Exile

by Caleb James

  The two of them startled as the creature’s rasping tongue licked the glass of the rear window. Flames sparked from its forked tongue as it tap-tap-tapped and cracked the pane as they passed under the George Washington Bridge.

  “Hang on!” Charlie shouted as he swerved across three lanes and shot up the entrance to Fort Tryon Park.

  Centrifugal force pulled the creature back, but not for long.

  As the partially devoured truck struggled up the steep hill to the Cloisters, she was back at the glass.

  “Which way?” Charlie shouted.

  Liam pulled back, aware that somehow Charlie and his wonderful truck had done the impossible. I know this place. He spotted the bike path and imagined where it connected to the tiny deer trail that led to the weeping tree. Now it was up to him. I am going to die, but maybe, just maybe…. “Stop the truck!”

  Charlie slammed on the brakes, and before either he or Finn realized what was happening, Liam yanked open the rear door and raced into the night.

  WITH ONLY moonlight to guide his steps, he ran up the bike path, his eyes glued to the dense foliage, his ears attuned to the beast as she abandoned her tasty truck and gave chase.

  Love you. Love you. Eat you. Eat you.

  His heart sank as he ran and ran. Did I miss it? Is it somewhere else? Where is it? In the silvered light, he caught a deeper dark in the hedge. He shot for it, and with branches catching in his hair and tearing at his arms, he hurtled through the thicket, the toes of his shoes catching in roots. He stumbled and clutched branches to keep from falling. Please, please, please.

  Behind him, the love-hungry beast smashed through the undergrowth. Love you. Love you. Eat you. Eat you.

  But there were other sounds, above the distant sirens and the ravenous thoughts of the broken queen. He heard Charlie and Finn… and frogs. Thousands of frogs and crickets and birds. Like a symphony in front of him, leading him forward. The sounds of another world fanned the dangerous whiff of hope. He barreled over the last twenty yards of the dirt path and emerged in the clearing. The moon flooded down onto the massive mulberry. It’s here!

  He screamed into the night as he raced across the clearing, the white salamander in pursuit. “Charlie Fitzgerald, I love you. Do not follow me. If you truly love me, do not!” He heard music from within the tree and the pounding of the beast inches behind him.

  It nipped, hot and wet, at his ankle. With all he had left, he dove into the tangle of limbs.

  “I love you, Charlie Fitzgerald.”

  As the crazed beast leaped after him, her mouth, with its razor-sharp teeth, clamped around his ankle.

  Love you. Love you. Eat you. Eat you.

  The pain, more than anything he’d experienced in his life as the bones in his leg cracked, did not lessen his moment of exaltation. I have done what was asked of me. She is alive, and she is broken. I have known love. I am ready to die.

  Thirty-Five

  LIAM AWOKE on his back in the roiling blue-gray splendor of the Mist. He heard and felt the howl of the beast and the rattle of chains. He scrambled onto his elbows. “I am not dead.”

  Charlie, in T-shirt and black pants with the bumblebee stripes, lay unmoving and curled at his side. For a horrible few moments, he thought the worst.

  “No, we’re not dead.” Charlie sat up, faced Liam, and ran a hand through his hair. Unbidden, he kissed him.

  “I am dead,” Liam said, his breath hot between them. “I am, and this is heaven.”

  Charlie pressed his forehead against Liam’s. “Not heaven, but close. You’re alive. You have all your pieces, thanks to Lizbeta. Though know that I’d love you in any form.”

  “The creature had my leg.” His hands played over his knee and down to the ankle. He pulled up his pant leg and remembered the pain. “Tell me, Charlie….” There was an angry red stripe around his shin, the imprints of her teeth like a dotted line around the limb.

  Charlie’s words choked. “I tried to pry her off. We both got sucked in here. We’ve been here before,” he stated. His fingers entwined in Liam’s hair.

