Disenchanted (17 page)

“Either way it ends bad for you.” She tosses one of the pillows from the couch at him.

He tosses the pillow back. “What do you suggest we do, my little water lily?”

“How about chick flick night?”

We both groan, neither a fan of the genre.

“Hey, at least they have happy endings and no one dies.”

“Beg to differ,” Rey says and holds up his hand, ticking off movies where someone ends up with a horrible disease and dies, or sacrifices themselves to save another. Nyssa’s pouty lip growing with each down-turned finger.

“It’s decided, no chick flicks.”

“Hey, what about Dara’s vote?”

“Like she would ever voluntarily watch a chick flick. Jenny would be a better bet.”

“That reminds me, any news about Jenny?” I ask, reeled back into the conversation.

They shake their heads.

“I’m worried about that girl.”

“Maybe she went back to Nebraska.” Nyssa hugs the pillow Rey tossed at her, during their little chick flick discussion.

“It’s not like she has any magical Talents The Collector would be interested in.”

“No, but there are plenty of other predators out there,” I say, reminded of the guy I’d seen her with.

The warm June day suddenly feels like January, their conversation churning up all kinds of images. Including, but not limited to, the night I saw her in the coffee shop. I haven’t told them about that little scene, bad enough they know about me seeing her before I discovered the missing bag.

“So what’s it going to be horror, or action? We could go sci–fi if anyone is feeling a little spacey.” He tosses another pillow at Nyssa.

Thank the gods for Rey and his ability to flip the subject, and Nyssa’s short attention span. My own attention still focused on my absent receptionist. Something tells me she’s a missing piece in the puzzle encompassing my life. A puzzle made up of mistakes, broken laws, kings and repeating history.

If Einen is the shadow of the past, will I be the shadow burned away in the present?

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Surprise, surprise, I’m left behind as the other two go pick out our entertainment for the night. When I offer to buy pizza again Rey stoically tells me to fix nachos, he’s tired of pizza. Before I can protest, they scoot out the door. I can still hear their laughter as they practically run down the hall.

Nachos, how in hel am I supposed to pull that off? Guess making nachos out of nothing will keep my mind off shadows and sunlight. A shiver runs down my spine and my tummy does that nice flipity
–
flop again. Enough, I need to stop thinking about it at least for the moment.

Opening the fridge for a soda, I find it practically overflowing. The first cupboard I can reach is full and so are the others. My keepers have been busy. This place doesn’t resemble my kitchen and by that, I mean it has food. Besides things like cereal, instant potatoes and frozen stuff to pop in the oven, or microwave, my kitchen is usually pretty bare. This is like a...well, a normal kitchen.

Humming the
Twilight Zone
theme, I gather hamburger, veggies and cheese. “They want nachos, they get nachos.”

Several layers of meat and cheese later, my nachos resemble more of a casserole than your typical munchies. Bowls of chopped lettuce and homemade pico de gallo wait on the counter. I’d even gone all out and filled little dishes with salsa and sour cream. This was going to be one fancy movie night at casa de Fey.

The cat, so thoughtfully winding himself around my ankles, takes off with a stream of indecipherable screeching for the door. Either Dara has decided to join us, or my grocery fairies are back. Obviously Dara, when the door opens and I’m not overwhelmed with chattering. Shoving the
nachos
in the oven I head to the living room, finding C.C. curled up on her lap as she lounges in Rey’s vacated chair.

“What did The Sisters reveal?”

“Nada, as usual.” I sit down, her raised eyebrow a hint that I’m supposed to elaborate. “A bunch of mangled crap about my destiny and that they hid me as long as possible.”

“Any hint as to what this
destiny
is?”

I shake my head, pinching the bridge of my nose between my fingers. “Nope, can’t tell me because it will do more harm than good. I’ll find out when the time is right and I’ll have choices to make. Like I said, mangled thoughts, no answers, not even a hint.”

No, I’m not about to divulge everything. She hasn’t been totally forthcoming with me either. Not that I’m placing my trust in Var Royd, but I know she knows something she’s not telling.

“What about the part about protecting you?”

“Couldn’t tell me that either. I did find out mein Schattenkind means
my shadow child
.”

She doesn’t look surprised—not that calm, collected Dara ever looks surprised—but one eye twitches ever so slightly. If I hadn’t been studying her, I would have missed it. A small crack in her usual cool armor.

“Hey, I’ve been meaning to ask you, does the title First Arrow mean anything to you?”

Wow! Could that be shock I see passing over her face before her expression becomes even more blank than usual? Voices echo in the hall and the door swings open, saving her. Rey and Nyssa enter laughing and shoving, a bag of videos and case of beer in hand. Damn, yet another unanswered question.

“You’ll be happy to know, we compromised. Nyssa gets her romance, albeit a little sick and twisted in the beginning of the series, and the rest of us get some laser action.”

“Can we skip the part where she plays dumb blond and you try to drag the title out of her? Perhaps moving right to the viewing?” Dara asks.

Nyssa nods enthusiastically. “
Han Solo
, yum.”

“Just pop the movie in while I get the munchies, don’t forget the surround and curtains.” I had to throw in that last dig, but my sarcasm is lost. Rey is a fanatic about atmosphere and usually harps about the tiniest details.

The teasing and petty bickering makes it feel almost like a normal night. Everyone settles in for a night of Mexican food and intergalactic war, except me. I can’t get my mind off the words
shadow child
.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Stumbling, crawling, pulling themselves across the ground, they gather around me. Slack–jawed vacancy replaced by adoration. Hands ranging from skeletal to the newly–deceased reach out, attempting to grasp my cloak, but pass through the insubstantial fabric. No, not fabric, but living entities, wavering shadows wrapped around my body, caressing, stroking.

