My eyes slowly crack open, and my first thoughts aren't of the brightness of the lights everywhere around me but that the constant throb of pain means I'm alive. I'm alive! "Ugh," is about the only noise I can make. My eyes squint at the overhead lights, but I close them as they're far too strong for me right now.

"Ori?! Orion! Yo! He's awake!"

I can hear a shuffle of movement around, and I try to force my eyes to comply and open up once again. They slowly crack open, but sluggishly, like they're not entirely under my control.

"I'm… alive? We–we won?" I croak.

"Dude hey, hell yeah, you're alive! You've been out for a week now. You want some water or anything?"

"Water." My scratchy throat also aches, and my voice only comes out as a strangled whisper.

"Alright, okay, here. Let's slowly raise you a little so you don't drown or something."

I feel my upper body slowly shifting as the bed underneath me also shifts, Khalil carefully making it so I'm sitting more upward than flat. Even that little bit of movement causes bolts of pain to spread outwards through my body. I grimace, unable to hide the pain from my face.

"Here dude, just a little sip to start."

I comply, letting Khalil pour a little stream of cool water into my mouth. I slowly swallow it down, but the pain is immense when I do, and it causes me to gag a little.

"Oh hell, I gave you too much!"

Coughing for a moment, I manage to shake my head and rasp.

"No, it just hurts to swallow."

"Dude, am I so happy to see your ugly mug again."

"H–How did we win?"

"We did not." Aria's face slides into my field of vision as she leans slowly from the opposite side of the medical bed.

"What?"

"No one won, Orion."

"Tallulah?"

"Killed. As was Percival."

"How are we still alive?"

"Kofi Freeman recognized that his house was the one who broke the hospitality agreement."

"Dude, that isn't what happened, Aria. I mean, he did, but that isn't how it went down, not even close."

There are glowering glances between the two, and I grimace.

"We'll talk about it when you feel a little better, my dude. Don't worry about it for right now."

I spy Aria's left arm in an extended cast that matches the same one on my arm. She has free movement, though, while my arm is in a sling that holds it next to my body without allowing me to move it. My pale eyes trail over Khalil, who looks fit as a fiddle.

"How are you never ever the one hurt? Luckiest fey alive, I swear."

"Dude, you know I'm too sexy. No one wants to hurt me."

I groan and slowly raise my free arm and hand towards the bottle Khalil opened to pour water into my mouth a few minutes prior. He hands it to me this time, and I carefully sip some water from the bottle. The agony in my throat is lessened when I only take small sips of water at a time, so that's what I do.

"We have an agreement with Selena Conghal." Aria murmurs.

"What kind of agreement?"

"Aria, don't you think we should bring up the heavy stuff when he's in a better headspace?"

"Khalil."

"Dude, no, you need to rest."

"Khalil. I'm fine. I've rested long enough. It doesn't look like I'm moving from this bed in the next day or two, so tell me what's happening at the very least."

Khalil throws up his hands in exasperation, letting Aria continue.

"The fey that wish to return to the Wilds will go in two nights. Khalil went and tracked down Fasolt. Once told of the situation, he offered to open a seam in Asheville immediately so they can all return to their village or wherever they choose to go."

"All of this already?"

"Yes. You were unconscious for a week." Aria flatly murmurs.

"Right, I forgot he said that. What was the agreement, though? We got what we wanted, but what did they get?"

"They wanted a meeting with your patron," Aria says somewhat derisively for her.

"Cass? She can't."

"What do you mean?"

"She literally can't leave the Wilds until she does something."

"What something?"

"I don't know, Aria, she never would say; I'm just saying that's going to be a hard agreement to keep our end of the bargain on."

"I see. I will speak with Selena on this."

"Nah, let me do it. She will have to come here since apparently I can't move yet." I grimace, my voicebox starting to ache. "Ugh, how bruised up is my throat? I feel like I'm trying to swallow rocks."

"Dude, the skin tone of your face and throat is, like, 'legit dark purple right now."

"I will ask her to join us."

"Well, let me get a couple hours more of rest before you do…"

"You are fine, Orion. It is only mid-afternoon. You see the sun. Close your eyes and rest."

"Oh, man, maybe I really am out of it."

