Page 44 of Bound to the Dorm Elf
This morning, it’s worse.
I can’t stop rewinding every single word I’ve ever said to them — the awkward small talk in the library, the weirdly loaded “noise complaint” at the party, the way Bill’s eyes always seem to lookthroughme instead of at me. My brain keeps tugging at scraps of memory like loose threads, trying to stitch them into something that makes sense. It doesn’t. It just leaves a knot in my gut.
Rovax, of course, is perfectly fine.
He’s sitting on the edge of my desk chair like a mountain disguised as a man, cleaning one of those curved blades he insists on “training” with in the woods. No expression. No fidgeting. Just… maddening calm.
“You’re not worried,” I say, more accusation than question.
“Worry is wasted movement,” he says without looking up. His voice is steady enough to make me want to shake him.
“Worry is normal,” I snap, crossing my arms.
His eyes flick to mine. “Fear makes prey easy to find.”
I glare. “So your advice is what? Just… not be afraid? Wow, great survival tip, thank you so much.” My voice comes out sharper than I mean it to, but I’m wound too tight to reel it back.
He doesn’t rise to the bait. He just studies me for a long, heavy moment, the kind of silence that makes my skin prickle. Then, finally, he sets the blade down on my desk and says,
“Then let them look at me instead.”
The words stop me cold.
“What?”
“They’re circling,” he says, as if we’re talking about wolves and not two government creeps with matching bad suits. “If they are determined to find something, I would rather they watch me than you.”
“That’s—” I break off, becauserecklessis the first word in my head, but under it is something else. Something I don’t know what to do with.
“I’m not hiding behind you,” I say instead.
He leans back slightly, still holding my gaze like he’s weighing my answer. “You think this is about hiding? No. This is about drawing fire.”
“That’s the same thing.”
“It isn’t.” His tone is final, like he’s just closed a door I’m not allowed to open.
I turn away before he can read whatever’s on my face, busying myself with shoving laundry into my hamper. My hands are shaking, which makes it harder than it should be to fold anything. I hate that he can probablyhearit, the uneven rhythm of fabric snapping into place.
“You’re not invincible,” I mutter.
“No,” he agrees easily. “But I am harder to break than you.”
I spin back around, my chest tight. “That’s not the point.”
His mouth tilts, not quite a smile. “It’s exactly the point.”
There’s a beat of silence between us, the air charged with something I can’t name. Finally, I huff out a frustrated breath and drop onto my bed, kicking my heels against the frame.
“I hate this,” I admit, low.
“I know,” he says. “But hate it quietly. You don’t want them to hear.”
It should irritate me. It should make me want to argue. But instead, it’s… grounding, somehow. Like a stone in a storm.
I hate that too.
The email pingsinto my inbox just after dinner, sandwiched between a coupon from the campus bookstore and a reminder from the library about overdue books.
