“Well.” Lorcan drummed his fingers against his cheek. Outside, the wind picked up, rattling the window in its frame. “Again, to state the obvious: either because she can’t use magic for this particular task, and perhaps she is unable to take whatever it is through the Faerie Realms?”

  Well, that just created even more questions. I huffed out a frustrated breath.

  Okay, Astrid. Think. You were raised on witch schemes. You should be able to figure this out.

  I’d been dealing with Wanda’s sisters since I could crawl, and all of them were capable of some truly Machiavellian plots, certainly enough to rival the High Sidhe. So, what could that woman be up to?

  The window rattled again, and I glanced up at it, worried for a second that it might actually break. Out in the night, I could just barely see the faint glow of the prison in the distance. Just the memory of those jutting spires and smothering walls was enough to send a shiver down my spine.

  And suddenly I went still. My thoughts whirled, busily trying to put the puzzle pieces together, and not much liking the look of the picture they were making.

  My mouth was so dry, I had to swallow twice before I could get my words unstuck. “Hey Lorcan?” My voice came out hoarse, barely more than a rasp. If I was right, this was huge. Like, hugely huge. Like the hugest of the huge.

  “Yes?”

  “What if it isn’t a ‘what’ that she’s planning on moving?” Then I allowed my gaze to travel to the window, where we both could see the lights from the prison in the distance.

  He frowned, his eyebrows bunching above his nose before flying up almost to his hairline in surprise. “You mean…?”

  I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the magical shadow of the prison, glowing in the night like hellfire. “It’s not just witches locked up in the Jinx Junction penitentiary, is it?”

  Lorcan’s face fell into careful lines. It was the mask he’d learned to use when he wanted to hide whatever it was he was feeling. He didn’t use it much around me, or the coven, but you didn’t get to be centuries old by flying off the handle for no reason.

  “No.” His voice was low, and quiet enough that if I hadn’t developed super hearing, I probably wouldn’t have heard him at all. “Anyone dangerous enough, or violent enough, gets sent there. It’s the worst of the worst of the supernatural community. Murderers, madmen, war criminals. The ones who couldn’t be held anywhere else.”

  Yeah. That was what I’d thought.

  “So, what if Cattleya is trying to break someone out of the prison?” I spoke slowly, thinking as I went along.

  “Then why the ice cream van?”

  I nodded because it was a good question. “What if she’s trying to get someone from the Winter Court out of the prison—which would explain the refrigerated van. In this heat, a Winter Fairie would have trouble.”

  “But why spring one of their enemies?”

  “To use them as a hostage?” I answered with a shrug. “If that’s the case then… well, then Uncle Fox would have to be in on it too?” Which would be a good reason why he didn’t tell me whatever intel Cattleya had told him. Because he didn’t want me to accidentally let that information out.

  “If Fox’s plan to wed Taliyah to unite their courts failed,” Lorcan began, drumming his lips with his fingers. “Then perhaps he’s resorted to plan B: namely, springing someone important from the prison, someone they can use as leverage against Winter in the war?”

  I nodded. “A Winter hostage.”

  Lorcan frowned and I could tell he wasn’t happy about the idea. “It could fit. Of course, then the question is, is Fox Aspen working with the witches of Jinx Junction, or is he planning a prison break without their knowledge?”

  Oh, Goddess, I hadn’t even thought about that. Would Uncle Fox really tick off a whole town of dark witches just for some small amount of gain for his people? Oh, gee, let me think about that for exactly one point five seconds: of course, he would.

  Something cold and slimy coiled through my guts. Was that why he’d called me to Jinx Junction? To help him with some crazy plan? Or worse, was the reason I was supposed to go by a fake name and not reveal my heritage because he wanted me hanging around as a plausible scape goat?

  No. No, he wouldn’t do that to me, to his niece—his flesh and blood.

  Or would he?

  The war had been devastating to the Autumn Court. There had been a reason everyone had been so willing and eager to set up a betrothal between the two monarchs, after all. It wasn’t that anyone thought Fox and a literal infant Taliyah would be a good match, or something.

