Two weeks had passed without anyone locating her. She wondered whether anyone was even trying. Big Daddy had to be incensed and she understood that logically, though emotionally she had checked out. She'd depersonalized, separating herself from her body. It was the only way to be sane. It wasn't her body being defiled. It was someone else. Someone else who was suffering. Not her. She wasn't here.

Once in a while, she thought she'd catch bits of telepathy from Cosmo, but it was like tuning into a distant and poorly powered radio station. She couldn't send, only receive, and this only heightened her sense she was losing her mind. Her mind, the only place she could take refuge from this, and she couldn't hold it together.

When she was left alone, huddled and bleeding, she questioned how much enjoyment a rapist could really get out of a victim who just laid there and took it. Then again, rape wasn't about sex. It was about power. And this was about Big Daddy's rival exacting revenge against her father. It had nothing to do with her. She was just a convenient vessel.

Thinking it through logically didn't make it sting any less. Or, rather, it hadn't until she'd turned off her emotions. It was too dangerous to feel. This was her coping mechanism.

Occasionally, she wondered whether her godchildren thought of her. What had Jorgen done after they'd been rescued? She assumed they'd been rescued by now. Human children were much more important than adult faeries. Had Jorgen wiped their minds? Had he erased the timeline, so it had never happened? How had he explained her disappearance? Did they remember her?

It was foolish to worry whether they recalled her. Either they did, or they didn't. Questioning whether they remembered and agonized over her abduction was pointless. It led to another uncomfortable road, where more pain awaited, and she had no interest in pursuing it.

She slept, dragged into an exhausted state by her constant attempts at vigilance. Like it mattered. The "Don" had the upper hand. He had the wand, he had her powerless, and he was in control. Without her wand, she was nothing. And The "Don" had proven that quite effectively.

There was no refuge in her dreams. Either she dreamt that Cosmo had moved on without her or that no one cared about her anymore. She never dreamt anything happy anymore. It was like her mind had lost the ability to conjure up cheer. Maybe this was to be her lot in life.

But, how could it be taking Jorgen this long to locate her? Never mind Jorgen, how could it be taking her father this long? He had to be tearing up Fairy World to find her. Wanda whimpered, curling into a ball. Everything hurt, and nothing was okay. Fuck. She needed a fairy godmother of her own.

Someone shook her shoulder and she resisted waking. What was there for her in the waking world? Why would someone insist on bringing her back? She struggled, wishing to remain in a place that, if not pleasurable, was at least minimally better than reality.

"Wandita…" a familiar voice whispered and shook her head. Wanda frowned. Juandissimo? None of her dreams had ever involved him. Curious despite herself, her eyelids fluttered open. Intense and anxious purple eyes stared back at her.

"'Dissimo?" she murmured.

"Si," he said. "Wandita, we need to get out of here. We don't have much time before he shows up again. You need to get up."

Wanda stared at him blankly. Was he here to retrieve her? How could he be? How could he have found her? What if he was in league with her rapist? She stiffened, pushing him away. It took an effort; her attacker deliberately kept her feeble to prevent her from escaping.

"I will carry you," he said after a moment's contemplation. He scooped her up and then hissed, which was odd because he wasn't the one in pain. She continued gazing through him rather than at him. None of this made any sense.

"Mi amor, is this all your blood?" Juandissimo cried.

Wanda offered him a weak shrug. She'd long since inured herself to it. There was only so long you could remain horrified. And if Juandissimo was in cahoots with her rapist, then she couldn't stop him, could she? She strained for Juandissimo's wand and, to her consternation, he handed it to her. Relief swept through her and for a few seconds, she forgot to breathe.

Healing herself was so simple, though she knew her fractured mind would take more than magic. She relaxed; while she might normally have objected to being in Juandissimo's arms, she had no such compunctions now. He wouldn't have permitted her the wand if he intended to betray her. He was safe. She was safe.

She'd healed herself, but she hadn't given herself a blood transfusion, so she remained faint. She looked around and then handed Juandissimo back the wand. He raised it, about to transport them out of here and this nightmare, when his wand deflated. Startled, he stared at it, shook it, and tried again. This time, the wand sighed before giving up completely. Juandissimo's arms tightened around her.

"Not that one I would have expected to find her," the Don scoffed. As always, he remained in shadow, a glamour that Wanda found particularly irritating. She tensed, readying for a fight.

"Don't bother," he warned Juandissimo. "There is no escape."

