Chương 38: Chapter 37 - Stupid Questions

Iset was used to the nights being dim and quiet, but that night, it was dark, not dim, and the quiet felt oppressive. The glaring lanterns scattered around the room each cast a different tone of white or yellow light that changed every space outside their reach into a black hole. The muffled sounds of her and Conrad shuffling through the books were a grating distraction from her restless thoughts.

She hurried, pulling out each book, checking the publishing date—if it had one—and sorting them into the pile of books that could be more safely ignored, or the pile of books that Emerra would have to look at when she woke up. The poor girl was finally asleep. With the combined power of coffee and anxiety, she'd fought it off for as long as she could, but then her exhaustion had shut her down. Conrad had taken one batch of books away from her.

When he returned with a new batch, five seconds later, he'd found her dozing. He put down the books and coaxed her over to the couch she'd sat on while talking to Abraxas. Emerra protested the entire time, but it came out in a garbled mumble that Conrad had ignored. Iset caught herself gazing at the sleeping figure and shook her head. She knew she needed to focus, but it was no use. Scanning through the books required minimal attention, freeing her mind to mull things over. A pipe. And a skull.

Emerra had always had an almost indolent disinterest in understanding the Eyes of the Sphinx, so Iset had assumed the responsibility of tracking and analyzing what they could do. Her knowledge of magic and the supernatural world made her, in some ways, better qualified to do it, and Emerra was happy to tell her about her experiences, even if she was resistant to learning about the Eyes themselves.

Because of Iset's study of the Eyes, she was the person most likely to know if the pipe and skull that Emerra had seen was a vision. And she didn't know at all. Not counting her dreams, Emerra had had at least two types of visions. The first type was fairly common—if a seers' visions could ever be considered "common." They'd been triggered by touching something, and the visions had superimposed themselves over her natural view.

"Overlay visions," Iset murmured. Conrad's ears twitched toward her. She didn't notice. The second kind of vision was different—somehow. Emerra had insisted on that, and Iset agreed with her, though she couldn't give a reason why. It had occurred in Fort Rive, when Emerra had seen two different versions of a long-dead man simultaneously acting out scenes from the past. No matter how much Iset had searched, no reference to a similar vision could be found. Iset had never told Emerra that.

It was a breach of her values to hide information without good reason, but whenever she tried to bring it up, Emerra would look at her with those wide black eyes, and the words would wither in Iset's throat. She couldn't bring herself to say anything that might make Emerra feel alone. A sense of frustration stole into the mummy. She let out a tsk sound without meaning to. Never mind that now. Was the pipe and the skull some kind of new vision? It was possible.

The Eyes of the Sphinx were unique, and they'd never been studied before. There was no telling what kind of visions might come of them. But Iset had never heard of a vision—couldn't conceive of a vision—that followed the seer around while being unattached to an object, place, or time. And it was curious that Emerra had only started seeing them after Abraxas had arrived. That could be nothing but coincidence, but the thought gnawed at the back of Iset's mind like woodworm. Big Jacky would scold me, Iset realized.

It was usually the other way around, but not when it came to the Eyes of the Sphinx. Jack Noctis was adamant. You couldn't trick those eyes. You couldn't fool them. You couldn't force them to see things that weren't there, and you couldn't hide the truth from them. He would've scorned the idea that a demon could influence them. Iset paused with her hand resting on top of a book. The Eyes might have been infallible, but humans were not, and the Eyes belonged to a very human young woman.

Iset didn't know which idea was worse—that Emerra might be having a vision that no one in the house could understand or that their seer might be seeing things.

"Iset." Iset turned toward Conrad. He kept his voice low so he wouldn't wake Emerra: "Are you okay?"

"I'm sorry, Conrad." Iset pulled the book off the shelf and opened it.

"I'm distracted. That's all." Conrad let out a quiet grunt and looked back down at the book he was holding. A moment later, he grumbled, "Do you mind if I ask you a really stupid question?" Iset looked up. Conrad was standing below a lantern perched on the shelf by his head. It made it easy for her to see how his ears were moving.

"The wiggle of embarrassment," Emerra had called it. The name was apt. Iset had seen it several times in the first few months after Conrad had moved in, but that had been years ago. She'd forgotten how cute it made him look. All thoughts of visions and demons were driven out of her head by curiosity. What question could possibly make Conrad so self-conscious?

"Of course," she assured him. Conrad closed the book and walked it over to the pile it belonged in. He didn't speak until after he'd put it down.

"Do human females go into heat?" Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. There was silence. The only movement was Conrad's ears, wiggling more than ever. Rarely was Iset so glad that her bandages prevented anyone from seeing her expression. She waited the extra second it took to be sure she could speak without any hint of laughter.

"No. Probably not the way you're thinking—not like wolves do—but there's a lot to that question, so I'm not sure if that's really what you wanted to know. I'd be happy to explain things, but it would help if I could get more context." Conrad walked back over to the bookshelf. In the lamplight, Iset could see he was scowling.

"Emerra doesn't know I'm asking about this," he said. Iset glanced toward the couch. Conrad pulled a new book from the shelf.

"She's asleep." Of course. If Conrad had brought up her name, then the question probably had something to do with Emerra, and Conrad would never have asked the question unless he was sure she was unconscious. It was hard to blame him.

"I understand," Iset said.

"Do you know who Charlie is?"

"I'm afraid not."

"He was a therapy dog from back when Emerra was sick. She was really close to him. They spent a lot of time together. Then she wakes up and comes here, and she starts having these…really bad…nightmares." Conrad seemed to be struggling with what to say, but Iset thought she could sense where this disjointed story was heading.

"She came to you?"

