A toilet what? My rage turns into irritation, and instead of incinerating her, I shake her from my back.
“Yep, you’re a grade A jerk. I was trying to help with the peppermint suggestion. Plus, I hear horses like those.”
That’s it. I’m going to kill her. My curiosity’s gone, and all that’s left is annoyance. I decide to shift into my humanoid form, so that when she dies, she’ll know I wasn’t a horse at all. As I shift, I decide to tell her off, first. What kind of person just climbs up on a horse she doesn’t know? One she just tried to kill, for that matter?
“You—” But the soot and ash and rock dust in my lungs makes me half-choke, and that’s all I say before I have to suppress a cough.
“Hey.” She smiles then, and she snorts. “You learned a word. Nice work.”
Is she mocking me?
I think about how she shot at me, even though I must be the scariest thing she’s ever encountered. She’s clearly well-adjusted in this time, and she’s violent. Plus, her energy’s dark. Instead of destroying her, I surprise myself by reaching out again and pushing hard. It works, and I bond her this time. A feeling of accomplishment pulses through me—a rare feeling for me. I think she’ll make an excellent guide, but if she doesn’t, I can always force her.
Now that the bond worked.
Once the bond settles into place, my fiery throat and my burning eyes stop immediately. I forgot about that, how being bonded to a human who can support and direct my actions helps me to exist here more comfortably. I inhale slowly and exhale, my throat and face calming.
But she’s acting the same, almost as though she didn’t even feel me claim her. I take a step closer, and she backs up, averting her face from mine.
“You are mine,” I explain.
“Yours?” She shakes her head, finally meeting my eyes and then glancing away immediately. “Nope, I’m mine. You are yours. But that was three words. Pretty good job for a newborn baby who throws fiery tantrums.”
It seems like I’ll have to invoke my control through the bond right away. She isn’t showing much respect at all, and while humor isn’t necessarily disallowed, she can’t mock me when anyone else is around. “You’re mine, human. You will help me restore the balance.”
When she continues to stare at me blankly, I decide to show her.
I turn to walk, my boots crunching against the drifts of snow. “Come.”
She struggles a bit, but eventually she stumbles along behind me, starting to understand that we’re connected, thankfully. We’re moving toward the settlement again, albeit quite slowly in this form. I’m about ready to shift back, now that she must clearly feel the bond between us and understand her part in this a little better, when she decides to bolt away from me.
Toward the edge of a cliff.
My newly minted general nearly offs herself because she’s an idiot. “Ah, ah.” I catch her, her arms pinwheeling wildly, just before she can crash over the edge and die.
The rocks her boots knocked over the edge skip and bounce their way down to the bottom of the ravine, and she inhales through her nose. I inhale and then exhale gustily, relieved that she didn’t fall and die. I’ll have to be more vigilant and keep a much tighter leash on this one.
On that thought, I decided to plunge into her thoughts, but when I try, I slam headfirst into a block. Her thoughts, which should be easily readable at this level of physical proximity, are clouded and unclear. I strain, and still, all I get is something about the color blue. Cobalt? It’s nonsensical.
“Now listen to me, woman.” I growl. “You will not run from me again. You’ll do as I order, and—” I can’t read her thoughts, but as I try, her soul rises up inside her body, shining and shimmering like a twisting, twining ball of light.
Light.
I can’t bond a light and bright soul. My darkness can’t form a connection to someone who’s light. And yet, I’ve done it, and I blame this infuriating woman. She’s half light and half dark, and now I’m in real trouble, because my one vulnerability when I wake up this powerful and this rested is standing right in front of me. If someone should manage to kill this woman, or if she should manage to kill herself, I’d be incapacitated for an unknown amount of time, and unlike every other general I’ve ever bound, she isn’t all dark.
Which means she might want to die, if she discovers the truth.
“How do you feel about starting wars and killing humans?” I glare at her. “Will you help me?”
She spits in my face.
I’ve never wanted to fry, crush, or break a human more than I want to destroy this girl at this very moment. The only thing keeping me from doing it is the knowledge that killing her would send me back to sleep for a very long time.
Still, I consider it anyway.
It might be worth it.
The biggest thing holding me back is the fire in her eyes. If I can convince her to help me, I have a strange feeling that I may have found the greatest general I’ve ever had.
