by Kaye Draper
"What did you really come in here to say?" I asked, way too tired for this emotional bullshit. And of the way I wanted to hate the asinine redneck, but just couldn’t seem to find it in me.
He leaned his elbows on his knees and met my eyes again, something like sadness in those mismatched orbs. "I came to say goodbye." He shrugged, as if he couldn't give a fuck less. "Job's done. You lot are home safe. It's time for me to go back to the closet where they keep the hammers and screwdrivers and the rest of the tools."
I shook my head. "Oh, don't be fucking stupid. Go get cleaned up and sleep. Stay here as long as you want."
In fact...something inside me was starting to panic at the thought of the gruff, annoying asshole leaving....
Halstad stood and gave me that sad look again. "You don't get it, girlie. I don't get a choice. I’ve fulfilled my orders. And my contract is almost up."
He turned and started to leave, then stopped. "This family of yours," he said, voice almost a whisper. "I didn't think love like that was real. You were right back there in the nowhere place though—it is real. But...it always hurts, doesn't it?"
He stood there, looking like he was fighting some internal war. His boots were loud as he strode back across the hardwood floor, fire in his smoldering magic eyes. He braced his hands on either side of my chair and I froze as he leaned down and pressed his lips to mine.
Something sparked between us and I jolted with the force of it, grabbing the back of his neck and holding him there as his forceful kiss went pliant, opening to me, inviting me in as if he was...afraid. The beast inside me stirred and gave me a knowing prod. I moved my hands to his face, running my fingers across his rough blond stubble.
Fuck. I knew this feeling, this energy moving between us, weaving us together.
Halstad pulled back, staring into my eyes for a few seconds, breathing hard. "Goodbye, gryphon." He straightened and pulled his stupid goggles down over his eyes. "You take care of that pride of yours."
I surged to my feet as he turned to leave. "What?" Clenching my fists, I followed behind him. "That's it? Just...oh, hi, I think I'm one of yours, see you later?"
He paused and turned back to me and it infuriated me that I couldn't see his damned weird eyes, couldn't read his expression. "I'm not interested in being one of your many toys," he said flatly. "But it doesn't matter. Because I couldn't stay here, even if I wanted to." He turned away. "You don't own me. Someone else does."
I stood there seething as the asshole clattered down the stairs and out of my life.
"What the fuck?" I asked the unconscious fae in the room with me. If he were awake, Oisin would definitely say something witty and snark-filled to bring me back to my damned senses.
I didn't even like that gruff, annoying, asshole of a mage.
So why, even with everything else that was going on around me, did I feel like I'd just lost something important?
Chapter 18
That night, the entire pride piled into my oversized bed. Hisashi and I curled around either side of Oisin, with Con snuggled in behind me and Kai spooning Hisashi's lanky form, petting him like a scared animal.
We all managed to keep a hand on Oisin, hoping he could draw from our magic. Even Con reached across me to plant a hand on the fae's stomach, with a whispered "just on the off chance."
I thought I wouldn't be able to sleep until Oisin was awake and with us again. But I was wrong. Surrounded by the auras of my pride, all of which seemed to have gotten stronger, I fell asleep the second my head hit the pillow and slept like the dead.
The next morning, Oisin was still dead asleep and everyone else was quiet and subdued. It helped a little bit to know about that fae coma thing Halstad had mentioned. But it was still maddening, watching my fae lie there like a corpse. Especially since he'd nearly been a corpse.
I wanted to do something more, but we couldn’t take him to a human hospital, and Kai and Hisashi told me what I already knew…a supe healer couldn’t fix what was wrong with him. It wasn’t physical.
We took turns sitting by Oisin's side, as if he might be able to sense us near him and come back to us. I was tempted to take every shift myself. But I knew I wasn't the only one who loved the little snark.
The sun was setting on our first full day back home, and it was my turn to sit with Oisin. I flopped into the overstuffed chair by the bedside and picked up the trashy novel Kai had left in here, skimming through it for the good parts. Soft footsteps pulled me out of a scene with way too many ripped bodices and throbbing members and I looked up to find Con's warm brown eyes watching me.
