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“Amonth?” I shoved to my feet, somehow transitioning from prone to standing far faster than I’d intended. “Have you contacted my friends? Tres?”
“Geneviève. . .”
“They all probably think I died.” I was pacing, seeking boots and weapons, noticing that I appeared to be wearing some sort of vaguely medieval-looking nightdress. “What about Alice’s crime? How many more people are dead?”
“Geneviève!”
I paused and glanced at him. “Where are my weapons?”
“In their world, it’s been three hours.”
“Oh.” I stood in his home in this fairy tale place and simply stared at him. I suspected I was panicking. It was easier to focus on my friends, my clients, and the safe things than to ask myself about the changes I could feel in my body.
I ran my tongue over my teeth. The fangs were gone, or at least, retracted. I could feel the hard edges of my new unwanted teeth under the skin. I wondered if they’d retracted permanently or—
Fangs slid out, extending into my mouth.
Eli, uncharacteristically, approached and wrapped his arms around me. “They retract and extend, bonbon.”
“How . . .?”
“You make faces when your teeth extend,” he said with that small shrug of his.
“Do you owe Beatrice?” I stood there, staring at him with the gorgeous meadow just outside the missing wall of the building. “Do I?”
“No.”
A chime echoed through the house. Eli’s expression shifted to the restrained one that I often thought of as his fae face. Sometimes I forgot how much he revealed to me until that expression appeared.
“Gun? Sword?” I asked quietly.
Eli shook his head. “Not that kind of threat, cupcake.”
There before us was the same man from Eli’s memory. He was handsome in the way of feral animals, sharp lines and prominent muscles. If not for the grandeur of his fur-lined cloak and wealth of jewels glittering on his hands and wrists, I’d suspect him to be a warrior. He did not look any older than Eli, but determining age with the fae was a skill few possessed.
“Your majesty,” Eli said with a brief bow.
“I see the girl is awake,” he said with a cursory glance at me.
“Woman,” I corrected. “Witch if you prefer.”
The apparent king ofElphamestared at us. He did not address me, but instead spoke to Eli. “You entered the land of your grandfather with death at your side.”
“Geneviève is not death,” Eli said mildly. “She is a witch. A human.”
“She smells of death,” the king said.
I sniffed. “I smell just fine. Maybe a little flowery, but—”
“Your blood.” The king gave me a sad look. “I know the scent of death.”
“I told you she was injected,” Eli began.
“And I offer my condolences,” the king said, meeting my eyes briefly. He shook his head then. “Now that she is awake, however, we must address the things left unresolved as she healed. She cannot be here as your guest, son of my brother, prince of my throne.”
My head swiveled to Eli. “What did he say?”
Eli sighed and stepped between me and his uncle, the king. He glanced over his shoulder and whispered, “I am sorry, sugar cream.”
