“They missed you though not nearly as much I did.” His sex operator voice was gone, replaced with the strained tones of someone of the verge of a breakdown. And I was still too dense to understand why. He knelt before me, one hand crossed over his muscular chest. He moved like Amadan did, muscles sliding beneath smooth skin, slippery loose joints, but with an undertone of iron clad control. “My Queen.”
I blinked back at him, one hand absentmindedly rubbing the floppy, triangular ears of the largest hellhound. Apparently, skinless wasn't the right word. It had skin, just very clear, very thin, very slippery skin. I shuddered and pulled my hand away.
“What are … what are … ” My voice trailed off. You're the first of the Gray, George, repeated over and over in a continuous loop, reminding me that not only was I dense but also an idiot. The shared looks between Rachel and Amadan suddenly made a whole lot more sense. “What am … what?” I took a step back, resisting an intense urge to run and never, ever look back.
“What the fuck is going on here?” Corey barked, not used to being so thoroughly ignored. He gestured at Samael with the gun. “Who the fuck are you?” Samael rose to his feet in one, swift motion, silver earrings tinkling sweetly in the quiet house.
“Maybe my question might be,” Samael said, grabbing the end of the gun and shoving it away from his exposed midsection. His tightly chiseled, six pack of a midsection, my loins filled in. “Who are you?” Corey stumbled away from the fae and gave me a frightened look like he'd never seen me before.
“George, what's going on?” I looked back at him, face equally full of fear and then just sat down, in the middle of the floor, hellhounds and all. My legs couldn't hold the weight of my revelation. I just wasn't strong enough.
“I'm … I'm … I'm the Gray Queen?” I squeaked, clutching a hand to my chest. “But I can't be … I'm just a … just a … ”
Samael knelt down again and reached a hand out for mine. I jerked violently away and a wash of hurt spilled over him like a tidal wave. His eyes darkened with pain.
“I am sorry, Liadain,” he said, finally using the name I could tell he'd wanted to use since he first interjected himself into my head while Amadan and I had been having sex. “If I had been stronger, I might have woken sooner. I might have been able to stop him from cursing you.” He reached out another questing hand but stopped short of touching me, the fear of rejection burning in his eyes.
“I'm a … ” I looked up at his face. It was so familiar. High cheekbones, stark and perfect, like two slashes across his cheeks, strong, rounded jaw, eyes shaped like two sideways tear drops. “I'm a zombie.” Samael laughed and the sex operator switch was back on. It was like sound had finally found a way to materialize into solid matter and was now sliding across my skin like a sheet of silk. I almost screamed again.
“You're so … ” His lips pursed together and the next sentence came out in a heady hiss. “Blunt, my sweetness, just like I left you.” He hunkered down and imitated the cross legged position I was in. Several of the hellhounds tried to lie in his lap, like pussycats, but he pushed them gently away. “Unfortunately, yes. From what my mother surmises, Gadrael discovered you while you were still alive. She firmly believes he was the one who drowned you. Though I doubt he expected you to rise as one of the undead.”
“Your mother?” This from Corey, who'd backed up so that he was leaning against one of his decorative, Corinthian pillars. Despite the anxiety clearly present on his pale face, he was determined to keep up with the conversation. Samael ignored him completely, waiting patiently for me to speak.
“Gadrael … was the one who drowned me?” The fact that I now had at least some faint idea as to the identity of my murder didn't provide nearly the rush of joy that I'd expected. In fact, it fell utterly flat against the idea that I was some sort of faerie queen. Samael nodded and scooted closer to me. The heat of his body was unbearable, so I stood up and paced back and forth in the entryway.
“George,” Corey pleaded, still plastered against the column. “What the hell is going on?” Samael glared at Corey, eyes full of contempt.
“Shut your mouth, you piece of shit,” he said, and I only just realized that he had been speaking in perfect English the entire time. He was the first fae I'd heard speak so much of it so fluently, and he didn't have the slightest trace of an accent. Corey balked but said nothing. He knew better than that. The fae were dangerous. It was the first lesson he'd ever taught me about the Other Place and one that neither of us could forget.
