Session 16

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Niamh got a car for us to drive in.

It was an old, beat up Jeep that sputtered dangerously, the engine sounding close to a strangled sheep. Even though she warned us that it wouldn’t last to get to Rosebay, Keenan didn’t complain like I expected him to.

Faeries were strange things. Although he hadn’t said a single word to me since we left Niamh’s and kept a mood so foul that it could’ve given Lucifer nightmares, Keenan still managed to get my heart thrumming like the first time he touched me. Even though things didn’t turn out the way I would’ve liked, I found myself wanting to pause and rewind. I wanted to go back to that instant where Keenan seemed more human; to a time where it looked like he sincerely cared.

I believed I deserved that much. Ever since I woke up in Cillian’s yard, I hadn’t been capable of hanging onto anything good. Everything I liked always seemed to dissolve into the air around me like smoke from a fire, lingering around until it choked me dry.

But damn it, I still wanted it to last. I wasn’t quite sure what I was feeling exactly. I refused to admit that it was true love, mostly because I didn’t know the difference between loving and lusting. One seemed just as bad as the other, either way. Even if you asked how I felt about him now, I still wouldn’t know how to answer you. It confuses me too, but I guess that’s not anyone else’s fault but mine.

Anyway, droplets of rain began to pour from the sky, stealing away the silence that we tried to keep. Keenan kept a steady grip on the steering wheel as if it would run away if he didn’t, still refusing to say a word to me or even look my way. His attitude was starting to piss me off, but I never understood why I thought I was going to get more out of him other than that. I felt pretty stupid and embarrassed because of it, to be honest. I’m about 50% sure Keenan knew that as well, but he made no show of knowing.

I didn’t even know how long we had been driving for. No matter how hard I think about it, I still can’t remember. I guess it was because I was so goddamn worried about everything. I kept playing with my thumbs and stealing glances at him from the corner of my eye, like a little boy with a stupid school crush.

I gripped my seatbelt, trying to think of anything other than the gigantic mistake I was making. But I kept hearing my mother’s voice in my head, her past warnings sounding like echoes in a big room.

I knew that whatever she said was right, no matter how hard I tried to block out the sound. Humans weren’t made to be friendly with faeries. It was plain and simple that it wouldn’t end alright. Things like that never worked out the way you wanted it to. If I didn’t let him touch me, or hold me, or do any of the crap he did, I would’ve been alright. But like always, I never listened when I was supposed to. I never listened to myself when I knew I should’ve run away, and I definitely didn’t listen to my mother when she warned me about him.

Damn, she would probably have a stroke if she stood witness to what I had succumbed to. Thinking about that sort of made me sad. I mean, have you ever wondered if your mother was ever proud of you? Even though you fucked up more than a few times, do you ever think that somewhere deep down in her heart, she still loved you anyway?

I found myself thinking that a lot ever since Cillian died. I wondered if she would ever forgive her boys for going at each other’s throats, or forgive me for getting tied up with a devil. I would like to believe that she would, but the thing is, Cillian believed that as well.

The last thing I wanted was to turn up like him.

Anyway, it didn’t take long for the stillness to break me. Any other day, I wouldn’t mind his quiet. But it began digging into my skin and clawing at my chest, bothering me more than it should’ve.

Keenan never apologised. Not once during our whole drive. In fact, his silence had me thinking that I should have apologised. I nearly forgot about the horrors I’d seen, the ones that kept me up all night and made me scream in my sleep. I would’ve forgotten it all if it meant hearing his voice again, though.

He knew that.

“Would it have been easier for you if he just shot me?” I asked. “If Cillian had killed me like you predicted, would you have been happier?”

Keenan’s body became tense, trying to keep hold of whatever control he thought he had. “Stop it, Jack.”

It was the first thing I heard from him in hours. “Would you?”

“I said stop it.”

“You would, wouldn’t you?” I shook my head. “I wish he shot me. I bet you would’ve taken my soul too if that happened. You wouldn’t have batted a single eyelid if I left like that.”

