Chapter Four - Rhea
Before I fully woke, I could hear them.
“I don’t understand why on Mara’s green earth you chose to bring her back at all!” someone with a dark, melodic voice hissed from my left.
“What harm could she possibly do?” toned a deeper, gravelly voice from my right. “She’s human.”
The words had me bristling. I might be human, but should they misstep for one second, I’d have my blade through each of their hearts.
“So what? You’d truly have us bring her into Arelia, Dante?” the melodic voice asked.
“Why not?” I nearly jumped upon hearing the familiar, hypnotic voice I’d heard in the dark woods coming from directly behind me. “She’s pretty enough. Why deny the lords another plaything?”
The swaying movement beneath me, the heat and press of the body behind me… I was riding with the very man who had trapped me in the woods, the man the villagers call the Grim.
“This is different, Dante. This isn’t some damsel. She’s a killer.”
I felt the male behind me shrug. “It’ll make her all the more interesting.”
“Dante—”
“Enough,” my captor hissed, making me inwardly flinch at the sudden change from indifference to firm command. “I’m not asking for advice. Not on this. Besides, she’s awake.”
I started at the accusation, but it was clear the act was up.
I blinked and looked around. My hands were tied, not with shadow but with iron-tipped rope. There were two men riding huge stallions on either side of me on the road. They wore hoods over their heads, no doubt to hide the sharp points of their ears and the unnatural coloration of their eyes and hair.
I turned as far around as I could in the saddle and caught sight of him, the male they called Dante, his face much too close to my own, and my breath stopped. He was beautiful, in a violent way. And still, those shadows swirled about his face, keeping half of it hidden at all times. But through them, piercing violet eyes looked down at me. When I offered him my sweetest smile, he blinked and scowled, jostling the ropes that held me so I was forced to turn back around.
“Good morning, lads!” I sang, turning to the men on either side and offering them an awkward bow.
They each gave me looks of distrust and surprise, but the one to my left verged on amusement. I locked on to his deep amber eyes.
“Might I have the pleasure of knowing the names of the men who were so cunning and strong as to capture someone like me?”
“You say that as if it should have been a challenge,” the hulk of a male with laughing eyes said.
“I’ve handled beasts at least three times the size of you, sir.” I batted an eyelash at him.
“Oh, you’ve never handled a beast like me, that I can assure you.”
I opened my mouth to respond, delighted to find fae males just as easy to toy with as human men, but a deep, savage growl from Dante had the words stuck in my throat.
“She isn’t a friend,” he said, and I turned in time to catch a look that had me wanting to shrink away. I raised my chin and smiled instead. He lifted a corner of his lip in what appeared to be disgust.
“Did you happen to find my horse? I’d hate to think she’s left out in the woods, lost.”
“She’s better off,” Dante said, making my heart drop.
“All to get me riding with you, I suppose?” I asked. Dante sat silent, and I gave an exaggerated sigh. “I’d prefer a more… personable riding companion. The big one, perhaps?”
“If it were up to me, certainly,” he said with a devious smirk.
“But it isn’t? You look so… formidable. Surely you’re the one in charge.”
“You’d do well to stop speaking,” the smaller, harsh-tongued male on my right said.
“Alas, I’ve been told I’m cursed with a wagging tongue. It’s quite a tragedy, truly.”
I winced as shadows rose around me.
“But would you at least do me the decency of answering me one question? Where is it I'm being taken? And for what reason?”
“That’s three questions,” the large male said pointedly.
“What would you give me for an answer?” Dante asked with a hint of danger in his voice. A bargain with the fae is always dangerous.
“Silence?” I offered. He snickered.
“You should be more careful,” the smaller male said. “You’ll find that pretty mouth of yours sealed shut for all time.”
“Well now, that would be quite a pity, as I do enjoy using it.”
The large male snorted, a sound of surprise and amusement.
“Silence from you,” Dante sneered, “for the rest of the ride, and I’ll tell you true where our destination is.”
“Very well,” I relented.
“Arelia.”
As the word was uttered, I felt shadows creeping up my arms to my face and filling my mouth, gagging me until tears came into my eyes. When I looked up, Dante was smiling.
But what they didn’t know was that the girl they were taking to be made a bed-warming slave was a wolf in the clothing of a lamb.
I’d been searching for a way into the fae kingdom for months, and these fools would take me right through. My hands tingled with unrestrained energy as the token around my neck warmed.
Dante’s smile faded, and he looked away from me stiffly.
The miles of forest road and river blurred together as the trio of dark cloaked fae males carried me further and further in silence. Behind me, I was all too aware of the solid press of the body of the Grim, his shadows still stuffing my mouth. Next time I made a bargain, I’d be sure to tell him exactly where he could shove his damn shadows.
A choked sound came from Dante. I tried to turn in the saddle to scowl at him, but he pulled on the ropes that held me in place.
If this was to be the entirety of our ride to Arelia, I supposed I’d have to make the most of my unwilling silence. At least here in my mind, I still had weapons available to me.
