24. CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Calista
S teady pounding in my head woke me. My tongue felt like sandpaper dipped in acidic vomit. I tried to wet my lips, but my mouth was as dry as a desert and my tongue was dead weight, and so were my eyelids. I struggled to open them even though I just wanted to go back to sleep with the hopes that, when I woke again, my entire body wouldn’t hurt.
I snuggled deeper into the warmth of the bed and slowed my breaths to ease the nausea swirling in my stomach. An arm tightened around my chest as fingers wove with mine and rested under my chin. I sighed. The warm cocoon of their body made me feel a bit better.
My eyes popped open. How drunk did I get last night that I let someone stay the night? I blinked a few times until the room came into focus. Candles burned in sconces along the stone walls, chasing the shadows farther into the room. I couldn’t make out much in the darkness, but I quickly began to remember that I wasn’t home.
The Bluebell, I thought to myself as the day’s events came back to me piece by piece. I looked down at the hand I held in mine. Long, ashen fingers curled into a loose fist beneath my palm. Turning my head slowly, I confirmed what I already knew.
Astaroth.
Lips slightly parted, face relaxed, his lashes fluttered lightly as he slept on his side against my back, atop the cover. In his sleep, his sharp features appeared angelic and sweet, completely unlike the harshness of them when he was awake. I tensed and stared at the ceiling when his head slid closer on the pillow and touched mine. He pressed his nose beneath my ear and sighed. The warmth of his breath on my neck felt too intimate, and my brain instantly came up with scenarios for what it would be like when he finally cashed in on our bargain. I turned my head back as it pounded harder, trying to figure out how I would get out of this without waking him. My stomach had other plans.
I lurched for the side of the bed and hung over it. Wave after gruesome wave of dry heaves wracked my body. I could feel Astaroth move behind me before a wet cloth draped over my neck. He knelt at the edge of the bed and trailed his fingers down and back up my spine. That, coupled with the sweat cooling my feverish skin, made me shiver. Scared to move in case it brought on another round, I tilted my head and used the corner of the damp cloth to wipe my mouth.
“Oh god,” I mumbled and buried my face in the blanket, stating the obvious, “I puked on your floor.”
Astaroth’s hand paused at the base of my spine. The weight felt heavier than it should with the unspoken expectations and intentions that lingered between us. I rolled onto my back and covered my eyes with the bend of my arm.
“The sickness is easing. You should feel better on the morrow.”
“It’s easing? I feel like I drank a gallon of booze.” I peeked at his puzzled expression from under my elbow and reiterated. “Liquor? Alcohol?”
He chuckled. “Others have described it as such. And, yes, it’s easing. You’ve been sick for days.”
“What?” I sat up, the movement making the room spin.
Astaroth hurried up the bed and knelt at my side. He gently cupped my shoulder to prevent me from falling off the bed. “You need to rest.”
I rubbed my temples. “Apparently I’ve rested for days.” My hands landed in my lap as I turned to him. The lacing of his shirt was untied and loose in the eyelets revealing more gray tinged skin. Stains covered the cream material untucked from his breeches. “How many exactly?”
“Counting the day you passed out,” he said, moving to the other side of the bed and reaching for a cup on the nightstand. “Five.”
My gaze jerked up. His long, tangled hair framed his tired face. Even his eyes looked blacker than normal, the specks within almost nonexistent. He poured water into the cup and crawled across the bed, handing it to me.
“Oh, thank you.” I snatched the cup, happier than I’d ever been for a drink of water. “Sorry. Shit.” I squeezed my eyes closed recalling the three commandments Jessandra recited to me. When he didn’t respond, I cracked an eye open to find a sad smile on his face.
“I will never hold those over your head, Calista. That is part of who you are.”
He didn’t have to. The bajillion favors I already owed him were more than enough to last my lifetime. I sipped the water and winced from the dull ache in my parched throat, swallowing my resentment down with it for the time being.
“However, please be mindful with the others. They will not be as giving as I am.”
His graciousness rubbed me the wrong way. I cleared my throat and returned to the subject at hand. “Have I been here the entire time?”
“Yes.” He waited for me to ask the next question as I surveyed what I could of the room.
“Is this….” I looked down at the over-sized bed made for a seven-foot king. “Am I in your bed?”
“You are. I wanted you in the safest place as I nursed you back to health.”
“The safest place is your bed?” I asked incredulously.
Astaroth’s lips formed a tight line. “The safest place is and will always be by my side. The room is also warded to protect me when I cannot protect myself.”
I nodded, wondering what that meant exactly. “If someone gets past the ward?”
“The realm responds to the threat.” Astaroth ran a hand through his disheveled hair. “I assure you, this was the safest choice while you recovered.”
“I believe you.” Strange thing was, I did. There didn’t feel to be any strings attached or manipulated meanings behind his generosity. His actions were almost… human.
“I would never lie to you, Calista.”
