“What does that mean?” I asked, unsure I had heard him right.
“He’s fucking marked you, Syn, and it wasn’t just because he wanted to be able to find you. That mark means no other fucking Fae can touch you. No one can, but Ryder. He made you his own little fuck toy by placing that on you.”
“That's bullshit, Adrian. I'm not anyone's toy.”
He laughed, the sound was chilling, and so unlike him. His eyes turned turquoise again, but his posture was stiff. “You better get going. Your owner just walked in with his crew.”
I turned, looking through the crowded club. Everyone was watching us. “I need to go,” I whispered, pushing away from him.
“Syn, listen to me carefully. After Transition is done, or hell, even before it is, choose me. I promise to keep you safe. You know I’d walk through hell for you, girl.”
“Adrian,” I warned as I was surrounded by Ryder and his men.
“She chooses you, and she won't live through Transition, and neither would you, boy.” Ryder growled in warning.
“Is it true? Is this thing you put on me more than just some fucking property tag?” He narrowed his eyes and said nothing. “You fucker! You tramp stamped my ass!”
“It isn't on your ass, Syn,” Ryder growled as he pulled me against himself, even as I fought to stand my ground.
“Get away from me. I've lost everything! Everything, Ryder. I'm barely fucking standing on my feet and you just keep taking from me. I signed the fucking contract. You have me through Transition! Why the fuck would you mark me as your whore?” I was losing it.
He crushed me closer to his body and snarled in my ear. “If you ever call yourself a whore again I will put you over my fucking knee and spank your tight, fucking ass until you can't sit down again.”
“Let me go. Now!” He released me, and I felt it. My body sizzling with magic, as anger poured through me and lit up the brands on my skin. I'd thought that I would never see them again. I inhaled and exhaled, wild magic was coursing through me and I didn't have Adam with me this time to stop it. Shit! “I have to go,” I whispered, pushing away from him and through the club in a hurry to get to the cool night air, before I went nuclear.
I could feel it building inside of me, pulsing through my veins. The crowd of people split, and moved out of the way, opening a path as I ran through the club, oblivious if anyone was trailing me—or stupid enough to. I didn't have anyone to help take the power, or neutralize it. I could feel it growing unstable, a wild tangible thing that wafted from me.
I rushed out the doors as both huge bouncers parted to allow me outside. The cool air did nothing to quench the power raging inside of me. I felt my heart rate increasing and my throat closing. I was dying, being consumed with power overload, which was almost hysterical, since I didn't have any power ten minutes ago…and I'd wanted it. Ryder started toward me, and then pulled back in frustration, as if remembering something.
“Fuck, Z. Go get Adam, now!” Ryder growled.
“Let me through! Now,” Adrian shouted, trying to be heard over Ryder.
“Adam's um…Ryder—” Zahruk stopped as Ryder growled an inhuman sound that made everyone stop and take a step back away from him.
“Ryder, let Adrian through. He's connected to her too. He might be able to stop it.” Vlad said as the voice of reason.
Adrian was suddenly there, pulling me against him as he took me to the ground. I wasn't drawing in air. I shook my head as panic started to kick in. “Breathe. Come on, Fancy Face, let me in.”
I felt his magic touching mine. His was as cold as he was. The powers inside of him were deadly, and untapped, as if he hadn't been able to use them without the help of the coven. I watched his eyes light up as they held my own; beautiful turquoise so striking that I allowed myself to get swallowed inside their endless depths. I could feel him connecting to Adam and completing the link that the Coven had.
“That's it, Syn, give me more,” Adrian crooned as something growled from behind us. Adrian ignored it, but something inside of my body acknowledged the growl and heat flared up inside of me. I pulled Adrian closer, feeding him more power, until I could sense the others around us.
Something inside of me wanted out, violently. My body was teetering on the edge of something, my core drenched with need from whatever was inside, trying to get out. I shook with the force of it. It was overwhelming and primal, and out of my control.
“Oh, fucking hell,” Zahruk growled.
