Page 10 of Given to the Fae (The Dark Realms #3)

Ila shakes her head. ‘They think the Kismet is Breach Blet, remember? They’re taking her to the healer. They might take all of us if they intend to sell us here.’

‘I doubt it,’ Bell sniffs. ‘The Kismet always gets special treatment. Isn’t that right, Bryn?’

I don’t answer and she continues. ‘Though I noticed that one with the brown hair who gave us water never got what was coming to him after he threw you in here so hard.’ She eyes my forehead. ‘No stumbles, nor cuts. No little accident. Odd, no?’

I shrug. ‘I know about as much about it as you do. Ogdan and Sio weren’t exactly chatty.’

Bell snorts. ‘They were trying to get rid of you for years, weren’t they?

But for some reason it stuck this time. Perhaps you’re no longer Fate Touched.

’ She raises a brow. ‘Gods, if that’s true I do pity you.

They’ll all think you a seasoned slave, but you’ve never even had a bull much less a fae, or an orc, have you? ’

I look away, not liking that she’s talking about this.

‘You know that isn’t true,’ I whisper.

But she scoffs. ‘ That hardly counts, Bryn. You can trust me on that if nothing else.’

I hear the fae coming back and for once I’m grateful.

‘You better learn to be a good slave quickly, my dear,’ she mutters, ‘or you’ll be royally fucked in more ways than one.’

The cage door is unlocked and opened.

‘Out,’ Bere’s second, Locke, barks.

The three of us exit the cage gracelessly and stand in a line by the wall.

Bell and Ila are given food, but when I reach for a piece of the bread they’re eating, my hand is slapped away by Locke.

I stare at the floor, my stomach growling, and I wait for the water bucket to fall on his toe, or a horse to side-step onto his foot. But nothing happens.

Bell catches my eye and raises a knowing brow. I scowl at her even as my fear starts to eat at me.

I’ve never tried to escape. Life at The Barrack was survivable as Kismet and I didn’t know anything else, but if I’m no longer protected by fate, that changes everything.

I’ve always felt guilty, cowardly as I watched my human sisters be treated badly. Much of what they endured couldn’t happen to me. My legs go weak and I have to lean against the wall to stay upright.

‘Pull yourself together,’ Bell snarls, looking disgusted. ‘You’re pathetic.’

I almost nod. I am pathetic. I’ve always suspected it and now I know it. Perhaps I deserve to understand what all the other slaves I used to cuddle up with in the dark truly went through every day and night. Perhaps this, too, was fated.

I push myself away from the wall and steel myself to the very real idea that I’ll be whipped later and the fae cunt who does it won’t be thwarted, that I’ll be pulled into a lap afterward and find out what it feels like to take a fae cock.

But there are worse things than being beaten and rutted.

If I obey, perhaps I won’t experience them.

I frown at my thoughts.

Have I really discounted running away so quickly? Gods, I really am such a fucking coward.

I watch Bell and Ila being herded into one of the other stalls. A pair of leather sandals are dropped at my feet and a gargantuan blond-haired fae with oddly dark eyes for his coloring, who I’ve seen lurking by the fire, kneels in front of me.

Besides his incredible size, I see a handful of scars on the bits of his tanned skin that aren’t covered by his clothes and I feel a foolish kinship with him that I know is ridiculous. We aren’t similar.

The bizarre scene of him on his knees before me is muted when he ties the sandals on too tightly and I try not to focus on how the thin twine cuts into the skin of my ankles.

A leather collar is buckled around my neck.

It’s locked into place, and I’m pulled along behind Bere’s second, Locke, as well as the huge fae.

I’ve only noticed him before because he’s so much taller and broader than any of the others.

He’s kept his distance from the slaves. I don’t even think, like Locke and, maybe Jak, that he was in the camp during the revelries Bere instigated .

The two of them walk with me through the streets, and I look around as much as I can with my eyes lowered.

I feel glad that I’ve been given shoes when I notice the streets are made of hard stone.

The place is massive. There are so many bodies, so many orcs and goblins, trolls, shifters…

I feel an odd sense of panic beginning to set in and I try to occupy my mind.

I don’t see any other fae at all and I wonder why that is.

Though, now that I come to think of it, I only saw fae a few times over the years at The Barrack.

The others who came were usually demons, goblins, and pixies.

Someone bumps into me from behind and I’m thrown hard into Locke.

He turns with a curse and a snarl, his striking blue eyes taking me in as if concerned, as if he truly sees me for a brief moment.

