by S. J. West
“Stay close to Malcolm and Will,” Brand told me. “I need to go get Izzi.”
“Where did you put her?”
“Somewhere safe back home, I won’t be long,” he gave me a kiss and disappeared.
We all walked into Malcolm’s house together. When we were about to head down to his basement, I saw Brand walk through the front door with the small iron box in his hands. Once we were in the basement, I saw where Malcolm’s son, spent most of his nights. It was a 20x20 room. Malcolm hadn’t exaggerated one bit. The room was completely devoid of windows or any other openings except for the front door. When we stepped across the threshold, I noticed the walls must have been made of at least ten inches of steel.
After we were all inside the room and the door was secured, Brand opened the box and dumped its contents onto the floor laying the box down beside the bee in front of us. We were all in a semi-circle around the yellow jacket which lay motionless on the steel floor before us.
“Is she dead?” I asked not seeing any movement from the bee.
“No,” Malik answered. “She just needs some time to recover from being in the iron box for so long.”
I’m not sure how long we stood there but it couldn’t have been more than five minutes. Finally, I saw the transparent wings begin to flutter. Then suddenly, the bee was in the air buzzing from wall to wall desperately trying to find a way to escape.
“It’s no use, Izzi,” Malik told her. “It would be better for you to just change shape and answer our questions. Otherwise, this might go a lot less smoothly for you.”
After a couple of more minutes, I guess Izzi realized there was no escaping her fate and changed back into the form I was more used to. She stood tall and proud wearing absolutely nothing.
“What are you going to do to me?” Izzi asked Malik lifting her chin a little in defiance.
“You know the punishment for attempting to murder someone,” he said to her. His words frightened her but she refused to let it show for more than a second. “But if you answer our questions, I would consider sending you into private exile. Otherwise, I’ll send you to the others, and I think you know what that would mean.”
“What do you want to know?” Izzi kept her eyes locked on Malik as if none of the rest of us were in the room.
“I think I’ll let Lilly ask you herself.”
Izzi finally let her gaze fall on me. Her eyes raked me up and down with complete and total undisguised hatred.
“Why did you try to kill me?” I asked.
“I was bribed,” she answered with a shrug, as if my death meant nothing in the grand scheme of things.
“By who?” I asked. “And why did they want me dead?”
“How should I know why he wanted you out of the way? It’s not like I really cared about the reason.”
I heard a growl come from beside me and saw Brand grip Malcolm’s arm restraining him from taking another step toward Izzi.
“Wait,” Brand said, though I could tell by his expression that he had to exert a lot of control on his own emotional response to Izzi’s words.
“Then who was it? And what did you have to gain by my death?” I asked.
Izzi looked at Malik. “If I tell you the answers, do you promise not to send me to them?”
“You have my word,” Malik said. “If you tell us the truth,” he amended.
“It was Faust. He’s the one who wanted me to kill Lilly. He said if I did he’d arrange for Malik’s death so I could become the leader of the fairies. Since you don’t have an heir yet, I would be next in line.”
Malik looked to Brand. “It sounds true. Is it?”
Brand nodded his head once. “But she’s holding something back. There was more to the bargain.”
“What was the rest of the deal?” Malik demanded.
Izzi looked at Brand. “He said he could make you fall in love with me. Though, that was just a perk, not my main reason for helping him.”
“He doesn’t have that type of power,” Brand told her. “You should know that.”
Izzi shrugged her shoulders. “I figured as much. But I didn’t think it would hurt to try. If you can fall in love with such an ordinary human, I thought he could at least steer you in my direction and make you finally notice me for once. I mean seriously, Brand. You could do so much better.”
Before I knew it, Brand was holding Izzi up by the neck against the wall. She was desperately trying to pry his fingers away from her throat, unable to even gasp for breath.
“It’s only because of Lilly you’re even still alive,” he hissed at her. “Don’t ever disrespect her in front of me again. As it is, I’m having a hard time restraining myself from just snapping you in two for trying to take her away from me.”
I wasn’t sure what to do. I’d never seen Brand so upset before. The fierceness of his anger actually shocked me. It was a side of him I had never had to deal with.
As quickly as he snatched her up, he let her go and returned to my side. I could hear his ragged breathing as he attempted to get his raw emotions under control. I put a hand on his arm and felt him relax slightly under my touch.
“Where is Faust now?” Malik asked Izzi as she tried to take in a few breaths. I was sure Brand had been close to breaking her neck. I could only imagine how sore her throat felt. I could see the red outline of Brand’s handprint around her neck.
“I don’t know,” she whispered. “He contacted me. Not the other way around.”
“And you have no idea why he wanted you to murder Lilly for him?”
“No.”
Izzi leaned against the wall trying to breathe normally even though it sounded more like wheezing.
“She’s telling the truth,” Brand said in a disgusted tone. I wasn’t sure if he was repulsed by Izzi or himself. I assumed it was probably a little of both.
“Very well,” Malik said. “Transform Izzi and get back into the box.”
