9. Maeve

Iexpected us to pile into some rickety British car and drive down to the village, but instead the guys set off on foot across the gardens. Just outside the inner gatehouse was a small, cobbled path that wound down through the trees. It came out on the edge of a field. I could just make out the village in the distance – a row of houses dotted across the edge of the hill.

I had no idea that England’s landscape was so irregular. In Arizona, the plains stretched out in all directions, so the horizon was a constant companion – always impossible to reach but right there in your face. Here, rolling hills, quaint villages and ancient trees obscured it.

Corbin swung open a small wooden gate, darting his eyes both ways as he stepped into the field. “Do we own this field, too?” I asked.

He shook his head. “The estate next door – Raynard Hall – technically owns this field. In England, we have something called the ‘right to roam’ over open areas of land. It means that we’re allowed to walk through here, even though we don’t own it and it’s not a public road.”

Wow. In Arizona, if you walked on a farmer’s land without permission, he could shoot you. I checked over my shoulder for rifle-toting farmers as I followed Corbin into the field, a delicious shiver of the forbidden coursing through my veins.

We reached the village after a brisk twenty-minute walk that left me puffing. I expected exhaustion to grab me from all the traveling and jet lag, but instead, my body buzzed with nervous energy. The village looked just like the kind of quaint place you saw on English TV programs. Thatched-roof houses lined one long, narrow street, each one hung with handwritten signs declaring their purpose. There was a post office, a tearoom, and a couple of crystal shops. At the other end of the main street (or, as Corbin called it, the high street) were more modern shops with awnings, and something called Tesco that look like it might be a grocery store.

Down a narrow cobblestoned alley was the Tir Na Nog pub. I’d never been inside a pub or bar before, and as first experiences went, this one was awesome. Corbin, Flynn, and Arthur had to duck under the low beams that crossed the roof as they descended toward the bar. Dim booths were lit by candles on the tables and wrought-iron lanterns on the walls.

The boys lined up at the bar. Flynn pushed me in front of him. My eyes widened at the long line of bottles and the enormous taps jutting from the rustic wooden bar in front of me. There didn’t seem to be any kind of menu. How did anyone ever choose what they wanted?

“Fancy a pint, lads?” A girl about my age with a thick Scottish accent leaned over the bar, her elbows pushing her tits together so her cleavage was practically in Flynn’s face. He didn’t look like he minded. She wore her fiery-red hair in two long braids, and her wide mouth turned up in a cheeky grin.

“Five pints of your famous ale, thanks Neale, and a couple of menus.” Flynn leaned back and squeezed my arm. “We’ve got a friend with us today.”

“Aye, I didn’t know you had any of those, Flynn O’Hagan.” Neale slammed five giant glasses with handles on the counter and started filling them from a tap.

“I don’t even like beer—” I protested.

“This isn’t your watery American piss, luv,” Corbin said as Neale slid an enormous glass of amber liquid underneath my nose. “Wait until you try a real English ale.”

Judging by the bitter smell wafting off the top of the glass, I wasn’t going to be impressed. I dared a tentative sip, and nearly spat the mouthful back out again. This is worse than American beer. It’s too…beery. How could people drink this?

Neale flirted with the guys as she poured the rest of their drinks, sharing old jokes and gossiping about people from the village. They clearly came here a lot. This bothered me more than it should. I was starting to feel pretty grumpy until the guys backed away from the bar to find a booth and she turned to me with a conspiratorial grin.

“Welcome to Jolly Old Blighty,” she pointed at my pint. “How about I get you something a little more special?”

“Is it more beer?” I groaned.

“I dinnae ken why they ordered you that shite. You’re clearly not a beer lass.”

“Oh yeah?” I wasn’t sure if she was insulting me.

“Aye. I can tell by looking at a person what their poison of choice is, even if they dinnae ken themselves.” She pointed to the door as a couple walked in. “He’s into the craft beer scam, so he’ll order something expensive that tastes exactly like the five-pound pint of piss in front of you, and she’ll have a white wine.” She called over her shoulder to the couple. “What’ll it be?”

“A white wine for the missus, and do you have any of that Trappist IPA beer, you know, that one brewed by the local monks?” The guy stroked his hipster beard.

