by Conn, Claudy
“And how do I do that?”
“Let go …”
“No—at least not until I get to Danté.” I shifted back to the palace and the chamber that held Danté and Morrigu.
I arrived in time to hear Danté say seductively, “There are better ways, Morrigu, to accomplish what—”
His lips were near her ear, his hands were on her upper arms, and her naked breasts were pressed against his naked middle.
I wanted to throw something at him, but all I had was my death sword. I looked around, grabbed a vase, and flung it with accuracy. It popped him one good one on the forehead, and Morrigu jumped away!
“Having a nice time?” I asked him sweetly.
He rubbed his forehead and frowned as he strode towards me.
“Creep!” was the only word that came to mind and mouth, and I spat it out just before I shifted back to the TV chamber of the Dark King’s retreat.
~ Three ~
“WELL THAT WAS quite unseemly,” remarked Rolo, his tone obviously meant to display his disapproval.
“You think?” I was in a rage again, no logic to it. Logic was out the window, emotions were at war with each other and me, and Rolo’s attitude wasn’t helping.
“I do think, Daoine, that you are given to extreme emotions.” Rolo sighed. “Emotions are things you must set aside. I should also like to point out to you that you have left Danté in a precarious situation. He obviously followed you into the pit and might be as stuck in the Dark Realm as we are at the moment, if I know my Dark King.”
I didn’t have time to contemplate that suggestion as one of the huge monitors had a very lifelike and 3-D image of Danté just outside the Dark King’s glass structure. Evidently he had followed my scent here, but just outside was as far as he could get.
He was frowning as though he couldn’t quite see the retreat. He was shouting my name and obviously distraught.
I smiled to myself, but I did think it odd that the Dark King’s ‘place’ wasn’t inviting him in as it had me. I shrugged and decided to let him stew for a few moments out there. And then it happened.
I felt myself enveloped in a cloud of what felt like feathers. For a moment it was suffocating, and I gasped as the house’s robot voice said, “Relax, Daoine … we must make a journey.”
My first thought was, Danté. He’s still out there. He was outnumbered in the Dark Realm by those giant snake things, and I needed to keep him safe so I could kill him. He was here stuck in this awful place because of me, and now the Dark King’s house was playing games and sending me off willy nilly—God only knew where!
* * *
What does a male feel when he looks up, and there is his beloved, the one he came in search of, the one that makes him feel alive, the one—and not only is he in a room alone with a naked woman, but that naked woman is going off on his leg?
Aye, sick, is how I felt. It is no wonder I was thrown into a state of confusion. What does a male—Fae, human, any male—say? It is not what it looks like? Right—how was I to make her believe that?
After I fisted my hands in the air and regained control of a temper fueled by irritation and helplessness, I gave the situation some thought.
Here, to this barren land, was where I had tracked my Z, twice. Here was where the scent vanished. There was an answer, and it was all at once quite obvious. She had found the entrance to the Dark King’s mysterious retreat, a retreat he had built for his human mate. A retreat he, obviously at this moment, did not wish me to see, or enter.
I opened my Royal senses and demanded entrée. I caught a momentary glimpse of a structure made up of angled glass shafts of humongous proportions, and then it was gone.
I called for its return and for the next few moments was stuck in a back-and-forth battle for control of the situation as it appeared and disappeared right before my eyes. Damned annoying. For some reason, the Dark King didn’t want me following Z inside. There was an upside to the problem: at least the Dark King didn’t want me dead.
We, all Seelie Fae, have notions of what the Dark King is capable of, and we all know he is above our normal Fae (even Royal) mode of thought. My queen has said that he has evolved beyond comprehension …
Who knew what he thought reasonable or evil? Who knew to what lengths he would go to achieve whatever he fancied?
What to do? And then—all at once I realized that two more of the anaconda Dark Fae had slithered up too close and too personal. I had my hands full for the next few moments, as no sooner did I take the two giant snakes down but three more entered the scene. They seemed to be coming up out of the gray clay earth at my feet, and they were hungry!
