Page 15 of Till Kingdom Come

All those sweet “pleases” and “sirs” were helping his case too. I decided I didn’t need to teach him a lesson about impertinence after all. Probably not, anyway.

“No,” I said, smiling more broadly. “I’m not a knight.” Besides, he was far too sweet to kill. Instead, I asked him, “What will you give me for them?”

“I-I beg pardon, sir?”

“For my spurs. I said, what will you give me for them?”

“I-I don’t know. I don’t have any money, and it’s really not done that way. You see, you have to give us money. You pay a toll.”

“Ah, I see. And pray tell me again what happens if I don’t?”

The one with red hair moved restlessly on his horse and the other young men behind him nudged their horses to come closer. They were spoiling for a fight and by the devil, so was I. It would be a short one, but I was longing to see them all lying bloody in the dirt. Except for the boy at my feet. I might spare him.

“Bracca,” my father called in a languid voice from behind me. He was speaking in the Fairy tongue that was so close to Gaelic. “Stop playing with them. Kill them all except for the boy or let them go. But put an end to this now. I grow weary of it.”

As a half demonic creature, he didn’t need the blood he sometimes drank to sustain his life, but he seemed to enjoy it from time to time. I thought now might be one of those times. The “knights” heard him, and they gave each other nervous looks. They wouldn’t understand the words he’d said, but I was thinking they might have recognized the tone—which hadn’t been at all subtle.

“I’ll make a bargain with you,” I said to the boy. “Give me a kiss, and we’ll call it even.”

His eyes grew wide as the louts behind him began laughing uproariously.

I ignored them and pulled my foot up to the pommel of my saddle to remove my spur and then did the same with the other one. I dangled them in front of him.

“Come closer, boy, and take them.”

Blushing, he took a step forward and reached up. I bent over and clasped his wrist and pulled him up into my lap, armor and all. Considering how heavy his armor was, it would have taken much greater than mortal strength to do so, and the others with him gasped at my casual display of power, perhaps beginning to realize more and more how badly they’d fucked this up. They were beginning to understand on some basic, animal instinct level that they’d bitten off more than they could chew, and they were face to face with actual predators who could eat them right up.

I sat Killian on the horse facing me, and I bent him backward so that he had to pull up his legs and wrap them around my waist. He put his hands on my shoulders to keep from falling off, and I held him still while I gazed down at him, only to find his eyes staring right back at me with a shocked expression. I couldn’t seem to help what happened next—I lowered my lips to his and plundered his lush mouth thoroughly.

He whimpered deliciously and put his hands around my neck. It only spurred my appetite for him. I slanted my mouth over his and imprinted his taste on my tongue. Over and over again.

I thought with pleasure of this boy on his knees for me, that little mouth of his stuffed full of my cock. I shifted as the appendage in question grew harder at the idea. Yes, I’d like to breed this boy—a thing that might be entirely possible if he had some Selkie blood in him and if I used a little magic. I could breed him and watch that little belly grow fat with my child and make him sit on my knee as I rubbed my hands over it. And I’d make him like it.

I leaned forward slightly, inhaling his scent, which was both sweet and masculine. A little sweaty and unwashed too, but that was mortals for you. I’d like to see him in a tub, up to his neck in bubbles and hot water. I could nip at his neck and suck a little of his blood to mark him. I wanted to cover him in little bites to show everyone exactly who owned him.

I could feel the lust rising in me as I sucked on his tongue. He didn’t even try to pull away. I could hear the soft little whimpers start up in his throat, and I moved one of my hands to his groin. His piecemeal armor stopped at his waist, so I slipped my hand under it and inside his trousers, shoving them down so I could rub his prick and drive him out of his mind. He groaned again, breathless with excitement and pushed himself up into my hand. He was leaking and I could smell it on him. He angled his face up to ease the way for my kisses.

I was enjoying the taste of his sweet lips, when my father pointedly cleared his throat behind me. “You’ll have plenty of time for that later. Put an end to this.”

The boy was squirming, gasping for breath beneath me by that time, so I finally relented and pulled away with a last lick at his lips. He was swooning by then, so I tapped his cheek to wake him up and put the spurs in his hand. Then I straightened his trousers, took him by the wrist again and set him back on his feet on the ground. He stumbled and had to grab my leg to save himself from falling.

I could hear the others whispering and murmuring loudly to each other.

“He must be Fae!” they were saying, their voices full of fear and wonder, and I gave the red haired one who first accosted me an evil smile and a wink to let him know who he’d been dealing with. I confess I enjoyed watching the blood drain from his face. Then I pushed the boy away with my now spurless boot and wheeled my horse around to ride back to my father. The two of us rode across the bridge and into the village, leaving them behind us, and I didn’t look back. When we came out again an hour or so later, there was no sign of any of them. They had tucked their tails between their legs and run for home.

“I can read your thoughts, you know,” my father said, “Are you thinking of taking revenge on them?”

My father knew me well, and it was common for Fairies—particularly Dark Fairies—to settle scores with their enemies, or with those who were foolish enough to cross us in some way. My mother, Queen Leticia, had been pure Sidhe Fairy, through and through. They’re a vengeful tribe, and I had inherited many of her traits. When someone insulted or disrespected me, I sometimes enjoyed taking some petty revenge or other on them, no matter how long it took.

It wasn’t without precedent. For example, there was a family once who chose to build their home far too close to arath, also known as a Fairy fort or stone circle.Rathswere really the ancient remains of hillforts, or other circular ancient structures, but since the mortals had attributed them to us, calling them ours, we took advantage of the fact and claimed them right back. The man of the family was warned by other villagers that it was a Fairy rath; but he laughed and said he looked at such things as old-wives' tales. He built the house using some of the stones and made it beautiful to live in, but very soon his cattle died, and his crops went to ruin. His wife left and took the children. Eventually he was forced to move, and the house was torn down. No one would plant crops in the rath or live there again, so the grass grew back over it, green and beautiful, and the Fairies danced there again in the moonlight as they used to do in the old days.

“Not much point,” I said. “The redhead will be dead within a year. He’s not nearly the fighter he thinks he is, and he’ll be killed by a knight during a joust when a splinter from a lance breaks off in his eye and enters his brain. I don’t need to do a thing.”

“Do you see this?”

“I do,” I said. My mother had also passed down to me the gift of sight. It wasn’t the strong gift she had, but I had clearly seen the boy’s death as he had first ridden up to me. It had clung to him like a shroud.

“But he’s not the one I really want anyway. And I’ll have Killian soon enough. When do we take him?”

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