Beyond the Iron Gate (The Faery Meadow Book 1)

“Why did you leave me?” Lorcan accused Elaine.

He stood across from her in a room she never was in before. She could feel someone else standing behind her too, but when she tried to turn around to see who it was she was unable to. It was like she was frozen in place with something wrapped around her immobilizing her body. She couldn’t even move her head and so she was forced to watch Lorcan.

“I waited for you. Did you even notice I was gone? What was I supposed to do?” Elaine replied angrily.

Lorcan raked his hand through the strands of his bright red hair. He took an exasperated sigh before speaking with impatience.

“You’re my mate,” Lorcan said like it was the most obvious thing.

“I’m not your mate anymore.”

“Well, I’m not letting you leave me. You won’t leave me for...him!” he yelled at her.

“What are you talking about?” Elaine wanted to march right up to Lorcan and demand answers, but whatever, whoever, was holding her back prevented her from doing so.

“You don’t know what he is. Stay away from him, Elaine,” Lorcan warned her in a gentler tone.

Elaine thought he must be being genuinely serious. He rarely ever called her by her name.

However, she remembered the fact he left her outside the bar and forgot about her. She didn’t trust him anymore. “I don’t know exactly what you are either.”

“I can’t get to you where you are now. Just be careful, if not for me, for yourself.” Lorcan told her.

He looked worried, but Elaine felt like laughing at him after everything he did to her.

“I’m fine,” Elaine retorted.

Lorcan shook his head in disappointment. Suddenly, he faded away still shaking his head.

Someone behind her had observed her entire conversation and didn’t seem in any hurry to let her move away from them. She spoke in a whisper knowing she still wasn’t alone, ”Please let me go...”

The room remained quiet though and whoever was standing behind her still refused to do as she wanted. The air around her felt thicker. Since she was only able to stare forward it left it up to her mind’s imagination as to who was behind her. She felt weak and miserable.

A floorboard creaked behind her as her face heated up in anxiousness. Her hands felt sweaty and she glanced sideways sensing someone was walking up beside her. Heavy breathing brushed against her neck sending pins and prickles down it and onto her arms.

The strange warmth of their breathing felt like it was branded her skin and she wanted to shrink away from them, but she couldn’t. She dared not make a sound, but the hold they kept on her was abruptly undone and stepped forward with new freedom.

She turned around to see who it was.

Her blood ran cold when she found no one there. The room was empty and it looked to be she was its only occupier. Desperate, she squinted her eyes in an attempt to see further back into the shadows of the room.

“Hello?” Elaine called toward the shadows.

A cold hand landed on her shoulder and she let out a scream.

“Quiet down. You’re alright,” Colt whispered watching Elaine wake up as he released her shoulder.

Elaine sat up in bed blinking her drowsy eyes. When she glanced up at Colt.

Her voice was shaky as her eyes darted around the room as if expecting to find the stranger from her dream in the room with her, “S-sorry I woke you up. I just had a bad dream.”

“Some dream...” Colt grumbled as he turned from her to go sit on his bed across from her.

“I take it you didn’t sleep that much either.”

Colt made a grunting noise in agreement with her assumption and rested his head on his hand while observing her from his own bed. His intense stare made her fidget with her covers. It was light outside, she could see from the window of her room. She thought it was probably time she got out of bed anyway. So she stretched her arms with a yawn and stood up.

“Can you teach me how to fly?”

“Alright.”

Elaine shut her eyes imagining the image of her wings behind her like Lorcan taught her. She opened them after a moment and looked over her shoulder. She was surprised to see how quickly it worked.

She was relieved that they weren’t gone forever, when earlier, they refused to unfurl. Her pink wings swayed slightly as she gazed at them still mesmerized their intricate design and magnificent shine. It might have just been her imagination, but the edges over her wings seemed darker now than before.

Elaine grew nervous and crossed her arms. “Do they look okay to you? There isn’t anything wrong with them, is there? They should still work after the unmating thing right?”

“Only one way to find out. Let’s head out,” Colt remarked while dusting off his pants as he stood up.

