‘I’m afraid if she continues down this path, not even you can prevent that,’ Isolde said, her voice full of warning as she met Keira’s gaze again. ‘Don’t walk it, Kiki. Turn and give up this chase while you’re still able to.’

  ‘It’s my choice, Iz,’ Keira murmured, tightening her grip on her father’s old stalking rifle fastened over her shoulder.

  ‘Then I can’t help you.’

  Giving Elijah one last scathing look, Isolde beckoned to the other witches to turn, and Keira and Elijah watched them disappear amongst the trees. Keira’s stomach churned. She hated disappointing Isolde, and she hated being at odds with her even more.

  ‘You don’t need to do this, you know,’ Elijah said, once they were gone.

  ‘It’s the best way to get August back,’ Keira said, raising a brow at him.

  But he merely looked back at her, his gaze full of meaning. As if asking how bad it would be if she didn’t. She didn’t want to answer that. Wouldn’t know what to do with herself if she chose to let August go. Just stay in this village as a servant forever? She wanted more in life.

  They walked a little further in silence, until they spotted a small cave at the foot of a mountain. They settled on either side of its walls, crammed so tightly that their knees brushed each other.

  For a long while, Keira watched the quiet woods outside, while Elijah watched her.

  ‘What?’ she snapped when her skin felt a little too tight.

  ‘You’re in a mood today. I thought we were…getting comfortable with one another last night.’ He winked.

  She shifted against the rock wall. ‘Well, you thought wrong.’

  Fact was, they’d gotten too comfortable last night. All night she’d struggled to get him out of her head, images of his eyes, his mouth, his tongue – and what she supposed he could do with it – invading her every dream. Even now, his closeness made her skin feel like it was on fire.

  ‘Are we merely going to sit here and wait then?’ he asked at last, and Keira hissed at him.

  ‘Yes. It is better to wait for the stag to come to us, rather than go trudging through the woods for an eternity. But it won’t come if you keep talking. It’ll be able to hear us from miles off.’

  ‘Such a shame,’ Elijah muttered to himself, glancing about the cave. ‘It would have been a practical place for a lesson. You know, on touching yourself? But if it can hear us talking…it’d definitely hear the sounds I’d have you make.’

  She couldn’t help it. Her eyes cut to his, her lips parted, and a stirring spread through her body, heating the spot between her legs.

  She clenched them closer together, and Elijah’s smile grew wicked.

  ‘There is no point hiding it from me,’ he hummed, then leaned his head against the rock wall. ‘I sense it all.’

  ‘Is that a djinn thing?’ she asked, and nearly shuddered at the thought. Perhaps it was a good thing most of them were extinct. Elijah seemed…trustworthy enough, his arrogance and flirtatiousness aside, but she doubted every demon spirit would be like him.

  ‘You could say that,’ Elijah quipped, his voice short enough that she had the sense that he didn’t want to talk about it. Which only piqued her curiosity more.

  ‘Tell me about yourself. I hardly know anything about you, yet you already know so much about me.’

  ‘I thought you didn’t want us to chat.’ His mouth curved into a half-smile, yet the humour still didn’t reach his eyes. She rolled her own and sighed, setting her sights on the woodland area outside the cave. It was perfectly still, without an animal in sight, and she wondered if perhaps it was too quiet. If they should have moved deeper into the woods to find the stag.

  ‘How do you plan to kill it?’

  Picking up her rifle, Keira mimicked loading it and shooting. ‘Straight to the neck.’

  ‘Cutthroat little thing, aren’t you?’ Elijah said, making her snort sarcastically.

  ‘It means it’ll die within seconds. No suffering.’ Just like her father had taught her. And she wondered, in that moment, whether he had suffered or not, when a slight rustling sound caught her ear and they both stilled.

  There in the clearing appeared the stag, magnificent and mighty.

  It was larger than any stag she had seen before, its antlers wide and far-reaching; an intricate work of art crowning its head as if it were the king of the forest. Or an emperor.

  No wonder the legend had taken the shape it had.

  With her heart pounding in her chest, Keira aimed her rifle at the animal turning its head left and right as if looking for danger – unable to see it staring it in its face.

