Page 42 of The Hearth Witch’s Guide to Magic & Murder (The Hemlock Saga #1)

“He was slaughtering people, Saga—children.” The word hung in the air like an echo.

“Like the old stories they’d tell you to keep you in your bed at night, or away from strangers.

They were all warnings about the Erlking.

That was his legacy. A shadow made whole, the embodiment of winter, creeping through the dark spaces to lure and trap them; to consume them. ”

Saga’s throat felt tight.

“The truth is, what I did had very little to do with defending myself. He’d gone mad.

He closed the doors to Faerie, cutting us off from the magic, and killed anyone on the council who attempted to stand up to him.

It put both our worlds at risk. It had to be done.

” When Saga still wouldn’t face her, Avery growled to expel her frustration.

“Do you really think the council would have set me free—and early at that—if they thought I was an actual threat? Would your aunt and uncle agree to house me?”

No. She didn’t. She trusted Leigh with her life and knew Reza would never put anyone knowingly in danger, least of all family. But it was still murder, wasn’t it? It was taking a life. At last she turned around. “If he was such a terror, why didn’t anyone help you?”

Avery hesitated. “Some did help—in secret. I never could have managed it on my own, but it was important to the council that the rest of the world believed I did.”

“Why?”

“It is far easier to settle one lone act of treason than a coup and revolution. There was no upheaval of government, no one to question loyalties to the Aos Sí and courts of Faerie. They just had to punish me.” Avery attempted to shrug off her feelings about this, but Saga could see how much it had festered under her skin.

“I was already on the outskirts of society due to my human mother; it was easy for them to create a controllable narrative.”

“What about motive?” Saga realized as she spoke that while her questions remained defensive, they were now in defense of Avery. “How did they explain that away? Just some lone-wolf bullshit because you’re only half-fey?”

Avery’s eyes averted. “They did not have to stretch the narrative too much for a motive.”

Saga folded her arms. “You often butt heads with royalty?” Even in asking it, she knew she wouldn’t be terribly surprised by the answer.

“The Erlking was my father.”

She was wrong. “Come again?”

“In the loosest sense of the word,” Avery explained.

“He had an affair with my mother. Brief, but consensual as far as I know. The Erlking was not known for his gentility or compassion, so any questions you might have about that would only add to mine. My mother died before I could ask her. They could not have been more opposite creatures.”

Saga was reminded of the curious case of her own parents. While the stakes had been infinitely higher for Avery, she couldn’t help but feel closer to her knowing this small piece of information. “So you killed your father to save the world?”

There was another moment of hesitation. There was something Avery wasn’t telling her, or something she didn’t have the words to tell her easily.

“A sidhe is particularly difficult to destroy permanently. Bodies crumble, but the spirit rebuilds a vessel. That the Erlking has not yet risen again is actually…surprising.” Avery nervously licked her lower lip.

“Blood spilled by a relation is a blow that has a chance of sticking—similar to using your blood to seal a spell. The blood of your bloodline, and all that.” Avery took a deep breath and dared to meet Saga’s eyes once more.

“So you see, it had to be me to deliver that blow. There was no one else. Well, there was Gideon, but he’d sooner dance a jig in cross-gartered leggings than do anything that could be remotely perceived as treason. ”

Saga blinked and Avery looked self-conscious.

“I know this is a lot to take in.” The taller woman rubbed the back of her neck. She smiled weakly, but it faded the instant it was not returned. “Please say something.”

“They were going to keep you in prison for five hundred years for that?” Saga’s voice was barely above a whisper. “Would you have even survived five hundred years?”

“Fey have always had ways of making sure you live out your full sentence, one way or another.” Avery paused, seeming to debate with herself before continuing. “For my particular punishment, I was suspended in time through an imprisonment of sleep without rest and endless nightmares until awoken.”

“By true love’s kiss?”

Avery glared. “Very funny.”

It wasn’t that it didn’t sound horrific, or that she wanted to make light of what Avery had been through but Saga had learned from a young age that humor was her greatest ally. She was even smiling a little. “Was there a dragon and a tower too, or would that be only available if you made parole?”

“Saga,” Avery warned.

