Little thief.
The words didn't come through her ears but bloomed inside her skull, dark and wanting. She bit down on her tongue to keep from gasping and tasted blood.
"He can't enter," Arion said firmly. To her or himself, she wasn't sure. "Not while the wards—"
Laughter. Not heard but felt, vibrating through the roots that formed their shelter. Low. Amused. Patient.
"Wards." Eliam's actual voice came from everywhere and nowhere, muffled by earth and wood but still clear enough to raise goosebumps along her arms. "Such faith you have in your little protections."
The scraping resumed. Circling. Hunting.
Briar found herself backing away from the walls, toward the center of the space. Her legs felt unsteady, muscles remembering their exhaustion. The mark pulsed harder, and with each throb, she felt an answering pull. Toward the walls. Toward him.
"Ignore it," Halian said quietly, noticing her unconscious movement. "It's what the mark does. Calls to its maker."
"Three days," Eliam continued, conversational tone at odds with the menace of his presence. "Three days I gave you, out of... let's call it nostalgia. And you ran." Another scrape, longer and deeper. "That wasn't very polite."
"I don't owe you politeness," Briar managed, though her voice came out rougher than intended.
"No?"
Something pressed against the wall nearest her. She could see the wood bow inward slightly, roots flexing. Not breaking but yielding, recognizing a higher authority.
"You owe me everything," he continued, still invisible beyond their shelter. "Your life. Your sister's life. Every breath you've taken since leaving my forest has been borrowed. And now? Stolen." The pressure on the wall increased. A hairline crack appeared in the wood. "I've come to collect what's mine."
"She's under our protection," Arion stated.
Another laugh, darker this time. "Protection. Yes, I can smell your magic on her, brightling. Temporary little spells trying to muffle what's mine." The crack widened. "Tell me, Arion, when you touched her, did you feel it? That she belongs elsewhere?"
Heat flooded Briar's face. The way he said 'touched' made it sound intimate and possessive. Arion's jaw tightened, but he didn't respond.
"Nothing to say? How disappointing." The wall bowed further. Not violent, just steady pressure. "Perhaps you'd like to explain why you interrupted my huntsman? He was only doing his job."
"Your huntsman was dragging an unwilling woman through the forest," Sian interjected, water beginning to swirl around her fingers.
"My huntsman was retrieving my property." The temperature dropped. "There's a difference."
The mark flared hot enough to make Briar hiss through her teeth. Her knees wavered, and she locked them, refusing to fall. But her body swayed toward the cracking wall, pulled by invisible threads.
"Briar." Arion reached for her, steadying. His hand was warm through her sleeve, but it felt wrong somehow. Foreign.
The wall split.
Not dramatically but slowly, wood fibers separating, roots pulling apart. Through the widening gap, darkness pressed in. But in that darkness, two points of green-gold light burned.
Eyes.
Watching her.
"There you are," Eliam murmured, and his voice in the flesh was worse than in her mind. It sank into her bones and found all the hollow places fear had carved. "My wayward little thief."
She could see him now through the gap. A pale face, the curve of a mouth that might have been smiling. One hand pressed against the outer wall, and where he touched, the wood responded with eager submission.
"Let the others go," she heard herself say. "This is between us."
"Is it?"
His hand shifted, and more roots parted. She could see him better now, dressed in clothes that seemed cut from shadow itself, his white hair threaded with small bones and night-blooming flowers. Beautiful the way predators were beautiful—perfectly designed for their purpose.
