by Cate Corvin
Gwyn complied, his grin widening.
It was a heavenly muffin. I gave him the other half and realized I hadn’t smiled this much in a while.
Not even since before Ioin had ditched me for the sylph. I’d always been on my toes, trying not to make him feel lesser than me for not being Fae in Avilion. Everyone kept humans at arm’s length, unless the human had lived here for years and was part of the fabric of life.
It felt nice to not have to pretend anymore.
“Why did you get me breakfast?” I asked. There was something about Gwyn that told me he wouldn’t be upset about a Lesser Fae questioning the motives of a Gentry. He might’ve been Unseelie, but he felt… warm and open.
He polished off the muffin and looked over, giving me a slow once-over that made me feel completely exposed. It wasn’t an entirely unwelcome feeling.
“I took the last lemon twist yesterday,” he finally said. “You were stuck with apples. Ugh.”
A snort escaped me. I was really in top form this morning. “Well, thank you. I’m sorry I walked on your toes.”
“And ran into my chest.” He looked down at the broad expanse. “You could’ve broken my ribs.”
“You should be glad you didn’t catch an elbow. They’re the most dangerous part of me.” I waved one around. I could kill a man with one of these bad boys.
“They’re pretty pointy, yeah.” Gwyn scooted the box onto the wall between us. “But somehow I don’t think your elbows are the most dangerous part of you.”
He was looking at my mouth when he said it. I was convinced I was halfway to becoming a tomato by now, my face flaming.
I looked down at the box, at the street, anywhere but at those dancing eyes. “Right. I’ve also been told my head’s as hard as a brick, so you should watch out for that, too.”
“I’ll keep it in mind.” Was it my imagination, or had his deep voice gotten… silkier? “If I ever run into your face, I’ll do it gently.”
When I looked up, his grin was wider than ever.
“You’re a bad man, Gwyn,” I told him, but it was impossible to hold back my own smirk.
“But you’re smiling.” He raised an eyebrow. “So how bad am I, really?”
I glanced at his arm, and the vine of wolfsbane inked around his wrist onto the back of his hand. “You tell me.”
He saw where I was looking and shook out his hand, leaning forward to rest his forearms on his thighs. His hands hung between his legs where I couldn’t see them, but his smile had dimmed a bit.
I felt oddly guilty for putting a damper on a moment that had felt like sitting in the bright sun after months of rain. “Well, you got me tarts, so I’d place my bet at… no more than twenty percent bad. The rest of you must be sugar and rainbows.”
His grin came back in full force, and I exhaled. I’d been worried that I’d driven him off.
“And spice, and everything nice.” Gwyn raked his hair back, sending it spilling down his back. The easy movement revealed a black leaf of hemlock tattooed on his neck.
I wanted to touch his hair. The thought confounded me; I didn’t like Gentry Fae. They were rude and haughty.
Except Gwyn. It’d been sweet of him to care if this morning was better than yesterday’s.
But I was Lesser Fae, and he wasn’t; this was just an inexplicable act of kindness, nothing more. I pulled my eyes away and caught sight of the clock on the building across the street.
“Blessed Branches, I’m late for work!” I jumped to my feet and brushed crumbs off my bare legs, praying they didn’t stick to the body glitter. The last thing I needed was swarms of midges following me down the streets. “Thanks for breakfast, Gwyn.”
He handed me the box. “Tart for the ride?”
I started to shake my head, but he jiggled the box. “Mmm. Blueberry. So delicious.”
A laugh burst out of me. “When you put it like that, I can’t say no.” I took the box, suddenly feeling shy again.
He stood up to his full height, towering over me. I ignored the butterflies that had suddenly taken up residence in my stomach, turning towards my glittery pink bike and looking down. Somehow, I hated him seeing this bike and the idiotic fake fairy wings bouncing on my shoulders.
It just drove the differences between us deep. No Gentry would ever work for Fairy Ferry or a boss like Numa.
Gwyn fell into step next to me, his hands in his pockets. “See you tomorrow morning?”
