“The vial is behind you.” He pauses, then offers, “I can put it in your hand if that helps.”
“I got it.”
My arm feels like it weighs a hundred pounds. My eyes still closed, I reach out blindly, a cold sweat breaking out on my brow as I search for Nine’s vial. He murmurs directions that filter in like white noise. I tune him out. When the back of my hand knocks into something that feels like glass against my leather glove, I fumble around until I’ve got it in my grasp.
There’s no lid. I try not to spill any of the precious water as I drag it to my lips and tip the contents back. A tiny stream dribbles out of the corner of my mouth where I missed. At least I get some.
It’s the cleanest, most crisp water that I’ve ever tasted—and I’m not just saying that because I feel like garbage. It’s a mouthful, if that, but it’s enough. It rinses the horrible taste away from my mouth, moistening my dry tongue, and getting rid of the pointy, pinchy pain at the back of my throat.
The pounding in my head subsides a little, too. The headache is still there, my stomach still angry and empty, but at least I can finally open my eyes—barely. Just a sliver in my face, enough to look up and see the dark expression on Nine’s face.
“Why did you do this to me?”
“What do you think I have done?”
Pulling myself into a sitting position, cracking my eyes open a little wider in time to watch Nine as he pointedly avoids Rys’s lantern, I point across the narrow sewer.
“Don’t pretend you don’t know. It was your stupid peach that made me puke up my guts,” I say accusingly. “Were you trying to poison me, or was that just a lucky side effect?”
“Peach?” echoes Nine. “I didn’t give you any peach.”
“Someone did. It was under the blanket you left behind.”
“I left nothing. It wasn’t possible for me to. The shadows have kept you hidden and, after the cemetery, I thought I should give you your space. It took me until just now to find you.”
Oh, no. Oh, no, no, no. It had to be Nine. Because, if it wasn’t, where the hell did that demon peach come from? As sick as it made me, I decided it had to be a terrible coincidence because Nine would never knowingly hurt me. But if he didn’t leave it—
“Where is the peach?” he asks roughly.
“It’s over there,” I tell him. I try to push myself up off the ground and fail miserably. My legs are wobbly, my arms too weak, and I collapse in a heap before I’ve climbed a few inches off of the ground. I gesture at the flickering flames in the lantern. “Take that if you need help.”
Nine throws a dark look at the lantern. “I recognize the fire. Let me guess. It’s another gift from Rys?” A muscle tics along the edge of his smooth alabaster jaw as he clenches his teeth. “He found you first.”
Yeah, well, that much is obvious.
A second later, I pick up on what Nine said and I have to swallow again to keep the bile from rising up in my raw and aching throat.
“Another?” I say. The word comes out like a croak. I swallow one more time, pushing back the taste of spoiled fruit that returned with a vengeance. “Do you think he’s the one who left the peach for me? Why would he want to poison me?”
Nine doesn’t answer me right away. Neither does he grab the lantern or take it with him as he starts to search along the dark edge of the sewer wall. He doesn’t need it. After a few seconds, he bends down. When he straightens, I see the half-eaten peach grasped loosely between his long, slender fingers.
He holds it up, his silver eyes dimming to a dark, gun-metal gray as he glares at it. “I’m not so sure he did.”
I don’t like the way he said that. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“That he—” Nine stops there, shakes his head, then starts again. “It’s a very old faerie trick. Think of Hades and Persephone, the story of the pomegranate. Feeding a human faerie food is a sure way to force them into Faerie.”
My stomach—already so messed up—drops. “What?”
“If a human tastes faerie food, they won’t be able to survive without it. Human food won’t satisfy you ever again. If you want to keep from starving, you’ll have to go to Faerie and stay there.”
“What?”
I can feel the niggle of panic as it begins to come to life. One positive to being this freaking sick is that I don’t have the strength to fall into another attack. It still sucks. All around me, the air grows heavy. It’s hard to breathe.
I want to scream.
