Runaway Fae

by Runaway Fae

  The moon had been hidden behind clouds and now it shone dimly in the night. Shauna glanced around her. Water and more water. She couldn’t even locate the thing she had landed on after she came through the portal, but suspected that it was what had grabbed her ankles.

  She swam forward a short distance, waiting for her eyes to adjust more to the darkness. It had never been this dark in Faeland. Even at midnight, there was some light. Was this how the humans lived? It seemed depressing, and she began to wonder if it was a mistake to come.

  “Perhaps I just landed in a bad area,” she mused.

  Still, there was nothing to see. Where was the land? As she tread water, considering casting an illumination spell to shed more light on the area, a noise behind her caught her attention. She spun around to find a large ship bearing down on her. Waving her arms in the air, she began to yell out. “Help. Please help me.”

  When she spotted someone leaning over the side of the ship, a grin spread across her face. Praising the person’s perfect aim, she grabbed onto the floating device he threw down directly in front of her. She was hauled up to the deck, and slipped on the wet wooden surface as she brushed hair from her eyes. “Thank you. Thank you so much,” she muttered as she rung out her hair and tried to get her dress from clinging to her legs. Stupid of her not to have worn something better suited for travel. A laugh bubbled in her throat until she looked up to greet her rescuers.

  Creatures. Shauna screamed and very nearly threw herself back over the side of the ship, but one of them grabbed her arm to hold her in place. She looked ahead and behind the ship as far as she could see, but still there was nothing in the darkness.

  With trepidation, she examined the silent crew who were all staring at her. She remembered them, the tall slender beings with black skin. The Darklings. Large eyes, pointed ears. Here they were in various stages of dress. Some were naked; others were fully clothed or wore only a shirt or pants. None wore shoes.

  As she examined them, one created a ball of black and red fire in his hand, and he tossed it up and down, a tactic to scare her, she supposed. It was working big time. She pressed her body back against the side of the ship, wincing as the wooden side bit into her back. Her heart pounding, her throat dry, she chewed her bottom lip in anticipation of one or all of them attacking her to end her life.

  One of the Darklings, an older one she guessed by the deeper carvings in its leathery face, approached. “Look what we have here.” Its voice grated, like fingers on a chalkboard, pitched high and unexpected. “A pretty young Fae, lost in the darkness. And here we are, just in time to save her before she’s eaten by the creature that lives in the deep.”

  She frowned. Who was it calling creature? It needed to look in the mirror.

  “Such naughty thoughts,” another voice said, deeper, sexier.

  Shauna glanced up to where she heard the male voice, and gasped in shock. It couldn’t be. He was dead. Confusion and hurt warred inside her. Tears blurred her eyes and she tried to blink them away. They fell unbidden onto her cheeks, and she wiped them hoping he wouldn’t notice.

  The man she mourned, the one she lived in guilt over how she had rejected his love stepped down a grouping of four stairs to cross the deck and stand before her. His thumb came up and he wiped the last traces of her tears from her face. She shrunk from his touch, sensing the evil inside him.

  Liam was different. Most noticeable was the fact that his skin, once so pale as all the Faeries had, was now deep blue. His smoky grey eyes, which she had loved, were almost black. A jagged scar ran from beneath his right eye down across his cheek to his chin. It made him appear dangerous, terrifying. “Liam. How can you be alive? I was told ....”

  “I know what you were told, Shauna.” He leaned forward to kiss her lips. She tried to turn away, but he captured her chin to force it up. When his mouth closed over hers, Shauna fought not to enjoy his touch or the tip of his tongue teasing her lips. After a moment, he drew back. “It was easier to allow everyone to think that I died.” He shrugged.

  Understanding dawned. “Y-You were involved in the attack. That’s why you never sent a guard for me. You arranged with these beasts to kill my family!” She flew at him, ready to claw at his marred face, to give him a matching scar on his left cheek. He easily caught her and lifted her off her feet. Shauna fought against him, kicking as hard as she could.

