Everil was saved from the necessity of formulating an immediate answer by Talia’s laughter, the sound drawing his attention back to the counter. The Gate had yet to acquire a hat, but she appeared to be trading clothes with the waitress, hoodie exchanged for apron. Everil watched for a moment longer than necessary, answering Talia’s wave with a slight, and hopefully vampiric, nod.
Finally, he turned back to Bo. Yet again, it seemed as if what should be said and what Bo wished to hear sat opposed to each other.
He could not simply diminish the man’s earnestness.
“I am not in the habit of bringing guests to the river,” he offered, instead of addressing the true issue. “It was important to me as well.”
“But?”
“Among the fae, obligation is a currency,” Everil said haltingly, desperate not to offend. “We don’t use your gold or paper money. We trade in magic and favors. Declan came to my aid as a friend, but that bill will come due in time. Since you arrived, you’ve given much and asked nothing. I suspect that, had I told you what I intended but not invited you, you’d have let it lie. You’d have not asked, even knowing what it might have meant to you.” He sighed. Despite his best efforts, he was getting this all wrong. “Is it so strange that I might wish to be of use to you, instead of only using you?”
“It sounds less gross and coercive when you put it like that,” Bo muttered, glancing up from under the dark fall of his hair. Unfairly appealing, even irritated. “That why you can still hurt me? Gives you an out in case the person you owe wants something you can’t or won’t give? I’m not trying to be an idiot about this,” he added, still watching Everilthrough distractingly long lashes. “I hear ‘use,’ and I think, fuck, how’d you put it? ‘Ill done for sport and profit.’ I’m just trying to make it fit.”
“Even the most soft-hearted of fae would consider your parents’ treatment of you to merit death.” Everil’s voice went river cold with the words. “That is exactly what I’m speaking of. They took without giving. There was no exchange. No fairness. By our measure, they owe you deeply, a debt that would require blood or a lifetime of service to repay.”
Bo lifted his head at that, mouth set in a hard line, gaze searching.
“Humans don’t have a lifetime long enough for that.” Bo sighed, sharp and sudden. “Fuck. Fine.Fine. I get it enough to know I don’t fucking get it. I’ll stop trying to shove human ideas of obligations down your throat. Fucking bloodthirsty fae, wooing me into an agreeable mood with talk using them as examples of merited familial death. Fuck.”
Bo’s entertaining response was enough to mitigate the chill of protective anger. Perhaps, when they were better acquainted, they could discuss such matters in earnest.
“In fairness, then, I won’t press our ideas of reciprocity on you. It’s atypical to claim an obligation filled by an action that wasn’t undertaken with that purpose. But if you wish it, we will call my debt to you paid.”
It was worth it for Bo’s smile, first puzzled, then open in its delight. As if Everil had given him a gift, instead of denying him a boon.
“I mean, ‘atypical’ sounds pretty on-brand for us. Reckless, ill-mannered, foul-mouthed, and atypical. You bonded a vulgar human, Everil.” Bo shrugged, hands palm up, still smiling.
“Many fae would call the terms synonymous,” Everil answered, daring to the point of rudeness, coaxed to it by that smile.
“I’ll bet,” Bo said. “I wish it, though, yeah. Got enough people to worry about power issues with. And I’m kind of subjecting you to sitting in an iron tube for hours.”
“I’m the one who insisted we needed to depart. The car is bearable.”
It was. Barely.
Talia chose that moment to make her way back to the table, re-hoodied and bouncing with enthusiasm.
“He called me ‘sport,’ ” she announced. “I was hoping for ‘champ,’ but ‘sport’ is practically the same thing.”
“No hat?” Everil asked, still lured into inappropriate levity.
Nimai would be hunting them by now. He might not be a barghest, but that didn’t make him incapable of hiring one.
“Nope. Something evenbetter.But we’ve got to go now.” Talia’s eyes were bright with delight. “There’s analien spaceshipon the way. And they sell dolls and hats, and you can take pictures with the aliens.”
“It’s a tourist trap,” Bo said, his gaze on his phone.
“Ah,” Everil murmured, not wishing to sound ignorant in this as well.
“One of you remind me tomorrow to take you to Oliver’s Orange Palace. That’s on the way, too.” He lifted his head, tucking his phone back as well. “May as well stop for gas around there and see what’s up.”
It would be a chance to get out of the car. And both Bo and Talia seemed taken with this ‘alien spaceship’ idea. Surely, Nimai would not be hunting them this quickly. Hiring a barghest took time, and they had used no magic since leaving Brookhaven.
“Of course. Whatever you both wish.”
And still, he couldn’t ignore the sick foreboding in his gut, the sense that they should run and run without stopping, lest Nimai catch them. Lest Bo, sweet as he was rough-edged, meet his end as Lawrence had.
Slowly. And screaming.
