Signs of Cupidity (Heart Hassle Book 1)

The next day is tense. Ronak didn’t come back to the cabin all night, and didn’t show up at the training yard until midday, which, according to Sylred, is unheard of. Evert wouldn’t even look at him.

The day after that, things weren’t much better. No one was really talking, and even when I prompted the guys with funny jokes or sexual innuendos to try and snap them out of it, I barely got a response.

By the third day, I’d had it.

We were all back in the cabin after a long day of training. No one was speaking or sitting together at the table. Everyone tried to pretended to be busy with chores. Even Sylred, who always acted as the peacemaker, was in a serious funk.

I’m so upset on their behalf that I can’t even finish my dinner. The horror of that alone was enough to push me over the edge.

After listening to nothing but angry, stomping footsteps and manly grunts for the past half hour, I get up and raid their pantry. When I find what I’m looking for, I slam four cups on the table, along with the barrel of homemade mead. When you’re banished on an island, you have to get creative with your booze.

“Covey meeting right now!” I yell, cutting into the silence like the crack of a whip.

Sylred appears first, popping out of his room. I wait a beat, but Evert doesn’t come. “Evert, I’ll flash you if you get out here right now!”

It takes less than three seconds for him to appear. He comes right up to me, wagging his brows. “Well? What are you waiting for?”

I coyly lift the bottom of my fur shirt and show him my belly before letting it drop down again. He makes a face at me. “What was that?”

“That was me flashing you.”

He scoffs. “You were supposed to flash me your tits. A deal’s a deal.”

“Nuh uh. I said I’d flash you. I didn’t say what I’d flash.”

“Fuck.”

I smile triumphantly as Sylred shakes his head at us.

Ronak still doesn’t come out of his room. “Not-First, you get your butt out here right now, or I’ll come in there and breathe my Lust-Breath all over you!”

It only takes him two minutes to grudgingly comply.

“Sit,” I say, pointing to their chairs. The guys grudgingly take their seats.

I stand at the other end of the table and start pouring the mead, passing the cups around until we all have one.

“You all have a lot of bad baggage between you. I get that. But you are a covey, and that’s more important than everything else.” When Evert scoffs, I shoot him a glare to shut him up. “Now. This is what’s going to happen,” I say, using my very serious, I-mean-business voice. “We are going to sit here and play a drinking game, and you’re all going to like it.”

“A drinking game?” Evert asks dubiously.

“Yes. A drinking game. Although I expect it won’t be very much fun. It’s called dirty laundry. You’re going to get everything all out there and air it all out. All your bad, stinky bullshit that you keep burying so you don’t have to look at it. You’re going to pull it all out, and then you’re going to work through it, as a covey, and move on. You have the culling in less than two weeks. I know you guys don’t want to die, and I don’t particularly want you to die, either. So we will sit here and play this game until your dirty laundry comes out smelling like happiness and sunshine, or at least until you can stop hating each other. You get me?”

“This is stupid,” Evert says.

“You’re stupid,” I snap back, because I’m super mature. “Here are the rules. You say one thing you feel mad about, and one thing you feel bad about, and then you take a drink. If someone else agrees with your statement, you both drink. The game ends when no one else has anything to say or you’re too drunk to say it.”

“We’ll be here for a very long time,” Evert mutters.

“Then I guess we better get started. I’ll go first,” I shoot back, grabbing the cup. “I feel mad that I was shot out of the sky with an arrow,” I say, looking at Ronak. He meets my gaze, his face unreadable as always. “But, I feel bad about scaring you all into thinking I was here to cause you harm.”

“We weren’t scared.”

“Semantics.”

I take a long drink. The alcohol burns and throws me into a coughing fit. “Gods, what is this?” I ask through watery eyes.

Evert smirks for the first time in three days. “I make it. It’s not your average mead. I have to get creative on this island. It’ll put hair on your chest, that’s for sure.”

I wipe my mouth, pointing to Sylred. “You’re up.”

I choose Sylred because he’s the one least likely to fight me, and once he participates, I have a better chance of the other two following suit.

Sylred taps his finger on the table in thought. “I’m mad that my covey doesn’t get along anymore,” he says, not making eye contact with anyone. “And I feel bad that I can’t fix things.” He picks up his cup and downs the contents, grimacing slightly at the taste.

My eyes move down the table. “Evert?”

“This is fucking stupid.”

“I don’t care. Do it.”

He rolls his eyes and makes a big show of crossing his hands behind his head and stretching his legs out in a fuck-all attitude. 

“You want to know why I’m mad?” he challenged.

“Yeah.”

He shot his thumb over his shoulder at Ronak. “Because that asshole didn’t listen to his covey. He was too wrapped up in getting the noblest pussy he could find that he went blind to what was happening. A covey is only as strong as its link, and he’s the one that ruined it, not me. When he told me to fuck off and went for Delsheen, even though I knew she was fucking us over, he chose her anyway because he didn’t want to lose face. He would’ve subjected us to a lifetime of fucking misery mated with her bullshit, and he didn’t give a shit. A covey is supposed to be closer than brothers. We’re supposed to make decisions together, but he always tries to run the ship just because he’s the one with noble blood. And look at the good it did us. He got us banished for five fucking years.”

He downs the cup, not even bothering to answer the second part of the game. My eyes fall on Ronak next. He’s not looking at anyone, just staring at a spot on the table. I clear my throat. “You’re up, Not-First.”

He doesn’t say anything and I worry that he’ll refuse to participate or storm off. But to my surprise, he finally answers. “I’m mad at myself for what I did. With Viessa. With Delsheen. With the prince. With my covey. I’ve been mad at myself for every second of every day, for the last five years. I know our covey is broken and that it’s my fault. My guilt and anger eats me alive, and I haven’t felt anything else for a long time. So all I can do is try to keep us alive.”

Silence.

I swear, if one of my feathers popped off my wing and fell to the ground, we’d all be able to hear it, that’s how quiet it becomes once Ronak makes his admission. He tosses his drink back and then goes for the barrel, refills his cup, and drinks another while we all watch him. Even Evert stares at him.

Sensing the need to step it up, I reach for the barrel and refill my cup, too. “I’m mad at all of you for screwing up your covey bond. And I’m really mad for any talk about you trying to break it up. You guys are family. I can see it, even when you’re at each other’s throats. You work together. You understand each other. Don’t toss that away because of a few mistakes and a genfin hussy who didn’t realize your worth. Show her and that pig prince that they didn’t break you. Forgive each other and be the covey you’re supposed to be, and then go into that culling and win.” I take slow sips of my drink, hoping it will make it go down easier. It doesn’t. After I finish coughing, I say, “If you don’t, I’ll feel bad because I’ll have to shoot all your asses with arrows for being too stupid and stubborn to move on. And take it from someone who’s been shot by an arrow, it doesn’t feel very good.”

Evert smirks at me. “What, first you’re our resident demon and now you’re our angel trying to save us?”

I shake my head, feeling the effects of the alcohol already swimming in my brain. “Nope. I’m your cupid, and I’m going to do what I do best. I’m going to fix your fucking hearts.”