rogue shifter 06 - torn apart (15 page)

"You'd better grab some food before the goblins eat all of it. Their stomachs are bottomless."

"Yes, Lord," I said in Fae, trying to suppress my smile.

The food was delicious although the sauce was so hot I had to drink an entire glass of water before I could take another bite of anything. Good thing I'd tasted it before slathering it on everything on my plate. Isaiah probably would have made me eat it anyway.

"Let me introduce you. This is our head chef, Gillix, our baker, Rylee, and this is their son, Dilt. Nil, who fed you earlier has already eaten. There's another chef around somewhere." He shrugged, then in Seelie Fae said, "This is my new assistant, Salina." He looked me over. "She needs all the help she can get, so please answer her questions to the best of your abilities. As long as she asks them in Seelie Fae."

I smiled at them, at the same time flipping off Isaiah behind my back. They nodded back unenthusiastically, their mouths full of food. "Are they really goblins?" I asked.

He was chuckling. "Yes, unseelie goblins. They have a king who hires them out. Gillix and Rylee have served me for centuries. Those aren't their real names by the way.

"I figured. The food is very good. I hope you pay them well."

"I don't."

"You don't pay them or you don't pay them well?"

"I don't pay them for working in the kitchen. I pay the Goblin King and
he
pays them. However, they have other duties for which I pay them very well."

The two larger ones coughed, or maybe laughed. "They speak English?"

"Yes, along with a dozen other languages."

"Do they spy for you?" They laughed again. Yep it was definitely a laugh. I could tell by the way they shoved each other off the chairs while they made that sound. The wine would spill or the food would dump onto the table, but they'd just do it again anyway. Kind of like a high five or a punch to the shoulder in our world.

Isaiah answered, "Everyone spies on everyone in the DR. and we wouldn't have it any other way." The three goblins spoke all at once, one of them pointing at me, the words jumbled and hard to understand. As Isaiah translated, they drank their wine, spilling some on their plates and  licking it up.

"Dilt said you are beautiful, Rylee thinks you don't eat fast enough and Gillix said I should keep you far away from his king." Isaiah shoved a goblet in front of me.

"I shouldn't."

"It's your second dose. You're useless to me until you can access the lines."

"But I can see your world perfectly. There's no more mist."

"What you see and feel still isn't accurate. With each dose your magic will open to you like a flower." He shook his head. "Ech. That was bad even for me." He and his kitchen buddies downed another goblet and then laughed again, one of them sprawling over the back of his chair.

"Are you drunk?"

"I can't get drunk. My metabolism breaks down the alcohol too efficiently. It's one of the great hardships I bear."

"Jeez." I rolled my eyes. "Where's the violinist?"

The three goblins looked at me in shock then broke out in riotous laughter, one of them falling off his chair...again...and spilling what was left of his food on the floor. He still ate it. Now
they
were drunk.

"It doesn't take much." Isaiah answered my unspoken question.

"So why does the lord of the manor have dinner with his servants? Shouldn't we be eating our gruel in unheated cells wearing fingerless gloves and wrapped in tattered blankets?"

"That can be arranged, Ms. Smart Mouth."

"Sorry. I'll behave. I like my room."

"Drink."

I looked at the Goblins. Rylee and Gillix were crawling on hands and knees picking up the crumbs of what had fallen to the floor, while their son, Dilt, had to step over them to clear off the table.

Isaiah nudged the goblet closer. "I'll drink it in my room." He waited. "May I drink it in my room, sir?" He took hold of my elbow and we were there. I inhaled a long deep breath, closed my eyes and then tried to drink the whole thing straight down.

He snatched it away after four or five gulps. "Really, Jackie, sometimes I think you've lost your damn mind."

"Wha...?" My body shuddered violently and I started to sway, then gasped as the entire room began to tremble, walls caving in and the floor buckling under my feet. I cried out in fear while Isaiah grabbed hold of me and led me to my lone chair, forcing me to sit.

"Stay there and don't move."

"There's an earthquake!" I stood again and tried to run to the door, but he forced me back into the chair, where I clutched at the seat. Why wasn't he getting us out of here?

