Chapter 16

16

I pushed the heel of my hand into my chest to quell the sudden pain there.

No one saw a problem with this?

I felt foolish that I’d been thinking how Dorian and the Unseelie might be the answer.

“Miss? Are you all right?”

I forced myself to breathe normally and look down at Elaen, with her skin drawn and her eyes dull. “I’m fine,” I tried to say but no sound came out. I could only nod.

She rinsed my hair with the last of the fresh water before wrapping a towel around my shoulders. Numb, I stood trembling as she scrubbed me dry, pointedly avoiding making eye contact.

Elaen was a slave, pure and simple, because of circumstances she had no control over. It made Dorian Jade no better than King Tywin and both of them were absolutely certain they were in the right.

As though there was no middle ground where everyone, every single damn fae, had a place to live their lives.

Elaen helped me out of the basin and held out a loose pair of linen trousers, waiting for me to step into the legs one foot at a time. The material cinched at the waist and flowed loosely around my ankles. She followed the trousers with a loose wrap top that left my arms free, then with a little urging she sat me down onto the stool to braid my wet hair.

“You’re upset by what I told you,” she said softly.

The first swipe of the brush through the strands had me closing my eyes and swallowing a grimace. Not only because of the sensation but also to avoid staring at her reflection in the small mercury glass mirror and seeing the glint of the metal collar.

I had to be careful what I said. She probably wouldn’t report back to Dorian but what if he coerced her? There were ways to get people to talk even without the cognitive manipulation I possessed.

“I just think there should be a world where everyone is equal,” I replied slowly, considering every word.

Elaen’s hands stilled. “It’s a beautiful goal.”

Both of us quieted. She finished the braid with deft fingers and patted my shoulder, offering a thin-lipped smile before she ducked her head, disappearing through the tent flap.

She was right, though. I had to run. As fast and as far away as possible.

The sooner I got this over with, the better it would be for everyone involved. My gut told me Dorian Jade wasn’t going to let me go easily, but with Noren nearby, I had faith we’d be able to fight our way out of this camp. Most of the people here weren’t warriors. If worse came to worst, then I’d shift into my halfling warrior form and raze a path out.

I bent down in front of Noren and scratched his ears until he turned to face me fully, his attention sharpening on me.

“Find Onyx,” I said. I had no doubt he understood every word. “Tell him to meet us at the wall in about fifteen minutes. It shouldn't take too long to reach it. Make sure he understands what’s really going on. Can you do that for me?”

Noren blinked, as sure a sign as any that he understood, and I straightened as he jumped off the pallet and headed outside on silent paws.

I drew in a great breath and held it until my lungs ached. Now or never.

I’d memorized the way to Dorian’s tent. The maze seemed much less complicated with full morning light piercing through the trees. The same smoke curved from the top of his tent and I paused to knock at the entrance.

“Dorian? It’s Tavi.” My voice shook.

Crap, no shaking yet. Get a grip.

“You may enter.” He sounded as regal as any monarch I’d ever met.

I stifled the urge to roll my eyes at the grandiose tone

Dorian stood staring at a stack of papers when I walked inside and immediately set them aside just out of eyesight. “Tavi, good morning.” He offered me an easy smile and a flash of white teeth. “How are you feeling today?”

I swallowed over a knot of nerves and forced my face to mimic his. Actually, my arm barely hurt, although a dull throbbing remained if I tuned into it.

“I’m well, thank you. I wanted to talk to you about the matter we discussed last night.”

At this, his grin widened and his eyes took on the manic light I’d glimpsed yesterday, where they seemed to glow. An odd look and a distraction.

“You’ve given some thought to my proposition, then,” he said. “Come, let’s chat!”

Now or never . “I have.” I puffed my cheeks out and launched ahead. “First, thank you for everything you’ve done and for sharing your story with me. But no thanks. I’m actually ready to leave the camp and continue on my personal journey.”

I’d never even gotten a chance to explain my quest to him. He hadn’t allowed me a word in edgewise.

Dorian arched a thick dark brow and waited for me to continue.

This was the quietest I’d seen him.

