Page 42 of How Does It Feel?

“No?” he said.

His voice grew more gentle the longer he watched me.

“No,” I corrected him. “I was trying to get back to my microscope in the woods, and I followed the moths into a ring of destroying angel mushrooms. I stepped in, and the next thing I knew, I was falling on your crown prince. I’ve not made a single attempt on his life or anyone else’s, for that matter, yet I’m starved in a dungeon with a forest bog as a cellmate.” I huffed, the frustration settling back into my bones as I vented to the cat o’ nine tails.

He stopped his pacing and stared at me with a deep exhale and a tilt of his wise-looking head.

“Do you know who I am? Surely they told you before I entered. I am Lord Alistair Cain.” He paused as if waiting for a reaction from me.

“Yes, they told me. Very prestigious sounding. Please don’t kill me.”

He curled his lip at my words, showing the whitest and possibly sharpest teeth. Maybe even sharper than the forest bog’s, though not as plentiful.

“I don’t understand,” he said, plopping down on his side next to me. His tails flicked behind him. “I hunt by detecting rapid heartbeats, the music of someone afraid or running. It is impossible to hide from me. So tell me why you do not fear me? You, a little human, reach out and pet me, Alistair Cain? I’m half-inclined to believe you’re an assassin and the best one I’ve ever seen just from the boldness you possess.” He looked around the room as if this were some kind of prank about to unravel. “How could you not be afraid of me? I’ve killed hundreds of assassins from both the Seelie and human realms, and not one has ever reached out to . . . to pet me!” He began to pace again.

He seemed to be at a loss for what was happening. That made two of us.

A laugh snorted out of me at the thought of him also thinking I was some next-level assassin. What did they all think humans could do against Fae that caused them to be so frightened?

He stopped abruptly at the sound of my laugh.

“There is something else about you. I am drawn to . . . to protect you, and I don’t even know you. Tell me, you are not full human, are you?” he asked as he sauntered closer until he stood directly in front of me.

“I am human. I can guarantee that,” I said sadly.

If I weren’t, I wouldn’t be here in this position.

He watched me closely in silence. I hadn’t felt safe since I had been here, and my eyes began to flicker closed despite my best efforts to keep the lids open on my burning eyes. I was so tired.

“In all my life, I have never been inclined to spare a life, but I will not kill you, girl. Something I don’t understand calls for me to spare you, and though I can do nothing to help you beyond these walls, within them, I will not harm you.” His whiskers twitched. “You are in the Unseelie realm, child. There is not a corner you will turn that someone will not hurt you. What is your name?”

He lay down again, his body language more relaxed now. He was close enough that his long back draped over my bare feet and pushed into my knees. I sighed at the warmth and comfort of the action, grateful to feel any bit of warmth against my freezing skin.

“I was told by a friend not to give my name to the Fae.” I straightened as I remembered brown rat’s words.

“Your friend is very wise, and they are a good friend to you. Do you know why you do not share your name, child?” he asked, reminding me of an old grandpa.

I absently reached out and began to stroke the back and side of the cat blanket on my feet. God, this was so nice. I could almost forget I was in an Unseelie castle surrounded by monsters that mistook me for a killer. Almost forget that I was pressed against a wall painted with blood as I petted a nine-tailed death kitty.

“He did not say why you don’t give your name. I only see him for short times,” I replied.

“They are not your cellmate?” he asked.

“No, my friend is a brown rat that comes to me under a missing brick in my cell to warn me when others are coming. The forest bog was chosen as my cellmate last night,” I mumbled as I fought to keep my eyes from shutting in exhaustion.

“The rat speaks to you?” He sounded concerned.

“Well, yes, don’t you all here?” I asked.

Though come to think of it, brown rat was the only rat that had spoken to me.

“No. The rats are just rats. Whoever this rat is lies to you. They are a shifter taking the form of a rat. Animal shifters generally have incredibly close connections to animals. He is likely feeling the same foreign need to protect you as myself.”

I froze. Brown rat wasn’t really a . . . brown rat?

“I don’t understand? Why would animals want to protect me?” I asked as I reached out absently to scratch under his chin.

This elicited a deep purr, making the fur above my feet vibrate softly.