Rhys
was
pissed.
Which was sort of new for him. Mostly he just felt boredom, mild amusement, and mild irritation. Strong emotions weren't really in his repertoire and hadn't been for a good chunk of his life. That was what happened, when one's wings were ripped away at a young age. Before he had even formed a personality, it was all gone. All of... anything he might have cared about, hobbies he might have enjoyed, skills he might have wanted to learn.
Rhys was in a perpetual state of boredom. Listless, lifeless. Unless he was hunting something down, which entertained him for a time but he was so easily bored that even that only sparked any interest for so long.
But now? Now he was rightly angry. So, this idiot wanted to drum in the fact that he was a friend, did he? And then he wanted to leave? He should be grateful that Rhys even gave him any time at all to leave before the hounds were after him and the hounds were literal. Fairy hounds. Dark fae. Not nice creatures with corrosive, slavering mouths with rows of sharp teeth and glowing red eyes. Rhys' father loved them, in the way he loved anything. For their usefulness and their brutality.
Rhys entered the apartment he shared with a handful of the others, Raphael being one of them. He hadn't been here to pack or take his things. Good. Rhys began to gather things up so he could burn them to ashes. Raphael liked his stupid little souvenirs, his coffee cups and the collection he'd amassed for his human life--his books for class, his backpack, his "cute" lunch tin he just had to have.
"What are you doing?"
A familiar voice intoned. Rhys hadn't even heard him come in. He was just there, standing in the doorway with that casual smirk, watching as Rhys gathered things together like he was the one about to skip town. Rhys tossed the tin he'd been holding and tossed it carelessly away into the corner of the room. Raphael's room. If he answered with the truth, there was no head start. Keith was worse than any dark fae hound.
"Looking for something," Rhys said.
Keith bit into the apple he was holding, the very picture of casual. He stood there without a shirt on, his hair wet from a shower. He'd been inside the apartment the entire time but Rhys had been too absorbed in his anger to notice it.
"Well... what is it? Maybe I can help you... find it." The way he said it, Rhys got the feeling he didn't believe him.
"It's the key to the library. He was supposed to find a book for me and give it back."
Keith laughed, then tossed the apple at Rhys, who caught it merely out of reflex. Annoyingly, he caught it where Keith had already taken a bite. Rhys watched as Keith entered the bedroom and moved straight for Raf's bed. Leaning down, he put his hand underneath and retrieved an ornate golden key.
"This thing?"
Rhys reached down and plucked it out of Keith's hand.
"Yes," he said, "that's what I was looking for."
"Next time just ask me first before you destroy the kid's room," Keith said in amusement, eyebrow raised as he took in the mess that had become Raf's room. "Idiot."
Rhys' eyes narrowed but he said nothing more, just took the key he hadn't even been looking for and left Keith in the room alone.
Well fuck.
Satine stood in front of the apartment building, arms akimbo, staring up with distaste in her expression. She didn't like these apartments. They were disgustingly rectangular, devoid of structure or design. Just a fucking box they stuck people into like sardines in a can. Humans. Even if she was one, she had never grown up in their world and so everything was weird and different and unsightly.
Back where she came from—she refused to call it a home—there were dark spires like claws extending into the sky. There were also hovels, slums, with houses slumped over like hunchbacks and grimy cracked windows flickering with oily, weak light. If you weren't anyone, you weren't worth shit back there.
Yet, Satine never managed to rise above being worth less than shit.
Ironic, given that she was raised by the so-called royal family. Her lip curled just thinking about them. Something dark in her chest curled too, but rehashing all the ways she'd been wronged wasn't why she was here. She'd been out here too long. She wanted something familiar without being nauseated by all of the shitty memories that she harbored of her past.
