Escaping Destiny (30 page)

Inside the room, was shelf after shelf of my
favorite nail polish. It wasn’t just nail polish, though, it was
OPI nail lacquer. My Fairy had remembered that I was obsessed with
it, and that my entire collection had been destroyed when my house
had.

“You can pick from any shade. If you leave
the bottles you want, I will have them sent to Faery for you,”
Arista said politely.

“All of them; I want them all,” I whispered
brokenly, even as I turned and threw myself in Ryder’s arms. “Thank
you!” I cried, unsure if it was hormones or that he was extending
an olive branch and trying to give some of the comforts I’d thought
to never have again. There was a lot I could live without, but my
nail polish and coffee were both something I needed to just feel
like I was myself again.

“We will take one hundred of every color,”
Ryder said over my head to Arista.

“Seriously? That’s a lot of polish,” she
replied.

“Synthia wants it,” he whispered into my
hair, “and I want her to be happy.”

Arista sighed at his romantic comment. Shit,
I
was sighing! He’d brought me to the freaking OPI factory.
Shit! I was at the OPI factory, and was too busy hugging on the
Fairy to be grabbing bottles. I ripped myself from his arms and
darted my gaze, looking for my favorite shades.

“Can I take a few bottles back with us?” I
asked as my fingers itched and my palms sweated to touch them
all.

“He is paying for them.” She laughed and
shook her head. “So feel free, Princess, to take any of them that
you want.”

A few bottles? I left with thirty shades of
polish, hand lotions, polish remover, and countless other things
that I’d never been able to afford before. When we sifted back to
Faery, and the men had piled all the goods into a cabinet that he
glamoured for me, Ryder turned and smiled.

“Good surprise?” he asked.

“Best surprise.”

“I knew you loved the lacquer, and I’m
trying, Pet. It’s not safe for you to go home while your brother is
hunting you, but this was something I could do. Ristan has history
with Arista, so he reached out and made sure she could help. So,
how do you plan on thanking me?” he asked with a boyish grin.

“Nice try, Fairy. I still need time to
think,” I replied. “Maybe I’ll thank you later, in a way we can
both enjoy.”

“I like that idea,” he purred.

“I didn’t say drop your pants and get naked.
I said later; as in not right now,” I replied as he took a
calculated step toward me, only to stop at my words.

“Pet,” he growled.

“Fairy,” I smiled.

“I don’t like to be kept waiting,” he
replied.

“Neither do I, so I guess you better get to
figuring out how to void that contract.”

I spent a few days learning more about the
Demon. Not by choice, but because he said he had been getting
erratic visions about the Mages and my brother, Faolán, that he
couldn’t pinpoint. So he, which really meant Ryder, wanted to make
sure I was safe at all times, so I got stuck with over six and half
feet of Demon as a babysitter. Well,
they
called it
extending his duties as a bodyguard.

At least he made it interesting, and instead
of cooping me up and making me crazy, it looked like he and Ryder
must have discussed entertainments for me other than ‘spin the
Fairy’ and my days weren’t as boring as a result.

In the mornings, he would escort me to
Zahruk, who would spend an hour sparring with me. Nothing too
strenuous, though, because of the babies. But I got some payback of
my own for that little stabbing incident a while back. For some
reason, Darynda and the rest of my handmaiden posse begged to go to
these workout sessions (personally, I think it was to see Zahruk
and any of the other guards that might have been working out in the
armory without their shirts on.)

Darynda would not take her eyes off of
Zahruk, and Meriel didn’t just track Ryder like he was dinner; all
of the males were a buffet to her. I found out the first day of our
sessions that she was half-Nymph and she was always hungry, or so
it seemed.

After sparring, he would escort me to one of
the many libraries where we would meet up with Dristan, who would
bring out all sorts of dusty books and scrolls to help me
understand Fae history and politics. It seemed that he had more
talents than just being a flirt, and he was hoping that Ryder would
utilize him as more of an ambassador. He was also very protective
of the books in the libraries, and treated them like treasures. I
learned a lot from these two as sessions usually devolved in them
arguing about one topic in history, or another. Although they both
dodged questions about how old they were, it seemed that for some
of this history, one or both of these two were present as they were
both part of Alazander’s guard before they were part of Ryder’s. I
wasn’t sure why my handmaiden posse would always scatter, and
seemed to have other things to do when history or politics were
involved.

