Chapter Eleven

Chapter Eleven

A Daring Rescue

I did not know what to do when my creature placed her head against my chest and began to cry, but her tears were like knives, tearing at my heart, feeding a desire to avenge her pain. I was not used to these feelings, mine or hers.

Bewildered, I looked at the raven, who circled his wings before him.

“What?” I mouthed.

The raven stretched his wings and repeated the movement.

I shrugged, confused.

“Comfort her, you idiot!” the raven said in a half whisper.

I let my magic recede and dropped the selkie’s head to place my arm around her, but before I could, she pushed away.

“I hate this place,” she said, glaring at me. I felt the full force of her fury as if she had slapped me. “I hate you.”

“I told you not to return,” I said. My body grew hot, my hands tightening in the selkie’s sealskin. She had no right to rage at me. She was here because she killed my brother, and she was here now because she had ignored my warning. “I told you he was dangerous.”

“As if you are any better,” she spat.

“Oh, vicious creature, you do not want me to be better. I am the only thing that can protect you here.”

Her gaze fell to the sealskin in my hand, and then her eyes shifted to the selkie’s head, which looked up at her from the ground.

Her eyes still glistened with unshed tears, like emeralds shining in the earth. I hated that I had missed the chance to take her into my arms. No doubt I would hear about it later from the mirror, who was likely watching this exchange with Naeve.

The raven was right. I was an idiot.

And now she hated me, though I supposed she’d never stopped.

I studied her, noticing the blood on her dress.

“Are you hurt?” I asked, uncertain if she had just brushed against the selkie’s bloodied head, but then I noticed how she held her hand in her dress. I took a step forward, discarding the selkie’s skin. “Let me see your hand.”

“I’m fine,” she said, taking a step back.

“Let me see it,” I said, the words slow and deliberate. Something in my voice must have convinced her to obey because she lifted her bloodied hand to show her missing finger. “Where is it? Your finger?”

“The mountains took it,” she said.

“The mountains have your blood?”

“I could not resist,” she said.

“Because you bargained with them,” I seethed. “Foolish creature! What did you trade?”

She was quiet.

“Creature,” I warned, the word slipping between my teeth.

She did not look at me as she answered. “Three strands of your hair.”

“Three strands?”

Her gaze met mine. “I only had one. The other two must have belonged to your mistress.”

“Or a brother,” I snapped.

Her mouth tightened. “This is your fault! I would not have traded anything if I had not wished to guess your true name!”

“No one told you to bargain with the mountains!”

“He did!” she said, pointing to the selkie’s head.

“He wanted to kill me!” I yelled, kicking the head, sending it soaring into the surrounding woods. “I would have given you my name had you sucked my cock for four more days!”

It did not matter that I did not have the time. It did not matter that she must love me too.

“If I desired you the least bit, I might consider another trade, but as it is, you are the last person in this forsaken place I would ever fuck!”

“Do not be so certain, especially where your freedom is concerned.”

“Do not degrade me for giving you pleasure.”

“I am not degrading you,” I said. I felt myself bending over her, but she was just as stubborn, rising on her toes to match my venom. “If you let me, I would worship you. Perhaps then you might know what it is to be grateful.”

She slapped me and I reeled back, pressing a hand to my face to quell the sting, though it was covered in the selkie’s blood.

Her eyes glistened as she stared back at me, and I could not figure out what I had said that had made her angrier.

“Do not make me feel worse for something I already regret.”

I felt like she had cracked open my chest and laid everything inside me bare, and I hated it.

“If you had told me why you wanted my hair, I could have saved you a limb. The mountain does not know my name.”

“I am beginning to think no one knows your name. Perhaps you have no name at all.”

“I have many names,” I said. “It is the consequence of living so long.”

“A cruel existence,” she seethed. “Perhaps you should die, and you would not have so many.”

“Ah, but they do not end when you die,” he said. “I have died many times and I will come back with more.”

She paled at my statement, and I inched closer to her.

“Give me your hand,” I said.

She hesitated but stretched her arm out, trembling.

I took her hand and placed her injured finger in my mouth. Just as I predicted, she tried to pull away, but I held her, sucking hard, and when I released her, her flesh and bone were restored.

Her eyes widened with amazement for one second and then darkened with horror.

“No! I did not ask this of you!”

“You did not,” I affirmed.

“T-take it back!” she said, holding her hand aloft as if it did not belong to her.

“I will not,” I said.

“I do not want to owe you for this. Take it back!”

