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  Scarlet stepped closer to the cot and tears fell from her eyes. Caleb lifted his hand, but cringed at the sudden flow of blood beneath his elbow. Along his right side, I noticed his shirt was torn. A straight cut ran down his ribs from his chest to above his hip. Other small bruises and gashes riddled his body, and that was only what was visible to my eyes. A creature like Tristan could easily hurt someone deeply, in a way none of us would ever actually see.

  “How do we help him?” I begged.

  “Why can’t we call the police?” Scarlet’s voice broke. I expected her to become more frantic, but she was starting to gather herself, sort of the way a mother would.

  “Tristan isn’t mortal,” Charlotte delivered in a crass tone. “The police can’t do anything. This isn’t their realm.”

  “And Caleb?” Scarlet went on. She had stepped closer, able to see the shades of her brother’s eyes as they played randomly to nature’s hues. I stood over the cot and decided Caleb must’ve been an earth faerie. I wondered if he even had wings.

  “Your brother’s a faerie,” I announced. “He was turned into one, but Tristan was born one.”

  “A what?” Scarlet sort of laughed and sneered at the same time.

  “I’m so hot,” Caleb mumbled, twisting in the cot and struggling to breathe. As he choked, he turned over the side and spat out chunks of blood. He pulled at his shirt and the tear on the side ripped open.

  “We have no time,” Bryn urged. She turned to the wooden counter behind her and grabbed a knife. The blade was wide and sturdy, and the handle was constructed of a white wood. There were black symbols burned into the wood, ones I didn’t know.

  “Here,” Charlotte reached for the knife.

  “You might not have dragon’s blood,” Bryn warned to my sister. There was a possibility that she could become a dragon still, and that was a thrilling idea. Unfortunately, I had no time to dwell on it then.

  “What do you mean, dragon’s blood?”

  “You can heal him,” Charlotte’s eyes cast over mine and I felt chills wave over my shoulders and down my arms.

  “You can heal anything,” Bryn nodded.

  “It’s forbidden, I won’t let her,” Caleb fought out as he glanced to me. Bruises, deep and large, painted his bare chest, his hair greased in sweat. “I’ll ride it out,” Caleb stammered. “Let me feed. I’ll heal.”

  “You won’t, and you know it,” Bryn corrected. “Your injuries will best you before you obtain enough essence. Even if these three offered right now.” Bryn’s voice sharpened, louder and louder until it echoed off the basement walls. Caleb tried to take a deep breath, but just wheezed and choked on the air.

  My sister took the knife from Bryn and slit her palm just enough for a trickle of blood to fall. “Only one way to know, I guess.” Charlotte leaned over Caleb and placed the open, blood-filled gash of her palm onto his mouth.

  We all waited patiently to see what effect, if any, the blood would have. Charlotte’s eyes swelled with grief, and Caleb only looked to be in worse pain than before. He wasn’t healing, and he wouldn’t ever heal unless I gave my own blood. I knew it. Charlotte knew it.

  I raised the knife to my hand without a second thought. Bryn and Scarlet stepped back and watched, both in awe and in confusion, as I slit my palm and placed the blood onto Caleb’s lips. Charlotte stood and covered her mouth as she cried. We were hot, exhausted, but unable to quit. I felt him pull from my bloodstream. His thirst for health was great, but my will to give it was greater. I held fast as he drank for several seconds; soon I felt light and weightless.

  Caleb, tasting my health and my essence in one desirable cocktail, clamped onto my hand and sucked with such a force that I lost balance and fell against the cot. “That’s enough,” Bryn commanded, removing my hand from his. I stammered back onto my feet, with Scarlet and Bryn at my sides, until I felt I could stand on my own. My sister gasped, and a smile slipped over her face as we watched Caleb renew. His skin darkened and glowed. The bruises lifted, the cuts sealed, and his eyes became dark and rich as they once were.

  Caleb closed his eyes and took in a deep breath. When he exhaled, little orbs the color of chocolate filled the air in a single burst of energy. When he opened his eyes, they dissipated. “Thank you,” he whispered to me. I nodded as I sat down on a stool by the counter and closed my eyes.

