by Tenaya Jayne
“I agree. I hope I don’t die in battle in a forest. I don’t fancy becoming a guardian for all eternity, especially if I merged with my fallen adversary. That doesn’t happen in the Wolf’s Wood, in case you were wondering.”
“It doesn’t?”
“No. It’s a good thing too. We’d never make it through. No one would. There have been far too many battles fought in the Wolf's Wood. The whole place would be crawling with deformed, hybrid entities.”
She paused, then continued. "I'm sorry for taking us through there. It was a bad call. I’ve been through that wood back there so many times because it’s the most direct route to my house from the castle. But I’ve never gone through at night. I didn’t even think about the guardians giving us trouble. It must be all that blood you’re carrying—riled them up.”
“Hmm . . . Possibly. I probably brought too much.” Syrus shrugged. “I was just trying to be prepared for whatever. I swear I’m not a glutton. I need more when I’m injured, and I know that’s a possibility.”
Vampires are disgusting. She thought. Then she told herself it wasn’t his fault that he was born a sucker, any more than it was her fault she was born a Halfling.
Forest glanced at him over her shoulder again and almost stopped walking. He was smiling broadly at nothing at all. She could feel excitement emanating from him again, the same way she had felt it when they had first left the castle.
“Why are you smiling?”
Syrus’ expression changed to a childlike embarrassment. “I’m not.”
Forest turned her head back around and rolled her eyes. Then she jumped, startled, as Syrus burst out laughing.
“I can’t tell you how great this is!” he said exuberantly. “I’m not bored! Nor am I likely to be for the next two weeks!”
“Are you nuts?” Forest hissed. “Keep your voice down.”
“Sorry,” he said more quietly. “It’s just that I haven’t been outside the confines of my own castle for so long! Years. Now I’m out. It’s great.”
Forest found his enthusiasm annoying. “You can’t see,” she said in a clipped tone. “How can there be any difference between there and anywhere else?”
“You’re right. It shouldn’t matter…But it does.”
“Fine. That’s great. I’m so pleased you’re having a good time. Now shut up, and keep your happy little thoughts to yourself.”
Syrus clicked his teeth together. She looked over her shoulder at him again. His face was blank, but she could feel the anger generating from him. She smiled broadly, enjoying the fact she had angered him, and turned her head back around to face the road.
A sharp sting, like that of a bee hit her in the right butt cheek. “Ouch!” Forest jumped and whirled around. “What the hell was that?!”
“What?” Syrus asked blankly, innocent as doves.
Forest snarled. “I know you did that, Sucker!”
Syrus bared his teeth, taking one calculated step towards her. “You will show me respect, Halfling. I am the prince.”
“Not right now, you aren’t.” Forest stepped up to him, mere inches between them. “Right now you are nothing more than my shadow, and you will stay that way if you want to live through this.” She poked him hard in the chest with her finger.
Syrus had never been so enraged in all his life. An overwhelming desire to bite her washed over him, making his teeth throb. He knew she was right, but he was determined to put her in her place anyway. In one easy swoop, Syrus pinned Forest’s arms to her sides and lifted her off the ground, crushing her against him. His lips peeled back over his teeth as he dipped his head to her neck when the smell of silver sobered him. What was he doing? He had never done anything like this to anyone. Biting someone in anger was one of the lowest things a vampire could do.
Vitriol coated Forest’s insides as she thought how similar a position she had recently been in with Leith.
“If you do this,” she whispered. “You had better kill me, because if I live through it, I’ll make it my singular goal, to end you in the slowest, most excruciating way I can.”
Syrus dropped her to her feet, feeling lower and more worthless than he ever had in his whole life. “Forgive me . . . I was . . . angry.”
He wanted to touch her even if it burned him. She would never let him, not after this. He certainly couldn’t blame her. Syrus took a slow breath, feeling the great weight of loss.
Forest turned her back and marched on. A sob clenched in her throat, tears running down each cheek. Tears Syrus could easily smell.