Juandissimo deposited her on the bed and growled. She didn't know what he was thinking. He was a lover, not a fighter. Cosmo would have punched the guy. Juandissimo remained still, floating and sizing him up. He made a dive for the other faerie's wand and the Don shifted, avoiding the reach.

"Wandita, I—" That was as far as Juandissimo got before he dropped, a stone statue, down to the floor. She grabbed him and slowed his descent before he shattered against the hardwood floors. Despair, which she hadn't permitted herself to feel the last week, swamped her and she whimpered, clutching her ex-boyfriend.

"Make sure he came alone," the Don commanded to someone Wanda couldn't see. Faerie dust sparkled as the nameless and invisible someone rushed to do his bidding. Wanda clutched Juandissimo as all hope fled.

"'Wandita', is it?" The Don sneered. Her nickname sounded foul in his mouth. "Did you really think it'd be that easy? Did you really think you're alone, ever truly alone, here?"

"If Juandissimo came here," she said in a voice hoarse from disuse, "then there are people looking for me. They will find me."

"Oh, yes, they will eventually," he agreed. "When I'm done with you. Not a minute before."

He swept Juandissimo out of her arms as though he were a child's plaything and advanced on her. She bit her lower lip to keep it from trembling. She was nearly ten thousand years old. She was a faerie godmother. She would not be crushed into dust like this.

The Don's wand snapped her back to the bed and left her spread-eagled in front of him. His lecherous gaze scanned her body. As faeries, he could choose how to hurt her, what form to take, and which would leave the worst scars and the most blood. Her breath caught in her throat and she prepared to leave her body. The Don hissed, grabbing her by the throat and waving his wand again. The ability to separate from herself vanished as if it had never been. Dread tightened her throat.

"Not today, Wandita," he sneered. "Not ever again. Don't you think that's a little too easy? Perhaps I've been too lenient with you."

Cold sweat beaded on her forehead. She opened her mouth and found herself without a voice. It didn't matter. What she would have said, what would have had no effect regardless, was "please…"


They had been assigned a temporary godparent. As far as things went, Michael wasn't too bad, if a bit bland. No, that wasn't the problem.

Cosmo had lost his mind two weeks ago. Wanda remained missing in action. And Fairy World was up in arms over them, as well as Azalea and Lorenzo. Chloe and Timmy hadn't returned to Earth since this debacle had started. Everyone was afraid to let them out of their sights. This meant, in addition to Michael, they had Big Daddy breathing down their necks.

Big Daddy had insisted Timmy must have known something about Wanda's abductor. It had taken Chloe intervening to prevent the mafia don from strangling her godbrother. As it was, Timmy was leery, jumpy, and prone to flinching at sudden touch.

He trusted her, she knew, and maybe a small group of other people, their faeries included. But that was it. Unfortunately, while she worried about how their parents were faring on Earth without them, she was also concerned about her godparents and then themselves. Herself she put at the very bottom of the list. It was easier that way.

Timmy had only been able to give Big Daddy scant information about Wanda's condition. What he'd told him had infuriated him. Equally disastrous, Chloe had no problem imagining what might have transpired after two more weeks of that torture. Her heart and stomach were sick.

Cosmo was locked up and inaccessible. In his grief, he had nearly undone Fairy World. From what Chloe comprehended, Cosmo was getting a second-hand feel for what Wanda was enduring. And if it was that bad for him, then she shuddered to envision how Wanda fared.

They had been given full run of Fairy World, for what it was worth. Any other time, Chloe would have found this fascinating. Now, suppressing her own issues and frantic with worry over everyone else's, she was a mess. She could barely function. Any word about Wanda or about the ongoing investigation was enough to send her over the edge.

She knew her high-strung nerves were grating on Timmy's nerves. She couldn't help it. Didn't Timmy care about Wanda? Was he really that self-absorbed? No, she refused to believe it. Cosmo and Wanda were his godparents and had been since before she'd had them. He must have a greater attachment to them than she did. Perhaps he was just keeping his emotions under better wraps.

Yes, that was it. She wished she could hold it together nearly as well.

Timmy was not holding his emotions together very well. It was just that the slightest sign he might fall off the deep end left Chloe scrambling and freaking the fuck out. He had enough problems without his god-sister losing her shit.

Jorgen had pulled Poof out of Spellementary. He dismissed their temporary godparent but couldn't give Poof more than the gist of what was going on. So, Poof was agitated, Chloe was half insane, and Timmy woke up every night with nightmares of Lorenzo fucking him so hard that he was coated in blood.

But other than that, things were going swimmingly. Really.

What could possibly go wrong?