The Toll

by Jeanette Lynn

  “Does missus need to leave?” Voice dropping so low it went beyond a whisper, leaning in close, he shook my wrist. “I can take missus away, to a safe place,” glancing over at Calder, he nodded, “the babe too.”

  “Oh, Brevin, you don’t-”

  “But I do.” Skinny chest puffing up, chin lifting stubbornly, he insisted, “It’s not safe here anymore, and I’ve seen fit to protect you.”

  “Aw, that’s sweet of you, but I can’t-”

  “It’s too late for him,” Brevin’s voice deepened, stern, and he scowled. “You need to think of the baby, Phedaenya.”

  Hand tightening on my wrist almost painfully, I went to shake him off.

  Eyes going wide, I sputtered, “Brevin?” Grimacing, I rubbed at the red marks on my forearm, my senses on high alert.

  Blinking back to his usual self, eyes huge and guileless once more, he called softly, “Yes, missus?”

  “What’s the meanin’ ‘o’ this?”

  We both jumped at the sound of Quaz’s voice.

  “Quaz, don’t bellow like that, you’ll scare the baby. Besides,” I gripped the boy’s shoulder, “Brevin’s back.”

  Storming across the room, Quaz hauled Brevin up by the neck, slamming him into the wall. “Bleedin’ little arseholes! When will ye learn, eh?! We dinna welcome that wench bearer, an’ we dinna need the meddlin’ likes of ye! What did I say last time, eh? Ye think ta trick me, slippin’ in like that? Think I wouldna notice?”

  “Quaz! NO!!” Shrieking and panicked, I gripped his shirt tight, dragging across the floor, heels dug in, as he shouted the roof down. “It’s Brevin, remember? Have you lost your mind?! Now let him go this instant, before you hurt him!”

  “This aint no boy! It’s trickery!”

  “He’s a boy, and he’s under my protection and care, and if you don’t let him go right now, so help me!”

  “Not a boy, see?” Drawing his fist back, he slammed it into the poor boy’s jaw, sending his little body reeling.

  “Quaz! Brevin!” I was just about to zap him good, rage building red hot, burning inside me that he would do such a thing, and that’s when I heard it.

  A deep, amused chuckle came from Brevin, brown eyes lighting deep grey as he cradled his jaw. Smirking as he swiped blood from his lips, my jaw dropped as he grunted, stood up from his slump, and grew, stretching, the visage of a little boy covered in dirt and timid smiles gone, melting. Bo, the Wind Elemental, soon stood in his place.

  Words wouldn’t come out as I moved my lips, half shielded by Quaz as he made to stand in front of me.

  Calder, throughout this whole ordeal, was still sleeping, grunting and rolling over as he shoved a blunt shaped thumb into his little mouth.

  Bo caught the action and grinned, tenderness filling his gaze. “Gersthart used to do that too.” Eyes flashing, his face softened in remembrance. “This one over here,” he hooked a thumb at Quaz, who was glaring at him, pissed, runes lit up a black blue as a deep snarl rumbled from his chest, “used to suck on his big toe.” Shaking his head, he chuckled, “Slept in a little ball, foot shoved in his big maw, like a little pudgy pill bug. Niniane said-”

  “I’m sure that’s lovely an’ all, but memory lane burned down a long time ago, an’ in case ye’ve forgotten, I woke up. I dinna give a shite anymore. So get yer meddlin’ ass outta here, now.”

  Side stepping Quaz to confront the great impersonator, I had to know. “Why?”

  “Why?” With a wink, wind swirled around the spry Elemental and Bavol stood in his place, pulling his hat off for a deep bow, twirling the wide brim with a flourish as the pouch at his side slid forward. “Why, to protect you, milady Nugget, why else?”

  “Protection?” Quaz snorted, arms folded over his beefy chest, while I tried not to faint on the spot. “Riiiggghht. An’ since when does the four corners ever ‘help’ anyone?”

  Never taking his eyes off of me, face sobering, Bo murmured, “Since now.” Grey eyes flashing with specks of cerulean and gold, he nodded at Calder. “It’s not safe for you, either of you.” Holding a hand out, fingers curling towards me, he purred, “Come with me and we’ll look after you.”

  “We?” I was already backing up, shaking my head slowly. I had no intention of going anywhere with him. Ever.

  Lips tugging down, he frowned, worry lines creasing his brows in consternation. “Then let me take the babe. Surely you can see that he’ll be much safer in our care.”