Adam had returned to the Dark Kingdom with
the promise to return soon, and I did not see Adrian now that the
trial was over. The trial had taken both Adrian and Vlad out of
Tèrra for over two weeks, and they had to get back to their duties
of monitoring the Mages. It seemed that the Mage activity had not
slowed down there, even with the increase of more Mage trouble here
in Faery. It was an indication that there might be a lot more of
them than Ryder had initially suspected.

This afternoon Ristan had been entertaining
me with classic movies—since we had Fae-
per
View, which was
way better than Pay-per View. He could think of a movie, and it
would play on the wall like a projector.

He bet me that I couldn’t beat him at chess,
so I had the first time, at least. He’d won the second, and I’d won
the third. Each had a price…and we got to choose what it was. I
planned on tormenting him with chick flicks, and indulging in some
perfect girl time, since he insisted on babysitting me.

We watched Beaches first, which backfired. I
bawled my eyes out and he patted my back awkwardly. He made me
watch Goonies next, which with his reciting each of the characters’
dialogue in a replicated voice, had me rolling with laughter. He
was a sport and painted my nails, which in the end looked like I
had allowed a one year old to go wild on my digits.

“You are the worst nail painter, ever,” I
said, holding my hand up to inspect it.

“Who’s the idiot that wanted me to paint
their nails? And shit, this stuff stinks like Pixie farts,” Ristan
complained.

“Wait until you catch a whiff of the
remover,” I said, smiling evilly.

“Nice try.” He barked with laughter as he
glamoured the polish off with a twist of his fingers. “Hungry yet?”
he asked, yet again. He had been dropping these not so subtle hints
every couple of hours since he had gotten here. I was starting to
think Ryder was paying him to ask that question. Either that, or he
couldn’t wait for Ryder to take over.

“I fed from him yesterday,” I replied
flippantly. I’d done more than feed; I’d jumped him as soon as he’d
come to my room, ripping his clothes off before he could even grasp
what I was doing and gorged on him. Not that he’d complained when
he’d figured it out.

He’d slammed me against the wall, even though
he’d made sure to not hurt my midsection, and after I called him
dirty names for being gentle, he’d made me scream his name until
I’d lost my voice. He’d also broken the bed, which, hey, you
wouldn’t hear me complaining about it.

“Why are you always so nice to me?” I asked
Ristan as he leaned back and put his hands behind his head on the
bed leisurely. “Out of everyone here, you seem to be the most
willing to help me.”

“You make Ryder happy, Flower. I like him
better when he is happy. He hasn’t had an easy life, and I like
seeing him happy with you. I am also here to protect you from
anyone seeking to harm you. Besides, it gets me out of the tedious
bullshit that the others have to sit through, like holding court
and listening to everyone bitch and moan over what they think they
are entitled to.”

“Oh,” I replied and exhaled slowly,
considering what he’d said.

“Still—” he was cut off; his eyes flashed red
and began swirling.

“Ristan?” I asked. When he didn’t answer, I
moved to touch him.

“I wouldn’t do that,” Danu’s voice said from
behind me. “You touch him, and you will follow him into the vision,
child.”

I spun around and leveled my gaze on her. She
was dressed in an elegant light blue outfit of lace, and silk. Her
black hair hung loose, falling in gentle waves around her slim
hips. “You,” I said, barely above a whisper.

“Me,” she agreed with a beautiful smile on
her full mouth. “It’s time to choose, Sorcha. Life or death?”

“That’s pretty vague, Danu; even for you,” I
replied, placing myself firmly between her and the Demon who seemed
lost inside the vision.

Her eyes went from Ristan’s slumped form on
the bed, to me, and back again. “Interesting.”

“Still waiting,” I continued. I didn’t trust
her, and I sure as hell didn’t trust her with the Demon after the
shit he’d told me.