  The creatures laughed when she got in a good hit to his shins, and Liam growled. He flipped her around so that she was facing away from him and bound her arms to her sides with one of his. Struggling against him did nothing. She couldn’t remember Liam ever being this strong.

  During the times that they wrestled in the grass as children, she would always win because Liam wasn’t strong then. He was little more than a scrawny Fae, with long skinny arms and legs. She had often told him he looked like a little wet bird when he emerged from the lake. And every time she beat him, pinning him to the ground, he’d turn red, he was so mad. Her father, the king, had told her, “Shauna, don’t be so cruel to Liam. He’s little now, but I see him growing into a powerful Fae one day. And I also suspect, he’s going to make you pay for all the times you bested him.” Her father had chuckled then, touching a fingertip to one temple, telling her to remember. “Mark my words, Shauna.”

  Now held in Liam’s iron grip flattened against the length of his body—a body that was doing sensual things to her own—Shauna knew this was the start of his payback. Liam marched silently with her in hand across the deck to a wooden crate positioned next to the stairs he had descended earlier. He sat down, flipping her face down on his lap and placing one hand on her rear. She knew immediately what he planned.

  “Liam! You are not going to spank me.” The high and mighty command in her voice was unintended.

  A flick of his eyebrow as he grinned down at her told her her tone hadn’t been lost on him. She was nobody special in this realm, and on this ship, cutting through the darkness at a fast clip, Liam might as well be king.

  “Is that a command, Shauna?” he chuckled, the black eyes gone cold. “Do you remember the times you beat me at wrestling when we were children?”

  She twisted her head away from him to stare down at the floor. “No.”

  He laughed again. “No? Let me remind you.” He leaned down close to her ear, while stroking her rear. She gasped, tensing her muscles and trying not to let him get to her. He knew what he was doing. “You called me wet little bird. How inferior I was to you in every way.”

  She broke down, “I’m so sorry, Liam. I shouldn’t have said those cruel words to you before the attack. It was mean and I didn’t intend to destroy our friendship.”

  Before she spoke, he had been nuzzling her hair, breathing deep. Now, she felt him go stiff, the muscles of his legs tense. “Didn’t mean it? Of course you did, Shauna. You may not have meant to say it, but you felt it. You were the princess, I was your guard. Or rather one of your family’s guards. Indulging you as a child was fine, but we both knew your father would have cut it off soon enough to find you an eligible mate.”

  “That’s not true. In fact, mother told me recently that they all knew you loved me and I—well, she said my father would have given you to me if I wanted you.”

  Her words did not soothe his anger. If anything, she had made it worse. “Give me to you? You spoiled little—” He brought his hand down hard on her behind to shouts of glee from the creatures.

  Shauna cried out only once and then ground her teeth together. He would not get the satisfaction. Tears streamed down her cheeks with each stinging blow. When he finished, he shouted out a command in some language that Shauna didn’t recognize. She heard feet scurrying about and a door opening and closing.

  Liam repositioned her so that she sat on his lap. He lifted her chin and gasped when he saw her tears, as if he didn’t know he was hurting me, she thought bitterly.

  “Shauna,” he whispered.

  She tried turning away, but again he used his strength ag
ainst her. When he kissed her, she wanted to hate his touch, to hate him, but her mouth and her body craved him. He tucked her closer to his chest, touched a hand to her head and a small shock made her head jerk backwards. Before she knew what was happening, her world darkened and she slid into unconsciousness.

  Chapter Three

  Liam stood at the side of the bed watching Shauna sleep. She was still so beautiful, her chestnut hair worn wavy and long, accenting her wide green eyes. He hated himself for making her cry, hated the evil that lurked inside him. He had wanted to humiliate her and spanking in front of the Darklings seemed the best way to accomplish that. He had succeeded. Seeing her cry had nearly killed him.