“Did I ask for anything in exchange?”

“It does not matter that you didn’t,” she said. “Magic always requires a trade.”

“Then let me worry about what it will want,” I said and bent to pick up the sealskin. I stepped around her just as the selkie’s head rolled out from the surrounding flora, pushed by a tearful winged fairy.

“Do not cry for such a creature,” I said. “He touched what is mine.”

I snatched the head from the ground by his golden hair.

When I turned to my creature again, she was staring at the selkie’s head.

“What are you going to do with that?”

“I will plant it outside my window and watch what grows,” I said.

She said nothing, and she did not ask me what I intended to do with the sealskin either, but if she had, I likely would have told her about my collection of skins, which ranged from animal to human. One never knew when they might need a different skin.

“Come, we must go,” I said. “Dusk is approaching fast.”

She raised a brow. “Are you afraid of the dark?”

“No,” I said. “But you should be, even when I am near.”

I spoke only once on our return and that was to instruct my creature to walk a step ahead of me so that I may watch her from all sides. When we came to the palace, I threw the selkie’s head into the center of the courtyard and then looked at her.

“The mountains have your blood now,” I said. “They will call to you, and when they do, you must resist.”

“How will I know if they call?”

“It is likely you won’t.”

She narrowed her eyes. “You are most unhelpful.”

I smiled, half-hearted, only amused by her frustration. “Do not leave your room tonight, no matter what calls.”

Her throat constricted as she swallowed, and my eyes dropped to the mark I’d left on her skin. I reached across our distance and touched her there. I wanted to kiss her, to lick her, to suck her skin again, but she winced, so I let my hand fall away.

“Good night, creature,” I said, and she fled.

I returned to my chamber and dodged a shoe as I entered.

“What the fuck was that for?” I asked, glaring at Naeve, who stood on the bench beneath the window, hopping on one leg as she tried to take off the other shoe.

“Because you are an idiot! A royal one!” she yelled.

“What did I do this time?” I demanded.

Her answer was to launch another shoe at me, and I brought my arm up in time to block my face.

“You should be grateful?” Naeve said, quoting me. “Could you be any less romantic?”

“That is not what I meant!”

I meant that she might understand how grateful I had been when she’d knelt before me and took a part of me into her mouth, and I was desperate to return the favor.

Naeve searched for something else to hurl at me.

“What else was I supposed to say?”

“Anything else! Anything kind!” she said. “If she is going to love you, she has to like you, and there is nothing about you that is remotely likable.”

She plucked a pillow from behind her and pitched it at me.

“Stop throwing things!”

“You have five days! Five!”

“I can count!”

“Then make them count!”

“I’m trying!” I yelled. “Do you imagine this is somehow easy when I have had no love in my life?”

Naeve froze, the candlestick she’d chosen to throw at me next poised in her hand like a spear.

“Do you imagine I understand kindness when none has been given to me?” I continued. “Do you imagine it is easy to be anything other than what I am?”

“Easy? No, I do not imagine so, but change never promised to be, and if this is what you want, then you must do more than try.”

I glared at her and then left my room, slamming the door behind me, begrudgingly returning to the prince who lived in the depths of my castle. He lay on his thin bed beneath the window, one leg hanging off and scraping the floor. The strange hat he usually wore covered his face, and his hands lay folded atop his stomach.

“Your advice did not work,” I said.

The prince startled and sat up, his hat falling into his lap.

“Wh-what do you mean?”

“I told her she was beautiful, and she did not fall in love with me.”

“Well, how did you say it?”

“Why does everyone keep asking that? I just…said it!”

“Did you mean it?”

“Yes!”

“And she didn’t fall in love with you?” He seemed confused.

“I ripped the head off a selkie today. Do you really want to toy with me?”

“Of course, she must be playing hard to get,” said the prince quickly. “Perhaps you should save her from danger. She will be so grateful, she will realize her love for you instantly.”

“I did. Today. I saved her today.”

I’d killed the selkie for what he had done to her. She had seen me holding his head and his skin.

The prince opened his mouth and then closed it. After a moment, he said, “And was she witness to your prowess?”

“Well…no.”

“That’s it!” he said, snapping his fingers. “You must show her your skill, your bravery. She will melt at your feet!”

“If you are wrong, I shall take the feather from your cap.”

“What about my curls?” he asked.

“What curls?” I asked, a wicked smile tugging at my lips as the prince paled and smoothed his hand over his shorn hair.