An Embrace of Citrus & Snow (Fallen for a Fae #1)

18. Bo

Chapter eighteen

Bo

Fucking Declan.

Fucking trees.

Fucking Bo , insisting on keeping a bond that would snip Ever’s life from as long as he could want it to fucking chump change. It didn’t matter that neither of them knew it at the time. Ever’d wanted to break the bond, and Bo’d insisted they not.

Because Ever’s other option was oil slick shame, a name that made Talia wrinkle her nose in disgust.

(Because he’d seen those gray eyes and heard Ever’s beautiful goddamn voice apologize for getting near him. A disservice. And he’d felt more at home on that faded couch, his hands tracing Ever’s jawline, than he ever had anywhere else.)

Fuck it all because here he was. Walking down a beaten dirt path, hoping there wouldn’t be another damn dryad. Maybe he ought to move faster.

Yeah, because a mad dash down a strange world that fed on desire and intent wasn’t an obviously fatal mistake.

Bo didn’t sprint. Instead: careful, steady, keeping to the dead fucking center of the path, his hands in his pockets. Eyes on the trees, either birches or alders. He could do this.

Just…

He didn’t want to be the reason Ever died early. Why should he live four hundred years instead of forever, when every time someone looked in Bo’s direction, his stomach curdled with shame? Bo wasn’t that good of a lay. And still, Ever was walking his own path, facing his own trial. Had promised to keep Bo safe.

And Bo was a selfish asshole. He wanted Ever. So, he kept walking .

“I confess, I expected you to look a bit more like me.” The voice came from the trees. Warm and cultured, with a gentle hint of amusement along the edges. Bo flinched at the sudden sound. “I suppose I ought to have known better. After a century, surely Eric was ready for a change.”

“Eric?” Bo asked, turning toward the voice–the trees– despite his better fucking judgment. (He had no sense of self-preservation, apparently.)

A shadow resolved into something solid. The man, elegant in a dove gray suit and vest, had to be Lawrence. Gorgeous, looking as easy to bruise as Bo wasn’t, his hair curled gently about his soft cheeks and equally soft brown eyes.

“Oh,” the seemingly alive man said, “but you call him Ever, don’t you?”

“Everil,” Bo replied, flat. Ever hadn’t given Lawrence the okay to call him that. Because Lawrence was dead .

“Everil. Yes. Everil.”

Bo slowed further, but he didn’t quite stop. His attention was, admittedly, focused on the apparition. “It always weirds me out when people hook up with mirror images of their ex.”

“Arrogance on my part, I suppose,” Lawrence said with a sweet, rueful smile. “It’s quite surprising, overall. Three days, and already you know more of him than I did. For better or worse.”

Goddamn Faerie.

“You’re Lawrence, right? I’m headed–” Bo tipped his head down the path. “But if you want to chat about our favorite resident kelpie and aren’t going to try to feed me to the trees, we can talk and walk at the same time.”

“Delightful. This isn’t a place to be wandering without company.” Lawrence fell into step beside Bo, the leaves seeming to reach for him as he moved beyond their grasp. “You’ll have to forgive him for sending you off alone like this.”

Gentle and tragic. That’s how he sounded. And this– It couldn’t be Lawrence. Sluaghs saw death. Ever hadn’t mentioned them summoning ghosts.

“With all due respect, Ever didn’t send me this way,” Bo said, frowning. “I decided to do it. He’s not the kind of guy to make big sweeping decisions and expect me to go with it.”

“Is he not?” Lawrence cast him a sympathetic look. Bo, on his best fucking behavior, didn’t bristle .

“ No . Because we fucking talked about it at the house.” They had . Bo’d fucking stand by that and Ever. “Even if he was, he wouldn’t. He was pissed at my parents for taking choices from me.”

“Discussions with him so rarely go how one believes. He doesn’t know what it means to be human, not really. He does try. But he’ll never understand you.” Lawrence shook his head, curls falling forward with the gesture. When he spoke again, his voice was even softer, still that fucking sympathy, only now it had a splash of concern. “It’s very lonely, Bo, caring for someone like him. Everil visits. He doesn’t stay. And I’m afraid this visit is a short one.”

Fuck this guy.

