“Well then why did Silas sacrifice so much to keep me away from the Klovoda?” I asked. “I understand why he would want to keep me away from Kingsling, but the rest of them?”
“He knew the danger.” Quillan sounded as though his patience was running out, and that made me nervous, because he rarely lost control. Until today. “While Weston and the Klovoda might be separate, it remains that the Klovoda is that one step closer to Weston. Silas knew that Weston would find out about who you are to us, and then it would be the end of you, and the end of everyone connected to you. Because he wouldn’t just kill you… he’d kill Poison, Clarin and Tariq for hiding you from him, and he’d kill me and Silas, too. He wouldn’t need us anymore. Paired, we’re more than useless to him. We’re a threat to him. That’s why he has two backup heirs, after all. Noah and Cabe would die as a result of the bond, but he wouldn’t discover that until after the fact.”
I climbed over my own shock, pushing it into the back of my mind and forging ahead with my questions. Quillan was finally saying things. I wasn’t going to pause to dwell on just how outlandish those things sounded.
“Would he really do that?” I asked. “He acts like you’re important to him, and I think even I’m important to him, somehow. Would he really kill us, just because we’re bonded?”
“Yes,” Quillan gritted out, sounding like he was finished with the conversation.
“Why?”
He pulled to the side of the road again, yanking on the handbrake and throwing off his seatbelt. He escaped the car and began to walk away. I was left sitting there with my mouth hanging open, blinking at his retreating form.
“Um,” I managed, before pushing open my own door and running after him. “Quil—Miro?”
“Don’t, Seph. Just don’t. You don’t know what you’re asking for. If you open your mouth again, you’re going to regret it.” His voice was hard, heavy, and it held no trace of the kind friend that I had always felt I could turn to.
“What kind of a threat is—”
He growled low in his throat, spun around, and cupped the base of my skull, pulling my mouth to his. Something inside my chest exploded, fissuring out to my arms, forcing them up and around Quillan’s neck. My own reaction was more confusing than his sudden kiss. I didn’t have those feelings for him, I didn’t want his lips pressing into mine, his body backing me into the tree, his hands tugging my head back…
He tore himself away from me, swearing colorfully. “That backfired,” he groaned out.
I slumped against the tree, my hand hovering over my mouth. “You did that deliberately!” Even to me, the accusation sounded utterly ridiculous.
He shook his head, backing further away, turning to face the road. “That wasn’t supposed to happen.” He spoke to the road. “You weren’t supposed to like it. It was supposed to be a lesson.”
“Since when was that the best way to shut a person up?” I asked, unable to do more than slump against the tree, completely torn apart with emotion. What the hell was going on? “And I didn’t like it!”
He laughed, the sound carrying over the asphalt, mocking me with the dry undertone. “This is so messed up. This is so wrong. I need to figure out what’s happening to us.”
“Why aren’t you looking at me?”
“Seriously? You’re asking more questions?”
“What?” I swallowed. “I’m banned from all questions now?”
He turned and walked back to me, his eyes narrowed. I would have been afraid, except that Silas had turned me into an exceptional beast-tamer, and… well, Quillan didn’t scare me. I ran at him, colliding with his chest. I had meant to knock him over, but he had easily twice my body mass, and I was sure that it was only the shock that had upset his balance. Either way, he wasn’t going down alone. He grabbed me at the last second and I toppled forwards as he fell backwards, both of us landing with a painful thud in the grass. I recovered first, rolling over and sitting on his stomach while he continued to lie there, stunned. I grabbed his hands and held them against the ground, either side of his face.
“You’re being a bully,” I ground out. “Knock it off.”
His torso vibrated with a laugh, and I blinked at him as it spilled from his lips, turning his face into something warm and familiar. Before I knew it, I was laughing too, and I had released his hands to slump against his chest, the tense and ugly emotion that had been building inside me bursting like a too-full bubble, simmering down to nothing.