She’s mine. Mine. Always had been, always would be. And this time—well—this time, I’m not lettin’ her softly rounded rump out of me sight! She will wake up. She will. Then I’ll be blisterin’ her ass for scarin’ me so. Foolish, daft female! How dare she!
“You’re snarling again.”
“Who let him in?” Snarling louder, I snapped my teeth angrily. Snarlin’? I’ll show that pompous Elemental snarlin’! “Why isna she openin’ those bleedin’ eyes?!”
Glancing around at the occupants of the room, no one had an answer. Ketik was crouched by the entryway, cradling what I hoped was a bloody broken arm—teach him to love on me woman—and Quaz was holding Calder, closest to the bed, my wee beastie of a boy, who was snoring so loud from his shoulder, a thin line of drool sticking to my younger sibling’s neck, I couldn’t help but smile inside at the thought.
Would I be tellin’ Quaz that? No. Ornthren weren’t that way, we just weren’t. We didn’t have room for softness.
Eyes drifting to Nugget, I amended, other than hers. I’d make room for hers. She’s special, different. Mine. I craved it. Craved her.
Calder’s softness would be short lived, I knew for certain, giving way for his natural instincts to kick in as he matured, the curse pulling its effects as his runes took effect and the magic took over, but he wouldn’t stray far, none of us ever did. More or less, for better or worse, we tended to stick to our own.
Bo, arms folded, stayed farthest back, leaning casually into a corner.
I didn’t buy it for a minute, the worried look in his eyes belaying anything he could have tried to bull shit me with. Lies, that’s what he lived with, softly spoken, honeyed lies. He’s an Elemental, born to trickery and manipulation. He knew no other way. I’d resented him for it for so long, but I could give a shit anymore. Just want me bonded back.
“Isna there some stupid mumbo jumbo ta do? Magic isna workin’, an’ we’re runnin’ outta options. Been six hours, that canna be good. She’s healed but not wakin’? Why the fuck no’?”
“If I may?”
Bo stood and rushed the entryway at the voice, Ketik stepping aside as Zeme waltzed right in.
Earth, followed by a tall woman with a long black hooded cape, as well as Fire and my bearer herself, all came filing in.
“Aint a fuckin’ picnic,” I growled, crouching low by the foot of the bed. “If ye’re here fer a funeral, ye can all kiss our arses. She dies, all yer fancy, corner humpin’ arses die wit’ her.”
Fire’s eyes never left Nugget’s face, the moment he stepped foot in my domain. “Quit lookin’ at me bonded like tha’ if ye like yer eyes in yer head, ye crack pot, fire kissin’ Elemental.”
Phaestus snapped out of whatever fog he was in and glanced up at me slowly, taking his time, as if it physically hurt him to take his eyes away from the sight of my bonded’s prone from.
I’d cleaned her up the best I could, dressing her in one of my clean, white shirts. I’d wanted her to smell like me, desperately needing some kind of claim. Tucking a sheet around her, she looked peaceful, even now, at ease.
Fists clenched at my sides, I wanted to shake her tiny ass awake, demand she know I loved her back, tell her she’d never know the depth of... of everything I have for her frizzy orange hair or nugget shaped body, how much I burn for her completely. She consumes me. But she wouldna fuckin’ wake!
“She’s kin ta me, get of my get, Ornthren,” Phaestus said formally, quietly. “She’s only known me as Aitziber-”
“That stupid horse she was yammerin’ ‘bout?” Quaz muttered, swaying from side to side slowly, unaware of how naturally he took to watching a babe, my babe.
I’d have reminded myself to point it out to him later, in a very brotherly fashion, just to mock him—once he wasn’t holding him anymore, of course—if I was in the right frame of mind. Bleed him if he took offense. But that was the last thing on my mind right now.
A rough snort slipped past Quaz’s lips. “How’s that for a family reunion? Oi, I’m a horse, and yer daddy’s daddy, or some bull shite. Fancy a ride? That’s no’ creepy at all. Noooo.” Smirking, his eyes rolled towards the ceiling as he scoffed. “Makes our gatherin’s look downright fun lovin’.”
“Why are ye all bargin’ inta our place?” Ketik demanded, arms folding over his wide, thick chest. He was probably hiding his injury, not interested in showing any weakness to the lot. “This be Under. Not welcome, aye.”
