9. Chapter Nine #2
Even as panic engulfed him, Calder’s arms reached across the table to join his tentacles and actually plucked Adam out of his seat. Adam clutched at the firm skin, shocked back into the present moment with a little shriek, and he found himself settled on Calder’s lap a moment later.
Calder’s human arms joined all the others, and it was a lot harder to panic when wrapped securely in so many affectionate arms.
“That’s not something you need to worry about,” Calder soothed.
“Of course I have to worry about that!” Adam exclaimed, feeling some of the alarm spike through him again.
His voice was still too high. “Calder, I know it’s not definite that the shifter will die if the witch does, or vice versa, but look at what happened to my aunts!
I can’t be responsible for your death. I can’t. ”
He couldn’t bear the idea of cutting Calder’s life off like that, not even when he knew that it should be Calder’s choice.
Calder’s expression was very serious. “Adam, sweetheart, this is how the mythical shifter bond works. When one of us dies, so does the other.”
Before Adam could figure out how to yank Calder’s tentacles off and run for the hills, he continued. “But if we bond, your life will be extended to match mine.”
Adam was so caught up in his worry about cutting Calder’s life short that it took him a long moment to understand what Calder was saying.
“What?” he gasped out.
Calder nodded, gaze intent on Adam’s face. “You will live as long as I do. We are very hardy and difficult to kill, and the same would be true of you.”
“Are you sure?” Adam asked anxiously.
“I am entirely certain, sweetheart,” Calder assured him with the ring of absolute truth.
“You wouldn’t have to worry that I would ever leave you, nor I you.
If one of us was somehow killed or if we decided eventually that we were ready to move beyond, then we would die together.
Otherwise, we live for a very long time. ”
“Why aren’t there more of you?” That was maybe not the point, but Adam was still reeling, and the question had popped out.
“Unlike other shifters, we believe that a finite number of us ever came into being. We don’t procreate as regular shifters do.
Over the vast stretch of recorded time, a small number have gone.
We think they’ve chosen to move beyond. Some may still be sleeping and will rejoin us at a future time. But we were never numerous.”
Adam tried to grapple with this. “Wait. Came into being? Does this mean you don’t have parents?”
Calder shook his head. “No. We believe the Magic itself created us, but it’s not like that can be independently corroborated.”
“Wow,” Adam said, unable to come up with anything more intelligent to say.
Calder smiled softly, his gaze intent on Adam’s face. “I spent a long time as a kraken before I decided to become human. We were not born human as regular shifters are. We have similarities, of course, but we’re fundamentally different.”
Apparently. Created directly by the Magic? (Adam could hear the capital. Up until he’d met Calder, he hadn’t had a concept of magic as some sort of… of being?)
“Do you communicate with the Magic?” Adam asked.
Calder shook his head, then hesitated and turned it into more of an uncertain tilt.
“Well, not the way you probably mean. I’m not sure if you’d say that the Magic is sentient the way that we usually mean it, or perhaps it’s such a higher intelligence that we can’t really grasp it.
There are no conversations, no entity that we could speak to.
But when we open ourselves up to the universe, when we’re open to possibilities, we have found that over time, we are guided to where we need to be.
After all, what are the chances that I would be at the gardens on the same day and at the same time as you? ”
Incredibly remote, when weighed against the number of places that Calder had no doubt been in his entire long life.
What was the likelihood they’d even be in the same city?
Or that Calder wouldn’t have just been swimming around in the ocean as a kraken or a squid for the entirety of Adam’s little witch life?
Instead, here they were.
Calder’s dark eyes were fathomless as he admitted, “Bonding isn’t a step to be entered into lightly. It’s permanent, and as I have said, it will mean you outlive all of your friends and family.”
Oh. Adam clutched at Calder, whose tentacles flexed soothingly around him.
Adam hadn’t thought of it quite like that before.
On the other hand, he’d always been likely to outlive his father, and he’d been aware that witches with familiars and his shifter friends—okay, mostly Joseph, but he’d work on being better about that—would almost certainly outlive him.
That was just life. Normal people, witches, and shifters all had different projected lifespans. But no one knew how long they’d have.
Except, apparently, if he bonded with a mythical shifter, there was a good chance he’d have centuries. (He couldn’t think about millennia. That was a bridge too far for his brain right now.)
And Calder knew him well. He’d already pointed out the thing that mattered most to Adam.
You wouldn’t have to worry that I would ever leave you.
Adam had come to see that the situation with his mom was more complicated than he’d grown up believing. And he hadn’t ever logically thought that someone would lure Calder away. But the idea that he had a guarantee that the two of them would be together for the rest of their lives?
Yeah, Adam wasn’t seeing any downsides with that.
“I know it’s a lot to think about,” Calder said carefully, because Adam had taken too long to respond.
Adam clutched the nearest tentacles and met those dark eyes. Calder’s face had settled into a carefully neutral expression.
“It is a lot, and yes, I’m sure I should think about it more,” Adam admitted. “We probably need to talk about things and all of that. But I get to keep you, and you get to keep me.” His eyes stung, and he blinked back tears. “Do you know how much that means to me?”
Calder’s whole expression softened, his eyes lighting up, somehow dark and bright at the same time, even more mesmerizing than the first time Adam had seen him. “Yes, sweetheart, I know exactly how much that means to you, because it means as much to me.”
“Take me to bed,” Adam instructed.
It was the middle of the afternoon—but it wasn’t like Adam was talking about going to sleep.
Calder rose to his feet, easily lifting Adam with his tentacles. Adam wrapped his legs around Calder’s waist, because while he was sure Calder wouldn’t drop him, he still felt a little more secure this way.
It wasn’t far to the bedroom, and Calder carefully lowered Adam onto the bed. Adam immediately began to strip out of his clothing—and when his shirt and arms got stuck on his head, Calder carefully extricated him. Those tentacles were useful.
Adam managed to get out of his pants all on his own, and by the time he was naked, so was Calder.
Gods, he was magnificent. His upper body was basically made of muscle, like he could support all those tentacles even if magic wasn’t involved. It was incredibly appealing.
It made Adam feel extremely deficient… except that Calder’s hot gaze was entirely appreciative as it scanned over Adam.
“You’re so beautiful,” Calder breathed.
Adam poked at his belly, feeling heat bloom on his face. “I know I’m not… very fit.”
Calder immediately crawled onto the bed, caging him in with arms and tentacles that suspended Calder above him in a way that made Adam’s heart beat faster and blood rush south.
His human hands stroked the soft skin of Adam’s abdomen.
“You are exactly what I want.”
Adam’s brow furrowed. “But would you want me more if I were more attractive?”
Calder’s expression was somehow fierce and soft at the same time.
“I cannot imagine you being more attractive than you already are, sweetheart. I don’t care about you because of your muscles or lack of muscles.
If you decide you want to develop more muscles, I’m sure I’ll like that.
If you gain ten more pounds or fifty or a hundred because your cakes are the most delicious things anyone has ever eaten, then I’ll like that as well.
I like you just as you are, however you are, I promise.
” He sounded incredibly earnest, meeting Adam’s gaze with fierce certainty. “You aren’t lacking in any way.”