Antal’s look pierced her to the marrow, a silent promise of teeth in her neck, should she make good on her threat. Yet in the subtle tilt of his brow, she thought she glimpsed a concession of respect. Not used to humans standing their ground?
“Your clothes are a mess,” Fi said. “I’ll find you something to wear.”
She did not, unsurprisingly, have any daeyari-appropriate attire on hand. From her armoire, she retrieved a plush bathrobe, a fleece blanket. She left them beside the tub and gave Antal space, listening for the sound of sloshing water in case she had to rescue him again.
When he emerged, Fi stifled a laugh. She’d never seen a more ridiculous combination: the lethal lines of a daeyari ensconced in a pink robe, a blanket draped over his shoulders like a child caught out after bedtime. Antal’s nose wrinkled. He smelled of rose oil and mothballs.
Fi had a taunt ready… until Antal collapsed on her sofa. He coiled beneath the blanket like a wounded animal, some pitiful thing trying to make himself small.
On second thought, Fi was too exhausted to needle him. Too exhausted to dwell on how their fuck-up with Tyvo put them back at square one, still no plan for unseating Verne.
Modesty be damned. She drained the tub and poured a fresh bath. Though she pulled the screen up for privacy and surveyed the sofa at every opportunity, she never spotted prying eyes. At last, wrapped in her flannel and tired to the bone, she turned off the lights and dragged herself to bed.
No point worrying over a daeyari lurking across the room, Fi tried to assure herself. Even if she sent him away, he could sneak back once she’d fallen asleep.
In the dark, she spotted a glow of red, a single eye following her. Once she fell still in her bed, it closed, Antal curling deeper into his cocoon.
A tense silence. An unsteady peace.
Yet as Fi drifted toward sleep, it wasn’t a fear of claws that made her clutch her blankets.
Antal’s eyes haunted her, that look of a frightened beast. That rasp in his voice when he spoke of things he wished he’d donedifferently. Daeyari weren’t supposed to act like this.
Then again, two centuries was a long time to live. Long enough to gather regrets.
And Fi knew too well, how it felt to regret.
18
Bite me
Fi dreamt of a seaside on the Summer Plane. A coconut cocktail chilled her hand, hair tussled by salt as she swayed in a hammock shaded by big, frilly palm trees. The pleasant mood lingered as she woke, a tranquil start to the day.
Reality hit her as a sting of claw marks healing in her stomach.
Oh, and she’d invited a daeyari to a sleepover.
Sunny reveries crumbled to curses, but Fi stifled them with more resignation than fear. If Antal planned to eat her, wouldn’t he have done so by now? She’d wake not to a nest of furs, but her fingers turned to daeyari appetizers? Fi pushed herself upright in bed, rabbit fur draping her like a cloak, braced to confront the bullshit of a new day.
Her sofa was empty.
Concerning, considering she’d left a carnivorous immortal there the night before.
Fi scanned the room. Twilight drifted through the curtains, casting counters and furniture in dull shadow. She touched an energy current to the panel beside her bed, bringing on the overhead lights—aside from one obnoxious pane in the corner that flickered whenever the aurora got too strong. Still no sign of her visitor. No discarded blanket on the floor, no “goodbye, see you never” note on the kitchen counter.
Increasinglyconcerning. Fi tipped bare feet onto the cold floor.
At last, she looked up.
Fi bit back a yelp, though the hand that snapped to her heart looked no less undignified. There in the shadow of her rafters, Antal perched on a beam, still bundled in a bathrobe and blanket, squinting at the panel lights like some feral raccoon who’d accidentally stumbled inside.
“What in the merciless Void are you doing up there?” Fi demanded.
Antal’s eyes narrowed further. “I feel more… comfortable here.”
“Comfortable fromwhat? You’re an apex predator!”
The daeyari didn’t indulge her a reply. At least he no longer looked on the verge of collapse, his eyes back to a red smolder amidst the burrow of his blanket.Thiswas the creature from her father’s folktales? Who’d reincarnate as a feral monstrosity? Fi spotted none of Verne’s Beast hiding in the terry cloth.