“Dubhglass, what’s happened to you?” Niniane murmured, making to rush towards him, but he sneered at her concern, waving her off.
“None ‘o’ yer business, woman, best ye mind it.”
Flinching at the rebuke, she hastily stepped back, head dropping, long blonde hair hiding her expression as she stared down at her toes, peeking up from the hem of her dress as she wriggled them self-consciously.
“Och, dinna go playin’ the wounded mum now, eh.” Ketik clucked his teeth with his tongue, giving her a tsk. “No one’s buyin’ it no more, so ye can cut that crap right outta there.”
Our bearer did love to play the innocent, and yet she willingly bedded one man, and then another, then another, in a fruitless pursuit, trying to break the blasted curse, her curse, bearing babe after Ornthren babe and crying over it.
Not because she’d doomed another poor sod to a life of living in the shadows, seeking out baubles to keep our magic and the protection our runes offer us going strong, but because, once again, she’d yet to break a curse you simply couldn’t.
All for what? A normal babe? One that won’t hate her later? To fix her broken sons? Pfft. Selfish, is what she is. If she’d been smart, she’d have stopped trying decades ago. At least, that’s how I saw fit to see it.
Ornthren used to roam Under in the hundreds. Hundreds. Their roars once echoing throughout these caves. Now, after years of beings tricked and hunted down, slaughtered by Fae and humans alike for whatever purposes they sought, as far as we’re aware, we’re all that remains. It was a life grim with reality, watching your brethren picked off—your kin—for one bloody reason or another. Or watching as they’d rather die, succumbing to the mate-bond-madness, locked away in a magicked cell, than play puppet to some sick Caster’s fancy.
Hadn’t Niniane had enough? Buried enough of her own flesh and blood? When would it end?
All this weighing on me for so long, dragging me down, I’d judged Nugget unfairly. My bias had blinded me to it.
Not anymore. I had a lot to atone for, though I knew it would never be enough.
And she’d saved me. My chest ached until I thought I might keel over right there, swallowing down the lump of emotions clogging my throat. She saved me.
I dinna deserve her, but she’d saved me.
Zeme, waiting impatiently, foot tapping the ground steadily, let it fall a smidgeon too hard, clapping her hands together when everyone present jumped at the small tremor that rocked the floor.
“Now,” she called, smiling just enough to look convincingly happy about it, “since I have your attention, I’d like you to all shut your traps and listen up.”
As several sets of eyes set their sights on her, narrowing balefully, her face remained impassive, unaffected, demure smile in place, as if nothing was amiss, while she leaned forward. Tapping the hooded figure sharply on the shoulder, we all waited.
When nothing happened but a throat clearing from deep within the recesses of the material’s cowl, she gave the cloaked figure a nudge.
Leaning her own towering frame down, she whispered through the side of her smiling lips, “This is the part where you talk.”
Nodding slightly, hands lifted to fall from the wide, overlong sleeves masking the secret guest’s identity. Deeply tanned fingers, long and slender like a woman’s, but big enough to be a man’s, appeared.
“Oh, right, sorry.” Fidgeting with the material, tugging at the neck, a series of small grunts escaped the figure well cloaked, the tone female and light.
Done with thi
s shit, I marched over, ripped the ties, and tugged her hood off.
Bright green eyes, startling in their intensity, the same, if not more than Zeme’s, widened, a thick mass of spiraling wild white hair peeking out, framing a dark, olive toned, gently rounded face. To finish off her look, two very human looking ears peeked out, except, upon quick, closer inspection, I could tell someone had reshaped the top halves, where she most certainly, at some point in her short life, must have had pointed tips.
She was nothing compared to Nugget in my mind, though some other fool might disagree. Tall and well built, where my bonded was smaller, more fragile, and softly rounded in all the places, this female most assuredly was not. No, beautiful to others, perhaps, but my Nugget she was not.
“What do ye fuckin’ what, g’pra dra?” I wasn’t stupid, I knew a damned hybrid when I saw one.
What? I’d say Caster, maybe Fae, from her scent alone. Mm. A mix of the two and something else, something earthy and sharp, like the wild creatures that roamed the black woods of the Hill we often hunted, but I sensed no potential threat from her, powerful as her lot could be, so I’d let it pass, for now. I’d hear what the little g’pra dra—lost one, in the old language—had to say first, then I’d see if I let her live.
