eBooks are not transferable. They cannot be sold, shared or given away as it is an infringement on the copyright of this work. This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental. Samhain Publishing, Ltd. 512 Forest Lake Drive Warner Robins, Georgia 31093 Go Between Copyright © 2007 by Dayna Hart Cover by Anne Cain ISBN: 1-59998-565-9 www.samhainpublishing.com All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. First Samhain Publishing, Ltd. electronic publication: August 2007
Go Between Dayna Hart
Dedication To my boys: My sons, who seem to know I love them even when I’m under deadline. (Though I still think the mac-and-cheese dinners help.) My husband, who takes care of everything I neglect (even myself). You boys are why I believe in love and magic, now and forever. To my girls: My sister Kathy, who let me practice at being a mom, and still lets me believe I didn’t suck at it. Diana Castilleja, who I’m not sure if I should thank or hurt for encouraging me to continue and giving me a direction to go in when I was ready to give up. Crystal Jordan, who spurs me on to be better, and aspire for more. Jen McKenzie, who calms me in my deepest neuroses, and who, for some reason, makes me believe anything is possible. Nonny Morgan for being forthright with me when people were plain full of horsepucky. You girls are why I believe in myself, and for that I’ll love you forever.
Go Between
Claire smothered a gag that had nothing to do with the rye she’d been drinking. Glaring at the birthday gift, she cradled the bottle in her hand. So it was only a mickey. Claire was a cheap drunk. With her almost compulsive tendency to finish what she started, a forty in the house would have just been stupid. She wanted enough to ease her pain, not end up standing on her balcony, naked and screaming at passers-by. Not again. The no-name cola she’d been using for mix sat on the coffee table, which suddenly seemed too far away. After a moment of consideration, she swigged directly from the bottle of rye. Her eyes burned, and her cheeks bellowed, but it stayed down. She grinned with a fierce pride. The smile froze when her gaze fell on the papers on the ottoman and the gaudily wrapped package beside them. Reminders of what had caused her to crawl into the bottle to begin with. One was her birthday present from Ryan. Not the overly festive package, either. No, her high school sweetheart and husband of five years had served her with divorce papers. On her twenty-fifth birthday. Not that the divorce was a surprise, they’d been separated for over a year, but as always, Ryan’s timing sucked. The only one whose timing was worse was her sister, Marielle. Because she had just opened the divorce papers when another messenger arrived. Carrying the package. Neongreen wrapping paper with tiny purple and aqua polka dots, tied with a huge hot-pink bow; it was the ugliest thing Claire had ever seen. And whatever was inside it could only be as bad. Maybe worse. Marielle had some strange ideas of what Claire wanted, and who she was. Past birthday gifts had included edible underwear, adult-only Twister, and fuzzy socks. In the same package. The eye-popping paper didn’t disguise the gift—it was a book. A big book. A heavy book. Yet, still, a book. But Claire couldn’t help but wonder what kind of book it was. She’d spent an entertaining half-hour taking wild guesses. Her latest: a coffee table version of the Kama Sutra, with full colour illustrations. Bound in leopard-print velour. Claire studied the package again, letting her gaze trace the lines of it, too afraid to let her hands do the same. Lifting the bottle for another swig, she checked the level of the amber liquid inside. Half empty. Or was that half full? She giggled. It didn’t matter. Either way, she had half of a bottle to self-medicate with. If the book turned out to be the Nazi manifesto, bound in human skin, she’d have enough alcohol to drown the memory. The bottle tucked into the crook of her arm, Claire pulled the ottoman closer with her free hand. She hefted the book in her arms and debated putting it back, ignoring it, pretending it had never arrived.
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She knew Marielle would phone, though, asking pointed questions to make sure Claire had really opened the book. Sighing, Claire tore off the ugly pink bow. Peeling away the wrapping paper, she stared in disbelief at the cover of the book in her lap. It was a Squashed Faery book. Each page featured a different illustration of a faery, supposedly pressed between the pages of the book like a flower. She traced the gold-embossed lettering of the title with one finger, a smile tilting the corners of her mouth. Warmth that had nothing to do with alcohol spread through her body. She and Marielle had gotten a similar book when they were kids, from some aunt they hardly knew. They’d spent hours staring at the pictures, giggling at the expressions on the tiny faces. With every turn of the page they would try to convince each other they’d seen one move before the giggles would set in again. The happy memories made her feel worse as the reality of her current situation slammed into her. She was twenty-five. The middle of her twenties. The middle of a divorce. The middle of a crisis. She took another swig then put the bottle on the floor beside her. Peeling off the plastic that bound the book, she inhaled the familiar scent of paper, tainted slightly with the mustiness of age. She stopped after listlessly turning a few pages and stared down at the book. Red, brown, green and gold leaves appeared to swirl across the page, as though being tossed by a gentle breeze. The male faery, wrapped in an autumn-red leaf, was almost invisible. His hands were outstretched, palms up, as though he was trying to push the pages off himself. His hair looked like spider webs fanned around his chiselled features, which were pinched with his efforts. Without those tiny hands, she might never have found him in the tumble of leaves. Peering into the book, she followed the line of his wide shoulders, down his chest to a narrow waist. Not badly built, for a Little People. Little Person? Claire considered that, reaching over the book to grab the mickey. Something bit her breast, and she jumped, the rye sloshing in the bottle, but not spilling. “What the hell?” A spider. Maybe an ant. She looked at the page, expecting to see some kind of biting insect skittering across the page. Never mind that in the midst of a Canadian winter, any bug but a cockroach would be hibernating. And the thought of a cockroach—especially one that might bite—was just too disgusting to consider. When she looked down, already inhaling to let loose a scream that would shatter a bug to pieces, there was nothing on the page but the little faery. His tiny hands were clenched into fists, and his chin jutted at her
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in defiance. Something about that wasn’t right. She exhaled noisily and turned the page, then took another swig, her eyes closing against the fierce burn. She opened her eyes in time to watch the page flip back to the one with the leaffaery. Futile fury welled up in her chest. She’d told Ryan there was something wrong with the windows. Even when they were closed, a breeze came through the living room. This was proof. The brief moment of victory felt hollow, though. Ryan was across town at his girlfriend’s place—not there to listen to her gloat. She sighed, leaning away from the book to put the bottle on the floor beside her, checking it when it wobbled. Satisfied it wouldn’t fall, she stared at the little faery. His fisted hands were outstretched, pushing up over his head, a thin layer of plastic bubbling up from the page with his efforts. Wait. That wasn’t right. She pulled the book up close to her nose to examine the faery. “Are you going to sit there gawking, or are you going to help me out here?” The book fell to her lap, and Claire watched the faery jostle across the page. She stared in disbelief at the faery standing in the middle of the page with his hands on his hips. She tilted the book to the left, and the faery slid across the page. She angled the book to the right, and he skittered that way, his feet skipping underneath him to keep his balance. When the book was level again, he turned his gaze onto Claire. “Would you stop that?” He stamped his foot in irritation. “Oh, sorry,” Claire said, but he wasn’t listening. Reaching toward Claire, his hands pressed against the plastic, separating it from the page. His hands were far enough apart to create two separate bubbles with space between them. Claire thought they looked like pinchers. As his hands closed together, she realised she hadn’t been bitten, but pinched. Part of her brain whispered she should be incensed, but she was too fascinated to work up much in the way of anger. She stared as he pushed one hand to join the other in its plastic bubble, straining his muscles to break free. But the plastic wouldn’t give. It snapped back into place with a pop, and he sagged. Panting with exertion, he glowered up at her. “Could you give me a hand?” Without thinking, Claire reached out to touch the page with the tip of her finger. Wiggling her nail a little, she felt the soft resistance of the bubble around the little man. With a final twist of her finger, her nail gouged the bubble. The man’s hands burst through to grab her fingertip. Holding tight, he heaved himself out of the book, the plastic
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shredding around him. Once he’d brushed himself off, he stood astride the open pages with a triumphant grin. “Much better, thanks!” He shook his head, which sent his silver hair fluttering around his face. Stamping his foot on the page, he glared at the book as if he’d like to rip it to shreds. “Horrid place to spend a couple decades.” Brushing his arms off with the palms of his hands, he let his gaze rove her body. “Well,” he said, with one eyebrow cocked. “Hello there.” Claire looked down at herself and flushed. Her cotton nightshirt was nearly seethrough with age, and her slippers were shaped like frogs. A towel sat turban-style on her head, keeping her wet hair off her face and neck. The little man-faery didn’t seem to mind the details, however, as his gaze roamed her curves. “Stop looking at me like that,” Claire finally snapped at him, when he showed no sign of stopping on his own. “Oh, was I?” he asked, meeting her eyes. He blushed, and Claire fought the urge to giggle at the expression on his face. The mixture of chagrin and I’d do it again in a heartbeat were too hard to reconcile. “Yes, you were,” she said, her tone softening. “How rude of me.” His eyes sparkled with a smile, though he kept his facial expression saintly. “I’m Dell.” He looked as though he expected her to say something. “Dell of the Dale?” he asked, still looking expectant. She shook her head, and relief dawned over his features. “Oh, you must not have that poem here yet. Well that’s a relief. Builds up expectations and—” He blushed again, and Claire suddenly wished she knew the poem he meant. She had the feeling it ran more along the lines of a Nantucket limerick. He met her eyes. “No matter, really.” He extended his hand, and Claire once again held out the tip of her finger, this time to shake “hands”. As they finished, his gaze dipped to her breasts. A surge of modesty flooded her. She fisted the nightgown in one hand and held it away from her body so it would no longer cling to her curves. “Stop that!” Her voice, laced with laughter, wasn’t likely to frighten him into stopping. Not that it mattered, really. Maybe it was because she could squish him with one hand, but his brash leering didn’t frighten or anger her, though it would from a human. Instead, she found herself grinning at him. “If I go get some clothes on, will you—” she fluttered her hand in the air while she searched for the words, “—disappear? Or something like that?” 8
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He sat on the book, cross-legged, shaking his head. “I hope not! Disappearing is so messy!” His voice affected disgust, and Claire stared at him in confusion. She’d meant “disappear” in a not-so-literal sense, but he didn’t seem to have taken it that way. She wasn’t sure what to say. He seemed to know it, too, because he winked, and when he spoke, his voice had softened. “Go dress, love. I’ll wait here. I have lots to tell you, and the sight of you like that—well, go dress.” While she raced to her bedroom, she tried to recapture Dell’s voice in her mind. An accent she couldn’t peg down—something not quite as brogue as an Irishman, and not clipped enough to be a Brit. It was maddeningly intriguing. Of course, it’s the alcohol, she decided once she was in her room. Not that it had made her prone to hallucinations before, but there really wasn’t any other explanation. Fairies didn’t pull themselves out of books. Period. Still, there was no reason she couldn’t enjoy the hallucination while it lasted. She slipped her jeans on under her nightgown and pulled the towel off her still-damp hair. She took off the nightgown and tugged her way into a bulky sweater. A quick look in the mirror suggested the sweater was maybe a little too bulky. Even if the first man to pay her any attention in over a year was only eight inches tall, not to mention a hallucination, that was no reason not to enjoy it just a little. Changing the sweater for another, she eyed the difference it made. The new one cupped the top of her breasts, hung loose around her waist and hugged her hips. It was formfitting, but not too tight. Fingercombing her strawberry-blonde curls, she fluffed the tangles out and left her hair to dry on its own. She slid her feet into a pair of hard-soled terry cloth flip-flops after a longing look at her frog slippers. She was moving fast when she got to the living room. Not quite running, but there was a definite skip in her steps. Smiling, she stared at the book, still open where she’d left it on the sofa. The little man-faery was nowhere in sight. She kept walking, searching for him, her shoulders sagging farther with each step. It had been a hallucination. Stepping around the sofa, she grabbed the mickey and took a swig while looking at the book. The leaves and spider webs that made up the background of the page could easily hide him, she supposed, but she was still surprised she didn’t see him anywhere. Letting her arms drop to her sides, she felt a loss. Not just because he’d checked her out, although that had been a nice feeling. But he was something magical in an otherwise mundane life. She dropped onto the couch and sighed.
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“Do you have anything to eat?” She bolted upright. “Pardon me?” The voice came from somewhere in the living room, but she couldn’t find him. “I haven’t eaten in decades. I’m starving!” She looked up. Something flitted against the ceiling. Something too large to be a housefly. Heck, it was almost too large to be a bird. “What are you doing up there?” Exasperation was tempered by her relief at seeing him again. “I’m flying,” he answered. “Duh!” With that, he executed a loop-de-loop, followed by a twist. “I haven’t been able to do this since I got stuck in that book, either.” With whoops of delight, he continued spinning and flipping. Claire lost sight of him when he headed toward the dining room. She eyed the bottle of rye, wondering if another swig would help keep him around. Before she’d decided, her floors shuddered with a resounding thud, and she heard the unmistakable clink of breaking glass. Although she was running when she reached the dining room, she stopped inside the doorway, trying to decide how she was supposed to react. Dell lay across the top of her dining room table. Only, instead of the eight-inch version she’d thought was so cute and harmless, he was now six and a half feet of sinew, muscle and—sex appeal. She was staring at the leaf, which hadn’t grown—or at least, it hadn’t grown much. It had once covered his entire body, but now it concealed just enough—and too much—of him, all at once. Closing her eyes, she swallowed the lump that had formed in her throat. Burned into her eyelids was the image of his well-muscled thighs, currently wrapped around her chandelier. It was too easy to imagine herself in its place, his legs around her, her body pressed against his— Her eyes popped open. Talking to hallucinations was one thing. Lusting after them was something else altogether. Neither of them seemed sane, but one seemed indecent on top of it all. She realised he still hadn’t spoken. “Are you all right?” Her voice sounded far away. And frightened. He propped himself up on his elbows and met her eyes. Sheep-faced, he nodded. “I’m fine.” He blushed, looking crestfallen. “It was so pretty.” He indicated the fallen chandelier. “I thought I’d dance on it. It never occurred to me I’d hit a Fold.”
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“Come again?” He smiled at her, skimming her body with a lingering glance. “You look nice.” He struggled to sit up. “Could you help me get this off?” Shaking her head to break her stupor, she moved to help him lift the light fixture. Since she and Ryan had bought the house, she’d wanted it replaced. Faux crystals dripped from every fake brass arm. A chain held it in place over the table, snaking across the ceiling and down the wall to an outlet. “Wait,” she said, moving to unplug it, shrugging her embarrassment when she was done. “Doesn’t hurt to be careful.” Once the light was safely moved to a corner of the table, she turned back to Dell. He looked comfortable, reclining on her table. Her gaze followed the lines of his body as she moved toward him. His feet were long and thin, as were his legs, though muscles strained as though trying to escape the confines of his skin. The sharp angles of his hips were visible on either side of the leaf. How well did it cover him? She rolled her eyes at herself. Again with the leaf. She pulled her gaze along the soft coating of hair that didn’t obscure the muscles of his chest, up his long neck. His face was angular, softened by the smile that seemed part of his face, instead of an expression on it. His hair was pale. At first glance it seemed grey, but closer examination showed it to be so much more than that—it was as if each strand were actually spun from silver. It looked soft, and she found her hand reaching out to twist a strand between her fingers. It felt like spun silk beneath her fingertips. She became aware of a building warmth between her legs and a tightening in her stomach. Hallucination or not, Dell was hot. He turned heavy-lidded eyes the colour of copper toward her. Eyes full of an intense expression she couldn’t understand. She rocked on her heels, closing the distance between them, her eyes sliding closed. He smelled like a winter breeze, and when his breath fanned over her face, it smelled like wild honey. The contrary scents were intoxicating. She pushed herself away. Before her soon-to-be ex-husband, she had only kissed a handful of boys. And none since he’d left. Looking at Dell’s lips, unable to raise her eyes any farther, she knew kissing him would be like nothing she’d experienced before. Although the promise of it sent her nerve endings shivering, she wasn’t ready for it. Not now. “I—” He cut her words off with his own. “Would you come sit with me?” “On the table?”
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He nodded. “I’m not sure how big the Fold is. I think it is the size of your tabletop, but it would be embarrassing, to say the least, to discover I was wrong.” She felt her face scrunch up in confusion, and he dragged his fingertip down her nose as though smoothing out the lines. “You mentioned a fold before.” She shook her head. “I don’t understand.” But she took the hand he extended to help her up, and let him lace his fingers with hers once she’d settled beside him. “There is so much to explain.” He sighed, tension tightening his shoulders, making the skin of his arm rub against hers where they touched. Pleasure trickled through her, a languorous frisson along her nerve endings. “I live in the land of Fae,” Dell began, “a world which has always been parallel to your own. We are separated by a Curtain, a thin barrier between your world and ours, which has allowed us to keep to ourselves.” “But we have stories. I mean faery tales—” He grinned. “Mostly to ourselves, then.” Turning his smile on her, he winked, and she felt her desire flare again. God, when had a man ever affected her like that? She forced herself to focus on his words. “The best way for us to be in your world was to find a Between. Doorways, twilight, the exact spot where the surf meets the sand. These are Betweens.” He looked at her. “A doorway is between two rooms, twilight is between day and night.” Rewarding her with a smile, he continued. “In the last century, the definition of Betweens has grown pretty lax. Magic can exist between someone’s fingers, between their ears—” he grinned at her, “—between their legs.” She blushed, but held his gaze, and he winked before continuing. “This got our people into a frenzy. Many of us studied the phenomenon, although just as many took advantage of their sudden freedom, flitting back and forth between our worlds to cause mischief or mayhem, depending on their nature.” She nodded her understanding. People reacted differently to freedom, too—wanting to explore or to conquer, depending on who they were. “It soon became clear that the Curtain between our worlds had retracted. Just a sliver—enough to allow access between our worlds to those few who found out about it. We don’t know how, or why, but we can predict some of the effects. The biggest one is the increase in the number of Folds in the Curtain, places that belong to both worlds, or neither, at the same time.”
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This part she didn’t get, and she looked at him to explain. He took her sweater in his hands, his fingers brushing against the skin of her stomach as he did, making her shiver. Smiling to let her know he’d noticed, he pleated the sweater over his fingers. The first pleat went around his index finger before he folded it back between his middle finger and ring finger, then around his pinky. Looking down at it from above as she was, the folded shirt formed a series of U-shapes. He wiggled his index finger inside one of the U’s. She watched the tan-coloured tip of it move in fascination. “This is a Fold. A spot where the Curtain twists, resulting in a special kind of Between.” She nodded. It made sense. “These Folds are different sizes, and show up in new places all the time, although some of them are fixed. Inside these Folds, fae and humans co-exist in their normal forms.” Her mind leapt to understanding. “So this is what you look like in Fae?” He nodded, another rewarding smile lighting his eyes. “But on Earth, or outside the Fold, you morph to eight inches tall. And if you went outside of the Fold—” Realisation flooded through her. She’d been imagining kissing him, and he’d been holding still, unwilling to move more than an inch or two for fear of shrinking to the size of a Ken doll. The image of it, her lips suctioning his entire head, which could then fit in her mouth, flooded her mind, and she felt the heat rise in her cheeks. “You’d have gone back to being eight inches tall.” He nodded, seeming to understand her discomfort, though she hoped he had no idea of the reason behind it. The heat deepened in her face, but her mental slide show seemed reluctant to stop. It was hard to maintain the image of him as a Ken doll, and far too easy to imagine herself giving in to the seduction of his kisses. Claire’s mind leapt away from the image of them indulging themselves on her dining room table. She leaned back and found herself staring at the smooth planes of his back, unmarred by freckles, scars or— “Wings,” she breathed. “Where are your wings?” His face twisted into a grimace, not of pain, but concentration. The expression soon smoothed into contentment. At the same time, the muscles in his arms rippled, and she felt something gossamer against her shoulder. Turning, she saw the tip of a wing shimmering at the corner of her eye. Following the soft rounded line of it with her eyes, she saw that his shoulder blades, normally a sharp ridge of bone, had flattened. With a twitch of his muscles the wings folded themselves into a pocket of skin atop his shoulder blades, rendering them “normal” once again. “Shit,” she said, exhaling softly to avoid gasping, and he chuckled. “Pretty much.”