  But still, I really didn’t think he’d set me up like this. But he was definitely up to something—just something a little bit less messed up, or so I hoped. Maybe I was just supposed to be a distraction? A vampire in a town full of witches was like tossing a lit match into a warehouse full of fireworks. The result was likely to be impressive and blow the actual roof off a building.

  Maybe my bumbling around and making all the witches focus on me, so obvious and so suspicious, would give Uncle Fox and Cattleya a chance to smuggle their prize out of the prison? It still hurt like hell that he wouldn’t tell me I was just a pawn in his game. It hurt to think Uncle Fox would just use me like that, and not even warn me that something might be going down.

  He was supposed to be my family.

  Some of what I was feeling must have showed on my face, because Lorcan straightened up and reached out to take my hand.

  “Hey,” he said, gently. “We don’t know what’s going on. Perhaps we’re wrong. Perhaps it’s something else entirely. Something innocent. Or, as innocent as things get with Fae aristocracy scheming together.”

  “That doesn’t sound likely.”

  He nodded. “Regardless, try not to jump to too many conclusions, alright, Sweetling?”

  I let out a slow breath and nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, you’re right.”

  But the sick feeling in my gut wouldn’t go away. Was it the blood I’d drunk earlier? Could blood go off, like spoiled milk? I hadn’t felt so queasy since I’d opened my eyes without a pulse.

  “I think I need some air.”

  Three strides took me to the window, and I flipped the lock and yanked it open. A sudden gust of wind tore into the room, sending the drapes flying and scattering the deck of cards we’d been playing with across the floor. Lorcan cursed, making a grab for them, but he only managed to snatch a handful before they hit the wall, skittering under the bed.

  “Sorry, sorry.” But I didn’t close the window. I didn’t sweat, and my heart didn’t pound, but there was an unbearable tightness in my chest that would have made it very hard for my lungs to expand if I’d actually needed the air.

  Lorcan was right. It was stupid to get emotional, to let my feelings be hurt, all over something that was wild speculation at best. I needed more information, if I wanted to get to the bottom of what exactly was going on in Jinx Junction. But one thing I knew for sure, my long-awaited training session with Uncle Fox the next night was sure going to be interesting.

  Something moving down on the street below caught my eye, and I glanced down. It was a weird time of night for someone to be out and about. Most even the hard-core partiers had wrapped up for the night. Sunrise wasn’t that far off, almost time for all the good little vampires to get in their beds. But there, down on the wooden walkway in front of the hotel, was someone walking slowly, as if looking for something.

  It wasn’t the easiest to tell from the third floor, but whoever was lurking down there didn’t look to be very tall. Small, hunched shoulders, dark hair. It wasn’t until she glanced up that I recognized her. It was the girl from the bar. The one I’d had to stop from blowing up her potion and probably giving herself a nasty burn at best, and a nasty hex at worse. What was her name again? Meredith.

  She was also Sheriff Boline’s daughter. So, what was she doing outside my hotel at a time of night so late that it had somehow cycled back around to being early again? And was her mother aware she was out and about? Something told me the answer to that question was a resounding ‘no’.

  She glanced up then and caught me watching her in the window. Meredith froze mid step, like a deer startled by a hunter. Her face was as pale as the moonlight as she jerked her gaze from mine and hurried around the corner, disappearing from sight.

  Well, huh. That was weird. Of course, everything was weird in Jinx Junction, and I was starting to lose the ability to even recognize it. With the army of dark witches protecting it, Jinx Junction was pretty safe, even as Hollows went. If you weren’t a vampire, at least. But it was still strange for a girl who couldn’t be more than sixteen to be out on her own strolling around, especially because it looked like she was up to no good. Why had she been out there? What was she looking for or what was she doing?

  Well, those were questions that would have to go tragically unanswered, because Lucretia Boline had made it exceedingly clear just what she would do to me if I so much as looked at her daughter again, and I wasn’t interested in giving her an excuse to act out that terrifying little vision.

