Don't Throw Me Away

"I..."

I opened my mouth to speak, then shut it again. My thoughts were a tangle. Had I ever, even once, told Sion I was going to throw him away? I searched my memory, but there was no way I had.

No—hold on. He's been kept here by force, and the moment I say I'll let him go, he bursts into those absurdly huge tears? What kind of reaction is that?

Wondering if Sion had somehow decided that set free meant abandoned, I bent my knees until our eyes met and tried again.

"Listen. I'm not throwing you away. I'm setting you free. I'm letting you go."

"Isn't that the same thing?"

"How is it the same? Setting you free means undoing what bound you, and letting you go means..."

Halfway through, something snagged. The words felt wrong.

Sion looked at me with those blue eyes. Then, lips parted just enough to show the tips of his fangs, he spoke.

"I already have nowhere to go. It's all gone. All I have left is you, Master. If even you throw me away, I'll die."

Sion had lived in a Wolf-kin village hidden from human eyes. There was no chance he had any ties in a place like this. His village had burned, and everyone in it was dead or sold into slavery. Wolf-kin were fiercely communal and wary by village; once a pack had formed, stepping into another could get you attacked and killed.

"..."

The moment I understood, I couldn't make myself close my mouth.

I hadn't thought of any of that. I'd simply assumed that if I burned the Slave Deed and took off his collar, he would bolt at once.

Wasn't his loyalty supposed to be branded into him?

I'd read in the book that they had locked him away, abused him, and forcibly brainwashed that loyalty into him. When his master was in danger, his body had moved before his thoughts could catch up, and even as he died he had longed for his homeland and his people. I had been certain he would want to leave Aine's side the instant he could.

And yet Sion had taken it as being thrown away.

I had come here with nothing more complicated than the intention of letting him go, and now my head was a mess. I could already tell this wasn't going to go smoothly either. In truth, I'd expected him to be the most troublesome of all. However forced that loyalty might have been, Wolf-kin were known to give their lives once they recognized someone as their master. That was why he had met an unwanted death protecting Aine.

I let out a heavy sigh and looked at him. Tears still trembled at the corners of his eyes. I didn't much care for the sight of someone crying, and yet I was realizing, right now, that on the right person even tears could be devastatingly alluring. Still, I couldn't leave him sniffling like this forever, so after a moment's hesitation I lifted my hand. Sion flinched and ducked.

Right. The magic on these gloves.

The enchantment reflected any blow back onto the attacker. The first time Sion had resisted, the gloves had punished him badly, and ever since he flinched on reflex whenever he saw them. That was why Aine had worn them every time she came to see him. I'd put them on just in case, but this was clearly a terrible idea. It felt like poking at an abused child's trauma.

I started pulling the gloves off. Sion watched, wary. Once both were off, I flung them behind me. His gaze followed them as they tumbled across the floor, then returned to me.

"See? There's nothing I can do to you now. If you attack me, I'll just take the hit."

I drew in a long, slow breath. It felt like laying my weakness bare. Maybe I hadn't needed to spell it out, but I thought that only by going this far would he finally feel safe. With my bare hand I wiped the tears from the corners of his eyes. Sion closed them. Once the tears were gone, I stroked his hair.

The kennel—Sion's house, if it could be called that—was visited every day by a servant Aine sent to bathe him and groom him to perfection. Whether she came to look or not, he was required to remain at the height of beauty. There could hardly be anything more stressful.

Still running my fingers through his hair, I used my other hand to undo the shackle. With a click, the collar dropped to the floor at his feet. Sion's eyes followed it.

"I have no intention of throwing you away."

Of course I meant to set him free, but that had never meant abandoning him. Even so, I couldn't just leave him shut up in this house forever. Taking off the collar didn't make everything all right.

I turned it over carefully. How could I give him his freedom again—not so that he looked only at me, but so that he could meet other people? The feeling refused to leave me alone.

"Is there anything you want? A wish, maybe."

"Something I want...?"

I nodded. A thoughtful look settled over Sion's face. At last he spoke, carefully.

"Master's..."

"Huh?"

Me?

