Fae (3 page)

“So, I understand you feel you’re too good for the food I provide you?” He had a thick, Eastern European accent, and always sounded calm and relaxed, which made her wish he’d just scream at her.

“No, Master, I-”

Nikola pressed his foot down over her neck, cutting off her air.

She tried to arch her back off the floor to ease the pressure, but it didn’t work.

“Stay still.” The hum of the bands turned into a painful ache, which amplified quickly for every moment she disobeyed, so Fae stilled, even though spots were starting to appear before her eyes. “I don’t like being lied to, you know that. Alec and Lena have already reported that you refused the food I provided this morning. Now let’s try this again, were you too good for the food I provided?”

Fae’s vision was fading, so she gave in and nodded. Instantly the pressure on her neck released and she took a gasping breath, coughing against the strain in her throat. Nikola still looked calm and professional in his suit, unruffled by the situation. He stepped in front of her and leaned against the front of his desk, waiting a moment for her to catch her breath.

“Sit up and kneel, Fae.” The bands hummed again, an ache beginning to rush up her arms before she rolled to her stomach to push herself up into a kneel. She was still dizzy from the stun gun and the near suffocation, so she was leaning heavily on her hands as she forced deep breaths. Nikola sighed, “Look at me, and tell me why you refused the food I provided.”

She lifted her head to look at him knowing he was not going to like her answer. “It was drugged, Master.”

Nikola gripped the front of the desk, knuckles white, but his voice remained calm and steady, his dark eyes intent on Fae’s. “I’m aware of that. I always do this to make the dinners more pleasant for everyone. You haven’t explained why you would refuse what I provided you.”

The intensity of his stare was making her uncomfortable, and the low hum of the bands was distracting. “Master, I know you will have to dose me tomorrow for the dinner, and since the build-up does not work on me I thought I would be more effective in my chores today if I were not drugged.”

“And whose choice is that to make?” His voice was cold and precise, and his bored facial expression didn’t change.

“Yours, Master,” Fae whispered, before gritting her teeth so she didn’t try to keep defending herself.

“Good. Now that we’re on the same page…” Nikola took a small vial of clear liquid out of his jacket pocket. “You’re going to take the Oblivion, and you’re not going to defy me in front of the other girls ever again.” Turning the vial over in his hand, he tossed it to Fae who caught it and held it in her lap.

“Master, I –” Nikola raised his hand and cut her off.

“Stop. Drink the vial. Now.” He had put his will behind the command and the bands reacted quickly, aching pain crawling under her skin. Fae doubled over as the pain burst in her chest, feeling like her ribs were trying to collapse in on themselves. It was hard to breathe through the pain, but the amount in the vial was a large dose and she really,
really
did not want to drink it.

Nikola stepped forward, walking around her slowly. “It’s only going to get worse the longer you fight this, and in the end you will still drink it.” Fae gasped as the pain increased, sure that her bones were cracking, and the golden light of the bands had increased so it was visible through her eyelids. Nikola sighed and leaned down, pulling Fae back up by her hair. Another wave of pain came and her body arched.

“Drink. It.”

Fae’s thumb popped the lid off the vial and she brought it to her mouth. The moment she swallowed it Nikola let go of her hair, and the pain abruptly ended. The relief from it was a sense of euphoria all on its own and she brushed her cheek to find it wet with tears. She quickly wiped her cheeks off and took a deep, steadying breath. She’d given in. Again.

Weak.

Nikola was standing in front of her as he held out his hand for the vial, which she returned to him wordlessly. When she looked up to meet his eyes, he delivered a sharp backhand. It wasn’t hard enough to do more than make her cheek sting, but it almost surprised her. She’d obeyed him and it hadn’t mattered. It never did.

“Do not embarrass me any further, slave.” His voice still sounded bored with the situation as he continued. “You will behave like the perfect servant tomorrow, or it won’t matter how much my guests want to meet you. I’ll give you to the guards for the evening. Understood?”

Fae nodded, and the bands hummed in response to his command. Nikola turned back to his desk.

“Good. Get back to work.”

Chapter Two

Seattle, Washington

Kiernan shut the lid on the observation glass, and sat back in the chair at his desk thinking over everything he’d seen. The glass allowed him to see any of the Faeoihn assigned to him, but he only ever seemed to find himself watching Fae.
Why her?
Other than going out in the city when he had to for errands, he spent most of his time with the observation glass open on his desk. Showing her.

It was, honestly, getting a little weird.

He was lost in his own thoughts about everything that had happened that morning when Cole appeared in his living room with a loud pop and dropped himself onto the couch. “Kiernan, that’s it, I am taking you out of this damn house. You don’t get to be Mr. Hermit anymore.” When he didn’t respond Cole shouted, “Hey!”

He snagged an apple from the table and threw it at Kiernan. It narrowly missed him and bounced off the window behind him, and Kiernan glared at him.

“What the hell, Cole?!” He leaned down and picked up the apple, throwing it swiftly back at the man’s head, but Cole caught it with irritating finesse.

“Man, you didn’t even notice I showed up. I could have come in swinging a battle axe, and you wouldn’t have done anything about it!” He stood up and walked over to where Kiernan sat, his eyes catching the box.

