Fairy Bride Ch7: Casting Reflections (Patreon)

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The chandelier lights glisten off the fountain’s streams, flashing brilliantly on the stoic marble arches and tiles of gold and lapis lazuli.  The distant clink of slot machines and rattle of roulette wheels fill Henri with familiarity, just like the sharply dressed waitstaff.  Thrill and vigour seem to live in this space, independent of any guest, adding a soul to the Monte Carlo’s large, romanesque foundation.

If he wanted to, Henri Ombras could close his eyes, stop his breath, and imagine himself in his own parlour, long ago.  The slot machines become the shuffle of battered cards and the sound of traffic turns into scraping wooden chairs.  No lights, no playboys.  He could just disappear into the shadows in his mind, memories completely untethered from the centuries that created them.

His eyes open.  He can’t afford to lose himself here.   Not around so many fresh inviting bodies, when the Wilds are still Calling him so loudly.  Not with Captain Edward Morris’ curt voice crackling through his cell phone.  So Henri smiles into the fountain, instead, looking for his reflection, waiting to find the man he knows he’ll never find again.

“I don’t understand.”  The Magistrate is speaking too close to the phone, but Henri knows better than to point it out.  They called Morris an ‘old soul’ in the 1830s, when he was still breathing; it’s impressive enough that he knows how to charge it.   “You’re calling because Harcourt made you buy a stereo?”

“I’m calling because your contact is going to fucking bankrupt me.”  Henri hisses, waltzing between tables.  “I don’t have the patience for this, Morris, he’s stealing my money.  He wouldn’t stop whining about 7-channel speakers.  Insisted it was for his wife.  I had to charter a new room.  A penthouse room.  Care to know how much that costs?”

“Pray tell.”

“Five thousand pounds.”

“You’ll make that back in an hour.”

Henri chuckles.  With every table he passes, another dozen small tendrils slip forth, plucking up chips from unseeing dealers and distributing them in his pockets.  “Not if I start thinking that way.”

He counts out how many seconds the Magistrate’s sigh lasts.  Seven.  Not bad.  “If I start abandoning allies because they’re expensive, you may want to worry.”

“Ah!  I’m offended.”  Henri puts a hand over his heart.  “After all these centuries.  Have I helped you rise so high that you’ve completely forgotten your little old Keeper?”

Morris’ voice goes flat.  “You’re about to ask for more government stimulus.”

“I am but a humble small business owner.”

“You’re in a casino.  Gamble if you must.”

Henri rolls his eyes.  “I can’t gamble!  I’m in Monaco, it’s too easy!”

“We can’t afford to lose him.”

“Why?”  Henri smiles, slyly.  “I’ve been meaning to ask.  What exactly is Harcourt giving us?”

“You already know.”

“I want to hear you say it.”

“His networks.”  Morris explains.  “His protection.  Without either, our plans - ”

“Might get delayed, yes yes,” Henri rolls his hand, speaking venomously.  “What a tragedy we will have wrought, if our Kepts suffer for three-hundred-and-four years instead of three-hundred-and-one.”

“This isn’t a joking matter.”

“Then why do you keep treating it like one?”

“Porter.  I don’t know what’s upsetting you.  You know how many rely on our reforms, depend on us to make the right choices-”

“The right fucking choices,” Henri smiles joylessly.  “Always the right choices, and never the right thing.  Morris, I-”

“Mi scusi, signore?”  He’s thrown off by a small waitress, holding a plate of hors-d'œuvre and mumbling in Italian. “Le può interessare un canapé?”

He stares at her, vacantly.  Light hair, and a tanned, freckled face.  He can see the veins in her offered hand, bulging with sweet blood just beneath the skin.

“Posso aiutarla?”

Her voice sounds like soft silk, but it’s not the voice he hears.

And her face is not the only face he sees.

