Tainted Read online

I was left to wallow in self-pity all by my lonesome self. I couldn’t sleep and it was really late so I just lied still unable to make sense of anything until I couldn’t stand it anymore. I dressed in the quick pull on ivy green gown with the buttons all down the front and walked to the garden that I’d worked to fertilize earlier. I sat staring at the water sprites dancing for me who never slept either. I attempted a smile for them and even a laugh. No one else was there to see my real thoughts, which was nice.

  I easily enjoyed all of my gardening efforts as of late. Danella brought me seed after seed of all my favorites never saying a word about my troubled mind. The garden was richer than it had ever been. Giggles and singsong fell all across the fountain mingling with my thoughts. They continued for a while in the same rhythm until the sprite on the left of me jumped and looked off in a sideways direction. I turned to look and there stood Pike.

  “What do you want?” I sounded a little more boldly miffed than I meant and hated that my entire body stiffened at his approach. His scent seemed to never leave me lately and that miffed me even more since he never left the court leaving me without a detection system for either prince.

  “Would you rather I leave?”

  “That’s not up to me.” I sat still focusing on the quiet night sounds of crickets and frogs.

  “Is it not? You’re not the queen of the Seelie court?” He just stood there, staring at me in his same weaponed getup that Ian usually garnished twenty-four hours a day.

  “That’s not it and you know it.” Speech time. I don’t know what came over me. “You know, Pike. I never did anything to you. You act like you hate me, then you act like, I don’t know…you doubt everything I do, then act like I’m this wonderful queen you want me to be. You double standard everything Ian does, yet you seemingly have his best interest in mind. I don’t know what you are, or might be, or could be… that much I’ll say out loud, but you’ve got to sort out your priorities. You can’t keep acting one way and not another. If there is something I should know, tell me. But don’t keep stringing me along like a yo-yo.” I let out a long standing breath.

  He clapped his hands together as if applauding and clasped them together instead. I slit my eyes in anger. He was still making his jokes.

  “Sorry. No jokes. Your ingenuity is boundless.”

  I had it blocked. What happened? “Stop reading my mind. And I believe you said I lacked brain cells so that would be hard for me to do.” I rolled my annoyed-to-no-end eyes purposely. One minute insults, the next compliments. After closing my eyes briefly and holding my breath to block him out, I knew it would work as long as I wasn’t talking, but being able to think, respond, and block was complicated.

  “Very good! You are amazing,”he stopped himself from advancing forward with actual real shock and maybe a little awe. I knew the glint in his eyes and what it meant.

  “Please don’t. Pike, what do you want from me?”

  “A chance to show you your options.”

  “There aren’t any. I was claimed by Ian. The prophecy is fulfilled. You’re the only road block." I paused then added, "And Kin.” My head was trying to convince me of something as the truth but really my heart knew it is an outright lie. All three of these men were important somehow. I just wish someone would let me in on the little secret of why or how the other two factored into the equation.

  “Am I? Or do you not find your own road blocks to substantiate an excuse.”

  “Stop it. You don’t own me. Don’t try to sway me.”

  “I’m not. Just making you think about your own swaying. And you’re the one exception to the claiming.”

  “Why are you here? And what do you mean?”

  “Isn’t it obvious, Grace?” Pike opened his arms wide at the sound of my name.

  “I think you should go, cheerio.” My name. They liked to use my name against me. I waved my hands at him wanting to be alone faster than he was letting me.

  “As you wish, Grace, my queen. If you should need me, just call.” His voice was so soft and purring. He really meant it, I think, even above the “I’m so sexy I won’t get let down” voice going on with it. He was so confusing.

  As he faded back into the shadows my mind saw Pike as two separate things. Unfortunately, the rationalization wasn’t sane. One described him as a multi-layered Twix bar that you never seemed to find the bottom layer too. The other...a giant can of mixed nuts. He couldn’t just be one kind of person.