They’d said that I would be sold as a bed warmer. Some lord of the fae world would buy me as a plaything. The thought had my stomach tying itself in a knot. Fae males were known throughout the human world for their strength, their cunning, and their propensity for human women.
I slowly forced in a breath through my nose as we passed a glade. I pushed the fear down and allowed myself a long moment to admire the shimmering water of the pond, water lilies growing on its banks and loons swimming in circles in its middle. The sunlight reflected off the water and warmed my face as I let out the air in my lungs in a slow, careful stream.
I counted the facts, keeping all emotion from them.
The males who held me now were much stronger and quicker than me. Particularly so now that the shadow-bastard had destroyed my elixirs. But I still had my luck. I could feel Mara’s token even now where the pendant hung against my chest.
I was being taken to Arelia. I would finally have a way past the veil. And once I was past it, I would become a slave to a fae lord. If these bumbling males to my left and right were any indication, fae males were just as easy to manipulate as human men.
I just had to hope my new owner wasn’t as cold and deadly as Dante had proven to be.
Memories of him easily overpowering me last night in the woods had a chill running up my spine, and I became all too aware of every inch of his body that touched mine as the horse we rode stepped over a particularly rocky patch of road.
I could bear whatever torment waited for me beyond the veil. The High Priest had made sure of that. Every cadet at the citadel had to be taught to endure torture. Fighting against the fae meant any kind of torment was possible, and we needed to be ready for it.
But with my mark, my fate, the High Priest knew I would be likely to face it much sooner and far worse than the others.
He’d personally put me through a dozen or more forms of torture. Afterwards, he would mend my wounds with deceptively gentle hands while forcing me to vividly note the kinds of pain and feelings. He had me build up a tolerance to everything from whipping to poison.
Bile rose in my throat as an unwelcome memory of other forms of torture he had put my body through. I was certain to need that particular form of preparation if I was to be a fae lord’s slave.
In front of me, Dante’s hands tightened on the reins. I traced the veins in his hands that snaked up his muscular forearms with my eyes, grateful for something simple to put my attention on instead of the sickening memories of other hands on my body.
I knew my body could endure it. I had endured it all before. I would bear what I had to, for the freedom of my people.
“We’re nearing the veil,” the golden-haired fae to my left said. The horses slowed as if they could understand his words. I looked around the woods, but there was no indication that anything had changed in the long hours we’d spent riding.
But something had changed, not in appearance but in something beyond it. My thoughts were growing slower, heavier. There was magic here, the air was thick with it. I wanted to ask about the veil, to get any kind of information I could draw from my captors, but the shadows still swirled in my mouth, and any attempt to speak was swallowed by them.
A light breeze tugged at the sleeve of my tunic. I flexed my fingers in their bonds and found I could reach my belt, just barely.
The horses continued on as the air around us grew ever heavier. I wished my mouth had not been sealed with shadows. I wanted desperately to suck in a breath of air through more than my nose.
My fingers carefully pried the metal crest from my belt. I drew back and let out a loud, fake sneeze as I threw my head backwards.
Dante snarled as the back of my head smacked against the hard muscle of his chest, but the distraction seemed to work. There in the dirt of the road was my crest, marked with the dove. Perhaps someone would see fit to come looking for me, and if luck was on my side, they would know this place was where the veil was thinnest.
The air thickened as the horses continued on until it felt as if we were wading not through air but through deep water.
“You’ll need to hold your breath,” Dante said, leaning low to speak the words into my right ear. “If you breathe at all while we are crossing the veil, it will know you are human. And it will destroy you.”
He sounded much too excited for the prospect that the veil might tear me apart before any fae lord had the chance to. As if in response to his threat, the world around me seemed to sparkle with energy. My hair stood on end like the very last moments before a lightning strike.
“Take a breath,” he purred, his pleasure at my fear all too evident.
My heart raced, but I forced myself to pull as much air as I could into my lungs. My eyes watered as the air around me began to pull at me, like it would tear me apart piece by piece.
Beneath me, the white horse walked on as if unaffected. The same road and trees moved around me, and my escort moved through the world as if nothing had changed at all. But my skin was threatening to crawl right off my bones as the crackling energy built to an unbearable intensity. I wasn’t sure which would kill me first, the sensation of being torn apart or the burning in my lungs as I fought the building urge to take a breath.
The moment I thought I would no longer be able to resist the urge to suck in air, a hand closed over my mouth and nose.
“We’re almost across,” Dante said in my ear. His words were strangely soft, contrasting with the unmovable hardness of the hand covering my lips.
My lungs burning and my mind frantic, I struggled against him. But his frame was like iron behind me, an immovable wall. Tears welled in my eyes and spilled over, dripping onto the back of his hand.
Stars swirled in my eyes as consciousness slipped away. The last ridiculous thought I had was how smooth and warm the skin of the hand pressed against my mouth was.