“I–” Don’t say sorry in Faerie, Bo. Don’t tell the ghost-trial to fuck off. “It’s regrettable that it was hard for you. That really sucks. Twenties must’ve been rough enough to begin with, let alone a flaky boyfriend.”

Lawrence looked away toward the trees. “Everil was a very dear friend. I did care for him. And I believed he cared for me, in his way.”

“Dude, he fucking mourned you for, what? A century? Jesus.”

“A drop in the bucket for him. I made my mistakes, and I paid for them,” the ghostly-but-not man murmured, sighing. He dismissed his own past with a fluttering wave of his hand. “These things happen. We all do pay, eventually. But the best we can do is try to look after others, isn’t it?”

“He fucking mourned you,” Bo repeated, fiercer than before. “Made your home together into a goddamn shrine, almost. He wouldn’t have just let you die. He’s not like that.”

Lawrence was quiet for a moment, glancing at Bo sidelong. “I didn’t say it as a slight against Everil. He is what he is, as we all are. I wouldn’t want someone else to go through what I did, is all. And so, we’ll walk for as long as you’ll allow, and I’ll hope you feel like listening.”

Bo didn’t bare his teeth. He considered that a win.

“Fine. Talk.”

“Thank you. You know, I do believe he cares for you, as you do for him. You’d not be taking a stroll with me if you didn’t.” His smile was as soft as the rest of him. “But even so, four hundred years? I think I would have tried, and failed, to smother him with a pillow. He’s not an easy person to live with. ”

“It’s a good thing you won’t be the one living with him that long then, yeah?” Bo grinned at the somber, lovely man and didn’t even gnash his teeth. “What made living with him difficult? He leave wet towels on the floor? Drink all the milk before you had your coffee? Make noise in bed?”

“I’m only the messenger,” Lawrence answered with gentle distance, stepping back from Bo and shrugging helplessly. “I’m sorry if this hurts to hear, but you do need to hear it. And I’d rather you hear it from someone who cares for Everil than someone who despises him.”

“Like Nimai.”

Lawrence didn’t quite flinch. But he looked away again, if only for a moment, then back to Bo.

“Him. And others. He had plenty of detractors when I knew him. Everil wasn’t subtle. Brookhaven was an escape for us. We were both running from scandal. I was simply foolish enough to believe it was the same one.”

“What was he supposed to say? ‘I’m a kelpie, and I’m running from my abusive ex’ or something?”

“Perhaps you’re right. But there was so much he kept from me and little to soften the blow.” Lawrence moved closer again, watching Bo with big, pretty eyes. “That’s what I mean, Bo. Not petty domestic squabbles. That he equivocates on those things that matter most.”

“He’s fae. Blunt isn’t exactly a quality most of them have.”

The trees murmured, roots crawling gently toward the edge of the dirt path. Lawrence spread his slender, pretty hands beseechingly before him. “As you say. He isn’t human. He doesn’t think as we do. He used to disappear for days. Weeks. Can you imagine? We got in terrible rows about it. I thought he was ignoring me.”

Snarling at Lawrence felt like snarling at a random fan coming up to earnestly tell him about putting him on in the background or following him when he was a kid. Just trying to help and fucking genuine about it. Like Antonio.

Unlike Antonio, Bo couldn’t help Lawrence survive the fae. Too late for that.

God damn it.

“What was he doing?” Bo asked. “Going to Faerie?”

“He was forgetting about time. Off somewhere and not realizing that I would miss him. ”

“I– Yeah, I get it. It’s hard to trust someone who ghosts you and talks sideways,” Bo agreed, albeit somewhat sideways himself. He winced. “Fuck, ghosting like, disappearing for days on end with no notice or news. Not ghost like…”

Bo started to wave his hand at Lawrence, realized it was a dick move, and let his hand fall to his side.

“It’s alright.” This time, when Lawrence smiled, it wasn’t sad. “This isn’t one of those stories where the ghost isn’t aware that they’re dead. It’s probably for the best that we both be willing to face what happened to me.”

“It’s not– Look. Ever’s lucky you didn’t end things with him then and there. I can’t say I’d‘ve stayed on board for that kind of stuff.” See? He could do tactful. Sympathetic, even. Hell, Bo didn’t even sidle away when Lawrence got closer again, all entreating eyes and lifting his hand to pat at Bo. “It’s not exactly the same for him and me, though. Even if we didn’t have the bond, I know what he is, you know? Context and shit. And the soulbond thing.”

