Page 23 of My Fae Lady

I blushed. “Ah yes, that would be an obvious indication. I’m still not sure why you are blocking me, however. Is there some reason coming across an Unseelie is bad? Am I engaged to a fugitive?”

“How many Unseelie do you know who willingly leave Faerie? If she is here, it is for a pressing reason. I, for one, would rather know what that reason is before making our presence known.”

“Living in a tree for centuries has made you paranoid.” I rested a hand on Sylvan’s broad shoulder, using him for balance as I peered over his head at the window of the hotel’s lobby. I smiled. “That is not an Unseelie. She is a gentlewoman.”

I pushed Sylvan aside and hopped down from the hansom. I was through the hotel door before he managed more than a curse.

“Caro,” I called, my voice echoing through the foyer. “What are you doing in Isthmuston?”

The woman turned. Though her grandmother was the only fae in her lineage, a quirk of inheritance had given Caro a fully fae appearance. She kept her dark blue hair tamed in a sleek knot at her nape, which emphasized her angular features and tall, pointed ears. Her wings matched her hair at the arch and transitioned to the palest periwinkle at the tip.

She opened her arms and met me halfway across the lobby with a hug, but she didn’t smile. “I’m so glad I found you. I sent a letter as soon as I heard, but then I thought it might not reach you in time or it might miss you if you had already left Rook Manor, so I came to the border so I could send a messenger stone keyed to your aura instead, but I stopped by the hotel first and they said you had checked in but were out shopping today, so I decided to wait here instead.”

Caro delivered this entire explanation in a single breath. She had a habit of explaining both too much and not enough at the same time, her thoughts going too fast for words to keep up. If I had actually received the letter she had sent, it would no doubt lay everything out clearly and logically, but talking to my friend often required giving her several prompts to get the full picture.

Before I could start my questioning, however, we had to move away from the lobby, where we were drawing attention.

I pulled back and smiled at Caro. “I am so glad to see you, even if you do bear dire tidings. Let’s go up to my suite and you can explain.” I looked over my shoulder and spotted Sylvan lurking a few paces away. “Sylvan, come meet my dear friend, Miss Caroline Aislar. Caro, my fiancé, Lord Sylvan. Let us all adjourn to my suite.”

I looped my arm through Caro’s and steered her toward the stairs. She was so busy gaping at Sylvan that my hold was the only thing keeping her moving in the correct direction. It surprised me to discover that I did not like knowing she couldn’t tear her eyes from him.

Was Sylvan watching her too? I had more fae blood than Caro, but mine was all Seelie. Did he prefer the Unseelie beauty of my friend?

Why should I even care if he did? Our bargain would be fulfilled soon enough and our time together would be over.

After tripping on the first step, Caro finally looked at me again. “Lord Sylvan?” she hissed in a whisper that wasn’t all that quiet. “Where did you find him?”

“In my ash tree.” Sylvan, of course, didn’t politely pretend he couldn’t hear Caro.

My friend didn’t get flustered. She craned her neck to look at him again. “Where is this ash tree? You have no wings, yet there is a look of the Unseelie about you.”

“You are correct. And my tree is in the Gremyl Woods.”

Caro tripped again.

I cleared my throat. “Perhaps the interview can wait until we are in the parlor? I don’t want you to fall and break your neck, Caro.”

“Giselle, we need to talk.” This time her whisper was so quiet I barely made out the words.

“My suite is at the end of this hall,” I told her.

Soon enough I unlocked the door, and we all filed into the tastefully generic parlor. Unheeding of proper gentlemanly behavior, Sylvan moved past Caro and me and claimed the pewter gray settee, plopping himself directly in the center with his legs spread in an uncouth manner.

“Giselle and I need to speak privately,” Caro announced with a glare at him. Apparently her inability to take her eyes off Sylvan hadn’t been for positive reasons.

A little of the tension building in my neck eased before it occurred to me that Caro taking an immediate dislike to Sylvan was a worse reaction than her being attracted to him. My thoughts were a mess, logic hard to summon. Was I jealous?

No. It was simply the stress of the entire situation. Especially with Sylvan ignoring everything I’d taught him the moment we were alone with Caro. True, she wasn’t the one we had to convince, but what if he behaved the same in front of Mr. Hilferty?

Sylvan didn’t move.

I sighed. For better or worse, he was a part of this now. “You might as well share your news in front of him, Caro. We’re bound by a bargain to see this through.”

She paled. Though she had grown up in Windonbury and spent most of her time among humans, her Unseelie grandmother had made it a point to educate her thoroughly regarding bargains, as she had inherited the power to make them. She was well-versed in the dangers and would no doubt have shared dozens of horror stories with me if she had known I planned to bargain my way into acquiring a groom.

I moved to the settee and raised an eyebrow until Sylvan took the hint and scooted over. I wanted to face Caro while she explained what had pulled her out of Windonbury, and the only chair that accommodated wings in the parlor sat opposite the settee.

After a moment, Caro sat across from us and laced her fingers together in her lap. She took a deep breath, and I knew she was gathering her thoughts, trying to organize them. She did that with people she didn’t know well, who might judge her for the ramblings that otherwise poured out.