The tavern has a historic vibe, which I find interesting because here are these men with their big guns and fancy, futuristic cars, and yet everything inside this place looks to be made of items from the 1920s. Even down to the way they dress, in their dark clothing, thick trousers, and black caps. All of it feels aged, yet there’s something about it that screams it’s ahead of my world.
They have unique clothes and guns. Even the liquor on their bar doesn’t look like ours. Theirs is in bigger bottles made of steel instead of glass, with black and brown labels. The glass tumblers they use are a crystal-like vintage. Folk music blares from the speakers, and men are shouting as they slam cards and poker chips down on a table during a heated card game.
Women dressed in short dresses sit on some of the men’s laps, and behind the bar is a man and woman in all black serving drinks. It’s like The Great Gatsby and Blade Runner had a baby.
Caz and his henchmen march past the bar, and most of the people steer clear. A woman literally leans back so she doesn’t touch them as they pass. They continue down a dimly lit hallway and make a left.
I hurry along, keeping my head down as a few men in a corner become rowdy. Another set of men stare at me, probably wondering who I am.
When I take the left, two French doors are ahead, propped open and revealing a dark, spacious office. The office walls are covered in shelves, filled to the brim with books. A rolling ladder is perched in front of one of the shelves, and I have the urge to walk over and climb on it, just to swing around all the shelves and discover what kind of literature is in this office, but I don’t. They’re already looking at me like I have two heads. It’s best that I blend in.
Caz walks around the large wooden desk in the center and pulls back a leather chair, taking a seat. Rowan and the big Killian guy sit in wooden chairs on opposite sides of the room. Killian begins wiping his bloody knuckles with a damp towel, and Rowan places his new gun on his lap like it’s a pet, lightly stroking the metal with a cloth to remove smudges.
“Have a seat. Maeve won’t be long,” Caz says to me, gesturing to the chair on the opposite side of his desk.
I look from him to Rowan and Killian, who both cock a brow before returning to what they were doing. Their mannerisms are identical, yet they look completely different. Killian is dark skinned—darker than me—with a bald head. He’s buff and appears to be made of muscle. One of his ears is pierced with a steel hoop, a red jewel engraved into it. Rowan is strong looking in his own way. He’s not buff like Killian, but there’s something hardy about him that warns you not to cross him. His skin is paler than Caz’s, freckles peppered across his cheeks and the bridge of his nose. His hair is a dark reddish-brown.
I move across the room, pulling a wooden chair back and sitting. My eyes drop to a stack of leatherbound books and notebooks near the corner of the desk. Three fountain pens lie in angles atop a scattered set of papers, and a brown stain in the shape of a ring is on the upper left corner of one of the papers, most likely from a cup of coffee or tea.
Behind Caz is a rusted black gas lamp, lit and flickering, and on each wall at least two to three pillar candles, offering warm glows. “Who is Maeve?” I ask after clearing my throat.
I look into Caz’s eyes as he removes the worn black gloves from his hands. He doesn’t answer. Instead, he pulls out yet another black cigarette thing from his silver case. When he sparks it, I sigh. What I wouldn’t give to get high right now. Or maybe I’m still high and that’s why I’m imagining all of this.
“She’s our mother,” Rowan answers, and Caz cuts his eyes at him before returning them to me.
“Wait…she’s your mother and who else’s?” I ask, because I could’ve sworn Rowan said they were cousins in the car.
“She’s our mother.” Rowan gestures between himself and Killian.
“You two are brothers?” My brows lift with surprise.
“Where the hell did you find this woman, Caz?” Killian grumbles, clearly agitated by my question.
“In my forest,” Caz replies as he exhales, letting a chain of smoke spill through his full lips.
“Your forest?” Killian continues a frown. “What was she doing there? Spying?”
“No,” Caz says, and nothing more.
“Is she wearing Juniper’s clothes?” Rowan sits forward in his chair. “She looks like Juniper right now. That’s literally the weird shit Juniper would wear.”
“Rowan, please.” Caz rubs the center of his forehead.
Someone knocks on the door, and I look back to see a short, pale boy with a gray cap on his head, his hands folded in front of him.
“Mr. Harlow, sir,” the boy says, his head slightly bowed. “Maeve and Juniper have arrived.”
“Good. Send them back.”
Caz puts out his cigarette, placing it on an ashtray, and then clears his throat as he leans back in his chair. Moments later, a woman appears between the double doors of the office. For the first time, I see someone dressed in color. She’s wearing a red skirt with a color-block white and black blouse tucked into it. A red hat with black and white beads is on her head, and her hair is in tight pin curls beneath the hat, not a single hair out of place. Red rubies wrapped in gold dangle from her ears. Her heels click as she enters the office saying, “This’d better be important, Caz, or so help me…” The woman stops in the middle of the office, staring at me.
