Chapter 28.5
Cliff
Islammed back my whiskey, barely feeling the sting of it at this point.
Sloshing the bottle, I found that more of it was gone than I was proud of, but it wasn’t as if there was anyone with me on the balcony to disappoint.
No one I could hurt. I had earned my isolated bender after the shit I’d endured tonight, hadn’t I?
Sighing, I set the bottle down and peered at the spread of sketches before me.
There had been a blank-paged journal in the desk drawer of my guest room.
I couldn’t begin to wrap my mind around how this place worked.
Would the borrowed book and pencil vanish into thin air the moment I stepped off the premises?
Fuck if I knew.
Flipping to a new page, I let my pencil scrape across the paper with fast, unthinking strokes.
Cold mountain air made the pages quiver slightly, smelling of spruce and fresh snow and…
something sweeter. Probably an effect of the gemstone-alternated forestry surrounding the cabin now.
It was still a welcome reprieve from the suffocating perfume of the gala.
I wasn’t trying to draw anything in particular, but a woman’s figure slowly took shape across the page: Sylvia, donning that shimmery gown from when the shapeshifter had mocked me by taking her form.
Angling my hand, I scowled in concentration as I shaded the tousled hair that fell just over her shoulders.
I hated to admit how much the image had haunted me.
Sylvia, a human.
Illusion or not, until that moment, Sylvia’s transformation had felt like this impossible, intangible thing.
A dream that would never come to pass. But now, the shapeshifter’s cruel tease was like a precursor of what would come.
Tomorrow, she would be attempting the spell with the help of Delilah and Tristan.
What would it be like, having her in the car beside us, not as some outcast fairy, but truly as one of us?
I kept warning her she might be disappointed—being human had been pretty shitty over the years for me—but Sylvia would hear none of it. Stubborn to the end.
After considering the sketch for another moment, I added the gauzy, cicada-like outlines of her wings at her back: how I’d first met her, and how she’d always remain in my mind. Fierce, delicate, and far too trusting for her own good.
After refilling my glass and taking another gulp, I turned my attention to the blank page on the other side.
Cages and monstrous forms took shape in my mind—familiar, nightmarish forms, but I resisted the urge to unleash them on the page.
My hand moved before my mind caught up with a different idea.
Feminine curves cloaked in gossamer fabric and a slitted skirt, opalescent wings, and long hair that tumbled to her waist.
I paused, unsure what had possessed me to draw Zia, of all people. I guessed I did have her to thank for my hand not smarting like a motherfucker from that cat bite. Even the bruises across my torso were healed, something Sylvia had always been incapable of doing, even at her best.
My pencil scratched again, accentuating the curve of her eyes: long-lashed and kind. Kinder than I deserved, given the things I’d said.
And pretty—the color of the ocean.
A soft stirring came behind me. At first, I thought it was the wind, but I had come to recognize the cadence of fairy wings humming in flight by now.
A diminutive figure slipped past the glass door, silhouetted by the warm ambient glow inside.
She was halfway across the deck before she spotted me and came to a sharp halt midair.
“Shit, you scared me!” Zia gasped, clasping her hands over her mouth.
I slammed the sketchbook shut.
“Hey. Sorry,” I grunted, straightening in the deck chair. Guess I’d been so still and morbid in the dark that I’d blended in with the furniture.
“No, I didn’t mean to intrude. I was just coming for some fresh air.” Zia held up her hands, already adjusting her flight as she considered returning inside.
My heart tugged for her. After being caged as a prisoner for over a week, I could understand how she wanted to steal away to the open air.
Hell, she needed that. I’d been restrained and eye-to-eye with death enough times to get it—really get it.
That need to reassure yourself that freedom wasn’t an illusion.
The sting of the cold burning your throat.
A little pain to confirm you were still alive.
A gravely chuckle escaped me as I glanced at the half-empty bottle by my feet. “Not interrupting much.”
Even in the dim illumination, I caught how her expression pinched when she noticed the whiskey. Good. She could stop wasting her energy pretending I wasn’t a pathetic, reeking mess.
I gazed back out at the fir trees—lush and green, bursting with strange, luminous flowers that snaked up their trunks. Zia’s wingbeats drifted closer.
“Drinking alone is bad luck where I come from,” she said, landing on the balcony rail.
I couldn’t mask my shock in time to hide it from her, particularly when her wings folded against her back and she settled into a seated position.