Even a mixed breed like herself should know better than to enter and Ornthren lair uninvited, magicks within her be damned.
Eyes lifting boldly, brazenly to meet mine, flashing silver and then back, tilted stubbornly to glare into mine. When her gaze drifted towards my neck, she blinked.
Shoving past me with much more strength than a weak human, she marched right over to my bonded’s body, checking her wrists and neck.
I was just about to pull her off when she spoke.
“Oh, bright eyes,” she whispered, pressing her forehead gently to Nugget’s pale, sparsely freckled one, murmuring something too low for even Ornthren ears to pick up. “What did you do, you crazy lump?”
Pulling back, expression tight, she practically ran at me, determination plain enough on her face. Arms shooting up, I caught them, thinking she meant to wrap them around my neck and strangle me, picking her up by her clasped wrists in my palm, ready to toss her off.
“Hey!” She fought, writhing, arms flailing, legs kicking. “Release me, you fool! We need to help her.” As she fought harder, her bare feet grazing my shin, I simply held her out farther.
“And you mean to... strangle the ‘help’ out of him, or into him... my dear?” Bo frowned, gesturing to the annoying female.
“Yeah. What the fuck’s that on about?” Ketik’s lips pulled up in disgust while Quaz let out a warning growl.
“Anyone care to explain what’s going?” Bo waved his hand, vaguely gesturing at the cursing she-devil currently spitting and hissing at me, barking mad, then the rest of the group gathered.
From the look on Niniane’s face, whether she was in the know or not, she wasn’t telling, a speculative look on her face.
Phaestus was glaring down at his fellow Elemental, probably wishing Water to a mortal, human body so she could trip and fall flat on her face for once, just to see how it felt.
“You said the one Zeme found could help,” Fire muttered, his tightly clenched fists hardening as they started to hiss and smoke.
“I did,” Niniane murmured quietly, and that was it.
All eyes turned to Mother Nature and she blinked. “Don’t look at me?” Finger lifting gracefully, she pointed to her abundant chest delicately. “I brought her here, didn’t I? As I’d been asked. My part here, as far as I’m aware, is done.”
“Why the fuck’s the rest of ye here, then?” Ketik grumbled.
“Oh, for the- Would you just put me down!” Shrugging, I opened my hand, smirking when the annoying, fair haired, wriggling wench yelped and flopped back on her ass, tangling in her long cape as it tried to swallow her up hole. “I can’t- Ugh! You- Argh! Arg!”
Yanking her to her feet, I ripped her hood off, jerking her head back as she hissed like a wet cat.
“Now, lassie, can ye fix me mate, or was ye just blowin’ smoke up Elemental asses, eh? Dinna have time for this shit.”
Pushing her hair out of her eyes, gone silver as she bared her little white human teeth in some semblance of what was possibly, to some, a feral smile.
Unperturbed, I leaned down, growling hard, getting into her face.
“I don’t know what she ever saw in you. You have the personality of a wet rag, and you’re nothing but a bag of skin and bones!” She spat the words at me and reached up, and with one swift, harsh wrench, ripped the leather necklace encircling my neck right off. “This.” She waved the braided bit around, still intact. “Should have been your first clue.”
Our bond came rushing to the fore, slamming me back with the force of it.
My breath left me and I gasped, back scraping against the red cave wall as I stumbled along it, slapping a hand to my chest.
Eyes wide, I felt her, as if she’d crawled right up inside of me, breathing life into my empty soul. That warm, all-encompassing feeling she brings out in me, soothing me down to my bones, had me shuddering and then shivering as it flashed through me.
My eyes immediately raked over my bonded and I ran to the bed. Would it work? Will she wake?
“Nugget? Nugget, luv, will ye wake for me now, eh?”
When she didn’t, I almost lost it. If not for the soothing reassurance of our connection, I might have.
Scooping her up in my arms, careful of the sealed flesh by her neck, high on her shoulder, I nuzzled her cheek with mine, humming low in my throat, ignoring the catches in it every so often as my eyes started burning.