Surprise lanced through me. He wanted to meet up again?
Had I actually died and woken up in a different reality?
“I… yeah.” I tried not to sound so shocked. “But you have to let me get breakfast next time.”
With an extra paycheck coming in from Robin, we’d be absolutely rolling in tarts. The king and queen of Tart Castle.
“Try to come a bit earlier,” was all he said. “Give us more time to talk.”
My face was probably a permanent shade of crimson. “I’ll be here.”
I placed the box in my bike basket and swung my leg over. Before taking off, I waved once, curling my fingers once I’d dropped my hand.
“Bye, Briallen Bananatree,” he called with a bark of laughter, but when I glanced back, he was gone.
I turned the corner towards Fairy Ferry, and a roar ripped through the air.
A motorcycle breezed past, the body lacquered glossy black. Several bones were mounted over the handlebars.
And Gwyn waved back at me with a grin as he passed.
I stopped pedaling, slowing to a halt. Everyone in Avilion knew those bikes; they belonged to a notorious Solitary Fae gang, who answered to no laws and neither Queen. The bike, the tattoos of poisonous plants...
Gwyn was part of the Wild Hunt.
5
“Trade you.” I held up the box with the last blueberry tart and wiggled it around enticingly. “For the package to Thornwood.”
Audra Brightbreeze looked at it askance, but I already knew she was sold. The nephelai loved tarts about as much as I did, and that was saying something.
“I still need an extra package or I won’t meet my quota this week,” she said, but her eyes were glued to the box.
“Here. Three for Acionna Harbor.” I popped the box on her table and stacked three packages wrapped in dried seaweed, trading them for a gilt-wrapped box marked as FRAGILE.
I ran my fingers over the glossy paper. “Bet it’s a cut-crystal dildo.”
Audra made a face, swiping her pale blue hair out of her eyes. “Cut-crystal still isn’t good enough for their kind,” she said, clearly glad to be rid of the Thornwood delivery. “Nothing but pure diamond for Gentry cootch.”
I made a gagging sound and stacked my boxes, making for my bike. “Thanks, Audra.”
All I heard in return was a muffled noise. She was already stuffing the tart in her face.
But now I had a perfect alibi to show up at Thornwood twice. I was just lucky Audra hated the Gentry even more than I did and would even prefer Sobek Street over the high-class neighborhood.
I shot through my deliveries, saving the Thornwood package for last, and even managed to pedal up the hill to the gates before sundown.
I rolled to a stop at the gates, already digging in my pockets for my ID, but the feline guard waved me on through the gate. It was already sliding open for me. “Go on.”
I paused with my hand in my pocket. “You don’t need ID?”
“You’ve been granted clearance.” The guard gave me a deadpan stare. “Unless you want to wait around to sign in?”
I shook my head, determined to be at Robin’s by six o’ clock sharp, even though this should’ve been a momentous occasion for me.
I’d been granted unfettered access to the ritziest neighborhood in Avilion, thanks to Robin.
I dropped off the gilt package on the front steps of a glittering mansion made of ice and pedaled to the back of Thornwood as the sun sank behind the trees. Dragging my bike behind the stone wall and out of sight, I didn’t e
ven bother to check the front door, instead stomping my way through the tall grass to the back door.
It opened under my touch. I wished I’d had time to shower before showing up, covered in sweat and more glitter than a nereid stripper would use in a year, but Robin had known perfectly well what he was getting when he signed me on.
A loud, high voice filled the air as I walked into the office, shedding glitter everywhere.
“Honestly.” Sisse was perched on the desk again, wearing a dainty suit woven of hellebore petals. She perched her hands on her tiny hips. “Have you any sense whatsoever of blending with the populace?”
I looked down at my pink booty shorts and crop top. “They don’t wear this in Thornwood?” I asked innocently.
The pixie rolled her eyes and I smiled when her back was turned. Like I said. They’d known perfectly well I wasn’t going to show up in tactical gear or a suit.
“You can keep the glitter.”