“Coming right up,” Neale winked at me as she pulled out two glasses and fixed the drinks. “What did I tell you?”

“That’s remarkable.”

“It’s my superpower. That’s how I ken you’re not going to have another sip of that beer. You want tae ken what your drink really is? I’ll fix it for you.”

“Sure, why not?”

Neale grinned wickedly as she placed a glass in front of me, poured a clear alcohol in, then topped it off with tonic water and a slice of lemon.

“You’re a GT girl. Go on, tell me I’m right.”

GT? I guessed the T was for tonic, but what was the G? Gin? I’d never had gin before. My teenage years weren’t exactly resplendent with alcohol-fuelled parties.

I picked up the glass and took a sip. It was delicious – refreshing and zesty, with a bit of a kick. No bitterness whatsoever.

“I’m a GT girl, and I didn’t even know it.” I grinned back at her. “Thanks.”

She waved a dismissive hand. “Aye, I’m a magician. I ken it. Go an’ join your fellas and I’ll bring over some scran for you all.”

I had no idea what scran was, but if it was as good as this drink, I’d be first in line. I was starting to feel a lot better about Neale and England in general. I slid into a seat at the end of the corner booth next to Arthur. The guys raised their glasses with a resounding “cheers,” which was clearly something you said in England, and we clinked.

The booth was far enough away from other diners and drinkers we could hear each other talk. And talk we did. Corbin and Arthur regaled me with tales of the castle’s history – famous knights and bloody battles and raunchy nobles. Flynn broke in with ridiculous remarks, every word out of his mouth making me burst out laughing, even as the others groaned. Rowan remained mostly silent, his kind eyes studying mine from across the table. I noticed that when he spoke up to insult Flynn, or recall a date that Corbin forgot, the others immediately ceased speaking to listen.

Neale dumped huge plates of meat pies (I know, WTF, right? But they were delicious), french fries (or “chips”, according to the guys) and mushy peas (not so delicious – Corbin finished off mine) in front of us. If this was English food, I could live with it.

According to Corbin, the Briarwood lord who added the Tudor wing was a royalist, and once hid King Charles in a secret room in the library for a couple of months. “I’ll show you the room later, if you like,” he said, shooting me that heart-melting smile of his.

“I’d like that very much,” I said.

By the time dessert came (Banoffee pie – another first for me, but definitely not the last), my nerves disappeared. It was impossible to feel like the frumpy science geek around these guys, with Flynn squeezing my hand and Arthur’s thigh brushing against mine, and Corbin smiling and Rowan’s soulful eyes never leaving mine.

How the hell was I going to survive living with these guys without making a fool of myself?

The history lesson stopped around the Victorian period, and the guys completely avoided mentioning my mother or how they themselves ended up in the house. Instead, Arthur ordered another round (apparently, people in England bought one drink for everyone at the table, and they all took turns) and we debated the merits of various films and TV shows. I hadn’t seen a lot of the BBC shows they all knew, and anything with violence or premarital sex or magic or science fiction was banned from our house, but Flynn’s dramatic reenactments more than made up for my lack of knowledge.

More rounds came, and more food. I had no idea how long we stayed at the pub, but after awhile, I missed snatches of conversation as I faded in and out of sleep. The jet lag was catching up at last, and the GTs were probably not helping.

After my head nodded against his shoulder, Corbin said, “I think it’s time we got her home.”

The guys stood up, and with a wave to Neale and a promise to return, I staggered outside with them, gripping Flynn’s arm for support. Outside, I was surprised to see it was dusk already, and the cheery gingerbread houses were now shrouded in shadow. The temperature had dropped, and a crisp, balmy breeze kissed my skin. I rubbed my bare arms, wishing I’d thought to bring a sweater.

“Here,” Arthur shrugged off his coat.

“That’s okay. It’s not far to walk—” But Arthur was already fitting the coat around my shoulders. It was a long black wool trench, the shoulders sticking out like a tent from my body, and my hands disappearing into the sleeves. I wrapped it around and breathed in Arthur’s scent – smoky and sooty, like a bonfire.