I heard a scuffle of feet moving and something struggling, but I ignored it as I cupped Adrian's face and kissed him. I didn’t know why I did it. Only that I did, and that we both were glowing, raw current flowing through us, around us. He moaned against me and ran his hands through my hair as he deepened the kiss.
And then he was gone, and Vlad was shouting curses violently.
I looked around, stunned. What the hell had just happened? I looked up at the faces of Ryder's men. They looked unsure and worried. Ryder and Adrian were both missing. “No,” I shook my head. This wasn’t happening. “Get him back here, now! Zahruk, bring them back, now!” I was screaming, coming off the ground quickly as my hair flew around my face with the current running through me as the glow left my body, along with the rush of power.
“Sorry, Synthia, this isn’t our quarrel. Ryder will bring the boy back in one piece—I think,” Zahruk said carefully.
“No! This isn't happening. I don’t know what the fuck just happened, but I need him. I need him alive, dammit. I can't lose anyone else.” My voice cracked with unshed tears. I couldn’t handle it if Ryder killed Adrian because of something I couldn’t control.
“Go home, Synthia, and tell the Guild I took out the problem. Tell Alden if he ever tries to turn another of my creations against me, it will be war,” Vlad snapped, before he went back inside the club, leaving me alone with Ryder's men.
I turned to Ristan, numb with shock. “Tell Ryder that if he killed Adrian, to never think about me again, to never fucking try and contact me again. I will not be owned, and I will not be Transitioning. Transition can take me to bloody fucking hell right along with it for all I care. Tell him I am no longer his.”
Ristan pushed closer and grabbed my arms and shook me a little. “Flower, snap the hell out of it now, before you light up the entire city again.” He got right up in my face, and those patterned eyes swirled at me dangerously. “You’ve got to stop trying to think he is ever going to behave like a human, Syn. He’s not. He is a Fae warrior, and we come from one of the most dangerous places that you couldn’t even imagine in your worst dreams. What you saw in Faery was just a glimpse of what we consider relatively safe. He. Is. Fae. That means he is a fucking predator that is used to taking what he wants, and he will protect and defend what belongs to him by any means necessary. And, before you go on and on about how no one owns you, trust me, he does. You just haven’t gotten it through your head yet, but your heart knows it’s true.” I tried to turn away, and he wouldn’t let me. He just kept after me until I had no choice but to look in his eyes again. He softened a bit when I did.
“Flower, I know this a big change for you. You will Transition, and you don’t have a choice in the matter. You have got to learn our world and ways, and you don’t have much time in which to do it. Ryder may wear the mask of a human, but he has only been in this world for a little over fifteen years. That is a blink of an eye to us. He is still trying to adapt and understand this world, and sometimes it gets messy. Now, I am sure nothing permanent happened to your boy-toy this time. Come on, and I’ll give you a quick sift home.”
I nodded and placed my hand in Ristan’s. I was losing control. I’d kissed Adrian, and it hadn’t been him who I’d wanted to kiss—that damn growl had made my mind go blank, and I’d kissed the wrong male. I'd also failed to take out the target and, what's worse—I was teetering on the brink of Transition, and I could feel it starting to take over.
Chapter Five
When I got home, I could f
eel the power draining, but it had taken its toll on my body. It had been dark magic, and there had been no light to counter it. I'd been light based, with dark magic as a backup. Dark magic was dangerous, and you had to be careful of using it at all. I’d just done a huge power overload, and now I felt it with every move I made.
The dog was waiting at the door when I arrived, and he growled at me. Great, even my dog hated me. “Mister Fancy Pants, go lay down!” I shouted, frustrated with everything, and scared for Adrian.
The door I'd just slammed closed, flew open. “Get the fuck out here, Syn,” Ryder growled.
“Where's Adrian?” I cried, not knowing if I wanted the answer.
“Afraid I killed your boyfriend?” he asked coldly, his eyes turning hard.
Mister Fancy Pants snarled, but stayed beside me. I swallowed and shook my head. “Leave me alone,” I shouted back.
“You belong to me, you kissed him. You breached the fucking contract, Synthia,” he replied scathingly as he crossed his arms over his t-shirt clad chest.
