Her lips parted in shock at his wickedness, and he enjoyed the glimmer of interest in her eyes—until she punched him in the shoulder. “Liar. You have not,” she scolded.
“You don’t know,” he protested, but laughed, spinning her so she had to use her hand on his shoulder to steady herself instead of punching him again.
“I do know,” she replied, almost primly, when he slowed them again. “Even this ignorant mossback knows that selective shapeshifting requires painstaking practice and that only the most talented—” She broke off, a furious blush crowning her cheekbones. “I didn’t mean…”
“That’s all right,” he replied, making sure to sound bored, which was easy since he’d become essentially numb to any references to his lack of talent and inexcusable refusal to apply himself. “You are far from the first or only person to make note of my startling lack of shapeshifting ability.”
“Gendra and Zeph both say it’s not lack of ability,” Salena continued, blithely poking at the sore spot. “Even I can see Moranu’s hand on you. You’re Her chosen. If you’d just apply your—”
“Salena,” he broke in, cutting off her words ruthlessly, “if I want a lecture on my laziness and feckless ways, there are any number of people I can go to for that.”
“I didn’t mean to upset you,” she said quietly, after a few moments of fraught silence.
“You didn’t,” he said with deliberate lightness, sending her into a twirl and snagging her back closer than before. “You’d have to work much harder to match the casual gossip and direct remarks from my nearest and dearest that I hear on any given day.”
“Oh, Rhyian…” Salena searched his face, sympathy in hers. Now that stung.
“Feeling sorry for me?” he asked coolly, layering in haughty disdain. “Don’t. At least I can shapeshift.” As soon as the words escaped his lips, he wished them back. But it was too late. Salena’s expression chilled.
“Was that supposed to hurt?” she asked evenly. “I’d forgotten how well you do that, go from charming to cruel in an instant. Thank you for reminding me.” She stopped, yanking her hands from his.
Moranu curse his stupid tongue. “Salena, listen—”
“No,” she flung over her shoulder as she plowed a path through the dancers. “I’m done listening to you.”
He caught her arm but continued on the same trajectory. “I don’t see how that’s possible,” he said through his teeth, “as you’ve avoided any real conversation with me for seven years.”
“There’s a reason for that,” she shot back, face set in furious lines. “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.”
“What does that even mean?” Spotting a small salon off the main hall, Rhy poked his head in, verified it was empty, and dragged Salena inside.
“Stop dragging me around,” she spat as he closed and locked the door.
“Stop running away from me,” he snapped back. “Either that or stop blaming me for not chasing after you.”
She pulled up short, her fury cooling. “You have a good point. Just leave me alone, Rhyian,” she said wearily.
“I did,” he said simply. “Didn’t we both do that? We left each other alone for seven years, and it didn’t fix anything.”
She sat heavily on a plush chair by the fire, holding out her hands to its warmth. “Maybe some things are too broken to fix,” she said in a quiet voice to the cheerful flames.
“Your heart?” he asked, not sure if he wanted to ask sincerely or make a joke to lighten the mood, so his words came out somewhere in between, uneven and raw.
Salena looked up at him, no poise in her face, only sorrow, blue eyes glimmering with unshed tears. “Don’t laugh at me. You know you broke my heart. You did it on purpose.”
He raked his hand through his hair, deeply regretting he’d forced this conversation. This was why he hadn’t gone after her to begin with. But, as always happened when Salena was near, he couldn’t seem to resist her siren call. “It wasn’t like that,” he said, knowing it sounded weak and cowardly as he spoke the words.
“What was it like, Rhyian?” she asked. “Here’s your big chance to explain.”
He opened his mouth, but no words came out. Sometimes he didn’t even understand why he’d done what he had.
“Let me tickle your memory,” she said in a quietly lethal tone, standing and stalking toward him. If Salena were a shapeshifter, her First Form would be a predator for sure. Probably a wolf. “I gave you my virginity. After months of