Page 100 of By the Fae

For the rest of my probation, I play-tested the game we had built. Always playing as Goldie. Watching the rendered version of that perfect back, knowing I’d scratched it up, and he loved it. I wrote a speech for the games expo, trying to keep it as passable to something a person not internally crumbling to dust might say.

I tried to remember to eat and go to bed at a reasonable time. Even if I spent the entire night either staring at the slats above my head, or else typing more failed passcodes into his phone. I drank coffee with Abby and listened to her chats about the band and her finals. Galmin quit again. Travis was ecstatic. The latter of the boys had found another ‘blinder’ of a spray-painted penis on a bus stop outside of Pannor, the capital city of the Human Realms.

And I dragged myself into work. Where I spent the day sitting on the sofa of a man who looked exactly like the man I loved.

The auditorium was bigger than I’d thought it’d be. Darker too. With more people. Dozens, perhaps hundreds, more. Leather-upholstered seats fanned out from the stage, seating, whom I assumed, were the bigwigs. The men, and few women, we were tasked with impressing. They were a mix of humans and fae, and squinting through the crowds, I also spotted a gorgon, a centaur, and a small group of werewolves. At the back of the cavernous room, others stood in clusters, or rows, their faces obscured by the fading lights.

Among them, Goldie. But not really Goldie. Stupid, taunting Seth-Goldie. He’d already given his presentation to rapturous applause. Because of course everyone enjoyed watching their own personal dream date give their speech. Even if his game was just another bog-standard woman-with-oversized-knockers-searches-for-the-root-cause-of-the-zombie-apocalypse RPG. Afterwards, he elected to hover in the gangway near the front, his arms folded across his chest and a mocking, challenging smile on his lips.

Abby had dressed me again, this time in my comfy evening dungarees, the ones I had worn to Tallywhacker’s. She did my hair and makeup and tried to depuff my eyes as much as possible. I’d snuck her into the expo but hadn’t been able to spot her from the side of the stage yet.

August flitted about between the remaining designers. Asking us questions. Trying to prepare us, calm us down, but only riling up the nerves of the guys left to speak.

For once, I felt thankful to Goldie for bailing seconds after I confessed my love to him. I had used up my emotional quota for the entire year, and consequently had no room left for nerves. Only sheer, unending numbness.

“It’ll be ten minutes, that’s all. Use plenty of graphics. There’ll be a Q and A after that. Just answer them as best as you can. I understand Goldie did most of the build, but those are your ideas as well. You had a lot of sway over him. Don’t forget that,” August said to me, before flitting off to chat with Greyson, who looked on the edge of vomiting.

I took out Goldie’s phone once more. I’d already tried his birthday. I typed it again.Error. I tried the release date forMagic Thief One.Error.

“Come on, you stupid thing,” I whispered to it. I had one more try before another thirty minutes of shut down. Without expecting anything, I typed my passcode in. Fourteen oh nine.

It unlocked.

I almost dropped the thing.

Fourteen oh nine. My passcode worked. My birthday. And the name of my first game.

“Okay, Holly, you’re up,” said August distantly.

I scrambled through his apps. Opened his photos. There we were, right at the top. The selfies that I took from his phone one Sunday afternoon while lounging on his sofa. My heartbeat spiked dangerously to see he’d saved them all to his favourites. I zoomed in on his face. In eight out of the ten pictures, he wasn’t even looking at the camera. He was looking at me, a smile ghosting his lips.

“Holly, you ready?”

“Yeah,” I replied, selecting his recently opened apps, heart smashing against my windpipe. The browser was still open on the last platform he’d used. A networking forum.

I stopped breathing. He’d asked a question. There was his user icon, with his perfect scowling face. Seemingly, dozens of people had chipped in with answers. His question read:

Is there any way to keep a human alive as long as a fae?

The top answer, upvoted by several thumbs up emotes, and downvoted by none, was the longest of the answers by far. A literal essay. Skimming, I caught the wordsundead, risky,andpotentially fatal.I scrolled to the top again. Helpfully the original answerer had added:

TL;DR In short, no, there are no modern ways for a human to extend their lifespan without causing terrible and irreversible consequences.

I dropped the phone.

“Come on, Holly, they’re waiting for you,” August said, picking up the phone, glancing at the screen with a frown, then tucking it into the front pocket of my dungarees. She pushed a microphone and a small remote controller into my hand and ushered me towards the spotlight.

“Oh, and Holly?”

I turned back to August.

“Welcome, officially, to the FaeGames team, senior designer.”

Chapter 34.

Holly

Faces, blurred by the super trooper, stared at me. Dust motes floated in striped clouds in front of the stage. Behind me, a cinema size screen displayed our game. My knees weakened at the bobbing image of a giant shirtless Goldie. I dug my hands into my pockets and pulled out my speech notes.

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