Authors: Crystal Collier
It was like standing in the sun, but not feeling it on your skin. Disappointment ate through her.
“Hello, Bellezza. How are you today?”
Her lashes batted. “I am always well when you are near.”
He laughed. The sound pulsed like bursts of light, the echo of angelic glory.
“Have you mastered it yet?” His head tilted.
The child looked down, shoulders drooping. “It troubles me.”
“Hm.” His lips came to a close. “You will overcome, I am confident.”
Bellezza threw herself at the bars. Alexia leapt in alarm. She cursed herself for the reaction, taking several seconds to overcome the agony.
“I am tired of trying,” Bellezza pled. “Please let me go!”
He touched the tip of her little nose. “You will go free—” Her face brightened. “—but not today.”
The girl’s countenance fell.
“I think you are making progress. In fact,” his unrelenting eyes finally turned on Alexia, “she is proof.” The kindness had gone. His glare hung heavily on her, like dark storm clouds after a glimpse of perfect sunbeams.
He rounded to her cage, nodding for Lester to loose the bars. His grimace deepened as he neared her side—not so much a grimace as a darkening of the eyes. She wanted to melt into the floor and cease to be.
“Some ointment, Lester.”
The key-bearer exited.
He hesitated only briefly, flashing an agonized scowl as he took a seat. Alexia wished she could escape. He was disappointed the fall hadn’t killed her. Now he’d have to do it himself.
Their gazes met. She dove wholly into his, consumed by the need to be wrong.
“Well done, Alexia. You found me.”
25
Healing
His words ushered forth so quietly, Alexia wondered if they’d penetrate Bellezza’s corner. His glare clashed with the pain in his expression. She held still, searching his face for any hint that their reunion brought him the slightest joy.
His head shook. “This may well be the least intelligent thing you have ever done.”
She frowned. How could he possibly know that unless he’d been watching her all along?
Depression swallowed her whole. He had been watching. He could have come to her at any time, and he hadn’t. He didn’t want her here.
Her face burned with embarrassment. She wanted to dig a hole in the earth and climb in.
“Foolish,” he muttered, focus turning to the bandage on her temple.
The corners of her eyes stung, readying to produce tears. She blinked them back and bit into her lip. She would not cry.
Lester returned with a screw-cap jar and handed it to her blue-eyed tormentor. Daubing a bit of the creamy white substance onto his fingers, he removed her bandage and touched the side of her head. Unholy flames burst into her temple and ate through the muscles—agony to match her emotional suffering.
She jerked away. He grabbed her jaw, holding her in place. Her teeth grated. She had wanted so long to be this close to him, and now that she knew what it meant, she ached to burst through that prison door and be far, far away. Pain. True, blinding pain. Let her heart be laid to rest now. She didn’t have need of it anymore!
She threw an arm at him, crying out as Hell’s fire coursed into her head.
He caught her arm and laid it gently beside her. The inferno died, his fingers glazing softly down the side of her face. Tingles fired up from her toes.
His hand retracted.
She gasped, eyes opening. She wanted him to touch her again, to feel the pain, the flames, the ache of lightning through her bones!
He stood.
Why? Why did his contact do this to her?
She tenuously lifted her gaze. He stared back, his handsome face granite, his scar a jagged marble blemish.
“That is enough for today.” His eyes snapped soundly away as he handed the bottle back to Lester. “Redress the wound. Keep her down.”
And he moved abruptly from the confines.
26
Almost
Kiren stopped just outside the door, landing against the wall and pulling his hands through his hair. He covered his mouth and closed his eyes. A little worse—had her fall been only a little worse . . .
He bit his knuckle, channeling into his own flesh the need to break something.
Movement pulled his attention up, to the boy hovering in the shadows. The young man twisted a hat in his grasp, eyes wide.
Kiren straightened, shoulders back. He swallowed, seeking the calm that had been his constant for so long, the calm she shattered by merely existing. He lifted a hand, patted the boy’s shoulder and escaped to the night.
Escaped to sort the conflicting needs pulsing through him.
