Page 1 of Faerie Fate (Fae Academy for Halflings #7)

Chapter One

T he cloak was made of steel wool and desperation.

Purple fabric plastered to my clammy skin and made every step uncomfortable, the hem dragging the ground. The hood was pulled up over my head to keep anyone who happened to be out at this ungodly hour from seeing my face.

Cloth rustled behind me, accompanied by a swallowed yelp when Bronwen Minuti stubbed her toe and hopped on one foot to my side.

“Will you be quiet?” Coral Ferenze hissed. “We’re trying to be inconspicuous.”

“I’m not the one talking,” Bronwen whispered back.

At it again . I glanced over at Mike in time to watch him roll his eyes.

My mother Livvy followed closely, with my old mentor and best friend Melia Haversham a step behind her.

“This is the place where the portal opens to the Fae Academy for Halflings,” Melia pointed out once we stopped.

Two days ago, we’d made it back to the kingdom of Eahsea to plan our next steps, after Kendrick Grimaldi overtook the fae academy in the mortal world.

For two days, he’d terrorized the students there. Made it his personal playground of pain and god knew what else.

For two days, I’d agonized over why the spell to unlock my witch powers hadn’t worked, despite Livvy’s insistence that the words and the magic ingredients needed had been passed to her by the goddess Faerie herself.

At least Melia was here with us now.

And trying to leave my cousin Coral out of it would be like wearing white after Labor Day. That level of betrayal. She refused to be discarded—her words—despite the danger.

A breeze stirred the inconspicuous limbs of oak trees shadowed by moonlight. Somewhere in the distance, an owl or some similar creature hooted out a dirge before taking off in a rustle of wings.

And to our backs slept the king’s city with its great white castle standing watch over its domain.

Nighttime in the fae kingdom felt different from normal darkness. As though the air itself tasted sweeter, filled the lungs better. I dragged in a breath all the way to the bottom of my lungs but it did nothing to counter my sense of dread.

Death was out there and breathed thickly down my neck. The silent depths of magic could turn against us in a blink. Cruel, vicious.

The crescent moon hung in the center of a black sky with diamond-like stars sparkling, and nothing but terror and probable death waited for us on the other side of the portal.

This was where we’d stepped into Faerie for the first time. My first glimpse of my mother’s world and now Livvy stood there, watching my reaction. I noted her interest and dragged a breath into my overly tight lungs.

This area connected directly to the mortal fae academy. A general consensus had decided it was the safest way to reach our old school.

A chill in the air rubbed my nerves raw.

I hid myself deeper in the cloak. In the distance, a howl split the silence of the night, and instead of freaking out, Livvy and I shared a secret smile. Noren was on patrol and the direwolf would never let anything happen to me. If anyone understood, it was my mom.

“I really don’t like leaving you this way.” Melia reached for me and grabbed me by the forearms to root me in place. “Tavi, are you sure you want to do this?”

I licked my lips. Swallowed. “No, I’m not, but it’s not like we have a choice,” I replied. “We have to break in.”

Melia nodded, her tawny skin ashen, before she reached into the pocket of her cloak and drew out a key. “I’ll use my key, then. And we’ll be here waiting for you.”

“I really think my talents would be better served with you, Tavi, rather than being a lookout.” Coral studied her perfect nails. “Talk about a waste.”

Bronwen scoffed. “If I have to hear about it one more time, I’m going to throttle you.”

Coral’s eyes glowed amber. “You can try.”

We’d already been back and forth with this argument.

“We need lookouts on the Faerie side,” Melia said again, but her habitual patience was a rare commodity just now.

I turned to Coral. “Look, if anyone stumbles upon us from this side, you can beat them, kill them, I don’t care, but stop them. Stop anyone who might come through from the human side, too. Unless it’s us. Please don’t kill us.”

Coral didn’t look appeased as she cocked her hip to the side, her expensive flats tapping against the mossy ground. She tossed her hair over her shoulder in such a Coral gesture I almost burst out laughing.

“Fine.”

She said it like she was the one doing us a favor and in a way, she was. Because it paid to have another half-shifter ready to kick ass if things went sour. And knowing what always happened to me?

The shit would hit the fan soon enough.

“We’ll need help to get the hostages out,” I added. If we find them .

Noren would stay behind. It split my heart into pieces but I had no clue if it was safe for him to leave this realm. I wasn’t about to take any more chances and lose someone I loved.

