A few steps into the room, Peter finally heard voices.It had to be a peculiarity of the architecture that he hadn’t up until now, and also the reason why no one had come to check on Miel’s smashed knee when he’d screamed about it.
Peter listened to the still indistinct sound, and he breathed a sigh of relief when he recognized it as Corvin’s voice.
The seconds began to stretch then.Peter could very nearly feel that there was a fight coming, however brief.Laurette and Carl-Conrad, presumably also Gertrude behind them, were the same, moving stealthily along the rows of wine shelves.
It wasn’t long until they saw light, though not much of it, flickering across the uneven wall ahead of them.A few steps after that, the wall behind the shelves ended to reveal yet another recess.
“Come here, little human.I’ll give you food if you’re hungry.”
“Oh, fuck off already.”That was Corvin’s voice, and while it trembled, he sounded angry.Good.
The unfamiliar voice—the other Fae brother—chuckled.“You wish to observe me as I stroke myself to completion?I can do that.Does it help to get you ready?”
“Are you—for real?Oh-em-gee, I don’t want to see your cock!”
“That is only an option if you make it vanish in your hole.One of your holes.”
Laurette was ahead of Peter, and he was holding up a hand as he peered around the corner.Peter stilled, every muscle ready to move when it was needed.It was as if all the time spent in a courtroom and behind his desk had done nothing to dull this instinct, this calm readiness that you needed when going into battle with others.
Laurette dropped his hand, and they moved fast.Carl-Conrad was first, dashing forward like a precisely trained war dog.Then came Laurette.Then Peter rounded the corner, his sword an extension of his arm he didn’t even have to think about.Gertrude was behind him.
He had barely a second to see and understand the scene.Corvin was bound with ropes that looked like they’d been intended for something else, and the ends were attached to a hook in the wall behind him, the wall of the recess.Given the angle, he wouldn’t have been able to get the rope off that hook.He’d either bitten his lip or had injured it some other way, fresh blood beading up there even now.
The Fae had set an oil lamp on the floor to his right, the glass cover filthy, and he had his dick out and in one hand.He was holding his pants with the other and turning toward them.
Carl-Conrad struck first, closing sharp teeth around the wrist of the hand that was holding the pants.Laurette pretty much barreled into the Fae.Peter saw him flip his sword in a split second, reversing pommel and blade so that he struck the Fae in the chest with the pommel and didn’t outright gut him.All air whooshed out of the Fae with the crunching sound of bone breaking.
Peter, with no better use for his own sword, cut the rope right off the hook.Then Corvin screamed.
“Shh.We saved you.”Peter’s ears were ringing from excitement as well as the sound of the scream.
Corvin raised his still bound wrists.“Peter!”
“Yes.You were supposed to be waiting in the bushes by the cafeteria.”
“Well, they saw us.”Corvin struggled to his feet, which weren’t bound.“Mike?Mike!Peter’s here!Peter and a bunch of weird guys.”Carl-Conrad bumped his head into Corvin’s thigh.“Oh, a bloodhound?Good, c’mon, doggie, find Mike.Go, go!”
“Y-you…!”the Fae managed, though he was wheezing.
Laurette stepped back and let him slide to the ground.“Getrude and I have this one.You go find the other.”
Peter nodded and wheeled to get in front of Corvin.He pulled out his phone and turned on the light, for Corvin’s benefit more than his own.“Where is Michael?”
Corvin shook his head, breathing heavily.“I don’t know.This place has so many rooms and—they dragged us both down here, and they gagged and muzzled Mike.They only had that lantern thing, and that guy back there was carrying me because I kept trying to slow them down.I didn’t see much.”He wiped his head with his bound hands.“They did something to him too, something that made him stop when they saw us at the cafeteria and came after us.”
Carl-Conrad yipped and led them through another doorway.Peter moved his cellphone light across the room.This one was storage, old crates and tools mounted to the wall above a workbench.Some of it looked like it had once been well cared for, but covered in dust and the first sprinklings of rust as it was, that must have been a long time ago.
“Probably magic.”
Corvin nodded.“Yeah.He was trying to lead them away, I think to be able to use his song more effectively, and—did you say magic?”
“Well, Corvin, they are Fae.”
“And all Fae know magic?”
“Normally, yes.”Except possibly Cloudtree, who looked like a prime specimen of Fae but clearly wasn’t.Which spoke well for him.
“Wow.Shit.But wow.Theo and I talked about those fae fucking books when we were at the bookstore and—” Even in the cellphone light, Peter saw Corvin’s cheeks heat and his mouth clamp shut.“I mean…”
