WASHING the ash out of his cut hurt, though having Leo play nurse took some of the sting out. So did the ice-blue mint he took from his stash—an analgesic he usually kept on hand for the times he burned himself making candy.
“Those things aren’t addictive, are they?” Leo asked, pulling on a pair of latex gloves as they sat at the kitchen table. He reached for a sterile cotton pad and the bottle of rubbing alcohol.
“Nah. Magic.” Cole lifted the shoulder of his uninjured hand. “I mean, I guess long-term effects on the brain probably haven’t been studied by scientists or anything. But I’ve never heard of anyone getting addicted. Maybe just to the candy.”
“Sugar addiction is real,” Leo agreed, his fingers gentle on Cole’s wrist as he turned the palm up. The magic didn’t numb everything, so it still hurt when Leo gently pressed on the flesh to make sure there was no ash left in the wound.
Though Leo was careful, the rubbing alcohol made Cole grimace, the harsh scent stinging his nose.
“This is pretty deep. You should probably have stitches.” Leo raised his eyes to Cole’s face. “And maybe ask the nurse for advice before you cut your hand for a damn blood sacrifice next time. The outside of your arm would’ve been better. You’ve seen too many dumb movies.”
Cole flushed. He would have liked to say he’d picked his hand for a good reason, but in truth, he hadn’t thought about it. He’d never done this sort of protection spell before—or any other kind of blood magic. “I guess I’ll have to suffer.” His stomach lurched a bit as Leo sterilized a needle, and he looked away out the window just as Niamh flew in.
She didn’t say anything to Leo—apparently he was still on her shit list—but she cocked her head at Cole. “Really? You cut your palm?”
Leo snorted quietly but said nothing, just adjusted Cole’s arm so it rested comfortably on the throw pillow he’d borrowed from the couch. “Try not to look. I’ll be as gentle as I can.”
Cole bit his lip and kept his eyes on Niamh, thinking about the other thing he needed to find. Something that would protect Leo when he wasn’t home with Cole. Cole had never heard of an amulet so powerful that it would actively repel anyone who sought to do the wearer harm, but certain trinkets would grant some amount of luck when it came to evading such people. The problem was that most required an item of some significance—heirloom jewelry worked best, since it could usually be worn inconspicuously, but Cole didn’t have any, and he wouldn’t ask Gran. Items made by the spellcaster could also work, but Cole doubted any of his candies would stand up to the magic he’d need to put inside them. They’d probably melt and Leo would get a sugar burn.
“Cole?” Leo prodded.
Cole looked over without meaning to and saw that Leo had finished the stitches while he’d been thinking. Seven tiny, precise lines down the center of his palm. That gave him an idea.
“Do you have anything better than Polysporin?” Leo asked.
Actually, Cole did, somewhere in the back of his fridge, provided it hadn’t spoiled.
It hadn’t, and Leo applied some of the salve to Cole’s cut before carefully wrapping his hand in a layer of gauze. “There,” Leo said, and finished the whole thing off with a kiss to Cole’s knuckles. “Finished.”
Cole wanted to get started on his amulet idea, but before he could say as much, Leo yawned hugely, and Cole followed suit. Perhaps that could wait until morning. After all, they’d be safe here. “Bed?” Leo asked hopefully.
“Yes, please.”
It had been a long time since Cole had shared a bed with a partner on a regular basis. He wasn’t sure he’d ever done it with sex completely off the table. He thought it would be strange, brushing his teeth next to someone else, crawling into bed with them, making room in his sleep routine for another person. And it had been, a bit, the first day or two—he had double sinks in the master bath, but their elbows bumped while they brushed, and Cole liked to read the news in bed on his phone before he went to sleep, but Leo made grumbly noises at the light.
But when he closed his eyes at last, Leo’s steady breathing filled his ears. Leo got him—for some strange reason Leo loved him. And if Cole had his way, he would never be alone again.
“I AM a genius,” Cole said after breakfast, having dug a ball of yarn and a pair of needles out from where he’d stashed them in the altar room.
Leo simply raised his eyebrows before going back to the book Cole had lent him. It was old—definitely older than Cole, probably older than Gran—and discussed the theory behind simple hedge magic. Leo seemed engrossed.
“I am an idiot,” Cole sighed two minutes later, setting the needles down. He couldn’t do much with a slash across his palm; the bandage seriously messed with his dexterity.
This time Leo put the book down entirely. “I didn’t know you knit.”
Cole shrugged. “I’m not very good. Especially right now.” He waved his bandaged hand. “Kate taught me years ago, said I should learn even if I’m not much of a spellcaster. And she was right, because in theory I should be able to weave a protection spell into a scarf or something—if I could actually use both hands.”
“Hmm. Can I?” Leo asked, reaching for the yarn. Then he picked up the scissors and cut a few foot-long strands. He tied the ends together. “What if you just…?”
Cole considered. “It might work. Three-strand is probably too simple to hold it all, but let me cut a few more and see.” He’d be pretty embarrassed if the protection bracelet he made his boyfriend overloaded, caught fire, and burned him.
Eventually he made it work with fourteen strands, though the ends of the bracelet weren’t pretty and the whole thing looked amateur. But fourteen strands contained the spell Cole wove into it, along with a spray of lavender, without any sign of strain. He was tying it around Leo’s wrist when his phone beeped.
Kate Alpin, the display informed him. Oh good. Just what Cole needed: prying questions from well-meaning family members. Probably a not-so-subtle reminder that Gran expected him at dinner today too. Well, too bad. If Gran wanted to see him, she could call him herself. Until then, Cole had better things to do.
