Sam stiffens in his saddle, spine going rigid. “What?”
“Short for Astor,” I clarify with mock seriousness. “A royal war mare. Built like a barrel and dumb as rocks. Suits you perfectly.”
“I swear to—” Sam starts, his voice dropping to that dangerous register.
“Not my fault you ride like a farmer’s widow,” I interrupt, swinging back into the saddle and ignoring the low rumble from his chest that sounds suspiciously like a growl. “All stiff-backed and clutching the reins like they’re going to save you if she bolts.”
Once the banter dies, strangled by Sam’s glare and Cashira’s pointed silence, the quiet returns, thicker than before and heavy with unspoken tensions. The trees thin out as we crest the ridge, their dark canopy giving way to open sky and revealing the edges of the Night Court proper spread out below us like a living tapestry.
From here, the villages begin.
Thatched rooftops draped in morning mist that never quite burns off, even in the afternoon sun. Lanterns floating midair over cobbled lanes, their light shifting colors in patterns that follow no logic. Fae citizens wandering in silk-trimmed cloaks and velvet doublets, their movements graceful and deliberate, pausing in their daily routines to stare at our little traveling circus with curiosity that borders on suspicion. Sam’s size alone draws attention, few mortals reach his height, and fewer still carry themselves with that particular brand of coiled violence that marks him as a predator. It’s the women who truly unsettle them though, who make conversations stop mid-sentence and children press closer to their parents.
White hair is rarely a characteristic trait for fae. Too rare to be coincidence, too rare to go unnoticed.
Cashira keeps her hood up, but the wind is a traitor, pulling strands of silver free to catch the light like spun moonbeams. Her skin is deep bronze, sun-drenched and regal, with the kind of bearing that speaks of power held and wielded with purpose. Esme rides just behind her, hair unbound and flowing like winter starlight, skin a few shades darker but unmistakably linked by blood and magic. Sharp cheekbones that could cut glass, proud shoulders that never bow, and something ancient and knowing in her eyes that makes my chest tight. There’s something missing. Something that should be there and isn’t.
A flicker I can’t name, her power perhaps. No. There’s something there, faint, but she’s not powerless.
The absence clings to her like a second shadow, subtle, but present. It’s like looking at a puzzle with one piece deliberately removed. A whisper of something lost. Forgotten. It raises questions I don’t want to ask, implications I don’t want to consider. I don’t want to be curious about this woman, don’t want to wonder about her story or her scars or the way she moves like she’s carrying invisible weights. I want to know more,need to understand what I’m escorting and why her presence makes my blood sing in frequencies I don’t recognize. I open my mouth to break the silence, to ask the questions burning in my throat, but something stops me, some instinct that warns me the answers might be more than I’m prepared to handle. My questions go unanswered for now, but they don’t disappear.
The road bends toward a craggy outcrop where gargoyles perch like watchful sentinels, their stone eyes tracking our movement with unsettling intensity. Just past them, rising from the landscape like a declaration of power, the full bulk of Castle Noire comes into view.
I hear Esme inhale behind me, sharp, soft, like she’s trying to breathe in what can’t be understood at a glance.
She doesn’t speak, but I almost hear her thoughts as if they were my own.
Dark towers like broken teeth. Spires that twist and bend against natural law. Balconies like claws hang over deep shadowed courtyards. Fountains that shimmer and shift from clear to black to silver. Obsidian walls that reflect nothing but darkness. A castle enchanted to defy gravity, reason, even light.
I don’t turn around. I don’t need to. To me, it’s beautiful. It’s terrifying. It’s home.
Of course, Sam has something to say about it.
“Great. A castle,” he mutters, and I can hear the unease in his voice despite his attempt at nonchalance. “What is this, a vampire lair?”
“I wish.” I sigh, studying the familiar battlements with eyes that see past the grandeur to the politics and schemes that lurk in every shadow. “At least vampires have manners.”
We reach the outer gates, massive structures of black iron inlaid with protective runes that hum with barely contained power. They’re flanked by black-plated guards standing alert at attention, their faces hidden behind helms shaped like snarlingbeasts. The sight should be reassuring, home, safety, familiar ground. Instead, it feels like approaching a trap.
Lounging across the side rail like he owns the place, draped in a crushed-velvet cloak over his black leathers and flicking a jeweled dagger between his fingers with casual precision, is Rue.
“About damn time,” he says, rising to his full, lean height with the kind of fluid grace that comes from years of court training. His grin flashes white against his golden skin, all teeth and mischief. “I was told to wait here for your return, and you know how I feel about waiting, Locke. Waiting is for people with nothing better to do, and I always have something better to do. I don’t know how much longer I would have been forced to endure this tedium, but dear old Papa Sylviane demanded my presence here until you returned with your precious cargo.” He gestures dramatically at his perfectly coiffed appearance. “I’ve been exposed to weather. Weather, darling. This skin doesn’t repair itself, and I refuse to develop freckles at my age.”
“You’re fine,” I grunt, because Rue’s dramatics are as predictable as sunrise and twice as tiresome.
Rue flounces toward Esme with the kind of theatrical swagger that makes him either beloved or despised, depending on the audience. His eyes sweep over her and then Cashira with the calculating assessment of someone who trades in secrets and scandal. “Well, well. Aren’t you three just the beginning of a delicious scandal. I can practically hear the whispers starting already.”
I shoot him a look that promises violence if he doesn’t behave. “Escort. Now.”
Rue winks at me, spins on his heel with a flourish that makes his cloak billow dramatically, and gestures grandly toward the castle. “This way, my darlings. Let’s not dawdle. The King hates dawdling almost as much as he hates being kept waiting, and trust me, you don’t want to test his patience today.”
Instead of the grand front steps that most visitors use, we’re led along a side path that coils around the gardens like a serpent. The foliage here is aggressively curated, every plant chosen for maximum impact and barely contained menace. Black roses the size of fists release perfume that’s equal parts intoxicating and warning, their thorns gleaming like obsidian needles. Silver tulips with thorns as long as daggers sway without any wind to move them, their petals catching light and throwing it back in patterns that hurt to follow. Bushes shaped like serpents wind around sculptures of wolves, harts, and stars, their forms so lifelike they seem ready to step off their pedestals and hunt. Everything here is beauty twisted sharp, elegance with an edge that cuts.
“Queen Lucelle’s touch,” I mutter to no one, though I catch Esme’s quick glance in my direction. “Wouldn’t be surprised if the hedges were listening. Half of them probably are.”
Esme glances sideways but says nothing, though I catch the way her fingers tighten on her reins. She hasn’t said a word since we discussed the horses, and her silence feels deliberate now, like she’s retreating into herself as we approach whatever waits inside.
She doesn’t need to speak. Her silence is loud enough, screaming caution and wariness that I feel in my bones.
