Page 25 of The Rake OR The Orca Who Met His Match in a Selkie Desiring Revenge

“I won’t use it then.”

“That’s it?” She asked.

“That’s it. We all have our shit, Elspeth. If my exploits have taught me anything, it’s that part of playing with someone is respecting that you aren’t the first to affect them. There’s always history that you can’t control. The best thing to do is accept and move on. I can’t control what others did to you and it’s silly to assumeit has anything to do with me. Is it something you want to talk about?”

Did she? Bile rose in her throat. “Not particularly.”

“Very well, we won’t.”

“It’s a pretty common word… at least in situations like this.” Or at least she hoped it might? It was everything she’d dreamed of in the early days of a relationship.

Instead, it made her feel like she might vomit.

“And the touching…” she continued, “I think it might have all just been too much. I’m sorry.”

Aegir nodded, pursing his lips together. “Elspeth, I will never be upset with you for having feelings.”

Tears welled in her eyes. How was everything so wrong? So twisted? She wasn’t this weak, pathetic thing. She was the backbone of her family. She was the one that held things together when they needed it. And gods-dammit, she needed to pull it together if she had any hope of getting her brother back.

Her poor brother. He was barely a year younger, a man grown, but she’d rarely thought of him that way. He’d towered over her since she was thirteen, so he’d been her “bigger little brother” for some time.Right now, he needed her to be strong, needed her to hold it together so she could find him. Once he was free, he’d need her to help him heal. Because the gods only knew what he’d need to heal from.

Here she was, blubbering like a child after the gentle touch and kind words of the most handsome man she’d ever seen, while he was enduring sure horrors. “Oh, Feann…”

Aegir tilted his head in confusion.

“Sorry,” she said with a wry chuckle at her repeated apologies. “I was just thinking…”

“About your brother…” he said, eyes wide with recognition. He blew out a breath, set his forearms on his knees and hung his head.

This was where he would tell her it was too much trouble, right? That there was no telling where he was. Where he’d try to separate her from her friends and family so she’d trust him? But no, that wasn’t fair. Aegir had done nothing to earn such suspicion.

“Is he bonded? The letter seemed to imply that.”

“Yes,” she whispered, that horrible day flashing through her mind. The red of the elf’s blood as it dripped down his arm, held aloft as if triumphant.

“And, I’m assuming that his bonded is not likely to cooperate with any sort of unraveling we discover?” He opened and closed his fists where they hung between his legs.

Elspeth shook her head, dread pooling in her stomach. “No, he needs to die.” Her eyes closed. What would Aegir think of her? Condemning a man to death, an evil one, sure, but still a person, to death so easily. Worse, what did she think of herself? She should abhor this part of her that hungered to see him dead at her feet, to smile at his last gasps of air. These feelings were so foreign she could hardly recognize them, she was a healer after all.

“Now that I can work with!” Aegir’s exclamation jolted her in her seat. He clapped his hands and jumped to his feet. “Do you want to do the killing or shall I? Or do you think your brother would?”

Aegir paced back and forth across the room, his eyes alight and excited. She followed him, the sudden burst of noise and energy made her head spin, but she couldn’t tear her eyes away. Every part of his body was held at the ready, like he was ready to burst.

“I—I don’t know if he would… he doesn’t really know how to fight at all… nor do I for that matter.”

Aegir waved a hand dismissively. “Well, I can’t really help with that, but you, well, we’ve got time. You don’t need toknow much, really, because you look so damn harmless. I’d prefer to kill him myself, frankly, but this is your rescue, so we’ll do as you want.”

Elspeth pursed her lips. “If you think it’s possible, I’d like to try.” If she didn’t try, what was the point of being there? She knew that because of his position, Aegir would be better suited, but if he seemed to think that she could do it herself, that felt more meaningful.

“It’s a plan. I’ll think through what we might be able to accomplish, but in the meantime, I should probably show you a few things, do you know much combat?”

“Aegir, I know exactly zero combat.”

“Right then…” Aegir slicked his hair off his forehead. “Close quarters—though I’ll hate for you to be in that much danger—is our best option, not much need to aim if you are in their face.”

He tapped his chin, gesturing in the air and mumbling to himself. It was like an entirely new person inhabited him now, or rather a version of Aegir she’d not seen in days. This was the Aegir she’d met on the boat, at least for some of the time. How many Aegirs had she seen at this point? The more she wondered, the more she realized that his behavior shifted slightly with each face and form he wore. Even when he had been speaking to only her, when he’d worn an elf’s face, he’d kept hisspeech affectation. Perhaps it was so that he wasn’t caught unawares, but his commitment to each character was… startling. Moments ago, she could have sworn that his shoulders had been more prominent, but in the space it took him to stand up, they’d shrunk and squared.

“A dagger will be best. We’ll need to get you a holster. Two, rather. Thigh and bosom should do it. For tomorrow, we’ll fashion one of mine until we can get you your own.”