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“Our lives are connected,” Lian reminded her. “They won’t kill me.”
All three of us looked at Priel.
“I’m not hiding behind you,” he growled back.
I sighed.
Of course he wouldn’t.
It wasn’t even worth the debate.
“Let’s get this over with. We need to change the future.” I tightened my grip on Priel’s arm, and January let go of me so we could walk to the building. The snow melted beneath all of our feet as we went, exposing dirt and rocks that didn’t affect my fae toes at all.
There was no furniture inside; just a large, open room that I could now see was shaped like a triangle. The walls and floors were the same cold, gray stone, and there were no windows to allow us a peek out at either the seelie or unseelie portions of the land.
“So what’s the plan?” January asked me.
I grimaced. “We use the queen’s name to get her here, tell her what Vevol told me, and hope for the best.”
January’s eyebrows shot upward. “Damn.”
“Yep.”
I looked at Priel, who looked at Lian.
“Naomi,” he said aloud. “We need to speak with you.”
I felt a wave of magic roll through the room.
The air shimmered wildly, and then a woman stepped through the glittering strip. She was slim, with perfect-looking wavy dark hair, and pale skin. There were magical tattoos all over her hands, and she wore a bell-shaped, long-sleeve sweater dress with tights beneath it. Compared to her, the rest of us probably looked homeless.
Her eyes were narrowed as she took in the building around us, but they softened slightly when she saw January.
“Aeven is going to be furious,” she warned, as she straightened her dress and brushed invisible dirt off of the fabric. She pronounced the name ay-vin, and I was fairly certain she was referring to the Tame King, who the men had called “Aev,” pronounced ayv.
“We’re sorry, but it couldn’t wait,” January said, looking at me.
I didn’t bother waiting to launch into an explanation. “I found out yesterday that I can see the future. And communicate with Vevol, the goddess. She’s been sending me visions of a war that’s coming, unless we can figure out a way to stop it. If it comes, it’ll be the end of all of us—men and women, seelie and unseelie.”
The queen’s eyes widened slightly. “Because of us?”
“Because there are twenty of us to hundreds of men, I’d imagine,” January said.
Naomi nodded. “The unseelies don’t want romantic relationships, but they do want the power boost that comes with having a mate. The girls on my side are unhappy. Most of us would prefer a way back to Earth, or at least the Seelie side of the world. Myself included.”
“Ours don’t want to leave,” January admitted.
She was right; Mare, Dots, and Sunny hadn’t ever said anything positive about the unseelies, who would be taking them across the border when their five years were up.
“Women leaving the unseelies could cause a war just as easily as anything else. The men are a ticking time bomb right now,” I told the other ladies. “We need a way to give all of them an equal opportunity, without favoring either side.”
“They’re the ones who came up with the five-year rule,” Naomi said, shaking her head. “We’ve been trying to come up with a way out, but there isn’t one. They watch us like hawks. And even if they didn’t, we have nowhere else to go.”
“What about here?” I asked her, looking around the building again. It was empty, but decently large. “What if we all tell them that the women are tired of their games? The unseelie have a king, and the seelie have the Wild Hunt. Why can’t we have our own leadership, and make our own decisions?”
“We have no way to build, and there’s not enough space here right now,” Naomi pointed out. “Having our own leadership may prove useful, but what would be the purpose? Ultimately, it’s still us against the men, and there are hardly any of us. We have no bargaining power, other than our bodies. And I already gave mine to Aeven, to satisfy the last deal.”
I considered sharing what Vevol had told me, but hesitated.
