Chasing Cats

by ERIN BEDFORD

  She waved her hand to a guard, and the sound of something being dragged drew my attention to the side of the mirror. My eyes landed on an unconscious Chess, beaten and bloodied.

  The guards left him lying in a crumbled pile in front of the mirror. He had to be touching the mirror for it to work, but he wasn’t awake to do anything of the sort. I stared at my mother. She sat on her throne watching in amusement at my distress.

  Narrowing my eyes in determination, I knew what I had to do. Having only activated a mirror once before and only in the Underground, I wasn’t entirely sure it would work, but I reached my hand out, anyway. I touched my hand to the frame of the mirror and poured my powers into it. At first, nothing happened. Then the solid glass began to ripple. I placed my hand on cool liquid, the feel of it swirling around my skin still foreign to me. Bending down, I stuck both arms through the surface and grabbed a hold of Chess.

  He was heavier than he looked. I grunted at the effort it took to move him even an inch, while my mother watched me with amusement. Growling, I placed one foot on each side of the mirror and yanked Chess through the mirror’s surface.

  When he was back on my side and safe in my arms, I glared back at the mirror. It had become solid again, and the smirking face of my mother was fading from view.

  This wasn’t over. Not by a long shot.

  Chapter 19

  Broken But Still Fabulous

  I HELD CHESS against me to take in the damage to his body. Bruises marred his beautiful face, making his eyes puffy and swollen; his usual grinning lips were split. The pale pink of his locks was colored dark brown where blood had dried in his hair and his garments were in shambles. I could see where a blade had torn into him through the rips in his clothes. I needed to take care of him, fast.

  “Alice!” I yelled. “Help!”

  As I was checking to see if he was still bleeding, Alice rushed in.

  “My goodness!” She gasped.

  “Don’t you faint on me,” I warned as I tried to lift him up, but found myself lacking super strength. What was the point of improved senses if I didn’t get the whole shebang?

  “I would never.” She scoffed and knelt beside me.

  Being careful not to bump him, I twisted around to see how far the bed was away from us. It wasn’t that far, maybe a couple of feet; two small girls like us could handle it. Probably.

  “Just help me get him onto the bed.” My voice strained as I tried to lift him into my arms.

  Alice tried to pick him up around his waist.

  “No, don’t,” I snapped. “Grab his legs. There're fewer injuries there. We don’t want to damage him any more than he already is.”

  It took us three tries before we finally dragged him onto the bed. It wasn’t the most graceful or efficient way to do it, but we got it done. Squatting down to unlace his boots that were miraculously still intact, I motioned to Alice.

  “Go into the bathroom and get me some clean towels,” I grunted as I tried to get the boot off of his muscular calf. “Then get under the sink and grab the box that has a cross on it that says first aid.”

  “Understood.” Alice made for the door while I wrestled with his other boot.

  Once both feet were free and, thankfully uninjured, I returned to his chest, where his skin peeked through the cuts in his clothes. Just seeing him like this made my blood boil.

  The cuts were the same as before. The old scars on his body I had tried to ask him about time and time again, had they also been from my mother? It only made sense that they would have come from her as well.

  “Grab some water from the kitchen!” I called.

  Alice hollered back an okay from the bathroom.

  “Now, let’s get these pants off of you,” I mumbled to myself, while my face heated up at the thought of seeing him nude for the first time.

  I had imagined seeing him naked plenty of times. Most of them in my dreams. But in every scenario, I had never imagined the first time I got his pants off would be like this.

  “Here you are.” Alice brought in the items I had requested and sat them on the edge of the bed. She arched her brow as I stood with my hands at the waist of his pants, but not moving. “What are you doing?”

  “Should I wake him?” I let go of his pants and stepped back. “I should wake him, shouldn’t I? I mean, I wouldn’t want to be disrobed without my knowledge.”

