Asylum (Touched by the Fae 1)

“You have to forget this nonsense and come with me. You don’t have any idea how much trouble you’re in right now.”

“Yeah? And why’s that? Because you won’t tell me. You’ve never told me anything except to keep my hands to myself and guess what, Nine?” I show him my gloves. “That didn’t work out so great, did it?”

“Very well.” Nine glances over his shoulder, peering into the inky blackness of the shadow as if he’s searching for something. He nods. “You’re not wrong. Dawn isn’t for a few hours yet in the human world. There’s some time. Ask your questions. I vow to answer them if I can if that’s the proof you need to trust me on this.”

Trust Nine when I just discovered the truth about him? Yeah, he’s got a snowball’s chance in hell of that happening. But I also recognize that I’ve backed him into a corner. For some reason, he’s desperate to get me to agree to leave with him. He thinks answering my questions will make me trust him again?

Sure. Let’s go with that.

Hey. The fae can’t lie, but humans sure can.

“How are you both fae?”

“Don’t you remember how I told you there were two kinds of fae?”

Now that he mentions it, I kinda do. “The Cursed and the Blessed.”

He nods. “That’s right. The Cursed Ones are the Unseelie, the Blessed Ones the Seelie. Two different races make up the same people, all of us lorded over by the Fae Queen.”

“So you’re saying there’s good and bad types. Blessed and cursed.” My heart skips a beat. “Which one are you?”

“It’s not as simple as that. Good and bad… no. I’ve told you this before, Riley. Those are human concepts. In Faerie, it comes down to Light and Dark. One rules during the time of the sun, the other when the moon is out. It’s when we are at our strongest, that’s all it means.”

I don’t have to ask which one he is again.

Dark Fae. Nine’s skin is ghostly white, his eyes that freakish silver, but his hair is midnight black and he wears the shadows like a second skin. Plus, he always made sure I knew that he could only come to the human world at night.

And now I finally know what the beautiful monster is.

A Light Fae. Golden eyes, golden hair, golden skin. He lit the house on fire during the afternoon—in the sunlight.

Rys must be part of the Seelie class then, the Blessed Ones.

Okay, Nine totally just made his point. No way would anyone ever consider Madelaine’s killer a good guy. And Nine, as dark as he might be, has only ever been kind to me.

I’m just about to ask him why when he continues and I don’t get the chance.

“Just because he’s a Light Fae, a Seelie, don’t make the mistake in thinking he’s not dangerous. He’s still a fae, and one who will stop at nothing to get what he desires.”

Has Nine forgotten about everything Rys has cost me so far? Madelaine, my poor hands, and the last six years in the asylum?

I’ll never forget for a second how dangerous he is.

I show Nine my gloves again. “Yeah. I know.”

“Do you really? He was just playing then. You were a child, nothing more. Last night, he hunted you down, stole another touch. It only made him stronger. It’ll get worse when you hit your twenty-first birthday.”

Because they’re letting me out of Black Pine, I guess, and Rys will have an easier time looking for me. But how the hell does Nine know that?

Pretending like I’m not suddenly spooked by the idea of Rys forever searching for me, I shrug. “I still have more than two weeks until then to worry about my birthday.”

A strange expression flashes across his face, there and gone again. For a second, it looks like he’s about to argue with me before he changes his mind.

Shaking his head, long hair spilling down the back of his strange coat, Nine says, “Rys is even more dangerous now. A fae who has set his eyes on a lover is often ruthless and the laws say—”

A too-loud chuckle bursts out of me. “A lover? Oh, come on.”

“You must take this seriously, Riley. He’s convinced himself that he wants you.”