Page 185 of Tamed By Her Touch

His expression and the feelings she was getting from him worried Clair more than anything else.

“I cannot talk about this here,” he said at last.

A faint sensation brushed against the inside of her mind again—grief so deep it made her chest hurt. Then it vanished behind that invisible wall.

She drew in a slow breath.

“You’re blocking me,” she accused silently.

Blocking her from what? She didn’t know but she knew it was happening.

“I don’t know exactly what you’re doing,” Clair continued, “but I can feel you in my head, and every time something slips through, you shove it away. So whatever this is, you know more than you’re telling me.”

His face tightened.

“Clair, please,” he murmured and there was so much pain in those two words that her anger softened despite herself.

“All right,” she said quietly. “Not here.”

Relief flickered across his face.

“Thank you.”

“But we are talking about it later,” she clarified.

The big Hybrid looked away.

“We will talk,” he said at last.

“Soon,” Clair emphasized.

“Yes.” He nodded.

She studied him for a moment longer, not entirely convinced. Then Maera cleared her throat gently.

“There is one other thing,” she said.

Clair groaned.

“Of course there is.”

Maera smiled.

“Nothing alarming. The Council has asked to see you both once you have recovered enough to attend.”

Clair frowned.

“Are we in trouble?”

“Quite the opposite. Varell has already transmitted the preliminary evidence from Sendar’s confession and Kaelus’s data files. The Council wishes to formally recognize what the two of you have accomplished,” Maera said.

Clair looked at Kaelus and saw that his eyes were still on the floor.

“And,” Maera continued, “There is the matter of the Vow of the Goddess.”

Clair looked at her in surprise.

“I thought we didn’t need to do that anymore.”