“I’ve wanted to find my mother for the longest time and I finally have the opportunity to do so now.” No , I reminded myself. No excuses for my choice. Only the facts . “I have no iron in this fire.”

“No iron in this fire,” Dorian repeated. He took a step forward, his arms loose and his thumbs looped casually into the pockets of his trousers. “Tavi, I need you to understand. You are a part of this fight simply because of your existence . I understand you have personal goals you feel the need to accomplish but at this point, allowing you to leave on a frivolous errand makes no sense.”

Allowing me?

“Finding the mother I’ve never met is frivolous to you?” Immediately my back went up. “I thought you placed a lot of stock on the importance of family.”

He shook his head, his gaze sympathetic under his long black lashes. Fingers lifted, he pressed them in a triangle shape to his lips before he lifted his head again.

“It seems as though your priorities are not in alignment.”

I blinked at him.” Excuse me?”

“There are so many other things requiring your talents and skills. As you can see, it does not behoove me to allow you to leave. Not when I finally have you here.”

I started inching closer to the door, preparing to outright run. “What do you mean?”

Dorian simply smiled. His posture remained relaxed, easygoing. “I think you’ll find that you won’t mind staying once you've had a few days to reconsider.”

“You can’t keep me here.”

“On the contrary. I can. I plan to, until you see reason. Trust me.” He still sounded accommodating even as he swung the proverbial ax. “It’s for the best.”

He lifted one hand out of his pocket and drew out a medallion like the one I was wearing. At once my spine stiffened, heat flooding my entire body. My stomach dropped. What…what was he doing? I turned away…or rather tried. The effort left me wrung out, exhausted, as I fought to move my arm, my leg, a single muscle in my face, and found my body did not belong to me anymore.

“Don’t worry, Tavi. No one is going to hurt you while you’re here. I simply can’t allow you to leave, not yet. Not until you’ve had time to consider things from my perspective,” he continued.

“What have you done to me?” I managed to say through the thin seam of my lips. Terror rose up, screaming, too loud to blot out.

“You and your friend Onyx will stay with us. At least your necklace is not as cumbersome as the collars the servants wear. The same material, however. Magical bindings,” Dorian explained. He pursed his mouth. “I find them absolutely necessary. Also, congratulations on your powerful manipulation of my direwolf. I commend you for what you’ve managed to accomplish. I meant to mention it yesterday but didn’t want to startle you.”

“No…”

Tears pricked the corners of my eyes. In that single sentence, he’d confirmed everything for me.

Dorian Jade had been the one to send the direwolf to kill me, to siphon my powers. When it didn’t work…he’d clearly moved on to Plan B.

Now he had me right where he wanted me.

“It’s a shame I’m going to have to take him back. You are skilled, Tavi, a powerful halfling who, with the right guidance, could reach staggering heights. There is still time for you. At this point, however, I suggest you take a few days to adjust and make yourself useful at the same time,” he added.

“Whatever it is you’re doing?—”

“ Done ,” Dorian interrupted to correct. “It’s what I’ve done, this trap you’ve fallen into. I don’t blame you. For all your power, you’re still young. It’s hard to consider things from every angle.”

He whistled a slow, hissing melody I’d never heard before. My heart thrummed agonizingly against my ribs as Noren stepped into the tent.

“Please, don’t. You can’t do this,” I managed.

“I’m taking him back, my dear. After all, he’s my weapon. As you will be as well.”

Everything inside of me broke when Dorian lifted his hands. Magic rushed out from him in visible waves. He didn’t need a spell. Not when this was his show, and he ran it effortlessly. Flawlessly.

Noren stiffened, a growl building in the back of his throat until all of a sudden it stopped. As quickly as the sound began, it cut off, and the direwolf appeared to grow several inches.

Even his expression shifted, his lips peeled back from his teeth in a snarl, and he trotted back to Dorian’s side and sat. Facing me.

Sizing me up the same way he had when we first faced off.

God, no .

My heart cracked at the expression. My friend was gone. Disappeared, as though our experiences never existed. Perhaps they didn’t, because the animal who stared at me now only wanted blood. Mine, specifically.

