“What choice did I have?” Suire snapped back. “You abandoned me. Abandoned all of us. All our plans. And for what? One ofthem? The creature was making you soft.”
Oh.Oh.
Oh, fuck.
Bo made a mental note to think about that later, when Everil’s friend ofcenturieswasn’t admitting to doing something fucking shitty, like killing what Bo guessed was Everil’s last boyfriend.
This wasn’t Bo’s to be angry over. It wasn’t. That didn’t stop him from being absolutely pissed off.
“You had the choice not to hurt your longtime friend,” Bo snarled. “That’s a choice you damn well made. You’re an asshole.”
She’d put a mind fuck spell on him, dragged him to the woods, tried to get him skewered, and was telling Everil she murdered his last boyfriend for his own good.
Bo fumed, bristling and angry. Everil put a hand on his shoulder; whether to hold Bo in place or to offer comfort, Bo didn’t fucking know.
“Shut up among your betters, boy.” Suire snapped.
“I could say the same to you, Suire,” Everil growled. “Speak to Bo in that tone again, and I will feed you your tongue. Unless he prefers to do it himself.”
Suire’s eyes widened, her mouth open in a protest she didn’t voice. Bo bared his teeth at her in the distant semblance of a smile. For all that she bitched about the pretty kelpie being ‘soft,’ she’d apparently forgotten he was still a fucking kelpie.Bohadn’t.
“We tried to make it painless,” she said, as if that should make it all square between them.
Bo leaned into Everil’s hand where it rested, unmoving, on his shoulder. Like the confrontation the day before, Everil didn’t flinch away, his touch solid and present. Protective.
“Tell me, Bo, are you experiencing pain?” Everil asked, his voice very, very dry.
“Yeah,” Bo answered, as if his still rough, uneven breathing didn’t spell it out for the masses. “I’m experiencing some goddamn pain, Everil. Pretty sure I was about to get skewered for daring to fight the fuck back.”
“You harmed mysoulbond,Suire. Injured, with the intent to kill.”
“I did no such thing.” Suire countered, her chin lifting. “I opened the way and cast a spell that didn’t damage a hair on that human’s head.No onebonds a human.”
Bo didn’t bother getting his back up over her shitty comment. Not withsoulbondringing in his ears. Everil strode closer to Suire, all wintery determination, his back straight and frost glittering in his footsteps.
Suire stepped back toward the tree, sending the leaves rustling. Bo flinched, and Everil paused, glancing back at him.
Dust and quiet. The comfort of forgotten places. Safe. Bo was safe.
With a silent nod, Everil turned back to Suire.
“Why not? The dryad bonded to a tree.” It’d be funny in any other context. Everil didn’t inspire much in the way of giggles. “Or is it more acceptable when you don’t have a personal stake in the situation?”
And not for the first or last time, Bo thought:Oh, fuck.
“Everil,” Suire objected.
“That was rhetorical.”
Suire, wisely, shut her fucking mouth, her luminous eyes bright. She couldn’t seem to decide whether to glare at Bo or look reproachfully at Everil.
Bo swallowed hard but managed to muster up the strength to glare back. He didn’t say anything. Even a guy like him, pissed off and ready to spit tacks, could be a little wary when still around the person who brain-fogged them and tried to get them killed.
Everil glanced back again. Angry gray eyes meeting tired blue. Everil’s rage was still there, nuclear winter to Bo’s fire.
When Everil held out a hesitant hand to Bo, invitation unspoken, of fucking course Bo went to him. He shied away from the branches that were once the dryad, steered clear of Suire as far as fucking possible, but he went.
Fingers tacky with blood met Everil’s and held on, Bo leaning in, his forehead against Everil’s shoulder in an echo of the night before. This time, Everil didn’t turn to stone under his touch. Instead, he brushed his fingers through Bo’s hair. Gentle, careful of the cuts.
