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Garrick gestured to the cabin ahead of us, nestled on the edge of the glade. “This is where I’ve spent my nights for the past month. Wouldn’t you also be drawn to company?”
“Humancompany?” I asked pointedly.
Something flashed across his face—loneliness or pain, I wasn’t sure. “Any company.”
An icy breeze swept through the clearing, and I noticed the way Garrick flinched. I’d assumed up to this point that maybe his magic somehow kept him warm, and he didn’t need his coat. Apparently I’d been wrong. I picked up my pace, eager for the promise of shelter.
The cabin door creaked as Garrick swung it open, but the interior was cozy, if cramped. Other than a small washroom in the far corner, there was only one room, containing a fireplace and a bed layered in heavy blankets, a chest resting at its foot.
My eyes snagged on that bed, and my heart thundered in my chest. Until now, I’d been anxious for safety and a chance to survive. I hadn’t considered what it would mean to spend the night in such close quarters with a stranger.
Garrick might have saved my life, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t harm me later. I’d been taught all my life that the fae were cruel and deceitful. Their generosity generally came with a steep price. If Garrick was right and I did possess magic—outlandish as that was—then maybe he’d saved me in hopes of using me. Or maybe he was the one the royals had sent to fetch me after Charles had offered me to them. If he retrieved me for the crown, perhaps he’d receive a lavish reward.
I hovered near the door, rubbing my temples and willing my sluggish mind to work faster as Garrick clicked the door shut behind us and strode toward the fireplace. Silently, he built a fire from a stack of logs waiting on the hearth, leaving me alone to my thoughts.
We will decide what to do in the morning.As if Garrick would give me a say in my fate. I shivered.
“You’ll feel a draft by the doorway,” Garrick said, never taking his eyes off the flames he was coaxing to life. “I promise Iwon’t bite.” He smirked. “Not after we’ve only known each other for one day, anyway. Perhaps after two.”
Embarrassment stained my cheeks as I tried to decide if his jesting tone meant he was flirting with me. “What sort of promise is that?” I managed to choke out.
Garrick studied me, amusement still dancing in his expression. “Fae cannot lie, so I would say it’s worth far more than a mortal one. You can trust me when I say I won’t bite...unless you ask me to.”
I gaped at him, but rather than dignify his words with a response, I wrapped his coat more tightly around myself, longing for the comfort of my own home. What I’d give to be in my bedroom sewing, away from this brazen fae and the ways in which he made me feel both terrified and scandalized.
Garrick’s humor melted as anger darkened his face. “Come sit before you freeze. You can trust me, and my word, far more than you could trust your brother or the promise he made to your dying father.”
My heart dropped into my stomach. “How do you know about that?”
“Like I said before, I heard the townspeople whispering about you,” the fae said, his tone as disgusted as I felt. “Their constant gossip. Their judgment. They bemoaned poor Charles Cantwell’s vast generosity and sweet temperament, the way he sacrificed in order to uphold his vow to your father.” Garrick placed a hand over his heart in mockery. “Tonight, we saw the true worth of his words.”
“Indeed,” I whispered, tears burning my eyes.
Garrick leaned back on his heels, scanning me slowly. “I’m sorry. It was insensitive of me to speak that way. Please, warm yourself. I promise you that no harm will come to you in this cabin.”
I arched an eyebrow. “Outsideof it?”
“I can make no promises about that, Florentia.”
“I...prefer Ren,” I said hesitantly, before relenting and approaching cautiously, sitting as gracefully as I could on the floor. I held my hands out toward the growing fire. Though there was an acceptable distance between us, I couldn’t help but feel uncomfortable. I’d never been unchaperoned like this with a man who wasn’t family. “It’s not proper for a lady to be alone so long with a strange man,” I ventured. Not that I wanted Garrick to leave...I simply hoped he would take note and behave like a gentleman, though that was probably too much to hope from a fae.
“It’s also not proper to throw your sister out into the night and leave her to freeze,” Garrick growled.
Startling, I glanced at him, surprised at the hostility in his tone. And maybe a little bit afraid. His guttural voice was a sharp reminder that he wasn’t human.
Garrick cleared his throat. “I’ll stop speaking of your brother.” He turned away, shaking his head. “It’s just...my kind value loyalty above all else, especially to loved ones. It’s hard not to think of him as the vilest of men to break his word and threaten your life so callously.”
I had no response to that.
For a long while, we sat in silence, letting the fire crackle and pop, its warmth slowly enveloping the cabin. My tense muscles began to relax as Garrick rose, moving about the room to gather a kettle, filling it with water from a supply he must have kept on hand, and setting it over the fire to boil.
“Do you truly live here?” I asked after a long while, studying the way the firelight cast flickering shadows over the sharp planes of Garrick’s face. His piercing gold eyes remained focused on the dancing flames, not turning to look at me. He was handsome, in the breathtaking way that fae tended to be, but there was a ruggedness about him. It wasn’t only the leathersand fur clothes he favored or the fact that he had bows and quivers of arrows hanging on the wall. It wasn’t the mud-encrusted boots he’d shucked off at the door. It was something in his very appearance, one that told me he was as dangerous as he was beautiful. He was predatory, lethal—with or without magic.
“I’m a hunter,” Garrick repeated, shrugging. As if that alone answered my question. But then he went on: “I travel throughout the mountains, and there are cabins scattered everywhere. I keep necessities stocked in each so I can take shelter while I await my prey.” He collected two mugs from a cabinet, added tea leaves, and poured hot water from the kettle into each.
When he offered a mug to me, I cradled it in my hands, letting the rising steam caress my face. “Do you set out traps and bait them to come closer to your cabin?”
Garrick turned to me, his mouth twitching in another smirk. “Why? Are you hungry for venison? Hare?”
