Page 2 of Whispers of the Dryad

Yeah, I felt like shit for not telling her about the bond.I felt like shit about a lot of things.Lorraine wasn’t like Ava.She was human, just like my ex-girlfriend had been all those years ago, but she was nothing like what I’d thought humans to be after Ava had shredded my heart like it was nothing.Lorraine was sweet and kind and caring.She wasn’t selfish and out for personal gain.She didn’t try to get whatever she could out of a situation, no matter what it did to others.I hadn’t known that about her when I’d met her.I hadn’t cared about who she was or what she wanted, because I’d been determined to hate her, to not get involved or attached in any way.Of course, that part had failed royally, and now I was stuck on this woman who was pissed off at me, furious that I’d deceived her.She had a right to be, I guess, but she wouldn’t have believed me if I’d told her what was going on.She would have thought I was crazy, delusional, a nut job.Or she would have run the other direction—right back into the arms of those traffickers.It had been my job to keep her safe—it still was—and I couldn’t take the chance that she’d run away from me.Shit happened in her world, and she’d ended up in a hell of a mess.I liked to think of this bond thing between us as an aftereffect of that.Not that she wanted to see it that way.“What is it?”Lorraine asked when I told her I wanted to show her something.She was curious despite her fury—and it was adorable.Everything about her was.Her long blonde hair, her evergreen eyes, the sweet, naïve expression on her face.Even her anger was fucking hot.

If she had any idea what a turn-on she was when she was angry with me, she would have dropped her fury long ago because she just made me want her that much more.And not just to fuck, either.Of course, I wanted that.Lots and lots of it.I wanted more, though.I hadn’t felt this way about anyone in a long time.I hadn’t wanted to.After I’d given up my immortality for Ava only to have her up and leave me, I’d sworn I would never love again.Lorraine hadn’t been on purpose, though.Everything about her—from her appearance in the vale despite being human, to me trying to save her when I knew I should have stayed away, to the way I’d started falling for her just because I was checking up on her—had been a surprise.I hadn’t thought anyone could be the way she was.I just couldn’t allow any of it to go too far.I couldn’t be with her, and she couldn’t be with me.She was human, and I was a drus, for one.Fuck if I was going to even consider giving up my immortality for someone again, and she couldn’t become immortal, so it would never work.Maybe for a couple of decades, but then Lorraine would expire and I would live on with nothing but another broken heart.I firmly pushed the thoughts away when they popped up because it was pointless.Growing old together wasn’t an option and staying young together was impossible.I would just have to treat her like a fling.This would end, eventually.All Hallows’ Eve would come and go, and our bond would break.Lorraine would go back home to her sister and her life, and I would move on to greener pastures.Dolus would help me with that—after this was all over, I wouldn’t even be a drus anymore.I didn’t know yet what I would be, I just knew that I hated who I was and I was going to do my damnedest to run away from myself.The upside of magic was that shit like that was actually possible.Lorraine pushed open the door and I snapped back to the present from my spiral of thoughts.I waited for her to step into the cabin, and when she did, she gasped.“What…?”

I chuckled and followed after her.I’d changed everything about the cabin.It was no longer a medieval hunting cabin.With a bit of magic, I’d turned it into the places I’d seen in town when I’d visited with Lorraine.A couple of days ago, she’d begged me to let her see if her sister was alright, and although I’d been in human towns and cities before, seeing it through her eyes had changed everything.The world had moved on; it was modern and riddled with modern conveniences.That was what I’d done for her in the cabin.The kitchen was kitted out with a stove, a microwave, a kettle, and a fancy coffee machine that humans apparently coveted.The living room sleep couches had been replaced with soft, supple leather couches; there was a coffee table on a new rug, and flowers and ornaments on shelves and end tables.The bedroom was new, too.A modern bed with new sheets and lamps on the nightstands made the place look as modern as the places I’d seen.“When did this happen?”Lorraine asked, looking around as if she’d been transported into another world.I chuckled at the thought—I guess she had.“Magic is a wonderful thing,” I said with a shrug.“How did you do this?I woke up in an old cabin this morning, and Philippa and I weren’t outside that long… Is that electricity?”

