The Old Man in the Bed (Chris)

Only when Chris was well away from Linden and the arena did the consequences of what she had done dawn on her. What was she thinking dunking him in the water? If Linden had taken what she had done as offence and not as a joke, she would be howling in pain for who knew how long. Perhaps forever. She must have been mad. Why did she always let the anger get the best of her? She had to learn to control it better.

‘What’s done is done,’ she told herself firmly. ‘There is no point in fretting over it.’

Aside from her horrible mistake with Linden that could have ended up with her head on a pike, her days went smoothly—with only one sour note. It was, of course, Rina.

Chris asked herself a thousandth time why she was sharing a room with her. The woman had no decency at all. None.

Two nights a week, sometimes three nights, the woman brought a man to spend the night with. The partners she brought were sometimes young, sometimes old. The woman changed her partners like men changed their cloth