Supposedly, Rhys was here with his little tagalong friend and... Keith. If ever there was someone who deserved to be banished to hell, it was Keith. Hopefully he wasn't around; Satine couldn't be held responsible for what she might do to him on sight. She started to go inside the building when that familiar face she'd been looking for stormed out. It looked like he didn't see her, because she waited for some sign of recognition but... nothing. Rhys looked distracted despite his stoney-faced expression.
"Ey. Little fairy boy." That was safe to yell here; at most someone would think she was some kind of blatant homophobe, which was all right by her. Didn't make it true. Satine strode towards him, her glossy dark boots clicking with each step. "You too good to acknowledge your own sister now?" The words were abrasive, after her usual fashion, but the slight smile on her face was not.
Rhys heard the shout but didn't look up. He recognized the voice and he knew that if she saw him and acknowledged him, that meant she would follow him. There was no point in stopping for her. She'd catch up.
All of Rhys' life, Satine had been there. She was older than he was by a couple of years, so she was a regular fixture in his life, just like his mother, just like his father. But she was the least... terrible influence by far. To Rhys, she was the parts of his mother that had been robbed from her when she had been tied forever to his father. Rhys understood it on the surface; she was a pooka--a type of fae that was known to be free, mischievous, playful. His mother had lost all of those things over time.
Rhys' first memory was of her crying. He didn't remember how old he was but it was before he lost his wings. "I can't lose another one," she said. Rhys didn't know what she meant then but he did now. He didn't know about her lost son, the one she'd been forced to trade for Satine. It was before Rhys knew that Satine wasn't a fairy like him, before he understood why Satine was on the outside when he was not.
His mother never loved her. Satine. But she loved Rhys with every fiber of her being. Rhys knew, because he could see it, even if his lack of wings meant he couldn't feel it anymore. Rhys was the only child she still had left and she thought constantly of that son robbed from her, taken away to be with humans.
They both cried, though. Rhys had seen it. They didn't love each other, the two women in his life. But they were both sad. When Rhys was young, he used to play with her. As children often do, they were silly little games, like hide and seek or playing out in the big lake that surrounded their castle home. They would catch pixies and swim naked in the shallow end of the lake. They drew pictures when the weather was bad and they would make up stories for the pictures and they were the main characters, going on adventures together. They were only a couple of years apart, after all. But as the ennui inside of him grew, they too seemed to grow apart.
If there was still any part of the old Rhys inside of him, it remained with her.
"I heard you," he said as he kept going but he did spare her a glance. "What are you doing here?"
Satine regretted a lot of shit from that god-forsaken place she came from, but she never regretted Rhys. He was the only one worth staying for around there, the only little bit of brightness in an otherwise pitch-black past. Maybe it was because they were raised together. Maybe because they spent so much time together and were of a similar age, it was easier to form an attachment.
See, Satine didn't have issues with feelings and emotions; she wasn't Fallen. That seemed to be a theme in her life. Not being things, not being enough. Not belonging. But Rhys never made her feel that way, even if they drifted apart gradually over the years. Satine knew it was because he was a Fallen that his feelings became dulled and faded, that the inquisitive and bright little brother she used to play with and roll around on the grass with as they wrestled and tussled was still in there, just corrupted. The memories of him couldn't be corrupted though. That was what mattered in the end.
She strode along after him, double-time. Two steps to his one, with those fucking long legs of his. Satine snorted. Sure he heard her. "What do you think?" She didn't come here to see Keith that was for damn sure. And she tolerated Rhys' little buttnerd lackey, Raphael, but she wouldn't make a trip all the way down here for that little air-head. Yet, she was reluctant to say that she missed him. It took a while for her own feelings to get warmed up, okay?
Catching up, she elbowed him lightly in the side. "Your hair on fire or something? In a hurry to get places?" Shit, where the hell was he storming off to? Satine's sharp glance slid over him, taking in the tension in his jaw and the steely look in his eyes. That look that said he was determined to not feel a certain way about something. Rare for one who had been fallen for so long. Feelings. Hah.
