Page 49 of Eight of Swords, Part Two

Danya watches him closely. ‘Bad means sex?’

Lachlan drains the liquid greedily. It burns his insides to numb them, and that’s what he wants. He wants to be numb because this is going to be fucking awful. He’s burrowing so deep into worst-case scenarios that Danya’s hand on his arm triggers a full-body flinch, and he drops the glass, the sound of it shattering ringing in his ears.

‘S-sorry, I’m sorry.’

‘Is fine,’ Danya says. ‘Look at me.’

His eyes are the same shape as Roman’s.

Lachlan wants to fucking die.

‘I can’t do this,’ he whispers for the first time since he was a child because, after a certain age, no matter how bad it was, he could always get it done. ‘I can’t.’

‘I’ll do it, then, OK? I’ll lead. Whatever happens, we will get through, and it will be fine. I’m the one who killed her, anyway.’

‘It’s not for her,’ Lachlan says. ‘He didn’t even r-remember her name.’

‘Lachlan.’ Danya lifts his face. ‘I’ve got you.’

No one’s ever said that to him before.

Lachlan doesn’t know what it means, not really.

‘You do?’

‘You just stay with me, yes? Trust me.’

Lachlan trusts Danya with his life.

‘OK.’

He downs a final drink before getting to his feet and walking with Danya to a set of rooms that he’s never spent significant time in beyond basic alignment checks. Penhalyx’s quarters are very much like the Cove in terms of connectivity, easily twice the size of the house Lachlan grew up in.

‘Gonna be OK,’ his friend says.

Lachlan nods.

Danya knocks, and they wait outside until a voice gives permission to enter. Lachlan won’t remember what happened, but he knows it was dark inside. He knows there were candles. He’ll see bruises, injuries and three strange cuts on his body the next day, and he knows where they came from, but not how, and he knows Danya kept his promise.

But he won’t remember anything else.

✴

The week of Penhalyx’s stay is marred by a kind of exhaustion Lachlan’s never felt before in his whole life. His mind is foggy, his body is tired, his tendons strained, his instincts off. Fever takes him for the first time… ever.

Lachlan has no memory of getting sick as a kid, but this, whatever it is, comes with a vengeance. Danya covers for him, and Blaire takes over Carrigan’s former role. Lachlan won’t remember much at all about that lost week in the middle of November, only what they tell him.

Sometimes, Danya brings soup for Lachlan during the quiet midnight hours when their shifts align.

‘What’s happening to me?’ he asks Danya when he manages half a bowl of soup and no more.

Danya sets down his spoon, doesn’t look at Lachlan, but he places his hand atop Lachlan’s for a beat. ‘You just need rest.’

Lachlan sleeps with Mimi in his arms every night.

He’s avoiding Jules again, but with the old man lurking and prowling, neither will risk talking until he’s gone. Mimi feels Lachlan’s forehead with the back of her hand and says things he doesn’t understand.

She says, ‘You put him in the lava place,’ and ‘It hurts his wings.’