“Don’t feel bad. You’ve enough going on in your life without having to remember to check in with everyone else.”
I stared at him opened mouthed. As far as I was aware, the fae couldn’t sense a change in emotions like a shifter could. And Gabriel Mason was only part-fae at that. The last time we’d discussed this, he didn’t think he’d inherited any fae magic from his mother. And I was adept enough at schooling my emotions by now that I knew nothing had shown on my face. “How did you know I felt guilty?”
Mase all but vibrated in his chair, excitement so palpable I felt it from across the room.
“Was I right?Fuck me. It was more of an educated guess that time.”
“Mase,” I growled, and he grinned.
“Axel and Dathal seem to think I have fae magic after all. Maybe my soulbond with Rys helped bring it out in me, but we’ve been working on it these past couple of weeks. Working on recognising my magic and understanding what it’s trying to tell me.”
Interest beyond piqued, I sat forward. “And? What sort of magic have you got?”
“You know how Dathal has amazing intuition, that he always seems to know when we’re on the right track in our investigations and when people are lying or telling the truth?”
I nodded. Having Dathal work with us had been a huge help. Thinking and sometimeshopingyou were on the right track was one thing. Having it confirmed with almost one hundred percent accuracy was a game changer. “Is that what yours does?”
Mase scrunched his nose. “Not exactly. Axel believes I’m more attuned to people’s emotions. Like how shifters react to scents. When a person has a strong emotional reaction, I can feel it here.” He rubbed a spot just below his ribs. “Not all the time at the minute,” he confessed with a slight shrug. “But we’re working on it.”
Excitement stirred, my smile quick to appear because this was huge. “That’s a handy talent for a detective to have.”
Colour rose to Mase’s cheeks. “Like I said, though, I’m not able to do it all the time yet. It’s a bit like Axel’s in that comes and it goes.”
I guess that made sense. I already knew that, for whatever reason, being this side of the gateway had a dampening effect on fae magic. Stood to reason that any magic Mase had would react the same.
“They want to take me through the gateway and see how it behaves there.” I couldn’t get a read on what he thought about that.
“Seems like a logical step.”
“It does, but…”
“But?”
“What if it works all the time once I’m there? What if it’s just like Axel’s and I feel every strong emotion that people have?”
I frowned, not seeing the problem. “Isn’t that the point? To see if youcando that?”
“Yes, but I won’t be able to turn it off.”
Ahh.
“Axel said he had to learn to turn off his magic so he wasn’t reading the minds of every person he met. I’m not sure I want to go through the gateway and risk an onslaught of emotions unless I have a way to switch it all off.”
I winced. “I see your point.” Tapping my nose, I added, “Sometimes I don’t want to be bombarded with all the scents flying around. Learning to dial back our senses is one of the first things we learn as shifters.”
“Exactly.”
“But,” I said, earning a questioning look, “in order to learn how to turn it off, you might need to have it working all the time.”
“Ugh.” Mase groaned and dropped his head into his hands. “That’s exactly what they said, too.”
“They are the experts.” When he didn’t emerge from his hiding place, I tried a different tack. “I know it’s a daunting prospect, but if you want to explore your magic, then isn’t it worth trying? You don’t have to spend long over there. Maybe you have a limited range? You could go through with Dathal and Axel and stay near the gateway so that you only practice on those two.”
Mase hummed in answer but raised his head to look at me. “You’re just full of good advice this morning, aren’t you?”
If only I had some for Jake, too.
“I try.” My smile was harder to find than it had been a few minutes ago, but it suddenly came a lot easier as an idea formed. “What are you doing after work?”
