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I keep going before cowardice can improve its argument. “I thought about it after I left, and the hunger spiked so hard I nearly lit up in an alley. It wasn’t like before, Sable. It wasn’t loose. It wasn’t looking for whatever was nearest. It was her. Her pulse, her scent, her…” I stop because the rest of the sentence is not safe in my mouth. “If I get close and it decides wanting is the same thing as feeding, I could kill her.”
“You do not know that.”
“It is close enough when the risk is her soul.”
Sable’s expression softens. “Corin, listen to me.”
“I am listening.”
“No, you are building a prison in your head and calling it responsibility.”
I laugh once, bitterly. “That sounds like something responsible people say about prisons.”
“You came home. You regulated. You did not hurt anyone.”
“This time.”
She steps closer until I have to look at her. “Rhazek told you hunger denied becomes hunger distorted.”
“Rhazek also throws people through walls when they annoy him, so maybe we do not make him our sole moral philosopher.”
“He knows infernal instinct.”
“He is infernal instinct wearing expensive boots.”
“And he taught you control.”
That shuts me up, which is rude.
Sable touches my sleeve, not my skin, and her voice lowers. “What did the pull do when you walked away?”
“It got worse.”
Her eyes sharpen again. “Worse how?”
“Painful. Not physically exactly, but close enough. Like the distance was wrong.”
“And when you turned toward her?”
“It eased.”
She nods slowly, already filing that away in the infuriating part of her brain labeled useful facts my brother would rather ignore. “That sounds like a bond attempting proximity.”
“That sounds like a curse with romantic aspirations.”
“It may be stabilizing.”
“It nearly made me glow in public.”
“Because you fought it while panicking.”
“Ah, well, forgive me for being dramatic about the mysterious lady-bond trying to make me stroll into a dark elf estate and lick the window.”
Sable’s mouth twitches despite herself. “Please do not lick noble windows. They probably ward against that specifically.”
“I hate that you’re making jokes.”
“I learned from a fool.”