I set the book aside and took the steaming mug he held out to me. "Seriously?" I groused. "Again?"
Con had been force-feeding us all—teas, soup, herb-infused biscuits. The human nodded, his eyes sad, but one corner of his mouth lifting in a smile at my complaining. "I promise, this is the last one for you and Kai. How do you think I feel? Your leg and cuts are are all knitted back together, and her broken ribs were fine this morning. But my weak human carcass is still covered in bruises."
I sighed. "Yes, daddy."
He rolled his eyes. "Just drink the tea. You might be physically healed, but we're all still a little...depleted."
"Fine," I said mutinously.
Con kissed me on the top of my head and left, probably off to torture Hisashi next. The fox hadn't been physically harmed, but Con was trying to supplement something to do with energy pathways. It was all magic-user mumbo-jumbo to me.
I lifted the cup and drank my fucking herbs, scalding my tongue in the process. Swearing, I glanced at Oisin, wishing the fae was himself so he could magic my drink to a tolerable temperature.
I froze when I found emerald green eyes staring back at me.
"Oisin!" I hurried to set the cup aside, sloshing it on my fingers in my rush. "You're awake!"
I pushed up out of my chair and sat on the edge of the bed, reaching out to stroke his cheek. He was still pale and had dark smudges under his eyes and in the hallows of his cheeks.
He licked his lips and I swore again. "Sorry! Water. I'll get you water."
Gods knew I wasn’t giving him my nasty tea. That was no way to wake up. And besides, Con made them special for each of us. I didn’t know if my tonic would mix with fae physiology. I rushed to the bathroom and filled a Dixie cup, then hurried back to Oisin. My fae. He was awake. He was okay!
His green eyes followed my movements with a sort of detached curiosity. I set the cup on the bedside table and slipped an arm under his slender shoulders, lifting him and stuffing several pillows under him to prop him up so he could drink. "There you go." I handed him the water, feeling awkward and chattery under that gem-like gaze.
I held out the water. "Do you need help with this? I'll get you something else in just a second. Probably one of Con's awful fucking teas."
Oisin lifted a shaky hand, the wide sleeve of his silk pajamas falling back over his bony wrist. I put the little paper cup in his hand, then helped support it just in case. He took a sip of water, then another, his green eyes never leaving my face.
Finally, he pushed the cup into my hand and shoved it away. He hadn't had much, but I wasn't too worried—Gods knew Con would have him swimming in magic herbs and “hearty, sustaining food” in no time.
Oisin kept staring at me, and I stared back. He looked so foreign to me without his long, lush hair. His pointed ears stood out against his shaved head, emphasizing his faeness...and his vulnerability.
"Are you okay?" I asked after a long time of mutual staring.
He tilted his head, and his silken voice was hardly more than a whisper, like the breeze through the trees in the forest where we'd run in our animal forms. "You're...the gryphon," he said firmly. "I remember your name, I think...it's Gesa?"
He held out a delicate hand to me and I took it, dread washing over me, drowning out all the relief I'd felt just seconds before. "Oisin? What...." I couldn't finish the sentence. It sounded...Gods, it sounded like he didn't
fucking know who I was.
He wrinkled his brow, as if trying really hard to recall something. "Where is the man with the white hair?"
I swallowed hard, fighting the warring urges to scream or cry. "White hair...Hisashi? Do you want me to get Hisashi?"
He tilted his head and I could see the pulse fluttering in the long, thin column of his throat. "Hisashi?"
I cleared my throat. "Uh...yeah. He has white hair. And...a tattoo on the side of his head?"
Oisin nodded. "Yes. I see. Hisashi."
He closed his eyes. "Gesa. Hisashi. The man with the brown skin and the kind eyes. The woman with eyes like the sea." He squeezed my hand weakly. "I can't...I...don’t know their names. But I remember I love them. I love them all and they love me."
He curled onto his side, his eyes still closed, and I moved some of the pillows so he could lie down again as he burrowed under the covers, those beautiful green eyes still closed, hidden from me.