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They sat in silence for a moment while Claire pieced together what he’d said. “How did you get out of the book?” she asked. “You weren’t in the Fold then.” He laughed. “So full of questions.” He wrapped his arm around her shoulders. “My guess is that you were at a Between of your own.” She shook her head even as the truth of it crashed over her like a bucket of water, her own thoughts skittering through her mind like ice cubes. In the middle of her twenties, in the middle of a divorce, in the middle of a crisis. Between twenty and thirty, between phases of my life. Understanding forced its way into her mind. He must have seen something in her eyes, because he nodded with compassion. His arm tightened around her shoulders in a hug. “I suppose I am,” she sighed. “Not only that, you must have some inherent talent.” He shrugged. “Not just any human would have been able to help me get free of that book.” “The book!” She jumped to her feet and looked at him over her shoulder. “Are there more of you trapped inside?” Her pulse raced at the thought of more of them, trapped and waiting for rescue. Dell shook his head. “No, no. I was just foolish and headstrong.” He waved it away as unimportant, and pulled her back down to sit with him. “I suppose it wasn’t all bad, though.” His gaze roamed over her figure again, and she smiled. It was strange how comfortable she felt with him. The way he looked at her made her feel desired and beautiful, though the same look from someone else would have made her furious. Startled, she wondered when exactly she’d stopped thinking of him as a hallucination. As she examined him from the corner of her eye, it was hard not to believe he was real. He met her gaze, and she smiled, letting their eyes connect and communicate until the air around them heated with their desire. He kissed her, a tender kiss that nonetheless enflamed her senses despite her frantic attempts to keep control. His hands slid up her arms to cup her face, holding her close while his tongue explored her mouth. Three loud thumps echoed in her ears before she realised it wasn’t her heartbeat, but someone banging on her door. She looked at Dell, then flicked her gaze to the door. “I’m not expecting anyone,” she whispered, grinning. He looked at her, molten desire in his eyes, and cocked his head to listen. His eyes darkened, and he sighed. “We’d better check it out.” Sliding off the table, he reverted to his eight-inch form before his feet touched the ground. Hovering in the air, he waited so Claire could follow 14
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him. She started toward the front door, but he shook his head and pointed through the doorway between the dining room and kitchen. She looked at him, confused, but gave a helpless little shrug and then waved a hand, indicating he should lead the way. Once they reached the doorway, he motioned for her to crouch down, and then pointed at the windows. She understood the silent message: stay out of sight. Peering around the cupboards at the glass sliding doors that led to the back yard, Claire didn’t see anything. A heavy-handed and insistent knocking startled her. It was definitely coming from the front door. A sudden surge of rebellion rose in her chest. She didn’t have to let him tell her what to do. Standing with elaborate movements, so he could see she was taking charge of herself again, she took a few steps into the kitchen and away from the glass sliders to the back yard. The pocket door on the wall opposite the sliders opened into the foyer and she headed that way. Dell called to her, his voice quiet but clear. “We’ve got to get out of here.” Turning to say something to him over her shoulder, she caught movement from the corner of her eye. Through the sliders, she watched something dark lumber through the shadowed yard, and shuddered. “Oh shit,” Dell said, his voice so full of fear and hatred Claire felt fear well up in her own chest in response. “Goblins,” he whispered, shaking his head. “We really need to get out of here.” He danced in the air, shifting position to go back through the doorway to the dining room. She couldn’t bring herself to move any closer to the glass doors, though, even if it was the fastest way out of the room. Instead, she went for the pocket door at the far end of the kitchen. Staring over her shoulder, she saw the goblin move closer to the glass, a darker spot in the darkness outside. Its eyes glowed a putrescent yellow that made her think of bile and phlegm. On all fours, it was as tall as her waist, and as she watched, it pulled itself upright to walk on two legs. It seemed unnatural, like a dancing wolf, and she shivered. Nothing so menacing should be able to mimic humanity. Three more steps—she made it through the doorway, into the foyer. Which simply put her next to the front door. Thump. Thump. It shuddered on its hinges as she passed. She swallowed the scream that rose in her throat. Her body contorted as she kept her eyes on the door, even as her feet continued carrying her forward. She tried to turn around and focus on where she was going, but it was too late.
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She tripped. Her chin grazed the carpet and her teeth clicked together, but she caught herself with her hands before collapsing into a heap. Dazed for a moment, she shook off the fuzziness crowding the sides of her vision. She used her hands, moving forward on all fours. She managed to get her feet under her, her fingertips hanging mere inches off the floor and she tried to straighten without slowing down. Startled by the sharp sound of glass exploding behind her, she put on a burst of speed, running toward the dining room bent over at the waist. “Shit,” she squealed through gritted teeth. Dell flitted down to rest on her shoulder, tugging at her with his tiny hands. “C’mon, love. To the Fold.” She shuddered, her eyes searching for the thing she knew had broken through the glass in her kitchen, the thing moving toward her with a sucking sound accompanying each footstep. The thing which might steal her sanity if she looked too long in its glowing yellow eyes. A scream clawed at her throat for freedom, but she fought it back. “Come on,” Dell insisted. He moved to hover in front of her face to force her to look at him. “Just a few more steps, love.” She pulled herself to her feet and raced through the living room, back into the dining room. He climbed onto the table-top, reverting to his larger size, and she climbed up beside him. He wrapped his arms around her, holding her tight to him. “You’ll have to trust me, lovely.” She nodded, not trusting her voice to speak. “Close your eyes, it’s less frightening that way.” “What’s less—” She stopped talking as the room seemed to tilt, twisting in on itself. It looked almost as if her dining room were a scene painted on a large piece of cloth, and someone had just grabbed that cloth by the centre, pulling it away. Before it disappeared, something large lumbered into the room, twisted shapes she couldn’t assemble into a cohesive figure. Just the phlegmy eyes that glowered at her full of malice. It leapt toward them, hand outstretched, and she closed her eyes, unable to scream through her terror. Something lurched beneath her feet. The table heaved like a bucking horse, then disappeared altogether. She felt as if she were falling, and Dell’s arms tightened around her. Instead of landing on something, it slid into place beneath her feet, and Dell relaxed around her, whispering into her hair. She cracked her eyelids open, afraid of what she would see. She gasped her astonishment. Trees of silver dipped as though bowing to a sapphire-coloured lake. Where her dining room table should support her was instead a blanket of grass so vibrant it was easy to imagine it had leeched the green from the nearly colourless trees. Where walls should surround them, endless expanses of open space met her eyes. When she blinked, she was
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afraid to reopen her eyes. She wasn’t sure what would frighten her more—finding herself still in her dining room, discovering Dell and this place were nothing but a dream…or being by the lake, heartbreaking in its beauty. She pried open one eyelid, and sobbed in relief. The lake spread before her. She hadn’t let herself consider it, but there had been a third option. She might have opened her eyes to find herself in her dining room, still surrounded by the goblins, her life about to end. The mental image of the creatures amplified the beauty of the world around her, and she opened her eyes wide, trying to take it all in. Light shimmered over the lake’s unbroken surface, hinting at the depths below. Dell’s grip loosened around her, and she worked her way free to show she could stand on her own. “It’s beautiful,” she said quietly, her hushed tone full of reverence. She tried to take it all in, turning in a slow circle. The sky was a pale shade of blue that made her think of a baby blanket she’d had as a child, soft and calming. The grass stood in sharp green spikes in contrast, and the lake mirrored it all in its unrippled surface. The few trees surrounding the lake looked like weeping willows, although their colour, too, was more white and silver than she’d imagined the ones at home could ever be. Dell smiled at her, and she looked over his shoulder, still half-expecting to see her kitchen behind him. Nothing but more green grass, a stand of trees. A mountain broke the monotony of the skyline beyond. Other than the soft whisper of the wind, the world was silent. “Will they follow us?” Dell shook his head. “This is an enchanted place. Even if they’re brave enough to step through the Curtain without knowing where it leads, they’d be incinerated if they set foot on the grass of this glade.” He let out a long breath. “We were lucky.” Lucky. She hung her head, letting the events of the day roll over her. The beauty of the place struck a chord inside her, freeing the frustration and disappointment that had been festering in her long before Dell climbed out of his book. To her dismay, tears began to fall from her eyes. Blinking, she turned her back to him, trying to hide it, but the tears wouldn’t stop, and soon her body was heaving with the force of her sobs. Dell wrapped his arms around her again, turning her so her face pressed into his still-naked chest. Her sobs ravaged her body, and she felt as if her insides were pouring out of her. Gone was her fear and terror. As the tears ebbed, she inhaled great gulps of air that smelled of grass and flowers, cinnamon and honey. She filled herself with it, replacing
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what her tears had washed out of her. Lifting her head, she met Dell’s eyes without shame for her deluge. “Thanks,” she whispered. Smiling, he brushed the tears from her cheeks with his thumbs, his fingers resting along the line of her jaw. “C’mon, we’d best get moving. There are people I should see, now that I’m out of the book.” She nodded, grateful for the reassurance of his warm hand in hers. She smothered a laugh at how desperate she felt to assure herself of his reality when only a few minutes ago she’d wanted to dismiss him as a hallucination. “Aren’t we kind of far from—” she looked around at the expanses of green, “—well, anything?” Dell laughed, a rich deep sound that echoed in her head and sent shivers along her skin. “That we are not. Aelfheim is there, in that stand of trees.” “Aelfheim?” “A city where elves and faeries live.” He smiled at her, the expression warming the copper of his eyes. “You will have seen nothing like it, I’m sure. Come on.” He tugged on her hand lightly, and she picked up her pace. “All right, all right, I’m coming.” His excitement was contagious, and she laughed. He was moving so fast she was half-dragged along, despite taking three steps for every one of his. Of course, following him afforded her a great view of his ass, and since he was still wearing just a leaf, it was quite a view. The leaf itself seemed to be withstanding the rigors of travel almost too well—it still covered those parts she was discovering she rather wanted to see. A few minutes later, they stood in the midst of a stand of trees, zigzagging a trail from one bole to the other. Finally, Dell shouted with triumph, and tugged her to stand beside him. Rubbing her shoulder, she stared at the largest tree she had ever seen. The trunk was wider than she was tall and, tilting her head up, it seemed endless in height. “What’s this?” she asked with a sickening feeling she knew the answer. “This is the entrance.” Dell pointed at the tree trunk, and Claire groaned. Notched into the wood, every foot or so, were perfectly spaced horizontal indents. She was looking at a ladder. Swallowing, she shook her head. “You have got to be kidding.” “You’re not afraid of heights, are you?” She shook her head. “Not normally. But this isn’t any normal height, is it?”
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Dell grinned, and she was happy to see he looked at least a little shame-faced. “No, not really. But you shouldn’t worry at all, really. I’m here.” Puffing out his chest, he pasted on a superhero smile, and Claire laughed. “I’m so reassured.” She stuck her tongue out at him, and he motioned her toward the ladder. “Ladies first.” “Of course,” she muttered, and started climbing. She counted the rungs each time her right foot found new purchase. By one hundred and thirty-eight, she’d lost count twice, and reciting the numbers was just a way to cover the other voice in her head. The one that wanted to say you’re going to die, over and over again. Loudly. Then, as she was beginning to think she’d have to tell Dell she couldn’t go on, her head broke through into sunlight. Eye-level with a leaf-strewn platform, she gasped in surprise. She hefted herself up and sat on the platform. A quick look around suggested there was a lifetime’s worth of things to see. Yet her eyes were drawn to Dell as he pulled himself up beside her. The muscles in his arms and chest were taut, like a crossbow about to fire. When he unleashed his muscles, he moved in a smooth motion. The muscles in his rear end, exposed by the leaf he wore, tightened and clenched, then eased into soft contours. Claire’s mouth went dry. Wiping dust from her hands, she couldn’t tear her gaze away from him. When he turned her way, she met his eyes with an unabashed expression. “We made it.” She sounded breathless, and hoped he’d blame it on the climb. He returned her grin and stood, a graceful unfolding of his body. She clambered to her feet much less elegantly, and shuffled her feet in embarrassment. “This is amazing,” she said, although she’d hardly looked around. She took a moment now. Other than the elves, who towered above her, and the faeries, who were of every shape and size, it looked like any town market. Booths dripped with things for sale, most of which sparkled in the tree-diffused sunlight. The sellers’ bored expressions were belied by their watchful eyes as they protected against thieves and watched for legitimate buyers and hagglers. Skirts, shirts and wings flashed and caught the light, dazzling in their beauty. “That’s nothing,” Dell said. He draped his arm across her shoulder and turned her around. With his other hand, he motioned toward the edge of the platform, and Claire moved forward a step to have a look. Peering over the edge gave rise to an immediate rush of vertigo. Her hands and feet broke out in sweat, and her stomach flopped over
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itself. But she couldn’t stop looking. Stair-stepping down to the ground were platforms similar to the one she stood on, full of more bored merchants and pedestrians who ignored them. When she felt Dell join her, she asked, “Why didn’t we just go to one of the lower platforms?” She couldn’t tear herself away from watching the scene below, so his words were like a television voice-over. “We couldn’t. The only way into Aelfheim is to climb up to this level. From here, we can go down to any of the other levels. But this is the entrance.” “We didn’t pass these on our way up.” “We did pass them, love.” “I didn’t see any of them.” Claire looked at him now. “How’s that possible?” “You’re right, you couldn’t see them. All the entrances to Aelfheim bring you here, to the common.” She opened her mouth to argue with him, and he winked at her. “It’s magic, love. Don’t question it.” She turned her gaze back to the rush of movement below. “It’s beautiful,” she breathed. Then she turned on him. “Why didn’t you use your wings?” “I couldn’t.” He chuckled at her expression. “Magic,” he said again, as though that were an answer that made sense. “Love, you have to earn your way into Aelfheim. What fun would it be if you could just close your eyes and wish your way in?” “What better way to make people appreciate the local atmosphere than making them think they’re going to die. Great gimmick for tourism, Dell.” He laughed, and took her hand, leading her around the common. She didn’t pay attention to where they were going, distracted by the elves and faeries passing by. Despite his lack of clothing, Dell didn’t act as though it made him uncomfortable. He garnered a few looks, but Claire felt curious stares fall on her more often than she noticed them on Dell. Maybe because of his state of undress, Claire found herself noticing the clothes of the people milling around her. Reds dominated, followed by purples, greens and blues. No one wore white. The men wore soft looking pants and loose shirts, the women long dresses that fluttered about their legs like moths against a window. She felt drunk on colour. Checking her watch, she realised it could still be the effects of the rye she’d had. It had only been an hour. An hour since her perception of reality had been blown apart. An elf strode past and his cloak fluttered in the breeze, revealing the end of a longbow
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strapped to his back. His eyes met hers for a moment, and she shivered. His almondshaped eyes were one colour from corner to corner. A flat gunmetal grey that reflected the world around him. She could see herself in miniature staring back. His expression didn’t change, but she felt a sense of welcome flutter in her chest. A soft suggestion of peace and warmth. She stopped moving, staring at him. He didn’t move, but she felt as if he was asking if she understood. Dell tugged on her hand, and she dropped the elf’s gaze. The emotions were ripped away, and she gasped, turning to look back at the elf. A hint of the emotions flooded her, but Dell’s voice dragged her gaze back to him. “It’s okay, love. It’s hard to talk to elves.” Dell’s casually lifted hand managed to suggest goodwill and peace to the elf. Claire wondered how he infused such a small gesture with so much meaning. Looking from the faery to the elf and back again, she felt the elf’s goodbye before he turned away. Dell smiled at her reassuringly before he turned away from her again. Then he gave a happy shout. Opening a door, he rested his hand at the small of her back to usher her inside. Distracted by the way her heart trip-hammered at the intimacy of the gesture, it took her a moment to realise they were inside a small shop. Dell nodded at the clerk behind the counter, even as he lifted a pair of pants from a shelf and slid his body into them. The casual movement sent tendrils of awareness through Claire, and she turned her gaze away. He reached in front of her with a well-muscled arm to grab a red shirt. Pulling it on, he smiled at the clerk. “On my tab, Arin.” The clerk shook his head. “You’ve been gone for twenty years, Dell.” “And look, you still remember my name.” Dell winked at Claire, and she couldn’t help but grin. “You saw how I was when I came in, Arin. I don’t have any coin on me.” “What about her?” Arin looked at Claire with curiosity, his eyes glittering like jewels as he stared at her as if he could stare through her clothes. Astonished, she felt her mouth drop open. But the look wasn’t lecherous, she realised. He was trying to figure out if she was carrying anything that might have any value. She tried not to roll her eyes. Pulling her pockets inside out, she was as astonished as Arin when something clattered across the floor. Dell pounced on it and handed it back to her with a question in his eyes. Claire swallowed a grimace as she realised what she held in her hand. Her wedding band. She stared at the circle of gold, wondering what she was supposed to feel. Because the disappointment she’d expected wasn’t overwhelming her. www.samhainpublishing.com
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Instead, she felt nothing. Her marriage was over. With a start, she realised there was no villain in her failed marriage. They’d both made mistakes, and she hoped she’d learned enough to not repeat them. Anger and bitterness, which she’d used as a shield against tears when Ryan had moved out, were abandoned. Underneath, she didn’t find the gaping wound she’d thought she’d been protecting. It was okay. She was okay. She raised her startled gaze to meet Dell’s. Without a word to him, she handed the ring to Arin. Once he took it, she seemed to find her voice. “I assume that will cover it.” Dell’s eyebrows arched, but he was smart enough to not ask the questions he so obviously wanted answers to. Instead, still holding her gaze, he spoke to Arin himself. “And boots for us both, and weapons, of course, Arin.” The merchant’s gulp was audible. “Yes, yes of course, Dell.” Arin twirled the ring around the tip of his thumb, his fingers around it like a cage. They chose the rest of their gear in silence. Claire could feel Dell’s frustration, but wasn’t willing to address it in front of the shopkeeper. Dell seemed to agree, because he growled at her as soon as they left the shop, “He would have let me pay on credit, Claire. You didn’t have to give him your ring.” Claire smiled and shook her head. “It’s fine, Dell. I didn’t need it anymore.” Meeting his eyes, she let him see how unaffected she was. “Are you sure?” There was a frightening seriousness in his tone. She nodded. “I’m sure.” She met his eyes until he looked away, then forced her tone to brighten. “We’ve got clothes and knives. Now what?” “We need to see the queen.” “Just like that?” Claire wanted to laugh. Seeing he was serious, she shrugged instead. “If you say so.” “She’s a childhood friend,” Dell said, and Claire mulled that over. She decided he thought that would explain why he could get in to see the queen without an appointment of some kind. Maybe it was enough…she’d never known a queen, and it probably would get tiring if a queen’s friends had to follow court etiquette all the time. Especially when goblins had invaded. Actually, she figured the queen might make time to see her if she mentioned invading goblins, so she shrugged and accepted that she and Dell would be meeting with a queen.
