by Tracy Lauren
“Instead I have given you your freedom,” he continues, “forfeiting my claim on you. And after you replace the items you damaged in my home, I will shepherd you all the way to Pontheugh. Does that truly sound like a fair deal to you?”
It doesn’t and Brom’s sudden generosity leaves me strangely curious. “Why…?” Is the only word I can manage to get out—my heart is pounding too wildly in my chest and my mind can’t find a plausible reason for my body’s reaction. I assure myself I’m not turned on by this troll.
“That’s my secret, but I’d gladly trade it to you for one of your own,” he answers, grinning at me, his fangs glistening in the firelight. I’m too surprised by the feelings I’m having to respond. A crazy thought strikes me and I wonder for a moment if they were right about me all along. I am mad. Because more than anything in the world, I want to lean in and kiss Brom. As wrong as it is, something about it feels so right. Hells, it almost seems as if I can already taste him on my lips—like vanilla and spice. I imagine the rough caress of his mouth on mine and how it might feel to have someone so big, monstrous, and strong wanting me too. He’s nothing like the boys that were back in my village…no, Brom is a beast…a true force of nature.
But I remind myself he’s just playing with me, goading me into being more cheerful. I clear my throat and break the intensity of our locked gazes. “It’s late,” I tell him.
And just like that, the spell is broken. He releases my hair and rises to his feet. “There’s a mat you can sleep on, I’ll set it out—” he begins.
“Wait,” I say, grabbing his heavy hand in mine. “Aren’t you forgetting something?” I pull the medicine bottle from between my breasts.
“You don’t have to,” he tells me.
“No, a deal’s a deal. You were pleasant company all evening. I can do this for you.”
Brom turns, showing me his back and the scabbing wounds scattered across it. But he’s the size of a building compared to me, I’ll never be able to reach his shoulders.
“You’re going to have to get on your knees,” I tell him.
Slowly, he lowers himself to the ground, looking over his shoulder at me. His grin is sly. “It’s hard to believe there was ever any question over who was the slave and who was the master.”
“To be fair, you’d make a much more agreeable slave than I ever did.”
“I can’t tell if that’s a compliment or—” He stops short, his words morphing into a groan as I massage the medicinal salve onto his back.
Chapter 25
Brom
I make up a bed for Adelaide, planting myself next to it to guard over her while she sleeps. Very quickly she falls silent. It has been a long day and I’m sure she will sleep deeply after the trek we made.
I replay the evening’s conversation in my mind, smiling over our verbal sparring and the way Adelaide never shies away, no matter what ridiculous things I say. It is a refreshing trait in a woman. Not that Sorya was ever a shy thing, but the fae have a different way of thinking about the world. No, Adelaide is a much better fit for me…as far as conversations go, that is.
Our campfire fire burns low, crackling every now and then, sending embers twirling in the air. In the distance I can see small flickers of light, mirroring the movement, but I pay them no mind…lest they begin to focus on me. Will-o’-wisps. They can be dangerous if allowed to be.
Instead I busy myself, focusing on sharpening my blade. I lose myself in the task, not wanting to think too much on the future and what will come after we leave the witch in Briarmere. The sounds of the Perished Woods filter in and out of my consciousness—the howling of wolves, the occasional screech of an owl—but nothing is near enough to cause me any concern. It isn’t until I hear a sound not so different from the murmur of voices that I still the work on my blade. The whispers draw nearer and I scan our surroundings. Dozens of small slivers of light begin to encircle our camp and more come pouring from the shadows.
The will-o’-wisps are approaching.
“Adelaide?” I say in a hushed voice.
She sits up next to me. “Brom…what’s going on?” Apprehension laces Adelaide’s voice at the sight of the will-o’-wisps surrounding us.
I clench my teeth, silently abasing myself. I should have warned her. I thought she was asleep, otherwise I would have…but all this time the girl has been awake, looking out into the night, watching the wisps. And in turn, they have been gazing into her.
