“Both.”
“It’s the same answer.”
Devan’s fair eyebrows ticked up. “Explain?”
“Varian found me at the scene of an accident my entire family had died in. I was badly hurt at the bottom of a ravine, no human medics or supernatural healers close enough to help, so he bit me to keep me alive.” Zio’s hand fluttered to the mark on his neck. He traced it with his thumb and shivered. “That was twenty-one years ago.”
“Wow.” Devan covered Zio’s hand with his own. “I knew you were young.”
“How?”
“The way you speak, the gaps in your knowledge old age would have filled. I didn’t know you’d been reborn of such tragedy, though. I’m sorry.”
Zio shrugged. “It’s okay. I was only a few days old—I don’t know what I lost. And Varian found good people to take care of me until I was old enough to fight.”
“You shouldn’t have to fight.”
“But I do... and I need it, you know? It keeps my head quiet.”
“Even if it’s the killing that made your head noisy in the first place?”
“Who says it was?”
“Not me. Just speculating. Sorry. It’s in my blood.”
Devan went back to stroking Zio’s face as though the conversation was done.
Zio leaned into his touch and pressed on. “Dash changed you, didn’t he?”
“Yes. I told you... I asked him to.”
“When you were eighteen?”
“Yes.”
“How long ago was that?”
“What does it matter? Age isn’t important to shifters.”
“Then why did you ask me?”
A wry smile warmed Devan’s boyish face. “Because I’m terminally curious.”
“So am I.”
“No, you’re not.”
“I am about you.”
“Okay...” Devan licked his lips, not seeming to notice or care that the tip of his tongue darting in and out quickened Zio’s pulse. “If you must know, it was thirty years ago, so technically, I’m forty-eight.”
“Technically. You look eighteen.”
“I feel it too when I shift. When I stop thinking.”
“I get that.”
“I know.”