He’s in Calais.  Even indoors, he can smell the ocean spray.  A woman tugs his hand.  He’s given her a basket of flowers. She’s layered in sweat, her flesh still warm, her belly swollen.  She smiles, sadly.  The doctors say they can save her, but she tells him she knows what’s coming.

She pleads with him.  “Ne me laisse pas.”

He’s in Tournai.  His hair whips in the summer wind.  Small fists pound into his armour.  Her young face is red from sobbing, her child’s voice broken from grief.  He tells her the King needs him, that he’ll see her soon, promise.  He already knows he won’t keep it.  He can’t remember his daughter’s name.

She pleads with him.  “Ne me laisse pas!”

He’s in London.  The air is thick with smog.  He stares at the scratches on her thighs, the tears streaming down her face.  She tells him that she can sleep with him, and he remembers when those words could cause pain.  When he passes his first ever verdict, she clings to him, begging him to change his mind, to keep her safe for just one more day.  He tells her he can only spare five minutes.

She pleads with him.  “Don’t leave me.”

Thousands of faces.  Centuries of names.  He recalls every heartbreak, remembers each tear.  He asks himself every time, when they look into his eyes and their hope breaks, what they think they see.  He doesn’t know.  He keeps trying to find it in water, or checking through the glass.

But he never casts a reflection.

“Signore!”

He blinks, and he’s back in Monaco, gripping a terrified waitress’ shoulders.  His face is mere inches from her neck.  He can feel his fangs on his tongue as he releases her.  He pretends to laugh.

“Scusi. Aveva qualcosa.”  He wipes an imaginary spot off her back, and leaves her like the rest, turning back to his phone.  “Morris, we need to talk about Harcourt’s wife.”

“You went quiet.  What was that?”

Henri ignores him.  “Has he told you anything about her?”

“Why?  Does she spend less?”

“This isn’t about the fucking money!”  Henri shouts, louder than he intended.  He scowls at the patrons who notice, and whispers into his phone.  “She’s fae.”

A pause, then - “What?”

“Her name’s Daphne.  She’s a nymph from the London Market, and she worked very hard to get my attention.  Morris, she’s not with him by choice.”

Henri makes his way to the edge of the room, waiting for Morris’ shock to pass.  “He wouldn’t.”

“He would.  He did.  Why would I lie?  I saw her marks.  Magister, we cannot stay silent.  Harcourt married a Kept…”

He hesitates.  Once he’s said it, it’s said.  The Wilds Call again, louder than ever, but…

Don’t leave me.

He takes a deep breath, exhales, and speaks.

“... and I’m going to free her.”

“I cannot let you.”

Henri squeezes the phone and takes a sharp left turn.  Tendrils fling out from dark corners and coil around his legs with every heavy step.  “Morris-”

“Quiet,” Morris cuts him off.  “Leave the room.  Too many mortals, too many ears.”

“I have.”  Henri adjusts his coat, looking down.

“I can hear the echoes.  Get down from the ceiling.”

Henri rolls his eyes and glances at the dozen tendrils keeping him tied in place a good forty feet above the floor.   He waves at one of the security cameras keeping watch below, confident he won’t show in the lens.  “Nobody’s paying attention, Magister.  And I’m not going to abandon my web just before the fly finds it.”

“How do you propose freeing her?”  Morris asks.  “Do you think he’ll give you the contract if you ask?”

Henri’s eyes flicker.  “Give me a dark room and I can be very persuasive.”

“He’ll have the Market at his back,” Morris replies.  “To say nothing of the human backlash if you murder a politician - ”

“Good.  Our young could use the training.  We’ve been too soft with the mortals for too long, Morris!  We should have taught them fear!”

“Calm down.  You’re letting the Wilds speak for you.”

“Why shouldn’t I?  Are you not fucking furious!?”  Henri grits his teeth, sneering.  “A human, performing a Keeping!?”

Morris’ voice stays level. “It’s not unprecedented.  How do you think they got their stories?  Henri, I am not dismissing your anger.  God knows I am upset too”

“He has taken everything we want to destroy, and expanded it!  He mocks us with his breath!”

