“We should probably give her some more details or she’s not going to come with us willingly,” Finn said.
Rourke pursed his lips and frowned. “That’s not typically how we do things, and we still need to collect the other two.”
Kael spoke, ignoring the others. “Long story short, Norah. You’re a changeling, a fae who was swapped at birth with a human child. Now that it’s the Summer Solstice of your eighteenth year, it’s time for you to return to the faerie realm, Otherworld, and train at the academy to learn how to use your various…gifts. You’ll belong to one of four courts, but we won’t know which until we test your abilities. That said, Redcaps are typically drawn to Winter fae, like me.”
I gaped at him, his words tumbling over each other in my head. A changeling swapped at birth. A fae. A realm where they expected me to go. None of this was logical. None of it could be real. But words from the stories also tumbled through my brain, melting together with what he had said. The legends had talked of this, too. Of children stolen from their cribs to replaced with fae young.
But how could this be true? How could magic be real? And how the hell could I, of all people, be one of them?
“You do realize this sounds crazy,” was the only thing I could say.
Kael lifted his shoulder in a slight shrug. “Perhaps. But tell me, deep down inside, do you not sense this as the truth? Are you anything like your mother? Have you always felt as though you were an outsider? You’ve seen things, felt things, that no one else could. The Redcaps, your ears. It’s really not difficult to see the truth if you just open your eyes to it.”
“There must be some other explanation.”
“Usually it’s much easier to introduce a changeling to our world, but you’ve made it a little difficult.” Kael sighed. “Normally we just take you straight to the Faerie Ring, so you can see it for yourself.”
Finn nodded. “Why don’t you come with us, and we can show you some proof.”
I shook my head, crossed my arms over my chest, and took a step back. “I’m not going anywhere with you. My best friend was just brutally murdered, right in front of me, and you four strange stalkers, who just happened to be there, I have to add, expect me to just go along with you? When you’re spouting nonsense about faeries?”
Rourke scowled, and Kael merely let out a sigh. It was the one with the flaming red hair who stepped forward, his eyes sparking with a dangerous kind of fire. One, I had to admit, made my breath get caught in my throat. His eyes made me feel as though he could see right into my soul.
“Look, I know what you’re feeling. You’re devastated. You’re confused. And you’re angry. You’re so angry about what happened to your friend that you wish you could punch that asshole Redcap right in the throat. Am I right?” He crossed his arms over his muscular chest and raised an eyebrow.
My heart thumped. He was right. A hot anger burned through me, nothing like I’d ever felt before. The only times I’d ever come close was when my step-dad turned his rage toward my mother.
I nodded.
“Good,” he said. “Use that anger to do what you need to do. If you come with us and train at Otherworld Academy, you can learn to fight these Redcaps. We’ll give you all the skills you need. Hell, there’s even a team of Hunters you can join once your Court has been assigned to you. You can fight these things. You could even find the creature who killed your friend.”
My heart had been racing before, but it was going at light speed now.
“My mom…”
“Your mother is fine,” Liam said. “We’ve been keeping an eye on things. And don’t forget that you’ll learn how to stand up to that asshole step-dad of yours, too, if you’re ever inclined to return after your training.”
“I do find it necessary to add that you’re now wanted for murder,” Kael said in an icy voice. “You have no job or home. If you stay here in the human realm, your life will turn to ash.”
“Okay, we don’t need to pile it on top of her, guys,” Finn said. “She’s had a rough few days. Have a little heart.”
“She needs to understand the gravity of her situation,” Kael replied. “We’ve been protecting her for the past few days, but we can’t stay in Manhattan after tonight. She’ll be on her own.”
On her own.
I shivered, despite myself. I’d had a sneaking suspicion that they’d been following me, watching me, but I hadn’t known what that had truly meant. And as insane as it sounded, I knew deep down in my bones that it was the truth. They’d tried to keep me out of danger, but the danger had only kept following me around. And I couldn’t fight those monsters, those Redcaps, on my own. And I’d certainly never be able to make Bree’s death right unless I learned to fight back.
“Okay,” I said after taking in a long, deep breath. “I’m not sure I completely believe you. This still all sounds totally insane. But I’ll come with you to see your proof, if you have it. You have to keep your distance though. The second one of you comes too close, I’m gone.”
Finn pursed his lips in amusement. “She thinks she can outrun us.”
I opened my mouth to let out a retort, but Rourke held up his hand and shot Finn a sharp look. “Agreed. We’ll keep a reasonable distance.”
For a moment, I hesitated. I was so torn. On the one hand, it seemed impossibly stupid and dangerous to go with these four guys. On the other hand, I had no idea what other choice I had. Because they were right. I’d run from the cops. Monsters were stalking my every move, my step-dad never wanted me to step foot in my apartment again, and I had no job. No money. No nothing.
All I had was myself, someone who might end up being the impossible: a changeling fae.
I had to go to Otherworld. I just had to hope this all wasn’t some sort of trick. I had to hope it was real.
Chapter Eight
The fae—if that was what they truly were—kept their promise. They led me through the city streets and into Central Park, never coming more than ten feet near me. They all stood tall and alert, their eyes darting across every shadow and passerby, as if they were on guard against unseen attackers. Maybe they were.
