The next morning, Rowan woke feeling like she’d been on the wrong end of a bar fight.
Every muscle ached. Her skin felt too tight. Her brain hummed with leftover static, like she’d fallen asleep next to a speaker at a concert.
She lay there for a minute staring at the ceiling, trying to piece together where her body ended and the seam’s aftertaste began.
Lake. Water. Thread. Two shores.
A voice like cracked ice saying *interesting* in the hollow of her skull.
She shuddered.
Harper’s soft snoring came from the foot of the bed—she’d apparently migrated in the night, half off the mattress, one arm flung across Rowan’s ankles. The comforter bunched around her waist exposed a constellation of old bruises along her legs from bumping into things constantly.
Rowan smiled weakly.
Her phone buzzed on the nightstand.
She groped for it.
UNKNOWN NUMBER: Heard you made a splash last night.
Rowan’s heart dropped into her stomach.
She sat up so fast the room spun.
“Shit,” she whispered.
Harper snorted and mumbled something about vampires and IKEA.
Rowan clenched her teeth and typed.
ROWAN: who is this
An answer came almost immediately.
UNKNOWN: Rude. We’ve been watching each other for years, cousin.
Cousin.
Her mouth went dry.
UNKNOWN: Fine. Formalities. Aisling of the Autumn Court, sometime darling and frequent disappointment. You can call me Ash.
Her fingers went numb.
She must have made a sound, because Harper jerked, blinking. “Wha—Ro?”
Rowan thrust her the phone with shaking hands.
Harper squinted. Read. Went very, very still.
“Oh,” she said. “Oh *no.*”
The phone buzzed again.
ASH: Don’t worry. I didn’t get your number from some creeper app. Magic’s much worse.
ASH: You shone *very* loudly last night, hinge-girl. Everyone heard.
Rowan’s stomach lurched. “She was there,” she whispered. “At the lake. On the other side.”
Harper’s eyes flicked up to her. “The blonde? In the reflection?”
“You saw her?” Rowan’s chest tightened. “I thought—I wasn’t sure if—”
“I saw…something,” Harper said. “Like…you, but…not. Before the water went weird.”
ASH: I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. You didn’t disappoint.
Rowan swallowed bile and typed.
ROWAN: stop calling me hinge
ASH: Would you prefer “bomb”? “Messiah”? “Mistake”?
ROWAN: prefer “rowan”
A pause.
ASH: Cute. I like the way it looks in my mouth.
Harper made a gagging sound. “I already hate her.”
“Join the club,” Rowan muttered.
ASH: Don’t panic. If I wanted to hurt you, I could have tugged harder *then.* I’m not stupid enough to pick a fight at a seam with Fox Boy breathing down your neck.
Her heart did something she refused to name at the words *Fox Boy.*
“She knows about Caelan,” Rowan said.
“Of course she does,” Harper said. “He’s been orbiting both your lives like a horny moon.”
ROWAN: what do you want
Several seconds stretched. The buzzing in Rowan’s veins got worse.
ASH: Oh, hinge. So *much.*
ASH: But for now? I want to talk. Preferably without twenty pairs of old fae ears listening from behind the curtains.
ROWAN: hard pass
ASH: You haven’t even asked what I’m offering.
ROWAN: the last time someone in your world offered my family something, it involved kidnapping a baby
ASH: You’re not wrong. But you’re not a baby anymore.
ASH: You’re me.
The words landed like a physical blow.
Harper squeezed her knee.
ASH: Tell you what. Consider this…a standing invitation. When you cross—and you *will* cross, we both know that—find me. Before Caelan parades you in front of the Court like the pretty grenade you are.
ASH: We can compare notes. Lives. Maybe trade a few pieces back.
ROWAN: we’re not puzzle pieces
ASH: No. We’re knives.
Harper shivered. “She’s dramatic,” she said. “I’ll give her that.”
ASH: Fox Boy will warn you about me. He has…stories. So do I.
ASH: Listen to both of us. Then decide who’s lying more beautifully.
A chill snaked down Rowan’s spine.
ROWAN: why are you doing this
Another pause.
ASH: Because they made a bargain with my life before I could talk.
ASH: Because they handed you my world before you could crawl.
ASH: Because *we* are the only ones who didn’t sign those papers, and I’m very interested in what happens if we start editing the contract.
ASH: See you soon, mirror.
The thread of magic that had been humming faintly around the phone snapped.
The number went blank. Not “blocked,” not “no longer in service.” Just…nothing. Like the messages had written themselves.
Rowan stared at the screen until it went dark.
“Okay,” Harper said finally. “On a scale of one to ‘we’re all going to die,’ how bad is it that she can text you across realms?”
Rowan dropped the phone onto the comforter and scrubbed her hands over her face. “I don’t know,” she said. “Ask your scale.”
