Cress could only watch as his human target backed away from the shelves. A lock of her dark, purplish hair spilled over her shoulder, brushing the ancient book humans were never meant to touch.
Kate Kole’s big, hazel eyes didn’t leave him as she inched far around the tables. Her back came against the library doors. She stared brazenly without bowing her head, and Cress’s hands balled into fists. Did she wish to lose her eyes?
“How…” Cress whispered through his teeth to the others, “in the name of the sky deities did she know about that book?”
Shayne stood rigidly at Cress’s side, his own glare pinning the human. But his hand lifted slightly toward the Prince, like he was prepared to stop Cress if he tried to lunge.
“You have caused me riling trouble, Human,” Cress told Kate Kole in his darkest voice. “The pain that awaits you… the lengths I will go to cause you to suffer… And this”—he nodded toward his brothers—“is nothing. I have many ways to get to you.”
The girl blinked. And then…
She smiled.
Smiled.
Cress’s legs twitched; he stepped toward her, but Mor’s and Shayne’s hands came against his shoulders. He could have tossed one of them aside, but not both. And perhaps he didn’t want to watch his faeborn assassins fly across the room at his own hand because of a human.
“You know I cannot let you touch her,” Mor whispered, apology and frustration creasing his face.
Cress glared at his human target. “I will crush your heart in my fist,” he promised.
The girl bit her lower lip over a terrible laugh. “I don’t think you can,” she said.
Heat drove into Cress’s chest.
The human tossed the ancient book at them—Shayne caught it before it touched the ground. She escaped through the doors, her burgundy hair vanishing into the dark hallway. The doors clicked shut, echoing through the library where the assassins stood. Silence returned to the shelves.
Mor was the first one to move; he inched over the floor, studying the splayed books more than anything else. Shayne and Dranian looked to Cress like he would have answers.
“Did she…” Cress’s chest tightened as the heat began to spread, “laugh at me?”
Dranian tore off his black coat and tossed it to the dusty floor.
“I am the greatest, most terrible assassin in the North. How…” Cress worked his jaw. He shook his head. Curled and uncurled his fists. “How does she keep escaping me?”
“She must have help.” Shayne scuffed his white hair and eyed the ancient book in his hands. His bare foot nudged a paper on the floor when he turned. He took in the mess of tomes and torn spines littering every surface. “What happened here, anyway? Don’t the humans know how to keep a study clean?”
“You fool. Don’t you know what this place is?” Dranian mumbled, and from down the centre aisle, Mor’s gaze flickered up. “This is where the Queene’s crossbeast was slain.”
“What?” Shayne’s light blue eyes widened. “Here?”
Cress could feel Mor’s stare on him. He wanted to ask what in the faeborn Corners Mor’s problem was, but try as he might, Cress could not pull his eyes off the spot by the door where his human target had just been standing.
Her laugh.
He had never heard a laugh like that, one without traces of malice and the threat of power that turned plants to ash and poisoned the air and forced the heavens to growl. Why did it ring in his ears? Why did it sound like a rusted flute or a cracked harp or the crisp crunch of dry leaves or a broken, delicate wind embracing the heights of the trees?
He hated this day.
He hated her laugh.
Cress flipped the pages so harshly, he tore one. After glaring at the flimsy paper that had refused to hold together beneath his frustration, he tossed it aside, grabbed the next page, and accidentally tore that one, too.
“Queensbane,” Mor scolded from across the table in the human academy library. “You’re going to lose more than your hair if the High Court discovers you ripped up a sacred book.”
Cress slumped into a chair. “I kissed her right on her human mouth,” he said. “She didn’t even bat an eye.”
Mor reached for the Fairy Book of Rules and Masteries and dragged the book over to himself. He flipped the pages slower and with much more care.
“It was a good kiss, too. It should have painted the heavens with gold and made the air smell of gingerberries,” Cress added with a mutter. He crumpled forward and rested his forehead against the cold tabletop. Perhaps a nap was in order.
“Here it is. This is the trick Shayne was talking about when he suggested the faeborn-cursed idea in the first place.” Mor turned the open book and pointed to a paragraph, and Cress peeked up from his position. The lines of dark text seemed to go on forever.
“Read it to me,” Cress commanded and closed his eyes, thinking of his fur-coated bedspread at the Silver Castle. Wishing for deep dreams that were clean and did not involve the object of his failed enchantment. Though, he hadn’t dreamt of his human target for several days. Perhaps he was starting to become free of her.
