Faerie Kissed

by Jaliza A. Burwell

  “I belong to Faerie, and you belong here. Find your true love who will whisk you off to Paris, Rome, Venice, and all those other places you’ve always wanted to go to.”

  “But this is all my fault. This should have never happened to you.” Madeline glared hard down at her lap, crying.

  Josie squeezed her thigh. “Look at me.”

  She blinked back her tears to no avail as she met Josie’s gaze. “My sweet baby sister. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

  I gasped as Josie’s words had an instant affect. Madeline stilled, her gaze going dull. Pain hit me hard at seeing her like that, so lifeless. We had grown up with her. She was always a bright existence in our life, always quick to laugh, and wanting us to chase her around. To see her like that... like no one was home.

  What was Josie doing?

  I tried to speak, but it felt like someone held a hand around my throat. No noise would come out. My voice had been stolen. Not even my limbs wanted to work. All I could do was sit there and watch what Josie did to Madeline. Controlled her. Turned her into a puppet. Acidic anger swirled low in my stomach and rose painfully into my throat.

  Jose didn’t seem to care as she kept talking, spinning a spell with her very words. “When you step out of my hotel door, you’re going to forget that you’ve seen me. You’ll only think you came for an overnight trip to the city to play tourist. You’ll go out, see your favorite places in the city, and then head back to Boston to live your life. Your memories of me are dull enough to feel an ache in your chest, but not enough to keep you from living your life the best that you can.” Josie continued, doing her best to weave her spell. Her skin became pallid, and it seemed like she was about to throw up as her words grew thick with emotions, and she blinked furiously.

  I almost threw up watching, my tongue feeling like ash was coating over it. The nausea in me was so strong as I watched Josie do something that was unforgivable. No one should ever take another person’s choice away. Not like this. What did Madeline do to deserve to be controlled like this? All she wanted to do was see her big sister again. Finally get some answers.

  Why was this turning out like this?

  Josie jumped to her feet, still holding on to Madeline’s hand.

  Madeline blinked and looked up at Josie. “I’m going to go get some coffee. There’s this I just down the street that has the best mocha latte. You’ll love it. Wait for me? Be here when I come back?”

  Josie’s smile was forced as she replied, “I’ll be here for the rest of the day.”

  Madeline’s smile was bright and heartbreaking. “Good.”

  The moment Josie led Madeline to the door, the spell around us broke. I took in a gasping breath, jumping to my feet. I tried to move forward, but for some reason I stayed there as Josie led her sister to the door.

  Madeline leaned over and kissed Josie’s cheek before stepping out. The moment she crossed the threshold, the air stirred in the room. Josie closed the door softly and watched through the peephole. It was a long few moments of holding my breath while Josie watched her sister on the other side of the door. The moment she turned around, looking relieved, I finally released all my anger.

  “What did you just do?” I asked, clenching my hands at my side.

  After releasing a slow breath, she finally looked at me. I wanted to pull her into a hug, anything to wipe that heartbroken expression off her face. But I was too furious to do that.

  “Why would you do that to her?” I asked and began laying into her, demanding to know why. Did she understand what she just took away from her sister? Did Faerie warp her so much that she could do that so easily? What the fuck happened to her humanity? The Josie I knew would never do that to another living being. Ever. “How dare you use your fae tricks on your own sister? What if that destroys her? What if you do some kind of damage to her brain? That was fucked up and you know it.”

  “Stop it!” Foster snapped. He got into my face, broad shoulders stiff. “You don’t understand anything. How can you call her out like that?

  “Like what? She just turned her fucking sister into a puppet. How is that okay?”

  “Guys...” Jason said, trying to get between us.

  I shoved him back. “That was Madeline! Not some criminal on the street. That was her baby sister. If she can do that to her own sister, what else is she capable of doing? You know what she did was wrong.”

  “No, I don’t know if what she did was right or wrong, but I trust Josie enough to make the right decision.”

  I snorted. “You mean like how she left us and went to Faerie? How she decided not to let anyone know that she was back here? I don’t think she’s capable of making the right decision.”

  “Enough—” Jason tried to interject, but Foster pushed him out of our way.

  “Hey, Asshole, when are you going to realize that sometimes, there isn’t a right decision? You keep living in this world where everything is black and white. Right and wrong. That isn’t reality.”

  “It’s wrong when you take someone’s choice away. When you control them like she just did with her sister. There is no gray when it comes to freedom of choice.”

  “That’s bullshit and you know it. Stop trying to live in a world where the answer is only right or wrong.”

  “You’re her lapdog now, Foster. She has you by the balls,” I said, so angry at that point that I wanted to make him hurt for not understanding. Why couldn’t he? It was simple. Freedom. The right for Madeline to make her own decisions.

  “Shut the fuck up. Even you don’t believe the shit you just said.”

  “Uh, guys?” Jason pitched in.

  “I understand that the military fucked you up enough that you can’t understand that what Josie just did was wrong.”

