Page 104 of When the Woods Go Silent

“Leave me alone,” I hiss, but he only grins, that foxlike quality of his turning to something more wolfish.

KIER

Looking through the window of the bookshop, I can’t fucking believe my eyes.

Rose is standing right there, her arm gripped by... me? Realization washes over me a micro-second before the rage rolls in.

How dare he?

“Ronan!” I roar, banging on the glass and rattling the locked door. His grin flickers toward me, and I see past the glamor easily, now that I’m looking for it. What has he done? What has he told Rose, in my name?

She looks frantically between the two of us, yanking her arm against his grip. It’s one thing to be told about fae glamor, but quite another to be tricked by it. She’s going to be furious.

Ronan’s lips are moving, and I don’t waste any more time on the locked door. My vines curl under the tiny gap at the bottom and up around the door, wrenching it off its hinges. It crashes onto the porch as I rush my brother, knife-like thorns slicing through the air toward him, and Rose screams, trying to twist away.

He finally releases her, and she scurries to hide behind the counter as our magic collides.

“Leave her the fuck alone,” I growl at him, scenting the hint of fire before he grabs a vine and incinerates it.

“No! Get the fuck out of my shop!” Rose yells, and I realize too late that we’re going to ruin everything if we fight here. The smoke alarm blares as I throw my strength into building thicker vines, working to bind Ronan so I can get him outside. He burns through them as fast as I make them, caring nothing for Rose and Ruby’s hard work here.

The only choice I have is to run and hope he chases me, forgetting her.

“Rose, get out of here!” I yell, just before taking off out into the front yard, pausing my earth magic for a split second to glamor myself invisible. Ronan takes no precautions, barreling after me as a car honks and swerves to miss him. The two of us crash into the forest across the street. I spare a glance at the bookshop, relieved to see it isn’t burning, and Rose is gone from the front room.

“What the hell were you thinking?” I hiss at Ronan, who has dropped all pretense of trying to impersonate me. His blue-black eyes flash a split-second warning before he unleashes fire meant to burn me more than my vines. I should be using my own fire magic, but I can’t start a forest fire. I’m holding back so much as it is.

“We can’t fight here,” I try, dodging one of his fists. “Take it out on me in Aralia, but we can’t risk the humans seeing this.”

Ronan curses at me, but I sense him pulling in his magic along with his temper. He knows there will be hell to pay if we expose ourselves for such a stupid reason.

“Stay away from her, Kier,” he warns, finally collecting himself, and relief floods through me. “She’s not the changeling. You told her about our world for nothing. I was just trying to clean up your mess.”

I watch him for a long moment as the forest seethes around us, the trees angry at being treated like bystanders. Ronan’s lying. He must be. We don’t know for sure that she is thechangeling, which means we don’t know she isn’t. Unless he knows something he hasn’t told me.

Either way, he’s lying, and the only thing I can do right now is get rid of him.

I hold up my hands in a show of surrender. “I know. I’ll take care of it, and the cleanup here. She wants nothing to do with magic. She won’t talk.” I have to get him to leave Rose alone.

She’ll never trust me now, after the way he impersonated me. My frustration starts to boil over again, and Ronan notices it.

He laughs darkly. “She will. When her friend runs away with the gobbelin prince, she will.”

“Too bad you can’t control that brother, either,” I taunt, unable to help myself. Ronan flexes for a moment, the air thickening around him as if he’s deciding whether to attack me all over again. Torrence is a thorn in his side, and I usually don’t bring it up.

Then he smiles in that wicked way a brother has, when he holds something over your head. “You thought you had a shot at finding the changeling, didn’t you? I see it now. All these extra trips to Earth. Brig and I thought you were just fucking your way through the locals. Oh, Kier.” He laughs again, shaking his head as though I’m nothing more than a child.

This sort of thing used to set me off, but there are bigger things at stake now.

I lean casually against a tree, aiming to appear unworried.

“Obviously. We were supposed to be done with this tri-ruler charade by now. And still, the threat of war breathes hot down our necks, none of us are free to do what we want, and the single thread of hope is finding some long-lost woman in a sea of billions. Of course I’m going to be fuckinglooking.”

His expression hardens. “Don’t think Brigance won’t hear about this.”

And he’s gone in a rush of his air magic, flying up and over the treetops like a fucking harpy. There’s nothing I can do if he decides to tell Brigance, and I don’t really care, either. They can’t stop me from looking.

I’m even more committed to solving the mystery of Rose’s magic and convincing her to trust me now, even if it’s only to spite Ronan.

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