Dorian clapped his hands together and a moment later, Elaen entered the tent with her head bowed.

“Sir?”

“Please escort Tavi to the kitchen. We could use her assistance in lunch preparation for the camp.”

I didn’t recognize the voice Dorian used, either. Cold did not begin to describe the ice spearing out from every syllable. The disdainful look in his eyes when he spoke to the high fae woman…

Neither of us had a choice. Elaen because she was a slave, and me because the power of the necklace was too much for me to fight. She took my arm and guided me outside with no hesitation. My footsteps were heavy, my stride wooden, and my gaze forced to stare directly ahead.

The farther we got from Dorian, the more control I got back. Unfortunately for me, it was never enough to break his spell.

“Kitchen duty is never fun, Miss. I’m sorry for you,” Elaen whispered.

The moment she’d spoken, she zipped her lips tightly shut again, as if even that small statement would land her in a world of trouble.

Another kitchen. My god, I couldn't get away from the kitchen.

I pulled out of Elaen’s arm and tugged at the thick chains around my neck, looking for a latch. Two metal studs stood out on one of the chains but I had no way of pulling them apart. They were seamless, perfectly constructed, and although it had first appeared wide enough to make it over my head, it now fit snugly.

Elaen let me struggle, winding through the tents until we reached a massive structure open on one side.

“You won’t find a way to get them off,” Elaen leaned in close to whisper against my ear. “They’ll shock you if you take a step outside of the camp boundaries.”

I seethed. “Like a dog with an electric fence.”

“I’m sorry.”

Elaen scurried off without making any introductions to the people working in the kitchen. None were needed, I found in a moment. A sullen-faced older gentleman with three arms, each of them boasting six gnarled fingers at the end of long hands, pointed me in the direction of a pile of potatoes.

A peeler rested on a butcher block slab beside the pile. His message was clear. Peel. And don’t stop until they were done.

It was a world of difference from Raelynn’s kitchen. Although my boss had been all business, the walls always rang out with laughter. Conversation flowed and the staff in the castle appeared to have their own language when it came to certain things.

Not a word would be said at times but someone would let out a snort of laughter that had the rest of them joining along once they understood the reason why.

These people were kicked, kicked, and then kicked again. None of them wanted to be here and I wondered if any of them had family at home missing them.

Those thoughts were too depressing.

I stood staring at the pile of potatoes until the older fae gently cleared his throat, then I moved into position.

How far away were we from the borders of the camp? How bad were the shocks from the collar?

I gnawed on my lower lip as I worked, the brown skin peeling easily away from the tubers to reveal white flesh inside. Shit and double shit. My stomach looped into a labyrinth of stress and with every inch I peeled, the more the acidic throbbing in my arm grew.

If magic made the collars work, then magic might be the key to getting out of them. Unless Dorian Jade specifically bespelled them to turn the user’s magic against them if they even made an attempt.

It might be a risk worth taking.

“ Psst . New girl. Hey!”

A hot whisper ruffled the hair near my temple and I turned to see a small-statured boy with the legs of a goat staring from the workspace beside mine. He stood on a stool, his hooves polished to a sheen like obsidian and his gaze searching.

Maybe he only looked like a boy at first glance.

Because the longer I stared at him, the more his eyes seemed to suggest this faun had seen terrible things.

“I know what you’re thinking,” he started. “I don’t look like a pure-blood fae. But I’m Seelie and that’s what got me here. Just my luck to end up running into one of Dorian Jade’s minions. I’m going to guess you told him something that pissed him off, because I saw you around the fire with his majesty last night. You looked like you were having fun. Right?”

My stomach flipped and took a nosedive. I’d almost banked on the silence to give me more time to calculate a plan to get out of here, despite coming up short.

“He’s not my biggest fan right now,” I answered honestly.

“I’d like to tell you it’s not so bad but I’d be lying. It’s really fucking awful.”

I jolted at the sound of such a harsh curse coming out of the mouth of someone who looked like a boy of ten. Then I decided I kinda liked his no-bullshit attitude. “Being a slave isn’t for the faint of heart, is what you’re saying.”

