The link to my mother was throwing me. Hard. I couldn’t shake the impression of being led by the nose.
Mom was gone. Dad too. Had been for decades. They weren’t leaving breadcrumbs for their daughter to follow, but someone must be, and that guiding hand wasn’t letting me go until I figured out their hints.
“The thing in the cell is feeding on creatures who live in the swamp.” I flexed my hands in the bowl, delighted to discover my fingers could move independent of one another again. “You saw those bones.”
The wards were operational. The creatures ought to have been contained. This was no critical failure the sanctuary had to answer for. It was a deliberate trap-and-release scheme. But why? What was the point?
“I did.” He lifted his gaze to mine. “I would have been one more skeleton without you.”
“Your daemon thinks he’s invincible.” I bumped his shoe with mine. “He’s got to work on that.”
“He does seem to believe he’s an unstoppable force lately.”
“He’s showing off.” I read between the lines. “For me.”
“He can be reckless, thoughtless, at times. He can’t bear the idea of you being hurt.”
True, but he had cause to think highly of his prowess.
“How can you win every single fight against every single challenger and not begin to feel invincible?”
“Challenges are about brute strength. No magic allowed. No weapons allowed. That makes it easy.”
There was nothing easy about taking down a daemon, even for a black witch.
“He’s not an unthinking brute.” I set my jaw. “And, yes, I’m defending you against you.”
“I appreciate the vote of confidence.” Asa leaned forward, thought about kissing me, noticed the goop still on my skin, and withdrew. “Clay would never let us live it down if we got stuck together.”
A snort blasted out of me, and I couldn’t stop the laughter that followed. “That would be so hot.”
The corners of his eyes crinkled. “We would be stuck together forever.”
“Stuck is a strong word.” I heard how that sounded and bit the inside of my cheek. “So is forever.”
“I don’t need the promise of forever.” He resumed cleaning me. “Just let me stay for now.”
“I can do that.” I wiggled my fingers. “And not just because Clay is a crybaby wimp who ditched his former partner to suffocate in spider butt gunk while he rocked on the ground and sucked his thumb.”
“I heard that,” Clay bellowed from the living room. “Privacy is an illusion.”
Among the paranormal set, yes, it was, and there was no changing that. Either you learned to live with it, or you spent the rest of your life setting circles or casting spells to ensure no one overheard the banal parts of your day. Or the mushy ones. As much as I would love to hoard Asa’s sweet words, I had been a witch too long to bother wasting magic on frivolity.
With another trek through the sanctuary on tap for tomorrow night, I was happy saving mine in case the giant talking spider had equally chatty friends.