“When you leave here. You haven’t fed in a while. You are getting docile,” he admonishes me.
I do feel tired and hungry. Crap. It never even occurred to me about feeding. Devon and Constantine are right, I really am ridiculous. I agreed to stay here where there are no humans to feed from, and I can say with absolute certainty that a Faerie Feeder won’t be provided for me to snack on. It hits me like a ton of bricks then that this is what Constantine’s plan was all about. He knew I wouldn’t heal up properly without feeding, and he knew I wouldn’t be able to do that here. “Thanks for the reminder, ghost boy,” I say and turn onto my back again.
“Ghost boy? That’s very insulting. I am neither a ghost nor a boy,” he says, offended.
“How old are you?” I ask.
“In what sense?”
“Both,” I say, knowing he means how old he was when he died and how many years he has been in existence.
“I was in my twenty-first year when I was slain and that was over three thousand years ago.”
“How old is Tiamat?” I ask, dying to know Her real age.
“That creature is over six thousand years old,” he replies with disdain.
“Oh. Wow. That’s like Old Testament old.” CK had said he thought She was around four thousand. He was way off.
He snorts in amusement but doesn’t say anything.
We sit in silence for a bit, then I break it. “How come you aren’t trying to kill me anymore?”
“How come you aren’t trying to kill me anymore?” he asks me back.
“Because you aren’t trying to kill me anymore,” I say as if it’s obvious.
“Oh. Well, your part in the bigger picture is becoming clearer,” he says mysteriously.
“What is the bigger picture?” I ask. I am not so sure I like his tone.
“That I can have you in your dreams. I already explained this to you. I can give you everything you ever wanted out of life, or death.” He says this with an odd look, and I am fairly certain that he is lying to me.
“I already have everything I want,” I say quietly.
“I have been inside your head, Aefre. I know that isn’t true.” He looks at me again. “Don’t you get it? It isn’t about being with a certain somebody or having a life with them or a baby or any of the big stuff. It’s about all the little things I can do for you.”
“I don’t know what you mean.” I frown at him.
“Think about it, Aefre. If you could go back in time and have or do anything you want, big or small, what would it be? And don’t lie to me because I already know. I just want you to say it out loud,” he says.
“I don’t want to,” I sulk, and he laughs at me.
“You don’t have to be shy about it. Just say it. Go back a thousand years and say what the first thing is that you could do if you could relive it.”
“Kill Radulf myself for being an abusive, disgusting wife beater and a rapist,” I shout, suddenly sitting up.
“There you go. Does that feel better? I can give that to you,” Remiel says and I stare at him.
Actually, it does feel better. I sink back to the bed. “But it won’t be real,” I say sadly.
“It will be real in our world. The one I will create for you, and that is just the start, Aefre. Anything and everything you ever wanted, no matter how small or how big.”
“How can you do that? How can you have so much power that you can create dream worlds and yet you can’t exist in the real one?” I ask.
“Dream worlds are easy. The real one takes effort,” he says darkly.
“No shit,” I mumble. I turn back onto my side to stare at him. “Remiel?”