Page 39 of My Fae Lady

“I beg your pardon?” The words were too tame, but I was too stunned to even curse. I tried again, focusing on logic to get past the dread filling me as his meaning sank further into my bones. “You don’t follow human law. Rook Manor is mine as my dowry. We had a bargain.”

A bargain that required him to . . .

Oh, damnation.

“We fooled your cousin and satisfied the solicitors,” Sylvan said without a hint of growl or fang. “Now I have returned home. The home I grew from a seed of wild magic. The one the Bartons stole from me.”

“And now you are stealing it back,” I said flatly. “It was an Unseelie ploy all along. You never wished to help me.”

Caro had been right to worry. I should have listened to her. I shouldn’t have assumed I could protect myself through an Unseelie bargain. Goddesses’ light, Douglas inheriting the manor would have been better than this, though House would have languished while empty, its dwindling stores of magic drying up.

I caught a glint of magic through the lens I still held and felt like even more of a fool. I had noticed that House was more responsive when Sylvan arrived, magic surging in a way it hadn’t in decades. I should have realized what it meant.

And there was something else niggling at me. Something I was forgetting.

“Giselle—”

I threw up a hand, warding off his justification. It didn’t matter that my ancestors had stolen Rook Manor first—that didn’t mean I could forgive Sylvan for taking it from me. No, I wouldn’t let him snatch away my home.

Sylvan ignored my gesture and kept talking. “I’m not going to steal from you.” He held the Scales out toward me again. “I wish to buy my house from you. You can stay until you secure a buyer for the Scales. Then you’ll have enough money to buy ten fine manors. You won’t need this one.”

My jaw dropped. He thought I’d sell the Seelie Scales? If anything, I’d return them to the museum, though only after I had inspected every line of their magic first. And buying another manor? As if anything else could just become my home? “It doesn’t matter what treasures you offer me. Rook Manor is my home. I am the Lady of Rook Manor.”

House trembled. Through my lens, I saw the threads of magic that formed the foundation of Rook Manor slithering into a new formation. Ice-blue Seelie magic pulled away from the forest greens and browns of Unseelie magic, though knots kept the strands from separating entirely.

The trembles became a quake, and I fisted my hand in the sofa cushion so as not to be bounced to the ground. Sylvan stumbled, slamming his free hand against the wall to catch his balance.

“What are you doing, House?” he growled.

I raised the lens, watching the Unseelie threads converge on him. A quick scan of the room showed the Seelie ones moving toward me. The strands tugged at each other, still connected but letting bursts of wild magic through, each one causing another tremor.

“House,” I shouted.

“Stop!” Sylvan and I ordered in unison.

Seelie and Unseelie power moved together, holding back the wild magic.

Sylvan pushed off the wall and spun to face me, his features sharp, his fangs on display. “It seems House does not like you calling yourself its Lady.”

“It has accepted me for two centuries. The problem is you.”

“I am the Lord—” He cut off as the floors and walls vibrated once more. His eyes narrowed. “Rook Manor accepted my earlier claim without issue.”

“Because I hadn’t realized I needed to make my own. Now it is up to House to decide whose claim is valid.” I shoved every hint of worry I felt about what would happen as deep as I could, and held the lens in front of my eyes in the hopes Sylvan wouldn’t see that I was far less sanguine about leaving the decision up to Rook Manor than I sounded.

I had bonded with House as a child. It had always favored me. But Sylvan was its original owner. Its creator. And there were far more Unseelie strands of power woven into its foundation than Seelie.

I lowered the lens, keeping my head tilted down as I slipped it into the pocket of my apron. Then I finally remembered the last bit of our bargain, that missing piece that had been niggling at me. “I may not be able to argue about Rook Manor being your home, but now that you have returned to it, I do believe you are meant to leave me to my peace. And I do not feel very peaceful around you at present.”

Sylvan grunted as the bargain pulled at him. He took a step toward the door automatically, then stopped and spun to face me. His lips were pulled back in a grimace as he fought the bargain magic, but he suffered through it long enough to speak.

“You could have done this the easy way, Giselle. I was ready to shower you with every artifact the manor had collected. But now I will show no mercy.”

“Neither will I.”

⊱❀⊰

I waited nearly half an hour in that room that led to the heart of Rook Manor after Sylvan left. I should have studied the flows of magic, tried to work out a way to overpower Sylvan’s Unseelie claim.