I didn’t understand why the hell I said those things. I suppose I was just feeling angry about the whole thing still. Why did it have to be him? I kept thinking. How come I’m not leaving?

Keenan’s grip tightened around the steering wheel. “Shut up, I said.”

“You were planning it, right? It must’ve been fun for you; fooling your client’s sorry excuse of a brother and making him believe he had someone on his side for once. But you’re no better than me, because you don’t have a home either. No one at home wants you back.”

Watching Keenan shatter was worse than receiving a punch from him. It felt good at first, but later on I started regretting it. I would’ve taken all the beatings in the world if it meant taking back what I had just said. Keenan swerved the car to the edge of the road like a goddamn maniac. He shut of the engine and edged closer to me little by little, closing the distance between us until I could see every speck of gold in his honey eyes.

“What do you want from me, Jack? Do you want me to touch you again? Kiss you? I don’t know if your behaviour is because what happened in that bedroom or your brother’s death, but you better not take it out on me. You’ve got to learn your place before I finish what Cillian couldn’t, Jack. You chose to be here. I never forced you.”

Something about what he said broke my heart a little. It was nothing gut wrenching, but enough to dig splinters miles deep. I knew some of his words held water, though, which was why I pulled my lips together to stop myself from crying. You’re a doctor, so you probably understand the crap that was running through my head all at once. It still gives me a headache, so I try not to think of it often.

There’s something dark about giving up on yourself, isn’t there? People don’t understand it until they’ve landed in the gloom, allowing it to drown you until you lose your sense of self. I think that’s what Keenan saw in me in that moment and maybe that’s what freaked him out so much, paired with the knowledge that he was the sole reason for it all.

“Don’t give me that look,” he snapped, causing me to wince at his loud voice. He moved away but kept his eyes on me, biting back most of the words he wanted to say. “You’ve got to think about me for a moment. Have you considered anything I told you back at Niamh’s? Do you give a rat’s ass about what’s at stake for me here?”

“I was killed by my own brother, only to be brought back to life by one of your stupid subjects. I’ve been beaten, bruised, cursed at, had a gun held to my head, forced to take witness of crimes that no one should ever have to see, and I’ve got nothing to show for it but the scars on my chest and you sitting right beside me. So tell me, why the hell should I give a ‘rat’s ass’ about anything right now?”

Keenan continued to stare at me, still attempting to invoke fear with each passing second. It wasn’t smart talking to him like that. Then again, nothing I had ever done was sane.

He opened his mouth to speak, but his attention was drawn elsewhere. He looked past me and frowned, an expression of annoyance and slight dread crossing his face. I followed his gaze out the passenger window, jumping in my seat when my eyes met another pair.

“Who the hell is that?!” I exclaimed. I nearly died right then and there, but Keenan only let out an irritable sigh.

“He’s my brother, Irial. Don’t be scared; he can sense it.”

Keenan reached past me to roll down the passenger window, allowing his ‘brother’ to stick his head through. The man ignored me and only stared at Keenan, holding a smile that stretched from one ear to another and showed white teeth as sharp as daggers.

Like Keenan, Irial was also stunningly beautiful. They did resemble each other in some ways that were noticeable. However, unlike Keenan’s honey eyes, Irial’s was a bizarre pool of indigo and dark violet, surging together in harmony. His wet hair spilled past his collarbone and reached just above his breast, glistening with the colour of blackberries.

“What do you want now?” Keenan asked him curtly. “I thought I told you that I didn’t want to see your face again.”

Irial’s smile only grew wider, which I had thought was impossible. He suddenly disappeared into a puff of black shadows, seeping into the car and resting at the backseat. I couldn’t seem to keep my eyes from trailing after him even though I really wanted to. He had me trapped without even trying.

