I could feel my frown deepen as tears stung my eyes, and I glared at the ground, avoiding the king. I needed to get out of there. Now.
“No, I’m not the king. I’m merely the king’s brother and assistant. Follow me.” The faery motioned for me to follow him before he began walking deeper into the wooded chambers. I looked around, wondering if I should follow him or not. My senses were on full alert, and I rubbed at my temple to ease the sharp pain it caused. Something was off about all this, and I was determined to find out what it could be.
I did follow, and was soon brought before another man.
“The king of the faeries, Azariah. My brother.”
Welcome, Ura. I’m sorry to answer your question so negatively, but no, there’s no escape. The king was speaking into my head again, and it was irritating. He’d done this before, when we’d first met, and I remembered it as clearly as I saw him now. How could I remember that but not other things like my life before all this? It gave me a tight headache just to think about it. My thoughts were bouncing off a wall in my head; I just couldn’t get through.
Don’t worry. The memories will not return. They won’t bother you anymore. Seek peace amongst us, and your mind will be at ease.
That’s totally comforting, I thought. Who would want to forget their past life? I didn’t. I wanted to cling to it like a life preserver while I drowned in this sea of uncertainty. This king—I didn’t care who he was—had no power over me, and I was going to run for it if I could.
I peered up at him through wavering, hate-filled tears. “Let me go. I don’t belong here.”
The king was plucking flowers from a nearby rosebush, examining each for defects and discarding the imperfect ones. He didn’t seem to care about what I’d said, and it made me believe he’d forgotten I was there. Nonchalantly, he walked back to a throne made of twisted branches and padded with leaves. How a chair like that had been formed was a curiosity. I didn’t know how anyone could build something like that out there in the forest.
I peered around, already forgetting that his brother had led me there. The guy had disappeared, leaving us alone.
Azariah’s features matched every one of the other faeries: leafy hair, dark green skin, shining oily eyes that looked more like a bug’s. Not that appealing. He also wore a thin white crown of twisted twigs that were laced with sharp protrusions making it look exactly like what it was, a crown. Royalty was the same no matter where you went. They were all high and mighty, noses perched in the air above everyone else, wearing their badge of superiority and commanding everyone to do what they least wanted to.
“You’ve got quite a mouth on you. Your thoughts betray all you want to say.” The king leaned forward, still plucking the petals off the roses. He was dropping the roses into a shallow basket, and I stepped forward, too curious to not look inside. The petals drifted perfectly into them no matter where he dropped them, rapidly filling up the basket. “Grab some roses. I need more petals.”
I nodded, knowing I should appease him while I tried to think up an escape plan without him realizing it. I had to guard my thoughts, so I forced myself to think of anything but escaping. I swallowed. It was going to be hard.
I glanced toward the rows of rosebushes. Every color imaginable was available, and I plucked several blossoms near me. I liked the colored ones best; the white ones made me sad, for they represented a clean slate. No memories, no past. I wanted all my harried memories back, for they were what made me, not this new life of blankness and assimilation into some foreign faery clan that cared nothing for me as an individual.
I squeezed my eyes shut before intentionally pricking my finger on a thorn. Flinging them wide open, I watched a drop of crimson blood blossom from the wound. I was still human inside. My blood had yet to turn green like the other faeries. That had to be something, right?
“Sit.” The king was now sitting Indian-style beside one of the baskets he’d filled. A servant popped out of nowhere and replaced it with an empty one. I slipped to the ground, placed the basket closer to me, and silently plucked a rose. The flowers were soft, too soft to be real or alive, but they were, and I could feel the life breathing beneath my fingertips in an unsettling way. Velvety petals lined each rose. The work was oddly satisfying, and I became entranced in the repetition of the task.
“You may think you know me and what my clan wants to achieve, but you couldn’t be more wrong. We are nothing like what your fearmongering society makes us out to be. I plan to show you what the fae truly are.”