  Chapter Eighteen

  At Beanies a couple nights later, I met with Bryn, Lydia, and Scarlet to talk about everything that was going on. The four of us sat there silently gazing at one another as we warmed our trembling hands on our lattes.

  My sister, of course, strutted in the door and broke the haze.

  “I won’t let him take you,” she blurted as she sat down beside me.

  “Not this again,” I rolled my eyes.

  “How do you even know he’s real?” Scarlet asked.

  “My brother’s met him,” I huffed. I can’t explain how it made me feel, not really. There was an excitement building in me that I couldn’t ignore. There was also a fear of the unknown, and of what people would expect of me.

  Of course, Bryn had a way of grounding my emotions.

  “So have I,” she said. Her brow arched as she looked right at me.

  I swallowed hard.

  “Will you be moving away?” Lydia asked.

  “Far, far away,” Bryn answered for me.

  “I’m not just leaving my life for some stranger I’ve never known,” I defended. “Or for some blood right that’s rooted in a wild fairy tale.”

  Bryn laughed at me.

  “What?” I asked.

  “You do know all fairy tales are founded in truth, right?”

  “I’m not going to let it bother me,” I said. Shoving my hands into my pockets, I slouched down in my chair. “Besides, maybe he’s ugly and I won’t want to be around him.” I was so sure of myself until I caught sight of Bryn’s eyes and something told me I was terribly wrong. “What?”

  “Well, let’s just say he makes the idea of prince charming seem dull.”

  “Great.”

  “Well, what is he like?” Lydia pried. She and Scarlet were leaned over the table with eager eyes and tapping fingers. True, we’d all grown up thinking about the heroic prince and his gorgeous castle in the clouds. But faced with the choice of him over my friends and my family… well, how could I choose?

  “He’s tall and strong—very, very strong. As the Lord of Warriors, he commands an army of thousands to fight against the faeries if they enter his lands. He’s pretty scary as an enemy.”

  Lord of Warriors? I wanted to laugh, but something in my gut told me it wasn’t the type of title to take lightly.

  “And as a friend?” Scarlet lit up with giddiness.

  Bryn smiled. “He’s loyal. Timeless. Noble.”

  I could practically hear Scarlet gasp.

  “What’s his name?” Lydia asked.

  “Elliot.” I cleared my throat as the taste of his name gave me the chills. “His name is Elliot.”

  “Irene and Elliot,” Scarlet grinned. “Sounds sweet.”

  “It’s a typical patriarch,” my sister slouched like me. “And he won’t get what he wants.”

  “Oh come on,” Scarlet sighed. “It’s like a dream, why are you so against it?”

  “Have you ever truly read a fairy tale?” Charlotte’s tone was borderline furious. I was starting to get the idea that, until I healed Caleb, she had hoped I wasn’t actually the lady. “They don’t usually end well.”

  “Sad young woman, beautiful, hurt…” Scarlet started with her classic know-it-all glare. “The prince comes along and saves her from a life she doesn’t like. Yeah, that’s not terrible.”

  “Scarlet, I like my life,” I said. Charlotte wasn’t done voicing her opinion though.

  “La Belle et la Bête,” Charlotte sat up and crossed her arms readying to school Scarlet.

  I interrupted before she could begin.

  “Saves the prince.”

&
nbsp; “Yeah, but—”

  “Let it go, Charlotte. I am who I am, there’s nothing that can change that.”

  “Are you guys from the same… place?” Lydia asked Bryn about Elliot. “Have you known him long?”

  “Actually, I met him for the first time at a royal wedding several years ago,” Bryn stated, then drank from her cup. “We come from different places; places meant for our own kind. The wedding was in New York,” she grinned, and her crescent eyes reminded me of Tristan.

  “A royal wedding?” I furthered.

  “Yeah, a distant cousin of mine married one of his,” she explained. “It was somewhat forbidden, but their status meant that they would be safe from the lineage marking.”

  “Wait a sec,” Scarlet’s eyes opened wide. “Are you, like, a princess?”