  Her finger readied to pull the trigger, and then⁠—

  Elijah rose and slipped on some rocks, causing such a ruckus that it startled the animal straight back into the bushes.

  ‘Whatever did you just do?’ she cried out incredulously. It had been half a miracle that the stag had shown in the first place so soon and with all their chatter, but now…? Now she felt certain it wouldn’t go near this place for days. Frustration tore at her at the thought. She did not have days.

  ‘Apologies, I just wanted a better look,’ Elijah said, at least having the decency to look slightly embarrassed.

  Harrumphing, Keira picked up her rifle and strode out of the cave, moving further into the woods.

  ‘We’ll be at it all night now,’ she complained. ‘And by it’ – she twirled on her heel, pointing at him as he opened his mouth to speak – ‘I do not mean a lesson.’

  ‘It’d certainly make for more fun,’ Elijah said pointedly and strolled past her, as elegantly and soundlessly as a cat. She took him in. His grace. His pure control of his body. So different from the stumbling buffoon she’d sat with back in the cave. So different that she could not help but feel suspicious.

  ‘Did you do it deliberately?’ she asked.

  ‘Do what?’ He shrugged and turned, clearly feigning ignorance.

  ‘Scare it away!’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. A djinn may stumble, you know.’ He continued into the woods.

  She shook her head and growled at him. ‘But you didn’t stumble. You startled it on purpose. Why?’ Whatever reason did he have to do so? Unless he didn’t want her to capture the stag… She paused. ‘Are you sabotaging my attempts to get August back?’

  Elijah barked a laugh. ‘You manage that perfectly well on your own.’

  ‘Whatever are you talking about? If you’re sabotaging me—’ She hissed and grabbed his shoulder, forced him around—and stepped back. His eyes glinted dangerously, full of challenge.

  ‘Have you considered that your “hunting skills” may be the problem?’ He stepped forward, forcing her backwards until she bumped against a tree.

  ‘My hunting skills are perfectly fine, thank you,’ she spluttered, narrowing her eyes. The tree pressed against her back.

  He smirked, his gaze once again assessing her in a way that made her skin flush. ‘To kill, yes. To kill, I’d say they’re rather admirable. But not to catch.’

  ‘What are you suggesting?’

  ‘I’m suggesting that you’ve hunted August to death. That perhaps’ – Elijah stepped so close now that she could feel his breath against her neck, her chin, the corner of her lips – ‘you’ve hunted him so hard, he no longer cares to hunt you.’ He brushed his thumb along her chin, tilting her head back to meet his gaze. ‘Not as he should.’ He let silence fill their closeness, letting his breath caress the bottom pillow of her mouth. Then he stepped back. ‘A good hunter hunts the prey. A great hunter lets the prey believe itself to be the hunter, until they’re caught in the snare.’

  ‘I don’t want to trap him.’ Keira sneered. ‘I—’ But as she spoke, Elijah waved her away.

  ‘Yes, yes, I know. You want to marry him, love him. You’re soulmates. And yet’—he spread his arms wide—‘you don’t see him out here hunting the stag, do you?’

  He left her speechless, continuing in the direction the stag had gone.

  Keira didn’t realise how far they had gone until she saw a tower rising in the distance, and it dawned on her that they were swiftly approaching the Tyrant Emperor’s old palace – or what was left of it.

  The site of the palace ruins was just as she remembered it.

  Vast and magnificent, one could just about make out how it had looked in its glory days, before Mother Nature claimed it, its extensive gardens stretching far beyond the main building.

  Keira stepped onto the grounds, sensing Elijah behind her. He’d gone awfully quiet, taking in the remains of what might once have been perfectly trimmed hedges and trees placed in formations, encircling delicate fountains that had long since broken and wasted away under the pressure of roots and foliage. Now, the trees grew wild, stretching their branched arms in the direction of the palace itself, as if they’d once been rebels about to storm it, caught in time and turned as one with the forest that had grown around them.

  ‘The Palace of the Cardinal Seven… Did you ever see it in its glory days?’

  ‘Briefly,’ Elijah murmured. ‘It sure looked better than this, though.’

