Chapter 3
I woke to such a stench that vomit threatened to rise in my throat. It took me a moment to focus. Whoever had knocked me out had done a fantastic job. The pressure behind my eyes was overwhelming. It would take strong wine and even stronger magic to rid me of this ache.
I looked at my surroundings. Straw and dirt covered the hard stone floor that I lay upon. I sat up slowly, listening as every bone in my body cracked and creaked. It took a lot of power to render me useless. It would take even more for me to regain my full strength.
"Oh, my word, she’s awake," a soft feminine voice said from behind me.
"It’s about time she got up. Sleepin’ her day away won’t make it any easier on her," I heard a second woman’s voice saying. I turned and looked. I saw two women standing near the iron bars, to what I presumed was a cell. The taller one looked to be the younger of the two. She had delicate features, the kind of softness that makes someone appear to be very young, but her eyes told her real age. She was older than me. The other woman was very short, and very plump. What I couldn’t quit staring at was her enormous nose. It was larger than any I’d ever laid eyes on before. Her wiry black hair was tucked haphazardly into a white bonnet. They were cleaning wenches -- that much was obvious from their shabby attire.
"Excuse me, but may I inquire as to my whereabouts?" I asked them.
The large-nosed woman let out a hoot. "Oh, yeah, all mighty one, you can ‘inquire’ all damn day. It don’t mean it’s gonna make it any better for ya to know."
"Please ma’am, I mean you no ill will. I’m looking for Prince Elwyn. I need to speak with him, it is urgent."
Again, she cackled as though it was the funniest thing she’d heard all day. The tall, delicately featured one, smiled sheepishly at me. "Sorry my lady, Harride’s always that way."
"Shut-up Sasha. Don’t be calling her no lady. Look at her, soaked to the bone, and on the floor with the mice."
I jumped to my feet. This made Harride laugh even harder. I didn’t care if she knew I was scared of rodents. I tried to bring my power to strike at her, but nothing came. Damn, I should have realized that they would put binding spells on the cell I was in to prevent me from using my magic.
"Stop it Harride!" Sasha said, sliding a small cup of water under the iron bars to me. "Why do you want to see the Prince?"
I had half a mind to just turn my back on her, but she was being a greet deal nicer to me than her friend. "I’m sorry, I don’t mean to be rude, but I’d rather tell the Prince my news personally."
Harride let out another deep laugh. I tipped my head to the side and caught a good look at her skin color, it was pale green. "You’re a hag?"
That made her stop laughing. Her beady black eyes glared at me. "I am. What of it?"
I clapped my hands together and squealed in delight. I had always wanted to meet a real live hag. The Blessed court only had the finest full-blooded faeries, and that was very boring after a while. I smiled and the look on Harride’s face softened.
"The girl’s completely nuts. She’s plain ol’ batty." She pushed a small bowl of soup under the bars to me. "You got a name?"
I bent down to retrieve the soup. I was famished. I hadn’t eaten all day. I put it to my lips and slurped it down quickly. Some of it ran down the corners of my mouth. I didn’t care. I wiped it off with the back of my hand and looked at Harride and Sasha.
"I’m Mackenzie."
Their faces went white. Sasha stepped away from the bars and backed right into the cell behind her.
"What?" I heard a deep male voice say.
Sasha turned and looked into the cell across from me. "Sorry bout’ that, lad."
Harride came close to the bars. "Come here girl." I did. When I got close enough for her touch me, she did. Her fingers were cold and clammy. I wanted to jerk back from her, but I didn’t. She pulled on my chin, and brought my face level to hers. "Well, Sasha, I’ve heard stories ‘bout them green eyes of hers. Looks like we got ourselves a Princess."
Sasha looked dumbfounded. No surprise there. Harride turned slightly and looked towards the cell that Sasha stood near. "Let’s go, I suppose that they’ll want to be catchin’ up."
