Page 61 of The Fallen
Anger erupted in Bryn as sure as the sea water had shot up like a fountain through theFreya’s deck. He pushed off with his legs, leapt the fire, and struck, leaving four deep gashes across the faerie lord’s cheek. Desiccated brown leaves fell from the wounds before they quickly closed just as Bryn landed a few feet away. Blackthorn turned, the long train of his tattered cloak making the gravel rattle.
“You had no right ta send that storm after us!” Bryn shouted.
“I had every right,” the faerie said. “After all, I am owed a debt, and you have failed to deliver. Your very purpose is to steal souls and deliver them to me. I refuse to offer up even one more fae to Hell.”
“If you want souls so badly, why don’t you get them yerself!”
“That I cannot do,” Blackthorn said, “As you well know. I have my purpose just as you have yours. We are all of us bound by the order of things.”
“Well, if you put Gil in danger again, you’ll be shit out of luck! And if you think you’re just going ta kill me, you’ll really be up the creek then, won’t ye?”
Blackthorn laughed, dry leaves tumbling across frozen ground. “First, little cait, you are not the only creature capable of catching a spirit as it leaves the body. Even certain humans can be taught the art. And second, I won’t kill you.” He took a few steps closer and leaned in until his pointy nose almost bumped Bryn’s. “I will kill any friends you happen to make, starting with that one.”
“You—”
“Hush, cait. Some solitary hunter you’ve shown yourself to be. In the old days, humans trembled at every thickening shadow because you might be waiting there. It seems you are one more thing they have bent to their will, robbed of your danger and magic and made harmless and dull. But you had better find that part of your nature and deliver me at least some souls by Summer’s End. If you do not, that little storm will seem as mild as a spring rain.”
Before Bryn could argue, a cold wind blew, leaves scattered, and the Lord of Half Twilight was gone.
Gil groaned, and Bryn hurried back to his side. He should change back, cuddle into Gil’s side as a cat. He couldn’t quite say why he chose to remain in human form, but it wasn’t for selfless reasons.
He sat cross-legged next to Gil, whose eyes fluttered open and slowly focused on Bryn. Gil sat up with a flinch. “Wh-what the fuck?”
Bryn smoothed the tangled hair off Gil’s forehead. “I… suppose I have some explaining ta do.”
“You’re the guy from the Drunken Scallop. How the hell did you get…. I think we must be on Grand Manan. I… I hope to god we’re on the main island, or it’ll take days for anyone to find us. What are you doing here? Where’s my cat?”
Bryn slowly trailed his fingers down Gil’s check, down his arm until he could clasp his big, rough hand. “Gil, look at me.”
“Where’s Mr. Brimstone?”
“Gil.”
Bryn saw the exact moment Gil realized… and the moment, a few seconds on its tail, when he denied what he knew in his heart was true.
He pulled his hand out of Bryn’s grasp. “What the hell are you trying to say? Are you trying to tell me that you…?”
“You know I am,” Bryn said. “I’ve been by yer side all these years. All that time you were in prison. All this time, we’ve looked out for each other.”
“Bullshit. I don’t know what you’re trying to pull or who you are.”
“You do know me,” Bryn insisted. He stood up. “Watch.”
When he changed from cat to man or vice versa, Bryn entered an in-between state. He became a swirl of glittering dark mist until his essence—atoms and energy, humans would probably say—coalesced into the other shape. Before he’d had the bad luck of meeting Brother Wilfred, he’d been able to do so at a whim… and he still could on Fridays.
Gil stumbled to his feet and backed away from the big black cat with the white star on his chest, so Bryn resumed his human form.
“No,” Gil said. “I… I hit my head on a rock. I have a concussion. Christ… maybe I’m dead.”
Realizing he was still naked, Bryn glamoured himself a gauzy kaftan before approaching Gil again. “Yer not dead, and neither am I, thanks to you. You fought yer way through what would’ve killed most men and saved me. Back when I was young, they’d have written songs about what ye just did.”
Gil pressed a palm to his forehead and swooned. Bryn quickly took his elbow and guided him back to his seat by the fire. Gil drew his knees up and wrapped his arms around them.For a long time, the crackling of the flames and the distant roar of the ocean were the only sounds.
Finally Gil spoke. “So… what are you?”
“The native people of my homeland think of me as a faerie creature,” Bryn said. “Cait-sith. The Christians called me demon.”
“How is this real?”