  Bryn had a little grin as she nodded.

  “And Tristan?” I sat up.

  “His dad’s the Faerie King.”

  “Oh,” Scarlet laughed with her mouth wide open. It caught the attention of the neighboring customers and Lydia nudged Scarlet to hush.

  “Tristan’s a prince?” my fingers were starting to tingle and go numb.

  Bryn just sat there sipping and nodding.

  “What’s the lineage marking?” Lydia asked. “Is that you have?” she leaned over and nudged me. I was obviously in my own head, but how could I not be? My mother had cast a spell to conceal me from a dangerous faerie prince. How could I not see that he was closing in? Tristan was a prince, and his brother—who most likely had veins of ice—had to be the one everyone feared.

  “Um, not exactly.” Bryn bit her lip in thought, then went on. “Hers is like a birthmark. A special sign that appears on your body after you’re born,” she told me. “Yours is brief and fades quickly. That way you’re protected until your magic takes hold.”

  “And for a faerie?” Scarlet asked.

  “The mark takes hold when the predecessor is put to rest. But the successor is almost always the next in line—in the bloodline.”

  “Does Irene’s follow her bloodline?” Lydia asked.

  Bryn nodded. “The dragons’ mark follows any of the ancient bloodlines.”

  “Is that why he wants to be with me?”

  “He’s been preparing for you all his life,” Bryn told. “He’s the only one who can truly protect you from your enemies.”

  “Like you?”

  She nodded again.

  “But you’re not my enemy.”

  “Look at what Tristan did?” Scarlet faced me. “He almost killed my brother.”

  I didn’t have anything to say to that. She was right, but there was more to his actions than what we knew. I was sure.

  “What do we do about that anyway?” I asked before sipping from my drink.

  “Nothing,” Bryn leaned back. “He’s already facing the consequences.”

  “And that means?” Charlotte asked.

  “It’s forbidden to feed on the Lord or the Lady,” Bryn took a deep breath. “He made a choice that he’ll have to answer for when Elliot arrives.”

  “Which is when?” Scarlet curled over the table in delight once again.

  Bryn shrugged.

  “I bet Dylan knows,” Charlotte shook her head. “He’s known about this for a long time.”

  “He has, but so have you.” Now I was the one shaking my head. “Why didn’t you talk to me about this?”

  Charlotte huffed.

  “I’m serious. I finally started to feel my magic and you knew it wasn’t anything like yours. What did I do for you to stop treating me like a sister?”

  “That’s not what I’m doing,” she sat up and faced me. “I needed to let you go, okay. Happy now? I needed to forget about you just like I forgot about mom. I know you’re going to leave; I know how this story plays out.”

  Charlotte got up and stormed off to the bathroom.

  “Geesh,” Scarlet leaned back and laughed.

  “It’s not funny,” Lydia caught Scarlet’s attention before getting up to follow my sister.

  “How did this happen?” I lowered my head to the table and let my hair fall around my face.

  “Even if you don’t want to pursue your life in Frostmoor, you still have to be crowned.”

  I listened to Bryn’s words carefully.

  “You have to leave this realm and go to Frostmoor with Elliot so that he can present you to the council. She’s probably afraid that you won’t want to come back.”

  “I read about that in my ancestor’s journal,” I leaned back. “The whole ceremony and all; it sounds intimidating.”

  “I’ve never seen it, but I’ve read about it. It sounds overwhelming, actually,” her brow lifted, “but at least you’ll have your title. And then Elliot will be at your beck and call, instead of you having to follow his orders.”

  “Wait, what?”

  “Yeah,” Charlotte plopped back into her chair. “You have to follow his orders until you take your crown. Which by then, you might be stuck on that stupid island.”

  Lydia was at the register buying some food then, and as the door swung open, the wind came in and whipped through the dining room and over the tables. There was a scent in the breeze that caught my every sense and stilled me to my core. Closing my eyes, I felt like the world had stopped. And by the time the door closed and Lydia had brought a plate of danishes to the table, I had missed a whole minute of time.

