Kellee turned, surprised to see me rooted to the floor only a few steps inside the room. “Kesh?”
No, no, don’t tell him any more. Not my name, not any of it. If I had known Kellee’s source was a fae, I wouldn’t have come. The second I stepped into the light, I’d be exposed. Would he know? The marks painting my skin itched. Would he recognize me? I didn’t recall him or his name, but there had been so many fae and my name was notorious among them. Not Kesh’s name. My other name.
But I wouldn’t run. Not from him. I briefly touched my neck, feeling the ghost of cool metal. He was caged. I was free.
I willed my feet to move forward and plastered a blank expression on my face.
“Ah,” the fae said. The smooth sound unwound me. “Marshal Kellee, would you be so kind as to leave us alone?”
Kellee chuckled. “That’s not happening, Talen.”
The fae cut him a look so deadly I was surprised it didn’t slice through the cage.
Unfazed, Kellee rapped his knuckles on the glass. “Remember who put you here.”
“How could I forget?”
Had Kellee captured this fae? I swallowed a hard knot in my throat and stopped beside Kellee. The fae’s eyes bored into mine, burrowing deep into my soul and digging up all the gems of my past. Had he once seen me painted with the blood? Had he roared along with the thousands of others who had reveled in their entertainment? He didn’t look the type to lose his mind over bloodlust, but they never did.
The fae’s smile held secrets. He glanced at Kellee but didn’t seem inclined to speak what was on his mind. He knows. He knows. He knows. My heart beat out the fear.
Talen dragged his gaze over me, slow and steady. “Thief.”
“I am no thief.” But I understood why he would think so. He likely sensed the low magical throb I carried with me.
His eyes narrowed, gaze piercing deeper. “What do you want?” he asked, looking directly at me.
I was here. It was done. And if there were consequences, I would deal with them. But right now, I needed answers. “What do you know about fae adopting tek?”
He waited a few beats, his thoughts probably lingering on how I carried fae magic. “We’re averse to using tek,” he said. “It pains us, as you know. But in extreme circumstances, we’ll adopt it, briefly, if we must.”
“Is it possible for a fae to live in a tek-advanced society?”
He flicked a hand, dismissing the suggestion. “Unlikely. For a day or two, perhaps. No more.”
I looked again at his surroundings. His cell—crisscrossed with metal. The tek observing from hidden corners. The array of tek I had seen on the way in. The prison was encased in tek. How was this fae even coherent?
Intelligence sparkled in his eyes. “You’re wondering how I have survived?” Talen asked. “I have been here a very, very long time. Besides living, my only other option is death, and I am not ready to meet the Hunt just yet.”
He must be in agony. Every breath, every movement, must hurt. “Then, isn’t it correct that a fae exposed to tek over a long period of time could live in a tek-advanced society? Like you are here.”
“Live? No. Survive?” He smiled at my question, almost as though it pleased him to have me ask it. “This…” He stepped back from the glass, the movement silent. “Was not voluntary.”
“But if he or she were exposed to tek slowly, over many years, they might build up a resistance?”
The fae blinked, possibly for the first time since we had entered. “It is possible but unheard of. It would take many years of voluntary exposure to human tek and a great deal of pain.”
So, Larsen had slipped under the radar over years. Centuries? “How long have you been here?” I asked.
“It has been three hundred and forty-two years since the marshal detained me.”
Kellee stiffened. Talen had revealed too much, and the fae’s smile proved it.
I blinked, careful to school my features. The marshal was how old? I stared ahead, refusing to glance at Kellee despite needing to see his reaction.
Talen’s soft smile had probably lured hundreds of humans to their deaths over the years. Here, he was using it against Kellee. He knew he’d given something away. From my time behind bars, I knew such slights against a jailor—small as they were—amounted to huge victories.
“You endure pain daily?” I asked, quieter now.
“I do.” To survive, he had built up an immunity to tek. If he’d done it, others might have as well. Others like Larsen. It would have taken time. Time during which the fae had fallen into myth and legend. Human generations. But the fae were nothing if not patient. Long-lived, what was a few hundred years of pain?
“Why do you ask, Kesh?”
A shudder tracked its way down my spine. “There’s—”
“No reason,” Kellee interrupted.
The fae studied us. His silvery hair moved beneath the light like liquid mercury. For someone caged for over three hundred years, he looked remarkably well. We studied each other. What family was he from, I wondered. Was he a social fae, a worker, or was he in service to the court? None of the answers mattered, but a fae locked away so far from home was a sight I’d never expected to see. It was like catching a mythical creature in a jar. It shouldn’t have been possible.
He moved closer to the glass and tilted his head. His violet eyes darted as he studied me. “What are you?”
I glanced at Kellee and saw the marshal raise an eyebrow. He had asked me the same.
“A messenger,” I replied.
“No,” Talen said. “You have the magic of my kind. I sensed it the moment you entered. You’ve spent time with us. A long time.” He touched his neck, and before I could stop myself, I had mirrored the gesture. I dropped my hand, but the flash of recognition in his eyes told me he understood.
“I see.” His smile grew predatory, and this time, when he looked at Kellee, there was a knowing brightness in his eyes and a smirk tugging at his lips. “Do you trust your companion, Marshal?”
“We’re done here.” Kellee strode toward the door, leaving me alone, facing the fae.
“I know you.” Talen pressed a hand against the glass. His flesh bubbled and sizzled, but he leaned in closer, ignoring the burn. “You have the power to free me from this prison. Do it, do it now and I will forever be in your debt.”
My heart raced too hard, tightening my chest. “I can’t.”
“You can.” Closer still. His beautiful eyes shone alarmingly with tears. In all the years I had spent with them, I had never once seen a fae cry. A single clear droplet skipped down his pale cheek. “Do this one thing and I will be yours.”
There was magic in those words. A promise, a curse. And my human heart ached for it.
“Kesh!” Kellee snapped. “Get away from him.”
I had loved them once, loved them like I was one of them. And this one, lost to his people, lost to his world, captured for centuries. Like me, he had been caged. I pressed my hand to the glass, over where the metal-infused screen scorched his palm.
“I know you, saru. Free me and I will be yours.” He dropped to one knee, closed his burnt hand into a fist, pressed it against his heart and bowed his head. “Allow me to serve you.”
Kellee grabbed my arm and dragged me toward the door. The fae stayed bowed, his words circling inside my head. Allow me to serve you.
“Don’t listen to him,” Kellee hissed. “Words are the only weapons he has left.”
Talen’s tear-filled offer haunted me long after the prison door had slammed shut.
Chapter 10
Marshal Kellee jabbed at the flight controls, disengaging the shuttle from the prison dock. If he exerted any more force, he’d push his fingers through the console.