  Liam had accused her of being spoiled and that was true, but in truth, he too had given her whatever she wanted. It was hard not to when she stirred his senses just entering any room he occupied.

  When he had come to live in the dark world with the Darklings, all he could think about was Shauna. She haunted his dreams on a daily basis. He had resolved to forget her, to live in this perpetual darkness for eternity, but when Darcy informed him that she had set in motion her plans, he had no choice but to bring Shauna here. It was the only way he knew to protect her. The question was, would she believe the truth when he told her, or the lie his blue skin told.

  He moved to sit beside her, reaching up to brush away a strand of hair on her forehead. Her long sooty lashes fluttered against her cheeks, making him want to kiss each eye and her nose and her lovely mouth. He grew hard thinking that way, wondering if she had been intimate with another Fae. Jealousy rose in his heart. Had he shared her bed even once, it would have made the last three years less of a living hell.

  “Shauna, wake up, baby.” He leaned close, brushing her lips with a kiss anyway. Before he could draw back, her eyes flew open and a stinging blow struck his chin. His head snapped to the side and he winced. Leave it to the tomboy princess to direct a punch at his head instead of slap. “Feel better now?” he demanded as he worked his aching jaw.

  She sat up. “Not yet, but I will. As soon as I get out of here and back home.”

  “I thought you were headed to the human world.” His gaze deliberately mocked her.

  “I was until I stepped into this nightmare. Did you have something to do with that too?” She gave him a look that said she still believed he had attacked and killed her family. It was time he shared the truth.

  He reached a hand out to her to help her up. She ignored it and slid to the edge of the bed, before moving to a chair positioned against the wall. He sighed. She wasn’t going to make any of this easy.

  “Shauna, I did not kill your family. I did not have anything at all to do with it.”

  She rolled her eyes, “Yet, you are alive instead of dead.”

  “So my crime is being alive instead of dead?”

  “You know what I mean.” She pointed a finger at his chest. “Your skin is dark blue. I don’t know much, but I know no Faerie’s skin looks like that unless they’ve been tainted with evil. The Darklings used to be Fae. They embraced evil and slowly turned black with the sin of their ways. For you to look like you do, I don’t have to guess that there is evil in you. I feel it every time you ki ... touch me.”

  He grinned, knowing she had been about to say kiss. It was gratifying to know she was affected by him, but not too pleasing that she sensed the evil lurking inside. There was nothing to be done about the darkness in his soul; he could only control it, not use the magic and hope that would keep him from turning completely black. The Darklings were depraved, evil creatures that thrived on hurting others. It had been trying to his sanity to live among them.

  “What you say is true, Shauna. There is evil inside me, but I can’t help that. Given a choice at the time, I would have elected to die rather than live this way.”

  She looked at him, startled. “What do you mean?”

  He recounted to her the events on the night of the attack.

  He had cast the spell that would lock Shauna inside the castle and hurried back to the town hall. It had been a shock to find the area crawling with Darklings. Many Fae were already dead as the Darklings outnumbered them five to one. Liam drew his sword and leapt into the fray, all the while keeping an eye out for a guard he could send back to the castle to protect Shauna. Oddly, none were in view at the time, except those that lay dead.

  Fighting his way into the hall, he glanced around at the carnage. Blood stained the walls, the floors, and the tables with their once pristine white tablecloths. Dead bodies of Darklings and Fae lay about the floor. Spotting the prince fallen, with a Darkling poised to kill him, Liam leapt over a chair, threw aside a table and made it in time to drive his own sword in the creature’s back. The thing squealed in pain, and Liam caught it before it fell on the prince. He tossed its lifeless body away and knelt at the prince’s side.

  “Your Highness, where is the king and queen? Where are the guards?”

  He nodded is head across to his father, not five feet away, the glassy-eyed stare indicating death. “The guards are all dead. They were struck first. My father’s dead. He told my mother to run. Please, help her, Liam, and my sister. Where is my sister?”