“He has lost my trust, believe me.  But - ”

The tendrils squeeze the rafters so tightly, Henri starts hearing cracks.

“ - if you attack Spencer, you prove every rumour-monger in the Court right.  They’ll call us violent upstarts, no different from those who led before us.  The Magisters will be furious, our reforms will be tarnished, and the Keeping will continue, for thousands more souls!”

“Forget the fucking economics!”  Henri snaps at the air, fangs extended.  “I am not standing by and watching him play God to his fucking fairy wife!”

A momentary pause.  Henri can almost see Morris’ expression shifting.  “You’ve spoken.  What did you tell her?”

“The same thing I always tell them.”  Henri replies, tonelessly.

“Because you know it’s the truth.”  Morris replies with his usual, infuriating sincerity.  “She’s Market, not Court.  This isn’t our jurisdiction, and we don’t know their laws.  It’s another world, Ombras. One we don’t understand - “

“I understand pain,” Henri hisses.  “She pleaded, Edward!  She begged!”

“How many plead at us every day?  How many are begging, right now, at your gates?  Why her, Henri, when you’ve rejected thousands who needed freedom more?”

“Because she still deserves it!”  Henri’s voice cracks.  “They always do!”

“What about the Scáthshiúlóir?!”  Morris finally sounds angry, and Henri freezes in place.  His skin grows even more cold.  “If you will not think about our young, think about them. Us.  Do you still remember when our numbers were strong, Ombras?  Do you remember what broke that?”

Screams echo whisperingly through the tendrils.  Joined by clashing steel, thundering hooves.  “Of course I remember.”

“If your scheme jeopardises our people, if it forsakes our young to another century of suffering, what will you tell them then?!”

Henri closes his eyes.  “I would tell them that I did the right thing.”

Silence.  Morris’ voice goes distant.  “You would.  But it’s not the right choice.”

“I’m so tired of making the right choices.”  Henri whispers.

“Then let me make yours.  I’m sorry, Ombras, but there is more at stake than you or I or she.  This isn’t our battle, and I need you for our war.”

Henri opens his eyes, searches the room below.  Daphne’s words ring in his skull, and the Wilds have never Called so loudly.

“In my authority as Magistrate of the Scáthshiúlóir, I forbid - ”

“I don’t need you to stop him.”  Henri muses, watching tendrils travel down the walls.

“Henri,” Morris hisses.  “That is an order.”

He disconnects.

Shadows already cloud the ceiling.  He can see Harcourt far below, laughing as he buys a pair of drinks.  The tendrils grip on the rafters loosen, and Henri feels his body lower.  It takes effort to not simply pounce.  He smiles sadly, and whispers.

“Forgive us, papillon.  We are monsters today, but we were once human.”

The tendrils release, and Henri falls, sinking into the shadows that long ago swallowed him.

Henri will turn up eventually, Spencer reminds himself.  Everything’s going well.   He should take Mallory’s advice and just relax.  His wife is happy, his defences held up.  There’s no reason to be scared.

But still he anxiously scans the room for the hundredth time.  Henri’s call put him ill at ease.  Perhaps it’s just Spencer’s nerves - Lord knows he has them - or the fact that Ombras is a literal walking, aether-pumped corpse, but he’d sounded cold.  The sort of cold that makes Spencer pull up his jacket, despite Monaco’s summer heat.  The same cold he feels emanating from this room, like every glittering chandelier was made of ice.

They really ought to do something about their climate control.  The other patrons are shivering, too.  Maybe it’s a gimmick to sell more drinks.

Spencer turns, and there he is - standing alone by a roulette table, watching the wheel spin.  That seems good - he’s playing games!  Maybe he’s just a bitter sort, like Morris.  Maybe all these ‘Shadow-Walkers’ are.

Could explain why they’re so bloody unpopular.