And I thought it was bad when I saw the wriggly little worm and had a freak-out that I almost ate it. Now he’s saying I’m gonna have to go to Faerie because I was too hungry to resist the gift of the peach?
Oh, hell no.
I’m shaking. It takes the last of my strength to finally get off of the ground. Pulling myself to my knees, I peer up at Nine imploringly.
“Help me, please. Make this stop. Make it go away. You can do it. I know you can.”
“Riley—”
“You want me to beg? I’ll beg. I’ll do anything you want me to. I won’t go back there, Nine. I don’t belong in Faerie.”
Nine’s expression closes off. His silver eyes gleam, the points of his ears peeking out through the inky strands of pitch-black hair as he looks down on me. His nostrils flare, a muscle ticking in his sharp jaw as he stares down at me.
“Don’t beg,” he orders. “I don’t ever want to hear you beg me for a thing. That’s even worse than you trying to thank me. Trust me, Shadow. You don’t ever want to be in my debt.”
Thank you… know that? I actually remember that. One of Nine’s earliest lessons when I was a kid. The fae don’t like to be thanked. You can nod your head, even offer a curtsy instead, but never, ever say thanks. Either you’re doing what Nine just warned me of—putting yourself into the fae’s debt—or you’re offering mere words in exchange for whatever it was the fae went to the trouble of doing.
At least, that’s how they see it.
Come on. I can’t plead with him to help me, and even if I got him to agree, a ‘thank you’ would be a major slap in the face.
What the hell am I supposed to do?
I stick my finger down my throat, hoping that that will help get rid of the poison; it won’t, but no one’s accusing me of thinking rationally right now. I’ve already thrown up everything in there and then some so while it triggers my gag reflex, nothing comes out.
I lay out on the sewer floor, my hands wrapped around my middle. My sides ache from the uncontrollable heaves. Now my mouth tastes like rancid peach, acrid vomit, and dirty leather.
So that didn’t help. Not even a little bit.
Did I really think it would?
I moan. Can’t help it. I’m so miserable, and so freaking upset, it’s all I can do. And now my only hope is staring down at me as if this is all my fault.
I blame Rys. And the peach. And the Shadow Prophecy for good measure.
I’m not going to Faerie. As I return to my fetal position, I figure this is as good a spot to die as any. Right now, I don’t doubt that that’s what’s gonna happen.
From somewhere above me, Nine lets out a sigh.
“I’ll do it. For you, Riley, I’ll do anything. But you won’t like it.”
I perk up just enough to prop myself on my elbow. “I don’t care if I’ll like it. Fix me.”
“First, there are a few things you need to understand.”
No, I don’t. “If it will make this feeling go away, do it. If it will keep me from having to go back to Faerie, I don’t care what you have to do.”
“Be careful, Riley. It’s not in a fae’s nature to explain the terms before entering into a contract. I’m doing you a kindness. You want me to tell you what will happen if you agree to let me help you my way.”
Not really. Maybe it’s the panic attack, or the threat of what eating the peach means, but I’m feeling even weaker as another second passes. I want it gone. I want it gone now.
“There
’s no time.”
“There’s plenty. If I had found you after another moonrise, I don’t think it would take. I had to search countless portals until I found Rys’s trace and here you are. There’s still time enough. The charm from the faerie food… it’s still fresh.”
“Trace?” I echo, letting out a groan as my head begins to pound against my skull again. It’s so hard to think, but that sounded way important—and like Nine was trying to slip it by me by bringing up the demon peach. “Rys’s trace? What… what does that have to do with me being poisoned?”
He hesitates. I brace myself.
It’s never good news for Riley when Nine has to think about what he’s saying.
He takes a deep breath—I’m amazed he doesn’t gag on the stench—then, as he exhales, he says, “You still wear his brand. You never gave me permission to touch you, so my mark never settled on your skin.”
Okay. Maybe I’m too out of it to really function, but that makes even less sense to me. And I’m over it.
“What, unh… jeez, Nine, I’m freaking dying here. If you’re gonna fix me, do it. Otherwise, just let me die in peace.”