The faun shrugged. “In so many words, yeah.”

The older gentleman cleared his throat louder this time and both the faun and I turned back to our jobs. For the rest of the time, we worked. My pile of potatoes never grew any smaller and every time I reached for the last one, another pyramid replaced the first.

Lunch came and went, with only a five-minute break to use the restroom and grab some water for the help . I gulped down a glass until my throat unclenched.

Dorian Jade was a monster.

A prejudiced, hypocritical monster.

Once our break ended, the older fae, who appeared to be a type of foreman keeping everyone organized, clapped his hands and sent us back to work. Instead of potatoes, this time I exchanged places with the faun and scrubbed the dishes used by the rest of the camp.

The blasting hot water scalded my cramped and aching fingers. Blisters burst open and the soap stung to the point where I bit my lip to stay quiet.

I’d be damned if I let Dorian hear me cry out or complain.

I never saw Onyx through the rest of the day.

Once we completed dinner, cooking and cleaning, I followed the other women across the camp toward a massive tent stretching out between the trees. A sort of female dormitory, one of them explained. I caught a glimpse of Elaen across the clearing along with the other two women who had set up my bath this morning.

It felt like a million years ago.

“Here is your bed, girl. ” A woman with short pudgy wings that appeared almost clipped pointed to the upper bunk of the nearest bed. “There is a fresh change of clothes on the sheets. Dorian insists on cleanliness at all times. He says it boosts morale for his people to see us so.”

Her voice was a murmur in the wind but I heard it clear as a bell, including the emotion behind it she no doubt wanted to hide.

Exhaustion, hopelessness.

I was right back where I’d started.

I said nothing, nodding at her until she returned the gesture and walked off to find her own bed for the evening. Every part of my body hurt, and my hands had gotten so chapped from working in the kitchen that the cracks around my broken fingernails bled.

Several of my nails had broken off below the skin line and I still felt the stinging pulse of the hot water.

The dorms were quieter than any I’d ever been inside. Maybe the raucous laughter of my bunkmates back at the Halfling Academy had given me a false idea, or perhaps things changed when you were locked up by magic and treated as a slave.

The women here had been pushed to the brink. They went about their duties with a quiet and tense hush, taking turns at the copper basin in the corner with magicked water running in a constant warm stream.

I took my place in line, mechanically washing my face and underneath my arms before I found a dark corner to change. There was no modesty here.

The lights went out automatically and I was already situated in the bed, the bunk rock-hard. I rested my arms underneath my head and stared at the gently wavering top of the tent, the coolness of the night omnipresent.

What the hell was I going to do? There had to be some way out of this even if I couldn’t get the collar to release me.

Was there a way to get back to Dorian and somehow use my mental manipulation on him? I had to be stronger than the collar especially with the Totalis ? —

Except I didn’t have the Totalis .

I’d left it in my change of clothes and those had been taken when they sent me from the tent. I wanted to slap myself.

Stupid. I was so stupid .

Tomorrow , I thought with a wide yawn, my jaw cracking. Tomorrow I’d worry about the artifact, and escape, and every other detail pressing on me. Sleep took me whether I wanted it to or not, mid-thought, and thankfully the dreams were not as horrible as they could have been given the circumstances.

I was running, chased by a creature in the dark, a creature with startling eyes and dark hair?—

A tongue ran across my face and slurped at the corners of my eyes.

Decidedly not a dream .

A massive paw nudged against my face, pushing with only a fraction of his strength, and I blinked awake into the familiar wolfy smile of Noren.

“Oh, my god.”

He whined low in his throat, my stomach dropping out from under me. Shrugging off the last of my sleep, I crawled toward the ladder and clambered down.

The second my feet touched the cold ground Noren leaped on me and I wrapped him in a big hug. “You came for me.” Tears burned, streaking down my cheeks, lost in the sea of his fur.

He chose me . Dorian hadn’t broken him. Hadn’t erased the kind protective streak of the direwolf I knew. I squeezed him to the point of suffocation.