  “But wouldn’t it be easier to clean his wounds while he is unconscious?” Alice reasoned. “Besides, I don’t think he would care, either way. I think this is more of you having an issue with seeing him disrobed. But you know, if you’d rather not, I could always—”

  “No!” I cut in, before adding, “I mean no, and it’s all right. It’s just me being silly. I got this. You can go back to your reality shows. I’ll call if I need anything.”

  I waved her off, suddenly more than ready to get on with it.

  She gave me a knowing grin before shuffling out the door.

  “It’s okay.” I shook the nerves out of my hands, trying to pep myself up for what I had to do. “You can do this. Just think of it like you are taking care of a relative. Not a hunky Fae, who may or may not be your boyfriend.”

  The last bit didn’t make me feel any better.

  With a deep breath, I quickly unbuttoned his pants and pulled down the zipper. My eyes grew large, and my gaze darted up to the ceiling when I realized Chess liked to go all-natural underneath his pants. It really shouldn’t have surprised me.

  With my eyes on the ceiling, I got the pants off his butt, but maneuvering them down his legs became a problem. Throwing a towel over his fun bits, I tried my best to not be too interested in them as I surveyed his wounds.

  The pants stuck to him from where the blood had dried on his legs. Grabbing the scissors from the first aid kit, I cut around the wounds and peeled the pants away.

  He groaned and began to mutter words that I couldn’t make out. I leaned in, hoping to catch some of what he was saying.

  “Hearts,” he mumbled, and I waited for him to continue. He remained silent.

  “What about the hearts?” I urged.

  “Not ready. Won’t give her the hearts,” he answered, his lips flopping over themselves from the puffiness.

  “What hearts?”

  He didn’t speak further.

  “Well, that was entirely unhelpful.” I waited to see if he would wake up and stifled a giggle when he snorted.

  He didn’t seem to be waking up, though.

  God that would have been embarrassing. I could imagine the look on his face, not to mention what he’d have to say if he saw me at his waist trying to rip his pants off. I couldn’t keep the heat from filling my face as I got the rest of his clothes off.

  When he was completely nude, sans the towel over his bits, I tried to take in the damage. Most of the bleeding had stopped, and there weren’t any internal organs spilling out of him, thank God. Blood I could deal with, but organs not so much. Luckily, none of the cuts were very deep. They seemed more for torture rather than to actually cause him mortal injury.

  “What did she want from you?” I asked myself as I set to work on cleaning him up.

  It didn’t take long for the water Alice brought me to turn pink, but I was able to clean most of him up before it needed to be changed. Since nothing needed stitches from what I could tell—not that I knew how to do that, or could really take him to a doctor for that matter—I simply covered them with bandages. Unfortunately, my bandaging skills were lacking, leaving most of his torso looking like a mummy.

  By the time I had him cleaned up and bandaged, it was well past my bedtime. Too exhausted to care about being in bed with the lecherous feline, I crawled onto the other side of the mattress and collapsed onto my pillow. I turned on my side to watch him as my eyes began to droop, and then I was gone.

  * * *

  I WOKE TO the sound of a male voice groaning and the bed shifting next to me. I b
olted upright when I realized what was happening. Chess had sat up on the bed and was in the process of trying to get up.

  I put my hands on his arm. “Lay back down. You shouldn’t be moving around so much.”

  He hesitated, and then complied with my wishes, though it was probably more because of the pain than anything.

  “What happened?” He watched me beneath his pale eyelashes with a pained look on his face.

  “You tell me?” I lay back down next to him, my gaze focused on his face and not the way the sheet had dipped at his waist.

  His eyes went up to the ceiling, and he was quiet for a long time. So long that I thought he wasn’t going to answer.

  “I went to tell your mother to leave you alone,” he said, at last, his voice was soft.

  I thought I saw a faint blush on his face.

  “But I thought you went to make preparations in case other Fae got out?” It was admirable that he would put himself in danger for my sake, and he obviously didn’t do that sort of thing often.

