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“Don’t turn on the light,” she said with her back to him. “Cian was right, there are more outside still. If you pay attention, you can sense them. They move like shadows, but there’s movement—more a sense of movement. They’ll go soon, I think. To whatever hole they burrow in during the day.”
“You should rest.”
“I know you say that because you’re concerned, and I’m calm enough now not to take your head off for it. I know I behaved poorly upstairs. I don’t really care.”
“You’re tired, as I am. I want to wash, and I want to sleep.”
“You have your own room. And that was uncalled for,” she continued before he could speak. Now she turned. Her face seemed very pale in the dark, pale against the dark robe she wore. “I’m not as calm as I thought. You had no right, no right, to stand in front of me up there.”
“Every right. Love gives me the right. And even without that, if a man doesn’t shield a woman from harm—”
“Stop right there.” She held up a hand, palm out, as if to block his words. “This isn’t about men and women. It’s about humans. The seconds you took to think of me, to worry for me could have cost you your life. We can’t spare it, neither of us. Any of us. If you don’t trust that I can defend myself—that all of us can, we’re nowhere.”
That her words made sense didn’t matter a whit as far as he was concerned. He could still see the way that monster had leaped on her. “And where would you be if I hadn’t destroyed that thing?”
“Different. A different matter.” She moved closer now so that he could scent her, the lotions she used on her skin. So utterly female.
“This is foolishness, and a waste of time.”
“It’s not foolish to me, so listen up. Fighting with and protecting fellow soldiers is one thing, a vital thing. We all have to be able to count on each other. But to brush me back from battle is another. You have to understand and accept the difference.”
“How can I, when it’s you, Glenna? If I lost you—”
“Hoyt.” She gripped his arms, a kind of impatient comfort. “Any or all of us might die in this. I’m fighting to understand and accept that. But if you die, I won’t live with the responsibility of knowing it was for me. I won’t do it.”
She sat on the side of the bed. “I killed tonight. I know how it feels to end something. To use my power to do that, something I never thought I’d do, need to do.” She held out her hands to study them. “I did it to save another human being, and still it weighs on me. I know that if I’d done it with stake or sword I’d accept it more easily. But I used magic to destroy.”
She lifted her face to his, and the sorrow was deep in her eyes. “This gift was always so bright, and now there’s a darkness in it. I have to understand and accept that, too. And you have to let me.”
“I accept your power, Glenna, and what you can and will do with it. I think all of us would be better served by it if you worked solely on the magicks.”
“And left the bloody work to you? Off the front line, out of harm’s way, stirring my cauldron?”
“Twice this night I nearly lost you. So you’ll do as I say.”
It took a moment to find her voice. “Well, in a pig’s eye. Twice this night I faced death, and I survived.”
“We’ll discuss this further tomorrow.”
“Oh no, oh no, we won’t.” She flicked out a hand, slammed the door to the bathroom inches before he reached it.
He whirled back, a man obviously at the end of his tether. “Don’t slap your power out at me.”
“Don’t slap your manhood out at me. And that didn’t come out the way I meant it.” Because there was laughter tickling the back of her throat right along with the temper, she took a breath. “I won’t snap to, Hoyt, when you order it, any more than I expect you will for me. You were frightened for me, and oh boy, do I understand that, because I was frightened for me. And for you, for all of us. But we have to get past it.”
“How?” he demanded. “How is that done? This love is new for me, this need and this terror that goes with it. When we were called for this, I thought it would be the hardest thing I’d ever done. But I was wrong. Loving you is harder, loving you and knowing I could lose you.”
All of her life, she thought, she’d waited to be loved like this. What human didn’t? “I never knew I could feel so completely for anyone. This is new for me, too, hard and scary and new. And I wish I could say you won’t lose me. I wish I could. But I know the stronger I am, the better chance I have of staying alive. The stronger each one of us is, the better chance we have of surviving this. Of winning.”
She stood again. “I looked at King tonight, a man I’d come to like quite a lot. I looked at what they’d made of him. What they made of him wanted my blood, my death, would have rejoiced in it. Seeing that, knowing that, hurt beyond the believing of it. He was a friend. He became a friend so quickly.”
Her voice trembled, so that she had to turn away, move back to the window and the dark. “There was a part of me, even as I tried to save myself, that saw what he had been—the man who’d cooked with me, sat with me, laughed with me. I couldn’t use my powers against him, couldn’t pull it out of me to do that. If Cian hadn’t…” She turned back now, straight and slim.
“I won’t be weak again. I won’t hesitate a second time. You have to trust me for that.”
“You called out for me to run. Would you say that was putting yourself in front of me in battle?”
She opened her mouth, closed it again. Cleared her throat. “Seemed like the thing to do at the time. All right, all right. Point made and taken. We’ll both work on it. And I’ve some ideas on weaponry that might be helpful. But before we put this, and ourselves to bed, I want to cover one more thing.”
