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Of all of us, Emerald had lost the most. She had lost her voice. She had lost her freedom. She had lost her identity. She had lost a child, though Violet had sworn me to secrecy on that knowledge. The Fae had kept her unchanged until she had given birth. And the moment she pushed her babe from her body, they had set about their gruesome work. Emerald had not even had the chance to hold her child before it was secreted away into the vast lands of Fae, never to be seen again.

She, of all of us, was owed ten pounds of flesh.

Emerald rushed me, and I held my ground, letting her come. She stopped right in front of me, her heaving breath dusting my face as her nose pressed into mine.

I met her eye for eye. “Do it, Emerald. Kill me if you wish. But if you don’t kill me, know that I will reap vengeance upon all of them for what was done to you. And what was done to all of us.”

Emerald took two steps back, a grand waving gesture that meant something akin to either “go on” or “the floor is yours.”

“The Oaken Rose is oath-bound to guide us out of here. I don’t doubt that she will well and truly do that. She’s required to by magic. The fact that I died down in those tunnels plays in our favor. The Oaken Rose would have felt magic crumple in on her, felt the weight and burden of her unkept oath pressing in on her. From what I could gather from my conversation with the La—my mother, that feeling is a sensation that every Fae dreads. She said it feels like someone is hollowing you out and tearing out your insides but not on a physical level, on a level much deeper and more disturbing. A Fae who breaks their oath, especially one sworn on magic itself, would be cut from magic altogether if they break their oath. And as Fae are magic in meat suits, it is a death sentence and a very slow withering death sentence to an otherwise immortal being.”

“So, you died. How’s that going to help us?” Green Man said, drawing Emerald into a comforting hug as she began crashing from the adrenaline of her anger.

“I intend on insisting politely at first. And then I plan on forcing The Oaken Rose’s hand. She doesn’t know that I’m Fae. She doesn’t know that, short of iron to my heart, I can only be temporarily inconvenienced by death while in this palace. I don’t know why, but I know how these oaths work. And I’m going to leverage it to my benefit. The bitch thought to cage a tiger with a wicker basket.” I watched them all as emotions played over their faces but never stayed stable enough to peg. “When it happens, it will happen fast. I will send Goose to collect you. When you see him, do not fight him. Let him collect you. He will bring you to me, and we will escape together.”

“Did you forget there’s dozens of humans here?” Violet spat.

“Hundreds. There’s at least one more warren, a human I had never seen and did not belong to our warren came to serve The Raven and I dinner. But I cannot help them until they are ready, and I certainly can’t escape with all of them at the same time. Not while I am unable to wield magic. Once I can, I will come back for them.”

“And what, you’re just going to nip down to the Market and collect up some magic?” Green Man quipped.

“No, but I have a plan. And I’ll need all three of you to help me if we are going to pave the path for us to free all the humans and burn this shit stack to the ground as we do so. You’ll have to trust me. I know none of us trust Fae and none of us have reason to. But I am telling you everything I know so that you see that I am hiding nothing from you. You can either chose to walk out of this bathroom and go straight upstairs to any of the Fae and collect the bounty for a human fomenting a mutiny—or even tell them who I am and set yourselves up as cushy little pets—or you can crawl around in the muck with me and see what sort of shit we can stir up for these fuckers. Make your choice, because the moment I turn my back, if I find you with a knife in your hand, I won’t hesitate to kill you.”

I watched the myriad of emotions pass through their faces.

It was Green Man who broke first.

“Fuck it. The choice is to die with their boot on my neck or die with my teeth in their ankles. I’m in.”

I nodded to him and looked between Violet and Emerald.

To my surprise, Emerald stepped forward, slapped me as hard as she could, then immediately followed it through with a bone-breaking hug and a kiss on my cheek. All traces of wrath erased from her beautiful face.

Violet continued to scrutinize me. “You’re not going to tongue lock us or oath bind us to your cause?”

“Nope. It’s a simple human thing. The knife is in your hand. You decide if you want it at your throat or in your fist.”

She grunted and crossed her arms over her flat chest. “Some Fae you are. Can’t even scheme proper.”

“Yeah, well, you’ll have to give me asshole lessons, Violet.”

The four of us fell into awkward silence before Violet looked up at me. “Okay, so now what? Rousing rallying speech and now what?”

I shrugged. “I’ll send word on next steps. Emerald, can you act as our messenger? Outside of the four of us, most everyone thinks your images are gibberish. We can understand you, but no one else can.”

Emerald communicated with the rest of the warren and the Fae in the palace with an image of graceful calligraphy being written on vellum with a quill. It was simplistic and far less artful than the wealth of communication she had forged with us, her closest cohort.

Emerald nodded her ascent.

“Good. Thank you, Emerald.” I looked between my chosen three and felt my throat closing with emotion.

These were the relationships I had earned. The relationships that would mean more to me in the coming weeks than any other relationship. I would lean on them when the tough armor I had collected around my heart.

They would be the rope I would use to reel myself back in from the edge when I was ready to fall into The Raven’s arms. I didn’t know how hard the road ahead of us would be, but I did know that no matter what path we four took, it would be far easier than the one I would have to take with The Raven to get us there.

Already, my skin was tingling with the need to touch him. Already, my breath was yearning to mingle with his again. It was torture. And I knew it would only get worse.

Chapter 39