"No! That's not —that's not it. It was just a thing that happened. We both watch too much TV, she finds fur comforting, and I didn't mind." Darius had mentioned that he'd seen Emerra leaning on Conrad as they watched their shows. At the time, Iset had thought it was adorable. Now she thought it was also profoundly sweet.

"So that's how you two got so close," she said. Conrad locked his eyes on her. They looked like two bright disks, shining in the dark.

"We're not that close," he said.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to imply—""I know, but that's why I'm asking. We're not that close." Iset waited. Conrad lowered his eyes back to the book.

"Last night she had another nightmare. I thought she might, so I left my door open so I could hear if she left her room—" Iset wondered how many times Conrad had to do that before he could talk about it as though it was a matter of routine.

"—but I was too tired after the fight. I didn't wake up. She came to my room instead." His ears were wiggling again.

"She stayed with me." Now Iset understood why he'd insisted that they weren't that close. It'd be easy for someone to misunderstand if he told them that he'd slept with her.

"This morning," Conrad said, "when I woke up, there was this scent coming from Emerra…" Iset felt her insight weaving all the details together, from the wiggling of his ears to how his last statement had trailed away. It took her a moment to think of how to phrase her question.

"I take it that this was an enticing smell?" Conrad nodded.

"Ah. I believe I can answer your question." Iset put the book she was holding on top of the bookcase.

"Human females don't go into heat, so that isn't what you were smelling. However, there are at least two times when a human female might produce a scent like that. You know about a woman's menstrual cycle?"

"Emerra doesn't have them." Iset paused, then said, "You'd smell them, wouldn't you?" Conrad nodded. Iset said, carefully, trying to avoid sharing more than she had the right to, "Because Emerra's body is revived, it's difficult to know what's happening. It's true that she doesn't have a standard cycle, but we don't know about her hormones. It's possible that something was going on and that it caused the scent you smelled this morning."

Conrad didn't respond, but Iset could see that his ears were still trained on her. She continued, "The other possibility is that she was aroused." The wolfman's ears flattened out to the side.

"Unlikely." Iset put her hands together in front of her face and rested them over her covered mouth. She pulled them away before she spoke.

"Conrad, you said you smelled it this morning?"

"Yes."

"Was it there when you woke up?"

"Yes."

"Was she awake?"

"I don't think so."

"Then she could've been having a dream. Women do have dreams like that, you know." After a second, Conrad's ears relaxed.

"That makes more sense." Iset noted the curiously flat tone of his voice. He added, "Should I ask her?" When Iset recovered from her shock, the word burst out of her: "What! —" Conrad hissed to remind her to be quiet. Iset went on in a fierce whisper.

"No! Oh, gods— no! Conrad, why would you say anything to her?"

"The scent—""The scent nothing! You don't go around asking about other people's smells. That's rude!"

"Why would it be rude?" Iset put a hand to her forehead.

"Is this going to be one of those cultural misunderstandings?" Conrad shrugged.

"All right. Let me try to explain." Iset let her hand fall back to her side.

"Conrad, humans can't smell anything. Not as far as you're concerned. We might as well be nose-blind. The only smells that humans pay attention to tend to be gross and awful—the kind of smells that indicate that something dangerous to our health might be nearby. When you tell a human that they smell, the only thing the human is going to think is that their body odor has become repugnant." The wolfman stared at her.

"I'm serious," she said.

"It's an insult."

"I know humans can smell each other. I've heard them mention it."

"We're not talking about perfume here, Conrad!"

"It wasn't a bad smell! Why would it be an insult?" Iset grunted.

"Let's try again. Can you accept the idea that humans are nose-blind? We really, truly, can't smell each other the way you can smell us. All that information you're gathering, we don't get it."

"Yeah, I know."

"Good. Try to bear that in mind because I'm going to be talking about something that's fundamentally different from your sensory experience, all right?"

"Yeah."

"Because humans can't smell each other's physical states, there's a lot of information that we consider private. We know what's going on, but we don't have to let others know unless we want to."

"Okay?"

"Whether or not a woman is aroused, or whether or not she's on her period—that is private information. Emerra may not even realize it, but I promise you that she thinks of it as her information, and if you know about it when she hasn't told you, she'll be upset."

"Why?"

"Because you violated her privacy."

"I can't help what I smell."

"I know that, and she knows that, but this isn't about intellectual understanding. She'll react on an emotional level."

"So I wait until she says something?"

"Conrad, she's never going to say anything. What we're talking about here is pretty taboo." Conrad's brow scrunched down and his eyes narrowed.

"You people never talk about it?"

"Not often."

"How the hell do you have a population of seven billion?" Iset smiled.

"Well, we don't talk about the smell anyway. Believe me, if a woman wants you to know she's aroused, she'll find a way to inform you." Conrad blinked, then shook his head.

"That's so goddamn inefficient." Now that Conrad wasn't feeling defensive, Iset found herself enjoying the conversation.

"Oh, I don't know," she said.

"If you think about it, our way might be more efficient. Lycanthrope females probably have to explain themselves every time they're aroused. Human females only have to say something when they want attention."

"Our women know we know. They don't have to say anything."

"They never have to say 'back off, not you'?"

"Don't pretend human females don't have to do that. And at least with us, we know they aren't interested without having to get shot down first." Iset laughed.

"I'll concede the point." With a twinge of regret, she added, "But I think we should get back to what we were doing." When Conrad looked down, his ears did a bit more wiggling, as if he was embarrassed to be caught neglecting such a vital task. Iset reached for the book she'd left on top of the bookcase and pulled it down. It was embarrassing that they could've forgotten, even temporarily, what they were doing—but, all the same, Iset had been glad for the distraction.