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He held her tightly from behind and whispered words in ancient Danu she did not understand but loved the sound of, and she knew she had surrendered her life to him.
~ Sixteen ~
“YOUR HUMAN ORGANS have reinvented themselves to accommodate the blood that has taken over your body, my love. So in that sense, yes, your inner body has been altered.” He answered her question as he pushed the heavy stick towards her. “Pick it up and use your knowledge of human karate to come at me.”
“Wait, what about my head?” Jazz asked. He had been working her all day, and she wasn’t exhausted but … confused. Her mind was still having a difficult time learning everything he was trying to jam into her. Like shifting. He thought she should learn shifting with the snap of his fingers, but she still had not been able to absorb it all.
Trevor had used Jazz’s pendant to communicate with the queen, who had simply told him to train her well. They had been at it for days, and he just wouldn’t give up. He insisted she learn the knack of it, but every single time she tried, she ended up only a few feet away.
“What about your head?” He grinned at her. “It is beautiful. Don’t I tell you enough?”
“No, no.” She slapped his big, muscular arm and then moved in close. She was having a very difficult time keeping her hands off him. She wanted to touch him, lick him, have him all the time. “I mean … I can’t wrap my head around everything. It’s all coming at me too fast.”
“I know, sweet Fios, but you have to. We have been at this for three days, and you were unconscious for two more. All this time, we have done nothing to hinder Pestale and Hordly from opening the portal at the weakest point of the Prison Wall. They know we are holed up here.” He paused and touched her cheek with the back of his hand. “I have not wanted to worry you, but they have visited outside here on more than a few occasions. I have seen them, and I am certain they are wondering what we are plotting. Hopefully, they will continue to worry about what we are plotting, and perhaps it will keep them from going forward, but for now …”
“Yes, you are right. Way too much time wasted,” Jazz agreed with a frown. “Okay, have at me.”
He did, and she was thrilled when she actually thwarted his lunge with the strength of an immortal and the skill she had learned as a human. “Ha!” she said, bouncing like a boxer in place.
“Good, only good, not great.” He chuckled.
“Why doesn’t it all come naturally?”
“Even we Fae have to be taught from infancy how to use our magic, learn our sciences.” He shook his head. “And you are not Fae—at least, not quite, not yet.”
She arched a look at him. “Does that mean I will be Fae one day?”
“In a manner of speaking. You will be …” He grinned at her and feigned a punch. “A half-breed.”
“Hey!” She shifted behind him and swatted his rump with a bright smile.
Chuckling with pleasure, he grabbed for her and took her into his arms. “Well done, Fios. You have the jump shifts down. Now you have to get control and be able to shift longer distances, as I taught you—let your mind find the coordinates and then go there.”
She sighed, picked up the long fighting stick, and jabbed playfully at him. He shifted in behind her, took it away, and said, “Pestale would now have you … take you wherever he wished, and you don’t know how to shift back to me.”
She turned around to face him, and sank into his arms to hold him tightly. “Okay, let’s try it again.”
He gave her back the long wood pole, and she took it up and gave him a saucy look. This time when she jabbed, she shifted above him.
He took a minute to look for her, and she came down once again behind him and slammed him lightly with the wooden pole. “Tagged! Whoop, whoop! If you were Pestale, you would have been stabbed with my sword. Ha!”
He grinned as he turned to her. “Well done, sweetness.” He folded her into his arms and sighed. “Let’s do a reconnaissance.”
“Yay, reconnaissance—how?”
“I’ll do the shifting for now. You just hold onto me—don’t let go.”
“Never letting go,” she said, tucking her hand into his leather pants at the waist. He grinned down at her.
“Do not distract me,” he cautioned, trying to look solemn.
She crossed her chest, where she hoped her heart still was, and said, “No distracting.”
And they shifted.
* * *
Trevor had felt a disturbance in the atmosphere. It cranked with power, and he heard a creaking of the Prison Walls that vibrated and fought the magic threads created by Queen Bridget. They had been reinforced by Queen Aaibhe after Bridget’s death and maintained with the help of her best Druid priests, but Pestale had found a way to weaken those walls. Sooner or later, he was going to open them wide enough to create the portal he needed.
