Page 10 of A City of Emeralds and Envy
He reaches for Fiero, and I react without thinking—pure instinct, my hand thrown out. A burst of concussive magic blasts from my palm, sending the green-skinned Fae back a few steps.
I’ve never been able to dothatbefore.
“Try it, fucker,” I say, breathlessly. “That’s only a taste of what I can do.”
Turning my attention to the rocks beneath his feet, I focus on setting their particles in motion. It takes a monumental effort, and my magic feels sluggish, as if some inner reservoir is far lower than usual. Which makes sense, considering all the power I channeled to bring us here, because of that book—
The book, the Tama Olc... where is it?
But the moment I think its name, I can sense it. The spellbook is mine, and it’s in my pocket. Not that it’s any use to me right now.
The tall Fae glances down at the rocks beneath his feet, which are barely vibrating. He looks back up at me, eyes narrowed with a mix of anger and interest. Then he stalks toward me again, tension in every line of his long limbs. I don’t blast him away this time—I think I’ve spent that power, whatever it was.
He leans down, his brilliant dark eyes, sharp nose, and wicked mouth a whisper from my face. “I’ll let you and yours live a little longer. But trust me, sorceress, I’m coming for you. No one leaves this island. You’re trapped here with me, in this godsforsaken corner of Faerie. And when your seven days of protection wear off, I’ll be waiting. I want to kill you personally. Slowly.” His lashes dip, his eyes finding my mouth. “Intimately.”
“You can try,” I say, with a confidence I don’t feel.
When he glances past me, I follow his gaze—and to my shock, I see that the bare gray feet of the dead Witch are forming tiny cracks, like stone struck by a mallet, on the verge of shattering.
“She’ll be gone soon,” he says tonelessly. “She’ll crack into pieces and dissipate into dust.”
I search for a pang of sympathy, but there’s none inside me. “Who are you, anyway? So I know what name to curse.”
“I don’t give my true name easily,” he says. “For now, you can call me West.”
“And I’m Dorothy,” I reply. “In case you want to beg me for mercy.”
His mouth tilts in a half-smile. “Dorothy,” he says softly. “Oh, this is going to be fun. I’ll be seeing you soon, little sorceress.”
And with a bang and a cloud of green smoke, he disappears.
6
I’m back in Faerie. But I’ve ended up in the wrong part of this realm, and I’m in the company of my docile-looking neighbor who’s been hiding magical abilities and who now possesses a pair of magic shoes—and who seems a little too comfortable here, for a human who was just tossed into a new world.
When I question the freckled Fae leader about the shoes, she says, “I believe they augment a person’s existing abilities, whatever those may be. The East Witch owned them for two centuries, and I’m not sure what else they can do. The only thing I know for certain is the law of seven-days’ protection for the next owner. No one can kill your friend in vengeance until that time is up. Of course, she could die in other ways.”
“How encouraging,” Dorothy says with a hard, bright smile.
Despite that dire reminder, the Fae woman seems friendly enough—perhaps because, with the East Witch dead, she has full authority over the town. She even tells us her name—Glenna.
The rest of the villagers seem glad of the East Witch’s death, but I don’t quite like the way they look at us. As if they’d devour us whole if they didn’t owe us something. Our welcome here is a fragile one.
The sunlight fades to dusk as Dorothy and I are led through the village. One of the Fae swipes the blood from Dorothy’s temple with a long brown finger and licks it clean with a sigh of delight. Dorothy doesn’t jerk away, but she shoots me a look of abhorrence and alarm.
The Fae who tasted her blood looks a bit confused at the flavor, but shrugs and takes another lick before ambling off.
As we continue toward the center of town, I explain quietly, “The Fae like the way humans taste and smell.”
“No shit,” she whispers.
When I told her my story, I limited the tale to the basic facts. Maybe I should have explained more of the interesting bits, so she’d understand Fae behavior. But I never expected us to end up here so soon, and certainly nottogether. Using the Tama Olc for inter-realm travel was supposed to take time. At the very least I expected a few hours to prepare and say my goodbyes.
No such luck.
When we reach the village square, preparations for an outdoor feast are already underway. Benches float into place by magic, and platters of food appear along the tables. A bonfire springs up, its light dancing on the ominous shapes of a gallows, several stocks, and two crosses with bits of rope fluttering from the crossbeams, where bodies must have once hung.
Beyond those structures rises a narrow, triangular building, a single wedge of dull black jutting into the evening sky. Symbols of crows, wheat, corn, and scarecrows decorate its ebony surface.
