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I watched Emon’s body relax, sinking heavier into the ground, and couldn’t help but smile at the small twitch in his booted foot signaling that he was finally asleep.

A strong arm was thrown over his eyes to shield the three moons’ glow and annoyingly it highlighted every beautiful inch of his bronzed torso.

Soft growling snores broke the eerie silence of the dead Balsam Plains and I was happy for it. Years of solitude had me craving more of his deep gruff voice no matter how much he pissed me off.

Staring at my dust covered hands, I curled them into tight fists, admitting what I did not want to.

I liked the bastard. He was gorgeous, yes, more than pleasing to look at, and those passionate gold eyes felt like they could strip you bare in a heartbeat.

Beastly and dangerous, his power was like that of the sun, bright and burning so hot that I barely noticed I was engulfed in the flames.

It made me feel alive again .

But the moment his knees fell into this dead earth to dig the grave of a beast that all fae feared, I knew he was more than just something pretty to lust over. There were depths within this shifter. Depths that if I looked closer at, would capture me more wholly than those gold eyes ever could.

Goddess damn him to Sheol, I didn’t even want to be here, didn’t even want to admit the tale he spun, and I definitely didn’t want to develop any deeper feelings for a shifter of all things.

A soft whimper broke the stillness of the night and my head whipped up to see Emon starting to thrash in his sleep.

“Please, no more.” He begged, growling and thrashing in the night. “I’ll give it to you..I’ll give it to you.”

He was dreaming…a dream that seemed more like a nightmare. A glistening sheen of sweat broke out across his torso that hadn’t been there moments before.

“Just stop. Please, please stop—.”

Moving quickly in a crouch, I eased around his sheathed claws that tore at the ground beneath him and knelt at the crown of his head.

His face was contorted with pain and his eyes rolled rapidly beneath his closed lids.

Tears stained his bronze skin and wetted the bearded scruff along his strong jawline.

Concerned, I tentatively reached out and smoothed back his hair.

“This is a dream, Emon. You are safe. Safe here with me, Remnant.” My shadows hovered beside me and I looked at them.

“Blanket him but do not restrain him.” I whispered.

By the way he was thrashing, it already appeared he was fighting against bindings in this nightmare.

“Please make it stop, please, please, please—.” He begged.

I ran my hands gently through his hair that had fallen loose from his tie. “Shhhh. It has stopped Emon. It has already passed.” I smoothed my fingertips over the scrunched lines of his forehead.

“Remnant.” He murmured.

Wiping the tears from this formidable fae’s cheeks and feeling as if I had intruded on a private moment he did not want to share, I continued to soothe him. “Shhhh. It’s over now. Rest. Rest Emon. I will be here when you wake.”

A rattling sigh escaped his chest with a few more unintelligible, whimpered murmurs before he finally eased, sinking into his bedroll once more. Pulling my hands back, I rested them in my lap, and watched the steady rise and fall of his sculpted chest…a telling sign that the nightmare had passed .

For two hours, I stayed vigilant over his resting form, watching for any more signs of the terror that had gripped him so violently.

Finally, feeling confident that he would be okay, I peered out over the darkness that seemed to have also penetrated our very souls.

Tonight, I had seen his…I had looked deeper, goddess damn me, and I knew now that whatever scars he bore, they were similar to mine.

I was not alone. Something I’d never felt would be possible, not after what had been done to me.

Trailing my hands through the black lifeless dirt, I pursed my lips. Irritatingly, Emon was right. This place was tainted, sick, evil—everything about it suggested the Sanguine.

I had been young when the blood wars took place, sheltered away, but I did recall my mothers tales…about the lifeless lands and the ravenous monsters. About the blood fae who wielded a great power that seemed to erase life itself.

The birth of my brother Kade had been the only light for my mother who had lost many loved ones during the war. He was one of the last fae to be born before infertility spread through our people like a slow plague.

A plague that Deirdre had been desperate to eradicate…at any cost. Her decision to ally with the humans on Earth had been the beginning of the end for her.

Bile filled my mouth and I swallowed it back, frantically looking towards the treeline as my breathing began to rapidly increase with panic.

I needed to leave.

