“Kissed. You said.” Jonathan threw himself into his desk chair and stared at the monitor, which Hæra couldn’t see from the other side of the desk. In the window behind him, the day’s sun sank toward the horizon. Not much time left.

“I didn’t know your lot did that,” he said after another moment. “You’ve told me how different my body really is from yours…and his.”

She groaned. Jonathan ought to know that now wasn’t the time to talk about Asgall, of all things. Never was the time to talk about Asgall. They had to solve Hæra’s problem, once they worked out what it actually was.

“You’ve been queer since she got here,” he continued. His knobby fingers rubbed over the white hair at his chin. “And now you’ve got a look in your eyes that reminds me of him.”

Hæra stiffened.

“I thought he cared about me,” Jonathan said to the monitor. Whatever he saw there appeared to fascinate him. “And then he tried to drown me.”

Hæra stepped forward, heart pounding. She hadn’t seen such a distance in Jonathan’s eyes since the night they met. “I am not Asgall,” she said, with all the force the words could hold.

“No? You want to hold her, same as he did me. And I don’t mean for a sweet little kiss.”

Nothing had been sweet or little about that kiss. It had eaten up Hæra as surely as a storm ate up the shore. As surely as she’d intended to eat up Madeleine at the beginning, which Jonathan didn’t and mustn’t know.

“We talked about this at the start,” she said evenly. “I saved Madeleine’s life. I care deeply for her. It’s not the same as Asgall and you. Did my brother ever kiss you?” She said the last in a lighter tone, thinking the situation could use some levity.

“What do you think?” No levity in Jonathan’s voice. Instead, there was something deep and dark, like pain.

That must mean no. Of course it did—the idea of Jonathan and Asgall kissing would be laughable, if anything about this was funny. “There you are, then. It’s not the same thing at all.”

“It better not be.”

Hæra started. Jonathan had never sounded like that before: his voice low, heavy, almost cold. It sent a chill through her blood. “Where’s this coming from?” she managed. “You’ve always supported me.”

“I don’t know. Like I said, you got that look in your eyes when you were telling me about what happened. And I remembered you’re not like me. You’d think it’d be hard to forget, wouldn’t you? What with how you eat raw meat and don’t sleep. But it’s that look that makes me see you as you are.”