fighting.”
Damn, that’s impressive. Illusion is a common magic, but most fae who are adept at it can only keep themselves unseen while they’re fighting. Those who are stronger might be able to hide an additional fae or two, but concealing half a dozen fae who are all moving and fighting and lunging in different directions takes some serious magical skills.
Which makes our job anything but simple. I’ll have to assume every fae with him is invisible.
“How do we know he’s here then?” I ask.
“He’s recruiting.”
At my frown, Aren gives me his signature half smile then motions me to follow him over the low wall. I slide over the wind-worn stone and grimace when my feet squish into the ground. There are no cobblestones on this side of the wall. Or, if there are, they’re underneath an inch-thick layer of mud. The city is built on a hillside, and we’re standing in a shallow canal that cuts between tall, stone buildings.
Trev sinks into the muck beside me. Without a word, we both follow Aren. Since the fae are silent, I keep quiet, too, suppressing a number of curses because it’s hard as hell to keep my shoes on my feet. The mud keeps suctioning them off. It’s slowing me down more than usual, so when Trev glares over his shoulder at me for the third time, I throw off the impractical dress shoes, hoping there’s nothing in this sludge that will slice open my feet.
When I catch up with Aren and Trev again, I realize we’re not alone in this canal. We’re following a fae. I only see the back of his shaggy head, so I can’t recognize him, but he’s not dressed in any kind of armor. And, if I’m not mistaken, he looks young, too young to be one of Lena’s swordsmen.
“He’s
imithi
,” Aren says, slowing his pace until I’m at his side.
Imithi?
Curious, I squint through the darkness as the fae stops and faces us. Aren used to be one of them. They’re orphans, fae who have no parents, no homes, and no roots linking them to anywhere in the Realm. They fissure from city to city, stealing, looting, and generally creating havoc wherever they go.
When we reach the
imithi
, the boy cocks his head at me, his silver-blue eyes openly taking me in from rain-drenched head to sludge-covered feet, which feel like blocks of ice now. I
think
he’s young, but I’ve always had trouble guessing how old fae are. They age slower than humans do, except in their early years. From birth until the teens, we mature almost at the same rate. It’s a good thing, too, because it would be freaking bizarre to talk to a twenty-year-old man who looks like a five-year-old boy. Still, it’s difficult to figure out those later teenage years. The boy looks like he could be a high-school freshman, but he could just as well be the age of a college graduate.
“She’s the shadow-witch?”
he asks in Fae.
“She is,”
Aren answers.
The boy makes a face.
“She doesn’t look like she could slice a leaf.”
Slice a leaf? I glance at Aren and see the corner of his mouth lift into a smile.
“Careful,”
he says.
“She’s stronger than she looks, and she has the willpower of a
kasnek
.”
I have no idea what a
kasnek
is, but Aren’s words are clearly complimentary, and his tone is warm and affectionate. It makes me warm. And it makes me want to slide inside his embrace. As soon as we have a moment alone together, he’s going to tell me what’s really making him put distance between us.
“Really?”
the boy says. He shakes his head, flicking his wet, curly brown hair out of his eyes.
“Can I touch her?”
“If you want to damage your magic, sure,”
Aren says with an it’s-your-funeral kind of shrug.
I glare at Aren. It’s human tech that damages fae magic, not humans, but most fae are so paranoid about their magic that they’ll believe almost anything about us. It doesn’t help that Aren’s spread more rumors about the “shadow-witch” than I can count, turning me into some kind of mythological
Damn, that’s impressive. Illusion is a common magic, but most fae who are adept at it can only keep themselves unseen while they’re fighting. Those who are stronger might be able to hide an additional fae or two, but concealing half a dozen fae who are all moving and fighting and lunging in different directions takes some serious magical skills.
Which makes our job anything but simple. I’ll have to assume every fae with him is invisible.
“How do we know he’s here then?” I ask.
“He’s recruiting.”
At my frown, Aren gives me his signature half smile then motions me to follow him over the low wall. I slide over the wind-worn stone and grimace when my feet squish into the ground. There are no cobblestones on this side of the wall. Or, if there are, they’re underneath an inch-thick layer of mud. The city is built on a hillside, and we’re standing in a shallow canal that cuts between tall, stone buildings.
Trev sinks into the muck beside me. Without a word, we both follow Aren. Since the fae are silent, I keep quiet, too, suppressing a number of curses because it’s hard as hell to keep my shoes on my feet. The mud keeps suctioning them off. It’s slowing me down more than usual, so when Trev glares over his shoulder at me for the third time, I throw off the impractical dress shoes, hoping there’s nothing in this sludge that will slice open my feet.
When I catch up with Aren and Trev again, I realize we’re not alone in this canal. We’re following a fae. I only see the back of his shaggy head, so I can’t recognize him, but he’s not dressed in any kind of armor. And, if I’m not mistaken, he looks young, too young to be one of Lena’s swordsmen.
“He’s
imithi
,” Aren says, slowing his pace until I’m at his side.
Imithi?
Curious, I squint through the darkness as the fae stops and faces us. Aren used to be one of them. They’re orphans, fae who have no parents, no homes, and no roots linking them to anywhere in the Realm. They fissure from city to city, stealing, looting, and generally creating havoc wherever they go.
When we reach the
imithi
, the boy cocks his head at me, his silver-blue eyes openly taking me in from rain-drenched head to sludge-covered feet, which feel like blocks of ice now. I
think
he’s young, but I’ve always had trouble guessing how old fae are. They age slower than humans do, except in their early years. From birth until the teens, we mature almost at the same rate. It’s a good thing, too, because it would be freaking bizarre to talk to a twenty-year-old man who looks like a five-year-old boy. Still, it’s difficult to figure out those later teenage years. The boy looks like he could be a high-school freshman, but he could just as well be the age of a college graduate.
“She’s the shadow-witch?”
he asks in Fae.
“She is,”
Aren answers.
The boy makes a face.
“She doesn’t look like she could slice a leaf.”
Slice a leaf? I glance at Aren and see the corner of his mouth lift into a smile.
“Careful,”
he says.
“She’s stronger than she looks, and she has the willpower of a
kasnek
.”
I have no idea what a
kasnek
is, but Aren’s words are clearly complimentary, and his tone is warm and affectionate. It makes me warm. And it makes me want to slide inside his embrace. As soon as we have a moment alone together, he’s going to tell me what’s really making him put distance between us.
“Really?”
the boy says. He shakes his head, flicking his wet, curly brown hair out of his eyes.
“Can I touch her?”
“If you want to damage your magic, sure,”
Aren says with an it’s-your-funeral kind of shrug.
I glare at Aren. It’s human tech that damages fae magic, not humans, but most fae are so paranoid about their magic that they’ll believe almost anything about us. It doesn’t help that Aren’s spread more rumors about the “shadow-witch” than I can count, turning me into some kind of mythological
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