Winny looked rather peeved with me. Sighing, she put her face into her hand. The term I instantaneously thought of was face palm. A friend of mine – Miranda – had been very hasty to use that whenever one of my friends or I said something rather stupid. Yet right now I wasn't feeling like I had said anything deserving of a face palm.
Regaining her composure, Winny put her hands on her hips. "Do you think I would joke about a thing like this! Now get up!" I could tell that she was getting fed up with my clueless attitude, and I still was trying to compute.
A meeting with the King and his sons. The King as in the King of the Faeries? This really was starting to become too much like a fantasy story. Not to mention his sons, which meant princes, which meant Arion. I didn't want that. So I gripped my chair, and tilted my chin up ever so very slightly. I had once played a Queen in a play. I could pull off this 'ordering people around' thing.
"I won't go. You can't make me." I could see Winny tense up with those words. She glared at me, and I glared right back. I. Would. Not. Budge.
A deep groan escaped her, and the annoyance was gone in the bat of an eye. "C'moooooon," she whined. "Please just come! I really can't make you do anything. I just need to get you there!" I shook my head, and turned my chair away from the doors. The last thing I wanted today was to meet the father of Arion, see Arion again, and meet whatever brothers that the bastard may have. No sir, I wasn't going to suffer that hell.
There was silence, and I heard the door slam. Spinning around towards the sound, and noticed that I was blissfully alone. Standing, I rushed around the space they had given me as a room.
It was well lit, and the walls were a deep brown. Each lamp gave off an orangey light. All the same, there were no windows. Nothing that I could even consider climbing out of. They had clearly thought about that. The bed was large – just like the room. The chair sat next to a desk, I now noticed. I dove into the drawers, hoping to find something –anything, really – that I could use to escape. Nadda, nilch, zip. Feeling a little more defeated, I ran to the door, and tugged. No luck.
Cursing my bad luck, I retreated to the bed. Clearly I was stuck. Surveying the room, I took note of the wardrobe, and the bathroom. Since the drawers had been quite empty, I severely doubted that there would be anything of help in either of those rooms. I hugged myself. Was this room where I was to stay for all my days? I felt lost. This room was so dark – at least compared to what I was used to. The bed was soft and comfy, but it wasn't my bed.
The thoughts that barraged my mind made me feel so along. Faces of friends and loved ones crossed my minds. People I would never see again. I would just disappear to them… It shattered me inwardly. I didn't allow myself to do the classic 'collapse to the bed and sob' thing. The tear came out. I won't lie. I wanted to die. Well, that might be a bit of an overstatement. All the same.
I sniffled a little, and calmed myself down. I rubbed away the tears. I would not show I was crying. That would give them a victory that they didn't need. Sitting there, I told myself that I would be myself. I would not bow to these people. I was my mother's daughter, and I would rebel against them. My parents had worked so hard to make sure I didn't land in their clutches. Now that I was there, I swore that I would make it hard for them to keep me.
That was the pep-talk I had needed, clearly, because I felt the little warm tendrils of confidence coming back to me. I even got myself to smile. I would be glad that I managed to rally myself in time, for that moment the doors burst in, and I gasped. There stood Arion.
I noticed quickly that he was back to the angry look. Did he only have three settings? Arrogant, blasé, and furious; he'd really have girls lining up. Inwardly rolled my eyes, but I was tense outwardly. From what I knew of him, I knew that anger came with a fight. Oh was I ready to fight. I was ready to throw back all of the annoyance I felt from my captivity at him. It was totally go time.
His eyes focused on me, and he strode towards me. I noticed that he was going to try to intimidate me by pinning me to the bed. 'Way ahead of you,' I thought, standing up. I matched strides with him, until we were close enough to have our toes touching. He avoided contact, and I was quite ready to rule this.
