Page 148 of The Shadow Fae Rhapsody
Aelfric doesn’t understand. The very fabric of my soul cries for me to go to him.
Svenn is my mate.
And there is nothing in the heavens, hell, or earth that can stop me.
Chaper 27 Svenn
My heart leaps at the sound of light footsteps. All joy vanishes when I recognize the approaching elf. I have no energy to entertain Red today.
“Fuck off…” I grumble.
The knight enters my detainment cell despite my hostility. He dips his head, his gaze sweeping over the arrays of weapons and shrapnel stuck to my body. “I think you will need help in removing those.”
I don’t fail to catch the hint of pity in his eyes.
“I don’t need your sympathy, elf.” My lips pull back in a silent snarl, revealing my canines—a glimpse of my features in his shining armor stops me short.
I realize how terrifying I must have looked to her earlier.
A fucking monster…
Just like that, a crushing agony pelts through me. I didn’t want her to see that part of me.
Not like that.
“You look like a porcupine,” the knight muses, kneeling next to me.
This red-hooded rabbit truly has no fear of the wolf. He sets out a leather-skin case on the floor, one that is usually used tostore paintbrushes, except this guy has an array of knives, pliers, and scissors inside.
I set myself still as Red uses his tools to remove bits of broken weapons from my wounds. My body would have purged them eventually in the coming weeks or months, some may even get dissolve inside of my tissues. Having them withdrawn from me, however, will hasten the healing significantly.
I just hate owing Red anything.
“I think the javelin’s pike went straight through the bone,” he remarks, taking his time to remove the broken piece of a wooden lance from my right knee. “This one is going to hurt like hell. Would you like me to call you a healer or do you want me to proceed?”
I let out a slow breath and nod.
“Here goes,” he says in warning. I barely grimace when he finally takes out the damn thing with his scalpels. I can be flayed from head to toe right now and still feel no pain, not when I’ve learned a new definition of the word today.
Red is unusually quiet today, his eyes trained on the task at hand. I find his silence unnerving.
“Why are you helping me?” I ask him after a while.
He pauses his ministrations momentarily. “We are alike you and I.”
I doubt it…
A strange emotion flares in his eyes when he speaks again. “The entire House Clayborne was set up to be crushed by the Wiolants. My family and I should have been dead by the Aeonians’ wicked scheme. But the Queen saw something in me and made me her trusted knight. I think she sees something in you too.”
A fucking monster.That’s what I am.
I swallow hard.
“I’m not a good person,” he continues, a fierce flame flickering in his eyes. “I don’t go around carrying these tools to heal like the Hlaryan elves. I use this for my… ‘questioning sessions.’ This is the first time I’m helping someone with it. It’s all because of her.”
His newfound strive to be good sounds eerily familiar. Nel tends to have this kind of effect on people. I think I understand what he means, though I don’t say it.
“I can’t really explain why,” he says thoughtfully. “All I know is I like myself better after meeting Rhianelle. It helps that I like her too.”
