11

 

 

The next morning, I’d woken up to find myself lying face down on the couch, covered in a soft comforter blanket. I was mortified when I saw the drool next to where my face had been. Damn. I had drooled in my sleep. Not sexy.

The elf was already in his kitchen making breakfast while he conversed happily to a very curious Siamese cat sitting on the counter next to him. The elf was making pancakes from scratch, from the looks of organic flour and mixing bowls. Tyrius had probably told him pancakes were my favorite—or his. Yeah, his most probably.

And yet, somehow waking up to the smell of fresh coffee on Gareth’s couch felt strangely intimate. Seeing him standing in his kitchen over his stove making pancakes made things more familiar, and even more intimate.

It didn’t help that the elf looked incredibly sexy as he cooked, the way his butt shook as he flipped the pancakes in his pan. He was wearing a simple black t-shirt that hugged his muscles perfectly, showing off his strong, powerful shoulders and wide back. His ass did look great in those jeans.

I was not crushing on him, but it was hard not to appreciate a man who was protective, strong, and had a damn sexy body like that. It left me with a mild sense of unease.

I have to get out of this house.

After using the bathroom, I’d plashed water on my face and washed under my arm pits. I needed a shower after last night’s fight with the werewolves, but there was no way I was taking one here, not at the elf’s place. I’d brushed my teeth after Gareth shouted from the kitchen that there was a spare toothbrush still in the box in the top vanity drawer and then settled myself at the kitchen table trying to think of something other than Gareth’s tight butt, which was seriously distracting.

“Look, Rowyn!” said Tyrius as he leaped from the counter and landed on the kitchen table. “Real pancakes! All from scratch! Not the frozen ones you stick in the toaster like when you do them. Only gran makes them from scratch, and that’s only on special occasions.” His eyes widened. “It feels like Christmas.”

I smiled at my furry friend. “It does. Except for the no-snow part.”

“And that right there,” said Tyrius as he crossed the table and tapped his paw on a tall glass bottle with a maple leaf on the label. “That’s real friggin’ maple syrup. Not the corn stuff. We have to take some back for Kora.” He spaced out for a moment, and I could see foam forming at the edges of his mouth.

“Your eyes are bugging out of their sockets,” I told him. “No coffee for you, Tyrius.”

“Screw the coffee,” said the cat. “I’m having real maple syrup.”

I frowned, knowing I was going to have a cat high on sugar in a few seconds. And that could get ugly. A felt a tightening in my gut as I shifted in my chair. “Did Gareth tell you what happened?” I didn’t know how long Tyrius or the elf had been awake. Seeing that Gareth had drunk a cup of coffee and he’d already finished preparing the pancakes, I would have to guess at least a half-hour.

Tyrius lost his excited energy as he sat next to my coffee mug. “He did,” said the cat, his shoulders slumped and his features creased in worry.

I shifted in my chair. My left arm still hurt, and I’d kept the brace on, knowing I needed another half-day for it to recover fully.

“I couldn’t go through with it, Tyrius.” I reached out with my right hand and wrapped my fingers around my mug, the ceramic nice and warm under my skin. “I couldn’t kill him. I knew I was condemning my grandmother, but it felt... wrong. I Hunt and kill for a living, but never the innocent. And now he’s dead.”

“Not your fault, Rowyn,” said Tyrius, though the worry wrinkle above his eyes was still there. “Don’t you think for one second that it was.”

I met Tyrius’s blue eyes. “But it was.”

“You didn’t want to kill the werewolf,” said Tyrius. “You had to, otherwise he would have killed Gareth.” I looked up in time to see Gareth flinch. “You changed your mind.”

“But I still ended up killing him in the end,” I said bluntly. “I still did it. I still ended up doing what Lisbeth wanted me to do all along.” Sighing, I took a sip of coffee. Damn that was good. I smacked my lips and said, “I should have stayed home. If I had stayed home, none of this would have happened.”

“Can’t think like that, woman,” said the cat as he took a sniff around the small opening of the maple syrup bottle. “The past is the past. You need to suck it up and move forward.”

“Yes, mother,” I told the cat as he beamed at me.

I took another sip of coffee, relishing the robust, warm liquid as it went down my throat. “Are you going to teach me pullomancy?” I asked the elf hopefully.

Gareth turned around and dropped two pancakes on the plate in front of me. “No,” he said without looking at me. He turned and placed his pan back on the hot burner.

I blinked, staring at him. “Why not? You said yourself that you wanted to help me. To teach me stuff. Why not teach me how to create elf dust?”

“Don’t forget the maple syrup,” interrupted Tyrius as he pushed the bottle towards me with his head. I leaned over and grabbed it. Then I poured a generous amount of the syrup over my two pancakes until they looked like they were swimming in it.

“No.” Gareth’s voice was blank as he reached over and poured more pancake mixture in the hot pan.