  Reality crashed down, his curiosity about his salvaged limb suddenly unimportant. No! His hand played over the sides of Charlie’s face. Like a doctor inspecting a patient, he sought for subtle, or not so subtle, breaks. Did he gain a pair of horns? His ears still looked human. He stroked the stubble of his cheeks and ran a finger between Charlie’s beautiful lips, fuller from the kissing. “Your teeth haven’t changed.”

  “I’m not broken, Liam.” And he returned the favor. Less about looking for defects and more about needing to feel every inch of him.

  Liam nestled into the embrace. “You might be mad.”

  “True. But no crazier than before I met you…. No, that’s not true. I am crazy. I see fairies, and I’m in love with the bravest, most beautiful man in three realms.” He inhaled the smell of Liam, his strength, the singe in his hair and on his clothes. He whispered into his ear, feeling his stubble against his cheek. “I love you.”

  The white salamander howled from the Mist. Its feet hammered the ground as sparks lit the Mist in lightning flashes of orange, blue, and white.

  Liam scanned in her direction, expecting her to emerge and come after him. For once fully glamoured, the results were irreversible… save for death.

  “Lizbeta,” Charlie whispered.

  Liam’s head swiveled from the direction of the white beast to Lizbeta in a gown that sparkled and mirrored the Mist. She looked upon the two men fused in their embrace.

  “You did not break your lover, Liam Summer. As to your leg, I used the magic you brought to make it right.”

  “I don’t understand. I lost my magic when I first passed through. Most of it, at any rate.”

  “To every rule there must be an exception. You know this, and you know why. It’s part of what balances the worlds. Think…. Your lover, your Charlie came through before, and he was not changed.”

  “That was a dream. There must have been an exception because it wasn’t real.”

  Charlie interjected, “Liam, we had the same dream. And I kissed you, and you told me that I shouldn’t. Even I know why I’m not changed and why you haven’t changed this time around. I think I even know what magic you—we—brought in here.”

  “But I glamoured you.”

  Charlie’s expression darkened. “Liam Summer, I, Charlie Fitzgerald, love you with all of my being. And because magic, while it may be twisty, does not lie, you must accept the truth. Our love, yours and mine, is not the product of deception. I don’t know what more proof you want. But the only protection in the travel between realms is unconditional and reciprocated love. It protected me, and it protected you… and that was before the kiss.”

  The beast roared as Liam realized what Charlie and Lizbeta said was truth. He, Liam Summer, cat’s-paw and whore to the queen, was loved… and not through a trick of magic.

  A world with a future opened before his eyes as he rested in Charlie’s arms. They’d live in his wonderful garage apartment on Staten Island. “You’ll show me how to do flooring and siding. Apparently I can make money wearing expensive clothes and having people take my picture.”

  Charlie let Liam’s words wash through him. “Liam….”

  “Charlie.”

  “You got to stop running from me.”

  “I’m done running. We’ll be together. We’ll rebuild Mike and Katie Fitzgerald’s home. We could get a dog… not a cat. Unless that’s what you want.”

  Lizbeta listened. She cleared her throat. “It sounds wonderful, and yet… you two are needed. My sister is clever, and she is strong. You have defeated, truly defeated, but half of May. Liam, you were tasked with bringing back the information we need to end this. Tell me what you’ve learned.”

  “Of course.” And they spelled out all that had been discovered from Gran’s exploration of Katye’s texts and from Alex, Jerod, and Nimby.

  Lizbeta listened and nodded. “This is our story. A war that lasted a thousa
nd years. May was our general, and she fell in love with theirs.”

  “The Hound,” Charlie said. He looked at Liam. “That’s what she called Finn.”

  “Tell me,” Lizbeta commanded.

  “My friend Finn. She had frozen us with some kind of spell. And she pointed and shouted, ‘Hound.’ In the grand hoo-ha of things gone weird, it was low down on the list of what we just went through.”

  Lizbeta pondered. “The Hound broke my sister’s heart. But more, she believes he robbed us… her, of our lands.”

  Liam spoke. “In one of the books was a drawing of the truce. May and the Hound, his hair as red as Finn’s. Each signed a copy. That’s where she was tricked.”