27
What You Are
Alexia dreamed of him smiling at her, although she didn’t know if it was night or day, and then she woke.
Scratching noises turned her head. She inhaled and convulsed under infuriated wounds. She breathed shallowly, aware of the throbbing in her knee, shoulder, side, and arm. But her head didn’t ache like it had.
Had he destroyed all sense? Had he damaged her so thoroughly that nothing remained? Was she dead already?
“Hello?” she whispered.
“Still here,” Bellezza returned acerbically. “Isn’t that refreshing.”
A rattling, like several marbles, spilled across a wood floor.
Alexia tried to shift off her sore back, but failed, moaning.
Bellezza chuckled. “Does it hurt?”
“Yes.”
The child laughed more. Alexia closed her eyes against the sound. Bellezza made a perfect match for him, equally beautiful, equally enigmatic, equally cruel.
The vicious girl passed the day doing whatever with her noisy toys. Alexia spent it listening and wishing for Sarah, or Father, or Rupert—anyone to rescue her.
The door whined open. Her head swung around. Lester’s form blocked the light.
He jangled a platter against the she-demon’s cage. Bellezza’s baleful eyes flashed in the daylight.
“You ready to eat, worm-hill?”
“You ready to die, dung-pile?”
He laughed and turned Alexia’s direction. “And what about our little Sparrow? Are you hungry?”
She nodded. He let himself into her cell and fed her like yesterday. Bellezza watched through the bars with intense odium, chocolate-colored eyes never wavering. If not aware of the fierce intelligence behind that mask, Alexia would have believed her a porcelain doll, perfect, empty, terrifying.
“How you feelin’ today?” Lester inquired kindly. His tone was so much nicer than yesterday she almost choked on her food.
“I am all right,” she lied.
“With an arm what looks like it’s barely hanging on, you say yer all right?” He glanced Bellezza’s direction. “Sparrow here shows promise, don’t she?”
The impossible little princess prickled.
“Well, I hope
it,
” he nodded back at Bellezza, “ain’t been too awful to cope with for one night.”
“Why am I here, Lester?”
His empathetic dark eyes gave her hope of escape.
He hopped up, kicked Bellezza’s food into her cell, and left them alone. Alexia noted how the girl’s rice splattered up over her dress and the diffident rage tensing her face before the door fell shut.
Alexia sniffled, halting for pain. Tears started. She wanted to see Sarah again and Father, and even Mother! She wanted to call Rupert a dolt and entertain Abby’s hopes of a good match. She would amuse strangers and flirt with tactless gentlemen—anything if it meant leaving this nightmare behind—anything if it meant living!
And yet just to see his scarred face again . . .
“Are you crying?” The harsh sneer interrupted her thoughts.
Alexia couldn’t trust her own voice.
“You are.”
She tried to stop the tears.
“That is so pitiful.” Bellezza’s final statement sent her over the edge.
“Oh shut up,” she snapped back. A long silence followed. She usurped the time to drain her emotions thoroughly, wishing over things that would never be, yearning for years she would never know, wondering why she had been so thoroughly stupid!
And yet, just to see his face . . .
“It is miserable, isn’t it?” The child’s soft voice thrummed with pleasure.
“What is miserable?”
“Oh, I think you know.”
“You enjoy watching others despair?”
“Yes,” she affirmed frankly. “What else is there?”
Alexia had no idea how to respond.
An hour ebbed by before the child spoke again. “Are you done?”
“What does it matter?”
“He is coming. You might not want to be seen . . . you know.”
“Why should I care?” But she wiggled her good arm across her cheeks, halting at the flux of agony in her side. She would rather be dead than face his scorn again. “I wish you had killed me.”
Bellezza went silent. Distant footsteps echoed closer.
“I am sorry, Alexia.”
The door swung open.
Alexia swallowed her sobs and focused on the wall. She wouldn’t look at him. He couldn’t break her. She wouldn’t ogle and wish for anything more than disdain in his countenance.
