The Desert Spear

skilled fingers.
    “Atta girl,” her father groaned, closing his eyes and pressing against her hands. “You were always the good one, Ren. Not like yer sisters, with no loyalty to kith and kin. Dunno how you turned out all right, with those two deserters as an example.”
    Renna finished her ministrations, but Harl grabbed her about the waist and pulled her close before she could pull out of reach. He looked up at her with tears in his eyes.
    “You’ll never leave me, girl, will you?” he asked.
    “No, Da,” Renna said. “Course not.” She squeezed him briefly, and then pulled quickly back, taking his mug to the keg and refilling it.

    Renna awoke that night to a crash as something struck her door. She leapt from bed, pulling on her dress, but there was no other sound. She crept to the door and pressed her ear to the wood, hearing a low wheeze.
    Carefully, she lifted the bar and opened the door a crack, seeing her father passed out on the floor, regurgitated ale staining the front of his nightshirt.
    “Creator make me strong,” Renna begged as she soaked a rag to clean the vomit from him and the floor, then half carried, half dragged her father back to his room.
    Harl wept as she heaved him into his bed, clinging to her desperately. “Can’t lose you, too,” he sobbed over and over. Renna sat awkwardly on the edge of the bed, holding him as he cried, and then disengaged as he drifted off to sleep. She went quickly back to her room and barred the door again.

    The next morning, Renna came back into the house after collecting eggs in the barn and found Harl popping the pins out of the hinges of her door.
    “The door broke?” she asked, her heart clutching.
    “Nope,” Harl grunted. “Need the wood to patch a hole in the barn wall. Don’t matter none, you don’t need it. Ent no marital relations going on in this room no more.” He hefted the door and carried it off to the barn, leaving Renna stunned.
    She felt like a frightened animal for the rest of the day, and didn’t sleep at all that night, all her senses attuned toward the thick curtain hung over the doorway.
    But nothing stirred the curtain that night, or the night that followed, or for a week after.

    Renna wasn’t sure what woke her. Corelings had tested the wards earlier in the night, but the sounds had faded to silence as they gave over to search out easier prey.
    The only light was a soft glow around the edges of the curtain in the doorway from the fire in the common room, burned low in the night. It threw a dim light over her bed, though the rest of the tiny room was bathed in darkness.
    But Renna knew immediately that she wasn’t alone. Her father was in the room.
    Careful to keep still, she reached out into the darkness with her senses, trying to convince herself it was only a dream, but she could smell the stink of ale and sweat, and hear his tense breathing. Floorboards creaked as he shifted from foot to foot. She kept waiting for him to do something, but he just stood there, watching her.
    Had he done this before? Snuck into her room and watched her sleep? The thought sickened her. Afraid to stir, her eyes flicked to the curtain, but escape that way seemed unlikely. It would take her four steps to reach the doorway. Harl could intercept her in one.
    The window was closer, but even if she could unlatch the shutters and throw them open before he got to her, it was deep in the night, and demons prowled the darkness outside.
    Time seemed to slow as Renna desperately tried to think of a way to escape. If she ran through the yard, she might make it to the barn before a coreling caught her. The big barn was warded, and not connected to the house. If she made it there, Harl couldn’t follow till morning, and perhaps by then he would have slept off his drink.
    Running into the night went against her every instinct. It was suicide. But where else was there to go? She was trapped in the house with him until sunrise.
    Just then Harl shifted, and she caught her breath. He came slowly over to the bed, and Renna froze, like a rabbit paralyzed with fear. As he came into the light, she saw he was clad only in his nightshirt, his arousal jutting through the cloth. He came close to her, reaching out to touch her hair. He ran his fingers through it, and then sniffed at them, his hand dropping again to gently caress her face.
    “Jus’ like yer mam,” he mumbled, and ran his hand lower, past her throat and collar, tracing the smooth skin to her