Not that Ever’d told Bo what he was straight out. Bo’d had to fucking guess. And he’d not wanted Bo in the first place. And– No. That wasn’t the situation now. Things were different, up to and including Bo not calling Ever a dear friend .

Around them, the trees shifted, growing more autumnal in their coloring. The forest grew denser, pressing closer to the path, a susurrus of wind Bo couldn’t feel rustling through the leaves.

“True,” Lawrence agreed, not seeming to mind the spiraling roots along the edges of the path. “You and Everil are more closely tied than we were. But doesn’t that make it hurt all the more?”

“The fuck you mean?”

“Being with a man who alternatively clings and freezes. Who is too wild to give you a proper home in Faerie and too tame to–” Lawrence cleared his throat, prim as the damned unicorn. “Be bold in the way you are.”

“Ever’s not actually a mortal horse,” Bo retorted, striving to sound calm and not like he wanted to snarl at the other man. He did remarkably well if he were to be humble about it. “He’s a kelpie. And it’s gross to talk about taming someone without it being an agreed-on kink thing.”

“Falling for him, I understand,” Lawrence continued as if he hadn’t been interrupted. “He’s terribly fetching. And charming, when he remembers to be. But I’m certain you could find some other like-minded sort, one who doesn’t require a four-hundred-year commitment.”

Bo shook his head, still not snarling. He wasn’t. He wouldn’t. This was a goddamn test , and Declan was an asshole .

“What do I care if he’s not bossy when he fucks? If that’s what gets you off, that’s a you thing. Not mine. And even if it were, he’s not interchangeable , for fucks sake. I don’t need a goddamn dowry for Ever. He’s funny and weird and frustrated because he thinks he shouldn’t be. I like him.”

“And what of his attachment to … that man?” Lawrence asked, his gentle voice mild for all that it skipped when he pointedly didn’t say Nimai’s name. “He will always neglect you, leave you reaching for him. And it will be because he fears that man’s judgment. He’s still desperate to please someone he despises.”

“You can go fuck right off.” Bo sliced his hand through the air, the gesture as sharp as his tone had become.

Lawrence drifted back again, his hand trailing over the trunks of too-close trees. He looked, if not smaller, than like he wanted to be. Sadness in those soft brown eyes, half hidden by a fall of curls, and he let the silence stretch, like the path stretched, the end never growing closer or further away.

“Bo,” he said sorrowfully. Bo wanted to punch him in the goddamn mouth. “I know what it means to find all your hidden dreams answered, a wish you hardly dared make, suddenly granted. He showed you a world you couldn’t believe existed. In a way, he offered me the same.”

“It’s not the same.”

The trees were too fucking dense. Claustrophobic. A press of leaves, thick as a brush fire, those twin walls of autumnal flames. They met over the path, blocking out the sky.

“You want to see the best in him. I did, too. I allowed myself to be swept up in it. In him.” Lawrence swallowed, shaking his head slowly. “And it cost me. Greatly. I gave up my family. My friends. My life, eventually. All for him.”

Lawrence sighed, and the wind sighed with him.

“We all make fucking choices.”

“You didn’t make the choice though, did you? You fell into it, none the wiser. You wished to protect Everil and the girl. That is undeniably admirable.”

“I didn’t do it for admiration.” Bo flinched from the trees, scowling overhead. “And I made a choice. I chose to stay. ”

“You didn’t know it would mean losing your aunt. Your brother. Your friends and fans. All to age and die while you go on, your only comfort to be found in a man who doesn’t understand what mortality is. A retreat to a world that despises all you represent.”

“Keep my family out of your fucking mouth,” Bo snapped. “Ever knew enough about mortality to be upset over you.”

“As he’ll be upset over you,” Lawrence agreed. “You see all our differences. But I see only similarities.”

“Don’t tell me what I fucking see.” Flat. The best he could do at the moment. “Some of that might be true. My family will die. I probably won’t. But if I tell Ever I don’t want to keep going, it’s been too long, I want out of the bond? He’d fucking let me out. He wouldn’t keep me in something I don’t want. ”

Bo stumbled, then. A tree root, pushing up the dirt in low mounds, catching at Bo’s feet. Lawrence remained in the tree line, his fingers passing through the trunks instead of over, now.