"Where's your dumb little shadow?" His absence was noticeable; usually he was dog-trotting after Rhys, babbling about something or other in that annoyingly chipper voice of his.
"In a hurry to get away."
Nowhere in particular. He wasn't actually certain what he was doing or where he was going. Just that he had almost been caught by Keith. And that could have ended badly for Raf. Not so much Rhys; he was protected for now. He was the king's only fully trained and capable son. It seemed like his experimentations only bred miserable wretches who declined into lives of hedonism. Jack Ripley's only saving grace was falling in love with a royal fairy. The other one was still on the line.
"He's—"
He wished he could tell her. But he couldn't. He couldn't tell anybody. Not yet. He said he'd give him that head start so he was giving it to him. The stupid fool! Why did he have to say anything? He could have left his intentions to himself and Rhys could pretend he knew nothing.
It was obvious though. Not long after they came here. It was so obvious that Raf would never want to go back. It was the part of him that wasn't gone. Whatever was happening, he should have shown it to Rhys but he probably knew how that would go too.
"He's running errands for me."
He slowed his steps.
"How's your mission been going?"
"Don't blame you," Satine muttered—she'd been trying to get away for years. Out here in the middle of fucking nowhere, it still wasn't far enough away from him.. She scrutinized Rhys again as he seemed to forcibly rein himself in. Errands, huh? That was normal enough; lackeys weren't good for much else. "Is he going to come back with another sack load of teacups?" That kid had a weird fetish. Or maybe he was a hoarder, but Satine definitely thought he had issues.
At the mention of her own mission, she cracked a dark smile. "Going okay." Satine wasn't saying much more else. Rhys was her little brother—her beloved little brother, even—but some secrets weren't meant to be shared. And he wouldn't understand. He had been doted on and appreciated since birth; he was the heir to the throne, practically, raised by the king's own hand and fashioned after his own image. By all accounts, Rhys was the golden child. Not a drop of rebellion in him, either, and he was loyal to a fault.
"Needed a break from goddamn Sal though. You busy? Wanna go relax?" By which she obviously meant—go and hunt something. Killing was their job but it didn't mean they couldn't enjoy it, either, and it was a great outlet for any pent-up frustrations.
"...probably."
Not. Probably not. Rhys didn't say it but he doubted he was ever going to see anymore new teacups again. And it shouldn't have made him feel a certain way but it did and that bothered him. This wasn't normal, none of it was normal. The sudden anger that came over him when he realized Raf was a turncoat was troubling.
They were both hiding things. Rhys could tell she wasn't sharing the whole story but he didn't press. He never pressed. He just let it go, let her do her thing. She was literally the only human he could stand but she was still a human. Rhys couldn't say he fully understood how they thought or felt about things. And she probably knew that. She had to know that; she wasn't an idiot.
"Sure," he said. "I'm the furthest thing from busy right now."
What was he going to do? Actually go to the library because he pretended he needed the key? Keith wasn't watching him. He was probably too busy getting wet over the thought of Jack Ripley. Gag.
"And I could use a little blood on my hands."
Something to remind himself of who he really was. Something to kill.
"That's my boy." She patted him on the back, and then almost as though she had to think it through, paused and rubbed it gently the way she used to when he was ill or troubled. Something was wrong. Something was off. She could tell when he was blasé and ho-hum life is boring, and she could tell when something disturbed that status quo. For Fallen, feelings and emotions were weird things. Forbidden things. Their very power depended on them being void of all emotion and yet their own natures fought against that. They were fae once; they were made in the image of beauty rather than to sow the seeds of chaos.
Thank fuck she was human, for that one reason. Thank whatever fucker was up there or down there that she hadn't been born with wings. To have everything that made her unique stripped from her was almost too much to bear. She still remembered secretly crying when Rhys had his removed. Magically excised. That fucker up on that throne did it himself, with his own two hands, and he was damned proud of it.
That fucker.
