“We just want you to succeed,” Morgan said. “I’m not going to be around forever, Sam. Neither will Randall. One day we’ll both cross the veil into whatever waits beyond it. I need to know you’ll be okay when that happens.”
And maybe I started panicking a little at the thought. “Are you dying?” I said, sounding rather shrill. “Is that what all this is? A lead-up to where you tell me you’re wasting away and will vomit profusely and then fall over and convulse obscenely in your death throes? You know I don’t like it when people die, and I really don’t like it when people vomit. Why would you do that to me—oh my gods, are you insane?”
“And of course that’s what you took away from that,” Morgan said, shaking his head. “Dear gods, Sam, take a breath before you pass out. You’re turning blue.”
I did as he said because breathing was good. “You can’t die!” I demanded. “I won’t allow it. If you even think of doing it, I will hunt you down and kill you myself. Are we clear?”
He smiled at me then, as rare as it was beautiful. “Crystal. And I’m not dying, Sam. Neither is Randall. We’ll be around a long time yet.”
“Either that or Randall will outlive us all just to spite me,” I muttered.
“I wouldn’t put it past him.”
“You’re mocking me, aren’t you.”
“Why, where would you ever get an idea like that?”
I eyed him up and down, trying to find any evidence of impending death. Aside from the tiredness, there wasn’t any. “You sure there’s nothing wrong with you?”
He didn’t hesitate. “I’m sure.”
“And you would tell me if there was.”
“When the time came—and if you needed to know—yes.”
“Morgan.”
He wouldn’t budge an inch. “Sam.”
I groaned. “Gods, you’re infuriating sometimes.”
“You’re infuriating all the time.”
“When I tell people you’re sassy,” I told him, “no one believes me. They just look at me like I’m the weird one.”
“So, how they always look at you, then.”
I scowled at him.
He looked rather pleased with himself.
“I guess we’re stuck with each other,” I said, trying to make it sound like it was the absolute worst thing in the world but not fooling anyone.
There was that smile again. “I guess we are.”
I hesitated, trying to find the right words to put his mind at ease. Words were never a problem for me. I could speak about anything and everything, though sometimes I tended to use them as a distraction or a shield. The more I talked, the less anyone would be able to see what I was really feeling. It worked, mostly.
But this was Morgan. He didn’t deserve that from me. Not now. “You know I’ll make you proud, right? Like, I know I can do stupid things sometimes. And maybe I don’t always think things through. But I’m going to be a good wizard. For you.”
He didn’t say anything for a long time, just sat there watching me. I tried not to squirm while I waited. Then, “You already make me proud, Sam of Wilds. Every day.”
“Should we hug now?”
“I’d prefer if we didn’t.”
“Are you sure? Because I feel like we should hug.”
“Sometimes,” he said, “we shouldn’t act on feelings, no matter how strong they may be. Now, since I’m sure I will not escape it, I suppose I should hear your epic ode to penises.”
“It’s long,” I warned him.
“So you’ve said.”
“And hard.”
“I am regretting so much already.”
MORGAN LEFT me alone with specific instructions to keep going as I was, no distractions. “Your Grimoire isn’t going to finish itself, Sam.” Which, of course, gave me the idea of making a spell in which my Grimoire would complete itself, which, you know. Genius. But I obviously spent too much time around Morgan because he must have seen my entire train of thought coming a mile away and threatened me with bodily harm if I even considered cheating in such a way. Oh, and no more dick poems, because his heart could only take so much before it stopped itself just to get away from me.
He was such a drama queen.
He’d said he’d thought it was almost time to begin considering a binding for my Grimoire, either the skin of a fallen enemy defeated in battle or a material hard-won in the face of adversity. It would probably be years, he warned me, before I found such a thing, but the fact that he thought I was ready was monumental. I hadn’t expected such a thing to fall from his lips for another five years at least, or even as much as a decade. It meant that my plan to be the youngest wizard to take the Trials would be within my reach. I had wanted to attempt them (complete them, I reminded myself) by the time I was thirty. If things kept going the way they were, maybe I could get to them sooner. Of course, that would be only if Randall would let me, seeing as how he administered the Trials. He was an obstacle that I was sure would find some way to muck up my plans, just because he could.
I was lost in a fantasy of finding a way to banish Randall to the far reaches of the earth, and I didn’t hear the door to the labs open. Probably not the best idea, given my propensity for having trouble find me at the most random of times.
But then there were hands on my waist and lips trailing along my neck, and my magic said yes and home and mineminemine. I tilted my head back, letting it lie on his shoulder as he pressed himself against my back.
“Hey,” Ryan Foxheart murmured against my skin.
“Hi,” I said, closing my eyes and relaxing.
“You didn’t hear me come in, did you?”
I scoffed. “Of course I did.”
I felt his smile. “Liar.”
“I was busy doing very important things.”
“Uh-huh. So, do we need to talk about why your Grimoire is open to a page that says His shaft is thick and epic / without it I feel apoplectic?”
“Nope,” I said hurriedly, reaching forward and slamming the Grimoire shut. “Nothing for you to see here. Secret wizarding stuff. Very hush-hush. Ancient and all that. Why, even seeing the words could cause your eyes to melt right out of your face.”
“Really,” he said, gripping my hips. “Is that what you’re going with?”
“It wasn’t even about you,” I said. “Not everything is about you, you know. Gods, how self-centered can you get? I’m a wizard, Ryan. I will have secrets. You’re tearing us apart.”
“Uh-huh.” He moved his hands from my hips, trailing them along to the front of my trousers.
“Ngh,” I said, because I had no blood left in my brain.
“Eloquent as always. Maybe I should just jack you off right here. Think that’ll help you become vocal again?”
Yes. Yes it would. He had the best ideas. I always thought so.
“Except,” he said, sounding regretful. He gripped my dick through my trousers with his big hand, holding it tight. “Except, didn’t Morgan say that if he ever caught us having sex in the labs again, he’d curse us both and make it so the thought of touching each other was the most disgusting thing that could ever happen?”