He sat. His presence alone wielded enough influence to leave her in anguish. She bit the side of her mouth as she waited, flustered by the overpowering draw of his company.
He opened the jar of salve again. From her peripheral vision, she saw him lift her mangled arm. The elbow twisted sickly in the wrong direction—something she hadn’t noticed before. She gasped and looked away, fighting the bile back down.
He sniffed. She glanced at him to find a private, sideways smile.
A stinging began, then the burning. She caught a quick breath and writhed under the agony. Tears burst forth of their own accord, spilling furiously over her face and into the cot. Nothing but white registered behind her lids as they shut. She squeezed the torture away, willing it to dissipate.
A dry cloth touched her face. She opened her eyes. He dabbed her cheeks with a handkerchief, but his frown remained stern as ever, if not the same angry expression of yesterday. And then it started again. The euphoria of his fingers against her arm, the lightning his touch sent up her spine.
She glanced at her elbow, startled at how perfect it felt. The bruising was gone.
He slid a bandage over the appendage, grimacing. He rose and retreated from the room, passing Lester on the way out.
“Finish it, please.”
She wished she hadn’t looked—for it left her pining again over his impossible form and continued coldness.
Lester bound up her elbow, but she didn’t understand why. It felt whole. This after he touched it? He healed her. Or had it been his miracle salve?
“What did he do to me?” she asked. “Is he a doctor?” She refrained from suggesting her next intuition: angel.
Lester laughed.
She shook her head. “Why are you bandaging it? It no longer hurts.”
“Just because it don’t hurt, don’t mean it’s done healing.” He patted her arm. “Rest, Sparrow. You’ll be back on yer feet sooner than you think.”
“And what then?” She blinked up at him.
Lester smiled.
When darkness enveloped them once more, Bellezza piped up. “That must have been some fall. How many ribs do you think you broke?” Her tone absolutely hummed.
“Leave me alone.”
The girl giggled wickedly.
Alexia closed her eyes and wondered how many flights she had tumbled down to the strangulation of her heart. But then, something had happened. She’d experienced the headache, the inability to draw air. It had felt like minutes but couldn’t have been more than a few seconds.
“Would you like to know a secret?” the child hissed excitedly.
“What kind of secret?”
A brief hush lulled. A warm breeze tickled at Alexia’s left ear and she inhaled a hint of nutmeg. “They cannot really keep me here.”
Alexia gasped. The girl’s lips drifted an inch away.
She steadied her heart and worked to calm her breathing. The child’s little hand brushed a stray lock from her face.
“How did you break free?” Alexia asked.
“No cage in the world can hold me.”
“Then what are you doing here?”
Bellezza sniffed. “Waiting.”
“For what?”
No answer.
“I like you, Alexia.” She meant she liked to unnerve her. “You are an intriguing creature, and that is why I am going to tell you.”
“Tell me what?”
“What you are.”
28
Altered
“You are
passionate
, Alexia.”
Well yes, but she already knew that.
“You live life more fully than pathetic humans.”
“W-what?”
Bellezza laughed. “We are going to be strictly rudimentary, aren’t we?” Her little hand landed atop Alexia’s, her tone patronizing. “You are so young.”
She shuddered under the girl’s touch, sweetly-bitter—as though the connection had a flavor.
“You are a child of
The Passionate
.”
“The Passionate?” she echoed skeptically.
“That’s right.” Bellezza’s voice brightened. “You are stronger, more beautiful, smarter, more powerful, more adept—”
“Are you,” Alexia hesitated, “Passionate also?”
“Of course.” The girl huffed. “And so is
he
,” the growl returned to her voice, “and
Lester
.”
It didn’t seem a stretch to connect superiority with
him
. Even Bellezza—well, it seemed difficult to think of her as anything but abnormal. But herself? “What did you do to me, Bellezza, when you screamed?”
She twitched away. “They used to fear us, the humans. They would do our bidding, revering us as gods!” Her tone darkened, voice growing more distant. “Now their rich seek to collect and own us. We have to remind them which race is superior, teach them their place in this world, make them grovel like the pathetic dog-eating-vomits they are!”