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Following him as he again circled the common, staring at doors and muttering, Claire noticed more than one faery or elf stop to look at her companion. Even when he’d only been wearing a leaf, he’d carried himself with dignity, but now, he projected an air of calm assurance. Claire shook her head in silent wonder. She didn’t think human men were capable of such confidence without falling over into arrogance. Trying to change her own line of thoughts, she spoke without thinking. “What are you doing, exactly?” The words he was mumbling had begun to sound like an incantation. Her head felt funny from spinning in circles behind him, and she stopped, watching him while he was in her line of sight, listening to his movements when he wasn’t. After a moment, he stopped moving long enough to answer. “Sorry, love. I told you that every entrance ends up here, no matter where you enter from.” She nodded that she understood, but his eyes were focused on the doors behind her. “Likewise, you can go anywhere from here. Provided you can find the right bloody door—” He began his muttering again, and Claire realised most of the people around them were doing the same. They wore the patient, weary faces of travelers. Some of their lips moved, although most of them seemed to be silent, and she asked Dell why. “Saying what you’re looking for aloud can help the doors to align for you. Earlier, I needed shops, so each of those doors would have opened into one. I needed Arin’s shop in particular, however, because he carries what I need, and he would have let me pay on credit.” He tossed her a grin over his shoulder. “Had I known you’d come through with payment, I would have taken us somewhere nicer.” Winking, he turned back to the task at hand. “Right now,” he sighed, “I’m having a bit of trouble. The door I’m looking for is, well, enchanted, for lack of a better word. So not everyone can find it, you see? I have to find the right combination of words to get the exact door. And then I have to hope it isn’t locked to me.” She nibbled on the inside of her lip. How was Dell hoping to find this door? If it was locked, what would they do? Where were they going? Without meaning to, she had been following him again as he paced. Now, he stopped moving and she collided with his back. She teetered at the edge of the platform, fighting to regain her balance. He turned and slid his arms around her in one fluid movement. The tensed muscles of his arms were like steel against hers, and she shivered. Meeting his eyes, she couldn’t help but let herself be amazed by the simple beauty of his face. The
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sharp line of his nose, the soft planes of his cheeks. She reached a hand up to touch his face, trying to assure herself he was real. His hand tangled in her hair, and he brushed her lips with his, moaning as he pulled away. “Lovely, we have to go. Believe me, we’ll take this up later. But…I’ve found the door.” He met her eyes with an expression of longing and firm resolution. Despite the fact he wanted her, he had something more important to do. Normally Claire would have respected such devout loyalty, but in this case, she wouldn’t have minded if his priorities had been a little out of order. She nodded, and he brushed another kiss over her lips before opening the door. “Come on, let’s get this over with.” He led the way, shielding her with his body, so her first glimpses of the room were largely blocked by Dell’s shoulder. Through the small triangle of vision left to her, which bobbed with each step he took, she could see the soft blur of rich fabrics and perturbedlooking faces—none of which were human. Murmurs echoed through the room, and fingers pointed their way, but Dell kept moving forward. Quickly. When he stopped, he inclined his head to three elves sitting behind a long low table. “I must see Queen Eliane.” All three turned cool measuring gazes toward him. After some time, their gazes flicked over Claire, who shuddered with the contact their minds made with hers. Then they nodded and gestured for Dell to sit. They were obviously intended to wait, and Claire tried to be patient. However, she wasn’t doing very well, and Dell shot her a warning look when she twisted in her seat to examine the room behind her. After she stuck her tongue out at him, she sat primly, her hands folded in her lap. She counted the gleaming marble floor tiles she could see from where she sat—twenty-four—and admired the cool silk drapes which hung from a central circle high overhead. It was only when they fluttered in a breeze she realised these panels of crimson and gold were the walls of the room. Ordinarily, she’d have been captivated by it all, but she was finding it hard to sit still. “Now what?” Claire whispered the question when it seemed the elves’ attention had returned to the papers on the table before them. “Now we wait for Her Highness.” “I’d sort of figured that part out. Then what?” He looked surprised. “And then you are going home.” “Home? Are you kidding me? There are goblins at my house!” He shook his head. “They were there because of me, lovely. Once I’m finished here, it will be perfectly safe for you to go back.” He tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear. 24
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She scowled at him. “How do you know that? How do you know whatever-it-was that allowed me to get you out of that book didn’t attract them to me, and not you?” She could tell the thought hadn’t occurred to him. It hadn’t really occurred to her, either, the words had just tumbled out. Now, with her own words echoing in her ears, she wished she hadn’t said them. If the goblins had been there for her, and not for Dell, what would that mean? It would mean her life would never be the same. Would that be such a bad thing? Was she happy with her life the way it was? Goblins, elves and faeries weren’t exactly the sort of change she would have envisioned for herself, but, if she were honest, hadn’t she been hoping for change? Claire was grateful for the stir of activity in the room that distracted her from her thoughts. People around her rose to their feet in a wave, and she was carried along with it, standing before she could even wonder why. She was somewhat comforted when she noticed Dell was standing at her side. The air erupted with the sound of bells, the soft tinkling of a song Claire couldn’t recognize. While she listened, a woman materialized before them. Dressed in a simple white dress with flowing sleeves, the woman herself commanded attention. Pearls and diamonds winked and flashed from where they were woven through her silver hair, which was tucked behind her pointed ears. Her skin was whiter even than the milky tones of someone who never went in the sun. Almost luminescent, it was taut, wrinkle-andblemish-free. Claire studied her flawless skin, her delicate yet capable-looking hands. Claire was surprised to notice her almond-shaped eyes were, from corner to corner, the same sapphire-blue as the lake. The queen’s gaze roved over the room, her eyes making contact with more than half the people in attendance before she noticed Dell. Not a single line marred the perfection of her face, but she managed to look surprised. She looked a question his way, and he gave an almost imperceptible shake of his head. The queen seemed to sag ever so slightly. Then, again without any movement of the muscles of her face, the queen seemed to smile. Dell’s answering expression was hearty and open. Claire felt a tug of jealousy at the familiarity between the two, but she barely had time to register it before the queen turned away from Dell to focus on her. Peace and warmth fluttered in Claire’s chest, and she inclined her head to indicate respect and acceptance. “Thank you,” she said in a quiet voice.
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The queen dipped her head in a nod. Claire concentrated on the beauty she had seen while touring Aelfheim and condensed it into a small feeling inside her chest. Meeting the queen’s eyes, she projected that feeling outward. If she hadn’t been watching for a reaction, Claire might have missed the hint of a smile that brushed the queen’s lips before she inclined her regal head in a nod. Claire lowered her eyes, and wobbled a little on her feet. Dell looked at her in astonishment, but his tone was light. “I told you talking with elves was hard, lovely. Sit down, please.” He stared at her, and she realised he wasn’t going to stop until she sat down, so she did, without breaking eye contact with him. “I’ll do the talking,” he told her, and he said it like a warning. His expression softened and he added, “I’ll translate for you when I can.” His features smoothed into neutrality before he turned his attention back to Queen Eliane. Silence while they communicated in Elven. Afraid to meet the queen’s eyes again, Claire stared at Dell, hoping to understand some of the exchange by watching his expression. She could see the cords in his neck pulsing, the muscles tensing. He was getting angry. It didn’t surprise her when words exploded from his lips in frustration. “Eliane, we were working to prevent this!” Silence. Claire forced herself to look into the queen’s eyes, but the anger she could feel the woman directing at Dell made her drop her gaze. A much longer silence. “So you’re still not really sure what’s going on with the Curtain? Well isn’t that wonderful.” His sarcasm was biting, though she could hear fear underneath it. He rocked on the balls of his feet, and puffed air out of his cheeks as if they were bellows. It seemed to relieve some of his tension, because his voice was softer when he spoke again. “What does that mean for us?” He shook his head, though Claire wasn’t sure if it was because of Eliane’s reply, or the business about the Curtain. “You think they’d come here?” Dell’s shoulders sagged. “Are you certain?” he asked aloud after a few moments, and she noticed the elves at the table look at him with disapproval. Dell ignored it, meeting the queen’s eyes boldly. He shook his head, his shoulders sagging in obvious resignation and disappointment. During the next silence, he stiffened, recovering himself. “I will ask her. Although I think it’s unfair and unreasonable, myself.” He inhaled a deep breath. “No, I didn’t say I disagreed with you. I just don’t like it.”
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Aware they were talking about her, Claire rose to her feet. She looked at the queen and felt her amusement. Confused, she faced Dell, hoping for an explanation. “It seems I was wrong, lovely. Queen Eliane seems to believe the goblins were interested in you, after all.” Despite the fact her knees felt weak beneath her, Claire forced herself to stay upright. “The same ‘between-ness’ of you that let me escape the book attracted the goblins to you. Eliane seems to think they were hoping to take care of you before one of us found you.” She didn’t want to know what he meant by “take care of you”. “One of us?” she asked. Dell shrugged. “Those of us who are not-goblins, for the sake of simplicity.” He motioned for her to be seated, and she complied, though it occurred to her people only asked you to sit when they were delivering bad news. She steeled herself. “Before I was trapped in the book, I was working with Eliane and others, researching the small rips and tears in the Curtain. Rips allow humans to cross into Fae; tears allow us fae folk to go to Earth.” He was looking at her, to see if she understood, and she nodded. “These rips and tears have always allowed one or two humans or fae to move through the Curtain. But each time someone passed through a tear or a rip, they stretched it a little. It became the responsibility of a group of fae-folk to sew those rips and tears, so the Curtain wasn’t shredded.” He met her eyes, and she nodded, though she was starting to feel like a bobble head. “This is where things get screwy. Recently…” Dell trailed off, his eyes losing focus for a moment. “Before I went into the book. I’ve lost so much time…” He sighed and seemed to shake the mood off. “Even so, it’s recently, as faeries measure time. Some…fifty years ago or so, a tear has sprung up that works as both a rip and a tear. The magic normally used to sew it up isn’t working. For the past fifty years Eliane, and the others like us, have spent more time chasing rogue fae than working on the actual problem.” He sighed. “So long as the rip-tear stops growing—” he tossed a look over his shoulder at the queen, who appeared not to be listening, “—and Eliane seems to believe that’s the case, we can set up border patrols, with checkpoints like customs. Fae and humans who want to travel between the worlds would be required to check in.” Claire caught the look he shot at the queen, and figured Dell wasn’t as convinced the rip-tear had stopped growing. For the second time today, she was recreating her world as she knew it, and fear tangled with her acceptance of this new reality. She let herself be reassured by the fact that there was a plan in place. And people in charge of it. She
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soothed herself with calming thoughts. No fae were going to be able to use magic wiles to charm or bewitch humans. Humans wouldn’t be able to run to Fae for magic solutions to mundane problems. Win-win situation. Then Dell was talking again, and fear began tiptoeing up her spine. “It’s fine for those who are willing to obey such treaties. However, there will be those on both sides of the Curtain who will disagree with what we are planning.” “But if the rip-tear can’t be fixed, and people are going to pass through, what else would they suggest?” Dell dropped his gaze for a long moment, but forced himself to meet her eyes when he answered. “Faeries aren’t all benevolent, wish-granting sprites. Sure, most of us are of the live and let live variety, but…” He gave a shrug. “There are also those who would want to eradicate the humans. And those who don’t want you destroyed would rather use you as prey, labour, you name it. They don’t see why we should have to live in equality with a bunch of non-magic users.” Claire’s eyes widened as she let that sink in. The thought of faeries running amok, taking over her world, left her hands clammy, her stomach twisting. Fear, frustration, anger and helplessness toppled over each other, leaving her breathless. What he was suggesting made sense. Humans had their own track record of oppressing or enslaving others. Often it was a pre-emptive strike—dominate those who might disrupt the status quo. If the fae wanted to dominate the earth as well as their own world, they would be met with resistance. Not just resistance, she realised, but there would be those on her own side of the Curtain who would want the same control. Dominate the fae-folk, use their powers and abilities for their own benefit. Claire swore under her breath as the full ramifications sank in. It would be war. Both sides would fight, creating utter devastation, until one side or another was decimated. “What does she want from me?” Her voice was soft, full of resignation. She was already half-convinced she would do whatever job the queen wanted. Dell reached out and took both her hands in his, his eyes warm. He opened his mouth to speak when Queen Eliane moved forward, catching Claire’s gaze with her own. Without thinking, Claire concentrated on a spot in her chest, an empty space for the elf to project her feelings. This way Claire could feel what the queen wanted her to without internalizing the emotions as her own. The queen treated her with another of her strange half-smiles, and the emotional slide-show began.
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For what seemed like hours, information pumped into her system. Much of it Dell had already explained, the rips and tears, and more importantly, the new rip-tear. Occasionally, Dell would nod or add some narrative to accompany the images Eliane was showing. Eliane conveyed the sheer size of it, and how much damage could be done to both worlds. Then her focus shifted, and she showed Claire her home, currently overrun with goblins. She would have to work with Dell to reclaim it. The tension from maintaining contact so long made her shake, and exhaustion swamped her. Her eyes burned, and she wanted little more than to close them, but she forced herself to keep them open and locked on the queen’s. A feeling of dread settled over her shoulders like a widow’s shawl, as the queen outlined some of the consequences of letting the goblins run unchecked. The scenes Claire had imagined earlier of the devastation of her planet were played out in colour for her by the other woman. The queen’s eyes narrowed, and her face filled Claire’s vision, though neither of them moved. She got a definite “for your eyes only” vibe, although in this case, it was full body surround sound. “You must get your home back. The house itself is important.” Eliane’s voice resonated through Claire’s nerve endings, leaving her weak. “But why—?” Claire didn’t mean for Eliane to hear her, but she apparently had, as she answered a moment later. Although she chose to interpret Claire’s words for herself. “Because if he believes you are the focus of the attack, he’ll watch out for you. If he thinks there’s something else to protect, his loyalties will be divided.” Eliane’s voice hardened. “Distracted, Dell can do more harm than good.” Claire’s eyes widened. The queen broke eye contact, and for a moment, Claire was suspended in a world of thoughts and sensations not her own, which left her feeling as though she were drowning inside her own skin. She inhaled, filling her lungs in an attempt to clear the foreign thoughts and emotions from her system. Queen Eliane dropped something into Claire’s hand before she moved away with graceful strides so smooth she seemed to be gliding. As easily as that, Claire and Dell were dismissed. “You speak Elven very well,” Dell said, when the queen was gone. Dry heaves racked Claire’s body, and she shuddered through them. Dell stood nearby, his presence reassuring. She inhaled deep breaths of the scent of him, letting her mind wander to pleasant thoughts while she purged her system of some of the residue of the queen’s communication. When she could, she met Dell’s eyes. “It’s the immersion program, I guess. I didn’t have much choice.” www.samhainpublishing.com
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Dell grinned, then sobered and shook his head. “It’s not an easy thing to do, Claire. You have talents I would never have guessed at.” Claire shrugged, his obvious admiration bringing colour to her cheeks. She changed the subject. “We have to go get the goblins out of my house.” Dell blinked, but otherwise didn’t show any signs of surprise. “We’ll need some supplies. Our little knives won’t be enough.” She nodded, shaking the little velvet bag the queen had dropped into her hand, smiling at the sound of coin jingling inside. For the first time since the queen had entered, she noticed the people in the room around her. “Let’s get out of here, can we?” With a nod, Dell led her to the door, back into the common. “Where to?” Claire grinned. “Queen Eliane recommended a great shop, where we can find whatever we need.” When he moved to lead the way, she put her hand on his arm. “Let me.” She winked and led him to a door. Dell swore when they stepped into Arin’s shop. “Here?” He spluttered the word, and Claire laughed aloud. “The finest selection available, Dell.” She met Arin’s eyes. “The finest selection, according to Queen Eliane herself.” Arin cocked an eyebrow at her. “Well then,” he said, but didn’t move. Claire smiled. “She told me to ask you about the moonlit lake.” Arin blanched. “We-e-ell then, that’s a whole other mettle of wish, isn’t it?” His fingers shook as he waved them away from the counter. Grabbing the top with two hands, he twirled it around in a circle, revealing a display of wicked-looking weapons. Pulling a handle from the ceiling drew down a shelving unit full of clothing and leather miscellany. Sheaths, scabbards and quivers she recognized, though there were more whose function she couldn’t begin to guess. Dell’s jaw dropped, and Claire laughed with delight tinged with a nervousness she chose to ignore. Fortunately, she covered it when she spoke, sounding more confident than she would have believed. “I need something portable, Arin.” He ushered her to a display of longbows, and she shook her head. “Portable. Concealable. Something less…Fae, more Earth.” Arin’s eyes lit up with a gleam that put the shine of coins to shame. “I have just the thing,” he said with delight. “Brand new, too!” He skittered to the back room. Dell gave her an amused look, shaking his head as though dismissing them both. 30
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“You’re going to need weapons too, Dell of the Dale,” Arin called, his voice hollow, and Claire imagined him face first in a cupboard or barrel. Claire grinned at how Dell’s cheeks grew pink at the name. “I need to hear that story after our little adventure.” He looked prepared to argue, and she just shook her head. “Either you can tell me, or Arin will.” She was still laughing at his stunned expression when Arin returned with something in his hand that looked like a small handgun with a long, flat extension off the back, where the hammer would normally be. Taking it from him, she was astonished at how well the grip fit her hand. “It’s a kind of gel we make here in Fae,” Arin explained. “Once you hold the weapon, it conforms to your grip. It can be reset, though it’s tricky. It customizes the weapon for one owner.” She nodded, then turned her attention to the pistol-like thing in her right hand. With the grip in her hand, the back extension of the weapon rested along the inside of her arm to her elbow. When loaded, the shaft of the bolt would align with her fingers. A short squeeze of the trigger eased the string back, another released it. “This is better, Arin.” She smiled at him, and Dell shot her a look that seemed full of jealousy. “Long sleeves would cover it, for the most part. If that’s not enough—” Arin pushed a button, and the whole thing collapsed in on itself and wrapped around her wrist. Claire stared at it, astonished. “The benefits of working with magic,” Dell said. She laughed over her shoulder at him, as happy with her new weapon as she’d been with her E-Z Bake oven the year she’d turned six. Of course, she’d managed to burn her fingertips on the oven when she was too impatient to wait for a cake to finish baking, and she hoped the weapon would work out better for her. “There are two quivers,” Arin told her with a smile as he pulled them out for her inspection. “This one straps to the inside of your arm, like so.” His thin fingers wove the laces just below her left elbow, then around her wrist. Those laces came together and ended in a jointed ring that fit over the middle finger of her left hand, and she looked at him with a question. He grinned the toothy smile of a magician with a new parlour trick. “Move your finger, like so,” he commanded, crooking his own finger and pulling it back. Following his example, Claire was surprised when a bolt slid out of the quiver around her arm and clattered against the counter. “You’ll have to learn to catch them, though.” Arin laughed, and she joined him. Dell just shook his head, but she saw the smile on his face. “The other fits on your thigh.” www.samhainpublishing.com
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Arin moved around the counter, but Dell plucked the quiver from his hands as Arin passed him. “I’ll help her with that one,” he said, his voice cold. A quick glance at him showed the set of his jaw, and a flash of anger in his eyes. He was jealous. Claire shook her head, swallowing laughter. His hands adjusted the straps around her leg, his fingers feathering along the muscles of her thigh. Although he worked efficiently, the contact he made with her was often lingering. Unnecessarily so, she thought. Little flares of heat lit where his fingers touched, sending tendrils of need to the apex of her thighs. Once the quiver was in place, she nodded her approval as she reached in and removed a bolt. “I’ll take it.” With that done, Dell chose what looked like a simple walking stick. When he wrapped his hand around the top of it and squeezed, it shifted to reveal a sword. “Pretty neat trick,” Claire said with admiration in her voice. “You want one too?” Arin’s voice was full of undisguised greed. Claire shook her head. “No, I want something that will strap onto my back. For this mission, I want one or two weapons visible. And I want them to inspire fear.” She winked at Dell, who whistled. “I’m starting to like the way you think.” The admiration in his voice was reward enough. Claire’s smile was genuine, but it felt sickly. Fear still wormed through her, making her skin crawl, but she forced herself to try to calm down. The goblins had invaded the wrong house. She held on to her anger and frustration, using them to prop up her shaking knees. Arin found her a sheath that would fit over her shoulder to hold a sword on her back. The narrow blade was black with pewter etchings. It looked like a weapon that could cut down enemies without anyone wielding it. Claire took it. After only a few attempts, she was withdrawing it from the sheath with a flourish. Dell looked at her. “You make it look like you know what you’re doing with that thing.” She grinned. “I do.” She waited, wanting him to ask for it, but she could see by the stubborn line of his jaw that he knew she was baiting him, and wasn’t about to give her the satisfaction. “I was on my high school fencing team,” she said. “It was one of the few things I kept up with as I grew older.” “Well well, aren’t you full of surprises.”
