#head lock

Kitsen opened up a door that led to the connected rooms where his friends stayed. He was glad they had agreed to stay with him here in the court. He would have gone crazy if he couldn’t just go find them when he needed to vent about the inane nonsense he’d been forced to care about since becoming King. He was still glad to be King, it was what he always wanted and had worked toward, but he wished he had been able to prepare for it more. He’d done the best he could, but with so much of it locked behind the queen’s own doors, it had been impossible to really be prepared for the work he had to do.

In a year this would all be worth it. He would be fine in a year. He would have it all worked out and then it would just be a matter of maintaining it. He could do that.

He knocked gently on the closed door that led to Damien’s room. Damien should be in there, since it was closed. He waited a moment before frowning and knocking again.

“Damien?” he called gently. He winced as he realized Damien might be asleep. He took a step back, sharp disappointment in his throat as he walked down to Duulan’s room.

He didn’t have to knock with Duulan. He had at the beginning of their relationship, but it had been a long time since Duulan told him to stop doing that and just come in, even if he was changing or sleeping.

Kitsen opened the door, breathing out a heavy sigh. “Duulan? Are you awake? I-”

Someone slammed the door as he was most of the way through it, catching his wing between the door and the frame.

He screamed out, the bones in his phalanges breaking under the pressure and his membrane tearing as he tried to jerk his wing out.

Someone leapt at him, grabbing his horns to drag him down violently.

He lashed out, his clawed fingers catching in flesh as he threw them off. Someone latched onto him from behind and he grabbed them, throwing them off his back. He finally wrenched his wing from the door and faced his attackers, getting a proper look at them.

The two were more animalistic fae, tiger like and very angry. Kitsen had caught one in the ribs, blood leaking down his side. The wound was deep, Kitsen knew, but the two fae, likely siblings, were being propelled by adrenaline and rage, and it always took a while for a wound to stagger a fae.

Kitsen bared his sharp teeth, his fangs proudly on display as he crouched. “Think carefully about what you do next,” he hissed. “I will not tolerate assassins in my palace.”

The tigers snarled in unison, tails lashing, before the dove for him again, forcing him to defend himself on both sides as they came at him from two different angles.

Still, he was bigger than them, and even through the pain, he could hold his own with his hands and his wings. He could ignore the pain himself.

The wounded tiger was beginning to flag, gasping for air and letting his sibling take on the main attacks.

Kitsen landed a back handed swipe to the sibling, slicing gashes deep into their face.

The tigers fell back into the bedroom, hissing and growling as Kitsen drew himself up to his full height. He lifted a hand, preparing to cast a binding spell he had learned from his studies in the magic arts of the rulers of the courts, when the injured tiger yowled and Kitsen heard something outside the door.

“Help!”

Kitsen froze as a yelp of pain came from the same voice. He whipped around and opened the door, staring out at what was going on.

A fae with gilded paper wings grinned at him, her hair falling over her eyes so he couldn’t see them. “Sorry to bother you, highness,” she said, tightening her elbow around Damien’s dark throat, his silvery eyes wide with fear as he struggled against the headlock, twisted where she held his wrists down at his hips in one hand. “But perhaps we could have a civilized conversation.

Kitsen bared his teeth at her. “Civilized!? You call this civilized!?” Still, he didn’t move another step, terrified of what she might do to Damien, who had already been through more than enough as a slave in this terribly upside down court.

“Oh, yes. Mm, so it’s true you care about humans. I felt that you would, but it is strange for one such as yourself to be worried about someone like him. Sure, he is beautiful, and I have never seen a human with freckles like metal shards in their face, but I don’t mind killing him, do I make myself clear?”

“You kill him, and there is nothing I won’t do to make sure you suffer for 15 years before you die,” Kitsen seethed.

She clicked her tongue, raising her elbow so Damien choked and had to stand on his tiptoes to breath. “But I could hurt him, couldn’t I.”

She had him. There was nothing Kitsen could do. It must have shown in his face how defeated he was as she threw back her head a laughed before looking back at him.

“Kneel.”

He hesitated, for only a moment before he dropped to his knees.

She dropped her elbow and Damien gasped in a breath, tears clumping his white eyelashes together. “No! Kitsen, don’’t-”

“Shut it,” the fae hissed in his ear before nipping at it, causing him to yelp as her sharp teeth drew blood. “Anything you do to annoy me will be met with pain, too. You will both do exactly as I say, understand me?”

Kitsen nodded numbly and Damien drew in a shuddery breath.

“Good. I am Minerva. And I am going to be the queen of the Autumn Courts. Ly! Ty!”

The tiger siblings came out, the injured one breathing raggedly.

“Mistress, Ty is injured,” Ly said softly. “May we go find a healer.”

“If he can find one, he can. You are going to bind our King and escort him to my rooms. I will need to play with him tonight to finish planning out how I will announce myself as Queen. I have to outdo him, at least. He’s made it difficult, though, what with the way he took the Queen’s head off in court.”

Kitsen growled low in his chest as Ly nodded, making sure Ty could walk before grabbing him by a horn to make sure he didn’t skewer them while they reached for his wrist.

Kitsen stared directly at Damien, trying to tell him it would be fine. He would find a way out and he would not let any harm come to the white haired human.

He caught a glimpse of movement behind Minerva and felt his spirits rise as he guessed who was approaching silently from behind, keeping his eyes locked on Damien’s.

Just as Minerva opened her mouth to make demands that Ly go faster, a heavy statuette came down on her head and she crumpled.

Kitsen overpowered Ly and drove his horns through their guts, shaking Ly hard, sending their body flying to smack into a wall as they spasmed and cried out piteously.

Kitsen got up, stumbling to where Duulan, his pumpkin headed servant and best friend, was helping Damien up, hugging him and telling him it would be alright.

“Damien! Are you hurt?” Kitsen asked, pulling Duulan and the human into a hug.

Damien nodded, swallowing hard. “I’m fine.”

“No, you’re not! You’re bleeding!”

“It’s just a scratch on my ear. You’re bleeding too!”

Kitsen was very uninterested in the bleeding scratches on his neck and back where the tigers had tried to hang onto him. “It’s fine. Did they hurt you? Did she crush your throat at all? Can you still breathe? This is all my fault! I should have brought Putac and Leor and had them go where you went. I-”

“Kitsen!” Duulan said soothingly, letting go of Damien and grabbing Kitsen’s face. “Relax. It’s fine. Where else are you hurt?”

“I-My wing. I think it’s broken.”

Duulan nodded. “I will find a healer and make sure these ones are dead. Go to Damien’s room and wait there. Please.”

Kitsen bowed his head. “Okay.”

“Good,” Duulan said, a bounce in his step as he drew out a knife. “I will be back shortly.”

Kitsen turned from Duulan’s upbeat malice to Damien’s shaking form, wrapping his unbroken wing around him like he did when sneaking him away from Erix to make sure he got some food. “We’d better do as he says,” he told Damien softly. “It’s okay, now. I am so sorry I allowed this to happen.”

“It’s alright,” Damien replied, leaning into Kitsen’s side. “It’s not your fault.”

Kitsen sighed, but allowed the statement to pass with no comment.

VTB Part 9