  “I did—make preparations that is. When I was finished, I confronted the queen.” He said the word queen like it was a vile word, which I was beginning to think it was as well. No queen would do what my mother had done and have a clear conscious. I know I couldn’t have.

  “Why would you do that? It’s not like she could really do anything to me. I mean, she needs me, right?” I frowned.

  “And that is why, my pet, she must leave you alone.” He looked me dead in the eyes, seriousness in his tone. “Let her find another way to get rid of the Shadows.”

  His eyes gave away more than he was saying. Something was wrong. What did he know about defeating the Shadows that my mother hadn’t already told me?

  “Why? It’s just a little blood and some words. She told me herself.” Even if she had been lying, it wasn’t like I could tell through a mirror. But I doubt she would have lied right to my face in front of those in the room with her. Even if it was only the guards.

  “Yes, I suppose that is all it is.” Chess barked out a laugh, and then grabbed his side and moaned.

  “Then what?” I sat up from the bed. “What’s the big deal?”

  “The big deal?” His eyes filled with anger. Whether it was anger at me or anger at my mother, I didn’t know. “The big deal, little girl, is your mother, Queen of the Fucking Underground, is offering up her own daughter for slaughter.” He gave a dark laugh again. “And just after the kingdom thinks we got you back.”

  I didn’t understand. I heard the words he was saying, but they didn’t make any sense. How could I be going to my death? Nothing anyone had said had portrayed me dying, and a little blood certainly didn’t bring thoughts of death to mind.

  “Hey.” He turned his emerald eyes to me, the anger in them gone. He reached out with one clawed hand and cupped my face. “Do not worry, love. You won’t die if I have anything to say about it.”

  “Because I’m not ready, right?” I tried not to let my uncertainty at his words show.

  Something passed behind his eyes, but he simply smiled. “Right, so…” He trailed off, looking down at the sheet covering him. “You couldn’t wait until I was conscious to tear my clothes off?”

  “You wish. Alice did it,” I lied, letting him change the topic, because it was getting depressing, even for me.

  His eyes lit up in surprise, but he leaned in close to me until his nose was a hair from my neck. “I don’t think she did, did she?”

  My breathing became shallow. I swallowed and stuttered out, “Yes, she did. I faint at the sight of blood.”

  Chess loomed above me, the sheet all but gone. My body stiffened. I kept my eyes on him as he lowered himself to his elbows, allowing his lower half to press against me. If I hadn’t already been breathless, that would have done it for me.

  “You forget, my kitty Kat.” He took a big inhale of my scent and growled. “I can smell you, and you smell like a lie.”

  Instead of answering, I focused on the bandages that were now colored red. “You’re bleeding, you know.”

  “Damn.” He rolled off me with a wince. “You sure know how to kill the mood, love.”

  I gave a nervous chuckle. “That’s me, mood killer and virgin sacrifice.”

  “Virgin?” Chess quirked his brow.

  “Okay, not virgin, but you know what I mean.” My face had to have been as red as a tomato right then. I got off the bed to get more bandages as a diversion.

  “You stayed with me?” He questioned as I dug through the box of supplies. “Why?”

  “Because I care about you. Why else?”

  “No one has ever cared about me. Not enough to stay by my side through the night.” He said it so softly I almost didn’t hear him.

  “Someone must have cared for you.” I turned from the box, an aching beginning in my heart. “Your mother? Father?”

  “No. No one.” He shook his head, his dirty hair hanging around his face, hiding the darkness that had overcome his features. “I didn’t get to know my mother. She bore me as was her duty and then gave me to my father who tolerated a half Seelie child who was like him but not in so many ways. He was strict, and yet had a way of knowing exactly what everyone needed, but never me.”

  “I’m sure he cared.” I approached the bed, my words more meaning to comfort myself than him. “He must have, maybe he just didn’t know how to show it.”