“I left my apocalypse-o-meter in my other jeans,” Harper said.
Rowan’s laugh came out thin.
“Do we tell Caelan?” Zia asked from the doorway.
They both jumped.
Zia leaned against the frame, coffee in one hand, hair wet from the shower. “Sorry,” she said. “Your door-knocking ward’s good, but you were yelling. I figured it was either fae nonsense or a spider.”
“Fae nonsense,” Harper said. “Spiders at least obey physics.”
“How long have you been standing there?” Rowan asked.
“Long enough to hear ‘I’m Ash,’” Zia said. “I’m with Harper. Hate her already.”
“Do we tell him?” Rowan repeated.
Zia took a sip of coffee, thinking. “If you don’t, he finds out from his creepy vine network,” she said. “Then he’s mad you didn’t trust him.”
“He’ll be mad anyway,” Harper said. “He has that face.”
“He has a lot of faces,” Rowan muttered.
Harper eyed her. “Spoken like a horny cryptid enthusiast.”
Rowan threw a pillow at her.
“We tell him,” Zia said firmly. “But…on your terms. Not as ‘please rescue me from the scary blonde,’ but as ‘here is new data, help me game it.’”
Rowan nodded slowly. “Yeah,” she said. “Before the seam tonight.”
Harper stiffened. “Tonight?”
“Sam—” Rowan started, then caught herself. “We’re not crossing yet. He wants to see Gran. Then…we…go over terms. Again.”
“You are not going back to that lake,” Harper said.
“We’re not,” Rowan said quickly. “Caelan said it was too…noisy. He’ll come…different.”
“Great,” Harper said. “Mysterious and vague. My favorite flavor.”
Zia sat on the edge of the bed. “We have a few hours,” she said. “Let’s use them. We know more now than we did two days ago. We adjust strategy.”
Rowan stared at the ceiling again. Her body still ached. Her bones felt…stretched.
“I don’t know how to…fight someone like her,” she admitted quietly. “Someone who…wants what I have.”
“That’s literally every man I’ve ever dated,” Harper said. “Follow my lead.”
“Step one,” Zia said, ignoring them. “We assume Aisling is neither fully ally nor fully enemy. She’s…third faction. Her own.”
“Chaos agent,” Harper said. “Hot chaos agent. Annoyingly.”
Rowan winced.
“Step two,” Zia continued. “We assume she and Caelan have history.”
Harper snorted. “You saw the way he looked at her in that prophecy through-the-window thing,” she said. “History with a capital H and probably a body count.”
“And step three,” Zia said, “we don’t let either of them tell us who to be to each other.”
“Us?” Rowan asked.
“You and Ash,” Zia said. “You and Caelan. Ash and Caelan. All triangles, all messy. We define our own edges.”
“You say that like it’s easy,” Rowan said.
Zia’s eyes softened. “It won’t be,” she said. “But you’re good with words, Ro. Use them.”
Rowan’s gaze flicked to her phone.
*We’re knives,* Aisling had said.
She wasn’t wrong.
Rowan just had to decide where she wanted to cut.
***
Caelan arrived at Hollybrook in mundane clothes and a glamour that made his edges blur just enough for human eyes.
To Rowan, he still looked like a blade someone had tried to dull and failed.
Sandra at the desk barely glanced up from her crossword as he followed Rowan down the hall. To her, he’d be a visitor. Maybe a nephew. Maybe a hospice coordinator. Someone forgettable.
Rowan resented how easily he slid into her world when she was about to step out of it.
“Your message was…short,” he said quietly as they walked. “A name. ‘She texted me.’ That was all.”
“I didn’t have time for a dissertation,” she muttered. “And I wanted to say it…here. With Gran there.”
His jaw ticked. “You think I’ll…behave better with an old woman watching.”
“Yes,” she said. “And no.”
He huffed a breath that might have been a laugh.
Gran’s door was propped open with a slipper. The room smelled like antiseptic and peppermint.
She looked smaller than the week before.
Her hair lay flat against her head. The color had gone out of her lips. Her hands, resting on the blanket, trembled faintly even in sleep.
A tight, panicky sensation pressed against Rowan’s ribs.
“She’s…” she started.
“Fading,” Caelan said gently.
Rowan shot him a sharp look. “Don’t you dare say it like it’s…natural.”
“It is,” he said softly. “And it isn’t. Both things can be true.”
Gran’s eyes fluttered. Opened.
She blinked at Caelan first.
“Took you long enough,” she rasped.
Then she looked at Rowan.
“There you are,” she said. “Come let me look at you before I check out of this dump.”
“Gran,” Rowan whispered, moving to the bedside. She sat, took her hand. It felt like parchment and bone.
“Don’t make that face,” Gran said. “I’m not dead yet. You’re not rid of me that easily.”
