Page 49 of Fae Unleashed
The man whimpered, and my stomach sank. That voice was familiar. I’d had my suspicions, but I hadn’t wanted to believe it.
“Feri?” I asked incredulously.
The man lifted his head and sneered at me. His eyes had turned the deathly white of Faust’s hair. White lines, much like my own cursed tattoo, snaked along his pale skin. That was enough to tell me who had placed the cursed glass needle in my boot.
“Tell her what you did,” Del growled.
I lifted a hand to stop them both. “You don’t have to. I know already.”
Disappointment shouldn’t have felt this heavy, but I could barely hold it on my own. It dragged me to the floor where I could look Feri in the face and askwhy.
“Look at you,” he spat. “You’re a disgrace. You’re never going to take your throne the way you’re going. Beryl is going to turn you into a pretty little puppet. That’s only if you don’t run away first. I can see it on you. There’s nothing tying you here, nothing to make you care about your people. Aboutme.”
I ran both hands over my face. “I do care! I’m trying. This is the best I can do with what I’ve been given. If everyone would stop looking down on me, then maybe this wouldn’t be so hard.”
“I have been trapped in that animal form for two decades. While you got to play house with your mortal parents, I was stuck running away from predators like a piece of meat. Do you know how degrading that is?”
I laughed, but only because I did know. The sound that left me was hollow. I touched the scars at my throat and watched the light in Feri’s eyes flicker like he’d been caught off guard. The man had been so caught up in his own pain that he’d forgotten others could suffer as well.
“I watched a man tear my Pack apart from the inside,” I said to everyone and no one in particular. “Since I didn’t know who or what I was at the time, I had no power. There was no way for me to stop him from picking us off one by one. I couldn’t stop him from terrorizing my best friend for something she couldn’t prevent.”
Feri had misjudged me. He thought me selfish and entitled just because I didn’t behave the way he expected a princess to behave. I didn’t know how to be that person, but I did know how to have empathy. I knew how to care about those suffering because I couldn’t get my shit together.
“You’re all a mess,” Del said as she rocked back on her heels.
She wasn’t wrong. Our court had been scattered. There were those who’d fled to save their own skin—like Tal, Ostara, and Foxglove. I could barely trust them. Then I had the cursed—like Rhoan and Feri who wouldn’t tell me what was actually on their minds.
I looked Feri in the eye. “Trust me. That’s all I ask of you. I’m not going to force you to prove your loyalty. There’s no need for a show like that. All I need of you is trust that I am doing my best.”
His expression crumpled. The man looked as though he wanted to hang onto his anger, but he couldn’t do that in the face of my easy forgiveness. He hadn’t expected me to behave in such a way, and it swept the rug out from under his righteousness.
“None of us are getting what we want,” I muttered, thinking of Rhoan.
Del watched me, but I avoided her gaze. I’d been jealous of her. Now I knew that every time she’d held me back or pushed Rhoan away from me, it’d been for his safety. Maybe she loved him, but it wasn’t like he could love her back.
He couldn’t love anyone.
That had to be such a lonely existence. I didn’t blame him for drinking. The man had seen too much and had no one to help him forget the pain of it. His drink had been the only thing to keep him from drowning in it.
“What…what do you want me to do with the overgrown ferret of a man?” Del gestured to Feri. “I could dump him in the middle of nowhere like you had that man do to me.”
I remembered locking Del in a wooden trap and having Maddox leave her far away from here. Guilt trickled up from the pit of my stomach. I shook my head. I couldn’t do that again. Feri wasn’t a risk to my health and safety—mostly because I refused to be afraid of Faust anymore.
“Feri, you can have another chance.”
All eyes in the room turned towards me. I’d expected as much, but it still made my skin prickle. Del licked her lips nervously before turning her gaze way. Feri, on the other hand, gaped at me with open astonishment like he’d expected me to be vindictive.
Absentmindedly, I touched the ends of the inky tattoo spreading across my chest. “You might think me incapable of being rational. Maybe you consider me uncouth or unfit for the throne, but you opinion doesn’t change my plans. I’m going to save the Seelie Court, and when I do, there is a place for you there. Both of you.”
They thought I was going to turn into a monster. It was a look that I was getting accustomed to, even though I wished otherwise.
Feri bowed his head. A great sob wracked his body. He crumpled forward, forehead to the floor as he cried. The white lines of Faust’s deal receded. Feri’s body shrank back to that of a ferret again. He covered his head with his little paws.
I stood, went to scoop him up, and held him close. “The curse won’t be a problem when I’m done.”
Del sidled up to me. Voice lowered, she said, “Faust is only playing with you right now. When he comes for you, there will be no escaping him.”
“You’re all so afraid of a playground bully.” I shook my head. “Faust has been pushing our limits to see what he can get away with. We almost killed him the other day.”
