Chapter Six
Declan
Declan woke to find himself curled tight against his bedroom wall. On the other side, Antonio slept. Too far, when Declan ached to touch. He itched with it, that need to be closer, a feeling like ants under his skin.
Bloody ridiculous, dramatic sluagh. That’s what he was. Declan had gone years without physical contact outside of brief moments of familial affection. Being apart from Antonio for mere hours shouldn’t be a hardship.
But it hurt.
The clawing need would be so easy to resolve. A few steps and a wall was all that separated them. Antonio slept; Declan could feel the comfortable blankness of his rest. Done quietly, and the human wouldn’t even need to know.
Invade the man’s personal space. The protected area just for him. On the first morning.
No. Declan wouldn’t do that. Instead, Declan showered and dressed, dark jeans with too many straps and a plaid button-up with sleeves cut off. He ignored the fresh scratch of steel wool over the ants as he pulled on his boots and didn’t bother to style the white fall of his hair.
And maybe, perhaps, he leaned against Antonio’s door instead of walking directly to the kitchen. Pressed his forehead against the dark wood, eyes closed, as he sank into the bond.
It wasn’t the same as contact, but it helped. Bronzed Antonio, who cleaved to iron and tasted like copper. Who’d touched Declan as if he truly wanted him, fit them together so well it took everything in Declan not to strip down there in the park.
Antonio had felt so good. Solid and broad, running hot as his soul, his hand up under Declan’s jacket, on the ridge of his spine and sides. A completely new sensation, that touch to Declan’s skin without glamour. So much better than any touch had felt before.
It didn’t matter. This wasn’t about him. He turned from Antonio’s door and headed to the kitchen, hoping to steal a cup of coffee in the quiet of the early morning, undisturbed by anything but his own foolish wanting.
It wasn’t to be. Aisling sat at the large table, expression uncharacteristically blank, fingers wrapped around a steaming mug.
“Hello, Declan,” she said. Her even, light tone gave him pause. “You bonded the Hollow?”
Ah. So she’d spoken with Florian.
“His name is Antonio,” Declan replied, studying the fruit Faerie saw fit to manifest on the kitchen counter. “I thought you liked him.”
“I do. I also told you he was unsuitable, darling. You said you were to speak with Everil on removing the curse. Not to use that favor to do this.” She hissed the last word, cheeks flushed and angry.
This.
Declan stared at his mother. His one true support, confidant since he was old enough to not annoy her with sticky hands and tiny claws.
How odd it was, that the cold, slick curl of hurt at the pit of one's stomach could continue to be a surprise, even after so long.
Declan took the time to study the feeling before tucking it away.
It wouldn’t do to wake Antonio with his dramatics.
“You think so little of me?” he asked, loathing the plaintive note in his voice. “Calloway, that insipid wisp of the House of Acacia Hold, wants to steal him away. Wed him. Antonio asked me, Mother.”
“Sweetling, I only–” Aisling stood, appearing within Declan’s personal space in a blink. She grasped his hand before he could step away. “Everil nearly killed you.”
How was he to say anything to that? Difficult enough to think with Antonio so far away, and she brought up Everil.
“That’s not relevant.”
“That kelpie was cruel to you. You stood by him near your whole lives, even after he bonded that shameful excuse for a brownie.” Venom on her tongue, rare as it was acidic. And, like the ants, blessedly figurative. She was not a sluagh. “One vision and he left you shattered.”
“I was not shattered, Mother.” He’d been too numb to be shattered.
“Your marks faded,” Aisling retorted. “You barely ate. For thirty years, I thought I’d wake up and see you gone, Declan. If not for Eithne strong-arming you to the mortal realm, I would have lost you.”
She would have, yes. Everil and Declan had exchanged furious words during their fight.
Lawrence’s death vision, more gruesome than most, imminent enough that the colors nearly bled from oversaturation, lines tight and crisp.
The smell of death and viscera, sickly sweet and thick, still lingered in his memory.
It had ended as it always ended: Declan abandoned for being the creature he was born as.
Everil speaking his true thoughts about Declan, what Declan was.
For half the argument, Declan had feared Everil would attack him in grief-fueled anger.
He hadn’t known if he’d be able to kill his only friend, sick with the knowledge that it likely wasn’t mutual.
Then silence, for a century. Declan had missed Everil so much.
“Antonio is not Everil. He’s not frightened of me.”
