Desert Tales: A Wicked Lovely Companion Novel

corner of his eye, but he didn’t look up until after she had taken a new sheet and covered Sionnach with it.

“We won’t fight his battles for him,” Rika said as she stepped away from the now-bandaged faery. “We don’t do anything without choice.”

“We will if he has an Alpha out here who swears to him.” The temper in Sionnach’s voice was matched by the fury in his expression, and Jayce began to understand that the intense, changeable moods that Rika sometimes exhibited were simply the way of faeries. Sionnach looked livid where he’d been calm only moments before.

When Rika didn’t reply, Sionnach added, “I won’t stay here sworn to him, Rika. I won’t. You shouldn’t either. He’s not someone we can trust.”

“So is there someone you can trust?” Jayce turned the page and began sketching. It was a way to force himself not to stare at the two faeries, not to remind them that they were letting him see their world so much more than he’d expected.

“Donia!” Rika breathed the word. “She’s the new Winter Queen. She exists to oppose him, and she was like me, carrying Winter because we trusted him . . . and were mistreated by him. Her mortality was stolen by him.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Sionnach insisted. “There’s always a price with the court fey.”

“Donia was once like me, Shy. She’s not like them. Maybe—”

“No,” he interrupted. “I won’t swear to either of them—or any other court. We don’t need them here. Be my co-Alpha, Rika. Help me through this. Then, I’ll get well, and together we’ll keep the desert free. If you share Alpha status, we’re untouchable.”

“Not to a king or queen. He held his throne even when he was a bound king.” Rika’s voice had grown louder. Suddenly, she let out an audible sigh and walked over to Jayce. She looked down at his sketchbook. “Nice.”

Jayce flipped it around to show Sionnach a sketch of himself, but he looked healthy in it, reclining on the bed like a decadent monarch with platters of fruits and a decanter of wine in his reach. The food was overflowing, as if from a horn of plenty.

Sionnach laughed, his anger of a moment ago seemingly vanished, and he asked, “Is that a hint that it’s dinnertime?”

“It didn’t start that way, but maybe.”

Rika shook her head. “You”—she pointed at Sionnach—“rest. I’ll be back. . . .”

Sionnach made a faux-serious face. “Yes, Rika.”

After she left, Sionnach looked at Jayce and said, “I’m not interested in competing for Rika. She’s dating you, and sharing Alpha is not romantic.”

For a brief moment, Jayce considered pointing out that he knew that Sionnach had romantic feelings for Rika, but he also realized that since faeries didn’t lie, Sionnach truly wasn’t intending on trying to woo Rika away. Jayce didn’t understand how the faery could have such obviously strong feelings for her, but not act on them. He also knew that Sionnach wouldn’t tell him, so he simply prompted, “So . . .”

“So help me keep her safe.” Sionnach darted a look at the doorway. “Maili is trouble. Rika’s been in her cave so long . . . she’s never really lived around faeries. She’s been near us, but I didn’t let anyone bother her. If she’s in the world with us, she’ll need your love even more. You’ll remind her why keeping peace matters.”

Jayce didn’t respond, but he had a growing suspicion that Sionnach was more involved in Jayce and Rika’s relationship than Jayce had realized. That suspicion was confirmed when Sionnach muttered, “I didn’t mean for things to happen like this when I finally got you two together.”

“You got us together?” Jayce gave the faery a stern look, although he was probably about as intimidating as a tortoise was if it were glaring at a coyote. “What did you mean to have happen?”

The fox faery flashed his teeth at Jayce in an approximation of a smile, but he didn’t admit anything further.

“Jayce? I have fruit, bread, cheese, but”—she stepped in the doorway and paused, her expression uncomfortable—“I can’t give you food.”

“Right. Faery rules: no food from your hand.” Jayce scrambled to his feet. “Sorry.”

Sionnach was silent as Jayce followed Rika to her pantry.

After they were out of his earshot, Jayce asked Rika, “So you talked to Sionnach about me before we met?”

She paused. “How did you . . . ?”

“Something Sionnach said,” Jayce replied. He started heaping food onto the wooden plate that Rika pointed out. “Does he spend a lot of time around humans?”

“Some. He wants everyone to be safe, so he watches out for them. He didn’t used to, but more and more over the years, he has. I’ve been glad; it’s the right thing to do.” She was filling a second plate for Sionnach. “I think it’s smart too. Both the Summer Queen and the Winter Queen used to be mortal.”

If not for the fact that Rika was a faery discussing faery politics in a cave, the quiet gathering of food would seem normal. Sometimes it was easy to see the mortal girl that she had been. Those glimpses of Rika were enchanting in a way that her Otherness wasn’t. He didn’t mind that she was fey, didn’t want her to change, but the world she lived in was a little alien and unsettling. Knowing that an entire civilization existed hidden within his own left him with a sense of peril that he wished he didn’t have. Until Rika, the desert had seemed safe—potentially harsh and filled with natural dangers, but those weren’t threats with motive. Snakes didn’t bite with malice; the sun didn’t create heatstroke with intent.

Except according to Shy and Rika, the sun sometimes did just that when it was a manifestation of the Summer King . . . who is my girlfriend’s ex.

Jayce shook his head at the oddity that was now a part of his life and then followed Rika back into the main chamber. Sionnach had been dozing. He looked up at them drowsily, eyes half-lidded. Even injured and still, the fox faery had something of the feral animal that Rika didn’t.

“The other problem is that Maili has taken some issue with Shy, so . . .” Rika’s words faded away when she noticed Sionnach blinking sleepily. “Sorry.”

Jayce handed the faery a plate of food while Rika balanced her own plate on the vaguely table-shaped rock outcropping. “Why does Maili have issue with you?”

“It was inevitable.” Sionnach suddenly looked uncomfortable, not meeting Rika’s eyes.

“Why, Sionnach?”

“Seriously, Rika . . .”

“A girl,” Jayce said in relief. The injured faery might have feelings for Rika, but he obviously also had someone else in his life that he hadn’t told Rika about. “There’s a girl.”

“No.” Rika laughed. “Shy doesn’t do relationships, so that’s not it. So what is it?”

After a long moment of silence, Sionnach asked, “Why do you say that?”

“Because you flirt with Rika to get her to do what you want, but you say you aren’t interested in pursuing her that way, right?” Jayce flashed Sionnach a smile, half daring him to admit that he hadn’t been honest with Rika about his feelings but half hoping the faery would keep his secret. He admitted to himself that he felt threatened by the history the two faeries shared, but they both insisted that there was nothing more. Jayce hoped his expression was not too revealing as he added, “And because a girl being involved seems like the only thing you’d be hesitant to admit.”

“Shy?” Rika sounded puzzled.

“So maybe there is a girl. . . .” Sionnach sat up straighter in the bed. “I spent some time with a mortal lately, but it’ll pass. I’ve never been one for relationships, Rika. Everyone knows that.”

“But?” Jayce prompted, enjoying watching him squirm.

“But I told Maili and the rest that we ought to be a bit less invasive with the mortals and maybe consider being more respectful. She thinks it’s because of my mortal.” Sionnach looked defensive, tilting his chin upward and staring directly at Jayce, as he continued, “I think treating mortals like toys is just not where we need to be. The world’s changed and—”

“So have you. Good idea,” Jayce interjected with a faux-somber look.

Rika looked stunned and a little speechless.

“It’s not just because of Caris— . . . the mortal,” Sionnach added hurriedly with a look at Rika. “Now that the Summer King has power for the first time in centuries, there will be trouble. He’ll be trying to be strong enough to