“You won’t die. I won’t allow it.”
Another moan. His magic water must’ve worn off. My stomach hurts so bad now, I want to cut my gut open, rip it out, and throw it into the depths of the sewer. Anything to make the pain stop.
“Honestly,” I grit through clenched teeth, “the way I’m feeling right now, I don’t think that’s gonna stop me. Stop stalling. Do it.”
“I won’t take another touch without you understanding why I must.”
Whoa.
Hang on.
Touch?
Who said anything about a touch?
I’m okay with removing my stomach to get rid of the pain. But to willingly accept his touch… suddenly, his insistence that I make the time to listen to him makes a ton more sense. Even as sick as I feel, my instinct is to crawl away from him.
“Touch?” I want to hurl again. It’s a miracle that I keep from sitting up and folding over. “Why would you even say that?”
Nine crouches down low, close enough that I can see his fancy black boots, the silk of his pants, the tail of his shadowy duster—but far enough away that I can dodge his touch if he reaches for me.
He gentles his voice as he begins to explain.
“There are two ways to erase what his peach has done. I can touch you, give you some of my strength while leeching the poison from you. Or, if you’d prefer, I can burn the poison and Rys’s brand away. It’s extreme, I know it is, but you shouldn’t risk the Light Fae being able to track you by following his mark. Touch magic or fire, it’s your choice. Either way, I’ll fight the peach’s charm and make it so that Rys won’t be able to follow you unless you call for him. That’s the best that I can do.”
I dare a glance up at Nine’s face just as his pale gaze flickers over to the flames dancing inside of Rys’s lantern. My stomach clenches and, this time, I can’t stop myself from lurching up, finally folding over, and gagging.
By the time this newest wave of unspeakable agony washes over me, I want to cry. And that’s nothing compared to how it feels to know that Rys marked me in a way that his touch is like a fancy fae GPS tracker or something.
How? Maybe it really is the peach getting to my head, but I don’t get it. The fae can’t lie, and Rys told me...
“That’s not how he found me,” I argue. “He… he told me he knew to follow the pockets—”
“That was true. What he didn’t add was that, from the moment you let him touch your skin, he could follow you across time itself. It’s part of a fae’s magic. Those touched by the fae can never escape the brand.”
Great. Just freaking great. Nine tells me this now?
Okay. Okay. He’s not really leaving me any choice. I guess I should be glad that he’s explaining this all to me so that I’m going into this with my eyes open. He didn’t have to do that—and it wouldn’t change anything anyway.
I’m not going to Faerie.
Nope.
“Let me just… okay. I let you touch me, I’m finally free of the Light Fae… but then you’ll know how to find me. Right?”
“Yes. Until the fire burns my brand away, or you give another precious touch away.”
“You keep saying, unh, fire.” I wipe my mouth with the back of my glove, then lean on my elbow again so that I can marvel at the leather that covers the ruined flesh. “Is that why…”
I can’t say it. Maybe I’m being ridiculous, maybe I’m too sick to even entertain my wild train of thought, but I can’t say it.
Nine understands. “Yes. It’s part of the Seelie’s light magic. When you refused Rys, he wouldn’t leave knowing that, after all this time, you still had my touch on your skin. He found a way to remove it.”
That’s not all his damn fire did.
“It wasn’t so easy for me to find you after that,” Nine adds, “but rumors led me right to Rys. He wants you. You know that, Riley. He’s always felt like he had a claim to you, from the moment the Fae Queen assigned him to find your mother and bring you to Faerie. He didn’t. Obviously, he didn’t, and he’s the only one who knows why. I told you that the asylum was a safe place to keep you out of Melisandre’s reach. What I neglected to add was that Rys helped me arrange it. It was a compromise. We’d work together to keep you protected until you came of age. After that, it was every fae for himself. He charmed you into giving him your touch. He’ll always have power over you until it’s gone. And that’s not even counting the peach.
“I told you. You have the choice. You can burn the brand away, using the fire he left behind. Rys won’t be able to come after you then and it should be enough to counter the food from Faerie.”
