For Your Heart (Hill Dweller Retellings) (9 page)

    
He squats in front of me, keeping eye contact.  “The
Aos Si
are the Gentry.  They rule over the faerie races in Otherworld.  They’re very powerful.”

    
I scoff.  “What, like for real?  Like, inhuman, supernatural beings?”

    
He cocks his head.  “They are perhaps more cruel than your average human, but I would not call them inhuman.  The
Aos Si
are descended from humans – at least partly.”

    
Shaking my head, I say, “You've got to be kidding me.  I mean, I may be into reading this kind of stuff,” I gesture at the heap of manga and fantasy novels on my floor, “but I don't believe it.”  Do I?

    
Green Man gives me an annoyed expression.  “Do you think I'm lying to you?  I've never given you a reason to think I'd lie to you.”

    
“Okay, fine.  Prove it,” I growl.  “Prove you’re not a hallucination.  Prove faeries and these ess-shee people exist.”

    
He spreads his arms wide looks down at himself and lifts his brows.  It looks like he can't help but smirk.  “I glow green, what other kind of proof do you need?”

    
He has a point, but I’m not buying it.  “You could be a regular old guy with a weird vitamin deficiency.  Use magic.”

    
Green Man’s smirk fades.  “I have no magic.”

    
But you’re green
!  “No magic?” I repeat with a disappointed shake of my head.  Seriously?  I imagine a hot faerie and he doesn’t even use magic?  That’s crap.  “But, don't all faeries have some kind of magic?”

    
“I am
not
a faerie.”  He sounds both disgusted at the prospect and a little like he’s losing his patience.  “I’m an
Aos Si
, part human, part angel.  Like I said, we
rule
the faeries.  Meaning we’re better, more powerful.”

    
I crunch a brow and make an obvious point of glancing back at
Nephilim John
– which I’m sure he just pulled that line of BS from – though kudos to him for knowing what a Nephilim is.  “Right,” I slather on the sarcasm, “and magic wielding faeries would allow themselves to be subjugated by non-magic wielding
Aos Si
because…?”

    
Seeing my point, he tips his head.  “The
Aos Si
have magic.  They possess the Talent.  It would make no sense for those with angelic blood to not retain some sort of power.”

    
“All of them except you, apparently.  So, Mister Non-magic-wielding-
Aos Si
-lord-who-rules-over-faeries-that-just-obey-you-because-you-
don’t
-have-magic-and-oh-look-you’re-apparently-descended-from-angels-but-have-no-wings, what
exactly
do you do in your Ter-na-Otherworld, or whatever it is?”

    
He squares his shoulders and straightens.  “I'm a knight of the Summer Court.  I was elected and bestowed with the graces of a knight by the queen herself.  I serve as her personal guard and consort.”

    
I laugh.  I laugh until I’m literally crying, because this is
really
crazy.  I’m totally nuts. 

    
“Why are you crying?” he asks.

    
I can’t help but grin like a mad woman as I shake my head and attempt to wipe away hysterical tears.  “Graces of a knight?” I wheeze.  “You mean like chivalry?”  He’s lacking in that area.  Big time.  “So let me get this straight, Lancelot, you were elected by the Summer Queen and she made you her personal knight because she's what?  Altruistic?  I mean, no offense, but a magic-less ruler over faeries seems kind of laughable to me.”  I don’t go near the angel bit, I don’t believe it.  I mean, really?  What Catholic girl would believe this jerk is an angel?

    
Green Man bites his lip.  He seems to understand where I'm coming from.  “In the Summer Court, there are two things that will give you power.  The magic you are born with and the flesh on your body.  I don't have magic, so I use the other.”

    
“Flesh on your…” My jaw drops and I feel the horror spread across my face as I realize he didn’t mean consort in the business partner sense. 
He's a man-whore
!  That explains a lot. Ugh, gah!  So, what is he, a fallen angel?  Demanding my heart?  What kind of wacked out mind-loop is this?  What would a therapist say to me if I explained that little tid-bit about my imaginary murderer?  “You're disgusting.”  I don’t know if the words are for him or for me.