  Foster’s eyes flashed dangerously with his fury. His fists were at his side, ready to make a swing at me. I was expecting it, trying to push him hard. I was too angry to care. Someone needed to pay for what had happened.

  Before I could open my mouth and say anything else that would probably cause a fissure between me and them, a loud wailing cut through.

  “Fuck you all,” Jason snapped. He grabbed on to Josie who collapsed into him, taking in shuddering breaths as she sobbed, her eyes closed, skin pallid. She clawed at Jason, like she was trying to get inside of him. He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close. She buried her face into his chest as her whole body shook. She kept wailing and gripping at Jason.

  Foster and I could only stare at her in confusion.

  “Now is not the time to go on about what is right or wrong. Couldn’t you guys tell how hard that was for her to do. She had to have a reason and before condemning her so quickly”—he glared right at me—“you should have talked to her.” He hoisted Josie into his arms and carried her up the stairs. She was too lost in her breakdown to notice what was going on.

  I was left standing there like a complete asshole as Foster chased after them. Her wailing reached me, and unable to help myself, I went to her, needing to give her comfort.

  No one said anything as I crawled into bed and rubbed her arm. She was on top of Jason, crying still, with Foster on the other side. I rubbed her arm and then her back, wishing for her to stop making the heart-wrenching noises. I wanted to take that pain away from her. I desperately wished I could.

  Instead, I could only feel like a complete asshole and try to comfort her as best as I could, though I knew it wasn’t enough.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Once I woke up from my breakdown, it was late at night. Heat surrounded me as Waylon, Jason, and Foster slept, still touching me, trying to give me comfort even in their sleep. I appreciated it. Especially since I knew some of them weren’t happy with what I’d done.

  Could I have left her with her memories, with the knowledge of the fae? No. I really couldn’t. It wasn’t to make it easier on her, at least not the whole reason. The fae world was not something she could dig into and live through. They’d kill her. Or use her ag
ain, turning her into a slave.

  So I took her choice away. It was better than her innocence.

  I drew in a deep breath, pushing through all my memories of Madeline, but then it landed on a particular one. The day my baby sister was born. I had only been five when she was born, and yet I remembered every single detail. My tired mom holding her. Dad helping me climb up so I could get a better look at the small bundle she held so close. Me poking her and thinking she was so soft and tiny. A tiny baby. My tiny baby.

  I glanced at Waylon, wondering if he’d calmed down or if he’d wake up angry. I didn’t know and was nervous to find out. Needing to give my mind something to do, I got out carefully, not wanting to stir them. My body oddly ached, or maybe it was my inner being that did so. Mental exhaustion was a real thing, even if people tried to pretend it wasn’t.

  Maybe that was what I suffered from.

  The hotel suite was quiet, with only the guys’ snoring as a distraction. I didn’t like that. I wanted to turn on music and blast it to break the silence.

  Our war room was my next best option, and after using my phone to softly play music in the background, I gave the maps my full attention. There had to be something there we were missing. There just had to be.

  Nothing was random in my world. There had to be meaning. Maybe there was some kind of ley line that ran through those spots. I’d need to find someone who knew about those. What were around those spots? They all varied from residential, commercial, to being near the water or near the highways. I’d need to take a deeper dive.

  I tried to find the center of it all, but that didn’t tell me anything either. The very middle of all the action, or at least my best guess was a coffee shop. Also, it was so irregular, all the spots scattered around the city.

  The floor piled with scrap pieces of paper as I tried different ways of tracing them, wondering if that would give me any clue. Still nothing.

  I huffed, frustration bubbling up. What was Laikynn thinking? How was he deciding? There had to be a method here. There had to be. Biting my lip, I tried again, this time tracing from the points in order that they appeared.

  That didn’t help either. Damn.

  I did it in reverse, and still nothing.

  Left to right got me nothing. Neither did right to left or up and down.

  It was when I did it by neighborhood that it began making sense.

  “That son of a bitch.” I traced faster, checking to make sure I stayed with the neighborhoods.

  It wasn’t just one symbol. It was multiple. Points were missing that made it confusing, but by the time I was finished, my blood ran cold and my heart beat too fast.

  He couldn’t be.

  I checked and double-checked, hoping I was wrong, but it had to be this.

  Laikynn was creating a spell right out of all the points. A powerful spell that I only knew about because once I was in the fae realm, I made it a habit to read all their scrolls, including ancient spells that only existed in old texts forgotten in a library.

  It was a magic transfer spell. The only one who should really know about it was Faerie. It was what she’d done to me after all.

  And now it looked like Laikynn was going to do it between the realms.

  I snapped a couple of pictures with my phone and then sent it all to Coffey along with an explanation.

  I wasn’t sure how long it’d be for him to reply, but I didn’t expect it to be instant.

  I will be there soon.

  No matter how much I stared at the text, it didn’t quite make sense. Here? At the hotel? In the city? In the states?

  He didn’t make me wait long, only minutes later knocking at my door.

  “What are you doing here?” I asked, staring at him.

  He raised an eyebrow before remembering who I was and dropping his attitude before it got him killed.

  “May I enter, milady? I have information for you and your text only verified it.”

