His expression had her peeling laughter again, unable to help herself. It was just too funny to her, this great world destroying dragon cursed by Hecate and then shoved forcefully into human guise before being dumped on the human world like an unwanted puppy.
She had never met Hecate before, but she had heard about the woman coming to the human world from time to time, scoping things out and making sure her girls were safe.
But she was sure to stay well away from the witches. They tended to smell different to humans and you didn't want to be a predator near a witch if Hecate was nearby. She was rumoured to have a nasty habit of simply exploding people like a dropped egg.
He was glaring at her then and she grinned back at him, delighting in his suffering.
"Oh come on Nid, you have to laugh at these things. Maybe she'll take pity and give you back your pretty form."
He flinched at her nickname for him, glowering as he jabbed a syringe into her stomach and she began to scream as the corrosive agent ate through her.
So she had deserved that, she knew it. But it had just been too good a story for her not to rub his nose in it. It was one of the first things you learn if you meet another mythical when coming to the human world for the first time. It had been told to her with the very first mythical creature she had met, a cat incidentally.
A little ball of black fur with a large white spot on his chest. She had taken to the beast instantly, offering him meat she had stolen after she had seen him and getting excited when he had settled in her lap.
It was the first creature she had ever seen in the human world that wasn't a human and she loved him blindly. He had purred and kneaded her legs, letting her pet him and then when she had sighed and went to place him on the ground he had told her off sternly for stopping.
She had dropped him and scrambled back, shocked at the talking beast.
He had laughed at her and sat down, calm as you please and told her not to trust creatures, nothing was ever what it seemed in that world.
He had gone by the name Catsit, though none of the humans had ever bothered to ask him his name. He had asked her for what she called herself and she had told him, as well as telling him she was new to the human world.
He had then told her what to expect, and to avoid the witches and a few other choice species that no one wanted to mess with.
She had thanked him for his help and he had asked for a bowl of milk in payment, which she gladly stole for him and he lapped it up before prowling away.
She had only ever seen him once since then, returning to that same village several decades later and he was still sitting there, calm as can be.
She had joined him for a time, offering him milk and a mouse to eat, they had talked and then she had left. She would have to go see if he was still there one day, assuming she survived Ayathian.
Harla was yelling something, but she couldn't hear what it was in her blind pain. It seemed the saliva and the corrosive had interacted badly and she had fallen unconscious. She didn't imagine Harla had liked that very much.
When she came to, she squinted and saw that Jaia's lip was bleeding, Harla's knuckles were bleeding and he was hunched over his ribs.
It seemed Jaia had booted him hard enough to break them and Harla had punched Jaia in the mouth in retaliation.
"Can we go home now?" she mumbled.
"We are home, sweetheart," Jaia said gently, looking down at her limp form.
"Can we find a new home?"
"As soon as we get out of here," he said, looking up as Harla appeared above her.
"At least you're not dead…" he said dryly.
***
"You know, I don't think I can die any more," she said conversationally. "Before it was easy, you die and go for a nice stroll, then a swim and whoosh, you're back. But now? Being immortal isn't any fun when you can't actually die any more. Living is hard…"
She didn't know why she was talking, it had simply spilled out and Jaia looked down at her, confused.
"Are you okay?"
"That bastard bit and drugged me, then that other bastard in the corner beat me..." she turned her head to Alaric. "Because he's a child!" then she turned her head back to Jaia, though it was dangling limply on her neck. "And then, after all that, the first bastard is going to try and get into Faerie. I just know he is. And you know what? He can go to Faerie and then Tatialia can eat him, and everything will be fine."
"Why would Tatialia eat him?" Jaia asked dryly, seeming to realise something.
"Because she's mean…," she dragged out the last word. "And she probably eats bastards for breakfast. She's that type of mean. How I could possibly be related to her I don't know, I'm not that mean."
She was spilling way too much information, she knew it, but she had suddenly gotten the urge to talk and was running with it.
"Tatialia is the Queen of Winter. How are you related?" Harla asked.
"She's my grandwitch," she said, smiling at the play on words and thinking it was quite clever.
"Grandwhat?" he asked, looking at Jaia.
"Etani is the granddaughter of Winter's Queen. She's a Princess of Winter," he said, frowning down at her.
"I thought she was a Princess of Ayathian."
"Ayathian doesn't have any. She's a foreign diplomatic prisoner," Jaia snipped.
"Yeah, a diplomatic prisoner of that bastard," she gave a little wave in Alaric's direction.
"What's wrong with her?" Jaia asked.
"I think she is having a drug reaction. Etani how do you get into Faerie?" Harla asked, realising his advantage.
"That's easy, you just open the-" Jaia had driven his knee up into her back and she yelped in pain.
"Jaia what is your problem?!" she demanded, distracted from the topic.
"Stop talking," he said and she scowled up at him, irritated and sore.
"Open what Etani?" Harla asked and she looked at him blankly, not understanding the question.
"Open what, what?" she asked, confused.
"How do you get into Faerie?" he asked
"Well, there's a gateway in The Underneath, you could go there."
"You said you just had to open something, how can you get into Faerie if you need to?" he demanded.
She opened her mouth and Jaia kneed her again.
"Jaia stop it!" she cried, distracted again.
"Do that again and I'll kill you," Harla growled.
"How did you even get to be a lord? You're a jerk," she said of Harla, not giving him time to respond before she looked at Alaric. "You need to pick your people better, they all suck."
Alaric snorted a laugh in agreement and Harla turned on him.
"Should I sedate you further, Your Majesty?" Harla hissed.
"You should, Alaric isn't very nice," she looked up at the chain above her, her hands turned red from the strain of her weight on them. "Can your hands fall off from blood loss?" she asked Jaia and he looked up at her hands.
"I don't think so," he said, but didn't sound very certain.
Settling her feet on the ground, she pulled herself up, only to sway dangerously and find herself face to face with Jaia, grinning at his startled face.
"Hi handsome, fancy meeting you here. Do you come here often?" she purred, teasing him.
"Too often," he said, wary of her tone.