  “Never!”

  “No!”

  My voice came out louder than Quaz’s deep felt snarl, bringing Bo’s back up.

  “You won’t let me help you and you won’t leave.” Sputtering in frustration, Wind blurted, “Have you gone mad, woman? You’re surrounded by Ornthren, your bonded has forsaken the bond, and is, as we speak, going mad. What do you think will come of this that will somehow benefit you?!” He was bellowing now, shouting out at me, arms spread out wide, thrown up in the air. Wind was starting to swirl around the room, picking up the corners of blankets to flap them on the bed.

  Calder started to cry softly, letting out a little whimper and a hard chuff. Walking over, sure to keep an eye on Bo, I picked him up, angling his little body so his head rested on my shoulder. Fists gripping my shirt tight, my baby burrowed against my neck, little nose snuffling, letting out a grumbling sigh.

  “My son is an Ornthren,” my eyes shot to Bo’s, lips pursed, orange brows winging upward, face set, “we’re here and we’re staying here.” Head held high, chin raised, I murmured haughtily, a superior tilt to my lips, “Where we belong.” It felt good, as the words slipped past my lips, felt right.

  Realizing his mistake too late, Bo held his hands up in surrender. “I meant no offense, milady, you misunderstand.” He would have made his way across the room to me if Quaz’s warning growl hadn’t put him off. Giving Quaz a quick, dark look, he murmured softly, voice placating, almost pleading, “Phedaenya, you must see reason.” Deep gusts swirling again, whipping around him in a maelstrom of air and dust, he was back to his own self, Bavol gone, melted into the shadows, grey eyes dark and troubled. Long, silky looking onyx hair pulled back away from a handsome, angular face, high cheek bones flushed with frustration, warm air whipping around him angrily, he was a wind god personified.

  “I see reason,” Quaz hissed, “no reason at all not ta take ye outside an’ kick ye on yer trouble causin’ arse.”

  Teeth gritting, Wind gave Quaz a warning look. “This doesn’t concern you, Leith.”

  Leith? Was that his real name? My head bobbed back and forth, bouncing between the two. They spat at each other so fast, it was hard to keep up.

  Why does Bo wish me to go with him? What does he want from me, from us?

  “What is it you’re after, Elemental? Because I’ll tell you now, you’ll get nothing from me.”

  “I wish to protect you. You’re already in too deep. We only wish to help.”

  Eyes narrowing, chips of glowering blue glass, I asked outright, “Did the Lady put you up to this?” The idea already had my blood boiling. Did she never listen? Did Troll not tell her to quit interfering? She’s caused enough damage, hurt enough, and as far as I’m concerned, isn’t welcome. If he was helping her in any way...

  “I do not help Niniane,” he swore, shaking his head as his grey eyes flashed.

  Quaz was about to open his mouth to protest, but Wind silenced him with a look. “I do not help her anymore,” he corrected.

  My eyes met with dubious red ones set in a grim, grey face mirroring my own doubts.

  Noting this, Wind’s arms flapped to his sides. Clearing his throat, he ran a slender yet masculine hand, tipped with long fingers and short, blunt fingernails, through his hair in frustration. “I speak truth.” Tortured eyes, free of any veils or falsities—no games—slowly met each of ours, one by one, evenly. “She has caused enough damage. I’ve no desire to contribute to it.” At another look from Quaz, he grumbled, “Anymore.”

  “But you were f
ollowing me.” Skeptical of him and this whole farce, I couldn’t let it go. “You were Bavol, you led me to Magda’s camp. Magda said she was expecting me.” Shaking a finger at him, I spoke aloud while working it all out in my head.

  “I led you to the camp,” Bo agreed.

  “She was expecting me, said she was told I was coming. She waited for me.”

  “She was. She did.”

  “You told her, didn’t you?”

  “No. That was Niniane’s doing.”

  “Then you’re helping her!”

  “I didn’t help her, per se...”

  “Bah!” Poppy cock and horse crap! He led me there, knew what he was leading me to, then left me.

  “You abandoned me and left me to fend for myself. What if they’d kicked me out? I didn’t take the locket. No toll was paid, so Magda’s protection spell is worthless! Feel thwarted?” Triumph was mine as I smiled smugly.

  Quaz, slightly confused, gave me an inquisitive glance. “Locket?”

  “I don’t know.” Thinking about it, I shrugged. “It’s hard to recall now, now that I think on it.” It felt like a faint memory.