As he drew his hands away, I noticed dark scars crisscrossing his lower arms around his elbows. They ran all the way around his arm. I wondered what had caused them, but it felt wrong to ask.

Arthur noticed my gaze and drew his arm back.

As we walked away from the shops and out along the country lane toward Briarwood, dusk darkened into night, and the sky opened up above us, the Milky Way scattered across our heads in vibrant steaks. It was completely different from Arizona, with new constellations visible and others obscured. I stopped in my tracks, craning my neck up for a better look.

Someone crashed into me, sending us both toppling into the grass. “Oops, sorry.” I turned to help him up. It was Rowan. He accepted my hand, his warm skin sending a tingle up my arm. One of his locks fell across my shoulder.

“What were you looking at?” he asked, flipping his dreadlocks back over his shoulder.

“Saturn,” I replied, pointing out the orb of the biggest planet. “It’s so clear tonight that we can see the stripes of her clouds with the naked eye. And there’s Venus, and Mars. And there’s Virgo – that’s my star sign.”

“You believe in astrology?”

I shook my head. “Absolutely not. Even if the alignment of the stars could somehow predict your personality, which is pretty damn unscientific, it wouldn’t work because modern astrology doesn’t take precession into account.”

“Precession?”

“Yeah, it’s the wobble of the earth’s axis.”

“The earth wobbles?”

“It does, actually. Kind of the way I’m wobbling now.” I laugh as I steady myself. My head spins from the alcohol and the lack of sleep and these four wonderful, enchanting guys. “It’s caused by the gravitational attraction of the moon on the equatorial bulge. Because of it, the positions of the stars in the sky change incrementally every year. Thousands of years of incremental changes have moved the intersection point of the celestial equator and ecliptic – that’s the path of the sun – by 36 degrees, which means that when a person is born during the recognized period of time for Aquarius, the sun wasn’t actually in that constellation when they were born. It’s more likely to be Pisces or Ophiuchus?—”

“I’ve never heard of Ophiuchus before.”

“It’s actually the thirteenth star sign, although not many people use—” I didn’t get a chance to explain because a man darted out of the shadows and blocked our path.

“Hello,” he said, extending a hand out in front of him, palm facing us. His voice was obscured by a black hood, but it was deep and rich, almost singsong. A black coat – not unlike the one I was wearing – flapped around his tall, muscular frame. From the darkness of his hood, the moonlight flickered off two prisms of emerald light, eyes that reminded me of something, but I couldn’t think what.

I didn’t think to be scared. I assumed it was some other neighbor out for a walk, but Rowan’s body stiffened, his soft face tightening. Tension rose in the air around us, but nothing like the sexual heat I’d felt in the secret kitchen passage with Corbin and Flynn.

Rowan was poised for a fight.

His hand tightened around my arm. “Get behind me,” he whispered.

“Huh?”

I heard a shout up ahead as the other guys realized we had a visitor. The grass rustled as they ran back toward us. “Rowan, keep her safe!” Corbin yelled.

“What’s going on?” A flicker of fear licked my throat. My eyes fixed on the man standing in the grass. He kept his hand held in front of him, curling a finger toward himself.

“Good evening, Maeve,” the man said, his crystal eyes blazing. “If you come with me now, I won’t harm your friends.”

A lump of fear rose in my throat. “Who are you? How do you know my name?”

The man raised his hand and lifted off the hood. I gasped as I recognized that black hair tinged with gold and the pale, porcelain skin. The narrowed eyes of a predator met my gaze. It was the guy who’d harassed Kelly and I at the Coopersville fair, the one I nicknamed the bellend, who had waved and smiled at me across the fairway as I’d watched my parents burn.

The force of that realization hit me so hard I physically jolted. I thought that guy had just been some random jerk, but the fact that he was here, jumping me in this field, and he knew my name… this wasn’t random.

He was stalking me.

But why?

Who was I apart from a twice-orphaned science geek?

“What do you want from me?” I demanded, trying to keep my voice steady, free of the fear that hurtled through my veins. “Why are you following me?”

“Now, if I told you that, that would take all the fun away.” The guy drew his hand across his face in a weird gesture that managed to appear threatening. “And I can tell you’d be a lot of fun, Maeve Moore.”

