Finally, they reached a gilded door the Fae pushed open without knocking. Cillian and Bran were pulled into a room that could have doubled as a small library despite it apparently being used as an office. Rather than a single story, it was two, with a spiral wooden staircase leading up to a mezzanine that wrapped around each wall and overlooked the main space below. The walls were lined with bookshelves that sat between arched windows overlooking a swath of greenery Cillian assumed was a garden of some sort.
Even as he took in the space, most of his attention was focused on the pair of Fae before them whom their captor bowed to—no, Cillian thought, just the lord, because that was who sat at the grand wooden desk carved with a motif of wolves. He wore a soft gray coat embroidered with violet thread that matched a waistcoat of the same color. His black hair was cut much shorter than their captor’s, and there was a streak of white running through it at an angle. A faint scar cutting toward his left eye marred the otherwise perfection of his face.
The Fae lord was handsome in a way that would have made Cillian look more than twice at a bar or a club back home. Here, when those silver-colored eyes stared at him and widened fractionally, Cillian only wanted to look away.
The lady standing next to the Fae lord’s ornate chair wore a peach-colored gown that paired well with the soft pink of her pinned-up hair, showing off her pointed ears capped in gold. She held an open book in her arms, one finger frozen on a page, staring at them with pale yellow eyes, her lips parted slightly in surprise.
The Fae lord set down his pen and stood. “Damarus?”
The Fae who’d caught them in the forest and dragged them to this town gestured with the hand that still held both roots. He spoke in English rather than the Fae’s own language, and Cillian wondered about the reasoning behind letting him and Bran know what was being said. “Lord Ainmire. I found mortals in the forest during my ride.”
The Fae lord’s gaze never left Cillian’s face. “Mortals.”
“A witch and their companion.”
Ainmire wrenched his gaze from Cillian to Bran, and Cillian had the sudden urge to step between the two of them. “A witch? And you didn’t kill him?”
“There were extenuating circumstances, as you can see.”
Again, the Fae lord’s attention snapped back to Cillian, the lingering silence in the room suffocating. After a moment, he turned to the lady with him. “Leave us.”
So maybe not his lady, butalady, someone who worked for him, because she made no argument to the order, merely dipped into a shallow curtsy, set the book on the desk, and left the room in a gliding sweep of her skirts. The guard from the forest went with her, closing the door behind them both. The latch caught with a quiet click, the sound overly loud in the silence.
Ainmire finally came out from behind his desk, approaching where they stood in the middle of the room with slow, measured steps. Light caught on the golden wolf pin attached to the lapel of his coat, making it glint. He stopped directly in front of Cillian, studying him with an intensity that made his skin crawl. They were of the same height, andCillian raised his chin a fraction of an inch, ignoring all his discomfort, refusing to show weakness in front of the Fae lord.
Ainmire lifted one ungloved hand and wrapped his fingers around the knot that kept the root tied around Cillian’s throat. The pressure made Cillian swallow reflexively, throat hurting from how dry it was. He was pulled closer, forced to move so he didn’t choke. Ainmire stared at him for a long minute, not blinking, before he finally released the root, letting Cillian rock back onto his heels.
“You say you found them in the forest?” Ainmire asked.
“Well past the boundaries of where the wyrding has encroached in the past,” Damarus said.
“They certainly stink of that place.”
“Your friend here didn’t want to stop somewhere and let us clean up first, so you’ll have to deal with the smell like we have,” Bran said.
“Be quiet,” Cillian said warningly.
Too late. Bran speaking up meant Ainmire’s attention turned to him, a smile curving at his lips that Cillian didn’t like.
“You must be the witch,” Ainmire said, moving to stand in front of Bran, a look in his eyes that made Cillian stiffen. “We Fae have a standing law to kill your kind.”
“Same for us witches,” Bran gritted out.
Ainmire gripped Bran’s chin, forcing his head up. The Fae lord was taller than Bran and seemed intent on using that fact to try to intimidate him. Cillian could have told him it would get him nowhere. “Is that so?”
“Get your handsoffhim,” Cillian growled. He managed a single step toward Ainmire when something came to rest against his back, over his spine, blade so sharp it cut through the fabric of his shirt with no pressure at all. When it cut into his skin, he froze, warm blood trickling down his back.
“None of that,” Damarus said in a low, amused voice. “Not if you wish to keep his spine intact.”
It took Cillian a moment to realize that Damarus wasn’t speaking to him and hadn’t seen him as a threat. That it wasBranwho’d been the one to cause the Fae to act—Bran, who had magic glowing in his clenched fists tied behind his back, chin still caught in Ainmire’s grip. Bran’seyes flicked toward Cillian for a second before he let out a heavy breath and unclenched his fingers, his magic fading to nothing.
Ainmire smiled at Bran, eyes gone half-lidded, thumb moving to drag over Bran’s bottom lip. Cillian wanted to rip his fingers away bone by bone. “Good choice, pet.”
“Fuckyou,” Bran spat out.
“I don’t fuck pets. Not until they are housebroken, at least. You tend to bite until then.”
The flash of revolted horror that crossed Bran’s face had Cillian ignoring the knife at his back in his need to put himself in front of Bran. Before he could even lift his foot off the floor, the root around his throat went tight, cutting off his air. He was reeled backward, a boot hitting the back of his knees, taking his legs out from beneath him. Cillian crashed to his knees; the only thing saving them from something worse than bruises was the plush rug covering the hardwood floor.
