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“I swear to god all the time. Last I checked, no lightning bolts showed up when I lied.”

“That’s because your god is just that, a statue on a bunch of wood. The Bandrui says that, after his ascension, he was killed by his own people for being an evil spirit. He rises every now and then, usually in times of great peace, and walks among his people again. But he’s trapped in a cycle of being slain by those same proclaimed followers.”

I’d long ago forgotten about trying to walk, but this would have stopped me in my tracks anyway.

“Hold on. You’re telling me that a bunch of fairies believe in Jesus Christ?”

“Fae.” He smirked a roguish smile at the flash of spunk. “And why wouldn’t we bunch of Fae believe in another magical creature? There are hundreds of different types of us wandering this world and yours. We’re not the exclusive heirs to magic. We live at its source and are its direct offspring. Unlike the jealous god of Abraham, we don’t demand that anyone believe in us or our gods. It’s rather convenient to our way of life that humans don’t believe in us anymore.”

“Ah, yes, makes kidnapping them for daora much easier, I assume.”

“It does, yes,” he said with the conviction of a wet tissue.

“You know that’s deplorable, right?”

“To whom? To you? I would imagine so. I won’t defend the practices of the Fae. I won’t lie and say there is some greater reason or meaning to why they keep daora. It is an ancient practice that was different before the Ard Rí took the throne. It has become . . .” He turned away from me as if to hide his shame while the realization that he had been an active participant in this fell over him. “It was never like this before. With a new Ard Rí comes many changes, though. This is but one of them.”

“Of course. Understandable. We should all easily understand that, right? It’s so simple. It was just a change of Ard Rí that changed it. None of you are awful, evil creatures that steal innocent people from their loving families, mutilate them, and force them to suck your cocks before you beat them near to death. Just a simple change of the Ard Rí!”

“Innocent people? Loving families?”

Anger flared in his eyes, and he stepped into my space, his chest and thighs pressing against me. His body radiated warmth that seeped into mine.

I craned my neck up to stare him right in the eye as he glared down at me.

I wanted to crumble under the weight of his wrath. Images of the King’s twisted, laughing face as he hunted me flashed through my mind, but I stood strong.

“Where was your family, Cricket? Hmm? I’ve been to your little hovel to ensure that you were not missed, and you know what I found? Hmm? Nothing. Not a single photo. Not a single missed phone call. Not even letters gathering in the box to get rid of. The only person who missed you was your greedy landlord who asked if I was your boyfriend. Tell me, Cricket, were you fucking him for the rent? Is that why your icebox was leaking water all over your kitchen floor into the same black mark that showed it had before? Are you just as terrible as a lay as you are at sucking cock?”

“You went to my house?”

The violation was too much. How fucking dare he. No one went into my sanctuary without my expressed permission.

“Of course I did.” He growled, backing me up by pushing forward into me. “Do you think I would trust Rictus to ensure that the daora he sold were, in fact, castoffs?”

“You had no right!”

I ignored the latter part of his statement. He wasn’t wrong. I was a castoff.

“I had every right. Did. You. Fuck. Him.”

The gentle rumble that was usually his soft baritone had turned dark and ugly.

“Every fucking night. I rode that old man’s dick every fucking night and made him scream my name. And when he came inside me, I let him. I fucking loved the way it leaked down my thighs as I walked down the hall to my free apartment.”

I hissed back the lie easy and just as vile as what he was accusing me of.

Storms gathered in the forest of his eyes. The steel band of his arm snaked around the small of my naked back, and he lowered me down to the stone platform I had been resting on. Despite the rage that blew through him, he handled me with the tender care of a museum curator, nestling a holy relic into its protective case.

“Go to fucking sleep, Cricket.”

“I’m not a fucking child,” I yelled to his retreating back.

He paused, turned sharply on his heel, and was right in my face again. “No, what you are is a beautiful little fucking liar. Or at least you had better be.”

He was halfway across the small room before I found the next thing to volley at him. “Or what?”

Ah, yes some of my finest work. Eloquence, thy name is Cricket.