"This way." Satine redirected her steps to her car, which could take them to better hunting grounds than downtown fucking Hazleton or the suburbs. Someplace where they could hunt with complete freedom, where dying screams couldn't be heard. "I know where some ferals might be hiding out." For the challenge.
The motion was familiar and calming. Before everything became shades of black, white, and grey, Rhys used to actually be quite the animated kid. Everything about him then was the picture of mischief, taking strongly after his mother in that regard. A button nose and a wide smile, windswept curls and limbs like a colt, Rhys looked like Trouble with a capital T.
And he was. He had a wide imagination back then. Nothing could bore him. Everything was a curiosity and he and Satine had an entire black castle and its surrounding lands to explore.
The change after his wings were robbed for him weren't immediately apparent because he had been so young. But in time, it was as if everything that ever made him who he was began to... disappear. Colors faded. His imagination--which used to soar--became stale, stagnating. All of his curiosity became much milder. Soon, he was mired in a world of boredom, of disdain.
Rhys' mother cried for him when he couldn't cry anymore. Her poor heart couldn't take it. One son, robbed and switched for a child she didn't want, the other robbed of his soul right before her eyes.
Following Satine's lead, Rhys got into the car. Ferals. Now that sounded up their alley. They could kill them; they were basically mutated humans anyway. The feral ones were even worse. Or maybe better, since they were less connected to their humanity. Really, they were just animals to Rhys.
"I'm sure you've heard by now that Keith failed." He crossed his arms. "My precious half brother still has his wings and doesn't even know it..."
It really was like watching Rhys dying before her eyes, the way his personality faded. Satine was too young to know what to do back then and even now, she wasn't sure if the path she forged for herself was the right one. She couldn't tell anyone about it; she could confide in no one. But that was the last straw. When she realized that the Rhys she knew and loved wouldn't come back, there truly was nothing left for her. Without Rhys—her Rhys, her precious, spirited, lively little brother—what was she hanging around for? To be denigrated and looked down on? To serve some mad fallen king hell-bent on converting all of the fae across the world to fallen?
In the car she was quiet for a moment, letting him talk. She focused on driving. "Mm I heard. Seems like you've got trouble on your hands, with that fae prince he's tangled up with. You think he's close to realizing his powers? Did you get anything useful out of the fixer you found?"
That was a stroke of luck—fixers were rare even in the fae realm, but one with that much information on their target? He was a sitting duck, practically. Satine only heard whispers here and there through her connections in town, but Rhys would let her know all of the major developments, she was sure. Jack Ripley wasn't her problem anyway; she had her own mission with Niall Gallagher, and keeping tabs on him until the King himself could come to reclaim his child. But Satine, she had other plans—plans that didn't involve waiting around like a good little girl. Not this time.
Part of him was a little envious. Jack Ripley... Born of a human and His Darkness, The Fallen King. Rhys wasn't envious of the half human part. But he was envious that he had been gifted so much freedom. Rhys' freedom was gone once he Fell. For a short time, that chafed at him but over time, like everything else, it lost its color and Rhys lost interest.
But being out here, out from under his father's thumb and most of his advisors and all of his watchers, it was different. He could understand, a little, why Raf was so enchanted with this place. With freedom. And all the things he never had growing up in the dark palace.
Rhys looked down at his nails. Clean. Like he never killed anything or anybody at all. But the fixer was gone now. All the usefulness wrung out of him.
"Not much, but enough. I think he's very close to realizing his powers and Keith needs to stop playing games with him." The games were fun and all but not nearly so fun when they had so much riding on this. Of course, if Keith failed, he would take the fall and the punishment. But some part of Rhys thought this was also meant as a test for himself. How good was he if he couldn't even handle a couple of subordinates? And he'd already lost one. Meanwhile, the other was too busy getting off to make the final strike.
But Jack Ripley wasn't the only one they'd come to collect. Rhys looked over at Satine.