  “Are you alright?” Bryn leaned over and tapped my hand.

  And before the flash of the vision that carried a taunting Tristan with it could fully form, I jerked back and stuck my hands deep under my arms.

  “I can’t,” I shook my head.

  “You’re a seer?” she guessed.

  I gave a nod.

  “Practice can help.”

  “I don’t need to practice. I need it to go away.”

  “You won’t get any better unless you use it every day,” Bryn arched her brow.

  “Do you?” Scarlet took a bite from a raspberry danish. “Do you use it every day?”

  “I’ve never met a faerie who didn’t.”

  “But that’s how you survive,” Lydia spoke up from between bites. “I mean, you use your magic to feed, right?”

  Charlotte reached over the table and grabbed Lydia’s hand. “He’s been feeding on you, hasn’t he? Is that why you were sick?”

  “You got sick?” I asked. I couldn’t believe my ears. I had no idea what was going on around me anymore.

  “It was an accident. He didn’t mean to, he was hurting,” Lydia said quickly and then went back to eating. Well, stuffing the rest of her pastry in her mouth is a little more accurate.

  “When I hurt him?” I felt awful. “Did he have to… heal you?”

  “Yeah,” she nodded.

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “I understand why you did what you did. I don’t blame you.”

  “Cole?” Scarlet’s eyes widened. She faced Bryn and asked, “Is this how my brother became like you?”

  “No, the exchange in essence has to be complete in order to turn.” Taking in a stuttered breath, Bryn spoke her next words lightly. “Your brother was hurt badly, and I had no choice but to turn him.”

  “What happened to him?” Scarlet leaned close.

  “I um…” Bryn breathed heavily.

  “Please. I don’t understand everything like you guys do. But I really want to.”

  Bryn’s eyes scanned over Charlotte and me, and I could tell she knew she had to explain what happened.

  “Caleb and I went to Antauk to ski this past February. We spent the night in a remote cabin up in the hills.” Charlotte listened as though she’d heard the story before. Surprisingly, she didn’t seem jealous like I imagined her to be. “We skied while it snowed; large flakes fell on the slopes all day. It was magical, like we were inside a snow globe. Later that night, I got a call and had to get home. I thought it was safe to drive, but the roads were far worse than they looked.” Bryn took in
a long breath and when she exhaled, I could clearly see her eyes gloss over. “We spun out and slid into the ditch, but Caleb,” she paused, “Caleb’s window busted open and some of the glass cut into his neck.”

  Scarlet sat back in a gasp. “Oh my God.”

  “And you saved him,” Lydia concluded.

  Bryn nodded. “He’s my best friend. I’d do anything for him.”

  “Thank you,” Scarlet whispered, her voice choking back the knowledge of what might have been.

  “Doesn’t it bother you how Tristan hurt him?” I asked.

  “Of course it does. But Caleb isn’t a mortal anymore. He’s stronger.”

  “Not on his own,” I shook my head.

  “Right, and won’t he pay for feeding on your blood?” Lydia guessed.

  “Tristan will take the blame—for everything that’s happened,” she tightened her jaw and crossed her arms.

  “You can’t just let him do what he wants in the meantime,” I argued.

  “He’s not acting for himself,” Bryn’s eyes shot at me.

  “He’s manipulating us to get what he wants. You know it. He made me feel like I could trust him, and then he hurt Caleb.”

  “You can trust him.”

  I laughed at Bryn’s words.

  “You want someone to hate, hate Iliana. Or better yet, hate Lorcan.”

  Lorcan? Could this be Tristan’s brother?

  Before I could ask more, another customer came through the door and the wind whipped through the place like before. And just as magical as it was the first time, I was caught in the moment like nothing else mattered but the scent on the wind.

  “Irene,” Lydia shook my arm like she’d been doing so for minutes.

  “What?”

  “Where were you?”

  I shrugged.

  “I can smell it too,” Bryn closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “He’s close, Irene. You don’t have long to wait.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Almost a week went by since I last saw my friends. I was getting anxious about everything, and all it did was push me further into seclusion.