I could go back, face the blood wraiths, and reclaim my cabin.

Except it was too late. Gripping the earth harder, the memories took over and I released a soft sob, barely audible over the loud pounding of my heart.

***

“Why?” I screamed at the elegantly beautiful fae before me with pain and fury. “How could you do this to me?”

Deirdre. The Queen of Faerie. My friend. My lover. My everything…watched me with cold hatred and disgust in her exquisite turquoise eyes. It was th e same look she had given me the last three months while they raped and tortured me on her orders.

“So beautiful and so broken.” She crooned softly watching me cling to the cold sterile table I had woken up on.

Standing half naked with nothing but a blood soaked shirt to cover me, I was vulnerable and weak.

The burns around my wrists ached fiercely from the iron chains that had once bound me, and my right wrist was mottled with deep blue bruises.

I glanced down at the completely fractured iron cuff.

It should have been impossible for any fae to break but someone had, hammering the abhorrent metal until it gave… eventually freeing me.

My bruises were an easy price to pay for the heroic act but who could have done such a thing?

I shook my head, focusing on Deirdre. “What have you done to me?” I whispered.

“This is all your doing, Remi darling.” She purred.

“A coward's answer.” I spat and spied the flickering of the shadows beneath us—my strength was returning. “You left me here, imprisoned in irons to be used for three months while I begged you to end it.” I narrowed my eyes, rage burning my entire being. “You should have killed me.”

She laughed. A beautiful cold sound that used to make my heart stutter. “Yes, you beg so prettily, Remi darling. It was wholly amusing but very much a waste of your energy. You could have at least tried to enjoy yourself.”

My jaw clenched. “Like how you enjoyed watching, De.”

Her eyes flickered over my naked legs and then back to my face. “Yes.” She purred.

Snarling, I donned my armor from the shadow void. Covering myself in its sleek white silver plates. Deirdre sneered at the sight. After all, it had been a gift from her—a lover's gift.

Yet, from the way she was looking at me now, it was hard to believe that she ever held even the smallest ounce of love for me.

“You had my loyalty, my life, and my heart. Why was that not enough for you? Why did you take it this far?”

“Do not speak to me of your loyalty and love!” She hissed, stepping toward me angrily.

“For years you defied me. Sparing the shifters and granting their disgusting kind safe passage in my lands. Protecting those giant lizard beasts while they destroyed our peoples homes.” She laughed then.

“Let us not forget your little rebellion— did you honestly believe you could have stopped me? The Queen of Faerie, chosen by the goddess herself?”

My chin rose. “I will stop you.”

Her smile glittered dangerously in the light.

“Oh Remi darling, it is cute that you still think that.” She arched a silvered brow.

“They have all been hunted down and executed, you know.

Their bodies hang on the city's gates as we speak and I made sure every single one of them knew their deaths were because of you. Your captains Xi and Riley especially.”

I forced my knees to lock before they buckled under me from crushing grief. “Are there any lines left that you have not yet crossed, De?”

“You should have known, Remi darling. That I will do anything to ensure the survival of our people.”

I shook my head sadly at the beautiful deranged fae before me.“This isn’t about survival anymore. It is an obsession, a madness. I know you want your own child…to have again what you once lost. But this isn’t the way.”

“You know nothing—” She screeched and furious gusts whipped around me, stinging my face like a winter wind. “You don’t know because you never had it! But I did. My sweet perfect baby boy was mine. He was mine and the goddess took him from me.”

“Deirdre…” I took a step towards her, my heart breaking for the pain that swirled in her stunning turquoise eyes.

She snarled at me and I was slapped forcefully with more of her elemental winds. My nails clawed into the metal table to hold myself steady. “I don’t need your sympathy! I don’t need anything from you. Not anymore! The fae will have what we lost and I will be celebrated once again!” She shrieked.

My shadows darkened much like my heart.“What do you mean not anymore?”

“It means that you have finally served some true purpose. After all these years, I will at last get what I want out of you.” She crooned and smoothed her hands over the curves of her fitted white dress. “I should thank you really.”

“Thank me for what?” I said through clenched teeth while my heart thundered wildly in my chest.