Page 91 of Five to Love Him
The hive chuckled. “We too have collected an old toy our gleaming one loved, and it upsets him that we cherish it. He feels teased by us.”
“Wait, you’re mated too? You have a glowworm person?” Leo was holding out the chairs for three of us before we could stop him, and he stroked our shoulders when we sat as if to make sure we’d not keel over then and there.
“A glowworm person? Hmm.” The hive was deep in thought, looking at the distance with the coffee pot in hand and standing in front of the toaster without pushing the button. He was here with four, and if he’d left with two already, he’d come with six. He was big at eight, but still, to leave his own gleaming one with only two and do this for us…we felt our cheeks redden as we considered it.
“Well, you don’t just glow at night for us, Leo, but in the darkness is when you are brightest.” We pulled our chairs closer toward him.
“I like glowworm person, and my glowworm person agreed.”
“Wow, right, you just talked to them?” Leo asked.
The hive nodded and resumed making breakfast and serving us, yet another kindness. “Yes. He’s really enjoying the word.”
Leo’s cashew milk was in the fridge, something the hive couldn’t have known. We stood and got it for him, poured it into his mug. Yesterday was over. What that human had said, that he would come to get us, it was still as scary as it had been, but perhaps our bosses would find a way to stop him. If not…if not, maybe we could think of a ruse of leading him away from Leo. Whatever happened, we knew we couldn’t allow him to get Leo.
“Hey, we should all get together, us two glowworm persons and you two hives. A double date with lots of bodies.”
“Hmm.” The hive slowed as they considered it again, and we thought they might be talking to their gleaming one about it.
It was Leo’s idea, so we’d not oppose it, but another hive who was bigger and not as weak as we might make Leo want that. Jealousy spiked. We’d never felt it, not in the way we heard it in the tales of humans who had fallen slaves to it.
“We’d have to do it in the underground,” we said.
“Yes! Or at St. Auguste. I get staff credit for the cafeteria, and the food there is actually really good. Plus, big tables.”
“St. Auguste. That sounds like an especially good idea. Hive, your Leo is a cunning lion.”
“Me? Cunning?”
“You don’t know in what way you have been, but you are. We are grateful to have met you.” The hive said it both to us and Leo, and we nodded though we cast our gaze down.
“Cryptic,” Leo said.
We sighed. “We should go to work soon. To the studio. We didn’t get anything done yesterday, and we left the computer on. Xander might be upset about that, given that he is so environmentally conscious.”
“No work today.” Leo fixed one of us in his gaze. “It’s Saturday, plus they said…well, they called it a hunt?”
“That’s the term they used,” the hive confirmed.
“Anyway. They said to tell you to stay home today, a few more days if that’s what you need. I don’t have to go to school either for the time being, not even Instructor Arick’s class, though I should probably text Tate.”
“Hunt.”
“Do you feel…I don’t know. Is there any particular way you feel about that?” Leo asked softly.
“We feel very good about it,” the hive mumbled. They had picked flowers and put them on the counter, using one of the vases we had found at the very back in one of the bottom kitchen counters. We liked the hive, knew we were lucky to have met them.
“We don’t know.” We tried ordering our thoughts, but that wasn’t easy. It was as if there were walls in our mind that we couldn’t find a way around.
“It’s not like you have to feel any particular way about it. There’s nothing wrong with that,” Leo said.
We picked at a slice of toast the hive had put on our plate. “How do you feel about it?”
Leo drank his milk coffee, three sips, then he put the cup down. “You know how comic books teach you that the good vigilantes shouldn’t kill? That they should let the justice system take its course? That’s not really how it works in real life.”
“Technically, this is lawful,” the hive said.
“Huh?” Leo’s brows rose.
