“And it was different. There was a kingdom at stake. I’m not trying to say I’m better than you. I don’t think that at all. I’m trying to tell you that you have choices. You have more freedom than Beck and I had.”
“Stay out of it, Ci. I’m going to do what I need to do, and that’s that. My father has always complained that I wasn’t willing to do what it takes. Well, I’ll show him.”
Dante hurried along, leaving his cousin with the perfect wife and happy life behind. He didn’t need a lecture from Cian. Cian was happily married. He had his brother to depend on. Dante’s sister treated him like he was still five years old. Come to think of it, everyone treated him like he was a child. He was thirty years old. He ran a business. He ran an arm of the family business. Of course, he had an assistant and a manager who did most of the daily work, but everyone had help. Not everyone was as efficient and organized as his sister. Not everyone wanted each minute of the day planned out to model efficient time management.
What, he asked himself brutally, did Cian expect him to do? Should he tell his father to go straight to the Hell plane and righteously pack his bags? Where would he live? How would he survive? He’d never gone without a day in his life. He liked being rich, and he was good at it.
A long wail split the air around him, and Dante stopped. It was the howl of an animal in pain.
“What the hell was that?” Cian asked with a hitch in his breath.
“I think that’s our guest,” Beck replied.
Beck broke into a run, his long legs eating the distance to the tent. Meg struggled to keep up with him. While Beck ran ahead, Cian took their wife’s hand and hurried her along. Dante jogged, easily catching up and matching Beck’s stride.
There was a crowd outside the large tent, though he noticed they gave the place a wide berth as though what was inside was too terrible for them to get too close to it. It was easy for Dante to fight his way to the front.
All around him, the people and creatures whispered in hushed tones. They talked about the animal in her cage and wondered if the bars were enough to keep her from their children. Savage, one called her. Brutal. Some spoke of her attempting to eat the little gnomes assigned to care for her.
Maybe he would rethink the whole getting-married plan. Maybe Rhys had another, less hostile consort he could buy. He didn’t need to die to prove this point to his father. A nice, homely, uneducated rube would do nicely. He wanted her to shock his father, not cannibalize him.
“Rhys, what’s going on now?” Beck asked.
A small man with a pointy red hat moved toward Beck and Cian, who had taken his place beside his brother. Dante felt Meg at his side, but he was watching the gnome. Rhys of the Gentle Hills, who had served the Finn family for decades, bowed deeply.
“Your Highness,” the gnome said, nodding to each of the Fae royals. “I am sorry to have bothered you, sir. I simply do not know what to do with the lass. She is completely feral. The demon gave us a potion to keep her weak. We’ve given it to her every day, hiding it in the water she drinks, but I fear it doesn’t work. She wouldn’t eat for the first three days she was here until Cara had the idea to give her raw flesh. She is an animal, sire. Though I am loath to do it, I must ask you to put her out of her misery.”
“No,” Meg argued instantly. She rushed to her husbands.
Dante held his tongue. The sounds coming out of the tent made him think that maybe Rhys was right. There was a long, loud howl. He wasn’t sure how a sound like that came from a thinking being. It was primal. The sound was pure rage.
“Meggie, calm down,” Beck commanded, his voice dropping to a low, dark bark. Meg’s head dropped immediately.
“Yes, sir,” she said quietly.
Beck’s hand came out to lift her face up. The harsh lines left his brow, and he kissed her forehead. “I’ll do what I can, Meggie mine. Trust me.”
She smiled up at him, though Dante could see tears unshed in her eyes. “Always, baby.”
Beck looked back at the gnome. He pulled his sword off the scabbard on his back and held it at his side. “Let’s see her, then.”
The flap of the tent was pulled back, and Dante found himself following his cousin.
To his heightened senses, the room was quite pungent. Whoa. He checked his gag reflex.
“I am sorry, sire,” Rhys apologized, his face reddening. “We have not been able to clean her. She is filthy. When we attempt to get close, she tries to bite and scratch. She growls like an animal. It is the only language she seems to know.”
“I thought I gave you translator implants,” Dante heard himself saying. His eyes adjusted as the sunglasses flowed back into his jacket. It was dark in the tent. All of the flaps that would allow light in had been closed. There was a single candle burning, and only a bit of light filtered through the canvas at this time of the day. The place felt a bit like a pit. Or a tomb.
Rhys snorted. “As if we could get close enough to get one in her. We’ve barely managed to keep her fed and to give her the medication the demon claims she needs. I don’t know what the bugger was thinking bringing me an animal to sell. She’s not fit for any society.”
Whatever else was said, Dante missed because he caught his first glimpse of the female in question. Through the gloom, he saw a slender figure move to the bars of a cage. He could see nothing of her face, but her form moved, flowed, toward the front of the cage.
The cage was the largest of the ones kept in the tent. A “mate cage,” as the Fae called them, was supposed to be for show. It was a tradition that was passed down through the centuries. They were richly decorated. There were carpets covering the dirt floor and soft mattresses with fine blankets for the women to rest on. The blankets and pillows had been torn apart in the girl’s cage. It was a chaotic mess, but still neater than the female herself.
She glowed. Like all consorts, there was an aura about her that a vampire couldn’t mistake. His cousins might need to physically touch her to know that she was an adequate bondmate, but Dante could plainly see it. She glowed like Meg glowed. He wondered, seriously wondered, exactly how sweet she would taste. After she’d been properly cleaned, he thought with a shudder.
Dante’s eyes adjusted to the low light. He studied the woman.
Her brown hair was matted. He couldn’t tell how long it was, but there was an awful lot of it. She was covered in dirt and other things Dante didn’t want to recognize. He was surprised to find her naked. Rhys would have given her robes to wear when she wasn’t on display. Her small breasts were round, and Dante couldn’t help but think they would make a sweet handful. She was slender, but her hips flared in a pleasing way. She would be lovely when she was clean. She sniffed the air around her and growled low in her throat at the newcomers.
“You see, Your Highness, she is completely feral. There is no intelligence,” Rhys said.
“Bullshit,” Dante muttered, not taking his eyes off the woman for a second. The woman in the cage was baring her teeth, but he was looking at her eyes. They were a startling blue. They looked like seas of the tropics on his home plane, blue and clear, and he felt like he could see deep down to her soul. He stared, quite caught in her eyes.
The woman rattled the cage viciously. Her small hands wrapped around the bars as though she could pull them apart with nothing but her own will. She howled, but Dante could hear something beneath the seemingly chaotic sounds.
“Befria mig.” She said it over and over again. He didn’t recognize the language, but it was there all the same.
“Befria mig?” Dante tasted the words, trying to make sense of them. Vampires were known for being very talented with languages, and his innate skills told him that this seemingly feral woman was trying to communicate.