Thio’s eyelashes flutter and he regroups, shoulders leveling. “But the topic of the grant research project—that I chose on my own. And I picked my mom’s topic because—” He pauses. “She met my father and married into the Tourael family shortly after she started at DaylarTech. She’s… idealistic. Believes that what she did there helped the world. And sometimes it did, but… she developed some dangerous shit, too, shit thathurt people.” He bites one lip ring, trying to convince himself as he says, “But she isn’t a bad person, Sebastian.”
I nod rather than speak. If I open my mouth, I’ll remind him that this isn’t what we do. We don’tshareshit like this. It was an accident that I even met his mom.
“The last project she worked on.” His face grays. “She was trying to disconnect a conjurer from their item, and it came after a series of failed projects. You don’t fail in my family. Even those who marry in.Especiallythose.”
I stroke the back of his neck, like I’m soothing him.
“One of her first tests went… badly. No one could figure out what happened. But she was overworked and exhausted and stressed.That’swhat happened. My family is so cutthroat that even after being married to my father for almost eighteen years, she still felt she had to prove herself and push beyond her own limitations.”
My face collapses as his goes detached.
“After the accident,” he swallows, the tendons there straining, “my father went back to the Fae Plane. I haven’t seen him since.”
“How old were—”
“Seventeen.”
Electricity seizes my muscles.
Seventeen, and alone in a family set on weaponizing every ounce of magic. Seventeen, and watching his mom get battered by that ambition.
Eighteen, and dropping out of Camp Merethyl because there’s no side of this machine that doesn’t destroy.
“I moved in with some relatives until I started at Lesiara U.” Emotion breaks across Thio’s face again, imploring and raw. “The intention behind their plan for me was to make up for my mother’s failing and my father’s abandonment. For our unit of the family to not be alost cause. And I’ve gone along with everything they’ve demanded of me, I’ve played the good Tourael, because—” A tight swallow. “Because my mom got a settlement for the accident, but that money ran out after the first two years. My family’s been footing the bill for her to stay at Blooming Grove ever since. They’ve made it quite clear that her continued support is contingent upon my…amalgamationinto a Tourael company.”
Horror streaks through me. “They’ll stop paying for your mom’s care if you don’t work for them?”
His lips pinch. “I’m aninvestment. Arasne’s my main babysitter, so to speak, and I play along, but when I saw the opportunity to expand on my mom’s project, to do something formein all of this?” He shrugs. “I won’t involve her research directly, though. That’d give my family an avenue to claim any results I get.”
“After you graduate,” I start, choosing my words carefully, “you said you aren’t going to work for them.”
The ghost of a smile passes over his face. “I’ll need some kind of high-paying job to keep up with my mom’s payments. But luckily, my family has a lot of enemies willing to fork over money for me, so my plan is to get a job with one of their competitors.”
I recognize what it is to have no self-preservation; that slightly wild yet sad look in Thio’s eyes. He doesn’t want to work for any Tourael competitor, he just needs the money. He doesn’twantany of this beyond taking care of his mom.
What doeshewant? If he could choose. What would he do?
Stupidly, I open my mouth to ask him. These questions aren’t mine to ask and his answers aren’t mine to hear, so when his fingers pull on me again, defying the way matter occupies space by drawing me impossibly closer to him, I pretend I’m relieved to be cut off.
“I’ll do what I need to support my mom,” he continues, “and it’ll be a big, final middle finger to the Touraels, so they’ll know. They’ll know I’m her son, not theirs.”
My lungs cave in but I quickly inhale, forcing them to stay inflated, to keep the ache away.
“Why didn’t you ever say you hate your family as much as I do?” I whisper, too pitiful for my liking. But I feel like my foundation with Thio has been decimated in the last few minutes. Everything I knew about him went from immovable stones to quicksand.
He shrugs. “I didn’t know why you hated them, just that you did. I may not have chosen this path on my own, but that doesn’t mean I don’t take pride in the work I produce; and you were an immature little twat who kept fucking with my lab.”
I roll my eyes. “I neverdamagedanything beyond—”
His finger pins my lips together and I give him a look that lays out, in no uncertain terms, that Iwillbite it off.
He grins, and it does something to that strain in my chest. Makes it quiver and ripple.
“Damage or not, you were a nuisance,” he says. “For all I knew, you hated my family because of their war efforts, which is fair. But I refuse to take the blame for my entire family’s sins, and I don’t owe anything to people who expect me to.”
I lick his finger and he recoils with a smirk that says,You little shit.
One piece doesn’t fit, though, and I hate asking it.
