AllFreeNovel
Share Us
And still, Jareth had had trouble making sense of the description of the scene Tarick had witnessed upon entering the room.
It wasn’t until Jareth looked down at the boy, sprawled on the floor like a marionette with its strings cut, full lips glistening with a sick wetness, did something of the meaning of Tarick’s ramble click into place.
A rage Jareth hadn’t known he was capable of, only comparable to the moment he learned Suscon had raided the kingdom and murdered his father, burned under his skin like hot flashes of acid. He felt it the moment rationality left him, the moment his beast prowled beneath his skin, ready to pounce forward and tear the witch apart. And it would have.
The only thing that halted it, perhaps the only capable thing of halting it, was the gentle, unsettled movement from the floor.
The fae boy moved to stand, all pale limbs unfolding like a flower bud, moving with a peculiar grace despite his broken leg. His unnaturally-bright, poppy hair drooping around him like the petals they resembled, he was alarmingly small before them all, even the tall Victoria.
And every time his eyes had the chance of witnessing him, Jareth couldn’t help but be awed by the pure loveliness of the creature, the angles of his face and body moving from sharp to smooth so seamlessly, much like the doll Newt so wished him to be. But a broken one now, his skin dusted in a thin layer of grime, his leg in ruin, and his once-pristine, translucent skirt now a tattered rag barely stable around his hip, its stitching and patterns around the belt clearly Susconian, and therefore a reminder of who and what the boy was: and hence Jareth’s awe was suppressed. The suppression had been harder so when, days ago, the boy had boldly found a perch on his bed, pulled back a hanging strip of fabric from that skirt, and had presented himself.
Though the memory was unwelcome in the face of the situation now, it came nonetheless with its similarity to the boy’s actions now. But his rage was stronger than the reminder, and he shoved the memory away.
The boy was now taking a hesitant step towards him, without the aid of the crutch Jareth had left for him, he was quick to notice. There was an eager, hopeful brightness in the fae boy’s eyes that disturbed Jareth, as though the boy believed with full conviction that the situation was faultless. Jareth knew that the fae boy did not obviously speak their language, but between the heavy tone of the room, as well as his own passionate fury at the actdone upon the boy, with the out-of-place hope in the boy’s large eyes, left Jareth with a disturbed, curdling feeling of wrongness.
“Your Grace,” the fae boy began, stepping even closer with a flourishing gait that wobbled with injury, though theatrical enough, as though moving on an injured leg was something to be applauded for. “If you’ve heard well, then it is true. I’ve greatly pleased the witch Victoria.” There was a nearly-mad craving about the pretty creature, a desperation so fragile it was hard to witness. The pathetic hope made Jareth realize that, again, the boy thought that Jareth hadwantedthis service done upon the palace witch. The boy thought he would receivepraisefor it. The ludicrousness of it was baffling. “She was very happy with my company. I pleasured her…well.” To top it off, he bowed, bending with all the grace of swan’s neck twisting towards water, yet only serving to leave Jareth in a fit of rage.
He hadn’t attacked Victoria, as the boy blocked his path, but he saw her now over the boy’s bent form, scoffing and sighing at the entire situation.
Jareth’s knuckles cracked.
“Your Grace…” the boy repeated, straightening and finally noting the discontent rolling through Jareth’s entire being. Noticing too late. Jareth’s patience was at an end.
“GET ON THE BED!” he bellowed to the boy, as that was where the small creature should have been, not on the floor ‘servicing’ Victoria, nor bowing in front of him.
The fae boy yelped and ran off.
“This shouldn’t come as a surprise to you, as you’ve witnessed the manipulative ways of the creature yourself,” Victoria began incredulously, her scorn and malice containing a false-humored edge. “Didn’t it come to you with your father’s crown melted down to apleasure toy, and parade it in front of you?”
Jareth barely heard her, unable to get the cold fact that she hadtouched the boyaway from the forefront of his mind.
Tarick was obviously aghast. “You should not have come into the King’s chambers and forced yourself upon—”
“Upon who?” Victoria snapped, interjecting. Straight-backed from the moment Jareth had seen her in his quarters, she held herself much like the boy had, yet with a sterner, more confident disposition: as though no wrong had been done by her, and it angered him. “Thefae thingthat was a prisoner up until last morning? Or the palace whore that practically served as right-hand of Emperor Eldron, your greatest enemy? How about the jinx-creature that cursed the entire kingdom? Attacked our daughter! Take your pick to name the ‘boy,’ he’s still an enemy to the entire Kingdom of Diagor.”
“You go too far,” Jareth snarled. “Stay where you are,” he warned, when Victoria stepped forward to close proximity to carry out their argument. “If you step too close, I might rip your throat out.” It wasn’t a threat. Simply a statement of fact. “I did not give you leave to execute a prisoner of such priority. Nor should you have come to my chambers and used him so.” The battle to keep his voice from rising at the end of his statement made his breath uneven. He was practically growling by the end.
“Yet you gave me leave to execute the thing once before, before we discovered what it was, when it insulted your late father, ran from the palace, and attacked Newtalia. Justdaysago, the creature should have been executed. What changed? Did it bat its eyes enough for you to change your mind about it?Thisis what the fae do. It’s bewitched you! And your blindness to it will be your downfall.” She scoffed and shook her head, folding her arms across her breast. “I did not force myself upon it. I tested it. It came to me willingly, to see what it could gain from our encounter. To see how it could manipulate me, and therefore you. How could you be so ignorant to its intentions?! It wants to worm your way into your bed and see if it can bring you down! Don’t be a fool to it!”
“Mind your tongue,” Tarick barked. From the corner of his eye he could see that Tarick was as tense as ever, coiled like a spring, waiting for a lead from his King.
“You knew exactly what you were doing, Victoria!” Jareth snarled, purposefully avoiding her own accusations for the partial-truth behind them, as he was unwilling to be distracted by his own confusion towards the internal questions he still had towards himself. Whathadchanged his mind about the fae boy, that drove him to instinctively want to protect him so completely?
There was only one distinct answer that came to mind, and it was not one that he would use in his own defense, as he was unwilling to admit it to her.
It had been the jinx’s scent.
But Jareth did not have to defend himself. He was the King of Diagor, and now Victoria would be reminded of it. He had a history with the witch, but that history made no difference now.
“I do not care if it was Emperor Eldron himself!” he went on. “You were acting againstme, against my orders to leave the prisoner be. You’ve invaded my own apartments.”And you touched him.“I cannot trust you anymore, Victoria.”
“Invaded your apartments?” Her eyes narrowed and she chuckled once, darkly. “You didn’t mind mein your apartmentsnot so long ago.”
Jareth grit his teeth, taking a step forward and hissing, “You are not a queen. You are not a consort. You only live in this palace because I let you.”
Victoria’s own glare was just as hard. “I am Princess Newtalia’smother.”
“And yet you have not, out of your own volition, had any hand in raising her.” He shook his head gently, still vibrating with anger. “The only reason you were not reprimanded the other day, for acting on your own and nearly killing the fae boy, was because you promised to find out what is different about the well-water along with Beatrice. You think that because you are a witch in the palace, you are irreplaceable? Far from it. If you cross me, Victoria, you will be treated as any other person orliving thingthat goes against this kingdom. You have until morning to study the water, make your report, and leave this castle. You may no longer call it home.”
