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Void help me if Bees ever finds out I looked for my car before I tried to find her missing bonded.

Since I’m already down here, I might as well look more thoroughly for his carcass.

After thirty minutes of digging, scenting old benign smells, and sneezing, I give up.

He’ll rise from ashes. His kind can do that as well as mine can. My level of concern here is zero. But I can’t go back to Bees like this without a lot of explanation. What to do?

I could head to our place and clean up, figure out a good story to tell her to ease her mind and head back to Mom’s.

Plan set; I shift back into a man’s form before opening a path to the house.

I step through and come to a halt.

Kimi, King, and Mal blink at my sudden appearance from the dining room table.

Kimi is still in the cage I left him in, minus the shackles, balanced precariously on the arms of a chair.

Mal and King are tied to the chairs pulled away from the table with white cloth. They both have the same fabric pressed across their lips like duct tape. Bonding spells and mute spells.

What now?

They all stare back at me curiously as I take in the scene. Before I can open my mouth, I feel a presence at my back, and the cold feel of a knife presses to my throat.

The action is a surprise. Someone knows I have a physical form underneath the black mist. How?

“Bring her to me,” the immortal’s control is slipping badly if his accent is that apparent.

“No,” I reply, trying hard not to roll my eyes.

Good news, Bees, they all made it out.

The blade presses hard enough to bring up blood and grave dirt.

“Cutting my head off won’t net you results,” my voice is a mocking croon. I wonder if he can hear me without the added effort?

I stare at the three figures before me as he debates with himself. The terror my voice causes is still affecting them at least. Mitri hasn’t faltered.

“Where is she?” The cold monotone doesn’t change, but the knife pulls back a miniscule amount.

“Safe.”

The knife is taken away, and he grabs my hair in his fist, tilting my head back so I can roll my eyes to see him in my peripherals.

How did he know I had hair? How did he know where my throat was? I should be nothing but mist with eyes to him.

He bonded to Bees. She can see my true form. Does that mean hesaw me? She made it possible by connecting with him. That’s amazing!

I can’t celebrate about it yet.

Mitri looks a little blank. Like an evil wax figure with a frozen expression of nothing. His eyes more than make up for it, though. He is absolutely enraged.

“She lives again?”

My eyebrows rise in surprise. “Yeah.”

“I cannot feel her,” his eyes narrow on me.

I let the eye roll happen this time. “I’m not lying.”