  Liam noticed the blood spurting from the prince’s side and on the floor beneath him. If he didn’t get a healing Fae soon, he would die. “Shauna is safe. Come, we’ll find the queen together.”

  The prince shook his head, resisting. “No, I’ll only slow you down. Please, you must go after my mother, she—” His eyes widened in shock at something behind Liam. When Liam swung around, it was too late. A sword, held by Shamus, next in line to the Faeland throne, drove deep inside him. It cut through him as easily as slicing hot rolls, coming out of his back. The pain was unbearable. Liam felt himself losing consciousness, but fought to stay alert so that he could help the prince. But even as he mentally commanded his body to move, it would not. He had to watch in a state of blurred unreality as Shamus drove his sword again and again into the young prince, until he was dead.

  Liam’s eyes were closing, but he forced them open as Shamus strode toward him, a wicked grin of triumph spread across his face. “Why?” Liam thought he said aloud, though it could have been formed in his mind. He was so weak and in such pain.

  Shamus didn’t seem to hear. “Well, my friend. You are the last guard, and I’ve just killed the prince. What a great day ... for me.”

  Liam didn’t remember anything after that until waking up in a room full of darkness, a darkness that was beyond anything he had ever seen. The air fairly vibrated with evil. It choked him, made his insides burn. He gasped, surprise suffusing him. He was alive? But how?

  “So, you’re finally awake, Fae. Good.” A voice above him spoke to him, a musical sound, haunting music. “I thought I might have to give you more of my magic. I’m not sure you would want to wake up if that were necessary.” She laughed at her own levity.

  Liam tried sitting up, but found he was still too weak. She came around him then and pushed him back down against the bed he occupied. His eyes widened in shock and fear at the black creature before him. Her skin was black, her eyes and even her nails. But despite that, somehow she was beautiful. She wore a crimson dress with white ruffles around the collar and the wrists. Her straight dark hair was caught up in a bun at the back of her head, making Liam question the old-fashioned style of dress. Her figure was slender, dainty, and as evil as he knew she was, she was wholly feminine. The attraction he felt capturing a glimpse of her cleavage as she bent over him to check his forehead for fever, disgusted him.

  “What did you do to me?” he demanded.

  She smiled. “I saved your life.”

  “You should have let me die.”

  “Tsk, tsk. Is that anyway to thank your savior?” She stood and gathered a bloody cloth from a side table, wringing it in black water. “Now, you need your rest. We can talk about how much you owe me later.”

  Liam glanced about the room. Either he was getting used to the dar
kness or something was wrong. There was no light in the room, no window, yet he could see the furniture clearly. It was as old-fashioned as the clothes the Darkling witch wore, heavy and scuffed with years of use.

  The woman left the room and Liam stared up at the ceiling, wanting her to come back and explain to him what was happening. He wanted to know if the queen was safe, more importantly if Shauna was okay. His heart ached to see her, to make it right with her after they had parted on such horrible terms. They had argued before, but this time it had such finality. He didn’t mean what he said. He could no more walk away from her than leave his own body.

  As he thought on these things, rage grew inside him, out of proportion and unnecessary. He had been angry before, but this was different. If felt ... evil. His eyes searched the room, wild and fearful. And then he lifted his arms, his fingers curved and stiffened. He shot bolts of magic from his hands against the walls, the ceiling, and the door. Plaster, wood and cement exploded beneath the onslaught of black and red fire.

  “No!” Liam pounded his fists against the bed. He could not be a Darkling. His magic could not be evil magic. With despair welling inside, he looked at his hands. The skin was darkening. Where it had been almost translucent in its paleness, it was growing more and more blue. “Please, no.”

  The door blew open and the woman stood there serene, a small smile on her face. “Naughty Fae,” she cooed. “Or maybe I should not call you Fae anymore.” She laughed at that.