“That’s not my name,” I lied, my heart thudding in my chest. “Just tell me what you want or let us pass.”

“No can do, I’m afraid.” The guy snapped his fingers. The grass behind him rustled, and two more men rose out of the long grass, as if they were emerging from within the earth itself. Both wore identical long black coats and equally sinister smiles.

How come none of us noticed them lying there before? My heart pounded, and I shrunk closer to Rowan. Which was kind of ridiculous. With his wiry frame and quiet nature, I’d probably be the one protecting him.

Let’s pray it doesn’t come to that.

Rowan’s fingers looped in mine and he shoved something into my hand, wrapping my fingers around it. It felt like a twig. “Keep hold of that,” he whispered. “Don’t let it go, no matter what happens. Don’t let him see it.”

I nodded, keeping my eyes locked on my stalker as he took a step toward me, his sinister grin growing wider.

I caught another flash of black in the grass. My heart hammered against my chest. Was that another guy? Did my stalker have a friend?

But no. Arthur strode toward us, his face set in a determined scowl. Corbin and Flynn were right behind him. The three assailants advanced toward Rowan and I, their hands raised, seemingly unperturbed by the other guys approaching them from behind.

Arthur crept forward, his eyes narrowed in concentration. He raised an arm behind his head. The moonlight glinted off a narrow blade.

Shit.

As soon as I saw that blade, my whole body stiffened. None of our assailants had pulled out any weapons. They hadn’t actually touched us at all.

Arthur can’t really hurt that guy. He hasn’t done anything?—

I screamed as Arthur lunged. I braced myself for the blade piercing the man’s flesh, for blood and horror. But the guy whipped around and ducked the blow, moving impossibly fast – a black smudge against the inky night. Arthur swung his arm back, aiming for the guy’s head and yelling something in a language I didn’t recognize.

The man’s hand clamped down on Arthur’s wrist, stopping Arthur’s blow an inch from his face as if it were nothing.

What the hell? Arthur was strong. The stalker shouldn’t have been able to stop that blow.

Arthur’s face twisted in pain as the guy yanked his arm around, throwing him off balance and tossing the knife into the grass.

“Arthur!” I yelled, stepping forward to help him. Rowan’s hand clamped around my wrist, pulling me back.

“Stay with me,” he said. “You can’t fight them.”

“Can you take the heat, fire-wielder?” The man rasped, wrapping his arms around Arthur so that his forearm pressed against Arthur’s throat. Arthur’s face contorted, and he let out a strangled bellow. He grabbed the guy’s arm and for a moment, a bright orange light flared, as though someone had struck a match, but then it was gone and Arthur’s body went limp, his eyes rolling back in his head.

No. I’m not watching a guy die in front of me.

I’m done with death.

I jerked my arm from Rowan’s and rushed forward. “Let go of him!”

“Maeve, no!” Rowan tried to grab for my hand again, but I shrugged him away. I reached the guy holding Arthur just as Corbin leapt on his back.

I flung myself at them, intending to help Corbin pry the stalker’s arm from Arthur’s neck. My fingers grazed the guy’s skin and a sickening tingle shot up my arm, like a jolt of medicine that made me want to retch.

What the?—

Someone’s hands wrapped around my waist and lifted me away.

“He’s not worthy of you, Princess,” the stalker hissed in my ear, his breath hot and ugly on my skin.

“Put me down!” I kicked hard. The balls of my ankles smashed against the stalker’s shins, but he gave no sign that he even felt it.

“She’s a feisty one,” he sneered, tossing me to the ground.

I threw out my hands, but my chest hit the earth first, driving the wind out of me.

I gasped for air, my legs curling up against my stomach.

Rowan’s face appeared in front of me, his eyes wide with worry. “Maeve, are you?—”

But he didn’t get to finish his sentence. My stalker moved in a blur, faster than my eye could follow. He flung out an arm, catching Rowan across the chest. Rowan sailed through the air and landed with a thud in the grass some thirty feet away.

That… that’s not possible.

I coughed, my lungs burning. I tried to push myself up with my legs, but they wouldn’t cooperate. I had no idea where the other two assailants were.