He walked over to the door to their room and waited for Elaine to catch up before leaving the room.

Elaine followed Colt out the door and down the stairs. They exited the inn quickly together, and to the man Elaine thought was a faery, they also happened to be walking at the same pace. Colt knew she was beginning to trust him and he led her down the block to where he knew they could find something to eat. The strong smell of the market reminded Elaine of how hungry she was.

“Colt can we get something to eat, please?”

“I guess we might as well since we’re here.”

They walked up to a vendor and Colt handed her some kind of half-cooked meat. She placed it in the brown bag the faery behind the counter gave them.

“Hold this while I pay,” Colt told her while sliding the brown bag over to her.

She picked it up analyzing the other cooked bird legs on display. She walked around the vendor stand and her stomach growled as she eyed a tray of biscuits with strange yellow chopped up nuts in them. They almost looked like walnuts, but appeared purple and squishing to the touch. She wondered what was taking Colt so long to pay the faery man for the food and walked back over to Colt.

Colt’s face remained serious. “We don’t have any money.”

“Pay up, food isn’t free around here.” The faery man glared at him while starting to reach over to grab the bag from Elaine.

“I don’t care,” Colt growled back.

Seeing that the owner of the vendor wasn’t going to change his mind any time soon Elaine walked over to a small table and sat down hoping they could work something out. She scanned the ground briefly for any lost coins. Seeing nothing, she rested her head in her hands tempted to eat the food herself before the faery confiscated it from them.

She had assumed Colt would have money and wasn’t expecting this. She wondered about offering to work for her meal or do a task for the faery. She thought Colt could give him one his weapons and maybe that would suffice for more food than they could carry which would be perfect. Colt was walking over to her now though and Elaine frowned seeing him smile triumphantly when it appeared he gave the vendor nothing in return for their food.

“He gave it to you for free?”

“Yep,” Colt said while plucking up one of the bird wings in the bag and eating it.

Elaine looked over at the vendor owner. He didn’t seem hurt, but he did appear kind of disturbed now as he scrambled to bring them over more food.

When the vendor gave them a tray of biscuits free of charge Elaine narrowed her eyes after picking one up and inspecting it. She didn’t eat it immediately. “How?”

“Let’s just say he had a change of heart for the poor people of Banexul,” Colt said darkly. Then Colt throws a brown bag at me. I quickly catch it and open it up. “Eat up,” he added through a mouthful of meat.

“Thanks,” Elaine smiled.

She was very hungry and the faery who gave them all the food seemed more at ease as he sat down on his stool tending to the next customer. So she started eating her biscuit and then another and a third.

She happily let Colt finish off the meat. After a few minutes, they finished eating. They navigated their way down several streets and ended up back on the outskirts of town. They were close enough to see the wall that circled around it.

The streets were wider, but covered in more trash where they stood. There were less buildings back there and Elaine imagined he took her back here to hopefully train her how to fly since there were far fewer fae back there. There was more room to fly and less fae around too.

“Ready to try them out?” Colt asked while tossing a cleaned off bird bone over the wall of the town.

Elaine got a little excited, but she was still a little anxious. “Yeah.”

Suddenly, they heard a loud shout.

“Move it!” an enraged male voice said rushing right by Elaine.

However, she was too slow to get out of his way. Instead of jumping out of the way, she stared dumbfounded at him as the stranger yanked a long knife out of his pocket and thrust it toward her back. The knife landed in the center of her right wing. Then the fae ripped it out and continued running down the street. Upon the knife’s impact, she felt like fire was burning the spot on her wing. She fell to her knees and shivered in new misery.

Colt was startled at how he let his guard down so easily around the girl. He quickly lifted her up off the ground.

Colt tried to be gentle helping her stand, but she cried out in pain. It was inevitable her wings brush up against him in the process.

He winced at her agony, but tried to sound firm hoping she would calm down a little. “We’re going to have to fix this before you fly. We’ll have to go back to the inn.”

Then Colt jumped up and carried her back the quickest way to the inn -- through the air.