“You know, I don’t think I’m going to need a new name. My family lives for the standard seventy plus human years, so I’m not going to outlive my identity. I’ll just be an honorary Foxily.” It’s cool they’re all long-lived enough to need new names and all, but I’m pretty sure Elijah Penn will be mine until I die. Hmmm. “Is it weird picking a new name? I’m pretty attached to Elijah. It would be strange for people to start calling me Bob or Will or something. I don’t even look like a Bob.”
Darcy’s hand tightens on mine as everyone joins us on the array. “Before Darcy I was Gilju. Before that I was Manu. We get used to the new name after a while. It’s the same thing as celebrities with screen names; sometimes the name everyone calls you is who you become.”
I look at the beautiful, tiny man, and bend over, offering him a kiss that he accepts with a wicked look in his eyes. He’s so damn hot. I exchange some tongue twists with him before pulling back. “I can’t imagine you as a Manu, but only because I’ve seen the famous one’s dick inSpartacus,and you’re packing way too much heat to be a Manu in my opinion.”
Darcy chuckles and pulls me down for another kiss. I let him have everything he wants, and when he releases me, I’m hard and desperate for something to bend over so he can fuck me into oblivion again.
Until Bellamy’s dry tone says, “You two are hotter than the Fourth of July. I’ve seen Darcy’s dick, and now I have questions about how you’re getting that thing inside you.”
I laugh, reaching over to squeeze Bellamy’s hand. “It’s so mean of him to make you say that.” Then I turn to Romily. “With plenty of lube and stretching, and maybe a little blood magic?” I ask Darcy, who smirks.
“Just a drop,” he agrees.
Bellamy huffs beside me. “You never told me you were using magic.”
Darcy winks at him. “I ain’t never told anyone I was using blood magic to fuck ‘em. Ain’t no one ever noticed before.”
Bellamy raises his perfectly manicured brows, shaking his head. “I think you should have considered getting your partners’ consent for blood magic.”
“Darcy had my consent before he magicked me up, and it’s ok for him to use everything at his disposal to make sex better and more comfortable for his partners.” I rest a handover his shoulders and step in close like a side hug. “I don’t think anyone was endangered by the use of some magic, and it feels a little discriminatory to be upset because he accesses his magic through blood.” I pause, because Darcy uses more than blood when making his magic, and his body was made from people with different kinds of magic than he had before he was incarnated. “And fire too, right? Dancing? Maybe a little wish fulfillment?” I’m just guessing, but all of those feel right to me.
Darcy threads his fingers through my hand on his shoulder, keeping me close. “A little of all of that. I don’t dance very often because that magic is usually more than any situation needs.”
Fox points to Romily. “Wait, wait. You have more powerful magic than your one-punch man killing fist?”
Darcy chuckles, answering with a wicked note in his tone. “I save my most powerful magic for emergencies only. The murder fist is just a bit of hedge witch magic combined with wish fulfillment. It’s a simple spell that gives me a denser fist and a stronger arm with which to wield it.”
Romily puts his hands on his hips as Fox continues to talk for him. “Are you immortal too?”
Darcy’s laugh is beautiful and a tiny bit evil. “I sure as fuck am, and the council done gave me their ward on top of that.”
I don’t know what that means, but Romily widens his eyes then drops his jaw. He waits a beat and closes his mouth, then smacks himself in the forehead. I’m pretty sure he’s telling us that this ward thing is a redundancy that an immortal like Darcy doesn’t need.
“Does ‘ward’ mean something to your immortality?” I ask.
“It means that I don’t need a ward because I’m not killable,” he explains.
“What does a ward do?” My only exposure to the word is from old books where someone is someone else’s ward.
I’m assuming that it’s the same spelling for the word. I could be way off. Is it W-A-R-D or W-O-R-D or W-A-W-R-D? No, that can’t be right. That’s a ridiculous way to spell anything.
“A ward is a protective barrier that keeps out everything with the intention or ability to harm me. If you tried to hit me, you would be stopped by the ward.”
I immediately try to smack him, and my hand just stops mid air about an inch away from his body.
“Cool.”
“We all have wards except Fox,” Bellamy explains, eyeing Darcy. “They only work for Avatars and Harbingers if they’re not fighting, and they work for Acolytes when they’re fighting in defense of Reapers and Harbingers. I’m not really sure which ward I have now since I’ve become an Avatar.”
I reach out and try to smack Bellamy, and my hand bounces off the ward. If it wasn’t attached to me, it would have gone flying off the array. “That’s incredible. How do you get one of those ward things?”
“You become a Harbinger or have a Harbinger adopt you,” Bellamy replies dryly. “Or become an Avatar, obviously.”
I lean down and kiss the top of Darcy’s head. “He’s going to be the best Avatar of Neutrality there is. How long have you been the Avatar of Good?”
Bellamy frowns. “Since the day before yesterday.”
“Oh, did the changeover for Avatars all happen at the same time?”