I carefully set the water bottle on the little table next to my medical bed and then looked for the controls to lower my bed. Once I found them, I carefully lowered my bed and body to a more comfortable position.

Erica, the nurse who originally tended my wounds, peers around Khalil and smiles at me before injecting something into the IV by my bed. My eyes go heavy a few moments later, and warmth relaxes my body. Seconds later, I'm sleeping.

* * *

A light fluttering of cold fingers touches the side of my face, gently caressing my battered and bruised skin. When I start to crack my eyes open, the pale skin of the blurry vision that starts to come into focus makes me initially smile. However, as my eyes gain more lucidity, I see it's not Cassandra touching my face. Instead, it's Selena Conghal's beautiful face. I don't have an instinctive reaction to jerk back, but I'm sure my face falls slightly in disappointment.

"Ah, there you are. Apologies, I'm not her."

She doesn't even pretend not to know who I thought she was, which is a little refreshing. Starting off with vampire games three seconds into waking would be a rough way to start the night.

"Your lovely Khalil partner is right outside of the door, and your other sullen one is–well, actually, I've not the slightest clue where she is. I'm sure she's stalking about being surly or whatever else it is that she does when not killing things."

I reach over towards where I vaguely remember leaving my bottle of opened water; sure enough, it's there. I take a couple of slow sips from the bottle before even trying to talk in return to Selena.

"Sorry, throat was dry. Hurts, too."

"It looks so very much like it does."

Her dark eyes are focused on my battered face with an unwavering sort of interest. Immediately, I feel terribly uncomfortable being in such proximity to this predator, especially in my vulnerable state. As if she doesn't notice whatsoever, she continues smoothly talking, her voice like silk and satin all wrapped in one.

"Before we get started, I'd like to say that I was extremely surprised to learn you survived. You should consider yourself very lucky." She barely gives me time to even acknowledge her statement before continuing, "I was informed there was a little bit of a problem with our arrangement concerning the exodus of your faerie peoples."

"Cassandra can't come back here yet, so she can't meet with you."

"Cassandra Bentham, your patron?"

"Yeah."

"She can't 'come back here'? What does that mean, exactly?"

"I don't really know the details, sorry. I just know she told me she can't leave the Wilds until she finishes some kind of task. Cassandra made some serious promise to someone. She made it sound magical, like a fey's blood oath, which means the Wilds' essence will punish you if you break your word."

"And this is your patron, yes?"

My anxiety increases slightly when she repeats "patron" a second time, and I try to cover it by taking a slow sip of water.

"Yep."

"How curious."

I blandly look up at her smooth, alabaster-colored face. When our eyes meet, she gives me a languid smile of her painted ruby lips. She knows. I can just tell. This feels a little like a slow twist of a knife.

"You know, Orion–may I call you Orion?"

"That's my name, so yeah, sure."

"Mmm. Orion. You know, at first, I thought perhaps as you were so wounded in the forest last week against some of our house that you must have used up the strength of your patron Cassandra Bentham's blood in your system and, thus, why you could no longer rapidly heal your injuries. This made excellent sense as these sorts of things sometimes happen in violent times."

I elect not to say anything, so I don't dig my hole of lies any deeper.

"And yet, the most curious thing happened. I spoke with Christina Freeman–yes, of the very same Kofi Freeman name–and she had quite an interesting tale to tell me in quiet confidence."

I carefully take a sip of water. Selena smiles at me again as I do, but it's not a real smile; it's a smile from someone who knows they've caught someone in a lie and will draw out the process as long as they please. Selena leans forward, lowering her voice to a murmur that only she and I can hear. If Khalil is right outside of the door, there's no chance he overhears her because she sets her lips right next to one of my pointed ears.

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"Do they even know what is supposed to be entailed in patronage?"

"No," I swallow thickly, "at least I'm pretty sure they don't."

"Tsk-tsk. You bad, bad… bad boy. All of this is because you spun a little white lie in order to stop a confrontation."

I carefully swallow again and feel a few beads of sweat pop up on my forehead from nervousness. I try to casually take a sip of water while my anxiety increases from Selena's vicinage to my throat.

"You haven't the slightest clue what you have done, do you?"

"I was protecting my people."