Frowning, I jabbed my fork into the pancake. “I’m going to need all the help I can get right now. The angels want me dead. The werewolves want me dead. Am I forgetting another race of supernatural creatures that want my ass? Cause I’m pretty sure at the rate I’m going, I’ll be dead in a month. I thought if you could teach me pullomancy, I’d stay alive to see another birthday.”

“No.”

My blood pressure rose, making my skin around my face steam. “What’s the matter with you? One minute you’re all nice and telling me that all you want is to help me, and when I ask for that help, you turn me down.” I gritted my teeth. “Is it because I’m not an elf?”

Gareth’s shoulders tensed a millimeter, but he never answered.

Furious, I clenched my jaw, wanting nothing more than to throw my plate at him, but the moment the fork and pancake made contact in my mouth, I’d forgotten why I was mad.

“Whoa,” I said, my mouth full. “These are really good pancakes.”

Gareth turned around, seemingly pleased that I enjoyed his cooking. “More?” he asked as he held a spatula to the pan.

My lips pressed together. “If you agree to teach me?”

The elf scowled and then, ignoring me, he plopped two more golden pancakes onto the plate next to Tyrius, who was shifting from one paw to the next like he was stepping on hot coals.

“Rowyn, the syrup?” asked the cat, licking his lips and looking ravenous.

I leaned over the table and poured another generous portion of maple syrup on Tyrius’s pancakes. The cat didn’t even wait until I stopped pouring before he had his head in the pancakes, resulting in some clumps of sticky syrup in his fur. That was not coming out.

I sat back with a loud thump. “Why not? Why the hell not?” I asked louder, feeling my blood pressure rise again as I let the bottle hit the table with a clunk. “I’m a fast learner. I can do spells. Okay, so they were all dark—who cares. I still did them. Me. Without any training I was able to magic myself into a faerie. Come on, Gareth. I can do this.”

Gareth’s eyes narrowed at the tone in my voice. “Are you schooled in elemental magic?”

“No,” I answered and then beamed at him. “But that’s why you’re going to teach me.”

“No.”

Now I was pissed. “You were able to knock out four werewolves with just one hit of your elf dust. Not one—four. Four goddamn, full-fledged weres. They’re coming for me, Gareth. You know it. And I’m not stupid enough to think I can survive another four werewolves without help. Without your elf dust.”

“I’m sorry, Rowyn,” said the elf as he busied himself with adding more pancake mixture to his hot pan. “But it’s a no.”

“You want me to die?” I accused belligerently. “You want my grandmother to find my mauled and half-eaten body sprawled on my living room floor?”

When Gareth turned back around, he looked livid. “Don’t. It’s not going to work.”

I slumped in my chair and glared at him. “It’s the truth. There’s only so much I can do with my soul blades. Having your kind of magic could save my ass.”

“I would have to agree with Rowyn on this one,” said Tyrius, his mouth full and his whiskers sticky with syrup. “If she can learn it without her being an elf, what’s the harm in teaching her? She’d make a good student.” The cat’s eyes fell on me and I beamed at him. Tyrius knew that Gareth held a soft spot for him, and he was milking it. Attaboy, Tyrius.

Gareth sighed in frazzled frustration. “Even if I said yes,” said the elf and a sliver of hope rose in me, “it would take you years before you could conjure up enough elemental energy for the elf dust to work. It’s not just throwing herbs into a pot, lighting candles, and saying an incantation. It takes concentration. Patience, which you obviously don’t have. And years of practice to get it right. You want to learn it to do it now, but it’s not possible. It takes time.”

“I’m a fast learner,” I said. “I can do this.”

The elf watched my face for a few seconds but then shook his head. “I’m sorry, Rowyn.”

“I saved your ass,” I said, my voice nearly a shout. I gripped my fork until I could feel the metal handle cut into my palm.

Tyrius let out a low whistle. “She’s got you there, elf.”

“You remember that? Huh? Do you?” I said, my cheeks feeling hot. “I killed an alpha to save your life. Doesn’t that count for anything? Doesn’t it get me some free elf magic lessons?”

The elf shook his head. “It’ll be a waste of both our time. Haven’t you heard a word I said? It would take too long. I’m sorry.”

“You’re sorry?” I seethed, my body tense.

“Duck,” warned Tyrius, his body low against the table.

Gareth looked at Tyrius. “What?”

Dropping my fork, I grabbed my last pancake off my plate and threw it at him. Yeah, that was probably childish, but I was ticked. Really ticked.

He ducked, and the pancake smacked against the wall and stayed there, adhered by the maple syrup glue.

Tyrius laughed and Gareth seemed too surprised to say anything. Still pissed as hell, I sat in my chair and didn’t say a word to the elf while I waited for Tyrius to finish his breakfast. The poor cat had gone through a lot last night. He needed his strength, and I wouldn’t keep him from his favorite breakfast food.

Things were about to get really ugly, and I didn’t mean wanting to stab the elf with my fork.