Page 51 of Into The Green

"They're not rules. They're laws," Jasper chimed in.

"I don't have any laws. I mean... no one even knows who or what I am at this point. It can't be breaking laws for me to go. Besides, didn't they break laws by taking Jade?"

"You're talking like these are rational beings," Jasper said, tone condescending. "They're not. If we get caught, we get persecuted, regardless of if it was their crimes that drew us in in the first place."

"And the Dark realm is just as massive as the Light..." Doyle said, sounding suddenly hopeless, disgustedly wrenching away from the nymph beside him who had her hand between her legs, two fingers inside herself as she writhed and moaned.

"But, I mean, this hasn't seem that massi..."

"Oh, for fuck's sake. Stop being so naive," Jasper snapped, standing. "What you have seen of the Light so far is the equivalent of one inch of asphalt in a New York City street. You have no idea what you are talking about."

"Well it's lucky for me that I have such kind and patient teachers," I seethed, standing and moving out of the circle, Elm and Willow following behind me like a shadow and I suddenly wasn't annoyed by their presence. At least they weren't treating me like an idiot, like a pain in the ass little sister they didn't want tagging along.

I shouldn't have felt so deflated, so chastened. But I did and I could feel the tears building too fast to blink away and they trailed down my face hot and unrelenting. I bent slightly forward, hands over my face, trying to pull it together.

"Here. My beautiful. My goddess. Here, please..." Elm's voice cut in, sounding distraught as if my sadness hurt him in turn. When I opened my eyes, he pressed a small wooden bracelet into my hands. "I want you to have this. It is elm," he said, unnecessarily. They were tiny elm beads with elm leaves carved into them.

I looked up at him, a few stray tears still running down my cheeks. "That is really, really kind of you."

"Does it make you happy?" he asked, sounding like his life depended on my acquiescence.

"Yes," I said, despite the hollow feeling in my chest.

"I will make you five more," he declared grandly. "No, no. I will make you ten more!" he announced, running off to, I assumed, do just that.

"And it was very kind of you to do my hair too," I said, reaching up to touch it, feeling small petals and leaves sticking out of what seemed like an intricate plaiting. "It is very beautiful."

"You are very beautiful," she corrected. "I will follow you everywhere. I will please you. I will worship the ground you step upon. I will..."

"Get lost," Jasper snapped, walking up.

"Jasp," Doyle said, stepping up beside him. "Be nice. You know she can't help it."

"Fine. Please get lost. She doesn't like girls anyway."

"Jasper!" I hissed as Willow's face fell and she ran away on a quiet wail. "They might be fickle and superficial, but they have feelings too. You don't have a free pass to be an asshole to anyone you want."

"In my experience, they always take it and come back for more," he said with a nasty smile and I got the distinct impression that he didn't mean the nymphs. He meant women. In particular, he meant me.

Yeah, well, fuck that.

But before I could snap back, Jasper turned and stormed away, leaving us to scramble behind.

We walked in stony, strained silence for a couple hours before Jasper declared he was going to find some food, giving Doyle a hard look like he was relaying something, before storming off.

"He doesn't mean it, you know," Doyle said when he was gone.

"Mean what?"

"To be such an asshole. It's a defense mechanism."

"I don't care what it is, it's unacceptable," I said, rubbing a hand over my grumbling belly. "When I get out of here," I said, emphasizing the 'when' though it seemed less and less likely we were ever getting out of there, "I am going to stuff myself so full that I blow up like a Thanksgiving Macy's float. What?" I asked, noticing him eying me oddly.

"Fae don't usually eat much. We just needs some fruit, some nuts, maybe a mushroom or some nectar here or there and we are set. We don't usually get so ravenous."

"Yeah, well, we've kind of established that I'm a freak."

"Maybe it's a good thing. It could help figure out what you are."