“I think you made a mistake,” I said, trying to still the quaking of my voice. If there was ever a time for me to put confidence into my convictions, now was it. “I'm just the first of the Gray, not the queen. Rachel said you needed my help to find her. I can do that, at least for a little while, but I'm not your lover or soul mate or whatever.” Corey's pale skin had gone positively white with shock, and Samael was already shaking his head.
“She told me you had yet to accept your fate.” He paused, pursed his lips, glanced at the corner nearest the fireplace. “Though it might have helped had someone properly informed you of it.”
Out from the shadows stepped Amadan, just as naked, just as … erect … as Samael. He was grinning that Fool's grin of his and avoiding the patches of moonlight as he strode across the living room.
“I apologize, my Queen, but I didn't find it to be in your best interests.” His voice was bland, bored, despite the smile on his face. “I apologize.” He spoke in his lilting English and ran a hand through his indigo hair. “Can you forgive your most humble servant for tasting the pleasures of your bed?” Samael growled, low and rumbling, and then hissed, just like a cat, but with far more menace.
“If you weren't so valuable to the resurrection of the House of Gray and Graves, Amadan,” Samael snarled and although he left his words unfinished, the threat was implied. I avoided the face of my current boyfriend and tried to make sense of what was left of my life.
“What happened to the M.E.T. people?” Samael turned away from Amadan and back to me, rising to his knees and crawling forward a few steps before placing his head on the marble floor at my feet.
“As is customary for a Consort when greeting his Queen after a leave of absence, I bring you three gifts in honor of our courts. First,” he raised his head from the floor and snapped his fingers. Amadan lifted a covered basket from the area rug in front of the couch and carried it to me, placing it next to Samael. The weaving of the basket was incredible, like threads of silver twisted and bound together until there were enough of them to make a handle and base, and the covering was made from a shimmery, aqua fabric that glimmered and rippled like the water in a tide pool. The only disturbing part of the whole thing was that the basket was moving. I took a nervous step back.
“In honor of the Light Court, our gracious brothers and sisters of Seelie, I present to you, sweetness, the whelp of your most prized bitch.” Samael threw the covering from the basket with a flourish to reveal a tiny, gray furred pup. Its eyes were still closed to the world as it wiggled and huffed in the confines of the basket. The largest hound, the one I'd accidentally petted, trotted over to us and gazed up at me with her ruby eyes, burning with the flames of magic, before reaching her own hairless muzzle down and nuzzling what I assumed was her offspring. I didn't know what to say, so I did what any properly raised person would, I said thank you.
Samael blinked back at me, a mirror of my own, earlier confusion, and shrugged before pushing the basket aside and gesturing at Amadan who, surprisingly, picked it up and bowed, obeisance dripping with his every movement.
“Second, in honor of the Dark Court, our gracious brothers and sisters of Unseelie, I present to you, my love, the restoration of your house and property.” He waved a hand out to encompass the room as Amadan scrambled to retrieve something from behind the staircase. I waited nervously, mouth dry, with the knowledge that this was probably going to be something I didn't want to see.
I was right.
/> Amadan was dragging two, men, dressed fully in black, by their ankles. The bodies slid along the floor like only the dead can. Weighty, stiff, still. I gazed at them for a moment, trying not to offend my host because whatever he might say about my being his sweetness, he was still fae, and I couldn't trust him not to get angry and turn on me. Amadan deposited the corpses as close to my leg as he had the puppy. I think I preferred the dog. I wrinkled my nose at the scent of emptied bowels and waved him away. Again, without complaint or quarrel, Amadan returned the bodies from whence they had come.
Corey had relaxed just a bit, though whether because he was actually feeling less stressed or because he'd gone into shock like I was pretty sure that I had, I didn't know. He stared at me, trying to make eye contact, eyes desperate for information. I ignored him. My own thoughts were a whirl. I could barely breath. As soon as this ritual of Samael's was over, I was diving into a hot bath, alone, so that I could sort things out. After I called my mother, of course. It had been nearly thirty hours since I'd last spoken to her. Hopefully, she hadn't called the cops on me again.
