Frey Saga Book II: Pieces of Eight (6 page)

I was standing before I’d
realized it. And then, a brief flash of memory, too quick to act
on, told me the mumbling chant coming from Chevelle was a
problem.

Blackness.

I couldn’t say how long I’d
been immobilized. But when I did finally regain control, I didn’t
want to move. My head throbbed and my ears rang. I’d been down
before, Chevelle wasn’t causing the pain. That was me, fighting my
own brain.

But how could I
not?

I knew Ruby was waiting
beside me, anxious for me to respond. But I didn’t. I couldn’t
manage any kind of composure.

Eventually, the ringing in
my ears lessened enough that I could hear the sound of the girl’s
voice, which brought on another round of ringing.

A human. I could not, would
not, allow myself to be compared to
that
. It burned right through
me.

No one asked me to move, no
one mentioned we should be getting on our way. No one did anything
but entertain themselves with the stupid, idiotic human.

And time passed.

I had, after so long lying
still, eventually moved into a sitting position. Facing away from
them.

They seemed to enjoy the
oddity and had all gone down in my estimation because of it. And
even though Ruby and Chevelle had kept their distance from her,
staying instead in close proximity to me, I wasn’t sure they
weren’t included in that group. I had my suspicions that they were
not disinterested, but were there to keep me in line.

I stared down, my arms
wrapped tight around my knees, concentrating on picking at the dark
fabric of my pants. When I heard a peculiar noise from her general
direction, I wasn’t able to stop myself from looking over my
shoulder, a knee-jerk reaction. She was looking at me.

That dirty little
shit-monkey was looking at me.

“
Ow!” I yelped when Ruby
stomped my foot. Apparently, I had said that last part
aloud.

My toe throbbed. But Ruby
was wrong if she thought I’d be abashed. That girl had been eyeing
me with pity, like I was crazy or something.

I heard the noise again but
forced myself to ignore it, stomping off from the group. I mumbled
under my breath that I should have let them lop her head off and
Ruby made a sharp sound but I couldn’t tell whether it was a laugh
or a hiss.

I spent the rest of that
day on a rock at least a hundred yards away from them. And then
Chevelle came to get me. I imaged he was smug; he’d intended to be
done with her right then and there. I’d stopped him, I hadn’t
wanted them to kill her. The realization lessened my irrational
anger just enough to allow me to breathe a little. I hadn’t noticed
how tight my chest was. I tried to relax it as he stood beside
me.

“
We should continue
tomorrow.” He was so hard to read. I could only really tell when he
was angry.

I nodded.

He looked like he might
reach out to me, comfort me (or possibly smack me for my tantrum),
and then he turned and walked back to the camp. I sighed. And then
I got up and followed.

I found I was able to cope
with the human’s presence by completely ignoring it. It may have
been petty, but it worked for me. It seemed that, because I had
spared her life and gone into a marathon pout, which allowed them
to spend time with her, the group had taken to the human and she
was now to be under their care. Excluding, of course, Chevelle and
Ruby, who were constantly throwing glances toward me, I presumed
checking my stability.

But I had been a model of
good behavior, excepting the one incident around the camp fire.
Once I’d been back with the group, it wasn’t long before I’d seen
the source of the peculiar noise. It was the yelp of a small dark
and fluffy puppy the girl they’d been calling Molly had kept tucked
under her arm, beneath her heavy shawl. When I’d proven capable of
self-control, she’d given it more leeway, allowing it to romp and
play for the clear delight of its new audience.
Her
new audience. At that moment, it
inexplicably attacked her, biting at her viciously.

Like I said,
excepting
the one
incident. The girl had been baffled by it but had immediately
forgiven him, the tiny black pup with deep mahogany eyes named
Snickers.

When we reached the base of
the mountain, the overall feeling of discomfort in the group had
built to stony silence. We were hunting down Grand Council and we
had a human… pet. We made camp and Ruby escorted her from the group
for privacy. It was Ruby’s only real contact with her. I was
glaring in their direction, wondering why she didn’t just piddle on
our blankets like the pup, when someone smacked me in the back of
the head. I whipped around but couldn’t tell who had done it so I
gave up and threw myself down on a stone to wait for
dinner.

And then I realized they
were talking about her. They were trying to be discreet, but I knew
what they were saying. They were trying to figure out what to do
with her. How to get rid of her. My chest tightened as I focused on
the conversation.

Chevelle didn’t trust Grey
or Anvil with her but I didn’t know why. Rhys and Rider had
refused.

Steed spoke up. “I’ll do
it.”

I was talking before I
could contain myself, the words sour. “Sure you’ll take her
home.”

They all turned to stare at
me. It hit me that I was furious. And that I was standing.
Chevelle’s face was hard. I had a flashback of the look he’d given
me at Ruby’s so long ago, when he’d thought I was jealous of Steed.
I decided to shut my mouth, stay out of it. I forced myself to sit
back down.

But they were done. My
outburst had cost me knowing their decision. I lowered my eyes to
the ground as Ruby came back with the girl.

They chattered as they
prepared food, as if nothing important was happening, as if this
was just another common day. Ruby moved to sit with Grey and Anvil,
telling stories of the fairies again. I faded in and out of her
tale of Violet Moon. She had come from the South, further than any
area of record, and she possessed a wicked knowledge of the
changelings. The stories said she was bored with her native land
and traveled North, looking for those who would not know of her
disguises and deceits. My head lay cradled in darkness where my
arms made a nest across my lap as Ruby began regaling us with
Violet’s seduction of a young fire fairy, giving plenty of extra
and unnecessary details of his physique, when I heard Steed say my
name and I looked up, across the fire to him.