“I kissed him so you killed him? I couldn’t stop it, dammit, I couldn’t control it. Something inside of me needed to kiss him, not me. And it wasn’t even him this thing inside of me wanted! It was whatever the fuck was growling! So, yes, I kissed him, Ryder, because I seem to have a monster inside of me! And you killed him! So, fuck you, fuck him, and fuck me! Fuck everything!” I was swinging at the air with tears streaking down my face.
“You're close to Transitioning,” he replied carefully, his face still concealed in the shadows of the porch.
“No! I'm not doing it. Period. No fucking way. I control what happens in my life! I want to know what you did to Adrian!” I hated the fact that when I got pissed, I cried. Most of the time I didn’t make sense when it was this bad. It was such a girlie thing to do, and it screamed weakness.
“He's alive, Syn, bruised—but alive. He won’t be if he touches you again. No one touches what is mine, and lives. Make no fucking mistake, Pet, you are mine.”
“I am not your anything. You marked me without my permission. So I'm not yours until I decide to give myself to you. You can't just piss on my leg and say I'm yours. It doesn't work that way in the real world.”
“I didn’t piss on your leg, Syn. I fucked you. I claimed you. Regardless of what you say now, you gave yourself to me, and I’m pretty sure you would have agreed to anything I had asked while I was inside your pretty pink folds.”
“Bullshit! I am not yours. I'm not something that can be owned, Ryder! I am not a fucking pet that you can just chain to your fucking wall and play with when you want to! I'm a human being!”
“There's where you’re wrong. You're not human, you're Fae, and you're changing already. Fast. You broke the contract by kissing Adrian. I could kill you right now, and no one would be able to stop me. Just remember, I have Adam. Be at my club tomorrow night, or I will give Adam over to the women to feed, from him.”
“You can't do that!” I shouted.
“I can, and I will.” He sifted, before I could argue with him.
He left me standing at the door fuming. He was the most infuriating male on the fucking planet. Hot one minute and then as cold as the fucking iceberg that dropped the Titanic! I turned and slammed the door, pretending it was his face instead of empty space.
I showered, and changed before calling Alden on the phone number he had called me from, and reported that the target had been taken out by Vlad. “Alden, I recharged…” I said trailing off.
“And?” he asked cautiously.
“Dark magic, only.”
“That's not good.” He sounded worried.
“How bad we talking, Alden?”
“Pretty bad. If you have no light magic the dark will consume you. Did you use it?”
“I kinda went nuclear. Adrian calmed me down though. He balanced it out before I could get hurt.” And then he got his ass beat by Ryder…because of me.
“Adrian isn't connected, is he?” he asked quietly.
“Yeah, well with everything that went down, I kinda forgot to tell you that he was. He used the Coven bond to link to Adam and pulled power from me. He got too close, and I used mine against him to tap my line and pull from it. We're connected the same as we were before. His felt deadly though, stronger somehow, as if it had been building up without an outlet.”
“That's not good,” he said again.
“Alden, I really need good news right now. I'm not sure I can take much more bad news.”
“You have magic,” he replied chuckling.
“Dark magic, without light…I basically have bad magic that can kill me. Yay me. Any word on the ward’s inside my house?”
“I have my best people working on it. So far, we only have a few words figured out. I can tell you it protects against the Horde, but not sure if it pertains to a certain caste of Horde, or more. Shawn says it could also protect against a couple of other castes of Fae, like Dark and Light. So we ended up with more questions and only a few hints, so far.”
“Great, can you make them hurry up?”
“Listen, Syn. Try not to use any magic unless you have to. I'll dig through the archives and see what I can find on how to harness it. Good job tonight. I know you didn’t make the kill, but we'd still be chasing our asses looking for him had you not gone in. I’ll have Shawn work through these wards and see what he can come up with. Syn, what Shawn is doing—is for me, and off the record—the Guild doesn’t know, so don’t contact him directly. There is a lot going on at the Guild right now.” He hesitated. “Stay away from the Guild for the time being. As soon as I can, I’ll tell you what I think is going on.”
