“The Shadow King who doesn’t believe in talking?” I failed to keep the skeptical disappointment out off my voice.
“Sorry I can’t be of more help, Dorie. I hate letting pretty females down, don’t I?” He regarded me with a flirtatious crook of his head and a cartoonishly flirtatious smolder. “But as I said at the start of the tour, this is more like a museum to me than a home. I’ve spent my whole life at the High Palace. Understand, I’m only meant to give you this tour for the diplomacy of it all. If you want, though, we can move our conversation up toone of the empty bedrooms. Get comfortable while we play the guessing game of what’s in the Mountain Fortress’s basement?”
That second invitation had been enough to get me to back off. And I’d meant to follow up on the door mystery, but there were so many other mysteries on my “must check this out” list, I’d never gotten around to it.
A week later, holding a key that was definitely big enough to fit into that door in the floor, I deeply regretted not making it my number-one priority.
But no time like the present.
Someone from my time had given me this key. It had to be a message. Maybe one that led to answers about why I’d been shoved in that lake or, even better, an unbinding spell that would get me out of here.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, fated mates.My investigation into the gates had uncovered some of the most epic and romantic stories I’d ever researched.
But the thing was, I’m meant to be the one reporting on those kinds of stories. Not living them out. At no time did I ever say to myself, “Oh wow, I’m so jealous. I wish I could fall into a random time and get stuck there with a guy I just met, who was somehow supposed to become the love of my life.”
After what happened with my maem and Da, I wasn’t even sure I believed in love anymore. They’d fallen for each other so hard and fast. It had been a story worthy of a romance holo. And what did it get Maem? A one-way ticket to a lifetime of grief.
I didn’t know if I was capable of letting myself fall for anyone that hard, even if he was supposed to be my fated mate.
Also, there was the part where he put a freaking knife to my throat last night. Which made him all the walking-red-flag emojis.
Nope, nope, not staying here for the live-action reboot of that animatedIce Agemovie.
“FOUR! on the list of things to do if you’re stuck in time!”Kiwi chimed inside my mind.“Find an unbinding spell. Unbinding spells are like time travel’s version of control z. You utter it, and bip-bam-boop! You’re back in your original era, divorced from your fated mate.”
Yes, yes, Kiwi was right. I had to go looking for that door, but when I emerged from the grotto bathroom and rushed over to the double doors Aengus left out of, they refused to open. Even when I pushed them.
Poop emoji! Poop emoji!
What was I going to do now if I couldn’t?—
“THREE! I mean it, friend, stop freaking out.”
Okay, okay, I needed to stay calm… while stuck in the Pleistocene Age with a strange being with some kind of Jekyll and Hyde personality disorder that might lead him to murder me in my sleep.
Don’t ruminate on that, Dorie.I pushed the panic down before it could resurface.Just think… think…
What did I know?
That I was in the Pleistocene Age, but somehow also still in Ireland in the Mountain King fortress, which was filled with god tech. So, okay, I’d seen two glowing doors in the rock wall, one of which didn’t appear until we got close to it. Maybe the one to the outside was still open?
Sticking the key in my jumpsuit’s conveniently large pocket, I took what felt like at least a full five-minute walk to cross the cavern to the approximate location of the door. But nothing happened when I touched the wall.
Poop emoji, was I stuck in here? Imprisoned? When would Aengus be coming back, even? And when he did, would he bring his knife?
I forced myself to stay calm as I walked along the wall, looking for a door, any door that wasn’t the grotto.
To my shock, when I neared the part of the smooth rock surface just a meter away from where I’d slept, a glowing green door appeared.
As if it had only been waiting for me to touch it.
And, when I got closer, the glowing door adjusted to just a foot above my head.
It slid open with a whisper of stone. Taking a breath, I walked through it.
Then froze in place when I saw what was on the other side.
Twenty feet of emerald green.