My stalker grabbed me and yanked me to my feet, crushing my chest against his so his face was inches from mine.

Up close, his perfect skin looked wrong, like the skin of an android stretched over a heartless machine beneath.

“Let go of me!” I tried to wrench myself out of his grasp, but his grip was like iron.

“Look at you,” he rasped. “You’re so juicy, full of all that human blood and ancient magic. I just want to eat you right up.”

He stuck out his tongue and ran it along my cheek. Its rough surface scratched my skin.

Gross gross gross.

I tried to jerk away, but my limbs wouldn’t move. My whole body locked up, everything frozen in place.

What’s happening to me?

I tried to cry out, but my tongue wouldn’t move, either.

“Delicious.” With a final slurp, the stalker drew away, a self-satisfied grin spreading over his face. He wasn’t even tying to hide his face. His cruel eyes burned into mine. My skin tingled along his saliva trail.

“Don’t you touch her.” Rowan’s face appeared beside me, his features hard. He placed a hand on my shoulder, and suddenly, I could move again.

I kicked at the stalker’s legs, trying to trip him, but my blows only made him laugh.

“She is ours to touch as we please, witch.” He spat at Rowan, shoving him away. The stalker raised his hand, pointing his palm at Rowan. As I watched in horror, his fingers elongated, the tips curling over into long claws, curled over like the talons of a bird.

But how… this can’t be happening. I’m imagining it. It’s the jet lag playing tricks with my mind.

It was no trick. The claws reached closer to Rowan’s face, sharp points glinting in the moonlight. They were real all right, but how the hell did they get on the end of this guy’s fingers?

The stalker tilted his head to the side, and laughed cruelly. “Such pretty eyes you have, witch. I think I’ll take them.”

No. Fuck no.

I pushed all of my fear into my arm. My skin grew hot, and there was this weird swelling in my chest, like I’d just started running up a hill and the oxygen was hitting my lungs. I threw all my weight and all this strangeness at the stalker.

I expected him to catch my punch, but somehow, I slipped under him, and my fist connected with his jaw.

The punch was useless, barely grazing his skin. And yet as soon as it connected, my stalker’s face contorted with pain. His whole body sagged and shuddered.

Okay, so maybe I just hit his Achilles’ heel. Maybe he has a glass jaw. Not my problem. Now was my chance, without his claw-hands dangling an inch from Rowan’s eyes. I kicked out a leg. The shot was too low to get him in the nuts as I’d intended, but I managed to slam my foot into the side of his knee.

His face registered surprise for a moment, and then it twisted with pain as he dropped his hands to clasp his knee. Unfortunately, he seemed to have forgotten that he’d turned his hand into razor-sharp claws. What an idiot. He sliced open his trousers and made a real mess of his knee.

I backed away as the guy fell onto his good knee. Rowan knelt down as well, scooping up a handful of loose dirt from the edge of the trampled path. He pressed the dirt clot to the guy’s head, and muttered something in a foreign language.

My stalker moaned, his eyes rolling back in his head. “Nice try,” he managed to croak out. “But your powers won’t hold me for long, earth witch.”

“They don’t have to,” Rowan growled, his kind voice thick with venom. He kept his hand pressed against the stalker’s face. Underneath, the guy’s skin turned brown and leathery, bits of it flaking off and blowing away in the breeze.

I don’t know what made me do it, but I just knew.

My chest tightened, and I glanced down at my hand that had punched the guy. Inside my fist was the tiny twig Rowan had given me.

The twig that was in my fist when I landed that punch.

Before I could question what I was doing, I knelt down and pressed my hand over top of Rowan’s, holding the twig against the guy’s face. He screamed, but he couldn’t wriggle away.

I focused my mind on that twig and on the dirt clot in Rowan’s hand, on the two touching – two parts of the earth coming together. Somehow – and I have no idea why this even occurred to me – I knew it was important that I thought about that twig and the dirt and nothing else.

Fear and energy and tingles of heat and light swirled through my body. Bile touched the back of my tongue. But I kept my focus.

The guy’s face twisted and sagged. His eyes flashed with anger, and then they rolled back in his head.

His body stiffened.

