I was still thinking about renovations and purchases when I alighted from my Flyt home. My lips curled as I spotted a most unwelcome sight, my cousin Puzzle. He was a jack ass of the first order. So much so that one of my earliest memories as a child centered around the punishment my parents meted out after I glamored him to look like one, one day after magic and mayhem class. Yes, that’s a thing, but the mayhem is not to be used the way I did. One has to follow the rules as to when one can and when one can’t do certain things.
“Heard you went and got yourself a human,” he said, sauntering over.
“Really? He’s been here for several days now, and you’re only just now aware of him?” I prodded.
Puzzle narrowed his eyes at me. “I was away until this morning. Some of us are still held in high esteem by the Court. I was on a mission for the queen herself,” he preened.
“Well, I’m sure she appreciates you making sure she has enough linen to wipe her ass with,” I tell him.
He turns puce, his shaking telling me that he’s having trouble holding onto his temper already. “I’ll have you know that I was in Solaris, delivering a betrothal gift to the Crown Prince’s daughter.”
“The one who just became engaged to the goblin king’s grandson?”
“Yes. My mission was critical to helping maintain a peaceful, meaningful relationship with both realms.”
I had to give him that. It was the rules. While humans saw breaches of social etiquette as merely rude, with the fae, they were deadly insults. “I hope they enjoy the gift,” I offered.
His coloring returned to normal. “It’s a villa in Atlantis, so I’m sure they will. Now, what’s this about your human? And someone here said you bought the two floors below you.”
“I thought I should finally get a move on to establish myself properly. I’m close to my majority and
11
Jase
Being shackled by the legs turned out to be more traumatizing than being locked to the wall. Fastened against the wall, I knew I could not move. The short chains on my leg shackles gave me the illusion of freedom, only for me to be rudely awakened as they pulled tight. Even worse, in the dark, I couldn’t see the toilet bucket, and more than once, I knocked it over with the results you’d expect. I’m pretty confident that Hulk One and Mammoth Two were putting it in different places just to help me soil myself, too, for shits and giggles.
The other thing about the dark is it is insidious. I found this out when they took my meal dishes away, and they pulled a set of fucking shutters across the bars of my cell. No ambient light from the weak light outside my cell, no dim purple gleaming from the window. It was somehow actually darker than before, when they’d turned the lights out in the corridor. Nothing but the cool, the damp, the dankness of mold and mildew. Sat there in the darkness, my other senses began to sharpen. I could feel every prickle of cold against my skin. Each and every hair on my body quivered with the damp. My nose twitched against the scents the dank brought; the stench from my body waste became even more foul to my nose. Then there was my hearing. I could hear far off laughter, catch the almost sounds of someone screaming, and worst of all, the scratching sounds of vermin as they crawled out from the chinks in the mortar and skittered across the stone floor and across the walls.
I got two more meals before they stopped coming to feed me and to empty my waste. My nose became inflamed from my nose dripping, my eyes sore from watering. I could now no longer smell anything and my eyes saw nothing but colorful spots if I tried to see anything. My throat ached, the area under my jaw and the sides of my ears feeling stretched and uncomfortable from swelling. I could still hear, though. Even worse, I could still feel and when the bugs began to climb over my skin, the chains held me fast so I couldn’t escape them.
I refused to give in, though. If there is one thing a Florida farm boy knows, it’s that cockroaches are everywhere. Unable to afford anything than the odd can of out of date Raid from the Dent and Bent grocery store just a few miles away from us and over the border in Alabama, cockroaches were a fact of life growing up. Roaches, ants, love bugs, you name it, we had ’em, inside and outside of the trailer. Yes, trailer.
My father didn’t pay the insurance premiums on the house one year and a hurricane came and tore the roof off while flooding did the rest. He took the money we did get and drove to Enterprise, buying a fifteen-year-old fourteen by sixty that needed repairs, which it only sort of got. When you drink most of what little money you do earn away, it doesn’t leave much for anything else. So, yeah, I wasn’t going to start screaming and crying.