“Fuck. Adelaide, close your eyes!” I tell her, hoping it isn’t too late. For once, she listens, clenching her eyes shut.
“Brom?” she calls to me, her voice fearful and wavering. I jump to my feet and grab a log from the fire. Sensing my movement, she rises, wanting to follow me.
“Stay where you are, Adelaide, and do not open your eyes. They’re will-o’-wisps. Did your parents ever warn you of them?”
“No,” she says, shaking her head.
I take the log, the end of it flaming, and swing it at the phantom lights. They vanish like the ghosts that they are only to pop up again a short distance away. I swing at them again and again, keeping them at bay, but their whispers get louder.
“Brom!” Adelaide screams for me, her hands reaching blindly into the night. I hurry to her side and pull her close, holding up the fire in warning to the wisps. She clings to me as if her life depends on it, burying her face against my chest. “What are they?” she cries.
“The wisps, they will try and poison your mind and confuse you. They lure travelers into the woods until they are lost. If you stare at them for too long they can get into your mind and learn how to ensnare you. Adelaide, whatever you do, do not listen to them. They will feed you lies, all the lies you wish to hear the most, but they are not to be trusted, Adelaide. Do you hear me?”
Adelaide looks up at me then, her gaze intense. “You won’t let them take me.”
“I won’t, but they don’t know that yet, little one. They’re still going to try.” At that same moment Adelaide gets a far off look in her eyes and her brow furrows. Then, despite her fear from only a moment ago, she gazes out into the night.
I grab her chin, struggling to hold up the burning log and keep Adelaide in my embrace. “Do not look at them!” I remind her. The fog in her eyes clears and she nods her head with resolve, but already I can feel her grip on me loosening. It’s as if she cannot maintain her focus.
“What are they saying?” she asks.
“It doesn’t matter, Adelaide, everything they say will be lies.”
“Can you hear them?” she questions, as if she did not comprehend my warning. I can hear the wisps, just not in the way she does. What meets my ears is only a shadow of their voices, indecipherable whispers in the night. It’s Adelaide they’re calling to. Her arms fall to her sides as she releases me.
“Damn it, Adelaide!” I bellow. The wisps edge nearer, encircling us, and I swing the fiery log at them to keep them from coming any closer. With my free hand I clutch Adelaide by her waist, but she is pulling away from me, a confused look in her eyes. I grab her by the wrist, locking onto her more firmly.
“Wait, Brom…I think they’re trying to tell me something important,” she insists.
“By the Gods, Adelaide, what did I just say? Don’t listen to them!”
“Just let me try, Brom,” she insists. “I don’t think you understand. They sound urgent…it’s like they need my help…” She trails off, looking out at the wisps. I can feel the tension in her arm slowly increasing. She’s trying to pull away from me.
“Gods…” I mumble. I grab onto Adelaide and hoist her over one shoulder before I turn to the wisps.
“LEAVE HERE!” I bellow into the night. “I will not let you take this girl, she belongs to me!”
Adelaide begins to struggle, wriggling in an effort to drop off of my shoulder. I cast a harried glance over the wisps. They seem to remain just beyond the dimming light of our fire. It gives me an idea and I toss the log I hold back into the flames and qu
ickly gather up the wood pile I had planned to feed to the fire throughout the rest of the night. I add it all at once.
Sparks fly up and fresh smoke begins to curl. From the embers new flames appear. I scoop up every branch and stick I can find, building it up until it is an inferno. Fire licks the sky and the wisps edge backward.
Feeling protected, I pull Adelaide down and place her before me, gripping her shoulders and searching her eyes. They’re wide with fear and confusion and though I’m looking at her, she seems to be looking right through me. Her lips move, but no words come out.
“Adelaide. Adelaide!” I call to her and she blinks, coming back to me for a moment.
