“You need a kit,” Curio answers, one of his eyebrows ticking up in challenge.
It’s like he already knows I’m going to have something to say about this. He’s right.
“I do,” I agree, and I relish the flicker of surprise in his face at my agreement. “However, kits cost money, and I’m currently lacking the extra funds to pay for one,” I continue, stating the obvious.
I lackanyfunds altogether, but I’m pretty sure we’re both very aware of that. I doubt Curio will have any interest in buying back the weapons I plan to steal, especially since it seems hemadeall of them. That understanding drops in my gut like a massive rock, and I try to breathe through the intense astonishment that ripples in the shock-boulder’s wake.
Shit, how can I steal them now, knowing he made the exquisite weapons with his own two hands?
Despite the fact that I’ve vowed not to care, I immediately start to wonder what else is worth knowing about him.
Curio snorts and shakes his head. “I told Tarek you wouldn’t make this easy.”
“What can I say, I’m not an easy fae,” I reply, extra emphasis on every word in hopes that he can clue Riall in and all the leering and unwelcome invitations can stop.
“And you don’t need to be, but you can give us the benefit of the doubt on occasion,” he counters. “You’re here. No one has hurt you. Your belly is full. Your body is clothed. You can come and go as you please. Does that not earn some faith in us?” he asks, gesturing between us and then behind me as though he’s including his absent brothers in this conversation.
“If you truly understood my position, you’d know that faith in others is a luxury I can’t afford,” I impatiently reply, already fed up with the direction of this pointless discussion.
“You say that, but your actions show otherwise,” he accuses, far too much self-importance settling in the features of his face.
It should make him ugly. It’s annoying that it doesn’t.
I fold my arms over my chest and glare at him. “And how do you figure that?”
“When you were hurt at the ludere, you came to us.” He allows that sentence to hang between us for a moment before continuing. “You also left this morning and then came back. Even if you tell yourself it’s for a short time, you still trusted us, in one way or another, to help you. Does that not speak to some level of faith between us?” he asks, his brown eyes banked with imperious challenge, while one of his black eyebrows hikes up as though it’s punctuating his point.
I offer him a scathing look. “You give yourself too much credit,” I counter. “It’s less trust and more that you’re theonlyoption.”
“But wearean option for you, and that should speak volumes to the truth of how you see us, regardless of what you tell yourself because your feelings are hurt.”
I stiffen at the callous insinuation.
My feelings are hurt? My feelings…
Hot anger sears at that belittling minimization, and it’s all I can do to not reach for one of the tools hung on the wall behind him and then beat thecocky prickright out of him with it. He eyes me as though he can read my mind, and the twinkle in his eyes right now makes me think that he just might like that.
He’s obviously cracked.
“I can assure you, Skull, that more than just myfeelingshave been hurt while being owned by you and broken by Tilleo,” I snap at him, and he holds his hands up in surrender as though he thinks the bogus gesture will calm me.
“We’re not bad fae, Auset, we’re simply survivors.”
I scoff at that. “You’re both, at best,” I contend, not buying this innocent act for a second.
He laughs, which both surprises and infuriates me even more. I never quite know what to expect with these three.
“Fine, paint us with whatever brush suits you, but if you think your colors don’t look a lot like ours, you’re wrong, Moonling,” he asserts.
I shake my head and glower at him, completely bewildered as to how he can think that.
“This life is all any of us know,” he states, gesturing to the tools and weapons all around us before waving his arm toward the open doors and the peaks of the castle that can be seen over the tops of the trees behind us. “My brothers and I have had our own fair share ofmasters, Auset. Do you think we ended up here because we had other options? We could have stomped around complaining about how unfair it all was, thrown away the opportunity that was presented to us based on some useless moral high ground that serves no one, but we didn’t—”
“No,” I interrupt. “You became part of the problem instead.”
Curio laughs again, but it’s harsher this time, less amused. “No,” he counters as though he’s speaking to someone who’s too dense to follow at the pace he wants to set. “We took a broken system and made it work for us, made it work for countless others too,” he defends. “But you’re not ready to admit that, are you, Moonling?”
“Stop calling me that,” I bite out, dropping my hands to my side as though I’m searching for a dagger that’s not there. Outrage crawls up my throat, ready for me to release it like flames all over this fae and his warped view of right and wrong, but Curio cuts me off.
