Chapter 25
DAVID
The month the natives labeled Ottalia was nearly ended before David admitted he’d made a mistake. Autumn had attempted to take Anna’s place in the library, but she couldn’t stand silence or reading or books in general, so he was more irritated by her cheerful presence than anything.
He missed Anna. It had been a mistake letting her slip through his fingers.
For his mother, of all people.
After training one afternoon, instead of studying, Autumn had taken to playing a game where she flipped a book onto her hands cover-up, scoring points for each revolution before it landed. David stared at her for several minutes, wishing he’d just agreed to Anna’s ultimatum.
“I think you might be trying to annoy me into spending time with my mother,” he said.
The book landed square on Autumn’s open palm, and she beamed. “Did you see that? Three spins!”
He sighed. “You can go, you know. I’m a big boy.”
“I don’t mind,” she said. “I hate thinking of you down here alone.”
“I’d rather be alone,” he muttered under his breath.
“No, you wouldn’t.” She flashed him a smile and threw the book again. “What do you think Cole’s doing?”
“I literally don’t care.”
“He’s probably still in the infirmary,” she said, ignoring him. “Hey, are you hungry?”
Frustration rumbled in his chest, and he resorted to grossly exaggerated threats. “I will murder you and your whole family if you don’t quit.”
She only laughed. “You don’t know my family.”
David snatched the book from the air and tossed it to the table. “I’ll find them.”
Her smile wouldn’t fade. “You are grumpy. Are you really so offended that she chose your mother instead of you?”
“I’m not—” He stopped to moderate the volume of his voice. “I’m not offended.”
Autumn scrunched her face into an insultingly disbelieving expression, and the frustration swelled to true anger.
For most people, anger was hot—it provoked hostility and impulsivity—but years of emotional torture had bled the heat out of David.
His anger was cold, making his thoughts sharpen and turn calculating.
“Have you told Cole yet that you want to fuck him?” he asked.
Autumn’s joyful expression froze.
“Just wondering how he reacted to learning you want to use him as a sex slave.”
Her still-smiling face managed to scowl. “I know what you’re doing.”
“Oh, you haven’t told him yet? I could do it, if you want. He’d probably be happy to oblige—”
“David,” she said in a whiny tone. “Lumás are not slaves. They’re cherished.”
He ignored her. “Oh, wait. But he thinks you’re unhinged because you’re staring at him all the time, looking like you want to eat him.” David sucked in a breath. “Might want to dial back the psycho a little.”
She crossed her arms, but her emotions were still ecstatic, and now they were also amused, like she thought this was one big game. Had he lost his edge or something? He could usually hit a person’s insecurities square on the head, but Autumn wasn’t bothered by it.
“At least I don’t have mommy issues,” she said.
He sat back in his chair, glaring at her. “I don’t have mommy issues. I have daddy issues that translate into mommy issues. It’s totally different.”
“Right. This is exactly why I’m not going to let you sit down here alone and sulk.” She grabbed the book and tossed it into the air again.
“I’m not sulking.” Each word came out cutting, proving that he was, in fact, sulking.
“Anna is a good friend for you to have. You shouldn’t cut her out just because she chose your mother.”
“That’s not what I’m doing.”
Autumn raised a brow. “Have you forgotten I can hear your thoughts? You’re all in your feelings about it, and I know exactly how much you think about her.”
The urge to deny it scraped against his self-control, but he managed to stay quiet.
“She’s the only one who took a chance on you, right? The only one who chose to trust you? She defends you. She spent time on you. She likes you.”
“I offered to help her, and she ran away. She doesn’t trust me. She’s clearly scared of me.”
“Learning that sort of skill from someone like you had to be intimidating.”
The insult washed over him, chilled and salty. “What do you mean, someone like me?”
She rolled her eyes. “You’re so smart, and yet you’re still just a man. You understand nothing.”
“Spell it out for me, then.”
Autumn laughed. Truly laughed. She hid her face in her hands and cackled.
When she finally looked at him, it was with affectionate pity.
“You are very good looking, and you exist in this miasma of mystery and temptation. No one is immune to that kind of seduction, David. It drips from everything you do. People say they’re scared, but what they really are is intrigued. ”
Okay. Well… That was horrible information. It couldn’t have been true. He spent the majority of his energy hiding. Why the fuck would that be tempting to anyone?
“To top it off, you ration your smiles.” Autumn leaned forward, elbows on the table.
