Page 21 of Demon and the Raven

Passing others, though, I noted eyes that were seemingly too big for faces, smaller horns on others, like those of goats, and colors of skin, the palest blue, a flash of pink and gold, all leaving me with a singular deduction: it made sense that on a warm, sultry summer night, in a small town so close to the woods, there would be fae about.

Most of the time, it was hard to get a good look at them. They were those people you glanced at, noticed something different, something amiss, looked a second time, harder, only to realize it must have been a trick of the light, as they were so obviously merely people. But that wasn’t true. What had been revealed for that brief moment when the glamour fell aside was the being beneath the mask. Everyone could see magic at times, recognize what was apparent to our ancestors because they were raised to believe. Now, if people saw glittering purple eyes in the moonlight, they brushed it off, certain that was impossible. But I wasn’t like that. I’d been raised to see and to distinguish something other from the mundane. Added to that, I’d been branded by a god to recognize every trace of magic in the shadows, on the breeze, and, of course, walking around fairgrounds.

I felt two things at once: First, dread in the pit of my stomach. It was ballsy of them to be strolling out in the open without a care. Normally they were far more careful, so the fact that they weren’t meant that some piece was out of place. Some deterrent was missing. Second, when I stepped between two food stalls and stood still, checking my surroundings, I saw them everywhere. Not everyone at the carnival was a fae, but there were more than I’d seen in ages.

“What the hell,” I whispered to myself.

“Hell indeed,” a husky voice said from behind me.

The shiver that rolled up my spine was terrifying, and I froze.

“Why would you ever make yourself so vulnerable?” the voice asked. “That seems a stupid thing for a witch to do.”

THREE

Having only heard the voice once before, still, I knew who it was before I turned around. Nott, a nymph I met last fall when I went to confront Declan Grant, now a friend. She had been hunting fae at the time. She was as beautiful as I remembered, with her pale skin, emerald-green eyes, and jet-black hair.

“Do you know who I am?”

“Of course. We’ve met before. You’re Nott. You were⁠—”

“No,” she rushed out, shaking her head. “I’m Thero, and I serve Soter, the protector.”

I squinted at her. “You look just like her.”

Her jaw clenched, her eyes narrowing as she held my gaze.

“Oh,” I whispered, seeing the pain on her face. “Forgive me. You’re wearing her aegis.”

Quick nod.

Nymphs often, for protection and intimidation, wore the faces of their fallen. It was a mask—or aegis, as they called the glamour. The reasons for this were twofold. First, to those who battled them, it looked like they were immortal. It made sense—how terrifying and disheartening must it be to think you’d triumphed, vanquished an enemy, merely to have them come back again and again. And second, if you appeared in the visage of someone known instead of a stranger, you would be listened to and not questioned.

“What happened?”

“Would you step inside a cloche and speak to me?”

She was inviting me into what my grandfather had called a slip—a pocket dimension. Normally that was a trap, but in this case, since she was a nymph and not something trying to kill me, it was simply a place to talk privately.

Once I followed her into the shadow, maybe three steps, I saw the edges of what she’d fashioned, making the space where we’d been a six-foot square. Strange to see people moving by, so close, and knowing the two of us were invisible to them.

“Tell me what happened,” I pressed her once she faced me.

“We know not,” she rasped. “When we found her…when we examined what was left…before the end, she was bled.”

“But she was a powerful warrior, wasn’t she?”

“Yes.”

There weren’t a lot of things that could capture, as well as torture, a nymph. A witch could do it, but not a mage, and not any race of fae. I really didn’t want to guess at what else could have ended her. I had to clear my throat because for a moment I was scared, and I didn’t want the new nymph to hear that. “When I spoke to her last, after she found the fae she was after, she told me she was looking for a warlock,” I told Thero. “Could he have hurt her?”

She shook her head. “I know whom you speak of. It wasn’t him. That abomination was found and ended, and she credited your words as aiding her search. She spoke well of you.”

“That was kind,” I murmured.

She stepped closer, and when she did, she allowed the facade to drop, so I saw the green of her eyes change to a deep topaz and her black hair run to chestnut brown. The freckles across her nose were a surprise, as was her deep tan.

“I like your real face better.”