Rise of a Queen

Chapter 11

"What?!" Brandon lurched to his feet unexpectedly and his hip rammed against the table, sending our breakfast through the air then splattering it against the floor with a loud clatter of broken dishes. The dull headache that has accompanied me throughout this whole trip merged into a throbbing migraine once he began yelling, "She's here? Why the hell didn't you tell me last night?"

    Corinth flicked a splash of orange juice from her cheek with a look of annoyance, "Because we couldn't do anything about it and-"

    "We could have left hours ago." Brandon fired back.

    Just breathe Sadie, don't rip off his incredibly dense head just yet. I checked the clock and scoffed, "It's six in the morning, we went to sleep five hours ago. So no, we couldn't have left earlier. I'm sure heartless cretins such as yourself don't need sleep, but us regular humans do."

    "Don't be dramatic, you got more than enough sleep." Brandon retorted, throwing himself back into his chair with a loud humph, "Maybe you're not aware but this isn't a luxury vacation kid, this is a rescue mission. Our window to save Dustin is shrinking with each passing day but God forbid you don't get your beauty rest. I'll be sure to tell Dustin that when he finds out we were unable to save him because his girlfriend was taking a nap."

    That's it, can of worms smashed wide open.

    My fists slammed against the table, overturned cups and plates rattling with the force, "You want to talk about wasted time? Do you have any idea how much time we have wasted listening to your childish insults about Lumiere's eye, and all of your wallowing in self pity about how you had to work for the Council boo – fucking – hoo, and how it's all of our faults that we're behind schedule?! If you would take responsibility for your own actions, for once, then maybe you could get your head out of your ass long enough to see that you are a big part of the reason that we're so late to begin with, you condescending – monologuing – piece of shit!"

    Whoops, that was a little more than I had intended.

    Brandon sat frozen in the aftermath of my outburst, the only movement coming from an irritated twitch of his eye. On some primitive level, he knew I was right and his silence proved it. Corinth's hand slid over her mouth to hide her grin and the movement damaged Brandon's pride further, "Listen closely-"

    "No, you listen. Don't you dare put that blame on me. You're lucky I'm here in the first place considering this entire trip is based off your word alone, which has about as much value as a rusty bucket. You have given us no concrete evidence that Dustin is alive. A missing body and creative stories are not enough to prove a man's survival and it is certainly not enough to convince me. We are on a wild goose chase to find someone we're not even sure is alive. So instead of whining like a bitch about every damn thing that doesn't go your way, why don't you try providing a solution rather than adding to the problem!" My throat actually hurt from yelling.

    His teeth were gritted and his eyes narrowed, but a lovely amount of shock folded his lips down and propped his eyebrows high, "If I'm not mistaken-"

    "Brandon I swear, if one more pompous word comes out of your mouth, I am going to use that fork to carve out your vocal chords."

    He pitched laughter and lifted the fork with two fingers, holding it out for me to take, "Wrong choice, doll. The knife would be more efficient."

    "But the fork will take longer." I hissed, smacking his hand away, "Meaning more pain."

    Oh yes, the daggers he directed at me with his gaze meant I had officially crawled under his skin as he has been under ours during this entire trip. Good. It is about time he gets a taste of his own awful medicine because we have been more than patient with his attitude.