Three Parts Fey by Viola Grace Page B

“It
was close.”
    “Was it, or did
something call you?”
    She unlocked
her legs and tried to slide down his body, but he caught her before
she could touch the mossy ground. A silken robe wrapped around him
and hers reformed to cover her.
    Tremble held
her against him so that her feet still didn’t touch the ground.
“Why are you worried?”
    “I think we may
be waking something. The whispers in the woods are turning into
laughter. Something in there is excited.”
    He smiled and
stroked her cheek. “I think that was us.”
    She frowned and
smacked his arm. “Something else. I can hear it.”
    He nuzzled her
cheek. “I can hear it as well. Don’t worry about it. It isn’t
harmful. The woods here have just gotten old enough to have a
dryad. The forest here is in labour. It needs more power to bring
her out.”
    “Uh, how long
is that going to take?”
    “A few
decades.”
    Benny raised
her head. “What?”
    “What we just
did was an early contraction. The labour is just starting.”
    “Do you know
which tree it is?”
    He grinned.
“Not yet. We will all be invited when it is time.”
    “So, I am
guessing that we are now tied to the land.”
    He swung her
fully into his arms and carried her across the meadow. “You
manifest as a forest lord in your demon form and you are only now
accepting your tie to the land? I thought you were smarter than
that.”
    She smacked his
chest, and he chuckled all the way to the house. The sounds of
clanking weights told her what the other two were up to. While
Tremble had worked his invigoration off with her, they had chosen
the ancient method of physical exertion.
    Tremble carried
her up the stairs and cuddled with her in the bizarrely large bed.
It was still going to take some getting used to, but when he curled
around her and held her against him, she was willing to try.
     
    A few hours
later, hands on her body and a blindfold over her eyes wakened her.
She tried to determine who was touching her by the temperature of
their skin. After a few minutes, she gave up trying to figure out
what was who, and she simply enjoyed it.
    If this was
what suspension had in store for her, she hoped that her parents
took up a life of petty crime after the inquest.

Chapter
Thirteen
     
     
    “Harcourt Emile Ganger,
we are here to determine whether charges should be laid on you for
the soul interference with eight infants thirty years ago.”
    The occupants
of the chamber murmured, but Benny sat with her partners in
silence. Her mother was sitting in the row ahead of her, and her
father was in a separate section, under guard.
    The judge
finished the explanation of why everyone was there and sat back.
“Prosecution, proceed to make your case.”
    The prosecution
stood up and outlined the case. Benny had been born and her parents
had been worried about her. Her father had crept to the nursery and
copied her aura and soul on to the other baby girls.
    It was that
selfish act to defend his own daughter that had led Harcourt Emile
Ganger into the path of endangering the newborns that were next to
her. That danger had come to roost in the last two years, resulting
in seven deaths.
    The use of
demonic energy in the alteration of the life patterns of eight
babies was the charge. Using them as bait carried a relatively
minor sentence, but the soul tampering was the major
infraction.
    Jennifer was
called as a witness to the assault due to her imprint of Benny’s
patterns.
    “He grabbed me
and I don’t remember much after that. The energy felt weird and
greasy. I vaguely heard shouting, but I didn’t wake until I was in
hospital. I had no idea why I had been marked for death until I was
briefed by my parents’ counsel.” Jennifer looked more rested than
she had the last time they ran into each other.
    The prosecutor
nodded. “What did you think about what had been done to you?”
    “I was shocked.
I have always enjoyed a normal if oddly successful life. To hear
that the way I think was a copy