Chapter 5

Five

The fae on this side of the gate have always kept to themselves. Most of the time, I could go days without running into one of them. Now there’s a crowd of fae in the streets of Midnight Harbor and worse…they’re kneeling for me.

I immediately recognize a few of them. In the front holding a baby in her arms is the woman Sam and I ran into not that long ago on the river walk. The baby had been fussing in her stroller while the mom cleaned chocolate off the face of her toddler.

The baby had quieted as soon as I lifted her into my arms.

Fae babies have always taken to me.

I swallow hard, realizing there were clues dotted in my past about who I was and how I was different.

Fae babies are notoriously fussy now that they’ve been sealed off from the fae realm and all of its power and magic.

My mom complained more than once that I was just as bad.

“Get up,” I say to them, but my voice is weak and too quiet.

I’m lacking conviction, overwrought with fear.

Why the hell are they kneeling? Didn’t Stanley say I was the villain? Shouldn’t these people be afraid of me or outright hate me?

Of course, Stanley did tell me that kneeling is customary, if not compulsory.

But I don’t want this. I don’t want any of it.

“Get up,” I try again, this time louder.

The crowd stands to their feet just as Bran steps off the curb, putting himself between me and them. With the waning moon, it’s hard to make out all of their faces, but the crowd is spread out all the way to the opposite side of the street. There must be close to fifty of them.

“Why are you here?” Bran asks them, keeping his voice level because Bran knows how to act when in the face of something unexpected.

I wish I had his spine of steel. I wish I had his confidence.

Someone in the center of the crowd starts forward and the others go quiet.

The hair lifts on my arms and along the back of my neck.

I can’t be sure if it’s the night or some baser instinct, if it’s my fae side taking notice of this man as he steps forward into the pool of light cast from The Greasy Spoon’s windows.

My first thought is: I’ve never seen this man before. I would remember him if I had. And my second thought is: how odd that I’ve never seen this man before.

His dark hair is shorn practically to the scalp on the sides, maybe to make it easier to see the intricately knotted tattoos on the side of his head. The top is left long, and several strands hang in his face.

His ears are pointed, meaning he’s full blood fae.

I should have seen him before.

How have I never seen him?

And why aren’t my ears pointed?

Instinctively, my hand trails up to the soft shell of my ear where it rounds like a mortal’s should.

There are so many questions still, too many unearthed answers.

When the fae comes to a stop just a few feet from Bran, he clasps his hands behind his back and the metal rivets in his leather clothing glimmer like gold. More metallic threads shine in his highly decorated tunic.

Now that he’s much closer and in the light I can tell his hair isn’t black but midnight blue, like a pool of expensive ink spilled across a desk.

He looks like he stepped out of a child’s fairytale book. Even in a place like Midnight Harbor, he looks like he doesn’t quite belong.

“What’s your purpose for being here?” Bran asks, bypassing any kind of introduction.

“My purpose,” the man says, “is no concern of yours.”

Bran’s shoulders rise slowly with a deep breath. “Excuse me?”

“Bran—” I thread my hand with his and give him a squeeze. He shifts, tipping his chin so he can look at me over his shoulder. “Be nice.”

“Be nice, Mouse? Be nice? This is a blatant display of something and until we know what it is, I will not be nice.”

With a grumble, I turn back to the fae. “Can you help us out? He’s a man that likes to know what he’s dealing with.”

The fae turns his bright blue eyes on Bran. “Not quite a man, is he?”

“Vampire. Close enough. Why are you kneeling outside of a diner?”

He cants his head and his tunic glimmers again with the movement. “It is our duty to show respect. But beyond that, you used your power, which means everything is about to change.”

I said it, didn’t I?

The fae looks back toward the diner where Stanley and Judy are now standing outside.

“You kept this from us, brownie.”

Stanley doesn’t balk. “There was a reason she was hidden and bound, and it wasn’t my place to decide to undo it. Nor was it yours.”