“You’re not going to put me with the others are you?” She asked in a hoarse voice but I could still hear her fear.
“No, I’ll do what I said. You have my word.”
Without protest or another word to anyone, Izzi transformed back into the yellow jacket and flew back into the iron box sitting on the floor.
Malik closed the lid and held it securely in his hand.
“Is the plane ready?” He asked Brand.
“Yes, it’s waiting for you at the airport. Just give the coordinates to the pilot when you get there.”
“I’ll take you to the airport,” Will offered.
“I’ll be back as soon as I can,” Malik said to us before he and Will disappeared.
I turned to Brand, concerned about him. He tried to smile at me to show he was all right, but I could see the anger he was attempting to contain.
“Take me home,” I said to him, though it sounded more like an order than a request.
He took my hand and we were standing in his living room before I knew it.
“Come here.” I pulled him to me hoping to erase the rage our conversation with Izzi had awakened in him.
“I’m sorry you had to see me like that,” he whispered.
“Don’t apologize,” I told him. I pulled away from him and looked into his eyes. He was trying so hard to control the anger he felt but his eyes could never lie to me. “It was a natural reaction. If the tables had been turned, I probably wouldn’t have had the strength to control myself the way you did.”
Brand closed his eyes and hung his head. “I’ve never felt that close to killing someone before,” he confessed. “If you hadn’t been there, I’m not sure what would have happened.”
“You wouldn’t have done it,” I told him. “That’s not you.”
“But it could have been, Lilly,” he said opening his eyes looking at me for understanding. “She almost killed you.”
“But she didn’t,” I tried to reassure him. “I’m right here, with you.”
I’m not sure if it was the reminder of my mo
rtality or just a need to erase the anger he felt, but when Brand kissed me, I felt his desperation. I matched it with my own. I could still hear Izzi’s words about me being an ‘ordinary human’ and how Brand could ‘do so much better.’ Her words mirrored the thoughts I’d been having lately. But I didn’t want to think about that. I wanted to enjoy the feeling of being completely adored by the man kissing me even if I was just ordinary and didn’t really deserve to have him love me so completely.
Before I knew it we were laying in bed. I felt Brand reach under my shirt brushing his warms hands against the bare skin at my back. His lips left mine. I heard him whisper, “I love you” in my ear before he kissed his way down my neck to the little bit of chest revealed by my v-neck T-shirt. He pushed the bottom of my shirt up to reveal my stomach and continued his assault there, exciting every nerve in my body.
“Brand,” I whispered, “I don’t want to wait.”
He looked up at me and I could see the hunger he had in his eyes for me, but there was something else there I couldn’t quite identify.
He pulled my shirt back down and stood up from the bed.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, not understanding why he was leaving.
“Nothing’s wrong,” he said, standing a couple of feet away looking at me like he was afraid to come any closer.
“Oh,” I said, assuming I had completely misread his desire for me. “If you don’t want to…” I couldn’t continue what I was going to say. It was just too embarrassing. I tried to look away but I felt Brand’s hand under my chin as he sat down beside me on the bed forcing me to look at him.
“How can you even think that?” he asked dropping his hand from my chin. “I think I’ve made it pretty clear how much I want you.”
“But why did you stop?”
“You’re going to think I’m being completely paranoid.” He ran an agitated hand through is hair, like he wasn’t sure how to say what was on his mind. “But, it’s important to me that we do everything right. I don’t want to give Him any excuses to not bless our marriage.”
“Who? God?”
Brand nodded. “I truly think He brought us together, and I want to do everything right this time. Can you understand that?”
Actually I could. I always imagined my wedding night to be this one perfect moment in time with the man I finally gave my heart to. I knew without a shadow of a doubt Brand would do his best to make it even more beautiful for me than I could have ever dreamt it to be. To know he was willing to put aside his own desires in order to provide us with the best chance of a happy life together made my doubts about his true feelings for me lessen.
“Well, I guess I’ll just have to plan on a lot of cold showers over the next few years,” I tried to joke, feeling a need to lighten the mood.
“Or we could try to not take things as far,” Brand suggested, but I could tell he was as resistant to that idea as I was.
“I think I’d rather just take cold showers,” I told him pulling him back down on the bed so we could continue where we left off.
Chapter 9
When I went to take a shower, Brand went downstairs to start preparing lunch. Fearing for my safety, he kept phasing into the bathroom asking, “Lilly, are you all right?”
I would simply reply, “I’m fine” from behind the shower curtain. I think I did that at least ten times before I had enough of it and stepped out of my shower early. I toweled off quickly and put some clothes on before he had another chance to pop in on me and check on my welfare. I understood his worry and wished there was some way I could at least remove that burden from him. There was really only one way to do that, learn to phase by myself.
If I could do that one simple thing, Brand wouldn’t feel like he had to be with me every minute of the day to keep me out of harms way. Not that I minded his company, I loved it, but doing little things like taking a shower alone without having to worry about someone seeing me in a compromising position would be comforting.
