“I will rip the points off his fucking Fae ears and pin them to his skull with rusty iron nails.” Rans’ voice was still even and low.
I narrowed my eyes. “Why? Why blame him for doing exactly what I asked him to?”
His blue gaze was hard. “Because it was mercenary and self-serving of him. If you think he was doing it as some kind of favor, you’ve got a lot to learn about the Fae.”
“I didn’t ask him for a favor! I asked him if he thought he could do it, and he said it was possible. It wasn’t like he was trying to lure me into going with him!” I insisted.
I wondered if being a vampire meant you didn’t have to blink, just like you didn’t have to breathe—because it was becoming awfully hard to hold those glacier-deep eyes with mine.
It became even harder when he said, “I woke up to find you gone, but all your belongings had been left behind. There was no sign of a struggle. Still, I could only conclude that the Fae had managed to sneak in and take you, while I lay insensate mere meters away, drooling on my pillow like some kind of lack-wit after I’d vowed to myself that I’d protect you.”
Guilt tugged at me with more insistence. “Well... a Fae did sneak in and take me, but only because I asked him to.” My gaze slid away from his, despite my best efforts. “I should have left you a note, or something. I’m sorry. I’d expected to have to sneak back inside the house to get money for a cab. But Albigard just... showed up, the moment I ended the call. Portaled right into the back yard, because I guess the mead I accepted from him means he can find me anytime he likes, now.”
“Yes,” Rans agreed. “It does.”
I swallowed. “Anyway, it happened so fast that I just went with him. I didn’t want to have time to start second-guessing myself because, not to put too fine a point on it, I was scared shitless by that point.”
He was silent for a few moments.
“Fear is there to keep you from doing stupid things,” he said eventually. “You should have listened to that fear instead of ignoring it.”
But I shook my head. “Maybe that’s true for normal people. People who aren’t messed up, I mean. But when you’ve spent a lifetime being afraid, you either learn to move past it, or you never accomplish a goddamned thing. You wither away until only the fear is left.”
He didn’t reply, so I continued.
“Why did you come after me, Rans? I told you why I did what I did, but why did you do what you did? You accused me of trying to commit suicide, but you’ve just sentenced yourself to death within the next few decades by tying your life to mine.”
I was still having trouble holding his gaze, but I caught the way his eyebrow arched.
“You’re not worried that I might have sentenced you to death instead? It goes both ways, Zorah. If I die, so do you.”
I waved the words away, though. “You’ve made it seven hundred years, Rans. Black Death and shotgun blasts and all. Seems like most of the risk here is on your end.”
“It was a calculated risk.”
I wasn’t so ready to let it go. “Oh, yeah? About that... I might’ve been pretty far out of it, but it wasn’t lost on me that you didn’t know for sure about your survival being a treaty provision. What was it you said to the Magistrate? ‘I thought it must be something like that’?”
He shrugged, though I noticed that it was his turn to glance away.
“There are only so many reasons why the winning army in a supernatural war would leave one single member of an enemy race alive when they clearly have the means to snuff him out at any time.”
I digested that for a moment. “The winning army? I thought Nigellus called the war a messy draw.”
The bark of laughter Rans let out had nothing to do with amusement, I could tell.
“You’ve seen enough to form your own opinions about that, I’d imagine,” he said. “Fae are taking over your world, Zorah. More and more each year.”
“It’s your world, too,” I whispered. But he was right, of course. Admittedly, Nigellus was the only demon I knew, but he was holed up in a vice-ridden enclave with his aging butler, staying out of everyone’s way. And for all his obvious wealth and charisma, he hadn’t even been able to help us with getting Dad back. All of which was just a distraction from what was truly important in this conversation.
“So, you charged into the Fae Court and bound your life to a mortal’s because you thought that maybe there was a reason they hadn’t killed you yet, beyond luck or laziness,” I said. “I get that you’re angry with me. You have every right to be. But I’m allowed to be angry with you, too. You did the same freaking thing to me that I did to you—putting your life at risk to try and protect mine. And I still don’t understand why!”
The look he gave me was almost pitying.
“Bloody hell, Zorah. Why do you think?” he asked.
And with that, he had me—because I didn’t dare say aloud the thing I was thinking. It was stupid and naive, and if I were wrong... if he laughed in my face, it would be way, way too painful.
“I’m starting to feel kind of tired again,” I muttered... coward that I was.
He sighed, his chest rising and falling under the water for reasons that had nothing to do with the need for oxygen. “Go eat something