For a moment Kiernan almost regretted reconnecting with the man that was like a brother to him. He’d successfully avoided him, and all of the Laochra, for almost two hundred years – but with the digital age it was much harder to hide, and much harder to ignore Cole’s pleas for contact. Regardless, he’d missed him. No matter how annoying he was.

With a roll of his eyes, he spoke. “I noticed you, I’m just not in the mood for your shit. Anyway, I would have kicked your ass. You don’t handle axes well.”

“You
wish
you could kick my ass.” Cole scoffed, and started messing with a small stone egg sitting on the edge of the glass desk. “So, what were you doing?”

“My job.” Kiernan mumbled. Cole raised an eyebrow at that and switched to tossing the stone egg from hand to hand. “Do you ever stop messing with things, Cole? Put it down.”

Cole threw the egg up high and caught it close to the floor, just to be a dick, before finally setting it back down. “Well, I only stopped by because you haven’t been to base in a while, or to my cabin. Not checking in looks bad even if you’re
supposedly
doing your job.” Cole put emphasis on the word ‘supposedly’, adding finger quotes in the air. “Especially after your little vacation for the last two hundred years.”

“I said I’m not in the mood for this.”

“When are you
ever
in the mood these days? You went from badass, bloodthirsty warrior just a few centuries ago,” Cole spun a finger in the air to indicate the clean, modern apartment around them, “to this guy.”

Looking over his shoulder out of the floor-to-ceiling window behind him, he could see the bay and the cloudy, cold skies he loved, but today the view wasn’t helping. He couldn’t get Fae’s antics from the morning out of his head. She was definitely stupid – he couldn’t argue with the others who kept telling her that – but he kept watching her.
Just her
. She was interesting, too interesting to ignore, and had been for over a hundred years. Kiernan had gone from avoiding his monitoring duties, barely paying attention to the Faeoihn under his watch, to monitoring Fae almost daily with rare check-ins on the others.

Cole was still ranting about epic battles long past when Kiernan turned his head back around.

“Cole, shut up.” He stood up and walked around it past Cole. His friend just followed him as he headed towards his bedroom.

“So what was happening?” Cole indicated the other room with his thumb, “I saw the box out on your desk and I know you were watching one of them.”

“It doesn’t matter.” Kiernan leaned over and started looking for a book on one of his shelves, running his fingers along their spines.

“That’s true, but I never used to see you watch them, now the last few times I’ve been over the glass is always out.”

“I don’t watch all the time.”
Lie
. “This one is just interesting. Kind of feisty.”
Truth
. Kiernan had found and opened a book, but wasn’t really reading anything in it. It just gave him the option to not look at Cole.

“A lot of them are like that. Eltera didn’t choose the weak ones for her special little army. That’s why Gormahn chose their punishment. What better way to make a bunch of girls who are playing at war recognize their rightful place than by cursing them to serve in it?” Cole laughed a little, “It’s really smart when you think about it. Way worse than just having us kill them that day.”

Kiernan looked up at Cole, controlling the reaction on his face. He had blocked out most of those early years and didn’t want to hear Cole’s version of events, “Yeah, that’s true. I guess I just haven’t noticed it before.” He tucked the book back into the shelf, “Listen, I don’t really want to talk about the job. What did you want?”

Cole rubbed his hands together, grinning from ear to ear. “I was thinking we could go hunting! Get you out of this house and back in the mix. Personally, I’ve always wanted to kill another big cat. I think a skin would look great spread out in front of my fireplace. Impress the ladies when I bring them home.”

“Nothing you do will impress the ladies once they’re home with you.” Kiernan grinned and Cole dropped his mouth open, making a dramatic stabbing motion at his heart in response.

“Oh, Kiernan, you wound me.”

“You’re obnoxious, Cole, but yeah, hunting sounds fine.”
Fine
? He used to love hunting, looked forward to it and would bother Cole to go with
him
. Kiernan thought about the dinner party, and couldn’t understand why instead of going on a hunt he really wanted to stay and see what happened. Cole was right, he had been cooped up with the observation glass too long. He had to get out of the house, and being on a hunting trip with Cole would ensure he couldn’t cave to the temptation to check in on her again.
Perfect
. “How long do you want to be gone?”

“Eryn and I were thinking two or three days? If we get bored we can just pop back.”

“Wait, Eryn is going?” Kiernan worked to hide his reaction.

“He’s fine, Kiernan. Plus we’ll be somewhere in Southeast Asia, it’s not exactly civilized out there in the jungle. If he goes nuts, we’ll clean it up, and just so you remember we used to have to clean up after
you
.” Cole pointed at Kiernan, another of his infectious grins spreading across his face.

“This sounds like a
great
trip.” Kiernan laid the sarcasm on thick, but Cole seemed unfazed.

“Also, picture this… we’re not using any of these fancy new guns. Bow hunting only for us.” That grabbed Kiernan’s interest, and Cole saw it as he mimed drawing back a bow. “I knew I’d get you with that.”