I cower out of habit, but then I’m positioned between them, their muscular bodies warding off the busy throngs.

I stick close to them, noticing that, despite how big they are, they seem to weave through the streets with languid ease.

Later, I’ll perhaps wonder why they’ve bothered to stay between me and the masses who live here.

But I’m mostly just thankful. At the moment all I can think of is how big everything is here, the streets, the buildings.

The city sprawls out in all directions. How do they even know where they are, or where to go?

I do register my own surprise that I feel oddly safe with the two slavers and berate myself for being stupid as well as a coward.

I’m not safe with these fae. Any protection I’m getting from them is only because I’m worth a certain amount of coin and that number goes down if I’m damaged.

We stop in front of a small blue door that’s painted with a pink flower, and Locke knocks.

‘Just a minute,’ a female voice calls from inside and a moment later, I hear the creak of it opening.

‘Yes?’

‘We’ve brought this slave for you to look at. She’s new to us and fainted in the Breach this afternoon. We thought perhaps she was Gate Sick.’

‘How many times and how many Circles has she crossed in the past week?’

‘Two and two.’

The door opens further and I get my first glimpse of the healer. She’s a small pixie dressed in green. Her pointed ears are adorned with gold and her short black curls have tiny plaits here and there with bells tied to the ends. She moves back to let us enter and they jingle.

‘Come in, please. Bring your human.’

I’m led into a small cozy room with bottles and pots all over along with a cauldron that’s bubbling away over a fire.

‘Two Breach trips over two Circles shouldn’t cause Breach Blet. Does she speak?’

The huge one nods and Locke frowns at him, but he just shrugs. ‘I’ve heard her.’

I glance at him. When? Has he been eavesdropping on me and the other humans? I haven’t noticed him lurking, and I think I would considering his size, but I resolve to keep an eye out for him in future just in case.

‘All right.’ The pixie snaps her fingers in my face and, when I startle, she nods and lets out a small hum. ‘How many times did you travel the Breach before you were lately bought?’

‘Only a few times when I was a child, mistress.’

‘But no times in between?’

‘No, mistress.’

The Pixie frowns. ‘Two Gate trips from here, two Circles away. Were you at The Barrack by any chance?’

I glance up at her in surprise. ‘Yes, mistress. From being small.’

Another hum passes her lips. ‘Eyes down unless I tell you. You did well to survive there for so many years if that’s true. Strip.’

I move to take off my dress, but Locke stops my fingers from unlacing the front. I look up in surprise and trepidation, but he isn’t looking at me.

‘Why does she need to disrobe for you to know if she’s Gate Sick?’

Why does he care?

‘She doesn’t,’ the pixie mutters, canting her head as she looks up at him, ‘but The Barrack is not known for its care of humans. If she was there for as long as she claims, I’d like to take a closer look at her condition.’

‘I noticed she is scarred,’ he says. ‘Is The Barrack the reason why?’

‘Possibly, but I’ll need to look to be sure.’

Fine,’ the fae mutters.

His warm fingers leave mine and I feel their loss in a way I don’t understand at all. Perhaps it’s because I’m so rarely touched at all. I let my dress fall to the stone floor.

The pixie wastes no time, checking my hair, ears, eyes, nose, and mouth.

She asks me questions about the bandage on my arm and I tell her it’s two weeks old, not two days, so that she doesn’t know I stole a healing potion at The Barrack.

Maybe she wouldn’t care, but I have to be a good slave if I’m not Kismet.

I’d hate to be beaten for that just because I hadn’t thought to lie.

But her demeanor changes at my untruthful words as if she knows, and she takes a step back. Her hand takes hold of my chin and she forces my head up, her gaze boring into me.

‘Eyes on me. I know when a slave is hiding things,’ she announces, her grip on me tightening painfully.

‘I didn’t,’ I whisper.

The pixie slaps my face hard and I cry out. ‘Last chance.’

She puts a hand up and I realize the fae are much closer to me than they were a moment ago. I don’t want to know why. Are they going to pounce on me when they hear I’ve stolen before?

‘I– I took a healing potion,’ I stammer. ‘I was afraid it wouldn’t close and I’d get chills and fever from it.’

She lets go of me with a snort and then grunts in pain as she hits the tips of her fingers on the side of the wooden table. ‘When was the last time you were released?’

I shake my head uncomprehendingly, rubbing my cheek where it stings, and realizing with relief that fate has retaliated when the healer clenches her hurt fingers with her other hand.