It was exactly five days ago that Cress saw them for the first time. Midnight dawned over the human city, bringing forth the monsters Cress had been sniffing out since he picked up their trail in the academy library. He followed the path to a much larger public library on the cusp of the city where traces of fairies were left in the spaces between books and mixed into the dust on the shelves, along with a flirtatious, menacing wickedness that had haunted Cress’s dreams for many faeborn years.
The brand of the Shadow Fairies.
He refused to believe it until he saw them for himself.
Cress waited for two hours tucked atop a shelf until they came. Faeborn folk of the haunting sort drifted into the quiet space with no candles, lanterns, or torches. Their ears hosted a sharper point than Cress’s, their tattoos were painted on thicker, and their eyes…
Silver and brown, just like Mor’s.
A thousand fast memories of battle, narrow victories, and dreadful losses washed through Cress’s mind as he pulled himself further into the shadows, watching the band of seventeen fairies congregate in the middle of the room. They wore the darkness of night and held the menace of beasts in their faces.
What in the name of the sky deities were fairies of the Dark Corner of Ever doing here among the humans? Cress’s hand drifted toward the winged handle of his blade in his back pocket, but his fingers froze as one more fairy joined the rest; one Cress knew the mad-minded scent of all too well. The very one who had been the reason Cress despised fairy nobles of the East.
Bonswick pulled thin gloves onto his pale hands as he joined the congregation, and it was as though Cress was back in the Silver Castle, guessing at what the glassy-eyed fairy’s secrets were.
Cress rolled to his feet in silence and raced on padded toes toward the window before his Northern scent might sweep across the library. He leapt through the opening, his body turning as weightless as feathers as he glided on the wind a good quarter mile. He cooled himself to stone and sank back to the ground, landing with a thud.
He whirled to ensure he had not been followed. Only dark streets and distant sounds met his senses—the air was clear, open, and honest. He grimaced at the long crack he’d made in the street from his landing.
For the next hour, Cress jogged through random streets, slipping into every alley, racing through every park, brushing his scent across every landmark and lamppost.
When he was satisfied with his complex web of traces, the Prince headed for the trees.
“Why does everything of the sinister and magical sort always happen in a library?” he muttered to himself.
His mind was haunted. He saw the Queene smile cruelly as though she was there with him. He felt her phantom presence crawling on his shoulders like a glass moonbug. Levress ruthlessly guarded the gate herself. Cress would be a fool to believe she did not know about the Shadow Fairies in the human realm.
He tugged at his tight sweater as he marched across the road. The trees swayed in the midnight breeze, doing their best to relax him. But he came to a halt at the edge of Thelma Lewis’s yard before a heaping pile of dry leaves.
A low growl rumbled through him. Cress strode to the house ever scented of tea, freshly baked chocolate chip cookies, and honey. He came in quietly so he wouldn’t wake Thelma, and he crept up the stairs. The large clock on the wall said it was the earliest of morning hours, deep within the night’s belly. He nearly sprang all the way back down the stairs when Thelma stepped from her bedroom with her arms folded.
“Cress,” she said sternly. “If you’re going to live under my roof, you need to follow my rules. Every one of the young people I’ve raised has had to abide by them. Being strong enough to chop my firewood doesn’t make you an exception.”
Cress sank to a knee on the stair and nodded.
“No more coming in after dark. Do you understand?”
Cress nodded again, unable to look the old human woman in the eyes.
Thelma’s shoulders relaxed. “Get to bed, then.”
Cress trotted the rest of the way up and disappeared into his room.
Well, not his room, but the one he had chosen of the three spare bedrooms available.
He shut the door with a soft click and let out a heavy breath. A goblet of tea rested on the dresser, oozing the scent of honey. He poked it. It was still warm.
Cress listened until the soft footsteps of Thelma Lewis disappeared. He ventured to the dresser to pull off his sweater, stopping before the framed photos where a dark-haired human girl with hazel eyes and an oval mouth smiled beside a younger Officer Lily Baker.
Queensbane, that faeborn-cursed smile.
Cress grumbled and tossed his sweater, heading for the bed that was absolutely covered in the sweet fragrances of Kate Kole. He picked up the book from the nightstand where he’d left it the evening before and flipped it open to the folded page as he hummed to himself.
“Daffodils sway and the golden sun sings, la, la, la, la. Rivers rush and the silver stars sing, la, la, la, la.”
A much raspier voice sang it in his head.
Cress turned the book over. Every paragraph had messily handwritten notes in the margins, a few pages had the corners pressed down, and the cover was scuffed. It seemed Kate Kole had read this book a lot. He wondered why. It was terrible.
The fae Prince sighed and dropped it to his chest, his mind spinning with thoughts of enemy fairies hiding in libraries, human girls he never should have kissed, his brothers he was trying to avoid, and insolent human neighbours who didn’t know their place.
“Wait! Wait!” Thelma whispered, and Cress shot her a look for stopping him. “Not yet!” The old woman held the sleeve of Cress’s plaid button-up coat. Cress huffed impatiently as Thelma peered around the tree trunk. Her spirally gray hair glowed with morning dew.
The low rumble of a human chariot on four wheels trickled through the air and Cress waited, crouched with his fist smooshed against his lazy cheek. A large black bag was slung over his shoulder.
“Now!” Thelma said, shoving him forward.
Cress caught his feet and glided across the yard as smooth as the Northern winds, peeking through trees and shrubs to ensure no humans were watching. The neighbour’s chariot rumbled down the street as Cress came to their spare chariot parked before the house. He flung the vessel door open and began hauling fistfuls of leaves into the backseat from the large bag.
“That’s not enough!” Thelma’s voice came from beside him. Her floral gardening gloves covered her hands.