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“You have no idea.” Her voice came out in a silken purr, and she was astonished at her own brashness. But he smiled back at her, his own voice full of the same heat and promise when he said, “I’d like to find out.” Arin cleared his throat, and Dell grinned, holding her gaze with his. His eyes flashed, and she felt the colour rise in her cheeks. Arin coughed again. “Is there anything else you need?” Dell smirked, and Claire understood what he was thinking. She dropped his gaze, an embarrassed grin teasing the edges of her mouth. “I think we have everything we need from you, Arin.” Dell’s voice was still smouldering, and Claire forced herself to ignore the goose bumps that broke out over her legs in response. Fumbling with the drawstrings on the purse, she finally handed it over to Dell, who inhaled with a gasp when he opened it. He let out a low whistle. “Her Highness is certainly beneficent, when she chooses to be.” Claire peered into the bag. She guessed about thirty golden coins were inside the bag, which Dell was massaging with his fingers. She met his eyes, and he withdrew one coin from the bag, showing it to Arin, who also gasped, though he tried to cover it with a cough. “I doubt you can make change for something that big, Arin.” Dell twirled the coin in his fingers. Arin whispered an answer Claire couldn’t hear, all the while staring at the coin as though he’d like to snatch it from Dell’s hand. Dell just nodded. “Use it to set up our tab, Arin. I have the feeling we’ll be back quite often in the coming months.” He dropped the coin on the counter, and Arin pounced. Claire gave Dell a half-smile. “Assuming we live that long, of course.” Dell smiled at her. “We’ll live through this mission, love,” he whispered. “There’s still too many things I have to do.” He let his gaze rove her body. “And there are still some things about you I’d like to know.” His hand wrapped around hers, his thumb grazing the inside of her wrist. She felt as if her insides turned to liquid. She held his gaze, filling herself with the very new sensation of an adult male giving her his complete, captivated attention. Licking her upper lip, she watched him follow the movement of her tongue, and flushed. Still staring into his eyes, she whispered, “Let’s go kick some goblin ass.”
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Dell laughed aloud. He released her hand, but she didn’t feel free of him until he dropped his gaze. “Let’s go,” he said, waving his goodbye to Arin as they left the shop. She didn’t look forward to climbing back down the ladder, and said as much to Dell as they moved around the common. He smiled at her. “But we don’t have to. Since we know the Fold for your house is at the lake, we just have to find the door that leads to the lake.” “But the lake is down. Two hundred and some odd feet down.” “And the common has doors that can open clear on the other side of Fae.” Dell looked at her like she’d lost her mind. “Magic, love. It doesn’t have to make sense. It just has to work. Don’t try to apply some of your human rules to it; it’ll rebel by working for everyone but you. Or worse.” Turning back to his muttering, he left Claire to figure that out for herself. “But there have to be rules,” Claire finally sputtered. “Well of course there are rules. I need to think of the door I want to find, and I will find it. When I open it, the place I want to go to will be through the door. Not up a flight of stairs, or over a mountain—it will be right through the door.” He levelled her with a look. “But don’t start spouting any nonsense about height differentials or the trouble with popping up in underwater places with the ability to breathe, or you’ll screw it all up for someone else. Magic is perverse; it will either try to accommodate your rules, or it will do something on purpose to thwart them.” His look turned pleading. “Just accept it, love.” The world around them seemed to stand still while she looked into his eyes. Seeing, for once, not the reflective shiny surface like new pennies, but instead the “windows to the soul” eyes were supposed to be. She let herself dive into the man behind those eyes, immersing herself in what she knew of him, what his eyes communicated to her now. He was a laid-back person, certainly, but she realised he wasn’t as cavalier as he wanted people to believe, either. His serious side was as well-developed as the muscles of his ass, which she’d attest to being tight enough to bounce something off. She could even think of a few things to try bouncing. Below the thrum of her hormones, however, her instincts were singing, suggesting she could put her trust in Dell, and he wouldn’t let her down. She wanted to trust him, she admitted to herself. Taking a shaky breath, she stiffened her resolve. “All right, I believe you. Find the door.”
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Two minutes later, they were standing by the lake again, staring out at the water. “Now what?” she asked. “I thought we came here through a Fold, not a rip?” Dell laughed. “A little talent I have, love.” His tone was too nonchalant, and Claire knew whatever his talent was, it was important. “I can unfold Folds.” Claire raised an eyebrow at him, and he shrugged one shoulder. She could swear he was digging one toe into the ground, he wore such an aw-shucks expression. “No one else can do it. No one believed it could be done, before me.” When he opened his mouth to speak again, she held up her hand. “Don’t bother. I don’t want to know. I don’t want you to tell me how you did it, or why it works, and I most definitely don’t want to hear the physics behind why it shouldn’t work. Just do it.” Seeing his mouth open, she interrupted. “Undo it. Whatever. Just get us to my house so we can kick the goblins out. Any suggestions on that?” Dell nodded and wrapped his arms around her from behind, pressing her back against his chest. “Have your weapons ready.” He dropped a kiss into her hair. “On our way, love.” The minute the table solidified under her feet, Claire pried her eyes open and promptly wished she hadn’t. She’d stepped from utopia into a Dali-esque nightmare that only resembled her dining room. She just had time to get the impression of black slime hanging on her formerly peaches-and-cream dining room walls before she saw the first goblin up close. Her first impression was that he was a giant insect. His body was segmented, and each segment was covered with a hard shell that gleamed like an oil slick. For a moment, she wondered if they were all dripping with some kind of liquid, then realised it was the result of shining their skin. Spit-polishing, she thought, and her eyes flicked to the slime on her walls. She shivered. Head on, they were human-sized and shaped, though their eyes seemed to peer from the middle of their chests. One turned sideways, and he looked like a question mark, his head hanging between his rounded shoulders. Her hand squeezed on the trigger of her crossbow, aiming for his glowing eyes. The first four shots she fired bounced off chitinlike skin, and she grunted her frustration. “Their joints, Claire,” Dell growled. She wanted to look over her shoulder to see how he was, but couldn’t afford the distraction. She aimed at a goblin’s knees, shoulder, elbow, but the arrows bounced off. www.samhainpublishing.com
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“Joints my ass,” she muttered. Then one of the creatures reached his hand out toward her, and she recoiled from the thought of the three fingers touching her. Forcing herself to stand her ground, she noticed the segment of skin at his wrist lift from his lower arm. Joints. The next bolt she fired lodged in the space between those two segments. A yellow, mucous-like gel oozed from the wound and spattered against her legs. The goblin roared in pain. The noise was inhuman, and she grinned in triumph. Her next few shots lodged in an opening at another goblin’s hip, a neck, and between the moving plates of another’s chest. That goblin dropped, twitched, and didn’t move again. Hit a lung? Claire decided that was reasonable, and felled three more goblins in five shots. Their blood coated her carpet, a thin gelatinous layer that made her nose wrinkle even as she fought her gag reflex. Even worse, it smelled like a dentist’s office, that strange combination of antiseptic and bad breath. Now she could look at Dell, who had whittled the numbers on his side of the table down. However, there had been more goblins there to begin with, judging by the number still swarming him. “Shit,” she cursed, fighting the urge to stamp her foot. “You okay for bolts?” Dell asked, hardly sounding winded. “Yeah.” Her hand was sore, but the adrenaline rushing through her system carried the sensation away as soon as she became aware of it. Eight goblins left. Two of them injured already, and none of them seeming to clue in that their current approach wasn’t working. One of them lifted his head and made a noise. The sound was close to the skree-ee of a cricket, and Claire felt her eyes widen in surprise. It was almost musical. As she stared at him, her disbelief crumbled into confusion. The goblins lined up, shoulder to rounded shoulder, their hands slowly rising in the air. “Dell,” she called, ignoring how panicked she sounded. “What the hell is going on?” Dell shrugged, and he’d moved to stand close enough she could feel his muscles sliding along her back. That sensation was carried by her rioting adrenaline to every nerve receptor it could, and she shuddered. The sound stopped, and she jerked her head to meet those inhuman eyes once again. “Srr-er-er,” the goblin said. “Srr-er-er.” “Dell?” Dell’s sword was still raised in front of him. “Don’t relax. That’s what they want us to do.” But he didn’t swing the sword, and Claire realised he was as confused as she was. The goblin was still repeating the same sounds, as if saying the same thing over and over 36
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would help her to understand. Then his eyes met hers again, and pain coursed through her veins. Her skin felt as if it had turned to fire, and she moaned. Sinking to her knees, she managed to keep her hand up, holding the crossbow level with the chest plates of the goblin who had spoken. “Claire!” But something about what was happening felt familiar, and she waved Dell off. She was starting to feel shaky, but she kept her eyes riveted on those of the goblin, who finally stopped “talking”, if that’s what it had been. The silence somehow amplified her pain, and she winced, her gaze wavering from his. The pain eased, and Claire could breathe without feeling as if she was inhaling glass shards. The goblin inclined his head, as if maybe he was—concerned? Then Claire became aware of the screen she had created for Eliane to project her thoughts. Scrambling, she cleared the pain and frustration from that area of herself, like clearing weeds from a garden. “Here,” she thought. “If that’s what this is, try to talk to me here.” An image fought to appear on the screen, wavering, disappearing then reappearing. A white flag. Claire stared at it, stunned. The image faltered, and the pain— the pain she now realised was the presence of the goblin in her mind—receded. “Holy shit,” she gasped. Dell’s arm slid around her, pulling her to her feet. “If they hurt you, I’ll kill them all bare-handed,” he growled. His sword was at the ready, despite the fact one of his arms supported her. It was, in fact, the only thing keeping her upright. “Surrender,” she whispered, through parched lips. Licking them, she tried again. “Surrender.” “Never,” Dell said. She chuckled, although it made her throat and chest hurt to do so. “No. That’s what he was saying.” She gestured weakly at the goblin. “Surrender.” She swallowed, and tried once more. “He wants to surrender to us.” “How the—?” “Apparently I speak Goblin.” Claire fought the unconsciousness that rose to claim her with nausea-laced fingers. The expression on Dell’s face made her want to laugh, especially as his eyes flicked from her face to the goblin’s and back again. “Actually, I think he speaks Elven.” She nodded at the goblin, trying to decide the best way to communicate that she and Dell accepted their surrender. She lowered the crossbow
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carefully, a slow movement that she made as non-threatening as possible. Then she projected a crude image of herself laying the white flag on its side, and handing it to him. The goblin bobbed his head twice, making his cricket-like sound to the others. For a moment, it seemed the truce wasn’t going to happen. The other goblins moved toward him, making angry noises and motioning with their deformed, three-fingered hands. One of the goblins stood his ground, his face inches from the first. Claire lifted the crossbow, aiming at what should be his knee. Dell’s hand rested on her shoulder, gripping it tight. When she met his eyes, he shook his head. “If our guy loses, then shoot the other one,” he mouthed. “But give them the chance to figure it out on their own.” Claire turned her attention back to the goblins, who were chattering noisily back and forth. The first one roared, and she cringed, but kept her crossbow level. Who knew she was so heartless? But if her guy backed down, she’d shoot them both without blinking. She pushed the thought away, well aware it would resurface. Even if she didn’t have to shoot anyone, this moment of cold calculation would haunt her. Probably at night, when she was alone. But she’d have to deal with it. The goblins both stopped yelling. Their eyes swept the rest of their brethren, expectantly. Aware only that something was happening, something she didn’t understand, Claire watched in helpless terror. For a long moment, no one moved. Claire wasn’t sure anyone breathed. It dawned on her the two arguing goblins had put the question to the rest, and were waiting for their decision. She focused her attention, willing them to agree to the surrender. The goblins, almost as one, sat on the floor, crossing their misshapen legs beneath them. With a slight hesitation, the first one joined them, leaving the one who had confronted him standing. Claire’s finger twitched on the trigger, but she didn’t pull it. After an eternal moment, the confronter shrugged, a movement that seemed to require his entire body, then sat beside the first. Pain again fired along Claire’s body, and she cringed. It didn’t last as long this time before the white flag flashed on her inner projection site. She met the goblin’s eyes and nodded. “Thank you,” she whispered through the pain. “Aan-oo,” he repeated. “Aan-oo.” Dell was smiling. Claire closed her eyes with relief. “He said thank you, Claire!” His voice was a stage whisper, raspy but still carrying. And too loud for the way her head felt right now.
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“Yes, yes he did, Dell. In human, no less.” She felt him go rigid with shock behind her. He hadn’t realised that. Which meant the implications were just now racing through his mind. Claire smiled, her eyes still closed, waiting for him to tell her what she already knew. “He shouldn’t be able to do that.” She nodded. Bingo. It wasn’t very nice of her, but she liked having reached that conclusion ahead of him. He looked from the goblin to her, and back again. “How did you know?” She shrugged. “You had preconceived notions of what goblins were capable of. When he—” she gestured at the Smart Goblin, “—nearly set my skin on fire trying to speak Elven, I realised maybe he wasn’t all that stupid.” She shrugged again. “Maybe none of them are, there’s just been a failure to communicate.” Her tone softened as she saw her words hitting Dell like blows. Pain clouded his eyes, his features sagging into horror mixed with disbelief. “Oh gods,” he whispered. “What have we done?” Vaulting from the table, he reverted to his eight-inch size before his feet could hit the floor. Claire heard him curse eloquently. He seemed to vent most of his anger before he turned sorrow-filled eyes back to her. “They could be dead,” he said. He moved off, a trail of air in his wake tinged red with his anxiety. Claire realised with a shock she was seeing his aura. But why should that shock her? Here she was, kneeling in a puddle of goblin blood on her dining room table, ready to help Dell perform first aid on creatures that, a moment before, had been monsters from her worst childhood dreams—and a little aura was freaking her out? She stared down at the “beast” on the floor in front of her, compassion overwhelming her, so she had to close her eyes to fight it. Finding out they were intelligent had changed her view of them, just as it had Dell’s. The faery hovered a few feet away over the chest of one of the fallen goblins, cursing under his breath. “Wait, no, he’s just unconscious.” Dell sighed with relief. “Otherwise, he’s okay.” They stared at the number of injured goblins standing, sitting and lying down around the room. “We need help with this,” Claire said. For a moment, she couldn’t tell one goblin from another, then she found him. The warmth of recognition filled her, as if someone had tossed a blanket over her head. Shaking her head to free herself of the sensation, she was finding it hard to breathe. And hard to lower her gaze. The goblin blinked, his eyes closing from side to side, she noticed, and the sensation disappeared.
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Inclining her head in thanks, she took a deep breath, and opened herself to communicate in Elven with the goblin. She showed Dell and herself, trying to help the fallen goblins. She pulled her mental camera back, to show other goblins moving among the sick, assessing damage, offering help, cleaning wounds. Tight in again on herself, the leader goblin at her side. She wiped tears from her eyes, hoping the goblin had understood, unsure she had the energy to try again if he hadn’t. He began chirping, and she watched him convey her instructions to his men for a moment. Before he’d finished, she hopped down from the table and joined Dell. “The goblins are going to help us take care of the injuries.” “You sure about that, love?” Dell looked up from the goblin he was tending, with a sombre expression. She didn’t need to be told this one was a fatality. “Either that or he’s calling them to arms.” She shrugged. “I tried, Dell.” Her voice sounded small. Small and weak. She didn’t like it, but had to admit it suited how she felt. Stumbling, she cursed as her legs gave out and she crashed to her knees beside another body. Wincing more from the goo that insinuated itself into the fabric of her pants than any pain, she stopped her outstretched hands from placing any pressure on the goblin’s body. Once she’d steadied herself, she let her hands rise with the inflation of his chest, surprised at the warmth of the insect-like skin. “This one’s breathing,” she called over her shoulder, panic and relief rushing through her, making her unsteady once again. Staring at the alien body, she wondered how she was supposed to help him. Blood—mucous—whatever it was, it coated the creature’s abdomen. A stream of it had dried to tackiness on his thigh, and she found her eyes drawn to the drop suspended above the floor. Dell landed on her shoulder, his hand tangling in her hair to steady himself. “Where’s he hurt?” Holding still so she didn’t dislodge him, Claire said, “I don’t know.” The words were tinged with panic. She hoped he hadn’t noticed. “It’s all right, love,” he whispered directly in her ear. He took off from her right shoulder, and she caught sight of movement to her left. Turning, braced for attack, she watched a goblin walk with a surprising agility toward them. She lifted her voice just enough to reach Dell, who was hovering over the body, trying to find the source of the blood. “We have company.” Dell lifted his head to watch the goblin approach. Cursing, he moved closer to Claire, his aura a vivid shade of red. He
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held himself nearby, his body taut and ready to attack. Although she wondered what good he’d do in his current size, she appreciated having backup. Claire swallowed the bile that rose in her throat, and watched the goblin approach from the corner of her eye. The emotions he projected—familiarity, calm, peace— smothered her with their intensity. She felt as if she was being buried by a warm, decaying blanket, and she concentrated on her breathing, inhaling through her nose despite the stench, exhaling through pursed lips. Reminding herself that she could breathe helped ease her tension. Never mind that he was approaching with skittering speed, his feet lifting from the carpet with a slurping noise that made her gut clench. Relax, Claire. He’s a friend. At least she hoped he was a friend. Then it was too late to hope, because he was standing beside her, his breath warm and slightly wet on her cheek. It smelled less offensive than she’d thought, like lavender, maybe, or chamomile. She shook her head. He might well open that oversized maw to try to fit her into it, and she was trying to categorize the smell of his breath. Lifting her chin, she met his gaze without blinking, hoping he wouldn’t see fear in her eyes. Up close, the malformations of his face were even more obvious. His upper lip was hidden behind his elongated, jutting lower jaw, which made him look as if he were trying to swallow his own face. His full lower lip brushed against the underside of his flattened nose. Black slits she assumed were his nostrils ran vertically along either side of his nose, flaps opening over them when he exhaled. She realised she’d been distracted by it for a long moment, and jerked her gaze to his eyes, which were wide set, almost on either side of his head. While she stared at his eyes, noticing they weren’t just yellow, but flecked with green and gold, she was captured by the intelligence in them. “You’re going to have to help us,” she said, though she’d had no intention of speaking at all. “I don’t know anything about goblins. Not enough to help them. And I want to fix this. I’m so sorry.” Tears slid down her cheeks, but she kept talking through them. “Please, we just didn’t know.” The goblin nodded his large head, then swung it around on his thin neck to peer at the body on the ground. A sound that might have been a sob escaped his lips and he fell to his knees. “He’s dead. We should move on,” Dell’s voice was compassion and determination at once. The goblin ignored him, and Dell gave Claire an impatient look.