Caelan moved to the foot of the bed, careful to keep a respectable distance. For once, he seemed…unsure what to do with his hands.
“That woman,” Rowan said, without preamble. “Aisling. She…contacted me.”
Gran’s eyes sharpened. “How?”
“Text,” Rowan said. “Through…magic. I think. The number…wasn’t real.”
Caelan’s expression darkened. “Of course she did,” he muttered. “She’s always been…fond of shortcuts.”
“She was at the lake,” Rowan added. “In the reflection. She…touched the seam.”
Caelan swore in a language that made the lights flicker.
Gran cracked a smile. “Oh,” she said. “This just got even more interesting.”
“Interesting is not the word I’d use,” Rowan said.
“What did she say?” Caelan asked tightly.
“Called me…mirror,” Rowan said. “Hinge. Knife. Said she wants to talk. When I cross. Before you ‘parade me like a grenade.’” She met his eyes. “Her words.”
His jaw clenched. “That sounds like her,” he said.
“She said you’d warn me about her,” Rowan went on. “And that she’d have her own stories. She told me to decide who’s lying more beautifully.”
He flinched just slightly.
Gran watched him. “Well?” she rasped. “What’s your version?”
He was silent for a beat.
Then: “She is…complicated,” he said. “She came to our Court as a human baby. Fragile. Breakable. We poured magic into her. Fed her on glamour and blood and stories. She grew…sharp.” His eyes were distant, seeing something not in the room. “She learned fast that affection in our world is…conditional. That being interesting keeps you alive.”
He looked at Rowan. “She’s jealous of you,” he said simply. “Of your…ordinary. Your choices. Your grief.”
“That’s not my fault,” Rowan said.
He nodded. “I know. She doesn’t…care.”
“Do you…love her?” Rowan asked before she could stop herself.
The question hung in the air like frost.
Gran’s eyebrows crawled up.
Caelan’s mouth opened. Closed.
“It’s not a simple word,” he said finally.
“Try anyway,” Rowan said. “We’re short on simple.”
He looked down at his hands.
“Aisling and I…grew up together,” he said. “Not from infancy—I was already…old enough to be sent to war when she arrived. But I was the one who brought her your world’s stories. Who taught her how to taste apples without biting into the rot. We bled together on training fields. We…slept together. Sometimes. When it was…safe.”
Harper’s voice flashed through Rowan’s mind: *history with a capital H.*
Jealousy stung, sharp and stupid. She shoved it down.
“She is…I care for her,” Caelan said slowly. “I also…don’t trust her. Not fully. Not when she’s cornered.”
“That sounds like love,” Gran muttered. “The fucked-up kind.”
Caelan huffed. “Perhaps,” he said.
Rowan twisted the edge of the blanket in her fingers. “She wants my life,” she said. “Even just to…try it on.”
“Of course she does,” Gran said. “She’s not wrong to want. Wanting is…human. It’s what you do with the wanting that matters.”
“You’re very philosophical for someone on morphine,” Rowan said thickly.
“They cut me off,” Gran said. “Apparently ‘just give me the good stuff and let me watch the ceiling tiles’ is not medically sound.”
Caelan’s lips twitched.
“What do you want me to know about her?” Rowan asked him. “If we meet. When we meet.”
He considered.
“She is…charming,” he said. “She will make you feel seen. Understood. She’s very good at that. She will also…poke your sore spots just to watch you flinch. Because she flinched first, once, and no one cared.”
Rowan thought of the way the other woman had smiled from the reflection. Like a cat. Like a mirror.
“She said we’re knives,” Rowan muttered.
“She would,” Caelan said. “She likes thinking of herself as a weapon. It’s safer than thinking of herself as a girl.”
“And you?” Gran asked sharply. “How do you think of her?”
He met her gaze. “As herself,” he said. “Which she hates.”
Gran nodded, satisfied. “Good answer,” she said. “Doesn’t mean you’re right, but it’s decent.”
Rowan exhaled. “She told me to come find her,” she said. “First. Before I…see your Court properly.”
Caelan’s jaw flexed. “Of course she did,” he said. “She wants to…frame the story.”
He stepped closer to the bed. “Rowan,” he said. “When you come through…there will be a hundred hands trying to grab you. For power. For curiosity. For boredom. Aisling’s will be…lighter. But no less…selfish.”
“Honesty point to you,” Gran muttered.
“I can’t…stop you from seeking her out,” Caelan said quietly. “I wouldn’t even if I could. You deserve to hear from *both* of us. But I would…ask…” He swallowed. “Wait. Until after the formalities. Until after I have…placed you where they cannot…cut you to pieces over competing claims.”
Rowan stared at him.
“You want me to…meet your father, swear oaths in front of your Court, then go have coffee with my mirror,” she said.
