“Damaged?”
“Blind, in my case. Some were injured in the iron mines. Others were born with disabilities. If anyone couldn’t provide for themselves, through no fault of their own, they could collect alms.”
“No fault of their own?” he asked.
I cringed at the thought of Mage’s hand. “Once, one of Iric’s younger brothers, Mage, was caught stealing. As punishment, the Border Grays served justice in the form of cutting off his hand. He was only six at the time.”
Loftin blinked rapidly. “That’s barbaric. What did he steal?”
“Bread,” I answered softly. “And because he lost a hand as punishment for a crime, he’s not allowed to collect alms.” I mused, “Iric is a Border Gray. It’s why I was near the wall when I realized I could see out of it.”
He muttered a curse. “Iric is a Border Gray? Did he mete out the punishment on his brother?”
“No, and he wouldn’t have. He would’ve defied an order and faced the same punishment for disobedience, and then been stripped of his title and shunned. Thank goodness they didn’t ask him to be the one to do it.”
Loftin had no words. He just shook his head and muttered, “Six years old.”
“Iric and I try to help them, but the three youngest brothers are basically on their own, by choice. We’ve tried to keep them with us. We offer them food, shelter, and love. But they never stay long. Duncan lives on his own, but does the same for them. The boys just won’t stay put with us for long. It’s only a matter of time before Mage gets caught again, and if he does, they’ll push him into Faery as punishment.”
“A thief without a hand cannot steal,” Loftin offered carefully. “Couldn’t they take his other one?”
“They would force him out with one hand to defend himself with, and tell him he deserved it.” Even if he was only a hungry boy whose only crime was stealing food. Even if the Slopers had more than enough food to share so no Trencher should have to starve, especially the children.
Loftin didn’t have to say it. Humans didn’t stand a chance in Faery, and one who was mutilated would be the first to die in this unforgiving place.
“Why would anyone hide a fae inside a human village?” The question had been eating away at me since I first came to realize I was fae.
He pursed his lips and offered, “Perhaps it was to keep you safe.”
There was a hint of hesitance in his tone. It gave me pause, and the dark thought bubbled to the surface, the one I’d been trying to keep at bay. The memories of what happened in my home, the bubble in the lake…
“What if it was to keep Faery safe from me?” I questioned.
His back stiffened. “What harm could you cause?”
I’d only nearly gotten us killed twice now. Or was it three times? I stopped and took out my canteen, extending it to him.
“No, you drink,” he argued. “I can go days without water.”
“You can, but should you?” I asked, sipping the water and extending the canteen to him again.
He took a sip and handed it back, his eyes softening at the corners. “Thank you.”
“Loftin, I owe you everything. You’ve already helped me so much. I’m sure I could try a lifetime and never thank you enough.”
He glanced away for a moment and sniffed once. “We should start running again if you’re rested.”
“Sure.”
LOFTIN
She thanked me. Said she’d never be able to thank me enough. But that was all going to change the moment I took her to Nemain and betrayed her. I wanted to tell her who I was and what I was doing, that I was a liar and a manipulator. But my father’s life was on the line. The fate of Faery, my whole world, and everything in it was at stake.
But if I gave her over, and Nemain absorbed her power or killed her, would it mean that every hope I had would die along with her?
I needed to think. I needed more time.
The grasses thinned, giving way to a sparse forest of dead trees, their branches clawing toward the unforgiving sun. It wasn’t hot, but there used to be billowy clouds accompanying it in the sky any time one entered the Spring Court. Now, there was nothing but pale blue surrounding the large ball of fire that baked the forest at a relentless, but low temperature.
From the north, plumes of ash rose, appearing like curls of smoke. The smoke I told her Iric was going after. I’d picked up his scent again, and so did Karis, so we pushed harder than we ever had. She wasn’t kidding when she described the boy as a fast runner. We should’ve caught up to him by now.
“Into the forest?” Karis asked.
“Into the forest,” I confirmed. Dead leaves crunched beneath our feet, not as thick as those in Summer, but drier and more brittle. The balance in Spring had been so important, but here there was no balance to be found.
We didn’t make it very far into the woods at all.
Beside me, Karis stilled, staring straight ahead. I scanned ahead and saw nothing, sniffed and detected no new scents. Iric’s faint trail hung in the air, along the leaves, slicing through the woods, heading due north, right where I needed him to go.
“What is it?” I whispered, taking in the changes in her. With pallid skin, she gripped her chest with one hand and her staff with the other.
“What are they?” Her voice trembled.
I scanned around, desperate to see what Karis was seeing. Her breathing was erratic and her eyes darted all around as she turned in a circle, refusing to even blink as she took in something I could not sense.
“What do you see? Describe it to me,” I urged quietly, unsheathing my sword.
“I can see Shades,” she gasped, her lips quivering with every word, “and they’re telling me not to trust you.” She stared beyond me, and when I reached out, my hand touching hers, she flinched and jerked away. “Who are you?”
“I told you who I was. I am a hunter.”
“They say you lie,” she stammered. It was true.
