My Blood Is Yours (The Summoning #1)

28. Elowen

ELOWEN

“ P erhaps we should ask your mate.” I blurt the suggestion with little thought, purely out of desperation. Evandriel looks down at me as if I’ve just asked him to lick an unwashed asshole. Sariel even looks mildly surprised by it. “What? Who else are we gonna ask? It’s not like we know anyone else here.”

Evandriel scowls. “We don’t know her either. She could be a scoundrel for all we know.”

My eyes drift to where Evandriel’s soulbond lingers on the steps of what appears to be a town square—an open, park-like area where sculptures, elaborate flower beds, and sunbathing chairs are peppered about.

I can’t help but snort. “Scoundrel? She hardly looks it.”

Sariel follows my gaze, and Evandriel turns to do the same—just as she collides with a small group of teenagers, each of them issuing apologies.

“I mean, her clothing is quite obviously finely tailored and professional. She looks like she could be a politician even…”

My words drift as, the moment the teenagers’ backs are turned, the female dips her hands into each of their pockets. The move is so smooth, so fast—practised—that you’d have to be intensely focused on her to notice.

Evandriel’s gaze slowly rotates back towards mine, his brows perched in an expression that is nothing short of smug.

“You know, I think you’re right. She does look like a politician. Sticking her hands into other people’s pockets, a wolf dressed in finely tailored sheep’s clothing. My, my… your powers of perception are astounding, Elowen . ”

My lips pucker as I chew my cheek to keep from laughing, while Evandriel continues looking more and more distressed with each passing word.

“Well, maybe she’s desperate?—”

Evandriel’s eyes search mine, as though seeing me for the first time. “Desperate enough to steal from children?”

My eyes roll as I give him a dramatic scoff. “Why, they’re hardly children. They’re teenagers! And silver-spooned ones at that. Surely, whatever she’s just lifted from them will be swiftly replaced by mummy or daddy.”

Evandriel’s jaw drops. “Who are you?”

With a shrug, I begin picking at an errant thread on the sleeve of my servant’s dress. “Just someone who knows what it’s like to have to steal in order to survive.”

Evandriel’s expression softens immediately. He clears his throat, shifting uncomfortably on his feet. From the look on his face, he remembers—just as well I do—the state my mother and I were in before she’d been hired as a maid. Though, I can’t be entirely sure. I was so young that I can only vaguely remember that it was approximately around that time I’d met Evandriel for the first time.

“The female doesn’t have a hair out of place. I’ve seen poverty before. Experienced it. Have lived among it for the last century,” Evandriel’s eyes narrow at mine, “And you know just as well as I do—while poverty can strike anyone, it eventually wears us all down to the same brittle shade of tattered clothing, hole-y shoes, and haunted eyes. And that female is not it.”

I give a noncommittal grunt. Despite the veracity of his words, I also know that most people won’t risk their necks unless they have to. There’s something driving her to steal. And for some reason, I’m curious to know what it is. Evandriel continues rambling as if he can somehow convince himself that she isn’t his soulbound. Meanwhile, I continue to watch her, enraptured, as she pickpockets her way through the park with fingers as light as any feather.

“… In any case, she’s hardly the ideal person to seek help from. Unless we don’t mind being robbed of anything that isn’t physically anchored to our bodies. And even then, I wouldn’t be so sure. She’d probably happily relieve us of our internal organs for the right price.”

A bark of laughter escapes me. “You’re one to talk.”

Evandriel’s eyes narrow. “They were bad people.”

Sariel shrugs. “If anything, you two seem perfectly matched.”

My eyes flick up to Sariel’s twitching lips. Evandriel scoffs, looking thoroughly affronted. “I may be many things, but I can assure you that a slimy, slippery, conniving little thief isn’t one of them.”

My eyes roll. “That’s a little dramatic, don’t you think? I mean… maybe she’s desperate. And clearly, those teenagers are well cared for?—”

Even Sariel’s brows pinch with concern as he gives me a mildly admonishing look.

“—their school clothes are nicer than anything I’ve seen in my life unless it was from behind a thick glass window pane. Maybe she’s desperate. Maybe we can also help her.”

Evandriel’s hardly listening. He scowls in the direction of the female he thinks he’s been cursed with, and my heart gives a sympathetic squeeze as I consider the pendant around my neck and the bundle of letters in my hand.

“I’m going to talk to her.”

Sariel growls as I attempt to step out from beneath his arm. “She’s not going to bite me for trying to talk to her!”

Sariel’s frown deepens—as though the prospect is entirely within the realm of possibility. I scoff, turning on my heel, but grin to myself as his presence looms protectively behind me.

My footsteps rush forward as the female makes a hasty exit from the square. Sariel and I weave through the crowd inside the park until we burst through the other side, and my eyes hastily scan the vicinity frantically.

“Curses. We lost her.”

Not that the mundrapedra can’t remedy that. There isn’t a place in any realm she could hide from us. I turn towards Sariel—just as my eyes snag on a streak of blue bolting around a corner—and slamming straight into Evandriel’s chest.