  I dug my thumb into the space between my eyebrows, trying to work away the phantom headache I felt building there. It was late. The sun was coming up soon, and I just really hoped that I’d be able to fall asleep and not worry about all the crap going on around me for a few hours. That would be nice.

  I contemplated telling Lorcan that I’d just seen Meredith skulking alone outside but then decided against it for two reasons—first, he wouldn’t know any better what she was up to and second, I didn’t want to get him in trouble with Sheriff Boline either. As far as I was concerned, the sooner we could get the spell out of Jinx Junction, the better.

  I eased the window closed with a sigh and relocked it before turning back to Lorcan. “I’m not sure I’m up for any more Go Fish, if it’s all the same to you.”

  “Of course.” He smiled, wide enough to flash fangs and make the corners of his eyes crinkle as he stood up and smoothed down his shirt. “I’m fairly certain it changed into a game of fifty-two pick up at the end, anyway.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  I drew in a breath, letting the warm breeze curl into my lungs and held it there for a count of three.

  The woods were all around me, life glimmering in green and gold threads beneath bark and heart wood. The rustling of the trees was like a chorus of whispering voices. Magic hung in the air, as thick as yellow pollen. It was dizzying. It was breathtaking. I could have lost myself in it, if the little whining voice in my ear would just shut up and leave me in peace for a freaking minute.

  “Stop distracting me,” I muttered under my breath, shooting a sour look at the rodent winding around my legs.

  I was sitting in lotus position in the middle of a ring of elm trees, closing my eyes as I tried to hold the image Uncle Fox had given me in the forefront of my mind. I’d been at this for an hour, practicing the most difficult bit of magic I’d learned yet. Glamour. It was a common but intricate magic that most faeries learned early on. If you wanted to go unnoticed in the human world, you had to blend in. For smaller faeries, it meant disguising themselves as animals or children. For the Sidhe, it meant projecting a human facade.

  I was supposed to be impersonating a middle-aged white woman with a short, curly bob, and muddy brown eyes. So far, I’d only managed to make my hair look wavier, and that was due in large part to the rat’s interference. Not to mention the helpful suggestions from the peanut gallery.

  “I will not,” Yew squeaked, small paws scrabbling over my tennis shoes as he hauled himself into my lap. “You promised me a new owner. The witch we met in the last Hollow was barely fit to tie her own shoes, let alone cast spells. We had a deal, and now that we’re in a Hollow full of witches, I want you to uphold that deal.”

  The scornful description of my niece, Sybil, was insulting. Accurate but still insulting. The mannequin-turned-witch had a long way to go before she was fit to join witch society at large, let alone have a familiar. I’d made Yew a promise not long ago when I’d needed his help to get out from Valserak’s thumb and I intended to keep it. Honest. Just… well, just not right now.

  “What am I supposed to do, huh? Go up to every young witch I see and offer her a random familiar?”

  “Not the worst of your ideas.”

  I frowned at that. “And how would I explain the fact that I have you in the first place? Lucretia Boline threatened to smite me for having a brief conversation with her daughter. I don’t imagine offering her a black-market familiar is going to earn me any brownie points.” The less attention I drew from that woman, the better.

  “Find a way,” he insisted, rearing up on his hind legs so he could put his oversized paws on my stomach. I was pretty sure he was trying to stare me down. The attempt lacked any intimidation factor, mainly because he was a rodent the size of a house cat. “I am through being smuggled in your suitcase as you gallivant across the country—”.

  “Might I remind you that I didn’t invite you on this trip. You invited yourself.”

  He frowned at that and then frowned a little harder. “And there is only so much I can take from those two.”

