Page 3 of Cassian is Getting Out

Felix crossed his arms. “Are we meant to go around and say our names, age, and a fun fact about ourselves?”

“Great suggestion, Felix. That’ll work. Why don’t you kick us off?”

Felix rolled his eyes up at the ceiling. “I’m Felix, obviously,” he said. “I’m twenty-three. I’m from London. I was kidnapped and forcibly mate-bonded to a disgruntled employee of my father’s when I was eighteen. I haven’t been outside the house in five years, except for my therapy sessions and walks around our block.”

Ivar looked at Felix. “Those are two very unfun facts.”

“Perfect. This isn’t a very fun conversation.” Felix’s smile was all teeth and no warmth. “Your turn.”

“I am Ivar. I am twenty-four. I am from Västervik, which is a small island nation in the North Sea.” He smiled serenely. “I was the sacred virgin of Skalavik, a traditional island enclave. And then I was not so sacred any more, when I was not so virginal.”

Felix snorted.

“I came to London with my alpha, Toby, who does not mind so much that I am not a virgin, because he enjoys the sex very much and asks for it at least once a day.” Ivar paused. “I also quite enjoy it. Toby is an alpha with much power in his hips.”

Cassian gaped. He looked at Dr Carlisle to see if she would tell Ivar off for the oversharing. But she let it stand.

Felix was blinking fast now. “What the fuck? Are you serious?”

“Now it is Toby who blesses me when he fills me. That is his joke. Toby is not very funny.”

“Fills you with what?” Cassian asked.

“Cock and come,” Felix said.

Cassian’s face reddened.

Dr Carlisle cleared her throat. “Cassian, your introduction please?”

“My name’s Cassian,” he said. “I’m twenty-two. I’m from Australia, and I live with Colin, who was with me in the waiting room. He’s the one who threatened you with the dummy,” he added, for Felix’s benefit. “And there’s also his partner Diwa and their baby Tala. I’m getting paid eighteen pounds an hour to play with Tala, because Mrs Brown the housekeeper won’t let me touch anything else, and I’m learning to read properly.”

Felix stared at him.

“You’re learning to read,” Felix repeated. “At twenty-two.”

The small hairs on the back of Cassian’s neck lifted. “Yes,” Cassian said. He kept his voice steady and sweet because that was what you did when someone’s tone had teeth in it. “I didn’t get to learn when I was young. So I’m doing it now.”

Ivar was watching Felix with half-lidded eyes. “In Skalavik we have a word, taskig, for people like you. It means — well. It means what you might imagine it means.”

Felix turned to Dr Carlisle. “Is he allowed to call me taskig? I don’t know what that is, but it really sounds like he shouldn’t be?”

“It is the soft underside of a squid’s excrement hole. It is the only part of the squid we do not eat, so we throw it to the feral cats.”

Felix grabbed the nearest cushion and hurled it at Ivar’s head.

Ivar didn’t move. The cushion sailed past his left ear and hit the monstera, which shuddered but held its ground.

“Right,” Dr Carlisle said. Her eyes had slipped closed. “Right.”

Cassian glanced down at his hands. His thumb was on his wrist scar again. He wasn’t going to come out of this with a friend, by the look of it. Felix’s energy grated on him like steel wool.

“I lived in a high-control group,” Cassian said. “Until about a year ago. That’s why I can’t read. They didn’t teach me, so they could control what I learned more easily. I was in the Family of Light, in Australia. You might have seen the documentary about it by my friend Hamish McNally.”

Felix, who had been gearing up for another volley at Ivar, went still. He glared at Dr Carlisle. “You’ve lumped me in,” he said, “with a cult survivor and an ex-holy virgin.”

“You do have quite a lot in common,” Dr Carlisle said.

“We have nothing in common.”