Antonio had promised to not fuck off and leave him for being a monster. Rough-spoken, handsome, watchful Antonio, had offered that with more ferocity than his agreement to the bond. (But hadn’t Everil, too, made such an insinuation, once?)
“It’s not you, alright?”
“Not yet,” Aisling corrected, softly. Declan was distantly aware that he flinched. “But even if he never is, he could be so much worse. He’s tied to your soul now, love. Can you blame me for being angry that you’d risk fading again? Coercion on your part–”
“Our bond was not forced.”
“–or by desperation on his, hummingbird, it could always end with him regretting it. With damaging you.” Damn her to the void.
Damn her and the brief glaze over her huge, black eyes, her bloody trembling chin.
For the crack in her voice when she said, “I’m so angry at you, sweetness. I just want you safe.”
Of course, she did. She always had.
“You ought to have birthed a third banshee in that case, Mother,” Declan said. He pulled his hand from her grasp and stepped away, shaking his head. “I need to read up on Hollow. Do you think Florian can get word to Calloway? Let the boy know his toy is no longer available.”
Let him know the shadow monster stole his toy away.
“You know he can, love, but–”
“I’ll be in the nook.” Curled up. Alone. Skin on fire and stomach sour. “Anything else?”
Aisling hesitated, gaze riveted on Declan’s face. “I’m to have some business over. Please let Antonio know so he’s not alarmed.”
“Of course. Let’s hope Calloway will decide to come calling as well, aye?”
Manners said he should wait for a reply. But Declan couldn’t shake the hurt of her suggestion that he’d acted as Nimai had. Trapped a bond. Purposefully forced Antonio into that flat, dead “I’ll do it” and then lashed him to his soul.
Declan instead removed himself from the kitchen, Aisling’s eyes on him the entire way.
Hollow, it turned out, weren’t a topic the fae had bothered to write much about. Declan would have quickly exhausted all he could find on the topic if it weren’t for the distraction of emptiness. A grasping desperation, all ringing, aching urgency, and Antonio and Antonio and Antonio.
Declan refused to think about it. About Antonio and the drag of want and lacking screaming through him.
No.
Instead, he would read and reread the same brief passage, taking no more from it with each subsequent attempt.
The old, leather-bound tome he’d found presented itself as an instructive piece on the care and raising of humans.
As such, it explored the oddities. The offshoots.
Theories about half-fae, rather than fae with a human parent, like Hyacinth.
The origins of changelings, and if the reverse were possible.
Horrifying stuff. And, like many terrible things, it proved as fascinating as it was stomach churning. Or it would have, if he could have thought more on what was written and less on when Antonio would wake.
It shouldn’t matter. The man deserved not to be mauled by his bond first thing in the blasted morning. Midday.
Finally, Declan felt the man stir and brushed aside another nagging pang of touch starvation, swallowing hard. He could control himself. He would. He’d read, and not hunt Antonio down to clutch against him for as long as Antonio would allow it.
That determination lasted exactly as long as it took for Antonio’s voice to carry to him from near the door, tight with anxiety. “Shit shit shit.”
Gone was the blurry absence of sleep, and Declan’d been so intent to ignore his own discomfort that he failed to recognize the new intensity came from Antonio.
Presumably, Declan took the time to put the book down. He didn’t hear it fall.
He didn’t hear much of anything outside of the soft string of profanity from the hall and his own beating heart. Each step whispered of relief, a scrape of an ache removed as he closed the distance between them.
“Antonio?” Declan called, pushing open the door to the entryway. “Good afternoon. Are you–”
Declan froze in place, staring at the man. ‘All but nude.’ That was what Antonio happened to bloody-fucking-well be.
Antonio in his skin, bare save for a pair of black gym shorts and tattoos. Protective symbols inked over muscle, as solid at a glance as he’d felt when holding Declan close. And, voids take him, Declan watched with a greedy, helpless hunger as Antonio whirled to face him.
If he traced the line of blackberries at Antonio’s ribs, over the dip and rise of corded strength and bone, would Declan taste himself? The leather of a favorite jacket, of blood and ink spilled under a bright sun.
“Are, ah…” Declan tried to say, dragging his eyes up to meet Antonio’s. Antonio took a step back, looking first alarmed, then relieved. Relieved, even as Declan fumbled for words. “Did you sleep well?”
Antonio rocked in place, bounced slightly on the balls of his feet. Those work rough, dark-tipped fingertips tapped against his leg, curled and uncurled. Gorgeous legs, as well-formed as the rest of him. Declan’s hand wouldn’t be able to span even half.