I slapped at where they crawled and bit, whatever the fuck these bugs were. Probably some type of giant magic cooties. I stamped hard, ignoring the pain that shot up from my barefoot, through my ankle, and up my calf in my determination to try to squash them before they got to me. I raked my hands through my hair, shaking my head wildly to dislodge them. Nothing worked for long. More and more of the damned things came. My skin began to itch and I began to alternately feel hot and then cold. Damned things likely carried some kind of plague, transmitted by bite.
I slept fitfully, startling awake to keep them from crawling in my mouth, as I had to keep it open to breathe now that my nose was stuffed closed. I pinched my nostrils a lot, too, making sure none had gotten up in there as I slept. The day I discovered the itching in my ears and ass and was doing my best to dig them out before they did me even more harm, I was blinded by the shutters opening and the loudness of a familiar voice.
“I said to leave him in the dark, not stop feeding and cleaning him!” the figure snapped at someone.
“We do apologize for the inconvenience. We will, of course, not be charging for the services not rendered,” someone replied.
“And?” the first figure asked.
“And comp you twenty-five percent off of the total bill payable,” came the grudging sounding reply.
“That should about cover how much it’s going to cost me to get him presentable,” the figure muttered. “Ghost! Stop that! Someone grab his hands, he’s going to hurt himself in ways I don’t want.”
Ghost, yeah, that was me. I was a ghost, alright. My past was dead. This male, he was my ticket out of here, even though he was also the one who dumped me here.
“The bugs,” I explained, my voice sounding harsh. I needed to be away from them. There were bugs and then there were bugs. These bugs were nothing like Florida bugs. These wanted to eat me, I just knew it..
“Shh, now. The bugs are all gone,” he told me. Lord Willow, my brain said, stuttering as it tried and mostly failed to reorient to the sudden change of environment. “Look at me,” he demanded, peering into my eyes as he grasped my chin. I locked eyes with him and fell into the vastness of space, free at last as I floated away.
12
Willow
I accepted the discount as adequate recompense as the final outcome was what I had been aiming for, more or less. Ghost was a shell of himself, the thirst, hunger, fever, and darkness all preying on his mind enough to make him hallucinate. I didn’t appreciate having to drop him off at the grooming parlor to get cleaned up, though. The one saving grace of that experience was that he’d fallen so deep under my spell, he was completely checked out. This meant he could be moved about like a doll, making the groomer’s job that much easier. I had them leave his beard stubble to a barely-there scruff just long enough to scratch deliciously as we kissed. I was under no illusion that would happen any time soon, though. There were better odds of him sucking me off, to be honest. I shivered with delight at the phantom caress against my thighs as I imagined this. Yes, this was the first thing I’d aim for. I’d decided. He was going to be my concubine and my assassin. It would help keep matters neat.
While I waited to pick him back up from the groomer, I took a bubble to the bank. Ash had not only duly produced a shopping list of needs but had a tentative order ready with an Aesir weapons merchant. All I had to do was give it my seal and arrange for pay
ment and the whole lot would arrive within hours. What we couldn’t get on such short notice from the merchant, Ash was arranging to buy locally. There was one item on the list that raised my eyebrows, though, a kami-spun silk set of pajamas with a matching robe. Imbued with the magic of the gods, weapons that were thrust through the fabric would be unable to harm me. The cost of just that alone was equal to what I could make selling a single haul of fairy dust. Speaking of which, after spending as much as I have, I really needed to broker another deal. I made a mental note to shimmer a message to Alpha Wilcox. If memory served me right, the time for their bi-annual interpack run was coming up, and his pack was due to host. There was usually a massive party after and I’m sure they would need plenty of dust.
