I squint at him. “You actually know that phrase?” He doesn’t strike me as the kind of fairy who hangs out on earth.
“Do you know it?” he presses.
Looking from him to Des, I hesitantly nod.
“That’s the law here in the Otherworld.”
I’m still not following.
“When in the Night Kingdom,” Malaki explains, “a fairy must follow their laws. Des here doesn’t want you to leave the Night Kingdom because you’ll both be subject to another fae kingdom’s laws.”
“That’s pretty much how it works on earth,” I say, confused as to why this is an issue.
“The Flora Kingdom enslaves humans,” Des cuts in.
Ah. And therein lies the true probl—
BOOM!
The room shakes as a wave of magic washes over us, throwing me back into my seat. Our plates and utensils rattle on the table, a few falling off the edge and crashing to the floor. In the distance, I hear muffled gasps.
The three of us look at each other.
What in the—?
All at once, we’re moving, my chair toppling behind me in my haste to figure out what’s going on. Malaki, Des, and I rush from the room, dinner, missing men, and slave-holding kingdoms forgotten.
Out in the halls, fairies are dashing around, trying to find shelter. One of the palace officers runs to us, bowing hastily to Des.
“There’s been a security breach,” he explains, his voice breathless. “One of the portals is down—something’s crossed over and collapsed it.”
“Gather a hundred of my best soldiers and have them meet us in the air.”
As soon as Des gives the order, the officer is off, running back the way he came.
We begin to move again. Rather than heading down to the main floor of the palace, I follow Des and Malaki to one of the castle balconies.
My eyes scour the horizon, looking for something, anything to explain that violent wave of magic. It had felt so familiar …
Des tears his gaze from the horizon to look at me. His lips part, and I’m pretty sure this is where he tells me to get back inside.
Instead, he closes his mouth and squares his jaw. Striding over to me, he clasps the back of my neck. “Do you wish to join me?” he asks.
“Always.” It’s less thought than it is instinct. Where my mate goes, I go.
“Desmond—” Malaki protests.
“This will be dangerous,” he warns me, ignoring his friend. “Either of us could die. Are you still sure?”
My heart thumps like mad. Had I ever thought that Des’s love would be stifling? That it would coddle me like a security blanket? Because this isn’t stifling or coddling. It’s dangerous and all-consuming, and right now it leaves a taste in my mouth like blood and smoke.
“I’m sure.”
Behind us, Malaki throws up his hands.
Des nods to me, his face foreboding. “Follow my lead and keep yourself safe. That’s an order.”
His wings unfurl behind him, blossoming like some twisted, thorny flower. In response, my own wings stretch wide.
With a burst of magic he leaps into the night air, his wings propelling him up. My own take off isn’t nearly so graceful, but several seconds later, I too am airborne, trailing after the King of the Night, Malaki at my back.
I don’t see what caused the commotion until well after Malaki, Des, and I have joined up with Des’s soldiers.
Far below the floating island of Somnia, on the main landmass that makes up the Otherworld, a massive fireball is unfolding, thick, inky plumes of smoke already rising from it.
Flakes of smoldering ash drift around us the closer we get. I squint down at the flames as the smoke burns my eyes.
My brows furrow.
Right in the center of the inferno, right where I’d assumed the heat would be the hottest and the fire would burn the brightest, there’s a blackened pathway that the flames don’t dare touch.
One of the guards points to something along the singed trail, and I follow his finger. There, amidst the charred earth, are what appear to be two figures.
It’s not until we’re about a hundred feet away from the ground that I recognize one of them.
Well, fuck me good.
Temperance “Temper” Darling, my best friend and colleague, is marching among the blaze like she controls it, dragging a very frightened looking fairy along with her. Her dark eyes glow like coals, bolts of electricity snapping from her.
Uh-oh.
She’s officially lost control of her power. I’ve only ever seen her like this two other times, and neither ended well.
Around me I can feel fae magic building in the air. I don’t know if it’s all coming from Des, or if his soldiers are also adding to it, but throwing power at Temper when she’s like this only ever leads to one thing—destruction.
I glance over at Des, who’s studying Temper. There’s no recognition on his face, and why should there be? For all I’ve told him of her, he hasn’t actually met Temper in the flesh.
Sometimes I assume my mate is omnipotent and infallible, that he knows everything and everyone at every moment in time. That nothing can truly sneak up on him.
But it can and it obviously has.
He begins signaling to his men, who adjust their positions, their bodies tense and ready.
If I don’t do something now, they’re going to firebomb my friend, and that’s going to end badly for everyone.
Coming to a hasty decision, I tuck my wings close to my back. My body dips, beginning to dive for the earth.
“Stop!” someone shouts behind me.
There’s no way I’m stopping.
I glance over my shoulder. My eyes meet Des’s, and for a moment, all we do is lock eyes. Right now I’m neither following his lead nor keeping myself safe like he instructed. He has every reason to use his magic to stop me in my tracks, but he doesn’t.
That small show of faith bolsters my own courage.
There’s no way for me to communicate to him that this woman is actually my best friend, or that I might be the only one who can salvage the situation before someone gets hurt. The only thing I can do is nod to Des.
