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A tta cradled a cup of tea in her hands. She hadn’t taken a sip, but she relished the warmth against her fingers. Still, an hour later, she was chilled to the bone.

That thing floated in its hollowed-out lantern cage on the coffee table, wings moving so quickly they were just a blur.

“We need to move it,” Sonder said gently.

He was right. Who knew what it was taking in. If it could report back somewhere. “Keep it away from the hawthorn.” Her voice came out rough, haggard. “Away from your parents.”

She didn’t have to explain. Sonder knew as well as she did that it needed a conducive environment to maintain its strength, to thrive.

He rose and silently picked up the cage, holding it out in front of him as he left the room.

When he came back, he told her he’d put it in the wine cellar. Deep underground, but without the mycelium of its species, it wouldn’t have a way out. At least she hoped that was true.

The phone rang, and Sonder looked puzzled for a moment before going to answer it.

couldn’t hear the person on the other side more than the distant hum drum of a voice.

“Gibbs,” Sonder finally interrupted. “Slow down.”

turned, still living in a daze. Gibbs? Why was Gibbs calling Sonder at home?

“Yes, I understand.”

He hung up and returned to ’s side. “Gibbs?” she asked.

Sonder sighed. “The short truth is that he is in the Society, Achilles House specifically. I’ll explain when I get back, but I have to go to hospital. The Inhabited or, I suppose, Uninhabited woman is in a terrible state of drug withdrawal, and her son called Gibbs?—”

“Your informant?” Her brain was finally catching up.

“One of them. He called Gibbs and said she was alive but he needed help.”

“You can’t go there as you,” she protested.

“I know. Gibbs told him he was sending someone. He didn’t tell the lad I was the man he met today.”

“I’ll go with you,” she said instead of I don’t want to be alone .

Sonder seemed to be in heavy debate with himself inwardly if the crease between his brows was any indication. “I don’t want to leave you alone with that thing.”

“But someone needs to keep an eye on it,” she finished for him. “You’re right. I need to figure out how to hold it indefinitely. We can’t waste any more time on that front.”

He looked into her eyes for a long moment. “All right. I’ll be back as quickly as I can.”

Alone, the manor felt cold, as scared as she was. A gale hit the house, making it shudder, like it knew what sat beneath it, in its depths, invading it. Murdoch Manor’s new inhabitant.

shivered and went into Sonder’s study to steal one of the three jumpers he’d left lying around. With it on, inhaling the scent of him, she felt safer.

Liar, Liar, her insides sang, trapped in briar, sliced by thorns and tossed in the fire.

Cursing, stomped to the atrium to retrieve a few more items she needed and two plants she’d planned to research, taking them back to the safety of Sonder’s study. She lit a fire and went to the kitchen to make a fresh pot of tea and a sandwich.

Retrieving the sandwich-making supplies, she pondered how peculiar it is that something transcendent, something unparalleled, can take place and yet humans still walk, breathe, move, live the same. Things like hunger and exhaustion should cease to exist in the face of the sublime, the tragic. And yet, there they are. It felt blasphemous.

stilled, a slice of deli meat in mid-air on its way to the bread. “There’s a fucking faerie in the cellar.”

She dropped her sandwich paraphernalia to the plate and made for the cellar door.

Her hand rested on the handle for a moment as she contemplated if she was about to make a grave error. On second thought, she decided to arm herself first. Just in case.

Returning to the cellar door armed with black salt, mugwort, and palo santo, fingered the Tears of the Grieved bottle around her neck and flicked on the light switch, venturing down the stairs. To her dismay, only one dim bulb flickered on, the manor so old and outdated. At the bottom of the stairs, however, she saw a shelf of kerosene lamps. The Murdochs and their lamps .

She lit one with a match and held it aloft to take in the space. It was dank and musty, almost entirely made up of shelving holding countless bottles of wine, whiskey, Scotch, you name it. She guessed she was looking at more money than her parents made in five years down there. More than she would have made in ten working at Gallaghers’. At present, doubted she still had a job at all after not showing up for two shifts with no explanation. Alas, she had more important things to worry about than that.

And there it was. A flitting faerie, a trooping creature of the Fae, sitting in the middle of an alcohol shelf next to a bottle of Absinthe—The Green Faerie. It was comical, really, Sonder’s odd sense of humour. The bottle he’d placed the creature next to was ornately described as La Fée Verte , a naked, green-haired pixie on the vintage label.

moved her lamp to the cage holding a real, true faerie. She bent down to peer at it, looking at it intently for the first time. She should have brought her notebook to sketch it, all the sinewy bone, the flitting, crêpe-paper wings. Part of her wanted to go up and retrieve a journal, then come back down. But the little creature tipped its head to one side, and mirrored its movement. Time suspended, just for a second, two beings eyeing one another. And then it flew forward faster than she could see, slamming itself against the thick glass of its lantern cage.

startled back, dropping the lamp. It smashed to the floor in a thousand pieces, the light guttering out. Regaining her composure, she slowly approached the cage, pulling a handful of black salt from the pouch she’d brought. It was harder to see in the dim glow of the overhead bulb, but she managed to examine the latch. It was held fast, but they needed something air-tight next time. They hadn’t known the bastards could dissipate unbodily, though she supposed it made sense. How else would they inhabit humans without anyone knowing?

That was when she saw it. One of the Celtic binding knots had come undone. Slipped free.

swore she heard a laugh, dark and sinister before smoke began rising from the grates at the top of the lantern. No. She stepped back. Not smoke. Vapour .

The faerie was escaping.

wildly threw black salt at the vapour, reciting broken bits of her prayer, her spell, her enchantment—whatever the hell it was. Sparks flew from the vapour where the salt hit, like the dancing embers above a blaze, but it wasn’t stopping it. She didn’t have the smudge sticks or palo santo lit. No black candles. No binding knot.

A hiss came at her ear and she screamed, a blinding, excruciating pain burying her skull in agony. bent over, the vision so strong it took her breath away.

The Hawthorn Grove.

Faeries as far as the eye could see, wings flitting against fog, sharp teeth bloody, bits of flesh and flora in their gaps.

hit the cold floor of the cellar, a strange tinkling meeting her ears before she felt the bite of a cut, and everything went black.