“I thought you were going to stay back and keep watch!” Cress whispered in return.
“Heck, no! I came to show these neighbours of mine not to mess with me.” Thelma picked up the whole bag and dumped half into the vessel. Cress’s eyes widened. He reached to help her until only half the leaves were left.
“We can’t fit much more,” he said, glancing into the bag.
“Then we’ll put them somewhere else.” Thelma headed to the house and nudged a loose window open. She glanced back at Cress with a wicked smile and gave him a nod.
Cress looked between the old woman and the window.
“Queensbane,” he muttered, hiding a preposterous grin. He hoisted the bag over to the house and held it up, tipping it into the window so the remaining leaves spilled into the quaint living room beyond.
Thelma looked over her shoulder and gasped. “They’re coming back!” she said, and Cress tore the bag back out. Leaves spurted across the grass.
He looked both ways for somewhere to hide until Thelma grabbed his arm and began tugging him back toward her own yard. The old woman snickered as they hustled, and Cress smothered a grin.
“What will you do if they come over angry?” he asked.
“I’ll just get you to answer the door!” Thelma’s roaring laughter rang through the pines as Cress reached around to support her weight. She leaned against him, limping as fast as she could.
“You’re an evil human,” he said. But the old woman’s joy seeped into his bones, leaving a thousand phantom giggles in the air, and after a moment, Cress’s smile faded.
Evil was immoral agendas hidden behind cruel smiles and the threat of death in the air.
The truth was, Thelma Lewis was far from being evil. Cress didn’t believe there was a drop of evil in her, whether her granddaughter was a fairy killer or not.
When they came into the house, Thelma hobbled into the kitchen. “I’ll make tea. We earned it.”
“I’ll help,” Cress said, but he paused as his own words rang clear in his ears. “Actually… I’ll be right back, Grandma Lewis.” Before Thelma could ask, Cress disappeared up the stairs and into his room. He shut the door.
His hand pressed roughly against his chest. “What are you doing, Cressica?” he growled.
He should not care that the old woman was kind, or that she promised to teach him how to make freshly baked chocolate chip cookies, or that she had a contagious laugh. These were his weaknesses, and he had fallen into them with disgraceful ease. If she was a fairy, Thelma would have been excellent at laying traps, not because she wanted to hurt anyone, but because everyone would be drawn in by her warmth and baking.
Cress turned to lean his back against the door. His gaze traced the objects in the room. Objects that reminded him of a human girl he had come to kill. Hair ties, mirrors, and crimson lipstick lay in baskets atop the dresser. Forgotten clothes were tucked into the drawers. A small book collection filled the far shelf, and a tall lamp rested beside the bed, perfect for reading.
Cress closed his eyes with a tight jaw, inviting the cold to return to his gaze.
He moved for the nightstand and tore the drawer open, lifting out the gold-winged handle of his fairsaber. His thumb traced over the button that would draw out the hidden blade. Enough was enough. He had to destroy Kate Kole before it was too late and he lost everything that mattered.
The scent of herbal tea drifted into the room from downstairs and Cress released a heavy breath. There was no point in hurting the old woman. She’d already admitted that her human illness would bring upon her end soon anyway.
But. Kate. Faeborn-cursed. Kole.
Cress had to end this today before his constant need to be near her, to learn all about her, and to hear her raspy voice overtook him and drove him mad. Hiding in her quarters was all he could do to keep himself from charging through the city of humans to find her for all the wrong reasons.
He was not ready when he saw her.
It had been several days since Cress laid eyes on his human target, but for whatever absurd reason, he had forgotten the preposterous depths of green in her eyes and the potency of her offensively innocent fragrance.
He also forgot how to breathe when she intervened in Shayne and Dranian’s petty male fight at the human bookshop. Cress watched it from the window with fire in his blood. He wanted to smack Shayne and Dranian for being such faeborn-cursed fools.
Cress twisted the yarn in his pocket between his fingers as he observed them all tumble from the bookstore entrance like a pack of messy swamp-loons. Shayne had blood in his teeth.
Kate Kole parted from his brothers and fluttered off in the other direction despite Mor’s shouting. Cress stalked after her with several cold words cooling the tip of his tongue. He had warned her. He had been clear. Yet still his brothers were cleaning up after humans, attending human functions, and forgetting their true place among the dignified fairies. Forgetting that they were trained killers created to show little mercy in a hunt.
After a few blocks, a store came into view and Cress stopped walking. Smells of tea and sweets flooded the street from it, but most potently… the itchy scent of cursed fairy yarn tickled his nose. Kate trotted up the front steps.
Cress marched to the front door and grabbed Kate Kole before she could go inside. She released a quiet gasp when he pulled her backward, shoved her aside, and went in himself.
His deadly turquoise gaze fell over the group of females nestled together with magic in the air and yarn on their fingers.
Assassins.
Of course.
No wonder his human target had been able to enslave his brothers. Cress wanted to laugh at the lovely revelation. Kate Kole was not cleverer than him.
Seconds later, Cress took the sisters down two at a time right in the dreaded middle of the human street, but the treacherous members of the Sisterhood of Assassins kept getting back up. They beat him, only by a miracle of the sky deities, with claws and needles and wills of iron. They forced him into an alley, and there Cress laid his head back as the dizzy, endless dark came to steal him. But then her voice sailed in against the black waves, plunging into his mind and releasing ripples through his thoughts.
“Wait!” she screamed before the Sisterhood killed him. And that had been enough.
Cress stifled a moan as the heartache rushed in, worse than any puncture in his flesh. For the first time, he was too weak to deny his wants. When she came to him, he begged her to stay like a fool who deserved to lose his tongue.