“Brom, who is that?” she asks. “It sounds familiar, doesn’t it? It’s just so quiet…if only I could get a little closer, I could hear—”
“You will not leave my side, little one. I won’t let them take you, remember?”
“No one’s taking me anywhere,” she tells me, placing her hands on her hips. For a moment I confuse it with lucidity. Then she continues. “I have to go to them,” she explains.
I rub one hand over my face, growling in frustration, but I don’t dare release my hold on Adelaide. When I look back at her, she’s gazing through me again, cocking her head to the side in an effort to hear the poison the wisps are trying to spill into her mind.
Just when I think things cannot get any worse, Adelaide’s pupils dilate and her mouth drops into an O of horror.
“Adelaide, listen to me,” I say forcefully, trying to remind her of the danger she is in. But she hushes me, swatting at my chest with her ineffectual human hands. Cocking her head to the side, she’s desperate to hear the wisps.
“It’s the cart!” she exclaims suddenly. “It’s gone off the road!” With that she tries to rip free from my grasp as if she plans on running out into the night. But there’s no way she can escape my hold.
“Adelaide, there is no cart. You are in the Perished Woods,” I tell her, knowing exactly what cart she speaks of. This was my fear, that it would come back to this. When she was trapped under the sleeping curse it was the same thing. Anytime she would whisper her fears it would be about her parents’ cart rolling and them being crushed and suffocated in the mud.
“You don’t understand,” she cries, desperate. “You can’t hear them like I can!”
“There is nothing out there,” I tell her gently.
“You’re just like the rest of them!” she screams, bucking to escape my hold. “No one would help! No one!”
Without warning she stomps heavily on the top of my foot, I lean forward, wincing in pain, and she takes the opportunity to deliver a knee to my groin. My hold on her fails and she tries to dart away. But I will always be too quick for her.
I snatch her into my arms and lift her off the ground, locking her into a bear hug. Her own arms are pinned to her sides and she kicks frantically in an effort to escape. “You’re killing them!” she wails.
“They’re already gone, little one. Your parents are long gone. There is nothing out there for you.”
“No! You’re lying!” she says, refusing to give up on the wisps’ deception. “Listen, Brom! Listen! They’re calling me!” Adelaide sobs, letting her head drop into the crook of my neck.
“The will-o’-wisps will be gone come morning, you will see things more clearly then,” I promise her.
“You don’t understand,” she tells me, her voice heavy with a despair deeper than anything I have ever seen or felt. It pains me to my core.
Watching Adelaide under the sleeping curse was as much of a nightmare for me as it was for her. But to see her like this…it is as if her nightmare has come to life.
I think back on what helped her when she was the most restless…on all the things that gave her peace.
I run a hand through her ruby hair. I want to say all the same comforting things I said to her when she was sleeping, only embarrassment makes me bite my tongue. But Adelaide trembles against me, her sobs racking her body and it makes me swallow my pride.
“I’m here, little one. Everything will be alright, I promise you this.” I repeat this over and over again, all the while caressing her hair.
Slowly, her sobs begin to diminish and she pulls away, just enough to look at me. “Brom…it’s not true, is it? It isn’t really them?” she asks. The look on her face is so stricken I almost hate to give her the truth.
“It’s just you and me here, Adelaide. No one else.” When I look into those tearful, green eyes of hers I can see she’s desperately clinging to reality. Around us, the wisps flare and flicker, trying to ebb closer. The whispers coming from the flames rise into a low murmur and Adelaide winces. When she closes her eyes, big, wet tears fall down her cheeks. She presses her forehead to mine.
“There’s something out there, Brom,” she tells me fretfully. There is a change in her now. She no longer seems drawn to the whispers, instead she seems frightened of them.
“No, little one. It is only the wisps and they cannot harm you.”
“Brom, I can hear them! I’m scared. If I open my eyes I know what I’ll see…I know who I’ll see—” She breaks off, sobbing again. “Make it stop,” she begs. “I can’t do this again. Please, make it stop.”