He toppled backward, slamming against the ground.

His head bounced.

He didn’t get up again.

I sucked in a breath. What just happened?

Rowan helped me to my feet.

“What did we do?” I cried.

“No time for that,” Rowan dragged me toward the others. “Come on!”

I stumbled across the field after him, my breath ragged and my lungs screaming.

Arthur, Corbin, and Flynn fought the other two guys – the five of them climbing over each other in a whirlwind of flailing limbs. I saw the flash of a white blade under the moonlight and Corbin cried out.

Corbin rolled out of the fray. One of the assailants leapt on top of him, sending him sprawling to the ground. Corbin managed to roll over beneath the guy, and he hooked his hand under his shirt and pulled out some kind of necklace which he shoved in the guy’s face.

The assailant screamed as the metal necklace touched his skin. He lashed out at Corbin with the same clawed fingers. Corbin wrenched his head to the side and the guy raked his claws through thin air.

Rowan ran over and grabbed the guy around the neck, trying to pull him off Corbin. I stood frozen, unable to move. All I could do was watch the carnage around me.

Arthur and Flynn took down the other attacker. Arthur pinned the guy’s arms while Flynn tore open something in his pocket and sprinkled it into his face. The guy screamed, thrashing wildly in Arthur’s grip, his foot nearly clobbering Flynn in the face.

And then, poof! He disappeared.

What the?—

I was leaving a lot of sentences unfinished tonight.

I squinted into the gathering dark. Yep, the guy was definitely no longer there.

Flynn helped Arthur to his feet, and the blond giant hunched down to retrieve his knife from the long grass, the stalks bent and broken from the fight.

Meanwhile, Corbin was off the ground. He and the last assailant circled each other like two boxers in a ring. The black-cloaked guy had a long, curved sword made of some kind of white material. It looked like the rib bone of a large animal. The white blade shimmered with a pale blue light along one edge.

Corbin’s eyes flicked to his friends. “Arthur!” he yelled, raising his hand.

Arthur tossed his blade through the air. Corbin reached up and grabbed the handle just as the assailant swung the white sword at his arm.

I gasped. The entire world moved in slow motion, the blade inching closer to Corbin’s raised arm. Moonlight gleamed off the sharpened edge.

The blue light kissed Corbin’s skin, but before it sank into his flesh Arthur slammed into the guy, knocking him sideways and plunging a second knife into his side.

“Arrrrrrgghhh!” the guy bellowed. Arthur leaned his full weight into his, twisting the knife into his flesh. Blood spread out from the wound, but in the dark it looked weird, kind of green. But that was probably just a trick of the light and the green meadow.

The guy’s eyes rolled back in his head, and his body stiffened. But before his back had even hit the ground, he also disappeared, his body shimmering away into the air as if it had been made of dust.

I glanced behind me to where we’d left my stalker’s body lying in the grass. He had gone, too, although the rustling of the grass behind suggested he might have picked himself up and run.

My head spun. All three of the black-coated attackers had disappeared. They hadn’t just been knocked out – they were completely gone.

“Sound as a pound, Aragorn!” Flynn cheered, thrusting a fist into the air, an enormous grin on his face.

Arthur took a deep bow, pushing a knife back into his belt. “It’s too bad I left my sword at home. I could have done some serious damage.”

“What the hell is going on?” I demanded. “Why are guys jumping out of the grass to attack us? One of them knew my name. And how in God’s name did they do that trick with the claws? Where the hell are they now?”

That was more blasphemy than I’d get away with in an entire year in the Crawford house. But right now, it seemed appropriate.

Corbin stood over the place where the last guy had lain and scuffed the earth with his boot. He clutched his shoulder, and I noticed his black t-shirt was torn where the blue-tinged white sword had touched him. Blood – definitely red – ran down his arm. “We need to get going. We don’t know if any more might be coming.”

As if on cue, the grass rustled behind us. Corbin whipped his head around, then pointed to the house. “Go, now!”

I started to run.

I barely got ten feet when something slammed into me, sweeping me off my feet.