“That’s wise,” Lawrence said, though it was hard for Bo to tell if he spoke or the leaves did. “Thinking of it as a temporary arrangement. Something you can keep for now but escape when you’re ready.”

“That’s not what I said,” Bo snapped, turning hard to face Lawrence. His foot hit a small mound of dirt, only dumb luck keeping him from falling. “Don’t you twist my words like that.”

“Careful,” Lawrence said, all genuine, solicitous concern. “Faerie is a dangerous place for our kind. And he won’t fight for you, Bo. He won’t stop you when that time comes. When it gets to be too much. When he gets to be too much.”

“It sounds like you don’t actually know him. You sound like Nimai.”

“If I’m wrong, I welcome that.” Lawrence’s eyes were green. So fucking green. Hadn’t they been brown a minute ago? “Dreams are always safest at a distance. Wanting, that’s the fun part. Having is where it all gets messy.”

“If you think someone respecting your free will means ‘temporary,’ that’s a you problem.” Bo rubbed his arms, scowling. “If I thought he’d treat me like a fucking pet, his to own instead of because we want to be together, we wouldn’t be talking. Fuck you for trying to make it sound like I want an out. I don’t want temporary. I have him, and I want him.”

Lawrence stepped back onto the path, directly in front of Bo. Or maybe he’d always been there. Maybe it was his foot Bo tripped on, not a root. Either way, Bo froze, Lawrence’s eyes once more the brown of bark and his curls the faded blond of fresh-cut wood.

“Be angry if you wish. Be stubborn. But most of all, be careful.” There was blood on Lawrence’s pale pink lips, and his hair hung knotted and heavy with it. He raised his hand toward Bo again, as if to stroke his cheek, his fingers all raw meat and cracked bone. Lawrence stood without legs, had left them by the tree line, the roots that’d caught Bo’s feet. And his stomach–

The wind picked up, and Lawrence was gone in a swirl of golden leaves, while Bo found himself standing not on the dirt path, but before Declan, the sluagh waiting with his flower crown and curling smile.

No more Lawrence, pretty and soft, covered in red that came from somewhere deep. Gut blood, Bo’s dad called it once, while they watched a survival documentary. When you saw it, or smelled the cloyingly sweet copper rot, you knew that whoever it was, they weren’t going to make it.

Bo had to catch himself, unsteady from the sudden lack of looming trees. He stared across the clearing at Declan, standing there with his fucking flower crown and one pale finger lifted to his lips. The guy was even more corpse-like in Faerie. Sharp nails and raptor’s eyes, looking like a goddamn nightmare in too-tight skin.

Bo bared his teeth.

“The gang’s back again,” Declan said, smiling, the fucking asshole. “What’s the craic?”

“What the fuck was that?” Bo spat out. “Was that him?”

“I don’t know who you saw.” Declan lowered his hand, and something pulled . Dizzying, strange, tasting like oranges and snowmelt. The world shifted, and there was Ever, alive and real as the bond that beat between them. “Just a wee bit of magic and memory, Bo. A trial.”

Just a trial. Not a resurrection. Fuck. Thank fuck.

“You’re an asshole, Declan,” Bo managed to say, though the acid faded somewhat now that he knew it wasn’t Lawrence Lawrence. He turned away from the bastard, starting toward Ever.

He barely made it a step before Ever was on him. Like with the dryad, he held Bo at arm’s length, the song of his nearness enough to drive Bo to slump against him. Almost. Even with Declan pointedly looking elsewhere, Bo didn’t think Ever’d welcome Bo clinging over much.

“May I?” Ever asked, his words unsteady. His hands moved to Bo’s shoulders, thumbs hesitantly tracing along Bo’s collarbones. “I would feel better with you close.”

Fucking not-ghost didn’t know shit. Ever might not cling all the time but, fuck, Bo could always feel that he wanted to. Even now, holding Bo, his touch so fucking gentle while his voice trembled. Asking. Bo felt the apprehension in Ever just from that.

