Page 38 of Given to the Fae (The Dark Realms #3)

‘Doesn’t seem to matter much now, does it?’ she mutters, her cheeks turning pink.

‘Well, I’m going to sleep,’ I say as I unbuckle my belt and part my tunic.

I sit on the bed and toe off my boots before lying back with my arms under my head and mostly close my eyes.

I watch her as she deliberates for a bit before stifling a yawn, then she does the same as me. I feel her settle next to me and turn onto her side away from me, curling her legs closer to her body. She always sleeps like that, I’ve noticed, as if trying to take up as little room as possible.

Having seen etchings of slaves in what amounts to their communal chambers at night, I know that they tend to sleep closely together for warmth and comfort.

‘Are you used to sleeping with others?’ I ask, without really meaning to.

She looks over her shoulder at me and nods cautiously.

‘At The Barrack?’

She nods again.

‘Do you miss it?’

She shrugs. ‘Usually they made me stay on the outside.’

She turns away and I wonder why.

‘They didn’t like you?’

‘Suppose not.’

I’d like her to trust me more than she does now and I know the only way for that to happen is to prove to her that I’m not like the masters she’s known.

‘It was on the floor,’ she murmurs. ‘It’s hard to get comfortable on these soft mattresses, but it’s warmer up here.’

‘If you...’ I take a deep breath. ‘If you want to move closer to me, you can. If it’ll help you sleep.’

She gives me a suspicious look and I put my hands up in front of me.

‘Only to sleep,’ I reiterate.

She turns away again without a word and I think she isn’t going to take me up on the offer, but then she shuffles closer, her back pressed to me.

It’s not long before her breathing evens out and I know she’s asleep.

Perhaps she does trust me more than I thought. I feel a pang deep in my chest as I turn toward her, draping my arm around her and hearing her soft sigh.

Though my own slumber doesn’t come, I close my eyes and relax until I hear the others returning to their room next to ours awhile later.

I feel her stir beside me. She stiffens when she feels my arm around her waist but soon calms when I don’t move it.

‘About the things I said before, do you know what it could be?’ she murmurs, not looking at me.

‘Are you feeling yourself now?’

‘Yes,’ she whispers. ‘Nothing like yesterday.’

I need her to tell me the rest of her story, the things she’s keeping close.

‘Let me think on it,’ I say after a beat, ‘but you must tell me if anything else happens, and I’ll help if you feel like that again.

’ I squeeze her shoulder gently. ‘You don’t want to be feeling that way out there alone.

Not many males will ask questions if a beautiful female wants them. All right?’

Her answering snort is soft, and I take hold of her shoulder firmly, turning her to face me and noting that she comes willingly.

‘I know you don’t think yourself attractive,’ I say and watch as she cringes in on herself.

My eyes narrow. She thinks I’m playing some cruel game with her.

‘Bryn.’

She glances up at me, her eyes surprisingly angry.

‘I mean it. I don’t care what others have told you. You need to understand that you are looked at and you are coveted even without the bracelet. You will be in danger if you’re alone when... if it happens again.’

‘That isn’t true,’ she whispers. ‘It can’t be.’

‘Why?’ I ask impatiently, ‘because masters have told you things to make you feel small and stupid, ugly and useless?’

Her bottom lip trembles.

‘They say those things to many of the slaves. It’s a way of keeping them from fighting back, Bryn.’

She lets out a caustic laugh.

‘There’s no need for them to do that. There is no fighting back for us, Jak.’

‘They also do it because words can hurt and punish as surely as the lash. Tell me you will let me know of even the smallest change.’

‘I will,’ she says, and I narrow my eyes because I don’t believe her.

‘Promise it.’

‘I promise,’ she says, her eyes widening a little.

‘It’s binding when you make an agreement with a fae,’ I tell her and it’s only half a lie. ‘I mean it, Bryn.’

‘Fine,’ she grates out. ‘I’ll tell you.’

I give her shoulder a squeeze and get up from the bed.

There’s a knock at the door and Morgan comes into our small room.

‘The lunar celebrations will begin soon. We thought to join them.’

He looks at Bryn, and I know this is for her because Morgan rarely makes decisions with thoughts of diversion and entertainment in mind.

‘With me ?’ She stands up, excitement lighting her countenance. ‘As a fae?’

‘Yes, but you must stay with us,’ he warns, ‘and keep the bracelet on.’

‘I will!’ she says.

I roll my eyes as she follows Morgan, bounding down the stairs with a laugh.

I can’t help but smile a little, though thoughts of the next few days weigh heavily on me.

Are we really going to let her be sold to the pits?

Now that she’s not in the room and can’t see my face, I consider what she’s told me.

I wasn’t being completely truthful before.

There is another reason she might have carnal needs.

Could it be that she’s not as human as she appears?

I shake my head. That’s impossible. She wouldn’t have been able to hide it for so long. Someone would have noticed before now.

Deep in thought, I follow the others down the stairs to the main room, and when we leave the inn, the streets are already alive with free folk, though I notice it’s mostly witches.

We explore the market first, and I watch as Bryn starts out not touching anything and barely looking up from the ground.

However, she soon realizes that no one can tell what she is, and when the second seller invites her to touch the baubles on his stall, she does.

She grins at no one in particular as she traces the metal filigree of a necklace and then moves on to the weapons of the next stall, and then to the glittering ribbons and cloths of the third where she fingers the soft textiles.

For once she’s not hiding her thoughts and feelings, and I can see a glimmer of who she’d be as a free human, what she should have been.

‘She’s...different like this,’ Locke murmurs to no one in particular.

I glance over at him and I let him see my anger.

‘You should never have made that deal with her when you never had any intention of upholding it,’ I say quietly, making sure no one’s listening.

He turns to me in surprise and then snorts. ‘You fuck her once and think it means forever?’

‘That’s not what this is about, Locke. Letting her have a taste of freedom only to snatch it away, it’s cruel and you know it.’

‘Is it?’ he sneers. ‘Or will she thank us for giving her some memories to cling to when she’s in the cells beneath the arenas, waiting for her end?’

‘Is the mission really worth this?’

‘Worth what?’ he scoffs.

‘You. Her. Us.’ I lower my voice. ‘I know that you’d give your life to end the kidnappings from the Light Realm and I know why.’

‘You know nothing!’ he seethes quietly, but I ignore him.

‘But would you give your soul as well? She’s worth saving. You know it as well as I. She’s shown us who she is, and she isn’t what we thought when we first set eyes on her all those days ago, my friend.’

‘What are you saying?’

‘I want to take her with us as we promised her we would. To the Light Realm. It’s where she belongs.’

‘You’d put our mission in jeopardy for her?

Bere is the link we’ve been looking for and I almost have his full trust. He’ll tell me everything I need to know given time.

How she works. Where she’s based. The information we are tasked with finding, Jak.

But you want to cut that time short before we have what we came here for?

Now when we’ve come this far? For one human when we could save all the free folk who are being stolen from the Light Realm as we speak? ’

I grit my teeth. ‘I can’t leave her here.’ I grind out.

He sighs and puts a hand on my shoulder. ‘I’m the leader for a reason,’ he says and looks away from me. ‘You won’t have to.’