Ink Exchange tf-2

by Melissa Marr

  Niall didn't worry about consequences as he struck the Ly Ergs. He didn't worry about where his king was. He didn't worry about anything. He avoided some but not all of the Ly Ergs' blows. Although the red-palmed faeries were more concerned with drawing blood than with inflicting permanent injury, they had murdered their share of faeries and mortals over the years.

  Bananach darted past Gabriel and caught Niall in the upper abs with the tips of her boots. Searing pain rocked him back as the boots' poisonous iron cut into his flesh. He stumbled, and she pressed her advantage with a swipe of her blood-soaked talons.

  Then Gabriel grabbed her and steadfastly moved their fight away from Niall, back toward the fence, leaving Niall free to deal with the Ly Ergs. It was disturbingly good fun, salve for the gloom Niall had been trying to shake. It didn't change anything but was refreshing.

  By the time Niall had most of the Ly Ergs retreating, Gabriel had bloodied Bananach severely enough that she was leaning against the one Ly Erg who'd held back from the melee. But even so, she fought until Gabriel punched her hard enough that she swayed backward and tumbled to the ground.

  Gabriel told the single unwounded Ly Erg, "Take her out of here before Chela notices I've had another tussle with her." He snarled at the rest of the Ly Ergs, who'd eased closer. "I keep getting into fights with Bananach, Che's going to get all territorial. Don't none of us want that, do we?"

  The Ly Erg didn't speak but merely stepped up beside the raven-woman. Bananach rested her head against his leg.

  "You're inconveniencing me, puppy. If necessary, I'll see the ice queen or the kingling. Someone's" — she snapped her jaw at Niall in what was either an invitation or a warning— "going to help me get this court set right."

  "Irial said how we'd handle things." Gabriel stretched out his arms to show the raven-woman the spiraling orders on his skin.

  "Iri needs to go. He's in the way and not doing what needs done. War's what we want. Need some proper violence. It's too long." Bananach closed her eyes. "And you following me everywhere's getting old."

  "So stay put and I'll stop following you." Gabriel lowered himself to the pavement with a graceless gesture and began inspecting his wounds. He grimaced, a decidedly unpleasant sight with the blood flowing down his face, as he poked at a gash on his forehead.

  The Ly Erg reached an already red hand down to caress Bananach's bloody face and arms, nourishing himself on battle blood as his kind had once done on red-soaked fields. His skin shimmered as Bananach's fresh blood seeped into his palm. Another Ly Erg walked up and laid his hand on Gabriel's blood-covered face. Despite the fact that they'd all been trying diligently to skewer, maim, and otherwise incapacitate one another mere moments ago, they were almost cordial for a few bizarre moments. The Ly Ergs took the pain and blood into their skin, unmindful of past conflict in the moment of postfight pleasure and sustenance.

  Then Gabriel swung at the Ly Erg who stood patting his still-bleeding wounds and said, "Enough. Get her out of here. Maybe you could try being obedient tomorrow?"

  "Maybe you should try staying out of my way tomorrow." Bananach stood and flicked her long hairlike feathers over her shoulder with a look of disdain. She might be bruised and unsteady on her feet, but she wasn't cowed by anyone. Then, with a solemnity that was as eerie as her violence, she shifted her attention to Niall. "Think about what you want, Gancanagh—what's right. Forgiving the Dark King? Forgiving the Summer King? Or letting me bring you justice, pain, and war, and everything you desire. We'd both be happy."

  Once she was out of sight, Gabriel asked, "You might have walked away from Irial, Gancanagh, but do you really want this lot influencing our court? Do you want to help her?"

  "I'm not getting involved. It's not my court." Niall sat beside the Hound. He wasn't sure, but it felt like one of his ribs had been cracked.

  Gabriel snorted. "It's yours as much as mine. You're just too much of an ass to admit it."

  "I'm not like you. I'm not out looking for fights or—"

  "You don't back down from them, though. 'Sides, Irial's not all about fighting either. That's why he keeps me around." The Hound grinned and gestured at the shattered windows and cracked bricks. "There's more to the Dark Court than violence. You bring out another sort of darkness. We both belong in the shadows."