"How's the Niall Gallagher situation? I heard somebody tried to cast against him and it failed. He's probably got a lot of strong protection spells all over him." And not just from his human family. Rhys was well aware of his mother's feelings for her firstborn son. She wouldn't give him up without a fight and some said a mother's love spells were the strongest the world could know.
"Keith is a fucking asshat," Satine growled, secretly hoping that Keith did fail just so she could see him getting torn apart by the king. Not her king, though. Not even her real dad. Her real dad was somewhere out in Ireland with the rest of her family, never even knowing that their baby daughter had been taken from them and replaced with a fae baby.
And they were hunters, was the real irony in all of this. Her family was legacy. They hunted since the beginning of time, taking down scum like those ferals that she and Rhys were about to go an decimate. They probably also hunted fae, and fallen. Well, that part was unavoidable but Satine was sure that she could at least protect Rhys if it had to come down to it. Rhys was her brother, if not by blood then by tears alone. She loved him in her black heart, as much as anyone could love another person. (Or non-person, as it were.)
"Oh you heard about Sri." Satine's laugh was unamused and dark. "Spell rebounded so bad, he was torn to shreds. Wasn't pretty." After that they decided to take a step back and reformulate their original plans. "We've been taking turns keeping an eye on him. That hunter boy he's with isn't much of an issue, because he's human, but we're not equipped to deal with fae magic that strong. Probably need to wait for a Surge to get him really defenceless, enough to corrupt him."
That was their plan—her plans with Sal were ridiculously simple. Get in and stab the fucker in the heart. No fae magic could defend against a blade, after all. Satine pulled off the highway, down a stretch of bumpy side road. "Ready to fuck somebody's day up?" She smiled over at Rhys. If they couldn't have a good day, nobody else better be having a good day around them either.
Nobody was going to argue with Satine there. Keith was like the exact monster soldier that the king must have wanted. Sadistic. Murderous. Something about him really attached to Jack Ripley, though. It was his job to taint his soul and break him to the point of falling. But Keith took it to extremes. And it was obvious he was fully enjoying himself. Rhys... didn't know how to feel about it. He didn't particularly care what happened to Jack Ripley--half brother or not--he just didn't know if that was what he wanted for himself. To get on that level one day.
"At least it wasn't you."
Satine might be human but she'd learned a few tricks, living with fairies. Consuming fairy food. She could cast if she wanted to, a different kind of magic than a human witch, but a kind of magic nonetheless. Rhys was relieved it wasn't her that took that spell. He couldn't--didn't want to--imagine her being blown apart by powerful fae magic.
"Or you could corrupt the human hunter," Rhys said casually. If Niall Gallagher cared for him, corrupting him could be that simple. Love was such a powerful thing. Some said it was an innate natural spell of its own. Rhys wondered what it felt like. Wondered why they eschewed it for great and terrible dark power that might not even be enough to dispel... love.
"Killing him wouldn't be enough," he said, "but corrupting him and making him watch his lover change... that could be the tipping point."
And he said this out of an experienced understanding. He saw what happened to his mother when the corruption reached Rhys. Watching a loved one change... corrupted a part of them, too.
Not wanting to really dwell on it a moment longer, Rhys was more than relieved when they arrived at their destination. Some lone road, some corner of a forest where nobody would see them coming. He looked back at Satine and her devil's smile and he smiled back, grimly.
"Let's fuck shit up."
Or she could just kill him.
Making him suffer like that was the fallen way, or it was Keith's way, but really... Satine didn't hate Niall Gallagher. She didn't know him enough to feel any type of way about him. The little she saw of him during her rounds of staking out his place didn't tell her much. He was a flaming homosexual, that much she knew, but she never heard him talk, didn't see him doing much else. His lover protected him so intensely and so zealously that it was rare to even see Niall Gallagher alone, all by himself.
So... yeah. A blade between the ribs was the most merciful way to get the job done. And then she could join her real family and there, she knew she would be useful. Not only did she know magic, she grew up around it; she could lead them to dens of supernatural creatures and she could finally be accepted. She would be home.