My business at the bank complete, I bubbled back to the groomer. They were just blowing his hair dry. His scrubbed skin shone, glitter from a will o’ the whisp shining almost bashfully from his now completely void of hair body. It drew even more attention to his dark locks atop his head and that sexy stubble, making me want to sink my teeth into him to see if he tasted as good as he looked. I bet he would, given his natural scent. His flaccid cock was now shown to full advantage, too, begging to be toyed with. That wasn’t why he’d been shaved, though. This was yet another example being made to him, showing him that I had full control. It was a lesson I’d let him find out for himself after I got him home and put to bed, allowing him to sleep off the rest of my magic’s influence. It was a real shame he’d be out of it so unable to enjoy his first bubble ride.
I paid the groomer and led him out using the new leash fastened to the harness the groomer sold me, along with a pair of soft-soled slippers and a loincloth. The harness was made of braided silk rope which went around his throat, crisscrossing his chest and back. The leash attached to the back, where one tug would hold him back and snap release would allow me to let him free. I’m sure he’ll hate it, but it’s a necessary tool to show that he’s currently in training. Trained pets and servants are allowed to walk on their own, and if they do something that breaks the rules, they face the full consequences. He was too new at this to let that happen to him. He’d break a rule within the first five minutes and never know it until he was sentenced for it on the spot. The harness and lead also make it easy for me to get him to trail along with me in the current state he’s in, with no risk of someone luring him away. The rules are quite clear; any master foolish enough to allow their servant or pet to be pied away loses the said property.
We made it to the corner where the bubble station was without too much trouble. He was stumbling around less and his eyes had stopped watering. He sounded less stuffed up, too, as he breathed. He still shivered a bit and when I ran a hand along his back, I realized he still felt warmer than he should. He needed to be fed a tonic to finish purging whatever ailed him. I was sure I have some in my medicine chest and if not, I could have one delivered easy enough. We stepped into the next empty bubble, him now cognizant enough to hesitate before plunging through its membrane. As we began to float, he looked about dreamily.
“Is like Willy Wonka,” he said, wonder coloring his tone. I shudder at that. Wonka was infamous across the realms. A changeling who grew up, he re-crossed back to the Veil via a fairy ring, before returning to the human world after kidnapping a tribe of Coca Locas from the Kat Kit region of the realm of Shugah. If that wasn’t bad enough, he paid a Sandman to drop a twisted version of events into a human’s dreams. That human wrote a children’s story that became a classic that they’ve immortalized in film. With Wonka as a hero, no less! Madness!
Still, he went about it all while following the rules, so it was a permitted Mayhem. It cost the Sidhe Court a lot of bother politically, though, as he had been one of their theirs. Queen Nougat and King Mint of Shugah did not relent, and the two realms remained at an impasse to this day despite Wonka’s daughter, Charlotte, having repatriated the Cocoa Locas who wished to return.
Ghost said nothing else until we landed. Then he gave a small giggle, which made my mouth twitch as it was so out of character for him. He looked at me with a goofy smile. “Are you a good witch or a bad witch?”
Uh oh. That glitter obviously was laced with a small amount of fairy dust. My human was flying higher than the bubble we just landed in. I gave his leash a gentle tug.
“Come on, let’s get home.” We had to cross the no flying zone around my building and it was getting late.
“The bricks aren’t yellow!” he pouted.
Nope, and they weren’t bricks, either. It was past time to get him into bed.
13
Jase
I woke up with warm air kissing my bare skin, the natural dim light of this topsy turvy dystopian world shining through a floor to ceiling window facing me. I blinked. I was in a damned dog kennel cage. That soft fabric beneath me? It was a damned doggy bed made to fit the collapsible cage. I couldn’t stretch out and I couldn’t sit up, so I rolled over. A luxurious four-poster bed and a dresser came into view. Damn it, I was in his bedroom, and he was nowhere to be seen. I grasped the bars and rattled them, hoping it would attract some attention, either from him or maybe a maid or something.
It caught the attention of something, alright, as a small woman with brown hair and eyes, wearing a brown dress, tan apron, and a peaked hat came into view.
