Page 20 of The Pixies' Chosen

He grins flirtatiously at me and my heart immediately warms at that familiar loving expression. It is enough to reassure me that my brief feeling of something mixing in our lovemaking was nothing more than the product of my imagination. “Of course. You cannot truly think that you were thinking clearly protesting so much about our queen. I cannot wait to tell Ammayi the good news! It may take her a bit to warm up to you after everything, but I know that she will?—”

“Wait. Why would Ammayi need to warm up to me?” I interrupt him, puzzled by the delight carrying through our bond as he speaks. “It would be better for us all if we start distancing ourselves.” I frown at the lock of shock and betrayal on his face. “You don’t truly mean to carry on like you have been? It is not fair to any of us. And I meant what I said about turning over a new leaf. We will get things settled here, and when we get backhome, things will be different. It will be just as it was when we were newly paired as a hive, and next breeding season we will?—”

“What about Ammayi?” Tryst interrupts, and I am alarmed to see his expression shuttering behind a grim mask. Something cold moves through our bond.

“Ammayi… Well, we will help her get settled into her new life as much as we can, and once we get home, I will swear I will find someone among the fae who might be able to reverse this?—”

Tryst’s bitter laughter makes my wings snap out in surprise, and he shakes his head as he regards me sadly. “I should have known better, and yet I actually believed…” He sighs heavily as he fixes me with a hard stare. “Forget it. I should have known that it was too good to be true.”

“But I never said…” I protest weakly, guilt stirring darkly within the pit of my stomach as he spins away, his wings snapping out angrily.

“Just stay away from me, Havoc,” he whispers over his shoulder, the finality of his words echoing along our bond and deep into me. I feel my heart crack within my chest as he flits up from the tree branch.

“You would abandon me?” I shout in bewilderment. “We are hive—we are practically mated even without a queen, and we have been for more years than that female has been alive. You would throw it all away for a female who cannot survive in our world?”

I stumble back as he rounds on me, his chitin chiming angrily as his emotions sting me repeatedly through our bond. “We have a queen.Ihave a queen, and her happiness is as much my responsibility as yours is—which means I will do whatever I need to do to help her survive in our world.”

“What, by disguising her meat, lying to her, and pretending that living in her human abode is the next best thing to being human?” I reply sarcastically. “How does that make her happyrather than watching her die a little more inside because she is no longer fully human in the ways that matter most to her? She does not wish to be a pixie!”

“She does not need to be a pixie. And because of that I will do whatever I need to do,” he shouts back. “My love for Ammayi is no less than my love for you, you pathetic troll gob, which means there is nothing I would not do to make it easier… to make her happy, just as I do for you.Youare the one who wishes to abandon us and throw our love away. And that is exactly what you will be doing because I will not leave her just to fulfill your selfish desires and save your pride. Because that is what this really is. You will not give Ammayi even the slightest chance because you will not bend even a little or make any sacrifice to your comfort or pride. You think you are so strong, but you are afraid of the changes that we must make. Do not act as ifsheis the weak one. And do not blame me when this is all because ofyou.”

I stumble backward, my wings fluttering in surprise at the vehemence of his words. Surely he does not mean it. How many times have we lay in his hammock, swinging lazily as we whispered confessions of our love beneath the towering trees? He would not give that all up to remain in this place.

“You intend to stay here?” I rasp in disbelief, realization dawning on me. Never had I imagined that he would actually wish to stay in this world.

He draws back then with a bitter laugh and glares at me scornfully. “Fulfill your obligation as you see fit to Ammayi, but after that we are done. I will not tear Ammayi from this world any more than I would abandon her to an unhappy fate alone here. Return to the nest when you are ready—or do not. I do not care, and I can comfort Ammayi without you.”

His parting words lingering in the air between us, Tryst flits away into the rising morning and I am left feeling more lost andalone than before. I thought I was making the right decision—the best decision for all of us, and yet all I did was hurt him. Not only that, but I fooled myself into actually believing that this was just a game born out of desperation, or a sense of obligation. I refused to see how much he had already bonded to Ammayi. And now I hurt him even more by deceiving him. And perhaps even deceiving myself.