Chapter 6
Regia’s sun was less than an hour from dawning over the horizon. After their little altercation, Forest and Syrus walked at a brisk pace, without stopping, and in total silence. They made good time and would arrive at Forest’s house before the sun broke. When they came close to the remnant town of Anue, she led them off the road, onto back trails. It took longer, and the ground was rough, but there was too great a chance of being spotted on the road now.
Forest wrestled with her emotions. Syrus hadn’t really done anything to her. He’d wanted to, but he stopped himself. If only Leith had ever stopped himself, her life would look very different. Syrus was used to having everything he wanted the moment he wanted it. She was a warrior not a whore! He shouldn’t have forgotten that. But she had started it. Around and around her thoughts went.
She turned and looked at him. Throughout the last few hours when she had observed him, she could see his self-loathing. Now it was obvious he was pouting. She almost giggled—almost.
The tall stone wall encapsulating her land was visible through the trees ahead. Magic and the overgrown foliage around it protected her property. Forest stopped and turned to face Syrus. Just as it had been when she had first laid eyes on him, her whole body seemed to clamp down defensively.
Syrus stopped in his tracks, his eyebrows lifted quizzically. His shoulders tensed as though he thought she might attack him.
“All right,” Forest huffed. “We’re almost there.”
“So why are we stopping?”
“Because we need to talk about what happened earlier.”
His expression looked like he had just bit into a lemon.
“How would it be . . .if . . .let’s just . . .forget about it.”
Syrus’ mouth fell open in shock. Then he smiled, as if the sun was shining out of his face. Forest looked away from him angrily. Why did she have to find him so appealing? Why did he look as innocent as a child when he smiled? How could anyone of his age have moments that were totally guileless?
“Thank you, Forest.”
She had never been thanked with more feeling or sincerity, and Forest found it disarming. She began walking again, more out of self-preservation than urgency. “It was necessary for us to call some kind of truce.” She did her best to sound flippant. “The protections on my property prohibit anyone inside that I consider an enemy.”
Syrus was amazed that she would tell such an outrageous lie. That type of magic was not only rare, it would have been impossible for someone of Forest’s standing to afford. And personally tailored enchantments, like she described, were almost unheard of. He was about to tell her that he was not even close to being such a fool to believe such a whopper, but just as the words were about to tumble from his mouth, he decide not to start another fight. He would wait and see what other lies she told, and he could make a game of trapping her in her own web. That could prove fun.
“You must have a lot of enemies, Forest,” Syrus said jovially. “Just who are you trying to keep out?”
“Mostly those of your ilk.”
They reached the outer parameter of Forest’s land. Syrus could feel the immensity of the wall and couldn’t help but be impressed with its size. The creeping vines that grew over the door, hiding it completely, moved aside when Forest touched them. She passed through without hesitation. Syrus would have moved more slowly had he known that she hadn’t been lying a moment ago.
The enchantment held Syrus on the
gate’s threshold. He couldn’t move. The magic passed through his body like a ghost blade, before releasing him. The door shut behind him, and the vines crept back into place. Winded and astonished, Syrus had only ever felt such a personally tailored spell in the vampire castle. It made sense for a spell like that to be there, and in the Fortress castle, but on the private property of an illegitimate Halfling, it was absurd!
“I thought you were lying!” he exclaimed loudly. “How is it possible that you could have such an enchantment? Are you a wizard’s mistress in your spare time?”
Syrus started as a loud beeping filled the air.
“It's all right. . . Just a moment . . . I have to turn off my security system.”
He listened to her walk away, and a moment later the beeping stopped. Syrus stood still, afraid to move, in case there were other security measures waiting to snare him.
Forest laughed as she walked back to him. “It’s all right now. You can relax. I don’t have any tripwires or landmines.”
“What was that noise?” he asked, still tense.
“My security system is a . . .ah . . .human thing.” Forest was nervous about how he would respond to all of her illegal human devices and paraphernalia.