  I poorly hid a smile. Ignoring the fact that he’d smuggled himself, uninvited, Flax and Smudge had been a surprise visit. I’d met them while stumbling through the Autumn portion of Faerie. They were a raven and gray cat respectively, able to morph into childlike human versions of themselves at will. They were meant to teach bespelled scarecrows how to frighten off intruders, but had given the duty up in order to join me here, in the real world, for however long. Uncle Fox had thought they might cheer me up a little bit—clearly he’d caught on to the fact that I wasn’t exactly happy in Jinx Junction. Had he offered any other information? No, because that would have been too easy. Well, if he was going to keep his secrets, then I was going to keep mine—including what I’d overseen with Cattleya and with Meredith. Two could play this stupid game.

  Not to mention that I was pretty sure my uncle was already well aware of what was going on with Cattleya—the more I thought about it, the more I figured they were in league together—about to do something infinitely stupid. And if he didn’t want to involve or tell me about it, well, I didn’t want to know. I’d just as soon not have the wrath of every witch in Jinx Junction coming down on me fully.

  As to Flax and Smudge, Flax had taken a liking to me after I’d defended her from some of the Prince’s guards. Uncle Fox only tolerated them because their presence allowed me to pester the small faeries with questions, instead of using him as a fount of all knowledge. They’d shown up before I’d set out for my training session, and just having them here made me feel a little lighter, a little less alone. They wouldn’t be much use in might, but they were still friendly and familiar faces. Both things Jinx Junction was sorely lacking.

  Even now, they were giving me half-hearted praise from the sidelines and were routinely berated by Mocha when they disrupted the lesson.

  Yew let out an indignant squeak when he was lifted off my lap and tossed toward the sidelines by an unseen hand. Uncle Fox then shot everyone a warning look over my head, eyes flashing gold as his temper got the better of him. It wasn’t often that the Prince of Autumn lost his cool, but my entourage was enough to try the patience of a saint.

  “Quiet down,” he said in a warning tone. “Or I will see to it that you all ride in the baggage hold when we fly to our next destination. And I will put you all into one cat carrier.”

  That shut everyone up, even the finicky Mocha. I sensed he wanted to say or do more, but didn’t dare cross my uncle. Even an entitled familiar knew better than to cross the most powerful faerie in the region. Fae royals weren’t exactly known for being reasonable nor for letting bygones be bygones. No one did devastating, petty revenge like the Fae.

  That was why I was holding all the questions that were burning the back of my throat until the end of the lesson. I wanted answers, and if Uncle Fox was anyone else, I’d have been demanding them by now. But, well, the coven had taught me that family only went so far, and I didn’t want him to be angry with me. At least, not until I knew how angry at him I should be.

  Still, it was a struggle. And the annoyance with Yew wasn’t helping anything.

  “Better,” Fox said with a sigh. “Now, focus. I want you to turn into this woman and weave a subtle compulsion into the glamour I taught you last week. No one should look twice at you if you do this right.”

  It should have been simple. Faeries learned this one straight away, when they were barely more than children. Even Taliyah, who’d been raised human for almost five decades of her life, had managed to master glamour within a short time. But every time I tried to keep the image of an average, mundane woman in my thoughts, it trickled away. The tip of my nose had been tingling like crazy for most of the session, and it took every ounce of restraint I had not to rub it raw. I was dead. It wasn’t as if I could get allergies, but I still felt like I desperately wanted to sneeze.

  “I’m trying,” I said, fixing the image in my mind again.

  The woman was plain. It should have been easy to paint a picture of her and project it outward. In some ways, the process was similar to what I was used to. Witch magic operated on three principles when you boiled it down to the basics: intent, incantation, and issue forth. Faeries didn’t actually need the second step, which should have made it easier, not harder. Witches absorbed energy from the natural world, using that energy to fuel and recharge their magic. Faeries were nature, a personification of their season and its values. I didn’t need words to make magic happen, though I sometimes said them aloud for my own comfort.

  “Try harder,” Uncle Fox pressed. “It’s essential that you master glamour. You’ll be traveling under a guise almost every time you cross over into the mortal world. Staying as you are paints a target on your back. Assassination attempts are coming.”