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The goblin began to groan, and Claire’s muscles clenched with sudden fear. The noise grew within seconds to something larger, more rhythmic. He was chanting. Claire met Dell’s eyes, smiling bravely to reassure him because he looked ready to take on the entire goblin army on her behalf. She caught her lip between her teeth to stop the ready retort “I can take care of myself”. She bit down, the sharp pain distracting her from the warm glow that crept along her skin with the realisation he was concerned about her. Schoolgirl, she chided herself. The thought was reinforced when he landed on her shoulder, and she flushed with his nearness. “What’s going on, love?” He was talking in her ear again. “I don’t know,” she said out of the corner of her mouth. The goblin tipped back his head, and the noise like crickets chirping joined his wordless chanting. Goose bumps broke out on Claire’s arms. She could see the goblin’s voice, leaving his mouth like a pale fog, marching toward the body on the ground. It climbed onto the body, caressing his face, and Claire inhaled sharply. Fear clawed its way through her, fluttering in her chest like a moth in a glass jar. Claire clapped her hand over her mouth to stifle a scream. A shape formed itself out of the fog, the malformed pieces assembling into something vaguely human-shaped. The goblin continued his chirp-like chant, a tendril of fog connecting him to the tiny fogbeing, which now pressed its tiny hands into the nose flaps of the body. It turned, impaling the chanting goblin with an eyeless gaze, and the goblin responded by chanting louder. The fog-being pushed its hands into the nose flaps, but Claire could see it was struggling. A quick thrust lodged its arms up to what would be its armpits, but it could go no further. The body’s eyes opened, closed again as the fog-being withdrew. It turned again to look their way, and when its hollow gaze fell on her, Claire gasped. Then it felt as if someone twisted a knife in her chest, and she watched as a cotton-candy-pink cloud left her lips. It floated for just a moment before it was added to the fog-being, which was growing into something recognizable. A few moments later, she realised it was a miniature goblin. She wrenched her gaze away and noticed other clouds emerging from the other goblins, all fleshing out the fog figure with their breath. Despite the craziness of her day, this was the first time she’d seen actual magic at work, and she felt dizzy with fear and confusion. She wasn’t supposed to be afraid, was she?
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Once the fog-figure was assembled and fleshed out, it turned its head her way. When she met its gaze, she shivered at the awareness which swirled in the smoke-grey eyes. Somehow, this thing was more than a simple creation. No longer something, he was someone. She fought to understand, or at least to accept what was happening when he began to move. Slowly, he crouched to kneel on the chest of the goblin he was modeled after. Extending one long finger of each hand, he slid them inside the body’s mouth. Claire could hear the pop of the goblin’s jaw as it was opened, the stretch of the strange skin, which sounded like creaking leather. The fog-being turned his head, his eyes meeting those of the goblin beside her, who nodded before blowing him a kiss. The kiss took off from his finger like a dart of mist and arrowed straight for the fog goblin, who watched it approach without flinching. When it struck the centre of his forehead, the fog-being broke apart, the fog which once made him up coalescing around the face of the body. The goblin beside her tensed, and a quick glance showed Claire he was leaning forward, as if willing something to happen. The body inhaled. The multi-coloured fog was pulled into those strange nostrils, down into the chest of the goblin who had been dead just a minute ago. Claire shivered. After a few laboured breaths, the formerly dead body sat up. His eyes moved, she watched them take in the room. He looked at her with a silent thank you in his expression, and when his gaze locked with that of the goblin at her side, she was close enough to feel the overflow of emotion. Love, gratitude, the belated fear of both goblins washed over her like waves lapping at her skin. Understanding dawned a few minutes later. “He’s your son,” she said to the leader goblin. She wondered how she could clarify that, with an image or thought, but the goblins both nodded. “Mah suh,” the leader agreed, tears shimmering in his strange, compelling eyes. Claire smiled at him, tears welling in her own eyes before she turned away. Dell flew off her shoulder. When he spoke, his voice was hoarse, and she wasn’t sure if it was from repressed emotion or exertion, as he tried lifting the arm of another goblin body. “Come on.” He grunted, finally lifting the arm by the wrist. “His shoulder is out of socket.” Claire must have looked confused, because he answered her unspoken question. “He’s not dead, Claire. He’s knocked out. We’ll likely wake him up when we pop this back into place.”
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Claire moved to help him, but the goblin reached Dell first. With deft fingers, he lifted the unconscious goblin’s arm, while Dell helped to guide the shoulder into place. The squelching noise of the arm’s movements made Claire feel dizzy, but she was roused by the pop when the shoulder slid home. The goblin jumped, but remained unconscious. Dell lifted an eyebrow. “Maybe he’s worse off than I thought. That should have woken him.” “Ah.” The goblin spoke, getting Claire’s attention. Then the uncomfortable process of speaking with him in Elven began again, ending quickly this time, at least. He had eased the goblin to sleep through the pain, allowing him time to heal before waking. “Wait,” she whispered, already drained by the short communication. “What’s your name?” She stared down at her toes as she asked. He laughed, a noise she wouldn’t have recognized, but he transmitted just enough in Elven that she understood. “Brr Nah,” he said. “Bernard? I was afraid of something named Bernard?” Claire snorted her incredulity. Still shaking her head in disbelief, she introduced herself and Dell. “Kyah, Deh,” Bernard repeated, bowing his head at each of them. Dell was grinning, Claire saw, and his aura’s colour had eased off from the angry red of earlier. “How many more to fix up?” Claire asked. “That’s it,” Dell answered. “We should get them back to Fae, Dell.” Claire sighed. “You do that, while I tend to the wards.” “Wards?” Dell moved closer to exclude Bernard from the conversation. Claire bit her lip. “Eliane gave me some magic…” she thought for a moment for the word, “…well, charms, I guess. Wards to place around the house to keep it safe from uninvited guests.” With a motion she indicated the goblins, then crooked her finger to include Dell himself. “I think I’ve been insulted,” he said, but there was shaky laughter in his voice. Untying the pouch Eliane had given her from one of the belt loops of her jeans, Claire reached into its depths to withdraw a pair of metallic circles. Each one was the size of her palm, and although she could see etchings on the surface, she couldn’t quite make out what they were. Her eyes slid off the design, as if there were no pattern. “It’s probably a Between,” she muttered to herself. “Between making sense and not.” She felt 44
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Dell staring at her, and glared at him over her shoulder. “Do what you have to do, Dell. I can take care of this myself.” “But who’s going to take care of you?” His voice was a whisper, and Claire wasn’t sure she was supposed to have heard. When she shot him a look, he raised both his hands in mock surrender and backed away half a foot. He didn’t, however, back off. “Once you’re done, we can both get the goblins through the Fold, right?” “I can’t Fold.” She saw his look. “Unfold. Sheesh, whatever.” “If I hold your hand, you’ll be okay, right? Now that you know what to expect?” Claire nodded, pulling her lip between her teeth. She knew where he was going with this, she just wanted him to keep talking while she decided how to answer. “So it makes more sense for me to help you set the wards. The faster that’s done, the easier it will be to move the goblins, and get them a healer. We could even bring a healer here.” Claire sighed, knowing he was right. “Fine.” She didn’t say anything else, trying to hold on to her anger. It was so much easier to be angry. When she wasn’t angry, Dell made her feel uncomfortable, in a fluttery kind of way. She was attuned to his voice, every nuance of his tone affecting her heart rate. The fact that he was eight inches high diffused the sexual pull that had torn at her while he was human-sized, but she was attracted to him all the same. Attracted by the sound of his voice, the joy in his laughter. Being angry was a welcome barrier to all of that. And she had every right to be angry. She hadn’t thought about it after talking with Eliane—hadn’t had time to, really. What with the thrill of adventure, killing and avoiding being killed, not to mention the whole raising of the dead thing, she’d put it at the back of her mind. Now, however, with him standing so close, and looking so good (although in miniature), she dragged her anger to the forefront. He was keeping something from her. Eliane had told her the house was the target of the goblin’s attack. But she hadn’t told Dell. Eliane had said Dell wouldn’t let Claire go with him if he really thought she was in danger. They’d allowed Dell to believe Claire herself was the object of the goblin’s pursuit, and yet, he’d allowed her to come here to oust the goblins from her home. In all essence, he’d used her as bait. Why had he done that? If he were genuinely concerned for her safety, wouldn’t he have tried everything he could think of to get her to stay away? He must have his own agenda. His own reasons for wanting her to go to the house and fight the goblins. She snuck a glance at him as she led the way down the hall, trying to believe in him. Wanting to believe in him.
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“You seem to know where you’re going,” Dell offered. She wondered if he was confused by her change of attitude, or if he’d noticed. “I do.” Eliane had said it would be best if the wards could span the entire house, but even a doorway would do. The closet in the spare room marked the farthest end of the house. She would put the other one in the kitchen, and the line between the wards would span the length of the small house. Moving through the room, she ignored how empty it was. She and Ryan had never found furniture for the room beyond a gorgeous desk set and a sofa-bed, which was in sofa-position most of the time. They’d never had sleep-over guests. Reaching the closet, she hefted the disk in her hand and took a deep breath. Lifting the disk, she slid it into place on the back wall, whispering. She’d been afraid she wouldn’t know what to say, but the words slipped from her lips without warning. Without thought. When she finished, Dell was staring at her. She tried to brush past him, but he flew into her face. “Claire, there’s something wrong here.” He moved with her when she tried to dodge to the left. “Let me see the other disk.” She shook her head. “I know what I’m doing, Dell.” He reached for it with his tiny hands, and Claire lifted the disk over her head, trying to keep it away from him. She slapped it against the front wall of the closet, directly across from the other disk. Her lips moving, she heard the words before she felt them form in her mouth. “Stop, Claire.” Dell lunged at her. “Something’s wrong. That isn’t a ward spell.” Claire sank to the floor, released from whatever compulsion had been driving her. “It’s done,” she whispered. Dell moved into the closet to stare at the disks. “That bitch,” he yelled, his hands fisting at his sides, his foot stamping the air. Claire fought the inappropriate hilarity that bubbled inside her at the sight of him. Dell moved to hover directly in front of her face. “What did she tell you those disks would do?” Claire shook her head, hilarity immediately erased by the expression on his face and the raw anger in his tone. “They’re to ward the house, provide protection from any other unwelcome visitors.” Seeing his steady vibration, the anger emanating from him in waves
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that even his aura couldn’t find a colour for, she felt fear lick along her veins. “Aren’t they?” Dell let loose a sound that could have been a grunt. Or a sob. Whatever it was, it left his voice raw. “No, love, they aren’t.” He floated to sit on her knees, which she was hugging to her chest. “Eliane was playing you.” “She wasn’t the only one, was she, Dell?” Her voice was cold, and she willed her anger to make her eyes blaze, setting her jaw so she would seem unmovable in her stance. She must have succeeded, because Dell recoiled. “What are you talking about?” But his voice sounded wary. They were interrupted by a sudden sizzling sound that made Claire think of electricity. Heat flared against her right shoulder, the one partway inside the closet. She jumped, and Dell leapt into the air, his hands grasping her shirt and pulling her into the middle of the room. After she caught her breath, she rolled onto her stomach to look into the closet. The space between the two disks had filled with something rippling and blue. A curtain of light, maybe. She couldn’t see the other closet wall through it, though as she stared at it, she thought she could see the outline of something—shapes. She blinked, and the image that had tried to resolve faded. “Like one of those damn Magic Eye things,” she whispered. Dell looked at her, and she shook her head. It didn’t matter. “What is that thing?” “A doorway.” She looked at him with exasperation and realised he was serious. “A doorway?” Dell nodded, and she rolled onto her butt to sit cross-legged, her eyes fixed on the doorway. Fear lodged itself inside her, ready to take up residence. Her palms broke out with sweat and her feet tingled. A doorway implied comings and goings, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to know what would be coming through this one. Her eyes remained fixed, even when Dell spoke. “It’s a doorway between here and Fae.” He sounded as if his heart was breaking. “Why?” Claire couldn’t begin to formulate her question. Why is the doorway there? Why did Eliane lie? The hardest question of all was why did you lie? and Claire was finding it hard to think, let alone say anything aloud. “I don’t know, love,” Dell said, his hand resting on her shoulder. “We need to get the goblins to Fae, though, and since there’s a nice, handy doorway here…” He trailed off, and Claire turned to look at him.
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“Dell,” she said in shock. “You’re big.” Puzzlement crossed his features. Then he looked down at his body, his hand against her shoulder. “What the—” She shook her head. Six-foot Dell oozed sex appeal. What did that mean, considering she didn’t know if she could trust him or not? She answered his question and her own. “I don’t know.” He shrugged, rising to his feet. “There’s a lot going on here that I’m not happy about. And trust me, we’ll get answers. But we have to get those goblins taken care of first.” He sighed, leading the way down the hallway. “Come on, we’ll get those who are injured first. Someone will have to go with them so they’re not attacked on sight.” Bernard spoke from in front of them, causing Claire to jump in surprise. “No,” he said aloud. Fire licked along her skin as he projected the rest of his thought. “I’ll go first.” “That’s stupid,” Dell said bluntly. Claire laid her hand on his arm, her heart picking up speed at the feel of the warmth of his skin, the muscles that moved under her fingers. Cursing herself a fool for her body’s reaction when her head and heart were still in turmoil, she snatched her hand away. “Listen to him.” Her tone was soft but brooked no arguments. Bernard inclined his head in thanks. “Think of how my people will react if you begin carrying the most injured of us away, through a magical doorway.” He projected the images—his people renewing their attack—and Claire sighed. “He’s right, Dell. If we start carting the injured and unconscious out of here, they’re going to think something’s up. They need a guarantee we’re not just taking them off to kill them, or throw them in some kind of jail.” “Then talk to them,” Dell said to Bernard. Bernard shook his head. The projection was fire and knives as Claire was exposed to the overwhelming distrust the goblins had of other fae creatures. Flashes of their history: betrayal, being hunted down and exterminated. She shuddered and broke the connection, apologizing to Bernard with her eyes. “No, Dell, he has to go through the doorway with us the first time and come back unharmed. It’s the only thing his people will believe.” Dell shrugged his acceptance. Claire realised the story that Bernard had shown her had another side—Dell’s side. Did he feel betrayed by the fact she’d sided with the goblin? She rubbed her temples with the heels of her hands. She was walking a
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diplomatic tightrope between them, and she didn’t even know their history. The hatred ran centuries deep, from what she’d let Bernard show her, and she was unable to understand what she was trying to mediate. “Fine,” he said to Bernard, “you come first.” “Dell, I’m going, too.” “No,” he growled at her. “You need me. I can translate for Bernard. I can argue his case.” Dell shook his head. “I can do that.” Her heart tore with the words she had to say to him. “I don’t trust you to do it.” Despite the disappointment she saw in his eyes, she kept her gaze on his. Just before his gaze lowered, she saw the heartbreak in his eyes. Anger, Claire, she reminded herself. Righteous indignation because he has you here battling goblins even though he believed it put your life in danger. Righteous indignation was a stretch; she could barely manage frustration. She wanted to trust Dell. Shaking her head, she forced her emotions aside. Self-preservation was more important than hurting someone’s feelings. Even if that person was Dell. The three of them slunk toward the glowing doorway in her spare room closet, lost in their own thoughts. The doorway had grown more menacing in their absence. Not that it had changed in any way, but the mistrust between them, the hurtful words both spoken and unspoken, made the doorway shimmer with malevolence. “Let’s get this over with,” Dell said. Claire repressed a shudder when Bernard took her hand, the cool hardness of it in stark contrast to the warm flesh Dell slid into her other. “Let’s go,” Dell said, his voice still flat and emotionless. The doorway was no longer emanating heat, Claire realised as they stepped toward it. Her breath stuck in her throat as the hair on her arms lifted. She was terrified of this doorway, she admitted to herself in the moment before they stepped through. It took more than one step, which surprised her. She’d thought they would pass through onto the other side immediately, but the first step only placed them inside the screen, the world around them reduced to shimmering blue and the sound of a bug zapper on the fritz. Dell’s hand tightened over hers, and she realised she’d been trying to free it to cover her ears. Blushing, she waited for them before taking another step. Tingling broke out over her body, and the bug zapper analogy began to feel too appropriate. Power
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danced along her skin, a humming, hair-raising feeling that terrified her. It didn’t hurt, but the sound and the feeling hovered at the edge of it, threatening pain every second. Unwilling to wait, bracing herself for the same fire that devoured her senses when Bernard tried to talk to her in Elven, she forced the other two to take the next step with her. She emerged, blinking in the pale softness of what could only be a waiting room, despite the otherworldliness of it. Claire stared around the pastel-coloured room, her gaze failing to find the seam that should mark where the wall met the ceiling. It left her feeling disjointed. Her stomach, as confused about which way was up as she was, flopped inside her, deciding that her throat was the right place to be. As her eyes adjusted to the room, her stomach flipped the other way, landing back in place with such force it made her breathless. She closed her eyes and forced air into her lungs. Opening her eyes carefully, she let her gaze skim over chairs that were oddly shaped, distorted to fit bums that might have more than two legs, or to accommodate the folded length of wings. Yet they were, unmistakably, chairs. Chairs suited to a waiting room—they looked as if they would be comfortable for stints of ten minutes or less. A monolithic wooden desk sat at the far end of the room, though no one was seated in the ornately carved throne behind it. A soothing voice surrounded her, coming from the walls themselves, or so it seemed. Moving her head, looking around the room, didn’t narrow down the location of the voice. “Welcome,” it said. “Welcome to Fae. This is—” “Enough.” A voice from somewhere nearby spoke, cutting off the formal-sounding welcome. A recording, Claire realised. Programmed to respond to anyone coming through the doorway. Without any other sound, Eliane moved around the previously unoccupied desk, her white skirts trailing behind her. Her projection of welcome and peace wavered as her eyes fell on Bernard, who still held Claire’s hand. Claire was pleased to note Bernard wasn’t slouching or cowering; he met Eliane’s gaze with a level frankness that seemed to surprise her. Dell and Bernard released her hands at the same moment, both of them stepping in front of her as though shielding her. “You tricked us,” Dell whispered. Claire could feel his projection, and it was tinged with disbelief, anger, and love. The confusion of contrary emotions whirled through her, leaving her breathless and dizzy. If this was just emotional runoff, how must Dell be feeling? Her hand drifted to rest on his arm, trying to comfort him, but he shook her off, stalking toward Eliane.