She glanced at a light on the ceiling.I nodded.“I heard it’s something you need, so I made it happen.”

Lorraine shook her head.“This doesn’t make sense.”

“It doesn’t have to.”

Not here in the vale.”

“I’ll never get used to magic,” she muttered.“I have three surprises for you,” I said.I hoped to the gods that this would be enough to show her how sorry I was about deceiving her.I took her hand and led her to the kitchen, showing off the coffee machine.“Oh my God,” Lorraine breathed.She loved coffee.I didn’t understand it—it tasted like shit—but if that was what she wanted, then that was what she would get.“Look,” I said and led her to a room that had been added onto the cabin.“This wasn’t here before,” Lorraine said with a frown when we walked through a door that led from the living room.When we stepped into a bathroom, she gasped and stared.“A bath, a shower, and a toilet,” she said softly.“I don’t…” Her voice caught in her throat, and she looked at me with all kinds of emotions in her eyes I couldn’t understand.I didn’t know what the point was of all this shit, but she seemed to like it.“You have no idea how incredible this is,” she said.She was right, but the look on her face suggested it was pretty damn epic, and that was what I’d been going for.“One more thing,” I said, and I took her hand again and led her to the bedroom.Lorraine gasped and exclaimed about everything she saw until I opened the closet.“Ash!”she cried out, staring at the shelves.I’d lined it with the modern clothes Lorraine’s people wore.Pants and tops and underwear—that part had been the most fun to bring into existence—and shoes.A hairbrush, and clothing for different temperatures and occasions.Not that there were any occasions out here, but that wasn’t the point.“You got me a wardrobe,” Lorraine said, dumbstruck.I nodded.“I figured you were sick of tunics and that old shirt you always wear.”

I much preferred her without clothes, but I didn’t mind her wanting to dress in all the strange layers of the modern day—I could have a lot of fun peeling her out of them.My cock punched up thinking about getting her naked, and I tugged at my pants, trying to rearrange my erection so she wouldn’t see it.“Thank you,” she breathed, finally turning to me.“Sure,” I said nonchalantly, as if I wasn’t fucking reeling inside that I’d managed to make her happy after I’d fucked up.“I don’t understand half this stuff, but I figured if you’re forced to stay here a while longer, it might as well be in a place that feels more like home would to you.”

Lorraine nodded.“It really does.All of this feels like I’ve been transported to another world.”She giggled at herself.“I guess I have been.”

“You like it?”I asked.Lorraine nodded.“You have no idea.”She looked up at me, and her eyes were bright.Her lips parted.I wanted to bend down and kiss her.I wanted to do a lot of things, but I held back.Instead, I lifted my hand and brushed my fingers down her cheek, lightly touching her.She leaned into my touch a little and closed her eyes.As if she remembered she was still angry with me, her eyes shot open, and she took a step back.I watched her walls come up and her face shut down.“Thank you for doing all this,” she said, but her tone was colder now.“It’s really wonderful.I’m sure it will make my stay for the rest of the time I’m here much more comfortable.”

I nodded.“You’re more than welcome.”

She narrowed her eyes at me, and I could almost hear what she was thinking.I’m not welcome, I’m forced to be here.

Fuck, I knew I should have done everything differently, but what was done was done, and there was no undoing it now.I couldn’t change it, and was it really all that bad to be around me?I was suddenly angry, too.I balled my hands into fists.“I’ll see you later,” I said and turned around, storming out of the room.I wanted her to call after me, to ask me to come back, or offer that we spend time together the way she often did.She didn’t—she let me go, and I marched away from the cabin, upset that she was still angry with me, even if she had a very good reason.There wasn’t much I could do, though.I was doing what I could to make it up to her, but that was clearly not enough.I should have done things differently, but like with everything, hindsight was fucking twenty-twenty.My magic could do a lot of things—I looked after the forest, I was powerful, I could disguise myself, and in the vale, time was strange, and we could all conjure something out of nothing if we wanted.It was how I’d made that entire cabin into something Lorraine would appreciate.The one thing my magic couldn’t do was change the past.Everything would have been different if I could do that, but the past was something even we immortals had to live with.All we could do was make the best of what we had, no matter what that looked like.Lorraine just had to figure that out, I guess.I hoped she would do it soon, before it was time for her to leave and our time together was up.

