My eyes drop to her chest, but it’s obscured by a robe of thorns. I don’t know what I expect to find there—a huge gaping hole, a Frankenstein-like scar, something that might indicate a missing organ—but it’s impossible to see anything.
And, more than likely, that’s not what she means, anyway.
I can’t imagine we’re looking for a literal heart.
That would be… impossible.
Or maybe not.
Maybe fae leave their organs lying around outside their bodies all the time. Maybe there really is a bloody, beating heart lost in a thicket somewhere in this realm, or at the bottom of the ocean, or at the top of a snow-dusted mountain, or guarded in a dragon’s hoard.
I close my eyes.
The seeking instinct sits there, just below the surface, where it’s always been. Sharp and ready, waiting for me to call it up.
Only… now is probably not the time.
I should probably focus on getting the hell out of here before I get lost in the instinct to seek.
All around, hunters are beginning their hunt. Some leave immediately, heading back toward the awful thorn tunnel, some start speaking quietly among themselves, and others eye the assembled courtiers and the figure of the retreating queen, headed deeper into her bower.
An elf—yet another brave or stupid soul—steps toward one of the fae courtiers who linger behind. He says something, though I’m too far away to hear it, and the fae’s eyes flash.
Not just with emotion, though.
With magick.
It’s impossible to miss, with the way the elf’s shoulder slump, the way he leans into the fae’s touch when she rests ahand on his shoulder, the way he lets himself be led away into the darkness behind the dais.
I shiver again.
Whatever help or advice that elf was expecting to get from the courtier, I can’t imagine he’s going to get it wherever she’s leading him.
As if the rest of the lingering fae noticed their friend’s success in luring an unwitting victim away, more of their eyes turn to the crowd. More predatory smiles expose more sharp teeth, and the malevolent energy radiating from the court is nearly as unmistakable as the fae’s magick was.
Time to get the hell out of here.
I slip away unnoticed, protected by a charm that renders me invisible and nullifies any scent I might be putting off. I bought it from a former Crescent witch who was absolutely delighted to sell it to me when I told her how I like to slip in and out of the Veil right under Esme Hawthorn’s high and mighty nose.
Heading back toward the tunnel of thorns leading out of the bower, my mind races.
A heart.
A fae’s heart.
Maybe literal, probably metaphorical, but absolutely creepy and unhinged.
Which honestly fits the vibe the fae queen has going on here.
This whole place is insanely creepy.
I don’t know why I was expecting ferns and toadstools and motes glittering in forest glades, but instead I stepped out of the Veil to find a queendom of death. Dead trees and thickets of thorns, this absolute nightmare of a court, like something out of the very worst kind of twisted fairytale.
Her bounty being a freakingheartfeels very on-brand.
The crowd is thinner now than when everyone was arriving earlier, and—thankfully—less panicked. When the darkness of the tunnel closes over me, I risk one final look back.
I wonder if he’s left already.