I stroked his fuzzy, shaved head and tried not to sob. What the fuck had Oisin's father done to him? What had he taken from me? From us all?
Oisin sighed and his body went soft as he started to drift off to sleep. "I love them," he whispered. "I remember the love. You can take everything else, you bastard. You can take everything…but you can't take that."
I did cry then, hunched over in my chair, wracked with silent sobs as tears scorched my cheeks, swamped with all the things I'd been holding at bay since this beautiful fucking chunk of my heart was stolen from me.
Chapter 19
Kai found me some time later, pulling me out of my chair and into the hall, wrapping herself around me and not letting go until I stopped shaking. Fuck, I was so damned relieved it wasn't Hisashi who'd come to get me. How could I tell him our fae didn't remember us?
Finally, I got a grip on my stupid emotions and pulled back. Kai rubbed my arms and her dark blue eyes were searching. "Oh honey, I'm sure he'll wake up soon."
I shook my head. I couldn't even begin to tell her. "Did you need me for something?" I asked instead.
She sighed and reached behind her to pull my cell phone out of her back pocket. "You left this in the kitchen, and it's been ringing constantly for the last ten minutes. Hisashi said you needed to answer it."
I rolled my eyes. Having a resident psychic might seem like a great thing, but in actuality all it meant was one more person bossing me around. Still, if he said I should answer the phone, I should probably answer the damned phone.
It started vibrating in my hand. I didn't recognize the number, but I swiped the answer button anyway. "Yeah?" I said, not in any mood for fucking phone calls.
"Finally!" Evalyn's sweet, French-accented voice was not what I had been expecting. "Gesa, we need to do a video call. The Silverleaf clan needs to hear from their new king. Put Oisin on the line, please."
I just stood there. Suddenly, everything was just too fucking much.
Kai took the phone from my numb fingers and pressed the speaker button. "Hello, Evie darling," she said in an upbeat voice. "I'm so happy to hear you survived the little event we attended. But Oisin is indisposed at the moment. You'll have to call back. Maybe sometime next week."
Evalyn tsked at Kai. "Now is not the time for joking, my kraken friend. We are in the middle of a bit of a political...situation. I'm afraid I must insist to speak with my brother. He needs to address his subjects to avoid unrest." Her voice dropped to a whisper and it sounded like she might be covering up the phone with her hand. "Seriously, Gesa are you still listening? While you all were on the run, we've overthrown the nobles who supported my father. Oisin is the rightful clan heir, and once I made it known what our father had been up to, the clan is calling for blood. I need Oisin to come home and settle things!"
I took the phone back from Kai. "Evalyn," I said with what little calm I could muster. "I don't fucking care if the sun is about to fall from the sky, you can't talk to Oisin right now. He's still in a fucking coma from what your precious fucking clan let that monster do to him." Okay, so that calm didn't last. I ended with a full-on growl.
She was dead silent for a beat. Then she dropped the whispering and her tone was placid and commanding. "Of course we understand that the king will need time to right the wrongs inflicted on him. The Silverleaf clan would be honored to accept a message from his High Consort."
I pulled the phone away from my ear and frowned at it before speaking again. "Evalyn have you--"
I was going to say "have you lost your fucking mind," but I was cut off.
"We will look forward to your address in five minutes. Thank you so much for your time, High Consort Lionheart."
The call ended.
I stared at Kai. "What the fuck just happened?"
She laughed. "I think Oisin just became a king, and you are some sort of honored mistress. But it looks like someone has to talk to the peasants, so they don't riot."
She turned me and shoved me toward the stairs. "Your office. I'll get you a hairbrush and a shirt. Go!"
I stumbled down the stairs. What the fuck was I supposed to say to the fae? Something like "oh, hey there. You almost caused me to lose my mate. Fuck you all in your uptight fae asses?"
Somehow, I didn't think that was going to fly.
Kai met me a minute later, forced me into a blouse and dragged a brush through my hair. Then she shouted at Hisashi to come help her with the "fucking technology."
I found myself sitting at my desk, my top half clothed in presentable items, my bottom half still in pajamas. My phone was propped up on a stack of books, so it captured my upper half.
