Red Sky In The Night

Four.

Being tied to a chair, helpless and at the mercy of your kidnappers was no one's idea of a good time. Amerie looked around through Derek's eyes, seeing what he did which wasn't much in the blacked out warehouse and the scream that soon echoed through the building had him fighting for freedom all over again.

He knew that sound. He understood the fear.

So did Amerie.

Shadows moved all around him and she couldn't focus on anything until the corpse was dropped at his feet in a flash of bright light. The human woman would have been pretty if not for the cuts all over her face or the red smile around her neck. Looking around the scene had changed and now free, Derek cradled the woman in his arms while he screamed her name in sheer agony. His pain too much for the faerie to handle, she forced herself to let go and removing her palm from his forehead the illusion was broken yet he was still trapped in the hell of his own making beneath her.

The darkness that held him seeped up to cover her, desperate to bring more into its depression and closing her eyes she was back on her hammock while his tortured breathing still filled her ears. Pity, empathy and overall sadness filled her and the images of the woman haunted her vision now as it did his. Understanding his darkness was easier now, living through such horrible acts of violence she could never have comprehended until seeing what he had.

She didn't know how he got each cut on his skin, if it was anything like that she didn't want to know and her fear of what the humans were truly capable of had her silent around him the next morning. He had been at those people's mercy, but Amerie was not naïve enough to think that he would be unable to inflict the same forms of punishment on others if given the chance. Was this why they were told to stay away from humans?

 Derek could tell something was different with Amerie the following morning. She never met his gaze and seemed almost transparent in his presence, yet she still followed him around, not willing to leave and a few times he was certain she was about to speak, but the words never left her. It was nearly midday and although Derek was content with the lack of conversation all morning compared to how curious she had been the night before, Derek felt obliged to say something.

"You ok?" He asked as they walked by the river. The fact faeries can't lie was killing her so instead she only shrugged. Taking it as yet another sign of being superior to 'humans' he couldn't stop himself from snapping at her. "Well if you don't want to be here, you can just leave"

His guard had been put back in place and Amerie wondered why she felt compelled to stay. He needed someone to help him and since the humans had left him alone, perhaps the duty was meant to fall on her. Never one to fit amongst her own people she didn't particularly want to go back to her Clan and that fact she was feeling more at home here than she ever had anywhere else scared her more than his nightmares.

"You're very interesting."

"What?" That was something he didn't expect to hear and also something Amerie didn't expect herself to say. Derek cursed himself for not answering a little more intellectually. No wonder she had these lesser opinions on his species, he wasn't setting the best example of the intelligence that the majority possessed.

Derek's heart nearly stopped as she took his hand and turned it over to show his palm. The line of the wound was nothing more than a silver scar, slipping up the underside of his arm it had not yet faded with time and her finger ran over it in a way he couldn't deny was completely seductive. At that moment, Derek forgot how hard he tried to keep his wounds hidden, let alone avoid being touched, especially being touched in the way the faerie currently was and a shiver danced up his spine as he felt like he was falling under a spell of some kind.