“Okay,” he put his hands up in surrender, “you’ve convinced me.” Kiernan figured this was the best thing he could be doing, and getting to dust off some of his skills would be useful. Also, if he didn’t give in, Cole would just keep bothering him. “When would you want to leave?”

“Let’s head back to base now!”

“Alright, I’m just going to grab a shower. I doubt we’ll get one when we’re out there, and I prefer being clean.” Kiernan pulled his shirt off over his head, and Cole cursed.

“What the -? Are you an idiot?!” Cole was suddenly right next to him, grabbing his left arm. Dark, thorny vines coiled up Kiernan’s arm starting from his palm and stopping just short of his shoulder.

“It’s okay, Cole, I just haven’t taken care of it yet.” Kiernan pulled his arm away with a sharp jerk.

“Haven’t taken care of it? If you wait much longer it will
kill
you.” Cole’s eyes were tracing the vines that looked like they were tattooed on Kiernan’s skin, and he noted how close they were to Gormahn’s mark, the black sword pointing down, over his heart. Kiernan turned around and ran a hand through his hair in frustration. He hadn’t meant for Cole to see the vines, it was just further evidence that Kiernan wasn’t obeying Gormahn’s command anymore. It was the last thing he needed another Laochra to report back – but there were just some things that he couldn’t stomach anymore.

“So what do you want me to do to fix it, Cole?” Kiernan’s memories made him nauseous. “Want me to go and slaughter a village? Kill some soldier just for not listening to his commanding officer? Hurt some woman for not listening to her husband?”

“If you have to, yes! That’s
exactly
what I want you to do! Gormahn was pretty clear with the rules when he created us. Make sure the Faeoihn are suffering, keep the wars going, and punish those who break his laws.” Cole snapped his fingers in front of Kiernan’s face. “You can find someone, somewhere, who is being insubordinate, or showing cowardice or disobedience.” Kiernan didn’t respond. “Come
on
, Gormahn just wants you to deliver some justice!”

Justice
.

Kiernan clenched his fist and bit down so he didn’t yell at Cole about what Gormahn called
justice
. The strong were not meant to prey on the weak; they were supposed to protect them. There had been a time in Kiernan’s life when he had lived the right way, before Gormahn had taken him. Gormahn had twisted all of their beliefs and a lot of the others still followed him blindly. Except Kiernan wasn’t blind anymore, but revealing that to Cole wasn’t going to help him stay free of the rest of them to figure out who he really was. Who he’d become in the last century, where more mattered than just the sound of a battle cry and a sword leaving its sheath.

“Alright, Cole. You tell me, how do
you
take care of the vines?” Kiernan really hoped that Cole’s answer didn’t change how he felt about him. He had so few people he still talked to that losing Cole’s friendship wouldn’t be a small loss after millenia together.

Cole grinned. “There’s a few military schools near where I live in Virginia, a lot of the guys there sneak out against their commanding officer’s orders and go drinking at the local bars. I get into a bar fight every couple of weeks; sometimes send one to the hospital. They learn their lesson, I’m doing my job of appeasing Gormahn’s command, the vines recede, and I’m confirmed as a complete and total badass. Ta-da!” Cole spread his arms out, and then began bowing to an invisible crowd.

Kiernan couldn’t help but smirk a little at Cole’s ridiculousness. “I might be able to do something like that, as long as those kids don’t die.”

“They’re fine, they just don’t forget the lesson. Don’t worry though, I’ll help you remember how to have a bar brawl before we go tiger hunting.” Cole winked and Kiernan shoved him in a friendly way. Cole punched him in the shoulder in return.

“I taught you how to fight, remember?” He grinned and Cole rolled his eyes, but Kiernan continued, “And the hunt sounds good.” He needed it, needed to be away from this apartment and the observation glass for a few days. Getting the vines back under control was necessary too, as much as he dreaded it. Kiernan looked down and tugged on a belt loop on his jeans. “But, unless you want to see me naked, I suggest you leave and I’ll meet you back at base in an hour or so.”

Raising his hands in surrender Cole backed up, “Alright, alright. Just know that I’d only suggest you doing anything because I don’t want you to fucking
die
. We’ve had each other’s backs for too many lifetimes, okay?”

Kiernan nodded back, and Cole disappeared. It always took Kiernan a second to process the whole popping in and out thing, so he blinked and rubbed a hand over his face. One of the few advantages of having a god own you was that the god had to give you some level of power to keep you alive. Gormahn had claimed them so he could raise his own army to destroy Eltera’s Faeoihn. They got to heal, they got to move themselves at will, and they got to give up everything that made them human.

Lucky, lucky
.

Staring into the mirror in his bathroom, Kiernan rubbed his hand across the vines on his arm. He shook his head, and gripped the edge of the counter as his urge to check the observation glass came back.

“You can’t do anything, so stop obsessing.” Kiernan met his own eyes in the mirror; the iris and the pupil were so dark they were impossible to tell apart, like all of the Laochra. “Just stop thinking about her.” He closed his eyes, trying to think of anything else, but all he could see was her face. Her beautiful, perfect – “Fuck.”

Yeah, he really needed to go hunting.