by Terry Spear
Hawk Fae
The World of Fae, Book 6
Terry Spear
PUBLISHED BY:
Terry Spear
Hawk Fae
Copyright © 2013 by Terry Spear
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the author, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review.
Discover more about Terry Spear at:
http://www.terryspear.com/
Dedication
Thanks to Edgar Allen Poe and Robert Frost, two of my favorite poets, who made me appreciate the form and beauty of poetry from an early age.
Blurb for Hawk Fae:
Sometimes doing a good deed can prove to be a disaster, Ena, dragon shifter fae, discovers as she must flee her home. But her staff chooses to go with her and deal with the dangers to reach the safety of the hawk fae kingdom, if the king there welcomes them. The human, Brett, promises to help her escape the marriage to the despicable dragon fae prince, rather than return home to his Earth world. And now all the dragon shifter fae are at risk of having to face the dragon fae king's wrath.
Esmeralda, the hawk fae king's sister, has been imprisoned by the griffin on their island for half of her life and she finally makes her escape, only she gets herself into even more trouble.
Against her wishes, Ena must forsake Brett on the journey, and he finds his world is turned upside down once again and now he has to survive the life or death trials of the phantom fae kingdom.
Table of Contents
Terry Spear
Dedication
Blurb for Hawk Fae:
Also Available by Terry Spear:
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Acknowledgement
About the Author:
Author’s Note:
Phantom Fae
Chapter 1
Also Available by Terry Spear:
The World of Fae:
The Dark Fae
The Deadly Fae
The Winged Fae
The Ancient Fae
Dragon Fae
Hawk Fae
Phantom Fae (coming in 2014)
The World of Elf:
The Shadow Elf
The Darkland Elf (TBA)
Blood Moon Series:
Kiss of the Vampire
Demon Guardian Series:
The Trouble with Demons
Demon Trouble, Too
Demon Hunter, coming 2014
Non-Series for Now:
Ghostly Liaisons
The Beast Within
Courtly Masquerade
Deidre's Secret
The Magic of Inherian:
The Scepter of Salvation
The Mage of Monrovia
Emerald Isle of Mists (TBA)
Chapter 1
What was wrong with him to agree to this fae madness? Why hadn’t he said yes when Ena, the dragon shifter fae, offered to take him home? All disaster was about to break loose and he was smack dab in the middle of the whole fae mess. When he could have been safe at home.
Well, kind of.
The truth of the matter was that Brett Sadler had to know why he had the fae-seeing ability. Was he truly one of the fae as Princess Alicia, the granddaughter of the dragon fae king, suggested? If so, which fae kind did Brett belong to? Did he have family somewhere in the fae world? If he was one of the fae, he certainly didn't want to be stuck on Earth world with fae-seers, like his friends were. He could imagine them trying to kill him once he began to show off a fae aura.
One way or another, he had to discover the truth.
He was grateful to still be alive, and glad Ena had saved him from death. Though she'd warned him often enough she would eliminate him if he gave her any trouble. He knew that Ena was growing on him in the way she scowled at him, growled at him, and threatened him. In front of her staff, she acted in charge and infallible. Beneath that “I’m dragon shifter fae, mind my words” was a sweet vulnerability as evidenced by the way she treated her staff of misfits as if they were her family.
But Brett was a human fae seer who had killed fae and was now living among them. Never in a million years had he expected that he’d come to the fae world, or be allowed to live once they'd taken him prisoner. He never thought he'd die back home at the hand of the fae, either. Just continue to eliminate the fae who posed a threat to him or his friends and that he'd live to a ripe old age.
He watched as Ena considered her gold coins and jewels piled high in her dungeon and how she was going to move it. Her arms were folded across her black velvet vest, her black boots clicking against the stone floor as she paced back and forth, her green eyes focused on the treasure.
Many of the fae Brett now lived among wanted his head for what he had done. Taking the fae princess, Alicia, hostage had turned his whole world upside down. How more could it become so inside out when for now, he wasn't even in his own world any longer?
The thing of it was once he had a taste of this world, he wasn’t sure he wanted to return to the mundane life he’d had back home. His foster parents had reminded him daily that he was lucky they'd taken him in. At the high school, he didn't quite fit in, unless he connected with other fae seers and then that meant more of a danger to him. Some of the fae seers he'd hooked up with were hot heads and when they saw a fae, they wanted to kill him. Brett was more interested in ensuring the fae didn't know he could see them. He preferred playing their own games and coming up with ways to deal with them other than terminally. There had to be another way.
Someday, he might do something useful in his world, but for now, he wanted to help Ena escape the dragon fae king’s wrath—as soon as Prince Grotto learned what she was about to do—in the worst way. The reason she was in this mess was because Brett had helped take Princess Alicia prisoner. As Ena's reward for saving the princess, Alicia's grandfather had declared Ena would wed Alicia's cousin. He was a dangerous dragon fae. Sure, Ena would become a princess if she were to wed Prince Grotto. Brett also knew that the fae intended to use her for her special skills and terminate her when she proved useless.