“Henri!  Buddy!”  When Henri turns around, his long face is utterly blank.  Spencer waves the glasses in his hands.  “Drinks?  Not sure if you ‘SW’s’ can down some Moscow Mules, but that would just mean double for me!”

He laughs.  Unnervingly, Henri doesn’t join him.

Spencer forces a smile.  “Where’s Morris?  I know we can’t, heh, Zoom call, but-”

“Sudden change of plans.  Sorry for not informing you.”  Henri’s voice sounds colder than the air coming out of the vents.  Does he realise how off-putting that is?  “I was hoping we could still enjoy a gentlemen’s evening.”

“I could’ve brought my wife,” Spencer raises a brow.

Henri shakes his head.  “I’d be wasting money on the stereo speakers.”

“Ombras, look, I apologise for all her antics.”  Spencer giggles, taking a swig of his first drink.  “She might not have made the best first impression - “

“Oh, no, she impressed me quite greatly.”  Henri clasps his hands behind his back.  Spencer winces.

“She can be silly!  Comes with her age!  I can barely keep up with all the whimsical little thoughts that sprout from her-”

“You never told me she was fae.”

Spencer swallows, rubbing the goosebumps on his arms.  It’s getting even colder, somehow.  “You can understand the need for discretion.”

“Does she?”

Spencer frowns.  “Okay, sure, she’s a klutz.  It’s a nymph thing, you’ll get used to it quickly.  Don’t worry, I’m handling them.”

“Are you?”

Spencer rolls his eyes.  If he’s only here to be lectured about his marriage, there’s a jacuzzi and seven high-end Toshiba speakers he could be enjoying.  “I’m not some uninformed nonce, Henri.  She comes from a unique society, she has unique needs.  But I’ve done my research, and we’ve worked hard to preserve her heritage.”

Henri’s smile flickers, and he turns back to the wheel, hiding his face.  “Is that what you call it?”

“Of course!  I’m a multiculturalist!  I’ve given her every assurance she needs to ease into human life-”

He gasps.  Shadows are starting to spool from the legs of Henri’s trousers, like smoke from a machine.  Spencer looks frantically to the other guests, but they ignore him completely.  They’re too busy shuffling for the doors.

Doors which quickly disappear into fog.

“Henri?  What’s - Ah!”

Spencer leaps back, yelping, as an inky tendril slithers near his foot.  It pushes out from the mosaic tiles, joined by dozens more sliding from the cracks in the walls.  With every second, they grow larger.

And each one is wriggling towards Spencer.

“Ombras!”

“Henri Ombras,” Henri speaks with venom.  “French for ‘shadow.’  In English, ‘eclipse.’  Not very original, is it?”

Spencer gulps.  By the time Henri turns around, his form is lost to shadow, blurry and throbbing in a constantly changing shape.  The only clear features are glowing green eyes, greying skin, and an impossibly wide smile.

Henri licks his jaws, revealing sharp teeth.  “But, then again, it wasn’t my choice.  This name was bestowed long ago, when your ancestors hid in stone castles, killed each other over forty cattle, and still remembered why you should fear the things that move in the dark.”

Spencer tries to grab a table for support, recoiling as his hand brushes against the felted surface.  It’s gone cold and slimy, moving under his touch.  Henri continues to disintegrate before his eyes, growing taller as his limbs disappear.

“H-Henri, stuh-stop.”  Spencer stammers.  “I-I-I duh-don’t know what you’re tuh-tuh-talking a-about-”

“‘Henri Ombras’ is meaningless to me now,” Henri cuts him off.  “I can’t recall the name that came before.  But I remember the hurt, the betrayal, the knife that stabbed my heart with its every utterance.  Pain, Harcourt, endures.  You should know that well.”

Spencer hears whispers behind his hissing voice.  Soft at first, but growing louder.  An old woman, a young boy.  In French, English, and a dozen languages besides.  Soon hands begin to reach out from the blackness, joined by howling, tear-filled faces.

“I-I-I can give you money-”

“YOU CAN’T DO THIS!”