I watched the two of them walk away. Catching up? What in the world were they talking about? I scanned the cell in front of me. A large pile of rags that I assumed to be a man, lay with his back to me. His hair was a dirty tangled mess, and I could definitely identify him as the source of the stench I’d smelled. If I hadn’t have just heard the man speak, I would have thought him dead.
"You there. Who are you?" I asked.
The lump of a man moved a tiny bit. Then I heard him growl. "What is it to you? Who the hell are you?"
That voice. I knew that voice. I’d spent my entire life listening to that wondrously deep, erotic voice tell me stories, and whisper passionate sayings in my ear. My heart felt as though it would leap from my chest. "Cedric?"
The smelly man turned around quickly in his cell. Nothing on him was recognizable. He was a filthy mess. His face was covered with a long dirty beard, but his eyes, his beautifully blue eyes, stared out at me. "Cedric! Is it really you?"
"Mackenzie?" He sat up slowly. He was so thin now. I couldn’t believe it was him. "Mackenzie, tell me that my eyes aren’t deceiving me. Tell me it’s you. I’ve fought long and hard not to go mad, tell me that I’ve succeeded."
I pushed my body against the bars and reached my hand out to him. "It is me, Cedric. It’s me … I’m real. Oh, gods … I was told that you’d been killed."
He put his arm out through his bars and our fingertips touched. It felt so good to touch him again. "I suspected as much. No, I don’t know if I’d call this living, but I’ve been here since they captured me."
I was horrified. "You’ve been down here for sixteen months and ten days?"
Cedric looked elated. "Mackenzie, I didn’t think you were counting."
My fingers laced in his. "Each day that you have been gone has felt like an eternity, Cedric."
I wanted to find out all about his capture and how he had managed to survive, but footsteps in the hall silenced me. I looked down and saw Harride returning with two very large men. Cedric gasped and pushed my hand away from his. I heard his voice in my head, Get away from the bars Mackenzie. Go! We had developed the gift to read each other’s thoughts at a very early age. The older faeries were all quite impressed. They had never known a pair that possessed such a talent before. I did as he said. I put my back against the furthest wall of my cell and waited.
Harride and the two men came to a stop in front of my cell. Both men stood almost seven foot tall. Their shoulders were massive as were their forearms. Both men had shaved heads that showed off their curvy ears. Their eyes were a great deal wider than any faerie I’d ever seen. They were no ordinary faeries. No, they were mixed with something large.
"Are you part giant?" I asked.
Cedric begged me to shut-up. I truly had no idea why I asked them that. The pale-skinned one pulled out a set of keys and went for my cell door. The deep cocoa colored one sneered at me.
"If you are lying about being the Princess, then you shall see what part of me is truly giant," he said in a voice so deep that the floor shook when he spoke.
The pale-skinned one turned to him. "Duane, stop scaring the poor thing," My body relaxed. He wasn’t going to let the other one hurt me. "Let me do the terrifiyin’."
Well, so much for that happy thought. I backed into the corner of the cell. The pale one headed straight for me. I waited until he was within range before I threw my foot out hard. It slammed into his kneecap and brought him down quickly. I seized hold of his ears and clawed at them as he bent before me. His hands came up and grabbed hold of my wrists. I brought my injured knee up hard into his face. We both screamed out in pain, as he let go of my wrists. I took off towards the open cell door. I would have only one shot at this, and I knew that I had to make it count.
Duane blocked the exit qu
ickly. I didn’t have time to think. I lunged at him, and took him by surprise. I’m sure that it’s not often that a one-hundred pound, five-foot-six-inch faerie princess comes leaping out at you. Yeah, that would catch most men off guard, I was sure of that. The force of my body hitting his pushed us just outside the door of the cell. The binding spell lifted from me. I mustered up all the energy I could and sent it flying into Duane’s stomach. He doubled over and clutched himself on the hallway floor. I turned and looked at Harride, she was wide-eyed and smiling.
"It’s ‘bout time someone taught them boys some manners." She looked into the cell I’d been in. "Dermot’s goin’ to be real mad with you."
