AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Are we done?” Rys demands.
The captain nods.
And I have no idea what just happened.
Oberon’s words keep running through my mind.
Melisandre wasn’t his ffrindau, but she was his mate. The partner he chose—even if the Summer King chose wrong—and the woman he promised to cherish forever.
Well, until she stole his throne, tried to kill him by trapping him in the human world, and he repaid her by lopping off her head.
I get it. I’m pretty sure I understand why he passed that message to me and Rys through Helix. Oberon has always been one step ahead of everyone, almost as if the Summer King knows what’s going to happen to all of us before it does. Not that I believe that. If he could, wouldn’t he have foreseen the whole being betrayed by his own mate thing?
Unless it only works on everyone else...
Huh.
Fate. It all comes down to fate, doesn’t it? But even though Rys seems to agree with Oberon, he’s still trapped by the prophecy that has affected his life for so damn long.
And, you know, there’s one line of the prophecy that I never really understood. She’ll be freed with a lie… if I’m the chick in the prophecy, then I’ve got to be the ‘she’ the soothsayer was talking about. And I’ve got the human blood, the sunshine hair, sky-blue eyes. The daisy chain tattooed to my skin that, to the fae, seems to be painted on.
And now I’ve been freed. Helix told me so. Oberon granted me my freedom, but what’s the lie?
Maybe I’m thinking too literally. I mean, it’s not like my hair is really sunshine. Besides, the fae can’t lie—but that doesn’t mean they tell the truth. It’s just that they want you to believe that it is.
Or, in the case of Rys, he believes it.
I’m not his ffrindau. Ever since he sacrificed me to escape Siúcra, he’s accepted that and acted like there’s no possible way we can be together. Even if he promises that I can stay with him, live with him, can I really do that and not want him to touch me?
To love me?
Not even a little.
I have to figure out how to get him to agree to claim me for once and for all. None of this wishy-washy bullshit where he treats me like a guest one second, then decides that he wants me to be his… until he pushes me away for my own good. After we left Jim with Morgan, I thought that everything was going back to the way it was before.
But it hasn’t, and it only gets worse after Helix’s unexpected visit.
He goes back to the Rys he was when Jim was staying in the manor. We see each other at mealtimes, but that’s about all. I don’t know what he’s doing during the day—though I doubt he’s going to meet with Oberon, he’s definitely going somewhere—and I keep to myself, pouring all of my frustrations into my art.
One night, about a week later, I’m in a particularly foul mood. I ate dinner by myself, even though Lolly told me that Rys was on his way back to the manor. He told her not to wait for him before she set the table, and to pass on his apologies to me that he was missing dinner.
I hurried through my meal, then return to my room. Because I’m super frustrated—and in more ways than one—I decide to start a brand new painting. I throw up a fresh canvas and think about what I’m visualizing.
For some strange reason, I think back to the Faerie Market. Both times I was on the auction block, the scene of the faceless crowd, hidden by the shadows, silhouetted by the torches… it was fucking terrible. I’ve had nightmares about it ever since and, considering the mood I’m in, I decide to confront my fear by ripping it out of my memory and throwing it up on the canvas.
Maybe it’s not the healthiest way to approach it, but, hey. Call it my defense mechanism.
I reach for a jar of paint, grab my palette. It’s habit, reaching for the right brushes, prepping my color palette, working out the scene I want to paint before I actually commit it to the canvas. As I do so, the motions almost mechanical, I’m still back at the Faerie Market.
Not on the stage, though. I think of the cramped tent where the redcap kept the cages and he did his business, selling those unfortunate enough to end up on the block to their highest bidders.
I drop the jar of paint in my hand. It opens on impact, the opalescent color spilling out on the floor, but I barely notice.
Holy. Shit.
Can it—
No—