"Yes, I suppose in that moment you thought you were, but now you've set something very interesting in motion." The way she says interesting makes it sound like it's a bad thing in this case.

She slowly leans back from my pointed ear, not touching me nor making moves to. My heartbeat–which I didn't realize had increased from my anxiety of Selena's proximity–starts to slow once she moves a little away. She casually moves a chair next to me and sits in it, taking care to very methodically cross her legs and look me over in the same manner. This woman honestly scares me, I suddenly realize.

"What–what do you mean?"

"Your fey, they return to the Wilds, or whatever it's called. They live happily ever after?"

"Sure. I guess? I'm not a fortune spinner."

"But here, you've caused three draugar deaths–well, soon to be four. There is also that you somehow corrupted a willing pet fey we were training and rather growing accustomed to having around to tell us little tidbits and play with–who then subsequently died because she decided to have an emotional crisis. That's not to mention what happens when the Falcon House finds out via some rumor that supposedly one of their patronaged minions was assaulted under the guise of hospitality–by not just the House of the Bear, but the very eldest one."

Not knowing exactly what to say to all of that, I sit wordlessly for at least a full minute. Finally, I just decided to go with an admittance of ignorance.

"I don't know anything about your people and houses or politics or anything like that, sorry."

"I very much can tell, Orion of the Wilds."

"Um, sorry?"

"Were it only so easy to smooth it all over with a simple apology."

I lapse into silence again, taking the last few slow drinks of the water left in the bottle. Carefully, I try to set the bottle back on the table next to me, but since there's hardly any weight to it, I accidentally knock it over while trying to put it down. It clatters noisily around.

"But it isn't all terrible doom and gloom. I know your little secret, little faerie. For now, I'll keep it, as will Christina Freeman."

"You're not going to kill her, are you?" I say, just realizing that Selena corrected the number of deaths to four instead of three.

"Oh heavens no. She's the best draugar to be turned in many years; it's frankly a shame she isn't mine and that Kofi will take the glory for her turning in the future. She will be an exemplary member of our house as she gains experience, strength, and age. No, no, we can't have Vincent de Burgh poking about, asking questions about what happened to his maker other than the obvious, now can we?"

"Whatever you say, lady."

"Hopefully, his scions won't have also to be tidied up. Truly, this is quite a mess you've created."

She leans forward slightly as if she were letting me in on a little secret. The chair is the only thing that makes noise when she shifts forward. Immediately my heartbeat increases along with my trepidation from her close presence once again.

"I'm going to keep your secret because you did me a little favor."

"What favor did I do?"

"Percival de Burgh, good riddance."

"He was what to you?"

"My maker, which was the only good thing he's done in two hundred years. Well, aside from turning my darling Kofi."

"You guys are seriously messed up. There is so much death, and not even caring about or celebrating it. I don't even get you people at all."

"I see your ears, so I thought perhaps initially that you were a little older than you looked. But I can tell that is not the case, and you are a younger one, aren't you?"

"Old enough. Just because I find killing people distasteful doesn't mean I'm a young idiot."

"No, but potentially causing a host of problems that lead to an unknown number of lives lost, touched, or changed dramatically? Yes, for that, you are a bit of a bumbling, 'young idiot.' I was hoping to curtail some of those issues-to-be by speaking to your supposed patron in advance, but since we both know that she isn't your patron and apparently is stuck in faerie-land, that's obviously a problem I'm also going to have to solve as well."

"I mean, you could still talk to her, but you'd have to go into the Wilds to do it."

She blurts out a clipped laugh, suggesting that what I just said was one of the most hilarious things she's heard all night, if not all week.

"Me? Go to your Wilds? Don't be ridiculous. I'd rather not run about covered from your faerie sun all of the time dressed like some savage or whatever else it is that Cassandra Bentham must do there."

"What are you talking about? The sun in the Wilds doesn't kill your kind. I guess it's just really annoying. I don't obviously know from first-hand experience, but I can tell you for a fact that her bare skin doesn't burst into flames when the sun touches her there."

She fixes me once again with one of her contemplative looks as if she were either trying to decide if I was lying or trying to decide what angle I was playing at.

"Curious."