If I had been thinking logically, I would have asked questions about my new status. I would have pried, queried, and hounded until I found out what I needed to know. Then I would have run away and cried. Not because I was sad, but just because I was confused as hell, lost in a world I didn't understand. But I didn't do any of those things. Either because I was mesmerized by the pale, lavender of Samael's eyes or the glow, yes glow, of his pale skin, or maybe just because I had gone completely insane, I wasn't sure.
“Lastly, in honor of our Gray Court, the children of our conjoined souls, those not here or there but in between, I present to you, my Liadain, the body of your most humble servant, dressed as you desire, ter i souldh.” I didn't understand the last part: tear-ee-solve was a word I'd never learned from Rachel, but when Samael rose from the floor and swept me into his arms, I got the gist of it.
His canines nicked my lips, drawing just the tiniest drops of blood, which he swirled expertly around my mouth with his long tongue. As my eyelids fluttered and my eyes rolled into the back of my head, I thought, this guy could probably tie a hundred cherry stems in the blink of an eye. And then I passed out.
I adjusted the straps of my new bikini carefully before stepping out the sliding doors to the cement patio. A new family had recently moved into the house next door, bringing with them a sixteen year old boy whose dual obsession with telescopes and cameras had gotten him into trouble more than once in the neighborhood in the few short weeks they'd lived there. I wasn't taking any chances.
I cursed as I flitted from shadow to shadow, trying to avoid a scorching burn on the soles of my exposed feet. The day had turned out to be an abnormality in Eula's rainy spring schedule, and I was prepared to enjoy it to the fullest. Rachel was due back from work in a couple of hours, and although I had made her a halfhearted promise to wait until she got home, the lack of air conditioning in the house had gotten the best of me.
I raced across the remaining stretch of sun drenched pavement with a whoop and launched myself into the clear waters of the swimming pool. Shafts of light pierced the watery depths as I wriggled my arms and legs in a poor imitation of a swimmer, my feet pushing off the concrete bottom of the pool and propelling me towards the bright blue of the sky.
And then I stopped moving. My arms and legs flailed as a collar of steel gripped my neck, simultaneously holding and choking. I kicked my legs, grasped the collar with my hands, tried to scream. Water dove into my lungs like an expert diver, straight to the bottom it plummeted until it forced the last reserves of oxygen from my chest.
My eyes rolled upwards, looking for salvation, pleading for release. I could see nothing from my vantage point beneath the chlorine infused water. It was what my attacker wanted. It was what he'd been waiting for.
Darkness closed in on me slowly. At first, I had thought it would bring me peace. Take me to the heaven my mother had promised me existed, but as my body faded, my soul grew sharp.
Memories flooded my head that could only be borne from fairy tales yet I knew them to be true.
He'd tried to kill me; I'd run away. I was hiding, waiting, until I could gather my power beneath me, until I matured enough to understand and to destroy him. My court was shattered like a broken mirror and until I had pieced enough of it together that I could see my own reflection, I had to stay hidden.
But he had found me.
My revelation had come too late. My human body was dead. It floated to the surface like a ghastly pool toy, auburn hair billowing out around my head like a halo; my glassy blue eyes stared up the sun with the knowledge that they would never see it again.
But I was also lucky.
He had drained himself when he unleashed my mother's stolen power among our court and though he had been consuming liath at an alarming rate, he was still weakened. He had been lucky to find me here, or so he'd thought, and although he'd had the strength to kill me, he could not wait around in the World Above to dispose of my corpse.
After he had gone, my spirit wavered in the air like just another wave of heat streaming from the patio, and I extended what little power I still possessed to call for help. Fairy doctors were rare and the type that I was searching for, rarer still, but there I found him, across town, seemingly waiting for my call.
I brought him to me, watched him work his magic to animate my corpse. He couldn't sense my presence; I didn't want him to. I merely waited until the climax of his spell and then pushed my soul back into the body I'd stolen the moment it had breathed its first breath.