ChapterThree

Lorraine

When Ash stormed out, I was so close to calling after him and asking him to stay.I could have made us each a cup of coffee with the new machine or something.My pride got in the way, though—I hadn’t wanted to forgive him just like that, just because he’d done something nice for me.Although, I had to admit, this kind of nice was on a whole new level.I walked through the cabin again, taking in everything Ash had done.I still didn’t know how he’d done it—I didn’t understand the magic in this realm at all—but the place was incredible.It looked like something that might have escaped from an interior design magazine, and the cabin had everything that I could have dreamed of.A coffee machine, clothes I could wear—including a bra—and a shower.God, I’d missed being able to bathe and shower.The stream outside the cabin had been more than enough, and weirdly, I didn’t get dirty in this realm the way I did at home, where taking care of personal hygiene was a daily necessity.Still, I missed being able to stand under running hot water, and when Ash left, that was what I decided to do.I walked to the bathroom, shut the door, and stripped off the ratty hunting dress I wore.One of the dresses had gotten caught in the crossfire of Ash’s passion, and this was the only other one.Aside from a few tunics and my oversized T-shirt, I hadn’t worn anything else in weeks.I turned on the hot water and waited until the entire bathroom had steamed up before I climbed under the spray.The groan that escaped my mouth was completely involuntary, and I nearly melted with pleasure when the hot water cascaded over my body.Ash might not have known anything about modern living, but he’d known what he was doing when he decorated this place.The showerhead was a waterfall head, the water streaming over me, covering me like I stood in the rain, and it was a slice of pure heaven.I had no idea how long I stood under the water with my eyes closed, letting the water slide over my body.

It ran through my hair, and I finally reached for the soaps and lotions that stood on a shelf nearby—how had he known about all these things?I worked the shampoo into my hair until it was a thick lather and rinsed it before I added conditioner, repeating the process.I washed my body with lotions that smelled divine.I’d told myself I would stay under the spray until the water ran cold, but it never did.When I finally decided to get out, it was as hot as when I’d started.Maybe this was another part of the magic.I found a fluffy towel and wrapped myself in it before I padded to the bedroom with wet hair.The closet was filled to the brim with clothes I wanted to try on, but I opted for yoga pants and a tank top.It felt so good wearing panties and a bra again.I’d never really cared about bras—they were a part of everyday life—until I hadn’t had one to wear for the longest time.Now, wearing one again felt so good.I brushed out my wet hair before I walked outside and sat in the sun.I closed my eyes and tilted up my head, drinking in the sun while it dried my hair.I hadn’t noticed if Ash had put a hairdryer in the cabin.He probably had—he seemed to have thought of everything.I liked sitting in the sun, though.I felt calm and at peace, clean and like my usual self, something I hadn’t felt since the night I’d been snatched away from home.Everything had been such a shock when I’d first arrived here: the isolated medieval cabin without any amenities.It had taken a while for me to work through the shock of what had happened, to wrap my mind around what Oscar had done, and even longer to understand that I was caught in a world of magic.It had felt like a long time, but it hadn’t been very long at all.Still, having these luxuries I’d always taken for granted finally made me feel like, in some way, I’d been able to return home.Was that what Ash had tried to do for me?Had he done this to make up for the fact that I was stuck here?It was possible—he did look like he felt guilty about what he’d done, and he really went out of his way to show me he cared.I was still just so angry.What would Cat have said about all of this?She’d always been very serious about me accepting Oscar’s flaws when they wouldn’t change.Then again, a gambling addiction and lying about it wasn’t the same as a character flaw, exactly.Or maybe it was.After all, Oscar had had no qualms about selling a person—his own girlfriend, no less—to pay off his gambling debts.Either way, I’d been terribly wronged by two men I thought I could trust.I hoped my sister was alright.Ash had taken me to see her—she hadn’t been able to see me, but at least I’d been able to tell she was okay.Until then, I’d been terrified that Oscar had done something to her, too.I had no idea where he was now, but Cat had always been strong, and if anyone could fend for herself, it was her.I missed her.At least I would see her soon.Just another two weeks before Halloween, even though it would feel like a lifetime, and then I would go back home as if nothing had ever happened.My heart constricted at the idea.I would be glad to go home, but this place had become a place of refuge, and I’d become attached to Ash.Even if I believed he was a lying, deceiving son of a bitch.It turned out I had a type.If I really thought about it, Ash hadn’t done anything as awful as what Oscar had done to me.And he’d given me so much when Oscar had only ever taken from me, either subtly or outright.

