Chapter Twenty-Two
Ivan
Iwoke up to darkness. I couldn’t see that much around me but could feel that I was sitting on a cemented floor. A musty dankness filled the air. My surroundings felt cold and damp. I was most likely in a small room in a cellar. I’d been kidnapped. It was actually kind of embarrassing. I’d gone down without a fight. Not my style. This was no coincidence. It seemed whoever was after me had finally succeeded.
The sound of the door opening and approaching footsteps focused my attention. I stood up, readying myself for a fight. “You should have killed me when you had the chance,” I called out into the dark. “Because now I’m going to end your life.”
“Such big talk for someone who doesn’t have the upper hand,” came a familiar male voice.
The space was suddenly illuminated, and I could see I was definitely in a cellar but in some kind of alcove behind bars with only a pallet on one side and a bucket on the other. And on the other side of the bars was Jullian and a vaguely familiar man with tanned skin, curly white hair, and purple eyes. Of course, this Jullian fucker would be behind all of this.
I crossed my arms, not wanting to give him the satisfaction of seeing me worried. “Where am I?”
Jullian clasped his hands behind his back, eyeing me with those sickly yellow eyes, a smug look on his face. “You are back in the fae realm. You took a while to find since crossing over to the humans, but all of your inquiries about looking for a cure for your memories gave you away. Not that smart of you.” He waggled a thin finger at me as if to scold me.
I balled my hands to my sides, containing my anger. I could bend the bars apart and rip his throat out, but first I had information to learn. Aaron always said I could be a little hot headed. Someone else told me the same, but I couldn’t remember. That bothered me, not knowing, but it didn’t matter right now. What mattered was understanding why they were after me, why they hadn’t killed me, and what they planned to do. Then I would kill them both. I pointed to the other man. “Who’s this asshole?”
The purple eyed man growled and took a step toward me. Jullian shot out an arm across him, and the man paused. So, Jullian had the power here. Although he looked almost like a corpse come to life, people seemed to love following his orders. I wasn’t sure of his strength, but I was sure of his influence. Or, rather, money.
Jullian lowered his arm, an arrogant smile on his thin lips. “You don’t remember? You’ve met him before. This was Jalisa’s fiancé before you interfered. Jacob.”
I gave him a blank stare having no idea what he was talking about. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Jacob chuckled. “If I’d have known it was going to be this easy, we could have gotten those witches to do the spell before they even got married.”
Jullian kept his gaze on me as if studying my reaction. “What’s done is done.”
My agitation was growing, and my patience was lessoning, not a good combination. “Who is Jalisa?”
“No one important to you. Not anymore.”
That wasn’t true. I knew it. My mind went back to my journal. I’d read several pages this morning, but already my memory was cloudy of it. I dug my nails into my palms, welcoming the pain. The distraction from the frustration of not knowing. I didn’t have the upper hand here, and I had no understanding of why I was in this situation. “Why the fuck am I here?”
Jacob took a step forward. “Because you’re always in the fucking way!” he spat. “We had a plan. We were going to be a part of an oligarchy. Change the rules.”
I snorted. “You tell the court that? I’m sure the king and queen would love that.”
Jullian cut his eyes at Jacob. “You speak too much,” he said in a low voice before focusing on me again. “You are here because you must be detained. We will make the court believe that you are gone and resume our original plan with Jacob’s marriage.”
I arched a skeptical eyebrow. “You think you will keep me here?”
Jullian gave me a patient smile. He really thought he had nothing to be worried about from me. “Your family will take care of your whereabouts.”
I stilled. “My family knows I’m here? They let you do this?”
Jullian gave a gallic shrug. “Some. Some are part of our plans. It is the only reason you’re alive. Otherwise, we would have killed you on the spot.”
“You’ve tried. Several times.”
Jacob rolled his eyes as if what I said was insignificant. “And yet, you survived. It was all for show. To ensure you had no idea who was after you. If we really wanted to kill you, we would have. Although I think some were a little zealous in their attempts to harm Jalisa.”
I frowned. That name again. Every time I heard it, my heart panged as if it had meaning. Once again, my mind went back to the journal, but I recalled even less of what I’d read that morning. It gnawed at me like a dull pain that I couldn’t ignore. “Who is she?”
This time Jacob sneered at me, enjoying my predicament. I might kill him before Jullian. Although I didn’t know him, I found his presence irritating. He also seemed rather stupid. “Don’t worry about it, you idiot maggot.”
His anger toward me seemed uncalled for. I was the one kidnapped. I wanted to bash his face into the cement floor. Several times. Until he was dead.
Jullian sighed. “Do not antagonize him.”