Briefly she glanced at Rhys. He was family, too. He was home once. But now... The fact that he could suggest such a plan was proof positive that he was no longer her little brother. He was just Rhys, son of Drake Nightshade. Prince of the Fallen. So Satine steeled her resolve and nodded. Yes. Fuck shit up. Avoid that weirdness she sensed in him earlier, disregard her own feelings. Just go and kill and feel better about themselves.
"All right." She hopped out lightly, feet crunching on the dry leaves and branches underfoot. Satine didn't wait for Rhys, just as Rhys didn't wait for her back at the apartment. She knew he'd follow, into the woods and between the trees, treading now lightly, avoiding even the slightest bit of wayward noise. Wolves had amazing smell; ferals more so. But Satine cast a quick blinding spell over her to keep her scent out of the air, and crept forward with one hand on her belt, where her fae-crafted daggers were.
Not much to say about that plan? Rhys thought it must be her humanity. Without a real conscience, Rhys could easily come up with horrible ways to harm and torture people, even if that person was his older brother. Still, in the silence as they moved through the forest, he thought about this Niall Gallagher. Rhys saw photos of him, of course. Candid photos, though, shots from far away, taken by spies.
Niall looked like the perfect mixture of their parents. He had their father's hazel eyes and mop of dark, curly hair--just like Rhys, just like Jack. They all took after their father in that way. Height, too. They all got their height from their father. Drake Nightshade was a handsome man; a lot of the fae women--like Raf's mother--wanted him, not just to raise themselves to a higher status but because he was handsome, strong, talented. But he was also hateful, cold, and brutal. Some women liked that. Go figure.
But... from the images, Niall had their mother's softer features, her nose, the shape of her face. Jack Ripley had their father's face--the strength of his chin, his nose. It was strange to look at these two virtual strangers, at their images, their visage... and see familiarity in them. They were his brothers. If he looked at their images too long, he started to... almost feel a flutter of something. But it went away as quickly as it appeared.
In usual hunting fashion, they cloaked themselves from their prey. Rhys didn't pull a weapon like Satine did; he used his fae magic to corrupt and kill. It was all very... hands on. He glanced at Satine, watching her as she moved, quick and light as any fairy. What did she think of the one who was beloved by their mother? Surely, as a human, she felt something for him, even if it was jealousy. Maybe, perhaps, she didn't respond to Rhys' plan because she had come to love him as she watched him. Not really her brother but... he had been raised by her real family. He might as well be a brother to her, in the way Rhys was.
He turned away, looking out over the landscape. Then... He pointed at a pair of wolves who were trotting together in a ravine, tails high, noses low. Seemed like they were looking for something.
Satine avoided over-thinking. It got her through a lot of the shit they made her do to 'prove herself' and her loyalty to the goddamn dark king. Drake Nightshade. What a despicably common storybook name. Like something ripped straight out of a bad fantasy book. It wasn't his real name, she'd bet. Not Drake Nightshade, when he was born a fae. Maybe it was something fruity like Rainbow Joy McSparklepants, and he wanted to get as far away from that as possible. (That was the stupid name she gave the villain in one of her childhood stories, the ones she made up with Rhys back when he was still innocent, before he Fell.)
And really, neither was Satine her real name. It was a name she made for herself because she wanted to distance this monster that she had become from the pure-hearted little girl she used to be. Back when she thought she was their real daughter, that Rhys was her real little brother, and when she hoped one day for her own wings to grow—so that they could be taken from her. The world had a bad way of crushing hopes and dreams. It had a way of grinding certain people down to dust.
But hey, what was the point of bitching and moaning? Satine got shit done. She was no one to be fucked with and the two wolves that Rhys pointed silently out to her were going to learn that the hard way. Satine made a half-circle in the air with her index; she would go one way, Rhys could go another. They'd trap them in a classic pincer movement. With a little crooked grin, she was gone. Adrenaline surged through her body as she sprinted at top speed along the side of the ravine, hidden by a screen of trees.