“Oh?”
“Yeah, humans put them in their houses and then if someone breaks in to hurt them or steal things, this loud noise sounds, and the police are called. I’m obviously not trying to alert the human authorities—” she gave a nervous little giggle “—but if someone was able to get through my outer barrier, I would know it when the security system began sounding.”
“Uh huh,” Syrus muttered, his face totally stoic.
Forest waited for him to have some kind of reaction. The moment dragged. He set his pack gently on the ground and crossed his arms over his chest. Then he laughed, catching Forest off-guard.
“You have a lot of illegal human relics here, don’t you, Forest?” he chortled.
“Yes. I do. In fact, ‘a lot’ might not cover it. I guess it’s better that you know before you come inside the house.”
“You’re a smuggler!” Syrus laughed enthusiastically. “This is great! I don’t know much about Earth and not only can you teach me, you have lots of human stuff I can try.”
Forest narrowed her eyes and tucked her tongue in her cheek. He wanted to play with her stuff, did he? Well she had more than enough to keep him occupied over the next few days. It was the perfect way to avoid him while they were stuck here together.
“Pick up your pack and follow me inside,” she ordered.
“First tell me how you came to acquire your protective enchantments.”
She huffed, feeling her exhaustion, and decided to spit the story out with as little embellishment as possible. “A few years back, a wizard was rumored to be traveling through the town we circumvented on our way here. An associate of mine promised to tell me when, and if, the wizard passed through. Once I received word, I set out on the road to see if I could locate said wizard. I found him easily enough and offered him a drink and a place to rest from his travels for a while. He was tired and conceded to spend an afternoon at my cottage. As soon as I had him comfortable, I presented him with an offer he couldn’t refuse. That’s all. We made the exchange, so to speak, and he went on his way.”
“So you have been a wizard’s mistress,” Syrus said with self-satisfaction.
Before Syrus could bat an eye, she pulled her sword on him. The tip hovered half an inch under his chin, and his flesh began to constrict away from the silver blade.
“I am a warrior, not a whore!” she shouted. Her vision blurred, and her body shook with rage. “I paid him in human goods, not with my body!”
Syrus didn’t dare move even a fraction. He'd confronted real danger before, and he recognized her threat was legitimate. He'd spoken without thinking and had meant only to tease her, but she was way over reacting. He didn’t trust himself to speak, not even to mutter an apology. So he did the only thing he could think of to show her respect. He took one slow step backward and lowered himself onto his knees.
Forest’s mouth fell open, the rage draining away into shock. The shock doused the fire in her head with cold water, and her vision cleared. She looked at her sword, held ready to kill as though it were not her hand holding it but a stranger’s. The future king of Regia had humbled himself before her in order to win her pardon for the offense. It was not even a great offense given that he was royalty. He had the right to say anything he wanted to her. But he had recognized that she was on the very edge of killing him. She had to give him credit; he was clever. Nothing he could have said at that moment would have eased her rage, so he shocked her out of her homicidal intentions instead.
Forest pulled her sword away and sheathed it, feeling embarrassed and idiotic. She picked up his pack and slung it over her shoulder. Kindel had said that she brought out the worst in people. Now she was thinking she had possibly met someone who brought out the worst in her.
“The house is this way.” Her voice was rather weak.
Syrus stood up and followed her without reply. It was a difficult moment to recover from for both of them. He gave himself a stern mental warning to watch what he said to her from now on, and to remember that he didn’t know much about her at all.
Forest’s house was a small stone cottage; reminiscent of the one Snow White found full of dwarves. It was set in the back of her property with her garden stretching out around it in all directions. Regardless of the circumstance, Forest was happy to be home. Nothing she owned gave her a stronger feeling of pride than her house. During her absence, entropy had grabbed ahold of her garden. She'd deal with the overgrowth and bracken after cleaning the leaves from the fountain. If Syrus would stay inside playing with her many human toys for the next few days, she could work in her garden in peace.
