Skins & Needles (COMPLETE)

Cracking Armor Part 2

Charlotte

There was a brief period of silence between when I said that, and when we switched conversation topics.

"So, how's dating work?" I asked, and Arsen laughed, forcing me to momentarily pause in my inking.

"Well, when two people like each other, one person asks the other on a date..." he began, and laughed again when he saw my glare.

"Ass," I muttered, but I felt myself fighting a grin. "I mean, you know, with Shifters."

"When two people like each other--"

"Arsen!" I scolded, only now I was laughing too. This man...

"Fine, fine," he conceded. "It's not really different than regular relationships, I suppose. But you can't have anything lasting with someone who doesn't know. At least, not around here. I know in other places, in different shifter communities, it's a little more relaxed with the aspect of telling our secret, but not by much."

"I see," I said slowly as I returned to work. "I mean, that makes sense I guess. You'd be hiding half of your life from your significant other."

"That, and shifters have significantly longer lives than regular humans," he explained. "If I never used my gift, and wasn't killed in any unnatural way, I could expect to live to around three hundred."

"Shit," I muttered. "And if you did?"

"Probably half that. Two hundred on the high end, and maybe a hundred forty on the lowest."

"Other than knowing, and I guess potentially giving your gift to the person you wish to spend your days with, is it the same as human relationships?"

Arsen paused for a moment, as if contemplating answering, before humming softly to himself.

"Mostly."

"Mostly? So there are no, like, mates or whatever? Like in all the books and shit?"

"It's not the same," he told me. "There isn't a set mate for a shifter like all the sappy romance novels will have you believe. Instead, we form mate bonds, which can be broken if you never grant that person your gift, and reformed with someone else. There isn't just one option in the whole world to be a shifter's mate, I mean to say."

"And if you give someone you have a mate bond with your gift?"

"Then you're mates for life."

Makes sense. So not that different from the sappy romance books.

"What do they feel like?" I wondered, trying not to let my heart rate pick up at the sudden, stupid idea that Arsen could feel that toward me. We hadn't known each other long enough, right? And we'd only kissed a handful of times. And he was pretty vehement about me not being in the Know. And why was I even thinking about it? I was still trying to get over him!

Right?

"I'm not sure," Arsen answered, bringing me out of my barrage of thoughts.

"Oh," I said, feeling my heart sink anyway. What the hell, Charlotte? Get over it already! "I mean, that seems like something you'd probably know if it was there."

Arsen didn't reply, but instead just eyed the artwork on the opposite wall, lost in some thought of his own. For a while, the only sound to be heard was the humming of the tattoo gun, and in that moment, I preferred it that way.

I was in the Know. I should have been happy. But I felt like I'd taken two steps forward and three steps back with Arsen. Oh well. Now at least I knew it wasn't the secrets keeping us apart. It was the mystical bond shifters formed with those they could potentially be with for life, and if Arsen didn't even know how one felt, then it was clear he didn't have one with me.