Where the trees thinned out, she sprang out, daggers drawn. Satine took a flying leap and landed on the back of one of the wolves. Sure sign of a Feral—they were much bigger than the ordinary wolf. More like wolves on steriods. One of her daggers sank into the thick fur at the back of its neck; it let out a sharp yowl and immediately tried to buck her, whipping its slavering, snapping jaws around. Satine let out a growl of her own as the other dagger flashed like a blur through the air, stabbing indiscriminately.
She just wanted to see the blood and the fur fly. To feel the life ebbing from that strong wolf's body. Its companion was already springing at her, jaws bared and howling, but Satine knew Rhys would have her back.
Just like that, there was their prey. Satine went around one way and Rhys the other; there was no way their quarry was getting away from them, he thought with a sense of grim satisfaction.
Satine didn't go easy on the wolf once she came at it--and it really didn't see her coming. The other wolf came at her, its snarling mouth ready to latch onto her--right before Rhys came at it, his dark magic slinging directly at its throat and pulling it back and away from Satine almost as if it had been roped in. As the wolf went tumbling onto its back, Rhys leapt atop it and his hand came down onto its throat.
The corruption, the corrosion was strong. The wolf began to struggle more at first and then... as the dark touch really sank in like a deadly poison, it began to go limp. It twitched a few times in its death throes and then it was out, dead and gone. Rhys could feel its energy--it went directly from the wolf and into Rhys, making him stronger, giving him a boost of much needed energy.
He felt his heartbeat quicken and even with his hand still wrapped around the wolf's throat, he threw back his head and closed his eyes, letting the feeling of its energy invigorate him. Then, after a moment, he got up, giving the now dead wolf a hard, vicious kick so that it rolled down the nearby hill, body limp and useless. He turned towards Satine, his eyes flashing red for a few seconds. His hand flexed a little where he'd grasped the wolf.
"You always did like it as bloody as possible," he said, regarding her handiwork.
"Well you gotta show your work, Rhys," Satine said with a short laugh, rising from the dead wolf with a quick wipe at her face. Blood smeared all over her, all down her front, but it was nothing a good shower wouldn't fix. Besides, was she hurting for money? Not really. She could buy new clothes to replace the ones that were ruined. Human money was basically printed paper, anyway.
"Feel better?" She walked over after kicking hers down the side of the ravine too, watching it rolling only briefly. Rhys looked invigorated. That brought another smile to her face as she patted him on the back (with a bloody hand) and then she paused. "Hey. Is that...?"
A little Seek-Me floated towards them, playfully doing loops in the air. It stopped before Rhys, tinkling in a happy kind of way, and presented him with a letter.
"The hell? Who'd send you a letter out here?"
"Yes, actually."
He felt much better, with new power coursing through him. The wolf he'd killed was barely spared a glance as he smirked. Yes. Much, much better. And then he was alerted to something as Satine voiced her question. Looking up, he saw the Seek-Me and raised a brow. Okay. Who was sending him a missive?
It seemed like Satine was wondering the same thing.
Taking it, Rhys saw that it was obviously addressed to him. Mildly curious, he opened it and instantly regretted it. He should have recognized the writing immediately. He frowned, skimming it. This was no time to actually read it, though. Not in front of Satine. Quickly, he stuffed it into his pocket.
"...I should get back to work."
He didn't even ask if Satine was finished here or not. They could have hunted a lot more than they did but... He was suddenly not in the mood. He stalked back through the woods. Why was that idiot sending him a damn letter? Now he was leaving a paper trail!
"Aaaalll right," Satine said slowly, watching Rhys stalk back towards the car in a terrible mood. An actual terrible mood, hm? Not merely vague annoyance or faint irritation? No scorn? No blase dismissal of whatever it was that he had read? Going back to work surely didn't demand this level of... reaction.