Squeezing my orange eyes shut tight, I murmured to her softly, uncaring, at this point, of our audience. “Come back to me, love. Come back to me, eh?” I kept it up, tense, hands rasping over her hair as I crooned to her softly. Swallowing past the thickness in my throat, I grumbled at the stranger watching us steadily, shifting just enough to glare at her, “I thought ye said it would work?”
“It is.” Nibbling the top of her thin lip with her bottom teeth, she admitted quietly, “Erm, it’s supposed to.” The glimmer in her eyes, a light sheen of moisture rimming along the tip, had me growling.
“Quit growling, Troll,” a sweet, tired voice murmured groggily, batting weakly at my wrist as she let out a loud, jaw cracking yawn. “You’ll wake the baby.”
“Hah!” Shouting, curling around her, I took her lips rougher than I’d intended, only pulling back when she demanded to be let up for air.
Gasping when I finally let off, warm blue eyes, deeper than the ocean and brighter than any sapphire I’d yet to see, smiled up at me.
“You’re back,” she whispered, awe and no small amount of pleasure tipping those full, pink lips, fingers reaching up weakly to trace the shell of my ear.
Nuzzling into her hand, my lips stretched so wide I thought my face might split. All those things I wanted to say to her, swore I would, came rushing back with a vengeance.
Leaning down, meshing her soft lips with mine, I murmured against them quietly, “Dinna think ye’d be rid of me stubborn arse so quickly now, did ye? I’m like a boil on yer dimpled ass, Nugget, deep and set in good. Stuck wit’ me, ye are, woman. Stuck.”
Snorting, her fingers fell away and she rolled her eyes.
At the twinkle in my eyes, she muttered, “Oh, please, troll-lover, tell me more.”
Grinning, I leaned down, growling into her throat, “Ye’re mine, wench, for forever.” Ignoring the soft feminine sighs, and a few unimpressed snorts, I didn’t care. My bonded saved me, in more ways than one, and I’d spend the rest of my life making it up to her, the only way I know.
“Well, at least you brushed your teeth, right?” The little chuckle, while small and innocent, teasing, was full bodied and rich, warming me down to my oversized toes.
Grunting, a little growl rumbled my chest. “Nugget?”
“Hmmm?”
Hmm. Was my wo
man purrin’? “Keep it up an’ I’ll blister yer arse black an’ blue.”
Sighing heavily, her eyes slowly shutting closed, small smile still tipping her lips, she whispered, “And there’s my grumpy bonded. Tsk-tsk, husband-mate, there are others around. Someone might think you actually care.”
A single, grey, hairless brow arched. “An’ ye think a room full of arseholes will stop me? Love yer naggin arse an’ frizzy orange hair, ye dafty. Dinna ye know?”
“Arseholes? Hey!” Wind took the lead in affront, but it was Ketik who won most genuinely displeased, muttering a very heartfelt, “Blighter.”
Rolling eyes more vibrant than the green grass rolling the hills after the rain, Earth wasn’t one to take offense from petty taunts. “Hardly,” she muttered dryly, brushing her thick mane of golden brown locks, colorful leaves of soft brown, deep red, and sun bright yellow, mixed among various twigs and small vines, peeking throughout, off one softly rounded shoulder.
“Hah.” Nugget’s g’pra dra smirked, eyes never leaving my little bonded’s.
She’s obviously formed her own kinship with my woman, enough to offer her a brind adna—the necklace Nugget had used on me—she’d used as a ward—a safeguard. Kin indeed. Infused with strong magicks, the plain looking piece, an old trick to mask their weaker get, a protection offered only among those deemed worthy of such a prized boon.
The dark and the light, magicks from the old ways, wielded by Nugget’s lost one, just made the bauble all the more potent, more powerful.
I could attest to it meself, how harsh a punch it packed.
“Bloody Ornthren.” Phaestus, sighing heavily, muttering under his breath, was more pleased to see his kin awake than anything, relief rushing his craggy, world worn features. With a quick nod in my direction when I glanced over, he left, melting back into the crowd hugging along the wall, disappearing into the shadows as he made a swift exit.
Nugget reeled me back in when her fingers found my jaw, pinching it between thumb and forefinger before her hand fell weakly to her side. “Promises. Promises,” she said on a sigh.
The Toll Page 46