“You could still—”
“Don’t even say it,” she said. “You don’t know how much I want to leave, but I can’t. Not now. I have to try to stop Lavana. Even if I don’t have a real chance. I can’t stand aside and let her take the family. Not after everything...” A breathy, humorless laugh escaped her. “I guess you understand that, don’t you?”
“I wish I didn’t,” he said. “Then I might be able to convince you to forget about all of this and go back to the mortal world”—a smile peeked out above his bicep—“and your pizza.”
She shifted, resting her arm on the bed and her head on her arm, touching Hero’s front paw lightly with her finger.
“He told me something,” she said, meeting Kaelan’s gaze, “about what our friend has been hearing.”
He slid off the bed and onto the floor next to her. “What’s that?”
“Every voice should sound different,” she said, “but they don’t.”
He frowned slightly. “He could hear them?”
She nodded.
He leaned back, brow knitted. “You don’t think that our friend is lying—?”
“I think our friend has been through a great deal,” she said. “The speaker is to blame, not the listener. Even after all that has happened, I don’t think our friend has that kind of guile.”
“The speaker…” he said. “But how? They know so much.”
She chewed her lip. “I can’t imagine, but... I believe him.” She touched Hero’s head gently.
The backs of Kaelan’s fingers brushed her cheek. “I’m worried about you, Magda.”
She shied from his touch and the shivers it inspired. “I thought you called me puppy.”
“It doesn’t really suit you,” he said.
“I don’t know why everyone always felt the need to give me a nickname anyway,” she said. “Riker used to call me Mags. I hated it. It sounded too much like rags... bags,”—her nose wrinkled—“sags.”
He gazed down at his hands, locked together between his bent knees. “Not as good as Magpie, I guess.”
Her chest clenched. “Please don’t.”
“Tell me again that you don’t love him.”
She dropped her head. “I already—”
“Have you slept with him?”
Her throat dried out, her breath shortened. “Yes.”
He continued to stare down at his hands, his silver eyes seemed to flicker green. “And you expect me to believe that means nothing?”
“What do you want me to say?” she asked.
“Does it have anything to do with why you refuse to go back into exile?”
“Are you asking for yourself or for your new friends?” She gestured towards the hearth where Kirk had been pinned.
He was quiet for a long time, staring at his hands.
Finally, he said, “I know what you feel when I kiss you, Magda.”
Her face burned. She dropped her chin to the bed, looking over the top of Hero’s body, keeping Kaelan in the corner of her eye.