“It’s time to choose whether or not you will
allow Faery and your children to die because you insist on hanging
onto that last thread of humanity you have inside of you. That last
little bit of disbelief. It’s your choice. I cannot make it for
you. I had thought, given who I had paired you up with, that you
would be an easy sell. Adam caught on and embraced it, even as he
was in Transition,” she replied softly as she took in the wide
variety of nail polish.

“I can just choose to accept you?” I asked
guardedly. I wasn’t born yesterday.

“Of course, Sorcha,” she said, holding up
bottle after bottle and examining each one at her leisure. As if
she had all the time in the world. “There really isn’t a catch, so
please stop assuming I am a monster. You are being rather rude,
considering I am here to help you.”

“No one in this world does anything for
free.”

“
We do, my child, if our existence depends
on this world surviving,”
she replied inside my head.

“Stay out of my head,” I warned.

“I’ve been inside of your head since the day
you were created. I set the events in motion that created who you
are and who you were meant to be. Ryder was only following what I’d
given him for his path. He had to see the evil, which he’d been
born of to stop it. You had to endure hell to become a warrior and
protector. Sometimes living through something so horrible will
shape our minds, and make us stronger in the end. Like you.” She
turned and continued her perusal of the polish. “Of course I didn’t
want them to die; they were a perfect match for you. The Guild was
the perfect place to hide you while you came into womanhood.
Transition came much faster than I expected, but of course Ryder
figured out the clues and found you sooner than I had intended him
to.”

“So, you are saying you planned it all?” I
raised a brow and took a step closer.

“Much of it. You exceeded most of my
expectations. I couldn’t stop the Mages, or Joseph. Faolán put a
little kink in my neck; however, his greed fulfilled what he was
supposed to do. I can see the future and how each choice shapes
things. I can set events into motion. However, I cannot directly
interfere with free will and I can’t stop bad things from
happening. Sometimes those bad things are necessary, like what you
saw in the maze. From death comes rebirth, from fire comes
reshaping and reseeding. Fire shapes and molds in the forge. What
are trials in life but fire? They shape and mold. There are some
things that even I cannot foresee. Like your participation in the
Wild Hunt, although that swan dive was a nice touch.” She smiled,
and dipped her head to me at her words.

“Why me?” I asked.

“You have a fire in you that most of the High
Fae lack these days. They grow careless in age, bitter even. Many
have lost their compassion along with their emotions. They lose
touch with what I created them for. They are the keepers of this
world I have created. I used part of my soul when I created it. If
Faery dies, that part of me will die as well. All creatures of
Faery have a small piece of me within them. While many Gods have
perfected their own worlds, mine was built to be…interesting.
Perfect is so boring, don’t you agree?” she asked, turning to look
out the window beside her.

“Yes,” I answered hesitantly, wondering where
she was going with this.

“Good. I’m glad we agree on this,” she
replied. “Sorcha, I can hear you loud and clear. I can hear your
thoughts louder than anyone else in this world. You are special to
me; I gave you a part of me no one else has. In fact, I gave you
enough that you could be considered my own daughter.”

Wow…put the brakes on Becky! She did not just
say that!

“Oh, but I did.” She smiled and shook her
head. “He’s right; you are quirky and fun.”

“Who is right?” I asked slowly.

“The Demon; he has a soft spot for you.”

“What did you give me?”

“That’s a story for another time. Right now,
we need to worry about what is coming, and less about the details
of how we got here. There are, shall we say, several concerns
conspiring right now and you need to let me in. If you don’t, you
and the babes won’t live through it. One of these concerns is
Faolán. He’s a power hungry Fae, and trust me, there is nothing
worse. He has discovered what you are carrying and even now he is
trying to figure out how to get into the coronation,” she
stated.

“Do you ever bring good news?” I scoffed.

“I’m a Goddess. I never bother myself unless
it’s important. I could tell you how the whole world of Faery is
depending on those infants, but you’ve already been told that. Adam
was open; he allowed me in and embraced the power I had to give
him. He is ready for his trials. It’s your turn, Sorcha. Let me in
so I can protect you. Accept me so those infants have a fighting
chance.”