Maybe it was unfair of me to compare the two.My anger toward Oscar was still vicious, and if I ever saw him again…

My anger toward Ash was quickly waning.I just didn’t know how I should feel about him.I cared for Ash.A lot.Our attachment was still strong despite what he’d done, and I cared about him in ways I probably shouldn’t have.He was a great guy in a lot of ways, and something about him drew me in ways I couldn’t explain.And then there was the whole “it’s only temporary” thing.It was weird to build a relationship, a connection, with someone when I knew it would all come to an end soon.Ash was the epitome of a summer fling, except nothing about him and the life I’d led with him the past couple of weeks felt like a fling.In some ways, it was like none of it was real, and I was stuck in a dream I would forget as soon as I woke up.In other ways, it felt like what we had was something that would last forever, which was a concept that could be easily understood in a world where time seemed to stand still…

The more I thought about everything, the more my mind spun until a dull ache throbbed between my temples.I opened my eyes, pulled back to this reality, and I sighed and ran my fingers through my hair.It had dried almost completely, and I got up and walked back into the cabin.I didn’t know what the future held; I struggled to untangle the past, and everything right now was one big question mark.It was how my life had been since I’d come to the vale, and I doubted I would have any clarity until I left.Maybe the easiest thing was to live in the moment.And in this moment, I wanted to make a cup of coffee—not the makeshift stuff I’d been living on until now, but the real deal.

ChapterFour

Ash

Iwalked through the trees, grumpy that Lorraine was still upset with me.It’s not that I had tried to buy her affection, but I’d hoped changing the cabin for her would change how she felt about what had happened.I’d been wrong, and that pissed me off.I hated when things didn’t go my way.A deer appeared between the trees, and I stifled a groan.A moment later, Artemis appeared.When I saw the deer, Artemis was always close behind.“Ash,” she said with a warm smile.She wore a short hunting dress, and her hair was tied back in a braid that hung over her shoulder.She wore sandals, laced up with leather thongs around her legs to her knees.“I haven’t seen you in a while.”

I shrugged.“I’ve been busy.”

“I saw, protecting the human girl, fighting for her life.It was very honorable.”

“Thanks,” I scoffed.It hadn’t been about honor; it had been about protecting her when someone out there was set on getting their hands on her, no matter what it took.“I still don’t know what’s going on with that.”

“What do you mean?”Artemis asked with a frown.“You say you saw what happened, then you’ll know the men who came for her fought me with magic.They shouldn’t have had magic—they came to the vale from the human world.This was a human problem, but someone with magic interfered.”

“That sounds incredibly familiar,” Artemis said.I rolled my eyes and sat down on the mulch, my back against a tree.Artemis perched on a nearby rock, folding her legs underneath her.“I’m not referring to what happened between me and her.I know I interfered when I shouldn’t have, but?—”

“I think whether or not you should have interfered is relative.”

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