Time to shift, and when I landed on terra firma it was in the middle of a gray, dimly lit, cobblestoned avenue teaming with Dark Fae of all different castes, sizes, and abilities. I am a Royal and thus have the power of shapeshifting. As much as it repulsed me to do so, I took on one of the gruesome appearances in front of me and mingled for the moment. While I waited for the Dark King to release my Z to me, the least I could do was a little spying …
* * *
“Radzia …” my father’s voice called me. No. This was an illusion. It couldn’t be real. My dad stood with his black hair loose and blowing in the wind at the MacDaun Dolmens, where he had been slaughtered. He whispered something to me about the death sword and the prophecy. And then he called my mother’s name.
And then I saw that we had been taken back in time to the moment when he actually realized something was coming at him. His Druid senses had picked up on the change in the atmosphere, and he knew he was about to die. He sensed it all, and his last words were, “I love you both …”
I felt my heart breaking all over again as I watched Gaiscioch, in his invisible state, step out of the dolmens. Obviously, he had found a way to come through the portal, if only for a little while. Obviously …
My dad couldn’t see him, standing there grinning like a mad, wicked bastard, but floating in time, helpless to change it, I could. My dad was about to be cut down by a murderer he couldn’t see.
I was but a ghost in this scene, but I jumped in and stood between my father and Gaiscioch, my sword pointed at Gais’s abdomen. This was my dream … my rules … and I had to make a push to save my father. “Want a target, Gaisy boy? Come on then—here I am. You have no qualms about engaging a female, do you? No, of course you don’t. You don’t have any qualms at all, and even for a Fae, fewer ethics. What can a female Fae—half human at that—do to you?” I made a small circle with my sword in front of his face, and I could see that he was, if not anxious, concerned as he studied me.
He backed up a half step, and I sliced my sword as I jumped forward. I beamed with so much satisfaction to see his head go flying in the air and land on the grassy plain …
I heard my father’s voice say my name one last time, and then he was gone. The scene was gone, and I knew it had been an illusion, taken from my head, my dreams, my hopes and nightmares.
“Why?” I demanded.
“You need to know exactly how your father was killed. You need to know what you have inside you and how to face and destroy Gaiscioch, Daoine Princess.”
“It was only a dream … nothing more,” I snapped back.
“Your dreams until now are the true illusions. What you were just shown was a truth. It will show you the way.” Crystal’s holograph warned me softly, “You need to face your insecurities and ‘feel’ what you can and must do. I am limited in what information I can provide for you.”
“Limited by what?” I demanded.
“By the laws of destiny,” she said sadly.
“I have to get to Danté.” I don’t know why that spilled from my lips. I didn’t want to look at Danté, or think of Danté, or …
“Even though you believe he has been unfaithful to you?” Crystal’s lovely eyebrow was raised questioningly.
“No, he wasn’t,” I snapped.
“Wasn’t he?”
“No—maybe … I
don’t know.”
“Good, then you should find out,” she said, looking right into my eyes. How does she do that? I wondered. She was a holograph, but she felt so real.
“I mean to,” I said, and there it was, the truth smacking me in the face. I still believed in Danté, in spite of what I had seen with my own eyes. I took a fraction of a moment and reviewed the scene, as sickening as it was to me, and something stood out profoundly. It was the memory of his hands, which had not been precisely holding her but, rather, pushing at her shoulders …?
Nevertheless, he should not have been in that situation. He should not have allowed the naked Morrigu to come that close. He should not have, period!
“You mean to? Then find him and together find a way home. He thinks he can take you home, but my king has removed that particular skill and ability from him. It will be your job to get you both out of the Dark Realm and back where you belong. Z, you were meant to fulfill the prophecy or die. You must remember that.”
