Wayward

I just finished Valiant and sad to say, I personally thought that Tithe was better. It isn't a sequel, though it does have a few appearances from our favorite characters from Tithe. It's pretty good.

A reviewer pointed out to me in the last chapter that Nephamael had killed Spike in Tithe, and I checked. He did, so a mistake on my part. I'll upload and replace the chapter minus the Spike reference as soon as I can. Kaye and Roiben fluff ahead, also some candid appearances by our own Ellen. Did anyone hate her in Tithe at all? The way she was written it was kind of hard for me to hate her, but I don't know. Ellen's had a hard life.

o O o

Chapter One

"Yet there are pangs of keener wo,
Of which the sufferers never speak,
Nor to the world's cold pity show
The tears that scald the cheek–"

- William Cullen Bryant, "The Living Lost"

Kaye awoke the next day to the familiar white noise of her grandmother yelling at her to get moving so she wouldn't miss the bus. Pushing herself up off her undersized mattress, Kaye rubbed the sleep from her eyes and did her best not to gag at the awareness of just how much smoke was in the air in her grandmother's house. Ever since she had ruined her permanent glamour, Kaye couldn't smoke anymore. She figured that was a good thing, even if her mother offered her a cigarette more than once a day, with frequent scoldings from Kaye's grandmother.

"If you miss that bus, I have no problem with personally dropping you off at your school in my blue bath robe and curlers!" Kaye heard her grandmother echo from the doorway of her room.

Why did she do this five days a week?

"I'm up, Grams," Kaye exclaimed groggily, making herself stand and losing her balance for a moment as her head swam to combine the multiple images of her grandmother together. Once she regained her equilibrium, Kaye she raised an eyebrow at her grandmother, "Since when do you use curlers?"

"Since this morning. Now, get dressed!" She chided with a wave of her hands towards Kaye. Her grandmother turned and left, Kaye letting out a long sigh of relief from the silence that followed that exit.

Kaye got moving, careful not to hit her wings on her bathroom door beneath her sweatshirt as she squeezed into the small space and in front of the water stained mirror. She had forgotten to wipe off the thick black eyeliner and mascara Corny had gotten her for her birthday a week ago. She didn't ask why he had gotten her make-up. The blond hair of her glamour looked bright against the pale color of her face.

She looked like crap.

"Just another day in the life of an average pixie," Kaye muttered to herself, trying to comb her mess of blond hair.

"Now, pixie, average is certainly an insult," an all too familiar voice sounded near Kaye's ear from behind her, making a smile curl across her face as a shiver traveled up her spine.

Turning around, Kaye realized she was nearly a foot shorter than Roiben, not for the first time, but something that made her laugh at seven in the morning. His glamour still hadn't changed; hair that used to be silver was now a pallid shade of white, dressed from head to toe in black. Leather.

Kaye hadn't seen him for the last couple days, which he had tried to explain as business pertaining to evil fairy king work, but Kaye just shrugged it off each time. One look from Roiben…one kiss was enough for her to lose all and any form of thought. Today, however, Roiben did not seem like he came to visit just for pleasure. His eyes were darker than normal, and a new scratch occupied his left cheek, she noticed.

Kaye searched his face for a moment, before finally replying, "I don't think the rest of Faerie would mind me being average long enough for things to settle down." It was meant as a jest, but Roiben's eyes flashed even darker as his gaze flickered down. What wasn't he telling her?

o O o

Rath Roiben Rye had woken up that morning, relieved he had actually gotten sleep, but the good mood was soon foiled when his knew knight, Morwen, had informed him of the Unseelie Court's choice about the upcoming centurial event.

Wayward had not been something Roiben had gladly taken part in, though it only took place once every hundred years, it was a part of his duty to the old Unseelie Queen to participate in the games. He took pity on the prizes that had been traded around, the stakes that had been lost, awarded, or in some cases, sacrificed, as was tradition of Wayward.

This century, Roiben would have preferred not to have rebelled against Nicnevin so he would not have to be the one conducting the events.

"Did the Thistlewitch ever tell you about the Faery Games?" Roiben asked at last, though he doubted that a solitary fey that intended to overthrow Nicnevin would inform its only hope of such events.

Kaye bit her lip. "She never mentioned it…neither did Lutie," Kaye replied. Did she see annoyance in Roiben's eyes? "Why do you ask?"

This was his problem. Faeries didn't have hearts like humans did; they didn't feel the raw emotion that drove humans to either sanity or insanity in their world. It didn't matter what Court you belonged to. You never achieved true emotion. Faeries had feelings, but nowhere near as strong as human emotion. Kaye had grown up a human, but was a pixie at heart, and yet she had saved his life, saved her human friend Corny's life, freed the solitary fey…whether she knew it or not, she possessed human emotion.

And the problem? Roiben thought he had that emotion about Kaye. Or for Kaye. Or saw it in himself…about Kaye? He didn't know how to phrase it; he didn't even know what to call it.

That was his problem. Because now he had to tell her that after surviving the ordeal of the Tithe, she would be roped into the realm of Faery yet again. She'd insisted on visiting the Unseelie Court, even some faeries still held a grudge against her for giving the solitary fey their freedom. No one would touch Kaye while she was under Roiben's protection.

And yet, every time Roiben thought something really would happen to him if something happened to Kaye that he couldn't prevent…something bad, something that might hurt her.

That thought scared him.

Without warning, Roiben leaned down and took Kaye's face in his slender hands, kissing her, hoping that it would clear the doubts from her mind, if only for a little while. That was another problem. He felt something curl through him every time he kissed Kaye, through his veins, obliterating his thoughts…even when he thought about her.

What the hell had she done to him? Roiben mused, as he slowly pulled back from Kaye, a soft smile on his lips. "Just wondering," he replied, his voice deep.

Kaye was pleased with his answer, and the kiss, then nodded to his all black outfit. Navy, maybe? Or the color of the night sky, perhaps?

"You know, black never really was your color," she said with a grin.

Roiben welcomed the humour; glad to forget his burdens for the short while that he spent with Kaye.

o O o

"Where the hell have you been?" Corny demanded as Kaye walked up to the gas station.

"Sleeping, you?" Kaye asked casually, used to Corny's bad mood in the morning. This had become her schedule. She would force herself to go to school, or risk moving back to New York, and every morning she would hitch a ride from Corny.

Again, why did she do this every morning? A voice prodded inside Kaye's mind. She pushed it aside. Corny's annoyed expression turned into one of drunken happiness so fast that it put Kaye off a little.

"A faery visited me last night," Corny said, his gaze distant, a grin still on his face.

Kaye tried her hardest not to laugh. Corny's preferences in hook-ups weren't always the smartest of choices. She surveyed his body: no scratches, gashes or slashes. So the faery must have just come to play with him. That sent an unwanted shiver down Kaye's spine. Faeries didn't just do those kinds of things without wanting something in return.

"Come on, lover boy, you're my ride and school starts in ten minutes," Kaye replied.

Corny snapped out of his reverie, and grinned at Kaye. "You, saying those words…you're a pixie, are the heroine of the solitary fey and have the King of the Unseelie Court eating out of your hand, why do you even bother with school?" He asked, putting the gas pump in his hands back into the slot and walking over to his car, made entirely of fiberglass for Kaye's sake. Corny had found the car in a dump behind the station a few days ago, and Kaye was relieved when he told her what the frame was made of.

Kaye shrugged, and ignored the pinch in the hollow of her stomach as she followed Corny over to his car.

You're a pixie…why do you even bother with school?

Kaye didn't answer Corny as she stepped into the car, shutting the door behind her.

She didn't answer, because she didn't even know the answer.