These things that huddle around me, I know what they were, what they are. There will be no excuses, no questioning, all I need to do is ask, no not ask, command. They are mine to do with what I will, just like the shadowy forms that surround me. Anything I desire. Mine. Just say it and it shall be.

Something on the fringe of the crowd catches their attention. With more grace and precision than I expected, they part, leaving a path. The bowing and scraping is now directed at another. I know without asking who the shadow–cloaked figure is. Jealousy flashes as their devotion turns and I can feel their confusion as I picture them destroying this intruder.

“Control. You must learn control,” says the voice I used to call friend. “If you do not embrace it, do not
take
the power, it will destroy you.”

I feel it more than hear it ripping through the rage that encompasses me, but something clicks. Making me painfully aware of my surroundings and the flood of emotions I’m riding. He lowers his head and fades into the darkness. Leaving me lost, confused, and a little more than scared as the crowd turns its attention back to me.

***

I wake drenched, clutching at the tangle of sheets binding me to the bed. This has to stop. Surprisingly enough my heart hasn’t propelled through my ribcage. This had to be the most disturbing of the dreams yet, even beating out my own death. I’d had no control in that one. In this one, I was the one in control and I liked it. Strike that, I loved it. All that power.

Rolling from the bed, stumbling into the bathroom, sheet and all, my stomach takes a dive. I heave until every last chip and its toppings are gone, then rest my head against cool porcelain.

Remnants of the dream hang behind my eyelids like some warped silent film. Dead things, beginning with the plant at NTF headquarters, working up the food chain until they are of the two–legged variety. They reach toward me. They chant my name, even that stupid plant. “Plants can’t talk.”

“I know plants can’t talk. Did someone have a little too much last night?”

I scream as blinding brightness fills the room and throw my arms over my face in a feeble attempt to block my eyes. With a resounding click blessed darkness returns.

“Keely? Are you okay?”

Rey is leaning over me. I can see him, but it just isn’t registering. So cold. So very, very cold. My teeth are chattering and I’m shaking so hard every bone in my body aches.

“Keely? Nys! Get in here, there’s something wrong with her, and it’s not a hangover! Geez, Keely, let go that hurts.”

He places his hands over mine where I’ve grabbed his shoulders and removes them. He winces as he touches one shoulder, then the other, drawing back blood–coated fingers. “Gods, girl that was quite the death grip you had there.”

I want to apologize, but with the word death, my shaking intensifies and I can barely see, let alone speak.

“What’s wrong with her?”

“Don’t know. At first I thought she was hung over. Hasn’t said a word, just sits there all glassy–eyed, shaking like a damn vibrator. Nearly shredded my shoulders when I tried to calm her down.”

Someone is touching my face and I try to swat the hands away.

“Hey, it’s me. Nyssa. She’s all clammy. Looks like she threw up. Food poisoning?”

“No, we all ate the same thing.”

Their voices are garbled and faces all streaky and fuzzy. The pain. I’ve never felt such pain. Passing out is a definite possibility, but that would mean sleeping, sort of, and I don’t want to go back to that nightmare world. Somewhere in the depths of my addled brain I feel wet sandpaper sliding against my face.

“Back off, C.C., she’s sick,” says Rey.

Hissing, growling, and a shout of pain before the rough wetness is back. C.C. My cat, not a new form of nightmarish torture.

“Should we call 911, or a doctor?”

You’d think when you’re lying on the bathroom floor shaking like an epileptic the words
doctor
and
911
should be of some comfort. Hel and no. Doctors equal needles. I’ve always had a fear of needles and those words cut through my convulsed mind bringing the pain of thousands of them stabbing me in every place imaginable.

“No,” I forced through chattering teeth. There’s another fear for you, dentists. The slamming of my jaws probably caused some serious damage.

“But Keely, you’re sick,” says Nyssa, hovering over me.

“No. Doctors.” Forcing the words out hurts almost as much as the tremors ripping through my body. I want it to stop, but not at the expense of being poked and prodded.

“Get her back into bed,” says Nyssa. “I’ll make some hot tea, maybe we can warm her up.”

I moan when he lifts me, followed by a series of whimpers as we move across the room.

“Sorry darlin’,” he whispers, the warmth of his breath against my ear a strong contrast to my icy skin.

I nearly bite through my lip wanting to scream as he lays me on the bed. He pulls up the covers, then slips in beside me.

“Now I know you’re sick,” he chuckles against my neck. “Any other time if I’d crawled into bed naked with you, you’d have tossed me across the room.”

I hear the words, but they don’t mean shit. I struggle to get closer to him, wanting to crawl into the intense heat of his body.

“Damn, it’s like hugging a block of ice. What the hell is wrong with you, or would that be hel? I’ve heard her realm is pretty damn cold.” He slides an arm and leg under me, wrapping his whole body around mine. “Don’t cry, sweetheart, we’ll get you warmed up.”

I hadn’t realized I was until his fingers brush my cheeks.

“Rey, what in Hel’s Realm are you doing?”

“Warming her up. Do you know a better way than body heat? Wouldn’t hurt if you crawled in here too, and it would definitely help me having two girls in bed.”

The scratch of Nyssa’s lacey pajamas is like razor blades after the smoothness of Rey’s bare skin, but she is warm.

“Gods, she’s a frickin’ iceberg.”

“I know.” His grip tightens around me. “I’m afraid she’s going to hurt herself with all this shaking. Fuck.”

My ears are buzzing so loud, I feel more than hear Rey whisper against my neck and shoulder. I snuggle in closer to his animal heat. Pain, so cold it burns fills me, shoves its way to the surface. The tingling stretch of my skin feels like a unitard ten sizes too small as it tries to contain whatever it is that wants out.