Momentarily snapping out of the spell the petals had placed me under, I glared up at him, my eyes widening at the mention of my “fearmongering society.” So he knew where I’d come from and why we were hunting them, only spinning it around to make his clan out as the victims. How dare he? We were not fearful, we were only defending ourselves.
“Why are you so keen on abducting people like me? What purpose does it serve? We’ve been at war for centuries, the fae and mortals. This sort of thing only forces our hand.”
“I do no such thing.”
He leaned forward, his dark eyes hardening as his lips tightened. “You don’t know the entire story. Your kind has hunted mine to extinction. You think we like to kidnap people to swell our ranks? You fight against those who were once just like you. The true faeries, the ones who are of pure blood and born here in the forests, are rare. We are all tainted with humankind because you hunt us until we can no longer sustain ourselves. They made us… you made us what we are and forced us to take from the others in order to survive. To merely exist.”
He sat back, ripping the ephemeral petals with a definitive jerk, shredding most of them in the process. He glanced down at the ruined flower pieces in his hands and tossed them aside in disgust.
“You know nothing. You humans are oblivious to the chaos you cause.”
“What chaos?” I shook my head. “We know how you plump up your ranks. The kidnapping, the blatant terrorizing of humans. I’m here, aren’t I? You’re the one who forces them to join you. We don’t want to be here. We kill your people to get our people back. Don’t you get it? It’s a vicious cycle, and you must stop or we’ll find ourselves with no other choice. You’re the one continuing the war.”
My hands dropped to my lap, and I stared at the blossoms in my grasp, scratched and bleeding from the thorns lining the stems of the roses. Drying, dark red blood lined the cracks of my palms, and I noticed the king’s hands matched mine, except his blood was a dark blue-green like his skin color. Mine remained red. Would it always remain red? Would it turn that unnatural shade? How could he understand my plight when we were not the same inside or out? Yet, we were all flesh and blood, ever the same. We both bled, ached, fought for what we believed in… so different yet the same. How would anyone fight if they knew what they believed was wrong?
“Why am I here with you?” I mumbled. “Didn’t you want to evaluate me or something? Get on with it.” I was done with the petty games and subjective observations. We could argue until the sun burned out on who was wrong here. Humans or faeries, it didn’t matter. We were both on the losing side of the battle, both taking heavy casualties. The war was never going to let either of us win until both of us backed off.
The king eyed me strongly, lifting an eyebrow as he scanned my thoughts, his face contorting at what he found. I gasped as my head tingled from the intrusion but covered it with a tiny cough. I didn’t want to raise His Majesty’s suspicions or turn him into an enemy just yet. He couldn’t know I was studying him in return, trying to discover his imperfections, weaknesses, and vulnerabilities.
I was part of an organization opposing what these faeries stood for, but exactly what it was, eluded me at that moment. Tapping my temple, I strained to remember what group I worked for and who I was, but I failed miserably. Great, the memories I wanted weren’t the ones hitting me like a runaway train at the moment. I didn’t want to know we were at war. I just wanted to go home, wherever that may be.
&
nbsp; “You’re different from the others.”
The king narrowed his eyes at me as he dropped the last of the petals he’d been plucking into the basket. Instead of standing up for more, he sat staring at me. It made me uncomfortable, and I pretended to busy myself with more petals. The forest smelled amazing with all those freshly plucked petals perfuming the air with their fragrance. I would have loved to live anywhere it smelled like that, except there, of course.
“How so?”
“The others. They never fought so hard against turning. You, you’re strong. Unconventional. You must have powers even in human guise.”
“All the more reason to let me go.”
“That isn’t possible. I need you more than you could ever know.”
“Why?”
He did not answer. The silence became unbearable, and I risked a peek up at the king. He was scratching his chin, reminding me of someone I knew. Who could it be? I shook my head and looked away, ripping more petals out, refusing to take great care like I had before. I couldn’t remember, so why even bother? I wouldn’t give the king the satisfaction of anything.