Robin’s deep, sensuous voice sent an entirely welcome shiver down my spine. He descended a set of dark stairs behind me, and I found myself backing away, giving myself a bit of breathing room.
He was still just as gorgeous even without a fear-for-my-life induced adrenaline rush to heighten my senses.
Deep blue eyes looked me over. “They’ll expect glitter where you’re going.”
I resisted the urge to cross my arms over my chest. “Right. Because I’m the honeypot. Sure you don’t want to put on the miniskirt and give it a go?”
He didn’t bother to dignify that with a response, choosing instead to cross to his desk and slide open one of the drawers. “First things first. We need to go over the mission parameters.”
I just about choked on my own spit. “Mission parameters? I’m going to a nightclub, not invading the Seelie Palace.”
He was extremely good at ignoring me. Robin pulled a manila file out of the drawer and slapped it on the desk. “Have a seat. And take those wings off, I don’t need glitter all over my chairs.”
I complied, hanging the mesh wings on a hat stand and pulling up a wooden dining chair. “What’s the plan, boss? Whose pot am I honeying?”
He had graceful hands, long fingered and elegant. They matched the rest of his polished demeanor perfectly, down to the pressed white shirt and perfectly trimmed beard.
Those brilliant eyes flashed up to my face, dead serious, and I found my humor fading fast.
“You’re going to help me convict Prince Brightkin of human trafficking and breaking the Unveiled Accords.”
All my humor over this ridiculous situation vanished like a popped bubble. I sat back in my chair, staring down at the incomprehensible papers.
Prince Brightkin was second only to Queen Titania, her eldest son and the heir to the Seelie Throne. Everyone knew his thousand-watt smile and sea green eyes, because his face graced most of the tabloids on a regular basis. The subject of his potential engagement to a princess from the Autumn Court of Tír na nÓg had dominated the newspapers for most of the last three months.
And as for the Unveiled Accords… they were the only reason Avilion existed in the open, the only reason that humans and Fae could coexist at all.
They promised protection for any human in the city, that no one would be spirited away by the Wild Hunt or fed a poisonous mushroom for entertainment, that each and every human would wake up exactly as they’d gone to sleep.
Or as much as they could, anyways. I still wasn’t convinced being around even a small amount of Fae magic didn’t incontrovertibly change humans.
“There’s no way.” My voice sounded far away. Breaking the Unveiled Accords for a Lesser Fae was an immediate death sentence. There was no trial, just a swift execution in the street.
Robin shuffled the papers. “Collecting solid evidence will be difficult, but with you to grease the wheels, it’s completely possible—”
“No,” I interrupted. “I mean there’s no way Prince Brightkin is breaking the Accords. He’s…”
Robin raised an eyebrow. “‘The hottest thing since ‘Djinn Gone Wild’?” He quoted the latest tabloid with acid tones. “I hate to break this to you, but beauty doesn’t mean the soul isn’t rotten to the core.”
“I mean he can’t because he’s the heir apparent to the Seelie Throne,” I snapped. “He’s the prince.”
Robin’s full lips twisted, and he tapped the papers. “That’s why we haven’t arrested him yet. As the prince, he’s nearly untouchable, and the Queen would prefer we handle this quietly.”
A sick feeling bloomed in my stomach. A Lesser Fae would be gunned down on the spot, but the Prince practically got a free pass.
“This is extraordinarily important, Miss Appletree. I was pulled from the Ghosthand Killer case to take care of this.” He slipped a photo from the papers and slid it across the desk to me. “Prince Brightkin’s activities are putting the Accords at extreme risk. Queen Titania wants him brought under control as quickly as possible, with as much solid proof as possible when we do so. If humans are being trafficked into unregulated Fae territory…”
He didn’t bother to end it. I could guess.
More than one human activist group wanted the Unveiled Accords shut down. The loudest and most radical of them, the Unstained Souls, had been loudly in favor of nuking Avilion and wiping it off the map completely.