“Stanley, do you know this man?” I ask him.

“The name is Arion,” the fae answers. “And I am a Lord of the Summer Court.”

Though I’m trying my hardest not to appear overwhelmed, hearing his title makes my eyes pop open with awe.

“I didn’t know any of the high born were on this side,” Bran says.

“You wouldn’t.” Arion narrows his eyes when he looks over at Bran. “As I said, it’s none of your concern.”

Oh, well, shit. This isn’t going well.

Bran practically vibrates with rage.

I take a step, inserting myself between them before Bran has a fae heart dripping blood from his hand.

“It’s really nice to meet you, Arion,” I say, trying for diplomacy and kindness. After all, if I’m regarded as the villain, I need to do everything in my power to prove to them that I’m not.

“Can you at least tell us if you’re friend or foe?”

Arion shrugs, but it’s a calculated shrug with no ounce of casualness to it. “I think the answer to that question is entirely up to you.” He unclasps his hands from behind his back and offers up a thick card captured between his middle and pointer finger.

Before Bran can tell me otherwise, I snatch the card from the fae.

It’s thick, the paper creamy, but textured like linen. The text on the front is an elegant, looping handwriting and the note says: Moonlit side of Bramwell Pond. Tomorrow night at midnight.

I look up at Arion.

“Come if you wish. Or don’t. I don’t care.” He turns away and the fae crowd parts for him. He clearly rules what few fae remain on this side and my fear and anxiety turn into a knot.

I don’t like that I’ve literally never met this man, and I definitely don’t like that he immediately knew how and where to find me. It means he knows more about being fae than I do, which isn’t much at all.

He has the upper hand no matter how powerful I’m supposed to be.

I take a step to follow him when Bran hooks me by the elbow and whirls me around. “Where the hell do you think you’re going?”

I lean into him and lower my voice. “We need to find out what’s going on here.”

He takes the card from me and reads it over, then curses beneath his breath. “Waiting will be better, little mouse. Trust me.” He yanks me down the street away from the fae where they’re dispersing fast and following after Arion, the darkness of the night swallowing them up.

“Aren’t you curious about him? I hate waiting and I don’t want to run away,” I argue.

“There’s a difference between running away and knowing when you’re at a disadvantage, and following some random fae lord into his territory is an error in strategy and intelligence.”

“Are you calling me dumb?”

He makes a tsk sound. “No, Mouse. Inexperienced is the better word.”

I pull out of his grip and cross my arms over my chest. I hate that he’s right. And we did just establish some new rules within our relationship and here we’re already testing the limits.

I want to make perhaps unwise decisions and Bran wants to keep me from doing it.

We stand off against one another. His eyes glimmer with golden anger.

“No,” he says, reading my stubbornness.

“Yes.”

“Mouse, I will not hesitate to throw you over my shoulder and cart you back to the house and chain you to a fucking bed.”

I narrow my eyes at him. “You wouldn’t.”

He takes another step toward me, nostrils flaring. “Try me.”

Do I hate this idea? I feel like either way, I’m winning here. If he lets me chase after Arion and the other fae, I’m getting my way. If I disobey him, he’ll chain me to the bed and maybe do other things to me.

I take two steps backward. Bran’s jaw flexes.

“ Mouse .”

I can’t help it—a tease of a smile spreads over my face. I need this. We need this.

I step off the sidewalk, but before my foot hits the street, Bran has me in his arms and thrown over his shoulder.

It happens so fast, the world spins.

“Hey! Come on!” I say, but my fight is full of laughter.

Bran pulls out his cell phone and makes a connection.

Someone answers on the other end. “Yes, Mr. Duval?”

“Get me a length of chain. Have it in my bedroom in ten minutes.”

“Yes, sir.”

Bran hangs up and then smacks my ass. A high-pitched yelp escapes me.

“Naughty little mouse,” he says and then carts me off into the night.