“A man of words and not of deeds is like a garden full of weeds.” Irial’s voice was nothing but a soft whisper, melodic and sickening all at the same time. “As the weeds begin to grow it’s like a garden full of snow. And when the snow begins to fall it’s like a bird—”

“Enough with the rhymes and get on with it,” Keenan snapped, forcing Irial to take shape behind us. He tilted his head and frowned.

“Daddy had an illegitimate child, one he thought he tamed, but it went wild. Up to the world he went, stealing souls to daddy’s content. But daddy knows what his son began; a thing called love with a human man.”

I never thought I’d see Keenan freeze the way he did that night. He went as hard as stone, his face painted with terror and panic. It was seriously a sight to see if I hadn’t been so ridden with fear myself. I thought that nothing could scare me as much as Cillian did, but Keenan never told me how dangerous his brother was.

Keenan’s voice was so faint that it dropped below Irial’s whisper. “Dad knows?”

“It’s like a penknife in your heart. And when your heart begins to bleed, you’re dead, and dead, and dead indeed.” He allowed Irial to reach out and touch him, stroking his hair softly as he leaned in towards his ear, whispering, “I’d be careful if I were you. Your secrets are all in view.”

“Is that all you came to say?”

Irial leaned back in the seat, letting out a loud laugh. “I was just kidding, daddy doesn’t know. But you did put on quite a show.” He turned to me, sucking in the scent of my skin. “Ah, but I do understand what has you so...riled up. The chaos in him would even make dear daddy corrupt. How sad; you never thought of sharing, but I do understand how bringing him home would be daring.”

Keenan pressed his lips together. “He isn’t exactly something I want to share.”

“You injudicious fool,” Irial spat, the shadows around him moving quicker. He disappeared from the backseat, appearing at his rightful spot outside my window. “Nothing you own is ever truly yours, not even the things you’ve worked hard for. He only gave you a simple task. You work hard, we gain power. Why do you look so sour?”

“I’m still doing my job, aren’t I?”

Irial raised a slender brow, leaning back from the window slightly at Keenan’s quipped voice. “You’ve never yelled at me before.”

“I wasn’t—” Keenan stopped himself and let out a breath, trying again with a quieter voice. “I wasn’t yelling at you, Irial.”

Irial didn’t look like he was buying it. He skipped around the car, keeping on his toes and waving his slender arms here and there in some sort of foreign dance. It didn’t take long for him to make a full circle, stopping at my window once again. “This heart of yours seems to have grown dire. If I were you, I would check the tires.”

He disappeared suddenly, allowing me to breathe. I sucked in the dry air, blinking away the tears that had spontaneously gathered around my eyes. No matter how much I tried, my hands wouldn’t stop shaking.

It felt like a new form of death.

“Give it a moment and his effect will leave you,” Keenan said tiredly, rubbing at his temples. “That reaction happens to most humans, even among fae.”

“Is he really your brother?”

Keenan glanced at me. “There are scarier things you’ll have to face than my big brother, believe it or not. Are you going to regret it now? Do you regret me?”

I sat still for a long moment, slightly paralysed by Irial’s confrontation, my mother’s warnings lingering around my head, and scarred by the things I had seen him do. But all of it stopped once he let a small smile slip right through and plant itself on his lips, a smile that told me he knew my answer before I did.

I looked at him—I mean, really looked. I peered through the malicious Keenan, through the fake Keenan, shifting through all the facades he built over the years for the one that made me who I was; a greedy, selfish bastard who didn’t know the difference between good and evil.

Swallowing, I hoped that hard ache in my chest would just disappear. I wished I could say that I was as strong as him to throw away the feelings that bothered me just so I could be someone else entirely. But his scent had me before I could run out of my own skin, wrapping around me as he let out a soft sigh that sent tingles down my spine.

Jesus, he was something else. Something that should be ignored and never touched, and shouldn’t make breathing harder than it actually was. In those mere seconds, Keenan made me feel like everything was okay. He made it seem like he was just a guy who could fix the wreck I was. It wouldn’t be a perfect fix, but it would be damn close to ideal.

And since I’m being honest with you, I guess I was okay with that.

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