His mouth twitched. “Something like that,” he said. “Though we don’t have…coffee.”
“You really need to work on that,” she said.
He spread his hands. “I am trying to keep you alive,” he said. “Expanding our beverage options is a…secondary goal.”
Gran coughed, then winced. “Girl,” she rasped. “You already decided to go. Don’t let this play out without…you steering.”
Rowan looked down at their joined hands. At the soft skin folded over knobby knuckles, the blue veins like fragile rivers.
“What would you do?” she asked.
Gran snorted. “I’d walk into their Court with my tits out and a shotgun,” she said. “But that’s just me.”
Caelan choked.
Gran’s eyes softened. “I’d…listen,” she amended. “To both of them. To all of them. Then I’d do whatever made them the most uncomfortable while keeping my own soul intact.”
Rowan laughed through tears. “I don’t know how to do that,” she said.
“You do it all the time,” Gran said. “You walked into that PTA meeting in tenth grade and told all those women their sons were little shits.”
“They *were* little shits,” Rowan muttered.
“Exactly,” Gran said. “You spoke it. They hated it. You didn’t…crumble.”
Caelan’s gaze flicked between them, something like awe in his eyes.
“You talk about terrifying things like they’re…grocery lists,” he said softly.
Gran smirked. “You should have seen me in my twenties,” she said. “Now. Enough depressing talk. I have…one foot out the door, but I’d like to enjoy the view a little.”
She looked at Caelan. “Tell me something nice about your world,” she ordered. “Not the prophecies. Not the power. Something…small. She’ll see the big shit soon enough.”
Caelan blinked.
Then, slowly, “There’s a courtyard,” he said. “On the east side of the Palace. Everyone forgets it’s there because the door looks like part of the wall. The leaves fall in a pattern there that…is never the same twice. The first time I showed it to Aisling, she tried to catch them all in her skirt.”
Gran smiled faintly. “Better,” she said. “What else?”
He thought.
“There’s a woman who bakes honey cakes,” he said. “She’s older than my father. No one remembers when she arrived. She makes them too sweet and always burns the edges, and the entire Court pretends this is how we like them. She would...adore Rowan. She loves mortals. Says we’re too complicated.”
Rowan’s throat tightened.
“And there’s a tree,” he said. “In the wildwood. An oak. It grew...crooked. The first King wanted to cut it down because it didn’t fit the pattern. My mother wrapped her arms around it and told him he’d have to cut through her first.”
“No wonder Maerlyn hated her,” Gran muttered.
“My mother won,” Caelan said. “The tree is still there. Aisling carves things into its bark when no one’s looking. I...sit under it when I don’t know what to do.”
His eyes met Rowan’s.
“You would like it,” he said softly. “I think.”
Rowan’s chest hurt.
“I don’t...want to like your world,” she whispered. “It’ll make leaving harder. If I...have to.”
His jaw clenched. “You won’t leave alone,” he said quietly.
Gran sighed, long and shuddery. “Good,” she whispered. “I can...go now.”
Rowan’s head snapped to her. “No,” she said desperately. “Not yet. We still—”
Gran’s fingers tightened weakly on hers. “Listen,” she said. “Carefully. I won’t have time to repeat myself.”
Terror rose, hot and choking.
Gran’s gaze was clear. Fierce. “You are not an apology,” she said. “Not for my bargain. Not for your mother’s life. Not for whatever you do next. You are...your own damn story.”
Tears blurred Rowan’s vision. “Gran—”
“Make...them...bleed,” Gran whispered. “If they try to...write it for you.”
Her hand went limp.
The heart monitor beeped wildly. Nurses who’d been waiting stepped in like a tide—soft hands, calm voices, efficient movements.
They ushered Rowan and Caelan gently aside.
Harper and Zia burst into the room minutes later, wind in their hair.
They looked at Rowan’s face and knew.
Harper made a small, wounded sound and threw her arms around her. Zia’s hand landed on her back, solid and warm, while a nurse turned off the machines.
Everything telescoped.
The antiseptic smell. The flickering fluorescent light. The ugly wallpaper.
Rowan clung to her friends and sobbed.
Somewhere in the corner, the shadows tightened like a fist.
Caelan stood very, very still, hands balled at his sides, watching the only woman who’d ever terrified him more than any Courtier be reduced to stillness.
Whisper uncurled itself from the corner, ember eyes soft for once.
“One bargain ended,” it hissed. “Another begins.”
Caelan’s jaw flexed. “Not yet,” he said. His voice was hoarse.
“Soon,” Whisper said.
He looked at Rowan—small between her friends, big with grief, magic humming around her like a storm.
“Yes,” he whispered. “Soon.”
And for the first time in his long, complicated life, Caelan of the Autumn Court understood what it meant to be truly, genuinely afraid.
Not for himself.
For her.
---