“I shouldn’t have blamed you. Verne would have acted, with you as accessory or not.”
Fi hated the rawness scraping his throat. She hated how it made her shiver. “You said this isyourfault?”
“You heard Verne. She saw an opportunity. Saw me asweak. All because…”
“Because daeyari are supposed to be vile? Mysterious? Not give a shit about the humans they rule?”
“Yes.”
For a heartbeat, neither of them was fighting.
A denial would have been easier. Fighting him waseasierthan whatever this was, his words too soft around the rasp of breath, neck barely strong enough to hold his head up.
“So what’s wrong withyou?” Fi said.
“Too many things, Fionamara.” His words came weak. Weary. “I tried. As Veshri watches from the Void, Itried. I don’t want things to be this way. If I had any other option… but I’m sorry. That you had to be part of this.” His lidded gaze slid down her face.
And stalled on her mouth.
He frowned.
When he reached for her, Fi flinched.
Another instinct. She saw claws, and red eyes, and all of her stiffened like a dumb hare before she realized what he’d intended—Antal, reaching for the bloody cut Tyvo’s claw left across her lips. To heal? To comfort?
She’d never know. He pulled back in an instant.
Antal straightened in the tub. Fiwatchedhis expression snap back into that granite facade, that shield of teeth and tightened jaw. A mask—but once she’d seen the cracks, she couldn’t unsee them, that uneven tempo of his breath and the too-tight clamp of claws against the cedar. A slip of vulnerability he shouldn’t have shown.
Fi said nothing of it. She didn’t know where to beginthinkingof it, this daeyari half dead in her tub, his words hollowed with guilt an immortal shouldn’t possess.
She returned to the simpler task of cleaning blood from Antal’s shoulders. He pulled more energy into his neck, repairing flesh, giving her room to work while he gritted his teeth. Easier, this way. So much easier than that fleeting moment his thumb had brushed her wrist.
“You spoke the truth,” he said. “Youaremore useful, with an energy sword.”
Fi let her cloth stray over still-raw skin. Antal hissed.
“You were unconscious for most of it,” she countered.
“I saw enough. Few humans can hold their ground against a daeyari, much less one as old as Tyvo.”
“Will his antler grow back?”
“Antlers regenerate slower than flesh. It will take time to recover, and never as it was before. He’ll be very angry.”
“Good. Fuck him.”
Fi startled when Antal laughed.
Had she heard him laugh before? Scoffs perhaps, humorless and biting things, the sounds of the two of them waging battle without blood. This was new. Despite the rasp in his throat, Antal’s laugh came deep, trembling the water of the tub.
“What?” Fi bristled.
“A week ago, you cowered at my feet. Now, you boast for cutting a daeyari’s antler off? You couldn’t have done Tyvo worse insult. Antlers are a source of great pride.”
“Are they?” Fi eyed his, blank at the tips and that odd patch in the second band, otherwise carved with flowers, auroras, some sigils she didn’t recognize. Too delicate, for a carnivore. “Then you’d better not get on my bad side.”
Perhaps a bolder dare than Fi ought to risk. Even injured, she guessed Antal would be a treacherous enemy. But not invincible. That bolstered her confidence.