“Oh God, oh God, oh God-”

A child screams.

“You’ve inflicted that pain on her.  Every day, for years.”

Spencer’s breath freezes.  His heart begins to race.  Sweat creases his brow.  “Wha-what?”

“Did you think you could lie to us?”  Henri's voice echoes against the darkness, rising in volume from a dozen places.  “Did you think you could hide?”

“What did she tell you!?”  Spencer shouts, panicked.  This can’t be right.  The magic’s supposed to bind her.

“Everything you didn’t ban.”

“Sh-sh-she’s guh-guh-got it wrong, Henri!  She’s fuh-fuh-fickle!  Guh-guh-gets all these silly ideas, and re-re-refuses to understand-”

“HER!?”  Henri shouts.  “No, Harcourt, she understands her slavery perfectly well.”

“It’s not slavery!  I didn’t-”  Spencer whimpers as more tendrils slide over his legs.

“But there’s someone who doesn’t yet know fear.  Someone who thought it safe to cross beings far more powerful than he.  Someone who hasn’t experienced real pain.  But no worries, Mr. Harcourt.  He might still learn.”

The shadows close in around Spencer. He tries to jump away, but the tendrils pin his feet.  Something rises from the shadow to smile at him. Eyeless, featureless.  Nothing but a black mass with giant teeth.

“If he doesn’t free the woman he’s named ‘Daphne,’ he’ll never forget the lesson I give him.”

Spencer trembles.  “Nuh-no!  You-you’re not listening!  I-I-I-I can explain-”

“EXPLAIN!?”  Henri’s booming voice rattles the furniture.  “Will you call this ‘multiculturalism?’”

“I didn’t write the sources, Henri!  I didn’t make the spell!  All nymphs are Kepts, you know that!  This is Grove culture!”

“DO NOT DARE SPEAK OF THE KEEPING TO ME!”  More tendrils swirl around Spencer’s helpless arms.  He struggles in vain.  “You know where Morris and I stand.  You’ve seen our Kepts’ faces-”

“This is nuh-nuh-nuh-nuh-nothing like that!”  Spencer stutters out.  “I’m nuh-not looking for some SERVANT!  Or suh-suh-some fuh-fuh-fucking TOY!  I’m a good Keeper!”

“‘Good Keeper?’” Henri laughs, his voice reverberating.

“You nuh-know it’s true!  She’s guh-given gifts, she’s tuh-tuh-tuh-taken care of, and I’ve never, ever mistreated her - akh-h!”

A tendril tightens across his neck, and Spencer writhes, desperate for air.  Another one wraps around his chest, lifting him clean above the tables.  “Do your lies even fool yourself?”

“I f-f-fucking love her!”  Spencer chokes out as his feet helplessly dangle.

“You call this ‘love’?!”  Henri’s teeth rise to greet him, an elongated shadow spilling from the neck.  “I’ve spent centuries listening to these excuses, Harcourt!  Do you think they’ll fool me now!?”

Spencer’s eyes grow wide.  He’s still rising, even past the chandelier.   “Ah-ah-Henri, wait!  You-you can’t!  They’ll cuh-come looking for me!  You’ll start a war!”

Whispering voices fade in and out around the vampire like a whirlwind.  “But there will be one less monster to see it.”

Fangs snap at the air by Spencer’s nose as he claws at the tendril around his neck.  He tries to look at Henri, and feels something inside him churn.  He’s massive, a snaking, slimy behemoth that reaches into the rafters.  His bright emerald eyes have vanished, but hundreds have taken their place, peppering his skin, all focused on Spencer.  The faces no longer remain in the shadow; now they bubble up from his body, screaming and clawing in mimicry of the moment he killed them.

“Mostro!”

“Monstre!”

“Monster!”

When he looks at the floor below, his gut cramps.  When he thinks about losing Daphne, it tightens even more.  His mind fumbles for solutions.  Someone to call on, something to say.  Some way to reach out to Morris before the Shadow-Walker -

… Morris.