“Should,” I echo weakly. “What if it doesn’t?”
“Then it was all for nothing. When the Shadow comes of age, she’s also supposed to come into her powers. Melisandre’s spies warned her where you’ve been hiding. As soon as you were the right age, she planned on having you brought to Faerie to face her.”
To face her. Right. What was it Nine said in the graveyard? That the Fae Queen has no problem killing me just so that I don’t kill her first. Doesn’t matter that I’m not the murderess type. She’s fond of her throne, her power, and her head. What was one pesky human, especially when she had no problem turning us into decorations for her garden?
If I let the faerie food take hold, I’m done. I’ll never be able to eat anything else again. And where do you find faerie food?
Ding! Ding! Ding!
Faerie.
That’s right.
Well played, Rys. The bastard fae used my hunger against me. I didn’t want to follow him to Faerie—whether he wanted me to stay with him, or he would sacrifice me to get on the good side of his queen when it finally sunk in that I’d never be his ffrindau thing—and he found another way to get me to go.
Nine already told me, and I can’t deny it: if I can’t fix this and now, I won’t have a choice unless I want to starve to death.
And I would. I totally would. Before I gave in and let Rys win, I would totally do it.
Not now, though. With Nine here, and my stomach killing me, I have one last chance. It goes against everything I was ever taught, everything Nine ever told me, but self-preservation is the only thing I’m thinking about at this second.
I don’t really want to die. Not if I can save myself.
Or let Nine save me.
“I accept.”
“Riley—”
“Better the devil I know, right? If it’s you or Rys who can track me down, it’s no contest. Touch me, Nine. Do whatever the hell you have to do. Don’t care. You have to save me.”
For the second time, he hesitates.
My eyes are slits in my face as I grit my teeth through another wave of debilitating agony. He’s not moving any closer.
What is he waiting for?
His gaze flickers back to the lantern.
“The fire will hurt, but you’ll have your freedom. The Shadow deserves her freedom.”
“In real life, shadows are stuck to the bottom of a person’s shoe. There’s no such thing as freedom, Nine, not really.”
“Riley—”
A whimper escapes my throat. I can’t keep it back. Another wave of nausea shudders through me, but even that pales in comparison to the terror that jolts my senses at just the thought of going anywhere near an open flame.
For my whole life, I’ve been conditioned to hate being touched. All it took was one fucking awful afternoon to make me throw away all that brainwashing. I hate the idea of giving him permission to lay his hands on me—but there’s absolutely no way that I’ll ever willingly let fire lick at my skin again.
How can I make him understand?
My brain is fuzzy. So much of my focus is on keeping my stomach from lurching into my throat, but I clench my fists and think.
Nine’s my Shadow Man—but he’s also a Dark Fae. And I know exactly what I have to do to get him to do what I want.
“I’m giving you permission to touch me, Nine. You get to take the power in the touch while I get to hide from Rys and forget that stupid freaking peach. Seems fair. So, do we have a bargain?”
“No.” He pauses, then adds, “The terms are not fair.”
Since when does a fae give a shit what’s fair or not? Unless he thinks I’m trying to pull one over on him. Is the touch not enough? What else can I offer him?
There’s only one thing I can think of. “I’ll throw in my true name. If you don’t already have it, I’ll give it to you. Is that better?”
“You misunderstood me. When I said the bargain wasn’t fair, I meant it’s heavily weighted in my favor. For anyone else, I’d agree—but not you, Shadow. Remember that. This touch will be different than any you’ve felt before. Deeper, so much deeper, there’s a risk that there might be other… effects.”
Effects? What’s that supposed to mean? And why is he telling me this now?
I don’t get the chance to ask. Before I do, Nine edges closer.
His silver eyes are blazing. I don’t know what the hell is going on, but his eyes are shining so brightly that they seem to glow. No—they are glowing. Between that and Rys’s lantern, the dark gloom of the sewer isn’t so bad.
Shadow (Touched by the Fae Book 2) Page 4