  “Perhaps.” His voice was small, as if he couldn’t begin to believe it.

  “What happened to him?”

  “Oh, well, after the queen found out I couldn’t give her what she wanted, she paid my father for the right to have me be the moderator. I haven’t seen him since.” He kept his eyes down while I went about changing his bandages. The cuts were starting to heal already, thank God for Fae abilities.

  “That’s terrible. How old were you?” I tried to keep the conversation going, no matter how upsetting, to either distract him, or me I wasn’t sure which.

  “Thirteen.”

  “So young?” I had a horrible, disgusting thought. “Wait. They didn’t pay you the same way they do now, did they?”

  “Oh, no.” Chess laughed at the horror on my face. “I didn’t start getting paid until I was of age and could become of some use to her. I was given a home and food, but I had to find my own friends and make my own fun.”

  “That must have been very lonely.” I felt my heart break a little for him. I might be a loner by nature, but not to have anyone there, not even a parent, was unimaginable.

  “Well, it was a long time ago, and I have plenty of friends now, and I have…” He trailed off, looking down at me with uncertainty.

  “Me,” I filled in for him. “You have me.”

  “Yes. I do, don’t I?” He gave me a smile that made my heart feel like it would burst from my chest.

  So instead of dealing with the sudden influx of emotion, I did what anyone would have done: fled.

  “I’m going to go check on Alice.” I stood abruptly, ignoring the startled look on his face as I closed the door behind me.

  As I made my way to the living room, I tried to still the thundering in my chest. I remembered this emotion. It was something I’d promised myself I’d never feel again after what happened with Dorian. I couldn’t feel this way. Not already.

  It was barely dawn, and Alice was already on the couch, watching some early morning talk show.

  “How is he?” She glanced up from the TV briefly.

  “He’s awake and getting better, but he said something I wanted to confirm with you,” I explained to her how Chess was born and what he had to deal with on his own. When I finished, I had to ask, “Did you know about this?”

  “About Chess? Yes, unfortunately, I did. I told you I have talked to him before. He had come to my mirror a few times, each time wanting to know why I did this to him.” She shrugged, as if there was nothing new about it and to her it probably wasn’t.

 
; “You? How was it your fault?”

  “Why does anyone think it is my fault?” She scoffed, turning back to her show and the never-ending bag of chips she kept finding.

  Where was she getting them? I swore I never kept junk food in the house, besides my ice cream fix, because I had no self-control when it came to food. I’d be as big as a house if I didn’t keep them out of the cupboards.

  I did know why anyone would think it was her fault, though. She seemed to be the go-to person for the blame whenever something went wrong. Just because of one stupid wish.

  “Sometimes, I wish I had never made that silly wish and had just stayed here. Then none of this would have happened. You would be happy with your prince, and the Shadows would not even be a problem.” Her blue eyes glanced longingly around the room as if the cheap wallpaper with dancing flowers was a palace.

  “The Shadows would still have been a problem that needed to be dealt with,” I assured, sitting next to her on the couch.

  As I sat beside her recalling my conversation with Chess, I realized something. This started before I became human. Before the tree and my wish. Even before Dorian and I got engaged.

  Could my mother really be that evil? She surely wasn’t capable of such depravity. But all the answers, the half-breeds, the need for a half-breed to defeat the shadows, all of it seemed to focus entirely on me. It had always been me.

  Jumping up from the couch, I eyed the curious Alice. “Keep an eye on him, will you?”

  “Where are you going?” She didn’t move from her spot on the couch. I think I’d created a monster. Shaking my head, I started for the kitchen door.

  “What do I tell Chess if he asks?” She finally looked up from her show.

  “Just tell him I’ll be back and not to worry.” I glanced toward the bedroom, anxiety filling me. I didn’t want to leave him in his vulnerable state, but I needed to know.

  “But where are you going?” Alice stood up now, confusion crinkling her face.