demon for weeks. You never fully transitioned. You basically slowed your own death, but death comes for everyone.”
“So you’re killing me? How does that logic work?”
“I’m turning you. I’m clearing away the stamp of the fool who tried to and the taint of the shadow demon who wanted to own you.”
Anger flash-fired through me.
“Have no fear, Hellion. No one else will be able to claim you.” He stroked a finger down my cheek.
“Except you.”
“Except us,” he corrected. “Fin is right. You do belong to us, but we also belong to you.”
I rolled my eyes and jerked away from his touch. “I didn’t ask any of you for this.”
“I know.”
“But you’re doing it anyway.”
“I can’t let you die.” The admission should make me feel something. Wanted. Needed. But all it made me feel was…
“That isn’t your decision to make.” I glared at him, and he gave me another of those faint smiles. It didn’t quite reach his eyes though.
“It is very much my decision,” he said. “As modern people are fond of saying, the buck stops here. I will make sure you have what is due you. The vengeance on those who harmed you.”
“I can get that on my own.”
“I have no doubt.” At least he sounded like he meant that part. “Just as I have no doubt that I will very much enjoy helping you. The crimes done to you are numerous, and no one hurts what is mine.”
I moved away from him, but I couldn’t escape. He was there, like a shadow in my step. A pulse under my skin. He was pulling all the blood from my body.
Again.
“The pain is real,” he murmured. “I can block most of it. But this is the best way to ease your transition.”
“Wow, I’d hate to see the hard way.”
He didn’t comment. I focused on the ocean, on the foam of the sea as it rolled in and how the air tasted. I loved the ocean so much.
“Why?”
“What?”
“Why do you love the ocean?”
“Can you at least pretend to not read my mind?”
“Not right now, no,” he said. “I am taking all of you into me, and then I am having you take me into you. You will know me as intimately as I know you when we are done.”
Resentment sliced through me. “You turned Rogue without his permission.”
“He hated me for a long time.”
“Why did you do that?”
“Because he was my friend, and I did not want him to die.”
“But he didn’t want to live like this.” Did Rogue and I have that in common? And I thought he was such an asshole to me.
“No,” Alfred admitted, moving to stand next to me. I was tempted to lean my head against his shoulder, but I resisted it.
Barely.
“He didn’t think it natural. Elves are—they are very attuned to nature. He was—is a frost elf. He thrives in winter, it is his favorite season. His magic is a part of him. When I turned him, he lost some of that. He gained more, but…that took time for him to grieve and to acclimate.”
“And you feel no regret for it.” I dared him to lie to me. I’d been in that memory. I’d been there when he turned him.
“I do not regret saving my friend. Nor do I regret giving him the time to make his peace with it.”
“Generous.”
He shrugged.
The light faded, and it was getting darker. I sat abruptly. The sand was warm beneath me, even if the breeze was cold.
“I could just not drink.”
“I cannot let you do that,” he told me, and he sounded almost sorrowful. But he wasn’t. He didn’t regret doing this to Rogue, and now he wouldn’t regret doing it to me.
“Did you force Fin, too?”
But even as I tried to focus on him, he faded. Through blurred vision, I found him hovering over me. His mouth was red with my blood. He pressed his lips to mine, a teasing kiss, and then ground his hips gently against me.
I refused. Even if my body wanted his, I refused.
I closed my eyes and blocked him out.
“Hellion,” he whispered. “You have to drink. Take back from me what I have taken from you.”
“No.”
His sigh filled the room.
“Fiona,” he commanded, and my name settled on me like strings attaching themselves and jerking me to move. I opened my eyes to find his throat right there. He rolled onto his back, pressing my face into his throat, and then he dragged a hand down to my ass, massaging it. “Drink.”
I scraped my teeth