Alexia cringed. “How can you do that from a cage?”
“That is why I am here,
Sparrow
: to prepare, to become strong. In time we will put things aright.”
Chills skittered down her arms. Was that why he’d kept the girl—as a weapon against humanity?
Alexia clutched the sides of her cot. What madness had she stumbled upon, and what did that mean for her or her family?
***
A meal came. Bellezza didn’t speak more, certainly at ease now that she’d set Alexia’s mind to the impossible task of sorting truth from fiction.
“My food, please.” Bellezza rolled her eyes.
As Lester slid the platter under her bars he sent Alexia a smirk. “Yer a good influence on her.”
She took the compliment, and worried they’d never free her just for that reason.
Once again she and her prison mate were shut into darkness.
“Tell me about your parents,” Bellezza requested unexpectedly. “Who is your father?”
Grateful for some regular conversation, Alexia told the girl about her family and home, about the gardens she feared she’d never see again, her room, collection of books, and the hunting grounds.
“But my family is normal—human,” she concluded, “so that makes what you suggest—being
Passionate—
impossible.”
“Ah, but are they?” The girl’s voice vibrated with intensity. “Or do they hide it from you?”
Alexia blinked. Did her parents refrain from speaking—no, interacting in front of her for fear she’d discover one of them was unusual?
“What about your parents?” she asked, wishing desperately to take her mind off the subject. “
Which of yours is—?”
“I don’t have any.”
“But you must—”
“Would you stop talking?”
Bellezza’s impatience startled her. She’d been certain the girl wanted to carry on a full conversation.
Time stretched. Alexia’s mind kept circling back to the ideas Bellezza planted, but she pushed them away. They were lies. Or if they weren’t, she refused to believe them. Soon enough she’d escape and return home. In Father’s house it would be easy to believe it all of this was naught but a nightmare.
Eventually the door fell open.
He
smiled kindly at her cell-mate. Alexia turned her face away—though it took every fragment of self control. She didn’t want to see his pleasing countenance, or the way he would glare at her.
The cell door opened. His shadow crouched across her as he resumed a seat. She continued to glare the other direction. He cleared his throat. She bit down, forcing her gaze straight ahead.
He pulled back what remained of her left sleeve to examine the mottled blue shoulder, and his fingers brushed her skin. Sparks exploded from the spot. She glanced up.
His lips pressed together, stretching his scar, brows drawn as he studied the wound. No animosity pinched his expression, but also no acknowledgement the connection did anything to him.
His eyes met hers. The aqua weight of his rolling tides washed over her, swallowing her in their depths, making it impossible to turn away, to breathe.
“Hello, Alexia.” The words broke her trance like the receding spray of a wave. She blinked back at him, dumbfounded by his change in mood. “You are healing well.”
She bit her tongue as he lifted her no-longer-mangled but impossible-to-use arm.
“Hmm.” He straightened it and she fought, writhing for the increased pain it would cause. His hand fell over her eyes. Before she could move he shoved the arm back into socket. She screamed—a true, honest scream. She fought mental blackness. Struggling out of the torture, she surfaced minutes later.
“Hush now.” His breath warmed her chin, his magnificent lips hovering just above hers. She watched them, wondering if they were as soft as they appeared. And would Bellezza materialize out of nowhere and rip out her beating heart for pondering the feel of them?
He leaned away, a self-conscious frown flitting over him.
She moved her shoulder. It worked! “How did you—?” At his scowl, her question faded. She didn’t know why she expected his favor to continue.
He rose. “Bellezza?”
The child preened at her bars. He escaped Alexia’s cell, and spoke to the girl in muted tones. The disenchantment came crashing in: he belonged to her.
Bellezza grimaced.
He turned toward the door. “Lester!”
The elder entered.
“Transport is needed.” Those ultra-blue eyes grazed over Alexia. Her breath caught. “Immediately.”
He exited. She couldn’t help the disappointment when he disappeared, but the desperate potency alarmed her.