“But you save the best ones for her, especially when you’re baiting her for attention.
She’s noticed, David. So when you offer to take her to a private place and whisper temptation into her ear, can you not see how that would be slightly unnerving? Maybe even a little tantalizing?”
“She’s a pixie,” he felt compelled to point out. “Pixies don’t…”
How to finish that? He’d read everything he could find on the Pixie Effect, and each book was clear—their sex drive woke only with the experience of falling in love. This was the one thing he’d never questioned with Anna, that the prospect of sex was squarely within the impossible.
“They do when feelings are involved,” Autumn said.
“Feelings? What are you even… This—you—are wrong.”
Autumn snorted. “I can hear how much she thinks about you, too.”
Ugh. He didn’t need to know that. After meeting that pixie, the constant sense of isolation that had accompanied him since childhood had been crumbling away, and he’d found himself craving more and more of her.
It had never occurred to him the draw might be reciprocal.
The absurdity of a woman like her—a pixie, no less—wanting anything deeper than a tidal pool of a relationship with him, especially since he’d be a keila, had kept things fairly straight in his head.
It was easy to not imagine the inconceivable.
Didn’t stop the dreams that had begun to wake him up at night, teaching him how easy it was to want things he couldn’t have or to wonder how those things tasted.
Autumn dropped her voice. “Why is it so hard for you to imagine that people might like you?”
“Because no one ever has,” he said honestly.
“Anna does. Stop pushing her away.”
He didn’t want to push her away. He wanted to carry her right back to this table where she belonged.
“Then do it!” Autumn said and tossed the book again.
Fed up, David stood. “You are the most obnoxious creature in the world.”
She lit up with a megawatt smile. “Thanks! That’s what big sisters do best. We annoy.”
A rush of warmth spread through David’s veins, laced with affection. Big sister? Was that what she considered herself?
“Yep,” she said. “Siblings by fire. It’s stronger than blood, by the way. So keep being a jerk. It won’t change a thing.”
He groaned out a sigh. “I really like you, you know. It’s very inconvenient.”
She smiled. “I know.”
A quick peck to Autumn’s temple, and he was gone.
So…
He wasn’t offended.
He wasn’t.
But also…he was kind of offended. He had offered a piece of himself to Anna, volunteered to give her something he’d never given anyone—a window into his life—and she’d spurned it.
No. She hadn’t spurned. She’d asked for more.
I want you both.
As if his mother, a woman who lived in this cushy, beautiful place, could understand even a portion of what the coercive magic could do. Her life had never been threatened for it. Her skin had never been torn open. Her bones never broken.
David had the coercion down to a precise science. He knew exactly how to control it. Knew the shape and feel of it. Knew with horrifying accuracy what he could do with it.
Elenya Manae had no claim on Anna. She was his.
Not his.
That wasn’t what he meant.
Or…
Was it?
Why are you arguing with yourself?
Fuck it. If Anna wanted a teacher, he was the best one she’d ever get, and meandering up to Galadaine’s study, David was…well, not determined to prove it to her because that would imply he cared in some fashion.
And he didn’t care.
He merely wanted to hear her admit she was wrong.
But now, thanks to Autumn the meddler, his sensible thoughts had been confiscated by a thief of irrational possibilities. Blue eyes. Soft skin. I can hear how much she thinks about you.
David stopped dead in the middle of the hallway, causing strangers to glance his way.
Fuck. When did Anna Ainslan crawl so deep under his skin? She was a fucking pixie. Off-limits.
First of all, he didn’t save smiles for her. The notion was ridiculous. Second of all, how often was Autumn near enough to Anna to determine the amount of time she spent thinking about him? And why did she bring his looks into all this?
Good looks equated to nothing. Take Isobel, for instance.
David forced himself to keep moving, to cross through the Sunshine Room without looking at any of the folks inside.
By now, he was used to the surreptitious glances and outright glares, but prickles of awareness rose the hairs on his neck anyway.
The old habit of glancing over his shoulder, of anticipating an attack was a hard one to kick.
The door to Galadaine’s study was closed, and David fingered the handle, debating. What would he even say when he entered? What reason could he give them for showing up unannounced after a month of silence?
His thumb pressed the lever before he’d truly decided to enter, and the door swung open easily.
The sounds of paradise drifted to him from the adjacent room.
He couldn’t make out the words, but he caught the velvety tone, and though the magic wasn’t aimed at him, it slinked into his blood, heating him from the inside out.