  Funny, the word need. It had the power to question what one really wanted and really needed. It had the power to persuade or deny one’s own true desires. Or does it? What does one really need? And who really marks one's destiny? I was somehow destined for being the Fey court queen without much order giving, destined for this prophecy that isn't precisely readable to the naked eye, and destined for being guarded by not one but three Fey princes all fighting for what...I wasn't entirely sure. I just followed the flow the last few months and only now am I freaking out at the prospect of going forward another step.

  I sat there for at least another hour or so in thought. The water sprites were true to their abilities and continued dancing after I was alone again. He was most likely still in the shadows watching and waiting for me to need him so I blocked with everything I had.

  When I started to stand, a hand grabbed my shoulder from behind, the same hand that grabbed my shoulder a hundred times over my lifetime. I seated myself again out of being polite to the forced hand that still to this day gave me small shivers all up and down my back. I wished the sudden shift in wind would die back down for Pike’s scent hadn’t left the air yet.

  Guessing he was having trouble facing me by the way he stood directly behind still, I broke the silence first. He was here and that was most important. “How did you know I was here?”

  “I don’t sleep, Grace. And I always know where you are. It’s my duty.”

  Duty? Duty! I couldn’t hold it in. “Duty? Why does it have to be duty, and not for want of seeing me?”

  “That’s not what it meant.”

  “It is, though. You feel like you have to be there or you are failing me. Well, stop it. I don’t want to be found because of duty, I want to be found because you want to see me. I’m not in any constant danger and you’re the only one who seems to visit me out of duty, not want.”

  “You really have no idea what you are saying," he grunted.

  "Really, Ian."

  He faced me. "I'm a man, Grace."

  "Yes, I noticed," I smiled uneven with sarcasm.

  He sighed, "A man only harbors that duty when he can’t seem to function on a day-to-day basis because he finally found the one reason to be the warrior he was meant to be. For the girl he loves. It is an honor. That is why, but I can’t erase the reason otherwise. You will always be in some form of danger, Grace. It comes with the territory.”

  Others visit me because they are intrigued or want to be in my company. Pike's on the edge of the woods, guarding and well, other reasons too. “You act like you have no choice to be near me. Like I’m an idol, not the one you love.” Where was this coming from? I was completely spilling my guts--all my recent fears. Every last one of them.

  “He came to see you tonight because he wanted too.” He said it aloud. He’d done it. Now we could proceed. But did he want to?

  “Yes!” Yep! He ignored the topic and headed straight for the most important one. The one I wanted to avoid. Great!

  “Did you want him here?”

  “Yes! He is more honest with me than you.”

  His heart was crumpling into a thousand icicle pieces sharpening and painfully stabbing him over and over, but he didn’t show it. “I see.”

  “I see! Ian. That’s all you have to say. I’m screaming inside. I know there is something you’re not telling me. I know you are hiding something more about him and Kin and this whole prophecy. It is killing me. It makes my mind wander down paths that are excruciatingly painful. Pike is a menace, but gives me something I’ve
never had before, he tells me the truth.”

  His face was beet red with anger. The wind picked up whipping his hair angrily across his eyes forcing him to brush it out every so often.

  “The truth.”

  “What keeps Pike hoping you will give up and move away from me? You're possessive, I get that, but there's more to it.

  “Because I don’t want to lose you,” he yelled at me. Never done that! Oh no, no, no, Mr. Hot Protector of my universe.

  “I know that. But do you do it because you love me or because you want to win me?” I all but yelled back.

  He couldn’t believe it came from my mouth. I’d said the words that had been on both our lips for months and I’d just said it aloud. He probably didn’t know the right thing to say though the truth would be good here.

  “When…in freshmen year at the high school when Kin tried to take you...and Pike was there first, he claimed you for his own against Kin. I had no way of knowing that day at the waterfall if it was me that claimed you, or Pike because he already had.”