"I mean, we could always do it old school. We travel and do trade all of the time, as Wilder. It's one of the benefits of not being part of a bigger tribe; we can do what we want. Anyway, I got off-topic. What I meant to say is that you could always write a letter, and I could deliver it. Then if Cass–andra," I have to add the second part of her name at the end and pretend I didn't, "wants to write you back, we can bring it through a seam to deliver it. Easy. Like I said, old school. I mean it's more work for me potentially, but it's not like I'm going to be using this arm any time soon, huh? Might as well keep myself busy doing something."

She tilts her head to study me for a few long seconds and then nods finally.

"Very well, we accept this alteration of our arrangement."

"Cool then." I slowly relax my muscles, having not realized they were so tense.

Selena continues to look at me with her current affable features–a perfect example of a dangerous vampire. Finally, her lips start to creep into a very slightly impish smile.

"I must ask her how she did it in the post-script."

"Did what?"

"Made a foolish little faerie boy fall in love with her without becoming his patron."

"Please, please, please don't."

She laughs softly, and it almost sounds genuine, before she moves and begins to stand up.

"Three 'pleases' without effort? Tsk-tsk. Were I only so lucky most nights. I should do it anyway in repayment for how terribly rude you were over the radio. I suppose you'll have to wait and see." Selena changes her tone a little after her little choice teasing. "They've told me you will be on your feet in a day or two. I will have a letter sealed and ready to be delivered by then. I'll have someone deliver it by hand here to you, and you'll find it when you wake. Good night, Orion. Try not to accidentally cause any more ordeals while you are here. We already have too many things going on and do not need more."

I mumbled a good night to her, and as she moved out of the room to leave, I watched her go. A few minutes later, Erica's smiling face returns to inject a small thing into my IV once again, causing blissful numbness and sleep to take over my body once again.

* * *

A little noise or disturbance slowly brings me out of sleep. My eyes are still heavy, but I try to blink away the sluggishness while I look around. The daylight filtering in through the window tells me that it must be the next day, and I grunt, trying to figure out what noise I'd heard. Khalil comes walking out of the bathroom next to me, and he excitedly exclaims when he sees I'm awake.

"Hey dude. Welcome back again. You were out for a long time."

"How long?" My voice sounds and feels like sandpaper again. I smack my lips a couple of times, which causes Khalil to get a bottle of water and open it for me. While he continues talking, I sip carefully at the water. My throat feels immensely better now, though.

"Couple days again. Aria's taking the horde down to Asheville–I guess, technically, she started taking them a few hours ago. I said I was going to stay here with you; not going to leave my dude alone with these crazy bloodsuckers."

"Thanks Khalil." I manage to smile.

"Sure, no problem. So, you ready to get up and move around? They wanted to let you get your rest and all that and let you decide when you were ready to start moving. You want a mirror? You're almost back to your handsome lady-killing self."

"I'll get up."

"Whoa, whoa, slow down turbo. They gotta cut you out of some casting around your ribs and maybe fit you with some fabric sleeve or something. Let me get that nurse that fancies you. I'll be right back."

He doesn't even give me a chance to agree or not before he's out of the doorway. I use my uninjured free hand to rub at my bleary eyes. Once my eyes clear from their partially blurry state, I see a simple brown square envelope lying on the side table where I was just about to place my water bottle. A legitimate red wax seal with a pressed bear symbol is on the back, firmly sealing the envelope closed. Next to it, there's a small white folded paper, taped closed, with my name handwritten on it. I slowly reach over to pick up the note with my name on it, then tug it open before carefully reading it over.

> Orion,

>

> Our little chat was quite illuminating. You'll find the letter to be delivered in a brown envelope. It is sealed and should be delivered as such. I believe you referred to it as "old school." Please mind the letter delivery etiquette of that time and do not break the seal.

>

> S.C.

>

> P.S. If you need an actual patron, come and see me. We could have a lovely time together for a very long time.

I groan inwardly after reading the note before folding it back up and moving to stuff it carefully into my pants pocket–or would have if I had any pants on. Hearing footfalls coming and thinking quickly, I reach over and slide the note underneath the brown envelope so no one is tempted to open and read it.