    
I try to slip away – put distance between us, to reject how far this mind-bend is going – but he grabs my elbow.  “Let go!”  I wrench my arm away and back up.

    
He stops short.  “Don’t you want to be touched?”

    
Yes
.  “No.”  At his almost hurt expression, I say, “I mean, I don't know what kind of nasty faerie STIs you're carrying.”  What am I talking about?  I can’t get sick from a hallucination.  But, he doesn’t know that…

    
He examines his hand, looking confused.  “STIs?”

    
My eyes widen in disbelief.  My own hallucination doesn’t know what STIs are?    “AIDS, herpes, gonorrhea, you know?  Sexually transmitted infections?  Weren't you paying attention in health class?”

    
“I have no health class,” he says slowly, as if pronouncing foreign words.

    
My stomach drops, making me suddenly doubt my own self-prognosis.  Maybe he’s not a hallucination.  Maybe there actually is a faerie-lord – a killer – standing here demanding my heart…  He continues, unconscious of my sudden doubt.  “I never get sick and neither have any of the
Aos Si
I've fornicated with.”

    
Fornicated?  He seriously said that, didn’t he?  Suddenly, my skin feels irreparably dirty and creepy-crawly, as if being in the same room is infiltrating me with unknown pathogens and marring my soul with bad orgy juju.  How many people has this guy slept with?  He’s unclean – in more than one way.  I grasp the cross around my neck and recite a silent Hail Mary.  Oh crap, I don't know how faerie diseases are spread!  What if they’re airborne?  My stomach feels like up-chucking Dad's beef and barley stew over the sage-green carpet.  I press my free hand to my mouth. 

    
Green Man finally notices my discomfort and backs into the center of the room.  “
Aos Si
have no diseases,” he informs.  “Neither do faeries.”  He shoves his hands under his arm-pits – like he's afraid to touch anything.  “Otherworlders could touch a human with a disease or sickness and never get it,” he mutters.

    
I force my hand away from my mouth.  “Just don't touch me anymore, okay?”

    
Green Man gives me a long look.  “What if I
want
to touch you?”

    
My temper flares.  “Well, you can't!  It's against the law to touch women without their permission.  Don’t you know that?”

    
Green Man scoffs.  “Where I come from you're an outcast if you don't want to be touched.”

    
“I guess I'm an outcast,” I snarl and struggle to my feet.  “Go away already.  You can’t have my heart and I have to go to bed.”

    
Green Man watches as I pull pajamas out of my drawer.  “You're a very strange girl, Jeanette.”

    
I straighten.  The sound of my name coming out of his mouth sends a knife through my chest.  I have to look down to make sure I'm not bleeding.  I grimace at my pajamas.  “I'm weird?” I turn to him and give him my best ‘look who's talking’ expression.  “At least I'm not a hallucinated green faerie, mister...what-ever-your-name-is.” I dismiss him with a flick of my wrist.

    
“Tamrin, my name is Tamrin, and-”

    
“Tamrin?” I interrupt.  “That a girl’s name.”

    
He gives me a flat look, as if daring me to call him girly.  I don’t, so he continues.  “
And
I’m not a hallucination.  But that doesn't matter.  The only thing that matters is you paying me back for the rose you ruined.”

    
I cross my arms.  “You can't have my heart.  I don’t even know you.”

    
“That also doesn’t matter.”  Tamrin stares possessively at my chest.  “You will give it to me.”

    
I finally realize he’s not talking about a date.  He literally wants my heart – the organ itself.  I put my hand to my chest, as if that would stop him if he decided to go Lizzy Borden on me.  “I kind of need it, you know?”  I say, my tone sarcastic because this is too unreal to warrant being as serious as it really is.