"Sit up and don't fidget," Kai demanded.
"And, you might want to stop with the death glare," Con said helpfully.
Hisashi waved him away. "She needs to look mean. Establish that she's the alpha and no one fucks with her. It will make Oisin look stronger by association, since she belongs to him."
We all stared at him as I remembered that our young fox had spent his formative years with a family that was the definition of uptight ceremony-obsessed formality.
Lucky for me, he was wearing his silk kimono-style robe, his go-to when he didn't feel like wearing real clothes. I dragged him closer, turned him around, and pointed at Kai. "Make his belt into a pretty bow thingy."
"Gesa? What the hell are you doing?" Hisashi demanded as I extended a talon and cut a slit in the back of his robe. "This is my favorite robe!"
"Shift," I commanded.
He heaved a sigh, but didn't argue, letting his magic roll over him and push him into half-shift. "Happy?"
I pulled his fluffy tails through the hole I'd made, batting them away from my face when he twitched them in agitation. "Hey! Careful with the tails. Gods, they're sensitive, you know!"
"There! He's all pretty," Kai said with an obnoxious grin.
Hisashi turned to me, arms crossed over is chest, his white fox ears pinned back like an angry dog. "Gesa..." he warned.
I smiled up at him. "Yes. That's perfect. Keep that whole menacing animal thing going on."
Kai pulled him around to stand behind and to the right of my chair, lining us up so we both showed up in the phone screen.
The phone rang and I let out a breath before pressing the answer button.
"High Consort Lionheart, ruler of the Lionheart clan," Evalyn's sweet voice called as she waved to me on the screen. She was dressed in some sort of flowing, gossamer fae nonsense that was completely inappropriate for winter. Not that the fae clan had to suffer anything like snow, thanks to their freaky intertwined worlds and all. Her eyes flicked to my right and I knew she was seeing Hisashi.
"And...consort of the Miyamoto clan. The Silverleaf clan welcomes you." She stepped away from the screen to reveal a makeshift stage in the form of a particularly wide, flat boulder. Below was a large gathering of fae, all arrayed in silk and gauzy stuff, dripping gems and wearing flower crowns. Honest to the Gods flower petals were thrown up in the air to rain down like snowflakes as the crowd
cheered.
Evalyn did something so the view swung to show me a huge projector-style screen that had been set up for the crowd. It showed me sitting at my massive oak desk, glaring. Hisashi stood at my side with his arms folded, hands tucked into each opposite sleeve, looking all ethereal and regal.
The view on my end slid back to the crowd and Evalyn spoke again. "The king's consorts are assisting him with some important matters, so we must keep this brief," she said with a smooth apologetic voice. Turning to me, she bowed. "Please," she said, with a wink only I could see. "I understand there was a message the king wanted you to pass on.
Kai held up her own phone, where a text message had come in from Evalyn's phone. I read while trying not to look like I was reading something. Just say something about how he is honored to welcome the next era and move on because you are very busy and important.
Looking at the screen, I scanned the gathered crowd. Oisin was a fucking king of the territory owned by his ancient clan. This was a problem. A huge problem.
First, Oisin was damaged.
Second, ruling them would very likely take him away from us.
Third, fuck them. They made this fucking mess. They could deal with the fact that they'd turned a blind eye to their crazy-ass old ruler while he was off being evil and tormenting the one person who ever dared stand up to him.
I pinned several of the fae with a glare, hoping they felt singled out in the crowd. "Oisin would like me to convey how honored he is," I said calmly, pretending I was at one of my mother's stupid parties or handling some political argument for Gabbi as she ran the gryphon clan in my place.
I paused. The thought of Gabbi made me smile a wicked, satisfied smile as an idea occurred to me.
"I'm afraid we don't have much time to convey all the things your new king would wish to say," I managed to get out. "He will be busy for some time. However, you can rest assured that your leader is well protected," I looked to Hisashi so everyone would get the point. Oisin had the leader of the largest gryphon clan in the U.S. and a rare, scary powerful nine-tail with him. "Even from his own kind," I added with a warning glare. No one better think they could just come get him this time.