  He saw the anguish in my eyes with his own showing clearly. Then the light bulb in my mind went off. “And Altheon’s not talking. Then why did Altheon say you claimed me that day at the campfire?”

  “No, I’ve replayed that many times. He never said my name, or any other. He simply said that the guardian had named you to his own. You were claimed, but by who or how many?”

  “This is mad! Don’t I get a choice in any of this? And you were my guardian. Two men can't claim the same woman.” I threw up my hands. He didn’t respond but the wind howled letting me know it had incomprehensible answers that would go unanswered tonight. He told me, that's what matters. “Well, do we need to know, or do I get a choice in who I deem “worthy of my love” to marry?”

  “I don’t know. I wish I did.”

  “This is—insane. This is pure drama…and not me. Why do you give me hope and then do things like this that send me in a different direction.” I looked at his face and softened mine so caught up in it all that I’d forgotten the pain he must be in to tell me all this.

  “Try being the tough guy in this. You make us all act like pansies without so much as lifting your pinky finger. I can't make this decision for you, Grace. You know where I stand, how I feel.”

  Fine, I'll seal it aloud, shout it to the heavens. “Then you know I really don’t care about the others as much as I do you. I choose who I want to be with. And Ian, Prince of the Seelie Court, who hasn’t a last name for me to say when I mad, I love you! I love you! I.love.you! I don’t care what everyone else says. So stop hiding things from me that supposedly predict my entire dang future. Pike is a good friend to you and perhaps to me one day. He is honest with me or at least loyal.” I turned now and stood, put my hands on his shoulders, and shook him harder than I meant too. “Stop trying to protect me 100% of the time and try loving me 100% of the time. Protection is a privilege, but not a requirement. I want to see you smile, not destroy yourself inside because you are keeping secrets from me that could tear you and me apart in the end. Or worse, destroy yourself trying to keep me safe. What kind of life is that? And how would that not turn to something to abhor later. I don’t want to be your burden.”

  He hated being vulnerable in front of me. The more I am around him, the more I see the shield unfold it’s hidden depths. He hated worse what he saw as power over him. Not the court power, but the power I’d held for many years now and didn’t know it till right then, appreciate it like I will from here on out. I could tear him apart at the seams if I wanted to and he’d follow me the whole way as he could do to me.

  “Then you should also know that Pike is honorable in his intentions. He only wants what he thinks is rightfully his. He doesn’t mean any ill harm to you. And…that Kin is watching your house. That is what Pike came to tell you tonight. Us…tonight. He is watching and waiting. Though he doesn’t have any clues yet as to why Kin is watching.”

  I was relieved at Ian’s honesty and alarmed at the news at the same time.

  “We have guards posted in your house and around it. Kin knows we’ve been there. If he’s looking for a loophole, we’ll find it first.”

  I was calmer than I should be and only because he was talking. “What if he is bluffing to keep you busy? Perhaps his agenda is somewhere else entirely.” Then suddenly, I wasn’t...calm that is.

  “Perhaps.”

  “What if he intends to hurt my parents to get to me? Or stir the human world to create mistrust or lure me there to hurt me or…”

  “Stop, Grace. This is why we hesitate to tell you things. Pike isn’t completely honest with you all the time. He has secrets to keep you safe too.”

  He liked saying that, I noticed. Acting childish I noticed too. “Like what?” I pouted my lip feeling the crisp wind slap my hair in my face. It wasn’t this windy moments ago and for the most part, rarely happened at all near the Seelie court. In fact, the angrier I got about Kin, the more it stirred. The Fey have control of the earth's plant life and all that grows, so maybe more.

  I’d done it again, forced something out of him. He sighed before adding more signaling it would be bad. This shouldn't be the way to get information though. “We found Kinsler in your bedroom a few nights before we took you into the court.”

  I knew now, he really just didn’t want to admit another way of failing me. I was finally realizing this was almost physically painful to him, but I needed to know this though and gestured for him to go on.

