"Yeah, no kidding," he grumbled. "From the sound of things, it won't put the man and his boys out too much if the selkies call it quits on their arrangement. But siblings won't be kind. They rarely are. Once they catch wind that their fun time is affected, the kiddo that flew too close to the sun is really going to catch it."

He shrugged. "I'm fine passing along the apology. But I'm personally not too hard up for trying to plead his case to Miss Brienna. A peltless selkie is essentially a slave, regardless of the boy's feelings."

What can he say? Vouching for a woman who faced servitude under a man under an unseen 'contract' wasn't new for him.

Lilith. Eve.

He could only hope they were both well.