Her heartbeat quickened. I could hear it, and see her chest heave under the energy they were using to manifest and speak with her. “Don’t trust them, and whatever you do, do not let them touch you,” I warned her.
“What? Why?” she asked, frantically looking around her. “What do they want? They’re all talking at once,” she whimpered.
I needed to get her away from them. “We should run through them, but make sure that none of them touch you.”
“Why? What will happen if they do?” Her eyes delved warily into mine.
“They can drag you into the Underworld.”
She shook her head when I tugged her forward. “If I run through them, there’s no way I can avoid them all. They’re everywhere.”
“Then we take another way. We retrace our steps into the meadows and double around the woods toward the sea.”
She all but crumpled. “But Iric’s this way. He has to be close.”
If the Shades were that thick and she could see them and they her, I couldn’t risk them telling her about my deal with Nemain, or who she truly was. And I didn’t lie to her about them or what they were capable of. Shades were powerful. They could drag fae to the Underworld, and I’d be damned if I’d lose her now that we were so close.
We had to get away from them. I’d earned a measure of her trust, and I needed to keep it.
Karis wasn’t evil like Nemain. She was kind, caring about the smallest things like being helpful or offering a drink of water. She wanted to pet the Puca, for goodness sake. And whenever she was sad or upset or hurt, and she turned her eyes to me, I felt her pain. I’d never sensed anything like it.
She hadn’t manifested any dark powers. She made things grow. She brought life back to a desolate and dying land. Karis acted human because she was raised as a human. I chipped away at her fear and made her trust me, which meant I had become one of the creatures who preyed upon the weak. No better than an Unseelie beast.
Predator.
Hunter.
Manipulator.
Part of me realized the necessity of becoming these things and worse. The other part of me hated myself for it.
I took her soft hand in mine, letting my thumb graze her skin. Her eyes left the Shades and found our hands. “Let’s retrace our steps and go around. Iric wouldn’t have seen them. They wouldn’t have bothered a human. They’re only attracted to certain fae.”
“You’re sure?” she asked.
“I can’t see them, Karis. Iric shouldn’t be able to, either.”
10
LOFTIN
She relaxed the moment we backed out of the forest and re-entered the meadowed hills, but her mood turned pensive, a fact that didn’t bode well for me. What did the Shades tell her? I considered all the possibilities as we walked alongside one another. Whatever they said, it didn’t shatter her faith in me; however, I wondered if they splintered it. Like a crack in a glass, given the right conditions, the crack would spread and eventually the glass would break apart.
Karis walked beside me, allowing me to lead her through Faery, but as we crested a hill, she came to an abrupt stop, her face alight with awe.
The thought never occurred to me that we would skirt one of the human cities along our journey. It was inevitable now that I considered it, but she clearly hadn’t expected to see another, and so relatively close to her own.
“I always wondered if there were more cities out there, or if Ironton was the only one. I know you told me there were more, but seeing it is a little surreal, to be honest. What city is this?” she marveled as we topped the hill and glimpsed down on the dome of smoke covering another of the human towns. The smoke was thick, like that of Ironton after she left it. She truly had thickened the barriers between our worlds when she crossed through.
“Briarwood.” Most fae knew the names of the human towns because of the humans who foolishly dared leave their safety. I wasn’t sure how the human superstitions began, but each seemed to have formulated the idea that they should send one of their own to fetch smoke for their walls. The smoke was supposedly from Faery, and thus into Faery they flocked every Midsummer eve.
“How many are there?” she asked, staring at the city.
She was beautiful; the wonder on her face heartbreakingly innocent. Nemain was going to shatter her. She wouldn’t last a minute in her mother’s presence. I swallowed the thick knot of that knowledge, then answered, “Less than a dozen remain.”
“Were there more?”
“There were,” I confirmed.
“What happened to them?”
“Disease, or fighting within the city itself until little was left and the survivors had no choice but to leave and seek refuge in Faery.”
“—where they could not survive at all,” she concluded softly.
“Yes.”
“What happens to the domes? Are the dead still trapped inside?”
I shook my head. “Somehow the magic that made them knows. It’s like it senses there’s no life within it and the dome disintegrates.”
I was so entranced in watching her stare at the human city, at the emotions rolling over her face, I didn’t sense the danger. I didn’t know they’d snuck up on us until Karis’s body went sailing into the air and she landed with a dull thump halfway down the hill. The blow twisted her body so she landed on her back, the breath knocked from her lungs when she smacked against the rocky soil.
“Karis!”
A flock of Sluagh surrounded me—incorporeal, they had no bodies—more shadow than anything. One of the oldest of the Unseelie fae, they were made of pure evil. And they were strong, attacking in packs. Writhing forms of darkness, they kept together as a group, some hovering just over the ground and some higher. My sword would be useless, but the one thing shadows hated more than anything in the world was fire and light. And that was one thing I did have.
I just had to get to Karis before they did, so I could protect us both.
I took off down the hill in a sprint, sending a wall of flame toward them as I ran in the opposite direction. Frantic shrills filled the air behind me, but that wouldn’t hold the survivors off for long. I skidded down the rocky path, stopping beside her, shooting more flame from my hands as the Sluagh approached once more. The survivors had regrouped, and they were mad as hell.
