I pause at the door where the fire-torch breathes orange light into the hall. Holding my breath, I peer around the doorframe. The dark fae steals every bit of courage from my soul.
My legs quiver at the sight of him, despite that he has his back to me, and I have to seize my middle to stop from wetting myself right here and now.
He’s fucking huge.
Not just tall. Not just taller than human men by a solid foot or so, but wide too. Muscles bulge out from beneath his chain-link armour vest. His arms are bare, an earthy dark complexion glittering in the firelight. I decide he has legs for arms, they’re so muscular. Down his back, pale blond hair falls sleekly from a nape-ponytail, giving off the glint that a sword flickers with in moonlight.
Everything about it screams warrior. He’s a walking killing machine. Built for the bloodshed he spreads over the world.
I hold my breath and quickly creep by the doorway. I pause at the other side, silent and waiting. But he didn’t hear me.
My breath comes out in a ribbon of relief before I head down the hall. My options are limited. Can’t go back to the doors that are open, can’t go up the stairs or back into the cupboard. Only option is straight ahead, through the door I came from.
I sneak back into the kitchen of the café, my footsteps careful and certain. This time in the kitchen, I don’t make a sound. Not even the noise of boots against the floor gives me away. I tread carefully, like my life depends on it, because it does.
I make it to the half-door before sound escapes me. A whimper chokes me. I slap my hands to my mouth and cringe, not at the sound I made, but at what I see through the windows of the café.
Already, the village is burning.
Even through the dust caking the windows, I see the flames soaring up the faces of the buildings, consuming them. Fire rages through the once-homes, and destroys the memories that once lived here. It’s amazing how quickly fire catches. It seems to jump from one building to the next, like the plague did when it first came.
But worse, hordes of the dark fae are out there. I see them on their beastly steeds, brandishing their swords in the fierce reds of firelight. Some of their laughs slither into the café and snake at my feet. I’m frozen by the sight of them out there—at what they are doing.
They are hollering over the cries of my captured people.
At least a dozen people—definitely human—are sat on the ground, surrounded by armed dark fae. Like guards, almost. But…
I step closer to the windows, careful to keep tucked in the shadows of the café. As I inch closer, I can better see the faces of the humans, illuminated by the fires raging all over the village.
They’re not my people.
These people—they are undoubtedly human. I can see it in the hollow expressions that their faces wear, the torn and bloodied ordinary clothes clinging to their slender frames.
But I don’t recognise any of them.
These people are strangers. But what’s odd about that is how closely they are guarded by at least twenty of the dark fae. They stand with their backs to the humans who huddle together on the ground, and they hold their weapons ready while the rest of them pillage this village.
I do recognise the face of a body on the street. It lays there, lifeless. Its face stricken, eyes wide open and reflecting the fire that consumes all around.
Lee.
Guess he didn’t make it. I wonder who did. I might still be alive, but that doesn’t mean for a moment that I’ll make it out of this alive. Chances are, I’ll end up just like Lee there. Left like garbage on the ground. Something to be stepped over, ignored. Forgotten.
I slink back into the shadows.
Don’t have time to waste on anyone but myself and my own survival. I need to find a way out of this damned village before I burn down with it.
I throw a look over my shoulder and see the glow of firelight brighten. It stretches up the walls and starts to invade the kitchen.
The dark fae are coming back this way—they’ve finished with the inside of this building, finished gutting it to find people like me.
Now they’re headed right for me.
Looking around the café, I see how trapped I am. The door that leads to the main street would spill me right into the laps of a hundred dark fae, and I can’t go back into the house behind the café.
With no real choice, I rush to the window I came through. With a quick glance out at the alley, I see the blaze of fire all around. It’s eating its way through the village from all angles. Still, I don’t see another way out.
I throw myself out of the window, fast. My landing comes with a smack on the cobblestone ground.
With a grunt, I roll onto my side and sluggishly get to my feet. The light from the blaze shows me all the ways to die—run out into the main street, run to the wall that blocks the alley from going anywhere, run into the burning building opposite me, or run back into the café and face-off with two dark fae.
