Page 7 of Curse the Fae

“Me,” I confirm, proudly and defiantly.

The Fae’s stifling breath coasts across my skin, leaving a trail of goosebumps in its wake. He had expected my arrival, since he’s the one that summoned me here. What he hadn’t anticipated was to feel me like this, wet and plastered to him, brandishing a weapon against him, and talking back to him. He may not see my rebellious expression, but he hears it.

In one vengeful swoop, the Fae arches his daggers, trapping my spear within the prongs. I give a cry as he uses the momentum to hurtle me so far backward, my spine smacks into a dirt wall padded in foliage. We’d emerged near a rim without me realizing it. Only a miracle spares me from hitting the edifice and cracking my head open like an oyster.

The serpent lurches forward. His daggers cross over my throat and pin me to the facade. My breasts heave through the drenched fabric of my dress, the swells mashing into his pectorals. I wheeze as he leans into me, cutting off my air supply and rousing angry tears to my eyes.

Tears this monster can’t see. Tears he can smell instead.

A malevolent sneer dabs at the corners of his mouth but doesn’t fully extend into more. Grinning would mean he’s satisfied, which he isn’t. He’s nowhere near done with me.

Those irises sizzle. Instantly, I understand what he’s about to do.

I flail and attempt to puncture him with my spear, but he jerks me in place, crushing me beneath his weapons so that I can’t look away. If it were as easy as squeezing one’s eyes shut, none of his targets would have suffered this fate. But he’s too swift for that, his gaze too fast to dodge. His keen eyes somehow locate mine, then flash like a pair of suns, the gilded rings seeping in like venom. They probe my vision, trying to leach something from it.

Panic churns in my womb. I squint, but it’s no use once the light sneaks through the cracks.

Please. Please, don’t let him take my sight.

Will I remember the faces of my family? Will I forget the likenesses of water and the animals I’ve saved?

Whimpers froth up my throat but fail to reach my tongue. A spasm of movement follows. Without warning, the daggers loosen and jolt away. I cough, flooded by relief when the pool swirls back into view, in addition to a set of mercenary eyes.

The water lord glowers in confusion, his errant gaze brewing with menace. I should be sightless like him, but I’m not.

It hadn’t worked.

His power doesn’t affect me.

3

I register this truth at the same time my captor senses it. Yet my relief is short-lived. His grip on the daggers tightens once more, reinforced by a scorn as deep as an abyss.

He slams me back into the wall. Under the foliage, rocks bite into my shoulder blades, and the waterdrop pendant burrows into my spine. My dress is rucked high as the Fae’s vast body sweeps between my legs, splitting them like a trench. The place where his pelvic bones dissolve into a tail grazes my parted thighs.

My right leg bends, and my foot plants on the surface behind me. I feel every feverish inch of him, from the humanlike chest to the slick, unearthly appendage below. He has the toned physique of a swimmer, and his scales are as smooth as the rest of his frame. Nonetheless, I recoil.

Beneath the water, his viper tail bludgeons the pool, whisking up a small maelstrom that travels over the ripples. It reminds me of a distress signal, though no one is around, meaning no one is coming to help me.

Despite his inability to see, the Fae gauges the location of my face. His eyes seize on my features, his pupils reflecting my petrified gaze. His breath is a vapor—misted and likely toxic. “Drop the fucking weapon.”

Instead of obeying, I clench the spear in my grip. “No.”

That onyx mane slides across the Fae’s shoulders as he tilts his head, visibly picking apart my answer. Pointed ears peek from his hair, as tapered as pikes. Then in a single, seamless motion, he drives the crisscrossed dagger handles harder against my throat.

I gag, oxygen and circulation leaching from me, tingles prickling my toes and fingers. The water lord waits for me to expire, his orbs dicing me apart. His visage is equal parts unflappable and invested, detached and savage. For all the gold of him, and for the heat emitting from his body, his soul is as cold as the bottom of the sea.

Either that, or he does see me in a way I can’t fathom.

I do my utmost to resist, to the point where his eyes glint with intrigued malice. He must be unaccustomed to humans lasting this long without air. I impress him for a second before my captor’s expression turns inconvenienced, and he nudges the daggers even harder against me.

The spear rolls from my digits and splashes beside us. While keeping his vacant irises directed toward me, the Fae frees one of the daggers from my neck and uses it to flick the water, as if he’s dealing with a pest.

My spear should be sinking. However, the ripples keep it afloat and ferry the weapon into one of the many nooks digging into the cavern walls, where a thin stream of water leaks through.

Grief and outrage sting my eyes. He might have my throat braced, but he hasn’t shackled my voice. “Monster,” I spew.

“Mortal,” he grates, as if both words are equivalently contemptible.

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