“Karis?” I kept my voice steady, though I was anything but. Adrenaline pulsed through my body. I felt her arms and legs. Her bones weren’t broken.
She clawed at her throat, gasping for air.
“Calm down,” I soothed. “You took a fall and the breath was knocked out of you. You’ll be fine. Just relax.” I hoped it wasn’t anything worse than that.
Shooting more flame at the growing mass of shadows that had merged into a large, rolling wave and that threatened to break over our heads, I closed my eyes. Laying over Karis, I shielded her as my power burst from me in every direction, consuming everything in its path.
I held the burst steady, flame swirling all around us.
Karis’s mouth gaped open, water leaking from her eyes. “Shh. It’s okay. I promise, it’ll be okay.” She pinched her eyes closed against the heat, but she saw what I was capable of.
I closed my eyes, feeling the power drain away, hoping it was enough to drive the Sluagh away or incinerate them. At this point, I didn’t care which. They were the worst of the Unseelie demons. They didn’t belong in Faery. And they hurt Karis. How badly I didn’t know, but tears still flowed steadily from her eyes into her hair.
The fire inside me burned out. I glanced over my shoulder, hoping for the best, expecting the worst, and found nothing waiting to strike. The Sluagh were gone. Bits of ash rained down from the sky onto Karis’s face as I lifted my body from hers.
Her breaths were steady now.
“Karis?”
Her lips wobbled.
“Talk to me. Where are you hurt?” I felt her legs, arms, and stomach for injuries, then lifted her head off the ground.
“I’m okay,” she croaked.
“Can you sit up?” I asked.
She lay there, staring at the sky, and shook her head.
“You can’t, or don’t want to yet?” She was scaring me.
“Just... give me a minute,” she rasped, closing her eyes again. With my forearms propped on my knees, I kept watch all around us. I wouldn’t make the mistake of letting my guard down again.
She finally lifted her head, slowly curled into a sitting position, and took a deep breath. “Are you okay?” she questioned.
Befuddled, I regarded her. “Am I okay? Are you okay?”
“The canteen broke my fall,” she confessed with a wince. She was stiff. Her posture, the way she gingerly moved, everything indicated that she wasn’t hurt badly, but would feel the effects from this for a few days.
Thank goodness she’s okay. I couldn’t bear to see her hurt. The thought startled me.
I contemplated the top of the knoll, at least fifty feet above us. The memory of the sound of her body hitting the earth surfaced. I shook my head. If she were human, she wouldn’t have survived the blow, let alone the fall.
“I knew you could make fire, but I didn’t know you were an inferno. At the end, I could feel your forearms shaking. You burned yourself out, didn’t you?”
“I did.” It wasn’t the easiest thing to admit. There was a time when my power was an endless well. Now, it felt that there was only a drop or two left.
She rolled her shoulders. “Will they come back?”
“There are more Sluagh in Faery, but the ones that just attacked us no longer exist. When you’re able, we should start moving. It isn’t wise to stay here after what just happened. The fire could attract some creatures we’d rather not deal with, especially with my power depleted.” I pushed to my feet and offered her my hands. She accepted them and rose gingerly. My hands glided to the back of her neck, where I felt the muscle.
“What are you doing?” she squeaked, tensing but leaning into me.
“Making sure you weren’t injured.”
Which was bad for both of us, because it meant she was as affected by my touch as I was by touching her, even though I didn’t mean for it to be intimate.
KARIS
His arms were wrapped around me as his fingers kneaded my flesh and muscle. No man had ever touched me so boldly before. I squeezed my eyes shut. He’s only checking me for injuries.
I didn’t know where to put my hands. They naturally found his broad chest, but that was a mistake. It brought our faces too close together. Trying to pull away from him, I stepped back, but his arms clamped around me, low on my spine.
“No pain?” he asked sincerely, staring down at me.
I was stiff, but not hurting. I shook my head.
I couldn’t relax with his arms around me. My entire body felt hot. Could he feel it? See the flush in my cheeks?
“Loftin?” I had to step away before I did something embarrassing like push up onto the tips of my toes and kiss him at the corner of his lips, right at the edge of thank you for saving me and I want more.
His hands tightened on my skin. An emotion I could not place rolled across his face. “Yes?”
I swallowed. “We should probably get going. I’m okay. I promise.”
He slowly removed his hands and stepped away. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled.
“For making sure I wasn’t hurt? That’s nothing to apologize for.” I’d wantonly enjoyed the feel of his hands.
First the Banshees, then the Puca, the thing in the woods I refused to peek at, the Shades, and now the Sluagh—which looked like they were made of something that wasn’t from this world. Everything in this damned place was confusing and dangerous. The Shades warned me not to trust Loftin. They said he lied, but he told me not to believe them; that they were only trying to hurt me. I didn’t know what to think or believe, but as far as I knew, Loftin hadn’t tried to hurt me. He hovered over me during the Sluagh attack and completely burnt his power out trying to keep me safe.
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