Chapter 14 #2
“I would really appreciate if he didn’t!” Bellamy called over, tending to Clover a few yards away. Great, we really had garnered an audience.
“I’m leaving,” Soren said, turning towards his Soul Mate. “Explain.”
Before I knew it, Ford was crowding me again.
“Please step back,” I said, hating how weak my voice sounded. It was hard to sound strong when most of my energy was going towards convincing the Bond that no, I shouldn’t jump on top of Ford and bury my nose in his neck even though yes, he does smell very nice.
Ford halted, then retreated a step, his expression staying firmly murderous, though now I was pretty sure that rage was directed inward.
It was that realization that pushed me to explain. “Sometimes,” a swallow for strength, “when the Bond is having one of its moments,” one more pause, “it will make it painful for someone else to touch you.”
“Someone else?” Ford parroted.
Goodness. My face felt hot. “Someone other than…”
“Me.”
My head weighed a thousand pounds as I nodded in response.
“Esme.” Ford dragged his hands down his face, his voice weary. Is he tired? Tell him to sleep. “You need to tell me these things.”
Well, I did not appreciate that little lecture. “I’m not going to be your teacher. I had to figure this out myself, so do you.”
I hauled myself onto Sky’s back in a flash, needing some distance.
Ford stayed rooted to the spot, only moving to dodge my leg so it didn’t smack him in the face. Once I was settled on the saddle, he got even closer, wrapping his hand around my calf.
“No,” he said plainly.
I blinked. Surely I’d heard him wrong. “Excuse me?”
“No,” he repeated. “That’s not what’s going to happen.
” I tried to pull away, to put some distance between us.
I mean, it was really ridiculous that he could stand next to a towering beast of an animal and still have a head and some impressive chest showing.
“The only way this is going to work without killing each other, someone else, or ourselves is if you tell me what you need.”
Something happened to his tone at the end, turning rough and commanding. As if the Bond had taken over his voice for its own use.
It was so forceful, the only thing I could bring myself to do was nod. That, and the reminder that he was right. I’d been close to all three options at various points.
Ford shook his head. “Verbal yes, please.”
The part of myself that prioritized self preservation figured it would not be appreciated if I pointed out that he’d never said please to me before. “Yes.”
A small smile played at the corner of his lips. “A little more feeling this time.”
Well, shit if I was going to have a human lie detector next to me all the time now, I was in for far more embarrassment than admitting that I didn’t like it when other people touched me.
“Look. I’ll try okay? That’s the best I can promise right now. I’ve trained myself to handle it differently, so I might forget.”
Now it was Ford’s turn to look a little harrowed. “Okay,” he said, looking at me for a long moment before slowly turning away.
That wouldn’t do. I could deal with every other iteration of our relationship, but I couldn’t deal with awkwardness.
Before he made it too far away, I sputtered out, “It can have odd requests sometimes, but others are basic. So just you know, tell me, if there’s something that—”
“You still have my flannel in your saddle bag?”
“Uh…I—yes, I do,” I managed, like I couldn’t feel that red and black fabric burning into my leg like it was made of molten fire.
Ford nodded, a few dips of his chin, before taking two solid strides toward Shadow and jumping into the saddle in a way that made my cheeks feel hot again.
My mind felt hazy, the exact situation I was trying to avoid as we gathered up our group. Bellamy and Soren, Freya and Arthur.
If you knew how to look for it, the differences between them were stark. Not just the difference between paranimas—a one hundred percent match—and paraspets—a measly seventy percent. I’d seen some parasepts who were so close, so in sync, they were indistinguishable from the more compatible Matches.
No, you could tell there wasn’t an ounce of connection between Freya and Arthur. Arthur’s truest connection lied with his twin, forced to live a world apart in service of the Empire and Freya’s secret.
I knew it weighed on her, which probably made their dynamic worse. Arthur and his twin Adam were Freya’s seventh Match. Seven different twins who were ripped apart to hide the fact that Freya could Cross on her own.
The one grace was that they kept her Matches short, somewhere around two years.
Enough that their chances of dying decreased.
Oh, they would be sick—you couldn’t Cross on your own without your body nearly crumbling from the pressure of it—but as far as any of us knew, her past Matches were now living a comfortable, Empire-funded existence.