I need strong blood to revitalize my clan, he said inside my head. I hated the feeling.
“Get out of my head!”
“Regardless of what you think, I do not want to marry you.”
I looked up, confused. “What?”
“You asked me what I wanted with you. Yes, you’re here to be evaluated for marriage, but it’s not what you think. It’s an old tradition that the king checks all incoming females to see if he’d like them for his wives, but I don’t. I already have one and always will. I am using this time to get to know you. But I do want to warn you. You will be marrying someone else.”
“Excuse me?” What the hell was he thinking? I wasn’t going to be marrying anyone, not him or anyone else. Especially not a faery.
“You’ll be marrying my brother, Atieran. You met him briefly. He’s in need of a bride, and I’ve just approved of you for him.” He waved at one of his servants. I hadn’t noticed that so many of them were lining the walls, invisible until called upon. When the servant approached, he leaned down to listen to his king’s request.
“Bring Atieran to meet his new bride.”
He nodded, throwing me a curious glance before straightening to take his leave without uttering a single word. My cheeks heated as I flushed, blood churning beneath the surface of my skin as sweat pooled on my brow.
How dare he assume I’d want to marry his brother? I wasn’t property to be distributed to his sibling. My fury grew as I crushed the roses in my hands, blood and petals clinging together.
“You can’t be serious. Didn’t I just explain to you that you need to let me go? I won’t stay here and marry your brother or anyone, for that matter. You’ll let me go or… or….”
“Or what?” The king’s eyes turned angry, his brow furrowing as he challenged me to continue my rant. I clamped my mouth shut, feeling the air vibrate with his rage. His jaw clenched as he watched my silence. I prayed I hadn’t pissed him off too much. He was the king after all, and his telepathy was powerful. The flowers in the basket in front of him withered like poison had dripped from his mouth. I shouldn’t have pushed the boundaries, I knew this, yet there I was doing what I did best. I was always fighting, but it was what I was good at, and even without memories to back it up, I knew it down to my marrow, just like I knew I didn’t belong there.
“You will do as you’re told or there will be consequences.”
The king straightened before getting to his feet. I swore under my breath as I watched him grow, literally, as he stood up, shoulders jutting out wider, making him look even larger than he already was. Corded muscle wrapped around his bones, and I could see that he kept himself fit even though he was pampered and cared for by all his servants.
“I—I won’t.”
Choking on my protests, I glared at him as his brother re-entered. Now that I had another glance at him, I could see how similar he was to the king. My stomach rolled, and I felt sick even though I was still sitting down, surrounded by baskets of those blasted rose petals. The scent had turned nauseating rather than soothing, and I would have rather watched them burn than smell any more of them.
“Atieran.” The king held his arms out as his brother took him in for a strong, tight hug. So, this was the king’s brother. It was obvious from the identical build and the way their features matched. He was just as built as the king and looked very much royal himself. Pampered, well fed. That kind of thing.
Atieran let go of his brother, his dark eyes settling on me. His stare was so intense, I wondered if he possessed any psychic abilities like his brother. The thought made me blush, for I’d just been thinking about how handsome he was. For a faery. The heat in my cheeks threw me off, for my embarrassment was certainly obvious in the perfect shade of scarlet gracing my skin.
My emotions felt raw in that place, and I’d failed to realize it earlier. I barely had any control over them, the lack of inhibitive memories keeping me from erecting my usual shields. I looked away before I humiliated myself further.
“This is who you’ve chosen?”
“Yes. This is the newcomer from the recent raid. She is the best of the bunch we acquired, and I’ve chosen her to be your bride.”
They spoke like I wasn’t standing there hearing every word. This infuriated me more, and my jaw locked as my nails dug into my palms.
“No other females were taken?” Atieran never removed his eyes from me. I could feel them even when I turned away.
“No. She’s the only one. The others were males. We don’t need any more now. Our ranks are still quite robust.”
