“That was too close.”

“It still worked.”

“No thanks to you, brat.”

Tea (Rowan, his name was Rowan, only a handful of people had taken to calling him Tea) turned and glared at Aiden. “More like, no thanks to you.” Aiden said nothing in response to the accusation, too busy running over the schematics Tea had shoved at him upon leaving the town and boarding the train back to Jacksonville. As they took their respective seats across from one another, Tea decided it was an appropriate time to remind Aiden why this mission almost failed. “The community was listening to me. They didn’t start questioning our authority until you came in.”

Aiden scoffed. “Shows just how little control you had if they were thrown off by me.”

Tea’s scowl deepened. “Do you even think about the negative energy you put off?”

“So?”

“So? You show them nothing more than a glare and you expect them to be compliant?”

“I’m sorry. Does my face bother you, oh star of the moderation?” Only then did Aiden look up, and that same glare that had thrown off the community of inhumans Tea had been trying to negotiate with threw him off as well. Instead of engaging, Tea glanced down at his hands. “That’s what I thought.” Aiden returned to looking at the schematics, and Tea went about ignoring him as best he could. Usually, this was how the discussion would end. Tea would say his piece and then Aiden would counter it with something pointed. Tea would accept defeat simply because he saw no point in arguing with someone so hardheaded, especially when that someone showed no outward interest in anything Tea had to say. Tea was used to feeling like the other wasn’t listening.

But today for whatever reason, it rubbed him the wrong way.

He knew the reason it bothered him. Despite his good sense, he called Aiden out on it. “Maybe if you didn’t look at them like they were all monsters, they would’ve been more willing to work with us.” Maybe if he didn’t look at Tea like he was a monster, Tea wouldn’t feel so much resentment towards Aiden.

“I don’t know if you noticed, but they were monsters.”

“They don’t need to be reminded of it constantly. That was part of the problem.”

“Them being uncomfortable in their lot isn’t my problem.”

“But getting the job done is your problem, and you—”

“I’m done,” Aiden looked up with a glare that froze Tea’s tongue. “Enough, okay? It’s over.”

Tea’s tongue unfroze just enough for him to murmur, “Fine.”

Aiden was right. Tea should stop. He really should. He sat back in his seat and stared at the floor, the train rocking them as they headed home. Shifting his gaze out the window, Tea watched the landscape pass them by. Leaning on his palm he sighed heavily. His limbs felt shaky, and he wasn’t sure if it was from the train or the anxiety of sitting across from Aiden. He hadn’t been comfortable in Aiden’s space in a long time, and Aiden seemed to make sure Tea knew that it was in fact his space and not Tea’s. All because Aiden was human. Mostly human. The massive wings which dragged behind him, wings he rarely glamoured out of sight, were the only parts of him that even resonated that he even had a partner in the Red Cord.

Tea should be quiet. Without thinking he started humming softly to himself. The sound soothed him slightly, made him feel less antsy being in the same car with Aiden for an extended period of time. At this rate, he could probably close his eyes and let the rocking of the train help him forget Aiden was even there.

Except Aiden started groaning, the disgruntled sound coupled with the exclamation, “You’re really trying to pick a fight today aren’t you kid?”

The skinwalker stopped humming, exhaling with just as much aggravation as Aiden showed. “I thought you were done.”

“Just sit there and shut up.”

“I did.”

“No, you’re sitting over there whining.”

“I’m sorry,” Tea began, rolling his eyes and mimicking Aiden’s earlier comment, “would you like me to stop breathing too?”

“I could arrange that for you if it wouldn’t inconvenience your best of friends.”

“I don’t have a best of friends.”

“You have a partner. A pain in the ass one too.”

“Yeah, I didn’t ask for one either.” It fell completely silent. Tea resumed staring out the window, assuming the argument was over when the frustration was seemingly muted by his statement.

But then . . ., “Run that by me again.”

Tea let out another loud exhale. “What now?”

“What did you just say?”

Tea pinched his sinuses, refusing to even look at Aiden. “Nothing. I didn’t say anything.” Nothing of consequence, or so he thought.

“What did you just say, kid?”

“Nothing!” Tea looked up and shouted just in time to see Aiden leaning forward and out of his seat. Aiden’s palm clasped Tea’s wrist, and in a flicker of remembrance he was able to twist his arm out of Aiden’s grip using his own thumb’s weakness against him. “Don’t touch me,” Tea warned. The heat from Aiden’s palm on his wrist was already scorching his skin uncomfortably, and soon he would start shivering from the attempt to grab onto him. He glared up at Aiden’s red eyes, which scowled back at him with an unpleasantness that hadn’t been there before.

“Say what you just said again,” Aiden commanded in a voice similar to the one he used to use when mentoring Tea.

He reached for Tea again, and again Tea jerked away. “Don’t touch me!”

“Alright kid,” Aiden snarled through gritted teeth, fingers suddenly snagging Tea’s tie and yanking him forward. Tea slipped off the seat, landing hard on his knees and hearing a slight crack in them from the impact. He let out a growl of his own, which Aiden silenced with one twist of Tea’s tie. Tea’s mouth slammed shut, and he closed his eyes and angled his head away from the other. “Let’s start over here: you’re going to answer some questions.”

