by Inara Scott
“You can’t… ” she sputtered, pulling away. “You don’t… ”
“Oh, but I do.” He splayed his hands out across her back, letting his fingers trace the delicate curve of her spine. “I don’t believe any of this is even remotely possible, and I don’t really care. All I know is that you brought me back to life. When you left it was like I’d lost a piece of myself.”
“A piece of yourself?” she repeated, half-whispering.
He shook her gently and placed delicate kisses on her lips, eyes, and the tip of her nose. “You are a part of me. I have no idea how this whole faerie thing works, but I know I’m never letting you go.”
She opened her mouth to speak but there was a whoosh of air from above, and they all looked up. Kaia swore under her breath as a figure floated down beside them, landing with a thump on the cold marble floor.
Garrett looked at her with horror.
Now he knew it wasn’t a dream. Because if this was a dream, it wouldn’t include Portia.
“Well, don’t just stare at me like a bunch of fools,” Portia snapped, extending her hand imperiously. “Help me up.”
Garrett complied, his thoughts a confused mess. Portia? Through the faerie ring? Icy fingers of fear slid through him.
Damn it, this wasn’t a dream.
“You followed us here?” he said.
“Of course.” She straightened her shirt around her shoulders. “I couldn’t very well let the lot of you fumble around on your own. You’d never make it home by yourselves.” Portia raised a foot and kicked one of the dogs, who were sniffing at her skirt, in the face. It yelped and took a step back.
“Stupid boggles,” she muttered.
“Portia, are you going to tell me… ” Garrett broke off. “Well, I don’t even know what you’d tell me. You’ve been here before?”
Portia ignored him, glaring at Kaia. “I should have known you were Fey. It simply never occurred to me one of your kind would actually go to all the trouble of being hungry and living in a shelter.”
“I didn’t have a choice,” Kaia said. She murmured a low command, and the boggles took several steps back. “Zafira commanded it. What are you doing here?”
“You think these two are the only ones who know what to do with a faerie ring?” Portia said as she adjusted her clothing.
“Portia,” Garrett said, his voice strangled. “For the love of all that is holy, how do you know about the Fey?”
He didn’t even know what Fey meant, and Portia was now some kind of expert? Was there anything the woman didn’t control?
Portia carefully smoothed her hair, tucking a loose strand behind one ear. “Your grandfather.”
“My father?” Victoria interrupted. “What does he have to do with this?”
Kaia held a hand to her mouth. “Garrett, is this your mother?”
“Long story,” Garrett said. “Love and forgiveness.”
Victoria smiled at Kaia. “I think you had something to do with it and for that, I thank you with everything I have.”
“The man I married wasn’t your father,” Portia said, ignoring the interruption. “Your real father left me poor, pregnant, and completely alone. Because he didn’t have the courage to stand up to her.”
“Oh my.” Kaia pressed a trembling hand against her brow. “Oh my. I should have guessed… the music in the garden was so beautiful… and your face… ”
“What about my face?” Garrett demanded, looking from her to his grandmother.
“Portia, what are you saying?” Victoria stared at her, wide-eyed.
“Your father was one of them,” Portia said, gesturing contemptuously at Kaia. “A good for nothing creature with the willpower of a two-year-old child.”
“There are male faeries?” Victoria said, looking ill.
Kaia put her hands to her cheeks. “No. No male faeries. Just elves.” She swallowed hard. “And satyrs.”
Victoria glanced at Kaia. “Is that bad? Why do you sound like that? What’s wrong with satyrs?”
“Zafira doesn’t like it when her satyrs—” she broke off, spinning around to look down the hall at the sound of a voice, echoing with a strange, hypnotic power. “Damn.”
Garrett blew out a breath. “Let me guess—she’s here?”
Kaia nodded miserably. “She’s here.”
Garrett turned confidently down the hall to face her. “It’s about time.”
