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“Because.” He shrugged, eyes still on me, yet this time I chose to focus just beneath them. “You spend more time with him. Because you show him more affection. Because you accepted him first. Shall I go on?”
“And why doyouhate it when I callhimsweet?” I dug my claws in, using the smallest pressure when his hold on me tightened. Any more and he would crush my bones and damage my lungs.
A thought crossed my mind, and before I had time to reword it or even reconsider, the words had already rolled down my tongue.
“You can’t possibly want me to callyousweet?”
Sharp pain burned my jaw before acracksounded in my ears. I yelped, letting go of his head to dig my claws into his wrist instead, terrified because he’d moved so fast—toofast for me to see his hand shooting for my jaw until he gripped it hard.
He knew such a pressure would crack my jaw.
He knew, and he used it.
There was a sharp heat, an unrelenting throb like a hammer continuously ramming against my jawbone. I could not suppress the low whines that echoed deep in my throat.
“Little Elf.” The pressure tightened, and I let out a loud, sharp cry, my claws prodding as deep into his wrists as they could, but that didn’t faze him. “For your own safety,never, and I meanever, call a Spidersweet.”
The word was spat out like it was poison in his mouth, acidic and sickening. I couldn’t understand how such alovingterm could cause so much hostility and hatred. It petrified me, rattled my spine in a manner that he noticed.
He leaned closer, his bared fangs directed atme, his eyes flaring in a way that had my own instantly closing.
“Not a mild Karru and certainly not an aggressive Cyrva. Eon may not show it, but he hates it just the same. He just hides it better than me.”
His fingers pressed harder, and I couldn’t handle the pressure any longer, the shriek that left my lips loud and piercing even to my own ears.
“Do you understand?”
I didn’t understand, but I nodded desperately either way.
Only then did he loosen his grip, his fingers lingering on my face as heat emanated from them. My skin soaked up every drop like it was medicine. My jawbone began to go numb until there was only a faint tingle where it had previously throbbed.
“Don’t say or do anything reckless, little Elf,” he said,softly, and I still had my eyes closed. “Anyone else would have killed you.”
“You hurt me,” I whispered, voice so small and weak.
Slowly, En’s hands moved on my face, and I snapped my eyes open, watching as he pressed his forehead against mine. He closed his own eyes, his lashes fluttering like the wings of a black butterfly.
“Some lessons are painful to learn. Another would give you no warning or mercy.”
My bottom lip quivered. “Why?”
“Because you don’t mean anything to them.”
My breath faltered.
He opened his eyes slowly, only a little so that I didn’t see the blinding fire in them. “I can never be soft, little Elf.”
Liar.“Then why are you holding me gently?”
“Because I could destroy you.”
My teeth sunk into my bottom lip.“But you won’t?”
“Because I need you.”
Because I mean something to you.
The situation would have been much less complicated if he could simply use words, but he didn’t have control of that. He wasn’t raised the same way I was. He wasn’t taught the same values and morals as me.
