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I looked over to where Tres and Alice both stood.
“He’s your responsibility,” Beatrice said with a shooing gesture. “He was bound to you before he died.”
“But—"
“Take your subjects for now and leave. I will remove the corpse. By morning, you may return.”
“My what? They are not—”
“The boy is bonded to you. You wouldn’t let me kill the murderess.” Beatrice ticked them off on her fingers. “And you already made yourself clear about the faery. They are yours.”
I followed her as sheflowedto the front porch. “At least keep Tres—”
“You do realize I can hear you?” Tres said.
Beatrice walked deeper into the shadows of the house and said, “I’m not ready to answer anything else tonight. I have companies to oversee. Inquiries. Go home, daughter.”
“Not your daughter.”
Beatrice’s laughter echoed around the room. It wasn’t a complex bit of magic, but it was one that left me shivering.
Be careful, her voice slid into my mind.There are those in this world and inElphamenot kind to abominations like us. Go, now. I will handle the corpse and evidence. If you want any of their lives ended, leave them here. Odem is fine. Your newdraugris as safe as any in your command. More so than a human or fae.
I looked up and met her gaze.
“Will you take your subjects and leave?” Beatrice asked. I heard the alternative echoing in my head, her offer to rid me of any of them.
“Come,” I said, looking at Tres, Alice, and Eli in turn. This was my life now; I had the responsibility of three lives. The alternative was their deaths, and I wasn’t that much of an abomination.
I hadn’t answered all of my questions, but I was alive.
We stepped outside, and I texted Jesse, Sera, and Christy, “Meet at bar? Alive. Could use a drink. Tres, Eli, and Alice C with me. Will explain there.”
Honestly, I wasn’t sure how to explain, but my friends still loved me despite my ancestry, Eli was at my side more-or-less contently, and I was about to have a drink with adraugrand my almost-murderess. It wasn’t the worst plan I’d had that month.
Hopefully.