  “Not a trick. It was necessary,” Lizbeta said. “Though May disagrees. After a thousand years of war, we knew that coexistence was impossible between fey and human. The treaty was essential, and it is binding. She means to undo it. Your redheaded friend, Finn. Tell me his full name.”

  “Hulain,” Charlie said. “Finn Hulain.”

  Lizbeta stumbled. Her gown, which on closer inspection was lit by thousands of tiny fey, lost its shimmer. “It all comes full circle.” She drew a deep breath and with nimble fingers wove an image in the Mist. The specter of a man with red hair and even features appeared. It smiled.

  “That’s kind of him,” Charlie said. “Maybe a relative.” He took in the much taller man with his flowing flame-red mane.

  “Of course, though what his role in all of this can be, I do not know. But here’s the way of magic, Charlie. Treaties, like spells, can only be undone by those who create them. Your friend Finn carries the blood of the Hound. My sister means to reunite the realms and rule over all, with magic and bloodshed beyond imagination. We have contained but half of her. To rule, she must be whole. To rule, she must destroy the treaty and the truce and make herself as one.”

  “What do you mean ‘half of her’?” Charlie asked.

  “Charlie Fitzgerald, you’re new to our world, but careful with questions. They come at a cost. May split in two. It’s how she slipped my collar. I should have been prepared. I am now. Half of her went to the See, and as we speak, the other half wreaks murder and havoc in the Unsee. She gains power as she gorges on the magic of her subjects. None are safe. It is a world in need of heroes. In need of you.”

  Held tight in Charlie’s arms, Liam felt the weight of her words crush his dreams. “This is truth.” He shivered and took comfort as Charlie’s arms wrapped him tighter. “Tell me, Lizbeta, of Cedric, his Marilyn… their haffling son, Adam.”

  “In hiding. For yes, she means to take that child.”

  Charlie nodded. “It’s what she did with Alex and then with his sister.”

  Liam watched the fantasies of a life with Charlie and his boisterous family vanish. “I will go,” he said and tried to pull free from the strong arms that held him.

  “No!” Charlie interjected. “Look at me, Liam. If you’re going, I’m going. And while you might think that I run blind into burning buildings, I know what I’m doing. We got lucky this time. If she’s been snacking on magic folk, what we’re about to face needs a plan… and reinforcements.” He kissed Liam’s temple. “A dead hero is no hero. We do this together.” Not taking his eyes from Liam, he addressed Lizbeta. “We will help, but we need to gather strength. Alex and Jerod will come, and there may be others able to make the trip.”

  Lizbeta nodded. “Yes, return to the See. I will keep this door open and await your return. You have saved one realm this day. I wish it were enough. So take a week, but any longer will see her too powerful. Or worse, she will find Adam Nevus. In which case all of our efforts will have been for naught, as she will again cross into the See and devour all who would stop her. She will find the blood of the Hound. She will not stop until the treaty and the truce are dissolved.”

  Charlie took Liam’s hand, and they stood. “Let’s get out of here. I’m taking you home.”

  Liam knew he should be frightened; he wasn’t. “Strange.”

  “Tell me,” Charlie said.

  “I’m not afraid.”

  “It’ll come.”

  “It’s not that…. I’ve lived with fear my entire life. I’m not brave like you, Charlie.” He squeezed Charlie’s hand, puzzled by the emotions in his heart and the lightness in his chest.

  “You are brave.” Charlie turned into him, their noses touching. “It’s not about fear, Liam, but what you do with it. You faced yours, over and over again. You are brave, and you are mine, and for as long as you will have me, I am yours.”

  “Then I’ll have you forever.”

  They kissed. And when the kiss was done, they were no longer in the Mist but in the bower of a weeping tree, serenaded by a symphony of frogs, birds, crickets… and sirens.

