“I will if you swear to keep your mage and human by your side and under control,” the blonde fae said.
“Agreed.”
Gritting my teeth, I kept my retort to myself. I wanted out of these body-lock vines more than I wanted to tell blondie to F off. She nodded, and the vines fell away, allowing Hekla and me to take a real breath.
I straightened my dirty white shirt and tugged my ripped jeans back into place. I was super glad I’d donned my trusty black motorcycle boots before I’d worked that last spell in the cursed castle with Lucus. This was no time to be barefoot. Situations like this called for some good shit kickers.
“Come. You can explain all to my mother using those fine manners of yours.” Blondie led us down a path lined in ferns that were populated by snails as big as my fist.
Lucus dropped back to walk with us. “Are you well, Coren? Hekla?”
I redid my messy bun to keep my hair out of my face. “I think Hekla is tired of that question.”
Hekla removed an errant dark blonde hair from my shirt, then stared straight ahead. “Yup.”
I shrugged at Lucus, masking the tremor of fear and anger running through me with forced nonchalance. “Maybe try it again after I find a mage who can keep me from electrocuting myself with magic and when Hekla is safely back in our bakery’s kitchen.”
Hekla pointed at me. “What she said.”
Lucus’s gaze strafed the surrounding trees and the dark shadows that housed pools of night even though the rest of the world had embraced the day. “I don’t know what the woman meant about portals not working here. Stay close. Baccio and Aurelio will be keeping an eye on us. They are here if we need them.”
“You sure about that? Baccio isn’t my biggest fan. Now that he knows you were helping me, a mage, he might decide he’s better off without us both.”
“He is my brother. He will not fail me.”
I shrugged. I didn’t share his optimism.
“Where did the others go anyway?” Hekla tripped over a tree root, and I caught her elbow.
“They disappear into trees to feed on energy. I know. It’s super strange.”
“Cool though.” She stared straight ahead, her cheeks pale.
“Yeah. And the vampire—”
“That guy who attacked us at the theater was a vampire, right?” Hekla picked at her cuticles, a nervous habit I hadn’t seen her do since we’d opened the bakery.
“You’re doing great absorbing all of this.”
Hekla flashed a nervous smile and pushed her hair away from her wide cheeks. “I honestly thought your Aunt Viv was pretty smart for a nutcase.”
My mouth popped open. “You believed her all this time?”
“No, but I didn’t not believe her.”
I frowned. “That makes no sense.”
“Yes, it does. I held off on judgment.” Hekla tugged her sweater’s sleeves over her hands.
“Ah. Okay. Well, to answer you, yes, Kaippa is a vampire. He isn’t all bad, I guess. He kind of helped me here and there.”
Hekla shot me a glare. “In between attacking you and me.”
“Yes.”
“You need to set your standard a touch higher on the What Is Bad scale.”
“It’s been a long week.”
In a line, we snaked through a forest with more oaks as tall as skyscrapers. A scent that reminded me of that mulled wine stuff Aunt Viv used to make suffused the air. Weird. Not bad weird, but still.
We came to a silver pond that reflected the oaks, ferns, and the sunrise-painted clouds barely visible between the branches.
At a flat rock covered in bright yellow moss, the fae stopped and turned. “As you enter the inner realms of our court, you will feel as though you are drowning. The sensation only lasts a few moments.”
“Delightful.” I rolled my eyes, wanting Hekla to join in on the mood-lifting sarcasm, but she still looked like a cat tossed in a bath.
“How did you manage this?” Lucus asked the blonde. He bent at the surface of the water and touched the rippling silver with one finger.
“As I said, we have a ... relationship with mages. They prepared a haven for us in exchange for community here because they were ostracized by their own and by humans.” Without another word, she walked forward into the water and slowly disappeared beneath the gentle, lapping waves.
Hekla tugged my sleeve, ripping the seam a bit. “I'm not doing this, dude.”
“Look. I'm not a fan of letting the magical water eat us either, but I don't think we have a lot of choice here.”
Chapter 2
“Why can't we just stay? Find a train to Edinburgh and flirt with cute Scotsmen and eat toffee pudding?”
“That sounds amazing, but I have to see the mages they have here. I’ll actually die if I don’t. And I don’t want you to go because Kaippa and Baccio are out there somewhere and they know you. They might hurt you.”
Hekla picked at her cuticles and took a shuddering breath. “Good points.”
“Once we figure some stuff out, and I'm not afraid I might die in the next second, we’ll make some plans.”
Hekla opened her mouth to say something but shut it again. She was staring at Lucus, and I knew exactly where her thoughts were. She could tell we were a thing.
I made a face. “I don’t know where to start. Look, Lucus and I…”
She shook her head again; this time she did it so hard that her thick black bangs went askew. “He’s hot and all,” she whispered, “but, Coren, promise me we’ll go back to our normal life at some point.”
My stomach clenched. “I can’t make that promise.”
Hekla leaned her head on my shoulder and uttered a little whine. “I was afraid you’d say that. Lie to me, friend. Just lie so I can keep on.”
“We’ll be back at our bakery by tomorrow morning, cursing our struggling refrigerator and mixing jelly for the weekend doughnuts.”
“I love that lie.”
“Me too.”
I wondered how long it would take Ami to call Titus and alert the police. At some point,