I'd asked what he wanted, and out came me. Nervous about whatever followed, I swallowed hard. Then, eyes brimming again, Sion said,

"I want to stay with you, Master. Always."

"..."

Once again I had nothing to say. I was so thrown I started to wonder if conversation was supposed to leave you speechless this often. I stammered out a question.

"...Don't you hate me? I'm the one who put a collar on you, locked you in here, and treated you like a dog."

Saying it out loud made the cruelty feel more real. How much worse must it have been for him? Sion's eyes wavered.

"I want to kill you."

"..."

"I want to tear you to pieces. I want revenge for my people. For my family."

I flinched. His killing intent was thicker than I'd expected, sharp enough that it seemed to lance out and pierce me. But then tears spilled from his eyes again, and the killing intent vanished without a trace.

"But now all I have left is you, Master. No matter how much I hate you, no matter how badly I want to kill you, I can't do without you."

"..."

"If you want, I'll be a real dog. So please don't throw me away."

I squeezed my eyes shut, thinking that if something had gone wrong, it had gone very, very wrong.

No matter how I turned it over, letting Sion go right this moment was impossible. I couldn't abandon him under the name of freedom just to ease my own conscience. And shutting him back up in this house was, by any measure, unethical and wrong. To begin with, the place was called a kennel. The name alone was a serious problem. So I decided the first priority was getting Sion out of that house.

"My lady, that man..."

The coachman stared at Sion, who had come out with me, his face full of bewilderment. At the sight of him, Sion growled and hid behind my back. He must have thought the man meant to tear him away from me.

"Um... you could call it a rescue, I suppose..."

The irony of rescuing someone I—or rather, Aine—had locked in that house in the first place was ridiculous, but from where I stood, that was what this was.

"Don't ask for the details. Let's just go home for now."

"Y-yes. Ah... yes..."

We'd just taken the "dog" out of the place everyone called the kennel. I could understand the coachman's confusion.

Right. It doesn't look normal from your side either, does it? I don't even know what I'm doing right now.

A sigh escaped me. All the while Sion stayed plastered to my back, watching everything around us. A man far larger than I was, hiding behind a much smaller woman and bristling at the world—it was a strange sight, and all the more pitiful for it.

"Get in."

I climbed into the carriage with Sion. The moment the door shut, he stuck himself to me again.

Ugh. Th-this is uncomfortable...

Never mind how spacious the carriage was. Having a man's body glued to me with no room to breathe was deeply uncomfortable, and yet... I looked down at him. Only after clinging to my arm did Sion look satisfied.

His wariness of me, at least, seemed to have vanished. Once he'd confirmed that with the gloves off, touching me brought no pain, he refused to let go.

Even after all that abuse, he can't live without the person who did it?

If there was a word for a feeling like that, it was probably a knot of love and hate. He still looked at me with murder in his eyes, his body twitching as if he might kill me at any moment, and yet he was straining not to be parted from me. Watching that, something in my chest ached for no good reason. Maybe it reminded me of myself as a child—clinging and begging not to be thrown away, even while I was abused every day. Remembering that, I understood Sion's heart all the better.

"Sion."

The carriage began to move. At the sound of my voice over the rattling, Sion lifted his head. Eyes fixed straight ahead, I spoke quietly. I didn't know why I said it.

"Don't cry anymore."

When I can't even promise to protect you.

And even now, I still don't know what that strange look Sion turned on me that day was meant to mean.

In the end, Sion didn't leave my side until we reached the mansion. Stepping down from the carriage, I wondered where on earth I was supposed to put him. Just then Rita came running out of the building. For someone coming to greet us, she looked a little too urgent.

"My lady, you're back? Oh—and who might this be?"

After her greeting, Rita turned a curious look on Sion. True to form, he pressed even closer to me, wary.

Honestly. I'm going to start sweating.

"Never mind."

"Right, well—oh! That's it! My lady, you have a guest! An important guest!"

"A guest?"

I tilted my head, puzzled. Aine, absorbed in collecting and painfully short on human relationships, wasn't the sort of person who received visitors.

"Who is it?"

I asked. Rita threw her mouth wide open to answer—