Page 262 of May: Bloom & Bane

“You are not corrupting the bunny,” I murmur.

“I have absolutely no idea what you mean.”

Droot steals one of Damon’s earrings.

“Let’s go, nephew,” Damon whispers. “Uncle Damon will even pierce your ears. Our secret.”

Droot flinches slightly.

“On that thought… let’s do clip-ons. There is no shame in accessible fashion.” He tilts his head, a smile tugging at one corner of his mouth. “My Little Bird is here.”

Damien emerges from the treeline, his gait uneven, left leg dragging through the snow with every step. He stops at the edge of the clearing, a dark hood covering his face. He stares at Ashán kneeling in the middle of it with his mate gathered against his chest. His shoulders drop an inch and he lets out a shaky breath, something in his milky eyes cracks wide open.

He crosses the clearing as quickly as his bad leg will allow. He’s smiling. I have never seen him do that before. It changes his entire face—it takes the grave off him. He drops into the snow in front of Ashán and grips him by the back of the neck like a brother. “Ashán, you did it!”

“I did it,” Ashán smiles.

“Eden—” Damien’s head snaps to her belly. “She’s⁠—”

“She’s fine,” Eden says, crying and laughing at the same time. “She’s just fine, Damien.”

He drops his forehead against my son’s, and lets out a raspy laugh. Neither of them lets go of the other.

“I thought I’d killed you,” he says quietly.

“You didn’t.”

Damien’s hand slides from the back of Ashán’s neck, over his shoulder. And he goes very still. His eyes lock onto the twin masses of scar rising from either side of his spine. They’re layered, ring inside ring inside ring, the shadow scarred so many times it has gone hard and dense as knotted wood.

Twelve. You can count them.

Damien’s thumb passes over the outermost ring, very slowly, his smile long gone.

“Damien,” Ashán says.

“I did this.”

“No.”

“I can count them.” His voice has gone hollow, hand trembling where it rests on his back. “There are twelve, Ashán. I can feel every one of them. I did⁠—”

“Look at me,” Ashán says.

Damien is entranced, staring at that scarred, empty place until his breathing starts to stutter.

“I said I couldn’t cut,” he whispers. “I told you I couldn’t cut. And then I did it twelve times, and I got good at it.” His throat bobs. “By the ninth time I wasn’t even shaking anymore. What kind of man stops shaking?”

“Damien.” Ashán reaches back, closing an enormous clawed hand around Damien’s forearm and pulls until Damien is looking at him. “Do you want to know what those scars are?”

Damien doesn’t answer.

Ashán turns him until he is looking at Eden—at the flushed, freckled, breathing woman curled against his chest.

“Look.”

Damien finally lifts his eyes.

“That,” Ashán says, his voice cracking, “is what those scars bought.”