Page 41 of By the Fae

“But,” he said, ignoring my question and drawing out the word, “It wipes my energy. Like drains it. So . . . I’m gonna have a nap now, and you’ll eat your breakfast and play on the game like a good girl, and then later, we can talk.”

He was really going to leave me alone in his living room? Where his flatmates might just turn up unannounced? And not even give me a demonstration of his magic?

“Don’t worry, it’s light out. Dima will be asleep, and Mal’s still out, and Taur’s actually very shy,” Goldie said, as though he read my thoughts. “Only Sugar Paste is likely to bother you, and she’s not dangerous unless you eat her doughnut. So, I’m heading to bed now.”

Suddenly he leant down, putting one hand on the seat beside my legs, and for a second, I thought he was going to kiss me. My heartbeat kick-started, my eyelids fluttered as though they were preparing to close. But he merely grabbed something from the cushion, tucked it into his jeans pocket, and sauntered out of the room.

I sat back against the couch, staring at the opening screen of the game, trying to regain my normal breathing pattern. I didn’t want Goldie to kiss me. Of course I didn’t. Stupid body. Stupid knee-jerk reflexes.

I’d been the one to suggest the no kissing rule. It would be so unwise for us to kiss.

Sure, I stroked himtherelast night until he got his mess all over my favourite t-shirt. Sure, he had his fingers inside me. Sure, he broke me in under five minutes, called me gorgeous, a fudging queen, a goddess. But kissing somehow was so much more. Went so much deeper.

It was soul penetrating.

Or at least, it would be to me.

I poured myself a coffee, dumped half the milk into it, and took a fist-sized bite out of the nearest cinnamon swirl. Hopefully, the excessive sugar would calm the wild butterfly-rave inside me. It was delicious. Too good to be human made. Elvish maybe? The plain white paper bag containing Goldie’s flatmate’s pastry gave me no clues to the maker.

Within thirty seconds, I’d demolished the whole thing, and stared ruefully at the second one. I shouldn’t eat two cinnamon swirls. They were larger than the minotaur’s hands. It would be wrong to smash another one. What if one of his flatmates wanted it? I shook my head and took a sip of coffee. My insides tugged over the obscenely delicious smooth/bitter combo. Of course, if I’d been alive as long as Goldie had, I’d be a coffee snob too. I made a mental note to ask him his actual age.

I set the mug aside and turned to the game.

Press A to START

I did. And was taken to a screen with a heading reading,CHOOSE CHARACTER.

And my lungs stopped working.

There were two characters to select from. One a fae. I pressed the A button, bringing the character to the front of the screen, delaying the inevitable.

Pointed ears, retro baggy jeans, no shirt, shiny yellow hair. Goldie. A self-insert.

Perhaps this was always how he programmed prototypes. But he hadn’t appeared in any of his games before. It felt strange. Voyeuristic, even. Like looking through his social media photos without his knowledge. Which I definitely didn’t do. Much.

He’d given himself stat bars.

HP

STRENGTH

STAMINA

GLAMOUR

I blew out a breath before tapping the back button and selecting the other character. A human. Female. Curly brown hair with purple streaks, spectacles, dungarees.

Yep, it was me.

Was I meant to be flattered or annoyed? Because I was feeling both.

I compared my stat bars to Goldie’s and was very glad I had not chosen that moment to take another sip of coffee, lest I sprayed it all over the pastries. Well, I supposed that would’ve been one way to guarantee the last cinnamon swirl.

He’d made my stats the same as his, but . . .

Okay. HP was at half the level of the fae’s. Strength, at a third. Stamina, also at a third. And Glamour, Glamour was non-existent, currently resting at precisely zero. I mean, there was truth to it. Humans were inferior to fae in all the ways he’d listed, But I couldn’t help but think Goldie was being too narrow-minded about what constituted a decent stat. That, or he was doing it simply to pee me off.

Which, after knowing Goldie intimately, I felt surprised by. Maybe even a little hurt—

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