    
“I need it, too.”  His hands drop and he's got his dagger in his hand.  He holds it poised like he's ready for a knife fight, but his muscles freeze and he cocks his head, his face perplexed.  “I just…don't know how to get it out without damaging it,” he reflects more to himself than me.  “It has to be perfect.”

    
I shove myself back against my shelf, wishing more than anything I could press myself between the pages of someplace else.  Narnia.  Middle Earth.  Hell, Wonderland would make more sense than this.  “Put that thing away!”

    
He takes a step toward me.

    
Maybe this is my subconscious fear of what happened long ago, showing itself as this guy. Don’t they always say you have to face your fear before it will go away? I take one step toward him.  “I’m serious, Faerie Man.  It’s one thing for you to be all give me your heart, but another thing entirely for my own hallucination to scare me to death.”

    
Frowning, he takes another step toward me.  “I don’t understand why you insist on believing I am not real.”  He cocks his head.  “Although, perhaps it will be less painful if you don’t believe that it’s really happening.  I’ve never hurt a woman before, but…I suppose it has to happen one day.”  He lifts the knife again.

    
Suddenly cold at my own hallucination’s icy intent, I put my hands up in placation.  “Okay,” I yelp, my voice on the verge of breaking, “How about this, you can have my heart when I'm done with it.”

    
He lowers the dagger an inch or two.  “When is that?”

    
I shrug.  “I don't know.  Sixty years or so?”

    
Shaking his head, he steps closer.  “No, that's too long.  Roxel will notice by then.”  He snatches up my wrist.

    
I struggle against him, my tearing eyes never leaving the dagger.  My fear of his Otherworldly germs are forgotten for fear of his weapon.  “Wait, wait!” I whimper as I cower against the wall.  I can feel myself shaking under his hot touch.  My knees are too weak to hold me, I dangle from his grasp like a ragdoll.  He may not be real, but my fear is.  “Can't we talk about this?  I mean, it's just a rose, right?  Let's just go to Hanford's Nursery and get a new one?”  I’m babbling, sniveling, but I don’t care.  Anything to stall my gruesome death.  This may be a hallucination, but I’m all too aware that crazy people can accidentally kill themselves because of what they think is real.  I want to scream for Dad, but I can’t involve him in this.  I have to deal with this on my own.  I have to make Green Man go away…Preferably without scaring myself to death first.  More words spill out.  “Better yet, let's order one out of a catalog.  Those are better, right?  We'll get one exactly like it.  From South America, if you'd like.”

    
Tamrin lowers his dagger and gives me a disbelieving look.  “You simply cannot buy any other rose to replace it.”

    
“Why?  A rose by any other name and all that, right?”  I try an unsteady smile, hoping he’ll get the Shakespeare reference, but he seems more outraged by the prospect.

    
“It was a unique flower.  A
magical
flower.  Look.”  He puts down the dagger and with his free hand reaches into a side-pack.  He pulls the rose out.  “You picked this yesterday and I have not watered it, yet it doesn't droop or shrivel.  Only…,” he drops my wrist and reaches into the pack with his other hand and pulls out a small handful brilliant red petals – also unwithered, “…this.”

    
Sniffling, I stare at the rose, as perfect as it had been sitting on its long thorny stem in the middle of Carver Hall Park, then at the petals sitting like pooling blood in his palm. 

    
Sighing, he puts the rose on my desk, then he plops in my swivel chair and stares at the petals in his hand.  “Can you buy a rose that does not droop or wither after being pulled?”  His voice sounds as hopeless and afraid as I feel.  “Any other rose just will not do.”

    
I shake my head, knowing I'm sealing my own fate.  My whole body gives out and I sink to the floor, a girl-sized puddle drowning in her own hysteria.  I don’t know what’s real and what’s not.  He seems so concrete, his touch and scent and intent.  But he can’t be, can he?  He’s green and claims to be a faerie lord.  I wrap my arms around my head in rejection, sobbing.