Page 125 of A Cruel Kindness

“It would have been the smart thing to do,” Ford grumbled. “What doesn’t make any sense is why he didn’t kill you. He could have made it look like an accident, but he made sure you knew it was him then left you alive. You could use the Prince’s slight as motivation to wipe the floor with them.”

I shook my head, my eyebrows creasing together. “We can’t be rash. They might want exactly that. For us to use all our resources on retaliation. They pulled away from camps nearby anyway.”

God, even as I said it, I realized how realistic that sounded. We’d never had to deal with the full weight of Muli’s offenses yet. We’d always just been playing defense.

“You need to focus on getting better,” Freya said, her eyes dropping to my leg. Even now, the limb felt better than it should. It had barely been twenty four hours.

“What happened to him?” I asked while I looked at Soren, uncaring what the verdict was on my own health. I was clearly breathing. My leg felt more like a strained muscle than an open wound.

“Bond Madness,” someone said from across the room, and I looked up to find Esme walking in with a look on her face I’d never seen before. She was hard to read when she wanted to be secretive, but that wasn’t what was happening.

There was emotion there, but it was one I didn’t understand. It almost seemed like she was looking at something she both equally recognized as much as her own face, but that she’d never seen before.

Esme walked up to the bed, hovering closer to Ford than I think she realized. “There isn’t an official word for it, but when the Bond recognizes your Soul Mate in danger…well,” she broke off with a small chuckle, “It goes a little bananas. He carried you on Lucky’s back for two miles, keeping you off the saddle the whole time. He had a few bruised ribs and some torn tendons, but he’ll sleep it off.”

Nausea rolled through my stomach. He’d hurt himself just to protect me. “He’s going to be in so much pain,” I said, my voice breaking.

“I said had,” Esme responded gently. “He’ll have healed by now.”

“What?” I breathed in relief, not caring how unbelievable that sounded. I just cared that he was okay.

I looked up to find Ford and Freya looking at her in confusion. Esme sighed, then looked at Freya as she explained, “It’s kept very quiet, because God knows someone would try to round us up like animals and experiment if they knew. Paranimas heal very fast.” That much was now explicitly clear. When I’d noticed soreness fleeting faster or my breath catching quicker, I had no reason to focus on it. With my leg … now it was obvious. “But when they are injured protecting their Match, they heal almost immediately.”

“How do you know that?” Ford bit out, a little too harsh. I knew him now, well enough to know that bite was from betrayal, not anger.

Esme kept her eyes on Freya as she said, “Peter told me.”

You could tell that explanation nowhere near satisfied him, but that had to wait. There were so many more questions I needed answered. “When is he going to wake up? Is Clover okay? What about Lucky? I—” I stopped to heave in a breath, and Freya took her chance to answer.

“He’s been out for about twenty hours, you for a little longer. Clover is fine. She just needed a few stitches. Lucky is snapping at everyone who comes within two feet of her. I kept him busy with carrots while I stitched her up.”

I fell forward to give her a hug, trusting she’d return it. I’d never had so many people who seemed to care about my experience before and it was extremely overwhelming.

When I regained my composure and felt the urge to touch Soren again, I leaned back and arranged myself on the bed, ignoring the bite of pain in my leg, so that I could settle myself more firmly against him.

Once I heard his heartbeat, using that to center me, I remembered what else Elijah said to me. “Right before Elijah found me, I heard a landmine. What was that?”

“Soren found it.” Freya’s hand rose up right along with my panic that he’d been hurt. “He was throwing rocks and blew one up. He’s fine.”

My confusion only rose. “Elijah told me that he couldn’t let me save them. As in plural.”

Ford laughed under his breath with a curse. “I’ll go tell Peter. We need to pull back from the search for the moment.”

With a final kiss on my head, Freya rose to follow him.

Esme remained. “He’ll be okay,” she said and when my eyes rose to meet hers, I finally understood.

I wouldn’t press it, not now, but it was clear she was speaking from experience. If she’d succumbed to the same madness Soren had, her story that the Bond hadn’t awoken wasn’t true.

“Thank you,” I said softly, hoping she knew how grateful I was that she showed a moment of honesty with me I was sure wasn’t shared with many others, if anyone.

Esme smiled somewhat sadly, then turned to go, leaving me listening to Soren’s heartbeat against my ear.

For the first time since I’d woken up, the Bond spoke. He’s okay. I’m glad he’s okay.

I let it ramble on happily, knowing that even with everything falling down around us, I wasn’t engaged anymore.

I didn’t have to fight it.