“Who’s this?” she asks, but by the way she looks at me and the way her jaw drops, it feels as if she knows exactly who I am. I feel like I should know her too, but I don’t. I’ve never seen her before.
“Maeve, this is Willow Austin,” Caz announces, “and she’s the reason I’ve called you here.”
The woman continues staring at me, her mouth slightly ajar.
“By the stunned expression on your face, I’d say you know exactly who she is,” Caz goes on.
“No—I…I mean, yes, but…how? How is this happening again?” Maeve finally closes her mouth, pressing her red lips together and looking from me to Caz.
“Um…I’m sorry. Is anyone going to tell me what’s going on?” I ask.
I glance at Rowan, and his eyes are wide as he shrugs hard, his shoulders practically touching his ears.
“Mum, why don’t you have a seat?” Killian suggests, rising from his chair.
“Yes. I’ll do that.” Maeve walks across the room, sitting in Killian’s chair. He rubs her arm, and she gives his hand a quick, affectionate pat. She pauses on the pat, stiffening as she studies his knuckles. “What happened to your hand?”
“Had to kick a Rippie fucker out,” Killian says, pulling his hand away.
“Language, Killian!” Maeve snaps, releasing his hand and then shaking her head. “Back to the issue at hand. Caz, where did she come from?”
“She landed in my forest, Maeve.” Caz folds his fingers on the desk. “She doesn’t know how she got there, or how she ended up in my territory, but she was there. Cerberus found her. Fortunately, I got there before he could rip her to shreds.”
Oh, fuck him! I frown at Caz.
He stares back at me, one eyebrow cocked. Fucking me should be the last thing on your to-do list right now.
My jaw drops, and I start to say something, but Maeve shifts in her chair and clears her throat. She’s staring at me again. I shift uncomfortably.
“You’ll have to pardon my gawking, darling. It’s just—well, the last time I saw you, you looked different. Your hair was…not like this. It was shorter. Curlier.”
“What do you mean? My hair has always been like this,” I tell her.
“Right…to you it has. But the last time I saw you… my word, that was nearly ninety years ago.”
“Ninety?” I ask, confused. “Do you mean nineteen?”
“No, ninety.”
I frown. “Uh…okay.” I’m nowhere near ninety so it couldn’t have been me. “I’m sorry to ask, but how old are you exactly?”
“One-hundred and fifty-eight,” she replies casually.
I blink several times, trying to process the number that just came out of her mouth. She doesn’t look any older than fifty—if that.
“Okay. This…um. This is all really weird and confusing. Do you think you can tell me how to get back home, please?”
A woman rushes into the office with a crystal glass in her hand. The liquid in her glass sloshes over the rim, spilling over her tan knuckles. “Late, sorry!” she chirps. “I needed this very badly before coming back here to deal with you lot!”
“Juniper, if you’re going to drink, just stay at the damn bar,” Caz grumbles.
“Oh, shut up, Caz. I had a long day, all right? Do you know I was in the village today and some woman tried to fight me? She was out of her bloody mind! I calmed her down, but she kept calling me a bitch, because apparently, I’ve been sleeping with her husband.” She takes a swallow of her drink. “You should’ve seen that greasy fucker! Like I’d ever waste my time having an affair with a man like him!” Juniper sips her drink again, and her eyes bounce from Caz to me. “Ohhh…who’s this?” She grins.
“Just sit and be quiet,” Caz orders.
Juniper frowns and makes a face at him before slinking her way across the office and sitting on a black bench against the wall.
“Anyway, Willow, I suppose getting back would be the same way you got here,” Maeve informs me.
“I don’t even know how I got here. It’s not like I was planning to come to this place.”
“What’s the last thing you remember before arriving?” she asks.
“She was smoking and was high on something called weed,” Caz drawls, rolling his eyes.
“Weed?” Rowan and Killian ask at the same time. “What the fuck is that?” Killian asks.
“Is it like quish? The shit that made Newton lie in the middle of the street and get trampled by a fucking horse like an idiot?” Rowan laughs.
“Language!” Maeve snaps again, rolling her eyes.
“It’s a narcotic,” I explain. “It…makes me feel good. Probably like whatever you just smoked, Caz,” I say, gesturing to the half- cig on his ashtray.
“That’s not called weed. It’s bloom,” Caz says. “And it doesn’t make me high, or whatever you call it. It just calms me down.”
