Ages ago they thought El Meandro would be a bigger deal than it turned out to be. That’s why they still have a marble fountain by the entrance of Hotel Rekul, the kind with naked people pouring water out of their big jars. But that’s wasteful so close to the desert, so they plugged it up. Now it's a giant fancy marble flowerpot, bursting with the local plant life instead of water. Finches nest on the marble people's heads and the jar mouths. They won't even look at you, as if they're fancy guests and you're beneath them. As for the hotel's interior, it’s classy yet full of energy, with murals in bold colors and vague shapes. There's a fireplace made of roughly hewn rocks and potted cacti in different sizes. The desert experience! Or that's how they hope tourists will feel. For the true desert experience, please put some grit on your water bottle and scorpions on your sleeping bag.

When we walked in, the owner’s son was talking to a clerk sitting behind the counter. The former’s name was Ilario Cordel and we got along pretty well. I made his clients a little bit happier and sometimes got them to buy me dinners and drinks, so he let me hang around the hotel and sometimes invited me. We'd also fucked a couple of times, just in passing. He saw me coming in and, I think, at first assumed this was just another one of my regular visits, though usually I dropped by much later in the day. As I said, I'd gotten kind of a reputation. If I walked in along with two men, you didn’t need to ask what was going on.

But then, his eyes were snagged by Valentino’s emerald bird badge. Then he saw Vanth, and at that point it was anybody’s guess what he thought. The youngest Cordel dropped his conversation and hurried to my side.

“Good afternoon, Mr Cordel,” I said. “I’m going on a trip to see some relatives.”

Everyone knew I was related to the Megarchon, but most of the time I suspected they simply forgot. With Valentino standing there, though, there could be no question of who these relatives were.

“Of course.” The youngest Cordel was good at his job; after the initial confusion, he quickly landed on his feet. “We happen to have a private room unoccupied, if Your Excellency would like it.”

Private rooms were usually unoccupied in the dry season at this time of the day, but I wasn’t going to be the one to mention it.

“Sure. Let me pay for our lunch first.” Before he could object, I retrieved my bundle from Vanth, found the knot of underwear and socks, and extracted one check. “Here, keep the change.”

That was a considerable change to keep, as you could tell from the youngest Cordel’s struggle not to gape at me. Not that it bothered me or anything. The way he looked at me felt so weird, though. I’d sucked him off behind the coach house last autumn. Now I might as well be one of his city guests. Weirder than that, actually. It was as if Azul Mamani had never existed.

Our private room had a lovely view of the best side of town and the distant Lagoon. It felt so good to let myself sink into a plush chair in the cool calm of the hotel. A waiter brought us a jar of water and a basket of cuñapés, and I could’ve just sat there in silence eating and drinking and waiting for the lunch someone else ordered.

Valentino said he’d have what I was having and went to wash some of the dust off.

“You know what’s good,” Vanth said. Maybe it was the angle of the sunlight through the wide window, but he looked oddly delicate without makeup. Even more colorless than usual, like one of those creepy porcelain dolls. One someone had stomped on and put back together, but not as flawless as it used to be, not anymore.

I picked the menu. “Gonna treat myself then.”

Vanth picked up a cuñapé between index and thumb and bit off half of it. Way too dainty for a guy so tall. “Chipa, isn’t it?”

“Guess so. Cheesy yucca buns. Tasty.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll leave you a few.”

That was probably a snide reference to the fact that I’d already eaten three. Well, I didn’t care what he thought. After everything going on, I needed sustenance. Seeing how he didn’t care, I also ordered a light red wine I’d enjoyed in the past.

As the waiter walked away, Vanth stared at me.

“Would you rather have ordered the wine?” Surely he wasn’t surprised ‘cause the peasant turned out to know something of wine?

“Honestly, I know very little about it. Left to my own devices I prefer beer.”

Huh.

“Yeah, me too. But it’s a fancy hotel and all, so I might as well show off what I learned from men who dined and wined me in the past.”

“Sugar daddies?” He looked at me with mild interest, not judgement.

Huh.

“That implies they supported me, but they never did. At any rate, I’m off the market now.”

“It’s up to me to make sure you’re well provided for, then.”

I beamed at him. Vanth didn’t show much of a reaction, but I felt he was vaguely pleased.

When Valentino returned, still dusty but a far better sight, we were on our first wine glasses and my mood had improved.

I poured a glass of wine for the newcomer. “Seeing how I’m your host, it’s up to me to answer your questions, if you have any.”

“What have you done with my spell would be a good start,” Vanth said. “Why is there a hint of miasma around it?”

I turned to Valentino with a huge smile. “See? Didn't I tell you those weren't any old glass fragments?”

“Feel free to enjoy your triumph,” Vanth said.

“Well, I certainly didn't mean to,” I replied cheerfully. Vanth accepted my hankie, hair spell and glass fragments and all. First he removed a locket from his neck and placed the spell there.

I stood up and walked around the table so he could put the locket around my neck. All pretty normal, so of course I had to go and make it weird.

“It's like collaring a stray cat that followed you home, don't you think?”

Though his face remained expressionless, there was an interested gleam in his eyes. “Perhaps. But all stray creatures should be trained before they can share your bed.”

“I wonder if you know anybody who can do that,” I said innocently.

This time there was fire in his eyes. I basked on my own smugness for a moment before returning to my seat. Vanth squeezed my ass on the way, a warning of what he’d do to me when the time was right.

I'll have you know that when the entrée arrived soon after, I wasn't doing anything untoward. I could’ve ordered something fancier, but in the end I went with what felt comforting: potatoes in cheese-and-peppers sauce, with wedges of boiled mitema egg and crisp lettuce and black olives for decoration. Would I miss it in the capital? I could whip one up if I needed to, at least theoretically, but the sauce I made never tasted quite right. Was it hard to find mitema eggs in the capital? It wouldn’t be the same otherwise.

As I wondered that, something slithered from Vanth’s side of the table to mine, cautious but determined. Like a dumbass, for a second I wondered if the cutlery had come to life or something. It was a silver snake, about the right size to curl around someone’s wrist—jewelry, then. I didn’t know shit about that, as you might expect, but it looked like an antique from the days when aristocracy was a thing; a heavy piece with a profusion of delicate details. Every single scale had been cast separately; its little tongue flickered in and out, shining like quicksilver.

My checkbook was more money than I’d ever held, but a dozen thousand nureals wouldn’t come even close to paying for this snake.

“It’s cute,” I said, ‘cause I didn’t know what else to say. And it was cute.

“It’s yours,” Vanth said.

I extended my hand. The snake hurried up my wrist and curled up around it, immediately falling asleep. Or whatever you call it when pieces of bespelled jewelry stay still.

“It prevents its owner from bleeding out,” Vanth said. “A modest power, but I hope it’ll help you when harm can’t be avoided.”

Modest? Modest? This is why everyone hates aristocrats. I could’ve twisted his head off.

“I can’t thank you enough.” I covered the snake bracelet with my sleeve. “That means I’m its owner now, right?”

“Of course. It’s unspeakably uncouth to ask for a gift to be returned. Just make sure never to take it or the locket off. Not in the shower, not anywhere.”

“Don’t worry about that.” I saw enough of Valentino’s reaction out of the corner of my eye to know he thought I was the real weird one in this situation. Vanth didn’t pay attention to him.

I could’ve dropped the conversation and focused only on eating my meal, but I’d been raised to be a better host than that.