The day which had started early with a battle had past and the next morning was approaching. And things had calmed down considerably. Yesterday evening there had been a spontaneous city-wide party. People literally danced in the bloody streets, happy that the city had been taken back. At the end of the night, nobody could be sure anymore whether the red ground was blood of the sea-people or the typical red heavy wine the Aermorikans loved to drink so much. Most likely the whole stash of local wine had been consumed on one evening. All the warriors from the countryside and their chieftains were hailed as heroes. Of course, they received gifts, flowers, praise, and brotherly hugs from men and shy kisses from women. The local priests who had barricaded themselves in the temple during the fighting had brought some bulls that had belonged to the temple and had slew them on the royal plaza and had them roasted and eaten. Dancing and singing had occurred everywhere.

Everybody was happy, well, most where happy. Some warriors of the sea-people who were captured and not slain would for sure be executed or at least sold into slavery. Aermorik was not more civilized than the rest of the world and depending on whose eyes you would look fiend and hero were interchangeable figures projected on whoever one would favor. Well, here and now the sea-people were the fiends and the Aermorikans the heroes. Even the foreign mercenaries were well-regarded and got their share of everything.

Brendan woke up in a dimly lit room. Feeling a simple hard wooden bed below him with a blanket on top. Sunlight could be seen shining brightly through the cracks in the simple wooden shutters. He felt a delicate arm lying on his chest. He carefully turned his head right and saw the form of a woman beside him. She was snoring a little bit which actually made Brendan smile. He mostly payed for companionship but yesterday "heroic Brendan" – as she had called him when she approached him with the offer of a goblet of wine in her hand – did not have to pay for the attention of this lady. He was used to drinking a lot but the heavy Aermorikan red wine had taken its due. He a slight headache and his muscles were sore from all the running fighting and ... other things he had done last night. He could remember that she was more of a middle-aged woman but still looking well-preserved. Well, at least that was what he had thought after some red wine when everything had started to look soft and round in the light of the sun drowning in the sea.

Suddenly a noise raised Brendan’s awareness. The bedroom door started to open slowly and carefully. Brendan instinctively grabbed around in search for his weapons. He found a long dagger beside the bed. He had the habit of always putting at least a dagger near even when he was drunk. His habit had paid off! A small figure slipped through the small crack between the door and the frame. And started looking towards the bed. The woman was still asleep but then the small figure was looking at Brendan. They locked eyes. Brendan relaxed. It was a little boy. Possibly the son of this women. Hopefully there was no father waiting to come home. Did the woman not say something about a vanished husband yesterday? Damn, he just couldn't remember.

"Who are you?", heard Brendan a young slightly hostile voice.

"Brendan."

"You are not my dad."

"Obviously not. Otherwise, you wouldn’t come in my bedroom in the morning. My dad would have smacked my bottom if I would have done so uninvited." Brendan grinned to himself. His family had been bitterly poor. The joint bedroom was their living room, too. And their kitchen and in hard winter nights the shelter for their chicken and sheep. But he was in a good mood and why wouldn’t he play some tricks with this little man?

"It’s not morning. Its already noon."

"You are a little smart ass, aren’t you?“

"Yes, I am smart."

Men and boy looked at each other into the eyes in the dimly lit room.

“What did you do to my mother?"

"What do you mean?"

"She screamed a lot last night. I was really worried. What did you do?"

Brendan had a smug smile on his face and started to answer: "WEELLL. I did give her..." Suddenly he felt sharp fingernails digging into the inside of his thigh in an unpleasant way.

"Uahh... What I meant was I took care for her aching back. Yes, I did that very good. That’s why she screamed in relief."

"How did you do that?", asked the young boy with genuine curiosity.

"Fufufu... your mother is going to explain that to you today..." Again, he felt a sharp claw like grip on his thigh. This time more upwards between his leg.

"Uahh... I mean ONE DAY she will explain it to you!" The grip lessened. Brendan was a battle-hardened warrior, but pain close to that spot was nothing he was used to withstand.

The boy looked mistrustful at Brendan and his mother. Then seemed to drop his thought. "We are hungry. I and my sisters."

"You are a man, aren't you?”, asked Brendan with a grim voice. “Then make sure some food is on the table! Go and take care of your sisters!" Brendan was upset. That little man was around ten years old but still spoilt as a toddler. At age ten Brendan had committed his first deed of triple manslaughter, when three teenaged rascals had tried to rape his older sister. And now this boy who would be a man in a few years was demanding his mother to put some food on the table!

