!" For all that Icarus always repeated that the two of them were married, he was pretty close to Ingrid.
"What are you talking about? I'm a horselord!" He said so, as if she shouldn't even question him. "From the Dulo clan, no less!"
If he really was from one of the Twelve Ruling Families, Basila guessed that he was pretty down in the pecking order.
Not that it mattered. His country was enslaved now. Same as hers.
"You promised me forever!" Maybe she had read between the lines one too many times, but she had been sure that they had something!
"And I'll deliver! But Ingrid was here first!" He told her.
Only to receive a slap to the cheek.
"The hell do you mean, you'll deliver?" Ingrid yelled, as she got ready to slap him again. "You promised me we'll marry for true!"
Basila took a frying pan from a rack.
Oh, the shit was going to go down!
"I have to continue my clan!" Icarus was backing away from the two harpies, as he began to view them as. Couldn't they see that he had a duty to his clan? "I am the last heir!"
Basila snorted, twirling the pan in her hand.
"You don't deserve me," she said, already trying to find a way to get rid of the contract. She didn't need someone who wanted her for her womb. "But you can keep the kitchen maid! The two of you are made for each other!"
Ingrid turned around. For the first time since Basila knew of the woman, she had to agree that she was of Viking stock.
"Who are you calling a kitchen maid?" Ingrid hissed, taking a frying pan off a rack.
Icarus took a seat near the warm oven, helping himself to the sweetbread which was cooling near it on a cutting board.
"You!" Basila, apparently, wasn't about to back off.
Icarus knew what would happen. Put a berserker against a mage, and you get…
As he looked on, as Basila did her best to make sure that no hits landed on her head, he considered his options.
Ingrid was pretty and sure to give him many sons. Her hips were wide. His mother always told him that was important. They just needed to wait for him to get a bit older.
But… Basila made pretty leaf dresses…
And…
"Ladies!" He was going to get hit, he knew. Not that he cared. What were a couple of bumps on the head when such lovely creatures could become his wives?
He blinked.
Since when did he talk like that?
He shook his head.
Basila's way of talking was rubbing off on him. He didn't know if that was a good thing or not. But he wanted to set the record right.
"Basila! Ingrid is the owner of the town's Black Market!" Icarus blurted out.
Only to get another slap on the cheek.
"Why don't you scream it from the rooftops?" Ingrid yelled, as she raised her frying pan.
"You can hit me with the pan," he said, as he fell on one knee. "But then you will never know true passion."
"Hey! I read you the last one in one of my books!" Basila yelled. Icarus rubbed the back of his head.
"I'm a fast learner," he winked.
Both girls became red as tomatoes.
They already had ideas about Icarus and his talent to learn things fast.
That didn't mean they liked one another.
"Why are you here?" Ingrid the kitchen maid was gone. In her stead was Ingrid the Black Hand.
"Well, we need to get to the slime dungeon," Icarus, said, stealing a cookie off the counter.
"Those are for the Little Mistress!" Ingrid hit him over the head with the pan, but gently. It was just a tap.
A warning.
Icarus smiled at her, his fingers edging towards a different cookie.
"Icarus! I mean it! She'll notice that there are missing cookies from the batch, and then I'll be scrubbing floors until my hands bleed!" Ingrid protested, putting the frying pan on the counter and hugging Icarus like a plushy. "Be kind to me, Honeybun!"
Icarus sighed. Man, he hadn't thought about what the spoiled Little Mistress was going to do to Ingrid if she caught her out of line.
"Sorry, Sunshine," Icarus gave up on his quest to get another cookie.
Basila bit her bottom lip. Honeybun? Sunshine?
"What about me! How will you call me?" she resisted the urge to stomp her foot.
She was not as pretty as Ingrid. Not as… she looked at the woman's bust… gifted.
But darn it, she needed a Champion! She needed to get her family's slave runes off! Before they turned into Lichs!
And maybe… maybe one day, she could sit on the Holy Throne in the Pearl of the World.
Have her 1,000 dresses back. Everything she had lost.
If Icarus wasn't lying. If he really was the last heir of the Dulo, then he could stir his people into an uprising! He could give her everything she had lost!
"She wants to use you," Ingrid whispered, like the snake she was, or so Basila thought.
"And that Sunshine," Basila spat the pet name. The only sunny thing about Ingrid was her hair color! "Is already using you!"
Icarus sighed.
"Well, yeah, but that's what wives do," it was said so, as if it was normal.
Basila sighed, making a step towards the two.
"So, if she is Sunshine, what am I?" the elven lady hissed.
Not ready to give up.