Page 14 of The Pixies' Chosen

“She is what?” Tryst growls, and my wings flare slightly in surprise at the aggression in his voice. “What exactly is wrong with Ammayi? And you who was always snubbed and undesired by every else but me in the colony—who are you now that you demand the best that you set eyes upon while being completely ignorant of the fact that you have been given the best and are even now working hard to drive her away for a female who will never be yours? We have Ammayi—she is our queen!”

“No, she is not. She is not our queen until we actually mate her,” I inform him coolly as I rise into the air beside him with a hum of my wings. “And I have no intention of doing so.”

A dark look comes over Tryst’s beautiful face. “Still?”

I shrug and ignore the rapid, nervous beat of my heart in my chest. It warns me that I may be making a mistake—and I am fearful that is the case—but I refuse to simply give in and make a mockery of my pride, so I resolutely push it aside.

“It could still be reversible… and when that happens, we can correct this and have the female we were meant to have,” I mutter halfheartedly, but deep in my gut I know that he is right. And the truth is a painful blow I cannot accept.

“No,” Tryst murmurs just before releasing a long sigh. “She has already chosen her mate. You refused to see it, but it was there right in front of you. It was plain to anyone with eyes but you. And yet the thing that I wish most desperately to have never seen was the look in our mate’s eyes when you fluttered so eagerly around her sister.” He pauses. “Do not make it worse by forgetting the straw. We still have time to weave a bed before nightfall if you can manage to cease being selfish for one moment.” With one last disdainful look, he hops into the air, his wings humming as he flies away, leaving me behind.

My wings slowly droop as I stare into the distance, my mind replaying every glimpse of Inika. The way she laughed with her relatives. The way she smiled and the flush of pleasure on her cheeks. My stomach drops bitterly. In every one of those memories, that human male was there. In each of those memories, she touched him in some small way or responded to what he said or did. And yet I had danced around her, shimmering for her without realizing that she barely glanced my way.

I am a fool. And yet having to accept the female that fate shoved at me is a bitter pill that I do not wish to accept. She is a punishment for my arrogance, I am certain of that now. But I am equally as certain that I will never be able to accept her for my mate knowing this.

All I can do is help Tryst teach her to survive and then hope I can free him from her grasp and back to our own nest where he belongs. He is just confused right now because his basic biology is telling him something contrary to what is right. I will find a way to extricate him from this situation and we will return withno mate, but there could be other seasons for us. I will vow to him to participate in the courting dances. I will do whatever it takes to put this nightmare behind us.

CHAPTER 12

AMMAYI

Tryst and Havoc move with exceptional speed—I have to give them that. They work most of the day bringing in armfuls of straw before disappearing again and returning with more. It’s busy work but as there is a huge crow lingering outside in a tree far too close to the patio, I’m happy to remain inside and watch for their return. It is probably a bit of PTSD from the crow attack I experienced, but I can’t seem to ignore the very real fear that fills me every time I find its beady eye looking in my direction.

I do my best to ignore its presence and instead just focus on the activity of the pixie males as I watch them with fascination. I am perplexed at what all the straw is for, and I still don’t have the slightest clue when they finally sit down among it and start rapidly weaving it with tiny flicks of their fingers. Every now and then, they stop and run their fingers along the straw in complicated movements that leaves behind a knotted weave of silken threads as they work.

Wings humming occasionally with an iridescent glow as they work, they really are incredibly pretty to watch. My gaze slides covertly to Havoc, and I take a moment to enjoy his graceful movements. With the chitin covering him, there is less of a flex and bulge of muscles to admire, but he is truly poetry in motion that, even seated in the floor, he moves his arms and hands like a dancer, his torso swaying to a melody only he can hear. He’s even glowing again, though the violet is far more subdued than it was around Inika. Even the subtle movements of his antennae are sweeping glides through the air. They stir his short hair as they move, brushing it back from time to time from the chiseled angle of his jaw before his dark hair falls forward again, putting his silvery face in shadow so that little is visible except the tempting line of his lips.