And once again, as before, Crystal vanished, but this time I wasn’t left to my own devices—oh no, never that easy. This time I felt as though tentacles of velvet had picked me up and wrapped me in a cocoon. A dark, wet mist swirled all around me, and I felt not the slightest bit of fear, although I was pretty sure I didn’t like it one bit. I will never like being tossed about at someone else’s will.
It seemed an age as I traveled in the mist through space, and I knew I was traveling. How I knew this is a mystery to me; I just did. There was no sensation of movement of any kind, yet I knew. I didn’t expect to be spat out at my destination, but that was precisely what happened, and I landed with a thump in another territory of the Dark Realm, velvet tentacles no longer gentle as they vanished.
How did I know I was still in the Dark Realm? Easy—Dark Unseelie creepy crawlies were all around me. I mean, everywhere. In and out of wooden shacks that looked like they belonged in the old west, side by side with structures made of limestone. I wondered where they got the materials. Had the Dark King built these structures when he built his retreat? What power for a single Royal! None of the buildings looked inviting.
The street was made of cobbled stones, and hordes of uglies were hurrying about as though they were off to work …
It was disorienting, but I had to think quickly as the mist surrounding and obscuring my presence was dissipating in slow degrees.
When I was with Aaibhe, Queen of the Seelie Fae, she had showed me how to shapeshift. All Fae can shapeshift to some degree, but a Royal can become an inanimate object. I chose to blend in with the wall at my back and in essence became part of that stone wall.
Whew—I did it, but let me tell you, it felt as though I had been wrapped in sandpaper, plus I couldn’t move, and for me, that is torture. However, I wasn’t about to complain; things could have been worse—not much, but some. If I’d had my druthers, a stone wall was not what I would have chosen to be.
I had to wonder why the Dark King or Crystal had decided that this was where I needed to be dumped. Were they testing me?
I was able to move slightly, undetected, when I took on an inanimate shape. Slow motion was the ticket. So I got into position so that I could view what was happening inside the building and discovered that it was oddly enough an Unseelie ‘nightclub’.
What I saw astonished me—I mean smacked me alongside my head and told me I must be nuts if I thought I saw what I thought I saw. Unseelies dancing!
Ugly—in the sense that it was almost impossible to watch without getting sick. Limbs all over the place, insect bodies nearly dividing in two as they bounced … ugh.
I suppose this was the Dark Fae’s version of a cool and lively bar. The music, however, wasn’t half bad. Fae, it seems, even Dark Fae, have music in their blood!
Somehow, they had discovered how to make alcohol, and I watched as it flowed freely. Different castes co-mingled, and I caught some of the words. They spoke in Ancient Danu, and I should have understood everything, but the dialect was way off …
I watched them bump and grind and noted the differences between the males and the females, and let me tell you, it was gross. They wore odd-looking clothing, like sacks over their lower bodies, and some of them … eek … were kissing each other in places where I couldn’t detect lips!
And then I heard two male and very large spidery things speaking just two feet in front of me. I caught the word portal and went into my Daoine mind to translate. They were talking about a portal being erected either in or near Dublin, and my heart stopped. I needed to hear every word.
However, another grotesque member of their little group sidled over and told them to ‘shut up’ as the walls could have ears.
That made me worry—could he know I was here, or was he speaking about some other faction? He couldn’t possibly know I was part of the wall—could he? Nah. Still, it made me nervous. I zeroed in on the dialect and found as I listened that I was beginning to pick up more and more of the words. And then the newcomer indicated with the thing he used as a chin for his partners to gaze across the room.
There stood one of the Royal Dark Fae princes, and he was the best looking of the four. Earlier I hadn’t the time to study each one, but as I did now I had to admit that he was drop-dead gorgeous. I realized that this one had more than looks going on; he had the visage of a Royal who was used to taking the lead.
He worried me—everything about him worried me.
