Page 46 of My Fae Lady

“Take me to my workroom, please,” she begged through her teeth.

House did not oblige her.

Chuckling, I wiped my mouth and hands off on the cloth napkin. Then I joined her by the archway.

“House, take me to my sitting room. We have work to do.” When House ignored me, I dug my claws into the wall. Vines and leaves sprouted from the gouged wood and torn paper, but House didn’t comply.

Giselle’s victorious grin made my next plot even more satisfying. She thought she had me, the little vixen, but this was war and I was willing to play dirty. I grabbed her around the waist and hauled her over my shoulder.

“Put. Me. Down.” She kicked at the air wildly. One of her slippers fell off her foot.

“I’ve got the intruder with me, just like you want!” I shouted at House. “Open up my sitting room so I can go hunting for a present for her. Wouldn’t you like it if I gave Giselle a nice gift? One of the artifacts she likes so much.”

“It’s not a gift,” she snapped. Her body slumped over my shoulder. “It’s a bribe—one I will not be accepting, so you might as well put me down and stop wasting your time. I will never relinquish my claim to my home!”

Rook Manor allowed me to maneuver down the hall. Giselle huffed in my ear, her body limp in resignation as House pulled my sitting room up from its depths with a clatter that rumbled the walls. When the room was ready, I sat her down on the plush settee, then made my way to the stone archway without a second glance.

“It won’t work!” she called after me.

“We’ll see about that,” I shouted back before disappearing into the darkness.

There were loads of treasures to choose from in the manor’s depths. Perhaps I should just start hauling it out by the armload? Let her take her pick?

No, the more I thought on it as I sifted through one heap of treasure after the other, the more I believed selecting something with precision would serve me best. I stirred up a cloud of damp dirt searching and sorting the piles.

I took a break to stretch the kinks out of my spine and noticed the stream of magic had widened ever so subtly since I’d visited last. The Seelie fountain remained cold and unused, and the room where the heart of the magic hid remained shut up tight.

The faint heartbeat of the trapped being inside thrummed anxiously. Why was House still playing with its food? It should have consumed it already. Curiosity drew me over to the mound of bedrock.

I scratched at the stone with one elongated claw, a gentle summons. “Let me in.”

The heart of the house answered, its reply echoing directly into my mind: No.

“Why not?” I dug my claw in a bit deeper.

You left us.

“Not by choice,” I said soothingly. “And I’m back now. We can be whole again.”

Though I sensed the wild magic was still listening, the essence chose not to respond. It dimmed the torchlights at me in rebuke.

I left it be and returned to my treasure hunt. Over time, my continued presence here in the manor would reassure it that I didn’t plan to abandon it again. Or so I hoped. It didn’t sit well with me how fond House seemed to be of Giselle or that it appeared to insist I treat her as a proper bride instead of a paper one.

I didn’t like how fond of Giselle I had become either, for that matter. That had never been the plan, and with my connection to the manor being what it was, my feelings for her would only make House all the more stubborn. I had to convince Giselle to walk away on her own.

I found an item of worth then: a set of cufflinks decorated in brass filigree. Before I carried them out of the cave, I covered them with an embroidered handkerchief from my pocket—a thing Giselle insisted a gentleman always kept upon their person. A lesson that had apparently stuck in the back of my mind, because I still had mine on me.

I stepped through the barrier, and the sitting room swam before me briefly before the bookshelves and plush furniture came clearly into view.

Giselle hovered over the Seelie Scales on the end table, back hunched, her work apron pulled over her dressing gown, glass lens in hand.

“I come bearing gifts,” I taunted.

Giselle leapt at the sound of my voice. Her cheeks flushed, and she stuffed the lens deep in her front pocket guiltily. “I was only having a quick look at the artifact,” she stammered. “That doesn’t mean you’ve won.”

I sniffed at her. I didn’t like that House had accommodated her wishes while I was gone, bringing her the work apron. She sat down stiffly on the settee, staring pointedly away from me and the bribe I concealed.

I shook the cufflinks in my palm under the kerchief so that they clinked together. Curiosity pulled her eyes back toward me. Burgundy joy filled her irises.