A Thief of Nightshade (17 page)

“My brave, reckless girl.” He kissed her knee and shin. “I bet it hurt like hell.

Why didn’t you want to tell me?”

She shrugged again. “Most likely for the same reasons you never tell me anything about yourself. I know I’m reserved, I’ve always been. But as much as I’ve broken down and told you, you’ve reciprocated nothing.”

He straightened, his face getting the all-too-familiar distant look that it often did when they discussed his past. “I know.”

“So tell me something, anything, that no one else knows about you.”

He considered her request. “Do you remember that first day in class?” She nodded. “I completely lost my train of thought the moment I saw you. I also had a habit of staying behind the podium until that particular day, when I walked around front just to be closer to you. And you didn’t even look up.”

She

smiled,

recalling

Sam’s

chastisement. “I remember.”

He moved closer, crawling on his hands and knees until he was directly over her. “That smug grin tells me you already suspected as much, but I bet you didn’t know how long I stayed with you the night of the benefit.”

She partially sat up. “What?”

“I didn’t leave as soon as Samantha and that poor excuse of a human she called a boyfriend thought I did.” He tenderly pressed her back down and kissed her softly. “I stayed until five or so to watch you sleep.”

She blushed. “You did not ... and isn’t that a little creepy?”

He laughed. “I did. And it would have been shall we say, a tad inappropriate, had we not just shared our first kiss several hours prior. I thought it was romantic.”

Aubrey had to admit, though she’d criticized that very action in novels, it was romantic in the right context.

“How did you get back in?” She granted him a grin, enough of one to let him know that she at least somewhat agreed with him, and kissed him back. In fact, the more she thought about it, the more flattered she felt.

“I told Samantha I could show myself out, which I did, but it was much later than she’d anticipated and she was a little tipsy herself. I doubt she looked at the driveway again after she came in for the night.”

“Sam told me that you wouldn’t let Darin carry me into the house. I was mortified.”

He laughed and lay down beside her, propped up by his elbow. “I wouldn’t have let Darin touch you if his life depended on it. And just so you understand, I thought you were adorable that night. I’d been behind you in the gardens for a while. No, I wasn’t hiding. I actually called your name several times but you didn’t hear me. I don’t always stalk you, you know.”

She giggled, “It doesn’t sound that way. Not that I really mind, though. I like the idea of being sought after.”

He reached over and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, then ran the back of his hand across her cheek. “Do you not feel sought after now?”

“That isn’t what I meant.”

“Mrs. Sellars, there isn’t anything in this world or any other that could keep my heart from belonging to you and you alone.

Don’t laugh, I’m not joking.”

“I don’t think you are.”

He placed his palm over her necklace. “No, but you don’t believe it.”

“Actions speak louder than words. I know you love me and I believe you mean what you’re saying. I’ve just learned not to trust words. I’ve come a long way since I met you. I have let you in, which is more than I can say for any other relationship I’ve ever had, friendship or otherwise. It’s especially important considering how little you’ve returned the favor. You have yet to tell me anything that pertains to your family. What about your childhood, what are your parents like? What were they like? Did you eat your lima beans when you were a kid? I don’t know, you’ve never told me.”

“I’ve never liked lima beans.”

She groaned and rolled out of his embrace. “Nothing could keep your heart from mine? How about total honesty? I’ve bared my soul to you, Jullian. You’re right; this isn’t a joke. It hurts to think you don’t find me worthy enough to know anything more than just the surface stuff.

And you wonder why I’ve had a hard time telling you simple things, like what stupid stunt I pulled to break my leg. Let alone sharing events with you that changed my life and the lives of everyone else in my family.”

He stood up and walked around to where she’d turned her back to him. “I don’t know how to tell you,” he said quietly. “And please, Aubrey, don’t relate my issues with your worth. You know

how much that terrifies me. It has nothing to do with you—nothing at all.”

She uncrossed her arms and took his hands in hers. “I didn’t know how to tell you, either. But I loved you enough to try the best I knew how. You haven’t even given me that much.” When he didn’t say anything in response, her gut tightened. It wasn’t anger she was feeling; she would have preferred it. She dropped her hands.

“I don’t blame you. It’s always easier to say you love someone than to show them.”

Avalar

When Aubrey came to, the first thing she saw was a clock, dimly as though it were at the end of a very long tunnel. As the gears came into view, she realized the clock was actually quite close and seemed to have rubber attached to its right side.

“What are you?” The gears moved strangely, pulling up on part of the rubber, very lip-like.

Her vision cleared and suddenly what she saw in front of her wasn’t a clock at all but a hideous combination of winding gears and human flesh. She screamed, scrambling back on her hands and backed up until she hit a damp wall.