Brett wasn't sure how to help Ena move her gold and staff to somewhere safe—hopefully, in the hawk fae kingdom. They didn't have U-Haul trucks in the fae world. She was a dragon and that meant she wasn't leaving without her hoard of treasure. It was part of who she was—some kind of inborn trait.
"You said you'd call on your brother and dragon shifter…," Brett paused, hating that she had so many suitors, though he was annoyed with himself for feeling that way.
Why should he even care? He wasn't in line to "mate" with the popular dragon shifter fae. He shouldn't have even given the notion half a thought. Not when she’d threatened to annihilate him—several times—if he gave her any trouble.
But he was thinking about it just the same, irritated with the way they were treating her, when he believed she deserved so much better. Just like he would treat her with respect and loyalty because he truly valued all she'd done for him. She'd stood up to the king and not only asked for Brett to be her human slave in payment for saving his granddaughter, but in doing so, saved his life and risked the king's fury.
In her ebony velvet vest, slim trousers, and thigh-high suede boots, her black hair cut short, Ena looked like a Goth. The
prettiest Goth he'd ever seen.
She glanced at him when he stopped speaking. "I thought your dragon shifter friends," he said, unable to call them suitors, "were going to aid you."
"I changed my mind. I'm afraid my brother and my suitors will want to fight the king, and I can't allow it. None of them know my treasure is normally stored here and not hidden in some unknown cave. I'll… just move it, and we can find somewhere else to hide it."
"But… your brother will come looking for you, surely." As protective as her brother had been, Brett was certain Halloran would search for her everywhere.
She chewed on her bottom lip, studying her bounty again. "I'll leave a note saying that I decided to take a vacation. I don't need to give an explanation. In the past, I never said where I was going."
"Prince Grotto will hear what this is all about before long, won't he?"
She took a deep breath and let it out. "Yes. As soon as I miss the 'date' I was to have with Prince Grotto, unless he decides to cancel on me, and then he won't know for a little while longer. Otherwise, he will be angry at my defiance for not meeting with him. He'll ask my brother first where I've gone, though he's out of the fae kingdom at the moment on another mission for the king."
"And then what?"
"My brother will come looking for me first. He won't fight the king. I'll be settled, hopefully by then, and that will be the end of the problem."
"So… how do we cart all of this stuff off?"
She frowned at him when he called it "stuff." It was just stuff if they couldn't move it quickly enough. It would end up being the dragon fae king's booty, or Prince Grotto's—the king’s grand-nephew who was to marry Ena, by coercion, which was the whole reason they were leaving in the middle of the night. If they caught her before she could leave—then all this “stuff” was worth nothing at all to her.
Still, he knew how hard this had to be for her. He'd moved so many times over the years, and he wasn't all that old, but it was difficult every time. This had been her very own home, a stone keep tower, and now she didn't have anywhere else to really call hers. Brett knew that she only hoped the hawk fae kingdom would take her in. What if she was wrong?
"Can we get…" They were so backwards here he wasn't sure what they could use to haul the stuff. "…horses and trailers or something?" He was feeling anxious, sensing her own anxiousness. Wanting to do something to hurry the process along.
"My staff is getting the wagons and horses now. I have three. With Halloran gone on a job, I'll just borrow four of my brother's also." She smiled a little evilly.
Brett assumed she still wanted to pay her brother back for locking her in his dungeon. Sure, he'd had her best interest at heart, in a round-about way, but Brett would have handled the situation a lot differently, had he been her brother. Not that he wanted to think of her in a brotherly way.
"So if we take his wagons—he'll know you're gone."
"Ryker is just telling his people I need to move my treasure. I've done it before. Taken a couple of days to get back. No problem. We all do it from time to time."
"If Prince Grotto learns of it? Won't he assume you've run away with your gold?"
"No. He wouldn't believe I'd leave all this behind," she said, referring to her stone keep. "I imagine he'll think I'm hiding my gold so that he doesn't learn where it is, should I have to wed him. Which I won't."
"We'll need to have drivers for each of the wagons, won't we?" Brett was going to offer to manage one, though he'd never driven a wagon before. He didn't think it could be that difficult. He'd do anything to help out.
"Each of my staff members knows how to handle a wagon. I'll be… two short though."
"I can drive one," he said.
She eyed him speculatively.
"I've never done so, but, I know I can. You need me."
She smiled a little. "You realize if you break the wagon or injure the horses, you'll pay for it out of your gardener's salary."
Folding his arms, he smiled a little back and shrugged. He still hadn't served in that capacity yet, and now without a garden to manage, he most likely wouldn't for a very long time. That was another reason he knew she liked him. She constantly told him that he was indebted to her. Which meant she wanted to keep him around to pay her back. He thought.