Only Mom, Mike, and I would be going through in an attempt to rescue the academy students. I told myself it was going to work, but my rasping breath and the burning hot ache in my stomach told a different story.

Melia thrust her key into empty air and twisted, and the golden glowing outline of a door illuminated the dark. She twisted the key counterclockwise; the lock sparkled and the door opened up into a cavernous basement.

Spider webs hung in the corners, inches of dust covered the floor, and boxes were stacked against the walls.

“It wouldn’t have been nearly as grand if they’d shoved us through a basement wall into Faerie,” Melia whispered with a chuckle. “Right?”

Mike shook his head and a lock of golden hair flung casually across his forehead. Hidden beneath his cloak, it was easy to mistake him as a stranger off the street. His hair was his trademark. “This isn’t going to work,” he muttered.

Livvy rounded on him with a wide-eyed stare urging him to be quiet.

“I don’t want to do this,” he continued wildly. “It’s not safe. We’re just walking right into Kendrick Grimaldi’s trap. He’s going to catch us and he won’t let us go.”

“We don’t have a choice, Mike,” I said.

Cosmo Foxfall, the premier of the kingdom, had put a price on my head. King Tywin was in a coma.

Because Kendrick had taken possession of an entire school full of students and teachers who were half-fae, under the king’s protection no less, where did we go except into the fire?

The Fae Academy for Halflings was a feeder school into Faerie. If Kendrick tripped his way into a portal to here, we were all screwed.

“We have to do this.” Fear made me more insistent. “But if you’re not comfortable, consider this an out. You can stay here if you want.”

Surely Coral would leap at the chance to be a part of Alpha Team rather than Bravo.

My veins filled with ice. I didn’t want to do this without Mike, though. I needed him. If Noren had to stay behind, there was no one I trusted more in the world than the man who held my heart in his hands.

“Tavi.” Mike jerked his head to the side and gestured for me to follow him.

I did, cloak rustling, and he stole the next words out of my mouth with a kiss. His lips pressed to mine hungrily. His hands were on my hips and drawing me to him as he brushed his mouth to the corners of mine.

“I’m not going to leave your side,” he said against me. “Whatever happens, I’ll be there.”

My heart shivered. “I know you hate this. If there were any other way, I would have found it.”

Mike shook his head and the movement rustled his cloak hood. “ We’d have found it.”

His voice was a gentle reminder that I wasn’t alone. No matter how many times he reminded me, there was no easy way for me to lean on anyone else. Too much had happened for it to be natural, or easy.

“I don’t want anyone else getting hurt.”

It was a last ditch effort to save him. Mike was, after all, the crown prince of Faerie and next in line for the throne. With his father indisposed, his mother in the hospital recovering, and the premier in league with our enemies?—

Those thoughts disappeared into nothingness when Mike slipped his hand to the back of my neck and brought his mouth down to mine again. I sank into him. His tongue urged the seam of my lips to part and tangled with mine sweetly, a caress before he drew back.

The tenderness left me raw and bruised. We were toeing the line, prepared for the gun to sound and the danger to drop on our heads, and his lips became my anchor.

“Your heart is beating fast enough for me to feel it in my blood,” Mike whispered.

“I’m not feeling well,” I teased. “That’s the only reason.”

His eyes were kind and full of compassion when he drew back, and I missed his warmth immediately, wavering on my feet. The motion took me back too far. I wobbled, lost my breath and my balance in one swoop.

Mike reached out to catch me. “You okay?”

He knew about the curse now. The zombie witch Madam Muerte had infected me when she rose from the grave to snap a chunk out of my arm.

For the time being, Livvy was able to keep my symptoms stable enough that I could manage to brush my teeth, get dressed, rescue an academy full of teenaged hostages…

As long as Livvy was with me, I’d be fine.

I sucked in a deep breath and held it, closing my eyes for half a heartbeat. That was all the time I allowed myself. “Yeah, I’m good. No need to worry.” I flashed Mike a thin and anything but believable smile but he felt the time crunch as harshly as I did. “Let’s go.”

We were wasting time with the portal open.

I glanced over to see Melia gesturing frantically for us to hurry the hell up. She swept her arm in a shooing motion and I hustled as fast as my fatigued legs could hustle.

My unnatural witchy flu was going to have to wait until I got the kids out of the halfling academy. Then maybe I’d take a few weeks to recover. It was a big maybe. That kind of time was a luxury we could no longer afford.