He finished off the knot and raised his eyes to Leo’s. “So,” he said, “wanna play hooky?”
THE parking lot at the nature preserve had one spot remaining when they arrived, and it was a good thing they’d taken Cole’s car, because Leo’s SUV wouldn’t have fit. Cole, though, slipped in without any trouble, feeling, ironically, a bit like a kid in the candy store.
“Why’s it so busy?” Leo asked, frowning, closing the car door behind him.
Cole grabbed his hand and started tugging him toward the trail that led through the forest to the lakeshore. “You’ll see.”
Most of the tourists they passed coming back wore binoculars around their necks or carried expensive cameras, and they all had a certain bounce to their step. Leo cocked his head at them, but otherwise he seemed content to let Cole carry on with his surprise.
“It’s nice here,” Leo commented, taking in the scenery. “Nicer if it was quiet, though, maybe.”
“This park is as far south as you can go in Canada. There’s actually a sandbar that sticks out into the lake—well, sometimes.” Cole smiled up at him. “Good place to do magic, if you have an active power.” Sometimes his family rented out one of the pavilions for one of the witches’ Sabbaths, especially Beltane and Lammas; the park closed too early to do the entire celebration here, but the kids loved it.
Cole didn’t say that out loud, though. Thinking of his family hurt, and he didn’t want to ruin their outing. So he’d turned his phone off and left it in his jacket pocket. He concentrated on Leo instead, the way their footsteps synced up, the occasional bump of their shoulders.
Today they didn’t see much in the way of wildlife, aside from a handful of red-wing blackbirds and squirrels, which tended to ignore human passersby. But the dirt path squished pleasantly beneath their feet, and the crisp autumn air carried hints of lake water and rich soil, and the leaves were turning, vibrant reds and cheerful yellows mixed in with browns and greens. They had to let go of each other’s hand a few times to avoid clotheslining the giggling children who scampered down the path, followed more sedately by apologetic parents, but Leo always reached for Cole again after.
Soon came the indistinct murmur of a gathered crowd, and then suddenly, as they passed out of the trees into the beachside clearing, they met a wall of backsides.
Leo stopped abruptly. “What’s everybody….”
Cole smiled and followed his slack-jawed gaze up to a beech tree lit with the pulsing, vibrant orange of fall. Except it wasn’t the tree’s leaves that gave it the color—those were still green, little bundles almost completely obscured by fluttering black and orange.
“Are those…?” Leo asked, voice hushed.
Cole squeezed his hand. “Butterflies,” he confirmed. Tens of thousands of them, so many that the tree seemed to have been set ablaze. “I told you. Monarch migration. It’s a big deal.”
“It’s incredible,” Leo murmured. “This happens every year? How do they know to come back? I didn’t know butterflies lived that long.”
“They don’t. These ones have never been to Mexico.” Cole leaned into Leo as he spoke, not wanting to disturb anyone else. For the most part, the assembled watchers kept their voices down. “But every year they gather here, and every year they find their way to the same spot in Mexico. And every spring they come back, though it takes a couple of generations. Instinctively. Wild, huh?”
“Incredible,” Leo repeated, leaning his head against Cole’s. “Thank you, for showing me.”
Cole longed to kiss him, but maybe not here. At least not until he had a read on how Leo felt about PDA. “You’re welcome.”
For a few minutes they watched in silence, taking in one of nature’s marvels. But for the uninitiated—which included Cole—there was only so long you could stare at a tree full of butterflies. Eventually they turned around to head back toward the hospital so Leo could pick up his car.
“Think we can stop at my apartment?” Leo asked when they were about five minutes out. “I want to get a few more things.”
Cole was tempted to tell him he should get all of his things, but perhaps that was putting the cart before the horse. “Sure.”
Leo’s apartment was none the worse for wear, save the potted plant that hadn’t been watered in weeks. “It’s a peace lily,” Cole said, filling a pitcher with water from the kitchen sink. “It’ll perk up.”
Leo looked dubious, but he let Cole water his plant while he went into the bedroom to pack.
Cole had just set the empty pitcher on the counter when someone knocked on the door.
“Hello?”
Apparently they hadn’t closed it all the way; it swung open a few inches to reveal Nate, Leo’s neighbor.
“Oh, hey, Cole.” Nate’s broad, open face creased in concern as he stepped into the apartment. “Is Leo here with you? I haven’t seen him in a while.”
“Yeah, he’s just putting some things together.” Cole weighed how much to say. He thought Nate was trustworthy, but then it wasn’t his story to tell. “He’ll be staying with me a while.”
“Ooooh,” Nate said, waggling his eyebrows. “Say no more. Good for you guys.” Then he adopted an exaggeratedly put-upon expression, shaking his head and raising his gaze to the ceiling. “The good ones are always taken.”
Cole snorted. He wasn’t sure which of them Nate was referring to, but Nate was practically a puppy—far too young for Cole. “Sorry,” he said, but he couldn’t make it sound sincere.
Nate grinned. “It’s all good, my heart will go on.” Jesus, he was barely older than that song.
“Okay, I’m ready.” Leo emerged from the bedroom with a small rolling suitcase and a shopping bag, and Cole went pleasantly warm all over. Apparently he meant to stay for quite some time. “Hey, Nate. You need something?”
“Nah, just checking in on you.” He smiled, though this one looked a little anemic. “You kids have fun.”
Nate wasn’t nearly far enough away when Leo shook his head. “He’s a weird one.”
“That’s one way of putting it,” Cole agreed mildly. Nate would probably find it funny. “Come on. You can make me dinner, and then I’ll let you take advantage of me.”
“Now who could resist an offer like that?”