“You need me right now.” They both knew it, and there was part of Saga that utterly thrilled in that fact. She pointed her finger toward Avery’s sternum. “I’d let me have this if I were you.” Blackmail. For a joke.

The corner of Avery’s mouth twitched in amusement. “So you’ll help?”

“You’ll be with me the whole time?”

“Yes.” There was no hesitation in Avery’s voice now.

“And I won’t have to talk to them about anything personal or private or whatever?”

“I promise you, you will not have to say a word.”

Satisfied, Saga let out a deep sigh and lowered her finger like she was holstering a gun. “Fine. I’ll help you.”

***

They took the Jubilee to the Piccadilly line, then on to Knightsbridge. On the way, Avery did her best to fill Saga in about her graveyard meeting with Fiore and Bimo Shinwell.

As they were boarding their second train, Avery surrendered the mobile she’d been given.

Saga attempted to explain the basic workings of the contraption. By the time they had arrived in Knightsbridge, she’d taught Avery what the numbers on the paper were for and how to dial other people’s numbers and she put both her own and Reza’s numbers into Avery’s contact list.

Coming to street level was a shock in itself for Avery.

“I take it this is a lot different than it used to be,” Saga sympathized.

“The roads could barely be called as much then—even with some of the paving measures they’d taken, it was barely more than a haunt for villains, and then the aristocracy began to flood in and take the land, but this is…

astounding.” She gestured to some of the buildings of a neo-Renaissance style.

“I remember architecture like this—but these were not here then.”

“Ah,” Saga nodded. “I think you’ll find we had a few resurgences of different artistic styles through the years. London has become a bit of a hub for that, especially once active trade reengaged overseas.”

“It is so much more than I would have dreamed,” admitted Avery.

“The buildings?”

“Everything.” The word sounded weak. “There’s barely an echo of the London I knew here.”

“Two hundred years is a long time,” Saga said sympathetically.

“Not generally, no,” Avery disagreed. “I mean, yes, it is over two average human lifetimes, but… Saga, I know progress and the passage of time… It never moved like this.”

Saga eyed her companion thoughtfully and wished she was more of a history buff to help fill in the gaps.

“The invention of electricity spurred industry,” she explained.

“We had a boom of inventions, things became more accessible to more than just the rich… If it had been a different time, things might not have changed quite so much.”

“Are you suggesting I chose the wrong time to be condemned for two hundred years?” Avery quipped.

Saga ducked her head sheepishly. “Not intentionally.”

Avery double-checked the address from a paper in her hand. “I believe that’s the location we’re looking for.”

It was a stone building with classical details. The architecture blended well with the buildings on either side of it, flush between the Mandarin Oriental Hotel and the Pavilion Club. Simple yet elegant black lettering above the door read simply: REPRISE.

“Should we be here?” Saga asked, worried.

“Of course, we have an appointment. Well, you have an appointment.”

“How?”

“I called in a favor.”

Saga grew immediately suspicious. “I only just showed you how to use your phone, how were you calling anyone?”

Avery sighed and opened the door for her. “I said that to calm you. You don’t have an appointment exactly, but look,” she pointed to the WALK-INS WELCOME sign. “And you fit the required criteria.”

“Goody,” Saga chimed, joyless. She took a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and stepped inside.

Decadent did not even begin to describe the lobby.

Squares of white marble outlined with two thin ribbons of rose gold sprawled beneath them.

The walls themselves were a soft white, or perhaps the palest of blush—it was hard to decipher exactly with the gentle lighting.

The doors were also rimmed with rose gold intertwining around silver and gunmetal.

The doors themselves were an elegant black with an art deco design in rose gold as well.

This color scheme continued to the receptionist’s desk, where that bright dance of gold swirled within the marble itself to create a barrier between them and a startlingly beautiful woman.

She was impossibly tall and slender. She had the kind of form you’d expect to grace the fashion magazines of Milan: light olive-toned skin, dark and sensual almond eyes, and lips the color of pomegranates.

Saga swallowed, hard. “Hello.”

The model-like creature deigned to take notice of her. “Appointment or walk-in?” Even her voice was beautiful. It had its own melody that caressed any lucky enough to hear it.

“Walk-in,” Saga murmured, feeling incredibly self-conscious about her own voice. Was it too harsh? Was her accent not posh enough?

“Your name?”