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Eliane’s laughter vibrated in Claire’s chest, thrumming along her veins. Overwhelming Claire’s own reactions of disbelief and frustration, rendering them invalid. Claire tightened her focus, forcing Eliane’s projection to the safe site alone, unwilling to allow Eliane any further control over her emotions. “You tricked yourself,” Eliane told Dell. Although it seemed Eliane was ignoring her, Claire felt the other woman’s tug at her defences, and glowered her response. She wasn’t willing to shut out the conversation, but she was determined to stay in control of her responses to it. Even Dell’s emotions buffeted against her hastily built shields, although he seemed unaware of it. Claire steadied herself, feeling torn in two as she held herself still in the space between their projections. “How?” Dell hissed at Eliane. “By believing in you?” Eliane’s thoughts were now tinged with sadness. “Dell—” Images flashed through Claire that she couldn’t understand. Most of them seemed to involve a younger Dell and Eliane, in the typical misbehaviours of youth, climbing trees and causing mischief. The scenes continued, slipping through her mind faster and faster so she couldn’t make sense of them. But Dell could. Through the mist of memories, she could see him all too clearly. His mouth turned down, his forehead creased, and his eyes filled with sadness and longing. Indeed, she could feel the conflict that warred inside him as if it were her own. Claire fought the urge to interfere. It was too easy to believe he was being manipulated by Eliane, but there was too much Claire didn’t understand to know for sure. “I know all that, Eliane.” Dell sounded strained. Claire stared at her hand, which stretched, almost on its own, toward him, and she snatched it away. Clasping her hands, she wrung them so she wouldn’t be able to reach for him again. She wouldn’t appear to sway him, even by the slight pressure of her skin against his. Dell glanced at her as if he was trying to figure her out, but she refused to meet his eyes. This was between him and the elf queen. He stiffened at her refusal, and she realised he thought she was rebuffing him. She dropped her gaze to stare at her toes in order to hide the threatening tear fall. Despite the fact she didn’t trust him, she wanted to. Causing him pain tore at her own heart. Literally. She realised she wasn’t guarding herself well enough from the projection, and his pain was hers. When he turned away from her to face Eliane, it was worse than the confrontation. It was as if she’d been dismissed. Dell countered Eliane’s Rockwellian images of their childhood with one of goblins dead and dying on the floor of Claire’s house. Standing in the safety of the waiting room, Claire watched Dell’s version of the battle. Terror gripped her, and she kept glancing at
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him to reassure herself that he was alive and uninjured. She hadn’t realised how close he had come to being killed. With each squelching noise of his sword biting into goblin flesh, she shuddered. When a goblin came close to shearing Dell’s head from his shoulders, Claire bit her knuckle to stop herself from crying out. As terror flooded her, it broke her attention from Dell’s projection. Long enough for Claire to realise that Dell had managed to wedge himself into a very small opening of her heart, one she hadn’t realised remained open after Ryan’s betrayal. She wasn’t in love with Dell, but it was easy to imagine she could fall in love with him. Shaking with the realisation, she felt Bernard’s hand reach out to steady her. She flashed him a grateful smile and he let go once she assured him she was all right. “Thank you,” she whispered. Silence alerted her that Dell and Eliane were both staring at her, and she realised they expected her to say something. Dell’s projection hovered between the three of them, his fear and anger palpable, the disgust he still felt at himself for hurting the goblins, now that he knew they weren’t the monsters he’d always believed them to be. Dissecting the emotions, Claire tried to find a way to cut through it all and find some resolution. “Eliane, you lied to me. You lied to Dell.” Turning to Dell, she forced herself to face him, knowing that her next words were going to hurt him. “And I lied to you.” The words came out in a whispered rush, though she’d meant for them to be matter-of-fact. She couldn’t turn away from Dell, although she wanted to put off confronting him. “You lied, too, although it may have only been a lie of omission. Don’t deny it.” She held up her hand to stop him even as he opened his mouth. “Eliane told you I was in danger from the goblins. That they were after me. Yet you let me go back home and fight the goblins. You let me put myself into danger. Why did you do that?” His jaw set into a familiar stubborn expression. His eyes, however, begged for forgiveness, which confirmed what she was about to say. “You had an agenda.” Although she had believed it all along, saying it out loud required more strength than she knew she had in her. “You did,” she said, and felt tears slide down her cheeks. Despite them, she maintained eye contact, as if it would be a sign of weakness to look away. He didn’t move toward her, didn’t try to hold her or deny it. She respected that he was giving her space, but she ached for him to wrap his arms around her. Instead he rooted her in place with the expression in his eyes, one of sadness and pain, but beneath that—hope.
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“I did,” he whispered. Another tear snaked its way down her cheek, and she left it alone, despite how it burned, cooling quickly as it dried, leaving her skin feeling tight and chapped. She wanted to talk, to use her own words to stop him from saying any more. The words lodged in her throat, and she knew he was going to speak, and she would have to listen. Eliane interrupted them both with laughter. Claire was seized with the urge to slap her. How dare she laugh at their pain? She’d contributed to it. She whirled to face Eliane, but Dell was faster. “That’s enough. Perhaps this is amusing to you, but the rest of us are confused.” His voice turned menacing. “And angry.” Eliane waved her hand for them to continue, and Dell shook his head. “You’re taking the coward’s way out, Eliane. I think you could clear this up entirely on your own, but it would mean taking some responsibility, wouldn’t it?” He turned back to Claire, dismissing Eliane when it became clear she wasn’t going to change her mind. “I did have an agenda.” The words sliced Claire’s heart, widening the rift Dell had opened inside her and filling it with bile. “It was the same agenda I thought Eliane had. We want you to help us. I thought unless you saw the goblins on your own, saw the danger we were facing, you couldn’t comprehend the job that Eliane and I so desperately need you to fulfill.” Claire choked back her immediate reply. That was it? He had wanted her to see what she would have to face before undertaking something—a job? She shook her head. Despite the fact that he’d been manipulating her, she felt almost giddy. Relief sluiced along her veins, leaving her shaken. It was too much to process at once. She’d been a pawn to them both. It was such a contrast to what she wanted—a longing that rose within her and made her ache. A longing which made being Dell’s pawn harder to take. Shaking her head, she tried to force the awareness of him back to the depths of her mind where it had been hiding. This was hardly the time to acknowledge the crush she had on him. But there it was. Claire let herself turn it over in her mind. I have a crush on Dell. There, she’d admitted it, and would deal with it as soon as she could. So long as no one ever found out, it would be fine. She’d get over it. “You’re keeping something from me. I want to know what it is.” Dell’s voice cut into her thoughts, soft as a caress.
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For a wild moment she thought he was expecting her to confess her feelings for him. When she realised that wasn’t the case, she almost laughed her relief, letting words fall off her tongue to explain. “It’s my house, Dell.” “Your house?” He sounded so incredulous that she wanted to laugh, making the dizziness worse. “The goblins weren’t after me. They were after the house.” He whirled on Eliane, whose face was set in stoic impassivity, but his words were directed at Claire. “Keep talking,” he snarled. Claire stared at his profile, memorizing his features, looking for some softening of his jaw or eyes. What if he didn’t accept her explanation? “Eliane thought it was best you believe I was the target. It would keep you on your toes, where I was concerned.” “I wouldn’t have let you go back there. I thought—” His voice broke. “I thought they were after you, Claire.” The expression he turned on Eliane made Claire’s skin crawl as though searching for somewhere to hide. She thought her skin had the right idea. But when he turned to her, his expression and voice were soft. He was imploring her to understand. “If they were after you, you might not have been safe, even here.” Claire ached to reach for him and ease his obvious pain, but she was still angry. “In fact, if they were after you, and you were here in Aelfheim, they might have seized on the opportunity to make war with Eliane. But they weren’t after you. If I’d known, I would’ve insisted you stay here.” His voice was sharp, angry. Claire understood. Eliane had manipulated them both so Claire and Dell both would take care of the goblins. In order for it to happen, Dell had had to believe she was the target, and Claire had to believe the house was. Although angry with Eliane for manipulating her, Claire couldn’t help but understand why she’d done it. All’s fair in love and war, and all that. Which of course left her wondering if love entered into Eliane’s reasons, or if they were simply the product of war. Not that it mattered. None of it mattered… Claire had been willing to believe that Dell wouldn’t pay enough attention to her—that he needed to be all but royally ordered to take care of her. She’d manipulated him because it had made her feel safer to do so. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I believed…” She couldn’t help it, her eyes cut to Eliane. But she wasn’t willing to place the blame on anyone else. “I believed it was best if you thought I was the target. That you’d…” her voice lowered, “…pay more attention if you thought I was in danger.”
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“I would have protected you.” Claire’s eyes lowered at his tone, which was full of a naked honesty that made his voice tremble. “By making me stay here,” she answered, knowing she was pushing him. He sighed. “Yes, by making you stay here.” He sounded exasperated. “Here, where you’d have been safe.” “I never knew that was an option.” Claire was feeling smaller by the moment. Dell swore. Colourfully, in fact. His voice providing background noise to her thoughts, Claire considered all of this. “Dell…” He didn’t meet her gaze. She reached with a shaky hand to turn his face toward her. “Dell.” She tried to infuse the word with this is important, and he seemed to respond to it. “If the house was the only important thing…why would it matter to Eliane that I go? And if I was the important thing…why would she let me?” She looked at Eliane and saw approval in her eyes, and a slight nod of her head told Claire her hunch was right. A flash of anger flared within her, and Claire reminded herself all’s fair in love and war before continuing. “It was both the house and me. Without the house, I mean nothing. And without me, the house isn’t important either. Eliane did what she had to in order for both of us to survive.” Dell nodded, a gleam in his eyes that might have been respect followed quickly by a flash of anger. “I would’ve protected you.” “I know that now.” She dropped her gaze and whispered the words to her toes, unwilling to lift her eyes. “Why is the house so important?” “Magic,” she said, shrugging. “It’s Earth. There is no magic.” Claire’s eyes lifted and she stared at him, incredulous. “Dell, did you not see a goblin come back to life on my dining room floor?” Realisation and disbelief warred in his eyes. “That was magic, Dell. In my house.” She took a deep breath. “My house is a Between.” “It is now! Eliane had you put a damn door in!” He exploded, the words erupting from him with such force his voice was raw, and his hands flailed in his exasperation. He stamped on the floor. He was rage personified. “My home was a Between before that, Dell.” Claire’s whisper was loud in the silence around them. Even Bernard seemed to have stopped breathing, the air was so still. “Remember the big scary rip-tear? My house is in the middle of it.” www.samhainpublishing.com
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Dell swore, rounding again on Eliane. Her chin lifted in defiance, and Claire saw him tense with anger. “You’re not going back there, Claire.” Claire’s hands fisted at her side. “And why not, Dell?” “Because this is insanity, that’s why!” He whirled to face her, stalking toward her. Despite the fact her knees seemed to liquefy at the anger in his eyes, she stood up to him. His face was inches from hers. He was panting, his breath fanning her face, setting her hair rippling away from her forehead. An eerie, cool calm settled over his features and stole into his voice. “Your house is sitting in the midst of the most important area of Fae and Earth combined. If you stay there, you’ll be in the middle of a war zone.” “Which is exactly where both you and Eliane wanted me.” She hadn’t meant to sound so cold. His eyes flicked away from hers, and even when he refocused on her, he couldn’t quite meet her gaze. Which told her all she needed to know. “I think we’re done here.” She lifted her chin, and met Eliane’s gaze. “We’ll need a healer here when we return. We have some goblins who are injured.” Eliane’s reaction was shock, mingled with hatred. Bernard growled, a rumbling sound deep in his chest, below his jaw. Claire placed her hand on his chest, raising her other in the air between her and Eliane. “I take it you missed that part of Dell’s communication. You will listen to me.” Savage and relentless, she projected with a fierce energy, a tight-woven wire of emotion and images. When she finished, she withdrew with a finality and aggression that made Eliane gasp, and Claire grinned wickedly at the sound. “Now you know,” she whispered, her hands falling to her sides. “You have hunted, persecuted, and destroyed goblins for generations. I am standing here now, telling you that it will end.” Claire glowered at Eliane, and at Dell when he turned his astonished face to hers. “I refuse to allow such hatred to fester over a communication failure.” “Does that mean you’ll stop hating me?” Soft as his words were, they lashed her like a whip. “Is that all it was between us, Dell? A communication failure?” She lifted an eyebrow at him. “Don’t compare what has happened to Bernard and his people with the wilful lies you and she told me.” She turned back to Eliane before he could answer. “We’ll begin bringing the injured here. Unless you can move the doorway somewhere else?” Eliane shook her head in mute acknowledgement. “I figured not. You’d want people to always come here first.” Aware she was taking control of a situation where she
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had no real authority, she made herself sound commanding. “Clear the chairs out of the way, find some clean linens for the floor, and have a healer here when we return.” With that, Claire turned and walked back through the doorway, not waiting to see if Eliane complied, or if Dell and Bernard followed. Bernard was on her heels when she stepped into the bedroom. She let out a muttered, “Thank God,” before leading him into the living room. Letting him translate for her, she managed to work the uninjured goblins into teams and assign them to lifting the injured carefully between them. Their arms, it turned out, had three joints, which worked to their advantage. When two goblins linked hands, crossed their arms and bent their joints at just the right angles, they created a makeshift gurney for those too injured to walk. Claire projected a question to Bernard when she saw his son join the work crew, but he shrugged and let the boy continue. She was aware the moment Dell joined them. His presence drew her, despite her steely resolve to remain angry. She snuck furtive glances at him, without having any intention of doing so. By the time they had everyone ready to go, she’d made a mental note to have the healer look at his right arm. He was favouring it, and sweat stood out on his forehead when he tried to lift things. Not that it stopped him, of course. She shook her head, leading the way through the doorway. She met Eliane’s eyes the moment she emerged. Their gazes clashed against each other, and fear slid its way up her spine, like an ice cube defying gravity. Then the queen’s head inclined, ever so slightly, in a respectful gesture. As though her motion freed Claire to look around the room, she took in the tables lined along one wall, clean sheets covering their surfaces. Smiling, she projected weary thanks to Eliane, who mirrored the projection back. For the next few hours, life narrowed to a slim focus. Each small task became Claire’s entire world, whether it was wiping a goblin’s hide clean, or setting those who were uninjured to help, or talking to those waiting for the healer. A small contingent was sent to clean her house, though she wasn’t hopeful about their progress. Bernard stayed close, his translations speeding along progress in the sickroom. Despite that, Claire felt relief on those rare occasions he left her to check progress at her home, or to visit with one of his own. Communicating with him was difficult, an extra weight to carry on her already exhausted shoulders. As her eyes started to drift closed, she jerked herself awake and stared around her. Most of the injured were now resting, with only a few superficial cuts and bruises left to
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take care of. Claire stormed to where Dell was moving a box of supplies with his feet, having abandoned his injured arm. Grabbing the uninjured arm, she tugged at it, ready to drag him to the healer if she had to. He pulled his arm away as if her touch burned. Although she hated the tears that sprang to her eyes even more than the feeling of rejection that inspired them, she kept her tone calm. “You need to see the healer.” “Says who?” His eyebrow arched, and she noticed lines in his face, as though exhaustion was etching itself into his skin. Her fingers twitched with the desire to reach out and smooth them, and she folded her arms over her chest to stop herself. “Says me.” She glowered at him, but the smile that danced on his lips suggested he didn’t find her particularly threatening. Exasperated, she flung her arms out. “Dell, you’re hurt. You haven’t used your right arm in hours. The serious injuries have been tended to, so you need to get yourself taken care of. Frankly, you should have been in line in front of half the goblins who’ve already seen the healer.” Dell shrugged with his good arm. “I’m fine. Not your problem, Claire.” Claire imitated his shrug with her own, using both shoulders, something she hoped he noticed. “You’re right.” She turned to walk away, her heart making the steady climb into her throat. He snagged her arm with his good hand and spun her around. “Claire, we need to talk.” “Do we?” She searched his eyes, hoping to see some reflection of her feelings there. His mouth opened to answer, and she groaned, her insides heating until they felt ready to burst. “Hi Bernard,” she said over her shoulder. As soon as she could, she was finding a new language for him, because Bernard’s Elven was likely to kill her. Dell’s exasperated sigh filled her mind as she turned from him to look at Bernard. His misshapen face was twisted even more than usual, and it took her a few minutes to realise he was smiling. “Kyah, Deh,” he said. “Come.” He motioned with his threefingered hand for them to follow him. Dell’s face was unreadable, and Claire again fought to put her emotions away in a mental box to deal with later, unwilling to let them tinge her conversation with Bernard. She projected happy expectation, which caused his smile to widen. A frightening sight, but the sheer joy in his eyes made her smile. He was just like a child ready to show off his latest accomplishment. A very large, very misshapen child, but a child nonetheless. Dell moved to follow her, and she pinned him with a glare. “Where are you going?” “With you.” 58
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“No.” Her glower seemed to have better effect when tossed over her shoulder, because Dell actually backed up a step. “You are going to the healer.” She pointed to the now-empty examination table. He shook his head, but moved toward the healer. She took a few steps, then motioned Bernard to continue. She turned and held her position, facing Dell. Sure enough, as she watched, Dell spun on his heel to join them. She simply pointed, tapping her foot with impatience. Once Dell was at the table, the healer helping him to remove his shirt, Claire finally turned back to Bernard, her mouth dry. The image of Dell’s bare chest lingered behind her eyelids whenever she blinked. “Let’s go,” she said in a hoarse tone, accompanying her human speech with Elven projection. He’d never speak human well, but maybe he’d learn enough to stop making her insides feel like they were on a barbecue restaurant menu. Once through the doorway, Bernard turned to face her with his little-boy grin once again. Dragging his hand down her face pulled her eyelids with it, and he cooed his approval, grabbing her hands in his. With her eyes closed, he guided her through her house, surprising her when they stopped by asking her in human to, “Open eyes.” She did, and staggered to collapse on her pristine couch. Her gaze slid over the walls, no longer covered in the mucous that was goblin blood. Her carpets, though damp, were clean, and though the table was scarred, it had been cleared. A strange collection of forks, knives, and fake flowers filled the vase in the middle of the table. She smiled, noticing other goblin touches of hominess. The doormat was on the ottoman like a stiff tablecloth, a bowl of oranges and tennis balls atop it. Beaming, she turned to Bernard and the shamefaced goblins who’d made up the cleaning crew. “Thank you.” She projected her contentment and joy to Bernard, who translated it into a series of cricket-like chirps and violin-string purrs. She shook her head. Whatever language she and Bernard found in common, it wasn’t going to be Goblin. “How did you manage this?” she asked in a tone of wonder, staring at her formerly destroyed living room. No answer was forthcoming, which was what she expected. It was also probably for the best. A detailed description of what the goblins had been up to would be enough of Bernard’s projection, on top of her exhaustion, to kill her. Her skin flushed, and she knew Dell had arrived, was indeed striding up the hallway toward her. She refused to analyze how she knew that, or why it created a buzzing along her nerve endings, and a lightness in her stomach.
