“Do you like working for Tristan?”
Eli jutted his chin towards Reba. “You’d have to ask him that; I’ve never worked for Tristan. Only you.” He grinned. “Which I enjoy very much.” It struck Austin as an entirely genuine response.
Austin turned back to Liam. “Have you eaten yet?”
As he turned, a disturbance in the sand caught his eye. He stepped to the side and looked past Liam, eyes widening in alarm. The storm surge had retreated, and the ocean was once more a mile down the beach, though what it had left behind was far from the gleaming white shore it had risen to cover the night before.
The beach was cratered, large gouges torn into grey earth and dark stone. The centre of the crater, the deepest, darkest spot, was halfway down the beach where Austin’s nest had been. From there, it spread out, spiralling upwards and outwards to form an uneven, jagged basin. Even when it levelled off, the environment was changed; nowhere down the beach was thereany sand. Instead, it was a broad rock face dotted with boulders, spread out as if they’d been haphazardly tossed.
The porch steps ended at the edge of the basin, so perfectly aligned that it boggled the mind to imagine it as anything but deliberate.
Charybdis.
Austin looked over his shoulder, but Tristan had gone, so he looked left, to Liam. Liam gazed steadily back at him and said nothing. Austin turned the other way again as Eli sidled up to him, sliding both arms around Austin’s, a gentle smile in place.
“I thought it might be fun to host a game. Fighting on the sand is one thing—the Troop trains in that sand pit all the time—but fighting down there?” Eli gazed into the crater. “Nowthatwould be entertaining. We have the green tea you like. Shall I pour you a cup?”
Austin made an indistinct sound in reply. As Eli poured it, Austin glanced at Reba, who had been sitting silent and wary. “Have you eaten?”
Reba nodded.
“From the kitchen?”
Reba’s great wings trembled slightly.
Austin started to look accusingly at Tristan, but he was still gone. “I said you could eat from the kitchen,” he said, voice sharp, but not quite hurting anyone yet.
Eli put aside the teapot and unceremoniously shoved a cracker with cheese into Reba’s mouth. “I told you.” He looked to Austin. “He was told. I think he needed to hear it from you, though.”
Reba struggled with the mouthful, chewed, and swallowed in a lump so large it was visible in his throat on the way down. Austin stared until Reba picked up another cracker and bit into it, his eyes flashing quickly toward Austin and away.Austin went to his chaise lounge and sat, releasing several long, calming breaths.
Austin didn’t look at Reba. He stared instead toward the crater, the end result of the destructive force he’d unleashed last night. “I didn’t mean what I said. I was upset after Laurence.” Austin hatedadmitting that Connor’s stepbrother had got under his skin. Yet somehow, the idea of Reba not getting to eat Lassie’s cooking because of him itched beyond skin, into bone. “You can eat whatever you like whenever you like, and you don’t have to learn how to fly to do it.”
Austin kept his eyes pointedly away from Reba. His pride wouldn’t bend enough for eye contact.
“Laurence?” Liam questioned. He leaned against the porch railing, arms still crossed.
Austin picked at the silk sheet of his chair, the pace of his heart rising. He’d rather not think of that mess from yesterday, but the loss of the pendant that blocked his powers hurt. Liam could have been wearing it this very second. Reluctantly, he said, “His friend had a pendant that blocks my power.”
Liam stiffened. “He attacked you?”
Austin shot him an annoyed look. “Why would he attack me? I asked Tristan to get something that shields against my voice.”
“You’re not wearing anything like that,” Liam said, stern.
Austin blinked. Wearing it himself hadn’t occurred to him. Would that contain his voice fromall,rather than just one? “It was going to be for you.”
Surprise flashed across Liam’s face, then a peculiar expression Austin couldn’t identify. “I don’t need something like that.”
“No! You’d rather I give you headaches every day instead?” Austin burst out.
“Your voice only hurts when you’re genuinely upset,” Liam replied.
“Like now!”
“No, actually. You’re fine now.”
An indescribable annoyance swept through Austin. He sat up from his reclined position, teeth bared. “Only yesterday I banned Reba from eating unless he learned to fly.”