Within Central Park, they led me off the paved pathways that wound through the lush greenery. And my nerves began to falter. One thing I’d always learned growing up. Don’t go anywhere with strangers, and especially don’t go into the park after dark. And here I was doing both of them at once.
“Here we are,” Finn said in a cheery voice as we reached a clearing in a cluster of trees. It was pretty much a perfect circle, blooming red flowers lining the entire perimeter. The grass was perfect, lush, and a bright vivid green that almost glowed against the cloying darkness that surrounded us.
I hovered on the outskirts of the circle of flowers, unsure of what was supposed to happen next. “This is pretty and all, but I don’t understand how it’s supposed to prove that this whole faerie thing is real.”
“Step inside the ring,” Kael said in a soft, quiet voice that sent shivers down my spine.
“You mean, inside the circle of flowers?”
“That’s right,” he said with an eerie smile. “It’s called a Faerie Ring. When you step inside of it, you’ll see the proof that what we’ve told you is real.”
“You do realize that this sounds creepy as hell.” My feet were frozen to the ground. Logically, I knew stepping forward onto a patch of grass was not dangerous in the least. It was just grass. Those were just normal flowers. But my heart was pounding so hard against my chest that I could barely breathe.
Bree’s death still lingered in my mind, and a dull ache had filled my bones. I didn’t know how I could go on. I didn’t know how to move forward. The only thought keeping me moving was the idea of becoming the kind of girl who could hunt one of those monstrous creatures down. Because there was a truth that I’d tried to ignore, one that would make the ache explode into excruciating pain.
The Redcaps were drawn to me, if these four guys were to be believed.
I
f Bree hadn’t been with me, she wouldn’t have died.
So, I stepped forward onto the grass. For a moment, nothing happened. In the distance, I could still hear the familiar honk of yellow cabs, and I could see the lights of the buildings casting an orange glow on the cloud-studded sky.
But then everything began to change. The world rippled, the ground shook. And suddenly, everything went strangely, eerily silent. Night turned into day, and the dark sky morphed into light. I whirled in a circle, heart stuck in my throat. I was still in the Faerie Ring, in the clearing between the trees, but it was quiet now, so quiet. And everything had gone strangely bright.
It was as if the city had vanished and had been replaced by an endless sea of trees.
The four guys blurred in before me, and I jumped back with a sharp cry. One moment, they hadn’t been there. The next, they were mere inches away.
“Welcome to Otherworld,” Finn said with a wink. “So, now you see we weren’t lying.”
“I don’t understand. Where did everything go?”
“It didn’t go anywhere,” Kael said, voice gruff. Almost as if my very existence irritated him. “Manhattan is still where it’s always been. We’re just not there anymore. The Faerie Ring transported us into Otherworld.”
“Which is the…fae realm.” It sounded so insane that it felt like it wasn’t my own voice that said the words. We’d been transported to a fae realm through a ring of flowers? Maybe I really was going insane. Maybe this entire thing was a hallucination, a result of seeing my only friend in the world killed by a viscous wolf.
I felt a little lightheaded now, a dizziness sweeping through my body. Stumbling forward, I pressed my hand to my mouth and tried to breathe around the panic in my throat.
A strong pair of arms encircled me, saving me from face-planting onto the dewy grass. “Whoa there. Can’t have you passing out on your first night at the Academy.”
I twisted to look up into a pair of sapling green eyes. They were kind but mischievous, and a strange thrill went through me. He’d caught me once before. I was sure of it now. He’d been the one who found me passed out in the alley. And he’d caught me again now. I felt a strange tug toward him, a need to have him arms hold tight just a little bit longer.
My face flushed, and I yanked my gaze away. That was ridiculous. I didn’t want him to hold me up. This guy was a weird stranger who was calling himself a fae, and calling me a….changeling.
“Right.” I pulled myself out of his arms and brushed off invisible specks of dirt, hoping he couldn’t see the red in my cheeks. “So, you’ve convinced me that maybe the fae realm is real, though I don’t know how I’m supposed to know that this is really it. Still. Even if all that is true, it doesn’t necessarily mean I’m a changeling.”
Finn laughed and shook his head. “Norah, only fae can travel through Faerie Rings. If we want to bring a human here, we have to carry them through ourselves. In our arms. Kind of like how I was just holding you.”
He winked. He actually winked. The redness in my cheeks deepened another shade.
“So, because I was able to travel through by myself…” I trailed off, understanding immediately the implication of his words.
He nodded. “It was your final test. You’re fae. And you’ve got the ears to match, though they’re still growing.”
“But why now?” I couldn’t help but ask. “If I’m really one of you, wouldn’t I have noticed a long time ago?”
“Fae don’t begin to reveal their abilities until their eighteenth birthday. It’s a right of passage and cause for celebration here in Otherworld. For changelings, it’s a bit more complicated. You were lucky that your birthday was a mere few days before the Solstice, which is the day all changelings return to their realm. Otherwise, you would have had to deal with all of this on your own for months, like some others.”
I frowned. “Okay. But why? And why was I swapped at birth? What happened to the human baby? Does my mother know about this? Oh my god.”
