Page 5

I hoped.

Because I knew something worse was coming for me.

Chapter Two

Five Elven Princes

I woke up shivering.

Peeling open my bleary eyes, I saw the shutters were open and ice had gathered on the ledge. Despite the howling wind, my curtain hung stiff, frozen.

I frowned, confused. I had definitely latched the window.

The hair on the back of my neck rose, and gooseflesh trailed down my arms as a deep sense of fear ran my blood cold.

I was not alone.

I reach for my knife, which I kept beneath my pillow, but as my fingers brushed the hilt, it disappeared.

“Fuck!”

“Tsk, tsk, tsk,” said a voice. “Such language.”

I rolled onto my back, intending to reach for my ax, which rested on the bedside table where I left it, but my eyes caught on a figure leaning against the wall of my room. He was tall, thin, and ethereal. The tips of pointed ears peeked out from his long black hair, which slipped over his shoulder, as shiny as moonlight on dark water.

He wore a black wool overcoat trimmed in gold, leggings, and heavy black boots, the foot of one propped flat against the wall behind him.

He was an elf, and judging by the finery of his clothing, a lord.

“Fuck,” I said again.

This wasn’t good.

He, like all types of fae, had come from the Enchanted Forest. I had no doubt he had come to seek retribution for the toad I had killed.

A hand gripped my chin hard as something sharp trailed down the side of my face. Blood welled.

“Foul human,” said another voice, a wet tongue skating over the wound. “Foul mouth.”

I tried to move but couldn’t and only managed to sink my nails into the arm of my attacker, dragging them downward.

I felt his skin gather beneath my nails, and the creature hissed, his hand tightening on my face as he jerked my head back.

Now I could see his face, which was similar to the other elven lord’s, though somehow more vicious, and instead of dark hair, his was bright blond. His fingers dug into my jaw so hard, I thought he might tear it away.

“Release her, Sephtis,” said a third voice.

But he did not loosen his hold. If anything, it tightened, and he bent over me, eyes boring into mine, irises red-tinged and unnerving.

“Why should I?” he asked, his voice so low it was as if he were posing the question to me.

A hand seemed to appear out of thin air and jerked Sephtis’s free, and another elf came into view. This one looked the same as the first—dark-haired and beautiful. Only his eyes were different, a strange, mossy color, neither completely green nor completely brown.

“You were supposed to keep an eye on him, Lore,” said the new elven lord, and I assumed he was talking to the first elf, the one who had taken my knife.

Sephtis glared.

“Here to spoil our fun, Silas?” he asked.