Sabrina did not look—she couldn’t. Instead, she locked eyes with Jackson.
“I don’t understand.”
“You don’t have to. It’s over.”
“Over? This is how it ends?” she asked. “Is this really what you want?”
“I want you, Sabrina,” he shouted.
“You had me.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
Sabrina watched Jackson’s chest rise and fall as he breathed hard. “Then why did you abandon me? Why did you have a child…my child without me? Why did you meet me here earlier today, fuck me, and then run off? You ran away…again.”
“I—”
“You toyed with me, you spoiled-rotten, bitch.”
Sabrina was stunned by his words; they hurt nearly as much as his actions. “My life is complicated.”
“Mine isn’t?” Jackson replied. “You and Moselle, you both made my life a fucking mess.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Sorry doesn’t get these thoughts out of my head. Sorry doesn’t fill my needs; it doesn’t stop this…this…this—”
“Jackson.” Sabrina took a step forward. “Everything will be different tomorrow. Tomorrow, we can talk about this. We can make sense of all this. Tomorrow, I can take care of you.”
“I don’t need your pity, Sabrina. I need your—”
An earthquake shook the beach and everything on it. Sabrina watched Jackson look up into the sky. It was as if was searching for something. She drew a deep breath and finally glanced at Rae.
Natalia continued to feed. She had slashed Rae’s throat, torn off her pants and bit her in the pelvis. This is all my fault.
When another hard tremor hit, Sabrina stumbled to the side and accidentally kicked Natalia’s leg. The vampire looked up, blood dripping down her chin. Sabrina had never liked Natalia and wished she had a weapon—an axe or sword to swing down on her neck right now.
“Sabrina London,” Natalia said as her eyes flicked. “You and Jackson never finished what you started.”
“You know that mind-control shit you vampires do doesn’t work on me,” Sabrina said, crossing her arms. “Cade’s tried it, trust me.”
“I am much older than Cade.”
“You are much older than Cade.”
“Like I was saying, you should finish what you started.” Natalia’s voice was low, silky, hypnotic.
Sabrina had an urge to agree suddenly and wasn’t sure she could resist. “I want him inside me,” she said slowly, fighting the words as they came out.
“I’m sure if you ask nicely, he’d be happy to penetrate you one last time.”
“Penetrate me…”
“Yes.”
Sabrina pulled her shorts down to the ground. She straightened the cups of her top, and as she began to pull the one end of the scarf out of her cleavage, it suddenly spoke.
“Yo, heaven was a place on earth, until you came and ruined it, comrade.”
“Who is there?” Natalia looked about.
“Me.”
“What?” Sabrina asked as she blinked her eyes like she had stared at the sun too long. “Who said that?”
“Your favorite neighborhood slime boy toy.”
“Joe?”
The scarf rapidly changed shape into a puddle of goo that oozed down between Sabrina’s breasts, over her stomach to her groin and down her leg.
“Oh, baby, that was the best ride ever. Hey, sweet tits, lift me up and pour me down the front of you again, will ya?”
“Slitz,” Natalia hissed. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m doing my job, and mind you, the benefits were outstanding this time. Oh my gah…” Joe, in the form of a puddle of slime, shivered.
“What job, spy?”
“Dunyasha and I made a deal, yo, and you almost messed it all up being all bout it, bout it.”
“What’s going on, Natalia?” Jackson asked.
“I will handle this, darling.” Natalia faced Joe. “What deal? What job? Tell me. Now.”
“Joe?” Sabrina finally snapped out of Natalia’s mind control. “You were the scarf? All this time?”
“Yeah, baby, and I loved every minute of it, really. You know what they say, pink is the new slime.”
Sabrina struggled to think through the mental fog. “What’s going on here?”
“I hate to do this to you, I really do. I mean you, and I could’ve had something special. But Dunyasha, she promised me more. So much more.”
“Joe?” Sabrina said softly.
The slime went silent a moment, and when he did, his body undulated.
“It’s done. Sorry, lover lumps, I really hope you survive all this. Best of luck, eh.” Joe then transformed himself into a rat. “Okay, Natatasha—”
“Natalia.”
“Same difference. Dunyasha told me there would be an extraction. So, we gotta roll.”
“Dunyasha told me nothing of the sorts.”
“Well, why else would you and everyone’s favorite pet human be here?”
“We came to kill her.” Natalia pointed at Sabrina, who sneered at the comment.
“No. No. No.” Joe shook his tiny rat nose at her. “Dunyasha gave me specific orders. On the night of the wedding between Lord Raion and Bobo Sabrina, I was meant to alert everyone in the Tainted that the faker was fake.”
“What?” Sabrina practically shrieked. “That would ruin everything! Dunyasha wouldn’t do that. This was her idea. Don’t be stupid, Joe. That would get me killed and start a war.”
Joe squeaked a few times and then said, “Too late.”
One Night in London and the World’s Your Oyster
Lord Raion guided Amber through the warehouse to a staircase in the back and waved for her to go first.
“I had the office to this building cleaned, just for you,” he said.