I closed my eyes as the Dark Prince weaved his way through the heavy throng of disgusting creatures until he stood less than six inches away from me. He said, in a hard voice that was strangely at variance with his beautiful accent and the enticing tenor of the sound, “Damnation to bloody hell!”
I guessed he was angry about something, and I waited for more. It came.
“I could hear you three all the way across the room,” he spat at them. “There are castes here that must not know about the intricacies of Seelie Gaiscioch’s plans. I don’t want them lining up with him just now.”
“Yes, yes, my Prince,” said one of the beasts.
Ah, so he didn’t trust his own, I thought as I continued to hold my breath. Why? Who were these uglies gonna tell anything to? And then, as though he read my mind, he said, “Too many of the lower castes are finding ways to escape each day, and if they fall victim to one of the Seelie Fae looking for them they would very quickly give us away to save themselves.”
The group with him nodded in varying degrees of agreement, and one of them said his name. “Yes, Prince Pestale … you are right.”
“Of course I am right …” His voice trailed off as he turned and stared directly at the wall, which of course wasn’t a wall at all, because it was a Daoine princess … I. And what did I do? I felt my heart sink as I wondered what I should do next.
Shift, Rolo whispered in my head.
I wasn’t ready to leave, not if I could find out more about their plans. Did he have the power to see through my shapeshifting disguise?
I definitely saw something click in his black, glittering eyes … something before he shaded them with his thick, beautiful black lashes, but I also saw that his frown was one of dismissal. He hadn’t really seen me, although he had felt something ‘off’, and I supposed it might just be a matter of time before he detected my disguise—after all, he was a Royal.
* * *
“Gaiscioch … I need you … don’t you know how much I need you?” Morrigu clutched at me, and I wanted to drive my death sword through her brain and stop her lips from speaking.
I could see she was in a terrible state, babbling on and on about a Seelie Royal that had appeared out of nowhere to visit with her and then left abruptly. Her madness was getting worse.
I knew of course it had been Danté on the prowl, and I also knew I was going to have to find a way to get Danté out of the Dark Realm before he discovered the portal I had been building so meticulously in the dungeon of the castle. I thought about killing Danté, but I knew a very grand obs
tacle stood against me. He was, after all, a Royal—and one of the best warriors that had ever protected the Seelie Realm.
What to do? The only way Danté would leave was when he had the little bitch Daoine princess in tow, and I had no idea where she had gotten off to.
I also didn’t want Danté to find my war chamber, where I had an array of maps of Ireland and Scotland neatly laid out and very visible.
“Where did he go?” I shouted at Morrigu, hoping to frighten her into clear-headed speech.
“I don’t know, my darling. He came …” She eyed me mischievously. “I … introduced myself and … well it all happened so fast. I was … er … talking to him when all at once this Daoine appeared, a princess—Gais, she was in a rage. She threw my vase at him and then immediately vanished. It was most upsetting—Gais … I need you.”
“Get some clothes on, Morrigu, and get some control over yourself. You need to regain some of who you were when I first got here. You used to be so much more … lucid.”
“I swear … I am telling you the truth.”
I pulled at my lower lip as I thought the matter out. Danté had more than a passing interest in the Daoine princess. She was more than a mission to him. I came to the conclusion that the two were lovers. That would explain the little bitch’s anger when she found Danté with Morrigu.
I felt an unaccustomed chuckle ripple through me as I was struck by the picture this must have presented to the little bitch. However, my amusement was short-lived as I remembered that they were both loose in what I had come to think of as my kingdom. I would have to enlist the help of the four Dark Royals if I was going to ensnare the two. I sighed, not really concerned—after all, where could they hide?
Musing over this to myself, I thought of the proud Danté and his little half-breed. Daoine blood or no, that was what she was …
Right, so there we were, and the cold-blooded, logical Danté had finally met his ‘coup de gras’ with this child—for she was little more than that. How dare she stand up to me? Who by Danu did she think she was to stand up to me?
