Beauty (A Faery Story 3)

Her family. She needed her family. They would help her sort everything out. They would talk to her and make things right. Oh, she longed to see her brothers once more.

“Dante is back in the village. I followed you because I thought you might need some time to think about everything that has happened. I was told you were given the fire drug. I know how it feels. It is terrible and yet there was something wonderful about that first night with my Dante.”

Terrible and wonderful. That was a good way to put it. She’d already forgotten the pain, but not the rolling need that had threatened to boil over. She could still remember how it felt to be one with them. To have Lach deep inside her pussy and Shim’s mind binding to hers as he fed. In those moments, she hadn’t been alone. She’d been loved and whole, and it had all been a lie.

“What’s your name?” If she was telling the truth, then Bron had been terribly rude.

The woman straightened up, her chin coming up in a polite greeting. “Kaja. I am Kaja Dellacourt. I am your cousin, and I would like to be your friend.”

Bron couldn’t help but flush a bit. Kaja’s breasts were thrust out as she made her greeting. “And you are very comfortable being naked.”

The woman laughed, a sweet sound. “Megan thinks it is odd, too, but I cannot wear clothes in my wolf state so I have none on when I change. Now, can we talk about all the reasons you should come back to the village with me?”

And back to Shim and Lachlan and Gillian who wanted her barefoot and pregnant in the Unseelie kingdom? No way. Bron resumed getting dressed, pulling out her most comfortable shoes, a pair of boots Gillian had traded the last of her jewelry for.

Kaja didn’t seem to notice her silence. She continued on. “I do not like that man downstairs. He might not be a bad man, but he seems to have plans he intends to see through with you or without you.”

“That seems to be the order of the day, doesn’t it? Everyone wants a piece of me.” Including Torin.

“But your family wants to protect you. I don’t think that man down there will do much in the way of protecting you. He will protect his plan, perhaps, but his protection for you will only go so far as seeing his plan come to fruition. Of course, you could simply wait until your husbands catch up to you, and then they will kill him.” Her eyes lit up. “And they will let me eat him. Yes. I very much like your husbands.”

“Then why are you here with me and not off telling them where I am.”

“Because Meg has taught me much. There are many rules on the Fae planes, but the one that is the most important is the Girl Power rule. The queen explained it to me. Girls must stick together because men are all idiots who often times think only with their man parts, and man parts are not smart. Girls must show loyalty to one another in the face of man part foolishness. If you are determined to follow this man, who is not your husband or your kin and will likely lead you into something terrible, then I will be forced to follow you because you are my kin, and I cannot leave you to something terrible. And besides, there might be snacks along the way.”

Bron stared at her new cousin, unable to keep the smile off her face. Snacks? Dante, it seemed, kept his bride on a short leash. “I don’t think I can go back. Do you understand that they want me to go back to their plane and pretend like nothing is happening here in my home? What would you do if the place of your birth was being destroyed?”

“I would warm myself by the fire and pray it took several of the wolves of my pack, but if my new family was being harmed, then nothing could keep me away.” She studied Bron for a moment. “And I can understand where a good princess would see her people as her family. You could try talking to Lachlan and Shim.”

“I don’t think they want to talk.”

“I have found that my husband will agree to many things when his man parts are in my mouth. You see, Meg is right because many times Dante should not have agreed to such things, but he did agree so I would continue.”

Bron stared at her cousin. “I don’t think I wanted to know that about Dante.”

Kaja sighed a little. “Megan also told me I must use a thing called tact. I struggle with tact. So we’re going to this Sir Giles’s home?”

“Kaja, you don’t have to come with me.”

Kaja got off the bed and shook out her hair. “I do. I cannot break the sacred code of chicks before dicks. Dante will understand. Or he will not and he will spank me. The good news is we are no longer on his plane, and it was so sad that someone forgot to pack the torture device that makes my poor asshole burn.”

“Goddess, Kaja!”

Kaja’s brown hair shook. “Yes, see. Tact. I do not have it. But I was smart enough to leave that thing behind.”

Bron was just about to explain the meaning of the word discretion to Kaja when she heard an odd cracking sound. She went to the window. She could see a huge, dark cloud approaching the village. It moved swiftly and with great purpose.

“What is that? A storm?” Kaja stood beside her, her eyes on the cloud as it stopped over what Bron would bet her life was the town square.

“It’s not a storm.” A sick feeling hit her gut as the cloud hovered and began to rain down. But it wasn’t rain drops cascading to the ground. It was soldiers. “It’s an eddy wind. Fae who are very skilled at magic can ride them and take others along. It’s a way to get large groups of people somewhere very quickly. We need to get to the village, Kaja.”

She turned, satisfied when Kaja changed from woman to wolf in an easy shift that happened so fast Bron barely noticed it. One moment Kaja was a woman and then next a graceful wolf following behind her. The wolf looked up at her with questioning eyes.

“No, Kaja, we’re not leaving.” She couldn’t leave them now.

Because Torin had found her and she couldn’t run anymore.

Chapter Thirteen