"Sit. There's no earthquake, but if you try to walk you'll fall. Garrett won't want you coming back sporting a lump on your head or a broken arm." He huffed out an exasperated breath as I whimpered in fear." You are such a frustrating female. You should've sipped it. A little bit at a time."

"Did you tell me that?" I closed my eyes, but it didn't help.

He grabbed my chin and met my wide-eyed gaze, sending me some magic to calm me. Happily the room settled down and I was able to breathe normally again. "Any child knows that powerful magic should be taken in small doses," he growled softly.

"I was a
human
child. At least I thought I was. I didn't learn any of the shit that magical children learn. You know all this."

He dropped his hand and stepped back,  ignoring my tirade. "Tell me what you feel."

I glanced around. "The room's stopped moving."

"What do you
feel
, not what do you
see
," he snapped. "Close your eyes." I scowled and did what he asked.

His hand rested on my forehead, soothing my nerves but also allowing him easier access to my mind.  I didn't pull away because I trusted that he wanted to help me, but I still wished that he'd asked first. "Stop blocking. Your anger is clogging up your receptors. Focus the way I taught you, not the fae way."

I almost growled a reply, but decided that pissing him off wouldn't help me learn whatever he was trying to teach me. Instead, I took in a long deep breath and released it slowly, consciously relaxing the muscles in my body, section by section, the way he'd shown me. At the same time I focused on the sound of our breathing, the beating of our hearts, and the rhythmic tapping of footsteps as another servant traveled down the hallway outside my room.

"Better. Again." Unlike with my shifter magic, where I let go of the physical and concentrated on the magic itself, Isaiah's method required me to sharpen my senses to take in everything I was experiencing as I sat and breathed and lived this moment: The warmth of the soft fabric of my slacks against the palms of my hands as I rested them on my thighs. The spicy scent of Isaiah's breath. The cushion of the chair pressing against my rear. The ticking of the clock.

"Again."

One more breath and suddenly magic was pumping through my veins like oxygen-loaded blood without me making any conscious effort to pull it in. It came alive inside me, quickening my heartbeat like a shot of adrenaline, sharpening my senses into painfully acute points, heating my skin. I opened my eyes, terrified of being overwhelmed, burned to ash by magic.

"No." Isaiah's large hand was suddenly covering my eyes. "Close them and feel the magic. You're safe, I promise."

"I'm gonna be sick." I tried to stand, afraid that my heart was beating too quickly, that my shallow breaths were coming too fast. Isaiah grasped my shoulders and held me steady.

With his help I managed not to fall."I told you to sit and keep your eyes closed. Come." He didn't sound angry, thank goodness.

He flashed me into the bathroom and magically did up my hair so it wouldn't get in the way while I vomited. It wasn't pretty, but he stayed with me, supporting my shoulders and not scolding me. When nothing else would come up, he waited while I washed my face and rinsed my mouth, then flashed me to my bed and made me sit up with two pillows propped behind me. A water bottle appeared in my hand.

I wiped away a couple of tears then took a swig. "That was awful. I thought I was going crazy." The only good thing was that I must have purged myself of most of the potion.

He pulled a chair over next to the bed and sat. "It was awful for two reasons. You drank it down too quickly, and then you fought the effects." He looked closely at my eyes for a few moments, then took my hand in his and speared my index finger with a sharp claw. He sucked in the drop of blood that appeared. "Good. It seems you managed to absorb
some
of the potion, so the next time you'll..."

"Uh, uh. Never again. And when did I give you permission to take blood?" I scowled.

"You agreed to obey me, so you
will
be enjoying another dose. Surely you can spare one drop of blood for the sake of your son?"

"You promised..."

"I promised to keep you safe. To me that means alive and hidden with all limbs and bodily functions still intact and in working order. Minor injuries or stomach upsets do not put your life in danger." He rose from the bed and  paced, running a hand through his hair. "You'll be of no use to me at all if you don't have access to your magic You'll drink another dose tomorrow. Sleep now." I was suddenly under the covers wearing pajama pants and a tank top, just like what I usually wore at home. He'd used magic to change my clothes.