  “You are allowed to enter only with the understanding that those here with me are mine and if you dare to cause them any sort of discomfort, I will remove your head.”

  “Of course, my queen. I will never hurt yours.”

  With his promise, I stepped back and let him enter.

  The guys practically stumbled down the stairs but paused the moment they realized I wasn’t alone. Seeing Coffey threw them off. Their expression told me enough. They had questions for me, explanations to demand, and they didn’t like that Coffey was pushing that off.

  I nodded in acknowledgment, that one move telling them they’d get their opportunity.

  “Dr. Coffey has some information for us, and I have some discoveries to share,” I said and motioned toward the war room.

  Jason raised an eyebrow as he noted all the crumpled pieces of paper that I had tossed around. No one said anything as they surrounded the table and looked down at the map.

  “Nothing is random in the world,” I said. “And that also means the locations Laikynn chose. It took a while to figure it out because I didn’t realize he was writing an entire Faerie spell out.” I traced the page where I wrote the fae language. It involved curvy shapes and sharp angles entwined together to form a story.

  “This is a magic transfer spell?” Coffey whispered, looking down at the map.

  “Yes. And to a degree that will work or destroy the planet trying. He cannot activate this spell.”

  “What does it do?” Foster asked.

  “Takes magic and forces it elsewhere. Think infusing an item with magic.” I pointed to my charms. “But not to hold, to use, to utilize. It’s one thing to store magic, but another to make it someone else’s. It’s a hard, painful process that tears at the host and the receiver. For living creatures, it can kill them. For inanimate objects, it can shatter it.”

  “How would an inanimate object wield magic?” Waylon asked.

  “All those ghost stories about cursed items. They form a conscience. And normally, they become vengeful. If someone were to touch an item, the item would do everything in its power to possess them so that they will become a living thing.”

  “That sounds fucked up,” Jason said.

  “It is. And Laikynn plans to do something like that. I’m not exactly sure how it’ll work though.” I frowned, only seeing death and destruction at the end of this. The amount of magic he was planning was too grand.

  “And hopefully I’ll have more information for you,” Coffey said. “Since your visit, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it. What this fae wants to do is too catastrophic. Frankly, I’m almost positive that the world itself would not be able to sustain itself if he were to succeed in tearing the realms apart and combining them.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “It’s almost a sure thing that if he casts this spell”—he sweeps his hands over the table—“then the planet is going to shatter.”

  “How sure are you?” Foster asked.

  “Let’s say, it’d be a miracle if the planet is fine after the spell is completed.”

  No one said anything for a long moment as that information sunk in. There were currently almost eight billion people who lived on the planet. That was a lot of lives.

  “And those in the fae realm,” I asked.

  Coffey shook his head.

  That’d put it up over ten billion lives.

  “How exactly will this spell work?” Waylon asked.

  “Normally, it’s a transfer as I said. But this is off a little bit. It’s still very much the magic transfer spell, but he’s made adjustments from the looks of it.” I pointed to some of the points. “The fae written language is more picturesque than what you’re used to seeing. We can change what we are saying or the intent by adding on to the original symbol. The original symbol builds up until it says the full extent of what the writer wants.”

  I grabbed a piece of paper and did a quick sketch of the original spell. After I was done, I grabbed the new spell and set them side by side so they could see
the differences.

  “In this case, this is what the original spell is.” I pointed to marks on the new spell. “These are what he changed of the spell.”

  “Changed how?” Jason asked, looking closer at the papers, frowning hard.

  “He made it more destructive,” Coffey said, his eyebrows knitted together as he stared at the spell with deep concentration.

  I was almost too afraid to ask.

  Coffey expanded on his explanation. “As the spell happens, it’s meant to tear the wall between the realms down with it. Already moving magic from one realm to another would damage the wall. I wouldn’t be surprised if it collapsed from the transfer. But these extra layers to the spell will do more. Think of it like this. The original spell would have punched tiny little holes into the wall, causing it to weaken, and maybe possibly collapse because of those tiny holes. Now, he added to that spell so that when the transfer happens, it doesn’t create tiny little holes into the wall. It’s going to slash at it instead.”

  I nodded, it all making sense. “More damage to the wall to ensure it falls.”

  “Exactly.”

  “What information did you have for me?” I asked.

  “You already found the information yourself. I was coming over so I could take a look at the maps. I thought it’d be a symbol too and was going to work with you to figure out which one.” He shook his head. “To think they’re using an entire spell instead. Pretty brilliant if you ask me.”

  “If I were you, I’d be very careful with your thoughts right now,” I said in a low voice, warning him.

  The light in his eyes disappeared, and he cleared his throat. “Of course, milady.”

  “Great.” Jason clapped his hands, making me stiffen briefly at the sudden noise. “We know the how, the why, the who. The question is when, where, and what do we need to do to stop him.”

  I held in a snort as Jason went through his W’s. He had learned the method after watching a movie when we were kids and whenever he wanted to act like a detective, he’d go through them. Had to admit, it fit the situation.