“Kaia?” The black dogs bounded up at the sound of the voice. They ran and took positions at either side of the hall, head cast downward in a position that resembled a canine bow. The Queen of the Faeries—and really, there could be no mistake about what she was—strode toward them, fury radiating from her. “What is going on here? Who is that?”
She was at least eight feet tall, with long black hair that flowed in a wave behind her. She held a twisted wooden staff with a rounded head, and she brandished it toward them as she walked. Mina, Talia, and Analise hurried after her.
All four had wings. The same sort of wings he held in his memory of Kaia—wings that framed their faces and backs with sparkling light. They were impossibly beautiful, bodies like dreams, long legs and hourglass figures, and above all, a sensual radiance that made one want to touch and be touched.
He saw a flash of recognition in Talia’s eyes, and then Mina’s and Analise’s. Talia opened her mouth, but before she could say anything Analise elbowed her and glared. He felt a rush of gratitude. At least one of the faeries was on his side.
Zafira stopped in front of them, a smile creasing her pale pink lips as she surveyed the small group gathered at the end of the hall. “Well, well, well,” she mused. “What do we have here?”
“Nothing for you to worry about.” Kaia pushed Garrett aside and stepped in front of him. “They’re just here by accident.”
“Upon my word, it’s Portia.” Zafira practically glowed with delight. “Dear old Portia. How lovely to see you.”
“You know each other?” Garrett said. And why should he be surprised? Didn’t Portia always say she knew everyone—everyone who mattered, anyway?
“Portia tried to steal one of my satyrs,” Zafira purred. “But you lost that fight, didn’t you, dear Portia?”
Portia crossed her arms. “You threatened to take away his hearing, Zafira. Hardly a fair fight.”
“I gave him a choice.”
“A choice you knew he’d couldn’t take,” Portia shot back. “Music was his life. You knew he would rather die than live without it.”
“My father was a satyr who loved music?” Victoria’s voice was quiet.
“Why do you think I wouldn’t let you play?” Portia said irritably. “I knew once you did, she’d get her claws in you. And then you’d be as weak as him.”
Garrett’s vision momentarily blurred. That was why Portia hated music? Because of some long-ago affair with a satyr?
“What happened to him?” Victoria asked.
Zafira sniffed. “The silly creature drove me crazy with his incessant whimpering and whining for his lost love. I banished him from my sight. He was already a few hundred years old. I imagine he’s long dead now.”
Portia actually paled. Emotions Garrett had never seen before danced across her face. Pain, grief, even—God help them—something like regret. She struggled visibly to control herself and replace the moment of vulnerability with her usual irascible mask. “Serves him right for leaving me the way he did. He knew I didn’t want a child, much less one touched with your madness.”
Kaia shook her head. “Children cannot inherit the desires of a satyr, Portia. Their demons die with them. The only thing they can pass along is a bit of the Fey blood. There is no madness in that.”
“Victoria turned into an addict,” Portia pointed out.
“My addiction was my own,” Victoria replied. “Though the way you treated me certainly helped.”
“You sent me after him just to torment her,” Kaia accused, turning her gaze to her queen. “Even after all her famil
y had already suffered, you had to keep playing your little game. What about the troth? We can’t hurt humans directly. You know that.”
“I told you that you couldn’t use your magic,” Zafira said. She stamped her staff into the ground. “And you had to take human form. If anyone got hurt, it was because of the actions of a human, not a faerie.”
“Queen Zafira!” A glowing ball of light started toward them from the other end of the hall. As it approached, Garrett realized it was a tiny winged creature that resembled a cupid, with furry wings and a child’s face and body. This creature also had horns, and had a devilish look in its eyes that had nothing to do with love. The creature swept its small body into a bow in front of the queen. “Queen Zafira, I apologize for the delay. I was talking to one of the night faeries about her failure to attend court. Completely unacceptable, of course.”
“Imp,” Zafira commanded, “these humans have breached the walls of Faeria. Take them away to the wailing wood. I think they need to spend some time with the banshees.”
The imp looked at Garrett, Portia, and Victoria with an assessing eye. “How long should I leave them?”