I almost choked.

He hadn’t said my name.
He’d used my nickname… well, my old nickname… on
her
. My face burned. He
didn’t notice my glare. He was still talking to her, laughing. He
reached up to tuck her hair behind her ear and I heard a loud pop,
or maybe felt it. I was off balance for a moment and then I
realized it was fire.

I gasped as I looked around
to see how many of them noticed. Everyone. Not that I could blame
them, I had blown fireballs out of my squeezed fists so hard they
had actually been audible.

They stood motionless,
staring at me.

Finally, Ruby spoke. “Frey…
are you alright?”

I took stock. “Yeah.” What
just happened?

She took a tentative step
toward me. “Have you been practicing your fire?”

I shook my head; I hadn’t
practiced at all since the girl had shown up.

“
How do you
feel?”

“
Fine.” I held up my
hands. Maybe I should try to do it again?

“
No!” She must have read
my intentions. “Please, Freya, if you must, then do it away from
here.”

I took a closer look at my
surroundings, I had burned or singed pretty much everything in a
ten-foot radius. “Sorry.” I started to walk off; Chevelle had
joined me before I’d gone two paces. He was silent as he walked
beside me.

When we were much more than
a safe distance from the others, he finally stopped. So I stopped
as well, but a few steps later. I couldn’t place his expression as
I glanced over my shoulder at him so I simply faced forward and
took a deep breath. I had to force myself not to close my eyes,
though I still squinted some, as I held my hands out to release the
flame. But once I had, I knew my eyes were wide; I was astonished
at the size and power of it and it hadn’t even tired me. I turned
back to Chevelle, I thought he was hopeful. Or maybe he was just
trying not to laugh at my expression.

“
How do you feel?” he
asked.

“
Good.” I smiled. And then
I felt like a dork so I straightened up to match his
posture.

That almost made him laugh.
He stepped toward me.

I froze.

We were alone. And he’d
positioned himself square in front of me, not an arm’s length away.
Not near that far.
He didn’t speak, he just
looked into my eyes, like he was searching for someone.

At that moment, I
remembered touching him. I remembered looking at his strong hands
and placing my fingers just so on his.

And I did.

Before I could process what
had happened, his other hand was bringing my face to his for a
desperate kiss.

It only lasted a moment
before he realized his mistake. He pulled back to look at me again
as he spoke softly, almost a whisper. “Who are you?”

I shook my head and he
understood. He pulled slightly away from me. I was ashamed, I had
no excuse for my actions. I’d tricked him. The power, the touch.
And then I got lost in the thought… I had remembered the touch. I
looked back at him. “What’s happening?”

His face was pained but he
didn’t have time to answer. We heard the voices of Grey and Anvil
as they approached. Chevelle stepped back from me as we waited for
them.

My head spun. The three of
them had started an apparently serious conversation but I couldn’t
tell what it was about. I merely followed them and massaged my
temples as we made our way back to the camp. Steed was still near
the girl, quiet. Ruby had my blankets out and I went straight to
them, lay down and closed my eyes.

My dreams were confusing.
They were almost all about Chevelle, but some were horrifying and
some were not. I dreamt of the touch but instead of the memory,
which was not at all romantic, only personal, the dream included
the kiss. And I dreamt of things that were not tainted with memory,
only fantastic and impossible. I had some of the old dreams as
well, clinging to him as we rode away from the flames, tears and
ash smearing my cheeks. There was the dream of the cliff, too. I
stood looking out, across the horizon and he stepped beside me,
placing his hand gently at the small of my back. But this time,
when he shoved me off, instead of flailing the entire way down,
wings popped out and caught the air as I took flight, soaring in
the empty expanse.

I woke to the sound of
quiet laughter and was irritated to find them surrounding
her
again. I rode in
silence through the day, relishing a couple of the better
dreams.

Once we had reached the
base of the mountain, the terrain had turned almost immediately to
level ground. The trees were wiry and jagged-looking but they were
trees. And there was grass. But instead of feeling relief at the
more familiar landscape, I wondered how big a mistake I’d made by
leaving the castle.

We stopped for the evening
under the sparse shelter of a patch of those trees. It was warmer
so I excused myself to change out of the heavy leather boots and
wool pants into something a little more suitable. I opened my bag
to find that Ruby had packed me only black with leather or silver
accents.
So much for something
light.
At least it wasn’t all wool. I threw
on the first pants I found, switched my shirt, and laced the
lightest corset over it. I threw my cloak over my arm and walked
back to the camp, muttering about my red-headed
wardrober.

When I saw them, I had to
bite the inside of my cheek to keep from cursing. Steed was sitting
opposite the human, so close that it was almost indecent. I focused
on walking to my bags, across the camp from them, and putting my
cloak and pack away. I took as long as I could but, eventually, I
had to join the group. I thought I tasted blood.

I tried not to look at
them, I really did. But I saw him touch her cheek with the back of
his hand. She flushed and he grinned at her wickedly. That was the
last thing I was sure of.

What happened next didn’t
make any sense. I was across the camp, looking at him. But I
wasn’t. I could see myself in the periphery. And my head screamed
with pain. Steed moved across my line of sight as I swayed, and
then blackness came as my eyes closed.

When they opened again, my
head throbbed. Not the knife point, only a duller version. I tried
to focus and found I was back in my spot once more, staring at
Steed and the girl… but something was wrong. She had fainted? I
concentrated harder and discovered Ruby staring at me
accusingly.