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He grinned. “You are remarkably infuriating.” Eli leaned in and kissed my cheek. “Shall we return to our fair city, my crème brûlee?”
“Why do you do that?” I stared past him to a glimmering doorway in the copse of trees that hadn’t been there when we walked to our meeting with the king.
“What?”
“The dessert thing.” The doorway glowed brighter. He had to see it. “Why do you call me dessert names?”
Eli laughed. “My people crave the taste of rich desserts, cream, decadent tastes. And you, my love, I cra—”
“Got it,” I interrupted. I blushed, and then I sighed at the realization that the sex I thought was on the horizon was now out of reach. Engagedandintimate? I wasn’t about to risk that. “Is that our exit? The glowing thing.”
“It is.”
The tree he’d been petting unfurled a twist of branches that seemed woven. Inside were my weapons. Eli handed me my holster, gun, longsword, and short sword. They’d been held inside the arms of a tree. I didn’t ask why or how or any of it. I accepted my gear, motioned to the blindingly bright doorway and asked, “Will you open that? Or am I stuck here?”
“After you, Geneviève,” he said gallantly, and the door slid open. “Let us go to New Orleans.”
We stepped into the city midday. I remembered that a month of days inElphamewas only hours in my world. So, it was the same day I’d left, but a few hours later.
We were at Eli’s house, and while I had questions on how here was connected to there—and thinking of how hard that must’ve been like knowing his world was passing by that close to him—now was not the time. I started to follow Eli to the house, but that felt like wasting time.
“Tres.”
Eli glanced at me.
“She’ll kill him.” I motioned in the direction of Eli’s car. “Can we—”
“I need the keys, bonbon.” He gave me a smile. “I knew where we needed to go, too, but I cannotflow. . .and you choose not to.”
I nodded. He did know me, and know what needed to be done, so I stood there awkwardly in my fae-woven yoga pants and tunic. I was barefoot still. That seemed perfectly fine inElphame, but not so much in New Orleans. My city might be wet, but I’d seen everything in our streets from Mardi Gras beads to chicken bones, syringes to vomit. I needed to attempt to wear his oversized-for-me shoes or swing by my place.
I started up the stairs, to tell him, only to see Eli descending with keys and a pair of boots. Boots that looked suspiciously small for him. Quality leather boots.
“What size are . . .” My words dwindled at his expression. I accepted the boots.
“Your size, Geneviève,” he said drily. “Why do you continually find these things confusing?”
“Because no one else I know randomly keeps things in my size in their house,” I said tightly.
“They are not your fiancé, though, are they?”
“Thatjusthappened, Eli.”
He smirked. “So, you acknowledge that it happened? We are engaged.”
I sighed and walked toward the car. “Piss off.”
His laughter made me glad he couldn’t see my smile. I would cede this point. Arguing, debating, with a fae took a level of alertness I currently lacked.
As Eli opened my door, he smiled at me as if we were both in on a secret.
I said nothing, merely put my boots on and stared out at my city. I was grateful that I’d been able to return to it. I mean, it wasn’t the pristine, safe, natural escape that wasElphame.It was home, though. I felt a tie to it, not the same one to the soil where I was born, but one wrought of choice and blood. I protected the city. It was mine.
As Eli drove us to the Chaddock house, I could feel death in pockets of space. Graves.Draugr. No magic needed—or at least no conscious choice to extend my magic. My sense of the dead was simply there, like hearing or sight.
When we arrived at the Chaddock house, Eli stared at me a moment too long, and I knew that my eyes had shifted. My vision was unsettling; both my grave sight and normal sight were layered together.
We approached the gate to be buzzed into the Chaddock Estate. This time, no one replied.