“Forty or fifty years should be sufficient.”
“No!” Kaia cried, spreading her arms wide as if to shield them. She looked so fragile beside the other glowing, radiant faeries that Garrett wanted to pull her into his arms. Besides that, it was clear from the look directed at her by the queen that she was in as much danger here as he was.
“Wait—what about the troth?” Victoria spun around to Kaia. “You just said she couldn’t hurt humans directly.”
“The troth doesn’t hold here in Faeria,” Kaia said miserably. “Humans aren’t supposed to come here. That was part of the bargain.”
“Hey, wait.” The imp flew up to Garrett and examined him, grabbing his face and rubbing it between its hands. “This is Garrett. Garrett Jameson. What are you doing here?”
Garrett jerked away roughly.
The imp patted him on the head. “Isn’t that just the cutest thing? He must have followed her here. Maybe she didn’t screw up as much as we thought she did.”
Zafira swung around. “What are you talking about?”
The imp hovered a few inches from Garrett’s face. “She had to get him to fall in love with her, right? Well, I’m not sure I can think of a lot of other reasons for a grown man to jump into a faerie ring.”
“Of course I love her,” Garrett snapped. “Why else would I be here?”
Zafira banged her staff into the ground. It reverberated through the hall with a resounding echo. “Silence! I don’t care if he did fall in love with her. I want these humans punished and I want it done now!”
“Punish me, then,” Kaia pleaded, falling on her knees in front of the queen. “Bring back the Black Ladies. Strip me of my wings forever. Do whatever you want, Queen Zafira, but I beg you, please release these humans.”
“No!” Garrett grabbed Kaia’s shoulders. He pulled her to standing and held her tightly in his arms as he faced Zafira. “You can do whatever you want to me, but leave Kaia out of this. I followed her here of my own free will. You have no reason to punish her for anything.”
“If you must punish someone, punish me.” Everyone turned and stared as Victoria spoke. “These two deserve a chance to be together. I have had my time on earth.” Her eyes flashed with bright blue Jameson fire. “Feed me to your dogs or your Black Ladies, whatever they might be. Just let them go.”
“Oh, this is rich,” the imp said, rubbing his hands together with glee. “Kaia wants to be sacrificed for him, he wants to be sacrificed for her, and this one wants to take it for both of them. This is better than Shakespeare.”
“Shut up, imp.” Portia tweaked his ear. “If anyone is going to face the Black Ladies it’s me. I’ve seen them before. I can handle it.”
“Enough,” Zafira roared. “I don’t have to bargain with any of you. I should send you all to the demons.”
The imp bobbed in the air, stroking one horn reflectively. “Of course, you could do that. On the other hand, the man did fall in love with Kaia. Some might say she hasn’t done anything wrong.”
“She had to break his heart,” Zafira said through tight lips. “Not fall in love with him.”
Garrett narrowed his brows at the naked little half-boy. Was he actually trying to help them? “In all fairness, she did break my heart.” He looked at Kaia. “You didn’t just break my heart when you left, you broke all of our hearts.”
“There are humans in Faeria,” Zafira said grimly. “Someone will be punished.”
“You’ve been punishing me since you took away Aiden,” Portia said, her lips tight. “You kept from me the only person I ever really loved, and I’ve spent years torturing my family in a vain attempt to protect them from their Fey blood. Haven’t you done enough?”
Silence fell over the hall. Garrett wondered if it was possible he had seen a hint of softening in Zafira’s crystalline features.
“Banish me,” Kaia offered suddenly. She looked up at Garrett, her eyes soft and tender. “Banish me forever. Take my magic. Transform me for good. I don’t care. Just let me go with them.”
Zafira stepped back, raising her Staff to her heart. “What are you saying? That you’d prefer to live with the humans?”
Soft sounds of horror came from Mina, Talia, and Analise. Kaia gave them a comforting smile. “Yes. That’s what I’m saying.”
“If you leave,” Zafira warned, “you can never return. You will be banished forever from Faeria and the world of the Fey.”