“Fuck you,” Tea spat without giving it much thought. He clenched his fists. He couldn’t swing back, he’d just be reprimanded for it later.

That didn’t mean he wasn’t seriously considering it.

With the tie balled up in Aiden’s fist, it was less a leash and more a marionette handle. Aiden demonstrated his control over Tea now by swinging the fist that held the skinwalker’s tie firmly, tilting Tea sharply enough that his head struck the window’s edge. Pain spiked in Tea’s temple as he cried out, reaching up to cup the now throbbing, cold spot where his skin had split. Aiden pulled him back to sitting on his knees, fist still clenched in his tie and eyes still locked on Tea as the skinwalker let out a string of curses.

Aiden ignored the curses and asked over them, “You and Idlewood are bonded, right?”

“No shit,” Tea spat through the pain. Even his vision was throbbing slightly with his temple, all niceties dropped now that there was no air of civility between him and Aiden. They were alone and they were discussing things Aiden’s way.

Tea hated it. He started to clam up again as soon as Aiden asked the next question, “Where are your Scorch Marks?”

Just the thought of Scorch Marks and Fate Cords coupled with Don’s disapproving face was enough to shake Tea out of his silence. He snapped, “None of your goddamn business!”

Aiden tilted Tea again, Tea flinging his arm out in time to soften the next blow to his head but not in time to stop it completely. He let out a canine cry of pain, followed by a startled bark as he was rocked back into place on his knees. “Did Idlewood teach you to use that language in negotiation sessions?” Aiden nitpicked.

“You have no trouble—,” another tilt and this time Tea managed to catch himself fully. “Fucking stop!” he declared loudly, bracing himself on the floor and against the window. “What do you want?!” Because this was not how he intended to go back to Jacksonville.

“Did you make that bond willingly?”

“Who cares?!”

“Answer the question!” Aiden shook him as he ordered him, loosening Tea’s limbs and eyelids as he lifted him slightly higher by his tie. Tea’s vision was clear enough, albeit still pulsing from the wound enough that Aiden’s expression appeared way angrier than it likely was. Or less angry. He couldn’t tell, but he could tell that the man was serious when he reiterated, “Did you make that bond willingly?”

And it occurred to Tea then the severity of the slip he had made. At first he couldn’t speak. His mouth hung agape and his heart pounded, first from the exertion and second from the fear. He had misspoken. In misspeaking, he had revealed something that could defame Don.

It could defame Tea.

That wouldn’t be so terrible if it weren’t for the fact that a defamed skinwalker was as good to the Red Cord and the world as any other. Meaning he was worthless. Tea was completely worthless without Don.

And he’d just slandered him . . . .

Tea swallowed hard, wetting his mouth enough to speak clearly, “Yes.”

“You wanted to partner with Idlewood?” Tea froze, unable to answer. “Are you lying to me, kid?” Again, he couldn’t answer. Because initially, no. He hadn’t wanted this. Yes, he was lying. But he couldn’t admit the truth to Aiden. If he did, he’d be in trouble. If he did . . . .

He shook to think of what Don would do. Though the man had never laid a hand on Tea (yes he had but not a cruel hand, Don had never hurt him had he, not really, not intentionally), Tea had seen what Don was capable of firsthand. He had been there the night his family had died, the night his mother had screamed, “Monster!”

Tea simultaneously had no reason to fear Don and every reason to, and Aiden was asking him to betray the man he knew could kill him if he broke their contract and went feral.

“I’m n-not,” Tea assured, shaking his head wildly as he stared up at Aiden’s contorted expression with wide, fearful eyes. “I’m not lying, I—”

“I don’t believe you.”

Tea jumped at the accusation, hastily spilling, “I’m not lying. We set our terms. We agreed to be partners, he couldn’t force me to do that. We were—”

“You haven’t answered the question.”

“What?”

“You wanted this?”

“But I did an—”

“Look me in the eye and tell me you wanted this.” Aiden looked so serious.

And Tea felt so unsteady. This felt . . . wrong. Everything in this felt wrong, and before he could answer Aiden and get him off his back his stupid mouth opened once again and out fell the question, “What’s it to you?” Why did it matter so much to Aiden that Tea hadn’t wanted to be partnered with Don?

“It’s my job, brat. Answer the question.”

Tea hadn’t realized something within him had struggled upward enough to sink until it did. And when it did, it rooted him to the floor of the car and his expression went dead. As dead as if Don himself were grasping his shoulder and convincing him to say the right words. “Right,” he murmured, gold eyes locked with red. It was just Aiden’s job. “I wanted this.” This was all he would ever amount to.

Someone’s job.

Aiden watched him for a long time, seeing if Tea would falter and give in any way. Tea didn’t. Still, Aiden’s ultimate resolution was, “You’re lying.”

Tea’s response? “That you don’t believe me isn’t my problem.”

At that, Aiden shoved him away so hard he hit the seat like a sack. Breath knocked out of him, he pulled himself back up into the seat slowly and nursed his cuts and bruises.

He was silent the rest of the way back home.