“Wait. Please. Just… can we talk for a minute?”
Goddess, this is familiar.
Another desperate voice, asking me to stay. Another doorway ahead. Nothing to be done but step through it.
I don’t stay.
No part of me can bear to stay.
Not with this horrible, roiling feeling springing up from the very heart of me. Not with the temptation of being somewhere else,anywhereelse, anywhere in the world where I don’t have to stop running and face this, calling me forward.
The door swings shut behind me, and I don’t look back once.
I’m down the garden path, feet skittering over pea-gravel as I reach my car in the drive. Satchel tossed into the passenger seat, key in the ignition, I peel out of the driveway and head down the two-lane road that eventually reaches a highway.
From there, who knows where I’ll go.
Does it matter?
I’ve got nowheretogo. No place to call my own and no money to even start looking for one. Nothing but a big heap of recklessness and no ability to control my wandering spirit for long enough to make something of myself.
Minutes of silent stewing in the driver’s seat eventually turn into the whisper of a plan.
It’s a terrible idea.
The worst idea.
Certifiably bat-shit.
And I already know I’m going to do it.
I’m going to Faerie to hear about a fae queen’s bounty.
A bounty that could pay for a whole new life.
But first, I’ve got a few witches to see.
We’ve made our own little network of apostates—all the witches who washed up or walked out or simply let their coven membership lapse because it didn’t serve them anymore. A coven outside the coven, Joan likes to call it, and I couldn’t agree with her more.
My plan branches out, gains clarity. I make mental maps and calculate the time it will take to get everything I need.
A good disguise to ward off any wayward demons, a few curses to deploy if I get into trouble, supplies to see me through a journey to a new realm.
Excitement blooms in my veins, and I latch onto it. I feed it, nourish it, barrel forward until it’s all I see, all I feel, until it chases away everything I can’t face right now.
Until it’smine, and mine alone.
This entire scheme is more likely to go ass-up than not, but when has that ever stopped me?
Never. Absolutely never.
8
Callum
I hate Faerie.
This cursed realm, with its cursed denizens, always makes my skin crawl.
