Gradually, Dorian’s form—still braced at the door—took shape in the low light. Behind me, one of the purple crystals had begun to glow. I could see four walls and a low thatch ceiling, the rough bones of a cottage. The walls were mostly bare and windowless. In one corner, a double bed lay collapsed, the padding half on the floor. Through a doorway, a smaller room hinted at a kitchen.
This place hadn’t been lived in for a long time. The forest had started reclaiming it. A weed poked through the floorboards by my feet. The scent in the air was old, earthen, and musty, but somehow familiar.
Dorian turned toward me. His black hair had come loose, some of it plastered to his face. Even in the dimness I could see the sweat soaking through his leathers.
“Are you all right?”
My voice came out hoarse. “Me? What about you?”
His eyes traveled over me, slow and careful, as though he hadn’t heard me. “No cuts, scrapes?”
“I’m fine.”
He waved that away. He strode to the doorway into the smaller room and set both hands on the frame, staring inside. Then he began to pace the cottage, checking corners like he expected something to rise from the dark.
The place was strange, uncanny. Then I realized?—
“There are no windows.” I turned toward the crystal. It bobbed low enough to touch. “Is this another elder fae home?”
Dorian gave a low snort. “My mother would take offense to that.”
My head jerked toward him. Hismother? It struck me then that I had never once thought about Dorian’s parents. Or where he had grown up, except I did remember one thing he had said in the Eldermaze.
A dream from childhood. Something trying to get in, and him trying to keep it out.
My gaze traveled once more. The way he’d paced to the other room—there’d been familiarity in his step. “This is your home.”
“Was.” He rose from where he crouched, brushing dust from his hands. “I suppose it still is.”
“I thought you’d always lived in the citadel.”
“Only the nobility.” Yes, that’s right. He was lowborn. He read my face and said, “The common fae live where they can.” His voice was hard.
I turned toward a simple low wooden table, dragging my fingers through the thick dust. What had happened here?
Instead, I said, “That was the Wild Hunt outside.”
He let out a breath. “Yes.”
The icy fingers of my anxiety spread once more over my shoulders. “Are we dead and just don’t know it?” I gripped the edge of the table as my almost-father would do whenhe was evaluating a piece of woodwork; it was thick and well made. “I don’t feel dead, but maybe the dead never do.”
“You’re not dead, Eurydice.”
I lifted my eyes to him. “Something kept the Hunt out, then.”
“Only living fae can enter this place. No wraiths, no Wild Hunt.” Dorian tested the bed’s frame and eventually slid the padding off it and onto the floor.
“But I’m not fae.”
“You’re a guest,” he growled.
So I had gone from prisoner to guest. If we survived this, I’d probably be back to prisoner in the citadel. “So we’re safe from two of three threats.”
He grunted a yes. He picked up the edge of the bed’s padding and shook it free of dust.
I set my hand on the back of one of the dining chairs. It was low and rickety and just like the table. “And if the other fae come here?”
“Not likely. None of them know of this place.”