Atieran nodded toward his brother then turned back to me. “Her name?”
“Ura.”
“That’s not my name.” I rose to my feet as I snapped at him. “And I won’t answer to it either, so don’t bother.”
They both looked at me, expressionless and undeterred. Neither said anything, and I suddenly had the urge to cry, wondering what would become of me. This wasn’t how I’d imagined my life. What had I imagined, though?
“Take her away.” The king motioned to another set of guards lingering on the periphery. He looked bored and fed up with my protests. I didn’t care; I’d fight him to the end, even if I never got out. If I quit, what would become of me? I would never admit defeat.
“Let me go!” I screamed at them, yanking my limbs from their firm grasps. They wouldn’t let go, not even when I scratched at their skin and drew blood. They were happy to return the favor. One even made a point of jabbing me in my side with the sheath of a dagger to get me moving. I yelped in pain as I dropped my weight into their arms, almost dragging them to the ground with me. Exhausted, I huffed as I regained my breath from the struggle.
“That’s enough.” Atieran stepped forward and took my arm. “I’ll take her to the camp myself.”
The guards stepped away, leaving me with my heart racing and my fists clenched, holding them up to punch anyone else who came near me. I was willing to try. After all, what did I have to lose? The king didn’t appear fazed. In fact, he was already walking away, disappearing to wherever he spent his time when he wasn’t plucking petals. And why the hell did he need so many damned rose petals? I was left perplexed but unwilling to stand down.
“What is your name? Your birth name?” Atieran asked as he slowly reached out his hand, edging his way toward me until I dropped my fists and watched him, stunned. I realized he wasn’t going to touch me without permission. He dropped his hand and waved me forward. I reached up to touch my face, realizing my bottom lip was bleeding and swollen, inadvertently bumped in the struggle.
Atieran held out a small square of linen he’d conjured up out of nowhere. Too tired to ask where it had come from, I took it and pressed it to my wound.
“Ow. I don’t remember what my name is. I think it starts with an A? Annie, Amy, uh… I don’t know.” I groaned in frustration and wi
ped the blood from my mouth.
He patiently watched me as I wiped the blood away from my lip, seemingly interested in its crimson coloring. My blush deepened. I still didn’t know exactly what was going on, but at least I’d found out that not all the fae were cruel. That had to count for something.
“Thanks,” I said, holding on to the small piece of linen. It reminded me of the real clothes I used to wear, not this forest attire crap. “Why are you being nice to me? You know I won’t marry you.”
He gently took my arm in his as we walked. “I didn’t agree with the ceremony either, but I have no say in it.”
I scoffed. “Looks like being royal has its disadvantages.”
“You could say that.”
I looked away, staring off into the trees and scouting for an escape route. Atieran didn’t exactly tighten his grip on my arm, but he didn’t let go. Damn. A smart guy. I could deal with a dumb guard, but an intelligent faery? Why was I so darn unlucky?
“You don’t like it here.”
“If you were kidnapped and forced to get married, would you be hopping, skipping, and dancing around like a lunatic? Didn’t think so.”
“You should give it a chance.”
“The hell I will.”
“You might like it.”
“I don’t think so.”
I spit a wad of blood-tinged saliva onto the forest floor as we continued to walk. It was only then that I noticed we weren’t yet in the camp but on the outskirts. I could just make out their muffled voices. It was far enough away that if I could overpower Atieran, backup would be too far away to help him.
Suddenly, Atieran paused in his steps and stared at me. “Go on, then. Get out of here.”
I stood stunned and unmoving. “What?”
“I said go. You’ll see you won’t get far. It’s not my decision, it’s just the way it is. The clan will find you wherever you go. We are a hive mind, and any one of us can already track you. You can run to the ends of the earth, go deep under the ocean, or under the ground, but we will always be able to find you. That is how our clan works. We are forever linked. So, if you think escaping is a good idea, go on, try it.”