“Yeah. Yes, fuck.” Bo rested his hands on Ever’s waist, smile crooked, eyes searching. His. His goddamn kelpie, who wouldn’t run off and abandon him, who froze up but asked to hold on. Bo’s hand tightened as he gave him a light tug. “Go for it. I want you to.”

Declan could go fuck a tree if he had an issue with it. Worth the sluagh’s smirk to feel the scorched earth taste of Ever’s caution smooth out to old wood and cool streams.

Three days ago, Ever’d kept his distance. Now, he drew Bo in, a hand resting on the nape of his neck and another on his back. Ever buried his face against Bo’s hair, breathing deep.

“You’re not injured,” Ever said, the words caught between statement and question.

“Not a scratch,” Bo murmured back, wrapping his arms around Ever’s waist, holding tight. Warm. Whole. His. His . “You?”

Ever shook his head minutely. “Nothing more trying than an unusual conversation. Not that you need worry over my safety. I heal quickly.”

“Fuck you, I’ll worry if I want to,” Bo said with a little laugh, weak as it was. He leaned in to sneak a kiss to Ever’s shoulder, the kelpie shivering under his lips. “Wasn’t worried about you bleeding, kelpie. Not too mindfucked?”

“No,” Ever answered, a smile in his soft voice. “Not too much.”

“Good. Same here.”

“Humans,” the dryad had murmured, “tend to lie.”

Ever kissed Bo’s hair, then eased back, half turning to Declan. He kept his arms around Bo, though, which was more than fucking fine with him.

“Remind me not to ask you for any further ill-considered favors,” Ever said with a ghost of a smile. “Are you satisfied that I’ve taken your advice to heart?”

Declan looped his unfinished flower crown around his wrist, watching as it coiled and shrank into two bracelets, shiny as glass and a translucent pink .

“Aye, so I am,” Declan confirmed, long fingers playing over the dips of his flower petal bracelet. “You’re still stubborn when you wish to be. I’m glad to see what you’ve put your heels down for now. It would have gone badly otherwise, facing the misgivings your bonded harbors as you did.”

Misgivings.

Bo fell still, slit gaze slowly widening. Magic and memories. Misgivings. Doubts. Reservations. Qualms. A million different ways to say he’d played them with their own goddamn insecurities.

“Dude. That’s fucked up.”

Declan was fucked up. Cunning and smug and apparently a good friend to Ever but fucked up .

“You’re as bad as Bo,” Ever said, his words playful and his fingers stroking gently over Bo’s neck. “Bringing out the worst in me.”

“He says that,” Declan said to Bo, dry as the desert. “But I daresay you and I bring out different parts of him. At the very least, I hope so.”

Bo snorted. “Yeah, no shit.”

That, at least, they agreed on. Ever hadn’t had someone like Lawrence from the sound of it, not if he could tease Declan about it. Definitely not Bo’s mom and dad, thank fuck.

“I assume our next trial awaits.” Ever smiled down at Bo, small and fleeting, and Bo tasted shaded groves. He glanced back at their judge. “Declan?”

“Eventually.” Declan disappeared in a pale swirl of magic, replaced by huge trees, butted up against one another. They surrounded Bo and Ever, the branches and leaves reaching. Friendly, somehow. Moss seats, a curling root rising up and twisting to form a small, cupped room to the side where Declan had been.

“What the flying fuck?”

“Listen well.” Declan’s voice shivered through the room, quick and intense. Bo shut his mouth. “You each saw what the other fears. Your next judge requested you have room to reflect on what happened, time to rest and recover away from prying eyes or whispering magics.”

“You gonna slip us some secrets then?” Bo asked sarcastically. Ever glanced at him, still once more, but didn’t try to quiet him.

“What kind of friend would I be if I didn’t?” Declan countered, and Bo swore he could hear the man smirking. Goddamn fae, answering questions with questions. “Everil, the next judge is Leana, then Kesk and Veroni. Be wary of the latter. Since you’ve been gone, they’ve been recognized as the Monarchs’ heirs, grown cocky with it. When I say take this time to rest and reflect, I say that as your friend and not solely at Leana’s behest.”

“Kesk and Veroni,” Ever murmured, his voice level and soft. “My thanks for the warning.”

“I wish it were better news,” Declan said. He sounded like he meant it, too. “I’ll see you on the other side, my friend.”

And then: silence.