“Yes to all of those.”
Sawyer led the way to the kitchen and pulled out the requested items. Henry leaned against the kitchen counter and opened a bag of sour cream and onion chips. He chomped down on one and made a happy noise. Sawyer snagged a couple cans of cherry coke from the fridge and sat one down in front of Henry before flipping the tab on the second and taking a long gulp.
“We’re going to be friends,” Henry said suddenly. “Good friends. I can tell. I wish I could let you in on all of our secrets, but I can’t. I mean, I’m already going to have to make you forget a few things you heard earlier. But don’t worry. It won’t hurt. It’s better this way. Maybe one day I can get permission to tell you more, but now’s not the time for that.”
“What do you mean, make me forget?”
Before Sawyer could even blink, Henry had reached over and grabbed his wrist. His eyes glowed blue and Sawyer tried to pull away. He couldn’t. The skin on his wrist heated and Henry’s grip tightened. Henry was stronger than he looked.
“Henry, you’re scaring me.”
Henry frowned and looked down at his hand on Sawyer’s arm. “What the ever loving—”
Sawyer jerked his arm away, rubbing the now-tender skin where Henry had held onto him.
“Henry, I think you should—”
“Holy crap. You’re a null. What even is that?Howeven is that? I don’t know. I don’t even know.” Henry stood and began pacing the small distance between the kitchen and living room. He kept glancing Sawyer’s way. “This is gonna be interesting.”
“Henry. Stop. I think you should go.”
“Oh! Oh, shit! I totally just scared you, didn’t I? I bet I did. See, I thought it would be okay and you just wouldn’t remember. I wasn’t going to like… erase your memories completely or whatever. It wouldn’t have changed much, I promise. Dang it. Now you think I’m some weirdo but honestly, I’m like…honor boundto protect the secret but I can’t take the memories away from you. Which makes my life once again a bit of a conundrum. I love the word conundrum, don’t you? Anyway, you’re not supposed to know about us. That’s kinda rule number one.Crap. Uncle Meshaq is going to be so ticked off with me. I’m going to have to call him. And he’ll have to come here, but look, I know he’ll probably scare you even worse, because seriously, he’s like the scariest looking guy, but he’s— well, he’s totally scary actually but he won’t hurt you. I promise. But there are rules and I had to make like amillionpromises to my family before they let me out of their sight, even with Dumb and Dumber showing up like dark angels to watch over me.”
The front door burst open and Draco ran inside. His eyes were a deep amber, glowing in that same unnatural way that Henry’s had earlier. “What did you do to him?” His voice was low, deep, scary andfurious.
Sawyer had seen Draco annoyed about a million times. He’d even seen him pretty ticked off a time or two. But he’d never seen him truly pissed off until this moment. His voice had bottomed out and was shaky in a way that Draco never was. He looked at Sawyer’s arm where he held onto his sore wrist before snarling at Henry.
“Okay, okay. It’s okay, Dragon. I just… did you know he was a null?” Henry asked.
Draco glanced at Sawyer and shook his head. His scowl had deepened and he looked just as confused as Sawyer felt. He maneuvered his way between Sawyer and Henry, his breath still coming fast and his hands clenched into fists.
“Well, he is,” Henry continued when Draco remained stubbornly silent. “I thought I’d be helpful and just…. Take away those couple of words that he shouldn’t have heard. Like, you know,dragon. Probably not one he’s heard you mention, huh? And that way he wouldn’t have to know and I could talk to you and figure out exactly what he is to you without an issue. But he’s a null. It didn’t work.”
“You hurt him,” Draco snarled.
“I’m fine,” Sawyer said. He laid his hand on Draco’s back, not understanding exactly what was going on but knowing he needed to diffuse the situation. “I’m fine, Drake. Confused as hell, but fine.”
“It’s okay, Sawyer,” Henry said. “He’s allowed to be mad at me. But look, I’m going to tell you a story, because honestly I’ll be the only one who can get away with it without getting into trouble. Imighthave my uncle wrapped around my finger and he’ll be annoyed with me but he won’t actually punish me or anything.”
Draco pulled in a breath and took another step back. “Your uncle?”
Henry sighed and shoved another chip into his mouth. “Meshaq. But don’t freak out, okay? Dammit, you’re freaking out.”
And Draco was. Sawyer felt the tension rocket up about twelve notches in Draco’s body even as he began to actually heat up, his back becoming almost too hot for Sawyer to touch. “He won’t take him,” Draco growled.
“Of course he’s not going to take him! Ipromise. Look. Let’s just all take a breath and move the snacks to the table and I’ll tell your friend here a little story and bring him into the loop so you don’t have to keep any more secrets from him. Wouldn’t that be great? Isn’t that what you want?”
Draco’s breath caught and a tiny bit of the tension eased. “I would like that.”
“Excellent.” Henry scooped up his soda and grabbed the chips. He carried them over to the kitchen table and plopped down. “Goddess, if my brothers and sisters knew about this, they’d be laughing their asses off. You have no idea.”
Sawyer rubbed his hand down Draco’s back before moving to grab the cookies and his soda. He sat down at the table across from Henry. Draco pulled one of the side chairs next to him and sat down so close that their shoulders were touching.
Sawyer leaned into Draco as he opened the cookies and offered one to him. “Chocolate chip. Your favorite.”
Draco grunted but looked at him, took a cookie, and relaxed a bit more.
“Okay, where was I? Right. So, about like…. Four hundred years ago or something, a seer had a vision. A prophecy. Blah blah chosen one. Blah blah, savior of the supernatural. The details aren’t all that important except that a warrior was chosen from each clan to form the chosen one’s circle of protection. And each generation since then, when one guardian passes on, another is chosen.” Henry lifted his arm and held out his wrist. He had a mark there, almost like a tattoo, of two concentric circles. “I’m one of them. These marks appear when we’re chosen. Your friend is a guardian, too. And Beavis and Butthead up the hill, who are probably going to realize I snuck out any second now and come barreling in here, are also guardians. Fair warning.”