"Comes with the job, doesn't it?" he said with a smirk. "What about the last wagon. Aren't you going to drive one?" As soon as he said it, he realized the job was probably beneath her—given that she was a highly sought after dragon shifter and paid for her jobs with all kinds of treasure. Still, to save all that gold, wouldn't she need to drive one of the wagons?
"I will be searching for the best routes and safest locations to rest up on the journey to the hawk fae kingdom. I can only do that while soaring high above the lands as a dragon."
Wow, he wished he could do that.
"We'll hire someone else to go with us. The pay will be good. Are you really certain you want to go with us? It can be dangerous out there," she said, her usual "I am dragon, fear my roar" persona slipping and he saw true concern in her pretty green eyes.
He suspected that this was his last opportunity to return home to his world before he got into any further trouble. Instead of jumping at the chance to leave this world behind, he agreed to stick it out with the dragon shifter fae and help her escape a marriage that he feared would end in her death—at the hands of Prince Grotto of the dragon fae—not a dragon shifter, as much as they despised each other. He couldn't believe the fae intended to use Ena's abilities for his own devious purposes. Then again, he'd always been taught that the fae were never to be trusted.
"You need me," he simply said.
She gave him another one of her elusive smiles that said he might very well change his mind once they were on their way.
What had he been thinking?
That she had saved his neck, risking her own when she went up against the king of the dragon fae. That she could have stuck Brett in a dungeon, but locked him in a bedchamber in her keep instead. That she could have fed him prisoner food, which he imagined could have been pretty awful, but she had allowed him to eat with her at the main table, and not even with the servants. That she had protected him from her brother and his friend, when she could have treated him like an inconsequential human. That she had bought him a whole set of clothes—that he was to pay her back for—but the reason behind it was what was important. She'd wanted him to blend in so that the fae would not see him in such a bad light.
He'd never had a friend who had risked his or her life for him, or had gone to such lengths to protect him. Despite her telling him in so many words, repeatedly, that he was just a human, a prisoner, a servant, and her new gardener, he knew she was attracted to him.
Even though he knew he would have to face untold dangers here, he wanted to help her.
After seeing some of the fae world, where he truly didn't belong, he couldn't help feeling that if he returned to his home he would face an inevitable death anyway. He would see the fae in a new light, but they wouldn't see him in the same way. And that could get him killed. What if some of those who didn't like him here, came after him there? When Ena wasn't trying to protect him? They were fire-breathing dragons, and he had seen how Ena had disposed of one fae seer who had planned to kill the fae princess. So he knew firsthand that he couldn't fight them easily, if at all.
Another concern he had was that he might be one of the fae, like Alicia had been, only living in the human world. If that was so, he wanted to find his roots. He had been moved from foster family to foster family, mainly because of his declaration that he had seen people wearing colorful auras about them, and that didn't go over big with the foster parents. When vision issues were discounted, they thought he was a little crazy.
He wasn't sure how his friends would view him if he returned to his home when they'd been injured, and he had been clothed and treated like—family—he realized, just like the way that Ena had treated her staff. As if they were f
amily. He'd never experienced that before. They were an odd lot, but he truly felt he fit in, in a weird way. Maybe because all of them had treated him like he was a friend and helper—once they got over the fear that he had been a fae killer—and had no intention of killing any of them.
They heard someone coming, well, a lot of footfalls and Ena instantly turned into her dragon form. Brett wasn't expecting that, and he tried not to jump away from her as her beautiful, shimmery green wings were folded at her side, her elongated, bony green snout sniffing at the air, her head tilted to the side as she listened to those who were coming. She was still smaller than the males, but that didn't lessen the power of her dragon fire, and she still had a mouth full of wicked-looking teeth.
Ryker, her butler, called out before he appeared in the hallway to the cells, "Just us, mistress," and Brett assumed he knew her well enough to use precautions and warn her who was approaching.
She waited still, wary, watching, not shifting back.
Did she suspect Ryker was being forced to come down here and pretend everything was fine? From everything that had gone on and observing and learning, Brett realized trust didn’t come easily in the fae world.
He glanced around for a weapon in the jewels, dug through the thousands of coins, and found a jewel-handled sword. He'd used swords in his martial art demonstrations, so he knew how to handle a variety of them well. He grabbed the sword, the gold and emerald and ruby encrusted handle shimmering in the lantern lights, the steel blade shiny, his firm grip on the weapon. It was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen. And it felt right, like this sword belonged to him. Not that anything did. He was merely a visitor here for the moment and he could only borrow it.
Ena glanced in his direction, and he swore she smiled marginally, as if showing off her wicked dragon teeth just a little could be called a smile.
Then Ryker came into view, a half dozen other men with him.