The clock-thing, rolling around on one arm that had a wheel attached where a hand should have been and two very distorted legs, leaned closer. Half its face was mechanical; the other still seemed to be living. Jade green eyes peered back at her curiously. Moppish dishwater hair fell over its head and down one shoulder.

“It seems to me that since you are able to speak, it’s only polite to answer a question you must certainly know the answer to.”

She closed her gaping mouth.

Indignant, it twisted until it faced her with an entirely different side of its head, the back of it, actually, where it had another set of lips and eyes and a nose— this face was made completely of metal parts. It frowned. “I am called Cain. Now, what are you?”

She

looked

around

quickly,

discovering that on the far side of where she cowered were bars. They were both imprisoned, unless this creature was her warden. “Where are we?”

Cain turned his head around again.

“Now, that doesn’t sound like an answer at all. Allow me to clarify my question.

Are you human, Fae or Shade?”

“Tell me where we are first.”

Cain groaned, accomplished by a series of wheels clicking into place and pulling a metal string down his exposed throat. “We are in Koldavere, city of Goblins. The lower dungeons, if you must know specifically.”

“We? As in, you’re a prisoner here as well?”

He laughed, a sound worse than the groaning. “Do I look like a Goblin to you?”

“I haven’t a clue. I’ve never seen one.” She recalled vaguely, all too late, Jullian’s stories about Goblins and their specialty in metal works. Nevertheless, he hadn’t spent much time describing them.

“Well, I can promise you I am not, nor will I ever be, a Goblin. Now, will you be so kind as to oblige me with a reply?”

“I’m human.” She didn’t see the point in hiding anything. “What ... are you?”

Cain sat up from his wheeled arm and with his other hand, which rested at the end of a short, stumpy limb, scratched his chin. “Well, I wasn’t always this way.

The Goblins take things, replace them with other—things.”

She gulped. “Things, like eyes and hands?”

“Yes, yes. Now back to business.

What brings you all this way? You’re terribly far north for a human. Hmmm, such a shame, you’ve such pretty hair.”

“What brought you here?” She countered.

“Totally irrelevant.”

She

scoffed.

“No,

completely

relevant. Why should I trust you if you don’t tell me anything about yourself first?”

Cain thought about this, rolling his hinged silver tongue around in his mouth.

It grossed her out. “Well, I’ve been here an awfully long time. I don’t quite recall, really. They took quite a bit of my brain, you see.” He lowered his head, showing her the translucent side of his scalp where no hair grew. Inside, just as he’d indicated, was a hollow space.

“Ugh.” She recoiled, holding her stomach. “Do they ... do that to everyone who comes here? What do they do with the parts they take?”

Two metallic lids fell over his eyes like the shutters of a camera. “Well, they eat them of course.”

At that she rose and started to pace frantically. “I have to get out of here. I have to find my friends. Aislinn! Given!

Can you hear me?” She grabbed the bars of the cell and pulled at them, knowing full well they wouldn’t give.

Cain started toward her, but backed off when she jumped away. “Shut up girl, you’re going to draw attention to us! They get hungry when you start moving around too much. Imagine it a little like going by a table of well prepared turkey and roast and those little baby carrots all soaked in brown sugar, so appetizing just sitting there steaming fresh out of the oven. A little like that.”

Jullian, Jullian! Panicked, she slid down against the bars, her heart racing and without thinking, held her palm against her chest. Suddenly, an image flashed in her mind: Jullian, dressed entirely in white, seated on a silver throne. A brilliant smile graced his features before they suddenly fell dim. He pressed his hand also to his chest, and tilted his head down, his bright eyes searching for the source of the sudden strange emotion. Jullian, please help me!

She screamed again and a cold clammy hand clamped over her mouth.

She opened her eyes as she brushed his hand away and let go of the necklace.

Her vision blurred and she felt like she was about to pass out.

Cain looked her over again. “Stay with me now, passing out won’t do you any good.” He leaned in and seemed to study her hands.

She whispered, “You’ve got to help me get out of here.”

Cain

wheeled

backwards.

“It

certainly would be the polite thing to do, but you must understand, I can’t. There is only one way in and one way out and you don’t want to go that way.”

“Why?”

“Well, because you only go that way twice; once when you arrive and then when they’ve finally replaced all of you.

Then...” Cain grimaced, his tubular brows bending down in mock expression. “Then

they take what’s left of you to work in the mines.”

Aislinn felt like a thousand stones had been dropped on his head. He groaned, regretting once more the weight he’d put on over the summer and wondered what had possessed him to eat so many bison berries that he would pass out. Again. It wasn’t until he opened his eyes and saw the sludge growing on the cell wall that he realized where he was.

He scrambled to sit upright and looked through the bars to see nothing but darkly lit cavernous walls, littered with small trickling streams of water that ran from the ceiling to the floor. Something stirred behind him.