Lester brandished a blind-fold, placed it over her eyes, and rolled her cot smoothly out of the prison on wheels. Light shone brighter here. Footsteps echoed, but only one set. A draft tickled her arm, and then her cot halted.
The blinder pulled away and she glanced about frantically. A single boarded-over window admitted daylight into the small, ocher-hued chamber. A hint of earthy musk and pollen pulled her gaze to the drawing table across from her, supporting a white bottle.
The blue-eyed man sat on the edge.
She turned away, angry with herself for wanting to stare back. He remained there long enough that she finally chanced a look at him. His strict expression had changed. Tired shadows ringed his eyes, hands clasped between his knees, gaze on the floor.
“This is much more difficult than I imagined it would be,” he whispered. All pretense had fled. He spoke as though he were confiding in his dearest friend, as though they had actually met before. As though he knew her.
She watched him, confused.
He exhaled. “What did she tell you?”
Alexia scowled. He brought her here
alone
to learn what Bellezza said? She shrugged, then winced. His eyes followed the movement.
“Alexia.” Her name on his tongue sent a shiver through her. Tenderness filled his tone, a cadence that make her think of chocolate and spring time all rolled in one. He rose, catching her with his eyes, threatening to drag her under in his oceanic swells. “Please tell me.”
She shook her head, unable to refuse him. “Lies. She told me lies.”
“What about?”
She dove into his stare, silently pleading with him to agree. “We cannot be members of a separate race. I would know if a powerful people like the Passionate existed. I would know.”
His frown returned.
She folded her arms across her chest. “I am not what she says. There can be no such thing.”
He stepped closer. She sucked in a breath. His fingers landed on the bandages about her defenseless ribs, gliding tenderly from her side to her center. She struggled not to ache for his touch against her skin as intense heat breached the spot, melding her bones, searing out into her shoulders and hips.
It ended. She inhaled deeply and laughed for relief. It didn’t hurt!
He offered a hand, a grin ticking at his cheek. “Can there be no such thing?”
Her jubilation shriveled. She eyed his fingers—the same that healed her against all logic. Here was proof, and deny it all she wanted, it would not change reality.
She took a deep breath and gripped his hand. Electricity swarmed into her palm, firing up her arm and out to every nerve. His skin was smoother than she’d expected, and warmer. His gaze tugged at her heart, like the tentative play of swells over a sun-lit beach. She blushed, and looked away.
He pulled her into a sitting position, and she let him, focusing on the pleats of her green skirt.
The truths she’d always believed about life, about what was possible, about herself—they came crashing down like the collapse of her childhood home, burying her in stone and mortar. Her vision shook, and she clung to the only steady thing: his hand.
He was real. He was solid.
He is impossible!
Her stomach roiled and gooseflesh prickled over her skin. She released him and hugged herself, cold from the loss of their connection.
He knelt beside her, searching for her gaze.
It would be so easy to focus on him and forget how her world was turning upside down, but she wouldn’t. She belonged to a race of strange beings. She, who could dream the future, was part of a dangerous few. One or both of her own parents shared that blood and had never said a word.
Alexia inhaled a shaky breath. She wanted it back—her old life. She wanted who she used to be. She wanted Father.
Her healer rose slowly, fingers twitching at his side. She watched him through her periphery, battling the urge to throw herself at him and cling. She would not!
He snatched the bottle of ointment off the table and strode for the door.
She squeezed herself tighter. “I need to return home.”
His footfalls stopped.
Alexia slipped her legs over the edge of the cot and focused on his back.
His shoulders and neck straightened. “Is that what you truly want?”
She blinked. Want? Since when did her place in the world have anything to do with
want
? Or was that another part of the Passionate—placing wants before duties?
She shivered. “My family will worry.”
His head bowed and he sighed. “So be it.”
He stepped out the door and pulled it shut. A key rattled into the lock, and she gasped. Hurrying forward, she twisted the knob, but it held firm.
She pounded the door. “You cannot keep me in here! Let me out! I demand you release me this instant!”
Nothing.
She groaned, tears hot in her eyes. “I hate you!”