Why the fuck is Morris not here?

A sudden, enticing, and horribly dangerous thought strikes him.  Spencer almost panics at the idea.  If he’s wrong, there’s no Party or law to back him.  Just twenty metres of air and hard mosaic tiles.  But…if he’s right…

He has to try.  For her.  For them.

Spencer looks into the snarling creature that’s overtaken the casino, and decides, after all, that he’ll gamble.

“Do it!”

“What?”  Henri barks.  Spencer jolts back by instinct, laughing queasily.

“Go ahead!  Kill me!  I-I’d rather lose my life than lose her!”

“Have you lost your mind!?”

“No,” he smiles boldly.  “Because I know if I do this, I won’t be losing either.”

Henri’s massive jaws pull back, biting the air.  “I’ve walked this Earth for five hundred years.  Do you think I’ve survived without keeping my word?”

“I’ve b-been in politics all my life, Shadow-Walker, and I know the d-difference between d-d-doing and acting!  You’re not here to kill me!  You’re not even here to free Daphne! No, you monsters are all the same!  This is only about YOU!”

Henri roars, and a hundred voices echo him.  It takes all of Spencer’s focus to keep from shrivelling.

“Do you think I’m like you, Ombras?  Your reflection in the mirror?”  Spencer sneers, sweat dripping down his face.  “I’m not the one carrying around a c-cloud of screaming ghosts!  I’m not some storybook demon, foretold to blot out the sky!”

“Don’t pretend you know me,” Henri growls.  “You can barely conceive - ”

“And no matter how badly I’ve sinned,” Spencer shouts back.  “I’ve never sinned like you!”

The disembodied grin twists, and so does Spencer’s heart. He’s got him.

“What did you do, Ombras?” Spencer sneers. “Or, well…after five-hundred years in the Court, what didn’t you do?”

Henri’s eyes flicker.  As if on cue, the whispers surge forth, biting at Henri’s ears as ferociously as Spencer’s.

“Why did you tell them?”

“I just wanted to be safe!”

“I can’t go back, I can't go back!”

“I didn’t do anything wrong!”

Spencer presses.  “How many families has your casino destroyed?  How many souls have you thrown back into slavery?  How many escapees have you hunted down and killed with your bare hands!?”

“Silence!” Henri croaks.  “I had no choice!”

“Is that what you told the Scáthshiúlóir, the day you had them slaughtered!?”

For once, the monster rears back.   “No.  You cannot know this!”

“Do you think you’ve destroyed every record?  I learn about the men I work with!  Especially those who betray their leaders.”

“They were staging a Kept revolt!  They underestimated the Court’s power.  I couldn’t let them doom us!”

“So you doomed them instead!?  How many of your people are left!?  They could have freed every Kept, then and there.  And if you stop to hear them, you would fucking KNOW IT!”

The voices wail, furious and terrified.  Behind them are wordless screams and the hungry crackle of flames.

“TRAITOR!”

“Ombras, we’re kin!”

“What did the New Sun give you?”

“We don’t want to be the villains!”

“Stop!  They’re too loud!”   The shadow doubles over in an elongated silhouette, grasping at the space where his ears should be.  The voices all blend together, uniting into a single accusing sentence.

“Don’t leave me.”

“Ne me laisse pas!”

“Don’t leave me!”

“DON’T LEAVE ME!”

Henri howls, and five centuries of victims join his screams.

Until, suddenly, all fall silent.  The blackness fades, the walls stop oozing, and Spencer is staring into Henri’s despairing smile.

“I… have to try.”  He whispers.  “I have to do what’s right.”

“You never have.  You never will.  And you’re not going to start here.” Spencer rasps, finally able to breathe.  “Because you know that no matter how hard you stare into this mirror, I’ll never be your reflection.”

Henri’s face tightens, and he shrinks away.  Spencer closes his eyes, trying to keep his breathing steady as he’s lowered back to the floor.  The room loses its fog, machines spring back into life, and the figure before him slowly returns to the shape of a man.