My heart stopped as a new realization slammed into me.
“Does that mean…?” I whispered.
Kael gave a curt nod. “Your mother is not of your blood. As for the rest of your questions, all will be answered at Orientation this evening. If you go with Finn, he’ll take you to your apartment where you can settle in while we collect the other two changelings still in Manhattan.”
“The other two? There’s more?”
“Four from Manhattan. Sixteen in total each year,” Finn said, gently taking my elbow in his hand. “The four of us were tasked with collecting the Manhattan recruits this year. One is already at the Academy. She’s sharing your apartment with you. We collected her first, though that might have been a mistake…”
He trailed off, leaving the rest of his sentence unsaid, though I knew the meaning of his silence. If they’d come for me first, Bree wouldn’t be dead. It took everything within me to move my feet forward, out of that circle, and to leave my old life behind. Not that it was much of a life anymore.
A trail led through the thick forest. As we walked along the soft dirt, I began to notice just how different this place was to home. Specks of silver hung in the air, blowing this way and that along a soft breeze that smelled like sunflowers and the thick hazy musk of summer. Strangely, it was warm but not the same kind of heat that made the New York pavements feel so claustrophobic. This was a much different kind of warmth. One that felt soothing and soft, rather than cloying. There was humidity, but not too much. It was neither dry nor wet. It was, strangely, perfect.
Insects buzzed around our heads, but not any kind of insect that I’d seen before. They were like tiny golden birds with giant translucent wings. One let out a whistle as it darted in front of my face, a sound that was repeated by hundreds of others. It was a like a song. A familiar song. One I felt as if I’d heard before.
“What are those?” I finally asked.
Finn had kept quiet, almost as if he could sense my need for silence. Right now, there was still so much I had to process. And while I had so many questions, I didn’t even know where to start.
“Slyphs,” he said. “In the summer, they fill the forest, singing songs that can sometimes even be heard inside the Academy.”
Another slyph whispered by my ear and whistled a series of high and low notes that made my heart lift in my chest.
“They seem to like you,” he said with a smile. “Maybe you’re not a Winter fae after all. They don’t much like the cold.”
“And you…you’re a Summer fae?”
He let out a low chuckle. “Thank the forest, no. Summers are…hotheaded, to say the least. Fiery, passionate, easily angered. They’re far too dramatic for my taste. No, I’m a Spring fae. Liam back there is a Summer. The one with the red hair.”
I nodded. “I see what you mean. He got a little worked up about the Redcaps.”
“To say the least,” he said, casting me a sideways glance. “And his speech seems to have worked to get you to come to Otherworld. Like I said, maybe we were wrong about your Court.”
“But the Redcaps are attracted to Winter fae, right?” I asked.
“Indeed.” He pursed his lips. “Truthfully, it’s far too early to tell where you’ll belong. It usually takes the first full year to identify a changeling’s Court. Your abilities have not fully come to you yet, so you may demonstrate qualities of several Courts for awhile. Many do.”
“So, this training thing, it takes a year?”
“Oh, no.” He flashed me a smile. “Once we’ve identified your Court, you move on to more specialized training to hone your skills. The Academy is a three-year school. So, you should know that it will be your home for a long while to come.”
“Three years?” I stopped in my tracks. “No one said anything about three years when I agreed to come along. That’s not an option. My mom is stuck there with my step-dad. Bree’s killer is just out there in the streets. I can’t be gone for three years. I’m going back.”
“Ah…” Finn trailed off, giving me a bland smile. “Unfortunately, that’s not an option.”
I took three steps back, fisting my hands. “The hell it isn’t. What are you going to do? Pick me up and carry me to the Academy kicking and screaming?”
He lifted his shoulders in a slight shrug, and then flashed me a pair of perfect white teeth. “If that’s what it takes.”
“You wouldn’t,” I said, taking two more steps back down the path. Finn followed, mimicking my moves with a strange kind of fluid ease. Two more steps back. And then he followed once again, as if we were caught in some sort of magical dance routine.
“You’re really testing me, aren’t you, Norah?” He gave me a wink. “Fine. We’ll do things your way. If you take one more step toward the Faerie Ring, I’ll have no choice but to throw you over my shoulder. Be careful not to doubt me, Norah. I never lie.”
I narrowed my eyes. Surely he wasn’t serious. He couldn’t very well force me to stay here against my will. Then again, he was a fae. They all were, and there was no telling just how good or evil they might be. I mean, they swapped human babies with changelings. That in and of itself was wrong in more ways than I could count. And yet, I’d come with them willingly.
There’s nothing for you back in the human realm, Norah, a soft voice whispered in my ear. His voice. But he hadn’t opened his mouth to speak.
Frowning, I glared at him. Was he throwing thoughts into my mind? Whatever it was, I didn’t like it.
I took a step back.
With a laugh, he rushed toward me at an impossible speed, wrapped his arms around me, and threw me over his shoulder before I could even utter a yelp of surprise. I kicked my legs and pushed at his chest, but it was no use. His grip was iron-tight, and all my flailing did was make him squeeze tighter.
A Dance with Darkness Page 6