"Isaiah..." I covered my face with my hands.

He sounded amused. "I'll check on you later. Stan will get you up in the morning.
Sleep
."

There was magic in the word. I closed my eyes, unable to keep them open a minute longer as my awareness shut down.

CHAPTER TWELVE

After breakfast, a satisfying meal consisting of hot cereal, savory roasted meat and fruit, Isaiah appeared with another goblet.

I swallowed my last spoonful of cereal. "I'd rather not."

"I understand your hesitation, but I insist."

"No meetings today?"

"None that can't wait."

"I might get sick again." Maybe that would change his mind.

"Only if you decide not to follow my instructions."

"You didn't give any instructions yesterday." I pushed my plate away and glowered.

"This is key to your training. If you don't..."

"Okay."  I raised my palm in defeat, then extended it. "Hand it over." There was no point in putting it off any longer. Isaiah would push and push and drive me crazy.

"Good girl." He slid it across the table, adding, "Two sips. Then we wait one minute to see what happens."

I sniffed the liquid and winced. It smelled different in a bad way. He noticed my discomfort, so he sat beside me and scooted his chair a little closer.

"If I feel sick..."

"I'm here." He placed his hand over mine, surprising me again. "We all have to make sacrifices." His joke earned him a weak smile. "Now focus, then sip."

Two sips later I was starting to tingle. "I feel something."

He laughed. "Where?"

"My gut. It's kind of like that feeling you get when you're going to vomit."

His eyebrows shot up and we were instantly in the bathroom again. "I'm beginning to think that your shifter magic is resisting. Try to reassure it."

I sat on the closed toilet seat with a thump. "Really, Isaiah? Do you talk to your magic, because I haven't had that particular experience."

"I'm pure-blood, totally in sync with my power. But for you, holding out an olive branch to both sides might speed the process along. Think of it as an existential exercise. Go to your first vision—that plateau you created—and try to pull in both shifter and demon. You may be surprised at the results."

He was referring to the cliff I'd conjured when I was first learning how to build my shields and use my newly discovered magic. My power was so much a part of me now that I rarely needed to anchor myself mentally before pulling in energy. The vision brought back memories of Garrett instructing me on how to protect myself by building a shield and then on another day, us making love during the solstice festival. Looking away from Isaiah, I smiled.

"I see you remember the place."

"Of course I do."

"It's neutral territory, and quite tranquil as I recall." He used his hands to gesture dramatically. "I remember a lush grassy cliff overlooking a sea of rainbow-hued ley line magic under a bright blue cloudless sky." He sighed.

I narrowed my eyes. "There are clouds. The big white puffy kind."

"You're feeling better?"

"Yes." The tingling sensation had stopped.

He held out the goblet. "Two more sips." This was an order. I groaned. He growled. I drank.

My eyes and hands started to itch so I looked at the mirror over the sink. My eyes were orange—okay that had happened before—and my claws were out. What the...? My claws? I looked more closely. These were not my cheetah claws. These claws were at least two inches longer and looked razor sharp."Uh, Isaiah..."

"Lovely, aren't they?"

"How do I get rid of them?"

"Will them away, like you do your cheetah claws."

"I don't have access to my shifter magic here."

"How inconvenient." He smirked.

"So how do I retract them?"

"Figure it out, little demon." He stood. "Come, I have work for you." He left the room quickly.

I waved my hands around as I followed him. "How the heck am I supposed to work?" He ducked into a doorway ten yards ahead of me, so I broke into a sprint to catch up. "You don't have claws in true form."

He spun, wiggling his fingers in the air. Very long black claws had appeared at the tips. "You were saying? I'm able to make use of them whenever it's necessary, as you will be too."

I should have known that. "Oh. Well, can't you show me how to get rid of them?"

"Of course I can."

"But you won't."

"Not a chance." Grinning he turned again and moved off, his claws disappearing with the first two strides. "I expect you to learn to use the magic of my world. The claws appeared on your hands. You can get rid of them the same way."