"Mother usually does that."

"Behave like a man and do it yourself. Your mother needs to rest a little bit more. Oh yes, she is going to need to rest a lot after this night."

Brendan was mentally prepared for some more pain but interestingly enough nothing happened.

"Ok", the boy said and turned towards the door. At the last moment he stopped and looked again at Brendan. "Are you going to stay with us, now that ... father was taken by the sea-people?"

"Hell no! Not if I have a say in ... ow!" The sharp pain was back. This time directly beside a delicate place. Aermorikan women were fierce creatures! He had to fuck off as soon as possible and would rather pay for a laying in future.

The boy had a complicated expression on his face but then turned and left the room.

After he was gone Brendan fall back onto the bed and turned his head toward the woman who was looking straight at him. He could see the glimmer of her eyes in the slight darkness of the room. She said: "Are you stupid? He is way too young to know about that ... thing."

"Then you probably shouldn’t have invited me into your bed and done it with me like an animal all night long. But your boy will become a man soon. At his age---"

"I was drunk yesterday! When you are drunk, you do sometimes dumb things. And by the way: What you were doing at his age isn’t of any interest of me! My little Roderick shall stay the sweetheart he is!"

"I drank so much I am still drunk. So, I can say whatever dumb things I want," answered Brendan with his typical cocky smile.

She chuckled a little bit while shaking her head a little bit in slight disbelief but the tension seemed to have evaporated. Brendan felt how she put her hand on his right upper arm. Slowly and sensual was the way in which she caressed his thick, scarred biceps.

"He is right about one thing. My husband is still missing and I ..." She stopped mid-sentence and looked with her beautiful green eyes into his.

Brendan was no fool despite playing the role with an undeniable degree of professionalism. He knew what she was hinting at, maybe hoping for. Right now, he could see all the paths which the gods laid out before him – depending on his answer.

Brendan gave her a sad smile and moved closer to her until his mouth was close to her ear. "I do not blame you for your feelings and since you were honest with me I will for once not give a joke for an answer. All I am good at is killing people. I don’t believe that I can bring happiness to anybody’s life though that doesn’t mean I don’t wish for them to find it. I will live this brutal life of mine until I find my most likely violent end someday. My heart may wish for someone like you and in my dreams, I might see myself with somebody like you, but I think that is all these ideas are: pictures in my mind, dreams and illusions. Please be happy without me. No. Please decide to be happier by not inviting me permanently in your life. I am not the man to replace your husband and fathering your children." He turned away. If he had the ability to cry, he most definitely would have done so. But as fucked-up as he was, he shook off these emotions. He had to function efficiently, not to cry around like a bard or poet!

The woman had a sad expression on her mind. She was still caressing Brendan’s upper arm. She said: "Everybody just wants to be happy. If that’s the case I wonder why it is so hard to actually find happiness." Now she had a tear in her eye.

"Maybe the gods hid this answer somewhere. I don't know what makes truly happy. Maybe family can do ... when nothing catastrophic happens to your family. Still in the end we all die." Brendan knew this sounded deeply nihilistic but maybe these words described his own sad existence more then he would have openly liked to admit.

He got up and started to put his clothes on. When he got close to finishing and started to grab his weapons, she suddenly hugged him from behind while kneeling on the bed. He could feel the warmth of her body being pressed against him. "I won’t ask you to stay but just before you leave I want you to say my name and kiss me like you would imagine kissing the mother of your children."

Brendan turned around. She put her hand around the backside of his neck. He could again see the slight glimmer in her eyes. He grabbed her by the naked shoulders and said: "Alright my dear .... my dear." He hesitated: “Fuck, I can’t remember her name!", yelled Brendan to himself. This was awkward. She told him her name yesterday. But he was already half drunk when he started talking with her.

"My dear... A... Ba...Bea...Co...Cu…", started Brendan while looking at her eyes trying to get a hint from her reaction. Her half-closed eyes flared open and her solemn facial expression turned angry. "You don't even remember my name! Its Cironna!" Then half angry half joking she said: "You are an awful man and I never want to see you again you jerk. Get out!"

Brendan turned around and started leaving the room. He knew by displaying even fake anger towards him she had done them both a favor. He could leave now more easily, and she would miss him maybe a little bit less. For once he felt him fumbling with words actually had done something good. He evaded as much as he could the curious looks of two very cute little girls sitting at the kitchen table on the ground floor of the house nibbling on some visibly hard bread and left home ... the home of Cironna. Still even his powerful stride could not hide the slight unease he felt in his heart.