“I need some sleep. Maybe it won't be so bad with coffee in me.” Yeah, I could actually sleep after a cup of coffee. I could do anything after coffee.
We hung up, and I stretched, before heading in to get some liquid happiness.
I walked into the kitchen and fired up the coffee maker. Feeling a bit peckish, I opened the fridge. It was empty, and it hadn't been when I’d left the house. I closed it and scratched my head thinking it was strange, but the wards I'd cast were still up and working when I'd come in. The dog’s food bowl was still full, along with the water. I shook my head and went to the living room, grabbing up the remote and flipping on the TV, while sinking blissfully into the couch. Mister Fancy Pants sat at my feet wagging his tail happily. He looked bigger now and more alive now than he had when I'd brought him home.
He turned his head and leveled me with clear blue eyes. I patted his head and his eyes closed, like he really liked head pats and scratches and wanted more. I felt something ripple inside the room, and instantly went on guard. My heart raced as the thought of the Fae who had killed my parents flashed inside my mind. I reached into the cushion, pulling out one of the handguns. This wasn’t happening.
I felt someone sift in behind me. I turned and took aim, but Ristan was faster. He disarmed me and swore. “Flower, what the hell are you doing with a gun? Ryder felt your panic.”
I growled, but ignored him as I disarmed him and took my gun back. “Something isn't right. Can’t you feel that?”
Ristan turned his strange silver and black swirling eyes to the walls that had started to glow red with warning. The wards were reacting to something, and they only did that when something bad was inside the house, or close to it. “I don't feel anything. Your wards on the other hand…” He smiled and lit up his brands.
“Something is coming,” I warned. “Mister Fancy—fuck!” I shouted as I watched my dog shift.
Into a person.
“Nooooo! You turn back into a fucking dog this minute!” I shouted, stomping my feet as Ristan barked with laughter until he doubled over from it.
“Only you could go to the pound and pick out a Shifter, Syn.”
My dog was a Shape-shifter. A twenty something boy sat where my dog had just been, with lanky red hair and bright blue eyes. He was screaming with pain as he changed to his human form and
the wards were showing him no mercy. Alden had just told me that the wards were to keep out certain castes of the Fae, most likely Horde…were the Shifters from Faery too, and part of the Horde? Was Ryder Unseelie—the Horde? My mind shifted back to what I had glimpsed in his eyes a little over a week ago at the ball—like an animal was lurking there…his face shifting subtly, and the glimpse of fangs I know I had seen. The rumors about the Dark Prince were pretty consistent about him being one of the most powerful Fae out there.
Ristan watched as I put it together and shook his head. “I wouldn’t let your mind wander in that direction, Synthia. Nothing good ever comes from making assumptions.”
“Is Ryder the Horde King? The timing is about right. The rumors started about twenty years ago, and Ryder has been here for about fifteen of those years. He can't enter my house, his comments…” I stopped as Ristan turned to face me with cold merciless death in his beautiful eyes.
“Sorry, Syn, you're wrong.”
“No, Ristan, let her assume,” Ryder said from the doorway where he stood at the threshold. “The boy needs to get out of the house.”
We all looked down to where Mister Fancy Pants was writhing silently in pain. Ristan easily picked the now red-headed boy up and took him outside where it looked like he had immediate relief. I watched Ryder where he stood outside my door.
“You’re the Horde King,” I whispered.
“Is that what you think, Syn? That I'm the mythical Horde King?” He tilted his head and smiled coldly. Unfriendly.
“The wards…shifters must be part of the Horde, and the timing—it's too right,” I smiled, thinking how I'd just hit the nail on the head.
“And you think the wards only work on the Horde?” he asked carefully.
“I think you're the Horde King, Ryder, and that you're after something.”
I looked down to where his feet were on the other side of the threshold. He couldn't come inside the house. He’d had to pull me outside yesterday since he hadn't been able to come in, and the wards had landed him flat on his ass once already. “Alden said the wards protected, and that my parents had been hiding me from evil.”