He didn’t move, either.

Glee overrode every emotion as I scratched my hand through the fur at the scruff of his neck toward his jaw. He came back for me. And he brought…something.

My fingertips brushed against a hard piece of metal clenched between his teeth. I reared back, staring at him hard until Noren dropped the item at my feet and let out a low-pitched woof .

His eyes bore into mine as I bent to pick up the thing. I turned the device over in my hands, trailing my fingers over two metal studs on one side.

Two studs?—

They matched the shapes at the back of my neck collar.

I stood straight up, my gaze traveling between the device to Noren and back again. He bobbed his head slightly in a way-too-human gesture. A loud snore cut through the hush and I almost jumped out of my skin. He’d brought me a way out .

If we were going to do this, then I needed to hurry before someone woke up and saw a big fucking direwolf in the middle of the dorm tent.

Here goes nothing .

My hands refused to obey my unspoken demand to hurry as I placed the device against the collar, struggling to get the right angle so the pieces clicked together. The metal prods did not want to go in the slots. Frustration mounting, I shoved it into a better position, gritting my teeth. My wrist began to cramp.

Hurry!

The two pieces finally clicked together. The collar opened and fell off. I fumbled for it, grabbing it before it hit the floor, and faced Noren.

“You genius boy,” I whispered.

Not only had he come for me but he’d come through with a miracle. Whatever connection we had…this situation demolished the piece of guilt I’d carried around about manipulating him mentally. It might have started out that way but he was mine.

My partner and friend.

I glanced around to see if anyone had woken, shoving the device into the pocket of my sleep pants. We ducked out of the tent and I took in the star-lit night with my breath gusting in a white puff.

Several nearby fires had been banked for the evening with the embers glowing orange, crackling as they died.

I had no idea where Dorian had decided to stash Onyx.

I had no idea if he’d even gotten around to telling Onyx about the deal or not. To the left I spotted a tent of similar size to the female dorm but through the trees. That must be where he kept the males.

Would Onyx be there with them?

I crouched down in front of Noren. “Are you able to track Onyx?”

The direwolf stared for a moment before he pushed off to the left, his nose against the ground and his hair lifted along his spine. I refused to leave without Onyx. We’d gotten into this situation together and if he had to stay here much longer…they wouldn’t know how to help him. His injuries would be exacerbated if he said no to Dorian and they put him to work.

Or worse…what if he said yes?

I clenched my jaw as we kept our footsteps light, trailing around lazy fires and tents filled with sleeping families.

A twig cracked under my foot and I tensed, catching my breath. My awareness sharpened and I realized I felt the magic of the wall this close. Without the collar, its presence was oppressive, not something to ignore.

Why hadn’t I noticed it the first time I’d stepped into the camp?

I should have spent more time with Onyx instead of letting Dorian Jade distract me with his idealism. His plans for the future. They’d all felt too good to be true, and they were.

No, he had Onyx stashed somewhere and even Noren seemed to be losing the scent. He turned in a circle around one tent and went in the direction we’d already come from. He stopped in front of one of the tents and a quick peek through the flap showed a sleeping couple with their arms wrapped around each other and their forms surrounded by comfortable blankets. A small pet, a cross between a rabbit and a cat, perked its ears up at my arrival but made no sound.

I quickly headed back outside with my heart thrumming an irregular beat in my chest. Every breath seemed to tighten my ribs closer and closer to the core of me.

Sneaking around had never been my forte.

I lacked the stealth most wolf shifters had, and even though I tried not to make a sound, I felt like a herd of stampeding elephants. As though every inhalation I took might be my last, I swallowed convulsively.

We approached the edge of the camp and the tents were fewer here, the space between them greater, as though the occupants had opted for more freedom from the community. More isolation.

It suited Onyx but would Dorian have known about that? I highly doubted it. If anything?—

A hand wrapped around my elbow and jerked me back, my heart lurching into my throat.

“What the hell is this?” The man tightened his grip on me until his fingers bruised. My stomach sank down to the bottom of my feet. “You’re not going anywhere.”