“Just for me? I’m touched.”
“I hope you will find it…acceptable.”
When Amber passed him, her eyes were on his naked flesh. It looks so real. I wonder how long those slimes can stay like that? Lot easier than plastic surgery…
After she ascended the first few stairs, she looked back at Lord Raion. He was waving to someone or something out of sight.
“What?” Amber called back. “Something wrong?”
“No. Nothing at all, my bride. We just need our witnesses, is all.”
Amber had almost forgotten—her mind was focused on what came next. The fairy princesses would need to watch her consummate the marriage. Perhaps in a different set of circumstances, she may not have minded an audience, but today, here, now, with him? And worst of all, in front of her eldest sister, Carnelian. She just had to remind herself, They won’t see me as Amber. They’ll see me as Sabrina.
“Having them watch…it’s not going to be easy for me.”
“Trust me, once we begin, you will forget they are even present.”
“Yeah? Well, do me a favor and leave the fire fairy behind. I never could stand that bitch.”
“You know I can’t.”
“I know.” Amber reached the first landing. “Like, how many flights up?”
“Two more. Do not tire on me so soon, fairy.”
“Oh, I have plenty of energy left.”
“Good.”
Amber looked down the stairs. All four girls were being led up by Lord Raion’s guards. She could feel the golems’ radiation coming off them in waves of sizzling heat and had to pulse her wings slightly to heal herself before she grew any more nauseous.
“I hope you don’t mind.”
“Mind what?” he said as he looked at her curiously.
He didn’t notice? He didn’t feel my healing?
“I’m using my wings to heal myself from the fallout you and your guards are—”
“Do what you must,” Lord Raion said as he gently nudged her to keep going.
He doesn’t care. Amber looked back at the other girls and noticed how sick they all looked.
> Shit, their wings… Why aren’t their wings out?
“They’re sick.” She paused and pointed.
“I can see that. Keep walking.”
“They could die.”
“They will not. You fairy are more resilient than you let known. They will survive and will be released as soon as we are finished.”
Amber reached another landing and stopped again. “How do you keep them from unfurling their wings?”
“So many questions,” Lord Raion sighed. “Are you always like this?”
“I put the curious in bi-curious.”
Raion gave her a harder push this time and then answered. “Earlier today my slimes interfaced with each and stole some of their basic memories. To put it simply, these fairies have forgotten how to release their wings. But do not worry yourself, my bride—it is only temporary.”
“Interfaced,” Amber repeated. “Those slimes have to touch your head, right?”
“No, they can interface anywhere, but the best results are when they are nearest the brain or…”
“Or?”
“Or ingested.”
Amber gagged. “Eaten? Who would do that?”
“They can be very invasive,” Raion laughed. “If a slime has access to your internal organs, they can do all sorts of terrible things, Sabrina. That is why my slime bats assaulted you so—”
“Please,” Amber interrupted him. “You’re killing the mood.”
She looked once more at Lord Raion’s human façade, his muscles, beautiful face, and large cock. She would have preferred it this way—Sabrina would have preferred it this way. But now she knew that was not possible. She could not risk the slimes that coated his body touching her—entering her.
“We’re here.”
It was the last landing. There was a door, its outline was highlighted by a yellow-orange glow.
“Are you ready, my bride?”
Amber looked at the door, then the fairy princesses, and lastly, Lord Raion. She drew and deep breath, nodded, and said, “I was born ready.”
Raion pushed open the door and a gust of lavender scented air greeted Amber. She had smelled it before; it was a candle from a popular brand, one Sabrina burned in her palace.
“Lavender?”
“Your favorite, right?”
“How did you know?”
“My spies were in and out of your high-rise home long before it was destroyed. They catalogued and mimicked everything you owned from candles to clothing to—”
“Shoes and purses?” Amber finished. “Yeah, you know I expect you to replace all that was lost when my building was destroyed now that we’re married. I mean, you did cause the earthquake.”
She stepped into the nicely decorated room. The space was spotless—so much so, that when she looked down at herself and saw how dirty she was, she felt out of place.
“This room is so clean,” Amber marveled. “Is everything in here white? White carpets, white lamps, white furniture…”
“Do you like?”
“I do,” she said as she looked up at him. “I just wish I were cleaner…and…I wish you didn’t look like that.”
Raion sighed. “What do you want me to look like now, fairy?”
“Yourself.”
“What?”
Amber reached out to take his hand but stopped herself the moment she remembered she might risk an interface.
“Get rid of these slimes.”
“I thought—”
“We need to consummate this marriage. We need to become one. We can’t do that with you looking like this. I did not marry a human today, Lord Raion. I married you.”
He held silent and still.
“Please,” Amber said.
There was a tiny flash of light and suddenly the slimes poured off him to the floor. They transformed into rats almost instantly and scurried out the door as the fairy princesses were escorted in. Aspen must have hated rats, because she shrieked through her gag.
“Thank you.”
Amber took the moment of distraction to pulse her wings again. This time, she unleashed enough healing energy to reach the three girls.