Memories faded away, the knowledge of who I was disappearing, as I reactivated the magic I had used for so long to protect myself. It hadn't hidden me from Gadrael himself, but it had prevented my discovery from a thousand and one of his minions over the years. I cradled that protection around myself and let Georgette replace Liadain again.
Until the time is right, I told myself softly, whispered into my own ears like a lullaby, until the time is right.
I woke up screaming, cold sweat pouring down my forehead, a smooth hand stroking it away. A familiar nightmare is no less frightening because of its familiarity. In fact, the idea of knowing what horrors were to come was almost worse. I sat up, my mind a confused mess of ideas. I didn't know who I was or where I was for several moments.
I am Georgette Marie French, I told myself. Daughter of Annette Rosemary Cummings and Anthony Starling French, sister of Marilou Rose French-Walker though she doesn't hyphenate it. I'm twenty-six years old, never married, always dating. I have no children, I don't want any, and oh yeah, I'm undead though I'm not charming like a vampire or mysterious like a ghost, I'm just a zombie. And possibly the Queen of an entire court of human souls and madmen.
I gasped, sat up, pushed the arms that were wrapped around me away. I scooted back across the cold, marble floor until I was pressed against the front door. My eyes darted between Samael, Amadan, and Corey. All of which looked worried. None of which knew what to say.
“How long have I been out?” I asked them. I sounded like a little girl. One who'd gotten lost in the forest and had only just realized that over the bend there, the one where she'd expected to find her parents and their tents, was a vast stretch of wilderness the likes of which she had never seen and could barely comprehend. I was so fucked.
“Only a moment, sweetness,” Samael purred, crawling towards me. I squeezed my eyes shut as tight as they would go, so tight that it made my eyes ache, and waited. The touch I was expecting didn't come. Samael had paused several feet from me and sat down, legs crossed. There was something different about him now than there'd been before.
Oh, my brain and body both realized with a start, though my body was the one who was disappointed. He doesn't have an erection anymore. Considering he'd had one the entire span of our conversation, quite the feat for a fifty year old man, it came as a bit of a shock.
“Can I take a bath?” I asked, my lips quiveri
ng as they remembered the incredible kiss Samael and I had shared. It had been like taking moonlight into my mouth, like tasting the very essence of everything in the world that was still just a bit mystical, a bit misunderstood. He tasted like love itself.
The two fae men exchanged glances. Corey just stared at me, unblinking, gun still clenched in his hand.
“You don't need my permission to do anything, sweetness, my darling,” Samael cooed, leaning forward until his forehead touched the ground again. God, he sure is limber … I shook my head. I had more important things to worry about than sex. In fact, sex seemed like such a trivial activity at that point in time that although I had been rather promiscuous throughout my short life, the idea of it suddenly became anathema to me.
“Yeah, um, okay.” I rose to my feet with less than a fourth the amount of grace that Samael had when he followed suit. I started towards the stairs in a shambling, stiff-limbed gait that lived up to my zombie heritage, pausing only to stare at some smears of blood on the railing. I shook my head. I considered briefly the idea of asking one of the men to accompany me to the bathroom but figured if I ran into a M.E.T. corpse or two or even the poor, miserable body of one of our abandoned lich servants, I would deal with it myself.
I am the Gray Queen. Raised my hands, smothered my hair with suds, rinsed. My name is Liadain. Grabbed the loofah, rubbed a bar of soap across it, scrubbed my belly. I am the head of the House of Gray and Graves. Grabbed the shower head, sprayed myself off, replaced it. Samael is my lover. Ran a bath, slid down in scalding water, cried.
I waited in the water, my eyeballs and scalp the only parts of my body not submerged, and tried to understand my own thoughts. If I was a Queen, which I didn't possibly think I could be, then why was I always so fucking submissive? It was one of the things I hated about myself most. I wanted to be strong, smart mouthed, witty. I wanted to be a kick ass heroine in a horror novel, slaying bad guys and seducing master vampires, but I wasn't.
Gray and Graves: A Dark Fae Menage Urban Fantasy (The Three Courts of Faerie Book 1) Page 16