Fortunately, most of humanity was more enamored with us than vying to blast us into a radioactive wasteland. If they found out a high-ranking Gentry was enslaving people and shipping them out to the worst of the Solitary Fae, well… we might be looking at open warfare.
“Fine.” I looked down at the photograph in my hands and cringed.
Most of the pictures I’d seen of the Prince were of him smiling, waving to photogs, and being the most desirable bachelor in Avilion, generally speaking.
This photo was a candid shot of Brightkin passed out on a filthy floor, his face buried in the asscrack of a naked dryad. She was coated in glitter, with glimmering violet lines of evanesce, the most expensive drug in the city, still smeared across her ass. Several naked nereids and even a huldra were sprawled out over him.
All of that was understandable for a guy with as much money to burn as Brightkin, but… the worst part was a human girl who had no business being there.
She had to be in her late teens, blonde and pretty, but she was staring up at the camera, her pupils eating up most of her eyes and a slack look to her mouth.
“Did… did he give her evanesce?” I asked, sliding the photo back.
Evanesce was not meant for humans at all. It was made of magic, and being magicless, the human brain was eaten away by the drug until there was nothing but stringy webs of it left in their skull.
Robin was unsmiling and grim when he tucked the photo back into place. “Likely. Small doses of evanesce would certainly keep a human compliant.”
I felt sick. All those mornings we’d gathered in Fairy Ferry with gossip about Prince Brightkin, and he’d been face down in someone’s ass, high on evanesce, with a human involved.
Almost as bad, I realized why Sisse had been overjoyed that Robin had dragged an extortable dryad into his house. Brightkin clearly had it bad for nymphs.
“I don’t… I don’t have to let him touch me, do I?”
Robin looked at me, really looked into my face, and must’ve seen the sickness there. Some of the sternness left his own expression, his eyes softening. “You might have to let him put an arm around you, but no, I don’t expect you to allow him to grope or fuck you.”
The word fuck coming out of his mouth was jarring. He seemed too refined for that, but there was also something carnal and dirty about it, like he’d be an animal once the pressed shirt came off.
I shifted in my seat, thinking of Gwyn’s joke about nymphs who liked bananas. “Okay. I can do this. I think.”
“You can. All you have to do is play vapid and be gorgeous, and he’ll be eating out of your hand. Your only goal is to get close to his inner circle
.” Robin shuffled the papers back into the envelope and tucked them in the drawer, then slid another one open. “Now, I have two things for you. The first one is a perk of the job.”
I almost gasped out loud when he slid a shiny new box across the desk to me. “An Acorn 8? Those aren’t even on the market yet!”
The box had already been opened, and the sleek dark phone inside was nothing like my broken Dandelion+. It powered on when I tapped it, showing a background of gently waving lavender fields.
“I’ve already had your old contact list downloaded to the directory. My name is pinned for you, so you can call whenever you need help or find something.” Robin was still searching for something else, not paying attention to me lovingly cradling the phone I’d never be able to afford on my own.
“Wait.” I eyed the phone, so beautiful and unattainable only moments ago, with suspicion. “How did you get my contact list?”
“I have a contact who works in the Acorn data center.” He found what he was looking for and brought up a smaller box. “Miss Appletree. I’m the Left Hand of the Seelie Court. In less than thirty minutes, I could have someone bring up every text, every photo you’ve taken, for the past two years.”
He gave me the look that seemed to laser right through me, but all I could think about was how easy it would be for Robin to procure every single nude photo I’d taken, pixied out on sending, and deleted in the entire time I’d dated Ioin.
“That’s an invasion of privacy, boss,” I said indignantly, but I clutched the phone to my chest.
He couldn’t have the phone back. Not now. My greedy hands were already on it.
“I haven’t invaded your privacy. Yet.” The warning was clear in his voice. “All I had him do was back up your contacts to the new phone. Now, pay attention. This one you will use less, but could be far more important in saving your life in a tight spot.” He flipped open the small box.
“Are you proposing to me already? We haven’t even had dinner yet.”
Robin took a breath and briefly looked like he was debating wiping my memory anyways and pushing me out the door.
