1
The world goes sideways and all I can think is: ah, man, not again.
I’m still stumbling from the force of Saxon’s unexpected shove. Add that to the way the ground shifts beneath me and I can barely stay on my feet, let alone worry about what’s in my hands. Some sense of self-preservation kicks in, though, and I just manage to hang onto the muslin-like sack the treacherous Seelie gave me before he sent me right into the middle of an abandoned fairy circle.
The seeing stone he tipped into my palm so that I could peer through the glamour that hid the circle? That’s gone. I must have dropped it because my left hand is completely empty as it slams into the dirt, breaking my fall when I come flying out on the other side.
I land with a grunt, the bag of pretty, pink apples knocking the wind out of me as I tumble on top of them. They dig into my gut. Oof. I quickly roll off of the bag, still clutching the fabric between my fingers. When this is the only supply I have to keep from starving, I can’t lose it—even if I’m pretty sure that I am lost.
The sky is purple. While I’m lying flat on my back, too stunned to even think about scrambling to my feet just yet, I stare up at the sky. The first thing I notice is that it’s way darker now than it was only seconds ago when I was still standing with Saxon. The next? Is that the sky is freaking purple.
And not just the type of purple you get when a storm’s coming. Oh, no. It’s a rich, deep violet streaked with black clouds that are seriously black. Not grey, not charcoal, but pitch-black. It’s as intimidating as it is foreign, and it doesn’t do anything to help me figure out where I am.
Since I’ve been in Faerie, I’ve grown used to the magenta sky burnished with gold that whirled over my head. This isn’t right. Pushing myself up on my elbows, I glance around. Dark is an understatement. There’s no sun—no moon, either—so of course there’s no light. A layer of shadow covers everything, from the brittle grass to the bleak-looking, bare trees. It makes everything look black, though I don’t really see much. It’s like someone dumped a bottle of ink everywhere because, except for a couple of feet in front of me, the rest of the forest I’m in gets swallowed up by the darkness.
I’m lost and alone. That realization beating at my brain, I heft up my bag of apples and hurry to my feet. Spinning around, I look behind me. It’s just the same. Dark, dark, and more dark.
What the hell?
Saxon told me that the fairy circle was supposed to push me back across the veil. I step through it and, in a heartbeat, I go from Faerie to the Iron, the name the faerie folk have for the human world. Not that I wanted to. I didn’t. I have some unfinished business here—and a budding relationship with my scarred Seelie, Rys—and I refused to take the fairy circle.
Didn’t matter. The Siúcra guard shoved me through anyway.
I can’t blame him. Well, yeah, I can, but I’ve been in Faerie long enough by now that I kind of get where Saxon was coming from. Before we broke out of the Faerie prison, Rys told me that he had one of the guards on our side. That turned out to be Saxon, a Seelie who owes Rys a debt. And, believe me, “favor” means something totally different to the race in charge here. One of the fae will do anything to erase a debt they owe.
In Saxon’s case, he tried to repay Rys by giving me the bag of faerie fruit and sending me back to the Iron. It was too dangerous for me to stay here in Faerie. For one thing, I’m a fugitive. For another, I’m a human without a single drop of magic. If I get caught by the wrong creatures, it could be open season on me—or worse.
I’ve already been through some of the “worse”. Since I’ve been here, I’ve been poisoned, sold at a Faerie market to a Seelie noble, propositioned to be some kind of pet, sent to fairy jail, and then nearly “claimed” by a corrupt Unseelie prison guard—and, yes, it was just as unpleasant as it sounds. Sure, I also started to fall for my Seelie cellmate, and thanks to Rys masterminding our break-out, I thought my shitty luck might have begun to finally turn around.
I wish. Not only were we separated during the last stage of our escape, but after I followed his instructions to wait for him at a nearby inn, it wasn’t Rys who met me there.
It was Saxon.
And, according to the Seelie guard, he was there on Rys’s orders to make sure that I finished my escape by getting out of Faerie. When I refused, he did what he thought he had to: he pushed me into a hidden fairy circle.
Only it, uh, it didn’t work.
I glance around, my stomach twisted in nervous knots. I’m definitely not back in Kansas—or, for that matter, home.
Faerie. No doubt in my mind that this is still Faerie. The purple sky, the dark shadows… yeah, that’s a big honking clue that I’m still in the magical world. It’s just not any part of Faerie that I’ve been in before.
Not like that’s saying much. In the more than a month since I first found my way to this magical realm, I spent most of it locked up as a prisoner in Siúcra, the largest prison in Faerie. For a little less than three weeks I was trapped inside a cramped cell with nothing except a narrow cot, a magic shower box that tripled as a toilet and a washing-up station, and an enigmatic, scarred Seelie for a cellmate.
Rys…
Only a few minutes ago, I wasn’t sure whether I should be angry or hurt that Rys knew that I was his soul mate—that he knew he was sacrificing our relationship during the break-out from Siúcra—and that he arranged for Saxon to send me away from Faerie anyway.
Well, now I know. I’m fucking pissed.
My fury heats me up from the inside out. I can’t believe him. And, okay, he warned me not to trust him—his exact words were in Faerie, trust no one—but he kept pushing me not to worry. He was supposed to be right behind me. That’s what he told me and, damn it, the fae can’t lie!
I stomp my feet. It’s a straight-up angry reflex. I guess the shock’s finally wearing off as the reality that I’m trapped on my own in a dark and unfamiliar part of Faerie slowly sinks in.
Because of course I am—and, as much as I hate to admit it, that’s partly my fault. Not knowing what Rys planned on giving up, I made a sacrifice, too.
What did I expect? I knew that there was a price to pay to flee the prison. In order to let a prisoner leave through its gates, Siúcra demands a sacrifice. It has to be something super significant or the magic of the prison won’t even consider it. There was only one thing important enough to me that I figured would count. In one fell swoop, I gave up my chance to return to my old life—which included my apartment, my
family, and Jim, my boyfriend since I was sixteen.