“The rest of the crew is inside, burning through Lee’s collection of French reds,” I told her.
“I know.” Zia held up a fairy-sized goblet brimming with wine. That coy smile on her lips made me stumble over my words. It was like she had a playbook for how to disarm me, and she took great joy in doing so.
“You gonna bully me into stripping for more healing?” I got the satisfaction of making her squirm, but only a little.
Zia raked me up and down, everywhere she had healed earlier in the day. “Do I need to?”
Conceding a little laugh, I leaned back in my chair, swirling my tumbler. Even though I had been here first, I felt like an intruder on the balcony. I itched to retreat, but my half-assed excuses refused to take form. Zia gazed up at the night sky.
“Stars, it’s like a dream out here,” she said.
I hummed. “Somehow, I doubt Delilah’s gonna list this place for vacation rentals any time soon, but I wouldn’t mind a view like this more often. I bet sunrise is really something else.”
“You’re not planning to stay all through the night, are you? When did you last sleep?”
“I don’t mind. I’m used to burning the midnight oil. Someone’s got to keep watch.”
She chuckled. “I suppose I can’t blame a hunter for trusting his eyes over a witch’s wards.”
If only that were the whole truth. Sure, I could blame paranoia, but that was a drop in the bucket compared to everything else rattling in my mind.
How could I explain the numbness that gripped me like a vise and made sleeping impossible?
Zia was a near-stranger—the last person who needed to hear about how I saw my father’s ruthless sneer when I closed my eyes, his hand outstretched to receive me back.
Whenever I inevitably fell unconscious, I knew there would be fire behind my eyelids. A burning truck. A smoke-filled forest. The place where I’d left him.
The right choice.
But even the best choices had consequences. Whether he was pronounced dead or comatose, Mom would probably be too numbed on Xanax and lemon drops to feel anything. But when the news reached Anna…
I swallowed hard. This was all too fucking much.
My attention fell back to Zia while she was still distracted by the star-pierced sky.
I tried to steal details that could be added to her sketch if I didn’t end up shredding it.
Maybe the desk drawer in my magic guest room would give up some colored pencils next, but could I hope to do her hair justice?
The long, elegant locks were intricately braided, carrying more shades of green than I’d noticed before.
Her clothes looked light as air, remarkably different from Sylvia’s tactical leggings and fitted tops.
The fabric flowed off Zia’s frame like water, slits in her skirt revealing large swathes of skin like moonlight.
She looked so goddamn delicate perched before me—like an otherworldly, sexy Barbie.
A little color heated my cheeks as I set the tumbler aside. I had to be drunk enough if the words sexy Barbie had crossed my mind.
Get a grip.
“Your wings look better,” I blurted, just to have something to say. “You, uh…healed them good.”
Healed them good. What the hell was that, you fucking moron?
But Zia didn’t laugh at my expense. “Once the iron was gone, my power returned with a hunger.”
Another breeze pushed in around us, making her hair whip around her shoulders and her wings shiver. A dark patch of skin caught my eye; it stretched from just below the nape of her neck to the roots of her upper wings.
A painfully familiar E made of scar tissue.
I couldn’t stop the choked noise that escaped me.
Zia turned her head suddenly and caught me gaping. The corners of her mouth lifted, but I swiveled my head away before I could see whether she was smiling or grimacing at my attention.
“I’m sorry about the mark,” I croaked, knowing she would have healed it if it were in her ability. Apparently, even all-powerful nobles were no match against iron.
“That isn’t your apology to make,” she said gently.
Slowly, I dared to look at her again, forcing myself to hold her gaze.
She didn’t flinch, not even a little. Most fairies I’d encountered hadn’t been so pleasant, despite the cute packaging.
They’d either tried to scorch me alive on sight or sacrifice me to sirens.
Hazel seemed to be following her sister’s lead on warming up to me, but Sylvia had always been a little crazy to begin with.
Zia’s ease felt entirely unearned.
“I don’t get you,” I muttered.
“What’s to get?”
“The fuck are you doing out here, for starters?”
“I told you. Fresh air.”
“This place has like three balconies. Why stay here? Shouldn’t you be afraid of me, like your boyfriend? Gotta be honest, I’m surprised he loosened your leash at all to let you out of his sight.”
Leash hit the air roughly.
“Fuck. Sorry,” I sighed.