Suzanne McLeod - The Shifting Price of Prey

Confusion crossed his face. ‘What?’

‘The herd wants Spellcrackers back,’ I said slowly, like I was talking to an idiot. Which I was. ‘You made them sign it over to me, but now the curse is lifted so is the reason for giving it to me. If they think I’m an “item” with someone else, someone who isn’t a satyr . . . well, no doubt they’re even more determined not to lose out on their original investment.’

He sunk down on to the bed, dropped his head in his hands. ‘Gods, I should’ve realised they’d try something: I know what they’re like.’ He sighed and looked up at me. ‘I should’ve got them to agree to back off before I went. But with Nicky and everything, I just didn’t think. I’ll sort it now. I’m sorry. Gen, this isn’t how I hoped our getting back together would go.’

He was sorry! He’d sort his family! He’d expected something like this! He thought we were getting back together!

I threw my hands up, warring between fury and disbelief. ‘Finn, I wrote to tell you what the herd were up to. When you didn’t write back, I did wonder if the satyr messenger service wasn’t passing my letters on, which I was obviously right to. But hell, didn’t you wonder why I wasn’t writing to you? Didn’t you think about trying some other way to contact me? Or asking me what the hell was going on?’

Bewilderment clouded his moss-green eyes. ‘How could I? We were out of time sync.’

I blinked. ‘Since when?’

‘Since two weeks after we got there. I’ve only just got back.’ I stared at him. The Fair Lands have their own timelines, sometimes in sync with the humans’ world, sometimes not. A day here could be months or even years there, or the other way round, depending on who was controlling the magic. And if Finn had been out of time sync, it could explain his silence.

‘I did write to you, Gen, but I’m guessing you didn’t get my letter.’ He reached out to take my hand. ‘I’m sorry. I can understand your being angry about that, and with the herd being stupid idiots about Spellcrackers.’ He paused. ‘You must have thought my silence was deliberate?’

I looked down at my hand in his. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to leave it there or take it back. Three months of thinking he’d ditched me wasn’t something I could do an emotional one-eighty from in a few seconds. And okay, Finn might not have been totally responsible for his hurtful silence, that was down to his brothers, but he hadn’t seemed too surprised that they’d screwed things up for him. And he’d come over here channelling the green-eyed monster on his brothers’ say so. He seemed to be letting them mess in his life way too often.

‘I did think your silence deliberate,’ I said pointedly, then pulled my hand from his and crossed my arms. ‘It hurt, Finn.’

He flinched, then he straightened his shoulders and said softly, ‘Gods, Gen, I truly am sorry.’

‘So am I,’ I said, keeping my voice neutral.

He nodded, understanding I wasn’t ready to forgive him. The silence between us lengthened, turning awkward, then I sighed and asked, ‘Why go out of time sync?’

‘Some of the other girls were having problems,’ he replied, his relief evident that I’d spoken. ‘The Morrígan said they and their babies wouldn’t survive the births without a big intake of magic.’

The other girls were the rest of the faeling victims of the ToLA case. Though, unlike Nicky, they’d all signed on with the mad wizard doctor as well-paid surrogates. It would’ve been a good gig for them all if they hadn’t started dying. Deaths that Witch-bitch Helen, as the police officer in charge of the investigation, had covered up.

‘So the Morrígan slowed all their pregnancies down,’ Finn carried on. ‘It added another four months on to everyone’s due date, including Nicky’s. Other than moaning she was the size of a house she never complained, despite ending up pregnant for thirteen months.’ A shudder ran through him. ‘Not like some of the others.’

I gaped. ‘Nicky was pregnant for thirteen months!’

‘Yeah. But like I said, she was brilliant.’ Pride shone in his smile. ‘The baby’s a boy, Daniel Christopher.’

‘Wait! She’s had the baby?’

‘Yeah, two weeks ago. She’s talking about keeping him, but’ – he raked a hand through his hair and rubbed his left horn in agitation – ‘well, he’s only two weeks old so it’s still too early to know if he’s hers or not. Or who the father is. She was the last to give birth so that’s why it’s taken us so long to get back into sync with London.’

I sat down on the bed next to him. ‘Wow. That’s unreal.’

He nodded. ‘Yep. It is. Even living through it.’

Briefly I touched his arm. ‘Is Nicky okay?’

‘She and the baby are healthy.’ He grimaced. ‘She’s still got a lot to work through. Psychologically. We all have.’

‘Yeah,’ I agreed. They weren’t the only ones.

We fell into another awkward silence, then Finn gave the shoebox of petals a sidelong look. ‘Do those mean that something’s going on with someone else?’

My anger blew back up and I almost told him to mind his own business again. But even though the petals might not be the clichéd romantic gesture he suspected, I did have something going on with Malik and, even if it was still early days, I needed to tell Finn that.

But I wasn’t up for another emotional confrontation. Not right this minute.

I snagged a petal from the box. It still felt velvety soft and real. As illusions went, this one was top of the range. If it was an illusion. I held the petal out to Finn. ‘Does it exist?’

He gave me a searching look, then took the petal and examined it thoroughly before handing it back. ‘Seems real enough. Why?’

‘They weren’t here when I went to sleep. Robur, the dryad sentry, says no one’s breached the Wards, and the only sending spot is inside the fridge. So how did they get here?’

He stared fixedly at the window for a minute then cupped his hands; a small earthenware pot filled with violets appeared in them. ‘The Wards are set to let whoever is inside them call something from outside.’

‘They are?’

‘Yep. It’s pretty standard for this type of defensive Ward, in case you get trapped and need to call in food or water. Though usual rules for calling still apply; you’d have to know exactly where an item is before you could call it here.’ He held the pot of violets up with a smile. ‘These beauties are from my glade. First thing I saw last night, when I got back.’

Hmm. I hadn’t been aware of that particular feature, but it wasn’t really a security hazard; not with the way entry through the Wards was set up. Except— ‘There’s only Robur, Sylvia and me here. Robur’s not the type, Sylvia’s in Between and I was asleep.’ Not to mention I can’t call anything other than spells, and only then if I can see them.

‘Then I don’t know how they got here, unless . . .’ he trailed off, pensive.

‘Unless what?’

He stood and put the pot of violets gently on the windowsill. ‘Maybe you called the petals without realising it. It’s been known to happen sometimes with toddlers; they’re asleep and next thing a toy will turn up in their cot even though they couldn’t have known where it was. It’s thought either they were dreaming of it or it’s a manifestation of a subconscious want.’ His moss-green eyes darkened. ‘Though I guess that theory hangs on what you were dreaming about?’

My dreams had been of Malik, of gatecrashing his memory, or whatever the blood-spattered snowy plateau scenario was. And yes, the crimson petals on my white sheets had reminded me of that, and of our time in the hotel penthouse, but no way could I tie the two together as any subconscious want, not when the rose petals had felt like a threat. A threat, I decided, I’d be better talking about with Malik than with Finn.