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“It looks good, Bernard,” Dell said, projecting congratulations to him. Smiling at the goblins who still stood in a cluster by her living room window, Dell then turned to Bernard. “The healer would like to see you. One of the patients has woken, and he needs a translator.” Claire moved to follow him, but Dell reached out a hand to stop her. “Eliane said she would take care of it. I need to talk to you.” The humming along her nerve endings kicked up a few notches, and she found herself wondering if her arm hairs were singed from the heat of it. Bernard looked to her for confirmation, and she projected that she would stay with Dell. The cleaning crew, having finished their work, followed Bernard, although she caught the tail end of a projection Dell sent to Bernard, and wondered if they’d been coached to leave her alone with him. “We’re going to talk, love.” Claire swallowed her heart along with the words she would have said in reply. His gaze on hers rendered her speechless. “You’re angry, and I understand that. I don’t understand how your ‘lie of omission’ is less important than mine, though.” His voice was soft, but it didn’t stop the words from cutting. “Your lie thrust me into the middle of a battleground, Dell. You don’t see how that’s different?” “Not really, love. Because the lie you told me was to allow you to walk into that war zone, albeit with the feeling you’d be more protected. The fact is, we both manipulated the other to get what we wanted.” “And you think that what, cancels it out?” Dell shrugged. “It could.” “If I wanted it to, right?” Claire put her fisted hands on her hips. His shrug was condescending, and she felt her jaw drop in surprise. “Apparently men are jerks on both sides of the Curtain.” Holding herself rigid, unwilling to collapse until after he’d gone, she pointed toward the door. “Just go, Dell.” “No,” he whispered. “Not yet.” Unable to keep herself up, she sagged, sliding herself into the couch to cover the movement. He sat next to her, and she cursed herself for giving him the opening to get so close. “You need to hear about the job, love.”
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She bit her lip. Of course. The job. The same damn job he’d been willing to let her risk her neck for. That was what he cared about. Thinking he cared about her just made her a fool. “Fine. Talk.” Refusing to meet his eyes, she pulled at a piece of string unravelling from her couch cushion near her feet, which were tucked underneath her. “You’re right that I thought you were in danger, and let you walk into it anyway. In my defence, I didn’t really want to believe the goblins were after you. But if they were really after you, you wouldn’t have been safe in Fae. You’d have been far too easy to find. I didn’t know they were after your house.” The accusation in his tone brought her gaze to his, and he lifted his hands in surrender. “In the interest of honesty, I think I’d have insisted you go, even if I’d known that little tidbit.” Pain and disbelief settled like a lead weight in her stomach. Her efforts to digest it left her gaping at him, her stomach’s rumbling thankfully silent. But her treacherous eyes filled with tears he must have seen, because he tipped her chin up with one of his long fingers, his thumb sliding around to caress her cheek. “Not because I don’t value you, love, but because I do.” His voice was insistent, though she told herself he was being patronizing. “I needed you to face the goblins. Not because I expected you to communicate with them.” His eyes gleamed, and he held her chin so she was forced to meet his eyes. “Do you realise how incredible that was, by the way? We’ve never communicated with goblins!” She shrugged. “Bernard did the communicating. I just didn’t let you kill him. He’s the remarkable one.” “I sincerely doubt that.” Dell shook his head, but didn’t elaborate. “I needed you to face them. I needed you to see what devastation fae creatures were capable of. I needed you to understand the vision that we’re working for, Eliane and I.” The bond those last words implied sent jealousy writhing through Claire’s nerve endings. She forced herself not to think about it, not to worry about it. It had nothing to do with her. “And what is that vision?” she croaked. “We need for Fae and Earth to live harmoniously. This—what did you call it? This ‘big scary rip-tear’ ends at that doorway in your closet.” He caught her curious look. “I had a chance to talk to Eliane about it a little.” “While you were lugging supplies and goblins around by your injured arm?” Claire glowered at him. “Do you have a death wish, Dell?” Her voice went cold and quiet, the anger gone as quickly as it had come, replaced with the sterility of fear. “I’d really like to know. Do you have some insane desire to kill yourself?” www.samhainpublishing.com
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Dell shook his head. “No, lovely, I don’t wish to die.” “Then you just want to punish yourself.” She shook her head. “What could you have done that was so bad you’re still punishing yourself twenty years later?” His eyes clouded with pain, and she stopped herself from saying anything more. She waved her hand for him to continue his story, even as part of her mind was still worrying over the questions she wanted to ask him. “The ‘wards’ Eliane gave you were created specifically for the rip-tear.” He demonstrated with his hands. Putting them palm to palm, he pulled his palms apart, leaving his hands touching at the meaty part of his hand, below the base of his fingers. Then he pulled the fingers of each hand away, so his hands formed an X-shape. “The wards actually cinch the Curtain, pulling it together, and creating the doorway. The Curtain still exists above and below the doorway. But anyone with legitimate business will walk through the doorway.” Claire nodded, then shook her head. “I understand, I suppose. The wards left the doorway open, and narrowed the focus of where we have to look for people coming through.” “Exactly. However, there will still be those who want to come in through the loopholes above and below the doorway.” She nodded again. “The real difficulty is that the Curtain isn’t straight like that. It isn’t like going above the doorway would mean that people could cross simply by leaping over the house. The sides—” he wiggled his finger tips, widening and narrowing the top of the X, “—well, they could be miles apart, or mere inches.” He angled his hands so the X was skewed to one side. “Or the Curtain could be ripped and torn on an angle, which would make the opening feet or inches or miles from here. But your doorway is the centre.” Claire pressed her fingers to her temples, trying to massage away the tension. “All right. Basically the doorway in my spare room is the ‘legal entry point’, but it didn’t close off all the other places that people could cross from Fae to Earth or back again.” “Exactly.” Dell laced his fingers together and dropped his hands into his lap. “Which brings us to the job.” She sighed. The all-consuming, worth-more-than-her-life job. She could hardly wait to hear more. “You’ve seen the waiting room Eliane created on our side. She’d like to create the same here on your side, in your spare bedroom, as it were.” He coughed as if he’d breached a personal subject, and Claire motioned for him to continue. What was a spare 62
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bedroom at this point? “Well, we need to have a team of people on either side to welcome people, check out their reasons for passing through.” “Customs officers,” Claire murmured. “Exactly so! Customs officers.” “And that’s the job?” Claire couldn’t believe it. She’d risked her life, been lied to and manipulated, all so she could be an over-glorified welcome wagon? “No, Claire, we have something different in mind for you. We need you to be one of a team of specialists. To search for those who sneak through the Curtain in unauthorized places, and to bring them to justice. We want you to advocate on the side of peace for both worlds, helping to combat the fear and fury that would erupt on either side if knowledge of our worlds is leaked.” He paused, his eyes holding hers, tension building between them with the silence. When he spoke, he whispered. “We want you to be a gobetween.” “You want me to search out humans who’ve hopped the fence and landed in your back yard?” “No, love. We want you on this side of the Curtain, hunting out fae who’re causing a disturbance.” “What?” “You’d have a team working with you, most of them fae. But you’re going to recognize an otherworldly disturbance on this side much sooner than we are. Your team will help you understand what you’re facing, after you’ve alerted them to the problem.” His eyes moved as he looked into her right eye, then her left, trying to convey the seriousness of his words with his eye contact. Claire felt a shiver up her back as the importance of it all settled around her like a shawl. “But that’s only part of the job. When you capture those renegades, you will have to consider their punishment. Unauthorized crossings are punishable by death, in extreme cases. “As if that isn’t enough, there is still more. We also need you to advocate for fae rights with the few humans who know about us.” “What if I refuse?” “No hard feelings. We’ll use our resources to buy you a new house, and search for someone else who’s capable of this work.”
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In other words, he’d replace her. She should have known. He’d never given her any indication she was anything special. All he wanted from her was that she fill a job opening. She sighed. “I’ll leave you alone, lovely.” Dell rose, moving down the hall toward the doorway. Once he stepped through to Fae, she felt the painful constriction of her heart that told her he’d done exactly what he said he would. He’d left her completely alone. *** The doorway sizzled behind the closed doors of the closet. Claire could hear it, but worse, she could see the way it was lifting the hair on her arms. This was as close as she’d gotten to it, every day for the past four days. Even when Bernard came to visit, she couldn’t make herself step any closer. Instead she’d stood cupping her elbows in her hands to stop her body from shaking as he stepped through the closet doors, the scent of burnt rubber preceding him. Despite the lurch her heart gave, hoping this time it was Dell coming through the door, she welcomed Bernard’s visits sincerely, and with relief. Isolation wasn’t something she’d grown used to. Besides, she wasn’t sure what she would have said to Dell. He hadn’t been back since he offered her the job, and despite the way her heart leapt when the door opened, she didn’t really expect to see him again. She kept telling herself that it didn’t hurt anymore, but her heart felt a little too small in her chest, and she was blinking more than she should be, unless she was forcing back tears. She stopped herself from doing that, too, inhaling a deep breath to cleanse her system. Bernard wasn’t due to arrive today. The doorway was sizzling and hissing, but it would remain a secret until Claire made her decision. Eliane had promised her that much privacy at least. She supposed she should be grateful for the kindness, but it only made her angry. How kind of Eliane not to allow strangers to enter Claire’s home while she made up her mind. Never mind that agreeing to what had been requested meant upheaval of her entire life. Or that disagreeing would cost her her home. Never mind— Claire stopped herself. This line of thought hadn’t gotten her anywhere in the past three days, why would today be any different? Every time she thought she’d made her decision, her eyes would fill with tears, and she would sob herself into a dreamless sleep that never lasted long enough to refresh her. Sometime in the darkness of early morning today she’d woken. In the stillness of pre-dawn she’d realised she couldn’t let her one-
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sided connection to Dell be part of her decision. She also couldn’t ride the merry-goround of her thoughts forever. She would have to face Eliane, and in that moment, she would know what to do. Or at the very least, what questions to ask. She forced herself forward and gripped the doorknob of the closet. Standing with her hand on it, she gathered her courage. Opening the door, she faced the hissing blue screen that made up the doorway and took a deep breath. But she hesitated. Too long, and the breath she’d been holding leaked out the sides of her mouth. Trying again, she inhaled deeply, forcing herself forward. After her first step, she realised she’d done the wrong thing. She wanted to go home, and turned in the middle of the nothing that marked the second step inside the doorway. She tripped over her own feet and fell through the door on the other side, caught by a pair of strong arms. “Thanks, Bernard.” Except as the words left her mouth, she knew it wasn’t Bernard. Her pulse was racing, rushing blood to her cheeks, leaving her breathless and a little dizzy. Bernard didn’t have this effect on her. “I’m not Bernard,” Dell growled. Claire laughed, though it sounded tinny to her own ears. Like she didn’t know that. Her eyes panned up his body as she straightened to stand on her own. His pants were brown, something soft that swirled around his legs, but fit tight around his hips and waist. The deep blue shirt he wore made his hair look lighter, his eyes darker. Somehow it seemed to even make his skin look softer. Why else were her fingers burning to touch him? Dell glared down at her, and she wondered if she’d forgotten how tall he was. Her eyes were level with his chest, though she couldn’t bring herself to break her gaze away from his. “Does Bernard catch you often?” She bit her lip and shook her head, afraid of him, afraid of her reaction to him. Trying to regain her composure, she decided to say something. “He’s the only person I’ve seen in the last four days.” “Well that’s a bit of news I could have done without,” Dell grunted. He took her arm at the elbow and guided her toward the back of the room. “Come on, Eliane is waiting for us.” His words shocked her out of her reverie. “How could she be waiting? I only just decided to come.” “She’s been waiting for you for four days, Claire.” He released her when they reached the desk. “I was surprised by her patience.”
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Eliane’s laughter preceded her into the room. Her voice projected into Claire’s chest and echoed in her mind. “Indeed, Dell would have gone after you a hundred times in the past four days, had I not restrained him.” Startled to realise Dell had wanted to come to see her, Claire was more distracted by the word “restrained”, which called to mind images of silk stockings and handcuffs. Claire decided she preferred it when Eliane spoke in images. Because that couldn’t be what the queen meant. Or could it? Claire sighed, realizing the relationship between the two was just one more thing she didn’t understand. Despite the band of jealousy tightening around her chest, Claire smiled and projected her greetings to Eliane. “Have you made your decision?” Eliane asked her. “No,” Claire answered. “I mean—I’ve made and unmade my decision a hundred times in the past four days. I decided it was time to just come see you. I thought I’d know what I wanted to say when I was here.” “And do you?” Eliane’s voice. Or her thought. Soft as a caress, her thought was as smooth as silk inside Claire’s mind. Claire imagined it as a silk scarf laid over the opening of a magician’s hat. Inside was her answer. All she had to do was pull the scarf away. She met Eliane’s eyes, her voice full of wonder when she spoke. “I do.” Beneath the wonder was a certainty that frightened her. “I’ll do it.” The words weighed heavy in the air, and Claire felt the commitment of her answer more deeply than if she’d signed a contract in her own blood. Eliane smiled then, a radiance crossing her face that made Claire lower her eyes. The Elven queen was beautiful. Claire’s gaze darted to her side, where Dell stood, wondering if he thought so too. He was looking at her. She flushed and turned her head. “We have much to discuss,” Eliane projected. “And there is so much you must learn. I have left some information here.” She waved her hand toward the desk. “Study it, and we will talk again in a little time.” Eliane walked away, and Claire was left in the one place she wished she didn’t want to be. Alone again with Dell. Silence welled between them like blood from a wound. Sticky, and deadly if left unchecked. “Dell—” “Claire,” he said at the same time. She stopped. He continued, stepping forward to drop something that looked like a miniature headset into her hand. “Wear this when you
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go to bed. It will project information to you while you’re sleeping. It’s the easiest way for you to learn the information you will need before you meet your team. The dossiers are in the desk, you can take them with you. Most of it will be in the transmission, but I thought you’d like to have your own copies to refer to.” Claire nodded. “I’ll get them and go home, then.” Moving past him, she stumbled when his hand wrapped around her wrist like a manacle. She fell into his arms. Right where she didn’t want to be. Because it was so very much where she wanted to be. Fighting the lassitude that swirled around her like a blanket, pressing her to relax, she closed her eyes. A sudden rush of nausea assaulted her; it felt as though her fear was trying to crawl out of her system on a wave of bile. She refused to let it go. Without it, how would she resist him? Breathe. Calm down. Despite her best intentions, a deep breath just allowed her to inhale Dell’s fresh scent. She tried to ignore the rush of longing it sent along her nerves. When she opened her eyes, she met Dell’s gaze, which was full of concern “You’re treating me like—” His eyes clouded with confusion as she met and held his gaze. “Do you hate me?” The words were a whisper, each one pushed forward as if he was afraid of it. Her breath hitched. Could she lie to him? She didn’t want to lie, she just didn’t want him to guess how much he mattered. Maybe she could feign indifference. With reluctance, and some fear, she shook her head in answer to herself. He sagged with relief and she realised he thought she’d answered him. Words followed on their own. “Of course I don’t hate you.” Too much passion in her words. She wanted to say something to help temper that, but the heat flaring in his molten copper eyes made it almost impossible to think. She forced herself to focus on her anger in an effort to ignore the fear and hope banding around her chest. Pushing herself away from him, she stood on her own, a little away from the heat that seemed to emanate from his skin. “Then why?” He took a deep breath. “Why have you taken so long? Why didn’t you come talk to me? Why—” His voice broke on the word so he had to start again, his voice a whisper of sharp pain. “Why did you tell Eliane I couldn’t visit you?” I didn’t. She wanted to say the words, but she couldn’t, mesmerised by emotions she couldn’t name, which burned in his eyes before his lids dropped over them. He let go of her arm, too, so she was free again to move. But she didn’t, rooted to the spot by the frustration in his words. www.samhainpublishing.com
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Until she’d spoken, it had never occurred to Claire that Eliane would bar him from visiting. Just as it hadn’t occurred to her Bernard’s visits might have been without Eliane’s permission. Eliane had said the doorway wouldn’t be used until Claire had reached her decision. With wonder, she realised Bernard must have used the doorway without asking. A warm glow spread through her chest. Dell had wanted to come. Heat flushed her face at how angry she’d been with him for not coming. She moved her hand to touch his cheek, and was surprised at the files in her hand. She must have picked them up while she’d been thinking, but she couldn’t remember doing so. She glanced at the papers again, and the heat that had spread through her was blown away by a cold blast of reality. Of course he’d wanted to talk to her. He wanted to convince her to work for him. The damn job. Her voice was cool, and she marvelled at how composed she sounded. “Why would I come see you, Dell? You recruited me to work for Eliane. She’s my boss now. Why on earth should I come searching you out?” Naïve shock was the effect she was hoping for, but as she spoke her voice filled with vehemence; too much passion to pull it off. She hoped he hadn’t heard it, or he would know she cared about him and was holding herself aloof to spare her own heart. Humiliation painted her cheeks, and she felt them burn. His eyes flashed with disappointment, and then his expression was hooded. “That’s all I am to you, then? Human Resources personnel? I could have sworn—” Claire held her breath, willing him to go on. Hoping he was going to say something to prove her wrong; what did it matter if he proved her a complete and total ass? What if he cared? The thought made her jump as though she’d been jolted with live current. Her hand bashed the corner of the desktop and she jerked it away, dropping the files to the ground in a whisper of paper. Startled, she turned to look at them, and felt the connection she and Dell had just forged tighten, strain, and break. She bit back a sob, and they moved together to pick up the papers, careful to avoid each other’s eyes, each other’s touch. Papers in hand, she refused to meet his eyes. “I’d better get home and read these over.” He sighed, motioning for her to continue. ***
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The trip home was uncomfortable, and the fact it was short didn’t make it any easier. Dell held her hand in an awkward grip, going with her through the doorway. When she thanked him, she was telling his back. He was already on his way home. The disappointment that wrapped around her made her disgusted with herself, but it wouldn’t go away. She fought the urge to sob into a pillow, curling up on the sofa with the dossiers instead. Flipping through the pages, she read until her mind was ready to shut down, then continued, the words a blur of light and shadow. She slid the Bluetooth-like headset Dell had given her onto her ear. As she flipped through the pages, the information imprinted itself into her brain, and she welcomed it, soaking it like a sponge. Anything was easier than trying to deal with what Dell had told her. What he made her feel. Her eyes drifted closed, and she gave the clock a quick look. It was late, and she needed to sleep. Sliding the Bluetooth thing off her head, she let her eyes close. She’d just rest a moment… She woke with a jolt some time later, unable to focus on the clock. Shaking her head, she tried to figure out what had woken her, because it definitely wasn’t that she was wellrested. A sound. Her heart crawled into her throat and lodged there as she waited for it to repeat itself. The fact she couldn’t identify just what the sound had been increased her terror. Trying to quiet the sounds of her own body so she could hear, she held her breath. Her heartbeat pounded in her ears instead, and she let her breath escape from the sides of her mouth. There! She stopped, holding herself still. It sounded like the sizzle and crackle of an old electric outlet when you plugged something in. Only a lot louder. Shit. The doorway. Vaulting off the couch, she grabbed a knife from the vase on the end-table and stood in a half-crouch. Mental note, get a lock for the outside of that bedroom door. Claire shook her head. That’s assuming whatever’s coming through doesn’t have a good appetite and a bad attitude. Her teeth started to chatter. She’d gotten enough information tonight to know that not everything in Fae was friendly. Hell, most of them were monsters. Literally. Staring down the hallway, she felt herself start to shake. This was every girl’s worst nightmare come true. Something was coming to get her from inside her own home. The boogeyman was coming out of her closet. In that moment, she realised what she’d signed on for. This same terrifying moment while she waited for whatever was going to come
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through. The fear and anger at something invading her home—her world—without permission. Despite the fact she was terrified, a sense of purpose straightened her spine. Awareness slammed into her and left her cold. This job was important. Was she still pissed off she’d been manipulated into taking it? Hell yes. Did she blame Dell for doing it? With a sob, she realised she couldn’t. Then it hit her. The slow, sensual roll of awareness that started low in her belly and slid outward, a fire that consumed her from inside with tentative fingers of heat licking along the inside of her flesh. Dell. She tightened her grip on the knife handle, the pain of her knuckles anchoring her to reality. Without it, she was afraid she’d lose herself to the increasing awareness she had of him. From where she stood, she could see him striding toward her, his movements graceful and self-assured. And sexy—part of her mind tossed the words at her and she shook her head. That was ridiculous. Entirely true, but ridiculous all the same. Walking wasn’t sexy. As if he knew what she’d thought and wanted to prove her wrong, his wings unfolded behind him, a dazzling gossamer backdrop reflecting light; tossing rainbows in their depths. He was an avenging angel, a sensual seraphim—the pathetic attempts at poetic alliteration straggled across her mind as she avoided the truth: he was sexy as all hell. Her heart stopped in her throat, her breath stopped up behind it. The knife in her hand felt suddenly heavy, and she stared at it in disbelief. She’d been ready to— She forced herself to look in Dell’s eyes. The image of her plunging the knife into his chest repeated itself in her mind, and she fought to shake it off. If I hadn’t realised it was him… The knife thumped to the floor, and she jumped at the sound. “You’re not supposed to be here.” She threw the words at him as a challenge, hoping it would stop him. She should have known better. He was the avenging angel here to dispense justice, and she was an unrepentant sinner. Swallowing, she tried to bury the fear. Hide it, at least. The knocking of her knees shook her so hard she trembled as he approached. He stopped. Too close to her for comfort. Too far away. She couldn’t decide which, and shook harder. “You’re not. Supposed. To be here.” The words dripped from her lips. “We need to talk.” “I don’t want to talk to you,” she said, shaking her head back and forth in denial. “Then you can listen.”
