9. Chapter 9 #2
He’d stopped chewing while I digested what Marduk had said. I met his gaze, stood up, and reached across the table to put my hand over his. He was holding a fork full of lasagna, but dropped it back down on the plate to grasp my hand back.
“Thank you for being there. I’m sorry I tried to evade you,” I said.
My words made both of them gape at me. Danzig recovered first.
Swallowing the food in his mouth, he grinned at me. “I wondered why you did a little happy dance when you got to your car.”
I snorted. “Yeah. I wish you hadn't seen that.
“I saw nothing," he said, then shoved more food in his mouth.
“Except I want to know what you saw in that house,” I said.
With his mouth full of food, he looked over at Marduk.
“When he got there, he watched the bodies turn to dust,” Marduk said. “What you saw was only part of the process, not the end of it. Whatever spell was used on them was meant to completely get rid of them, not simply kill them.”
I blinked, suddenly losing my appetite. “That could've been me.”
After the words slipped out, I expected Marduk to act triumphant and say something insufferable like “this is why we were following you,” or “this is what we are trying to protect you from.”
Instead, he simply nodded.
“It’s terrifying to think about,” he agreed, his voice soft. “You can’t see, smell, or sense magic, so you could’ve walked right into that house and been hit by the same spell. Sometimes the spell is woven so well that another magic user might not notice it until it's activated.”
I finally understood his fears. The human world was scary enough, but I knew how to assess those dangers. This magical world all around me was full of new and unfamiliar scary things.
“Ignorance is my only excuse," I said. “But it's not a good one.”
“What do you mean?” Marduk asked.
“There’s a saying that goes something like ignorance of the law isn’t a defense,” I explained.
They both nodded. “Humans die because of magic all the time. Not enough to make the authorities worried, but it has caused some interesting conspiracy theories.”
“What theories?”
“Human spontaneous combustion,” Marduk answered. “And what happened today.”
I nodded. “There's a gap in my knowledge. Would you guys teach me about your world? I’ve learned a little from Mila and her men, but I need a more systematic education.”
Marduk nodded, looking eager. “Yes, we can teach you.”
Danzig finally put down his fork. I looked at his plate to find it empty. A look around told me that while we'd been talking, he'd eaten about half of all the food on the table. Leaning back in his chair with a satisfied sigh, he patted his belly. “That was perfect.”
“Did you chew?” I teased.
“Some,” he responded, grabbing a napkin and daintily dabbing the corners of his mouth. After I chuckled, he tossed the napkin down and picked up his beer. “I nearly shifted into my serpent form so I could swallow all the food whole. But I decided to be nice and share dinner.”
“How thoughtful of you,” I teased. It was nice to have Danzig back to his normal, good-natured self. It was also nice to be around Marduk and not have every other sentence about how I needed to be safe and let them into my life.
This dinner felt nice. Low stress and as if even Marduk was ready to listen to me.
“I wish this was how it always was.”
I didn't realize I'd said that out loud until Danzig started talking.
“I feel your discomfort is all my fault,” he said.
My jaw dropped. He was the easy going twin. Out of the two, Danzig was far more likely to tease, joke, and talk to me before acting.
“How is this your fault?” I asked.
He let out a long breath. “The day we met was traumatic for you. A lot happened and instead of giving you space to come to terms with everything, I kept following you around.”
“And you were naked,” I said, vividly remembering his body. Those memories might have featured in a few of my dreams.
He didn't smile or make a joke. “Shifters are used to nudity, but it's not part of your culture. I was insensitive to you in so many ways that day. And that night.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“I shifted into my snake form and snuck into your room,” he said. “I was there when Mila handed you her dog.”
“No, you couldn't have been,” I said. “That guest room wasn't very big.”
“I was hiding under the bed,” he said, looking ashamed.
“That's why Babette was so insistent on investigating under there,” I said.
“There's more,” he said.
“I got there a little later,” Marduk said. “We spent the night curled at the foot of your bed in snake form.”
Danzig blinked rapidly as he spoke. “That's why this is all my fault. I knew you wouldn't approve of what I did, but I did it anyway and invited my brother to join me. That set the tone of our relationship. You asking for time and space and the two of us ignoring you. It's not right.”
Marduk rubbed his hands over his face, looking deeply upset. “I’ve been thinking a lot about it. If I had a child and a male was treating her the way we've been treating you, I'd want to murder him, even if he was my child's mate.”
I was impressed at everything the men were saying, but this was a lot to think about.
“I'm going up to my room to call Mila,” I said.
I stood up and grabbed my phone. Marduk stood up. “Do you want us to leave?”
I looked down at Danzig. He still looked pale and I noticed he hadn't stood up. “No, you guys can stay.”
I really needed to talk to my best friend in the entire world and have her help me work out my thoughts and feelings.