  Odd. I’d been so enthralled by it, under its spell, but there was no regret now, or even when Vidi had initially taken off with it. No extreme sense of loss. My supposed attachment to it should have proven otherwise. Come to think of it, I’d barely thought of the trinket. It was no more now than a mere afterthought.

  “It was very powerful, and shown with blue, like a light coming from inside, you know?” Bo knew, so I didn’t expect a reply, but the unblinking look on Quaz’s face had me taken aback. “Uhm, it was the Lady’s locket, I guess. That much, at least, I remember.”

  Choking on his own spit, Quaz’s eyes fairly bulged. “An’ ye dinna take it?”

  “No,” my nose scrunched up in distaste, “as much as I’d wanted to, something was pricking at me... holding me back. I don’t know... It just didn’t feel right.” Thinking on what Magda had planned for Vidi, I felt firm in my decision, proud I’d followed my gut on this one. “And I’m glad I didn’t.”

  “Much stronger than ye think, Nugget.” Grunting, an odd look on his face, Quaz added, “No Ornthren alive would turn down a powerful pretty like that.”

  “I’m no Ornthren.”

  “No. You’re not,” Bo interrupted, “and we’ll admit we were wrong in assuming Niniane’s plan would work.”

  “Ye bleedin’ arseholes all had a hand in it?!” Ketik marched into the room, eyes licking with inky black, fanning with pin pricks of royal purple.

  All eyes turned to him and he hunched down, as if pained, thick hands fisting and digging into the floor, a look of pure rage on his face. There were cuts and bruises all over him, even a few unhealed gashes along his ribs and sides, face swelling in various places. It looked like he’d gotten into a fight with a gang of wild animals.

  “Hope the Fates wipe ye all from the earth. Every last damned one of ye!” Ketik was pacing back and forth angrily, a slight limp to his predatory gate, glaring at anything and everything. “Should have known! Should’ve known!” Whirling on the Elemental, he bellowed, “Know what ye’ve done, tossin’ ‘em in the shit pot like ye did?!”

  “She meant well,” Bo muttered, rubbing a hand down his drawn face. It had drained of all color. “We never meant for any of this to happen, any of it. She only wanted... She only meant... I’m not sayin’ it was right, any of it, and I take my part in the blame-”

  “She only what?!!” Ketik roared. “That whore did enough birthin’ me. Shoulda drowned me as a babe!”

  Chest restricting, I clutched Calder to me tight. Would he feel that way about me someday? Would he hate me like that? Wish he was never born?

  NO! Never, I swore. He’d know his worth, and he’d love as much as he’s loved.

  Looking to me for understanding, Bo shouted, “I brought you to the Travellers, I did, but the locket was supposed to keep you connected, so the bond wouldn’t break! It was supposed to make you want to come back!” Closing his eyes, he sighed heavily before glancing at me once more. “I’d had no idea of the other Other’s existence. Vidi wasn’t taken into account, and I didn’t know of Niniane’s bargain with Magda, or, until after the fact, Magda’s with you. We can’t even detect her, either one of them, for that matter. Their origins are mixed, and that causes complications. Niniane, if she’d known, hadn’t bothered to tell us, or take it fully into account. We didn’t want anyone else to get hurt. I would have put a stop to it. We would have. We were just trying to make the best of a bad situation. We were trying to fix it!”

  “You and Zeme?” I asked slowly, eyeing him skeptically.

  “Wind, Earth, and Fire.” There was something off about the mention of Fire—a slight hesitation, barely perceptible, but still there. Was Phaestus a reluctant party in the bid to ‘help’?

  “Fix it?! Does this bloody well look fixed to you?! Does he? He’s gone mad! We had ta chain him up so he wouldna gouge his own eyes out, an’ ye call tha’ fixin’ it?! He tried ta tear off his runes, slashin’ at his skin, mumblin’ ‘bout takin’ it away! He bleedin’ blames himself, the stupid bastard, for everythin’,” he wouldn’t look at me, couldn’t meet me in the eye anymore, “an’ he kicked the sow on her ass ta free her. When we went ta find her, all three of ye were hidin’ her from us. Ye even pretended ta be that snivelin’ little pisser that wet his self tryin’ ta save her!”

  “Pretended?” I latched onto that. “If you were pretending to be Brevin, then where is he?”