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Claire resisted the urge to clap her hands over her ears and sing “I’m not listening” to drown out his words. She was afraid to listen to him. “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Dell.” His wings twitched, which sent light and colour flashing behind him in a display that overwhelmed her. She swallowed despite the fact her mouth was dry. He radiated power, strength, and, she admitted with grim reluctance, sex appeal. No, she did not want to listen to him. She wanted him to go away before every resistance she’d built up in the past few days crashed around her feet and she begged him to do things to her body that made her flush. And not entirely in embarrassment. “Claire,” he whispered, his voice breaking. “Please.” Although he was pleading, he didn’t seem weak. He seemed…eager. Though he sounded calm when he said, “You asked me what happened, twenty years ago, that I’m still punishing myself.” Of course he’d know exactly what to say to make her listen. His head was tilted down, but he met her eyes for a moment. The result was a smouldering gaze that dropped her heart back into her chest and she gasped for air. If he knew how it made him look, the tactic was completely unfair, but Claire was certain he had no idea. She sighed and gave him an impatient, expectant look, one she hoped said say your piece and get it over with so I can go on with my life. Never mind that the immediate rest-of-her-life would include a cool shower with her massaging showerhead. She felt his hands on her skin as though from far away as he took both her hands in his and led her to the couch. Guiding her into it, he knelt before her, an innocent, intimate motion that brought a lump to her throat. He stared at the tips of her shoes while he spoke. “I got her killed,” he whispered, and although Claire had no idea who he meant, the naked pain in his voice left her shaking. His grip on her hands was so tight it hurt, and she almost welcomed the sensation, because other than where he made contact, she felt as if she were floating inside her own skin. Looking at his face, she understood his grip on her seemed to be important to him too. It was all that tethered him to the here and now; the rest of him was lost to memory. “We’d gone Earth-side to capture a renegade Amadán.” He shook his head, “What a fucking mess that was. Amadáns don’t do much—but they can manipulate humans like a master chess player manipulates pawns. Still, it shouldn’t have been a big deal. “As soon as my partner and I realised what had happened, we went through a Fold and hunted him down. We found him, too. Easily. You’d think that would have tipped us off.” Bitterness laced his words. “When Thalia and I found him, the Amadán was waiting
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for us. He’d found himself a witch. Found her, and his quirky little ability allowed him to use her as an arsenal.” Fury sent a tremor through his words. “We fought them, but it was insane.” As he shook his head, she could almost see him watching the memory play out in his mind, and wondered how many times he’d replayed the scene while he was in the book. She doubted he’d done much else. “I still don’t really know how it happened. It went too fast. The damn witch was stronger than I’d imagined anyone Earth-side could ever be. She was hurling lightning bolts and fireballs at us, shrieking the whole time.” His face broke into a humourless smile. “She was quite inventive with her profanities, and split her time between cursing us for destroying her house, and him for using her as his puppet. We didn’t want to hurt her; she wasn’t in control of herself. But we couldn’t reach him, either. He was so damn quick! “The Amadán figured it out, and used it to his advantage. Manipulating the witch’s mind, he negotiated her to the window ledge of her apartment, and the Amadán lunged for Thalia. I couldn’t let him get hold of her. She was my partner. And I couldn’t let the witch die just because she’d fallen under the Amadán’s spell. I lived and died in that moment. I needed to save them. Both of them. Somehow.” He sighed. “I took a gamble. “I managed to push the witch aside, but the Amadán was tightening his grip on Thalia. She wouldn’t have been easy to control, but what if he’d managed? Or used her as a hostage? It might not have been reasonable,” he admitted with what sounded like reluctance. “But at the time, I saw his hand tightening around her arm, and all I could think about was getting her away from him.” She heard the recrimination in his voice and knew before he spoke what had happened. She felt wooden, listening to his recital. “I had her. I felt the fabric of her shirt slide through my fingers. Time stood still while I scissored that tiny scrap of fabric between my fingers, held it. Time slowed as the fabric slid through my fingers. But it’d been almost enough. Almost, Claire.” Even though he used her name, it was as though he’d rehearsed the story he was telling her, and that’s what he was supposed to say. He didn’t meet her eyes. He didn’t leave the fog of his memory where all this was still happening, as she was sure it had continued happening every day for the last twenty years. “I almost had her. The Amadán grabbed her arms, and she twisted in his grasp. Things after that are a blur. The witch hurled a fireball, and Thalia turned the Amadán into it. Burning alive, he knocked things off shelves and tabletops, but he managed to
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keep control over the witch. She conjured a huge ball of light and threw it at us. She closed her eyes against it, it was so bright, but I kept my eyes open just a little.” Selfrecrimination weighed his voice down and she had to strain to hear him. “While I was still standing there, stunned, Thalia caught my arm, tipped me, and tossed me into the book. I have no idea how she did it. I saw that blue fireball hit her in the middle of the chest and send her flying, consuming her alive. The Amadán was dead, releasing the witch, who just stared down at Thalia’s lifeless body in horror. That was the last thing I saw before the pages drifted over me, and the book closed. She assumed I was dead, and eventually the book was put back on the shelf and forgotten.” His eyes met hers, full of sadness and pain. Despite that, she felt a surge of joy that he was looking at her, not some phantom from his memory. “That is what I punish myself for. Day in, and day out. For misjudging the amount of damage one fae could do Earthside. For letting her get killed in my place.” Claire’s head was reeling. She stared at him, and his eyes were clear. Focused. Everything he said had slid into her, becoming part of her awareness of him as a person. As a man. Shivering, she realised the story had frightened her, and more, it had given her some idea of Dell’s insistence about this job. Of course the job was important to him. Her logical arguments, her passionate denials, every thought she’d tortured herself with in the past four days collided against each other and toppled into dust. She’d forgiven him as he was coming through the doorway—as she battled her own fear. She even understood what he had done. But now she understood why he’d been so driven, and it made her humble. Of course he’d had his reasons for taking her to the house. He was right, they’d used each other to get what they both wanted. There was so much more at stake than her ego. Her world and his both faced destruction. So he had used whatever means necessary to get her to act. It was all clear. She rejoiced in the feeling of forgiving, not just Dell, but herself, because hadn’t she manipulated him? She’d been afraid he wouldn’t let her go with him, and she’d done what she needed to ensure she’d be allowed to tag along. All feeling left her body, then flooded back in a rush. Heat flushed her skin where he touched her. Her senses became hyper-aware, even as a small bubble of joy lodged in her chest, swelling and sending thrills through her body. The truth slid insidious fingers into her joy, without bursting it, setting loose her fears and other emotions, which mixed with her happiness. She’d been holding on to her anger, using it to brace herself against this shimmering, fragile tenderness she felt for him. Now she’d forgiven him, and what would
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that mean to her self-preservation? How would she keep those emotions at bay? Swallowing the pain of that thought, she took a moment to appreciate the lines of his face, the feel of his hands on hers. All right, Dell. You wanted me for the job. You got me. You never promised me anything emotional—that’s my baggage to carry. Straightening her shoulders, she gave him a calm, level look. “Thank you for telling me. I promise to do a good job.” Dell stared at her for so long she grew uncomfortable. “Is that all you have to say?” “What else?” Frustration exploded from the weight in her chest. “You want me to do the job, I took the job. You told me about your past, and I get how important the job is. What more do you want?” “What do I want?” The genuine confusion in his voice, in his expression, undid her. Anger rushed through her system on a wave of adrenaline. The question didn’t make sense to him. He didn’t want anything from her. All her angst and frustration, and to him she was a non-entity. How stupid can I get? Tears flooded her eyes, rendering him in Monet-like blobs of light. “Why are you here? What. Do you. Want?” The last word floated out of her on an exasperated sigh. “I want you,” he whispered. He was doing that looking-up-while-looking-down thing again, and Claire’s head did a long, slow spin. “Say that again?” One side of his mouth pushed up in a grin, digging dimples into his cheeks. He punctuated each of his words by moving closer to her. “I. Want. You.” The last word was a breath against her lips, and she inhaled it, reached her tongue out to taste the word, grazing his lips instead. Swept away by the feel of his lips on hers, massaging them into a tingling awareness, she shivered with longing. When he broke the kiss, she moaned, and his rewarding smile left her breathless. “Have you—” he glanced at the pile of paperwork at her side, “—finished with that?” She shook her head, unable to tear her gaze from his face. “Would it be all right if you took a little break?” Scowling, she thought of how many dossiers she’d been through and how many were left. “Probably not,” she whispered. “What if I help you study?” She laughed. “I think you’ll distract me.” 74
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He grinned. “I’m flattered.” His expression turned serious. “Should I leave?” She shook her head. “No, I’d like you to stay.” She couldn’t believe how shy she was. Her stomach actually had butterflies, an expression she’d never really understood before. But little flutters of apprehension were going off inside her. Moving the papers, he held them while he got comfortable on the sofa. Patting the cushion next to him, he looked at her with his up-down look and she felt butterflies descend a little lower in her body. She perched on the cushion beside him, fear and longing drifting through her veins. Flipping through the dossiers, she let her head rest against his shoulder. A comfortable warmth spread through her body. After a few pages, she dropped the files to the floor. “I can’t concentrate,” she told him. “Shall I go?” he asked her, and she twisted to meet his eyes. “No,” she whispered. “I really want you to stay.” Pressing her lips to his, she laughed aloud when he scooped her into his arms. “That’s good, lovely, because I’m not sure I could have left.” Standing, he held her in his arms like a child, and she laughed with delight. His wings spread out behind him, fletched with colour and light, glistening like a spider web after a spring rain. Awed by the sight of them, the feeling of power that emanated off them, Claire met Dell’s eyes, unable to speak. He lowered his mouth to kiss her, and she lost herself in his field of clover taste. Then she heard it. The pop and sizzle of the doorway, followed by the scent of burnt hair. “Shit,” she squealed, kicking her feet for Dell to put her down. “That’s Bernard.” Dell growled, a low noise in his throat, and she laughed a little breathlessly. “He’ll want to know what I decided.” Dell still glowered at her. “He’s been a good friend to me, Dell.” Part of her wanted to laugh at his expression—a little boy denied dessert. “He won’t stay long.” Dell very purposely swung her around to face him so she rubbed along the length of his body as he lowered her to the ground. She shivered, and glowered into his eyes. “That wasn’t playing fair,” she hissed at him as Bernard came in the room. “Deh, Kyah.” Bernard inclined his head at both of them. Claire steeled herself for his projection, surprised when it lacked the force it usually packed. “You’ve been practising,” she cried, thrilled with the progress he’d made. Although she felt wrung inside out, she didn’t feel as if she was going to spontaneously combust.
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At least, not from his projection—the liquid copper of Dell’s gaze, on the other hand, was making it unbearably warm. She tore her gaze away. Bernard asked if Dell being there meant she’d met with Eliane, and she nodded. “It looks like I’m official, Bernard,” she said, breathless with the sudden realisation of what she’d committed to. “I’m a go-between,” she whispered. She felt that Dell was staring at her even as Bernard projected his congratulations. Her gaze landed on the gaudy wrappings the book had come in, lovingly flattened and adorning a shelf near her television. Memories of who she’d been, just one week earlier drifted through her mind. Some things haven’t changed. I’m still in the middle of my twenties, and the middle of a divorce. The middle of a whole other kind of crisis. And now, I’m also stuck in the middle of two very different worlds. The big difference though, is now I’m at the start of something new.
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About the Author To learn more about Dayna Hart, please visit www.daynahart.com. Send an email to Dayna at
[email protected] or join her Yahoo! group to join in the fun with other readers as well as Dayna! http://groups.yahoo.com/group/thenoveltygirls_readers/
Look for these titles by Dayna Hart Coming Soon: The second book in The Curtain Torn series: Between Good and Aeval
He crossed dimensions to claim her as his queen—but her reign may destroy his world.
Adrienne © 2007 D. Reneé Bagby Adrienne Backett wants two simple little things this spring break: rest and relaxation. After nearly four years of slaving away for her college education, she deserves a holiday. What she gets is pulled into another dimension by a man who claims she's his rightful queen. Malik, King of Ulan, has until his birthday to find his bride before he must forfeit his throne. When a spell reveals her location, he will do anything, even cross dimensions, to claim her as his own. As if fending off a lusty king isn't enough of a headache, Adrienne finds herself a pawn in a rival monarch's plot to bring Malik's world to its knees. But is the real danger being stuck in the middle of a power struggle between rival kingdoms? Or the damage Malik could do to her heart? A Bron Universe Novel Enjoy the following excerpt for Adrienne: He went to the door of the bathroom and tapped lightly. “Go away.” Malik smiled sadly. “You know I cannot, my lady. The ceremony is but moments away.” He placed his palm flat on the door. “I have come to escort you.” “It’s bad luck to see the bride before the wedding ceremony.” “That is a superstition of your world, my lady, not mine. I assure you, my escort is perfectly normal.” No reply, only tiny electric shocks running up and down his arms—Adrienne’s panic. This was a waste of time. She wouldn’t see reason. Unfortunately, her time was up, as was Malik’s. He’d allowed her to avoid him the past three days because that ensured
he wouldn’t rip the clothes from her body and find out what her passion felt like. Even the presence of her entourage wouldn’t have deterred him. He only had to be patient a little while longer. That was the mantra he repeated over and over to keep himself in control so he could deal with the situation at hand in a calm manner. With a small push of power, Malik’s hand passed through the door to grab Adrienne’s arm. He pulled her through and made sure no part of Adrienne or her clothing remained in the door before he let her go. Releasing her too soon would have melded the two. He could separate them easily but the process was painful to a living creature and would only add to Adrienne’s panic. Adrienne stared at Malik in surprise. She hadn’t imagined it. He had pulled her from the bathroom to the main room through her bathroom door. Through it! It hadn’t hurt, but it was disconcerting. She swatted Malik’s hands away then stepped back. “You pulled me through the door.” “Would you have come out, my lady?” “Hell no!” The look she gave him showed the stupidity of his question. “Then it was necessary.” He placed his hands on either side of her head at her temples. She tried to pull away but found she couldn’t move. “What are you doing?” “Relieving your headache.” Of course, thought Adrienne. She had forgotten about her magicks, or else she would have stopped the headache herself. Malik released Adrienne when her headache alleviated, and stepped back to give her room. Her panic remained but the pain was gone. From the corner of his eye, he saw Nimat move in front of the bathroom door, barring Adrienne from fleeing back inside. He looked over everyone in the room. Khursid and Qamar stood in front of the windows, Hani had moved to block the closet in case Adrienne thought to hide there, and Mushira hovered behind him. Though they could not feel Adrienne’s agitation as Malik could, they responded to it by treating her like a caged animal ready to bolt at the first sign of weakness. This probably didn’t help Adrienne’s current state of mind.
He made a snap decision. “Out! All of you.” His tone left no room for argument, though Mushira and Khursid both seemed as though they would. A single look made them keep their silence and follow the others out of the room. After the door firmly shut behind the last retreating back, Malik spoke softly to his bride. “Adrienne, I know I have not given you much time to adjust, and an unfortunate happening marred your arrival here. I cannot change those things. However, I can make the rest of your time here happy, if you allow me.” He put his hands on her shoulders. It was all he could safely do, except he shouldn’t even do that much. Touching her was dangerous without the others around to bring him back to his senses. He focused on Adrienne’s agitation and tried to make it his own as a way to combat his lust. Only a few more hours and all his patience would be rewarded. Adrienne looked up at Malik and knew he meant it. She could read the sincerity in his words, and in his eyes, and feel it of him. He was concerned for her. “You really want to make me happy?” “Yes.” He breathed the word on a sigh. “I want to see my parents,” she demanded. Malik’s relieved look vanished. Good, she thought. What did he have to be so happy about when she was miserable? “I want my favorite stuffed animal from my bed. I want to yell at my bratty brothers for coming into my room without asking. I want to walk across the stage at my college graduation. I want to get my master’s degree. I want—” “Stop,” Malik yelled over her tirade. He dropped his hands from her shoulders and stepped away. “Why? That’s what would make me happy. Some spell says I’m your queen and you just snatch me away from my life and throw me into yours. You didn’t ask me! You still haven’t!” Adrienne didn’t want to yell. The others were right outside the door and they might hear her. She couldn’t help it. She’d held back her frustration and anger all this time, venting in her head but never aloud. With people always around, there was no privacy for her to tear into Malik like she wanted. Except now.
The wedding day had arrived. This was her last-ditch effort. Even if it didn’t work, she would have the satisfaction of telling Malik just what she thought about all of this, and of him. “You wish for me to ask for your hand?” “No! I wish to go home.” Silence.
Not all faeries have wings. Not all goblins are green. And not all wars are fought on the outside.
Blood of Eden ©2007 Edward Morris The first installment in the exciting new ARKADIA trilogy. Larry Cresswell, a disillusioned twenty-something, moves back in with his parents after college, gets his young girlfriend pregnant and ends up in the Oakland barrio, drunk and on welfare. Not as much of this is his fault as he’d like to believe. His girlfriend is a Changeling, left on Earth from the dimension of Faerie during a long and bitter war. One day she learns this, leaves and takes their daughter to Seattle, during the WTO Protests of 1999. This disaster, it is foretold, will punch a hole between dimensions and send her home as Queen of the Sluagh goblin-folk. Larry goes after his daughter, but to win her back he must first surrender…to himself. Only when he faces his own true origins can he hope to survive. It’s snowing in Arkadia. The King and Queen are imprisoned, and the Sluagh are on the march. Pass with Larry under the shadow of the storm, along with him for the hellride of his life…
Samhain Publishing, Ltd. It’s all about the story… Action/Adventure Fantasy Historical Horror Mainstream Mystery/Suspense Non-Fiction Paranormal Red Hots! Romance Science Fiction Western Young Adult www.samhainpublishing.com