  Niall ignored the implications of Gabriel's words. "I left the Summer Court. That's why Bananach was here— because I am solitary, fair game, prey."

  Gabriel clasped Niall's shoulder approvingly. "I knew you'd get it figured out eventually: you don't belong with them. You get a few more things figured out, you'll be all right."

  Then he lifted a broken brick and tossed it at a still-lit streetlight. As the glass shattered and clattered to the ground, Gabriel stood and started to walk away.

  "Gabe?"

  Gabriel's steps didn't slow or waver, but Niall knew the Hound was listening.

  "I'm not letting him keep Leslie. She deserves a life. Irial can't take hers like this."

  "You're still a slow learner, boy." Gabriel turned back. "She's part of the court now. Just like you. Been part of it since that first touch of ink went in her mortal flesh. Why do you think we're all called to be nearer her? I watched you try to resist it. Like draws to like. You're both Irial's, and with her being a mortal …"

  Niall froze.

  Gabriel gave him a pitying smile. "Don't beat yourself up over things that are out of your control … or worry so much after the girl. You of all faeries ought to know Iri's not going to give up on the ones he claims as his own. He's just as stubborn as you."

  Then the Hound was in his Mustang and vanishing into the darkened street, and for the third time in less than two days Niall was left with answers that did more to confuse him than ease his worries.

  Chapter 30

  Leslie rolled over, out of Irial's reach. Despite the vastness of the bed, she still felt too close to him. She'd meant to move several times already, to get up and leave. She didn't. She couldn't.

  "It'll get easier," he said gently. "It's just new. You'll be fine. I'll—"

  "I can't step away. I can't. I keep telling myself I'm going to go. But I don't." She wasn't angry even now, when her body ached. She should be, though. She knew that. "I feel like I'll throw up, like if I move too far from you …"

  He rolled her back over so she was being held in his arms again. "It. Will. Fade."

  She whispered, "I don't believe you."

  "We were starved. It's—"

  "Starved? We?" she asked.

  He told her what he was, what Niall was, what Aislinn and Keenan were. He told her they weren't human, not any of them.

  Seth was telling the truth. She'd known somehow, somewhere, but hearing it said again, hearing it confirmed was horrible. I am angry. I am afraid. I am … She wasn't, though, not any of those things.

  Irial kept talking. He told her that there were courts and that his—the Dark Court—lived on emotions. He told her that through her he would nourish them, that she was their salvation, that she was his salvation. He told her things that should terrify her, and every time she felt close to afraid or angry he drank it away.

  "So you're what in this faery court?"

  "In charge. Just as Aislinn and Keenan are for the Summer Court." There was no arrogance in his statement. In fact, he sounded weary.

  "Am I" — she felt foolish, but she wanted to know, had to ask—"human still?"

  He nodded.

  "So, what does this mean? What am I then?"

  "Mine." He kissed her to emphasize his point and then repeated, "Mine. You are mine."

  "Which means what?"

  He looked perplexed by that one. "That whatever you want is yours?"

  "What if I want to leave? To see Niall?"

  "I doubt that he'll be coming to see us, but you can go to him if you want." Irial rolled on top of her again as he said it. "As soon as you're able, you can walk out the door anytime you please. We'll look after you, keep you prote
cted, but you can always leave when you want to and are able to."

  But she didn't. She didn't want to, and she wasn't able. He wasn't lying: she believed that, tasted it, felt it in his words, but she also knew that whatever he'd done to her made her not want to be anywhere other than with him. For a brief moment, she felt terror at that realization, but it fled, replaced by a craving that made her sink her fingernails into Irial's skin and pull him closer—again and again, and still she was nearly shaking with need.

  When Gabriel walked in, Leslie was dressed. She wasn't sure how the clothes had ended up on her, but it didn't matter. She was sitting up and covered. There was an apple in her hand.

  "Remember to eat now." Irial stroked her hair back from her face, gentle like his voice.