  She didn’t doubt it. Many of the minor buildings had fallen to decay, save for a circular temple speckled with minty green foliose and the pale palace building itself, its elaborate stone carvings still visible through the layers of overgrowth.

  ‘It’s not too bad inside.’

  Elijah paused in his steps. ‘You’ve been?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Keira murmured, stepping between the pillars and up the small steps of the palace threshold. ‘I used to ride here often as a child. It was my personal playground.’ She pushed at the giant door. Slowly, it creaked open, revealing the vast hall inside.

  Pillars upon pillars lined it from one end to another. Some were chipped, and almost all were wrought in ivy and green growth, framing entries to different parts of the palace, adorning the space not occupied by a large staircase. It led past a giant, ornated window – the layers of dust so thick that the sunrays barely found a way through, save for the places where the glass had cracked and shattered.

  ‘I always imagined being a princess in these halls,’ Keira said, taking in the room. In every crack and crevice there were ropy vines and other thick foliage creeping through, hanging over railings, and decorating the space with their eerie beauty. Not even birdsong could be heard within them.

  She stumbled at that. Once again, it was too quiet, and she realised the djinn had not replied yet.

  ‘Elijah?’ She turned, seeing no one behind her but the empty grounds of the palace. ‘Elijah!’

  Muffled sounds caught her ears, and she rushed around the corner, seeing Elijah being hauled away towards the woods between two⁠—

  Keira gasped. It couldn’t be. No one had seen one in years. Yet there they were, two creatures from Faerie, dragging Elijah between them.

  ‘Elijah!’

  ‘Keira! Run!’ he shouted behind hands attempting to stifle him as he tried and failed to fight them off.

  One of them turned, throwing a spinning blade towards her, and a sharp sting followed.

  She hissed, clutching her arm, then pulled at her rifle, aiming it the best she could with her wounded shoulder. ‘Let him go!’ she shouted.

  The other fae turned to face her, sharp teeth gleaming in his wicked smile. ‘Put that down, human girl, before you⁠—’

  She fired, and the fae dropped to the ground.

  Stunned, the other fae stumbled backwards, glanced between her and Elijah, now dumped on the ground, and then took off into the woods.

  Keira rushed over, pulse still pounding in her ears, to find Elijah untying himself from coppery ropes. Beside him, the shot fae thrashed and writhed, his golden skin turning ashen grey as he gaped towards the sky before he stilled completely.

  ‘What–what happened to him?’ Keira stuttered.

  ‘Iron,’ Elijah mumbled, glancing between the fae and her rifle in awe. ‘Keira, did your father use iron bullets?’

  ‘I suppose so. Why?’

  ‘Because iron kills the fae, like copper redirects and prevents magic.’

  ‘Copper…’ She looked at the binds circling him on the ground. ‘That’s why you couldn’t fight them off. And the base of your lamp…’

  ‘Is why it can hold me. But that doesn’t answer the bigger question.’ Elijah frowned.

  ‘And what’s that?’

  ‘Why did your father keep weapons against the fae?’

  11

  TOUCHED

  ‘You know, as a child, I’d heal abnormally fast,’ Keira said as Elijah dabbed the wound on her arm with a cotton pad. ‘I used to pretend like I had magic. Like you.’

  They’d returned to the cottage and were sat upon his mattress before the fireplace, the warmth of it heating their skin in the dim light.

  He smiled softly; his own scratches were already healed. ‘It does come in handy, like that old rifle of yours.’ He paused, glancing at her ever so slightly. ‘So…why do you think your father kept weapons against the fae?’

  Keira shrugged. ‘I don’t know. But my parents always did warn me about magical beings, djinns included.’ She cut him a look that had him grinning so devilishly that it should have been illegal. Especially considering the way it made her stomach flutter. ‘I wouldn’t be surprised if half the village has iron bullets in their chambers, if only in fear that the Folk would cross the wall of Faerie.’ She scrunched up her lips and mused. ‘Why did the Folk try to capture you?’

  ‘I’m…indebted to the Spring Queen. I guess she’s getting impatient.’