  “Zeme has him,” Bo sighed tiredly, “he thinks she’s Adamina, and she’s convinced him it’s all a dream.” At the look on my face, he held up a hand. “As I’ve said, we didn’t want any more,” he hesitated and started over, but I was already distracted, only registering every other word, “we didn’t want any more humans being hurt. That was never our intention. We’d agreed to help Niniane at first, I won’t argue that. She’d just wanted to find a suitable match for Bektam, and when we found one in Phaestus’ mortal get, we thought it kismet. But things never go as they should, and none of it should have gone the way it- Are you alright?”

  There would be time to let that sink in later, and while I agreed Brevin shouldn’t be exposed to any of this, it was still disheartening. Above all that, though, Ketik’s words still pierced me. I felt struck. His next ones, for an entirely different reason, had me stopping dead in my tracks.

  “He loves her, ye stupid, feckin’...Would do anythin’ for her! Ye drove him ta this!”

  “I didn’t know they had some type of mixed Casters in their midst!” Wind argued. “I didn’t! Niniane never said, and for all I know, she may not have! Fae are backstabbing little creatures. Maybe she thought her trade was to smother a bad seed? Who am I to say or know? Those Fated bitches took our foresight, and ‘the well’ dried up eons ago! Other than our distinct elements, we’ve been stinted, shunned. Favor has long been out of our hand. The less man believes, the less we’re given, all that much more is taken. I could no better have guessed all this than one of those coin swindling hand readers! How were we to ‘see’?!”

  Chest heaving, lips pulled back, the fearsome Ornthren went toe to toe with the Elemental. “Mother dear has the ‘sight’,” he spat. “Coulda asked her, aye? Those three hags playin’ wit’ string never took it from her! If ye hadn’t have interfered, he coulda found her fat arse and dragged her back here months ago. They would be arguin’ an’ fuckin’, an’ whatever stupid shit they do when they think we canna hear them shoutin’ the roof down from the mist in Mid, an’ none of this would have happened!”

  My face reddened, flaming crimson, and I thought my cheeks might explode, they felt so hot. I’d thought we were in a dream realm then. Each time, had he been bringing me back here? Bringing me home? He’d said it’s real but it isn’t, some type of middle realm.

  “They took it from us,” Wind reiterated, gaze unwavering as he matched Ketik’s sneer, “from us.”

&nbs
p; “Oh? An’ Mum dearest dinna count now, eh?”

  “I don’t count her, but I think you’re wrong. I doubt she has the sight. It’s not like it used to be. It’s truly not like you think any-”

  “Ye expect me ta think a Water Elemental canna conjure up a bit ‘o’ spark an’ snap to see into a wee lass’ future? Pfft. Parlor trick fer yer lot. Dinna paint me stupid, windbag. Will be foolin’ me no more.” Arms crossing stubbornly over his chest, he muttered snidely, “So... what? Earth, Fire an’ Wind, no Water to put ye out? Ye’re just a band ‘o’ three now?”

  Face tightening, Bo hissed low, “Yes. Your bearer is no longer welcome in our circle. The line was drawn when-” His gaze darted to me and he stopped, clearing his throat roughly. “We drew the line.”

  “Hey!” My breath left me on a bellowing screech, a banshee incarnate. It had been building, coming to this.

  Ketik and Bo both jerked, swinging their gazes towards me.

  “Did he say it?”

  “Huh?” Ketik’s face was still an angry, snarling scowl, but confusion clouded his unfathomable gaze. “What are ye gettin’ on about now?”

  “Did he say it?” I took a step towards him. I needed to know. “Did he say he loved me?”

  “Ye stopped me from bleedin’ an Elemental ta ask if me blitherin’ eejit kin loves ye? Woman, are ye daft? ‘O’ course the fool loves ye! He’s been pissin’ daisies since yer chatterin’ ass came rollin’ in. Sap was stuck at the first.”

  I heartily begged to differ, but, what do I know of lovesick trolls? Enough to know they’re irrational when emotions are high, they’re insane, and they love to fuck... So, yep, nothing.

  Tossing an arm out, Ketik gave a dry, humorless laugh. Resentment filled his hardening gaze for a moment and he rumbled, “Everything he does, since even before he went an’ got himself leg shackled to ye an’ got the fuck over it, has been ‘bout ye. He’s an Ornthren, ye whinin’ cow. We dinna know softness, not when we come inta our own.” Thumping his chest, he growled low. “Can thank the Fates fer that one. Call it a must, call it the curse, or call it like it is—runes kick in ‘round puberty an’ ‘the sense’ ignites.”