Talia sighed and patted the bed, an action that Everil ignored, stepping over to the window instead. The sun was making its way up, shining through the autumnal leaves. Hehadloved this place once.
“What happened with you and Nimai?” she asked. “Sirel and Gyr wouldn’t talk about it.”
They had not spoken of Sirel. Everil’s mother. Who was, in many ways, Talia’s mother as well. “I’m sorry for your loss.”
Talia shrugged. “I didn’t see much of either of them, really. When I was younger, there was always someone to watch me. And then, once I was old enough, it was mostly just me.”
“I’m sorry,” Everil said again, more sincerely. “I should have been there.”
“Nah. I get it. I knew her too, you know? She was tired mostly, I think. Or mad because nothing went the way she planned. And once she … stopped … Gyr didn’t have any reason to stick around.”
Everil drifted from the window to the bed and settled in the spot that Talia had indicated. She scooted closer, her arm against his.
“I promise I won’t leave you,” he offered.
Talia snickered softly. “Duh. But that doesn’t have to meanhim. And you still haven’t said what happened.”
“We had an argument over my preference to remain in the human realm. It grew heated. He took action against me. I broke the bond.” The words sounded flat, even to Everil’s ears.
“That’s not what I remember,” Talia said, soft.
“And what do you remember?”
“You were terrified. I remember that. Crying. Scared. And you called on my last aspect, and they opened the way. I think they tried to talk to you, but…”
“But I didn’t listen.” The previous Gate had been a friend to Everil. When he had asked for transit, they had both known what he’d find. It hadn’t mattered. Just as it hadn’t with Declan.
So many voices of reason that Everil had ignored. Before and after Lawrence’s death. And now he faced the price for his stubbornness. Talia left to raise herself. Declan, once Everil’s dearest friend, neglected for the past century. Bo in danger.
If he had onlybehaved.
“Everil?” Talia asked, voice soft.
“Yes?”
“Doyou like Bo? If you don’t, then there’s no point in any of it.”
“I don’t need to like him,” Everil answered. But Talia kept looking at him, all wide, worried eyes, and Everil smiled at her. “He’s charmingly coarse. And has an unfortunate sense of responsibility.”
“I’m pretty sure that’s Everil for yes.” Talia pushed herself up, sitting back on her heels. “Alright. One sluagh, coming up. Let’s get this done.”
Chapter six
Bo
Bo stepped through thefront door, squinting into the late morning sunlight. If he was smart, he’d just keep walking. Everil’s pointed disappearance upstairs with Talia said everything that needed saying. ‘Fuck off, I don’t want you,’ written in every line of the guy.
Except … it was still there, even with the man gone. A thread that sang of wistfulness. Nearly smothered under waves of self-loathing and frustration, with a heaping side-portion of resignation. Butthere.
And every time Nimai’d come up, the negative emotions, the shame, had grown louder. It made Bo want to hang on tighter, to somehow make it better. Even if Everil didn’t want him to.
(Hadn’t it been a little like that with Robin, at the start? Trying to sort through all the shit they’d been through and learn how to be brothers, and it’d never have happened if Bo wasn’t fucking stubborn.)
It wasn’t as though Bowantedto hogtie his soul to someone. He wasn’t a protagonist in a book about red strings or some shit. But breaking the bond meant Everil going back to the fucker who made Bo’s skin feel like he’d crawled through an oil sick. Nimai, who Everil said would kill Bo if he got the chance. Said it like heknew.
Yeah, no, fuck. Bo didn’t have loads of positive qualities, but not being willing to throw someone at an asshole wolf was one of the few hedidhave.
His parents always warned him the fae would kill him if he didn’t listen to the rules. It kept him in line the way the threat of a monster in the closet might have. Bo, who was special. Who saw what others couldn’t. Who smiled for the cameras and signed the books ‘he’ wrote andbelieved.