I turned and saw Dermot rising to his feet. He charged at me. I lifted my hand and pushed the door to the cell shut. It latched. I turned my attentions to Cedric’s cell door. His hand wrapped around mine quickly.
"No, leave me. Go, get out while you can!"
"I will not leave you here to die!" I pushed his hand away and screamed at him to get out of the way. "Fire, I call upon you, do not fail me now!" A surge of heat rushed through my fingertips and out onto the cell bars. I watched as the bars melted away, leaving a large hole for Cedric to crawl through.
"Oh my, you really are the princess, aren’t ya?" Harride said behind me.
"Yes," I said, grabbing hold of Cedric’s thin hand. "Now which way do we go?"
"I don’t know." He shrugged his shoulders. It was stupid of me to ask him. Being locked in a tiny cell for a year had left him with a limited sense of direction. He had no clue which way was out. Harride hovered for a moment then let out a tiny giggle.
"Follow me," she said.
I looked at Cedric, he shrugged. Our choices were limited, so we followed her. She led us down the hallway to a small door. "Go through here. Don’t stop for nothin’. At the end of it, you’ll find the forest. From there you’re on your own!"
I bent down and kissed her on her enormous nose. She blushed, and signaled for us to go. We did. The two of us had to walk single file to fit down the narrow passageway. It smelled damp and moldy, that didn’t really bother me. What did bother me was the tiny sound of rats running out of our way. A shudder ran over my body. I hate rats!
Cedric’s hand touched my shoulder. He’d known me all my life and he knew all my fears. "They won’t bother you."
This, surprisingly, made me feel a thousand times better and I quickened my pace. The cold night air hit us in the face as we crawled through the tiny window to the outside. I was suddenly thankful that Cedric had lost so much weight. At his normal size, which was not fat, but very, very muscular, he would have never fit.
My feet hit the forest floor and I winced in pain. I turned and helped Cedric pull himself through the tiny opening.
"What will happen to Harride?" She was the only reason we’d gotten out and I didn’t want to see her punished. Dermot and Duane would be livid with me for getting past them.
Cedric’s hand came out to rest on my shoulder. He was extremely weak. That was to be expected. "Nothing. Harride will be just fine."
"How can you be sure?"
"Because, she is the one who raised the terrible twosome."
I thought of the old hag Harride, and did not think it possible for her to give birth to the two of them. My apparent confusion over the matter must have shown on my face, because Cedric laughed softly.
"Dermot and Duane were the end result of Giants pillaging their mothers’ village. The two were, of course, unwanted by their very Sidh mothers, and were left to die. Harride found them and raised them as her own."
"Poor woman." I wasn’t sure if she needed a medal of honor or her head checked.
Cedric chuckled as he bent down to kiss my cheek. I pushed him away quickly. "Cedric, you stink, and you’re hairier than a Yeti." This made him laugh more. I had to put my hand to his mouth to get him to quiet down.
"I have dreamt of the moment I would see you again." He put his head down. "I had feared that I’d never know your touch again."
I didn’t know how to tell him that he never really would know the touch of my skin against his again. Yes, I wanted to be near him desperately, but there was the matter of my marriage to Prince Elwyn, and now Rowan. I hadn’t thought of Rowan once since I’d seen Cedric. What did that mean?
Chapter 4
I let my head rest against the large oak tree near the edge of the river. I watched as Cedric put his wet brown wrap over a tree limb to dry. All the power I had left was used up when I conjured the necessary items we needed to cleanse ourselves. Normally, I would have been able to do that easily, but after fighting Dermot and Duane I was tired and weak.
I caught sight of Cedric’s bare backside and felt flushed. I truly had missed seeing him naked. Granted, he was a considerable degree thinner than he’d been when I’d last seen him, but that did not take away from his beauty. What did attempt to take away from it somewhat were the scars that he had all over his body. It was evident that he had been beaten and tortured. I asked him about them, but he refused to answer me.
