Reshina
Arthur shut the door behind him and I locked it. With the single candle as my guide, I slipped off the old sheet covering a small table. There, I had hidden the supplies I’d need for the extraction.
A few clean bottles, a bowl, some fresh bandages, and a towel I’d torn into strips were neatly packed into a roasting tray I’d pilfered from Piffle’s kitchen.
Keeping an eye on the fae, I gathered a few blankets I’d hidden as well, slipping off my shoes at the door and carrying the warm wool from the Citrine Cliffs to the corner of the room.
“There now,” I cooed, “it is just you and I.”
The fae didn’t move as I placed everything out before me, leaving the candle as far from us as I could to hurt her as little as possible when I pulled the blanket away.
I shifted my simple black linen skirts up to my knees to fold my legs underneath me.
“I’m going to pull this blanket off you,” I murmured, tugging gently, meeting a gnash of teeth when her head was exposed to the light.
Curling into the wall as if she wished to meld into the stone, her fangs were barred, a low click resounding through the room from somewhere in the back of her throat. She bundled herself into the smallest space possible, her hands and legs bound tightly.
I looked her over, searching for any sign that this Underfae was the same faekind as the carvings, paintings, and descriptions I’d uncovered over the past few weeks.
Her skin was gray in pallor, stretched tightly over thin bones.
Rags covered parts of her body, including her chest, and I agreed with Arthur’s observation. This Underfae was likely female.
A small splatter of blood had crusted over her chin and her wild, black eyes darted rapidly around the room before settling on me.
“What has Ishtak done to you?” I whispered, reaching out to trace over one of her disjointed fingers, little more than bone.
She bolted towards me, mouth open wide, fangs positioned to dig into my flesh and tear.
I was ready. With a short flick of my wrist, she froze under my power—all of her body stilling except for her eyes.
I wanted her to see me, see that I was genuine—a Goddess watching over all the faekind in Revelry above or below the surface.
“You need not be frightened. I need something from you, but you will receive the blood you crave in return.” I peered into her mouth.
She bore two sets of long twin fangs, each having grown in her attempt to bite me.
I busied myself preparing the bowl, cutting the surface of my palm and letting my blood drip onto a clean cloth.
“I’ve been reading about the Underfae,” I started, not knowing if she could understand my words.
“You were once great sculptors of stone. You built this place.” I sighed, looking up at the dim carvings in the slanted ceiling.
Listening to my blood drip, soaking the cloth entirely, I continued.
“You dug these tunnels and carved these rooms. Even Piffle doesn’t know how far these corridors roam.
You told stories through your carvings.”
I folded the blood soaked cloth, holding it under her nose. Though she was stunned, every one of her senses were working and with the fresh scent of my blood, her black eyes pooled with hunger.
Laying the cloth over the clean bowl, I held it up to her poised fangs, pricking them through the fabric. Drops of yellow liquid trickled into the bowl.
“Venom,” I confirmed, peeking under the cloth to assess how much was collected.
After a few minutes, the venom slowed, but she’d given enough for at least half a vial.
Removing the bowl and cloth from her teeth, I poured the liquid into an empty bottle, corking the glass and settling it to clink next to the curses in my pocket.
My hand had already healed in the few minutes since I’d opened the wound, and before I removed the spell over her, I tied another rope to the sconce on the wall and around her waist, ensuring she wasn’t going anywhere.
“This is the only chance of escape I have left. Please know that.” The spell fell around her and she reared back, a whimpering noise coming from her chest. I dangled the bloody cloth before her, and she snatched it with her tied hands, shoving it into her mouth and sucking repeatedly.
Taking the candle towards the door, I blew it out before unlocking it. “Rest here. I will return for more tomorrow. You will not be harmed. That I promise you.”
I opened the door just a fraction and slipped out, careful not to allow much light inside. Arthur sat at the opposite wall, arms draped over his legs bent at the knee. He lifted his head at my appearance, silent and waiting for me to speak.
I slid down the door, meeting him in position, bending my knees and slumping my head back against the wall. “She was not always this way.”
“There’s no record,” he started. “Nothing in the library explains what happened to them.”
“Ishtak,” I sighed, my wings slumping across my back. “All of this points to her.”
Arthur flashed me a guilty look. “I never tried to contact her. I said I would, but the truth is—”
“You cannot reach Ishtak in the western corridor and survive, I know.” I pulled the vial of venom from my pocket, shaking its muddy yellow contents.
“Too much of this and you’d be dead. Yes, light hurts them, but they are so many in number, they would overcome you and your source, snuffing it out and draining you dry.