  More from Caleb James

  The Haffling: Book One

  All sixteen-year-old Alex Nevus wants is to be two years older and become his sister Alice’s legal guardian. That, and he’d like his first kiss, preferably with Jerod Haynes, the straight boy with the beautiful girlfriend and the perfect life. Sadly, wanting something and getting it are very different. Strapped with a mentally ill mother, Alex fears for his own sanity. Having a fairy on his shoulder only he can see doesn’t help, and his mom’s schizophrenia places him and Alice in constant jeopardy of being carted back into foster care.

  When Alex’s mother goes missing, everything falls apart. Frantic, he tracks her to a remote corner of Manhattan and is transported to another dimension—the land of the Unsee, the realm of the Fey. There he finds his mother held captive by the power-mad Queen May and learns he is half-human and half-fey—a Haffling.

  As Alex’s human world is being destroyed, the Unsee is being devoured by a ravenous mist. Fey are vanishing, and May needs to cross into the human world. She needs something only Alex can provide, and she will stop at nothing to possess it… to possess him.

  Dark Blood Saga: Book One

  Handsome, brilliant, and surrounded by good friends, twenty-three-year-old medical student Miles Fox has a secret—and it’s not that he’s gay. Though he harbors a crush on his straight best friend, Luke. Miles, like his grandmother, Anna, possesses the healing gift, an ability she’s made him swear never to use or divulge, lest horrible things befall those he loves. It happened to her when Nazis butchered her family.

  But it all goes to hell when Miles heals a terminally ill man on a New Orleans cancer ward and wakes locked in the psych unit. Worse, news of the healing miracle spreads. For millennia, its carriers have been hunted by those who would steal it. Dr. Gerald Stangl and his teenage son, Calvin, know what Miles possesses. They, like their predecessors, will stop at nothing to take it, including kidnapping, torture, and murder. As the Stangls’ noose tightens, Miles and Luke are trapped in a death match with stakes higher than they could ever imagine.

  Readers love Haffling by Caleb James

  “There is no doubt in my mind that author Caleb James is able to write a fascinating, psychological fantasy and create some really outstanding characters.”

  —Joyfully Jay

  “Readers who enjoy young adult urban fantasy will have a ball with this action story and ride a pooka horse along with the adventurers.”

  —Fresh Fiction

  “This is a fast-paced YA fantasy.”

  —Hearts on Fire Reviews

  “So, if you are looking for fantasy, action, with a side of romance which features a gay protagonist, I’d say give this one a try. I think you will fall in love with Alex—just like me.”

  —Boys in Our Books

  CALEB JAMES is an author, member of the Yale volunteer faculty, practicing psychiatrist, and clinical trainer. He writes both fiction and nonfiction and has published books in multiple genres and under different names. Writing as Charles Atkins, he has been a Lambda Literary finalist. He lives in Connecticut with his partner and four cats.

  Website: charlesatkins.com

  Blog: calebjamesblog.wordpress.
com

  Facebook: www.facebook.com/Caleb-James-536765356387453

  By Caleb James

  Dark Blood

  THE HAFFLING

  Haffling

  Exile

  Published by DSP PUBLICATIONS

  www.dsppublications.com

  Published by

  DSP PUBLICATIONS

  5032 Capital Circle SW, Suite 2, PMB# 279, Tallahassee, FL 32305-7886 USA

  www.dsppublications.com

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of author imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Exile

  © 2017 Caleb James.

  Cover Art

  © 2017 Alan M. Clark.

  www.alanmclark.com

  Cover Design

  © 2017 Paul Richmond.

  http://www.paulrichmondstudio.com

  Cover content is for illustrative purposes only and any person depicted on the cover is a model.

  Author Photo by Bobby Miller.

  All rights reserved. This book is licensed to the original purchaser only. Duplication or distribution via any means is illegal and a violation of international copyright law, subject to criminal prosecution and upon conviction, fines, and/or imprisonment. Any eBook format cannot be legally loaned or given to others. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the Publisher, except where permitted by law. To request permission and all other inquiries, contact DSP Publications, 5032 Capital Circle SW, Suite 2, PMB# 279, Tallahassee, FL 32305-7886, USA, or www.dsppublications.com.