Arthur was one of my favorites, and though you could tell he mourned his twin, he was capable. Strong, smart, a good actor—it was the reason he was even allowed to join us.
I didn’t even feel the clench of fear that always gripped my lower stomach whenever we went out on a mission, my focus pulled internally. Peter was watching me, I could tell, coming with us until we were formally passed off to our Muli escorts.
God, I had to get it together. The ride over the hill was a little under an hour.
And I could. I needed to. I’d done it for three years and I could do it now, damnit.
I tapped on Sky’s side lightly, letting him know that he should stay on guard for a second. He released a heavy breath in response, giving me the go ahead. He would be getting many, many a treat later.
Pulling the brim of my hat down to hide my eyes, I let them flutter closed and took several deep breaths, retreating into my mind.
Hello, I said softly, a beckoning word just for the Bond.
I visualized it unfurling itself like a cat awaking from a slumber and cracking a curious eye open at me. I approached slowly, keeping my hands raised as I walked towards it, resting against the wall that existed at the back of my mind.
Slowly, the Bond, still in that cat-like form, got to its feet and stretched out. It was still scared, moving towards me like an animal that had learned to expect pain rather than comfort.
It’s okay, I said. You can go.
It didn’t believe me, still looking at me skeptically. With another deep breath, I inched past it and took its place against that wall, sitting down in the back of my mind and crossing my legs.
Surrendering. Letting the Bond step to the forefront for a moment, letting it draw strength so I could do the same.
I sat back and watched as it carefully crawled to the front of my consciousness, poking around to take stock of its—our—surroundings. I knew the moment it realized how quiet it was, how much unrestricted access it had to Ford.
The Bond flopped onto its back, exposing its soft underbelly and relaxing into the caress of Ford’s breathing and his scent and his nearness.
A soft whine clanked through my mind like the bells caged at the top of a temple. The Bond had been near death, but now I could see it growing, gaining strength again.
Its fur got shinier, its purrs more intense. Meanwhile, a tear slipped out of my right eye.
Even my body knew to let it fall on the side away from Ford.
Too few minutes passed until Sky let out another long breath, signaling that it was time for me to step back into myself. I moved slowly, careful not to spook the Bond as I approached.
With a mournful whimper, it got up and retreated, well-trained to know when it was time. When we moved to switch places, I reached out to stroke it, forcing myself to thank it.
Then it was back to where it rested, curling up for its sleep as I regained control of myself and opened my eyes right as we broke through the tree line, finding a group of Muli soldiers breaking through the morning fog.
I straightened a little on my saddle, feeling the heavy weight of attention on me already. Odd, considering we were still a couple hundred yards away, until I realized it was Ford who was looking.
“What?” I whispered.
“I’d like you to show me what you just did,” he said, his voice hoarse. My eyebrows flew together in shock. I couldn’t have been that obvious, it would have just looked like I was meditating. “I felt you. The Bond. It got stronger.”
With our enemies approaching and our lives on the line, all I could bring myself to do was say, “Okay.”
How silly was it that I was so scared of Ford, when there was a group of Muli soldiers standing right in front of us.
All eyes went to Elijah first—hard not too when he stood taller and broader than his already impressively sized companions, sitting atop a regal horse with a coat richer than a starless night.
It had been longer than I realized since I’d seen him, and his form was a shock. It wasn’t anything other than idle observation—especially since there was an entity living in my head who would remove its very home if it was anything different—but Elijah was, quite frankly, hard to look at.
It wasn’t just his size. He looked like he was carved out of marble—straight nose, a brutal curve to his jaw, pointed cheekbones. His eyes were shadowed by a strong brow, darkening the already deep brown of his eyes.
His skin carried the tan of someone well-used to outside work, but was still shockingly pale compared to the near black of his hair. The first time I met him, I thought he looked fucking terrifying.
That thought remained, if not slightly exaggerated from my baseline nerves.
On instinct, I looked around, trying to gain back some sense of understanding in my surroundings.
He was with the crew I recognized, four of his company. And Carson, who I should probably start considering as part of that group. He’d chosen them over us, anyway.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Soren tense up at the sight of Carson, though it probably had something to do with Bellamy now.