  She nodded. There were words she was to say, but they were gone before she could remember what they were.

  "Troubles?" Irial asked Gabriel. Somehow Irial was at a desk far away from her.

  She searched for the apple she'd been holding. It was gone. She looked down: her clothes were different. She had on a robe; red flowers and swirling blue lines covered it. She tried to follow them with her finger, tracing the pattern.

  "The car's here." Gabriel had her hand and was helping her to her feet.

  Her skirt became tangled around her ankles.

  She stumbled forward and was folded into Irial's arms as they went into the club. The glare of lights made her hide her face against his shirt.

  "You're doing fine," he told her as he combed out her hair, stroking his fingers through it, untangling it.

  "It's been a long day," she murmured as she swayed under his caresses. She closed her eyes and asked, "The second day will be better, right?"

  "It's been a week, love." He pulled the covers up over her. "You're doing much better already."

  She listened to them laugh, the strange people—faeries— with Gabriel. They told her stories, amused her while Irial talked to a faery with raven feathers for hair. She was lovely, the raven-woman, Bananach. They all were. Leslie stopped staring at Bananach, trying to focus instead on the Vilas that danced with whichever of the Hounds beckoned, swaying through the shadows in the rooms like they felt the touch of shadows as Leslie did—like teasing hands, promising bliss that was too intense to allow for speech.

  "Dance with me, Iri." Leslie stood and, ignoring the Hounds, went over to where Bananach was talking to Irial. It occurred to Leslie that this was a repetition of a tableau she could remember from other days: Bananach was around too often, taking Irial's time and attention. Leslie didn't like it.

  "Move," she told the raven-woman.

  Irial laughed as Bananach tried to raise a hand, only to have it forced down by Gabriel and another Hound who both grabbed at her.

  Irial said, "Bananach was just explaining why you aren't of any use to us."

  Leslie felt the shivering in the tendrils that tied her to Irial, and she knew with perfect clarity in that moment that he had tamped down on their connection so she could have a few extra moments of lucidity. He did that.

  "And what use am I, Irial? Did you tell her?" she asked.

  "I did." Irial was standing now, hand outstretched, palm up.

  Leslie put her hand in his and stepped closer.

  Beside Irial, Bananach had gone still. She tilted her head at an angle that made her look far less human than the other faeries. Her eyes—which were similar enough to Irial's that Leslie paused—narrowed, but she did not speak. She does not speak to me. Leslie remembered that from other nights: Bananach refusing to address "the pet."

  Leslie glanced at Gabriel, who stood waiting, and then around the club. They were all waiting. For me. For food. She thought she should feel frightened, maybe angry, but all she felt was bored. "Can you keep a leash on her while I relax?"

  Gabriel didn't look to Irial for the Dark King's accord. He smiled. "It would be my pleasure."

  Leslie knew that almost everyone in the club was watching her, but she suspected they'd seen her in far more mortifying circumstances. She slid her hands up Irial's chest, over his collarbone, and down his arms—feeling the tension in him that was utterly absent from his posture and expression. She tilted her head up and waited until he looked down. Then she whispered, "Am I just for using up, then?"

  She knew it, knew that the ink under her skin was intended to let him—let them—do just that. She knew that the bone-melting bliss she felt each time he funneled the storms of emotion through her, forcing a tidal wave through a straw, was a trick to keep her insensible to the clarity that she had grasped again in that moment—and she realized that she'd had similar moments of clarity other nights and forgotten each time when the rush hit.

  "Am I?" she repeated.

  He leaned closer still, until she could feel his lips on her neck. There was no sound, only movement, when he said it. "No."

  But she was willing to be: they both knew that as well. She thought about the life she'd had before—druggies in her home, drunken or missing father, bills to pay, hours waitressing, lying friends. What's to miss? She didn't want to return to pain, to worry, to fear, to any of that. She wanted euphoria. She wanted to feel her body go liquid in his arms. She wanted to feel the mad crescendo of pleasure that hit her with enough force to make her black out.

  He pulled away to look at her.