I know what I’m doing, I will him to understand.
Even though he can’t read my thoughts, I think he must glean them from my face. He stares at me for another moment, and then he puts up a fist. In response, his soldiers hold steady, their bodies still poised.
That’s all I have time to notice before I face forward again.
Beneath me, Temper stares up at the group of us, her normally warm eyes foreign and blistering as they land on mine.
This is the Temper that people feared at our boarding school, and here is the power that ostracized her.
The terrifying reality of her existence, the one she stares down each morning when she wakes up and closes her eyes to each night, is that she is capable of this carnage. She’s capable of it, and a part of her craves it.
There is a seductive power that she can tap into, and it lures her in whenever it can. Most days, she tells it to fuck off.
Today, she gave into it.
I know what the soldiers looking down at Temper are wondering. It’s the same question that’s plagued many of our clients.
What is she?
I stare at my friend through the haze, the heatwaves making her form shimmer and bend. There’s only one type of supernatural whose magic is this powerful, this frightening, this intoxicating—
A sorceress.
Chapter 16
Temper and I stare at each other across the expanse of space, her skin sparking as magic dances along it. Her brimstone eyes and electric skin are a world away from her normal, expressive self.
My friend is a rare breed of supernatural, and one most people should hope to never encounter. Sorcerers and sorceresses wield magic like witches, but unlike witches, they have a nearly limitless amount of power they can tap into on whim. The only trouble is, every time they use their
magic, it eats away at their conscience until there is nothing left.
Using small amounts here and there makes no real difference. But power like this? It can cleave away large bits of Temper’s morality.
The worst part of the whole thing is that Temper’s power coaxes her to use it the same way my siren coaxes me to give in to my own inner darkness. It’s always there, waiting for a moment of weakness.
My friend came for me. I disappeared, and she hunted me down, working herself up into a frenzy until her power swallowed her whole. She gave up a bit of her morality for me.
It’s a totally messed up show of friendship, but one that moves me nonetheless.
I begin to lower myself to the ground, the heat and smoke of the inferno suffocating.
Callie. I sense more than hear Des’s voice in the sky above me.
I glance up at him from where he and his men linger in the sky several dozen feet away from me.
His expression says it all. He’s not okay with me getting closer. Not one bit, and he’s getting ready to intervene.
I turn away from him. Temper is my biggest concern.
She watches me the entire time I descend, the fairy she holds struggling to get away despite the fact that he’s definitely not going anywhere.
I land on the smoldering ground, the heat like an oven around us.
“You grew wings,” she says, her voice toneless.
Not hi, not how are you, or why haven’t you called? Just you grew wings. Temper’s as far gone as I’ve ever seen her.
“That motherfucker made you grow wings,” she says, the heat around me rising with her voice. Her gaze moves from me to Des.
She shoves the fairy she’s holding away from her, nearly managing to chuck him into the fire. He staggers away from the blaze just in time, and then he’s bolting, taking to the sky, muttering all sorts of obscenities that Temper doesn’t hear. Her wrath is focused on my mate.
“Whatever you’re thinking Temper, don’t,” I say, my voice low.
If she touches a hair on Des’s head, then friend or not, I’m taking her down.
Temper’s attention swings back to me, her eyes thinning menacingly. She tilts her head, trying to figure me out. “What has he done to you?”
It’s obvious she thinks that I’m the crazy one.
On a whim, I take a step forward. “Put out the flames, release your magic, and I’ll explain everything.”
Her eyes still look as alien as ever and those little bolts of lightning are still jumping from her skin, but I swear I’m getting through to her.
But then she smiles at me, and it’s positively sinister. “What if I don’t want to?”
There it is, the monster that consumes Temper.
My siren surfaces, illuminating my skin. “Don’t make me glamour you,” I state, my voice menacing.
“You wouldn’t dare,” she says.
She’s right. In any other situation, I wouldn’t. For one thing, I’m pretty sure she can overpower my glamour. For another, I’ve never wanted to be on the receiving end of her fury.
But right now, things are different.
“He’s not my betrothed, Temper. He’s my soulmate.” I never had the chance to tell her.
It’s an explanation of sorts—that I’m not being held here against my will and that I will stop her if she tries to hurt my mate.
For one long moment, Temper doesn’t react at all. Then, slowly, her eyes drift up to the Bargainer, her face expressionless.
In the sky, more fairies have joined him, not all from his kingdom by the looks of them either. Temper’s gathering a crowd, and if this doesn’t end soon, either my friend is going to get hurt, or a bunch of innocents are.
Temper’s gaze returns to me. “He’s your soulmate,” she states, her voice almost trancelike.
I nod, my skin still bright.
Protect our mate, my siren whispers, cajoling me to glamour my friend.
I keep my mouth adamantly shut.
Temper closes her eyes, and I tense. For all I know, she’s about to ignite the skies and every fairy that’s in them.
I could stop her right now. All it would take is a little of my own magic. I have every reason to do so, and my siren wants it badly.
But I don’t.
Des gave me the benefit of the doubt only minutes ago. I can do the same for Temper. So I hold my tongue and wait for her to act.