I screamed, but a rough voice whispered in my ear. “Hold on.” It was Arthur, my Aragorn. He tossed me over his shoulder like I was a sack of potatoes and raced across the field, the beads in his beard clacking together as he ran. We passed Corbin and Flynn in a blur as they stumbled through the long grass.

The rustling behind us grew louder. My heart pounded in my ears. Something snarled, like an angry dog about to attack.

“Shite!” Arthur poured on speed, tearing through the gate.

Corbin, Flynn and Rowan leapt through after him, and Rowan slammed the gate shut. The snarling grew louder, and the gate rattled as a dark shape pawed at it. It sounded like a dog, but it was way too large. Arthur raced up the path and into the trees before I could get a good look. Flynn puffed in front of me. As Rowan passed us on the flagstone steps, I noticed his hands were shaking.

The snarls and growls of the dog – it had to be a dog – grew faint as we plunged deeper into the estate. It wasn’t following us up the hill. But it was big enough it could have just jumped the gate.

So why didn’t it?

We crashed through the inner gatehouse. Corbin and Flynn pulled the heavy wooden doors shut and drew the bolts.

Arthur didn’t set me down until we were back inside the Great Hall with the door firmly locked behind us. He dropped me on the couch and slumped down beside me, rubbing his throat, which was raw and red from where that guy had touched him.

“There were three of them,” he snarled at Corbin, who was digging around behind the bar, one hand still pressed against his shoulder. “How the fuck were there three of them?”

“They must be getting more powerful.” Corbin drew out a large first aid kit from a bottom drawer and dumped it on the coffee table. He riffled through the contents with his free hand. “They know we’re weak right now, and they’ve had years to plan how to take advantage of that. Maybe we…fuck.” He winced as he tried to open a bottle of antiseptic with both hands.

“I’ll do that,” Rowan said quietly, uncapping the bottle and pouring out a little onto a cotton pad. As he rolled up Corbin’s torn sleeve, I gasped. A red welt crossed his shoulder, laid on top of three long gashes that tore through his skin, leaving jagged rips that oozed blood. Bits of grass and dirt clung to the skin and his t-shirt.

Corbin winced again as Rowan dabbed at the wounds.

“Those rawny bastards.” Flynn slumped down in the sofa opposite, his foot kicking Arthur’s knife across the table. I noticed droplets of green liquid on the blade. Weird, some kind of stain from the grass? “Still, that was exciting. Good thing I’d had that drink or I would’ve been completely useless.”

“You’re always completely useless,” Arthur shot back. He grabbed a bottle of mead from the bar and filled four cups. “Admit it, you nearly pissed yourself when that pouka showed up?—”

“Excuse me?” I held up a hand. “I’m still waiting for an explanation?—”

“It’s weird they sent Kalen again after he messed up so badly in Arizona,” Corbin shook his head. “I don’t understand any of this. Fuck, if we hadn’t all been there tonight, this could’ve gone arse over tit.”

Arthur flexed his bicep, the bulging muscles transfixing me for a moment. He took a long drink from his mead cup, wiping the edge of his beard with the back of his hand. “As long as you’ve got me, you’ll be fine. It’s been an age since we had a tussle with an Unseelie. And three of them in the same night, what a treat.”

“Um, guys, what’s an Unseelie?—”

“You should have stuck that blade right in Kalen’s heart,” Flynn declared. “That guy is not going to leave us alone.”

“We need to figure out how they’re getting stronger,” Corbin said. “We need to strike now, because if they get too powerful we won’t be able to defeat them in our current state?—”

“HEY!”

My voice bounced off the high ceiling, echoing along the vast room. The guys jumped. Arthur splashed mead all over his pants. Four faces turned to me in concern.

“Could you maybe fill me in on what the goddamn hell just happened?”

I was swearing like a sailor tonight, but swear words were invented for nights like this.

The guys exchanged a glance, and then Corbin said slowly, as if he were choosing his words carefully. “What just happened is that we were attacked.”

“Brilliant deduction, Sherlock. I know that. But what was I attacked by? Those guys were on drugs or something… but I’ve never heard of any drug that can turn your hands into claws…”

“Not drugs, Maeve.” Corbin said, his eyes burning into mine. “I know this is going to be really hard for you to believe, but those guys weren’t human. They’re fae.”