  ‘The Spring Queen?’ Keira gasped, then swallowed as Elijah began wrapping her wound, his fingertips brushing against her skin. ‘She’s real?’

  The Spring Queen had been rumoured to be the last of her kind after the war against the Tyrant Emperor and the hunt for magical creatures. The last of the fae, sitting on her throne all on her lonesome even to this day. Although Keira supposed, from what she had seen today, that wasn’t entirely true.

  ‘She most definitely is,’ Elijah said, and a muscle ticked in his jaw. ‘There,’ he added, putting the final touch on the linen wrap around her arm, as a way of distraction. She allowed it, her attention preoccupied with the burn of his gaze.

  ‘Thank you for rescuing me today. I guess your end of our deal is fulfilled.’

  ‘It was hardly a favour.’

  ‘I’d beg to differ.’ He cupped her chin, and for a moment she wondered if he would lean in to give her a kiss for her troubles. Her heart skipped a beat at the thought, and her breath caught. But he merely shifted his hand to move a lock of hair behind her ear.

  Then he started putting away her medical kit and pocketed the cotton pieces used to clean her wound. ‘Although,’ he groaned, ‘I don’t know how I’ll live down the shame of having needed rescuing from a human.’

  ‘Oh, shut it, you,’ Keira growled, and hit him with his pillow. He chortled and lay down on his side, stretching his long legs along the mattress. She could not help but wonder what it would be like to be entangled with those legs, and her cheeks heated once more.

  ‘You could always hold up your end of the bargain, you know.’ She glanced at him with a challenge in her voice, matching the hum in her chest. ‘Teach me how to please a man.’

  He scoffed. ‘So that you may use the skills to please August while he does nothing to please you?’

  The words cut her, but not nearly as much as they also seemed to cut him, the tartness bleeding into his voice. Somehow, it softened the sting.

  ‘Fine,’ she said, putting on an air of indifference as she rose and headed towards the doorway. ‘Then you may remain indebted to both the Spring Queen and me. I will learn, with or without your help.’ She looked back at him with her hands on her hips, but her bravado faltered as she realised he’d followed, standing so close that it forced her back against the wall.

  ‘I have no doubt you will,’ Elijah crooned and leaned over her, one hand supporting his weight on the frame behind her head. Her breath caught, feeling his on her skin, watching the closeness of his lips. ‘Once you’ve learned to pleasure yourself.’

  ‘I best go up and try then, shouldn’t I?’ Keira taunted lowly, hoping her voice didn’t betray how much he affected her, before she slipped out from underneath him and waved him off, stumbling her way up the crooked staircase to her bedroom.

  ‘Remember, if you’re stuck, all you need is some expert fingers.’ He waved back, to which she responded with just a finger of her own. She could not help but smile as she heard him chuckle behind her.

  Once in bed, however, her mind would not still, and she found herself unable to think of anything but Elijah’s parting words.

  Barely half an hour later, she made her way downstairs again, dressed in her sleepwear, and paused at the threshold of the living room, picking at the doorframe.

  Inside, Elijah lay shirtless on his side on the mattress, head resting on his hand, eyes upon the hearth. The firelight devoured every inch of his exposed skin and muscles, until she cleared her throat and he looked up, his expression sober and wide awake.

  ‘I…can’t figure out how to do it.’

  Quietly, he beckoned her down on the mattress with him. When she did not move, he raised his hands. ‘I promised not to take or ask for your body, remember?’

  Hesitantly, she moved closer and sat down beside him with the hearth warming her back, her legs curled up underneath her. ‘Okay. Tell me.’

  He arched an eyebrow at her tense, locked-up position. ‘I can show you better than I can tell you. And I promise,’ he added as she bit her lip, ‘your nightgown will hide everything from my view.’ His hand started to reach for hers.

  ‘Might you not tell me something about yourself?’ she blurted out.

  He paused and looked up, dark, full lashes framing his beautiful eyes. They were a fine sea-green colour for the night, with specks of brown that turned into gold with the flickering light. ‘Like what?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ She chuckled nervously. ‘I–I just realised I still don’t really know you, and…’ She exhaled, gaze falling to her lap and her hands folded there. ‘You’re a mystery to me…still.’