Syrus’ senses piqued as he followed her. He was trying to map his surroundings. He would have to come back to the garden later and walk the perimeter to get a better sense of the space. As it was, he was exhausted, and in a terrific, but tenuous, mood. Forest was proving to be more interesting than he had originally anticipated. He certainly wouldn’t ever imply again that she used her sexuality as currency, ever. Since that obviously had struck a nerve, he began to speculate why.
As they approached the front door, all Forest wanted was to get inside, go into her room, and shut the door behind her. She didn’t want to talk anymore. She wanted him to leave her alone. It wasn’t fair that she was the one to have to house, entertain, and protect the most important vampire alive. She didn’t want him in her house. It was her place of peaceful solitude. A place with no bad memories. She was sure Syrus would think it was a hovel.
“Watch your head,” Forest said.
Syrus had to duck as he came through the door. His head spun with all the unfamiliar scents. Her house was full of human materials: paper, fabrics, plastic, metals, and even food. At first, the sounds of her appliances humming seemed loud and annoying, especially the refrigerator.
“You have human machines!” he said enthusiastically. “How do you get them to work here?”
“That was part of the deal with the wizard. All of my appliances and electronics work and I don’t even have to pay the utility company. The batteries in my flashlights and MP3 player never die, either.”
Syrus didn’t know what flashlights or utility companies were, but he was dying to find out.
“Uh. . .if you don’t mind me asking. . .” he began demurely.
“What I paid the wizard?” she said rather aggressively.
“Yes.”
Forest sighed. “It was extremely cheap, really. Well, it was cheap for someone who has access to Earth. I gave him a 27-inch high definition TV and a Nintendo Wii. Well, that was the original price of our agreement but I could tell he was feeling a little cheated after the amount of effort he had to put into securing my entire property, so I threw in the special Necronomican edition Army of Darkness Blu-ray. He left, the happ
iest wizard you’ve ever seen.”
Forest could tell Syrus didn’t understand half of what she was talking about and that he was about to launch into a game of twenty questions, or one hundred and twenty questions. She just didn’t think she had the energy for it.
“Would you like me to put your bottles in the kitchen?” she asked, still holding his pack. “If you want them cold, I can make room in the fridge.”
“Thank you. I appreciate it.” Syrus could feel her desire to get away from him. “Follow me.”
Forest showed him where the kitchen was, and she couldn’t escape without giving him a small explanation of the refrigerator. He found everything around him fascinating, even the feel of the linoleum under his feet. She led him to the spare room where she hoped he would stay throughout the time they had to kill. Syrus looked completely out of place for a number of reasons. He was so tall and broad that Forest hadn’t realized how small the room really was, until now. The room was also rather girly, like it might have belonged to a human teenager. Forest was glad he couldn’t see it. The Buffy the Vampire Slayer posters would have surely offended him.
“Do you need anything else?” Forest tried to remember how to be hospitable, not that she’d ever really known.
“No,” he said with a hint of dejection.
Syrus sat down on the edge of the bed, his back stiff and his face blank. Forest could tell something was wrong with his mood. She felt a pang of guilt. What was she supposed to do? Her job was to keep him alive. She was doing that.
Forest turned and left, closing the door behind her. She went to the kitchen and turned on the oven, intending to make a frozen pizza for herself. She mopped the floor while she waited and took account of what was in her pantry. She needed more Oreos.
Later, when she plopped onto her couch, remote in hand, intending to watch a movie, her eyes drifted to the door of the spare room. It had been an hour since she had left Syrus, and there had not been one noise from inside. She knew he probably wasn’t sleeping. She only needed about half as much sleep as a human and Syrus only needed roughly a third. She imagined him still sitting on the edge of the bed, immobile as stone. The longer she looked at the door, the stronger her sense grew of what was behind it. In the silence, a storm of emotions raged in her spare room, as if she had bottled a hurricane in there.