Garrett tightened his fingers around her waist and pressed his cheek into hers. He whispered into her ear, “You don’t have to do this, Kaia.”
She closed her eyes at the touch of his skin. “I don’t care about my magic,” she whispered. “Before I met you all I knew was how to hurt. When I became human I learned how to create. I learned about love. You’re a part of me now, and I’d rather be ripped apart by a thousand demons than for us to be apart.”
She pulled away from Garrett to face Zafira and the Handmaids. “I don’t want to turn my back on the Fey, but I need to be with Garrett. So banish me, Zafira. Please. Do whatever you want to do to me. But I will never again live without love.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Two Years Later…
“Are we ready?” Kaia held up the lighter to the single candle on the cake. The assembled crowd—Rachel, Ted, Lexi, Portia, and Victoria—shouted yes. Max pointed to the video camera to show he was filming. In his spot beside the high chair that held Sorah, Garrett and Kaia’s golden-haired child, Garrett gave her the thumbs-up sign and held up his saxophone and began to play. Sorah pounded her spoon and smiled a wide, toothless grin.
As they began to sing, Kaia entered the room carrying the cake high in front of her. She could hardly believe so much had happened in one year. Soon after they returned from Faeria, she and Garrett had married in a small ceremony at the Manor. A few months later, Portia had retired and Garrett had taken over as CEO at Jameson Enterprises. Though it surprised all of them, he said he finally decided he enjoyed running the company more than he enjoyed irritating Portia. With enormous relief, Max took over Garrett’s old job as director of the commercial real estate division. Bianca walked out soon after he quit. Apparently, being married to a middle manager wasn’t nearly as appealing to her as being married to a vice president.
Kaia, who still had a tenuous understanding of her human body’s reproductive abilities, had become pregnant. This to the absolute delight of her new mother-in-law and the grudging pleasure of Portia.
“…Happy birthday to you!” They finished on a high note. Garrett put down his sax and placed a kiss on top of his daughter’s head.
“Happy birthday, sweetheart,” he said softly.
Kaia felt the familiar prickle of joyful tears as she watched them together. She held out the cake in front of her daughter. “Now blow out the candles.” She puckered her lips to demonstrate.
Sorah squealed and slammed her open palms on the high chair tray. Kaia blew out the candle and everyone cheered. Delighted to find a lovely new object within reach, Sorah lunged for the cake and got a tiny bit of pink frosting on her finger. She held up her hand and stared at it for a moment, then immediately stuck it in her mouth. Her expression quickly turned from confusion to pleasure to determination.
She turned back to the cake.
Kaia straightened. “Oh no,” she laughed. “You’re not getting the whole thing. We need to cut you a piece.”
Sorah glared and reached her stubby arms as far forward as they would go. “Uhhh!”
Kaia grinned at Garrett, who came over to link his arm around her waist and drop a kiss on the top of her forehead.
“She’s an obstinate little bugger, isn’t she?” he said.
“I suppose she gets that from you,” Kaia replied.
“I don’t know. Her mother’s pretty stubborn herself.” He tipped her face toward his and kissed her gently on the lips. “I’m glad for every bit of it. I don’t know how she’d put up with me otherwise.”
“It’s hard,” Kaia said, her eyes dancing. “A daily struggle.”
He looked at her seriously. “Any regrets?”
She knew what he meant. Leaving behind her wings, her magic, and her faerie sisters hadn’t been easy, but it had been worth it. The answer came easily. “None.” She squeezed his waist and pressed him against her. “Not a single one.”
“Hey, lovebirds, pay attention,” Max shouted. “I think the kid’s going for the cake.”
Kaia realized she’d been balancing the cake only a few feet from Sorah’s face, and the child was straining to reach it with every ounce of her tiny body. She chuckled and moved it farther out of Sorah’s reach.
“No, no, no,” she laughed.
“Uh!” Sorah grunted, reaching out farther.
“Wow,” Garrett said, impressed. “She really wants that cake.”