Nothing. Not even a feeling. He’d gone completely dark.
Crap.
Walsh “parked” the horse and carriage at the edge of the dark fey lands and dismounted. My gaze flicked to the girl wrapped around my leg. Astra. She was like a stage five clinger and I wasn’t sure I was ready to just send her to find her way home on her own. Even in her human form she just held on to me or leaned into me and watched our surroundings with unease.
Walsh must have been thinking the same thing. He looked up at her from his place on the ground and extended his hand. “Come on. We’ll see you home. You can pass through the Light Fey City with us into the Witch Lands, and then make it home through Wolf City.”
She swallowed hard, looking at his outstretched hand with fear. Something dark slithered across my mind. What had men done to her to make her so fearful of them?
She looked up at me and I nodded. “You can trust him.”
Without hesitation she stood and took Walsh’s outstretched hand as he helped her to descend the carriage. I was next, and finally Sage. We stood, the four of us, bruised, bloody, but not broken. What a shitshow these entire last few days had been, but we were almost there.
“We cross the fence and I’ll find us a car,” Walsh stated.
I nodded curtly, my stomach in knots over the fact that Sawyer had gone completely quiet.
We approached the fence slowly, looking left and right. I half expected a sniper to shoot us down the second we crossed over, but after swinging my legs over the brick wall and hitting the rocks, I was relieved to see my head still attached to my body.
I looked around and took in Light Fey City.
Whoa.
In direct contrast to Dark Fey Territory, black asphalt roads and shiny modern buildings with solar paneled rooftops dotted the distance. Astra huddled close to me like a little loyal chihuahua, and shaking like one too. Sage caught my gaze and frowned at her, obviously worried about what had the girl so scared.
What had those motherfuckers done to her back there? Did they know she could heal people? Probably not or they’d have never let her go. I shook off my anger and we walked down the asphalt road, stopping in a thick outcrop of trees as we reached a neighborhood of track homes. Walsh glanced at a black BMW and looked over at us.
“I’ll be right back. If anyone comes, kill them. We can’t afford to sound the alarm that we are in enemy territory. Not here. They have modern technology and a huge army. There will be a contingent of guards on us in seconds.”
Astra squeaked in fear and I nodded to Walsh. “Will do.”
Considering we’d left in such a rush, and sadly I left behind the fey blade and shotgun, I didn’t really have any weapons to kill anyone.
After he jogged away, I turned to poor Astra. She lowered her chin even further as my eyes looked her over, really taking her in. She had a smattering of freckles across her face, but there were fine scars all over her body. Her neck, cheeks, chest. Little lacelike webbing of previous injuries. Previous injuries she had healed?
“Look at me,” I commanded, because it was the only way she seemed to be able to respond. I felt a small measure of power leave my body and wash over her and it terrified me. Was that… alpha power? Like what Sawyer did? And his father?
Her chin jutted up to look at me with those swimming blue eyes.
“You saved Walsh. That makes you my friend and I don’t letanythinghappen to my friends. Understand?”
She swallowed hard and nodded.
Sage tipped her head. “Me neither. Anyone fucks with you again, they lose their head right before I shove it up their ass.” She raised a fist for good measure.
Astra’s eyes bugged and I shot Sage a look that said to tone down the descriptive killing. This girl seemed very sheltered, like she’d been plucked right out of a nunnery. But our assurances and threats had worked to calm her. She stopped shaking and looked in wonder at the black sleek car that pulled out toward us, Walsh at the wheel.
Had she never seen a car?
We rushed forward, Sage taking the front and Astra and I popping into the back. I closed the door and slipped on my seatbelt as Astra looked around, wide-eyed. Her gaze tracked the ceiling, the console with all its lights, and the seatbelt at my waist.
Walsh gunned it, making the tires screech a little and I knew he was probably going to drive like a bat out of hell. Reaching over, I clipped Astra in, tucking the belt over Sage’s deer fur that she wore, and the sweatpants.
“It keeps you in the car if there is an accident and we bonk into something.” I was treating her like a child and I felt bad for that, but she was so naive and innocent. I just wanted to protect her.
She nodded.
‘Sawyer, I’m coming. Where are you?’I growled in my head, getting more and more frustrated that he wasn’t responding. If Meredith or her mother had done anything to him again, I was going to kill them both.