  She twined her arms around his neck and walked forward, forcing him to walk backward as she did so. "Later I'm going to be too blissed out to keep my hands off you. …" She shivered against him at the thought, at the admission here in public of what she was going to be like, not sure if admitting the desire was worse or better than telling herself some pretty lie to allay the blame. "This is fun, though. Being here. Being with you. I'd like to start remembering more of the fun stuff. Can we do that? Let me remember more of the good times with you? Let me have more of this?"

  The tension fled then. He looked beyond her and gestured. Music filled the room; bass rumbled so heavily, it felt like it was inside her. And they danced and laughed, and for a few hours the world felt right. The disdainful and adoring looks on the faces of the mortals and faeries didn't matter. There was only Irial, only pleasure. But the longer she was clearheaded, the more she also remembered things that were awful. She didn't feel the emotions, but the memories came into sharper focus. There, in Irial's arms, she realized that she had the power to destroy every person who'd given her nightmares. Irial would do that: he'd find out who they were, and he'd bring them to her. It was a cold, clear understanding.

  But she didn't want it, didn't want to truly destroy anyone. She just wanted to forget them again—even knowing she should feel pain was more than she wanted. "Irial? Feed them. Now."

  She stopped moving and waited for it, the flash of emotions ripping through her body.

  "Gabe," was all he said. And it was enough to start a melee. Bananach shrieked; Gabriel growled. Mortals screamed and moaned in pleasures and horrors. Cacophony rose around them like a familiar lullaby.

  Irial didn't let her turn around. He didn't let her see anything or anyone.

  Stars flashed to life in some too-close distance. They burned her up for a few brief heartbeats, but in their wake they pulled a wave of ecstasy that made her eyes close. Every particle of her body cried out, and she remembered nothing—knew nothing—but felt only the pleasure of Irial's skin against hers.

  Chapter 31

  Snatches of time were nothing but blurs and blank spaces, but the lucid periods were becoming more frequent. How long has it been? Her tattoo had been healed for a while. Her hair was longer. Often she could feel Irial close the connection, stopping the pull of emotions that slithered along the black vine that hovered between them. On those days almost everything was in order, sequential. So much of the time was a long blur, though. Weeks?

  She hadn't left his side yet. How long? How long have I… Today she would. Today she would prove she could. She knew she'd tried—and failed—to do this more times than she could guess.
There were bits of memories jumbled together. Life was like that now: just montages of images and sensations, and through it all there was Irial. He was constant. Even as she moved, she heard him in the other room. Always at my reach. That was dangerous too. The raven-woman wanted to change that, take Irial away.

  Leslie slipped into one of the countless outfits he'd ordered for her, a long dress that clung and swirled when she moved. Like everything he bought, it was of material that felt almost too sensuous as she slipped into it. Without a word, she opened the door to the second room.

  He didn't speak; he just watched her.

  She opened the door to the hallway. Faeries followed her—invisible to any other human in the hotel, but she saw them. He'd given her the Sight with some strange oil he'd rubbed on her eyelids. Lanky creatures with tiny thorns all over their skin were silent, respectful even, as they followed her. Had she been able to, she'd have been terrified, but she was nothing but a conduit for emotions. The walls didn't keep her safe from them. Every fear, every longing, every dark thing those passing mortals and faeries felt flowed through her body until she couldn't focus. Only Irial's touch kept her from madness, calmed her.

  The elevator door slid shut, closing the watching faeries out, taking her to the lobby of the hotel. Others would be there, waiting for her.

  A glaistig nodded as she stepped out of the elevator. The glaistig's hooves clattered as she strode across the expanse of the room. Leslie's own footsteps weren't much quieter; Irial had bought her only ridiculously expensive shoes and boots with heels.

  "… the car brought around?" The doorman was speaking, but Leslie hadn't noticed. "Miss? Do you need your driver?"

  She stared at him, feeling the flood of fear in him, feeling Irial several floors above her tasting that fear through her. It was like that, endless blurs of nothing but feeling emotions slither through her body to Irial. He said he was stronger. He said they were doing well. He said the court was healing.