Chapter 16 #2
Charles snorted. “Me and your dad have handcuffs, but not the kind you’re thinking.”
“Oh, for the sake of fuck, do you really have to?”
I looked up at Fellisse. “What’s happening?”
Inkiri, I noticed, had been angling himself so he blocked my view of the Koa Esher. Or the Koa Esher’s view of me.
“What’s happening is I’m wondering how you can go berry picking and find a fucking Koa Esher in the bushes.” Vergis looked at me over his shoulder.
Inkiri growled. “Rory did not look for their kind. We need to find out what the Koa Esher want with him and whether it was coincidence they crossed our path on our way to the Stone.” He turned to me.
I saw Charles and Lissir moving, and Vergis headed toward the house as well, presumably for the zip ties.
“Sweet thing, please let Fellisse and Nokim take you inside and watch over you.” He cupped my neck, and of course I turned all gooey within seconds and nodded.
“Okay, but you be careful. I need you.”
His gaze heated, but he controlled that emotion pretty quick, going back to business. To being a protector.
Fellisse and Nokim hurried me inside after that, and I just barely caught a glimpse of Inkiri and Lissir on either side of the Koa Esher, Charles following at a distance with his gun ready.
Fellisse left me in the mudroom to take my shoes off, and he went around to check the rest of the house while Nokim watched the door to the mudroom itself.
I headed along the hallway, but stopped partway. Kinnek was sitting on the floor with his back against the wall and his head bowed. His midnight dark horns still almost touched the beautiful landscape that lived on the walls. The landscape he had created.
I had not a single fucking idea what I should be doing. Kinnek was upset, and it wasn’t just anger, I could tell that much. I wished Lissir were here, or even better, Charles.
This, like the fogscape and the upset voice in my head, was too much adulting for me; more adulting than anyone should have to do. Unless they were an adult, of course. Which I wanted to be about as much as I wanted to be a mage.
But even so, just walking past Kinnek would’ve been cruel. I cared about him and didn’t want him to sit there by himself. I lowered myself to the floor to lean against the wall right next to him.
There were probably proper things to say here, I just didn’t know what those were. I awkwardly crossed my legs, cleared my throat, and said, “Well.”
Kinnek let out a stuttering breath and glanced at me, then back at the wall opposite.
I followed his line of sight and cocked my head. He was looking at the painting of the bagu, the one with his back turned that I’d first noticed when I arrived.
“I have a few photographs of him, but it hurts to look at them. It hurt so much after I quit the Raiken and came here, and I honestly don’t know why Charlie put up with it. I missed him every day, and Charlie was here. Charlie was right here with me, always.”
“Erm. That… Did the Koa Esher… I mean, do you want to tell me a little more?”
Kinnek snorted out a laugh that was almost a sob. “Vergis’s biological father. Another hangu mage. Not as skilled as me, but…he was better than me in all other ways. He deserved better.
“We were sent on a mission to free Raikengana who had been captured. It turned bad. They took Aragis when we tried to get away, but we’d made a pact.
We’d promised each other.” He wiped his eyes when the tears started falling, and I reached out to take his hand, like Lissir had done for me before.
I hoped that was right. Kinnek closed his fingers around mine.
“I didn’t have it in me to make him a sacrifice.
It was what we had promised one another.
Maybe he always knew that about me. He took a Koa Esher’s knife and slit his own throat.
He smiled at me, but I’ll never forget the blood. I still see it in my dreams.”
Don’t suppose you have anything for that? I said to the presence, the land. Wisely, it didn’t respond.
“I… Do you… I don’t know what to do. Can I do anything? Anything at all?”
Kinnek looked away from the painted back of the bagu he’d loved—the bagu he still loved.
His gaze stayed on the floor for long moments while all I did was hold his hand and not let go.
After a while, he squeezed my fingers and looked at me.
“Look at you, Rory. You really are a sweet thing.” He took a deep breath.
“You lost that basket, didn’t you, snapdragon? ”
“Guess I did.”
“Nothing we can do about that. But we have preserved strawberries in the basement. You want to help me turn those into… What did you call it? Discourse jelly?”
I smiled at Kinnek. His eyes had gone puffy and his skin looked blotchy. “Dissent jelly.”
“I see. Wanna make some?”
“Can we have iced tea while we work?”
Kinnek nodded. “We can. I love Charlie’s iced tea.” He got to his paws slowly, and he wasn’t his chatty self when we got to the kitchen, but that was fine. I didn’t know much, but I knew he didn’t have to be just then.