I do not ask you to seek Ishtak for my sake.
I do not ask anything of you but to help me leave this place. ”
“There is nothing else you’ll ask of me?” His words cut sharp in the air between us. Memories of the last few days, locked in an endless need of his mouth across my skin, settled like a portrait, flashing in glimpses of crimson sheets and warm breath along my wrist.
He waited for me to say it, waited for me to admit my want for his body, heavy over mine.
I did question it—what it might be like to take my pleasure from him in the very little time we had left before I’d poison the Beast and beat him to the ends of the castle boundary once and for all.
The longing was there in his eyes, as he stared at me across the corridor.
And I saw the softness in him—the counterpart to the raging Beast within his soul, longing only for the blood of the bite.
“Arthur,” I started, but he rose to his feet, shaking his head.
He held his hand out to me, helping me rise to my bare feet. “Never mind.” He kissed my hand, squeezing it gently. “Come. Piffle has put together a small meal in my rooms. Something to fill our bellies before we rest.”
“Your rooms? My fever is gone. I will return to—”
“If you need to keep the Beast at bay, I suggest you continue sleeping there until…the escape. He is calmer when you are there. He does not rage to be released.” He didn’t let go of my hand as we walked down the corridor, taking a right at the open passage.
“I can sleep on the chaise if you’d like. ”
“You are warm,” I said, squeezing his hand back. “And I am cold. Let us leave it at that.”
He nodded, giving me a simple smile and led the way to the black door across from the staircase that would lead me home.
For three days I carefully collected the Underfae’s venom. She had less to give after the first extraction, and though I fed her my blood each time, her feral nature continued—slashing and biting through the air every time I met her in the abandoned room.
The Beast was calm, only roaming a few hours each night while I slept in Arthur’s bed.
He’d slip back in and I’d turn, feigning fitful sleep to reach for him.
I was awake the entire time he was gone, and though I never said it, I yearned for the heat of his body next to mine.
We’d wake tangled together, my head resting on his chest, his arms wrapped around me.
We’d become two people forced together, but choosing each other’s company anyway.
Damn this curse.
Damn the both of them.
In the early morning of the fourth day, I lifted my head, resting my chin on his chest, watching him sleep. Arthur had become a friend in the six weeks I’d known him, and I didn’t want that to be the end of us… or what we could be together.
Tonight, we planned for my escape from the curse and thoughts tempted me. Dark ones, salacious ones, soft ones. I would bet all the marks in the Brackish Wood that this man could see to them all, but time was not meant to be manipulated in the lives of those cursed by the Veil.
We had either too much.
Or too little.
And as I stroked Arthur’s brow in a light caress, some part of me begged to stay. In all my six centuries of life, I’d spent little of them living for what I wanted.
My children, my people, my title, my crown—all had come first, leaving me a flame doused in the liquid chill of power that came with a price when it was thrust upon me at such a young age.
I had a list of moments where I wished I had the power to stop time from turning. I brushed a finger over Arthur’s soft mouth, adding this one to it.
His lips parted as he stirred, and I pulled myself closer, easing my mouth softly over his, brushing over his lips in a ghost of a kiss.
His eyes fluttered open, blinking in soft confusion that spun to realization.
Sinking his fingers through my hair, he pulled me to him, our mouths meeting in something desperate, something hungry.
He sat up, taking me with him, pulling me into his lap without breaking our kiss, and that lighted spark within me flared, shimmered—proved itself capable of climbing to flame with the caress of him to fuel it.
My hands dug through his hair, which had grown longer in the weeks since I’d arrived. My body raked against his lap, building in pressure for what I wanted—what both of us needed from each other that we’d denied ourselves in this curse.
The most beautiful pair of hands gripped my thighs, roaming to my backside while pulling me in. I met my turning point, deciding then which direction to go.
“I’m leaving you tonight,” I whispered between our lips. “If I do not go now, I fear the excuses I’ll make to stay.”
He pulled away, sweeping his hands along my neck to cup my face. “I understand. They need you more than I do.”
I peered into his steel blue eyes, knowing his response for the lie it was. I covered his hands with my own. “One more extraction and we’ll have enough.”
His lips met mine again, soft and wanting. “Go,” he whispered. “Before I beg you for more.”
On a sharp inhale, I kissed him again, pulling myself out of his grasp and from his lap. I pulled on my silk robe and left his rooms, refusing to look back.
I’d see him tonight.
We’d planned everything with Piffle.
And as I passed the staircase leading to the lands of winter, I did look back, knowing I’d see him at his doorway, watching the Goddess he’d been infatuated with for years plan her final escape from his grasp.