I sigh inwardly in admiration. He has beautiful lips. How many grown men have a perfect cupid’s bow for their upper lip? It makes me want to trace it with the tip of my finger. My fingers twitch with the urge, but any thought of touching him disappears as his eyes lift and pierce me. His pupils are like two spears aimed directly for my gut, and my eyes quickly snap back to the safety of Tryst’s lean bulk sitting within reaching distance.

As if sensing my eyes on him, Tryst looks up from his work and smiles sweetly. With his deep indigo glow, pewter coloring, sharp fangs, long black hair, and equally long black loin cloth falling to his shins, he looks more like a goth club poster boy or some erotic subject of dark fantasy art than anyone who would ever have been sitting in my living room. I would pinch myself to check if I were dreaming but Havoc’s sour stare at us ruins the mood enough to convince me that this is most definitely reality. I may be many things, but I’m not that much of a masochist to insert a male who visibly dislikes me into my fantasy.

I am, however, very much a living, breathing woman and not about to turn down the opportunity to enjoy Tryst’s flirtation.

Turning to Tryst, I scoot closer and grin when I see his smile widen in welcome. His wings flutter and hum a little, and he has this adorable little chiming sound coming from him as I lean into his arm to get a better look at what he’s doing.

Yep, nothing there but lengths of knotted silk-like threads and tightly woven grass straw. Bending over his arm, and more than a little aware of the way my breasts are pushing into his arm, I run a finger over the silk curiously.

“What is this?”

“Pixie silk,” he promptly replies with a considerable wealth of satisfaction. “There is nothing stronger nor more valuable in textiles among the fae kingdoms. Only male pixies produce silk, but the entire colony is capable of making very fine things from what we can provide.”

“Silk,” I echo, impressed. “But where does it come from? I don’t see any spinnerets anywhere. I hope it doesn’t come from the ass end of your abdomen like a spider. I don’t think I’m ready for that particular lesson on pixie anatomy.”

“Oh? Is there another lesson you would like regarding my anatomy?” he murmurs, his voice like hot spun sugar. “I would be happy to teach you everything in an in-depth exploration.”

My mouth drops open and immediately goes dry as my gaze slides over his face and slowly drops to admire every inch of his chest and the strong hands holding the woven grass straw on his lap. Should I accept the obvious invitation? And if I do, how much would Havoc likely murder me in my sleep? I can almost feel his gaze boring a scorching hole right through my back, reminding me that there is a tangled history between these two males that I know nothing about. Certainly intimate enough that they easily accepted the idea of sharing a mate between them. Perhaps it would be a better idea not to taunt that bull. Because frankly, if Tryst is a goth club boy, then Havoc is a dangerouslysexy idol who would likely chew me up and spit me out with little effort.

So I sit there indecisive for a long moment until Tryst’s amused chuckle draws me out of myself enough to smile sheepishly at him.

“Not ready for a lesson yet, it seems,” he murmurs. “A pity.”

Havoc makes a rude sound of disgust, his chitin chiming discordantly, but it seems that Tryst and I are capable of ignoring him at this particular moment because neither of us break our gaze to look his way. I can’t help but think what it might be like to actually sleep pressed up against him, wrapped warmly in his arms against the autumn chill.

Tryst’s amused chuckle draws me in, captivating me so that I am staring into his black eyes, my imagination still lightyears away from any form of reality, as he leans inward. I breathe a small sigh of awe. The chitin around his eyes is slightly paler than the rest of his face, but the edges of his lids are inky as if liberally applied to with kohl. Their sootiness draws me deeper into his dark gaze until he suddenly raises his first two fingers on his hand between us. My eyes shift to them curiously—and then I see it. There are tiny overlapping patterns on his chitin like a bizarre fingerprint except that it moves in shifting patterns, spilling out threads of silk.

“Wow,” I breathe and immediately clasp his hands in mine, holding them steady so that I can get a good look at them. “That is wicked.”

He grins down at me and moves his other hand in and his claw catches on the threads of silk, moving them in twisting motions around the spinnerets so that the thread slowly gains volume as he weaves the start of a chain. His body shifts toward me, and I relish the way his heat encompasses me as he bends over me, his nose brushing the top of my head for a moment before shifting down toward my ear. His breath is a seductiveheat brushing along the sensitive skin of my earlobe, and I shiver as the first hot plumes of desire rise slowly from deep within my belly.

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