I search myself. I’d do anything to help her in this moment, to bring Adelaide peace…and there’s only one last thing I can think of.
I close the distance between us and claim her lips in a kiss. She isn’t shocked. She doesn’t pull away or fight me. Instead, she dives in, hungry for comfort and willing to find it in anything—even a monster like me.
Her hands find my cheeks and, true to everything we do, we fight each other for control of the kiss. I bury my hands in her hair while she bites at my lips. The gasps of air Adelaide pulls in are as frantic and needy as her caresses. I groan over the desperate sounds she makes. They’re enough to drive me mad, but this kiss is for her, to ground her to reality. She might hate me after it’s done. I wouldn’t be surprised if she slapped me and called me out for the monster that I am. Still…I’d do anything for Adelaide.
It isn’t until our frantic kiss begins to slow and Adelaide pulls away that I realize the wisps have grown silent. She looks into my eyes, her expression concerned but not angry. “I’m afraid to look,” she confesses and I know she’s talking about the wisps.
“Don’t,” I command. “Only look at me, little one.”
“We’re just supposed to stare at each other all night?” she asks skeptically, still only inches from my face.
Carefully, I lower us to the ground. Adelaide’s legs wrap themselves around my waist and we sit facing one another.
“Talk to me,” I tell her. “Focus only on me.”
“What do you want me to say?”
“Everything.”
Chapter 26
Adelaide
Dawn is near, I can tell by the slow brightening of the world around us. I’m still too scared to look at anything besides Brom, lest the will-o’-wisps call to me again. Though I’m tired, I fight sleep, fearful even of what my dreams might bring. So, I lean my forehead against Brom’s nose and allow my eyelids to remain shut. They’re too heavy to keep open at this point. We stayed up all night together like this, just talking. We must have covered every topic under the sun…everything except that kiss.
It’s been so long since I’ve been kissed, but there was something strangely familiar about locking lips with Brom. The feel of his strong hands on my body, the tightness of his embrace, the taste of vanilla lingering between us…it all makes me feel as if there’s something on the edge of my consciousness that I can’t quite recall.
“Will you teach your own children how to fish?” he asks.
“I hadn’t given it much thought. I mean, I suppose I used to…when I was young and stupid and thought the best thing I could do with my life was get married. But now I don’t know.”
“What’s changed?”
I laugh. “I can hardly imagine myself mar
ried at this point. Who would even want me?”
“Don’t say that,” Brom reprimands.
“Why? It’s the truth.”
“No, it’s bullshit you’ve gotten into your head because you lived in a town filled with simple-minded fools. There’s a big world out there, Adelaide. You’ll meet the right person for you. One day you’ll have a home filled with little redheaded babies and you can put fishing poles in their hands as soon as they can walk.”
I smile at the image, but oddly enough I don’t picture my babies running around barefoot in a house in Pontheugh. I picture Brom’s lair. I sigh and nuzzle into him, chalking it up to the comfort I’ve found in our oddly matched alliance.
“Or you can let their father teach them,” Brom adds.
I scoff. “If I wanted it done wrong, I would.”
Brom laughs, low and rumbling. There have been times when that laugh has sounded so snide and sinister. But now, it only sounds relaxed and content. I like the change. “You’re awfully full of yourself for being such a little thing.”
“Let’s just be honest here, there’s no way I’m ever going to find a man who’s better at fishing than me.”
“Ah well, there’s your problem. You’re doing yourself a disservice if you plan on marrying a man. Humans are such a dull and impotent race,” he tells me, his voice teasing. “Trolls, on the other hand…”
“Humans are dull?” I challenge.
“All except for redheaded ones named Adelaide, yes.”
“Well, then the question is how does a girl get a troll to propose?”
“A troll would never propose,” Brom says, his voice mocking reprimand.
“Is that so? What would you do instead?” I question.
