Chapter 14 #2
Gerard’s chest tightened with a surging, uncomfortable sensation that felt far too close to fear. He shut it down immediately.
Emotions never helped him. What he needed was strategy.
Years ago, alone in his school library, he had read that the fae were bound by tradition and honor to the rules of any game they agreed to play.
Gerard didn’t know all of this tournament’s rules, nor exactly how Oberon had exploited them to force Lorelei into participating when she’d tried to slip away on their first arrival.
Still, he’d seen for himself how the individual trials worked.
Each challenge might be intimidatingly difficult, but none of them could be genuinely impossible, for the sake of their eager audience as well as the contestants.
Even if Lord Oberon was confident that Gerard—human, ignorant, and nonmagical—wouldn’t be able to complete this trial, a method for completion must exist.
All he had to do was think through it.
How would he recognize Lorelei in any form? What was her true essence?
Slowly, his head tipped back to examine those bright, colorful birds who’d been flitting back and forth above him all along.
On the floor around him, competitors hurried past his still body and swore at the various small, drab, brown birds who obstructed the path. Time ticked down on the clock of flowers, but Gerard’s gaze remained fixed on the bright plumage of the birds loudly squabbling above.
Was one of them more colorful than the others? More extravagant in her beauty? More likely to win this aggressive, nonstop battle over territory that they were all fighting? Or …
Wait. Everything inside him stilled as he suddenly remembered that vast, impossible voice from the field whispering to him, “Be careful with her.”
He’d taken it as a warning against Lorelei. What if it had actually been the opposite: a reminder to him not to make any more careless mistakes in judging her based on false gossip and his own preconceptions?
To the world at large, Lorelei did indeed present a fabulous show full of color and light. But when it came to her private essence, behind every mask and illusion …
What had he been missing all along?
“Curse you, get out of my way!” a male voice snarled. A soft thud sounded in the air an instant later, followed by a chirp of pain. “I don’t have time for this!”
Gerard’s gaze snapped downwards. Farther down the path, one of the fae noblemen had just kicked aside a small, drab, brown bird … who had apparently been trying to shield two other birds on their way across the path.
As the nobleman stalked off, the injured bird picked herself up, scornfully shook off her feathers, and strutted over to take up her shielding position once again for a full family of birds about to cross the path, including three fluffy hatchlings.
As Gerard watched, she puffed up her brown feathers, lifted her beak, and caroled a high and noisy taunt to all the large and dangerous threats currently clomping through the glasshouse.
… Just as Lorelei had taunted Gerard a few days ago as she’d stood beside her allies.
“Two minutes!” That was a dryad, her voice high with panic. “Gods above, there’s only two minutes left! Silverthorn, find me, damn your eyes!”
Calmly, Gerard took note of the announced time. Then he strode two steps closer to the slowly crossing family of birds and raised one booted foot as if to step downwards.
The family’s self-appointed guardian ran directly at him, hopping and flapping and shrieking unmistakable bird taunts. As usual, she was doing everything she could to be so outrageous that she kept all the world’s eyes fixed firmly on her—and away from those she was determined to protect.
Gerard’s lips curved as he reached down to scoop her up in his palms, ignoring every irate squawk and peck of her small, sharp beak against his skin. “Of course I won’t hurt them,” he murmured. “Lorelei, I see you.”
Whether she was feathered or not, for the first time in seven years, that statement felt true.
Light shimmered in his cupped hands, far too bright to bear.
He had to press his eyes shut against its blinding force, but he never turned away or released his grip as the shape in his hands shifted from a small, round bird into a beautifully rounded woman …
a woman he’d misjudged in so many ways. He was still holding her shoulders—now covered in layers of silk and shivering with convulsive tremors of reaction—when the light finally died down and he opened his eyes again.
Her blue eyes looked wide and lost, darting from side to side in confusion—and then they fixed on his and steadied.
Still holding his gaze, she took a long, deep breath. He tightened his grip, steadying her as her shivers gradually eased.
“I see you, Lorelei,” he murmured once again.
He’d meant his words as reassurance, but she reacted as if she’d been slapped, head jerking backwards. Her eyes flared with panic as she started to wrench herself free from his grip …
And the countdown clock in the corner chimed a low, resounding knell.
The trial had ended.