Page 71 of Elex

Clean and dry for what seemed like the first time in days I wandered out to the common area where Helios had cooked for us earlier. V was seated near the fire, a bowl of the same stew in his hands. He was eagerly talking with Helios.

“…so healing is part of being a Soma, too? Is that why you’re a doctor?” V asked, between shoveling spoons full of food into his mouth.

Helios smiled slightly. My brother’s charm wasn’t lost on the Illyrian.

“One of the reasons. I had wanted to do something different with my life, but with the war…” his voice trailed off as he saw me enter the room.

“Well, hello, Kitten,” he said, his voice a deep rumble.

I scowled at him.

“The name is Kat, asshole,” I growled.

“Good to see food and a shower haven’t dimmed your shiny disposition,” Helios teased.

I ignored him and squeezed V’s shoulder before sitting with my back to a wall that allowed me to see both entrances to the room. It placed me closer than I liked to Helios, but if it gave us a more defensible position in case of attack, I’d deal with it.

“So, Soma’s gain shape changing and healing abilities, and Mageia gain the ability to use all four elements and block the Suppression?” V asked, shoveling stew into his mouth between questions.

Hel—no!Helios, goddess dammit, nodded.

“So how do you know if your magic is compatible?” V asked.

“You just know,” Helios paused. “There’s… a feeling. A hum of energy. The stronger the response, the stronger the connection. When a Soma and a Mageia are compatible, they feel this draw toward each other. It’s… hard to resist.”

Helios wasn’t looking at me, but it felt like his comment was directed at me. Fuck, was he saying what I thought he was saying? That this spark between us meant that he and I were somehow… compatible? That we could be Bonded?

“So what happens if you Bond with someone who’s a total dick?” I interjected. “Can you break this connection?”

Helios shot a look at me that seemed part anger and part hurt, which seemed out of proportion to everything he had said so far.

“No! No Soma would ever want to break a Bond,” he growled, standing, and grabbing some of the bowls and utensils and slamming them into a sink. He stood with his back to us for a few minutes, hands gripping the metal sink, obviously trying to regain his composure before speaking again, much more calmly.

“The magic takes care of most of it. Your magic won’t attract you to someone you wouldn’t be happy with. The Bond—it usually only breaks at the death of one of the Bonded partners,” he said, his back still to us and his voice even more hoarse than normal.

“Did you… lose someone?” V asked.

Hel didn’t respond for a long time, then slowly nodded. My brother was freakin’ perceptive. He glared at me, and gestured toward our host, as if expecting me to do something to fix this. It was obvious I had hit a nerve with this conversation. Hell if I knew how to fix it, though.

“I’m… sorry, Hel,” V said. “Guess we’re worried about anyone who might get stuck with Kat, being the total dick that he is sometimes.”

Helios chuckled, then turned back to us.

“Not your fault. You guys don’t know… well, anything,” he said, holding up a hand to me as I started to bristle. “You don’t know anything about our society, about our people.”

V looked at me questioningly, and I nodded slightly at him.

“We’d like to learn,” V said.

Chapter 15

Helios

Istruggled with my emotions as I looked at the two Mageia in front of me. I knew they couldn’t know what they were saying when they talked about breaking a Bond, but it still stung.

This was what I was here for: Recruiting Mageia to our cause and telling them about our society. So I nodded.

“What do you want us to do, exactly?” asked Kat.