Very clearly, I remembered the note that my drama teacher had given me when I had been the evil queen character. She'd come up on stage, and straightened my posture. 'You're the queen. Act like you own everything and everyone on this stage! You don't take no for an answer, and there isn't anyone here that can tell you what to do!' With the memory my posture straightened. I would be that queen. Arion opened his mouth to speak, and I knew that it would be fatal to my winning of the argument if he got the first word in.
So I smirked, and said, "Don't you it's rude to burst into a ladies room?" He seemed to lose steam. He'd been expecting something different. He ignored the question, and returned to what he'd originally meant to say.
"Mmm. The King orders your presence. You should learn that you must come." He rose an eyebrow. That made me furious. What was I to them? A dog?
"I am not some slave that will come when you call," I responded as calmly as I could muster. Honestly, I could hear how my retrained fury made my voice tremble.
Arion titled his head. "We own you. You signed the contract with the accepting of the gift." He plucked that infuriating rose out of no where – where had he kept that – and waggled it in my face. I was seriously sick of the damn thing. "Not to mention…" he continued, "You spilt blood on it. Nothing binds a person better than blood." Looking enormously pleased with himself, I decided that I hated this man. He made me sick, for starters, but his mood swings made me crazy.
"I don't remember spilling any blood." Thinking back to the incident with the rose, I didn't remember distinctly anytime when I had gotten blood on the flower… Until I recalled the tiny stab of pain as the rose matured… I glanced at my palm. A little red dot decorated it, and I grimaced. Curses. Foiled again.
A warm laugh escaped him. "No more trouble, Grace. Come along." The man turned fluidly towards the door.
"No."
It was tiny, at first. I would not go with him. I would resist. He seemed to freeze, and didn't even turn back to say, "What?"
"No. I won't go with you. Nothing you can do will make me." I hooked myself to a bed post, and clung to it. "You will have to wrestle me off this bed post to get me to go anywhere with you." I said the last word with as much vehemence as I could muster.
Once again, he turned towards me. "I am getting tired of your pettiness, Grace," his voice dipped dangerously. "Come." The last word held no request – it was an order plain and simple. I responded by coolly flipping him the bird, and gripping the bed post even tighter.
The corners of his mouth twitched. "I had hoped it wouldn't come to this… but I invoke the contract. You will come here." I laughed at him. I laughed. I laughed until a crippling pain filled me.
I gasped. What was it like? Imagine a million needles being forced into your skin, and you wouldn't even be close. I could feel something sharp pushing up from under my skin, and when the first one broke through, I screamed. Thorns. Thorns were popping out of me! I panicked, and Arion just watched.
After a moment, another followed. At which point, he leaned over to me and whispered in my ear, "Just say that you agree to come with me, and the pain shall go away." Tears streaming out of my eyes, I nodded. "Out loud, my dear. I want to hear it."
"I…" a wave of pain came, and the rest barely came out, "agree." As soon as I said that, the pain dissipated, and the thorns returned under my skin. The wounds closed, as if they had never been there. Goddamn faerie magic. And I watched the whole thing undo itself with a morbid fascination. Feeling a wave of nausea, I took deep breaths. No vomiting.
"Shall we go?" His tone was pleasant. Like nothing had happened. If I could, I would have punched him. The more I considered it, the more it sounded like a wonderful idea.
I stood, and he held out his arm. Grudgingly, I took it, even through kissing a viper sounded like it would be more pleasant. What bothered me even more was the fact that he gave me a tiny smile after I did so. He smiled at me like the perfect prince charming. How vexing, I thought. It was probably because he could tell that I was still shaken from the torture I had just experienced.
Acting as a gentleman, he led me out of the room. It could have been picturesque, if it hadn't been for that fact that I looked like I was ready to kill Arion. He turned to glanced at me, and sighed as if disappointed. "Smile for my father, Grace. Your sullen face will put him off."
Returned his remark with a glare, I gave him a brisk and false smile. "Screw you," I replied, in the politest tone that I could say. His glower made me smile, and I plastered that pleased look on. It seemed to bother him more, and I soared with glee. The walk to the king was silent from that point on.