By the time I made it down stairs, Brand was setting the table for lunch. He’d made poached salmon with an apple-tomato chutney. I discreetly scrapped the tomatoes off hoping he wouldn’t notice.
“You don’t like tomatoes?” He asked.
“No, I don’t,” I confessed, “which is really weird because I like tomato sauce like in spaghetti sauce or sauce on a pizza. I’m sorry I can’t eat this. It looks really pretty and like something most people would love.”
“Don’t feel like you owe me an apology, Lilly. The more I learn about what you like and don’t like the better. I want to know everything there is to know about you.”
I couldn’t help but smile at his heart felt statement.
“So tell me,” I said continuing to eat the salmon, “who is Faust and why would he want to kill me?”
“Faust is a jinn.”
“What’s that?”
“You’ve heard of genies right?”
“Like the one in the Alladin story?”
“Yes, that’s basically a jinn. God made them after he made angels but before he made humans. When Lucifer rebelled, they joined his side and were banished down here with the rest of them. They all adopted a particular human form but they can also travel undetected as shadows. Sometimes they like to scare humans so they let them see their shadow forms. Humans who have seen the jinn call them shadow people.”
“Do they really grant wishes?”
“In a way,” Brand sat back in his seat idly flaking off pieces of his salmon with his fork. “They’re able to grant two wishes to whomever they trick into making them.”
“Why would they have to trick someone? I would think most people would jump at the chance to wish for whatever they wanted.”
“A jinn’s services aren’t free. Most people lose more than they gain in the end.”
“Why only two wishes?”
“People usually use the first wish on something small like wishing for a car or something physical that proves the jinn can do what he says. After their fooled into thinking they can get whatever they want for nothing, they wish for something bigger like wealth or fame, then the jinn has them trapped.”
“What do you mean?”
“In order to keep what they’ve wished for, they have to provide the jinn with a comfortable life. If the jinn ever leaves them, they lose everything, even more than what they lost to make their wishes come true.”
“Why doesn’t the jinn just wish for things for himself?”
“It doesn’t work that way. They can’t grant their own wishes, only the wishes of others.”
“So do they really live in oil lamps?”
“Not exactly.” Brand smiled at me like he found my naïveté endearing. “Their spirits are bound to certain objects. It’s different for each jinn. Faust’s is bound to a double sided coin. It’s how he fools people into becoming his patron. He strikes up a conversation with someone and tricks them into playing a game with the coin. Once the person touches it, their locked into a game they’ll never win.”
“So what do the people lose to get what they wish for?”
“Family and friends, everyone who ever truly cared for or loved them. They lose their old lives completely to gain the new life they wish for.”
“Is that why they only get two wishes? So they can’t use a third one to unwish what they asked for?”
“That’s how it usually works. Some people use the first wish more wisely and can use the second one to undo what their first wish did, but most people don’t.”
“So why would this Faust want to kill me?”
“I’m not sure,” Brand leaned his elbows on the table pushing his plate away completely uninterested in his lunch now. “But it might explain who’s been responsible for the accidents Will’s been saving you from.”
“What do you mean?”
“Someone could have been using a jinn’s power to kill you. It makes sense. All of the accidents were planned ahead of time and a jinn would have had the power to put al
l of the accidents you’ve escaped from into motion. They’re able to see into the future a small bit in order to make things which need to happen occur at specific points in time. They can set the events into motion but since Will knew when to pull you out of harms way, you were never where you were supposed to be to have them affect you.”
“So how do we find this Faust?”
“I’m not sure yet. But we’ll find a way,” he reassured me. “We also need to find your grandparents. I know a private investigator in New York. I’ll call him today and get him on the case. Hopefully it won’t take him long to locate them.”
“I never thought I’d ever get the chance to meet my mother’s parents,” I admitted, pushing my own plate of half eaten salmon away, having lost my appetite. “My mom was always so insistent about not having them in our lives; I’d just given up hope of ever knowing who they were.”
“You do want to meet them, don’t you?”
“Yes,” I said hesitantly. “I’m just not sure if they want to meet me.”
“I’m sure once they see you in person and all grown up, they’ll love you.”
“We’ll see I guess.” I didn’t realize until that moment how important it was for me to have my grandparents want to meet me as much as I had always wanted to meet them. The possibility of their rejection wasn’t something I had considered until now.
Brand stood from his chair and took my hand urging me to stand. It seemed like he always knew when I needed to be hugged.
“I’ll be with you when we meet them,” he said kissing my forehead. “Don’t look so worried, my love.”
I looked up into his warm grey eyes reminding me of his total and complete love for me and quickly forgot about my trepidations. I brought his lips down to mine wanting to lose myself in him.
“Good grief, is that all the two of you do?”
I broke off the kiss at the sound of Malcolm’s agitated voice. He, Will and Tara were standing only a couple of feet away from us.
I saw Tara prod Malcolm’s side with her elbow. “Quit picking on them. That’s what people do when they’re in love. Stop acting like a jealous fool.”