“You’re right, Mr. Harcourt.”  Henri stands tall, staring at the tendrils that shrivel into his arms.  “I’ve committed more sins than I have the capacity to remember.  But I want you to know, even if I am sparing you, your name is not cleared.  It took me five hundred years to become a monster, Spencer.  You only needed an evening.”

“... That’s what none of you understand.”

“Pardon?”

Spencer can feel his teeth grinding against each other, anger replacing the last remnants of his sickly fear.  He brushes at his jacket, forcing a laugh. “The Dryads, the Court, the Market, you’re all monsters.  There’s no justification for what you do, and that’s why I frighten all of you.  I’m not the monster you want to be.  With me, she won't be reduced to some object or plaything.  I’m doing this with humanity, and that’s why I will succeed.”

“Your wife is so terrified of you that she begged me for help.”  Henri’s eyes flare with heat.  “Would you call this successful?”

Spencer frowns.  “She’s spent her whole life in hiding, Ombras.  She’s scared of everything.  But with me, she’ll learn how to be safe.  How to be open.  How to be the only thing I ever wanted her to be.”

A tendril snakes from Henri’s pocket.  It glides above the tables before tossing a leather wallet on the felt, just beyond Spencer’s reach.

Spencer squints.  “What’s this?”

“Money.  Blank checks, cash, enough credit to start the next housing crisis.”  Henri smiles.  “It’s yours to spend.  Make my bill skyrocket, buy as much as you can fucking carry.  Consider it repayment for all your stupid favours.  I’m curious to learn if there’s any price greater than the torture of spending another evening with you.”

Spencer clenches his fists.  “Morris will hear about all of this.”

“Tell him.  I won’t be coerced.”  Henri smirks.  “Your wife might be helpless to stop you, but I am not a Kept.  I don’t have to listen to this madness.”

The Shadow-Walker turns to the doors, his tendrils pushing them open.  Spencer, brows furrowed, takes a few steps in pursuit.  “Wait!”

“Désolé, papillon.”  Henri mutters under his breath.  “I hope you fly someday.”

“Ombras!”

Henri turns around.

“You’ll see her fly soon.”  Spencer smiles.  “She’s getting better, every day.  I can tell she sees it, too.  And when she’s ready, Porter, I think I’ll have her walk up to your little gates and tell you she won’t be needing them.  That she found something better.”

“And what might that be?”

“Love.”

“Love?”  To Spencer’s surprise, Henri chuckles.  Not the vacant laughter he uses as a shield, or the hollow sounds made to mimic what was once human.  This laughter feels real, and surprised.

“Maybe you’re right, Mr. Harcourt.  Maybe you’ll succeed where entire societies have failed.  Maybe she will learn to love…”  Henri grins.  “... but she’s never going to love you.”

Spencer’s eyes go wide.  “I - ”

“Word of advice, from one who really knows the Keeping.  Love?  Ownership?  It’s one or the other.  You can’t have both, no matter how hard you try.”  With a wave, Henri departs, his words echoing off the empty casino’s walls.  “Slaves don’t fall in love with their masters, Spencer…”

The doors slam shut, but Henri’s voice continues on, whispering in Spencer’s ears.

“... they only fall in love with their chains.”


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Howdy, everyone!

Hoof. What a chapter! It looks like our moth’s rescue will have to wait again, but what are your thoughts? Is Henri still capable of acting righteously, or are his past sins too grave to redeem?

This week, I wanna give a BIG shoutout to Hark, who’s been silently improving Fairy Bride through his edits and advice since the first draft! He’s done a whole lot to make this story more readable and engaging, and I couldn’t have done this project without him.

Spencer might have won this battle, but Daphne’s far from losing her war. What will their next front be? Find out in Chapter 8: Mutual Consensus, coming out next Friday, September 1st. Thanks for stopping by, and I’ll see you all then!