Shortly after I hide the personal note from Selena, the pair of Khalil and Erica come clomping into the room. Erica shoos Khalil back out and then pulls the door closed in front of him, telling him it's for my own dignity and that he can wait outside for a few minutes. I slowly struggle to sit up, my muscles having not really worked for over a week, and I need a chance to get back into the swing of things.

Erica helps me to my feet, taking care not to inflict undue pressure on me. Then, she walks around me, inspecting the stiff, protective torso cast that covers my ribs. Erica tells me her plans to remove the cast and then explains to me not to wrap my ribs because she doesn't want to have the potential to add too much pressure on them since I'm so active. We get started, and it isn't long before she has the protective cast cut away from my body.

She goes on to explain that the break on my arm was quite severe, and it went through the skin. Rattling off medical terminology that I don't understand, I managed to gather that they were able to set the bone and reinforce it, but it is going to take quite some time to heal. She wants me to keep the cast on it for as long as possible, and then in two months, she says I can carefully cut it away, so long as I promise not to do anything strenuous for a week or two after its removal.

When I ask about my throat, she says that other than bruising and some tissue trauma, it should be completely fine in a few more days, though the bruising might take another week to clear up.

After she finishes, I make sure to tell her that I sincerely appreciate everything she, personally, has done for me and that if she ever finds herself having a reason to seek out faeries, I would be indebted to her and would always be happy to give her a little tour before she comes back here. That seems to brighten her up a bit more than I expected it to, and she seems to have a little bounce to her step as she moves to head out once I'm all dressed and decent.

Khalil walks in, looking over his shoulder after Erica, then back at me. He shakes his head.

"You just can't help it, can you?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Come on, dude. She was all rosy-cheeked and happy. You gotta stop flirting with everyone that has tits."

"Khalil, chill. I wasn't flirting with her. Unlike some people who use flattery and dumb nonsense to get people to like them, I'm likable. People like me. I make them feel good about themselves and do good things."

I grin at him, and he laughs at me, then both of us laugh together for a little bit. I shuffle over to pick up the brown envelope and carefully slip the white note underneath it into one of my pants' pockets.

"What's that?"

"Our half of the agreement with the vampires here. I'm delivering an official letter or whatever to Cassandra. Guess I'm going to be a carrier reafan back and forth for them for a bit."

"Hey, uh, look. That Selena woman…"

"Yeah, she's definitely dangerous, even though she doesn't look like it."

"Well, yeah, 'course she is. She's alright though, and I like her. We talked a little while you were out."

"Khalil, what did you do?"

"Oh wait–no, no, I haven't done anything! I was just wondering what it'd be like to, you know, fu–"

"–Seriously, don't, she's nothing like Cassandra."

"Alright, alright. Fine."

"Seriously, man."

"I said alright! Damn joy-killer. Your boy is just trying to taste the rainbow of life. All colors, shapes, and sizes." He gives me the most crooked grin I've ever seen from him. I blurt out a laugh before I can stop it and immediately hold my side.

"Man, you are so stupid; just shut up, honestly." I can't help but try to stifle a couple of laughs for a few more seconds.

He keeps grinning at me, and then we both make our way out of the infirmary room. Before too long, we've gathered all our things together, gotten our backpacks, and are standing alone in a parlor together. Since there doesn't seem to be anyone loitering around, we both give each other a fist bump and handshake hug.

"We did it."

"Yeah, yeah, we did. Let's go home, man."

Both of us make a little cut on the back of our necks over the mark of the traveler. A few paces later, Khalil comes to a dead stop.

"Fuck!"

"What?!" I startle in alarm at his sudden curse.

"I just cut my mark, dude."

"Yeah? So what? I did, too. It's how we get back, you know this."

"Dude, yeah, obviously I know that. I got currency cash in my backpack! I was supposed to buy some more of those flaming hot cheese puffs! Fuck!"

I look at him for at least three seconds before laughing and holding my side to try and stem the twinges of pain each time I laugh.

"Well, too late now. Any door you go through is taking you back. Guess you're just going to have to wait until next time you're here to restock."

"Dude, this was the absolute worst vacation ever."

I smirk some before I tug him along with me. He sulks, and I laugh once again before we choose to walk through the nearest doorway of the homestead, knowing it will take us exactly where we want to go: home to the Wilds.