“Well, that’s exactly what weed does for me. It calms me down and clears my head.”
“Bloom is the finest you can find,” Caz goes on. “I’m sure your weed holds no comparison.”
“How the hell would you know? You don’t even know what it is,” I argue.
“She was doing drugs,” Killian interrupts, cutting his eyes at Caz. “Can we really trust a junkie?”
“Excuse me?” I turn to glare at Killian. “I am not a junkie,” I growl. How fucking dare he?
He ignores me, still looking at Caz. “I don’t trust her, or this whole story about landing in the fucking forest.”
“You don’t even know me,” I counter. I don’t give a damn if he just beat some guy to death or whatever the hell he did, he’s not about to treat me like I’m scum on the bottom of his shoe.
“What if she’s here to hurt you? You led her right into your home, your place of work—she could be working with the Rippies for all we know!”
“I would know,” Caz responds calmly.
“How?” Killian demands.
Caz pauses before looking at each person in the room, and then me. “Because I can hear her thoughts—well, the important ones, it seems.”
“What?” Killian asks, irritated.
“If she were here to harm me, I would know it, Killian. She and I have already gone over this. I don’t know what kind of fuckery it is, but we can hear each other without saying a damn thing.”
“You mean like telepathy?” Juniper asks, perking up on the bench.
“Exactly,” Caz answers.
“Just like the woman from ninety years ago, only it wasn’t with Caz. It was with Tepper,” Maeve says, looking me over.
“Who’s Tepper?” asks Caz.
“He was a friend from Whisper Grove. I met the old Willow through him. He was close friends with your mum.”
“And where is this Tepper now?” he asks.
Maeve lowers her gaze. “Dead.”
I don’t know why, but my eyes lock on Caz’s when Maeve says that, goosebumps sweeping across my skin.
“So let me get this straight. There’s someone in this room who can get into Caz’s mind? Shit!” Rowan laughs, nudging his brother in the ribs with his elbow. “We can use that, brother! Talk about a loaded gun!”
Killian folds his arms, still frowning, finding none of this amusing.
“Unlike her, I can control my thoughts,” Caz informs them.
“How?” I ask again because he’s never explained it.
“I practiced when I first started hearing you. Months ago. I didn’t know who you were, didn’t trust you, and I knew deep down I wasn’t going out of my damn mind, so I learned. I had my own mind and I wanted to keep it to myself, just like everyone else gets to.”
“Yeah, but how? How do you block me out?”
He shrugs.
“How can I block you out?”
A smirk tugs at the edges of his lips. “Practice, I suppose.”
I groan in frustration. That answer doesn’t help me.
“If all of this is true,” Maeve interjects, stepping forward, “then I think the bigger question is why is she here? Why now, during the middle of this feud with Ripple?”
Caz studies Maeve before shifting his eyes to the left. “I’m trying to figure that out myself.”
The room falls silent. We bounce our eyes over each other, listening to the music amplify from the bar, the rambunctious chatter gravitating down the hallway and sneaking into the office.
“I know who we can go to,” Maeve finally says. “But you won’t like it.”
Caz narrows his gaze, looking into Maeve’s gray eyes, and Maeve cocks a brow, giving him a silent answer that I can’t grasp.
“No,” Caz growls, pushing out of his chair.
“She can help us, Caspian. You know it.”
Caspian? Is that his full name?
“I will not go to her. Not after her truce with Ripple Hills. And you stop worrying about my name.” He points a stern finger my way.
“She made the wiser choice, and you know it. She didn’t want to pick sides anymore,” Maeve goes on.
“Which is exactly why we can’t trust her! She can easily use that to her advantage to keep us against one another.”
“Well, if you don’t lower your pride and go to her, you’ll never get this girl back to whatever world she came from. Alora has connections to powerful Mythics. She’d know who to talk to about this.”
“Oh—no. No, I have to get home,” I say quickly. “I can’t stay here. This place is dangerous and, no offense, but I feel really sick here—like this whole place gives me nausea.”
Juniper snorts into her glass while Killian grumbles something incoherent.
“If we don’t go to Alora, Willow might be stuck here,” Maeve urges. “And I’m sure the last thing you want is this woman in your hair during this mess with Ripple. She’ll become a liability—one we don’t need, especially if people find out she can hear what you’re thinking, Caspian.”
Caz’s head shakes, but he doesn’t disagree. With a sigh, he cuts his eyes at Killian, who says, “I’ll send the message,” and immediately stomps out of the office.
“Juniper, Rowan, tell Veno to get a car ready,” Caz orders, planting his fists on top of the desk. “Looks like we’re taking a bloody trip to Vanora.”
