Half of Ruby

Chapter 1

Some days, Ruby really wished that the Fae could control time.

This, she decided, was one of those days.

If I had power over time, thought Ruby, I would change everything that had happened nine months ago.

But Jinx's movements sped up rather than slowed down as he swept towards her, a dark blot of ink staining the pastel neighborhood of ramshackle houses. A morning breeze picked up, crying as it tore at Ruby's dark hair, flicking up his hood for just a moment to reveal his glittering head of icy blond hair. 

Agitated red sparks sizzled from Ruby's frozen fingertips as Jinx drew out a rough cloth sack, bulging with loot, from under his cloak. He had offered six similar sacks to her previously. She had refused all six.

Who had he robbed this time?

Mere steps away, he lifted his head and turned his gaze towards her. Blue eyes, as vast and as magnificent as the sky, stared straight into her own sherry ones.

Ruby's breath caught in her throat as she froze in place, paralyzed for several horrible moments. Was this how deer felt when they gazed into the eyes of a lion?

She couldn't run now.

"Ruby," greeted Jinx. He slid off his hood, revealing his mess of unruly blond hair, his icy blue eyes, his pale, scowling complexion. Features which Ruby had memorized months ago, but which still shocked her every time she saw them.

"Sal," rasped Ruby, voice hoarse from lasting an entire morning without water. Her stiff, frozen fingers fumbled over the latch of the gate.

Jinx welcomed himself into the backyard, tossing his cloak over one arm. "I have gold," he said, gesturing towards the bulging sack. It weighed more than a few pounds, judging by the way he held it, and was about twice the size of Ruby's head.

"I don't want it," said Ruby.

Jinx raised an eyebrow. "And why not? It's Giant gold, Ruby."

Ruby gasped as shock shot through her body, as terrible and paralyzing as lightning. Giant gold. "You've got to be kidding me."

Jinx smirked at her, stuffing the rough sack into her hands. "You'll thank me for it later."

"No!" hissed Ruby furiously, shoving the sack back into Jinx's hands. "How could you!"

Jinx's eyes hardened as he gazed at her, who glared back undauntedly. "I'm only trying to help you, Ruby."

"Yes, and I...I appreciate that!" Ruby's voice faltered, almost cracking. Here we go again. "But not like this! Jinx, you can't keep being a thief. You're going to get caught—"

"Stop worrying, for once!" Jinx yelled. "Fine, sorry for trying to help." His voice dripping with venomous sarcasm, he snatched the sack away. "Happy now?"

She glared at him. "This is wrong—stealing. You can't go down like this."

"At least I earn something," snarled Jinx. "Unlike you, going to the markets to trade."

A poisonous concoction of desperation, guilt, and hopelessness welled up in Ruby's stomach, clumping in her throat burning through her eyes in the form of tears. Giant gold. He stole from the Giant.

Robbing a Giant was illegal, a capital crime. And yet Fae still did it, Fae who had nothing left to lose or who despised the Giants even fifty years after the Fae-Giant War. Ruby's mother often told Ruby about how the War had even affected the humans down in the Middle Land, Earth.