  “He was trying to make it look like you ran away. He wrote a convincing goodbye letter for your parents all before you could find out your true nature and choose this path. If he’d stolen you and hid you, your parents would not know where you were, and neither would we.”

  “So what happened?”

  “Danella caught him standing over you, I was there within seconds, and Pike and I dragged him out. Nothing else to it except that he has been in your house. Now that he can return, and has, Pike wants to be sure of his agenda.”

  “How did he get in? I don’t remember letting him in, not ever seeing him at my house. You said the Fey have to be invited.”

  “Apparently, your dad was home alone when Kinsler took it upon himself to knock and lie to your father about being there to take you on a date. He acted as if he was embarrassed like he had the wrong day, but not before your dad invited him in first. Danella showed up as he stepped in the doorway. Remember, I told you that salt keeps us out. That’s why your mom never had it on the front when I came over. He should not be able to get in now. She has salted everything but the floor they walk on.” He laughed and brushed the hair that had fallen in his eyes from the wind.

  I loved his laugh and didn’t hear it nearly enough. “Okay, so he got in, didn’t get me, and that’s a good thing!” I smiled. “And you two dragged him out, how? Pike couldn’t come in, could he? I mean, I didn’t even really know him till I moved here. Wait, you said he helped you!”

  Another secret. “I made you let him in. When Kinsler was standing over you, I was desperate. Danella and I couldn’t take him alone. Pike was forced to stand on your balcony and watch so I forced your mind to think it and you told him to come in.”

  I was furious he would do that and wanted to scream, but realized just how far he would go to protect me. They all would. What would I have done?

  “Saved again as you say!” This time I said it for the first time like it was a bad taste in my mouth. I didn’t mean it to. I just couldn’t help but notice the tally chart for saving me was horrendously long and perfect reminders to my weaknesses.

  “I won’t apologize.”

  “I’m not asking you to. You did the right thing. And remember, Kin is the bad guy here! When Pike knows more, we’ll talk then.” That was an invitation to change the subject.

  “And us? Are we real, or are you motivated by prophecies only?”

  “Grace, we’ve had this talk. The prophecy doesn’t make me do anything.”

 
“Then stop saving me all the time and just be with me. I am not exactly the queen type, nor am I performing much in the way of duties. I'd like some normish, regular boring kind of days back to back where we just hang out all day, just us.”

  “A queen’s duties are not to be defined by out of court relations alone. I will not have you running to their every need when much of it can be taken care of as it always has before. Recent events related to our courts are all related to your arrival, not your public relation attempts. I consider you my queen in every sense and will not have you overwhelmed with frivolity. Your body—“

  “Is safe with you. I got that.”

  He wouldn’t just stop protecting me. Of that I was sure. Knowing him, he would offshoot danger around every corner to make me think I’m safe. I knew enough to realize his fear of what surrounded the court was related to Kin and the Nyms even if I denied it in front of him. “I will give it my best to stop taxing over your body and the imminent danger it stays in. You deserve that.” He chuckled aloud. It was false and meant only to appease me because in his eyes, the dangers were still there.

  Not exactly what I wanted, but compromising he was, so I would too. “And the claiming thing. And don’t say you can’t tell me anything, and then say because I’d have to kill you...blah, blah, blah. Does it really matter, or is Pike just hopeful? Your actual real opinion, please?” I said a little too curtly.

  “Opinion wise, I think that I feel like you and I belong together, that I claimed you inside long before anyone,” he touched his heart. “The importance to the prophecy is not for me to say or what I can tell you about it. I can’t help, Grace. I’m supposed to let you figure that out on your own. I have a jealous heart that worries you’ll be taken from me. It eats me up inside. Sometimes, I can’t tell if you’re agonizing over being with me because you think it’s my duty just as you announced, or because you want to, or if I should release you and let you find out what you might want otherwise. I didn’t contemplate what would happen once you got to court. I knew your heart for years, but when one is shocked into a new world, can their heart change?”