She wrung her hands. “You’re awake,” she warbled. “I’ll let the master know.” She scurried away, the door swinging open for her as she approached it. That was a good thing, really, as she was maybe the height of an average two-year-old human child. I doubted that she could have quite reached the handle on her own. She returned a short while later.
“He said for you to relieve yourself and come to the kitchen to get something to eat. He’ll collect you from there when he’s ready for you.”
Right. I wasn’t surprised that I found myself prisoner again, left for others to tend to. Least these digs were more accommodating than my last ones.
She unlatched my cage and I rolled out. “Have a good stretch,” she advised. “You slept like the dead for two whole days. The groomer mixed a wee bit too much fairy dust in their will o’ the whisp highlighter.”
Hearing that, I had so many questions. Groomer? Will o’ the whisp? Fairy dust? What, what? I felt seriously lost, confusion warring with anger. The last thing I remembered was Lord Will O’ The Shit coming to get me, his voice chasing away the bugs trying to devour me. It sounded way too much like afterward, they’d sent me to a pet groomer and then put me in the kennel to sleep off some whammy they’d done to me there. All while I was out of it from being hung out to dry in a dungeon.
If there was a version of GlassDoor here, I so wanted to leave a bad review for my employer. Not that I could, if there was. He sucked, big time. I just knew if I left a review, I’d find myself back in that dungeon, having my fingernails pulled out because I broke some gods damned rule I knew nothing about. Knowing my boss, he’d look at me sadly, cluck his tongue, express fake sorrow at having to teach me to obey the rules, all while jacking off while I screamed in agony. He’d pause, dick still in hand, then do his eye mumbo jumbo thing so I’d sit there placidly while he came all over my face.
Wait. Why was I imagining him doing a sex act? He’d made a few lewd jokes at my expense and I knew that he found me attractive. Hell, he was gorgeous as hell and all, but no way was I attracted to him, right? He was a crazy fuck, a kidnapping trickster who locked me in a fucking dungeon to rot for days, then took me to a dog groomer, for Christ’s sake. I looked down. Bite me. I was hairless from the neck down and traces of pearlescent glitter shone against my skin. No way! I pursed my lips and huffed out of my nose, my hands balled into fists.
“Er, Ghost, Lord Willow was most adamant,” she said. I turned my attention back to the woman who barely reached my waist. She was looking up at me, her eyes full of consternation. My hands went down to cover my junk, which was right in front of her face, less than two inches away. I knew then that she was afraid o
f Lord Willow. I wondered what he had done to instill such a guarded look on her gentle face.
“Okay, sorry. I’m still feeling a bit spacey.”
“The bathroom is through there,” she said, pointing. “You’ll find a fresh loincloth in there. Let me know if you need any assistance putting it on. We took your other one off so you wouldn’t get tangled up in it.”
Loincloth? What fresh hell was this? I went where she gestured to, opening the door to find a very modern-looking bathroom with one of those toilets I’d only ever seen in that Pixar movie about the race car. The thing had a gazillion buttons with symbols I couldn’t decipher. Next to it on the wall was a toilet roll holder with a switch and holes for what I hoped was a speaker. I pressed it, hoping it was an intercom that would allow the small woman to hear me. I pressed the button, opening my mouth to speak only to shut it immediately as birdsong poured out. I pushed the button to turn it off only for the sound of rain to sound next. My bladder let me know just how badly I needed to go at that point. I flipped the seat up and aimed. This part had to work exactly the same, right?
The amount I let out and the color of it both told me that at least my boss had made sure I drank plenty of fluids while under his hocus pocus bullshit. I shook off my cock, hitting the button on the toilet roll holder one more time in a vain hope that would turn it off. Crashing surf and a thunderstorm greeted me. Great, just great. I couldn’t turn off the nature sounds to shit by soundtrack and had no idea how to flush the toilet. I glanced around, spying the sink behind me. A scrap of cloth with a set of ties sat on the counter next to the sink.
Unsidhe Assassin (Darkly Mine Season 1) Page 5