Page 379 of Eight of Swords, Part Two

‘It’s happened before.’

‘What did you give off?’

‘The opposite.’

‘The opposite of fear?’

‘If you could just shut up, that’d be amazing.’

‘What is the opposite of fear?’ Lachlan asks, unbothered by the state Riley is in, or maybe Kade is the only one who can see how deeply upset his brother is, how fraught he is right now.

‘Lachlan,’ Lee calls out.

He walks away, giving Kade a small wink.

The moment he’s gone, Kade reaches out and touches Riley’s shoulder, a gesture intended to provide comfort, but Riley flinches hard, eyes slamming shut.

‘Sorry. I’m sorry.’

‘It’s fine.’ Kade lowers his voice to a whisper. ‘You’re shaking.’

‘I’m just tired.’

‘Yeah, lot of that going around. You don’t have to do this.’

‘I can’t do this.’

‘Then go downstairs and take over strategic command. You’re upsetting yourself,’ Kade tells him as gently as he can.

‘I can’t control what’ll happen if I m-morph. I never know what I’ll…’ He makes a face of pure disgust. ‘Give off. My body always does the wrong thing,’ he whispers to Kade, like he’s begging him to understand. ‘It always betrays me.’

‘It’s OK. It’s gonna be OK.’

For maybe the first time ever, Riley drops his head to press it against Kade’s as he lets out a low whine of something horribly pained.

‘His blood is accelerating it.’

Riley actually sounds afraid.

‘Lachlan’s blood?’

‘Yes. It’s… it did heal us, but my body never does what it should. It’s broken. I’m broken. And his blood tried to fix things and my body is defending me against it, I don’t know. I don’t know anything. Every time I think I know something about myself, it fucking changes.’

‘I’m here. I won’t let anything bad happen to you.’ He then freezes. ‘Wait. Is this the… every three months thing?’

‘It shouldn’t be. It’s not due for like a month, but with Tanner’s blood, I don’t know. I never fucking know what it’s gonna do and it’s why I can’t help. I want to, but I just can’t.’

‘You’re not a coward,’ Kade tells him, pulling his brother into a hug. ‘You’re the bravest person I know, Riley. You go down. I’ll help her.’

‘How will you help?’

‘Well, I’ll figure that out. I’m sneaky.’

‘You’re sure?’

‘I’m positive. We’ll be down soon.’

Riley gives a broken sigh of relief. ‘Thank you.’