Page 14 of Elora and the Crow

“I loved the ladies, and I wasn’t discreet about it. I wasn’t looking for a relationship, but I was always honest about that with the women I slept with.”

“I’ve never met a shapeshifter who did want a relationship,” she said.

He frowned. “How many shapeshifters have you met?”

She shrugged. “Probably more than the average person, thanks to Sarina. About a year before I found you, Sarina lived in Spain for a while. She let me come visit her for a few weeks, and there was a shapeshifter party we attended.”

He could feel his temperature spiking, his anger rising that Sarina would put her sister in danger like that. “That was incredibly stupid of Sarina.”

She gave him a cool look. “You know as well as I do that my sister is far from stupid. Besides, I was with Sarina the entire night and perfectly safe. The worst that happened was a few of them hit on me. And that wasn’t even awful, it was just -”

“You’ve slept with a shapeshifter?” Hurt had replaced the anger, and how fucking stupid was that? He had no right to be upset about who Elora slept with. She was free to fuck whomever she wanted.

Oh yeah? Is that why you’ve spent the last two years cockblocking her?

He ignored his inner voice as Elora said, “No, I didn’t. But only because Sarina wouldn’t let me. Which was ridiculous because I was an adult, but she acted like I was twelve or something.”

She rolled her eyes. “Anyway, I think I know more than most about shapeshifters, and one glaringly obvious thing is that you don’t do relationships. Ever.”

“It’s too dangerous in our line of work,” he said.

She shrugged. “Maybe. Or maybe you all just have commitment issues thanks to your fucked up childhoods.”

“How old was Sarina when she was taken?” Jonah asked.

“Older. She was nearly ten.” Elora’s face had gone pale. “Our father hid her well, but they eventually found her and took her. But her being older made it harder for them to break her. Despite what they did to her, I don’t think they ever fully did. How old were you?”

“Four,” he said.

She winced. Her small hands tightened into fists in her lap, and the knuckles glowed a faint blue. “How can they treat their own like they do? What made them become such monsters?”

“The program,” he said. “There were always one or two graduates each year who happily stayed on at the Academy to be… trainers.”

She snorted, that blue light glowing a little brighter. “They can call it a fucking Academy and themselves trainers all they want, but we know what it really is. A prison, and they’re the guards.”

He wanted to take her hand, soothe away that blue light that betrayed her feelings, but Elora still didn’t trust him. He hated that she didn’t, but he had to accept it.

“Who did they use to keep you from shifting and escaping?” she asked.

“My father and brother,” he said. “And the collar.”

He couldn’t stop the shudder that wracked his body. Elora shifted closer on the couch and took his hand tentatively. “I’m sorry. Sarina doesn’t talk much about it, but I know they also used the collar on her.”

“They use it on all of us until we’re… agreeable,” he said.

“How does it work?” she asked, her hand still holding his.

“I don’t know. All I know is it stopped your ability to shapeshift.”

“Magic, maybe?” she said. “I’ve tried to talk to Sarina about it. I thought maybe if I knew better how it worked, like if it was a spell or something, then I could create a spell to reverse it, but she wouldn’t talk about it with me. She says if it is magic, it’s too powerful for me to stop.”

“She’s probably right,” Jonah said.

They sat in silence. The blue had faded from her knuckles, and he studied how small but perfectly right her hand looked in his.

She studied their clasped hands blankly before pulling hers free. “Sorry. You were saying that you were a, um, whore?”

He nodded. “Yeah. One night, I met a woman at a bar and went home with her. We spent the weekend together, and I was upfront about what I could give her. She seemed cool with it.”

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