What have I done?

CHAPTER 16

AMMAYI

Ilay in our nest-like bed, staring morosely in the shelf set up in corner of the room as I fiddle with the hem of my kurti. The silk is already starting to fade and though I wash it gently by hand in the sink with me every midday when Tryst carries me over and turns on the water so that I can bathe, the material is showing rapid deterioration from the constant wear.

It is really a pity my entire wardrobe wasn’t shrunk with me instead of just what I happened to be wearing that day. I guess I should be happy that I was at least wearing something comfortable at the time—it could have been worse, after all, but that litany is starting to get as worn and played out as the long silk tunic.

Truth be told, I am feeling stretched just as thin, wearing down a bit more day by day as I lose another little piece of myself. The moments I can enjoy in Tryst’s arms are the only brightness in my days that grow increasingly gloomier andheavier. Even Tryst, seems a little subdued and lost in thought at times, which has become even more noticeably since it usually follows after we’ve been interlocked with each other in a heated embrace.

I’m pretty sure he is thinking of Havoc in those moments when we are coming down from the heights of ecstasy together. It should sting that his thoughts are elsewhere, but for some reason it doesn’t. Truth be told, my thoughts have drifted to him in those moments as well since Havoc has spent less and less time here and when he is here, he keeps a careful, wary distance as if he’s in some sort of self-exile. As if he is an unwanted presence.

The thing is—I don’t want that, and I’m sure that Tryst doesn’t want that either, but I am no more certain how to bridge that gulf than I am of how to fix the disconnect within myself that is growing daily.

I flick the corner of the silk odhni against my nose and my eyes drift over the Tryst as the first strain of haunting notes of music fill the air. Seated casually on the arm of my couch, he leans back against back rest and swings one slender, sculpted foot as he plays a silver flute brought to his lips. His wings shift against the fabric of the couch, subtly moving the rhythm of the song pouring out of him. I listen, transfixed, my heart in my throat as it pours through me, giving voice to all the turmoil and bone-wearying sadness lying in the deepest parts of me.

Flopping onto my stomach, I pillow my cheek on my stacked hands I listen to the melody. It is long the song of some ancient, enchanted forest that doesn’t belong in this world and my heart constricts in reaction. I feel like I’ve plucked something special from where it belongs and am keeping it caged in this increasingly dusty apartment.

The song winds through me and plays along the shadows and the sweeping lines of my belongings standing in memorial to mypast. My apartment is starting to look like a haunted place that is the residence of ghosts only and so it is particularly suited to this music that echoes through the expanse of the room around us.

And still Tryst plays as if he’s caught in some internal place where the music builds to spill out from him. That music echoes from him, straight through me as if pouring through me along an invisible channel that is only manifested audibly by his delicately crafted flute. My eyes flutter half shut as I allow myself to drift with the song, my mind and spirit being carried on the currents and I lull my head as the melody builds, my eyes falling upon Havoc’s lean form. His long muscles shift, moving his chitin, making more aware of their presence despite the cool glamor and smooth lines of the chitin covering him. Havoc’s wings flutter from where he is perched, staring at us, and then flutter again rapidly before he suddenly flits in the air to land a short distance away from me.

I stare at him blankly, my mind chasing the strains of music playing through me from Tryst to focus entirely upon him. My lips part and I sigh his name as he comes to crouch a short distance away, his short, dark hair streaming around his dark eyes and sharp jawline.

“Havoc.”

His eyes momentarily brighten, and he flutters closer before resuming his crouched position. Gradually the tension in him eases as he remains there, nearly within touching distance, before his eyes lift to Tryst. There is something within that dark gaze—an incredible longing and ineffable sadness—that pricks my soul. I want to hold him close to me and hug him tightly, but I don’t dare. Instead, I watch the way his wings flick lightly to the cadence of the music.

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