Melissa Marr: Desert Tales: A Wicked Lovely Companion Novel

Rika passed the faeries, putting herself between them and the mortals. She could go closer to the dangerous metal than the other faeries could because she’d been mortal first, but she still couldn’t walk all the way up to it. Being even this close to the steel made her queasy and weak. Fortunately, the nearby faeries couldn’t approach it either, but sooner or later, Jayce would have to leave the protection of the railroad tracks and thus become vulnerable.

Although she wasn’t convinced that they would actually harm him, she couldn’t risk it. She made a noise, not quite a word but the start of one, before she realized what she’d done. Much like seeing him fall and reacting without thought, she’d done the same thing now. The result was the same as well: she’d begun talking to Jayce when he could see her. By her choice, she’d broken her own rules on keeping him at a safe distance.

Before she could think of how foolish it was, Jayce turned his head and saw her. “It’s you. . . .” He smiled and took a hesitant step toward her. “Where did you come from?”

Rika didn’t move. She opened her mouth to speak, to find some answer that was true. She settled on, “Out there.”

She made a vague gesture northeast, toward the desert, or more accurately, much farther away, across an ocean to a land where it grew cold, where there were seasons and so much greenery that her heart ached a little to think of it. Home. She couldn’t stand being there now, not after so long with winter’s pall on her, but she still remembered the beauty.

Jayce left Del and Kayley, moving farther from the safety of the railroad tracks. “You look like you’re not feeling well.”

When she didn’t answer, his arm went around her. He led her toward a wooden bench. Farther still from the tracks. Palm trees, looking battered and still proud despite it, cast narrow shadows.

“I knew we should’ve had you checked out. I couldn’t figure out how you vanished, where you were hiding. I looked in the caves where we were. I—” He stopped himself nervously before continuing, “I almost thought you were a dream, but Del saw you too.”

She stared at Jayce. Bruises shadowed his cheek. His ripped shirt had been replaced, but this one looked tattered too. A steel chain-link bracelet hung on his left wrist. Fortunately, since he held her with his right arm, the steel wasn’t likely to brush against her and injure her.

“Are you real, Rika?” he asked quietly.

“I’m real,” she assured him. That part she could say with certainty.

“Are you sure? You seemed almost like a dream earlier, vanishing when I looked away.” He was flirting, but there was an undercurrent of something else there. He might not consciously know that she wasn’t human, but an instinctive wariness in him tangled with a desperate hopefulness she’d seen when he drew his more fanciful images. Jayce caught her gaze as he said, “A beautiful girl shows up, saves me, and vanishes into the desert. . . . It’s either a dream or magic.”

Rika couldn’t speak. He thinks I’m beautiful. She should be thinking about the fact that he was implying that she’d vanished, but it was his compliment that made her stare back at him in wonder.

“You did save me, you know. I’m not broken anywhere. Just bruises,” he said in a voice so low that it felt like it was only the two of them in the world.

They were not alone though: not only were there faeries, but Del and Kayley also stood nearby. Del was watching them. Rika could see the couple in her peripheral vision. Kayley spoke to him, but his attention was fixed on Jayce. Despite the twinge she felt at their protective gazes, she was grateful that Jayce had such good friends.

Jayce turned to look over his shoulder, noticing that Rika was looking past him. “They’re okay.” He looked back at her and smiled. “Are you always this shy?”

Without having quite meant to, Rika nodded. She wasn’t used to talking to people. Months would pass when her only conversations were with Sionnach or with Jayce—who until today didn’t hear her because of faery glamour. When she had been the Winter Girl, she hadn’t exactly been beset by social invitations either. She spoke to whichever mortal girl Keenan tried to seduce, to Keenan, and to his advisors and court members. None of them had been faeries she could call friends: they all wanted Keenan to succeed; her job was to thwart him. Those were the terms of the curse that had ensnared her when he’d picked her for the test. If she’d been his missing queen, she would’ve freed him, been beside him for eternity. If she had refused the test, she’d have been his subject—one of the flighty Summer Girls who frolicked and danced. When she took the test and failed, she’d been cursed to carry winter and sworn to attempt to convince the next girl to refuse him. Even though she’d risked everything for Keenan—and lost—she’d been cursed to have to work against him as he tried to find the missing Summer Queen. Her situation hadn’t exactly made her popular.

She forced herself to look only at Jayce. After an awkward silent moment, several heartbeats too long, Rika blurted, “I’ve watched you climb before.”

What a stupid thing to say!

Jayce smiled though. “I wish I’d seen you then . . . maybe you wouldn’t have run away earlier.”

Tentatively, she said, “I don’t need to run right now.”

Despite how awkwardly she’d handled everything, he still seemed interested. “So do you want to walk”—he gestured at the benches—“or sit? We’re probably both too sore to walk too far.”

Faeries clustered closer, surrounding the bench. They didn’t speak, chortle, or react. They just pressed too near, their bodies brushing against hers and his, making Rika tense. She should tuck him into some safe steel-walled house. But I want to talk to him. She shouldn’t do it, but still she said, “Stay. I want to just stay here with you.”

“Later,” Jayce called to Del and Kayley. Then he put a hand on the small of her back. “There’s a quiet spot out this way.”

At the feel of his hand against her—even though there was a shirt between her skin and his hand—she hesitated, and then, shakily, let him guide her to a bench. Lingering with him felt more dangerous than anything she’d done since becoming a faery. There had only ever been one other boy she’d trusted, and he’d stolen everything from her. The fear and the memories of that mistake rushed back so intensely that she felt paralyzed and stopped mid-step.

“You said you didn’t need to run; remember?” Jayce said. She nodded and took another tentative step.

Behind them, faeries whispered. A number of them vanished in different directions, and she was silently grateful that they weren’t going to challenge her here. Maybe Sionnach was wrong about the threat; maybe the faeries had better things to do. She didn’t know, and just then, she didn’t care.

All that mattered was that she was with Jayce. They walked toward a bench, and she realized that he still had his hand on her back. He was touching her, and they were alone together.

Sionnach amused himself by flitting in and out of visibility around one of the somewhat nearby towns: starting a quarrel between strangers, kissing a mortal girl and fleeing while her eyes were still closed. I’d rather be keeping an eye on Rika. She was his priority, a project of sorts, but not every detail of his plan was something he could handle himself. It hadn’t been easy, but he’d lured the skittish faery out of her cave. The next step was up to her; he just hoped she didn’t screw it up. Or find out what I’m doing.