This should get all of you feeling a little better, get you seeing straight and thinking clear. She was far from finished though. Shit. In a few minutes, I’m gonna need all three of you to fly out of here. I’m gonna have to draw this out some and keep healing you guys until I know you’re ready.
Damn it, Carns, I wish I could speak to you. I need to share my plan with someone.
“Put them in their places.”
Lord Raion pointed to his men, and they pushed the girls farther into the room and positioned them surrounding the large, white-linen-covered bed.
The reality of it all suddenly set in. Once again, Amber felt like she might pee herself. Time had run out, and she had to make her choice—kill the lord of the Tainted now or after.
She watched Lord Raion as he relayed his orders. He was a monster—there was no way around it. She looked down at her hands; they were warm and dry. They reminded her that she was not a water fairy; she did not have the unquenchable desire for sex that Sabrina had. Amber would have preferred her final target be a human, fairy, even a vampire, but her wishes did not change her duty.
She tried to steel herself with a memory she had never wanted to never revisit.
This would not be the first time she had faced a monster; all female fire fairy had endured the same torture. It was called a rite of passage. Another trial by fire designed by the sick old men who ruled her kingdom. Amber looked to her sister; Carns had suffered the same ritual and had plans to change those archaic rules upon her ascension. Never again would another fairy girl have one of her own fire elementals turned against her.
Never again.
Amber remembered the heat, the pain, the terror. She had overcome it, just as every other living fire fairy woman had. And it had done what it was meant to. It separated her from the weak—the dead—and it fueled her rage then and forever forward.
I only hope this gives me all the power I need to burn everything here to the ground.
“Ready the camera.”
“Camera?” Amber said as her eyes went wide.
“Further proof.”
One of the golems placed an old VHS recorder on a tripod and centered it to the bed.
“You wanna shoot some vintage porn?”
“Excuse me?”
“You gotta be fucking kidding me, right? Yeah…” Amber drew out the last word. “Sabrina London’s history with sex tapes isn’t great. So, you know…”
“I’m aware of your past mistakes.”
“So…?”
“Tell me, is it true what they say? Fairy-kind…your lust is that of legend.”
Amber could not take her eyes off the camera. “Uh-huh.”
“Do you really desire sex all the time?”
“All day, every day,” she said as she rolled her eyes.
“My people, golem forged from nuclear disasters, we…”
“What?” Amber prompted.
“We do not reproduce.”
“Oh…” Amber got it. “So, you have no natural sex drive?”
“None.”
Amber lowered her voice and leaned toward Lord Raion. “I thought you wanted to fuck me? I thought that fucking me was part of all this? You know, like a major perk to the whole Otherworldly Assembly Elemental Kingdom domination.”
Lord Raion stepped away from her and waved to his men; one stood by each fairy princess, and those that remained lined up at the door.
“Wait.” Sabrina started to wonder if Lord Raion had performance anxiety…or worse. “What’s the matter? Are you…are you afraid to fuck me? Don’t you want—”
“What I want…” His voice rose. “I want what any conqueror wants. I want total dominion over all that is mine.”
“Sorry, not really into the whole Christian Grey scene.”
Raion grabbed her by the shoulders and lifted her from the
ground, his red eyes glowing as they roved over her body. “I want to reap my spoils.”
“Did you say rape the spoiled? “
“Enough of this!” He threw her backward to the bed. The moment she hit, her wings singed the covers and their flutter pushed her up to her knees.
“It just occurred to me, my lord.” Amber pointed to the jagged rocks in his waist and groin. “You don’t even have a dick. How the hell do you expect this to work?”
When Raion climbed onto the bed, it shook and groaned under his weight. Once he was kneeling in front of her, he covered himself with his hands.
“What do you call this?”
When he moved his hands, he revealed a large, stony cock.
Amber stared at it a moment. It was easily the least appealing thing on his body, but she was relieved it did not have veins that pulsated with glowing goo like the rest of him.
“Wow. Okay. You’re a grower not a shower.”
Lord Raion, in all his hideousness, waited before her to make a move. Amber asked herself one last time: What do you want to do?
“You have often taken elementals as lovers, Sabrina. Tell me, do all fairies enjoy sex with the elementals of their kingdom?”
Amber knew Sabrina had. Apparently, it was a common thing in the air and water kingdoms. “I mean, they are meant to serve. I cannot think of a better service.”
“Have you ever had an earth elemental inside you?”
“I haven’t, and let me tell you, the list of things that have been inside Sabrina London goes on and on…” she stopped herself and glanced over at her sister. The pained look on Carn’s face—it helped her with her decision; she would follow through. No matter the price.
“Lie back.”
Lord Raion did not move.
“I said lie back.”
It took him a moment to lay back and stretch out his long, rocky limbs. Amber knelt between his legs until he seemed comfortable—at least ready, by the angle of his rock-hard penis.
From this position, his back was to the others and she was able to make eye contact with them all.
“I’m going to get on top of you now.”
“That’s right,” he said nice and loud. “My bride is going to get on top of me now. Start recording.”
Three Burning Red Runaway Brides Page 27