The scar that most disturbed me was the one on his neck. I had not noticed it when his beard was thick and long. The scar ran from his right ear to the center of his neck. Someone had tried to slit his throat -- that much was clear. When I found out who it was, I would kill them. Yes, when I found the person who had been responsible for marring my sweet Cedric’s body I would deal with them personally. They would suffer a wrath like no other.
Cedric came closer to me. He was completely nude. Nudity was so common among faeries that were close, that it just seemed normal to me. His hand ran up my smooth leg. The touch of his fingers sent a shiver up my spine. I pulled away from him. I could not be this close to him naked now. So many things had changed. We could never be the way we’d been before. I glanced over at the limb where I’d hung my gown after washing it. It was still wet. I had no choice but to remain nude. I didn’t have the energy to summon the wind to dry our clothing.
Cedric leaned over and put his head on my shoulder. His long auburn hair spilled down and over my bare breasts. I closed my eyes. I would not endanger him. If the Prince did not order his execution for escaping, he would most certainly order it for bedding his soon-to-be bride. Cedric had one more threat to his life, one that he wasn’t even aware of yet -- Rowan. I was sure that Rowan would not take kindly to another man touching his soul-mate. No, I didn’t want to put Cedric in any more danger.
"So tell me what has happened since I’ve been away." His voice was deep and smooth as he leaned against me by the tree.
I told him about the events of the last year and a half. He was surprised to learn that the war between the courts had ended right after his capture. Neither one of us could figure out the reason as to why he hadn’t been released. I told him that my mother and I had grown even more apart since his departure. He winked at me when I told him that and put his arm around me to hold me tight. When I got to the part of my mother’s idea for maintaining the peace between the courts, he grew quiet.
"What exactly did your mother do?" He sat up and looked directly into my eyes. He would know if I were to lie to him. He was the only one who could tell by just looking at me. He didn’t need passion to get the truth from me and that was rare indeed.
"She thought it best that I get married to insure that peace lasted."
He grabbed hold of my chin. "Mackenzie."
The way he said my name assured me that he knew there was more to the story than I was revealing. "She … she’s arranged for me to marry Prince Elwyn of the Unblessed Court."
Cedric jumped to his feet and stormed towards the river. His power rose. This was both good and bad. It was good because he had spent so long in a bound cell that we weren’t sure if he’d ever be able to do magic again, but bad in the sense that that made him a threat to anyone around him. So much had changed since we’d last seen each other. He’d spent a year in Hell and I was sure that he had had to harden himself to deal with that.
What I wasn’t sure of was how much?
"Cedric, on a good note, I saw to it that a marriage contract was signed a few weeks back." He turned and looked at me. Fury flew across his face, no part of him was the sweet lover I’d known, this behavior was foreign to me.
"You have no idea how serious this is, do you? I knew your mother was power hungry, but giving her daughter away to a madman is too much, even for her. That maniac won’t honor a marriage contract. Mackenzie, you are a fool."
I felt no need to defend my mother. Cedric was right, she was power hungry, but Rowan had tried to convince me that the Prince wasn’t so bad. "I was informed that the Prince was not as bad as I’d thought him to be."
He came flying towards me quickly. "Take a good long look at me. You know the scars you were so curious about. He’s the reason I have them."
I took a quick breath in. Surely, he was mistaken. How could my mother promise me to a man who would do that to someone? I reached my finger out and ran it across the shiny scar tissue under his neck. I watched him close his eyes slowly.
"Look at me," I said softy.
His blue eyes opened and locked on me. "Mackenzie, Prince Elwyn is insane, and yes, he did this to me." My gut tightened. He was telling me the truth. I couldn’t bear to see the hurt in his eyes any longer. I lifted my head to meet his and kissed his lips. I had intended my kiss to be chaste. I had wanted to comfort him in his time of pain. When I felt his tongue deep within my mouth I knew I’d gone too far. Cedric had not known the touch of a woman in over a year. He was deprived and elated all at the same time. I wouldn’t push him away just yet, I couldn’t.
Peace Offerings Page 3