Mor’s deep voice filled the dark library like the old storytellers of the North. After a few stale paragraphs telling of things Cress already knew, Mor got to the part that said, “The key is to ensure that the human you wish to enchant has a spark of romantic feelings for the fairy bestowing the kiss before the enchanted kiss is performed. Even just a shallow feeling will be enough…”
Cress looked up to find Mor biting his lips together. A grin was dangerously close to showing.
“You think I did it wrong?” It was more of an accusation. “Should I have forced our lips together for longer?”
Mor ignored the question and kept reading, “But as with many rules of the fairies, the opposite can take place too, and a fairy ought to be careful not to kiss a human if there are any romantic feelings—”
“How did she not have any romantic feelings for me?” Cress stood—his chair screeched over the library floor.
Mor slapped the book shut and set it back on the table. “I can’t imagine how.” He was too composed to reveal if it was sarcasm.
“Females have been proposing to me for ten faeborn years. That measly human cannot possibly be an exception to my appeal.”
Mor placed a fist over his grinning mouth. “I apologize, Your Highness,” he said through his fingers. “This is the funniest thing that I have seen all year.”
“It’s not funny!” Cress kicked his chair, then folded his arms and paced. “She hid her real name, and it seems she cannot be swayed by an enchanted kiss. And now she’s enslaved my brothers! I’ve never been this furious in my entire faeborn life!”
“Yes. I know.” Mor nodded and turned the book back to himself. He bit his lips together tightly as he flipped through more pages. The corners of his mouth almost lifted again.
Cress stared long and hard at the curly-haired fairy. “We need to end this, Mor. We need to get back to the Ever Corners. Every day we’re here, it’ll be worse for you when we go back.” His shoulders dropped. “I’m worried about what the Court will do to you for my disobedience in coming here. I’m worried I won’t be able to stop them this time.”
Mor sighed and closed the book. “Don’t worry about me, Cress. The human just got lucky. We’ve watched her long enough for me to believe she’s not that good at this. Shayne is right—someone is helping her. We just need to figure out who it is and do what we do best; hunt him to his terrible death,” he said. “And in the meantime, you need to stay away from Shayne, Dranian, and me so we don’t learn your plans. We’ll be compelled to try and stop you from harming the human target if we know them.”
Cress’s chest filled as he ventured to the window. He watched the humans out in the cold as deep, rumbling clouds stole the heavens, toiling and darkening with his mood. He was going to wipe out the human realm with a storm soon if he didn’t calm himself. “You must swear to silence about all this once we return to the Ever Corners. None of our brothers will hear about how this human outsmarted us, and especially not the nobles of the North High Court. Do you understand?” he said over his shoulder. “I will be the talk of the North if they find out. Which is why I will hunt down every human Kate Kole loves most. I will return the suffering she’s caused me.” He breathed in that promise. He let it soak into his faeborn bones. He let it turn his will to flame.
After a moment, Cress sniffed. “Queensbane, why does this library smell like old fairy blood?”
Mor stood from the table, picked up the book, and tucked it beneath his arm. “The human didn’t specifically say we couldn’t harm her, did she? She only specified that we couldn’t let you harm her,” he thought aloud. “And the Queene only forbade me from using my Shadow Fairy gifts in ‘any of the Four Corners’ when I became her slave to join the North Brotherhood, correct?”
Cress’s jaw slid back and forth. “That’s correct.” He glanced back at Mor. “When was the last time you shadow-slipped?”
Mor looked off. “It’s been a while,” he admitted. He carried the ancient book to the back of the library and returned a moment later holding a large orange fruit. “Look!” he said, tossing the fruit to Cress. Cress caught it and held it up to study it. “It’s a human grape,” Mor said. “You have to peel it.”
Cress turned it over. A second later, he jutted his nail into the peel and began tearing off the skin. “It smells like a citrus drink.” He bit into it and sweetness bled into his mouth. He nodded, pleased with the taste, until something crunched between his molars. He stopped.
He spat the whole thing onto the floor and flung the remainder of the grape out the library window. “It has seeds,” he complained to Mor.
Mor was busy brushing dust off his sleeves. “Let’s go find Shayne and Dranian. I sent them ahead to gather supplies,” he said.
Cress shook his head. “No. Let’s split up now.”
Mor didn’t answer right away. “Are you certain?”
“Yes. You spy on the human and learn who’s helping her. I’m going to learn her real name, and soon I will tear apart her home with her inside it.”
Mor’s quiet moan filled the library. “Cress. Why did you tell me that?!”
