Page 85 of What Lies Beyond the Veil

“Is that normal? I can’t imagine the city isn’t heavily guarded,” I said.

“I hadn’t expected them to be here, no,” Melian answered. “We wouldn’t be passing through here if I had, no matter how many Marked are trapped in Calfalls. We would have gone the long way.” She glanced over her shoulder at Beck.

“We need to get out of here,” Jensen said, looking around the mouth of the alley and waiting to see if our Fae friend had followed us.

“Lead the way,” she agreed, her face a mask of pain.

“What about Duncan?” I asked, looking around for the other man who was nowhere to be found. He wasn’t Marked; wasn’t valuable to the Fae searching the city.

“Dead,” she said, touching a hand to my shoulder and pushing me to follow Jensen. Caelum moved at my side, and there wasn’t enough time for me to stop and ask what had happened.

If Duncan was already gone, it could wait until we were safe, even with the anguish written into the lines of Melian’s face. I stumbled over my own feet as I followed Jensen, my ears ringing in my head with the way that Fae had looked at me.

With the way the Mist Guard and the Wild Hunt had looked at me.

“Are our marks unique to the Fae?” I asked, searching through my memory of the others in the tunnels, trying to recall another with the same colors. There had been white marks. There had been black marks, but Caelum and I were the only ones where the white and black intertwined.

Caelum took my arm, guiding me to follow at Jensen’s back as Melian and Beck followed behind us. “Not the time. Let’s go, Little One,” he murmured, using his hand on the small of my back to keep me moving forward.

I hadn’t paid close enough attention to the marks on the Fae in theBook of the Gods,too concerned with studying the ethereal lines of their face, but one stood out in my mind. Denial coursed through me as my legs felt like they might buckle under me.

We cut through the alleys, navigating down the city streets when we dared. Jensen found the stone slab that covered the tunnel out, beside the stables, heaving it to the side and motioning all of us in while Melian and Beck hurried to catch up. I paused, waiting for Melian and Beck to take the lead inside the narrow passageway. It would have been too small for us to pass one another inside, and the darkness curved around a corner to make me believe it was far longer than the one we’d taken into the city.

I never saw the iron coming; never felt the stir in the air until it was too late.

Fire tore through my arm, cutting through the fleshy part of my bicep, searing my flesh as I jolted to the side and into Caelum’s frame. The throwing knife bounced off the stone wall in front of me, landing at my feet with a clatter, and my stomach turned over with nausea. He caught me, wrapping his body around my back and tucking me into the cradle of his arms as he grunted through whatever must have struck him next.

More iron that had been meant for me.

“Get in the fucking tunnel!” he ordered, shoving me forward and away from him as he jolted again. “Go!”

I hurried into the entrance, cradling my arm in my grip and trying to stem the flow of blood as Melian stepped up in front of me and pulled me deeper. I looked over my shoulder, waiting for Caelum to follow. He and Jensen locked eyes for a brief moment, understanding passing between them. As a dozen of the Mist Guard started to round the corner toward the tunnel, Jensen heaved the cover closed, concealing us from the soldiers.

“No!” I screamed, lunging out of Melian’s grip and banging on the stone that was too heavy for me to move on my own. “Help me get it open!’ I snapped, tearing at the stone with my fingers. My nails broke on the uneven surface, the tips of my fingers tearing open as I tried frantically.

“Estrella, stop,” Melian said, coming up behind me. Her hands came down on the tops of my shoulders, tugging me away from the stone blocking me from getting to Caelum. “We have to go.”

“I won’t leave him!” I protested, tearing away from her as my breath huffed out of me. “You go if you’re so willing to leave him behind. I won’t.”

“Stubborn fool,” she said, shaking her head in disappointment. Beck pulled at her arm, taking her further down the tunnels and leaving me behind while I waited. If, somehow, Caelum made it through, I had to believe we could catch up with them, because I didn’t know another way to get back to the Resistance in the end, and we’d have nowhere else to go.

I couldn’t think of what I would do if he didn’t make it.

The sound of fighting came from the other side of the stone barrier, and the odds that were stacked against the two men seemed insurmountable while I waited. Still, the pained grunts and shouts of terror were all-consuming as I waited, thinking at any moment that stone would be shoved aside and the Mist Guard would come for me.

My arm throbbed in response to the threat, the wound caused by the iron knife that had caught me seeming to burn through flesh like acid. I wasn’t Fae. Just an echo of a Fae soul trapped in a human body through the mate bond that linked our souls. If iron hurt me this badly, I couldn’t imagine what it did to a Fae himself.

Malice flowed through the air, raising the hair on my arms. My hands trembled as one last shout rang through the night. “Estre—”

The start of my name echoed in the air, making my heart leap into my throat. It hadn’t been Caelum’s voice that called out to me.

But Jensen’s.

I swallowed, taking a step backward as someone hit the stone on the other side. It slid to the side suddenly, the shadow of a man stepping into the entrance of the tunnel as he pulled it closed behind him.

“Caelum?” I asked, the shadows hanging about his face concealing him from me. He stepped toward me, the shadows release him as he emerged into the light. Blood splattered his clothes and face, his eyes seeming lighter than normal as he raised his sword and dragged it through a scrap of fabric he clutched in his hand, cleaning the blood from the blade which he shoved back into his scabbard. “Where’s Jensen?” I asked, my bottom lip trembling as fear consumed me.

This wasn’t the man I’d fallen in love with. This was the man tainted by Faerie magic, who had destroyed a cave beast.

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