My friend’s eyes snap open, and all at once, the flames of the explosion extinguish, as though they were nothing more than birthday candles being blown out.
Temper’s irises dim, and the glowing red lines that streak through them now begin to recede. Her skin stops sparking, and that hot, overbearing power of hers finally reels itself in.
One moment she’s a savage sorceress, and the next she’s just my friend.
She lets out a faltering breath. “Girl,” she exhales, “it’s fucking good to see you.”
That’s all I need to hear. I close the last of the space between us, wrapping Temper up in a hug. Her skin feels like sunbaked sand under my touch.
“You’re going to tell me about the wings,” she says as we hug, “and that you’re a soulmate, and how the hell you ended up here. Then and only then can I promise you that I won’t fry your boyfriend’s ass.”
Now that the imminent danger is gone, I can hear the drumming of my pulse. What would’ve happened if I hadn’t come along with Des? What would’ve happened if Temper hadn’t listened to my pleas?
I squeeze her tighter. “Fair enough,” I say into her shoulder.
Around us, fairies are beginning to drop to the earth, cautiously creeping closer. I don’t know how many seconds we have left to ourselves.
I pull away from her. “I can’t believe you blew up a portal to the Otherworld.”
“Bitch, that’s just called making an entrance.”
Chapter 17
Several hours later, after many death threats (both to and from Temper), a near incarceration, and a whole lot of explaining, Temper and I are with Des and Malaki in one of the Bargainer’s private rooms.
Temper crosses her heels over the armrest of the wingback chair she’s in, her back resting against the other armrest. “So let me get this straight: you two—” she points to me and Des, “are soulmates, but you couldn’t get together for a stupidly long time because this one—” now she points to me, “made some mad-ass wish. And right after you both finally got together, she—” me again, “was thrown into a fae prison, and some psycho king decided to give her wings,”—and scales and claws—“and then you—” she points to Des, “offed that motherfucker, but now you—” me again, “are stranded here.”
“She’s not stranded here,” Des says darkly. He sits in another chair, his forearms resting heavily on his thighs.
Temper harrumphs. “Like she can just waltz her feathery ass around L.A.”
Malaki steps forward. “Why don’t we talk about the more pressing issue at the moment: you obliterated one of the Fauna Kingdom’s portals and held a fairy hostage.”
Temper folds her arms, eyeing the fairy up and down. “If you want an apology, you’re looking at the wrong girl, compadre.”
A knock on the door interrupts the conversation. Des waves his wrist, and the door opens.
The fairy on the other side bows. “My king,” he says. “Lord, ladies.” He dips his head to each of us before returning his attention to Des. “There are Fauna fae soldiers at the palace gates. They’re demanding the sorceress’s arrest.”
And that marks another attempt at incarceration.
Des rubs his chin. “I refuse to hand her over,” he says.
“My king—” the fairy begins.
“The sorceress is an honored guest and thus has my protection and that of my kingdom,” he says. His eyes flick to mine. “Any damages her arrival has incurred will be paid in full from my personal coffers.”
My breath catches. He’s so obviously doing this for me.
Just wh
en I thought it was impossible to love him more …
Malaki’s eyebrows go up. He assesses Temper, who’s giving him a look like she wouldn’t mind getting a taste of him for dinner.
The fairy standing in the doorway hesitates, then bows. “Very well. I’ll let them know.”
After the door closes, the room falls into silence.
Finally, Temper clears her throat. “I suppose you want me to say thank you,” she says, picking at a stray piece of lint on the chair.
The fact that Des offered Temper his protection … I’m not sure he realizes that’s kind of a big deal for her. Temper is used to being judged and condemned, not given the benefit of the doubt.
“Now you must make a showing at Solstice,” Malaki interrupts. “You’re going to need to prove to the other kingdoms that you’re still a faithful ally. Otherwise, this could mark the beginnings of war.”
Des rubs his face. For once he seems like a weary king.
Sensing that he has sway over Des, the Lord of Dreams steps forward. “If you attend Solstice and show them that you are the same ruler you’ve always been, it will go a long way to cooling tensions.”
Des doesn’t say anything for a minute, just ponders Malaki’s words.
Those hypnotic, silver eyes of his meet mine. I can tell he’s torn between protecting me and protecting his kingdom. It shakes me to my core to matter that much to someone.
“I don’t need protecting,” I say.
“From these fairies you might,” Des mutters. Finally, reluctantly, he nods. “Alright, I’ll go—we’ll all go.” His eyes sweep over the room, touching on Malaki, then me, then—shockingly—Temper.
She’s coming too?
Temper looks pleased. “Sounds good to me. Consider me this one’s rib,” she says, jerking her chin in my direction.
It hits me, really hits me, then: Des means to take me and a hot-headed sorceress to a place where mortals are slaves. We’ll have to respect their archaic laws, laws that subjugate humans.
I suppress a swallow. What have we gotten ourselves into?
Chapter 18
“Girl, give it to me straight, what the hell is going on?” Temper asks.
A Strange Hymn (The Bargainer Book 2) Page 11