She followed him at a more leisurely pace, watching him with keen eyes. Something—someone—had gotten through to him. Satine didn't know what to make of it. She didn't read the letter and didn't see the writing, so she didn't know who sent it, but she thought that they were... dangerous. If Rhys wanted to remain the heir to his father's throne, that person was dangerous to him.
"Hey," she said as she caught up to him at the car, unlocking it. "You're sure everything's okay? You can still tell me things, you know. I'm your sister."
And she was here for him no matter what, no matter where their lives diverged. Satine turned the key in the ignition and pulled away from the woods, back onto the highway.
Like what? What could he tell her? Satine might be his sister but there were things he couldn't even tell her; it was too dangerous. The things she could do with this kind of information... He got into the car, and all the good feeling he felt from killing that damned wolf was gone. Like it never happened.
He... wanted to talk. It was a strange feeling. When did he last feel like this? He couldn't remember. Maybe never. But he wanted desperately to rant about it, to get it out into the air, to hear that he wasn't nuts for feeling so beyond pissed about everything to do with this situation. But who could he really trust?
The letter felt like it was burning a whole through his pocket, too. Even what he skimmed was enough to put him in an awful mood. He could only imagine how he'd feel if he pulled it out and tried to read it in its entirety.
Looking over at Satine, he considered it. Saying something. Her loyalties to his father weren't that... unbreakable. In fact, sometimes he believed she outright hated his guts, despite remaining mostly quiet about it. But this job out here, probably a test for her, it probably only made her that much less loyal.
"It's that idiot, Raphael," he said after a moment. "He's not doing his job."
Ah. Raphael. That little servant boy with the name and face of an angel, he stuck out like a sore thumb. Satine heard he was something of a joke, really—nobody took him seriously. He was always saying dangerous things, things that could get people killed if they weren't careful enough. And yet he was sent along on this trip. He came with Rhys and Keith, both very capable assassins and trusted extensions of the King's rule.
Whose protection did he enjoy?
"Raphael not doing his job is pissing you off? To that degree?" Satine snorted softly. Right. And she was born yesterday. Either it wasn't Raphael or it was, and something else happened. She thought back to the pause earlier, when she first met Rhys, when he couldn't even come out to say, in one breath, that he'd sent his servant out.
Was it the job? A job of a personal nature? Possible...
"Just kill him. If he's not doing his job, he's worthless. Father will send a replacement for you, it's not as if that's difficult." Satine side-eyed him. Why hadn't Rhys killed him, if he was that much trouble? She couldn't imagine it would be hard. But then she thought... of Raphael, his eyes on Rhys the last time she saw them together, the over-eager way he ran for refreshments, tea, coffee, how he hovered...
"No... I suppose it's not."
She couldn't be trusted with it. The fact that she brought up their father... Maybe her loyalties were still too deeply entrenched in their family. It made sense; she probably wanted to show him that she was worthy of his attention. If she did well here, she would show she was on par with any fairy. If Rhys said anything, she would probably be more than happy to reveal the truth to him.
"Just drop me off at my... place," he said. Although he'd been staying there for a few months, it still didn't feel like his place. It definitely didn't feel like home. "I need to talk to Keith."
"All right."
Satine didn't ask, didn't prod, didn't push for answers. This conversation was over--for both of them. That was the way it had to be for now, she thought not without a tinge of sadness. Rhys used to trust her with all of his secrets; now they were so distant. There were shades of their past selves inside, but too much time had passed between then and now.
The drive back was mostly quiet; Satine had her own thoughts to contend with and her answers were mostly monosyllabic and uninformative. In front of the apartment building she put the brake on, then after some thought leaned over and slid her arms around Rhys for a loose hug.
"Good luck, Rhys. I mean it." Satne pulled back with one of her rarer smiles--a warm smile she reserved only for him. "Don't do anything I wouldn't do, all right?"