I thought about that as I drank the last of the water and my previous response to that same declaration. If Astaroth wouldn’t hold my human qualities against me, should I hold his fae qualities against him? The rational side of my brain told me “No” and to accept his way of life the way he accepted mine. The emotional part of my brain screamed “Fuck that! He’s not even human, so his way of life doesn’t count.” I chewed at my lower chapped lip, biting off a bit of dead skin as my thoughts warred with one another and went to set the cup on the table next to me. The wooden music box I found at the market set there. I stroked the image on the lid, following the smooth carved lines of the tree.
“You said you nursed me back to health.”
“I did. It took you longer to recover than one of us. I feared you had succumbed to the toxin in the pollen.”
“Pollen?” Confused, I turned to him.
“The Bluebell is a dangerously beautiful flower—one of the deadliest things in the realm. There is nothing to counteract the toxin.”
“There was a pixie in that jar.”
He shook his head. “Impossible. It would have died. The sweet wheat can make you see things that aren’t really there if you eat enough and aren’t used to its effects.”
“I wasn’t hallucinating, Astaroth. I saw its face. It looked exactly like the one that flew out of the garden.” I hugged myself and felt for the missing pendant. “Then that rat bastard stole the necklace you gave me.” All the questions I had wanted to ask him popped into my mind. The skin on my hands remained the same. I glanced at his ungloved hands that gripped his knees as he sat crossed-legged and realized this was the first time I’d seen them uncovered. I wondered if my eyes would change first or if they would remain the same cornflower blue.
Astaroth nearly growled, “He did not get far.”
“You caught him?”
“Fortunate for him, he dropped it while evading capture.” He pointed to the box.
I placed it in my lap and opened the lid. Nestled inside was the wishing stone. The curious melody began to play, amplified by the stone walls, and singing to a part of me that recognized it.
“When will I become one of them?” I blurted. The fear refused to be silenced and tumbled from lips before I could stop it. “My brother started changing within hours.”
Astaroth’s lip twitched as he reached into the box and took out the necklace. He scooted closer, and I looked up at him as he draped it over my head. A flashback of the first time he did this played in my mind, making me ache to see Kaiden and assure him I was alive and would find a way back to him. The moment the pendant touched my chest, the stone thrummed in tune with the music box. I was conflicted about the peacefulness flowing through the thing that shackled me to this prison.
Astaroth gingerly touched the stone with his fingertip. Surprise flitted over him when it shocked us, but he didn’t drop his hand. The thrumming intensified until the stone vibrated like a tuning fork. The sensation was too much. I pushed his hand away.
Astaroth
“You didn’t answer the question.”
Nor did I want to. Doing so would push her farther away from me when all I wanted was to lie down and go back to sleep with her in my arms. My energy had depleted from sitting vigilant at her side for days, infusing her with my draining magic.
“I will answer it when the moment is right.” She scowled, little wrinkles forming between her brows. “I am exhausted and won’t last much longer.”
Calista looked down at the clean gown she wore, tugging the blanket up to cover her breasts, then to my dirty attire. “Did you undress me?”
“No.” I rose from the bed and went to my wardrobe. “That’s not how I wanted to see your nude form in my bed for the first time.”
She stiffened as I pulled the soiled shirt over my head and tossed it on the floor to soak up her vomit. I’d leave her to figure out the meaning of my words.
The muscles in her jaw ticked as she struggled not to look at my bare chest. “If I have my way, you never will.”
Calista gasped when I blipped in front of her and raised her chin with my finger. My hair fell around her face as I bent over her, shimmering in the soft candlelight. Her eyes dipped lower over my body and jerked back up to settle on my mouth. She refused to meet my gaze.
“You made your choice. We will not discuss it henceforth. When the time comes to fulfill your bargain, you will do so.”
She whimpered slightly and bared her teeth. “I was a child.”
“So was I,” I said, my patience wearing thin on the topic. She jerked back as if I slapped her. “We were both old enough to know what we were doing.”
Her chin quivered and breaths became shallow. Instead of the tears I expected, she whispered vehemently, “I hate you.”
I watched as the tears finally rolled down her cheeks. I could work with hate. It was a passionate emotion that could be swayed as long as it continued to burn.
I cupped her face, and she turned her head. “You won’t always.”
“Try me.”
I raised a brow and pulled away. “I intend to.”
I went back to the wardrobe, feeling Calista’s gaze travel over me, and retrieved a clean shirt. When I faced her again, she quickly averted her eyes.
“Do you have to do that?”
I laughed and put it on. “As much as I enjoy your scent, the smell of your vomit is not as enticing.”
She swiped at her cheeks. “I’d like to go to my room.”
The bed dipped as I returned to my spot next to her. “Once you heal. Go to sleep, Calista. We both need our rest.”
She turned her back to me and tugged on the blanket to pull it up. I moved to give her more slack.
“Don’t you dare get under the cover.”
I smirked as my eyes grew heavier. “I would only dream of it.”
As I drifted off, the music box began to play. Calista’s humming lulled me into a deep sleep and followed me into my dreams.